China’s economy grew 5.3% in the first quarter, beating expectations

Real estate continues deleveraging, and yet 5.3% GDP growth YoY.

Retail sales growth continues to be sluggish (3.1% vs. 4.6% predicted) and CPI is coming in cool (0.1% vs. 0.3% predicted). My theory for this is that China is actually seeing costs drop more quickly than CPI metrics can keep up. Traditional big-ticket household spending categories are housing, transportation, and education. Housing prices are obviously on the decline, but transportation costs are also decreasing due to the combination of cheaper EVs and an expanding HSR network. Education costs have been clamped down on after the crackdown on private tutoring, while average education outcomes have been raised by the crackdown on gaming. Meanwhile, traditional recurring costs like food and energy have been pushed downward by increasing trade with Russia as well as the rise of cheap solar.

It may be time to revisit the notion of ever-increasing consumption value as being important for economic growth. In this case, you can get the same quality of life with substantially less money. Why spend more to pad the top line retail sales number?

‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza

During the early stages of the war, the army gave sweeping approval for officers to adopt Lavender’s kill lists, with no requirement to thoroughly check why the machine made those choices or to examine the raw intelligence data on which they were based. One source stated that human personnel often served only as a “rubber stamp” for the machine’s decisions, adding that, normally, they would personally devote only about “20 seconds” to each target before authorizing a bombing — just to make sure the Lavender-marked target is male. This was despite knowing that the system makes what are regarded as “errors” in approximately 10 percent of cases, and is known to occasionally mark individuals who have merely a loose connection to militant groups, or no connection at all.

Moreover, the Israeli army systematically attacked the targeted individuals while they were in their homes — usually at night while their whole families were present — rather than during the course of military activity. According to the sources, this was because, from what they regarded as an intelligence standpoint, it was easier to locate the individuals in their private houses. Additional automated systems, including one called “Where’s Daddy?” also revealed here for the first time, were used specifically to track the targeted individuals and carry out bombings when they had entered their family’s residences.

In addition, according to the sources, when it came to targeting alleged junior militants marked by Lavender, the army preferred to only use unguided missiles, commonly known as “dumb” bombs (in contrast to “smart” precision bombs), which can destroy entire buildings on top of their occupants and cause significant casualties. “You don’t want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people — it’s very expensive for the country and there’s a shortage [of those bombs],” said C., one of the intelligence officers. Another source said that they had personally authorized the bombing of “hundreds” of private homes of alleged junior operatives marked by Lavender, with many of these attacks killing civilians and entire families as “collateral damage.”

In an unprecedented move, according to two of the sources, the army also decided during the first weeks of the war that, for every junior Hamas operative that Lavender marked, it was permissible to kill up to 15 or 20 civilians; in the past, the military did not authorize any “collateral damage” during assassinations of low-ranking militants. The sources added that, in the event that the target was a senior Hamas official with the rank of battalion or brigade commander, the army on several occasions authorized the killing of more than 100 civilians in the assassination of a single commander.

I actually think I'm going to throw up

Being a rather frequent flyer from Boston, I want to talk about the Biden administration's vendetta against JetBlue. JetBlue is a airline carrier operating in the US.

The US airline market is made up of the Big 4 (United, American, Delta, Southwest) followed by regional (Alaska, Air Canada), low cost (JetBlue), and ultra-low-cost (Frontier, Spirit) carriers. The Big 4 dominate passenger volumes (160M+/year), while the others sit in the 40M/year range.

JetBlue is an airline carrier that's primarily focused on the Northeast (New York, Boston, etc.). Spirit and AA have more national networks, which crucially means more slots for flights. AA also has a robust international network.

Naturally, you might think that having more competitors for the Big 4 would be something desirable for the Biden administration... And yet?

JetBlue and American Airlines had signed an agreement termed the Northeast Alliance. This agreement allowed JetBlue passengers onto AA flights (and vice versa) and route coordination along with various status recognition and loyalty program integration benefits. In 2022, the DOJ began a trial claiming JetBlue and American Airlines were being "anticompetitive" in their operations in the Northeast. In 2023, the ruling forced the Northeast Alliance to disband within 30 days. The core elements of the Northeast Alliance were designed to help JetBlue and AA compete with Delta and United in the New York and Boston markets. This, naturally, fell through.

JetBlue and Spirit Airlines had signed an agreement aiming to merge. The DOJ also claimed that this merger was "anticompetitive" as it would remove ultra low cost carrier seats from the industry. This merger was also terminated by the DOJ.

In this context, it's important to note a couple of things:

Spirit Airlines is not doing well. Domestic leisure travel demand has not rebounded as they'd hoped and their planes are not in the best shape. They're worth a fifth of what JetBlue was offering to purchase them.

JetBlue is not doing well. They're running losses and had hinges the entire company on one of the two partnership deals going through. Now, with both deals blocked and losses racking up, they're forced to cut service and cut routes while raising fees. As a result of this, JetBlue is currently paying pilots to not fly.

American is the straggler of the Big 3 (Delta, United, American) traditional carriers. Their profit margins are lower than the competition post-COVID.

This is to say, while Delta and United have been doing great throughout this entire ordeal, JetBlue is fucked, Spirit is fucked, and American is slightly fucked. This is the type of competition that the Biden administration encourages: one where the entrenched players aren't touched and smaller/less successful players can go fuck themselves.

(Canada) Gaza protesters blockade truck access to Port of Vancouver

Public high school students are occupying Chicago City Hall chanting “Biden Biden you can’t hide, you’re supporting genocide!”

The kids are alright.

Unbiased, independent, democratic media.

China's pharmaceutical price negotiations are fucking ruthless holy crap

4.40 too many 4 how about reduce another 4 cents?

Biden Calls Xi a Dictator, Risking China Backlash

oopsie

Why is it that, in the West, WW2 is remembered almost solely for the genocide of Jewish people?

Why does the Nazi genocide of Roma, the Nazi genocide of Russians and Poles, and the Japanese genocide of Chinese not get the same attention?

Edit: as pointed out by others, the Nazis also targeted communists, anarchists, LGBT people, and disabled people.

Neither the French nor the British were too keen on stamping on Nazism because they saw Communism as the greater threat. When the Soviets tried to build an alliance to intervene against the Germans they were rebuffed at every turn.

Even as the Japanese was committing endless war crimes and atrocities in China, the Americans were happy to sustain their war economy with iron, steel, copper, and oil until it encroached on French interests.

Blast Goes Off at Orthodox Church Campus in Gaza

Thanks NYT, want to tell me what caused that blast? No?