Have nothing to do with the [evil] things that people do, things that belong to the darkness. Instead, bring them out to the light... [For] when all things are brought out into the light, then their true nature is clearly revealed...

-Ephesians 5:11-13

New Unemployment Claims Headed for 50-year Lows

Saturday, 22 September 2018 05:32
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Friday, September 21, 2018:  

The jobless claims report from the Department of Labor (DOL) for the week ending September 15 came out on Thursday, the same day that Wall Street learned of even stronger corporate earnings. This one-two punch drove stock averages to new highs, which continued into Friday.

The report from the DOL was cryptic, and disappointing to economists who had forecast higher claims. Said the DOL: “In the week ending September 15 … seasonally adjusted initial claims was 201,000, a decrease of 3,000 from the previous week. This is the lowest level for initial claims since November 15, 1969.”

Even better was its four-week moving average, which smooths out week-to-week fluctuations: “The 4-week moving average was 205,750, a decrease of 2,250 from the previous week … [and] the lowest level for this average since December 6, 1969.”

Still better is the news that

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“Capital Goes Where It’s Welcome and Stays Where It’s well Treated” – Walter Wriston

Saturday, 22 September 2018 05:27
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This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Friday, September 21, 2018:  

The quote most famously made by Walter B. Wriston, the former chairman and CEO of Citicorp and former chairman of Ronald Reagan’s Economic Policy Advisory Board, is the one quoted in the title. He passed away in 2005, long before Trump’s tax reform plan (and its tax holiday for foreign corporate earnings) proved it to be so by beginning to transform the U.S. economy. In the first six months of 2018, nearly half a trillion dollars have been repatriated by American companies holding profits overseas waiting for such a time as this. Taxed at just 15.5 percent instead of 35 percent, companies are now reclaiming their foreign capital and treating it with the respect it deserves, and the results are showing up everywhere.

Apple is already bringing the “vast majority” of its $250 billion in foreign cash

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Nearly Half a Trillion Dollars Already Repatriated; More Coming

Friday, 21 September 2018 05:41
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Thursday, September 20, 2018: 

President Donald Trump said in an interview in July that untaxed corporate earnings held offshore used to be “$2.5 trillion … I guess it’s $5 trillion now. Whatever it is, it’s a lot more. So we have anywhere from $4 [trillion] to 5 or even more trillions sitting offshore.”

Thanks to Trump’s tax reform act and its related tax holiday, that number “sitting offshore” is now a lot less: almost half a trillion dollars less. In the first six months of 2018 alone, American companies have called back $465 billion of those untaxed corporate earnings from abroad.

In an attempt to denigrate Trump’s July statement, Politifact focused on just how much was being held overseas by American companies unwilling to pay the previously exorbitant 35 percent to bring them home. It was trying to show that Trump had once again exaggerated and overstated the numbers. But Manuela Tobias, writing the hit piece for Politifact, admitted that

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Time Is Running Out for NAFTA 2.0 to Include Canada

Thursday, 20 September 2018 05:27
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Wednesday, September 19, 2018: 

As talks begin again today [Wednesday] in Washington between top people from the United States and Canada over revisions to the inaccurately-named North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the pressure is all on Canada. Representative Steve Scalise (R-La.), the House majority whip, has about had it with Canada’s stalling. Negotiations have been taking place for nearly 14 months and essentially have been going nowhere. Said Scalise,

There is a growing frustration with many in Congress regarding Canada’s negotiating tactics. While we would all like to see Canada remain part of this three-country coalition, there is not an unlimited amount of time for it to be part of this new agreement.

Canada’s Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland was adamant: “Any negotiator who goes into a negotiation believing that he or she must get a deal at any price — that is a negotiator who will be forced to pay the maximum price for that deal. No deal is better than a bad deal.”

On the Canadian side, pressure is building on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to repudiate Freeland’s non-negotiable position not only from Doug Ford, the premier of Ontario (the center of Canada’s auto industry), but also his trade minister, Jim Wilson. Said Wilson on Monday:

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Trump Holds the Winning Hand in the Trade War with China

Thursday, 20 September 2018 05:20
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This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Wednesday, September 19, 2018: 

This definition of calling one’s bluff from the Free Dictionary is accurate: to call one’s bluff is “to challenge someone to act on their threat or prove that their claim or boast is true, when one believes they are making a false claim or idle threat (i.e. bluffing).”

Officials running the communist Chinese dictatorship dare not treat President Trump as an Obama by calling his bluff. Trump is holding all the cards, and they know it. And they know he is willing to play them.

