Written by Econintersect
Econintersect: Every day our editors collect the most interesting things they find from around the internet and present a summary “reading list” which will include very brief summaries (and sometimes longer ones) of why each item has gotten our attention. Suggestions from readers for “reading list” items are gratefully reviewed, although sometimes space limits the number included.
This feature is published Monday, Wednesday, and Friday in the late afternoon New York time. Today the ‘What We Read Today’ column missed the cutoff for our FREE daily newsletter, normally the only way it is accessed. So it’s been published in a Special Edition for the convenience of subscribers. As a result, it is today available for all to read.
Please share this article – Go to very top of page, right hand side, for social media buttons.
For early morning review of headlines see “The Early Bird” published Monday through Friday in the early am at GEI News (membership not required for access to “The Early Bird”).
BECOME A GEI MEMBER – IT’s FREE!
Most of this column (“What We Read Today”) is usually available only to GEI members.
To become a GEI Member simply subscribe to our FREE daily newsletter.
Sign up for your FREE subscription:
https://econintersect.com/pages/contributors/contributor.php?post=201711141400.htm
.
Other Scientific, Health, Political, Economics, and Business Items of Note – plus Miscellanea
- New York Fed Adds $82.7 Billion To Financial System in Latest Repo Transaction (The Wall Street Journal) The Fed began offering repo loans last month after a shortage of available cash in the financial system led rates to climb. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York added $82.7 billion to the financial system Friday, using the market for repurchase agreements, or repo, to relieve funding pressure in money markets.Banks asked for $21.15 billion in 6-day loans, all of which was accepted by the Fed, offering collateral in the form of Treasury and mortgage securities. In a second separate operation, banks asked for $61.55 billion in overnight reserves, all of which the Fed accepted, also offering collateral in the form of Treasury and mortgage securities. In the repo market, borrowers seeking cash offer lenders collateral in the form of safe securities – frequently Treasury bonds – in exchange for a short-term loan. The term of these loans can be as short as overnight. For more details on how the repo system work see What Is ‘Repo’? See also The System Is Burning Down.
- The Bee Is Declared The Most Important Living Being On The Planet (Science – and Info) The Earthwatch Institute concluded in the last debate of the Royal Geographical Society of London, that bees are the most important living being on the planet, however, scientists have also made an announcement: Bees have already entered into extinction risk.
Bees around the world have disappeared up to 90% according to recent studies, the reasons are different depending on the region, but among the main reasons are massive deforestation, lack of safe places for nests, lack of flowers, use uncontrolled pesticides, changes in soil, among others.
.
- Astronomers Just Detected 20 New Moons Around Saturn – Why Are We Only Finding Them Now? (Science Alert) With the discovery of 20 more moons orbiting Saturn, the ringed planet has overtaken Jupiter as host to the most moons in the Solar system. Saturn now has 82 known moons, whereas Jupiter has a paltry 79. As technology has improved, we have observed more and more of these tiny, distant worlds – and we can be reasonably confident there are still plenty waiting to be discovered. The Saturn moom Titan, the largest moon in the solar system, has been explored by fly-by missions from NASA – Voyager missions in the 1980s and Cassini more recently which spent 13 years in Saturn’ orbit. Titan is the only moon in the solar system known to have a thick, smoggy atmosphere. Another Saturn moon,frozen Enceladus, may hold an ocean of liquid water beneath its icy crust. The newly disciovered moons are much smaller, averaging an estimated 5km (3 miles) in diameter – hardly bigger than a very modestly sized asteroid.
.
- Press release: The Prize in Economic Sciences 2019 (nobelprize.org) Two economists from MIT (Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo) plus one from Harvard (Michael Kremer) have won the 2019 Nobel Prize in economics. Their research has considerably improved our ability to fight global poverty. In just two decades, their new experiment-based approach has transformed development economics, which is now a flourishing field of research.
