George Soros gave Ivanka's husband's business a $250 million credit line in 2015 per WSJ. Soros is also an investor in Jared's business.

Sunday, July 31, 2016

Americans in a presidential election year deserve a debate on serious matters such as why NATO has remained in a post WWII posture instead of focusing on terrorism. American taxpayers are also being primed for another Cold War with Russia. The media and the war lobby assume Americans will agree to yet another endless foreign war without discussion of the issues. We’re given McCarthy era attacks on Trump instead of debate. Trump simply said he didn’t want to restart the Cold War-Stephen Cohen-CNN, 7/30/16

7/30/16, Russia Expert Stephen Cohen: Trump Wants To Stop The New Cold War, But The American Media Just Doesn’t Understand,” Real Clear Politics, Tim Hains
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Stephen F. Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at NYU and Princeton, spoke with CNN’s ‘Smerconish’ Saturday morning about Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and the ‘New Cold War.’
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Cohen says the media at large is doing a huge disservice to the American people by ignoring the substance of Trump’s arguments about NATO and Russia, and buying the Clinton campaign’s simplistic smear that Trump is a Russian “Manchurian candidate.”
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“That reckless branding of Trump as a Russian agent, most of it is coming from the Clinton campaign,” Cohen said. “And they really need to stop.
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“We’re approaching a Cuban Missile Crisis level nuclear confrontation with Russia,” he explained. “And there is absolutely no discussion, no debate, about this in the American media.”
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“Then along comes, unexpectedly, Donald Trump,” he continued, “Who says he wants to end the New Cold War, and cooperate with Russia in various places… and –astonishingly– the media is full of what only can be called neo-McCarthyite charges that he is a Russian agent, that he is a Manchurian candidate, and that he is Putin’s client.”
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“This is a moment when there should be, in a presidential year, a debate,” he said. “And that is not what we are given in the media today.
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“Let’s go back to what you said Trump said about NATO,” Cohen also said. “Trump said early on, he wanted to know, 60 years after its foundation, what was NATO’s mission today. 100 policy wonks in Washington since the end of the Soviet Union, 25 years ago, have asked the same question. Is NATO an organization in search of a mission?”
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“That’s a legitimate question –but we don’t debate it. We don’t ask it. We just say, oh, Trump wants to abandon NATO.”
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Full transcript:

"MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN: When looking to blame someone for the cyberattack [against Hillary Clinton an the DNC], Russia was more than convenient. Is this a new cold war or political pot-stirring? Does this accusation have any basis in fact, and if not, could it cause real harm? Here to discuss is Stephen F. Cohen, American scholar of Russian studies at both Princeton and New York Universities. Professor Cohen, does Vladimir Putin indeed have a dog in our U.S. [election]?

STEPHEN F. COHEN: Vladimir Putin wants to end the ‘New Cold War — and so do I. 

Let me say, I have no ties to the Trump campaign or the Clinton campaign. But if I were to write your headline for you today, I tried on the way down here, I couldn’t fit it on the front page, but it would go like this: 

“We’re in a new and more dangerous Cold War with Russia.” 

We’re approaching a Cuban Missile Crisis nuclear confrontation with Russia, both along Russia’s borders and possibly over Syria. There is absolutely no discussion, no debate, about this in the American media — including, forgive me, on CNN. 

Then along comes (unexpectedly) Donald Trump, who says something that suggests he wants to end the new Cold War, cooperate with Russia in various places. What we used to call detente, and now —astonishingly– the media is full of what only can be called neo-McCarthyite charges that he is a Russian agent, that he is a Manchurian candidate, and that he is Putin’s client. 

So the real danger is what’s being done to our own political process.  This is a moment when there should be, in a presidential year, a debate. 

Because Mrs. Clinton’s position on Russia seems to be very different [than Mr. Trump’s], has been a long time. 

Trump speaks eliptically. You’ve got to piece together what he says. But he seems to want a new American policy toward Russia. And considering the danger, I think we as American citizens, deserve that debate, and not what we are given in the media today, including on the front page of the “New York Times.”

I end by saying, that this reckless branding of Trump as a Russian agent, most of it is coming from the Clinton campaign and they really need to stop. 

