November 21 2024

FLASH…Matt Gaetz out, Pam Bondi in…ICC issues arrest warrant for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
1. WWIII watch: In escalation, Russia Uses New Hypersonic Missile on Ukraine: VIDEO
2. Elon Musk’s Colossus Supercomputer Alarms AI Rivals with Record-Breaking Size and Speed
3. U.S. Credit Card Debt Hits $1.2 Trillion Amid Broader Household Debt Surge
4. US economy updates
5. Trump Transition Diary
November 21, 1877: Thomas Edison invents the phonograph, a way to record and play back sound

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FLASH…Matt Gaetz withdraws bid to be attorney general in Trump administration…Trump nominates Pam Bondi in his place…International Criminal Court issues arrest warrant for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

1. WWIII watch: In escalation, Russia Uses New Hypersonic Missile on Ukraine: VIDEO

Russia… launched a new intermediate-range ballistic missile at Ukraine in response to Ukraine’s recent use of American and British weapons to strike deeper into Russia. Though the missile carried only conventional warheads, using it signaled that Russia could strike with nuclear weapons if it chooses. Sounding by turns boastful and threatening, Mr. Putin called Thursday’s missile strike a successful “test” of a new intermediate-range ballistic missile called the Oreshnik. And he made clear that the attack on Ukraine was in response to a recent decision by the Biden Administration to grant Ukraine permission to use American-made ATACMS ballistic missiles to hit targets inside Russia. Ukraine has no radars capable of detecting such missiles in flight through the upper atmosphere, nor does it have air defense systems capable of shooting them down…Although other Russian missiles that have been launched into Ukraine can also carry nuclear weapons — like the Iskander and the Kh-101 — what makes the intermediate-range missile alarming, in addition to its range, is its ability to fire multiple nuclear warheads when it re-enters the earth’s atmosphere…That makes it difficult, if not nearly impossible, to intercept them. The missiles are also large and can fly far, high and fast, reaching hypersonic speed.  

Video link

My take: America’s hypersonic Achille’s Heel

Article Source: NYT

2. Elon Musk’s Colossus Supercomputer Alarms AI Rivals with Record-Breaking Size and Speed

Two things about Elon Musk’s new supercomputer have jolted competitors: its size and the speed with which xAI built it. The supercomputer, fittingly known as Colossus, consists of 100,000 graphics processing units, the chips best suited to training and running AI software. That is several times bigger than similar supercomputers built in the past by Meta and other tech giants. Stringing together so many GPUs into a single supercomputer isn’t as simple as it sounds because of how much power the servers consume and bottlenecks in the networking equipment used to connect the chips to each other. And completing the project as quickly as xAI did is unheard of. Musk and Nvidia, the AI chip powerhouse that supplied the GPUs for Colossus, said the data center and supercomputer were built in just 122 days. On a recent podcast, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said a GPU cluster of that size would normally take three years to plan and design and an additional year to get working. “No question that nobody slept,” Huang said of the Colossus project on a recent podcast.

Article Source: The Information

3. U.S. Credit Card Debt Hits $1.2 Trillion Amid Broader Household Debt Surge

Americans’ outstanding balances swelled to $1.17 trillion in the third quarter, up by $24 billion from the previous three-month period, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s Center for Microeconomic Data. That’s an 8.1 percent jump year over year, a mere 15 months after the nation’s collective credit card balance crossed the $1 trillion threshold for the first time. Meanwhile, household debt — mortgages, auto and student loans, and credit card debt — increased by $147 billion to $17.94 trillion.

Article Source: WaPo

4. US economy updates

A. Cable TV Decline: Comcast to Spin Off MSNBC and CNBC  

Comcast said Wednesday that it would spin off its cable networks, including MSNBC and CNBC, in a bid to unshackle its movie studio and theme parks from the waning fortunes of traditional television. NBCUniversal, Comcast’s media division, is set to cleave off a bundle of cable channels that generate roughly $7 billion in revenue annually, including USA, Oxygen, E!, Syfy and Golf Channel, into a new public company.  

B. Target share drop 21% on poor sales  

Target rattled Wall Street on Wednesday with a downbeat earnings report showing a sales decline, lower profit and an unwelcome buildup of unsold inventory. The company also cut its forecast for the full year, a bad omen ahead of the critical holiday shopping season. Target’s stock plunged more than 21 percent for the day, a loss of nearly $12 billion in market value and its biggest slide in two and a half years. Target’s results stand in sharp contrast to its rival Walmart, which reported stronger-than-expected earnings on Tuesday and upgraded its full-year forecast. Analysts have warned that strength at Walmart, considered a bellwether of the state of the U.S. consumer because of its size and the wide range of products it sells, could not necessarily be taken as a sign of things to come for the retail industry in general. Walmart’s low prices and investments in delivery and online sales have helped it attract shoppers across the income spectrum.

Article Source: NYT

5. Trump Transition Diary

Matt Gaetz withdraws bid to be attorney general in Trump administration, Trump nominates Pam Bondi in his place  

A. Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy: Federal workers should have 5-day, in-office work week  

Mr. Trump can implement any number of “rules governing the competitive service” that would curtail administrative overgrowth, from large-scale firings to relocation of federal agencies out of the Washington area. Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome: If federal employees don’t want to show up, American taxpayers shouldn’t pay them for the Covid-era privilege of staying home.  

B. Ray Dalio: “Donald Trump will reform government and the country like a corporate raider engaging in a hostile takeover of an inefficient company” 

This is my picture of what a second Trump Administration will look like. It is meant to be as accurate as possible without any assessments of good or bad. The picture that I see is one of 1) a giant renovation of government and the domestic order aimed at making it run more efficiently, which will include an internal political war to convert that vision into reality, and 2) an “America first” foreign policy and preparation for external war with China, which is perceived to be America’s greatest threat. The most recent analogous period is the 1930s, when such an approach emerged in several countries.

Article Source: WSJ, Time

November 21, 1877: Thomas Edison invents the phonograph, a way to record and play back sound

Sources

2. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/21/world/europe/russia-ballistic-missile-ukraine-war.html

3. https://www.theinformation.com/articles/how-elon-musks-supercomputer-freaked-out-ai-rivals

4. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/15/credit-card-debt-new-record-trillion/

5. A https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/20/business/comcast-msnbc-cnbc-spinoff.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
B https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/20/business/target-earnings-holiday-shopping.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

6. A https://www.wsj.com/opinion/musk-and-ramaswamy-the-doge-plan-to-reform-government-supreme-court-guidance-end-executive-power-grab-fa51c020?st=RY6pbK&reflink=article_copyURL_share
B https://time.com/7177760/trump-administration-changing-world-order/