Epoch INSIGHT Issue 15 by The Epoch Times

CAN OIL SURVIVE THE ‘WOKE’ REVOLUTION? By Nathan Worcester

FEBRUARY 4–10, 2022 | $6.95

NO. 5

Editor’s Note

The ‘Woke’ Revolution Oil industry insiders describe it as a new “license to operate.” Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) scores, which are increasingly used to judge valuation, are being imposed on the fossil fuel industry. Enforced by private companies, such as banks and investment firms, the scores could determine whether a business can attract financing. One expert described the ESG index as a “Chinese-style social credit score for rating corporations.” “Woke planners wield the ESG Index to reward the in-group and to squeeze non-woke players out of the market, driving ownership and control of production away from the noncompliant,” scholar Michael Rectenwald said. The scores are already having a real-life impact on the oil industry. BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager, has made clear that sustainability is something “every management team and board will need to consider” in terms of how it will “impact their company’s stock.” Its CEO also asked every company to provide a plan to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. Critics have already pointed to the “political concerns and incentives” behind this new push. Read this week’s cover story to see how ESG scores are “quite real and quite serious,” as one chief economist put it, and how they are expected to impact America's fossil fuel industry. Jasper Fakkert Editor-in-chief

2 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

JASPER FAKKERT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF CHANNALY PHILIPP LIFE & TRADITION, TRAVEL EDITOR CHRISY TRUDEAU MIND & BODY EDITOR CRYSTAL SHI HOME, FOOD EDITOR SHARON KILARSKI ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR

ON THE COVER The oil industry is no stranger to regulation, but now it’s facing a whole new force: environmental, social, and governance ratings, enforced by private corporations. ROBYN BECK/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

BILL LINDSEY LUXURY EDITOR FEI MENG & BIBA KAJEVICH ILLUSTRATORS SHANSHAN HU PRODUCTION CONTACT US THE EPOCH TIMES ASSOCIATION INC. 229 W.28TH ST., FL.7 NEW YORK, NY 10001 ADVERTISING ADVERTISENOW@EPOCHTIMES.COM SUBSCRIPTIONS, GENERAL INQUIRIES, LETTERS TO THE EDITOR HELP.THEEPOCHTIMES.COM (USPS21-800)IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY THE EPOCH MEDIA GROUP, 9550 FLAIR DR. SUITE 411, EL MONTE, CA 91731-2922. PERIODICAL POSTAGE PAID AT EL MONTE, CA, AND ADDITIONAL MAILING OFFICES. POSTMASTER: SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO THE EPOCH TIMES, 229 W. 28TH STREET, FLOOR 5, NEW YORK, NY 10001.

vol. 2 | no. 5 | february 4–10, 2022

26 | Unvaccinated

49 | CCP Crackdown

Teachers Thousands of NYC teachers on unpaid leave are awaiting court decisions.

Beijing’s regulatory winds are turning against big tech firms.

50 | Doom and Gloom Here’s how to deal with the naysayers in our lives.

36 | Border Security The U.N. is giving out “humanitarian cash” to U.S.-bound migrants.

51 | Life Lessons

A music pastor teaches kids not to give up and to help others.

38 | Forest

Management A new study suggests that sparser forests are more resilient.

52 | Q&A With Bob

Features

40 | Nigerian Massacre Terrorists massacred 18 villagers and burned houses as 30 soldiers stood by.

44 | Lobbyists

Powerful Washington figure Tony Podesta indirectly helps evil regimes.

45 | CCP Control

Beijing plans to censor and control the metaverse.

46 | Labor Market

Why are many women who worked before COVID-19 remaining at home?

47 | Policies & Impacts Have lockdowns in the U.S. and Europe reduced COVID-19 mortality?

48 | US Economy

Could the Fed’s tightening trigger another recession?

Woodson The focus on racism ignores America’s critical problems.

12!|!!DeSantis’s Florida Florida’s governor talks about states’ constitutional powers to protect individual rights.

56 | Iconic Kiwi Style

16!|!!Oil Industry Pressure New “environmental, social, and corporate governance” scores are changing the oil industry.

58 | Northern Wales

THE LEAD

30!|!!FBI Oversight Recent filings highlight IG Horowitz’s failure to cooperate with Durham’s special counsel investigation. New York police officers gather for the funeral of officer Jason Rivera in Manhattan on Jan. 28. Rivera and and fellow officer Wilbert Mora were shot on Jan. 21 while responding to a domestic dispute in Manhattan. Rivera, 22, died on the night of the shooting. Mora, 27, succumbed to his wounds on Jan. 25. ANGELA WEISS/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

An estate on the Tasman Sea offers easy, laid-back living.

Small and easy to get around, Wales offers stunning scenery.

60 | Claim Your Island How to make having your very own private island a reality.

63 | Bon Appetit!

A sampling of unique kitchen tools relied upon by pro chefs.

66 | Set an Alarm

These clocks make staying on time easy and entertaining.

67 | It’s a Date

Dating can sometimes be tricky, so here are some tips. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

SPOTLIGHT UNTOUCHED FOR MILLENNIA AN ANCIENT NABATAEAN CARVED tomb at the archaeological site of al-Hijr (Hegra), Saudi Arabia, on Jan. 31. Dating back to the first century B.C., the archaeological site includes 111 monumental tombs. Hegra was left practically undisturbed for almost 2,000 years, until Saudi Arabia opened the site to tourists. PHOTO BY THOMAS SAMSON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

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Visit THEEPOCHTIMES.COM 6 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

NAT ION • WOR L D • W H AT H A P P E N E D T H I S W E E K

The Week

No.05

Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz testifies before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Dec. 18, 2019. PHOTO BY SAMUEL CORUM/GETTY IMAGES

Durham Filing Rebuts IG’s Cellphone Claim DESANTIS ON STATES’ Constitutional Powers 12

UNVACCINATED NYC Teachers Living in Limbo 26

UN GIVING ‘HUMANITARIAN Cash’ to US-Bound Migrants 36

INSIDE I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The Week in Short US “The teaching of critical race theory, or the kind of teachings that would separate kids or discriminate [against] kids based on race, is a violation of their civil rights.” — Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.)

“[Build Back Better] is dead. If we’re talking about the whole big package, that’s gone.” — Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)

Not only did America’s private employers fail to add any jobs in January, but payrolls actually dropped by more than 300,000 that month, payroll processor ADP reports.

PERCENT A poll by ABC News and Ipsos indicates that 75 percent of Americans have a negative assessment of the economy.

$30

TRILLION America’s ballooning national debt has exceeded the $30 trillion mark for the first time ever, according to Treasury Department data.

499 RESIDENCES A total of 499 registered voters claimed storefront addresses as their legal residence in Arizona’s Maricopa and Yuma counties. Of that figure, 110 voted in the 2020 election, according to a study by the Public Interest Legal Foundation.

2 RECALLS—The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has issued a Class 1 recall—the most

serious type—of two COVID-19 tests, CovClear COVID-19 Rapid Antigen and ImmunoPass COVID-19 Neutralizing Antibody Rapid tests, made by Empowered Diagnostics. The tests aren’t approved by the FDA, even though the tests’ labels indicate that they are. 8 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

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301,000 JOBS

The Week in Short US TRUMP

Donald Trump: ‘We Have to End the Mandates’ MANDATES RELATED TO

MANDATES

Virginia Superintendent Mask Mandate Violates Governor’s Order A VIRGINIA PUBLIC SCHOOLS superintendent has ordered children to wear

masks and principals to suspend any who refuse to comply, in direct violation of an executive order by Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Fairfax County Public Schools Superintendent Scott S. Brabrand posted two messages about mask wearing, one being a public message informing parents and students that the “regulation requiring universal masking remains in place.” Another, private message to school administrators ordered principals to suspend or expel any student who refuses to wear a mask. Youngkin signed on Jan. 15 an executive order stating that “the parents of any child enrolled in [an] elementary or secondary school ... may elect for their children not to be subject to any mask mandate in effect at the child’s school or educational program." ELECTION

North Carolina to Release Records Showing Foreigners Voted R ECOR DS THAT SHOW foreigners

registered to vote—and actually voted in North Carolina elections—will be disclosed by the state’s board of elecAbsentee ballots at the Mecklenburg tions as a result of its legal settlement County Board of Elections office in with electoral integrity group Public Charlotte, N.C., on Sept. 4, 2020. Interest Legal Foundation. The announcement came weeks after Garbant Piquant of Garner, North Carolina, was arrested and charged with falsely claiming to be a U.S. citizen in order to register to vote, voting by an alien, and passport fraud. Authorities say the Bahamas native voted in every primary and general election from 2018 through 2020.

COVID-19 are wrong and should be rescinded, former President Donald Trump told The Epoch Times in an exclusive interview. “We have to end the mandates,” Trump said in an interview with The Epoch Times’ “Kash’s Corner.” “They have to be ended, and they shouldn’t have started.” Trump was president when SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, emerged in China in late 2019. Under Trump, the federal government didn't impose vaccine or mask mandates, but some states and counties required masks, including California. Under President Joe Biden, many jurisdictions began requiring COVID-19 vaccines. HEALTH

Investigation Discloses More NIH Animal Experimentation INJECTING BEAGLE PUPPIES

with cocaine is the latest in a series of taxpayer-funded experiments on animals disclosed by the nonprofit watchdog group White Coat Waste Project (WCW). Documents obtained by WCW disclose that the National Institutes of Health spent $2.3 million in taxpayer funds to keep dogs infused with an “experimental compound” of drugs that included cocaine. Experiments that ran from September 2020 to September 2021 and March 2020 to March 2021 were filmed to observe for adverse reactions, WCW reported. The experiments were contracted to SRI International, Nieves said, which WCW revealed in 2021 as the institute that was de-barking beagles by cutting their vocal cords so that the dogs couldn’t bark, howl, or cry during an experiment. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The Week in Short World UK

UK Ready to Sanction Russia, Johnson Warns THE UK AND ITS WESTERN

Peruvian President Pedro Castillo speaks during an event in Lima, Peru, on Dec. 5, 2021. PERU

Peru’s President Suggests Offering Sea Access to Bolivia PERU’S SOCIALIST PRESIDENT Pedro Castillo made cryptic remarks during

AUTISM

‘Signiﬁcant Association’ Between Screen Time and Autism in Boys: Study RESEARCH CONDUCTED by the University of Yamanashi in Japan indicates a

“significant association” between longer screentime for boys at 1 year of age and being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) when they are 3 years old. The research team, led by Megumi Kushima, encouraged a review of the health effects of screen time on infants and to control “excessive” screen time. The prevalence of children diagnosed with ASD at 3 years of age was 392 per 100,000, or around 0.4 percent, with boys found to be three times more likely to be diagnosed with ASD than girls and with no significant association for girls. An increase in screentime also correlated with a higher likelihood of being diagnosed with ASD, with a ratio of 1.38 for children exposed to screentime of less than one hour per day, 2.16 for those exposed to less than two hours, and 3.02 for those exposed for four hours or more. “Among boys, longer screen time at one year of age was significantly associated with autism spectrum disorder at three years of age,” the authors wrote. 10 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

EUROPE

Inﬂation in Eurozone Spikes to Record High INFLATION IN THE EUROZONE

notched a record high in the year through January, the European Union’s statistical agency reported, delivering a surprise for forecasters who predicted a significant easing of price pressures. Prices rose by 5.1 percent in the 12 months through January in the 16 European nations that share the euro currency, according to Eurostat. That’s the highest reading in the history of the data series and a far higher number than the 4.4 percent predicted by economists.

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a live interview about potentially granting a sea outlet to the landlocked nation of Bolivia. Castillo indicated he’d heard the cry for equal access from their southern neighbor, then added he’d “consult the people” of Peru through a referendum without giving further details. When asked about the reaction his proposal might provoke, Castillo said: “I don’t care about that. I’ve come to do the will of the Peruvian people.” Predictably, the president’s comments triggered an immediate outcry within the country. It’s the latest in a series of debacles and administrative missteps for the embattled head of state.

allies are ready to launch sanctions against Russia “the moment the first Russian toecap crosses further into Ukrainian territory,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said. Speaking at a joint press conference in Kyiv with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Feb. 1, Johnson said the UK and allies “will always stand up for freedom and democracy and Ukrainian sovereignty in the face of aggression.” Johnson said the build-up of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border was possibly the greatest act of hostility toward Ukraine "in our lifetimes.”

World in Photos

1. People gather for a Lunar New Year celebration at Vihara Satya Dharma temple in Denpasar, Indonesia, on Feb. 1. This year is the year of the tiger. 2. Fabien Rajon (front), lawyer for Jennifer CleyetMarrel, mother of Maelys de Araujo, speaks to the press during the trial of Nordahl Lelandais, at the courthouse in Grenoble, France, on Jan. 31. Lelandais is accused of the August 2017 abduction and murder of 8-year-old Maelys. 3. Fishermen’s boats burn after a fire broke out in the harbor in Tegal, Indonesia, on Jan. 29. 4. A family looks at strong waves ahead of the passage of tropical cyclone Batsirai, in Saint-Benoit, on the island of La Reunion, on Feb. 2. 2.

4. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Ron DeSantis ON STATES’ CONSTITUTIONAL EXCLUSIVE

POWERS TO PROTECT INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS By Bree Dail

hile some states —primarily those under politically left-leaning administrations—continue to enforce strict mandates two years into the pandemic, others such as Florida have maintained relative autonomy in economic and social freedoms. In an interview with The Epoch Times, conducted by e-mail, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis discussed his state’s policies and his approach to keeping the state open to economic prosperity by the limitation of government-enforced COVID-19 mandates. He also talked about how America’s constitutional framework ensures that states have the power to protect individual rights. THE EPOCH TIME S: Sir, we have

12 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

we knew very little about COVID. Now, in the second year of the pandemic, we have empirical evidence and can use it to make data-driven policies. Lockdowns have not worked to contain the virus, and we will be learning more about the harmful side effects for years to come. Likewise, mask mandates have not been proven to affect the spread or prevalence of COVID. In Florida, we’ve ruled out lockdowns and restrictions, and masking is a personal choice, not a requirement. Parents have the right to choose whether their own kids wear masks to school or not. No matter how we’d evaluate “15 days to slow the spread” in hindsight, this temporary measure should never have become “three jabs to keep your job.” No one should lose their livelihood because of these COVID jabs. In Florida, we’re making sure that people have a right to earn a living, people have a right to protections in their place of employment, and parents are able to direct the upbringing of their kids. And if you look at what we’re doing today, Florida is leading. The legislation passed in the special session earlier this month is the strongest law that has been enacted anywhere in the country in this regard. The Biden vaccine mandates are egregious examples of unconstitutional federal overreach. We live in

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now witnessed nearly two years of world crisis, in which governance has gone from proactive response to maintenance, and perhaps manipulation. What is the proper role of the national government in a biological crisis, and do you believe mandates—whether it be President Donald Trump’s “15 days to slow the spread” or President Joe Biden’s (now overturned) vaccine requirements for business— were necessary?

“The shutdowns have contributed to inflation, because Congress has passed multiple trillion-dollar spending bills.”

GOV. RON DESANTIS: In early 2020,

A view along Ocean Drive in Miami Beach, Fla., on Jan. 24. Amid the pandemic, DeSantis has strived to keep Florida open to economic prosperity. PHOTO BY JOE RAEDLE/GETTY IMAGES

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Nation Florida

the United States of America. In our constitutional system, the states are the primary vehicles to protect people’s freedoms, their health, their safety, and their welfare. What Biden is doing is not constitutional. There has never been a federal vaccine mandate imposed on the general public. When I was in the military, they used to give me all kinds of stuff, but that’s much different than imposing it on civilians in society. It’s never been done before. The federal government doesn’t have the power to do it. There’s no federal police power; states have the police power. So that’s from a constitutional perspective. In Florida, some local governments wanted to lock down businesses. They wanted to force mandates. They wanted to keep the kids locked out of school. I overruled them on that. The fact of the matter is, you don’t have the right to do wrong. I was elected to look out for the liberties of everyone in the state. If we had let them lock the kids out of school last year, we would have paid the piper on that for years and years in this state. If we had let them lock down businesses and restrict and do all that, we would have one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. So we had to stand up for people’s liberties, their livelihoods, their right to work, to operate their businesses. And it was the right thing to do.