SMERICONISH: Okay. I don’t know where to begin in unpacking all that you just offered to us. But I guess I’ll start as follows. As one who can’t match your credentials, here’s what I see from the outside looking in. I see Donald Trump having said to the “New York Times,” just within the last ten days, that he’s not so sure he would stand with NATO allies, and I’m paraphrasing, he would want to know whether they would be pulling their own weight. The inpart of his comments seems to suggest he could provide Putin with unfettered, undeterred access to the Baltic states –whose independence he resents. So it all seems to fit, therefore, that Putin would have a dog in this fight, would want to see Donald Trump win this election so that he, Putin, could do as he pleases, in that part of the world. CNN is covering that. I have to defend the network in that regard. But why does that not all fit, and why does it not all fit in the headline in today’s “New York Times,” which says Russian spies said to have hacked Clinton’s bid. 

COHEN: “Said to have.” Said to have. That’s not news, that’s an allegation. James Clapper. I don’t know who hacked. Everybody hacks everybody. I mean, we hacked into Chancellor Merkel’s cell phone. We learned that from Snowden. The Israelis hack, the America. Everybody hacks. The point is, and I know you said it, not to defend it, but as a provocation, that let’s take the position you just set out. That Putin wants to end the independence in Baltic states. There is no evidence for that. None whatsoever. 

The point is, is that on the networks — and I’m not blaming CNN, and there’s none on any network. There is none in the “New York Times.”

I am old enough to remember that during the last Cold War, all these issues were debated in that you had a proponent to each point of view. But you have now got accusations, both against Putin, both against Trump, which needed to be debated. 

The most — let’s go back to what you said — Trump said about NATO. Trump said early on, he wanted to know, 60 years after its foundation, what was NATO’s mission today. 

100 policy wonks in Washington since the end of the Soviet Union, 25 years ago, have asked the same question. Is NATO an organization in search of a mission? For example, it’s a mission for the last 20 years was to expand ever closer to Russia. So people have now asked why isn’t it fighting international terrorism? That’s a legitimate question –but we don’t debate it. We don’t ask it. 

We just say, oh, Trump wants to abandon NATO. I don’t defend Trump. Trump raises questions. And instead of giving answer to the substance of the question, we denounce him as some kind of Kremlin agent. That’s bad for our politics, but still worse, given the danger we’re not addressing it.""





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Democrats worry about Trump popularity in Ohio, starting with ground zero Mahoning County-Cincinnati.com, 7/27/16

7/27/16, "Because of Trump, Democrats worry swing-state Ohio slipping into 'Valley'," cincinnati.com, and , Philadelphia

"When Mark Munroe arrived at work Wednesday morning (7/27), he was greeted by nearly a dozen people lined up waiting to get into his office near Youngstown, Ohio.

"I've never seen a line waiting to get into my office," Munroe, head of the Mahoning County Republican Party, told The Enquirer. The reason? Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. "They all wanted Trump signs and stickers and wanted to know how they could volunteer," Munroe added.

Hillary Clinton had received the Democratic nomination for president at the party's national convention the previous night, a nomination she is scheduled to accept Thursday. But in typically deep-blue northeast Ohio, Republicans were gathering to work against her, a sign of Trump's popularity.

In 2016, the Mahoning Valley has become an unusual battleground in swing-state Ohio.

Working-class families across the Mahoning Valley have long been looking for a hero, and Trump has promised to bring back their manufacturing jobs. His message worries Democrats, who fear enough of their own will switch their allegiance to cost Clinton the election.

It's no accident Youngstown will be Clinton's first post-convention stop in Ohio on Saturday.

"The Mahoning Valley is ground zero of ground zero," said Dave Betras, chair of the Mahoning County Democratic Party. "If she can’t win the Valley big, I don’t know if she can win the state." And winning Ohio is crucial to winning the White House: Since 1960, no candidate has become president without the swing-state's electoral votes.

As many as 6,171 Democrats in Mahoning County voted in the Republican primary, Betras told The Enquirer, a high number for an area that has long thumped its chest about having deep pro-union roots.

Overall, including voters who had sat out in the 2014 primary, Mahoning County gained almost 21,000 new registered Republicans this year, Munroe said. That fueled Trump to a 50.6 percent to 37.4 percent victory there over Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who won the state primary.

"Mr. Trump is the first modern Republican candidate that is competitive in the Mahoning Valley, because he will fix bad trade deals and fight for Ohio working families," said Bob Paduchik, Trump's Ohio campaign manager.

