The John Batchelor Show

Tuesday 14 April 2020

Air Date: 
April 14, 2020

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
 
Hour One
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 1, Block A:  Elizabeth Peek, TheHill and Fox News; in re:   We’re seeing progress in the battle against the virus in New York, and fewer admitted into hospitals. On the heels of that, a lot of European countries are starting open up, and Mnuchin and Kudlow are speaking of mid-May. Jamie Dimon thinks June, July and August. The worst as that weeks ago investor had no way to quantify the times or situations.   We also know that the Fed ad Congress have put in place enormous amounts of stimulus. Other countries around the world are following suit.  Almost 200 million Americans have already received a check. JPMorgan announced a loss of 69% in Q1. Wells: 90%.  When we went into this, the banks were extremely well capitalized (after having yowled absurdly when they were originally required to do so.)  Europeans, not; which is why they're struggling more. Essential workers, having govt employers; knowledge workers, and then all the rest of us.  All kinds of businesses should be able to start up again, with some regulations in place. 
       There are dozens of therapeutic trials under way; if any can keep you from dying, then people will be much more wiling to go back to work.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 1, Block B:  Elizabeth Peek, TheHill and Fox News; in re: Barack Obama has endorsed Joe Biden.    Financial Times: “Obama endorses ex-running mate for president,” with the president looking extremely mournful.  Biden has made no inroads with blue-collar, moderate, traditional Democratic voters.  Black voters tend to be a pretty conservative voting bloc, some of whom have openly turned to Trump. A State Senator in Georgia, Mr Jones, decided to endorse Trump: economy, criminal justice reform, and many matters.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 1, Block C:   Tunku Varadarajan,  Hoover Institution executive editor, in re:  Tunku’s younger brother, Sidddharth Varadarajan, founding editor of The Wire. It published a story that included the fact that Yogi Adityanov, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh (just east of New Delhi), a BJP pol, had attended during the lockdown had attended a large gathering of leaders.    So Yogi Adityanov
 entered legal charges against my brother: disobeying an order of a public official, using a computer to impersonate someone, spreading a rumor, and the like.   An SUV  full of cops drove 400 miles to serve papers. My us in law rushed out and demanded they serve the papers on her —they said they couldn’t serve on women or children—so she, a professor, ate them for lunch and they gave up and served the papers on here.
       Of course, my brother couldn’t attend court 700 km away because there was no public transport. The investigation officer called him the day before, said, “You may respond by email.” They're using this to settle old scores against my brother because The Wire is a frequent critic of the BJP.  The press has been suffocated in te last years under Modi and BJB.  The police are not answerable any civil authority; extrajudicial killings.  Yogi Adityanov is a Hindu extremist. Best know for inviting India’s Muslims to leave and go to Pakistan, and he virulently opposes Christians.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 1, Block D:   Tim Kane, Hoover, in re: Unemployment checks: we’re paying people too much money.
 
Hour Two
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 2, Block A:  John Yoo, Berkeley Law, and Hoover; in re:  What powers are reserved to the states?  Article 2: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
       When a citizen believes he’s been abused by state or local police power, where can he go for redress? He can go to the courts, but we’re generally law-abiding people and we tend to obey the law.
       The federal govt usually ensures obedience to its rules by attaching rules to the funds it delivers.
       Congress:  Interstate commerce, and the spending clause.  It can block interstate commerce vs spread of disease, can close interstate highways, border.  It can spend money for supplies and grants; on vaccine or a cure—but all are Constitutionally in support of the states.
       For example, the NYPD has many more officers than does the FBI.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 2, Block B:  John Yoo, Berkeley Law, and Hoover; in re:  What are the limits of authority of the states?
Defense Production Act and the 1988 Stafford Act.  When FDR needed transport, he invented the Liberty Ship.  During the Korean War: Fed my order certain products and control distribution of materials.  It can say,  “Make our order priority, and the other goods second.”  Although there’s never been a Supreme Court case on the question, I believe that the Fifth Amendment requires the government to pay compensation for lost income.
1988 Stafford Act looks as if it's a wedge, a camel’s nose in the tent, of deploying the power of the federal military for the government to get what it wants.  It was intended as a disaster relief subsystem; a governor may refuse federal assistance, or accept fed troops. Posse comitatus limits the jurisdiction of the military: it may restore law and order or deliver supplies, but may not enforce a law in place of the police.
So far, the jurisdictions have respected each other.  Opening will be much more difficult.
..
The posse comitatus, in common law, is a group of people mobilized by the conservator of peace – typically a sheriff – to suppress lawlessness or defend the county. The posse comitatus (force of the country) originated in Ninth-century England simultaneous with the creation of the office of sheriff.
 
