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Most Central Bankers Were Convinced They’d Beaten Inflation, They Shouldn’t Have Been

A report from Realtor.com. “The pandemic sent the real estate market into overdrive before higher mortgage rates caused a virtual standstill. But now, the number of homes for sale is the highest since 2019, including in pandemic ‘boomtowns.’ The total number of homes for sale in October was 29.2% higher than the year before, marking the 12th consecutive month of growth. The Southern boomtowns that rose to prominence during the pandemic are once again making waves—with welcome surges in housing stock. Austin, TX, tops the list with a 40.1% jump in inventory, trailed by Memphis, TN, (+39.2%); and Orlando, FL, (+26.6%). These metro areas now boast listings that have surpassed pre-pandemic levels—a notable shift. Metros that saw the largest increases in the number of homes for sale included San Diego, CA, at 63.5%; Seattle, WA, at 60.5%; and Denver, CO, at 59.5%.”

“The metros that saw the largest increase in fresh listings compared with last year included Baltimore, MD, at 24.9%; Washington, D.C., at 19.4%; and Seattle at 17.5%. And those figures could climb even higher before year’s end. ‘November and December are usually some of the colder months in the housing market, but it’s possible we’ll also see an increase in listing activity in these months after the uncertainty of the presidential election subsides,’ says Realtor.com® senior economist Ralph McLaughlin.”

Washington State Standard. “Voters of all age groups say the economy is one of their top factors in deciding who to choose for Washington’s next governor. But the issue appears to be top-of-mind for younger voters — specifically the cost of basic necessities. ‘The cost of living has increased, the ability to buy a home on one income has, by and large, evaporated,’ said Grant Gutierrez, 31, a Seattle resident who does environmental justice work. ‘I think that’s a piece of why people are so fixated on the economy. Even if real wages are rising, adjusted for inflation and adjusted for cost of living, we don’t have as much wealth.’ Last week, on a street corner on Capitol Hill, Xihucoatl Alvarado, 24, a Seattle resident who works as a paid canvasser for Greenpeace was trying to get people to donate. It was tough work. ‘Every other person under 30 that we stop is like, ‘I can’t afford to do this right now,’ Alvarado said. ‘Like, ‘I don’t even have money for food or for gas right now.'”

Los Angeles Times. “Retiree Madonna Raffini recently shopped for groceries for herself and her 96-year-old mother. ‘I went into Walmart, of all places, and looked at the meat — little teeny steaks. Two of them, less than a quarter-inch thick, $18.99. That’s outrageous,” said the former Wells Fargo employee. ‘We can’t afford to eat beef anymore, or chicken for that matter. So that’s my No. 1 beef’ in the 2024 election. Economic pain — inflation, a lack of affordable housing, sticker shock when filling gas tanks and grocery carts, fears about steady employment and sustainable wages that can support their families — is acute in conversations with voters in Nevada. The state was devastated economically by the pandemic because of its reliance on tourism. Casinos were closed. The state had the nation’s highest unemployment rate — 28.2% — in April 2020, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Hundreds of thousands of the state’s residents had lost their jobs.”

“‘To hear a lot of people talk about it, the economy is in terrible shape,’ said David Fott, chair of the political science department and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, adding that for Nevadans, that feeling is framed by their experiences during the COVID-19 lockdown and its aftermath. I think it’s a hangover, that it’s one of the ways in which the pandemic is not over. We don’t have a downtown that suffers from people working at home and not coming back to the office the way Washington, D.C., does, for example,’ he said. ‘So we don’t have that, but we feel the effects in other ways.'”

“The cost of housing is another major factor, Fott added. ‘This is an area where although the overall inflation rate has been dropping, the price of housing does not always reflect that. There’s a lack of affordable housing,’ he said. ‘I read recently that to be able to afford to rent a one-bedroom apartment, someone working minimum wage would have to work two full-time jobs.’ As seen in other states, such as Arizona, the lack of affordable housing is partly blamed on the number of Golden State residents moving to Nevada. ‘Our market is infiltrated by Californians coming over with money to pay cash up front,’ Fott said.”

48 Hills in California. “Let’s put the Nov. 5 local election in some historical context, since many of the themes that underlie the major campaigns have roots in community struggles that defined San Francisco politics in the post-War era. The tech industry doesn’t like moving slowly and carefully. Big Tech wants to ‘move fast and break things.’ When you disrupt an industry, there are impacts on the people who work in it, but that’s capitalism. When you disrupt the Latinx community in the Mission by forcing people out, that’s something else entirely. Under Mayor Willie Brown and later Mayor Ed Lee, tech came to town in a big way—and wanted to move fast and break things. The response, particularly from Lee, was: Full throttle, go.”

“Airbnb ‘disrupted’ the hotel business, and also caused thousands of evictions and local tenants saw their apartments turned into transient rentals. It was illegal; Lee told the city staff to look the other way. Uber and Lyft ‘disrupted’ the cab industry, and left hundreds of taxi drivers with massive debts for city permits that they can never pay; it was illegal, and Lee told city staff to look the other way. In the process, thousands of San Franciscans were forced out of town, evicted, displaced by higher-paid tech workers.”