14 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

THE EPOCH TIMES: How did shut-

ting down the country impact the economy, in your view? Have these measures led to inflation? MR . DESANTIS: There’s no question

that lockdowns harmed the economy immensely. Just think about all the people whose livelihoods depend on having an open economy. Fauci was railing about the restaurants, probably sometime around the end of summer 2020. And I’m just thinking to myself, “He wants all this closed—and I’m going to highlight what this means.” So I did an event at a steakhouse down in South Florida, and we had the owner there [saying], “Thanks, Governor DeSantis, for business,” but we also had the butcher there. He’d been there 24 years, and he said, “I won’t be able to feed my family if we’re not open.” I had the bartender there, too. I had the servers, I had all these people throughout the organization come through. And in a state like Florida, if we had done a California lockdown, it would have been devastating because we have a service-based economy: tourism, leisure, lodging, parks, restaurants. A lot of Floridians cannot do their jobs on Zoom. So we were able to keep those afloat. In fact, in August of 2021, tourism in Florida did better than in August of 2019—pre-COVID. Hotel reservations, receipts in terms of revenue, restaurant reservations. So it just shows you that freedom works, and look, people vote with their feet. The shutdowns have contributed to inflation, because Congress has passed multiple trillion-dollar spending bills. When the federal government prints money like this, it causes inflationary pressure and erodes the value of the dollar. More reckless spending and

DeSantis has taken a hard stance to limit government-enforced COVID-19 mandates.

printing money will only make inflation worse. In recent history, different countries have experienced hyperinflation, and this is what causes that dangerous phenomenon. THE EPOCH TIMES: We are seeing

a rise in oil, heat, housing, and food prices. Historically, what has remedied this—and do you think the Biden administration is doing its part? What would you propose? MR . DESANTIS: Inflation is some-

thing that I was talking about a while back. And the White House was saying that this wasn’t real inflation, that this would not happen. And now we’re seeing it’s real. This has been going on for many, many months. This Thanksgiving was the most expensive Thanksgiving that we’ve seen in quite some time. It’s over a 20 percent increase just from last year, for families throughout the country. And of all the things where you’re seeing with the inflationary pressures, probably none have pinched people as bad as these gas prices that have been going up. So we’ve got folks that are commuting, we’ve got families that have obligations, and that just eats into their budgets. We’ve got job openings, we’ve got a lot

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DESANTIS SAYS THAT LOCKDOWNS HAVE NOT HELPED ‘CONTAIN THE VIRUS’ AND ‘HARMED THE ECONOMY IMMENSELY’.

Biden admitted he doesn’t have the authority to enact national vaccine mandates. Even six months ago, Biden and [Dr. Anthony] Fauci were saying, “Of course, you never mandate.” So the question is, do we actually have a Constitution that constrains people like Biden? Or is it just when he loses patience, he can do whatever he wants? I’ll take the Constitution.

Nation Florida

20 PERCENT The average family's Thanksgiving expenses were 20 percent higher than in 2020.

MR . DESANTIS: We don’t have lock-

of creating jobs, and that’s great. We’re doing our part here in Florida. But if the national economy has this inflation, even people that are earning more in income, if the inflation is outstripping your additional earnings, then you’re actually losing ground. Why the federal government would want to be printing trillions of dollars more in the midst of inflation, you’ll have to tell me how that makes sense. That’s not going to help. So, the Biden Administration at first tried to deny that inflation was happening, then said it was transitory and would resolve quickly, and now, reckless federal spending and money printing–championed by Biden–is making inflation even worse. He cannot deny it anymore, but it doesn’t look like he has a plan to address it. Though states obviously cannot control the money supply or federal spending, we do have an obligation to do what we can in Florida to push back against those pressures that we’re seeing come down out of Washington. We want to see $1 billion of gas tax relief for Florida motorists and families. And that will be something that will make a difference. It’s clearly not going to eliminate all the inflation-related price increases, because gas prices have gone up so much due to the Biden administration’s

policies, but the relief we’re fighting for will make a difference in Floridians’ pocketbooks. And I think we’re going to get a lot of good support for that. THE EPOCH TIMES: Forecast for

2022, what do you see as the future for the economy under continued COVID measures, and do you anticipate a national “vaccine passport” or quarantines for unvaccinated as seen in Austria?

downs, restrictions, or COVID mandates in Florida, and we have ruled out those policies going forward. Vaccine passports are illegal in Florida. Florida will continue to be America’s engine of growth and a beacon of opportunity for hardworking people from all over the country. But as long as the Biden administration continues to push these unscientific, irrational, job-killing policies, we will not see the kind of economic recovery that Americans want and deserve. If Biden and Fauci had their way, our country would become a biomedical security state. But fortunately, America’s constitutional framework ensures that states have the power to protect individual rights. Floridians do not have to worry about vaccine passports restricting their movement or draconian quarantines and lockdowns. This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Florida did a lot better in tourism in 2021 than in 2019 pre-pandemic by not implementing lockdowns, according to DeSantis. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

BUSI

OI INDUS Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Jan. 31. PHOTO BY SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES

16 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

FACES CREDIT

Critics argue that the new ‘envi governance’ scores are a Ch

NESS

IL USTRY SOCIAL SCORES

ronmental, social, and corporate inese-style social credit tool

By Nathan Worcester I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The Lead Energy

18 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

questions about the new primacy of ESG, arguing it can be a tool for exercising political control over the business world. “Just as non-woke individuals are canceled from civic life, so too will non-woke companies be canceled from the economy,” scholar Michael Rectenwald said in his Jan. 29 remarks to the Common Sense Society. “The [ESG] Index is a Chinese-style social credit score for rating corporations. “Woke planners wield the ESG Index to reward the in-group and to squeeze nonwoke players out of the market, driving ownership and control of production away from the noncompliant.” Rectenwald drew attention to BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s 2021 and 2022 letters. In his 2021 letter, Fink said that greater investment in what he called “sustainability-focused companies” meant that “every management team and board [would] need to consider how this [would] impact their company’s stock.” Fink’s 2021 letter also asked every company to provide a net-zero plan. BlackRock has had major stakes in fossil fuel companies; in 2021, it was reportedly the largest shareholder in Shell, and it’s also a major shareholder in ConocoPhillips. BlackRock didn’t respond to a request for comment from Insight. Alex Cranberg, chairman of the oil and gas firm Aspect Holdings, told Insight in an email that some aspects of ESG are penalizing U.S. companies for political reasons. “If an American company produces less, it just means that some other country like Qatar or Russia produces the oil or gas, or even that some more highly polluting fuel such as coal or wood is burned,” he said. “This makes zero sense, but U.S. oil companies are being denied capital by some banks, multilateral lending agencies, public pension funds, and university endowments. “Of course, these investors are the ones most likely to be motivated by political concerns and incentives. “ESG, in general, should actually have a positive impact on the U.S. oil and gas industry because U.S. operators are the most efficient and environmentally careful operators in the world.”

Internationalist Origins Rectenwald compared Fink’s 2021 shareholder letter to a 2020 article from Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, in which Schwab vowed: “Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed. In short, we need a ‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.” The internationalist, or globalist, nature of ESG is nothing new. In fact, the term “ESG” originated through a collaboration between the United Nations, the Swiss government, and a group of major banks that included Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse Group, and Goldman Sachs. In 2004, that group produced a report, “Who Cares Wins,” which asked financial institutions, companies, investors, pension funds, regulators, and others to incorporate ESG into their thinking

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nvironmental, social, and corporate governance—better known as ESG—is the order of the day in big business. According to its advocates, ESG rating provides investors with useful information on risks arising from climate change, pollution, and other environmental issues. Yet much of that information isn’t financially material. BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, notes on its webpage on “ESG Integration” that ESG information typically falls under “non-accounting” data: “It captures components important for valuations that are not traditionally reported.” The oil industry, long the bane of environmentalists, is no exception to this trend. At the recent Argus Americas Crude Summit in Houston, industry insiders gave the impression that ESG is a fait accompli. George Millas, CCO of EPIC Midstream, told the crowd of industry professionals that ESG is “like a license to operate.” “It’s like safety. We can’t ignore it,” he said. Ryan Lance, CEO of ConocoPhillips, told Argus Media’s Matthew Oatway, “You better have a Paris-aligned 2050 net-zero plan to take care of your own emissions that you create as a company—and that goes to the ESG.” Asked by Argus’s Stephen Jones whether ESG scores are valued properly, ConocoPhillips Chief Economist Helen Currie was direct: “I think they’re quite real and quite serious. “The evidence is showing that more and more operators are taking those requirements and those metrics quite seriously, and looking to better understand, ‘How do I understand how to integrate this into my business?’” she said. ESG and related environmental goals are already shaping major deals in the industry. In September 2021, ConocoPhillips purchased all of Shell’s Permian Basin interests for approximately $9.5 billion. Shell’s net-zero 2050 emissions target was cited as one key factor in the sale by Morningstar analyst Allen Good, as reported in S&P Global. Yet some commentators have raised

The Lead Energy

Oil-storage tanks in Carson, Calif., on April 25, 2020.

about prospective investments. Since then, the U.N. has developed a number of other environmental agreements to which large financial institutions have sworn allegiance. One is the U.N. Environment Programme’s (UNEP’s) Principles for Responsible Banking, which the program describes as “a unique framework for ensuring that signatory banks’ strategy and practice align with the vision society has set out for its future in the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Climate Agreement.” Roughly 45 percent of world banking assets are beholden to the principles, which were first introduced in 2019. Thirty-six banks that committed to that agreement are also signatories to the U.N.’s 2019 Collective Commitment to Climate Action (CCCA). With $16 trillion in worldwide assets, the banks have committed to setting a sector-level target for oil and gas, as well

“Just as non-woke individuals are canceled from civic life, so too will non-woke companies be canceled from the economy.” Dr. Michael Rectenwald, scholar

as other “carbon-intensive sectors,” to comply with the Paris Agreement and aim for net-zero by 2050. Insight reached out to the UNEP for comment on whether CCCA signatories are effectively required to divest some assets from oil and gas companies, but didn’t hear back by press time. In 2021, the CCCA was supplanted when the U.N. launched a new program in anticipation of the Glasgow climate conference: the Net-Zero Banking Alliance. The alliance includes 102 banks with $67 trillion in global assets—equivalent to 44 percent of worldwide banking assets. Signatories such as Citi, the Goldman Sachs Group, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and JPMorgan Chase have declared their intention to transition their portfolios in line with a goal of net-zero emissions by 2050. One bullet point in the alliance’s commitment statement notes that signatories should focus on sectors emitting the most greenhouse gases, while a subsequent bullet point directs signatories to follow the same sector-level target guidance as the CCCA. The commitment statement even tells signatories to “[facilitate] the necessary transition in the real economy through prioritising client engagement.” Mark Campanale, founder and executive chairman of the Carbon Tracker Initiative, believes such coordinated global efforts are steering capital in the right direction. “Initiatives such as GFANZ, the Glasgow Finance Alliance for Net Zero, have $130 trillion committed to net-zero pathways. These institutions can’t get to those goals by funding more fossil fuels. And with the clean energy revolution well underway,” he told Insight via email. While the specific term “ESG” originated with the U.N. and high finance, it has a number of progenitors. One is the so-called triple bottom line, a concept brought fully to life by British environmentalist and entrepreneur John Elkington. In his 1997 book “Cannibals With Forks: The Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business,” Elkington argued that three “bottom lines”—environmental quality, social justice, and, most conventionally, profit—were starting to guide large businesses at that point in time. In 2018, however, Elkington issued a I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The Lead Energy

“product recall” of the concept through an article in Harvard Business Review. He argued that triple bottom line adopters weren’t doing enough to question the economic system as a whole. “The TBL wasn’t designed to be just an accounting tool. It was supposed to provoke deeper thinking about capitalism and its future, but many early adopters understood the concept as a balancing act, adopting a trade-off mentality,” Elkington wrote at the time. “My view on ESG is that we are seeing a feeding frenzy at the moment with the financial markets seeing this as a getout-of-jail card,” Elkington told Insight in an email. Elkington believes that coal, oil, and gas are on the verge of being displaced: “The combination of solar, wind, and battery innovations looks set to undermine the economics of fossil fuels. “I also think that the evidence of climate chaos is going to press on much more ferociously than most analysts predict. A perfect storm, you might conclude, for the likes of ExxonMobil. They can promise to go net-zero by 2959, but the tide of history is turning—and they are on the wrong side of it. They will bleed capital, insurance cover, talent, and political influence.” ExxonMobil didn’t respond to a request for comment. Cranberg, of the oil and gas company Aspect Holdings, told Insight he would make a million-dollar wager with Elkington: “The value of the world’s oil, gas, and petrochemical production will be higher in 10 years [even adjusted for inflation] than it was in 2021.” Elkington’s perspective on oil and gas, though stark, may still place him in the moderate wing of environmentalism. In November 2021, Canadian environmental activist David Suzuki told protestors that “pipelines will be blown up” if Canada’s government doesn’t take steps in connection with climate change.

Harder to Drill Argus’s Oatway asked ConocoPhillips CEO Lance about the impact of ESG on financing for new drilling. Lance said that not enough capital is currently reaching upstream projects— in other words, the actual extraction and 20 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

production of oil in the United States and the wider world. “It’s probably 50 percent of what it needs to be globally long term,” he said, adding that the lack of capital from investors could make for a “messy transition” to an energy balance with fewer fossil fuels. Lance told Oatway that the cumulative impact of various regulations and proposed measures is significantly impeding his industry in the United States. “They’re basically energy illiterate on the Hill,” he said. Cranberg, of Aspect Holdings, disagreed. “I don’t think this is actual economic illiteracy except in a few cases; it’s politics,” he told Insight. The Biden administration paused new oil and gas leasing on federal lands and waters in 2021. The administration went on to hold its first offshore leasing sale in November 2021. On Jan. 27, however, U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras, an Obama appointee, ruled in favor of the Sierra Club and various other environmental groups; he threw out the leases, stating that the Department of the Interior didn’t properly calculate new greenhouse gas production as a result of the sale. With the rise of the Net Zero Alliance and similar consortia, which now control significant chunks of the world’s banking assets, another new hazard has emerged for oil and gas: namely, the possibility of debanking. That financial pressure is particularly acute in Europe. Bloomberg reported that European banks have curtailed their services to fossil fuel companies, citing comments from Jacob Gyntelberg of the European Banking Authority. Other legal risks have emerged as well. In June 2021, a Dutch court ordered Shell to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions a net 45 percent by 2030, as compared to its 2019 emissions, in a ruling that environmentalist Bill McKibben wrote “could be game-changing” on Twitter. Shell decided to appeal the ruling. Even with the rise of ESG, fossil fuel prices have risen—and so have the profits for many oil companies. Chevron, for example, enjoyed its most profitable year since 2014.

$67

TRILLION

The Net Zero Banking Alliance includes 102 banks with $67 trillion in global assets—equivalent to 44 percent of worldwide banking assets.

Higher energy costs have started to provoke widespread anger. At the Argus summit, Currie of ConocoPhillips alluded to the yellow vest protests in France, sparked by rising energy costs.

The Lead Energy

$100

PER BARREL

KAREN DUCEY/ GETTY IMAGES

Some analysts predict the price of Brent crude will hit $100 per barrel by the summer.

Environmental activists protest the arrival of the Polar Pioneer, an oil drilling rig owned by Shell Oil, in Seattle on May 14, 2015.

“It’s not imaginary, what you’re seeing,” she said. Some have blamed fossil fuel companies for the recent energy price hikes. “The cause of rapidly rising energy prices for consumers and manufacturers is clear: some of the nation’s largest and most profitable oil and gas companies are putting their massive profits, share prices, and dividends for investors, and

ter denouncing the sector. Campanale, of the Carbon Tracker Initiative, told Insight that divestment from fossil fuel companies was reasonable despite those firms’ profitable recent quarters. “Investors are pulling away from funding fossil fuel expansion where projects or company plans are not consistent with investors own net-zero commitment,” he said.

millions of dollars in CEO pay and bonuses, ahead of the needs of American consumers and the nation’s recovery from the pandemic,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wrote in a November 2021 let-

“Whilst energy demand continues its long-term growth, investors are looking to make sure this demand is met from renewables, not fossil fuels. “In addition, particularly during I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The Lead Energy

BlackRock has had major stakes in fossil fuel companies; in 2021, it was reportedly the largest shareholder in Shell, and it is also a major shareholder in ConocoPhillips.

periods of low prices such as we’ve seen in the last few years, the fossil fuel producers have not been making money. If these companies can’t make money, they shouldn’t be surprised if the investors aren’t there.” By contrast, Andrew Thornton, a senior fellow at the Mises Institute, sees the industry’s financial situation as indicative of hostility from the state. “Any industry that is experiencing a surge in profits but having trouble accessing capital is usually in the situation

22 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The object is elimination.” BlackRock and the Biden administration didn’t respond to requests for comment. Lance told Oatway he thinks the Biden administration wants to create uncertainty about the oil industry for prospective investors, thereby discouraging them from allocating capital to it. “I think it’s the atmosphere that this administration wants, but they don’t want the consequences that come from this,” he said, predicting that the costs of gasoline diesel, heating oil, and natural gas will rise over the short run. The federal Energy Information Administration (EIA) has projected that the price of oil will slowly decline, predicting on Jan. 12 that the price of Brent crude oil, a key global benchmark, will fall from $79 per barrel in the fourth quarter of 2021 to $75 per barrel in 2022 and $68 per barrel in 2023. If it does fall, that downward path may be volatile. In late January, the price of Brent crude

FROM L: BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES, PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Even with the rise of ESG, fossil fuel prices have risen— and so have the profits for many oil companies.

where future profits are being threatened by the government with either higher taxes or more onerous regulations of some sort. That is the situation with oil,” Thornton wrote in an email to Insight. “If there were no such threats, then there would be plenty of investment, normal profits, and low prices. Oil and energy are vital to economic output and progress, and they are already huge taxpayers! And yet we teach our children that they are bad. “What the world needs to focus on is lower food and energy prices via increased production.” Rectenwald thinks the one-two combination of ESG scoring and increasing energy costs is no coincidence. “The ESG Index is contributing to the rise in gas and oil prices, which is an intended consequence,” he said. “BlackRock Inc’s Larry Fink and the Biden administration want to drive up the costs of carbon-based commodities so that they are finally driven out of the market.