Trump won Trumbull County – Mahoning's northern neighbor – with 52.6 percent of the votes. It was the billionaire real estate mogul's biggest margin of victory among the 33 counties he won. Most of those victories took place in a continuous strip of counties spanning from Clermont County east along the Ohio River and north along the West Virginia and Pennsylvania borders.

Four years ago, Obama easily defeated Republican candidate Mitt Romney in both Mahoning and Trumbull counties – garnering over 60 percent of the vote."...

[9/25/2012, AP: Romney is "having mixed success with his chief target: white, working-class voters...A generation ago they were called "Reagan Democrats.""...Romney "is having trouble connecting with middle-class Ohioans."...

(continuing): ""They absolutely should be scared," said Alex Triantafilou, Hamilton County GOP chairman. "That area has lost a lot of jobs, and Trump is speaking to those people in a way that Mitt Romney did not four years ago. We honestly, in good faith, believe Trump is going to win Ohio for that reason."...

Economic sentiments motivate many of the voters in the Mahoning Valley. The economy there mostly has reeled ever since Sept. 17, 1977, known in the Youngstown area as "Black Monday." A steelmaker, the Youngstown Sheet & Tube Company, announced it would close a plant, starting the wave of layoffs and factory closures in the area.

By 1982, the Youngstown area's unemployment rate had reached 21 percent.  The rate is now at about 6 percent, compared with just under 5 percent nationally....

Despite Democrats' efforts, more Democrats could defect to Trump in Mahoning and Trumbull counties and throughout Appalachia, said Kyle Kondik, who wrote "The Bellwether: Why Ohio Picks the President."

But focusing solely on the Mahoning Valley doesn't capture the full picture of the battle for Ohio. Look to central Ohio, Kondik said. Trump may not do as well among Delaware County's wealthy Republican voters as Romney did there in 2012. In March, Trump finished a distant second in Delaware County to Kasich, who won the county with 63.9 percent of the votes.

“The question is: Will Trump do as well as Romney did in rich, educated suburban Ohio?" Kondik said.

Still, Kondik said: “If Trump can improve on Romney in Mahoning and Trumbull counties and hold on to Delaware County, he could win Ohio.""

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Ohio, 2012 election: Romney v Obama:



















Above, Nov. 2012 final Ohio results Romney v Obama, Real Clear Politics chart 
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Sept. 2012 article

Romney is "having mixed success with his chief target: white, working-class voters who are socially conservative and often have union backgrounds. A generation ago they were called "Reagan Democrats.""...Romney "is having trouble connecting with middle-class Ohioans."...  

9/25/2012, "Romney, Obama zero in on Ohio, a GOP must-win," AP, Charles Babington, Kasie Hunt

VANDALIA, Ohio (AP) — Ohio has emerged as the presidential race's undisputed focus. Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are making multiple stops this week alone in a state that's trending toward the president, endangering Romney's White House hopes.

The popularity of Obama's auto industry bailout and a better-than-average local economy are undermining Romney's call for Ohioans to return to their GOP-leaning ways, which were crucial to George W. Bush's two elections. Ohio has 18 electoral votes, seventh most in the nation, and no Republican has won the White House without carrying it....

Not even Florida has seen as many presidential TV campaign ads as Ohio, and neither nominee goes very long without visiting or talking about the state. When Obama touted his "decision to save the auto industry" on CBS' "60 Minutes" on Sunday, he mentioned not the major car-making state of Michigan but Ohio, which focuses more on car parts. "One in eight jobs in Ohio is dependent on the auto industry," Obama said.

Four new polls underscore Romney's serious problems in Ohio. Surveys by NBC and Fox News found Obama ahead by 7 percentage points. A poll by a group of Ohio newspapers showed him leading by 5. And a Washington Post poll released Tuesday found the president leading Romney by 8 points. All of Obama's leads were outside the polls' margins of error.

One problem for Romney is that Ohio's 7.2 percent unemployment rate is below the national average, as the Republican governor, John Kasich, often reminds residents....

House Speaker John Boehner, from the Cincinnati area, told reporters last week in Washington: "One of the things that probably works against Romney in Ohio is the fact that Gov. Kasich has done such a good job of fixing government regulations in the state, attracting new businesses to the state."

"People are still concerned about jobs in Ohio," Boehner said, "but it certainly isn't like you see in some other states."

