Black Mark for BlackRock
What to Know: The state of Texas has blacklisted BlackRock and other financial firms for boycotting the fossil fuel industry. That means state funds will no longer be invested through (or with) them.
The TPPF Take: Don’t mess with Texas.
“This is a warning and wake up call to financial companies that want to take Texas pension and taxpayer dollars and weaponize them against Texas,” says TPPF’s Jason Isaac. “The ESG movement wrongly bullies corporations into ignoring their duty to provide profitability for shareholders, in order to appease a vocal minority of progressive activists. And some major firms, like BlackRock, are capitulating.”
For more on BlackRock and other firms, click here.
Recession
What to Know: Revised numbers show the gross national product (GNP) fell 0.6% in the second quarter of 2022, meaning we’re in a recession.
The TPPF Take: There’s no denying it now.
“Despite the Biden administration’s claims to the contrary, the U.S. is in a recession,” says TPPF’s Vance Ginn. “And despite its claims that everything else is to blame for the 40-year high in inflation, the blame is on the bad policies of excessive spending, taxing, regulating, and money-printing out of Washington. And the progressive fiscal policy pursued by this administration and Democrats in Congress is only making it worse.”
For more on the economy, click here.
Cartel Terror
What to Know: Recent violence in Mexico, with cartels attacking civilians, is part of a larger pattern.
The TPPF Take: Mexico’s president won’t confront the cartels.
“The violence claimed 260 lives in four days across suburban Guadalajara, Guanajuato state, Ciudad Juárez and Tijuana and several cities in Baja California, according to a count by the newspaper Reforma,” says TPPF’s David Agren. “But President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) spent more time at his Monday press conference chastising Reforma and ‘conservatives’ for exaggeration and ‘yellow journalism’—while presenting homicide numbers for days in which the narco-violence was not flaring.”
For more on Mexico, click here.