Authored by Jonathan Turley,

John Corkins, vice president of the Board of Trustees of the Kern Community College District Board, has a simple solution for those faculty who question diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs: take them to the slaughterhouse. Corkins has since apologized but the Board conspicuously failed to address other glaring problems with his extreme rhetoric.At the meeting, Corkins responded to students and faculty complaining about a racially hostile environment. Faculty opposed to DEI policies were referenced as part of this threat.

Corkins declared that there are “abusive” faculty that “we have to continue to cull.”

He added:

“Got them in my livestock operation and that’s why we put a rope on some of them and take them to the slaughterhouse. That’s a fact of life with human nature and so forth, I don’t know how to say it any clearer.”

Corkins has since apologized and insisted

“My intent was to emphasize that the individuals who spoke during the public comment portion of the meeting have my full support…several African-American faculty, students and statewide representatives … bravely shared their feelings of fear based on the actions of a small group of faculty members and their feelings of disappointment in the district for allowing these actions to continue.”

Notably, however, the video of the Dec. 13 meeting does not give details on the specific racial incidents. There is reference to an ongoing investigation. However, there are references to faculty who have opposed DEI measures.

That would likely include a  group called the Renegade Institute for Liberty with history Professors Matthew Garrett and Erin Miller, who teach at Bakersfield College. The group filed a federal lawsuit against the district after they were allegedly threatened with termination for questioning the use of grant money to fund social justice initiatives at their college. They are both tenured.

The opposition to DEI measures has led some to object that the group makes them feel unsafe on campus. That reportedly included calls to terminate faculty who oppose DEI to create a safer environment.

While apologizing for calling for the killing of such faculty, Corkins does not address why faculty should be targeted if they oppose DEI measures. The hearing and the statements made against these faculty members creates a chilling environment for academic freedom. The message is clear that these professors are viewed as a dangerous element on campus.

The Board has an obligation to address this uncertain line. Corkins apologizes for calling for the killing of critics but not why criticism of DEI itself is a matter for action. There may be conduct that is threatening or violent. There is no indication of any criminal complaint, but there is a need to preserve an open and tolerant environment. However, that also includes tolerance for opposing views on issues like DEI.

There is no major campaign to remove Corkins. I am less inclined for such removal as I am interested in greater clarity on the rights of free speech and academic freedom.  Everyone makes dumb comments in unguarded moments. I accept that Corkins was carried away by the emotion of the moment. Moreover, Corkins was referencing “abusive” faculty and not necessarily putting all DEI critics in that category. That is precisely what should be clarified.

However, it would likely be a different story if a board member called for the “culling” of DEI supporters or groups on the left. There remains a double standard in how such controversies are handled in academia.

The support enjoyed by faculty on the far left is in sharp contrast to the treatment given faculty with moderate, conservative or libertarian views. Anyone who raises such dissenting views is immediately set upon by a mob demanding their investigation or termination. This includes blocking academics from speaking on campuses like a recent Classics professor due to their political views. Conservatives and libertarians understand that they have no cushion or protection in any controversy, even if it involves a single, later deleted tweet. At the University of North Carolina (Wilmington) one such campaign led to a professor killing himself a few days before his final day as a professor.

I have defended faculty who have made similarly disturbing comments on the left, including “detonating white people,” abolish white people, denouncing police, calling for Republicans to suffer,  strangling police officers, celebrating the death of conservatives, calling for the killing of Trump supporters, supporting the murder of conservative protesters and other outrageous statements. I also defended the free speech rights of University of Rhode Island professor Erik Loomis, who defended the murder of a conservative protester and said that he saw “nothing wrong” with such acts of violence. (Loomis was later made Director of Graduate Studies of History at Rhode Island).

Even when faculty engage in hateful acts on campus, however, there is a notable difference in how universities respond depending on the viewpoint. At the University of California campus, professors actually rallied around a professor who physically assaulted pro-life advocates and tore down their display.

When these controversies arose, faculty rallied behind the free speech rights of the professors. That support was far more muted or absent when conservative faculty have found themselves at the center of controversies. The recent suspension of Ilya Shapiro is a good example. Other faculty have had to go to court to defend their free speech rights. One professor was suspended for being seen at a controversial protest.

The message from this hearing could be viewed by some as affirming  that criticism of DEI is now viewed a threatening language. For conservative, libertarian, or contrarian faculty, it is not clear if such views will now be tolerated or viewed as grounds for termination (or a barrier to hiring).

This comes at a time when many faculties have indeed “culled” their ranks of conservatives. A new survey of 65 departments in various states found that 33 do not have a single registered Republican.

 In a recent column, the editors of the legal site Above the Law mocked those of us who objected to the virtual absence of conservative or libertarian faculty members at law schools. Senior editor Joe Patrice defended “predominantly liberal faculties” based on the fact that liberal views reflect real law as opposed to junk law.  (Patrice regularly calls those with opposing views “racists,” including Chief Justice John Roberts because of his objection to race-based criteria in admissions as racial discrimination). He explained that hiring a conservative academic was akin to allowing a believer in geocentrism (or that the sun orbits the earth) to teach at a university.

It is that easy. You simply declare that conservative views shared by a majority of the Supreme Court and roughly half of the population are invalid to be taught.

It is not limited to faculty. Polls now show that 60 percent of students fear sharing their views in class. Various polls have shown the same fear with some showing an even higher percentage of fearful students. There is a growing orthodoxy taking hold on our campuses with growing intolerance for dissenting faculty and students alike.

There are faculty who have raised concerns over DEI initiatives, land acknowledgment, and other policies. Even with the apology, the Board has allowed the underlying threat to linger. It should state why the opposition of faculty members, including filing in court, could be deemed as threatening or unacceptable viewpoints.

Authored by Jackson Elliott via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

When a 13-year-old girl said she actually was a boy, teachers at her Maine school allegedly started using male pronouns for her and a counselor gave her a breast binder to wear to create the appearance of a flatter chest.

No one told her mother.

Amber Lavigne said she discovered the device in her daughter’s bedroom. It was then that the child admitted a staff member at the Great Salt Bay Community School had given it to her, as well as changing the name and pronouns she used at school, Lavigne told her community’s school board members during a public meeting on Dec. 14.

The youngster was told to keep it a secret from her parents, which caused her increasing “stress, anxiety, and depression,” Lavigne told the school board of the Central Lincoln County School System (CLCSS) AOS 93. The district serves seven rural communities in mid-coast Maine.

“Utilizing these devices can cause serious side effects,” Lavigne told board members.

