Coronavirus just sent the Dow crashing 1,100 points and it could get worse(Source Yahoo Finance)

The disturbing coronavirus driven selloff across global stock markets this week may be the tip of the iceberg for one simple reason.

Stocks have yet to price in a mild — or somewhat bruising — recession in the U.S. as coronavirus infection cases pile up and bring consumer activity and businesses to a standstill. Up until now, equity strategists Yahoo Finance have talked with, say the stock market’s six-day drubbing largely reflects de-leveraging by hedge funds and speculators on momentum names (see Microsoft, Apple, etc.).

That suggests there could be another shoe to drop in stocks soon as  more strategists severely slash S&P 500 earnings growth targets as Goldman Sachs did Thursday; and  investors digest what is likely to be terrible global macroeconomic data in the weeks and months to come.

How Globalization and China’s Economic Crisis Might Jeopardize Our Precarious Medical Supply Chains

(Source globalresearch.ca)

The grave risks and dangers in the process of worldwide out-sourcing and so-called globalization of the past 30 years or so are becoming starkly clear as the ongoing health emergency across China threatens vital world supply chains from China to the rest of the world. While much attention is focused on the risks to smartphone components or auto manufacture via supplies of key parts from China or to the breakdown of oil deliveries in the last weeks, there is a danger that will soon become alarmingly clear in terms of global health care system.

If the forced shutdown of China manufacturing continues for many weeks longer, the world, could begin to experience shortages or lack of vital medicines and medical supplies. The reason is that over the past two decades much of the production of medicines and medical supplies such as surgical masks have been outsourced to China or simply made in China by Chinese companies at far cheaper prices, forcing Western companies out of business.

According to research and US Congressional hearings, something like 80% of present medicines consumed in the United States are produced in China. This includes Chinese companies and foreign drug companies that have outsourced their drug manufacture in joint ventures with Chinese partners. According to Rosemary Gibson of the Hastings Center bioethics research institute, who authored a book in 2018 on the theme, the dependency is more than alarming. Gibson cites medical newsletters giving the estimate that today some 80% of all pharmaceutical active ingredients in the USA are made in China.

Scientists discover Earth has a second (very tiny) moon(Source NBC News) A visiting mini-moon is circling Earth, according to astronomers who discovered the cosmic squatter in our planet’s orbit. The tiny asteroid, dubbed 2020 CD3, was spotted by astronomers in Tucson, Arizona, on Feb. 15.

“BIG NEWS,” Kacper Wierzchos, a researcher with the Catalina Sky Survey at the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Lab, tweeted Tuesday. “Earth has a new temporarily captured object/Possible mini-moon called 2020 CD3. On the night of Feb. 15, my Catalina Sky Survey teammate Teddy Pruyne and I found a 20th magnitude object.” Wierzchos said that the object measures about 6 feet to 11 feet across and that its orbit suggests that it entered Earth’s orbit around three years ago. He added that the discovery is a “big deal” because, out of roughly 1 million known space rocks, this is “just the second asteroid known to orbit Earth (after 2006 RH120, which was also discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey).” The cosmic interloper was officially cataloged by the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center on Tuesday. The center, founded in 1947, collects observational data on asteroids, comets and natural satellites in the solar system.

ANDERSON COOPER WORKED AT CIA IN COLLEGE

(Source blacklistednews.com)

Anderson Cooper sits at the heights of the US corporate media. A host of his own program on CNN and a correspondent for 60 Minutes, he may be one of the most powerful people working in journalism.

On February 24, 60 Minutes produced a report criticizing Bernie Sanders for comments he made in the 1980s tepidly praising social programs run by the revolutionary leftist governments in Cuba and Nicaragua. The 60 Minutes feature was hosted by Anderson Cooper, who pressured Sanders to denounce Fidel Castro and stressed, “There’s a lot of dissidents imprisoned in Cuba.”

