national security

As we speculated from the very beginning, and as was reaffirmed in "Is Nigeria, And Its Light Sweet Crude, About To Be Drawn Into The Mali "Liberation" Campaign?", the "French" (with complete and fully-comped US support) Mali campaign is slowly but surely migrating to its intended target: Nigeria, and rather its holdings of light sweet crude. And while the US presence in this latest resource land grab, this time in Africa, was so far rather stealthy, it appears the time for foreplay is over and moments ago Obama told congress has has dispatched 40 more American troops to Niger this week, bringing the total U.S. military presence in the west African country to 100. Let's hear it for the full retroactive transparency demanded by the War Powers Resolution.

How Many Constitutional Freedoms Do We Still Have?

Army Chief of Staff: “The conundrum we have is that we don’t need the tanks”

Everyone Knew Iraq Had No WMDS … and Was Not Behind Anthrax Attacks or 9/11

Chinese data takeaway...

We suspect that if one combines all the most apocalyptic scenes from 'Day After Tomorrow', 'Armageddon', 'Planet of the Apes', and '2012', then President Obama's address (scheduled for 1045ET) on the impact of the sequester will come close. Of course, he could merely comment on the fact that we need to cut spending (not slow spending growth) in order to revert to sustainability but we suspect this is not 'silver linings playbook'. Young children and pets should probably be removed from the room as our leader explains just how cataclysmic things are going to get unless we all just get along... As a gentle reminder, here is the very same President threatening to veto any effort to stop spending cuts - oh well, it seems there really are no easy off-ramps.

Timing is a bit inconvenient, however.

Even Democrats Are Starting to Admit It

Something totally bizarre has happened in the last three years. Oil in America has become much, much cheaper than oil in Europe. Oil in America is now almost $30 cheaper than oil in Europe. Why? The ostensible reason for this is oversupply in America. But there’s something fishy about this explanation...

• Obama Paints Wider Role for Government in Middle Class Revival (BBG)
• Obama to Seek a New Trade Deal With EU (WSJ)... or this is strawman why 2016 GDP will be higher
• Mobile phone sales fall for the first time since 2009 (Telegraph)
• Sequester Looms, No Deal in Sight (WSJ)
• Neither US party swallows a compromise (FT)
• Embattled Economies Cling to Euro (WSJ)
• For China, Spending Is Harder Than It Looks (WSJ)
• Bank of England's Sir Mervyn King says recovery in sight (BBC) - just a little more inflation first
• G7 fails to defuse currency tensions (FT)
• Japanese Leader Urges Firms to Boost Wages (WSJ) - so does the US one
• Fed Bank Chiefs Back Money-Fund Overhaul (WSJ), or force everyone out of MMFs and into stocks

5% fewer words, slightly shorter than last year but just as hope-full. From a hike (and inflation-indexed) in the minimum wage to a 140x multiplier of genome sciences investment (now that is Keynesian awesomeness); from extending homeownership (and refinancing plans) even more to energy independence; from Apple, Ford, and CAT's US Manufacturing to Bridge-Building and infrastructure spending; and from Trans-Pacific and -Atlantic Trade to cyber-security; it's all gonna be great - because as President Obama reminded us at the start... "Our housing market is healing, our stock market is rebounding," and this won't add a dime to the deficit... oh and that Student loan bubble - no worries, there's a college scorecard so now you know where to get the biggest bang for your credit-based buck. Summing it all up: Guns 9 : 3 Freedom ; Jobs 31 : 17 Tax ; Congress 17 : 40 Work ; Recovery 2 : 0 Unicorns ; Spending 3 : 2 Cutting

With the world so obviously gripped in currency war even the hotdog guy has moved away from saying how technically undervalued AAPL stock is to opining on who is leading the global race to debase, it was only a matter of time before the G-7 confirmed the only strategy left is FX devaluation by denying it. Sure enough, a preliminary statement from the G-7 came earlier, in which the leading "developed" nations said, well, absolutely nothing:

We, the G7 Ministers and Governors, reaffirm our longstanding commitment to market determined exchange rates and to consult closely in regard to actions in foreign exchange markets. We reaffirm that our fiscal and monetary policies have been and will remain oriented towards meeting our respective domestic objectives using domestic instruments, and that we will not target exchange rates. We are agreed that excessive volatility and disorderly movements in exchange rates can have adverse implications for economic and financial stability. We will continue to consult closely on exchange markets and cooperate as appropriate.

This follows a statement by the US Treasury's Lael Branaird yesterday in which she said that she is supportive of the effort in Japan to end deflation and “reinvigorate growth”. Lastly, the SNB's Jordan also confirmed that the Swiss National Bank will continue to do everything to crush its own currency, and will the 1.20 EURCHF floor, stating that Japan is merely doing the right thing to stimulate growth (i.e., doing what "we" are doing).  In other words, let the FX wars continue and may the biggest balance sheet win, all the while everyone pretends nothing is happening.

Update: S.KOREA RAISES MILITARY READINESS LEVEL, YONHAP REPORTS,  South Korean news agency Yonhap says U.S., China informed about the North Korea nuclear test on Monday

Just because it has been off the headlines for a while, the time has come for North Korea to remind everyone it is still there, somewhere, with what appears another underground nuclear test, a few short years after that last one from May 2009.

• N. KOREA TEST ‘LIKELY’ TO BE NUCLEAR: S. KOREA DEFENSE MINISTRY
  
• S. KOREAN DEFENSE MINISTRY CONFIRMS DPRK NUCLEAR TEST
• USGS says earthquake of 4.9 scale detected in North Korea near to known nuclear test site - RTRS
• Seismic activity has been detected in North Korea. North Korea is not prone to seismic activity, it could indicate a nuclear test - RTRS
• Seismic activity detected in DPRK... believed to be "man-made" per various ROK sources - VOA
• Artificial earthquake detected in N. Korea - Yonhap
• S. Korea's presidential office checking reports of artificial quake in N. Korea - Yonhap

Of course, since this won't have any impact on the only wars that matter, the currency ones, it is unlikely that anything but more jawboning, and hard language out of both South Korea, the US and the UN, will come out of this attempt by DPRK to appear relevant.

Governments Move to Destroy Online Anonymity ... Google Helps

Slowly but surely the administration is making sure that both the US constitution, and its various amendments, become a thing of the past. In the name of national security, of course. And while until now it was the First and Second amendments that were the target of the administration's ongoing efforts to eavesdrop on anyone, all the time, in order to decide who may be a domestic terrorist and thus fit for 'droning', coupled with an aggressive push to disarm and curtail the propagation of weapons in what some perceive is nothing more than an attempt to take away a population's one recourse to defend itself against a tyrannical government, the time may be coming to say goodbye to the Fourth amendment - the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures - next. But only in close proximity to the border at first. According to Wired, "the Department of Homeland Security’s civil rights watchdog has concluded that travelers along the nation’s borders may have their electronics seized and the contents of those devices examined for any reason whatsoever — all in the name of national security."