Studies suggest breast binders can cause back pain, shortness of breath, chest pain, skin problems, and rib fractures.

When Lavigne expressed concern to school officials for “this heinous act, they expressed grave concern,” she told board members.

Her daughter had turned 13 just a month before.

“She’s a minor child—my minor child!” the mother said, fighting tears throughout her three-minute opportunity to speak at the meeting. “And under no circumstances should she have been provided a chest binder without the knowledge of the parents.”

The school won’t release notes from meetings between the social worker and the child, Lavigne told board members.

A worker “at the school encouraged a student to keep a secret from their parents!” Lavigne said. “This is the very definition of child predatory sexual grooming. Predators work to gain a victim’s trust by driving a wedge between them and their parents.”

Voice quavering, Lavigne demanded that all employees with “knowledge of the secret be immediately terminated from their positions,” and “that our child’s records be released to us. Laws, policies, and parental trust were broken.”

A wedge was driven between the child and her parents, Lavigne continued.

“Consider for a moment if this was your child,” she said. “What would you do? No other parent should have to go through the trauma and distress that this has caused my family.”

Maine parental rights advocate Shawn McBreairty posted the video of Lavigne’s speech to Rumble.

Since the meeting, Lavigne has told The Epoch Times by text message that she plans to file a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission.

Lavigne and her lawyer declined to speak further with The Epoch Times, citing plans to file a lawsuit.

The Epoch Times reached out to the Great Salt Bay Community School, CLCSS AOS 93, and the school board members for comment. Calls and emails were not returned.

Secret Counsel

The staffer who was coaching her daughter’s transition to living publicly as a boy wasn’t alone in the secret, Lavigne said. Other school officials also took part, she alleged, by hiding from her the child’s use of male pronouns at school.

After Lavigne’s story went public, the Great Salt Bay Community School removed its staff directory from its website, according to internet archive the Wayback Machine.

The school also posted a statement on its website, saying some individuals had spread “rumors and allegations” online to “try and divide our community.” The statement never said what issue it addressed.

The Great Salt Bay Community School Board’s statement also claimed it made decisions based on Maine law, but never specified what these decisions were.

“When administrators receive concerns from parents and/or students about potential issues in school, the Board has specific policies and procedures in place that must be followed when addressing those concerns. Those policies comply with Maine law, which protects the right of all students and staff, regardless of gender/gender identity, to have equal access to education, the supports and services available in our public schools, and the student’s right to privacy regardless of age,” the statement reads.

Maine lawmakers now are considering a state educational rule that would allow social workers and school counselors to keep secrets about children from parents.

Chapter 117 of Maine’s Department of Education guidelines would make conversations between school counseling staff and children confidential to parents. Chapter 117 is not yet law.

In November, parental rights activist Alvin Lui predicted to The Epoch Times that Maine could soon allow social workers to provide breast binders to students without parental consent.

What Lavigne says happened to her daughter shows how gender activists can influence children, Lui said. They may lie to parents to get children to commit to permanent body alteration. They may urge pronouns, then binders, then hormones, then surgery, he added.

“All they’re trying to do is to put you off as long as they can, so that it can move your child through the train,” Lui said.

Maine parental rights advocate Shawn McBreairty promoted a fundraiser for Lavigne’s case on Twitter. The GiveSendGo account has raised $1,241 of the $2,000 goal “to help Amber and her family with her initial legal retainer,” he told his audience on Twitter.

Read more here…

In recent weeks, we have seen a burst of unexpected truthiness out of various regional Fed banks, a sharp contrast to the constant barrage of prevarication out of the Federal Reserve.

First, it was the Philadelphia Fed which effectively revised what was according to the BLS a gain of 1.1 million jobs to just 10,500 jobs, meaning that the Fed was looking at erroneously overstated, arguably politicized data, as it unleashed its burst of 75bps rate hikes in June… which happened just as June jobs number turned negative.

Then, a few days later, the Cleveland Fed suggested that the Fed’s entire inflation view is wrong, relying on core CPI (and PCE) data that is woefully, even dangerously, delayed – in some cases lagging market data by up to 12 months, and suggesting that rent inflation – a core component of shelter and OER inflation which is arguably the most important component of “sticky” US service inflation – is actually far lower if measured correctly. Specifically, instead of looking at the “all-tenant repeat rent index” (which looks at a broader, but much more smoothed population sample), the Cleveland Fed argues that what is key is the “New-Tenant Repeat Rent” index, which tracks market indexes such as Zillow and Apartment List far more closely, and thus represents reality much more accurately at key inflection points.

Needless to say, if either  – or both – of these analyses are correct, and the real US jobs market is far weaker than represented, and/or inflation is far lower than what the BLS has represented at a time when the Fed has hiked four times by 75bps, an unprecedented pace of tightening last seen only during the Volcker era in hopes of crushing what is an already stalling economy, the implications will be huge and potentially catastrophic for both the Fed and whichever political party is in charge.

But just in case there wasn’t enough doubt in the Fed’s actions prompted by the Fed’s own regional banks, in yet another controversial report, this time published by the St. Louis Fed, has one-upped both its Philadelphia and Cleveland Fed peers, finding that if one looks at the number of states with negative growth, the US is now officially in a recession (way to throw the political operatives at the NBER under the bus, guys).

Here is what St. Louis Fed researchers Kevin Kliesen and Cassandra Marks found in a report published just days before New Year’s Eve (a time when absolutely nobody would have noticed a shocking admission that the US is in a recession) in a report titled “Are State Economic Conditions a Harbinger of a National Recession.”

Economists view recessions as national events. However, past recessions have shown that some states’ economies continued to expand during a recession—particularly when the national recession was relatively mild. The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s state coincident indexes (SCIs) can be used to assess whether recession-like conditions have developed in each of the states. And if so, whether there is a threshold in the number of states that might signal a national recession.

*  *  *

The figure below plots, for each month, the number of states that had negative month-over-month growth based on this index. The figure shows that the series has favorable recession-indicator properties; that is, during national recessions, as defined by the National Bureau of Economic Research, the number of states that register negative growth in the SCI increases.

Here are the number of states that had negative SCI growth at the start of these six recessions:

• February 1980: 30 states
• August 1981: 30 states
• August 1990: 26 states
• April 2001: 24 states
• January 2008: 9 states
• March 2020: 35 states
• Average: 26 states

The 2008 recession is clearly an outlier. The likely reason is that it was unclear at the time that the economy had entered a recession. In April 2008, the advance estimate showed that real GDP increased at a 3.2% annual rate in the first quarter of 2008. By the time of the third estimate, released in June 2008, first-quarter growth was revised up to 3.7%. Likewise, the advance estimate for second-quarter real GDP growth was 1.9%, which was subsequently revised to 2.8%. The current estimates that reflect all subsequent revisions of 2008 numbers show that real GDP declined at a 1.6% rate in the first quarter but increased at a 2.3% rate in the fourth quarter.

