Senior White House economic advisors warned conservative donors and investors about their pandemic concerns as Donald Trump promised Americans coronavirus would “disappear”, according to reports.
That disconnect, which became apparent as advisers met with Hoover Institution board members on 24 February, would have enabled those investors to act prior to any economic slump caused by the pandemic, the New York Times reported.
Those details were outlined in a memo The Times obtained, which was written by a Hoover Institution board member and hedge fund consultant, William Callanan, amid three days of meetings with White House advisers.
Mr Callanan noted how J. Philipson, a senior economic adviser to the US president, told investors on 24 February that he could not yet estimate the effects of the virus on the American economy.
Mr Trump had, however, declared on Twitter hours earlier that the coronavirus was “very much under control” in the United States, and added that the “Stock market [was] starting to look very good to me!”
To some attendees, the implication was that the coronavirus could prove worse than Mr Philipson and other Trump administration advisers were signaling in public at the time.
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“What struck me,” wrote Mr Callanan, was that almost every official he heard from raised the virus “as a point of concern, totally unprovoked.”
And that included the president, who in tapped conversations with Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward admitted that the coronavirus was more serious than seasonal flu - but did not say the same in public.
On another day, National Economic Council director Larry Kudlow told board members that the virus was “contained in the US, to date, but now we just don't know”.
He had claimed in an appearance on CNBC hours before that the US was “airtight” against the coronavirus.
Mr Callanan’s memo was circulated among investors and Republican donors not long after, enabling them to bet against company stock prices, which they anticipated would fall.
By late afternoon on 26 February, US stock markets had fallen close to 300 points from their high the previous week, reported The Times.
8lackJack8lack on October 15th, 2020 at 14:09 UTC »
“But there’s a reason. There’s a reason. There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason that it will never, ever, ever be fixed. It’s never gonna get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you got. Because the owners of this country don't want that. I'm talking about the real owners now, the real owners, the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the senate, the congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying, lobbying, to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I'll tell you what they don’t want: They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. Thats against their interests. Thats right. They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table to figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago. They don’t want that. You know what they want? They want obedient workers. Obedient workers. People who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork, and just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it, and now they’re coming for your Social Security money. They want your retirement money. They want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street, and you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all from you, sooner or later, 'cause they own this fucking place. It's a big club, and you ain’t in it. You and I are not in the big club. And by the way, it's the same big club they use to beat you over the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe. All day long beating you over the head in their media telling you what to believe, what to think and what to buy. The table is tilted folks. The game is rigged, and nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care. Good honest hard-working people -- white collar, blue collar, it doesn’t matter what color shirt you have on -- good honest hard-working people continue -- these are people of modest means -- continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don’t give a fuck about them. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don't care about you at all -- at all -- at all. And nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care. That's what the owners count on; the fact that Americans will probably remain willfully ignorant of the big red, white and blue dick that's being jammed up their assholes everyday. Because the owners of this country know the truth: it's called the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.”
- George Carlin
williamb100 on October 15th, 2020 at 14:07 UTC »
I can't get over how Trump has an ex Goldman Sachs head by his side and Goldman Sachs released a report saying we'd recover faster with Biden.
NoobDev7 on October 15th, 2020 at 12:44 UTC »
Can’t help but feel that the market switched from autopilot to manual not to erase all gains in the last 100 years. Those numbers are completely out of touch with reality.