“Candidates who define themselves as progressives are, generally, about protecting existing vulnerable residents, about making a safe place for non-wealthy people who come here seeking sanctuary. About moving more intentionally and with everyone’s interest in mind, not just the rich. If that means we ‘lose’ some of the race for more innovation, more tech jobs, more disruption, maybe it’s worth the price. Maybe we should have a slogan that says ‘disrupt neoliberal capitalism.'”

The Denver Post on Colorado. “Whispering Pines apartment in Aurora has drawn national attention over allegations that it was overtaken by a transnational Venezuelan gang. In September 2023, police began to raise concerns about a Venezuelan gang in the area, according to internal department emails leaked late last month. City officials have said those emails described ‘speculation and concern among some of our officers’ that Tren de Aragua was active in the city. In October 2023, an Aurora police officer who specialized in environmental security visited Nome Street. The officer wrote in a report that “gangs in the area have moved into the apartments and use threats and coercion to control the apartments.’ He said the gangs had extorted immigrants at Nome Street in a bid to prevent them from talking to police — and that police cars had been rammed by fleeing vehicles. But the Aurora officer also indicated that conditions at the Nome Street property had invited criminal activity.”

“‘I’m not saying, as chief of police, there is not crime in these complexes,’ Aurora Police Chief Todd Chamberlain, who started the job in late August, said last week. ‘I’m not saying … people aren’t being victimized, because (they) are. But what I am saying, also, is that the place is not taken over. And what I’m also saying is that a lot of the information that’s coming out — it is a false narrative. It’s a false narrative that’s not based on facts. It’s not based on data, it’s not based on statistics. It’s based on anecdotal, third-party stories that somehow circulate and go around and around in circles.'”

Pro Publica on Colorado. “For months, Venezuelan migrants had been arriving in Denver with nowhere to go. At first, they came in groups small enough to escape notice by most. A few immigrant aid groups with connections on the U.S.-Mexico border warned city officials to prepare for more but were ignored. Then, in December 2022, a busload of about 90 migrants stepped into the freezing night, bound for Denver Rescue Mission. The shelter, which serves the city’s growing unhoused community, was full.”

“City officials and local aid organizations scrambled, filling a recreation center with beds to keep migrants from sleeping on the streets. A week later, their growing numbers prompted an emergency declaration, freeing up state and federal resources to help. The city filled a second recreation center with beds and transformed a third into an intake center. By the end of the month, city shelters housed nearly 500 migrants. It was just the beginning. But by the following January, Denver was feeling the full weight of being a welcoming city. More than 300 migrants a day were rolling into Denver, just over 4,000 were living in shelters and hundreds more were sleeping on the street. Aid workers reported flaring tensions between migrants and the unhoused at food banks and shelters.”

“Tim Rogers, a Denver native, was riveted by media coverage of the arriving migrants. The stories focused not just on what the mayor was spending, but on how the community was rallying to support newcomers. Residents delivered food, knitted winter hats and even opened spare bedrooms to them. Watching these families shuttled into hotels and shelters, Rogers couldn’t help but think about his own decade-long battle with homelessness. he had spent years on a waiting list for housing assistance. He still had friends living on the streets. And he couldn’t reconcile how the city would spend so heavily on the newcomers when its homeless population had long been desperate for that kind of help. ‘It ain’t fair,’ he said. ‘We got guys doing what they’re supposed to do, seeing their case managers and trying to get housing. If they ask to get a pair of shoes they get a big runaround.'”

“Even Denver mayor Mike Johnston wondered how long the city could keep it up. At the end of 2023, hundreds of migrants who had timed out of the shelters had erected a sprawling tent encampment, where families with small children were living in the dead of winter. Under mounting political and humanitarian pressure, he organized a city effort to disband the camp and in one day got all of the migrants sheltered again. But as Johnston touted the city’s accomplishment to reporters, two more buses pulled up with more newcomers in need of help. ‘It was like, ‘Will there ever be an end?’ Johnston told ProPublica. ‘That was a moment where, even when we were creating heroic solutions, we weren’t sure how sustainable they would be.'”

“Rogers, a slight man with wiry muscles built over decades of manual labor, moved into the apartment just before migrants from Venezuela began rolling into Denver. He watched the city mobilize to keep migrants sheltered and fed in a way it never had for him or his friends. ‘I’m sorry to say it, I know we’re all human, but to me it ain’t fair,’ he said. ‘Back in our day, you’d go up to a cop and he’d say, ‘We got a place for you,’ meaning jail, Rogers said. ‘They never threw us on a bus and took us to a motel.'”

The Globe and Mail. “Last week, the Canadian cryptocurrency billionaire Changpeng Zhao made his first public appearance after leaving U.S. prison. And Mr. Zhao talked about Toronto-Dominion Bank’s money-laundering woes. Mr. Zhao is founder of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance, which has broken U.S. anti-money-laundering laws in a manner not too different from TD. Binance was fined US$4.3-billion, and Mr. Zhao went to prison for four months. At a crypto conference in Dubai on Thursday, Mr. Zhao was asked if he thought his sentence was fair.”