It was not until the failure of Lehman Brothers in September 2008, which triggered a sharp decline in equity prices and an economywide plunge in economic activity, that most economists viewed a recession as highly likely. By October 2008, 47 states registered negative SCI growth.

The punchline: as the report authors rhetorically ask in the final section, “Is the U.S. Tipping into a Recession?”…

In sum, a threshold estimate based on this analysis shows that 26 states need to have negative growth in the SCI to have reasonable confidence that the national economy entered into a recession. Excluding the 2008 outlier raises the threshold to 29 states.

So, where are we now? In October 2022, 27 states had negative growth in the SCI. That would exceed the six-recession average of 26 states but would fall short of the outlier-adjusted estimate (excluding 2008) of 29.

Their unstated answer: yes.

Putting it all together, in just the past month we have seen (or rather read) the following:

• Philadelphia Fed admitting over 1 million jobs “created” in Q2 never actually happened
• Cleveland Fed admitting core CPI is far lower than what the BLS reports, and what the Fed feeds into its models.
• And now, the St. Louis Fed effectively saying that based on the number of states with negative growth, the US is effectively in a recession.

While we don’t know if these attacks on the Fed’s credibility by its own economists will be sufficient to force Powell to pivot, they will certainly be used by the Fed’s political enemies (because for the past year, whether he wanted to or not, the Fed has become Biden’s most powerful tool, and one which will now be attacked by Republicans) to seek a full reversal in Fed policies and it is safe to say, that they will get it.

Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

A New York Times op-ed suggests that everyone should “mate with shorter people” in order to save the planet.

Yes, really.

Author Mara Altman, claims that “When you mate with shorter people, you’re potentially saving the planet by shrinking the needs of subsequent generations.”

“Lowering the height minimum for prospective partners on your dating profile is a step toward a greener planet,” she adds in the piece.

“He’s even restricted dairy from his sons’ diets and only allows them minimal sugar in an attempt to limit their growth, saving them from the ills of height.”

Anyone else think things are getting pretty weird around here?https://t.co/mb45hs58E0

— Caitlin Flanagan (@CaitlinPacific) January 2, 2023

Altman argues that shorter people are “inherent conservationists, which is more crucial than ever in this world of eight billion,” adding that “if we kept our proportions the same but were just 10 percent shorter in America alone, we would save 87 million tons of food per year (not to mention trillions of gallons of water, quadrillions of B.T.U.s of energy and millions of tons of trash).”

Altman continues, “Short people don’t just save resources, but as resources become scarcer because of the earth’s growing population and global warming, they may also be best suited for long-term survival (and not just because more of us will be able to jam into spaceships when we are forced off this planet we wrecked).”

“Our success as individuals does not depend on beating up other people or animals. Even if it did, in an era of guns and drones, being tall now just makes you a bigger target,” Altman adds, concluding “I want my children’s children to know the value of short.”

Twitter wasted no time in ceaselessly mocking the piece:

Reporting the @nytimes for this disgusting tallphobia

— Dan Andros (@DanAndros) January 2, 2023

Short grooming is where we have to draw the line.

— BRANDON HARTSELL✌ (@brandonhartsell) January 2, 2023

Liberals think making their kids shorter is a win? Um, ok.

— Diana D (@Diana53999) January 3, 2023

Sing to me, o muse: “short is better, and it is the future.” https://t.co/EC8A2dUUbE

— John Schwartz (@jswatz) January 2, 2023

If one were to look on the bright side, at least Altman’s future allows for continued ‘mating’.

It’s a step down from “voluntary human extinction”, an idea previously amplified by the Times, so perhaps this is progress.

*  *  *

Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here. Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

Authored by Matt Taibbi via TK News (emphasis ours),

From the Twitter Files, a story about media, that also sketches the origins of Twitter’s surrender to the intelligence community:

1.THREAD: The Twitter Files
How Twitter Let the Intelligence Community In

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023

Twitter through the end of August, 2017 was on nobody’s radar as a key actor in the Trump-Russia “foreign influence” scandal.

By the second week in October — six weeks later — the company was being raked over the coals in the press as “one of Russia’s most potent weapons in its efforts to promote Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton,” with Clinton herself adding:

It’s time for Twitter to stop dragging its heels and live up to the fact that its platform is being used as a tool for cyber-warfare.

What happened in those six weeks? Answering that question is a key to understanding the content moderation phenomenon. In this period, crucial in the company’s history, a pattern was established. Threats from Congress came first, then a rush of bad headlines (inspired by leaks from congressional committees, and finally a series of moderation demands coming from the outside. Once the company acceded, the cycle repeated.

The documents lay out the scheme. You can see how the Russian cyber-threat was essentially conjured into being, with political and media pressure serving as the engine inflating something Twitter believed was negligible and uncoordinated to massive dimensions.

“KEEP PRODUCING MATERIAL”

The timeline started when a fellow tech titan, Facebook, decided in late August 2017 to suspend 300 accounts with “suspected Russian origin.” The move appeared to irritate some Twitter insiders, as Facebook not only shared data with Twitter, but with the Senate Intelligence Committee, where ranking Democrat and Virginia Senator Mark Warner was on an all-out hunt for Russian meddlers.

Twitter’s leaders, anxious to avoid being “dragged into another pitch for an industry wide solution,” as one senior lawyer put it, appeared peeved that Facebook pulled them into the congressional muck. Yet they mistakenly believed the company could still side-step the political/PR minefield, and “keep the focus on FB,” mainly because they were all sure there hadn’t been a big Russia problem on their network:

“No larger patterns.”

“We did not see a big correlation.”

“FB may take action on hundreds of accounts, and we may take action on ~25.”

18.The failure of the “Russia task force” to produce “material” worsened the company’s PR crisis.

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023

As the autumn progressed, however, Twitter’s leaders began to realize the Russia thing might hit them no matter what.

An early hint came in a September 8, 2017 piece in the New York Times called “The Fake Americans Russia Created to Influence the Election.”

