You Think the Stock Market Has Hit Bottom? Think Again

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[The recent jump in stock prices] looks like a bear market rally, similar to that in 1929-1930, with an additional 30% to 40% drop in stocks to come as the deep global recession stretches into 2021. In contrast, many look for a V-shaped economic rebound with a sharp recovery starting in the second half of 2020. A Bloomberg survey of economists foresees the economy contracting 3.7% this year before expanding 3.8% in 2021, far above the 2.3% growth rate in the previous expansion.

But bear markets that accompany recessions last about 11 months, far longer than the recent slump. According to Bank of America analysts, the U.S. stock market has never reached its bottom in less than six months after falling more than 30% in the face of a recession. . .

This pandemic is likely to be the most disruptive financial and social event since World War II with equally long-lasting consequences. Many will no doubt restrain spending in future years to rebuild savings, especially since the crisis caught them at a time of high debts and short financial reserves. A Fed study found that 40% don’t have enough cash on hand to cover an unexpected $400 expense. Also, the $600 extra unemployment checks on top of state unemployment benefits may induce some never to return to work, especially since those payments will probably be continued into 2021. The labor participation rate for working-age men has been falling steadily since World War II and from the late 1990s for women. (Read more from “You Think the Stock Market Has Hit Bottom? Think Again” HERE)

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Donald Trump Challenges China for Allowing Infected Residents to Travel the World; Trump Claims He Has Seen Evidence Linking Coronavirus to Wuhan Lab

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By Breitbart. President Donald Trump spoke at length about China on Thursday, openly criticizing the ruling Communist Party for their handling of the coronavirus.

“I don’t understand how traffic, how people weren’t allowed into the rest of China but they were allowed into the rest of the world,” Trump said, recalling how the Chinese government blocked residents from the infected city of Wuhan from traveling to other parts of China.

The president spoke to reporters after a White House event promoting America’s seniors.

At times, Trump attempted to be diplomatic with China but frequently returned to criticism of their party leaders.

“It’s a terrible thing that happened, whether they made a mistake or whether it started off as a mistake and then they made another one, or did somebody do something on purpose?” Trump speculated. (Read more from “Donald Trump Challenges China for Allowing Infected Residents to Travel the World” HERE)

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Trump Claims He Has Seen Evidence Linking Coronavirus to Wuhan Lab

By New York Post. President Trump on Thursday claimed he’d seen evidence linking the coronavirus to a lab in the Chinese city of Wuhan — but didn’t offer up any details.

“Yes, I have,” Trump told White House reporters when asked whether he’s seen proof that would suggest the virus originated in the lab.

When pressed, on what gave him that confidence, he said: “I can’t tell you that. I am not allowed to tell you that.”

Earlier on Thursday, the US intelligence community said it agreed with the scientific consensus that the novel coronavirus was not “manmade or genetically modified.” (Read more from “Trump Claims He Has Seen Evidence Linking Coronavirus to Wuhan Lab” HERE)

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Fake News: Trump Did NOT Order the Army to Conduct the West Point Graduation

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President Trump did not ask or order the Army to conduct the West Point graduation ceremony that is taking place in June, the Army secretary’s spokesperson said in an email to Breitbart News.

“The President did not order the Army to conduct the West Point Graduation,” said Army Lt. Col. Audricia Harris.

On whether Trump or the White House “asked” — versus ordered — the Army to proceed with the ceremony, she responded, “No.”

A West Point spokesman also told Breitbart News that West Point leadership was the one that came up with the June 13 date.

Despite the president not asking or ordering the ceremony to go forward on June 13, he has been slammed by Democrat lawmakers, leftist pundits, and activists for bringing 1,000 West Point cadets back to the campus and risking exposure to coronavirus. (Read more from “Fake News: Trump Did NOT Order the Army to Conduct the West Point Graduation” HERE)

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Five Major U.S. Airlines to Require All Passengers to Wear Masks

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Five of America’s largest airlines announced this week that they will require all passengers to wear masks during travel, as pressure mounts from unions and Senate Democrats for the federal government to issue a mandate requiring that facial coverings be worn by everyone on any U.S. flight. . .

As many states start to reopen for business and travel following weeks of coronavirus lockdowns, carriers are implementing social distancing and safety measures as Americans begin returning to the skies.

ABC News reported that on Monday, JetBlue became the first major airline in the U.S. to announce all its passengers “must wear a covering over their nose and mouth throughout their journey…including during check-in, boarding, while in flight and deplaning.”

On Thursday, Delta, American, United, and Frontier airlines all joined JetBlue in implementing separate policies requiring passengers to wear masks. According to Politico, “so far, Dallas-based Southwest Airlines is the lone holdout among the nation’s biggest airlines.”

