Politics

While North Korea has test fired numerous ballistic missiles (mostly intermediate-range, including one intercontinental) in the past, and as such today's launch was largely seen as merely the latest political provocation to Trump by a seemingly oblivious Kim John-Un, there was one notable difference in the launch post-mortem: according to press and Pentagon reports, the maximum altitude attained by the ICBM was 3,700 km (2,300 miles) with a flight time of about 47 minutes.

The New Russian Sanctions Bill Is Washington’s Monument To Its Criminality

Paul Craig Roberts

Perhaps sensing that Trump is rather vulnerable right now, and confirming reports from two days ago that an ICBM launch is imminent, moments ago Japan's NHK reported that North Korea has fired "what appears to be a missile" which landed in Japan's exclusive economic zone. The Pentagon, as reported by Fox news, confirms that Japan has indeed launched a ballistic missile, and is assessing the results.

Roughly a month ago, we noted that Republicans might be well served to stop sitting around twiddling their thumbs waiting for the next Russia 'bombshell' to drop and actually go on the offensive against an 'investigation' that has obviously morphed into mass hysteria courtesy of free-flowing leaks from a conflicted "intelligence community" intent upon bringing down a presidency rather than finding out the truth.  Here's what we said:

Despite a rebound in business survey hope, a number of consumer confidence measures have been tracking lower in recent months as Trumphoria fades. July's final UMich consumer confidence data confirms this trend printing at 93.4 - the lowest since Oct 2016. While current conditions rose to the highest since July 2005, the biggest driver of the overall decline was a tumble in the 'expectations' index.

Although a slight improvement on the early month preliminary print, the trend remains lower...