The Cleveland Browns shut down their facility for the second time in five days due to positive COVID-19 tests within the organization.
The southern African state has recorded a surge in cases since the end of the festive season.
Infosys (NYSE: INFY), a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting, today announced the launch of Infosys Cortex, its customer engagement platform. The platform leverages technology from Genesys, a global leader in cloud customer experience and contact center solutions, along with Contact Center AI services from Google Cloud and its managed artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics services.
Forty years ago, on January 20, 1981, Ronald Reagan was sworn in for the first time as president of the United States. He faced turmoil at home and abroad: His Democratic predecessor, Jimmy Carter, had presided over the worst recession since the Great Depression, staggering rates of inflation and unemployment, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Iran hostage crisis, and a mood of defeatism and exhaustion in the aftermath of the Vietnam War and Watergate. Despite all this, Reagan laid out a bracing vision of American renewal in his inaugural address. In language both plain and stirring, he appealed to the “moral courage of free men and women,” asking Americans to rededicate themselves to noble purposes. Rejecting the dreary politics of national self-loathing practiced by the Left, he revived the concept of American exceptionalism to unite and embolden a dispirited citizenry. Though Carter’s campaign against Reagan devolved into personal attacks, Reagan never responded in kind. He thanked Carter, sitting stone-faced behind him, for offering “gracious cooperation in the transition process.” In a stunning reminder of how profoundly America’s political culture has changed, he said to Carter: “Mr. President, I want our fellow citizens to know . . . you have shown a watching world that we are a united people pledged to maintaining a political system which guarantees liberty to a greater degree than any other.” Reagan never missed an opportunity to educate the world about America’s democratic achievements. Anticipating a rising tide of identity politics and tribalism, Reagan defended the common good. He lauded the American democratic ethos that, in times of crisis, knows no ethnic or racial divisions. “All of us together, in and out of government, must bear the burden,” he said. “The solutions we seek must be equitable, with no one group singled out to pay a higher price.” The key was to recover a vibrant, dynamic free-market economy. This objective — not massive government spending and tax increases — was the surest path to providing “equal opportunities for all Americans with no barriers born of bigotry or discrimination.” Though it’s easy to forget at this historical distance, Reagan spoke to the populist and egalitarian impulses that continue to shape American political life. He decried the stagnant economy that “crushes the struggling young and the fixed-income elderly alike” and “threatens to shatter the lives of millions of our people.” The unemployed, he said, had been plunged into “human misery” and “personal indignity,” while those who work faced a punitive tax system that harassed them and held them back. Reagan praised ordinary citizens — the “men and women who raise our food, patrol our streets, man our mines and factories, teach our children, keep our homes, and heal us when we’re sick: professionals, industrialists, shopkeepers, clerks, cabbies, and truck-drivers” — for their quiet courage in serving others. This was more than campaign rhetoric; it was an outlook on American civic life forged from the experiences of being born into a poor family in a small Midwestern town, living through the Great Depression, and witnessing the nation’s resilience during the Second World War. In one moment, Reagan declared that “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” In the next, he pledged that “your dreams, your hopes, your goals are going to be the dreams, the hopes, and goals of this administration, so help me God.” Long before George W. Bush coined the term “compassionate conservatism,” Reagan envisioned a government in partnership with its citizens, one ready “to stand by our side, not ride on our back.” Together, they would care for the neighbor in need: “We shall reflect the compassion that is so much a part of your makeup,” he said. “How can we love our country and not love our countrymen; and loving them, reach out a hand when they fall, heal them when they’re sick, and provide opportunity to make them self-sufficient so they will be equal in fact and not just in theory?” It is worth remembering that Reagan began his political journey as a Democrat and voted four times for Franklin Roosevelt. As he saw it, however, the party of FDR had