“‘I can give you a couple of data points for people to benchmark,’ Mr. Zhao said. ‘We failed to implement an adequate anti-money-laundering program. … I’m the only one who went to jail for this in U.S. history.’ This is where Mr. Zhao brought up TD, which recently pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering and has been fined, along with other penalties. No TD executive was personally charged or even publicly shamed by the authorities, Mr. Zhao said. ‘No one was named. Just the company was fined.’ Keep in mind that Mr. Zhao’s plea deal bars him from speaking ill of it. This was as far and as explicit as Mr. Zhao could go in saying, ‘Why did I have to go to prison while these TD bankers did not?’ A most thought-provoking question.”

“No two cases are exactly alike. The dirty money on Binance had flown to groups including ‘terrorists, cybercriminals, and child abusers,’ while TD’s case appeared to involve only drug traffickers. Binance’s case involved the breaking of U.S. sanctions, which TD’s did not. There’s a whole lot of crypto-specific stuff Binance did that doesn’t apply to TD. If we boil down what Binance and TD did, it’s hard to tell the difference. They profited off bad actors who used them to move dirty money. The amounts involved are similar at ‘hundreds of millions.'”

“See if you can tell which Justice Department comments refer to Binance and which to TD: ‘Because of the crimes it committed – now it is paying one of the largest corporate penalties in U.S. history… [the company] turned a blind eye to its legal obligations in the pursuit of profit.’ The company ‘chose profits over compliance with the law – a decision that is now costing … billions of dollars in penalties.’ ‘In one instance a compliance employee asked a manager what ‘the bad guys’ thought about the [company]. The manager replied: ‘Lol. Easy target.’ ‘As one compliance employee wrote, ‘we need a banner ‘is washing drug money too hard these days – come to [our company] we got cake for you.’ (The answers: Binance, TD, TD, Binance.)”

From ABC News. “It’s finger-pointing time. What, or more precisely who, is to blame for the inflation episode that has up-ended our lives for the past three years? Usually, this is the point where one can insert the name of their least favoured local politician, completely ignoring the obvious, that it has been a global phenomenon. Or, to zone in on a local recovery that isn’t entirely uniform with the rest of the world, completely ignoring the obvious; that each nation has unique strengths and weaknesses. In Australia, we’re routinely told huge government spending and expansionary budgets for the past few years have been largely to blame.”

“Which tends to completely ignore the obvious; that the past couple of federal budgets have delivered surpluses. And if they alone fuelled the continued inflation outbreak, why was inflation so undercooked during all those earlier years of deficits? The textbook definition on inflation will tell you that it is the result of too much money chasing too few goods and services. Which, in hindsight, all makes sense. Most central bankers were convinced they’d beaten inflation through their clever management techniques and were blindsided by the sudden outbreak three years ago. They shouldn’t have been. Globally, there was a huge cash splash during the pandemic to keep the economy ticking over. And once the world emerged from lockdowns, we suddenly found ourselves short of supplies as different countries came back on line at different times and shipping struggled to keep up.”

“As a nation, we’ve run large immigration programs since around the turn of the century. If we’d relied on our natural birth rate, the population would have been in decline, so we’ve brought people in. Prior to 2000, annual net immigration was a touch under 100,000 a year. That was ramped up to more than double during the next 20 years and peaked at 550,000 as borders reopened after the pandemic. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there were 19.2 million people living in Australia in 2000. That’s now grown to 27.46 million. That’s an increase the equivalent of more than one-and-a-half Sydneys.”

“As the graph illustrates, there was an unexpectedly large post pandemic bump in new arrivals which boosted demand for housing, leading to surging property values and higher rents. Meanwhile, the cost of building new dwellings has soared following large increases in the price of building materials.”

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This Post Has 52 Comments

  1. ‘Under Mayor Willie Brown and later Mayor Ed Lee, tech came to town in a big way—and wanted to move fast and break things. The response, particularly from Lee, was: Full throttle, go…Airbnb ‘disrupted’ the hotel business, and also caused thousands of evictions and local tenants saw their apartments turned into transient rentals. It was illegal; Lee told the city staff to look the other way. Uber and Lyft ‘disrupted’ the cab industry, and left hundreds of taxi drivers with massive debts for city permits that they can never pay; it was illegal, and Lee told city staff to look the other way. In the process, thousands of San Franciscans were forced out of town, evicted, displaced by higher-paid tech workers’

    It was bay aryans who first legalized airbnb and other STR dogs. I blogged about it a lot at the time. The Craigslist thing had been around for years but the stock market fueled companies took it to a industrial scale.

  2. ‘But as Johnston touted the city’s accomplishment to reporters, two more buses pulled up with more newcomers in need of help. ‘It was like, ‘Will there ever be an end?’ Johnston told ProPublica. ‘That was a moment where, even when we were creating heroic solutions, we weren’t sure how sustainable they would be’

    Yer a big hero Mike. Sanctuary cities are getting a lot of people killed and everybody is more miserable and poorer because of it. I’ve said for years, you can have a safety net, or open borders, but you can’t have both.

  3. “The cost of living has increased, the ability to buy a home on one income has, by and large, evaporated”

    All intentional and by design.