Still, the Fox News poll suggests there's room for Romney to advance. Nearly one in three Ohio voters said they are "not at all satisfied" with the way things are going in the country, and an additional 26 percent are "not very satisfied." Only 7 percent are "very satisfied," and 34 percent are "somewhat satisfied."

Romney is trying to tap that discontent. But he's having mixed success with his chief target: white, working-class voters who are socially conservative and often have union backgrounds. A generation ago they were called "Reagan Democrats."

In 2009, Obama's administration used billions of taxpayer dollars to keep General Motors and Chrysler afloat while they reorganized through bankruptcy. Romney said the companies should have been allowed to enter bankruptcy without government help. But an array of officials at the time said the automakers would have gone under without it.

GM still owes the government about $25 billion. But many workers in Ohio and elsewhere consider the auto bailout a success.

It affected thousands of businesses, some of them fairly small, that make products that go into vehicles, new and used. Jeff Gase, a UAW union member who introduced Obama at a Columbus rally last week, credited the president with saving the paint company where he works. "Mom and pop body shops" buy the paint, Gase said, and now his plant is running "full steam ahead."

Romney notes that many Ohio car dealerships went out of business during the industry reorganization.

But he is having trouble connecting with middle-class Ohioans, said Tony Tenorio, who hears political conversations in his job as an Applebee's restaurant manager. In June, when he worked in Elyria, Tenorio said many Ohio residents seemed ready to bail on Obama. Now, working at an Applebee's in the more affluent town of West Lake, Tenorio says those same people seem unmoved by Romney.

The Washington Post poll showed that 36 percent of all Ohio voters said they had been contacted by the Obama campaign, and 29 percent said they had heard from Romney's camp.

Romney campaign political director Rich Beeson told reporters Tuesday that Romney's campaign has 40 offices in Ohio to Obama's 100, but he said Republicans are keeping pace....

Beeson said Romney has one pitch for all of Ohio's voters: America can't afford four more years of Obama. "We don't have to go in and package a message to different groups," Beeson said....

Ohio working-class voters are courted in GOP ads saying Obama hasn't been tough enough on China's protection of its exporters. Obama is airing ads disputing both claims."

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Sept. 2012 article: "The main criticism that emerged, though, is that Romney is man without a message."...

9/26/2012, "Why Romney is losing must-win Ohio," CNN, Peter Hamby 
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"Polls show Mitt Romney trailing President Barack Obama in just about every one of the swing states where the 2012 campaign is being waged. 


So why exactly is Romney trailing? Two surveys released in recent days, one from the Ohio Newspaper Association and another from The Washington Post, crystallized the challenge facing Romney as he embarks on his second straight day of campaigning in the Buckeye State.

The topline numbers-Obama led by 5 points among likely voters in the Ohio poll, and a startling 8 points in the Post poll -- only tell part of the story.

Romney's favorable rating is underwater. Almost two-thirds of voters approve of Obama's decision to bail out the auto industry, a staple of Ohio's manufacturing economy. The president leads Romney by a wide margin on the question of who would do more to help the middle class.

Some pointed to the Obama campaign's aggressive effort to hang Romney's opposition to the federal bailout of Chrysler and General Motors around his neck. Others said a hangover remains from the divisive 2011 battle over collective bargaining rights that hurt the GOP's standing with working class voters....

Still others cited Romney's lackluster political skills and said his stiff CEO demeanor as a turnoff for Ohioans....The main criticism that emerged, though, is that Romney is man without a message."...

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Below, Trump in Youngstown, Ohio, Mahoning County, on primary election eve, March 14, 2016, Reuters

Trump, 3/14/16, Youngstown, Ohio
























Image caption: "Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Winner Aviation in Youngstown, Ohio, March 14, 2016. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein"




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Spiraling suicide and premature death rates of working class whites due to societal change, whites expected too much, can't adjust to new economy. Author of “Labor’s Love Lost: The Rise and Fall of the Working-Class Family in America.”-NY Times op-ed, 2/22/16 ("Working class whites" justifiably lack optimism, per author)

"Andrew J. Cherlin is a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University and the author of “Labor’s Love Lost: The Rise and Fall of the Working-Class Family in America.”"  
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2/22/16, "Why Are White Death Rates Rising?" NY Times, Andrew J. Cherlin, op ed contributor .............. 
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It's disturbing and puzzling news: Death rates are rising for white, less-educated Americans. The economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton reported in December that rates have been climbing since 1999 for non-Hispanic whites age 45 to 54, with the largest increase occurring among the least educated. An analysis of death certificates by The New York Times found similar trends and showed that the rise may extend to white women. 