gradually abandoned the concept of personal responsibility for the false security of the paternalistic state. Here, perhaps, was his attempt to realize, on conservative terms, a political society that takes care of its most vulnerable. For the first time in American history, the inauguration event was held on the west side of the Capitol, thus facing the direction that had always symbolized the American future. (“We go westward as into the future,” wrote Thoreau, “with a spirit of enterprise and adventure.”) Looking out over the crowd of half a million people, Reagan could see the monuments to Washington and Jefferson. Beyond the Reflecting Pool sat the Lincoln Memorial, the marble temple of the Great Emancipator, the man who embodied both the tragedy and nobility of the American story like no other. Reagan’s simple tribute seems deeply relevant in our age of rage: “Whoever would understand in his heart the meaning of America will find it in the life of Abraham Lincoln.” Gazing beyond the monuments, Reagan drew attention to the graves at Arlington National Cemetery, representing “only a tiny fraction of the price that has been paid for our freedom.” He praised the American heroes who fought and died at the Argonne, Omaha Beach, Guadalcanal, Pork Chop Hill, “and in a hundred rice paddies and jungles of a place called Vietnam.” The reference to Vietnam touched a nerve: Reagan despised the Left for treating Vietnam veterans with contempt; he was determined to valorize them instead. America would be prepared to defend its democratic way of life on the world stage, Reagan declared, just as it always had done. “As for the enemies of freedom . . . they will be reminded that peace is the highest aspiration of the American people. We will negotiate for it, sacrifice for it; we will not surrender for it, now or ever.” The principle of “peace through strength,” important from the earliest days of his political life, would undergird his entire foreign policy. The world was already getting the message, too: Historians debate the circumstances, but even as Reagan spoke the Iranians were putting their 52 American hostages on a plane home. Reagan’s liberal critics were wrong about him and about nearly every important political issue on which they opposed him: the dynamism of free-market capitalism, the power of democratic ideals, the nature of Soviet communism, the strategy for peacefully ending the Cold War. The progressive Left, to this day, remains in a state of denial about the man and his achievements. Some conservatives, too, seem to have forgotten Reagan’s political and moral insight. They have no memory of the fearsome cultural opposition he faced — or how he overcame it. They deride those who seek a return to his political philosophy, accusing them of dispensing “Reagan bromides” and engaging in nostalgia to evade present-day realities. Yet, as Reagan liked to say, “facts are stubborn things.” After his first term in office, with the American economy roaring back to life and the Soviet Union in steep decline, he won a second term, prevailing in 49 out of 50 states — one of the greatest electoral landslides in American political history. Behind these facts are lessons for the intellectually curious. Like no other political leader, Reagan united all of the major currents of modern conservatism: free-market economics, individual responsibility, limited government, a strong national defense, patriotism, populism, civic virtue, and faith. He made American exceptionalism his lodestar. Viewed objectively, his oratory — his natural eloquence, historical awareness, and moral clarity — rivals that of the greatest statesmen of the last century. Reagan neither bullied the American people nor treated them as hapless victims. He proved that the best way to move hearts and minds was to articulate a political philosophy: clearly, compellingly, and with a touch of humor that could disarm even his toughest critics. Reagan wrote the first draft of his inaugural address and made sure that every line bore his imprint. He closed the speech with a story about sacrifice for a noble cause. As he quoted from the diary of Martin Treptow, an American soldier in the First World War, his voice cracked with emotion: “America must win this war. Therefore I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice, I will endure, I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost, as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone.” In the aftermath of last week’s riot in the Capitol, it is blindingly clear that the promise of America — the concept of government by consent of the governed — is under attack. Thus, Reagan’s vision is needed more than ever. Indeed, the outcome of this struggle depends upon its revival: on ordinary Americans, united by their love of country, fighting to preserve the world’s most daring experiment in human freedom.