  4. ‘See if you can tell which Justice Department comments refer to Binance and which to TD: ‘Because of the crimes it committed – now it is paying one of the largest corporate penalties in U.S. history… [the company] turned a blind eye to its legal obligations in the pursuit of profit.’ The company ‘chose profits over compliance with the law – a decision that is now costing … billions of dollars in penalties.’ ‘In one instance a compliance employee asked a manager what ‘the bad guys’ thought about the [company]. The manager replied: ‘Lol. Easy target.’ ‘As one compliance employee wrote, ‘we need a banner ‘is washing drug money too hard these days – come to [our company] we got cake for you.’ (The answers: Binance, TD, TD, Binance.)’

    See if you can see the common denominator: they are all K-dns engaged in organized crime.

  5. “These metro areas now boast listings that have surpassed pre-pandemic levels—a notable shift. Metros that saw the largest increases in the number of homes for sale included San Diego, CA, at 63.5%; Seattle, WA, at 60.5%; and Denver, CO, at 59.5%.”

    I love watching an exciting race for the exits. Would the last investor to leave please turn out the lights?

  6. “The textbook definition on inflation will tell you that it is the result of too much money chasing too few goods and services.”

    How does that work out when you flood the economy with printing press money while shutting down economic production by decree?

  10. “he couldn’t reconcile how the city would spend so heavily on the newcomers when its homeless population had long been desperate for that kind of help”

    You are being replaced.

    1. You are being replaced.

      And it has a multi pronged approach:

      – Open borders
      – Invaders get better benefits than homeless citizens.
      – The opioid crisis.
      – The cost of raising a child without government financial assistance has become prohibitive for most.
      – Many people believe having children is an obstacle to their happiness
      – The Jab. We still don’t know what the long term consequences will be. Even if it doesn’t kill you right away, it might very well significantly shorten your lifespan. But it didn’t go unnoticed that the invaders were never required to be jabbed. Never. Meanwhile, health authorities and actuaries keep trying to bury the fact the unexpected deaths surged since the jab was deployed and mandated.

      So, the end result is a plummeting birth rate, well below the replacement level and probable shorter life spans. In just two more generations the US will be racially unrecognizable. It will also be socially unrecognizable, with poverty being the norm for the vast majority as most of the New Americans will be unskilled and living off of whatever scraps the government can give them.

  11. I saw this on msn dot com:

    Audrey Dempsey, a semiretired small-business owner, and her husband still work at the photography and travel company they founded three decades ago. They are the only workers remaining at the firm that employed nine people before the pandemic decimated their business.

    “It went in the toilet, without a doubt. We didn’t know how we were going to pay the bills,” Dempsey said, leaning on a cane because of the physical toll of working the prior night. Despite the nation’s economic recovery, she said many of their former clients have not returned. “Social Security helps us to pay the bills, but we still have to work.”

    The 72-year-old Democrat supports Vice President Kamala Harris and Sen. Jacky Rosen, arguing that the Democrats will stop Republicans from gutting Social Security and Medicare and will provide relief for working-class Americans.

    This simply floors me. I would expect a small business owner to understand that the Left is her mortal enemy, one that wants her to fail. But no, she doesn’t see it. If the small business environment was good, she would be able to sell her business and retire. Unfortunately her small business is now practically worthless and will probably fold, netting her next to nothing. Thanks to the left she will have to work until she drops dead.

    As for her Social Security benefits, once again she refuses to see that the Left’s inflationary policies make her real SS benefits decrease, not grow.

    Please excuse me, while I go and face palm.

    2. “This simply floors me.”

      You’ve heard the emotional response. Talk to the husband for the rational version.

  12. It’s that time again…

    “Multiple counties in California’s San Francisco Bay Area region reinstated mask mandates in health care settings starting Nov. 1, while other municipalities have recommended face coverings.

    Counties with mask requirements for employees include San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, Santa Clara, Napa, and San Mateo. But Santa Clara County, which includes San Jose, and San Mateo County also require visitors and patients in those health care facilities to wear masks.

    Those mandates, which were announced weeks or months ago, run from Nov. 1, 2024, until March 31, 2025. A similar mandate was imposed across the Bay Area during the 2023–24 winter and spring months.”

    https://www.theepochtimes.com/article/hospital-mask-mandates-come-back-in-californias-bay-area-what-we-know-5752380?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=ZeroHedge&src_src=partner&src_cmp=ZeroHedge

    1. FFS, I don’t know of anyone who is sick.

      The curve on the worldometers new cases page is level, meaning there are virtually no new cases.

      Then again those bay aryans have probably had every booster, meaning their immune systems are probably shot, so maybe they should take every precaution possible.

    2. Everyone knows it doesn’t work, at this point it’s just a humiliation ritual

      and not enough are willing to push back, even now. esp in Kali.

      1. “at this point it’s just a humiliation ritual”

        That’s all it ever was.

        The alleged “virus” was merely incidental to Big Government’s response to it.

        Never forgive, never forget. Never.