Both studies attributed the higher death rates to increases in poisonings and chronic liver disease, which mainly reflect drug overdoses and alcohol abuse, and to suicides. In contrast, death rates fell overall for blacks and Hispanics. 

Why are whites overdosing or drinking themselves to death at higher rates than African-Americans and Hispanics in similar circumstances? Some observers have suggested that higher rates of chronic opioid prescriptions could be involved, along with whites’ greater pessimism about their finances. 

Yet I’d like to propose a different answer: what social scientists call reference group theory. The term “reference group” was pioneered by the social psychologist Herbert H. Hyman in 1942, and the theory was developed by the Columbia sociologist Robert K. Merton in the 1950s. It tells us that to comprehend how people think and behave, it’s important to understand the standards to which they compare themselves.  

How is your life going? For most of us, the answer to that question means comparing our lives to the lives our parents were able to lead. As children and adolescents, we closely observed our parents. They were our first reference group.

And here is one solution to the death-rate conundrum: It’s likely that many non-college-educated whites are comparing themselves to a generation that had more opportunities than they have, whereas many blacks and Hispanics are comparing themselves to a generation that had fewer opportunities. 

When whites without college degrees look back, they can often remember fathers who were sustained by the booming industrial economy of postwar America. Since then, however, the industrial job market has slowed significantly. The hourly wages of male high school graduates declined by 14 percent from 1973 to 2012, according to analysis of data from the Economic Policy Institute. Although high school educated white women haven’t experienced the same major reversal of the job market, they may look at their husbands — or, if they are single, to the men they choose not to marry — and reason that life was better when they were growing up. 

African-Americans, however, didn’t get a fair share of the blue-collar prosperity of the postwar period. They may look back to a time when discrimination deprived their parents of equal opportunities. Many Hispanics may look back to the lower standard of living their parents experienced in their countries of origin. Whites are likely to compare themselves to a reference group that leads them to feel worse off. Blacks and Hispanics compare themselves to reference groups that may make them feel better off.

The sociologist Timothy Nelson and I observed this phenomenon in interviews with high-school-educated young adult men in 2012 and 2013. A 35-year-old white man who did construction jobs said, “It’s much harder for me as a grown man than it was for my father.” He remembered his father saying that back when he was 35, “‘I had a house and I had five kids or four kids.’ You know, ‘Look where I was at.’ And I’m like, ‘Well, Dad, things have changed.’” 

African-American men were more upbeat. One said: “I think there are better opportunities now because first of all, the economy’s changing. The color barrier is not as harsh as it was back then.” 

In addition, national surveys show striking racial and ethnic differences in satisfaction with one’s social standing relative to one’s parents. The General Social Survey conducted by the research organization NORC at the University of Chicago has asked Americans in its biennial surveys to compare their standard of living to that of their parents. In 2014, according to my analysis, among 25- to 54-year-olds without college degrees, blacks and Hispanics were much more positive than whites: 67 percent of African-Americans and 68 percent of Hispanics responded “much better” or “somewhat better,” compared with 47 percent of whites. 

Those figures represent a reversal from 2000, when whites were more positive than blacks, 64 percent to 60 percent. (Hispanics were the most positive in nearly all years.)

But we size ourselves up based on more than just our parents. White workers historically have compared themselves against black workers, taking some comfort in seeing a group that was doing worse than them. Now, however, the decline of racial restrictions in the labor market and the spread of affirmative action have changed that. Non-college-graduate whites in the General Social Survey are more likely to agree that “conditions for black people have improved” than are comparable blacks themselves, 68 percent to 53 percent.

Reference group theory explains why people who have more may feel that they have less. What matters is to whom you are comparing yourself. It’s not that white workers are doing worse than African-Americans or Hispanics. 

In the fourth quarter of 2015, the median weekly earnings [BLS] of white men aged 25 to 54 were $950, well above the same figure for black men ($703) and Hispanic men ($701). But for some whites — perhaps the ones who account for the increasing death rate — that may be beside the point. Their main reference group is their parents’ generation, and by that standard they have little to look forward to and a lot to lament."



"Andrew J. Cherlin is a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University and the author of “Labor’s Love Lost: The Rise and Fall of the Working-Class Family in America.”"