The Lead Energy

exceeded $90 per barrel at least once, with some analysts projecting it will reach $100 per barrel by the summer, according to Irina Slav of OilPrice.com. The EIA didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Where Does ESG End? Like Rectenwald, Thornton worries about the political uses of ESG. “ESG gives the appearance of objectivity, but it is really unscientific lipstick for purposes of taxation, control, and ideological (and political) pursuits,” Thornton wrote. “At best, they discourage certain types of environmental harm and encourage other types of environmental harm. All of these environmental efforts are very high on costs and very low on benefits, and for many reasons are irrational.” Those other types of environmental harm, he wrote, include the underexamined costs of wind energy. “Coal and oil energy is better for the economy, i.e., people, and their impacts are known and have been curbed,” he wrote. “Economic costs, benefits, and uncertainties, along with science, seem to be ignored by ESG. ESG seems to follow ideological guidelines.” Consolidation has emerged as another theme in the oil industry—and, on some accounts, another consequence of ESG scoring and similar pressure from finance. “I think consolidation needs to occur,” Lance said. Ozzie Pagan, of Macquarie, predicted that “smashcos”—companies consolidated by private equity firms—will continue to proliferate in the United States, eliciting agreement from other speakers on his panel. He pointed to “banks pulling back and putting pressure” as one explanation for the trend. Rectenwald thinks that ESG requirements could be part of a push toward “corporate socialism,” justified by the euphemistic language of “stakeholder capitalism.” “The ESG Index serves as an admissions ticket for entry into the woke cartels,” he said in his remarks to The Common Sense Society. “The tendency of woke capitalism is toward monop-

olization—vesting as much control over production and distribution in these favored corporations as possible, while eliminating industries and producers deemed either unnecessary or inimical. “Woke stakeholder capitalism does not advance socialism as such. Rather, it tends toward corporate socialism. “In extreme versions, it amounts to capitalism with Chinese characteristics—an authoritarian state directing the for-profit production of state-sanctioned corporate entities.” Campanale sees it differently. “Helping investors to protect their capital and make more informed decisions with a greater range of data and analysis is a good thing. Investing blind whilst ignoring the facts of the energy transition is helpful to no one,” he wrote. “Telling investors in canals when railroads arrived to look the other way; or telling investors in the wireless to ignore television; or more recently, telling shareholders in Blockbuster video to ignore livestreaming and Netflix, would all have been recipes to lose your shirt/your money!” Some have sounded the alarm about ESG score-like metrics for individuals. Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck cited Bank of America subsidiary Merrill Lynch, which he said has started to

issue ESG scores to some customers. Bank of America, a member of the Net Zero Banking Alliance, didn’t respond to requests for comment from Insight. In an August 2021 LinkedIn post, David Cox, a digital strategy and sustainability professional at Microsoft, mused on the possibilities of applying ESG to people. (Microsoft often tops lists of companies by ESG rating.) Cox began by stating that while “scientific consensus says humans contribute to a warmer planet ... pressure seems more on businesses to transform.” “ESG scores are assigned to businesses based on their ESG performance. This can provide easier access to sustainable finance and improve market capitalization. Why not do the same for individuals?” he wrote. Cox didn’t respond to a request for comment. Cranberg told Insight he wouldn’t be shocked at the development of personal ESG ratings. “Scoring and taxing an individual’s personal carbon footprint would of course be highly invasive, but could generate lots of cash, which is always attractive to politicians,” he wrote. “The question is whether the politicians would be able to pass legislation that exempted themselves and their own private aviation!”

ConocoPhillips CEO Ryan Lance says not enough capital is currently reaching upstream projects— in other words, there’s not enough funding for the actual extraction and production of oil in the United States and the wider world. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

24 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

SPOTLIGHT ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION PROTEST A DEMONSTRATOR SITS UNDER an umbrella while blocking an access route to Iquique, Chile, on Jan. 31. Chilean protesters have been rallying against the increase in crime that some associate with illegal immigration. PHOTO BY DIEGO REYES/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

N E W YO R K C I T Y

Unvaccinated NYC Teachers Living in Limbo Thousands of unvaccinated teachers, on unpaid leave since last fall, are awaiting DOE, court decisions

By Dave Paone

AT THE END of last summer, the Education De-

partment decided that teachers didn’t need to be vaccinated, but would require a weekly test, Lyakhnovich said. “Which a lot of us—we weren’t happy about, but, fine, we’ll compromise,” she said. But a few weeks later, the rule was changed so all teachers needed to be vaccinated by the end of September, and violators would be put on unpaid leave, she said. Lyakhnovich says the department accepted 26 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Unvaccinated elementary school teacher Nadia Lyakhnovich in front of a New York Department of Education building.

applications for religious and medical exemptions, although the requirements for each were nearly impossible to meet (such as being in the third trimester of pregnancy), and “about 99 percent of people got rejected” for their religious exemptions. The department offered the unvaccinated teachers two options. The first was they could quit, they would be paid for all remaining sick days, have health insurance for a year, but could not sue the department. The alternative allowed teachers to stay on unpaid leave, have health insurance for a year, and they still couldn’t sue. “We refused to sign either package,” said Lyakhnovich. THEY ALL APPLIED for unemployment insur-

“I want to have children in the future, and I just didn’t trust this vaccine.” Nadia Lyakhnovich, special education teacher

ance, she said, but only a few were accepted. Although the Dec. 1 date for unvaccinated teachers to be fired has passed, they remain on unpaid leave. Meanwhile, Lyakhnovich was told that while on unpaid leave, technically they’re not supposed to work on the books at all. She said that isn’t true. Rachel Maniscalco was an English and special education teacher in Staten Island at both the middle school and high school levels. At the time the vaccines were made available to the public, Maniscalco was pregnant with her second daughter and didn’t think there was enough data to warrant taking one. Maniscalco said a preliminary study by the New England Journal of Medicine showed a high

FROM TOP: DAVE PAONE/THE EPOCH TIMES, COURTESY OF STEPHANIE EDMONDS, DAVE PAONE/THE EPOCH TIMES

housands of new york city teachers who refused to receive the mandated COVID-19 vaccination were put on unpaid leave last fall and were told by the city’s Department of Education that they’d be terminated on Dec. 1, 2021, if they didn’t acquiesce. That date has come and gone with no action from the department, leaving the teachers still employed, but unpaid and in the dark about their future. Nadia Lyakhnovich, who was a special education teacher in East Harlem, is one of the teachers to be removed from the classroom. “I want to have children in the future, and I just didn’t trust this vaccine,” Lyakhnovich told Insight. “I had a friend who took it and it messed up her entire menstrual cycle. ... She also took a booster shot recently and she didn’t get her period for months.” Lyakhnovich, 32, also didn’t want the jab because there are no long-term studies of it yet, and the survival rate from the virus is extremely high. “So I didn’t see the point of getting this shot,” she said.

Education Pandemic Policies

rate of miscarriages and stillbirths to expectant mothers who were vaccinated; plus, she was already at a high risk of miscarriage. That was enough for her to decline to take the jab. Meanwhile, she is a participant in three lawsuits. One is a class action against the city’s health and education departments and the NYC Mayor’s Office. Maniscalco is officially named as the plaintiff representing unvaccinated teachers. The grounds of the lawsuit are that the mandate is unconstitutional. THE SECOND LAWSUIT is similar but

Global history teacher Stephanie Edmonds in her Bronx classroom, before she was put on unpaid leave.

Three-time plaintiff and unvaccinated New York teacher Rachel Maniscalco and her daughter Julia.

One concern that an NYC teacher has about the vaccine is that there are no longterm studies of it yet. Meanwhile, the survival rate from the virus is extremely high.

represents tenured teachers, who argue that because not getting the jab doesn’t violate their contract, they should be put on paid leave. Nicole Broecker is named as the plaintiff and the United Federation of Bronx, her savings are keeping her Teachers has been added to the list of afloat. She had always made it a habit defendants. to save money, and she thanks her parManiscalco is a lone plaintiff in ents for instilling that in her. the third lawsuit, which has several Over her five years as a full-time of the same defendants. However, in teacher, Edmonds found ways to bring this one, she’s citing a breach of labor in extra money while still working in laws, rather than a violation of the U.S. the school system, such as teaching Constitution. over the summers. The Education Department is show“I kind of knew this was coming, so ing no signs of making a I saved all my summer decision, and the lawsuits, school money,” she told all filed late last year, Insight. might drag on for months, “I can hold the line a litleaving these teachers in tle while longer.” a state of limbo. OF STAFF When Maniscalco was IF THE SITUATION drags had their religious first put on leave, she on for months, she feels exemptions rejected, spent a lot of time atthat driving for Uber Eats a teacher says. tending and speaking at or Amazon Flex may be in protests, sometimes up to her future. In the meanthree per week. She also became the time, she uses her time to participate face of the cause, giving interviews on in protests against the mandate as well national and cable news, as well as local as prayer vigils. New York stations. But Edmonds is a history teacher at heart. She would rather be teaching, I T T O O K T WO months for Maniscal- so she’s taken to YouTube to do just co’s unemployment payments to kick that—producing short videos of global in, so she worked temporary jobs, such history lessons. as bartending, tutoring, and as a recepHowever, Edmonds sees this chapter tionist at a tax preparer. Her husband of her life as a spiritual event. works full-time for a shipping compa“God is calling me and the other peony near John F. Kennedy International ple who are holding the line to build Airport. something, to make something,” she For Stephanie Edmonds, who taught said. “I feel like this is God calling me 10th-grade global history in the South home in a way.”

99%

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

R E A L E S TAT E

Best Markets for First-Time Homebuyers Communities in Utah, Nebraska, and South Carolina top the list By Mary Prenon

28 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

“A lot of younger people may not be able to afford homes in those downtown areas, but the surrounding communities do offer some great options for these ﬁrst-time homebuyers.” George Ratiu, manager of economic research, Realtor.com

Known for its easy access to the lakes and mountains, Magna has become a huge draw for outdoor enthusiasts. The Realtor.com report also notes that new home construction is booming in Magna, offering more options for home shoppers. In addition, the community has been gaining a reputation as a fast-growing tech industry hub. “Magna has also had both a strong economic growth and recovery during the pandemic,” Ratiu said. “The area has attracted a lot of California companies and residents.” Michael Wolters of The Stern Team, Keller Williams Real Estate in Salt Lake City, wasn’t surprised that Magna topped the list. “In terms of population growth, Utah was second to Idaho last year, and over the past 10 years, Magna has experienced a lot of revitalization,” he told Insight. Wolters said many of the homes in Magna date back to the 1800s, when the area was settled by people working at the nearby Kennecott Copper Mine. “Magna was always known as a blue-collar town, but in the past decade, we’ve seen a lot of new homes constructed and older ones getting a facelift,” he said. “Within the last three to four years, we’ve also seen a lot of new multi-family properties like apartments, condos, and townhomes.” In Magna, he said, where “affordability is the name of the game,” the median sales price of a single-family home remained at $371,500 over the past year. With an average time on the market of just five days, the area has been a destination for people who want to be near Salt Lake City but can’t afford the higher prices there. “The median price now for a single-family home in Salt Lake County is over $500,000,” Wolters said. Condos and townhomes are selling for an av-

FROM TOP: JCA IMAGES/SHUTTERSTOCK, COURTESY OF THE STERN TEAM, KELLER WILLIAMS, SALT LAKE CITY

hat do magna, utah; Mauldin, South Carolina; and Cottage Grove, Wisconsin, have in common? All three of these unassuming communities are listed on Realtor.com’s first annual “Top 10 Best Markets for First-Time Homebuyers Report.” Magna, a Salt Lake City suburb with a population of 26,500 (2010 Census) actually snagged the No. 1 spot on the list, based on criteria including affordable homes, plentiful jobs and young people, shorter commutes, and lots of choices for food and drink venues. Magna lies about 20 miles west of Salt Lake City. Completing the top five list in order of ranking are Chalco, Nebraska; Mauldin, South Carolina; Beech Grove, Indiana; and Portsmouth, Virginia. In preparing the report, Realtor.com ranked 1,112 cities and locations with a population of more than 5,000, taking into account the share of 25- to 34-year-olds in the local population. The report also measured the availability of homes for sale, local job opportunities, and affordability, estimated by the ratio of listing prices to gross incomes of that age group in each locale. Cottage Grove, Wisconsin, took sixth place, followed by Grimes, Iowa; then Kuna, Idaho; with Ferndale, Michigan, at No. 9; and Maitland, Florida completing the list. “We looked at places that were close to larger metro areas and major employer centers,” George Ratiu, Realtor.com manager of economic research, told Insight. “A lot of younger people may not be able to afford homes in those downtown areas, but the surrounding communities do offer some great options for these first-time homebuyers. We cast a wide net and captured places that might not be very well known.” Ratiu indicated that Salt Lake City has been emerging as one of the fastest-growing local markets, and nearby Magna has become a popular satellite community.

Salt Lake City, Utah, has been emerging as one of the fastestgrowing local markets.

erage of $250,000 for a two- or three-bedroom unit, while the rental market is also hot, with rents ranging from $1,500 to $2,000 for one- or two-bedroom units. Wolters and his team deal with a lot of firsttime homebuyers, with a mix of local residents and those from out of state. “When the pandemic started, we saw an influx of people from California to our area,” he said. “A lot of them were able to buy a home for cash after selling their high-priced homes in California.” The Salt Lake area, he believes, will continue to be a very desirable market given the housing options, cost of living, low unemployment, and growing economy. The area also offers several ski resorts and national parks. According to the Realtor.com report, more than 15 percent of Magna is home to the 25- to 34-yearold age group, and the average work commute is just 26 minutes. Some of the other locations listed on the report also find themselves in the shadow of larger, more well-known areas such as Indianapolis, Omaha, Virginia Beach, and Orlando. Maitland, Florida, coming in at No. 10 on the list, is just 20 miles north of Orlando and is known for its popular lakes, good schools, and homes on large lots. While the area is considered a more high-end suburb due to its proximity to Winter Park, newcomers from New York and California may consider the median $500,000 single-family home price to be a bargain. “The biggest influx of our clients has been from New York and California, where people are paying so much for rentals or housing and now realize they can buy a really nice home with low property taxes for less money,” Paul Young of Young Real Estate told Insight. Young, a U.S. veteran, started his own firm just four years ago in Casselberry, Florida, just a few

A single-family home in Magna, Utah, is listed at $374,000.

