White House

In the coming months, however many hours Clinton spends introducing herself to voters in small-town America, she will spend hundreds more raising money in four-star hotels and multimillion-dollar homes around the nation. The question is: "Can Clinton claim to stand for 'everyday Americans,' while hauling in huge sums of cash from the very wealthiest of us?" This much cannot be disputed: Clinton's connections to the financiers and bankers of this country - and this country's campaigns - run deep. As Nomi Prins questions, who counts more to such a candidate, the person you met over that chicken burrito bowl or the Citigroup partner you met over crudités and caviar?

America’s uniquely irrational behavior among civilized nations, whether or not a product of our diverse multi-racial society, has not served the country well during the past two decades adding the social problems created by racial inequality to an ever-widening economic inequality among Americans that Ronald Reagan legated to us. And as social inequality merges with economic inequality, a synergy of resentful rage is being created in cities and communities largely populated by people of color. Enter the city of Baltimore with a two-thirds black population, America’s problem-du-jour.

The graduating class of 2015 is the most heavily-indebted college class in history and the chart is "up and to the right," which in the case of student loans, is anything but encouraging. Fortunately, we have some advice for this year's graduating seniors...

"The median stock in the S&P 500 is the most expensive it has even been (for as long as we have data). That's never a good sign! If your favorite valuation indicator is not at 'the highest ever', then it is likely now at 'the highest ever except 2000'. That's not good company unless you are a short seller."

Following a report on Sunday, where Human Rights Watch said video and photographic evidence showed that Saudi Arabia used cluster bombs near villages in Yemen’s Saada Province at least two separate times, the US State Department said it is "looking into" the allegations but, as Foreign Policy reports, said the notoriously imprecise weapon — banned by much of the world — could still have an appropriate role to play in Riyadh’s U.S.-backed offensive (as long as it was used carefully).

Systematic Corruption Has Metastasized throughout the U.S.  ... Making Our Once-Great Nation Deathly Ill

"I love how he criticizes hedge funds, yet he had the first hedge fund. He criticizes activists, he was the first activist. He criticizes financial services companies, yet he loves to invest in them. He thinks that we should all pay taxes, yet he avoids them himself.”

For a long time there was confusion about the "quo" to the Saudi Arabian "quid" over its agreement to side with the US on the Iranian "nuclear deal" (which incidentally looks like it will never happen simply due to the Russian and Chinese UN vetoes). Then over the weekend we finally got the answer: the details are quite familiar to anyone who has seen the US Military-Industrial Complex in action: the US pretends to wage an aggressive diplomatic campaign of peace while behind the scenes it is just as actively selling weapons of war.

Having initially missed its deadline to provide a response to Congress with regard the 2012 leak of FOMC minutes to an external newsletter writer, The Fed reluctantly admitted that none other than Janet Yellen had met with them. Today, however, as The Wall Street Journal reports, The (unaudited) Fed has agreed to furnish a congressional panel with the names of its staffers who had contact with Medley Global Advisors in the months before the leak, “with the understanding that the names will be kept confidential." So we'll happily tell you who leaked it... as long as you don't tell the public. Audit The Fed!!!

Chuck Norris has a (long) message for "progressives" who think the paranoia surrounding the federal government's Jade Helm military exercises amounts to what Texas Republican Todd Smith branded "hysterical idiocy." In a new blog post, Norris — also known to some as Walker Texas Ranger — invokes Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, a Navy SEAL he met at a dinner party, and an antique store owner on the way to warning the government to stay off of his ranch.

Ben Bernanke’s skin is as thin, apparently, as is his comprehension of honest economics. The emphasis is on the “honest” part because he is a fount of the kind of Keynesian drivel that passes for economics in the financially deformed world that the Bernank did so much to bring about.

"The Japan-led Asian Development Bank unleashed measures that could help it hold its ground as a resource for regional economies, even as China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank gains prominence," Bloomberg says. In the latest sign that the US and Japan are struggling to cope with the rise of China-led multilateral institutions, the ADB is reportedly adopting "groundbreaking" measures to ensure it can remain competitive.

10Y German bond yields hit 42.5bps today (almost a 10x move off their 4.9bps lows on April 17th - before Bill Gross and Jeff Gundlach unleashed their bearish theses). While Draghi keeps buying, the move over the last week is 'almost' unprecedented in bond market history. We says 'almost' because we have seen this before - a sovereign issuer with an extremely low yielding bond suddenly see their bond market collapse... Japan 2003 (when Greenspan cut rates less than expected).

Fiat Money May Be Junk ... But a Cashless Society Controlled by the TBTFs Is Dictatorship