A pandemic that has killed more than two million people worldwide and the threat of insurrectionist violence will make today’s presidential inauguration of Democrat Joe Biden unlike any inauguration in American history. There will be no massive crowds, and likely no debates over crowd size. The National Mall will be closed to the public. And to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the traditional inaugural parade will be replaced by a celebrity-filled virtual event. There are 25,000 National Guard troops in Washington D.C., which has become a maze of fencing, concrete barriers and check points. They are there to discourage and prevent violence on the heels of the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol by a mob of supporters of President Donald Trump, who has refused to accept defeat and has continued to repeat baseless allegations that the November election was stolen from him through fraud. The FBI is doing additional screening of all of the National Guard troops in D.C. in an attempt to root out any members who could pose a threat, the Associated Press reported. Thousands of troops are also guarding statehouses across the country. Another difference with this year’s inauguration: the outgoing president will not be there. Trump, who is expected to depart D.C. for Florida at 8 a.m., will be the first president in more than 150 years to skip his successor’s inauguration. The last was Andrew Johnson, another impeached president, who didn’t attend the inauguration of Ulysses Grant, according to the White House Historical Association. Biden has said it is “a good thing” Trump isn’t attending. The inauguration events are expected to kick of at 10 a.m. with a virtual “Inaugural Celebration for Young Americans.” Biden is expected to arrive at the U.S. Capitol at 11 a.m., and will be sworn in as the nation’s 46th president at noon. Biden will be sworn in on the west front of the U.S. Capitol building, which is surrounded by a seven-foot-tall fence. Former presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton are expected to attend with their wives, as is Vice President Mike Pence. Pop star Lady Gaga is slated to perform the National Anthem, and Jennifer Lopez is scheduled for a musical performance, according to the Presidential Inaugural Committee. Country music star Garth Brooks also is expected to perform. The star power at Biden’s inauguration is in stark contrast to Trump, who struggled to recruit top-tier performers for his inauguration. “This is a great day in our household. This is not a political statement, this is a statement of unity,” Brooks said during a press conference Monday, according to several media reports. “This is history, and it is an honor to get to serve.” After he is sworn in, Biden is expected to participate in a Pass in Review ceremony, a military tradition that reflects the peaceful transfer of power to a new president. Biden, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and their spouses will then head to Arlington National Cemetery for a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Biden will then receive a military escort to the White House. The virtual “Parade Across America” at 3:15 p.m. will be hosted by actor Tony Goldwyn, a Biden supporter who played the president on the television show “Scandal.” The virtual parade will feature planned appearances by comedian Jon Stewart, Olympic athletes, marching bands and dance groups. Curiously, it also will feature a performance by the reunited alt-rock band New Radicals, a one-hit wonder from the late 1990s, and an appearance by Nathan Apodaca, who gained Tik Tok fame last year after he recorded himself skateboarding to work with a bottle of cranberry juice while listening to Fleetwood Mac. The Idaho Falls native was living in a Walmart parking lot at the time, but has since bought a house after receiving a flood of donations. The inaugural events will conclude with a primetime television special hosted by Tom Hanks, and featuring performances by Jon Bon Jovi, Demi Lovato, Justin Timberlake and others. The special will be carried by most of the largest TV networks. There was no similar event four years ago celebrating Trump’s inauguration. In addition to the pomp and circumstance, Biden also is expected to implement a series of day one executive actions, including ending Trump’s restriction on immigration from Muslim-majority countries, rejoining the Paris climate accords, extending a pause on student-loan payments, and mandating masks on federal property and during interstate travel. He also has promised to “cancel” the Keystone pipeline on his first day in office.