(Read more from “Five Major U.S. Airlines to Require All Passengers to Wear Masks” HERE)

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Experts Surprised to Find No Evidence of COVID-19 Spike From State’s In-Person Voting

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Among the many stories peddled by Democrats and their allies in the media about how Republicans supposedly want people to die from the coronavirus, perhaps none have been more prominent than the in-person election held April 7 in Wisconsin. Experts confidently predicted that the election would lead to a spike in coronavirus-related deaths.

Democratic strategist James Carville actually said that “Republicans will literally kill people to stay in power,” and he was not alone. The internet was virtually flooded with hot-take think pieces from liberals confidently predicting that Republicans would be held accountable for killing people by requiring them to show up and vote. . .

There’s one major problem with that narrative: The in-person voting does not appear to have killed anyone. The state of Wisconsin could identify only about two dozen in-person voters who were infected with coronavirus, and it was impossible to prove that even those people got the virus from voting in person, as opposed to any other method.

“With the data we have, we can’t prove an association,” said the head of the state’s Department of Health Services, according to National Review. . .

Oguzhan Alagoz, an infectious disease modeling expert at the University of Wisconsin, told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, “I don’t think that the in-person election led to a major effect, to my surprise. I expected it.” (Read more from “Experts Surprised to Find No Evidence of COVID-19 Spike From State’s In-Person Voting” HERE)

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Trump Denies COVID-19 Funds to Planned Parenthood

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The Trump administration has acted to ensure that no funds from the new Paycheck Protection Program, set up to assist small businesses battered by COVID-19, will go to Planned Parenthood.

“President Trump is committed to ensuring Paycheck Protection Program money is used for saving jobs at small businesses, not getting the government into the business of funding abortion,” a senior administration official told The Daily Signal.

“While not all Americans share President Trump’s pro-life beliefs, there is broad bipartisan support for the idea that American taxpayers should not have to fund abortion,” the official said Wednesday night.

The Paycheck Protection Program, designed to shore up small businesses that had to close or otherwise were affected by the coronavirus pandemic, allows businesses with fewer than 500 employees to be forgiven for the principal of a government loan if they don’t lay off their employees. The employers still have to pay the interest on the loans, overseen by the Small Business Administration.

The program’s initial $350 billion fund, established in legislation passed March 30 by the House, was depleted April 16. The program received $320 billion in new funding in a bill passed Thursday by the House and signed into law Friday by Trump. (For more from the author of “Trump Denies COVID-19 Funds to Planned Parenthood” please click HERE)

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Bombshell Notes Unsealed From Interview of Flynn Reveal Motive of FBI Agents; FBI Discussed Interviewing Michael Flynn ‘to Get Him to Lie’ and ‘Get Him Fired’

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By The Blaze. A trove of handwritten notes from FBI agents interviewing Mike Flynn revealed what may be evidence that they unfairly targeted the former official found guilty of lying in the investigation into Russian election interference.

The notes are from the January 24, 2017 interview of Flynn, and were released on Wednesday.

“What is our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?” one of the notes read.

Critics say this proves that they were setting a perjury trap for Flynn. (Read more from “Bombshell Notes Unsealed From Interview of Flynn Reveal Motive of FBI Agents” HERE)

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Michael Flynn’s defense claims FBI notes show agents tried to entrap the former national security adviser

By The Washington Post. New documents turned over by the Justice Department show FBI officials debated whether and when to warn Michael T. Flynn that he could face criminal charges as they prepared for a pivotal January 2017 interview in which the former national security adviser later admitted to lying about his Russia contacts.

The documents show law enforcement seeming to contemplate in advance that Flynn would lie to them — with an unidentified person even musing in handwritten notes whether their purpose was to induce a lie, before ultimately concluding they should “protect our institution by not playing games.” . . .

The new documents were turned over to Flynn’s defense April 24 and filed publicly Thursday after Attorney General William P. Barr in January ordered a review of how the former three-star Army general’s case was handled by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation. (Read more from “Michael Flynn’s Defense Claims FBI Notes Show Agents Tried to Entrap the Former National Security Adviser” HERE)

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FBI Discussed Interviewing Michael Flynn ‘to Get Him to Lie’ and ‘Get Him Fired,’ Handwritten Notes Show

By Fox News. Explosive new internal FBI documents unsealed Wednesday show that top bureau officials discussed their motivations for interviewing then-national security adviser Michael Flynn in the White House in January 2017 — and openly questioned if their “goal” was “to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired.”

The handwritten notes — written by the FBI’s former head of counterintelligence Bill Priestap after a meeting with then-FBI Director James Comey and then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, Fox News is told — further suggested that agents planned in the alternative to get Flynn “to admit to breaking the Logan Act.”