15% PEOPLE

in the 25–34 age group make up more than 15 percent of the population in Magna, Utah.

miles from Maitland. Since COVID-19, Young and his team have seen a huge migration to central Florida; currently, there are only 32 homes in Maitland now available on the market. While there are some condos and townhomes that do come onto the market occasionally, most of the properties in Maitland are single-family homes. Maitland also offers many lakefront properties, contributing to its popularity. “Those homes typically sell for close to or over $1 million,” Young said. “We’ve experienced a large increase in property values over the last two years.” Young has seen his business grow as well, with almost 200 agents now and a ranking as one of the top 10 independent brokerages in the county. His clients include a mix of first-time homebuyers, retirees, and international buyers. Ratiu said: “All of these communities on our list are the winners that we have observed, and I think you’re going to see a lot more first-time homebuyers flocking to them. A lot of millennials are thinking about starting families, and they want more affordable options with good local schools.” I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

DURHAM FILING REBUTS

IG’S CELLPHONE CL A IM Recent filings highlight IG Horowitz’s failure to cooperate with Durham’s special counsel investigation By Jeff Carlson & Hans Mahncke

Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz arrives to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington on Dec. 11, 2019. PHOTO BY WIN MCNAMEE/GETTY IMAGES

NE W S A N A LYS I S SUPPLEMENTAL COURT

filing by special counsel John Durham confirms previous reporting that Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General Michael Horowitz concealed crucial information from Durham in connection with two separate investigations—the ongoing prosecution of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann and the criminal leak investigation of former FBI general counsel James Baker. The Jan. 28 filing by Durham updated the court on precisely when Durham first learned of two cellphones that had been used by Baker while he was with the FBI. The existence of these phones was first mentioned in a Jan. 25 filing, in which Durham claimed that the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) had failed to disclose its possession of two FBI cellphones belonging to Baker. Following the Jan. 25 filing, Horowitz’s office apparently told Durham that the existence of one of the cellphones may have been mentioned on a conference call that took place four years ago. “The OIG Special Agent had a conference call with members of the investigative team, including Mr. Durham, during which the cellphones likely were discussed,” reads the Jan. 28 court filing. However, Durham stated in the filing that not only did he not recall the conference call, but also he had no knowledge of Horowitz’s possession of Baker’s cellphones before being informed of their existence by a separate investigative team within the FBI on Jan. 6. Notably, Horowitz was unable to say with certainty whether Baker’s phone was even mentioned on the Feb. 12, 2018, conference call. Moreover, at the time of the conference call, Horowitz’s office was not in possession of either of Baker’s cellphones. While Horowitz did gain possession of Baker’s phone several days later, on Feb. 15, 2018, there’s no record that he informed Durham. Nor is there any record of subsequent communications between Howowitz’s office and Durham regarding

the Baker phone. This despite the fact that Durham was conducting a criminal leak investigation into Baker at around the same time that Horowitz gained access to Baker’s cellphone. Although it isn’t currently known when Horowitz took possession of a second Baker cellphone, there appears to have been no follow-up from either Horowitz or Durham at the time, suggesting that neither of the phones had ever been mentioned to Durham. This is further supported by the fact that as recently as Jan. 5, Durham was seeking Baker’s “call log data” from the FBI’s Inspection Division, suggesting he didn’t know about Horowitz’s possession of Baker’s phones. While Horowitz’s objection to Durham’s Jan. 25 filing may have been intended to deflect from his office’s disclosure failures, the latest filing raises further questions. Even if Horowitz’s new claims about the alleged 2018 conference call were true, this wouldn’t have absolved him from disclosing this information in 2021, when he was formally requested by Durham to do so. However, the most significant revelation contained in the supplemental filing is that Horowitz didn’t object to the other assertions made by Durham in his Jan. 25 filing. That filing highlighted Horowitz’s failure to cooperate with Durham’s special counsel investigation. In addition to not disclosing the existence of Baker’s cellphones, Horowitz also failed to disclose that he and his general counsel had personally met with Sussmann regarding a “cyber matter” in March 2017, and Horowitz may have failed to disclose the identity of a Hillary Clinton-connected individual who provided the underlying data to Sussmann that led to the in-person meeting. All of these undisclosed facts are crucial to Durham’s case against Sussmann. Notably, Durham didn’t learn about this information from Horowitz, but rather from other sources, including Sussmann himself.

Horowitz’s Lack of Disclosure, Meeting With Sussmann On Oct. 13, 2021, Durham’s office formally requested that Horowitz provide “all documents, records, and information” in the OIG’s possession regarding Sussmann. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

In Focus Investigation

32 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Special counsel John Durham speaks at a conference in New Haven, Conn., on Sept. 20, 2018. Joffe, a computer expert with close connections to the FBI, is of great import to Durham’s case against Sussmann and to the wider investigation into the origins of the Russia collusion investigation. Joffe was named by Durham in the September 2021 indictment of Sussmann as the “Tech Executive” who allegedly “had exploited his access to non-public data at multiple Internet companies to conduct opposition research concerning Trump.”

A L L OF T HE PR E V IOU SLY UNDIS CL O SED FAC T S F ROM HOROW I T Z A R E CRUCI A L T O DUR H A M ’S C A SE AG A INS T SU S SM A NN.

According to the indictment, Sussmann and Joffe had “coordinated with representatives and agents of the Clinton campaign” with regard to the false data about contacts between the Trump Organization and the Russian Alfa Bank. Those alleged contacts were then used by Hillary Clinton and her campaign to push the narrative that Trump was compromised by the Kremlin. It remains unknown how or why Sussmann and Joffe were privy to the internet activities of the as-yet-unnamed OIG employee or why Sussmann felt the need to personally brief Horowitz about these activities. Upon learning on Jan. 20 of Horowitz’s personal briefing from Sussmann, Durham immediately reached out to Horowitz for clarification. On Jan. 22, Horowitz responded to Durham’s inquiry, confirming to Durham that Sussmann’s assertion was correct— Horowitz had indeed met with Sussmann in March 2017. As Durham was careful to note in his Jan. 25 filing, Horowitz hadn’t previously informed Durham’s office of

FROM TOP: COURTESY OF THE U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE FOR THE DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT, SAMIRA BOUAOU/THE EPOCH TIMES

Durham also requested any transcripts or other documents within Horowitz’s possession that contained certain search terms related to Sussmann. However, according to Durham’s Jan. 25 filing, the only thing Horowitz’s office produced prior to mid-December 2021 was “relevant transcripts of interviews” conducted by Horowitz’s office during its review of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation into alleged collusion between Donald Trump’s campaign and the Russian government. On Dec. 17, 2021, Horowitz produced one additional item, a forensic report on the “cyber matter” that Sussmann had reported to the OIG in March 2017, specifically that one of Sussmann’s clients “had observed that a specific OIG employee’s computer was ‘seen publicly’ in ‘Internet traffic’ and was connecting to a Virtual Private Network (VPN) in a foreign country.” When Horowitz provided this report to Durham, Horowitz told Durham’s team that he “had ‘no other file[s] or other documentation’ relating to this cyber matter.” Durham’s office then provided this written forensic report to Sussmann’s defense team six days later, on Dec. 23, 2021. But in a Jan. 20 discovery conference call between Durham’s prosecution team and the defense, Sussmann’s lawyers informed Durham’s team that Horowitz had withheld crucial information, specifically that Sussmann had met personally with Horowitz in March 2017 when he brought the “cyber matter” information to OIG. Critically, the OIG employee whose internet activity had been monitored by Sussmann’s client appears to have been important enough to warrant a direct meeting with Horowitz, raising further questions as to this individual’s identity. It’s also notable that Sussmann’s March 2017 meeting with Horowitz took place shortly after Horowitz announced on Jan. 12, 2017, that, due to congressional requests, he was initiating an investigation into events surrounding the 2016 election. Sussmann’s visit with Horowitz also followed shortly after Sussmann had pushed derogatory information about Trump to the CIA in February 2017. Moreover, Sussmann’s attorneys informed Durham’s team during this same Jan. 20 conference call that Sussmann’s client who developed the “cyber matter” information was Rodney Joffe.

In Focus Investigation

his meeting with Sussmann. Three days later, on Jan. 25, Durham made his initial filing, which disclosed, in part, how Horowitz had withheld key evidence from Durham. The follow-up Jan. 28 filing by Durham has provided additional details and dates regarding the events surrounding Durham’s discovery of Horowitz’s possession of Baker’s cellphones.

How Durham Found Out About Baker’s Phones On Jan. 5, 2022, Durham’s team conducted a conference call with the FBI’s Inspection Division, which is currently conducting its own internal investigation of FBI personnel involved in the 2016 Crossfire Hurricane investigation of the Trump campaign. Durham’s team was attempting to obtain information regarding “call log data” for Baker. The day after that call, on Jan. 6, personnel from the FBI’s Inspection Team followed up with an email to Durham’s team, informing the special counsel team that Horowitz’s office was “maintaining custody” of Baker’s two FBI-issued cellphones along with “forensic reports” that had analyzed the content of the two phones.

According to Durham, this was the first time he was informed of Horowitz’s possession of Baker’s phones. The next day, on Jan. 7, Durham’s office requested information from Horowitz regarding Baker’s cellphones. Horowitz provided the information that Durham requested regarding Baker’s cellphones on Jan. 10, 2022. That day, Sussmann’s defense team requested that Durham’s office provide any information relating to an undated meeting attended by reporters from The New York Times and Baker, along with Bill Priestap, thenFBI assistant director for counterintelligence, and Michael Kortan, then-FBI assistant director for public affairs. This meeting likely relates to events in September 2016, after Sussmann had gone to Baker with the Alfa Bank allegations. Following his initial meeting with Sussmann, Baker was subsequently told that Sussmann was also speaking to reporters at the NY Times. It was later reported that the FBI had asked the newspaper to temporarily hold off on its reporting. Sussmann’s request for information regarding this meeting is notable not only for the high-level FBI officials who met with the NY Times, but also in light of Baker’s criminal leak investigation that had been previously conducted by Durham.

Durham’s Jan. 25 Filing Precipitates Horowitz Disclosures Durham apparently wasn’t fully satisfied with the information provided by Horowitz’s office on Jan. 10, as Durham subsequently requested that Horowitz’s office conduct an “additional forensic examination” of Baker’s two cellphones. As Durham was waiting for a response from Horowitz regarding the additional forensic exams, Durham learned from Sussmann’s lawyers on Jan. 20 that Horowitz had met personally with Sussmann in March 2017 regarding the “cyber matter.” Durham’s discovery of the meeting between Sussmann and Horowitz, which was confirmed by Horowitz two days later on Jan. 22, may have been the impetus for Durham’s Jan. 25 filing. At the time of Durham’s Jan. 25 filing, Horowitz still hadn’t provided the requested “additional forensic examination” of Baker’s two cellphones. It was

this filing by Durham that first detailed issues surrounding key information that Horowitz had failed to disclose to Durham’s office. On the evening of Jan. 26, a day after Durham’s filing, Horowitz finally responded to Durham’s request, providing Durham with “those additional, completed forensic reports” that he had previously requested. While it isn’t known exactly what information was contained in these new reports from Horowitz, on the morning of Jan. 28, Durham issued his most recent filing, which added the new details regarding Baker’s cellphones, and also disclosed the existence of additional cellphones that are in the possession of Horowitz’s office. Those phones are in addition to Baker’s two phones and related to Durham’s criminal leak investigation of Baker. Durham’s office has issued a request to Horowitz to review these “additional phones.” While Durham’s latest filing is labeled as an update on Baker’s cellphones, its real purpose appears to be to publicly pressure Horowitz to disclose further materials in the OIG’s possession, including the additional cellphones which Durham seems to have only found out about in the past few days. Notably, it was Sussmann, the defendant, who provided Durham with information that focused the special counsel’s attention on materials being withheld by Horowitz. It’s highly unusual for the defense to provide the prosecution with information that the prosecution isn’t aware of. Strategically, it would seem this information would be better saved for Sussmann’s defense in the actual trial. It isn’t known why Sussmann offered this information at this time.

Former FBI general counsel James Baker testified before the House Judiciary and Oversight committees on Oct. 3 and Oct. 18, 2018. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

C RY P T O C U R R E N CY

Why Texas Is a Mecca for Bitcoin Miners Crypto professionals and billions of dollars in capital are ﬂooding the Lone Star state

By Andrew Moran

7th

34 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

FROM L: MARK FELIX/AFP /AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES, JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES

exas has turned into a mecca for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency miners over the past year. It might not appear to be a likely location for virtual token mining, but crypto professionals and billions of dollars in capital are flooding the southern state. This has led to a growing number of cryptocurrency communities across the state—and not only in Austin, Texas, which has been dubbed as a sort of Silicon Valley 2.0 in recent years. Workers install a new row of Bitcoin mining machines at the Whinstone US Bitcoin mining But why is Texas the primary benefi- facility in Rockdale, Texas, on Oct. 9, 2021. ciary of the “great mining migration?” Energy rates have been a significant incentivized to provide low rates, which electricity, forcing private companies factor in the Lone Star State’s crypto means customers can choose between to begin constructing additional power boom. Texas’s energy rates are current- different power providers,” Rehman plants. Should the grid start sputtering ly ranked as the seventh-lowest in the told Insight. “Cryptocurrency mining in the event of a major storm, as it did nation, with the annual average price per facilities can set up long-term contracts during winter storm Uri in February kilowatt-hour of 8.36 cents, with power providers, which 2021, miners could suspend operations ahead of North Dakota’s 8.53 means they can purchase to conserve energy for residential propcents and behind Nevada’s electricity at a fixed price for erties and businesses. 8.33 cents. many years.” Despite most of the state’s energy In addition to being the Public policy has further needs being satisfied by natural gas, largest energy producer in served as an integral com- about one-fifth of Texas’s energy also TEXAS the country, Texas has deponent of strengthening in- emanates from wind power, “making is ranked as having regulated the power grid, fadustry confidence. cryptocurrency mining a relatively the seventh-lowest cilitating a more competitive In 2021, Texas Gov. Greg green exercise, unlike other parts of the energy rates in environment for utilities and Abbott met with dozens of world—such as China—that use coal,” the nation. their customers, according to cryptocurrency leaders to Rehman said. Ali Rehman, a blockchain indiscuss a proposal that might Argo Blockchain, a world-leading crypvestor and the co-founder of Find The have seemed to be counterintuitive on tocurrency miner that set up operations Venue. the surface. in West Texas, is relying on renewables “Given that the power grid in Texas Miners could support the state’s power such as solar and wind—with natural is deregulated, electricity providers are grid by demanding immense levels of gas as a backup—for its mining needs.

Money Blockchain

“Because of the ability of Bitcoin mining to turn on or off instantaneously, if you have a moment where there’s a power shortage in a power crisis ... they become excess reserves.” Sen. Ted Cruz

Foreign restrictions have also been imperative to attracting the sector’s power players. China, which had controlled up to twothirds of global Bitcoin mining, banned all domestic crypto mining and trading in June 2021. This was in addition to restricting financial institutions from participating in crypto transactions, declaring all digital token transactions as illegal. “When China banned Bitcoin mining last year, a lot of Chinese miners started to look for places outside,” Kalyan Banerjee, co-founder of Lumenci, told Insight. “They found Kazakhstan and Texas. I would say that the overall Texas ecosystem kind of jumped on that opportunity, making all the right noises in the media and reaching out to those people, saying that there is enough land available. “There is enough power deregulation and the energy is cheap. So come here, come one, and come all.”

But if energy prices are one of the primary factors, why wouldn’t the miners migrate to other states with even lower costs, such as Louisiana (7.51 cents) and Oklahoma (7.63 cents)? In the past couple of years, many tech firms, entrepreneurs, and industry professionals have moved to Texas. This has resulted in an established crypto-related ecosystem. “As crypto companies flock to Texas due to their more lax regulation, support networks begin to become established,” Jonathan Teplitsky, the founder and CEO of Pipeline Marketing, told Insight. “These support networks include companies, co-working spaces like We-Work, VC-funded networks, socials and mixers, and even city-council-sponsored events and networks.” Speaking at the Texas Blockchain Summit in Austin in October 2021, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) promoted the industry, particularly how the sphere could support the energy system. “Because of the ability of Bitcoin mining to turn on or off instantaneously, if you have a moment where there’s a power shortage in a power crisis, whether it is a freeze or some other natural disaster where power generation capacity goes down, they become excess reserves that can strengthen the grid’s resilience by providing a significant capacity of additional power to be available for critical services if and when it’s needed,” Cruz said during the conference. In time, Bitcoin mining could play a substantial role in the Texas energy grid. “In five years, I expect to see a dramatically different terrain, with Bitcoin

mining playing a significant role [in] strengthening and hardening the resiliency of the grid,” Cruz said. Former Texas governor and presidential candidate Rick Perry described miners as “a major accelerant for job creation and sustainable economic growth in the state.” In November 2021, Austin Mayor Steve Adler told a local Fox News affiliate that he wants the state capital to become a “crypto city.” Should Texas continue its push to transform itself into a crypto paradise, the state could be responsible for as much as one-third of global Bitcoin output. But other places in the United States are competing with Texas for that heightened level of interest and investment. Miami has witnessed a wave of capital with blockchain and cryptocurrency firms popping up in the city. “So we would see the same type of innovation with respect to blockchain in both Miami and Austin,” said Harish Daiya, co-founder and CEO of Lumenci. Overall, it might not only be a handful of U.S. jurisdictions to serve as a magnet for crypto mining. With enough cheap energy and crypto-friendly regulations, experts anticipate that the entire country will be a mining hotspot for many years to come.