This was of many stories that helped the Times win a Pulitzer Prize for exploring “Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connections to the Trump campaign.” Author Scott Shane explained that social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter had been “turned into engines of deception and propaganda.” On Twitter specifically, the Times in conjunction with the cybersecurity group FireEye claimed, “Russian fingerprints are on hundreds or thousands of fake accounts that regularly posted anti-Clinton messages,” adding:

The fakery may have added only modestly to the din of genuine American voices in the pre-election melee, but it helped fuel a fire of anger and suspicion in a polarized country.

Twitter employees seemed puzzled by the FireEye piece, but didn’t really worry until the appearance of stories hinting they were being uncooperative with Washington.

“Hi guys,” wrote Public Policy VP Colin Crowell on September 23, 2017. “Just passing along for awareness the writeup here from the WashPost today on potential legislation (or new FEC regulations) that may affect our political advertising.”

5.“Twitter is not the focus of inquiry into Russian election meddling right now – the spotlight is on FB,” wrote Public Policy VP Colin Crowell: pic.twitter.com/2nzk8pLoCZ

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023

The article, “Facebook’s openness on Russia questioned by congressional investigators,” mostly focused on Facebook, but like the Times piece included a few shots across Twitter’s bow. It noted congressional “investigators also are pushing for fuller answers from Google and Twitter, both of which may have been targets of Russian propaganda efforts.”

Later that month, Twitter staff, led by Crowell, met with Warner and his staff, shared what the company believed to be true, that they had no coordinated Russian interference issue on their platform.

Not only did Warner not like this answer, he gave Twitter a fierce media paper-training, holding an instant press conference to voice his displeasure.

“Their response was, frankly, inadequate on almost every level,” Warner told reporters. Reuters added that Warner said the Twitter briefing was “mostly derivative of a presentation earlier this month given by Facebook,” and “lacked thoroughness.”

The Warner presser hit Twitter like a bomb. Gallows humor filled inboxes.

“Well these are good headlines…” joked a communications officer, passing along an email with the subject line, INADEQUATE ON EVERY LEVEL.

“#Irony,” mused Crowell, upon receipt (the day after the presser) of an e-circular from Warner’s re-election campaign, asking for “$5 or whatever you can spare,” to “help Mark hit his quarterly fundraising goal.”

In a circular to other senior executives about his meeting with Warner, Crowell explained that Warner “has political incentive to keep this issue at top of the news, maintain pressure on us and rest of industry to keep producing material for them.” He added that although Warner’s public posture was contentious, the private atmosphere was more of a “collaborative spirit.”

He also said congressional Democrats were “taking cues from Hillary Clinton,” who that same week told a Stanford audience she was the victim of a “virtual Watergate.”

Crowell explained further that the company was being “hurt” by outside academics and researchers, who “tap our API to pull together flawed reports painting the bot/Russian troll problem as a significant presence on Twitter.” He added:

It was evident in the room with staff investigators that these researchers had already briefed the committees and asserted Twitter is a major problem. These studies are also cited in recent media stories.

There are mentions throughout Twitter’s email record that fall of studies by a range of researchers “tapping” the data Twitter and Facebook shared with Congress. The company took special note of former FBI Counterintelligence agent Clint Watts, whose work on the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s “Hamilton 68” project gave reporters a public “dashboard” for tracking a “Russian Disinformation on Twitter.” Its web page featured a crude illustration of Vladimir Putin tossing bunches of red Twitter symbols into the ether:

Part of the reason Twitter hired Burson-Marsteller was because the company boasted a stable of former government officials — including many from the Obama and Clinton administrations — who had relationships with the Democratic Party’s loudest Russia hawks. Burson even sent over a “third parties” outreach document, detailing which members of their team had contacts with Strobe Talbott, Madeleine Albright, Richard Clarke, and former ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, among others.

TK News subscribers can read the rest here…

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

There is a growing consensus that 2023 is going to be a miserable year for the U.S. economy and for the global economy as a whole.  In fact, in all the years that I have been writing I have never seen so many big names on Wall Street be so incredibly pessimistic about the coming year.  Of course much of that pessimism is due to the fact that 2022 went so poorly.  The cryptocurrency industry imploded, trillions of dollars in stock market wealth evaporated, inflation became a major problem all over the industrialized world, and a new housing crash suddenly erupted.  Considering all of the pain that we have experienced over the past 12 months, it is only natural for the experts to have a negative view of 2023. 

The following are 11 ominous warnings that they have issued for the year ahead…

#1 The IMF: “We expect one-third of the world economy to be in recession. Even countries that are not in recession, it would feel like recession for hundreds of millions of people”

#2 Bloomberg: “Economists say there is a 7-in-10 likelihood that the US economy will sink into a recession next year, slashing demand forecasts and trimming inflation projections in the wake of massive interest-rate hikes by the Federal Reserve.”

#3 The World Bank: “As central banks across the world simultaneously hike interest rates in response to inflation, the world may be edging toward a global recession in 2023 and a string of financial crises in emerging market and developing economies that would do them lasting harm, according to a comprehensive new study by the World Bank.”

#4 Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan: “We’re going to have a shallow recession”

#5 Mohamed El-Erian: “Many ‘high-conviction’ U.S. recession calls are immediately coupled with the assertion that it’ll be ‘short and shallow.’ Reminds me of the behavioral trap ‘transitory inflation’ proponents fell into last year”

#6 Nouriel Roubini: “No, this is not going to be a short and shallow recession, it’s going to be deep and protracted”

#7 Larry Summers: “My sense is that it’s much harder than many people think to achieve a soft landing”

#8 Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon: “Economic growth is slowing,” Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said at the same conference. “When I talk to our clients, they sound extremely cautious.”

#9 Charles Schwab & Co.’s Liz Ann Sonders: “We have to take our medicine still, meaning a weaker economy and a weaker labor market. The question is, is it better to take our medicine sooner or later?”

#10 BlackRock: “Central bankers won’t ride to the rescue when growth slows in this new regime, contrary to what investors have come to expect. They are deliberately causing recessions by overtightening policy to try to rein in inflation”

#11 Michael Burry: “Inflation peaked. But it is not the last peak of this cycle. We are likely to see CPI lower, possibly negative in 2H 2023, and the US in recession by any definition. Fed will cut and government will stimulate. And we will have another inflation spike. It’s not hard.”

As you can see, there is a general consensus that things will be bad in 2023, but there is disagreement about just how deep the coming economic downturn will turn out to be.

If the worst of these forecasts turn out to be accurate, that will actually be incredibly good news.

Because the reality of what we will be facing in 2023 is likely to be significantly worse than any of these experts are currently projecting.

With each passing day, we continue to get even more numbers that indicate that big trouble is ahead.