This year’s Laureates have introduced a new approach to obtaining reliable answers about the best ways to fight global poverty. In brief, it involves dividing this issue into smaller, more manageable, questions – for example, the most effective interventions for improving educational outcomes or child health. They have shown that these smaller, more precise, questions are often best answered via carefully designed experiments among the people who are most affected.
.
.
Check if you want to edit or delete this post:
Articles about events, conflicts and disease around the world
U.S.
- 8 Republican Senators to watch on impeachment (Vox) Congress is back – meaning Senate Republicans are going to have to start answering pointed questions about where they stand on impeachment. While it’s pretty unlikely enough Republican Senators will actually vote to convict President Donald Trump if articles of impeachment are brought against him, members who represent swing states, such as Susan Collins, might feel pressure to defect due to pushback from their constituents. Others, like Mitt Romney, have vocalized opposition to the president in the past and are among the most likely to do so again. This article names 6 other senators who might be swayed.
- Warren ups Facebook fight with ad challenge (Seeking Alpha) Elizabeth Warren’s presidential has challenged Facebook’s (NASDAQ:FB) policy that exempts politicians’ ads from fact-checking, by running ads containing the false claim that Mark Zuckerberg endorsed President Trump’s re-election bid.
Germany
- Germany – National parliament voting intention (Politico) The center-right CDU party of Angela Merkel and the center-left SPD party have lost ground over the past 2 years, while the left (Greens) and right (AfD) have made significant gains.
.
Turkey
- Trump to impose sanctions on Turkey for military offensive in Syria (The Hill) President Trump on Monday said he would soon implement sanctions on Turkey following bipartisan backlash over his decision to greenlight the country’s incursion into northern Syria.
The president said in a statement that the U.S. will target government officials in Ankara and “any persons contributing to Turkey’s destabilizing actions in northeast Syria.” The sanctions include an increase on steel tariffs from 25 percent to 50 percent and a halt in trade negotiations with Ankara.
.
Syria
- Trump: Let Assad, Russia or China protect the Kurds (The Hill) President Trump on Monday said other countries – including China or Russia – should be responsible for protecting the U.S.-allied Kurds in northern Syria amid a groundswell of bipartisan criticism over his decision to pull American forces out of the region.
.
- Trump says the 1,000 American troops leaving Syria will remain in the region to help prevent revival of Islamic State (Associated Press) President Donald Trump says the roughly 1,000 U.S. troops he has ordered to leave Syria will remain in the Middle East to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State threat. In a written statement Monday announcing his authorization of economic sanctions on Turkey, Trump made clear that the withdrawing troops will leave Syria entirely. Trump confirmed that the small number of U.S. troops at a base in southern Syria will remain there. (Econintersect: This follows a week when the president said that it was time to bring the troops home.)
.
Nepal
- Nepal pushes to end dependency on India with China rail, tunnel deals (Reuters) Chinese President Xi Jinping wound up two days of meetings in Nepal on Sunday with separate deals for a rail link to Tibet and a tunnel, an official said, as the Himalayan nation seeks to end an Indian dominance over its trade routes by increasing connectivity with Beijing.
.
Ethiopia
- Ethiopia ‘Breaks World Record’ by Planting 350 Million Trees in 12 Hours (Science – and Info) Around 350 million trees have been planted in a single day in Ethiopia, according to officials, in what could possibly be a new world record. The tree-planting campaign, which is a part of a national initiative meant to grow 4 billion trees throughout the country this summer, aims to prevent further deforestation and climate change in a country that is prone to drought. Every citizen has been encouraged to plant at least 40 seedlings, with public offices even facing days off so that civil servants can take part.
Argentina
- How fracking is taking its toll on Argentina’s indigenous people (The Guardian) An oil fire burned for more than three weeks next to a freshwater lake in Vaca Muerta, Argentina, one of the world’s largest deposits of shale oil and gas and home to the indigenous Mapuche people. In collaboration with Forensic Architecture, this video looks at the local Mapuche community’s claim that the oil and gas industry has irreversibly damaged their ancestral homeland, and with it their traditional ways of life.
.
