COMMENTARY FROM jeffmoskin

[jeffmoskin]

The biggest white collar criminal moved from NY to DC.

[thelivyjr]

Spawned in New York for prime time!

Lucky us ...

[thelivyjr]

THE NEW YORK TIMES

"White House Pressed Agency to Repudiate Weather Forecasters Who Contradicted Trump"

Peter Baker, Lisa Friedman and Christopher Flavelle

11 SEPTEMBER 2019

WASHINGTON — The White House was directly involved in pressing a federal scientific agency to repudiate the weather forecasters who contradicted President Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian would probably strike Alabama, according to several people familiar with the events.

Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, told Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, to have the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration publicly disavow the forecasters’ position that Alabama was not at risk.

NOAA, which is part of the Commerce Department, issued an unsigned statement last Friday in response, saying that the Birmingham, Ala., office was wrong to dispute the president’s warning.

The release of the NOAA statement provoked complaints that the Trump administration was improperly intervening in the professional weather forecasting system to justify the president’s mistaken assertion.

The White House had no immediate comment on Wednesday, but the senior administration official said Mr. Mulvaney was interested in having the record corrected because, in his view, the Birmingham forecasters had gone too far and the president was right to suggest there had been forecasts showing possible impact on Alabama.

Mr. Trump was furious at being contradicted by the forecasters in Alabama.

On Sept. 1, the president wrote on Twitter that Alabama “will most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated.”

A few minutes later, the National Weather Service in Birmingham posted on Twitter that “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from Dorian."

"We repeat, no impacts from Hurricane Dorian will be felt across Alabama.”

For nearly a week, Mr. Trump kept insisting he was right, displaying outdated maps, including one that had been apparently altered with a Sharpie pen to make it look like Alabama might be in the path of the storm.

He had his homeland security adviser release a statement backing him up.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ ... P17#page=2

This business with the altered weather map is some real bizarre behavior all the way around by the Trump administration, but then weird and bizarre behavior is what we, the American people have come to expect from Team Trump, and here they have delivered bigly ...

[thelivyjr]

The Federal Reserve should get our interest rates down to ZERO, or less, and we should then start to refinance our debt.

INTEREST COST COULD BE BROUGHT WAY DOWN, while at the same time substantially lengthening the term.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 11, 2019

Trump is obviously quite clueless here, and confused, and he is showing his ignorance, big-time, which is something Trump is quite good at …

The Federal Reserve does not set interest rates on bonds, which is how we finance our federal debt …

The Federal Reserve can't reduce the interest rate on bonds because they don't control that rate; the investors do …

And it is the Treasury Department that sells bonds, not the federal reserve …

And no, the hurricane was not a threat to Alabama …

But don't tell Trump that or it will make him furious …

He is not to be contradicted - on anything …

Including his theory that the earth really is flat, and the moon stays in the sky because it is on the end of a stick someone is holding …

And so ...

[thelivyjr]

MARKETWATCH

"Dear Mr. President, why is it a good thing if a 10-year Treasury note is worth less than a bag of dirt?"

By Greg Robb

Published: Sept 11, 2019 12:48 p.m. ET

President Donald Trump’s demand on Wednesday that the Federal Reserve slash its benchmark interest rate “to zero or even negative” is misguided, economists say, because rates that low would be a sign of weak economic conditions.

“Trump is confused."

"European rates are low because Europe is in trouble,” said Robert Brusca, chief economist at FAO Economics.

Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics, noted that when a 10-year government note has negative interest rates, it is worth less than “a bag of dirt stored in your basement.”

Negative bond yields is a “red flag” that money has lost its value, he said.

Trump is the first U.S. president to say that he would want interest rates below zero.

Interest rates are at zero on government debt in Japan and Europe because those regions are barely growing economically.

Trump also tweeted that the U.S. should “refinance” its nearly $17 trillion outstanding debt.

This is also a puzzle to economists because the U.S. Treasury debt is not callable, like a mortgage, that can be paid off early.

The Treasury debt that pays a high interest rate has to run off in order to be refinanced at lower yields.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/dear- ... 2019-09-11

Instead of taking a real course in economics, Trump instead relied on that little book titled How to get filthy rich in the bond market that used to come in a little wax paper envelope in a box of CrackerJax ...

[jeffmoskin]

Maybe he is looking for cheaper financing for his upcoming hotel in Red Square.

[thelivyjr]

The dude is a confused windbag whose mouth seems to be on automatic pilot while his brain is somewhere in the back taking a nap …

He talks nonsense, because he doesn't know any better, and his followers who are more clueless than Trump cheer him on when he spouts gibberish like that to them, in a rally, or in a TWEET …

How smart that man is, they say …

How come nobody else ever thought of that, borrowing money at negative interest rates …

That means you have to pay back less than you owe!

That is a great deal!

So why isn't everybody doing it?

[thelivyjr]

Trump wants to run the United States government like one of his Trump bidnesses, where you get yourself all leveraged up, and then you work to stiff all your creditors by threatening to make no payments and go bankrupt unless they will give you better terms …

Whether Trump has knees broken to reinforce the message is unknown at this time ...

[jeffmoskin]

Who are the creditors America is planning to stiff?

[thelivyjr]

Everybody who happens to hold bonds …

Trump seems to think he can bring them all into a room and then dictate terms to them on the interest rate he wants to pay them, versus what the bonds they bought are supposed to pay ...