Shutdown?Tariff legality? Travel disruptions? SNAP disruption? Collapsing sentiment? Political uncertainty?
Or, questions of who’s running the show?
Source: ABC News.
Shutdown?Tariff legality? Travel disruptions? SNAP disruption? Collapsing sentiment? Political uncertainty?
Or, questions of who’s running the show?
Source: ABC News.
Uncertainty spikes as more US citizens realize the Government is a reality TV show, and it’s emcee is demented.
Here’s one source of uncertainty:
https://prospect.org/2025/11/08/why-does-schumer-keep-trying-to-cave-government-shutdown/
Chuck Schumer wants to throw in the towel. I recall seeing polling results a while back indicating that Ocasio-Cortez could primary Schumer. His current term expires in 2028, when he’ll be 78.
Chuck Schumer has now thrown in the towel. All those days of federal workers going without pay, air traffic being compromised, food stamps being cut off, and then Democrats agree to a budget that is everything Republicans wanted. Why bother with a shutdown if you don’t win something?
The public rightly blames Republicans for the hardship of the shutdown. The public doesn’t like Republican budget priorities. Republicans hold slim majorities, so should not be dictating everything that happens. The public routinely says they want bipartisan compromise. So Senate Democrats cave, asking in only a fig-leaf promise of a Senate debate on Obamacare subsidies. Bad policy AND bad politics.
Those Obamacare subsidies amount to only about 1/3 of the tax cuts in the Big Bloated Budget Bill, by the way.
Donald antoinette enjoys steak and scallops at maralago while the rest of America goes hungry. As trump signs off at night, “Good night peasants, enjoyed my chocolate cake. “
I think there is enormous certainty. The republican wing of the democratic party will always cave to the demands of billionaires. The “real” economy is in for a rough ride; but AI hype and systemic fraud will keep markets buoyed until the “unknown” known “black swan” appears in the usual guise: a debt meltdown followed by a collapse in the fraudulent valuations of over-leveraged assets (same as it always is). This is predictable because the entire team running things all made their fortunes through various and sundry schemes/government grift/insider trading and outright financial frauds. The probable new wrinkle is that this go round they will loot the treasury and tank the dollar allowing them to claim the government is “bankrupt” so as to ban all social programs outright. Crypto will replace the dollar as the “reserve” currency and an AI “fraud proof” global payment system will replace the current one. Sounds like snark but probably the “big brain” plan.
Back on November 3rd, baffling raised a point about the largest-ever one-day use of the Fed’s Standing Repo Facility (SRF). The Economic Times of India has taken note of the same fact, amere 5 days after baffling did:
https://m.economictimes.com/news/international/us/why-is-the-federal-reserve-pumping-billions-into-the-market-is-this-just-a-temporary-liquidity-blip-or-the-first-tremor-of-something-far-bigger-markets-fear-a-repeat-of-2008-global-financial-crisis/articleshow/125172942.cms
I don’t mean to beat up too much on ET. The Fed isn’t India’s central bank, after all. However, ET is apparently the second most widely read business newspaper in English, and hasn’t made any progress toward understanding why demand for liquidity was so high two Fridays ago. It’s conventional journalism – no better, no worse.
There’s nothing much new in the article, and the facts are mostly right, with one exception. The ET article claims the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (think of it as the new LIBOR) “has been climbing” to levels not seen in years. By the time that article was published, SOFR had already fallen in response to the Fed’s rate cut. Signs of stress had abated:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1NNqK
What I’d like to know is whether market concerns which the author highlighted have persisted. The article is out of date and misses the big issue – has the SRF proven itself? If the SRF does over and over again what it just did, then quantitative tightening went a bit too far, but the Fed’s fail-safe works. If the SRF could prove inadequate under some likely set of circumstances, the fail-safe ain’t good enough.
Pretty soon, we’re likely to see Fed staff assessments of the event. Popcorn time!
Speaking of Obamacare, Trump posted the following yesterday, I swear to god:
“BREAKING: DOGE halted a yearly payment of $2.5 million to Barack Obama for ‘royalties linked to Obamacare.’ He’s been collecting it since 2010, for a total of $40 million in taxpayer dollars.”
That’s right the government has been paying Obama millions in royalties for the use of his name in “Obamacare” — or so the Leader of the Free World believes, based on a satire article.
Has there ever been anyone this dumb in politics? Or a public so dumb they believe him? (Hey, at least the arithmetic checks out!)