For example, we just learned that luxury home sales absolutely cratered during the months of September, October and November…

Sales of luxury homes fell 38.1% year over year during the three months ending November 30, 2022, the biggest decline on record, according to a new report from Redfin, a technology-powered real estate brokerage. That outpaced the record 31.4% decline in sales of non-luxury homes. Redfin’s data goes back to 2012.

The luxury market and the overall housing market lost momentum in 2022 due to many of the same factors: inflation, relatively high interest rates, a sagging stock market and recession fears.

We haven’t seen anything like this since 2008.

And we all remember what the housing crash of 2008 ultimately did to the financial markets.

Normally, the beginning of a calendar year is a time for optimism.  As we look forward to a completely clean slate, it can be easy to forget the difficulties of the previous 12 months.

But this year things seem completely different.

On some level, just about everyone can feel that very challenging times are ahead of us.

Decades of very foolish decisions are starting to catch up with us in a major way.

Our leaders tried very hard to keep the party going for as long as possible, and to a certain extent they were quite successful in doing so.

Our politicians in Washington kept borrowing and spending trillions upon trillions of dollars that we did not have, and that definitely delayed our day of reckoning.

And the Federal Reserve kept the financial markets artificially propped up for years by endlessly pumping giant mountains of fresh cash into the system.

But such foolish measures only made our long-term problems even worse, and now our leaders are losing control.

All of the “mega-bubbles” are starting to burst, and the system is beginning to fall apart all around us.

It is time to turn out the lights, because the party is over.

We all had a lot of fun while it lasted, but now the bill is due and an extraordinary amount of pain is ahead.

*  *  *

It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “End Times” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

Authored by Stephan Livera via BitcoinMagazine.com,

As the 2022 chapter closes, it’s time to turn our eyes to what’s coming in 2023. Here are some themes I’m seeing for Bitcoin in 2023.

REGULATORY OVERREACH

The Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) Travel Rule is forcing exchanges and bitcoin service providers to document and share ever-more information about customer transactions. We are seeing politicians such as Elizabeth Warren publicly go against Bitcoin, and even if her proposed digital asset AML act has no real chance of passing, it does foreshadow that there are future battles coming on this.

But, on the other hand, we should also remember that governments were initially against voice over internet protocol (VoIP) technologies (e.g., Skype, etc.), and nowadays they use VoIP. It’ll be similar with bitcoin, where some countries adopt it as legal tender, hold bitcoin in reserves, provide Bitcoin services for citizens and encourage bitcoin investors and entrepreneurs.

CBDCS AND THE WAR ON CASH

The war on cash proceeds, with many countries taking high-denomination cash notes out of circulation, or banning physical cash transactions above a threshold. There are many countries talking about central bank digital currency (CBDC) trials, but my speculation is that most will not have the technical and overall economic capability to stand up a fully-functioning CBDC in 2023.

2023 will mostly be about trials and rhetoric, in preparation for future CBDC rollouts. Governments can especially force people into CBDCs in countries with large welfare states, with the understanding being, “If you want your welfare check, you’ll take it as a CBDC.” Just like Darth Vader in “Star Wars,” it’ll be a case of, “Pray I do not alter the deal any further.”

Once upon a time, CBDCs might have been seen as a “conspiracy theory” but by now they are clearly coming as a threat to financial freedom and privacy. Sadly, most people will not see the threat until it is too late and CBDCs are upon them — but it is also the pain of CBDCs that will push more people into using Bitcoin and the Lightning Network.

MAXIS BEING MINTED AND RESURGENCE IN SELF-CUSTODY INTEREST

Bitcoin Maximalists are being minted as casual “crypto” fans get rekt on platforms such as Celsius, BlockFi, FTX, Voyager, Vauld, etc. So, in some ways, it’s very cyclical, the 2014 to 2015 bear cycle followed after the collapse of Mt. Gox, and during the 2018 to 2019 bear cycle, we saw the breakdown of QuadrigaCX — so we’re just going through another round of people having to learn the hard way.

For 2023, we will see a stronger self-custody culture given the pain of 2022 is more recent. This is not to preclude future cycles and waves of new adoption with people coming in who are not as careful. Yield and shitcoin scams will be back in another form sooner or later, but it will be a new round of people who succumb to them.

We are seeing more rounds of content and webinars that relate to self custody. For example, with Swan Bitcoin I hosted some self custody 101 webinars (which will be ongoing), and these webinars had some of the highest interest and registrations of any Swan webinars ever offered. Offering an easy auto-withdrawal feature or being 100% non-custodial will be an important feature for Bitcoin on-ramps in 2023.

MINISCRIPT WALLETS AND FEATURES

Per Pieter Wuille’s site:

“Miniscript is a language for writing (a subset of) Bitcoin Scripts in a structured way, enabling analysis, composition, generic signing and more.”

For those who are unfamiliar, Miniscript is a way to more easily express different scripts or spending conditions for bitcoin. This could be built into different wallets in ways that enable easier cross-hardware and -software compatibility.

You might first think, “Why should I care?” and, at the start, you’d be right to ask that. But over time, this will enable more sophisticated self custody, enterprise or even inheritance planning scenarios. Want to have a three-of-three multisig setup that degrades down to a two-of-three multisig setup after 90 days? Or have different “back out” conditions that exist for a business context? Miniscript makes it easier to do these things, and to let people use their existing software or hardware for this purpose. To be clear, some of this is already possible with Bitcoin script today, but Miniscript makes it more technically feasible or easier to achieve in practice.

It will take time for these solutions to be built out, but the functionality does seem promising. Businesses and enterprise customers may be particularly interested in this because it could make their self-custody practices more practical for employees and key holders to execute.

Currently, there is Liana (by the same team behind Revault), and Ledger, which has announced Miniscript support in its hardware, and Specter DIY had already enabled support in 2021! Rob Hamilton has also spoken about Miniscript uses in the world of insurance here. I anticipate more support coming in 2023.

This could help push the use of bitcoin into self-custodial directions, and away from the “old model” of financial services where you have to place more trust in government, banks and fiat financial institutions to honor their word or not debase your wealth.

LIGHTNING FIRST

It’s time to bring about a Lightning-first model for two types of bitcoin transactions: low-value transactions and in-person commerce. We saw the mempoolfullRBF debate blow up toward the end of 2022, but the real answer for most of us is to promote and use Lightning first, where possible.