The exchange with Sanders set off a firestorm of attacks on the Vermont senator, with campaign rivals and a bipartisan cast of pundits slamming him for his mild defense of Cuba’s gains in literacy. But Cooper and his red-baiting performance remained above scrutiny. The media’s favorite “silver fox” hails from one of the most powerful families in human history. He is the son of oligarch Gloria Vanderbilt, and his great-great-great grandfather was Cornelius Vanderbilt, a prototypical American robber baron who had in fact helped lead a bungling imperial plot to build a canal through Nicaragua during the 1850s. A blue-blooded TV anchor coming from money and privilege is one thing, but a top news personality with a background at the Central Intelligence Agency is quite another.

Pope cancels visit with Rome priests for ‘slight’ illness(Source Associated Press)

Pope Francis is sick and skipped a planned Mass with Rome clergy across town on Thursday, officials said. The Vatican said the 83-year-old pontiff had a “slight indisposition” and would proceed with the rest of his planned work on Thursday. But Francis “preferred to stay near Santa Marta,” the Vatican hotel where he lives. There was no word from the Vatican about the nature of his illness, but the pope was seen coughing and blowing his nose during the Ash Wednesday Mass. It comes amid an outbreak of the coronavirus in Italy that has sickened more than 400 people, almost all of them in the north. Rome had three cases, but all three were cured.

Francis had been scheduled to go to the St. John Lateran basilica across town to meet with Rome clergy and celebrate a penitential Mass at the start of Lent. Francis is bishop of Rome, but delegates the day-to-day running of the archdiocese to a vicar.

The Argentine pope has generally enjoyed good health. He lost part of one lung as a young man because of a respiratory illness, and suffers from sciatica, which makes walking difficult.

Francis has had a busy schedule lately, including his public general audience on Wednesday and the Ash Wednesday service later in the day in a Roman basilica.

San Francisco declares state of emergency over coronavirus. Here’s what that means(Source CNN)

San Francisco’s mayor on Tuesday declared a local emergency to make it easier for the populous city and international travel hub to combat novel coronavirus if it comes — even while stressing that it isn’t there yet. The move will, among other things, help the city get reimbursed by state and federal governments for money it spends on preparedness, Mayor London Breed said at a news conference

“This declaration of emergency is all about preparedness,” Breed said. The announcement follows similar declarations in California’s Santa Clara and San Diego counties. The move came as US health officials warned they expect to eventually see a continual spread of coronavirus in the United States. Breed’s declaration is effective immediately for seven days, though the board of supervisors will vote on its continuation March 3.  These are some ways the emergency declaration will help the city prepare, health officials said at the news conference:  It allows staff to be pulled away from nonessential duties so they can focus on preparedness and prevention. This includes public health nurses, case managers and social workers, who will assess situations in the city.

Clinicians will be on call at all times to answer questions from anyone who calls the city’s customer service number, 311, with clinical questions about coronavirus. “It allows us to look at things like shelters, and other opportunities for us to expand, in the event that that’s necessary, and do a broader assessment of the city’s capacity to respond in the event that there is an outbreak,” city Health Director Dr. Grant Colfax said.

Buttigieg’s brother-in-law: ‘Everything Pete is pushing’ is ‘anti-God’ (Source foxnews.com)

Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg’s brother-in-law, Pastor Rhyan Glezman, slammed the Democratic hopeful for his comments Tuesday night, when the candidate claimed he doesn’t see “any compatibility” between supporting President Trump and the teachings in Scripture after declaring that God “does not belong to a political party.”

“Just everything that Pete is pushing is, it’s anti-God. I’m just gonna be honest with you,” Glezman said. “Nothing lines up with Scripture for him to make cases like to say that you cannot be a Christian and vote for Trump. He’s the one that is openly contradicting God’s word over and over.”

“Do you think that it’s impossible to be a Christian and support Trump?” CNN host Erin Burnett had asked Buttigieg during a town hall. “I’m not going to tell other Christians how to be Christian,” Buttigieg said, “but I will say I cannot find any compatibility between the way this president conducts himself and anything I find in Scripture.” Glezman also reacted to a clip of Buttigieg on “The View” addressing partial-birth abortion, in which co-host Meghan McCain asked the candidate about the topic, saying Democrats — including pro-life Democrats — want to know where his “line is.”