Exclusive: Flaws in rules for travellers were pointed out before they took effect
Intramural debates on the future of Republican economic policy are often framed as taking place between those who want to preserve small-government orthodoxy and those who blame free-market fundamentalism for many of the economic problems facing the country, from slow productivity growth to deindustrialization. But there’s one policy choice that both tax-cut devotees and reformist conservatives can join to remedy: the Tax Reform Act of 1986, or TRA86. This reform — passed with enormous support from both parties in Congress — is often pointed to as a success of bipartisanship and a relic of a more functional Washington. To be sure, the law included some good reforms, such as shutting down several tax-shelter strategies. But the changes TRA86 made to the corporate-tax code ended up raising taxes on investment in heavy industry and contributing to the decline in American manufacturing and reducing growth. First, some context. The corporate-income tax is ideally a tax on corporate profits, or revenues minus costs. In a perfect world, the cost of investment in a factory would be deducted in the year it is made, just like the cost of salaries. In reality, however, while calculating book income, investment costs are spread out over what is deemed to be the life of the asset, in order to match the cost of the investment with the revenue it generates. While that might make sense for an accountant, it creates economic problems. Thanks to inflation and the time value of money, deductions for an investment five years from now are worth less than deductions today, so companies cannot deduct the real value of their investments as they do with labor or administrative costs. This imbalance creates a tax bias against capital-intensive industries such as manufacturing. The first set of “Reagan tax cuts,” the 1981 Economic Recovery Tax Act (ERTA), expanded the investment-tax credit by implementing the accelerated cost-recovery system. Under this system, companies could spread the costs of numerous types of investment in equipment, machinery, and structures over shorter periods of time, and deduct a larger share of those costs sooner. These changes helped encourage capital investment, albeit aided by the concurrent decline in inflation. However, persistent problems with the tax code led to the demand for additional systemic reform in the mid-1980s, which ultimately culminated in the passage of the 1986 tax reform. The debate over whether to lower the corporate-tax rate or maintain ACRS was central to the debate. As Jeffery Birnbaum, author of Showdown at Gucci Gulch: Lawmakers, Lobbyists, and the Unlikely Success of Tax Reform, wrote on the 20th anniversary of the bill’s passage, “light” industries such as wholesalers preferred a lower rate, while the heavy industries preferred to keep accelerated depreciation. In the end, the light industries won. TRA86 reduced the corporate-income-tax rate from 46 percent to 34 percent but extended the depreciation schedules for several types of assets. The act increased the depreciation periods for numerous types of equipment, from industrial machinery to cars, aircraft, and railway parts, from five years to seven years, and did away with the provisions allowing companies to deduct a larger share of the costs in earlier years. However, the biggest increase came for structures. Commercial structures (whether office buildings, warehouses, or industrial centers) had to be deducted over 31.5 years, instead of over 19. Similarly, residential structures had to be deducted over 27.5 years instead of the preceding 19. Norman Ture, an architect of the 1981 tax cuts, referred to 1986 reform as “the Deindustrialization Act of 1986” the year after its passage. After TRA86, investment in most asset classes underperformed expectations. And in 1993, to add insult to injury, the depreciation schedules for commercial structures were increased to 39 years. Since then, there have been several temporary measures granting what’s called “bonus depreciation” to allow companies to deduct some investments faster (most usually equipment and machinery), the most recent example of which was included in 2017’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. So far, most empirical analyses of these past temporary reforms have shown they increased investment, as well as productivity and wages. These changes should be made permanent. No matter where you stand on internal conservative policy debates, whether you want to stimulate manufacturing specifically or you just want to cut taxes, fixing depreciation by allowing capital investment to be deducted immediately should fit your interests.
GoGold Resources Inc. (TSX: GGD) (OTCQX: GLGDF) ("GoGold", "the Company") is pleased to release the results of its initial Preliminary Economic Assessment ("PEA") at its Los Ricos South Project located in Jalisco State, Mexico.
Ault Global Holdings’ Coolisys Power Electronics Opens Sales Las Vegas Office for Its ACECool™/ACECool™ Hybrid Fast-Electric Vehicle Charging Systems
Academy Securities, a registered broker-dealer, certified Disabled Veteran Business Enterprise (DVBE), and Minority Business Enterprise (MBE), today announced the addition of David Dwyer to the firm. Mr. Dwyer joins Academy after spending 20 years at J.P. Morgan Securities as a Managing Director in North American Leveraged Finance. Mr. Dwyer is also a U.S. Coast Guard Veteran and U.S. Coast Guard Academy graduate. While at J.P. Morgan, he structured and underwrote high yield bonds and leveraged loans for both corporate and financial sponsor clients.
ProPetro Announces Preliminary Selected Unaudited Financial Data for Q4 2020 and Investments in Lower Emissions Technology - Earnings Release Date
The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (NYSE: BK) today announced that its Board of Directors authorized dividends on its common and preferred stock as follows:
Recently, the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) implemented new efficiency standards for residential furnaces, setting the minimum airflow efficiency requirement for such equipment, in order to reduce the consumption of electricity. Owing to such measures, the U.S. HVAC services market is set to grow from $25,625.8 million in 2019 to $35,714.5 million by 2030, at a 3.1% CAGR between 2020 and 2030, according to P&S Intelligence.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - January 20, 2021) - Chakana Copper Corp. (TSXV: PERU) (OTCQB: CHKKF) (FSE: 1ZX) (the "Company" or "Chakana"), is pleased to announce a non-brokered private placement of 20,000,000 common shares of the Company at a price of C$0.50 per common share for gross proceeds of up to C$10 million (the "Private Placement"). The Company is reserving the right to increase the Private Placement to issue a total of up ...