As a quick anecdote, I recall talking with Giacomo Zucco who was explaining his experience in El Salvador of paying with bitcoin at a supermarket. Unfortunately, the Chivo terminal at that time defaulted to Bitcoin on-chain, and as he paid on-chain, the people in the line behind him had to wait for confirmation, which was very awkward. Contrast this with a Lightning-first experience which could look more like this:

All I want for Christmas is to be able to spend my SATS instantly, anonymously, and *KYC free* at my local grocery store🎄🎁

Feliz Navidad from the #Bitcoin capital of the world, El Salvador 🇸🇻 🌏 pic.twitter.com/I67kgKhw17

— CoinBeast (@coinbeastmedia) December 25, 2022

We should show people the best of Bitcoin and for in-person, lower-value commerce, we should go for Lightning first. I believe we’ll start to see this being driven and encouraged by more Bitcoiners and local communities in 2023.

EXPANSION OF BITCOIN-ONLY COMMUNITIES AND EVENTS

We will see more events and small-sized conferences in different countries around the world. Contrary to some who believe there are too many Bitcoin conferences, the issue is more one of assuming that you must attend them all!

You should instead attend the events and conferences that align with your interests and/or geography. Having more conferences is a good thing, so long as they are done in a low-cost, effective way. For example, the Bitcoin bush bash is a model that we may see replicated around the world — free to attend, held in a hall or other free/cheap area, no recordings, smaller-size gathering that is hosted somewhere that is cost effective.

By lowering the expectations about things that typically cost a lot more money (e.g., fancy, professionalized operations, live streaming, lots of international speakers), Bitcoiners can grow their local scenes and meetups. This is not to detract from the larger Bitcoin events and conferences, as they also play a key role — but I see a “middle ground” that can be taken up by low cost, local events.

OVERALL SENTIMENT

Without having a crystal ball for 2023, I believe bitcoin’s fiat price will remain in a mostly sideways trend. Forget what the bull-hopium people are posting and talking about, they are usually chasing engagement or getting too caught up in their own echo chambers. It takes time for the cycle to bottom out.

But let’s look on the bright side, it’s a great time for stacking sats and building something. Remember, in prior cycles, it wasn’t so clear that “Bitcoin would come back,” whereas now, the world is slowly realizing that Bitcoin is here to stay.

Authored by Henry Schwartz via CBOE.com,

The ratio of listed option put volume to call volume is a well-known measure for traders who appreciate a relatively simple metric comprised of accessible data that can be applied across assets and time frames.

Like most indicators, interpretation of the put/call ratio involves several assumptions – primarily that puts express a bearish view, while calls are bullish. Like the Cboe Volatility ® (VIX®) Index, a high put/call ratio is often considered a sign of investor uncertainty, while a low level usually indicates optimism. Historical data generally supports this assumption, as the put/call ratio typically spikes during crashes and reverts to lower levels in bull markets.

In practice, many traders prefer to examine put/call ratios for index, ETF and equity products separately based on the characteristics and use cases across products. For convenience, Cboe Global Markets® provides daily summary data for several market statistics, including a put/call calculation that isolates equity (single stock) options flow trading on the hybrid Cboe Options Exchange (C1). 

Cboe Equity Put/Call

Source: Cboe Daily Market Statistics

As shown in the chart above, the daily average put/call ratio over the past five years has ranged from about 0.4 to 0.8, with a trendline near to 0.6, or three puts trading for every five calls. Prior to 2022, the highest p/call ratios correspond to significant market shocks, while the lowest levels were seen during the 2020-21 bull market, when the S&P 500® Index nearly doubled from 2300 to 4600 in 21 months.

Confounding some analysts and financial media, including columnists at Forbes, MarketWatch and Interactive Brokers, is the recent rise of the average daily put/call ratio on C1 to nearly 1.0 in the current quarter despite a rebound for equities and lower levels of volatility, illustrated by a climb of nearly 5% for the S&P 500 and a decline of nearly 10 points for the VIX® Index.

Source: WhatsTrading (trade-alert.com)

The inclusion of equity option data from all exchanges paints a similar picture, with the put/call ratio spiking to 0.85 in Q1 2020, followed by nearly 18 months at very low levels near 0.4 and a sharp climb higher this year to the current level peak near 0.84.

Equity Put/Call Ratio and Volume All Markets

Source: Cboe DataShop Option Sentiment

A closer look at recent daily data shows interesting spacing of the highest put/call ratios with Wednesdays consistently seeing the highest levels.

Cboe Equity Put/Call

Intraday data for one of the highest spikes on December 7 shows large surges of put volume hitting the market at 1 p.m. ET, and again near 2:30 p.m., causing the ratio to jump sharply from 0.86 to nearly 1.3 on the day.

Equity Put and Call Volume and P/C Ratio Per-Minute, All Markets – December 7, 2022

Examination of trade-level data on this day shows several large deep-in-the-money (ITM) put trades in AMZN with total volume exceeding open interest by a wide margin, eliminating the possibility of closing activity.

Source: Cboe Trade Alert

The most active contract, the 1/23 125 AMZN put, saw nearly 99k contracts trade, compared to 9,275 contracts open at the time. Open interest the next day was little changed.

Source: Cboe Trade Alert

A look at most-active ITM put flow on that date shows similar deep in the money activity in C, TSLA and BABA, with little next day open interest change. 

Source: Cboe Trade Alert

Breaking the data down by moneyness identifies a trend that accelerated in the second half of 2022—a surge in ITM put activity (black line near the bottom)—making up nearly 11% of the ADV in Q4 compared to a multi-year average near 5%. In fact, Q4 2022 ITM put share is higher than both ATM put and call share.

Equity Option Marketshare by Option Type

Source: Datashop Option Sentiment 

The incidence of heavy volume in deep ITM contracts with no resulting open interest is indicative of a strategy employed by the largest market participants to minimize exposure to early assignment. Commonly seen in deep ITM calls ahead of an ex-dividend date, this type of activity creates large blocks of open interest that are immediately assigned by another party. The net effect is that early assignment on original short positions is avoided based on the percentage pro-rata allocation method used by OCC. Another effect is a sharp spike in the equity put/call ratio that is nondirectional and unrelated to typical option use cases.

Historically, dividend related ITM call exercises have resulted in some of the highest call volume days of the year, including March 15, 2012, when a record 9M calls traded in SPY, but changes to the clearing process since then have dampened that activity. 

