Written by Econintersect
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.
Unbeaten Nyquist wins Kentucky Derby (Reuters) Favorite Nyquist ran a perfect race to extend his unbeaten record winning the 142nd Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs in Louisville on Saturday, sparking talk of a second consecutive Triple Crown champion. Nyquist, who had won a record $3.3 million heading into the Derby, extended his unbeaten record to 8-0 with a smooth trip under jockey Mario Gutierrez. Nyquist pulled away from Gun Runner down the stretch and then held off a closing charge by Exaggerator to win the first leg of U.S. thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown series for 3-year-olds.
How Trump could beat Clinton (The Hill) Trump needs to shake up the electoral map by winning states that Republicans have lost for decades. He intends to do this chiefly by winning Pennsylvania and Michigan, two states Trump won in the GOP primary season. He also needs to win the swing states of Ohio and Florida. If those four states go to Trump, Clinton could well be on the way to defeat.
How to use a urinal like a lady: a trans woman’s rebel tour of North Carolina (The Guardian) Female actress Shakina Nayfack has birth certificate that says she is a male. So she is in North Carolina, following that state’s new law which requires that she use the Men’s Rooms. She is turning visits to Men’s Rooms into performance art and posting on Facebook. See example below.
Loophole in U.S. shell company rule could spur misconduct: groups (Reuters) A new U.S. rule requiring the financial industry to identify owners of companies opening accounts includes a loophole that could spur, instead of curb, shell company abuse, transparency and anti-corruption advocates said on Friday. The Customer Due Diligence (CDD) rule, unveiled by the Obama administration on Thursday, is meant to prevent criminals from using shell companies to hide ownership, launder money and commit other financial crimes. But the rule leaves room for financial institutions to satisfy a requirement that they identify a shell company’s “beneficial” or true owner by listing a senior manager as such a person, said Elise Bean, former staff director and chief counsel of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, in a call with reporters.
EU
Migration crisis: Italians protest over Austria border fence plan (The Guardian) Turmoil in the EU continues. A demonstration against a plan to restrict access through the Brenner Pass between Italy and Austria has turned violent, with Italian police firing teargas at hundreds of protesters throwing stones and firecrackers. The clashes coincided with scuffles in Berlin between far-right marchers calling on the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, to resign over immigration and a much larger group of leftwing counter-demonstrators. Austria has said it plans to erect a fence at the Alpine crossing it shares with Italy to “channel” people. Part of Europe’s borderless Schengen zone, Brenner is one of the routes that migrants use as they head towards wealthy northern Europe.
UK
Sadiq Khan accuses PM of taking tactics ‘from Trump playbook’ (The Guardian) Sadiq Khan, the new Labour mayor of London, has launched an extraordinary attack on David Cameron and his defeated opponent, Zac Goldsmith, accusing them of trying to turn different ethnic communities against each other to stop him winning in the capital. Writing in the Observer after becoming the most powerful Muslim politician in Europe, Khan says the prime minister and Goldsmith deployed tactics “straight out of the Donald Trump playbook” – a reference to the anti-Muslim campaign of the Republican hopeful in the US.
Turkey
Turkey’s Erdogan pours cold water on hopes of progress on EU deal (Reuters) Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday poured more cold water on hopes for progress with Europe on a deal to curb migration, suggesting Ankara would not change its anti-terrorism laws just to meet European Union requirements. The EU has asked member states to grant visa-free travel to Turks in return for Ankara stopping migrants from reaching Europe, but said Turkey still had to change some legislation, including bringing its terrorism laws in line with EU standards. The migrant deal between Brussels and Ankara was negotiated by Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who this week announced his decision to step down as premier, capping weeks of public tension with Erdogan.
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia’s oil ‘maestro’ exits as young prince flexes his muscles (CNBC) The end of Ali al-Naimi’s more than two-decade tenure as Saudi Arabia’s oil minister signals a new era for crude markets, analysts said on Saturday, and appeared to be a reaffirmation of Saudi policy to let oil set its own pricing.
India
Kathmandu accuses Delhi of backing plot to topple government (The Hindu) A day after Nepal cancelled the visit of its President to India and recalled its ambassador, sources told The Hindu that the sudden chill in bilateral ties follows a week long battle of nerves during which Kathmandu accused New Delhi of backing a plot to topple the government in the Himalayan country.
North Korea
North Korea leader Kim says will not use nuclear arms unless threatened: KCNA (Reuters) North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said his country will not use nuclear weapons unless its sovereignty is infringed on by others with nuclear arms and it is willing to normalize ties with states that had been hostile towards it, state media reported on Sunday. The North will faithfully fulfill its obligation for nuclear non-proliferation and strive for ending nuclear buildup in the world, Kim said in a report to a congress of its ruling Workers’ Party (WPK) which opened on Friday, KCNA news agency said.
Australia
The 2016 election race formally starts as Malcolm Turnbull goes to thegovernor-general (The Conversation) The 2016 election is formally underway, with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull going to Government House to obtain a double-dissolution poll on July 2. The election, flagged in March when Turnbull said he would take both houses to the people if the Senate refused to pass the government’s industrial relations legislation, will be preceded by an eight-week campaign. This will be the longest campaign since 1984. The double-dissolution election – the first since 1987 – is legally based on the Senate rejecting twice or more bills to re-establish the Australian Building and Construction Commission and to toughen trade union governance. See also next article.
Election explainer: what does it mean that we’re having a double-dissolutionelection? (The Conversation) Malcolm Turnbull has made the journey to Government House at Yarralumla to ask the governor-general to dissolve both houses of parliament and hold a double-dissolution election. Both the Senate and House of Representatives will be dissolved. The writs will be issued, causing the election to be held. Section 5 of the Constitution requires the governor-general to issue the writ for the House of Representatives election. Section 12 of the Constitution requires the state governors to issue the writs for the election of the senators in each state. While the writs will formally set out the timeline for the election process, we already know the key detail: a double-dissolution election, to be held on July 2. Double-dissolution elections do not come along very often. This election will be only the seventh double-dissolution election since federation. The last double-dissolution election was held in 1987, when the Hawke government was returned to power. Double-dissolution elections do not always go the way of the incumbent government. In three of the six previous double-dissolution elections – in 1914, 1975 and 1983 – the government was defeated.
In an ordinary election, all seats in the House of Representatives – but only half the seats in the Senate – are up for grabs.
Senators are elected for a six-year term. Half are up for re-election every three years.
But, in a double-dissolution election, there is a full, rather than the usual half-Senate, election. All 76 Senate seats are vacated.
After a double-dissolution election, the rotation for Senate elections needs to be re-established. This means that half the senators will serve a “long term” and half will serve a “short term”. Only the “short-term” senators will be up for re-election at the next half-Senate election.
The process for determining which senators serve a “short term” is complicated.
Canada
Oil’s Cold Shoulder For Canada (Bloomberg) Roughly 1 million barrels a day of supply are estimated to be offline due to the fires around Fort McMurray in Alberta. And yet this looks set to be the first week in more than a month where crude oil actually closes lower than the previous Friday. The market hasn’t been wholly unperturbed. The discount at which Western Canada Select crude oil is priced below benchmark West Texas Intermediate has narrowed. Still, it doesn’t look like the extreme move you might expect with more than a fifth of Canada’s production capacity suddenly out of commission.