PureEdge Lighting, a manufacturer of high quality, personalized lighting solutions, has partnered with BIMsmith®, the leading platform for building product research and selection, to provide a new suite of Building Information Modeling (BIM) tools for architects and lighting designers.
Marijuana stocks have been on fire lately. If -- and it's a big "if" -- legalization did happen, it would create the world's biggest cannabis industry with over $100 billion in annual sales. In the past month, the Horizons Medical Marijuana Life Sciences ETF (TSX: HMMJ), a leading indicator of pot stocks, is already up over 12%.
The global tally for confirmed cases of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 climbed above 96.2 million on Wednesday, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University, while the death toll rose above 2.05 million. The U.S. has the highest case tally in the world at 24.3 million and the highest death toll at 401,777, or about a fifth of the global total. The U.S. added at least 105,870 new cases on Tuesdayaccording to a New York Times tracker , and counted at least 2,770 deaths. The U.S. has averaged 20,117 new cases a day in the past week. Texas is emerging as a new hot spot alongside California, and hospitals in towns close to the Mexican border are reported to be filling fast. President-elect Joe Biden held a memorial service for American COVID victims late Tuesday with a light display at the reflecting pool at the Lincoln Memorial. Brazil has the second highest death toll at 211,491 and is third by cases at 8.6 million. India is second worldwide in cases with 10.6 million, and third in deaths at 152,718. Mexico has the fourth highest death toll at 142,832 and 13th highest case tally at 1.7 million. The U.K. has 3.5 million cases and 91,643 deaths, the highest in Europe and fifth highest in the world.
President Trump granted clemency to former White House aide Stephen Bannon as part of a wave of pardons and commutations issued in his final hours in office, but he did not pardon himself, members of his family or lawyer Rudy Giuliani.
(Bloomberg) -- Gold gained as the dollar eased following comments from President-elect Joe Biden’s cabinet nominees on the greenback, the merits of massive stimulus, and the outlook for trade.U.S. Treasury Secretary nominee Janet Yellen told the Senate Finance Committee that a slew of state spending was needed to fight the coronavirus pandemic, while playing down concerns about the debt it creates. U.S. bond yields eased from Tuesday’s high and inflation expectations rose as she spoke, and held near those levels on Wednesday. Both have climbed since the start of the year.Gold has edged lower in the opening weeks of 2021, after rallying last year, as higher yields and prospects for an economic recovery curbed the metal’s appeal as a haven. Bullion is now trading near its 50- and 200-day averages as investors weigh the outlook for rebounding economies against the potential for a weaker dollar and higher consumer prices.“Gold has been facing headwinds from a strong U.S. dollar and higher real rates so far this year,” said Stephen Innes, chief market strategist at Axicorp. Ltd. Still, “maximum stimulus overdrive” and a slightly weaker dollar paint an encouraging backdrop for gold prices provided real rates oblige, he said.Spot gold rose 0.7% to $1,853.56 an ounce by 11:05 a.m. in London. Silver, palladium and platinum climbed as well, while the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index was 0.2% lower.Yellen also disavowed using exchange-rate policy to weaken the dollar, a difference from outgoing Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, while not saying she backs a “strong” dollar. On trade, several cabinet picks signaled the new administration would continue some of Donald Trump’s hard-line policies toward China. Antony Blinken, the choice for secretary of state, said the U.S. should bar goods made in Xinjiang.(An earlier version of this story corrected location of timestamp)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2021 Bloomberg L.P.
The "Second-Life Automotive Lithium-Ion Battery Market Research Report: By Type, Vehicle Type, Application - Global Industry Analysis and Growth Forecast to 2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