Mathematically, the decision to exercise a call or put early is related to the extrinsic value of the contract. For calls, if the dividend(s) amount exceeds the extrinsic value, a long holder is usually better off exercising. For puts, the decision is a bit more subtle, with extrinsic value compared to the carry cost on the strike. As U.S. interest rates have increased sharply to decade-highs this year, the cost of carry for deep positions has increased, while the selloff in many popular stocks has resulted in large blocks of deep put open interest. Unlike dividend-related call exercises, which tend to happen quarterly, put exercise dynamics may repeat daily if positions are open. In practice, put exercises are more common on Wednesdays based on the timing of settlement. Puts exercised on a Wednesday result in a stock sale on Thursday, which settles Monday.

 Fortunately, early-exercise candidate call and put strikes for all listed products are calculated intraday and available in a subscription product on the Cboe DataShop.

A sample from the file for December 7 shows that all the active Amazon deep put strikes were considered optimal to exercise as of 2 p.m.

Source: Early Exercise Strike by Option Class – Subscription

Understanding that simple total put/call ratio calculations are likely to be impacted by noise from exercise-related activity for some time, it makes sense to consider alternate approaches that would yield more stable output.

One method involves exclusion of in-the-money options entirely, effectively avoiding the most likely contracts that would be subject to dividend (calls) and carry (puts) early assignment: P/C using only OTM and ATM contracts.

All Markets Equity NON ITM Put/Call Ratio

Source: Data Shop Option Sentiment

Another method takes advantage of the account-type volume disclosed in the Cboe Open-Close datasets, available for each of Cboe’s four options exchanges C1, C2℠, EDGX ® and BZX ®. As the accounts involved in the exercise-related volume are not customers, a put/call ratio calculated from the customer totals will be unaffected and remain relatively flat over the past six months. 

Cboe Equity Put/Call Open-Close File Data

Source: Cboe Open-Close Volume Summary 

A last alternative would be to focus on smaller executions, using the size brackets included in the Open-Close datasets. This “Small Trade P/C” avoids the distortion of the large-scale early-exercise activity and may support a better picture of small-trader sentiment across time and product.

Equity Option Small Trade P/C

Source: Cboe Open-Close Volume Summary 

As we approach the 50th anniversary of listed options and Cboe, it’s a good time to reflect on how far our markets have come while acknowledging that some aspects of the business are remarkably unchanged. Focusing on the data side, exchanges and vendors are now processing over 170 billion messages per day1 from 16 exchanges that list nearly 1.5 million contracts on over 6,000 stocks, ETFs and indices. In 2022, volume surpassed 10.3 billion contracts, or nearly 42 million contracts daily, a new record that is more than double 2019 levels. New technologies and business models have widened customer access to listed options, while strong growth in listings and expiration cycles have resonated with retail and institutional traders who have embraced options in their quest to efficiently adjust risk and express specific views.

Despite these changes, the need for simple and effective ways to characterize market activity and investor sentiment persists. For any area of interest, a close examination of volume, volatility and options can deliver quantitative and qualitative insights to enhance understanding and complement any approach to capital and risk management.

Update (1500ET): FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty to criminal charges, and is set to face trial in October.

Appearing on Tuesday in US District Court in New York, US District Judge Lewis Kaplan set a trial date of October 2nd for the disgraced crypto king, after US prosecutors said they expect to submit all of their evidence in the case over the next month, Bloomberg reports.

While the plea was not unexpected, it buys the 30-year-old more time, legal experts say. Bankman-Fried will get a better idea on the evidence prosecutors have against him and plan his next move. The plea puts the case on track for a lengthy trial, which could last at least four weeks.

Bankman-Fried emerged from a black SUV into a crowd of photographers and TV crews Tuesday, ahead of a 2 pm hearing scheduled in New York. In December, US prosecutors in Manhattan revealed eight criminal counts against him, including wire fraud and campaign finance violations. -Bloomberg

Prosecutors have accused the 30-year-old of stealing billions of dollars of customer funds from FTX, and defrauding investors and lenders to Alameda Research, his trading arm. He also allegedly made millions of dollars in illegal campaign contributions funded by Alameda.

SBF has previously said he didn’t ‘intend’ to commit Fraud, but acknowledged making mistakes.

*  *  *

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried has asked a judge to conceal the identities of two people who will help secure his bail in addition to his parents’ house in Palo Alto, California, Bloomberg reports.

“If the two remaining sureties are publicly identified, they will likely be subjected to probing media scrutiny, and potentially targeted for harassment, despite having no substantive connection to the case,” wrote SBF’s lawyers in a letter filed on Tuesday seeking redactions of the names of the two individuals who intend to sign as sureties to his bail.

“Consequently, the privacy and safety of the sureties are “countervailing factors” that significantly outweigh the presumption of public access to the very limited information at issue,” the letter continues.

Bankman-Fried’s $250 million bail package – granted in his first appearance on US soil since his arrest in the Bahamas, was secured by his parents’ Palo Alto home, which is worth nowhere near that amount. The judge in the case also required that two people of “considerable means,” at least one of whom cannot be a relative, also sign the bond.

Bankman-Fried was granted a $250 million bail package in December, one of the largest in US history. The personal recognizance bond approved by the judge was secured by the equity in Bankman-Fried’s parents home in Palo Alto, California, which is almost certainly not worth anywhere near that amount. But outsized bonds are more a means of establishing harsh financial consequences for bail-jumping and are often backed by assets worth only around 10% of the stated amount. -Bloomberg

The two individuals have not yet signed the bond but intend to do so by the Jan. 5 deadline, according to the letter.

Bankman-Fried is set to appear in a Manhattan federal court on Tuesday to face charges on eight criminal counts ranging from wire fraud to conspiracy to commit money laundering, to conspiracy by misusing customer funds, CNN reports. He is expected to plead not guilty.

He faces 115 years if convicted on all charges.

Update (1455ET): Kevin McCarthy has lost the second tally for Speaker of the House.

McCarthy Fails Again In Second Ballot pic.twitter.com/ElBa7bLjM6

— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) January 3, 2023

Of note, when this happened in 1923, it went to nine ballots.

And look who’s gaining steam…

The 19 who voted for Jordan on second ballot

Andy Ogles
Lauren Boebert
Michael Cloud
Anna Paulina Luna
Mary Miller
Keith Self
Andy Biggs
Dan Bishop
Andrew Clyde
Phil Crane
Matt Gaetz
Bob Good
Paul Gosar
Andy Harris
Josh Brecheen
Ralph Norman
Scott Perry
Matt Rosendale
Chip Roy

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) January 3, 2023

#NeverKevin

Cc: MTG pic.twitter.com/4nyf2M6Sml

— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) January 3, 2023

*  *  *

Update (1310ET): Not even a quarter of the way through roll call, and Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has failed to secure enough votes to become Speaker of the House – which will push the contest into a multiple-ballot vote.