  13. A reader sent these in:

    LVMH, Kering and other luxury houses poured billions of dollars into China. Now they’re scrambling to adjust to what may be a permanent shift in demand.

    https://x.com/markets/status/1853222928206139451

    Delinquency Rate On Office CMBS Loans Surges Past 9% For First Time Since 2013

    https://x.com/Bisnow/status/1852527783135592936

    Does Warren see something that the rest of the market is missing?

    https://x.com/hmacbe/status/1853131304763904503

    The US Treasury added a mind-boggling $105 billion to the national debt in a single day yesterday, and the total now stands at $35.95 trillion.

    https://x.com/jameslavish/status/1853224931770892606

    Bosch plans to lay off 7,000 employees from its plants in Germany. The crisis in the automotive industry is intensifying. According to recent reports

    https://x.com/dailyjobcuts/status/1853260721808642314

    🏡 Homebuyers Lose $33,000 in Purchasing Power in 6 Weeks As Mortgage Rates Hit 7%

    https://x.com/dailyjobcuts/status/1853073497888555260

    Airbnb listings are getting WILD…

    This listing doesn’t allow cars in the driveway or on the street within 300 feet of the house…

    WHAT?!

    “If a car is parked on the driveway or on the street for more than 15 minutes, a $200 penalty per car will apply and your cars will be subject to towing immediately. We will regularly review camera footage and apply penalties.”

    https://x.com/KenjiCapital/status/1853195092980277660

    This is how many people live .. this is how they live ……..

    I would literally rather live in a motel 8 than have this view for 2k a month

    https://x.com/p8stie/status/1852827572918177929

    God I love @Montreal
    & its people:

    Landlord: “Tenant Illegally Airbnb-ing My Property in Montreal and I am getting fined”

    Community: “Well done OP, you’ve managed to be the bad guy in a story involving AirBnB.”

    https://x.com/NotoriousAirbnb/status/1852550454284337379

    POV: you’re going to Blockbuster on a Friday night in the 2000s

    https://x.com/NostalgiaFolder/status/1852498355576086643

    Huge oceanic Manta Ray spotted near Trinidad ( sharks for scale )

    https://x.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/1852595516170731628

    Sometimes I feel like high mortgage rates just distract us from high home prices.

    And we never really discuss it unless you explicitly exclude mortgage rates from the conversation.

    https://x.com/mortgagetruth/status/1853118219109687620

    1. Bosch plans to lay off 7,000 employees from its plants in Germany.

      Germany is undergoing a rate of deindustrialization that has never been seen before. Insane regulations and sky high energy costs are taking their predicted tolls. Unless voters reject this insanity, Germany is finished.

  14. Helter shelter: ‘Transitional housing’ is better than homelessness for those who need it, but it’s no easy path

    When Steven first became homeless in late 2022, he didn’t know who to call for help finding a temporary place to stay.

    “The first place I called was the Rock Bay shelter and they were like, you don’t want to be here — it’s one of the wet shelters.”

    A “wet” shelter, unlike a “dry” one, allows drugs and alcohol.

    Steven, now 37 — who asked to be identified only by his middle name because of the stigma associated with living in a shelter — had come to the realization that he could no longer afford his two-bedroom apartment in Vic West.

    He was surprised to find out that, for his category of shelter — called “transitional housing” — he had to pay about $600 in monthly program fees, which included a bed in a dorm and three meals a day, along with support services.

    “I didn’t realize you had to pay to be in a shelter, because I kind of thought that would be the place to go in the event that you didn’t have any options available to you,” he said.

    Including the storage space he rented for his possessions, Steven estimated that he was paying about $1,000 a month to be homeless.

    He started off sleeping in the shelter’s dorms, which house up to eight or 12 people, which he called a “nerve-wracking experience.” At the time, Steven was looking for administration work similar to his previous job in Vancouver.

    But he was living in an institutional environment where the lights in his room were on a timer and people would pass out in communal bathrooms.

    The shelter didn’t allow for microwaves, and staff removed the only communal electric kettle after a fistfight broke out over it, he said.

    Fights would break out about the most mundane things, he said, such as what to watch on the communal television. “Everybody has probably seen them like 100 times at this point, but they would still argue over Rust Valley [Restorers] — it was some kind of car-restoration show.”

    Steven’s shelter was a “dry” shelter with a no-drugs-or-alcohol policy, but occasionally people would smuggle substances in.

    Once, he woke up to the sound of a crack pipe shattering on the floor in the middle of the night.

    Most of the people in the shelter would get “drummed out in a couple of weeks” due to substance-use or behavioural issues, he said.

    While many residents were respectful and nice to staff, some were just “too far gone” and would be consistently belligerent or threatening, he said. “It’s not really fair that [staff] have to put up with that.

    “They try their best, but I think they’re just spread too thin. I imagine that burnout is probably considerable.”

    His shelter was better than some other places, he said.