U.S. and Texas flags fly in front of high voltage transmission towers in Houston on Feb. 21, 2021. Millions of Texans lost power when winter storm Uri hit the state and knocked out coal, natural gas, and nuclear plants that were unprepared for the freezing temperatures brought on by the storm. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

United Nations Migration

B O R D E R S EC U R I T Y

US taxpayers help fund illegal immigrant passage to southern border via UN cash cards

(Clockwise from L) Illegal immigrants walk toward a U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint near Mission, Texas, on March 23, 2021; cross the Rio Grande between Del Rio (far side) and Acuña, Mexico, on Sept. 20, 2021; and walk across the Rio Grande river from Acuña, Mexico, on Sept. 16, 2021. (Right) A Haitian migrant shows his cash card provided by the United Nations, in Tapachula, Mexico, on Jan. 14. 36 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

el rio, texas —U.S. taxpayers are increasingly funding the passage of a constant flow of migrants who ultimately cross illegally into the United States, according to new reports. A United Nations “cashbased interventions” program provides migrants heading to the U.S. border with debit cards, help with housing, transport, and medical assistance. The assistance is accessible in cities on the well-traveled routes from Latin America through Mexico. Thousands of migrants converge in southern Mexico where they apply for

asylum—which gives them unfettered travel in Mexico—then most head directly to the U.S. border, where they cross illegally and claim asylum again. Migrants there are issued debit cards that reload each month, according to Todd Bensman, who is reporting from the city of Tapachula at Mexico’s southern border with Guatemala. Bensman is the senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies. In Tapachula on Jan. 14, a Haitian man was waiting for his 3,600 pesos owed (about $170), Bensman said. A Honduran woman said her cash card provided 2,500 pesos per month for four people. In the northern Mexico bor-

CLOCKWISE FROM L: JOHN MOORE/GETTY IMAGES, CHARLOTTE CUTHBERTSON/THE EPOCH TIMES, TODD BENSMAN/ CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES, GO NAKAMURA/REUTERS

UN Giving ‘Humanitarian Cash’ to USBound Migrants

By Charlotte Cuthbertson

United Nations Migration

der city of Reynosa, families were receiving the equivalent of $400 every 15 days, he said. “The United Nations began ramping up CBI [cash-based interventions] in 2019, spending $60 million on 29,000 migrants in Latin America, and then doubling the outlays in 2020, with plans to vastly increase its use in the Americas during 2022 and beyond,” Bensman said. In fiscal year 2021, the United States contributed nearly $1.9 billion in humanitarian assistance to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), according to the State Department. The United States funds about 20 percent of the total United Nations budget, which comprises 193 nations, and 40

percent of UNHCR’s revenue, according to a report by the Council on Foreign Relations. The UNHCR budget for 2022 is $8.99 billion. Cash-based interventions have been used by UNHCR for several decades. They are “often a more dignified way of assisting affected populations, as they empower people to determine their own needs and the best way of meeting them,” according to the UNHCR. Silvia Garduno, the U.N. spokesperson in Tapachula, Mexico, said the cash cards are strictly regulated as a humanitarian intervention. “Humanitarian cash assistance is available only to individuals with particular vulnerabilities who are

seeking asylum in Mexico and who intend to remain in the Mexican state where they have applied for asylum until the process is completed,” Garduno told Bensman. “It is provided to help ensure they can meet basic living expenses while their requests for asylum in Mexico are processed. This process may last three to four months.” However, Bensman said he questions that the program only applies to highly vulnerable people and wasn’t able to get the actual criteria from authorities. “I suspect they are being very liberal on the definitions based on the migrant demographics I have seen,” Bensman told Insight.

The vast majority of migrants congregating in Tapachula end up crossing the U.S. southern border within months. Rep. Lance Gooden (R-Texas) recently introduced a bill to put a stop to U.S. payments to the UNHCR, the U.N. International Organization for Migration, and the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. “U.S. taxpayers should not be subsidizing a mass invasion of our country by an endless stream of unknown and unvetted migrants,” Gooden wrote in a statement at the time. “It is time for the Biden administration to put an end to this crisis and regain control of our southern border.”

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

F O R E S T M A N AG E M E N T

Forest ‘Resilience’ May Mean Fewer Trees

New study suggests healthier forests are sparser

By Nathan Worcester cientists study ing forest density in the Sierra Nevada have found that trees there were scarcer but physically larger in 1911 than in 2011, meaning “resilient” forests might be remarkably thin by today’s standards. “Our findings suggest forests need to be treated more intensively than is often done when just reducing fuels, particularly greater reductions in density,” Malcolm North, a professor at the University of California–Davis, and lead author of the study, told Insight in an email. He said the findings could be applicable to many forests across the Western United States. The study, published in the journal Forest Ecology and Management, comes at a time when environmental “resilience” has become a hot topic, including among lawmakers. The bipartisan infrastructure bill passed in November 2021 allocated billions of taxpayer dollars to various forms of “resilience” and “resiliency” efforts, including a reported $50 billion for climate resilience and weatherization, according to CNBC. Forest resiliency has started to attract attention and capital as well. In October 2021, the nonprofit World Resources Institute, the U.S. Forest Service, and several other organizations launched one of the first Forest Resilience Bonds as a means of funding the protection and post-fire restoration of California’s Tahoe National Forest. Recent devastating wildfires in Califor-

38 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

A firefighting jet drops a fire retardant on a wildfire near Santa Barbara, Calif., on June 18, 2016. nia have also brought renewed attention to the complex relationship between forest fires and forest health. The blame for those fires has been pinned on a variety of factors. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has attributed them to climate change as well as poor forest management practices. North and his co-authors argue that frequent forest fires, common in the Sierra Nevada and other regions before people started suppressing them, helped to remove competition among trees, yielding more vigorous individual specimens and more resilient forests. The researchers defined resilience in terms of a forest’s capacity to persist or thrive when under pressure from insects, fire, drought, or other characteristic stressors. “The term resilience is useful for communicating across disciplines and devel-

Environment Forests

FROM TOP: DAVID MCNEW/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES, PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

oping shared goals, but in that usage isn’t appropriately represent a maximum concrete enough to have scientific rigor stocking level.” or to be operationalized. The paper deNorth told Insight that small, commervelops a definition that is specific to dry cially nonviable trees could be removed western frequent-fire forests, and once through a mechanical thinning process grounded in that context, involving chainsaws. becomes more concrete “The small trees could and can be assessed usgo to biomass facilities ing stand density index,” that generate electriciNorth wrote. ty and/or heat, but there Stand density index aren’t many of those BILLION (SDI) allows foresters to plants in the western The bipartisan assess how well-stocked U.S., and the economics infrastructure bill passed in a forest is; forests with limit the haul radius to November 2021 allocated higher SDIs are denser. no more than about 50 $50 billion in taxpayer The scientists calcumeters (54.7 yards) from dollars for climate resilience lated the SDIs of forests a facility. This would and weatherization. from 1911 using data gathalso be accomplished ered through a pair of with both prescribed timber inventories taken that year. Their and managed wildfire.” 2011 data came from a dataset known as F3, which relies on U.S. Forest Service Another View forest inventory and analysis (FIA) data Not all scientists agree with North on the and satellite data, along with the forest danger of overstocking forests. vegetation simulator. Ecologist George Wuerthner has writThe scientists emphasize that their in- ten about tree density before, arguing vestigation was correlational and obser- that foresters’ concerns about it have vational, not a controlled experiment. more to do with the economics of the Many commercial foresters have come wood and paper sector than with ecoto similar conclusions about forest den- system health. sity and the role of fire. “Many fire researchers believe that “Healthy, wildfire-resilient, and many forest stands were always dense,” late-successional forests have adequate Wuerthner told Insight in an email. He space between trees. When forests are referred to a 2014 study based on Forest overly dense—that is, ‘overstocked’ Inventory and Analysis data from the and filled with too many trees in a giv- U.S. Forest Service as well as other data; en area—the trees in that forest have to the authors concluded that unlogged compete for more limited resources,” a mixed-conifer and ponderosa pine forspokesperson for the National Associ- ests in the American West were very ation of State Foresters told Insight in dense a century or more ago. an email. He also cited the work of Robert W. Cer“Prescribed fire is an invaluable tool for mak, who has turned to 19th-century forest and habitat management.” diaries from California to argue that forA spokesperson for the Federal Forest ests in the area were quite dense rather Resource Coalition wrote as part of a than open. statement on the Forest Service’s new 10“Forest health has been defined by the Year Strategy on Wildfires: “We cannot timber industry and their allies in forreverse the current pattern of loss and estry schools. These entities prefer ‘green devastation solely with drip torches or forest’ because that makes the best trees by clearing brush near homes. We must for logging,” Wuerthner wrote. manage forested watersheds to restore According to North, Wuerthner’s view them to health.” is a fringe position. In their paper, North and his co-au“About 98 percent of fire and forest scithors wrote that their findings suggest entists do not share this point of view much lower SDIs than even many for- and feel it is agenda-driven since it does esters advocate: “Instead of 35 percent not square with almost all of the data representing a minimum stocking level, that has been collected over the last 100+ our analysis suggests that it may more years,” he wrote.

A firefighter works on putting out a wildfire near Wofford Heights, Calif., on Aug. 25, 2021.

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

“There are reports that when security forces did arrive, they stood down and watched the massacre of more than 25 civilians.” Kyle Abts, executive director, International Committee on Nigeria

A military truck and armored personnel carrier at a military base in the center of Ancha, Nigeria, on Jan. 12. The village attack on Jan. 11 lasted more than two hours, and the military didn’t intervene, officials said. M AS S AC R E

Terrorists massacre villagers, burn houses, as 30 well-armed soldiers stand by

By Masara Kim & Lawrence Zongo 40 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

were injured, and 107 houses were burnt down.” The terrorists were chanting “Allahu’akbar” (God is great), according to survivors. They burned houses and food barns, incinerating children and the aged who couldn’t flee, all under the watchful eye of the soldiers. A few local watchmen returned fire with their single-shot rifles and shotguns, providing some cover to buy time for women and children to run out of the village. Two of the watchmen were among the fatalities discovered after the attack ended at 2:30 a.m., according to witnesses who attended the mass burial on Jan. 12. “It was like a rain of gunfire,” said John Rivi, leader of a neighborhood watch team, in a noon meeting with local officials attended by Insight in Ancha hours after the attack.

ALL PHOTOS BY MASARA KIM/THE EPOCH TIMES

Nigerian Soldiers Watch as 18 Villagers Killed

he scene of the attack was familiar to traumatized villagers in Ancha of Bassa County in Nigeria’s Plateau state on the cold evening of Jan. 11. A unit of 30 well-armed Nigerian soldiers was stationed in an abandoned school building inside the settlement. The 30 soldiers had assault rifles, an armored personnel carrier, and two trucks. Yet to the shock of 400 local residents scattering at the sound of terrorist gunfire at midnight, the unit of soldiers calmly held their position and never fired their weapons as terrorists murdered 18 local people, including women, teenagers, and infants. “The attack started some minutes after 12 a.m., leading to the death of 18 people,” Stephen Andy Igmala, chairman of Bassa County, told Insight. “Seven people

World Africa

(Left) A civilian watcher runs with a homemade gun strapped to his back in Ancha, Nigeria, on Jan. 12. (Right) A woman carries a bucket of water to quench the fire in her burned house in Ancha, Nigeria, on Jan. 12.

“They were more than 500. They surrounded the entire village before we knew it. They split themselves into groups. Some went south, some went west, some went east. Others took over the roads for possible evacuees.” The attackers spoke Fulani dialect (the language of the ethnicity often linked to such raids), according to Rivi, who said some of the attackers were known by the victims. The assault began when civilian watchers guarding the village with slingshots and locally made short guns were overpowered on a northern corner of the town, Rivi said. Some of the attackers were men who lived locally and knew the residents well. “We know them,” said Rivi. “One of them we know very well escorted a woman out of the village with her three kids before returning to kill her husband, father-in-law, and eldest son.”

Mary Bulus, 38, told Insight that she was led out of the town by a former Fulani business partner when he led a gang to attack her family residence. “He came with five other Fulani,” Bulus said. “Some held their guns on the faces of my husband and father-in-law. My eldest son of 12 was also there. “He told me to follow him if I wanted to live. He said I should not worry, that nothing will happen to any of my family members. “He escorted me and my three little children to the far bushes and went back to the village, and I was told that he was the one that killed my family members in the house.”

Call for General Ali to Step Down The military spokesman for the army’s special task force claims the army responded to a call for help but arrived too late to engage with the terrorists. Major Ishaku Takwa didn’t respond to inquiries from Insight, but he apparently gave a statement to a newspaper reporter from This Day Live, in Jos, who quoted him saying the troops responded “swiftly” after receiving distress calls.

“On reaching the community, the attackers had fled the village. Houses were destroyed and some villagers lost their lives during the attack,” Takwa said, according to ThisDayLive.com. The same claim was reprinted in Vanguard Newspaper but scrubbed out in a later edition. Kyle Abts, executive director of the International Committee on Nigeria, has called for the resignation of the Nigerian general responsible for security in Plateau state. “Major Gen. I.S. Ali, commander of Operation Safe Haven, needs to be replaced and prosecuted for crimes against humanity,” he told Insight in a text. “Ali’s negligence and inability to stop the massacre of innocent civilians needs to be investigated. “This incident is among a score of such incidents that have occurred under his command since January 2021. There are reports that when security forces did arrive, they stood down and watched the massacre of more than 25 civilians.” The attackers included local Fulani residents supported by hired mercenaries, likely bandits fleeing military airstrikes in Nigeria’s northwest, said Istifanus I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

P OL I T IC S • E C ONOM Y • OP I N ION T H AT M AT T E R S

Perspectives

No.05

A San Francisco street, usually crowded, stands empty during the pandemic, on March 18, 2020. PHOTO BY JOSH EDELSON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

WHY ARE WOMEN HOLDING BACK? Many women have chosen to stay out of the labor force 46

DO COVID LOCKDOWNS SAVE LIVES?

HOW RATE HIKES TRIGGER RECESSION

A new study challenges early predictions by epidemiological studies 47

Cheap money leads to dangerous risk exposure

INSIDE I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

THOMAS MCARDLE was a White House speechwriter for President George W. Bush and writes for IssuesInsights.com.

Thomas McArdle

America’s Enemies’ Lobby

How a longtime powerful Washington ﬁgure indirectly helps Beijing

t’s one thing to get rich lobbying Washington on behalf of powerful interests. It’s another altogether when America’s enemies benefit. Documents released last month revealed that Democratic mega-lobbyist Tony Podesta, brother of longtime bag man for the Clinton’s John Podesta, pulled in $1 million lobbying the Biden White House on behalf of Huawei, the Chinese telecom giant tied to Beijing’s People’s Liberation Army. A longtime worry has been that Western countries adopting Huawei’s low-priced communications hardware would become victims of espionage by the Chinese communist regime, or that at Beijing’s bidding, Huawei could even cripple the vital national services or industries of free economies that come to depend on its 5G technology. The Washington Post reported in December 2021 that Huawei chillingly touts that within China, it can identify individuals through voice and facial recognition and monitor prisoners’ re-education schedules through a program called the “Huawei and Hewei Smart Prison Unified Platform.” According to the Post, there are indications that Huawei is involved in police surveillance and corporate tracking of workers and consumers. Podesta’s $1 million isn’t merely for being an agent for Beijing, however. In 2020, FBI Director Christopher Wray took part in the Justice Department’s (DOJ) announcement of an indictment of Huawei for “conspiracy to violate the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) ... to steal trade secrets stemming from the China-based company’s alleged long-running practice of using fraud and deception to misappropriate sophisticated technology from U.S. counterparts.” But more disturbingly, the DOJ disclosed Huawei’s deceptive efforts to hide its “business and technology projects

44 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

in countries subject to U.S., EU, and/or U.N. sanctions, such as Iran and North Korea.” Through a subsidiary, Huawei “assisted the Government of Iran in performing domestic surveillance, including during the demonstrations in Tehran in 2009,” the DOJ contended.

Getting rich helping those who seek the destruction of America and the free world is a far darker brand of corruption, not to mention an existential threat to our nation. In 2019, the Post obtained internal documents revealing that over more than eight years, Huawei secretly helped North Korea build its wireless network, with the strong suspicion that it’s in violation of U.S. export controls it provided equipment to North Korea, which is under international sanctions for its nuclear weapons development and testing and its human rights violations. According to the Post, documents also showed that Huawei has business connections with the Chinese firm Dandong Kehua, which in November 2017 was sanctioned by the Treasury Department for moving goods to and from North Korea, viewed by the United States as financing Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs. What’s most head-spinning is that this longtime powerful Washington figure, who, indirectly though it may be, now helps the world’s most evil regimes, all of whom either have or will likely soon have nuclear weapons, is both a confirmed creature of the left and one of Washington’s most unashamed exhibitionists of bling. Podesta has been everything from a lawyer for Rolling Stone magazine to an

aide to the presidential campaigns of Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern, Ted Kennedy, Fritz Mondale, Michael Dukakis, and Bill Clinton. But in recent years, his perch has been as the flamboyant king of K Street lobbyists, known for his “red shoes and Italian suits,” hosting lawmakers and power brokers at his apartment in Venice during the famed Art Biennale exhibition, and showing off a museum-grade artwork collection in his mansion in tony Kalorama, a couple of doors from the Obama mansion. Add abodes in Manhattan, Sydney, Tasmania, on Lake Barcroft in Virginia, and a Capitol Hill townhouse devoted to fundraising. But the federal government caught up with Podesta’s work for the U.S. subsidiary of a Russian bank under U.S. sanctions. Art and real estate purchases and vacations ultimately left Podesta deeply in debt, forcing him to shutter his 62-employee lobbying firm, the Wall Street Journal reported in 2018, noting that Podesta and his wife had together given more money to the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates than any other Washington lobbyists over the preceding decade, according to records. Their “1,300-piece art collection ... valued at an estimated $25 million,” included Shepard Fairey’s famous ‘Hope’ portrait of Barack Obama, which they ultimately donated to the National Portrait Gallery. In 2007 and 2008, the Podesta Group paid in excess of $300,000 for the shipping and handling of Podesta’s art, apparently improperly reported as a business expense, according to documents viewed by the Wall Street Journal. Business, labor, and special interests tilting the scales in the halls of power against ordinary Americans is one thing. Getting rich helping those who seek the destruction of America and the free world is a far darker brand of corruption, not to mention an existential threat to our nation.