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IMF independent report finds top IMF staff misled their board, ignored impending crises. IMF has 'culture of complacency,' no apparent governance, ruled out any possibility their ideas could fail so had no backup plan to handle systemic crisis. Documentation about sensitive matters didn't exist-UK Telegraph

7/29/16, "IMF admits disastrous love affair with the euro and apologises for the immolation of Greece," UK Telegraph, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

"The International Monetary Fund’s top staff misled their own board, made a series of calamitous misjudgments in Greece, became euphoric cheerleaders for the euro project, ignored warning signs of impending crisis, and collectively failed to grasp an elemental concept of currency theory.  
 
This is the lacerating verdict of the IMF’s top watchdog on the fund’s tangled political role in the eurozone debt crisis, the most damaging episode in the history of the Bretton Woods institutions. 

It describes a "culture of complacency," prone to “superficial and mechanistic” analysis, and traces a shocking breakdown in the governance of the IMF, leaving it unclear who is ultimately in charge of this extremely powerful organisation.

The report by the IMF’s Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) goes above the head of the managing director, Christine Lagarde. It answers solely to the board of executive directors, and those from Asia and Latin America are clearly incensed at the way European Union insiders used the fund to rescue their own rich currency union and banking system.

The three main bailouts for Greece, Portugal and Ireland were unprecedented in scale and character. The trio were each allowed to borrow over 2,000pc of their allocated quota – more than three times the normal limit – and accounted for 80pc of all lending by the fund between 2011 and 2014.

In an astonishing admission, the report said its own investigators were unable to obtain key records or penetrate the activities of secretive "ad-hoc task forces". Mrs Lagarde herself is not accused of obstruction.

Many documents were prepared outside the regular established channels; written documentation on some sensitive matters could not be located. The IEO in some instances has not been able to determine who made certain decisions or what information was available, nor has it been able to assess the relative roles of management and staff," it said.

The report said the whole approach to the eurozone was characterised by “groupthink” and intellectual capture. They had no fall-back plans on how to tackle a systemic crisis in the eurozone – or how to deal with the politics of a multinational currency union – because they had ruled out any possibility that it could happen.

“Before the launch of the euro, the IMF’s public statements tended to emphasise the advantages of the common currency," it said. Some staff members warned that the design of the euro was fundamentally flawed but they were overruled.

“After a heated internal debate, the view supportive of what was perceived to be Europe’s political project ultimately prevailed,” it said.

This pro-EMU bias continued to corrupt their thinking for years. 

“The IMF remained upbeat about the soundness of the European banking system and the quality of banking supervision in euro-area countries until after the start of the global financial crisis in mid-2007. This lapse was largely due to the IMF’s readiness to take the reassurances of national and euro area authorities at face value,” it said.

The IMF persistently played down the risks posed by ballooning current account deficits and the flood of capital pouring into the eurozone periphery, and neglected the danger of a "sudden stop" in capital flows.

The possibility of a balance of payments crisis in a monetary union was thought to be all but non-existent,” it said. As late as mid-2007, the IMF still thought that “in view of Greece’s EMU membership, the availability of external financing is not a concern".
 
At root was a failure to grasp the elemental point that currency unions with no treasury or political union to back them up are inherently vulnerable to debt crises. States facing a shock no longer have sovereign tools to defend themselves. Devaluation risk is switched into bankruptcy risk.

“In a monetary union, the basics of debt dynamics change as countries forgo monetary policy and exchange rate adjustment tools,” said the report. This would be amplified by a “vicious feedback between banks and sovereigns”, each taking the other down. That the IMF failed to anticipate any of this was a serious scientific and professional failure.


In Greece, the IMF violated its own cardinal rule by signing off on a bailout in 2010 even though it could offer no assurance that the package would bring the country’s debts under control or clear the way for recovery, and many suspected from the start that it was doomed.

The organisation got around this by slipping through a radical change in IMF rescue policy, allowing an exemption (since abolished) if there was a risk of systemic contagion. The board was not consulted or informed, it said. The directors discovered the bombshell “tucked into the text” of the Greek package, but by then it was a fait accompli.

The IMF was in an invidious position when it was first drawn into the Greek crisis. The Lehman crisis was still fresh. “There were concerns that such a credit event could spread to other members of the euro area, and more widely to a fragile global economy,” said the report.