    People transferred from other shelters would share horror stories about people being “hot-shotted” — where someone is held down and involuntarily injected with drugs, he said. “Apparently it happens regularly enough to have its own term.”

    https://www.vancouverisawesome.com/highlights/helter-shelter-transitional-housing-is-better-than-homelessness-for-those-who-need-it-but-its-no-easy-path-9727215

    2. “What we have found in this country, and maybe we’re more aware of it now, is one problem that we’ve had, even in the best of times, and that is the people who are sleeping on the grates, the homeless, you might say, by choice.” —Ronald Reagan, 1984

  15. Border wall on the ballot: Laredo leaders discuss possible construction returning if Trump wins election

    By the end of former President Donald Trump’s first term, Laredo was up next to start construction on the border wall until President Joe Biden won the 2020 election, signing an executive order to stop its build.

    U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar has been openly opposed to the border wall in Webb and Zapata counties, and he believes in alternatives, such as his River Road project technology and the latest joint processing center, with an opening date set for late February 2027.

    “We had meetings with some landowners who supported Trump, and I told them at one time, ‘well, if you support the president’ at that time ‘he’s going to be doing the wall.’ You know, that’s a reality, but then Biden came in and it changed,” Cuellar said. “Let’s say Trump comes in again … that border wall comes up.”

    “If he comes in, then we might have that problem with the border wall. … That’s why I’ve been pushing for River Road technology. The checkpoint, as well, because I don’t want to have a border wall. And keep in mind, Laredo is the second lowest crossing (area), and if they look at that, then there’s no reason to put a border wall. That’s one of the reasons we got that immigration processing center, because the Border Patrol is not running around like in other places.”

    District III Councilmember Melissa Cigarroa said that especially with the Rio Grande so close, the wall would destroy a thousand acres of city riverside land and threaten the only source of drinking water for the community and for Nuevo Laredo. She said people have seen the destructive construction in other places along the border.

    “We know that should Trump become president again, we here in Laredo will suffer consequences of a nativist America-First policy that threatens to close the border and build the wall,” Cigarroa said. “Whatever your political persuasion, Trump’s policies will impact our community economically and socially.

    “I believe we, as a country, are stronger when we build bridges, not walls. I believe international trade has led to an economic boom that has transformed Laredo into the economic powerhouse it is today. I believe immigrants come into our county looking for opportunity and contribute to our future growth.

    “It’s stupid and destructive, his stance against immigrants. Here in Laredo we best understand that. Please vote and let your voice be heard. Laredo is the Ellis Island of the south and the gateway for Latin America.”

    https://www.lmtonline.com/local/article/mayor-trevino-laredo-border-wall-19865126.php

    1. Laredo is the Ellis Island of the south and the gateway for Latin America.”

      I’ve been to Laredo. It is the definition of “sh!thole”. No wall? With cartel ruled Nuevo Laredo across the river, you’d think they would want a replica of the Great Wall built.

  16. Sunday, Nov. 3: WhatsApp founder — and Daniel Lurie donor — goes MAGA

    One of Daniel Lurie’s biggest donors, the WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum, who has given the mayoral candidate $500,500, has gone all-in on Donald Trump.

    Filings submitted to the Federal Elections Commission on Oct. 24 revealed that Koum had donated $5 million to Make America Great Again Inc., a super PAC backing Trump’s candidacy that has fundraised more than $331 million from 2023 to 2024.

    The WhatsApp co-founder is a longtime Republican donor: Koum gave $10 million to a super PAC backing Nikki Haley’s presidential bid in 2023, according to the federal filings. He gave about $250,000 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which is dedicated to electing Republican senators, and several hundred thousand dollars to Republican Party chapters across the country.

    He’s also given $7 million to a super PAC called the United Democracy Project, a pro-Israel group that spent $10 million to successfully unseat Rep. Jamaal Bowman and $5.2 million to unseat Rep. Cori Bush, according to OpenSecrets. The PAC spent $20.7 million to attack Democrats in the 2024 cycle.

    Koum gave $2.4 million to the Republican Jewish Coalition, according to The Forward. The group has reportedly spent at least $16 million taking out pro-Trump TV ads in swing states.

    — Joe Rivano Barros

    https://missionlocal.org/2024/11/sf-election-blog-november-2024/

  17. SNL fans rip into show for one-sided mockery of candidate ahead of election

    Saturday Night Live has been branded ‘cowardly and pathetic’ over its one-sided mockery of presidential candidate Trump just days before the election.

    During the sketch comedy show’s ‘Weekend Update’ segment, anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che took turns evaluating Trump’s recent appearances and comments ahead of election week.

    The pair discussed the Republican candidate’s Madison Square Garden rally, his garbage truck photo op, and Trump’s odd microphone interaction in Milwaukee on Friday, among other moments.

    The comedian’s comments left MAGA fans infuriated, insisting they were ‘anti-Trump’ and ‘one-sided’, as Jost and Che only mentioned his opponent Kamala Harris – who made a surprise appearance on the show – a few times before circling back to him.

    ‘Comedians shall make fun of both sides, when they are one-sided [it] is just sad, cowardly and pathetic,’ and X user wrote.

    Another said: ‘Time to ignore SNL again. This entire segment was anti-Trump.’

    ‘Not funny. Go woke got broke,’ said another.

    ‘@nbcsnl your political bias is showing,’ a user said.

    https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/tv/us/article-14035395/snl-roasted-mockery-candidate-presidential-election.html

    1. “Saturday Night Live has been branded ‘cowardly and pathetic’ over its one-sided mockery of presidential candidate Trump just days before the election.”