ANDERS CORR is a principal at Corr Analytics Inc., publisher of the Journal of Political Risk. He is an expert in political science and government.

Anders Corr

Free the Avatars From China Beijing will attempt to censor the metaverse. Just say no.

he metaverse is coming. Imagine users jumping into a virtual reality (VR) mountain lake that feels cold, wet, and buoyant. They “swim” across the lake, using their own arm movements, emerge flying into clouds warmed by a volcano, and bump into an artificial-intelligence-powered Einstein ready to field questions about relativity. To give the feeling of reality to that scene, developers at Facebook, now called Meta, along with competitors at Apple, Google, and Microsoft, are creating more than the standard headset and hand controllers currently associated with VR. A metaverse suit that gives the illusion of touch and temperature has now grown from a “haptic finger” to a “haptic glove.” The ultimate metaverse experience will include rooms in which users’ actual bodies are immersed in water or engaged in indoor skydiving. Metaverse users choose a 3D-animated representation of themselves—or someone they would like to be—called an avatar. They strap on a physical video headset, grasp a couple of hand controllers to navigate through a 3D-animated world, and meet other avatars controlled by real people or the computer, with whom they can talk and shake hands. Big tech companies are all trying to dominate the space, which is arguably a lucrative natural monopoly. Yes, a diversity of quirky offshoots are competing with the tech titans, but like social media, films, and shopping malls, consumers tend to aggregate around the branded, centralized, and popular content with the biggest budget. Metaverse operators harvest personal data on individual preferences and shopping interests, along with abundant advertising revenues. They sell virtual real estate and products. Want your avatar to wear a Burberry scarf and Prada shoes? It will cost real money.

When Roger Federer’s avatar steps into the metaverse, driving a 2025 Mercedes-Benz concept car and wearing a 2025 Rolex concept watch, he’ll get paid to do so. Whoever controls the metaverse likely will get a cut of its transactions. The promise of metaverse revenues explains the gold rush atmosphere of competitive investment.

There is also much to be gained, for the CCP, in revenues, personal data, and propaganda opportunities, by dominating metaverse initiatives globally. China’s tech giants, including Baidu, Bytedance, Tencent, and Alibaba, are also jumping into the fray. Beijing will almost certainly attempt to censor and control the metaverse, as well as push its more “productive” uses, such as professionals attending a virtual meeting with colleagues, students attending lectures in virtual classrooms, or military cadets training in warlike atmospheres. But don’t expect the Dalai Lama to walk into the classroom unexpectedly. There will be no protests or mention of the Tiananmen Square massacre in Baidu’s metaverse. Males will be discouraged from looking too “feminine” in their personal style, and females will be encouraged to dress conservatively. “Non-productive” time in the metaverse will be limited, as is gaming in China today. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has real-world plans for global domination, and it doesn’t want its citizens socially corrupted in a virtual fairyland when they could be manufacturing tanks, warships, and silicon chips in real-world factories.

But there’s also much to be gained for the CCP—in revenues, personal data, and propaganda opportunities—by dominating metaverse initiatives globally. It won’t mind the metaverse’s corruption of Western youth, who it prefers to remove from real-world competition. But the Party will attempt to extend its influence to global content production. As with its influence over Hollywood films, China will use its funding and gatekeeper status to Chinese consumers and workers to attempt to strong-arm Western tech companies. If Apple wants Chinese citizens to access its metaverse, if it wants them to spend millions of hours in 3D modeling of the metaverse, and if it wants to continue selling iPhones and iPads in China, then it better make sure that it “tells a positive story” about China and the CCP to not only Chinese citizens, but metaverse users globally. That will mean no mention of Tiananmen Square in Apple’s metaverse, for example. Falun Gong users in New York who try to protest virtually on land they buy in Apple’s metaverse or carry a virtual banner saying “Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance” could simply vanish for violating its CCP-influenced terms of service. If Apple became the hegemonic metaverse that almost all users go to, much as they almost all go to Facebook or Twitter today for their social media needs, then serious freedom of speech issues would be raised. The European Union is already talking about regulating the metaverse and discouraging anti-competitive practices, of which Meta is accused. Regulators, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion advocates should plan on extending the protection of constitutional freedoms to our avatars as they populate that future space. The metaverse must be an outlet for avatar freedom, and avatars should have rights that aren’t controlled by the arbitrary rules of Meta, the CCP, or anyone else. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

MILTON EZRATI is chief economist for Vested, a contributing editor at The National Interest, and author of "Thirty Tomorrows" and "Bite-Sized Investing.”

Milton Ezrati

Why Are Women Holding Back?

Many women are choosing to stay out of the labor force

o ck d ow ns a nd quarantines in 2020 had a disproportionate impact on women. Though some saw bias, the main problem was that services suffered most in that environment, and women dominate employment in this area. Now, the post-pandemic recovery has disproportionately benefited services and presumably women’s employment prospects, but many who had worked before the pandemic seem uninterested in the unfolding opportunities. These women have remained outside the workforce, neither working nor seeking paid positions. Their decision seems to reflect a rather subtle calculation, but whatever their reasons, the pattern is worrisome— because the longer a person remains outside the workforce, the more difficulty she will have securing a job should she need one. Certainly, today’s labor market offers plenty of job options. Stories of labor shortages, especially in services, crowd the headlines. A walk down any main street in the country reveals a plethora of “Help Wanted” signs. Still, many women have simply made the decision to pass on paid work. According to the Labor Department, fully 1.5 million women who were employed in February 2020 have not only failed to go back to their former jobs, but they’re no longer even seeking work. The picture is troubling and contributes to income inequality, because most of the women who have dropped out of the workforce come from the lower end of the income distribution. For a while, the reason for the shortfall in work participation lay with the extra unemployment payments offered in the two COVID relief bills. These extra payouts affected both men’s and women’s decisions, but especially women’s. Since women

46 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

typically bear the bulk of child care responsibilities, the generous unemployment check not only helped them meet household expenses, but also saved the child care costs these women would have incurred by returning to work. Whatever explanatory power these extra payouts had, they ended last September and so can no longer explain the persistence of women’s reduced rates of workforce participation.

Fully 1.5 million women who were employed in February 2020 have not only failed to go back to their former jobs, but they’re no longer even seeking work. An upbeat explanation for this phenomenon might lie with the improved job and income prospects of the partners of those who have opted out. Much academic and Labor Department research on work decisions shows that the better the job and income prospects for one member in a couple, the more likely the other member is to give up paid work altogether, at least for a time. Well-documented as this kind of behavior is, it can do only a little to explain what’s happening today. After all, job and income prospects for partners were very good before the pandemic and women still participated in paid work at a greater rate than they do now. Two other less upbeat explanations seem to have greater explanatory power. One is inflation. Though wages have risen and would otherwise tempt both women and

men back to work, so has inflation, including the cost of child care, leaving the real return to work considerably less attractive than it might otherwise seem. At the same time, several states and even the federal government have considered the elimination of contingent work. Though most such rules seek to secure more benefits for workers, they also eliminate the kinds of flexible hours that enable people to make tradeoffs between work and other responsibilities, especially child care. By limiting this flexibility, such regulations make paid employment still less appealing, especially for women at the lower end of the income distribution. Labor Department figures certainly point to these combined effects. They show that mothers of young children who have just a high school diploma have been most likely to drop out of the workforce. This group’s work participation rate has fallen almost 8 full percentage points since the pandemic began. Though this group amounts to only some 12.5 percent of all working women, it constitutes almost onethird of the entire number who have decided against paid work. Perhaps the inflation will lift, as Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and others in authority have forecast. Should that occur, a continued rise in wages would draw women back into the labor force. If, as is likely, that happy event fails to occur or fails to inspire women’s greater participation, matters could impose a lifetime burden on those opting out—for long periods without work on a person’s record give employers pause when deciding to offer a job. Compounding the potential problem is the fact that the longer people stay out of work, the more their skills lose applicability.

EMEL AKAN is a senior reporter for The Epoch Times in Washington, D.C. Previously, she worked in the ﬁnancial sector as an investment banker at JPMorgan.

Emel Akan

Do COVID Lockdowns Save Lives? A new study challenges early predictions by epidemiological studies

LEON NEAL/GETTY IMAGES

u bl ic h e a lt h experts and politicians around the world have implemented compulsory lockdown policies to curb COVID-19 infection and death rates. But have these lockdown measures been successful in reducing mortality from the disease? According to a new study released by Johns Hopkins University, lockdowns have had little to no effect on COVID-19 mortality. As the world scrambles to contain COVID-19, many social scientists are studying huge data sets to explain the relationship between lockdowns and death rates. Early epidemiological studies predicted large positive effects to result from these lockdown measures. For example, researchers at the Imperial College London estimated that such compulsory interventions could reduce death rates by up to 98 percent. But a study by researchers Steve Hanke, Jonas Herby, and Lars Jonung challenges these early predictions. “Overall, we conclude that lockdowns are not an effective way of reducing mortality rates during a pandemic, at least not during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic,” the researchers wrote in a paper that presented the findings of their study. Hanke, a co-author of the paper, is a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University and the founder and co-director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Applied Economics, Global Health, and the Study of Business Enterprise. Herby is a special adviser at the Center for Political Studies in Copenhagen, Denmark. Jonung is a professor emeritus in economics at Lund University, Sweden. The researchers employed meta-analysis, a quantitative study that combines the results of previous research studies.

Studies show that lockdowns in Europe and the United States reduced COVID-19 mortality by 0.2 percent on average. “Based on review of 18,590 studies related to lockdowns and COVID-19 mortality, we determined that 34 of those studies qualified to address the belief that lockdowns reduce COVID-19 mortality, where lockdowns are defined as the imposition of at least one compulsory, non-pharmaceutical intervention (NPI),” Hanke told Insight in an email. NPIs are any government mandate that seeks to “limit internal movement, close schools and businesses, and ban international travel,” he said. “An analysis of these qualified studies supports the conclusion that lockdowns have had little to no effect on COVID-19 mortality. Lockdown policies are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument,” Hanke said. Governments have taken a wide range of measures in response to the COVID-19 outbreak since the first wave of the virus hit in 2020. A stringency

index was created by Oxford University researchers to track and compare these government responses. The index tracked such responses in 186 countries. According to the paper, studies that examine the lockdown strictness based on the stringency index found that “lockdowns in Europe and the United States reduced only COVID-19 mortality by 0.2% on average.” In addition, the paper states that shelter-in-place orders were ineffective, reducing COVID-19 mortality by only 2.9 percent. The researchers also examined studies looking at the effectiveness of specific NPIs and found “no evidence that lockdowns, school closures, border closures, and limiting gatherings have had a noticeable effect on COVID-19 mortality.” However, closing non-essential businesses seems to have had some effect, researchers noted, which is likely to be driven by the closure of bars. After three levels of screening, 34 studies were selected based on several eligibility criteria set by the researchers. For example, they only focused on mortality and excluded studies that use cases, hospitalizations, or other measures. Of those 34 eligible studies, 24 were included in the meta-analysis, according to the paper. “While this meta-analysis concludes that lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social costs where they have been adopted,” the paper reads. It also states that government responses were “strongly driven by the policies initiated in neighboring countries rather than by the severity of the pandemic in their own countries.” “In short, it is not the severity of the pandemic that drives the adoption of lockdowns, but rather the propensity to copy policies initiated by neighboring countries,” the paper reads. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

DANIEL LACALLE is chief economist at hedge fund Tressis and author of “Freedom or Equality,” “Escape from the Central Bank Trap,” and “Life in the Financial Markets.”

Daniel Lacalle

How Rate Hikes Trigger Recession Cheap money leads to dangerous risk exposure

48 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Once policymakers decide to raise rates, they often cause a recession, because the amount of risk taken by even the most conservative investor or household is simply too high. cuts or the rate hikes? Rate hikes tend to trigger recessions, as Jesse Colombo or Lance Roberts have shown in numerous charts. But what causes them is previous extraordinary levels of accumulated risks throughout the economy. The boom-and-bust cycle is now more severe and frequent, as we’ve seen since the late ‘70s. That’s why central banks never truly normalize policy and rates remain in negative territory in real terms. And investors know it. That’s why there’s a perverse incentive for households, businesses, and investors to buy any correction. The fear of interest rate hikes allows us to analyze what has happened in other similar periods. As Dan Tapiero wrote on Twitter, between 1985 and 1990, the Fed raised rates 325 basis points and the S&P 500 rose by 45 percent. The rate-hike cycle drove emerging economies such as

Mexico into the ground, and states such as California went bankrupt. Between 1993 and 2000, the Fed also raised rates by 325 basis points, and the U.S. stock market shot up by 225 percent. In that period, we saw the tech bubble burst and the arrival of the early 2000s recession. In the 2003 to 2007 period, the Fed raised rates by 375 basis points, and the market rose by 30 percent. It brought about the great financial crisis and the housing bubble burst. Between 2015 and 2020, rates rose by 200 basis points, and the U.S. index advanced by 65 percent. In that period, in 2018, we saw the Fed change its rate-hike course rapidly after a market correction. History shows us that central banks care much more about risky assets— stocks and bonds—than they say and certainly a lot more than they do about inflation. In December 2018, after years of a bull market, the U.S. stock market fell by 9 percent, and on Jan. 3, 2019, it corrected by another 2.5 percent. On Jan. 30, the Federal Reserve announced that it “will be patient” and stopped its rate-hike path in its tracks. The evidence of the U.S. economic slowdown is everywhere: retail sales, job creation, stagnant labor force participation, declining real wages, and slowing capital expenditure. To all this, we must add the continued rise in energy commodities because of the Ukraine–Russia tensions. The Federal Reserve is aware of the “bubble of everything” created in recent years and the elevated levels of debt throughout the economy. Unfortunately, the Fed has already left rates low and asset purchases high for too long to prevent an inevitable negative economic effect. Even worse, the solution will likely be to repeat the same policies that created the conditions for excess.

ANNA MONEYMAKER/GETTY IMAGES

he history of economic development can’t be understood without first understanding the importance of recession periods. Recessions are often the result of the excess accumulated in previous years. Creative destruction after a period of excess used to drive a stronger recovery and continued economic development. That was until risky assets became the biggest concern for policymakers. From the late ‘70s and early ‘80s U.S. housing slump and automobile industry crisis to the technology and housing bubble burst, there has been a clear process of causation created by interest rate policy. Constant decreases in interest rates lead to excessive risk-taking, complacency, and accumulation of exposure to increasingly expensive assets under the perception that there’s no risk. Bubbles become larger and more dangerous, because interest rates are kept abnormally low for a prolonged period, and it disguises risk, clouding citizens’ and investors’ perception of danger in elevated valuations. Cheap money leads to generalized and dangerous risk exposure. After every recession, central banks keep rates too low for too long, even in growth periods, because policymakers fear asset price corrections, and this leads to complacency and the creation of bubbles everywhere. Once policymakers decide to raise rates, they often cause a recession, because the amount of risk taken by even the most conservative investor or household is simply too high. By the time central banks decide to finally raise rates, the bubbles are already more than a market headline: They’re a dangerous and widespread accumulation of risk that negatively affects millions of unsuspecting citizens. The question is what’s worse: the rate

Fan Yu

FAN YU is an expert in ﬁnance and economics and has contributed analyses on China’s economy since 2015.

Are Big Chinese Firms in Trouble?

HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Beijing prioritizing smaller technology ﬁrms in state-sensitive industries

hen ic a rus flew too close to the sun, he got burned, tumbled out of the sky, and fell into the ocean. China’s tech giants have certainly been flying high. Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu, and other platform companies have become household names, made their founders billionaires, run apps that Chinese people use on a daily basis, and altogether hold immense power—economically, politically, and socially. We’re not predicting their demise here. But recent developments suggest that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) may be gunning for these companies, their executives, and their business dealings. The official communique issued after the recent Central Commission for Discipline Inspection’s (CCDI) Sixth Plenum included some strong words, vowing “to investigate and punish any corruption behind the runaway expansion of capital and the monopoly of platform enterprises in order to sever the connections between power and capital,” according to the English version of China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency. Those word choices from China’s top anti-graft organization, specifically “runaway expansion of capital” and “monopoly of platform enterprises,” suggest that investigations into Chinese big tech firms are underway. Regarding the expansion of capital and alleged monopoly activities, CCP regulators fined Alibaba and Tencent in January for failing to disclose a series of acquisitions that date back several years. The new round of fines follows several fines already extended to Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu in 2021. And investigations are extending beyond the corporate level. Concurrent to the CCDI announce-

After decades of allowing Chinese entrepreneurs free rein to build their businesses with minimal oversight—by Chinese standards—Beijing’s regulatory winds are shifting. ment in January, CCTV aired a series of documentaries detailing cases of former local officials ensnared for corruption. One such example was that of Zhou Jiangyong, the former party secretary in Zhejiang Province—home to Jack Ma’s Alibaba—who allegedly gave certain companies preferential treatment in exchange for financial and economic assistance for his family. While no specific companies were named by the CCTV documentaries, Financial Times noted that Jack Ma’s Ant Group was one of the companies that purchased land at a discount in Hangzhou, China, after buying ownership stakes in a company run by Zhou’s brother. On Jan. 26, Zhou was officially expelled from the CCP by the CCDI for corruption. These ongoing investigations could spell more headaches for Ma, who has

already come under intense CCP scrutiny over the past two years. More to come on this front, but CCP’s clampdown machines are revving their engines. After decades of allowing Chinese entrepreneurs free rein to build their businesses with minimal oversight— by Chinese standards—Beijing’s regulatory winds are shifting. In a series of regulatory actions that started in 2021, the CCP has made it clear that technology companies must work for the Party and directly support the Party’s goals. The CCP’s favors appear to be shifting away from the tech giants and toward smaller tech companies. Premier Li Keqiang recently called for more Beijing support for the country’s smaller tech companies and retailers. It has been a recurring policy theme for China, with small- to medium-sized businesses increasingly being prioritized by Beijing. CCP regime boss Xi Jinping has touted China’s so-called little giants for more than two years. Beijing even created a national program to divert funding to small to medium-sized enterprises involved in the science and technology sectors. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has identified almost 5,000 “little giants” across the country, granting them financial incentives and tax cuts. Many of these companies align directly with the CCP’s goals of dominating in semiconductors, health care, and automation/robotics. It’s a way to support China’s ambitions of growing an independent domestic technology sector, which was severely crippled by the Trump administration’s sanctions on firms such as Huawei. With major tech giants falling out of favor, the hope of CCP’s global technology dominance increasingly rests on these small companies. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

JEFF MINICK lives and writes in Front Royal, Va. He is the author of two novels, “Amanda Bell” and “Dust on Their Wings,” and two works of nonﬁction, “Learning as I Go” and “Movies Make the Man.”

Jeff Minick

Saying No to the Naysayers How to deal with the doom-and-gloomers in our lives ou’ve got to accentuate the positive,” according to the lyrics from an old song, “and eliminate the negative.” While there are dangers in being a “cockeyed optimist”—we find those words in another old tune, this one by Rodgers and Hammerstein— hanging around a habitual pessimist can drain our spirits, dim our enthusiasm for a job, and wound our pride. Most of us know these sorts of folks, the men, women, and even teenagers who manage to find a black cloud on the sunniest of days. Mention that you’re hoping for a raise in pay in a couple of months, and they’ll just guffaw. Let slip that you’ve fallen deeply in love and hope to be married, and you’ll get a mini-lecture on the pitfalls of matrimony, with statistics on divorce thrown in for good measure. Declare that you’re off to the Outer Banks for a vacation, and your listener will remind you that September on the coast is hurricane season. I suspect that much of the time, those who aim their arrows at the aspirations or enthusiasm of others are unaware of the distress their remarks inflict. They themselves aren’t necessarily suffering from depression or melancholia, but instead dispatch their comments without much thought. Some of them are simply contrarians, given to disagreement out of habit. Tell them it looks like rain, and they’ll be the ones predicting blue skies. Nevertheless, these negative quips can act like nettles, getting under the skin and stinging long after the exchange has ended. They also can have wider ramifications. Employers need to be aware of 50 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

The world sports its share of naysayers, but we don’t have to listen to them. habitually gloomy subordinates. As all teachers know, one or two bad apples can wreak havoc in a classroom. The same holds true for the workplace, where the defeatism of a few can diminish the morale and enthusiasm of the entire staff. So how do we handle the doomand-gloomers? If they’re people close to us, such as family members or friends, we can sit them down and explain that their negativity really bothers us. However, rather than upbraiding them for general pessimism, this approach works best when delivered on the heels of a specific comment. We can even take the opportunity to make light of their attitude. If a brother who can’t stand Uncle Bill gripes about an upcoming family reunion, we can shrug off his complaints with a grin and a casual remark, such as, “Oh, come on. He’s not that bad, and it’s just for an afternoon.” Employers might try to use this

same tactic. By reprimanding the offender on the spot with some humor, you’re training that person to leave their rainy day attitude at home. As for the rest of us who must work with such people, we can often avoid them. But when that’s impossible, we can greet them in the hallway with a smile and a cheery hello, trying to turn them toward a brighter path. I once worked off-premises for a company where most of the employees seemed unhappy. Pass someone on the stairs, and you were lucky to get a hello, much less a smile. That place desperately needed a goodwill ambassador, a sort of cruise ship director who would make the daily rounds with coffee and other refreshments and dispel the toxic atmosphere. It got to the point where whenever I entered the building, I would either whistle or sing softly. My attempts at cheer did little to lift the miasmatic fog, but they sure made me feel better. I learned a lesson on those visits: My attitude became a shield against their attitudes. And here’s some more good news: The world sports its share of naysayers, but we don’t have to listen to them.

Proﬁle Mentorship Helping Kids Tackle Life Through Music Mentorship

COURTESY OF DUFF ROWDEN

By Patrick Butler n sou t her n c a l ifor ni a , music pastor Duff Rowden was riding on a bike trail when he came upon an orange orchard loaded with fruit. “They were beautiful, large, ripe, and ready to eat,” Rowden said. “I thought I might take a couple, but they weren’t mine, so I rode away.” Two weeks later, he came by the orchard again. “The fruit was on the ground, split open, flies buzzing around, ruined, and inedible. I thought, ‘So many kids are like that fruit: ripe, ready, and full of potential,’” Rowden said. “But through bad choices or being overlooked, they end up broken and ruined. Somebody has to step up. “Then I thought, ‘Somebody else won’t do it.’ I had to do it. “I asked myself ‘What do I have that kids want?’ Well, I’m a musician and play guitar. Lots of kids want to learn how to play. I can do that.” He made it his mission to reach kids through music, starting nonprofit MusicalMentors.org in 2007 in San Juan Capistrano, California. He estimated that more than 1,000 kids have been helped by the organization thus far. “We bring troubled kids living in rough circumstances out of themselves,” Rowden said. “It’s more than learning how to play music. It’s about character development. “The skills acquired here are transferable to almost every facet of life. Playing music takes discipline, perseverance, commitment, and getting along with others.” He won’t let them quit. “We teach kids not to give up, and understand they can do something hard. After overcoming that huge mental obstacle, the sky is the limit,” he said. “They didn’t think they had it in them. Now they do. That’s a beautiful thing. We call it ‘Learning how to play life right.’” Rowden and his wife, Bonita, teach 16-week, beginning, intermediate, and

Musical Mentors founder Duff Rowden (back row L) and volunteer mentor Cara (front C) with students who were awarded donated guitars for their successful participation in the Musical Mentors program, in Santa Ana, Calif. advanced classes for youngsters aged 8 to 18. But the key to success is their young volunteers—assistant mentors— working alongside them. “A 16-year-old volunteer mentor has more influence on kids than I do,” he said. “I’m grandpa age. Youngsters expect me to listen to them. But when someone 16 shows genuine attention, that younger kid knows it’s unusual. “They think, ‘He doesn’t have to pay attention to me, but he is,’ and it becomes special, a real self-image booster. Volunteers make what we do shine.” There’s a benefit for volunteer mentors as well, Rowden said. “Most of them have no leadership experience, and mentoring changes their lives,” he said. “When younger kids look up to them, assistant mentors realize, ‘I am a big deal to somebody.’” One of the program’s success stories is “Zach,” who came to Musical Mentors doubting himself. “Zach liked to quit. If it was hard, he wouldn’t do it. The mentors had him learn one bar of music at a time, showing him how, until he learned a whole song. We call that process ‘Go slow and learn fast,’” Rowden said.

“You know, babies fall all the time when they’re learning to walk, but they don’t quit. Babies don’t know how to quit. Quitting is learned. “I tell kids like Zach, ‘Can you do what a baby can do?’ They say, ‘Sure we can,’ and they acquire a new perspective.” Zach learned that he could do something difficult and reap the rewards for doing so. He went through all the levels at Musical Mentors and graduated with honors. “His confidence soared,” Rowden said. “He tried more difficult things in life and did it. He tackled videography and became proficient.” Zach eventually became a ranger for the California Park Service and was assigned to Doheny Beach State Park. He was also chosen to make training videos for the park’s ranger school. Bonita Rowden said: “Many kids never learn to conquer something difficult. They need to find encouragement to overcome. Music is a special something they can get into and be part of something good. They’re developing skills not everyone has, so learning makes them special and opens doors. It gets them ready for life.” I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Nation Proﬁle

THOUGHT LEADERS

Resilience and Redemption The focus on racism fails to address America’s critical problems. We must ﬁnd solutions to remedy the moral and spiritual free fall of our nation’s children, says Bob Woodson

ighty percent of my closest friends have letters in front of their names like ex-something—ex-drug addict, ex-gangbanger,” said Bob Woodson, founder of the Woodson Center. In a recent episode of American Thought Leaders, host Jan Jekielek discusses with Woodson his work in disadvantaged communities fighting to overcome gangs, drugs, and poverty. They also discuss his insights into personal responsibility and transformation and how our focus on racism is failing to address America’s more critical problems of class and moral decline. JAN JEKIELEK: When

we were talking earlier, you said, “We have to think about how to win when we’re dealt a losing hand.” I think a lot of people are feeling that way.

Bob Woodson, founder and president of the Woodson Center, in Washington on Feb. 18, 2020. 52 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

blessed to serve people that others run from. Eighty percent of my closest friends have letters in front of their names like ex-something—ex-drug addict, ex-

SAMIRA BOUAOU/EPOCH TIMES

BOB WOODSON: I’ve been

Nation Proﬁle

gang banger. And they’ve, through God’s grace, been redeemed. MR . JEKIELEK: You got

into this work while you were in the civil rights movement. Tell me about that. MR . WOODSON: My dad

died when I was 9, and my mother had a fifth-grade education with five children to raise—I was the youngest of five. I dropped out of school at 17, went into the military, found myself there, and finished high school. When I came out, I went to college. I got involved in the civil rights movement because I thought America’s greatest challenge was racial, and it was during the ’60s. But I left the movement over several issues. One was forced busing for integration. I believed the opposite of segregation was desegregation, not forced integration. But the most profound issue was the bait-and-switch game going on. Some were using the demographics of low-income blacks to promote remedies that generated resources that went to middle-class people like myself, who were well-educated at the time. But the plight of poor people was abandoned. I began to work on behalf of low-income people of all races. The greatest barrier facing America isn’t racial: It’s class. It’s upward mobility for those at the bottom. That defines my journey for the past 40 to 50 years. Pastor Chuck Swindoll once said that 10 percent of who you are is defined by external circumstances—

your family, for example, or racism. But 90 percent of who you are and what you do is defined by your attitude toward the 10 percent. I concentrate on helping people understand that they have the responsibility to be agents of their own uplift, regardless of circumstances. Powerful forces tell large groups of people—particularly blacks—that your life is defined by the external circumstances. This is a poisonous message. That’s where I part company with the race issue. It’s preventing us from addressing the critical crisis facing America. MR . JEKIELEK: Another

way of looking at it is that people could actually be denying the 90 percent of who they are if they’re focused on that 10 percent. MR . WOODSON: There’s

nothing more lethal than giving people a convenient reason for their failure. You say to them, “You don’t have to compete. Because of the legacy of slavery and discrimination, you’re exempted; therefore we’ll provide you with opportunity. The entry standards will be dumbed down for you because of past disadvantage.” The Woodson Center challenges that paradigm, not with a counter-argument, but with counter experiences. We emphasize examples of people who have achieved against the odds under the worst of circumstances. There were 20 blacks who were born slaves who died millionaires, and they did so because they followed

“Powerful forces tell large groups of people—particularly blacks—that your life is deﬁned by the external circumstances. This is a poisonous message.” certain success paths. The Woodson Center has chronicled the stories of people who have achieved against the odds. One of the attitudes they share is they never succumb to bitterness. It’s important for America to understand that what we’re witnessing now has little to do with a legacy of slavery and discrimination. It has everything to do with our response. We need to go back and apply old values to the new challenges. MR . JEKIELEK: You told

me that there are more than 2,500 Woodson leaders out there. MR . WOODSON: In 39

states. MR . JEKIELEK: You’ve

had some pretty spectacular results in reducing gang violence. The House of Umoja is a great example. MR . WOODSON: My

hometown of Philadelphia was a youth gang capital in the ‘70s. A very enterprising

woman and her husband, Falaka and David Fattah, found out the oldest of their six sons was a gang member, so she invited him to bring his friends home. He brought 15 of them in. She said, “After talking all night, I know nothing about gangs. I know something about family, so why don’t you join ours?” She moved these 15 boys in with her six sons and husband, one bathroom. She said, “We have to be clean and disciplined and work.” Long story short, they retired her mortgage in a year or two, and within three years, they purchased five other houses because when young men found that there was a sanctuary, 100 of them now occupied these five houses in this community. Gang deaths went from 48 to two in one year. I followed her around and chronicled everything she did, and the House of Umoja was born. The principles I extracted became the foundational principles

I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Nation Proﬁle

“I concentrate on helping people understand that they have the responsibility to be agents of their own uplift, regardless of circumstances.” that the Woodson Center operates on. MR . JEKIELEK: When you

talk about these troubled communities, frankly, it’s not just the typical communities that you think of as troubled. In Silicon Valley, we know that children have a six times greater likelihood of committing suicide than the average across America. How did that happen? MR . WOODSON: Race is

MR . JEKIELEK: You’ve

said that the civil rights movement was hijacked. How has that manifested itself today? MR . WOODSON: One of

the goals of the civil rights movement was for blacks to enter politics. They said, “OK, let us run these cities. Our people will be better off

54 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

if you just take middle-class blacks and put them in charge.” Well, middle-class blacks have been running these cities for 50 years. Why then is the biggest income gap not between whites and blacks, but between low-income blacks and upper-income blacks? Why are these inequities occurring in cities run by their own people? When I was debating somebody from Black Lives Matter, I said, “Explain to me the racism where black children are failing in schools run by their own people.” Racism can’t possibly be the cause of it. It’s systemic incompetence, not systemic racism that’s the cause. It’s more of a class problem than a race problem.

MR . WOODSON: Bill

mination, grit, intestinal fortitude, and a will to work hard. No matter what obstacles you place in that child’s path, he or she will succeed. Show me a white child without those characteristics, no matter what opportunities you give to that white child, I can show you that child’s failure.” Your destiny is determined by your values. There are hundreds of stories of redemption and restoration around the country. But the qualities that enable people to achieve against the odds also make them invisible, because they’re not complaining and whining or protesting—they’re busy working. What we’re trying to do at the Woodson Center is establish the Center for the Study of Resilience and Perseverance. We ought to be thankful that we live in a nation that allows these kinds of amazing transformation and redemptive acts to occur.

Raspberry, the late journalist, said, “You show me a black child with self-deter-

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

MR . JEKIELEK: One key

thing you said earlier was that all of the solutions that stem from the Woodson principles involve accepting responsibility.

CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

preventing America from addressing the critical problem that it’s facing. America is in a moral and spiritual free fall that’s consuming young people of all races and classes. Young people are growing up without content or purpose in their lives, to the point where they devalue life. If a child devalues his or her life, then they’ll take their own or take someone else’s. At the Woodson Center, we started a group called “The Voices of Black Mothers United.” Sylvia Bennett-Stone is a mom who lost her teenage

daughter. She’s reached out to thousands of other moms who lost children through homicide. And now we’ve come together with moms who lost their children to suicide and opioids. A lot of Appalachian moms and low-income white moms have lost their children to opioid addiction. The Woodson Center is bringing these moms together. But to find solutions to prevent the continued destruction of our children, we must take race off the table. We hope to use the organization to help America confront the real crisis—the moral and spiritual free fall of our children.