“But my point is that it shouldn’t be up to a government official to draw the line,” Buttigieg said on the segment. “It should be up to the woman who’s confronted.” “I’m just in a state of lament when you hear that we have someone running for commander in chief who can’t make a moral decision on whether to keep a child after it’s already been born or to have it killed,” Glezman told Tucker on Wednesday. “What kind of moral suggestions is he going to be given if he can’t come to an understanding of that? It’s just, it’s alarming.”

Dutch government returns stolen 18th-century ‘precious crown’ to Ethiopia(Source CNN)

The Dutch government returned a stolen ceremonial crown to the Ethiopian government Thursday.

The 18th-century crown, which has great religious significance, went missing from a church in Ethiopia 21 years ago, the Dutch government said in a statement. Sirak Asfaw, a Dutch national of Ethiopian origin who emigrated to the Netherlands in the late 1970s, said in a video recording that the crown “came into his hands” in 1998.

Asfaw, a former refugee, told the AFP in an interview that he found the crown in a suitcase left behind by a guest to his apartment.

However, he kept the priceless object hidden for 21 years. He said he was reluctant to return “looted heritage to the same regime as the one during which it was stolen…That is why I have waited for 21 years and have safeguarded it all those years,” he said in a video posted when news of the crown emerged in October 2019.

Popular ‘inland ocean’ is approaching record water level heights (Source AccuWeather)

Lake Lanier is known as Georgia’s inland ocean and that ocean is rising this winter. Heavy rain has swelled the reservoir to its highest levels in over 55 years. In a Facebook comment from Feb. 13, the Lake Lanier Association wrote that they expect to surpass that 1964 record of 1077.15 feet. As of Feb. 19, the lake was at 1076.64 feet, with more rain in the forecast. AccuWeather Meteorologist Danielle Knittle said the area has received more precipitation in the first two weeks of February than the region normally receives on average for the whole month. “Through the first 17 days of the month, they’ve seen 7.37 inches of total precipitation, including those 4 inches of snow back on the Feb. 8,” Knittle said. “The normal monthly total for February is 5.28 inches. Going back to the start of the year, their normal precipitation through Feb. 17 is 8.24 inches, but this year has seen nearly 15 inches recorded.”

All that excess rain and snowmelt has swelled the massive lake for the second year in a row.

Less than a year ago, similarly dangerous water levels also prompted officials to urge residents to cut power to docks. According to WSBTV.com, most of the 10,000 docks on the lake last year had electric power running to them in order to run boat lifts or charge batteries. When the water rises, those submerged electric connections can become life-threatening.

More than half of all coronavirus cases outside China are from the Diamond Princess, but the cruise ship is already planning to set sail again in April(Source Business Insider) Of the more than 1,000 coronavirus cases outside mainland China, 634 have been diagnosed in Diamond Princess passengers, the World Health Organization said. Two Japanese citizens have died. An infectious-diseases expert said the hygiene conditions on the cruise ship were abysmal, making him “so scared” of contracting COVID-19. Despite being at the center of the coronavirus outbreak, the ship’s operator Princess Cruises plans to return the vessel to service before Japan’s Golden Week in April. It will be “fully sanitized” before setting sail again, but it’s unclear what the process looks like.  The Diamond Princess cruise ship now houses more than half of all coronavirus cases outside mainland China, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday. The cruise ship has been quarantined in Japan’s Yokohama Bay since February 3, and 634 passengers have contracted the illness. Two people from the ship — an 87-year-old Japanese man and an 84-year-old Japanese woman — died on Tuesday, Japanese officials reported. Beijing’s National Health Commission said that there are more than 74,500 coronavirus patients in mainland China, and some 2,118 people are dead. Outside China, 1,076 coronavirus cases have been reported in 26 countries, the WHO tweeted.