MCCARTHY NO VOTES:
Biggs — Biggs
Bishop — Biggs
Boebert — Jordan
Breechen — Banks
Cloud — Jordan
Clyde — Biggs
Crane — Biggs

— Olivia Beavers (@Olivia_Beavers) January 3, 2023

BREAKING: Rep. Kevin McCarthy appears to lose first ballot for House speaker.

Watch live: https://t.co/MPjgQRmzjX pic.twitter.com/wOrUCWbmzc

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) January 3, 2023

According to the Washington Post‘s Paul Kane, the last time this happened was 1923.

We are into uncharted territory: No one in House chamber right now has ever been alive for a multiple-ballot vote for House speaker, let alone seen one in person.
With 7 votes from Rs for someone other than McCarthy, we are certain to head to a 2nd ballot.
Last one: 1923.

— Paul Kane (@pkcapitol) January 3, 2023

What’s next? As Politico reports:

After McCarthy fails to get 218 votes on the first ballot, the Freedom Caucus antagonists have signaled that they will start backing another yet-unnamed candidate on the second ballot. The Daily Beast reported Monday night that that person is Ohio Rep. JIM JORDAN, the longtime McCarthy critic-turned-ally.

The Ohio Republican, however, has no shot at being speaker — something that his adoring conservative colleagues know very well. But, per the Daily Beast story, that’s not the point: They’re hoping to peel off more Republicans to back Jordan, aiming to have McCarthy’s vote count decrease from the first ballot to the second.

It’s an open question how long today will go until someone nominates a viable candidate for the gavel — someone like STEVE SCALISE (R-La.) or PATRICK McHENRY (R-N.C.). And there’s a fear that if one of these member’s names is called too early in the process, the conference will turn on them.

Buckle up. It’s going to be a long day. 

Hakeem Jeffries will likely win the plurality vote, but you need a majority vote to be the speaker. So they will just keep voting until someone gets a majority. In 1855 that took 2 months. #mccarthy #118thCongress #Speaker

— Ben Sheehan (@ThatBenSheehan) January 3, 2023

McCarthy’s loss on the first vote is a terrible day for mediocre Americans. Millions of Americans are mediocre, and they deserve representation too.

— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) January 3, 2023

*  *  *

Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) gave a Tuesday morning speech imploring fellow Republicans to elect him as Speaker of the House, as several notable members of the GOP have openly opposed McCarthy.

According to Axios, McCarthy has given hardliners nearly everything they’ve asked for, however he still hasn’t secured enough votes for the position, meaning that for the first time in 100 years, the House will likely hold multiple ballots for the speaker.

In his Tuesday speech, McCarthy listed all the concessions he’s made to the right, and pointed out that Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) praised elements of his rules package. Gaetz, notably, has spearheaded the anti-McCarthy movement within the chamber.

Gaetz, of course, has been rallying support against McCarthy. https://t.co/JcxS2Wx5sU

— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) January 3, 2023

“I’ve earned this job,” said McCarthy, after running through everything he’s done to become speaker – to which Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) reportedly shook his head, according to Punchbowl News’ Jake Sherman.

“This is bullshit,” said Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) in response to McCarthy’s speech.

.@mkraju just dropped a “bullshit” on CNN pic.twitter.com/53xj9p4VCE

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 3, 2023

In December, Gaetz said he wouldn’t vote for McCarthy because he’s “just a shill of the establishment.”

I’m not voting for Kevin McCarthy for Speaker because he’s just a shill of The Establishment.

The reason most of my Republican colleagues are supporting him is because they benefit from the redistribution of lobbyist & special interest money from McCarthy to their campaigns. pic.twitter.com/bdJmjwy6W7

— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) December 27, 2022

McCarthy also got into an argument with Rep. Perry, who accused McCarthy of having no track record on spending bills.

Perry & McCarthy got in a heated back and forth, even raising their voices-

Perry accused McCarthy of not having a track record on spending bills “You have no track record.”

McCarthy asked Perry what he is still fighting for

With @mkraju @MZanona

— Annie Grayer (@AnnieGrayerCNN) January 3, 2023

McCarthy’s supporters chime in:

In addition to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), McCarthy has the support of neocon Dan Crenshaw (R-TX), who has called McCarthy’s detractors “enemies” and “narcissists.”

“They are enemies now. They have made it clear that they prefer a Democrat agenda than a Republican,” Crenshaw told CNN‘s Manu Raju.

“This handful of members is very clearly looking for notoriety over principle. That’s what it is. And anyone who suggests differently is in some kind of make believe fantasy reality. It’s not, it’s not true,” he continued, adding “They lost those debates.”

“That should have been the end of it because that’s how a team works, right? But if you’re a narcissist, … then you’ll keep going. And you’ll threaten to tear down the team for the benefit of the Democrats just because of your own sense of self importance.”

“We will not vote for anyone else but McCarthy,” Crenshaw said. “These people think they’re stubborn, we’re more stubborn.”

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) January 3, 2023

Another McCarthy supporter, Mike Rogers (R-AL), said the GOP should bar McCarthy dissenters from getting committee slots – an idea Chip Roy didn’t like. 

CHIP ROY and MCCARTHY just got into it. @chiproytx Roy said he tried to negotiate on rules. McCarthy thanked him for handling it respectfully and said Roy should say yes more.

— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) January 3, 2023

Here’s Roy in December explaining the situation;

According to Axios, this could become a war of attrition in which “[a] good number of pro-McCarthy House Republicans are hoping some of the holdouts are bluffing and looking for a show — and will ultimately get worn down enough during the process to cave for McCarthy.”

Do you remember who made a formal nomination speech in support of KEVIN McCARTHY to be SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE on January 3, 2019?

*****It was your new best friend LIZ CHENEY*****

And now you know why Kevin McCarthy did not get a criminal referral to DOJ from the @January6thCmte!! pic.twitter.com/vhYmQEoWLV

— Don Winslow (@donwinslow) January 3, 2023

The likely candidate to replace McCarthy, in the unlikely event he pulls out, is Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA), who said he won’t run against McCarthy but has been quietly preparing for this scenario.

It doesn’t look like McCarthy is too worried…

GOP Leader McCarthy has moved into the speakers suite but if he fails to secure 218 he will have to move all his stuff back out ⁦@AllieRaffa⁩ pic.twitter.com/Lb2swMgQ2p

— Haley Talbot (@haleytalbotnbc) January 2, 2023