Children stand outside a convenience store located in a lowincome neighborhood in Miami on April 17, 2020.

T R AV E L • F O O D • L U X U R Y L I V I N G

Unwind

No.05

Man began tracking time by watching the sun and stars pass overhead. These unique pieces make the process much easier. PHOTO COURTESY OF L'EPEE

It’s About Time THE DAYS OF CLAIMING AN island are over, but you can still buy one. From tropical isles to some set in remote Alaskan rivers, they are awaiting your landfall. 60

ANCIENT LEGENDS, scores of castles, quaint villages, and beautiful scenery— all are to be found in misty, green Wales. 58

MAKING A GREAT MEAL is much easier when you have the tools that top chefs use, so here’s a peek at some of the special gear they insist on. 63

INSIDE I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

TAKIN’ IT EASY

A quirky New Zealand beach house, surrounded by lush nature, lists for $3 million By Phil Butler

56 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

on the grounds are a woodshed, a huge workshop, outdoor shower facilities, and a separate fenced, shady paddock on the estuary shore. Once a seasonal settlement of Maori settlers from East Polynesia, Mapua today is a thriving, if remote, community on the Tasman Bay just outside Nelson. The Mapua township retains bits of the culture of these first inhabitants in a perfect mix of classic “kiwiana” (quirky things that are purely New Zealander). Around the wharf there are charming boutique shops, fine restaurants, art galleries, and wine bars. The estate is only 30 minutes from Nelson airport, and it’s in the center of the Great Taste Cycle trail, close to wonderful vineyards, trout fishing sites, national parks, and a lot more. On a special note, with all oceanside properties like this Mapua estate, special rules dictate these can only be sold to New Zealand nationals. Phil Butler is a publisher, editor, author, and analyst who is a widely cited expert on subjects ranging from digital and social media to travel technology.

MAPUA BEACH ESTATE MAPUA, NEW ZEALAND NZ$4.5 MILLION (US$3 MILLION) • 5 BEDROOMS • 2,368 SQUARE FEET • OVER 12 ACRES KEY FEATURES • SEAFRONT ACRES • UNIQUE LOCATION AND SETTING • PRIVACY AND LIFESTYLE AGENT NEW ZEALAND SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY BO MANSFIELD, SALES ASSOCIATE M: +64 27 540 2060

ALL PHOTOS BY NEW ZEALAND SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY

itting right on the tasman sea in the charming village of Mapua, New Zealand, a laid-back private estate is all about harmony and taking things easy. On the market for $4.5 million NZD (about $3 million), this property embodies the iconic Kiwi lifestyle. Over 12 acres of lush nature surrounds this classic 2,368-square-foot beach house. With interiors that flow seamlessly into the wild outdoor seascape, the main house offers five bedrooms and four baths of wide-open spacious luxury. Almost all the rooms of the house have outside access to shady nooks and covered decks, and the pristine beachfront. There are three guest rooms, two downstairs lounges, a gourmet kitchen, an office, a music room, and a separate “sleep out” suite off the back deck. Upstairs, the master suite has its own lounge, bath, and observation deck. The open and breezy main house affords the owners and their guests panoramic views of the Tasman Sea, the estuary, and the stunning mountains of Kahurangi National Park. Also

A drone view at dusk reveals the town and estuary to the west. While the estate offers a feeling of total seclusion, it’s only a short stroll to Mapua town and the amenities there.

Inside, the home is open, airy, and elegant, and pure Kiwi temperament. The designers made use of the best traditional materials in a space meant for casual living and entertaining.

The home’s master suite on the second floor has its own lounge and other in-suite features, and offers the owners a magnificent panorama.

The property’s shaded and covered decks connect the breezy interior of the main house with the pool, the leisure areas, and gardens, and with the amazing beach just over the dunes.

Downstairs, the gathering spaces and bedrooms flow into the lush landscape, enhancing the feeling of continuity with nature. Warm colors, fine wood tones, and an "easy does it" sense carry over into every part of the property. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Travel United Kingdom

The picturesque Conwy Castle.

Northern Wales: Misty but Delightful This land of legends abounds in ancient castles and stunning scenery hat slight drizzle that the Welsh prefer to call “mist” didn’t bother us at all as we walked about the tiny village of Beddgelert, Wales. Wales may often be “misty,” but it’s also delightful—and Beddgelert is a good example of what makes it so. This village of only 300 people is exactly the sort of place for which the much-overused word “quaint” was invented. We had started our visit to the northern region of Wales in Conwy, one of the UK’s lesser-known and underappreciated historic towns. Small (with a population of 3,800 people), pleasant, in just a bit from the Irish Sea, and only an hour or so drive south from Wales’s northern border with England, Conwy is dominated by a massive late 13th-century castle with eight huge towers that English King Edward I constructed as part of his iron necklace of fortresses designed to intimidate the Welsh into submission. Every bit as impressive as the castle is the extremely well-preserved wall—fortified with

58 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

OVER

600

CASTLES dot the landscape in Wales. Caerphilly is the largest castle in Wales, and the second-largest in Europe, after Windsor.

21 towers and three gateways—that encircles almost the entire town. Other Conwy attractions include a museum that displays teapots from several centuries and supposedly the smallest house in the UK. We soon sized up the Welsh as polite, friendly, and helpful to visitors. We were also amused to note a couple of perfect examples of British understatement. One store was named The Useful Shop and the sign outside of a fish and chips spot announced that its offerings were “probably” the best in town. In Wales, you soon sense that you’re traveling in a land of legends, because you can’t go very far without coming across a medieval castle. Many Americans are under the mistaken impression that it’s mostly run-down coal mines, but the truth is that when it comes to scenery, Wales easily matches Ireland or Scotland. Indeed, few other countries in Europe—or the world—have so much stunningly beautiful scenery in so small an area. It’s very small—only about 170 miles long by about 60 miles wide, positioned to the west of the southern part of England and bordered

FROM TOP L: TOMAS MAREK/SHUTTERSTOCK, SHUTTERSTOCK, THE EPOCH TIMES, ANDREW CHISHOLM/SHUTTERSTOCK, COPYRIGHT FRED J. ECKERT, COPYRIGHT FRED J. ECKERT

By Fred J. Eckert

Travel United Kingdom by the sea on three sides. But don’t make the mistake of allocating it too little time. There’s To a much to see, and you also need to make allowconsiderable ance for the fact that it’s mostly mountainous extent, it is with mainly narrow roads. Driving around Wales may be slow, but reminiscent that’s really a good thing because there’s so of New much glorious scenery to take in. To a considerable extent, it’s reminiscent of New Zealand: Zealand. Almost everywhere you look, you see sheep. Northern Wales, and especially Snowdonia, the area around Mount Snowdon, is widely considered to be the most scenic and interesting part of Wales. This is where the old Welsh SCOTLAND language is most vigorously preserved. Signs are usually in both English and Welsh, but sometimes only in Welsh, and that can sometimes confuse things, as Welsh is a difficult language that favors long names, and BEDDGELERT the pronunciation isn’t at all what you would assume from the arrangement of letters. A good example is the Northern Welsh town WALES ENGLAND that’s famous for being the longest-named place in the world, Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllandysiliogogogoch (there are 58 characters in that name!). It translates into English as “Saint Mary’s church Wales is only about in the hollow of witch hazel near a rapid 170 miles long by whirlpool and the Church of Saint Tysilio near about 60 miles wide. the red cave.” The Welsh usually refer to it by its nickname: LlanfairPG. Between there and Mount Snowdon, you’ll find Caernarfon Castle, the place where the At reigning UK monarch’s eldest son is invested feet, Snowdon is as the prince of Wales. the highest peak in Mount Snowdon may not soar quite as high Wales. The highest as the Alps or the Rockies, but on a clear day, mountain in the the views from atop it are spectacular: You can UK is Ben Nevis, at see as far as the Isle of Mann and the Wicklow 4,413 feet. Mountains of Ireland. There’s a steam train

3560

The Northern Welsh town of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllandysiliogogogoch is referred to by its nickname, LlanfairPG.

If You Go Getting There: Visitors can fly into Cardiff from London or other international hubs. Getting Around: Wales is easy to get around, whether that’s via car, bus, train, or even ferry (from Ireland). When to Go: MidApril through midOctober is generally considered to be the best time to visit. Weather changes are common at any time of the year.

(Top) The Useful Shop in Conwy. (Above) A stream running through a small village in the countryside of northern Wales.

Guidebooks: Insight Guides’ “Great Breaks: Snowdonia & North Wales” and “The Rough Guide to Wales” are good choices. Information: See VisitWales.com

ride up and down the mountain that takes 2 1/2 hours. Nearby, you can take an interesting trip underground to visit the Welsh Slate Museum. Two other places that are considered “mustsee” tourist spots in Northern Wales are Portmeirion and Bodnant. Portmeirion is a sprawling Italianate fantasy village—no residents, only guests—consisting of 50 eclectic buildings ranging from Oriental to Gothic placed around a piazza that a Welsh architect whimsically put together on his property in the 1920s. The famous flowered pottery called Portmeirion was created by the architect’s daughter. You can buy firsts and seconds of the pottery here, although it’s now produced in England. Whereas Portmeirion is bizarre and can’t compete with the beauty of the Welsh countryside and villages that lie nearby, Bodnant Garden is simply splendid—perhaps the UK’s finest and certainly one of the most beautiful gardens in Europe. That’s what’s so delightful about Northern Wales—so many pretty sights to see and interesting things to do in such a small and easy-to-get-around area. Fred J. Eckert is a retired U.S. ambassador and former member of Congress. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

No man is an island, but any man (or woman) can own one

By Bill Lindsey

Lifestyle Getaways

Having your own private tropical island may be more attainable than you imagined; many are available around the world.

FROM L: DAVE Z/SHUTTERSTOCK, MARIDAV/SHUTTERSTOCK

hen it comes time to get away from it all, many people think of a boat. But even an 80-foot motor yacht can seem cramped after a few weeks aboard. Perhaps an island is the solution, and happily, buying your own island is easy when you know where to look and what to look for. The first step is to determine why you want an island. The answers range from bragging rights, such as, “I’ll be spending the weekend on my island,” to a desire to create a five-star resort such as Richard Branson’s Necker Island in the British Virgin Islands. Other reasons include using the island as a private campsite, a vacation home, or your primary residence. Next, consider where in the world you want an island. There’s no shortage of places to look. Of the top 50 countries with islands, Norway and Sweden have more than 500,000 (combined), while Canada has more than 50,000. There are 35,000 islands in the Great Lakes (including in the U.S. and Canada), 16,617 in the

The political climate and tax laws of the country governing the island are important subjects to be researched. United States, 17,504 in Indonesia, 7,641 in the Philippines, and 1,000 in the UK. There are 700 in the Bahamas, 307 in the Turks and Caicos, and 210 in Italy. These totals include islands in lakes, as well as those adjacent to the coast. Clearly, there are huge differences in the climates and geography of all of these islands, with most people preferring either a more tropical setting or one that combines privacy and easy access to all things civilized. A great example of the latter is a 3/4-acre-sized island on Oak Island. Located in New Rochelle, New York, a 30-minute drive from Manhattan, the island, accessible via a private bridge, is improved with a massive six-bedroom, six-bath Italian-style

residence, available for $4.9 million. At the other extreme is a 9.3-acre island in the Chiriqui Lagoon of Panama. Completely undeveloped and a 40-minute boat ride from the closest village on the coast, it can be yours for $150,000. Another option is Alisa Craig, a 244-acre island located 10 miles off the coast of Scotland. It’s chilly, populated mostly by birds, best-known for its curling stone quarry, and comes with a title. The 9th Marquess of Alisa will bestow her title upon the new owner in exchange for $2.4 million. Your budget is the most important factor in choosing an island. Those with easy access and improved by access to power, water, and residences cost more than completely undeveloped islands. However, it’s possible that an expensive, easily accessed, ready-to-move-in island may wind up being less expensive than what’s needed to buy and improve a remote island due to the cost and effort required for even basic improvements. Due diligence steps include determining how to reach the island. If there’s no bridge, does it have a dock, and if so, I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Lifestyle Getaways

LIFESTYLE

A PRIVATE PLACE

For the ultimate in seclusion, go offshore

1 Where Is It? A private island offers the ultimate in solitude, with many just a short boat ride from towns and cities.

62 I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

flects the development potential as well as a setting on the edge of Biscayne Bay and the Atlantic Ocean with world-class diving on living coral barrier reefs and world-renowned fishing grounds. The political climate and tax laws of the country governing the island are important subjects to be researched. This step is relatively easy for islands located in the United States, Bahamas, or Canada, but can become a bit convoluted for islands in South and Central America, the Mediterranean Sea, or Pacific Ocean islands. The bottom line is this: You can own an island. How you use it is the big question.

2 What Will You Do on It? Do you want to live on it or just enjoy owning it? There are islands with homes in communities a short drive from the city, while others are so remote, they may only be viable as a campsite.

3 How Do You Get to It?

Before you buy your island getaway, make sure to confirm its actual size! Some are quite tiny.

Access may be a big problem for some islands, so find out if it has a bridge, and if not, does it have boat dockage and if so, for what size boat? How long does it take to get to the nearest town?

THIS PAGE FROM TOP: GRISHA BRUEV/SHUTTERSTOCK, BAKERJARVIS/SHUTTERSTOCK

what size boat can it handle? The water depth is critical to allow even small boats to reach the island, much less a barge carrying water storage tanks or building supplies. Despite being separate from the mainland, islands are still subject to the same ordinances, rules, and laws. If the island doesn’t have access to power lines, can you install solar panels? Is the island located in an environmental area where development is precluded? Choosing an island with existing infrastructure for power and water and featuring a residence in move-in condition avoids the permitting process, the time effort, and the cost of making the island habitable and accessible. It also allows you to enjoy the property immediately upon closing the deal. An example of an island that has a high price tag, but is ready for immediate use and also has the potential to generate some income is the 26-acre Pumpkin Key, located a 10-minute boat ride from Ocean Reef Club or a 10-minute helicopter ride from Miami’s South Beach. Water and power serve the main house, two caretakers cottages, and the dockmaster’s apartment, as well as the 20-slip marina and tennis courts, which serve double duty as helicopter landing pads. According to the seller, the island has 12 bayfront lot sites ready for development that include access to the Ocean Reef Club. The $95 million price tag re-

Private islands are available for purchase throughout the world, so pick a spot on the map and start shopping. Research the climate, tax implications, and permissible uses before signing the check.

A Chef’s Toolkit:

KITCHEN ESSENTIALS PROFESSIONAL CHEFS CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT

A SPATULA WITH A HEART

Williams Sonoma No Kid Hungry Tools for Change Silicone Spatulas From $14.95

A simple spatula is essential for every kitchen. In addition to tasks such as mixing and spreading, it helps remove every last bit from a bowl, saving food and money. Featuring artwork by famous chefs and food experts, this collection gives 30 percent of proceeds to help feed children in need.

like an artist with a favorite brush or an IT tech with a preferred screwdriver, chefs have their own must-have tools for creating culinary masterpieces. You may be surprised by their choices. By Bill Lindsey

KEEP AN EYE ON THE HEAT

A TIMELESS KITCHEN WORKHORSE

ThermoWorks DOT Simple Alarm Thermometer $45

Butter Pat Industries Joan Cast-Iron Skillet $295

The key to the perfect flavor and texture of any dish is cooking at the correct temperature. This probe thermometer will prevent driedout chops and steaks—and food sickness from undercooked poultry. Set it to the desired temperature and it will beep to let you know when it’s done.

DOES EVERYTHING BUT THE DISHES

Inspired by and improving upon classic designs, this skillet is hand-cast in the firm’s own foundry in Pennsylvania and finished to a smooth polish, ready to fry, roast, broast, or bake using the glass cover. It’s made to be thinner and lighter than most skillets, yet sturdy for years of everyday use.

Thermomix TM6 $1,499

PHOTOS COURTESY OF MANUFACTURERS

A blender makes fast work of chopping and mixing, but this “smart blender” goes far beyond that. It can blend, slow cook, frappe, whisk, sauté, emulsify, stir, brown, knead, and grind. The 6.8-inch color screen provides guided menus.

THE MOST USEFUL KNIFE Misen Chef’s Knife $75 If limited to only one knife in the kitchen, many chefs would choose a chef’s knife for its versatility. This hybrid option has a German-style full tang and a Japanesestyle, narrow, 15-degree edge angle for maximum sharpness, making it well-suited for jobs from chopping vegetables to slicing fish, pork, and beef.

SURGICALLY PRECISE SLICES Benriner Mandoline Slicer $79.83 A mandoline is a better choice than a knife for precise slicing tasks. Four interchangeable blades with an adjustable thickness allow for cuts from paper-thin slices to chunky strips. It’s designed to be easier and safer to use than a knife when working with fruits and vegetables. I N S I G H T February 4 – 10, 2022

Epoch Booklist