      \\

      – I’m detecting a pattern here.
      – Following the purchase of Twitter and its emancipation as X, the mainstream media (MSM), aka the propaganda arm of the D party, but I repeat myself, is becoming irrelevant.
      – Make comedy and satire funny again. Make America great again. Make Trump President again.
      – Anyone voting for the D candidate is either a hard Left Communist or a low information voter (uniformed and/or ignorant of the issues).

      https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fcc-commissioner-rips-nbc-over-harris-last-minute-snl-appearance-plainly-designed-evade-rules

      FCC commissioner rips NBC over Harris’ last-minute SNL appearance: ‘Plainly designed to evade’ the rules

      ‘We have rules on the books, we have to uphold them,’ FCC commissioner Brendan Carr told Fox News Digital in a Zoom interview

      By Emma Colton Fox News
      Published November 3, 2024 1:50pm EST | Updated November 3, 2024 1:53pm EST

      “The senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission lambasted NBC’s decision to host Vice President Kamala Harris on “Saturday Night Live” in the final episode ahead of Election Day, while not offering equal time to former President Trump or other candidates in the presidential cycle.”

      “This has all the appearances of, at least some leadership at NBC, at SNL, making clear that they wanted to weigh-in in favor of one candidate before the election. That’s exactly why, for decades, we’ve had an equal time rule on the book, is to prevent that. Because remember, broadcasters are placed in a special position of trust. They’re not just like any other person with a soapbox on the corner. They have a license from the federal government that obligates them to operate in the public interest,” FCC commissioner Brendan Carr told Fox News Digital in a Zoom interview Sunday morning.”

      \\

      – Bonus articles.
      – Elections have (global) consequences.

      https://www.foxnews.com/politics/sen-mike-lee-warns-democrats-would-rule-america-uncontested-100-years-sweep-2024-elections

      Sen. Mike Lee warns Democrats would ‘Rule America uncontested for 100 years’ if they sweep 2024 elections

      The senator suggested that Republicans change their party mascot from an elephant to Peanut the squirrel

      Alex Nitzberg By Alex Nitzberg Fox News
      Published November 4, 2024 7:04am EST

      “Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, has suggested that if Democrats sweep the 2024 elections, they will control the nation for a century.”

      “He predicted that if Democrats win both chambers of Congress and the White House, they will eliminate the filibuster in the Senate, add justices to the U.S. Supreme Court, grant Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico statehood, and establish federal control over elections, redistricting, and campaigns.”

      “Day 1: Nuke the filibuster,” Lee wrote on X. “Day 2: Pack SCOTUS. Day 3: Make DC & PR states. Day 4: Enact federal takeover of elections/redistricting/campaigns. Days 5 – 36,500: Rule America uncontested for 100 years.”

      \\

      https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ahead-election-what-latin-americans-europeans-think-donald-trump-kamala-harris

      Ahead of election, what do Latin Americans, Europeans think about Donald Trump, Kamala Harris?

      ‘If Kamala Harris wins, then you may have a lot of agnostic attitudes, but you’ll have people say, “The United States is pretty much done with,”‘ says Latin America expert Joseph Humire

      By Peter Pinedo Fox News
      Published November 4, 2024 8:00am EST

      “As the world watches the U.S. election unfold, many, especially people in Latin America, believe that Trump is the only option to prevent the decline of American economic power and influence.

      “Joseph Humire, an expert on Latin America and executive director of the think tank Center for a Secure Society, told Fox News Digital that many Latin Americans hope for a Trump victory on Nov. 5.”

      “Humire said the Biden administration’s policy toward Latin America has resulted in it being “the worst that I’ve seen.”

      “The last four years the region has gone into a very difficult direction,” he said. “Food inflation is really high. Organized crime and violence are really high. And, you know, little by little, they’re losing their democratic practices. There’s a huge democratic backsliding happening in the region.”

      “Argentine President Javier Milei serves as an example of a recently arisen populist leader who has said he was inspired by Trump’s success in the U.S. Humire believes that a Trump victory on Election Night could lead to a slate of additional conservative leaders rising across Latin America, especially in countries close to Argentina such as Chile and Colombia.”

      “If Kamala wins,” he said, “they know they’ll look at that as an extension of President Biden, and they know how to work that. They’ve been pretty successful over the last four years, turning a lot of the policy failures of the Biden administration into profits and success for the transnational criminal organizations. And so, they’ll be more of the same.”

      “Donald Trump does not obviously play to the European audience. He’s not trying to win over European hearts and minds,” he said.

      “Mendoza said many Europeans are fearful that Trump will cut off all aid to Ukraine and pull the U.S. out of NATO at a time when the Russian threat is looming large over the continent.”

      1. “Humire said the Biden administration’s policy toward Latin America has resulted in it being “the worst that I’ve seen.”

        “The last four years the region has gone into a very difficult direction,” he said. “Food inflation is really high. Organized crime and violence are really high. And, you know, little by little, they’re losing their democratic practices. There’s a huge democratic backsliding happening in the region.”