The Logan Act is an obscure statute that has never been used in a criminal prosecution; enacted in 1799 in an era before telephones, it was intended to prevent individuals from falsely claiming to represent the United States government abroad. . .

The memo appears to weigh the pros and cons of pursuing those different paths. “I don’t see how getting someone to admit their wrongdoing is going easy on him,” one note reads. Flynn did not ultimately admit to wrongdoing in the interview.

The document indicates that the agents at least discussed the merits of a by-the-book approach: “If we’re seen as playing games, WH [White House] will be furious.” (Read more from “FBI Discussed Interviewing Michael Flynn ‘to Get Him to Lie’ and ‘Get Him Fired,’ Handwritten Notes Show” HERE)

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Tesla’s Elon Musk Rails Against Government Coronavirus Mandates

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Elon Musk summed up his feeling and “outrage” about the government-mandated U.S. coronavirus closings and restrictions every American is dealing with as “fascist” during a cuss-filled rant on the company’s earnings call Wednesday evening.

“The extent of shelter in place or frankly what I would call it forcibly imprisoning people in their homes is against all their constitutional rights…and erasing peoples freedoms in ways that are horrible and wrong and not why people came to America or built this country, what the f–k,” Musk lamented before excusing himself for the curse. “It will cause great harm not just to Tesla but to many companies and while Tesla will weather the storm, there are many small companies that will not” he warned. “Everything that people worked for their whole life is being destroyed in real-time.”

An order in the six-county San Francisco Bay Area, where the carmaker conducts the bulk of its production, forced Tesla to close that plant starting March 23 to help prevent the virus’s spread, and it was extended until the end of May. . .

That prompted Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn to fire off her own rebuttal bashing the billionaire.

(Read more from “Tesla’s Elon Musk Rails Against Government Coronavirus Mandates” HERE)

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Rep. Unveils Bill to Deport All Illegal Aliens During Pandemic

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Rep. Matt Gaetz unveiled legislation that would force the government to deport all illegal immigrants when a national emergency because of a communicable disease is declared.

“Democrats are taking advantage of a national pandemic by working to advance their radical agenda at the expense of Americans’ safety and well-being,” the Florida Republican tweeted on Wednesday. “The PANDEMIC Act puts Americans first by requiring that all illegal aliens be deported during a pandemic.”

Democrats are taking advantage of a national pandemic by working to advance their radical agenda at the expense of Americans’ safety and well-being.

The Protect American Nationals During Emergencies by Mitigating the Immigration Crisis Act was created in response to a bill put forward by Democrats that would release all detained illegal immigrants that are not deemed a public safety risk. (Read more from “Rep. Unveils Bill to Deport All Illegal Aliens During Pandemic” HERE)

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U.S. Doctors Claim That Trump’s Controversial Hydroxychloroquine Drug Does Help 91% of Coronavirus Patients

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By Daily Mail. The malaria drug hydroxychloroquine has improved the survival and recovery odds for about 90 percent of patients treated with the controversial medication, a physicians group claims.

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) presented data on 2,333 patients treated with hydroxychloroquine – including two supervised by Dr Oz – across the globe that shows 91.6 percent of those who got the drug fared better after treatment.

In a letter to Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, the group urged that doctors should not wait for results of gold standard tests of the drug to start using it in coronavirus patients and should instead base their use of it on reasonable interpretations of limited available data.

AAPS’s endorsement of the drug comes after a Veteran Affairs study of hydroxychloroquine found that those who took the drug were more likely to die, casting doubt over the potential treatment that President Trump has hailed a ‘game changer.’

The group of doctors dismissed those preliminary results, claiming that the 52 people who died were very sick, meaning their outcomes are ‘not indicative’ of hydroxychloroquine’s effects and that the drug would work better if used in patients with less critical illness. (Read more from “U.S. Doctors Claim That Trump’s Controversial Hydroxychloroquine Drug Does Help 91% of Coronavirus Patients” HERE)

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Michigan Doctor Charged With Fraud After Allegedly Touting Vitamin C Infusions as Coronavirus Treatment

By Fox News. A Michigan doctor has been charged with fraud after allegedly submitting false claims to Medicare for vitamin C infusions that he touted as coronavirus treatment and prevention, prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Dr. Charles Mok, 56, is charged with health care fraud and conspiracy to commit health care fraud, according to a 47-page complaint.

The complaint says that Mok operated Allure Medical Spa primarily out of Shelby Township. Allure operates 26 outpatients in eight different states, with a least six clinics in Michigan.

According to the complaint, Mok defrauded Medicare before and during the coronavirus pandemic by submitting claims for injections that were either never rendered or unnecessary. (Read more from “Michigan Doctor Charged With Fraud After Allegedly Touting Vitamin C Infusions as Coronavirus Treatment” HERE)

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