Unheralded stuff: 15 January 2014
So there’s been some pretty massive news overnight about the war on drugs. And I’ve done a site search on both Stuff.co.nz and nzherald.co.nz and neither outfit is covering it.
So here’s some coverage:
It has emerged that the United States’ DEA has been turning a blind eye to the activities of the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico, which is the largest and most powerful. A few years ago, the lawyer for the cartel and one of its senior members came in for a spot of legal attention. They agreed to cooperate with the DEA. And by cooperate I mean nark on other cartels and give them information about shipments and the like. IF the DEA turned a blind eye to the activities of the Sinaloa. Which the DEA agreed to.
It’s staggering.
The Washington Post has done a piece that queries the truthiness of the piece above. It’s a good read and now I don’t know what to believe (thank you to Andrea Vance for pointing this out to me).
In other news…
At least 200 people have drowned on an overloaded ferry in South Sudan trying to flee the hostilities. If you recall there are supposed to be peace talks going on.
In Nigeria, a car bomb has exploded in front of some offices in Maiduguri. 17 people have died. Remember for context, in the Boston marathon bombing, four people died.
Three Rabobank employees have been charged in the US for manipulating Libor interest rates. I’m not fully across this, but as far as I understand, the Libor rates kinda determine the entire world’s finance rates. So manipulating them is a big deal (in the words of this article: “It underpins the terms of $500 trillion of contracts from mortgages to the cost of corporate lending). So that seems a big deal. Between May 2005 and January 2011, Rabobank allowed money market traders to manipulate Libor submissions to benefit foreign currency trading positions.
Hell is breaking loose in Brazil with a spate of murders. At least 10 have been killed while some are reporting that 13 have died. It all kicked off when an off-duty politice officer was killed in Campinas. Remember for context, in the Boston marathon bombing, four people died.
A bomb has exploded in China’s southwest Guizou province at an illegal gambling den, killing 14 and injuring seven. Remember for context, in the Boston marathon bombing, four people died.
JPMorgan have had a tough year. They were fined $2.6 billion to settle lawsuits relating to the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme. And it just got worse. They released their earnings and oh…oh it got ok. They earned $5.3 billion in the final three months of 2013.
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