Brexiters bash POTUS

It was supposed to be a short and fairly chummy visit by President Obama, at the end of this week. His UK trip managed to coincide with the Queen's 90th birthday, and it became clear he would use the visit to reiterate his pro-EU views.

Mr Obama's visit was accompanied by an article he authored, published in the Telegraph, addressing readers in the following way:

"As your friend, let me say that the EU makes Britain even greater".

Then Boris put pen to paper.

Boris Johnson used a column in the Sun newspaper, to try and claim that Mr Obama had shown proven anti-British sentiments since his first day as POTUS, by removing a bust of Winston Churchill from the Oval Office, and reportedly having it sent to the British Embassy in Washington.

His comments quickly attracted ridicule. Mr Churchill's own grandson, sitting MP Nicholas Soames poured criticism on Mr Johnson's comments, saying:

When the descendants of historical figures you've chosen to invoke start debunking your arguments, you know you're having a bad day.

Mr Johnson's comments largely drew criticism over him choosing to mention Mr Obama's part-Kenyan heritage, as part of his column. It echoes the sentiments that flared up in 2011, when Donald Trump demanded that Mr Obama release his birth certificate. Mr Obama found them, and as expected, they proved he was born in Hawaii afterall. He later roasted Mr Trump at the April 2011 Correspondents Dinner.

The fact that people keep bringing up the Kenyan connection is troubling; it comes down to an inability to provide a logical argument to whatever Mr Obama is championing. Instead of creating a rational opposing argument, Mr Johnson and Mr Trump have resorted to making ancestry the issue.

Some might simply call this an example of dog-whistle politics. It's been seen to an extent with the 2016 London Mayoral Campaign. Sadiq Khan was accused by rival Zac Goldsmith of "giving cover to extremists".

You could say this outburst by Mr Johnson is some kind of bonkers siren call to Britain's closet xenophobes. Maybe Mr Johnson is testing the waters, to see just how far he's allowed to go. Or he might just genuinely think the Kenyan thing actually matters.

Such a move might have backfired on the Brexit campaign however. Mr Obama enjoyed very high approval ratings amongst a sample of Brits polled by the Pew Research Centre in 2015. 76% of UK respondents had a lot of confidence that Mr Obama was "doing the right thing regarding world affairs".

In comparison, his predecessor, George W Bush was only about half as well-received across the pond. Here in the UK during the Bush Junior years, about only half of respondents thought he was doing the right thing. How times have changed.

Having the mascot for the Brexit campaign openly bashing a US President that Brits actually quite like is just the latest controversy in a campaign that's still got another 7 weeks left to go.

Panama Papers leak

Members of the global elite are in spasms of panic, following the leak of millions of documents, from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.

Photo by Christian Taube / CC BY

Reports began to trickle in on social media, at about 10pm GMT about the leak. German publication Süddeutsche Zeitung has been credited with receiving the documents, which were eventually passed onto the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).

It is estimated they acquired about 11.5m documents, dating back to the 1970s, which go into great detail about years worth of transactions by wealthy individuals, using about 214k offshore companies in the process, it is alleged.

It is a sensitive revelation for global elites, because some of those involved currently hold high office, in some cases reportedly.

The scale of the leak is unprecedented. It dwarfs the Wikileaks Cablegate leak of 2010, with emails, photos, PDFs and a range of other files all adding up to 2.6 Terabytes.

To put this into perspective, you would supposedly require 40 Blu-Ray disks, just to store 1TB worth of data.

VIPs linked to the Panama Papers

Of significance to UK readers, David Cameron's late father has been reportedly mentioned.

Much focus, however, has been given to transactions relating to the President of Argentina, Mauricio Macri, as well as documents reportedly pertaining to associates close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

RT (formerly Russia Today) predictably reacted to the news, by claiming the media were giving excessive coverage to the documents which implicated those close to President Putin.

This is yet another demonstration of the outlet's bias, given that RT omitted actually including details about said documents. The bulk of this article decided to focus on a series of tweets about the coverage instead of the leak itself.

There is also mention of documents, reportedly relating to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. Ukrainian NGO/exclusively online news outlet Hromadkse.TV showed some enthusiasm in publishing information about his alleged involvement in the matter.

One of their English-language reporters, Ian Bateson tweeted the following, which serves as an effective contrast between the ways people chose to cover the story:

Source: @IanBateson (Twitter)

The offshore companies mentioned in the leaked documents will be fully published in early May, according to the ICIJ.

US economy roars ahead, with record job creation

The US jobs market continues to enjoy a sunny spell, with 215k jobs created in the month of March.

Obama took office at the depths of the recession. 6yrs of jobs growth has followed.

Source: St Louis Fred

Today's job report in the US marks the longest continuous period of jobs growth since 1939. 2.8m jobs have been created in the last 12 months alone.

After the dog days of the Bush Junior Presidency, where the economy endured 2 recessions and the US saw next to no jobs growth, the Obama Presidency has seen a steady recovery to new all time highs in employment.

The jobless rate ticked up to 5%, and some might say it's a sign that the good times are over. It's a puzzling paradox, you might think. Lots of new jobs, but more people out of work; what?!

Simple explanation: The job creation stat shows businesses are still happy to hire. The rise in unemployment, therefore, is a result of an increase in people entering the workforce, trying to find work. Possibly a sign of improving confidence.

Back in 2008, the collapse of Lehman Brothers sent shockwaves around the world. US unemployment hit about 10%, a level not seen since the mid 1980s. It was essentially viewed as a crisis level of joblessness.

The Obama recovery

Mr Obama's era in the White House has come to be associated with a steady recovery, albeit slightly weaker than hoped. Economic growth has taken a hit. Its pre-crisis average was 3% growth, but since 2010, it has dropped to 2% or so.

This recovery was mainly possible, thanks to a quick dose of fiscal stimulus, to bail out the car manufacturing sector, as well as the financial sector (apart from Lehman Brothers of course).

7 years of low interest rates coupled with quantitative easing aided this move, and in conjunction, they have slowly dragged the US out of a downturn which some feared could spiral into a new great depression.

The stimulus ended in 2010, as recession turned to recovery, and the mounting debts in industrialised economies began to become a burden. The period of low rates has just come to an end in the US, as we saw in December.

However, Fed Chair Janet Yellen soothed markets the other day, saying rate rises in 2016 would be less frequent than previously forecast. It's all just a question of how long it takes for inflation to take off again, before rates will need to continue their inevitable rise.

Greenback claws back losses of past decade

One of the disappointments about the Obama recovery is the lack of strong wage growth. The average American household has seen their income stagnate since the start of the new millennium.

The fall in real incomes explains the dissatisfaction with the recovery

Source: St Louis Fred

However, one of the quirks of the Obama years is the recovery in the USD's value. Between 2002 and 2008, it was falling, just as commodities like Oil and Gold soared.

The recovery in the US has prompted an end to monetary easing, causing the Dollar to rally. Commodities priced in Dollars have subsequently fallen, causing difficulties in countries that rely on exporting these materials.

A consequence of a stronger Dollar is lower-than-expected inflation. The Fed has now got a 2%-target for inflation, so they'll most likely keep eyes peeled on that, plus wages, before hiking any further.

US GDP figures for the first 3 months of 2016 are expected at the end of April. Some have feared growth may be seen to have slowed down, owing to jitters earlier in the year.