        People are calling it the “pink tide” (la marea rosa), as they elect socialists to solve their ills. This of course will plunge LatAm even deeper into poverty, meaning many more caravans will be heading to the border.

  18. War on truth has been a key factor in this divisive US election

    George Brandis’ opinion piece sums up what’s at stake in the US election (“Trump dodged a bullet. Let’s hope the world does and he loses,” November 3). If Trump wins, global politics will be disrupted when he ends support for Ukraine, giving Russia and China a confidence boost. US democracy may never recover and democracies everywhere will look increasingly fragile. His aggressive tariff policy will deliver a big hit to the global economy. Brandis is clear that Trump’s media apologists, who call themselves conservatives, are really just disruptors flying a false flag. How is it possible that Trump could win after US voters saw his attack on democracy on January 6, 2021? The answer can only be that he and his backers have used the war on truth to convince many Americans that the existing powers that be are the real villains. Will the 21st century become the epoch when truth lost the battle? Gary Barnes, Mosman

    https://www.msn.com/en-au/travel/news/war-on-truth-has-been-a-key-factor-in-this-divisive-us-election/ar-AA1tsp0j

    2. “How is it possible that Trump could win after US voters saw his attack on democracy on January 6, 2021?”

      Hey Gary, truth lost the battle that day and every day since when the likes of you and George Steponallofus bring it up along with “The Big Lie”.

  20. In other news, “Starbucks is staying in Seattle as the struggling chain tries to get back to its coffee core.“
    Good, keep your woke crap in Seattle where it belongs.

  21. ‘In October 2023, an Aurora police officer who specialized in environmental security visited Nome Street. The officer wrote in a report that “gangs in the area have moved into the apartments and use threats and coercion to control the apartments.’ He said the gangs had extorted immigrants at Nome Street in a bid to prevent them from talking to police — and that police cars had been rammed by fleeing vehicles’

    This was a really long ‘day before the election’ thing from the post I suppose. This point above shows they knew exactly what was going on and covered it up. That’s over a year now.

    ‘But the Aurora officer also indicated that conditions at the Nome Street property had invited criminal activity’

    This is the other aspect of this so called report. It’s the landlords. They are sleazy slumlords. Yeah, they are. So are the majority of the value add flipper cash out finance degenerate gamblers out there. That doesn’t diminish the crimes done by the city, the sheriff, DHS, FBI and the justice department.

    1. This point above shows they knew exactly what was going on and covered it up.

      What remains unsaid here is that the Aurora Police are afraid of the gangs, who likely outnumber and outgun them.

      Thanks, Dems!

  25. Watch: Pranksters Drop Off Illegals at Rich Liberal Harris Voter’s Home

    by Adan Salazar
    November 4th, 2024 3:41 PM

    A Kamala Harris voter quickly realized the error of her ways after a bus full of illegal aliens showed up at her house, in a viral stunt pulled by pranksters known as the Nelk Boys.

    Visiting a “rich liberal” with a Harris yard sign who professed “we need to be fair” to illegal immigrants, Nelk Boys founder Kyle Forgeard radioed a go-ahead to a person off-site confirming, “Guys, this is great. I think we found a new home for you guys.”

    “What guys?” the woman asks.

    “Who’s that? Is that your bus?” she continues inquiring, as a large bus pulls up in front of her home.

    “I don’t understand what this is all about,” the woman says, as several illegals pile out of the bus and head toward her home.

    “This is all the immigration. They’re gonna move into your house,” one of the pranksters tells her.

    “Oh,” the woman says, before adding, “They are not,” as she tries to go back inside her home.

    “What do you mean?” Forgeard asks her. “You just said you wanted to support everyone, though.”

    “Ok, I don’t…” the woman stammers as the illegals approach, with one of the pranksters assuring her “they’re not violent.”

    The woman ends up closing her door on the illegals and the pranksters, as Forgeard asks if they could at least stay for dinner.

    Nelk Boys
    @nelkboys

    She switched up so quick 😂

    1:13 PM · Nov 4, 2024
    ·
    https://x.com/nelkboys/status/1853500724669284450

    1. by Adan Salazar
      November 4th, 2024 3:41 PM

      The practical joke comes as Harris supporters have complained about being trolled with fake postcards informing them they’ll be receiving illegal immigrant families to shelter and feed.

      Jon Feere 🇺🇸
      @JonFeere
      Kamala voters receive postcards about opening their homes to migrants – and they flip out! They call the cops! Notice how
      @NBC10Boston
      doesn’t even ask if they’d take in a Nicaraguan family, or whether they disagree with Kamala’s open border: https://nbcboston.com/on-air/as-seen-on/shrewsbury-residents-with-lawn-signs-receive-fake-harris-campaign-postcards-in-mail/3535354/

      1:56 PM · Nov 3, 2024
      ·
      https://x.com/JonFeere/status/1853149354585907537

    1. Financial Times
      Berkshire Hathaway Inc
      Warren Buffett slashes Apple stake as he boosts cash to record high
      Berkshire’s stock-selling spree extends for eighth quarter, with $166bn dumped over the period
      The Sage of Omaha has found little to entice him in the US stock market
      Eric Platt in New York
      November 2 2024
      …

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