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 2, Block C:  Joseph Humire, Secure Free Society exec director; and Maria Fernanda Cabal, Senator in Colombia; in re:  President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua has been absent for 30 days, since a 12 March skype call. Is he dead?  (Vice President Rosario Murillo is his wife.)   He’s gone missing before as a resurrection, but this is the longest. My guess is that his health is delicate, as has lupus at age 74, and his wife has been running the government. One of the daughters is a fashion designer who returned from Italy.  Would his absence from the scene make a difference?  This is his second disappearance this year.  Suspicious. Latin American presidents travel, hide, go back and forth to Cuba, all the same. Argentina, Brazil, all of them. 
       Bogota is making it easier to comply: on even days, women may go out to buy food; on odd days, men.  We copied it from Peru, where it didn't work. A gay activist created a third gender, which people are poking fun at: “If you're gay you can go out any time.” 
       President Duque of Colombia introduced strict border controls; today, the dangerous and violent one is Ecuador, which is doing badly with the virus. Migrants are moving to their homeland, Venezuela.
Rouhani had a call with Maduro.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 2, Block D:  Joseph Humire, Secure Free Society exec director; and Maria Fernanda Cabal, Senator in Colombia; in re:  World Bank said Latin America as a whole ex-Venezuela would suffer a 4.6% contraction this year Demand from China and the G7 is falling dramatically. Pres Duque’s chief concerns are the virus, and the economy.    Demand diminution occurred before at the end of the commodities supercycle; this just makes it worse. Goldman:  3.8% down across the whole region.  Social and political instability loom.   Today our [Colombian] financial minister had to ask for $11,000 million from the IMF, which was accepted because we’ve never defaulted.  We’ll have to do a tax reform.
        If the US decouples from Asia, will it look more toward South America?  I think that’s a good idea.  North and South America Treaty Alliance? NOSTA?
 
Hour Three
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 3, Block A:  Joe Sternberg, WSJ editorial board, in London; in re:  Listening to economists: don't do it!
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 3, Block B:  Joe Sternberg, WSJ editorial board, in London; in re: Reopening London Parks.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 3, Block C:   Dr Alan Mendoza, Henry Jackson Society, in re: Coronavirus Compensation? Assessing China’s Potential Culpability and Avenues of Legal Response.  Global lawsuits against China for “patent breaches” of the International Health Regulations over its handling of COVID-19 could run to at least £3.2 trillion from just the nations of the G7, according to a newly released report.
The report claims that the Chinese government’s early handling of the disease and failure to adequately report information to the WHO breached Articles Six and Seven of the International Health Regulations [IHRs], a Treaty to which China is a signatory and legally obliged to uphold.  These breaches allowed the outbreak to rapidly spread outside Wuhan, its place of origin. In particular, our research has discovered that . . .  https://henryjacksonsociety.org/publications/coronaviruscompensation/
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 3, Block D:  Lanhee Chen, Hoover, in re: WHO: Tedros was a stooge whom the Chinese hired and the US let it happen in 2017.
 
Hour Four
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 4, Block A:  Gregory R Copley, Defense and Foreign Affairs, in re:   Population warfare, a frequent tool  of leaders; now, there are new ways: electronic media and information transmission.  The virus pandemic inspired a fear pandemic.  This is managed on a much more sophisticated basis. Stalin moved whole societies, as have the Chinese; but now our fear pandemic was inspired by modern media. People can be responded to and fine-tuned. Turkey started a war in Syria, and then Turkey moved huge populations into Europe.
       H1N1 took many more lives than has the Wuhan flu. In the last decade, we’ve seen a narrower and narrower bank of electronic [driving]. People respond very quickly, take control with their thumbs  on their smartphone  The more electronic we become, the shallower we become, and thereby more manipulable.  We think we're more sophisticated than people were in the Thirteenth century, but we’re susceptible to the same emotions.
       Trump is facing an impossible avalanche of emotions.
Had this come from Western Europe, it would have been seen as benign.  The language of the 15 January trade agreement said China in effect could break the treaty if there was a pandemic!
       China’s dependence on foodstuffs imported from the US.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 4, Block B:  Gregory R Copley, Defense and Foreign Affairs, in re:   Farewell to Dr Assad Homayoun, who was political counselor at the Iranian embassy in Washington, D.C. in DC, and close to Areshir Zahedi, now in Switzerland.  Assad thought strategically, was the repository of amazing learning in history. He advised ISSA on arcane volumes of strategic philosophy relevant to what we were doing. When the so-called revolution occurred inn 1979 – Khomeini stepped in only thanks to Carter—he formed the Azadegan Foundation (Free Man Foundation) to wrest control of Iran back into a democratic process, which was the way the shah’s government was heading. Shah had 400 political prisoners; Khomeini immediately put in thousands.  Shah’s effort was to re-introduce pre-Islamic traditions.  Three-legged stool: Crown, clerics, military.
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 4, Block C:  Bill Whalen, Hoover, in re: Warren Harding began his campaign with: ”Return to normalcy” [horrendous neologism; déclassé; ignoble. Try “normality.’]  Joe Biden began his campaign with “Return to normalcy.”
       He can't currently go out and barnstorm; he’s sort of stuck in a cellar in Delaware. 
Tuesday 14 April 2020   / Hour 4, Block D:  John Cochrane, Hoover, in re: Reopening will be a difficult problem.  Issues of fairness.