The eurozone had no firewall against contagion, and its banks were tottering. The European Central Bank had not yet stepped up to the plate as lender of last resort. It was deemed too dangerous to push for a debt restructuring in Greece.

While the fund’s actions were understandable in the white heat of the crisis, the harsh truth is that the bailout sacrificed Greece in a “holding action” to save the euro and north European banks. Greece endured the traditional IMF shock of austerity, without the offsetting IMF cure of debt relief and devaluation to restore viability.

A sub-report on the Greek saga said the country was forced to go through a staggering squeeze, equal to 11pc of GDP over the first three years. This set off a self-feeding downward spiral. The worse it became, the more Greece was forced to cut – what ex-finance minister Yanis Varoufakis called "fiscal water-boarding".

“The automatic stabilisers were not allowed to operate, thus aggravating the pro-cyclicality of the fiscal policy, which exacerbated the contraction,” said the report.

The attempt to force through an "internal devaluation" of 20pc to 30pc by means of deflationary wage cuts was self-defeating since it necessarily shrank the economic base and sent the debt trajectory spiralling upwards. “A fundamental problem was the inconsistency between attempting to regain price competitiveness and simultaneously trying to reduce the debt to nominal GDP ratio,” it said.

The IMF thought the fiscal multiplier was 0.5 when it may in reality have been five times as high, given the fragility of the Greek system. The result is that nominal GDP ended 25pc lower than the IMF’s projections, and unemployment soared to 25pc instead of 15pc as expected. “The magnitude of Greece’s growth forecast errors looks extraordinary,” it said.

The strategy relied on forlorn hopes that the "confidence fairy" would lift Greece out of this policy-induced nose-dive. 

“Highly optimistic” plans to raise $50bn from privatisation sales came to little. Some assets did not even have clear legal ownership. 

The chronic “lack of realism” lasted until late 2011. By then the damage was done.

The injustice is that the cost of the bailouts was switched to ordinary Greek citizens  – the least able to support the burden  – and it was never acknowledged that the true motive of EU-IMF Troika policy was to protect monetary union.

Indeed, the Greeks were repeatedly blamed for failures that stemmed from the policy itself. This unfairness – the root of so much bitterness in Greece – is finally recognised in the report.

“If preventing international contagion was an essential concern, the cost of its prevention should have been borne – at least in part – by the international community as the prime beneficiary,” it said. Better late than never."

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Added: From UK Telegraph article: "Indeed, the Greeks were repeatedly blamed for failures that stemmed from the policy itself. This unfairness – the root of so much bitterness in Greece– is finally recognised in the report."
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Added: "Full transcript of the Yanis Varoufakis | Noam Chomsky NYPL (NY Public Library) discussion," Posted on by yanisv


In the April 2016 conversation with Yanis Varoufakis, Chomsky mentions those who govern only do so as long as people consent:

"It is by consent alone that the powerful are able to govern. Meaning that if the governed refused to consent, to use your words, the game is over."...

"NOAM CHOMSKY:...He was probably quoting David Hume, who in “The First Principles of Government” makes that point very clearly. He says it’s surprising to see the easiness with which the great mass of the population is subordinate to their governors, because power is in the hands of the governed, and if we inquire into the means by which this wonder is achieved we see that it is by consent alone that the powerful are able to govern. Meaning that if the governed refused to consent, to use your words, the game is over.

YANIS VAROUFAKIS: That’s exactly right....Because you’ve got to remember our government won the election in January 2015 with a mandate to speak truth to the powerful, to say no to them....We had the whole media of Greece and the world completely and utterly, militantly against us....The banks were closed, people didn’t have access to their money. Pensioners were fainting in line in front of closed banks to get some money out in order to feed themselves. The press is bombarding, terrorizing people in their living rooms on their television sets, saying to them that if they went with us against the troika, Armageddon is going to come, and we’ll be expelled from the universe, not just Europe. (laughter) And those crazy, magnificent Greeks gave us 62 percent. Why? Because the one deficit they could not bear was the deficit of dignity."... 
......
Yanis is asked if what happened in Greece was inevitable:

YANIS VAROUFAKIS: "To say that it was inevitable that we would surrender and that the alternative would be worse is effectively to confirm that there is no alternative to barbarism, and I shall not confirm this."...
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Comment: I identified with Greek citizens being attacked around the clock by the media for the benefit of bankers. In America's case, these attacks by the globalist political class and media have been ongoing for decades. You'd think it would be enough for them to have destroyed this country, destroyed lifetimes of work and sacrifice, but it's not. They insist on filling the air with their seething hatred of us, usually that we're racists and xenophobes for wanting to have a country. (We don't have a country right now because we don't have a southern border. You can't be "xenophobic" about a country you don't even have). You'd even think they'd be happy that many impoverished Americans are quietly committing suicide these days, but no. They mock the dead for allegedly being stupid (white) hicks. In 2006, George W. Bush, called us racists for not wanting to give Arab governments control of our ports. (The failed Dubai Ports deal). It's 2016 now, so this has been going on for a long time. P.S. I'm familiar enough with Noam Chomsky that I wouldn't normally seek him out for inspiration. His words happened to be helpful in this case.



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Saturday, July 30, 2016

Trump rallies in Colorado Springs and Denver, Friday, July 29, 2016

Denver, AFP getty



















Col. Spr, AFPgetty












Museum in Denver, Reuters















Col. Spr., AFPgetty















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Above, 7/29/16, Trump rally in Denver: "Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump holds a rally, at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum, in Denver, July 29, 2016. Donald Trump held two events in Colorado." Denver Post

Denver, NY Times


























Above, 7/29/16, Trump rally in Denver, Colorado, NY Times photo by Nick Cote
























Above, 7/29/16, Trump rally in Denver, "Nick Towe arrives to a Donald Trump rally at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum in Denver, to sell Donald Trump merchandise, July 29, 2016." Denver Post 



























Above, 7/29/16, "Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump holds a rally, at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum, in Denver, July 29, 2016. Donald Trump held two events in Colorado." Denver Post  

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(Below is active link for above headline. Google is in a bad mood, will only allow 'tiny text.')

Top 6 photos, 7/30/16, via "As Trump lavishes Colorado with attention, he faces resistance in GOP enclave," Washington Post, Matea Gold, Jose A. DelReal

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Afternoon rally in Colorado Springs, evening rally in Denver:


7/29/16, "Donald Trump stumps in Colorado, promises “No more Mr. Nice Guy”," Denver Post, Joey Bunch
 
"Thousands waited in vain in a line that snaked hundreds of yards around the 1,600-seat Gallogly Events Center. More watched in an overflow room, as well....

Mark Pforr flew in from Pittsburgh to see Trump in Colorado. To him, Trump is the “only incorruptible politician” and the “only person I know who does not rely on anyone’s influence.”
Pforr, 42, said he was hoping to hear about Trump’s tax plans at the event.

John Willis of Colorado Springs, who came with his wife and daughter, would like Trump to make policy changes on trade agreements and on immigration.

Asked whether Trump can be considered a true believer who could succeed in conservative Colorado Springs, Willis paused and then said, “I really don’t know.” But, he added, the country has bigger issues to care about such as immigration.

The crowd inside chanted “Lock her up!” at the first mention of Clinton, the morning after she accepted her party’s nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia....

U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado Springs reassured the members of the conservative crowd that they did not want Clinton appointing Supreme Court justices.

“We don’t want someone who will carry on with Barack Obama’s policy of throwing Israel under the bus every chance they get,”  Lamborn said.

The crowd cheered for an end to political correctness and blamed President Obama for the state of race relations.

The Republican nominee will attend a 7 p.m. rally at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum in Denver.

Trump also is expected to attend a private fundraiser in Colorado Springs.

Trump’s two stops Friday represented the third and fourth Colorado events of his presidential run. Trump attended the CNBC presidential debate in Boulder last October. He spoke, along with supporter Sarah Palin, at the July 1 opening of the Western Conservative Summit in Denver.

U.S. Senate candidate Darryl Glenn, spoke at Trump’s event in Colorado Springs, Glenn’s hometown."...


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Above, 7/29/16, Trump rally in Colorado Springs, "Line is a couple hundred yards long for ... Just started to move thru metal detectors @csgazette," Matt Steiner





















Above, 7/29/16, "Still very long line to get into ... Those at back said they're worried the won't get in Colorado Springs Gazette 





















Above, 7/29/16, "Take a look at the crowd wrapping around the building now @UCCS! @KKTV11News, "Katie Pelton @KatiePeltonKKTV
 






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I'm the daughter of a World War II Air Force pilot and outdoorsman who settled in New Jersey.