The New York Times editors express hope that a proposed cease-fire in Yemen might hold:
Secretary of State John Kerry is expected to meet soon with foreign ministers of gulf Arab nations. If he can make sure they go forward with the cease-fire, there may be a chance of ending a conflict that has slaughtered civilians, tarnished America’s standing and diverted resources from fighting the Islamic State and Al Qaeda.
In March the US economy added a healthy 215K jobs, beating expectations and more importantly, pushing the average hourly earnings up by 0.3% on the month. Which, however, is curious because a cursory look at the job additions in the month reveals that nearly two-third of all jobs, and the three top categories of all job additions, were once again all minimum wages jobs.
For Israel’s Sake The Israel Lobby Must Be Held To Account
Paul Craig Roberts
It was ten years ago that the London Review of Books published an article on the Israel Lobby by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, distinguished scholars at two of America’s top universities. The following year the publisher, Farrar, Straus and Giroux found the courage to publish The Israel Lobby, a book with 357 overwhelmingly 5 star amazon.com reviews.
At 8:30am Eastern, the BLS will report the March payrolls report: the median forecast calls for a March nonfarm payrolls gain of 205k vs 242k in Feb., the high estimate is 250k, the low is 100k. The number is released three days after a particularly dovish Yellen speech, which prompted many to ask "what does the Fed know" - today's payrolls report will either provide the answer, if it is a big miss, or it will add to the confusion: if payrolls are surging, why is the Fed so concerned.
This is the breakdown of NFP expectations by bank:
Russia has criticised US plans to position troops, tanks and other armored vehicles full time along NATO’s eastern borders, and said that Moscow is preparing a “completely asymmetrical” response to the deployments. Alexandr Grushko, Russia’s Ambassador to NATO said on Thursday that Moscow would not act like a “passive observer” but would rather undertake all those military measures needed to counter the “totally unjustified increased military presence.” Press TV reports: “Of course, our response will be completely asymmetrical.