Early Headlines: Tory UK Victory Foreseen,Texas Wind Power, Greek Drop Dead Moment and More

Early Bird Headlines 08 May 2015

Econintersect: Here are some of the headlines we found to help you start your day. For more headlines see our afternoon feature for GEI members, What We Read Today, which has many more headlines and a number of article discussions to keep you abreast of what we have found interesting.

U.S.

• Whistleblower accuses cybersecurity company of extorting clients (CNN Money)  Hat tip to Alun Hill.  In a federal court this week, Richard Wallace, a former investigator at cybersecurity company Tiversa, said the company routinely engaged in fraud — and mafia-style shakedowns.  The company planted fake data and then pressured firms to hire them to clear up the problem.
• Latino activists press Hillary Clinton on major Pacific trade pact (Al Jazeera)  Supporting immigration reform without opposing Trans-Pacific Partnership is misguided, advocacy groups say.
• Why is Texas changing its mind about wind power? (Al Jazeera)  Texas became the country’s biggest wind power producer thanks to generous subsidies; now it’s poised to revoke them.  In addition the state would stop building the transmission lones need to bring the power from West Texas to eastern population centers.  Al Jazeera implies that the oil and gas industry is behind the legislative effort to remove support from wind power because the subsidies forthat industry would remain in place.  According to Mother Jones Texas oil and gas is heavily subsidized by Texas and by the federal government.
• Former Greenspan Fan Paul Krugman Now Calls Greenspan “Worst Fed Chairman Ever” (Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism)  Yves Smith has contributed to GEI.  Yves is not too kind in her comments regarding Prof. Krugman, but sounds like contributing to a downright love-fest when compared to her comments about maestro Greenspan.
• The Worst Ex-Chairman Ever (Paul Krugman, The New York Times)  Prof. K, who has lately started to see the involvement of money and credit in the macroeconomy, really is unmerciful in criticizing former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan who still does not appear to see the connection.  What is it they say?  There’s nothing as insufferable as a reformed drunk?
  

UK

• Election results: Tories confident as Labour falters (BBC News)  Exit polls have indicated that the Conservative Party could win close to an outright majority of Parliament seats with Labor a distant second.  The Labor Party has rejected those polls.  However, whatever chance Labor had to gain more seats than the Tories seems to have evaporated as all Labour seats in Scotland have apparently been won by SNP (Scottish National Party).  The biggest loser will apparently be the Liberal Democrats, projected to lose as many as 37 seats to hold only 10.  However, as far as official results are concerned, the declared seats show the Conservatives and their presumed coalition allies trailing rather badly – but it is still early.  See next article.
• Election 2015 results LIVE: Conservatives on course for victory as SNP annihilates Labour (The Telegraph)  The graphic below showed results at midnight EST (5 am GMT).

• Election 2015 results LIVE: Conservatives on course for victory as SNP annihilates Labour (The Telegraph)  The graphic below showed results at 3 am EST (8 am GMT).

Greece

• Greek bailout talks near ‘drop dead’ moment (Financial Times)  Unless Greece and its international creditors agree to a deal within 7 weeks to close out the country’s €172 billion bailout, and then quickly agree to another rescue, Athens is likely to run out of money and default on its debts. That would push it perilously close to crashing out of the eurozone.
  

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