On Monday, he announced his decision to impose tariffs on another $200 billion of Chinese imports, explaining why in his statement:

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Trump Puts Tariffs on Another $200B of Chinese Imports; China Retaliates

Tuesday, 18 September 2018 14:27
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Tuesday, September 18, 2018: 

In his announcement applying tariffs to another $200 billion of Chinese imports on Monday, President Trump made clear the reason for the tariffs:

We are taking this action today [because U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer] concluded that China is engaged in numerous unfair policies and practices relating to the United States technology and intellectual property — such as forcing United States companies to transfer technology to Chinese counterparts.

 

These practices plainly constitute a grave threat to the long-term health and prosperity of the United States economy.

The tariffs effective on Monday, September 24 on some 5,000 Chinese-made products will be set at 10 percent and increase to 25 percent starting January 1, 2019 unless China negotiates terms acceptable to the president before then.

At present China is presenting itself as an immovable object. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang, in anticipation of Trump’s announcement, said,

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Repatriation of Foreign Earnings Gaining Momentum

Tuesday, 18 September 2018 05:08
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Monday, September 17, 2018: 

When addressing business executives at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, in August, President Donald Trump said, “We expect to have in excess of $4 trillion [in foreign earnings held overseas by American companies] brought back very shortly. Over $4 [trillion] but close to $5 trillion, will be brought back into our country. This is money that [otherwise] would never, ever be seen again by the workers and the people of our country.”

The Commerce Department estimates that more than $300 billion of those profits stashed abroad were repatriated in just the first quarter of this year alone, surpassing the total repatriated in all of 2016 and 2017. White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said

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Did the Private Citizen with a Concealed Carry Permit Legally Intervene in Last Week’s Shootout in Chicago?

Monday, 17 September 2018 10:02
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This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Monday, September 17, 2018: 

Massad Ayoob wrote the book that put him in the forefront of authors dedicated to teaching others the enormous responsibility that comes with carrying a sidearm for personal protection, In The Gravest Extreme. In it, he wrote:

The man who wears a gun carries with it the power of life and death, and therefore the responsibility to deport himself with greater calm and wisdom than his unarmed counterpart, whose panic or misjudgment in crisis situations will have less serious consequences.

 

The power of the gun is never ignored, no matter how accustomed one becomes to the weight on his hip. A man carrying a gun for the first time is acutely, even uncomfortably, aware of its presence.

 

After a time, he ceases to notice both the weight and the responsibility, not because he has forgotten them, but because they have both been assimilated into his bearing and demeanor.

A shootout in a Chicago suburb Thursday evening began during a “routine” traffic stop (experienced police officers will say that there is no such thing as a “routine” traffic stop) when the suspect, rather than complying with orders to pull over, accelerated up an on-ramp leading onto heavily-trafficked southbound Interstate 55. The officers successfully boxed him in and he sprinted away while firing back at the officers. The suspect hit Cicero police Officer Luis Duarte four times.

His partner took off after the suspect on foot.

That was the moment when a nearby motorist, stuck in traffic, saw the incident develop, and intervened. As the Chicago Sun-Times reported,

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Was CCW License Holder Who Helped Chicago Police Justified in Shooting at Suspect?

Monday, 17 September 2018 09:56
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Monday, September 17, 2018:  

When individuals obtain their concealed carry permit they take on an enormous responsibility. They carry the power to kill and must apply that power exceedingly judiciously.

Last week a concealed-carry permit holder was commended by police for voluntarily intervening in a shoot-out in a Chicago suburb. The incident raises the question as to when an armed private citizen should intervene — and when he should not do so.

The New American explained how the incident unfolded in our initial report on the shoot-out:

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Will Trump Get His Deal with China and Still Allow Them to “Save Face”?

Saturday, 15 September 2018 05:53
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This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Friday, September 14, 2018:  

The Chinese are different. When travelling to China, Greg Rodgers offers this advice: “The concepts of saving face and losing face guide daily life in Asia. Causing someone to “lose face” … is a serious infraction.” He advises travelers:

The abstract concept of face obviously has nothing to do with anatomy, but instead can be described as a combination of social standing, reputation, influence, dignity, and honor. Causing someone to lose face lowers them in the eyes of their peers….

In a communist government, losing face could cause one to lose his life.

So how would Mr. “Art of the Deal” Trump deal with someone who would rather give up his life than accede to his demands?

From a western perspective, the timing couldn’t be better.

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Many of the articles on Light from the Right first appeared on either The New American or the McAlvany Intelligence Advisor.