BY TYLER DURDEN
Last year was a bad year for corn — the latest US Department of Agriculture (USDA) report shows drought conditions and extreme weather wreaked havoc on croplands.
USDA unexpectedly slashed its outlook for domestic corn production amid a severe drought across the western farm belt. Farmers in Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas were forced to abandon drought-plagued fields.
The agency estimated farmers harvested 79.2 million acres, a decline of 1.6 million acres versus the previous estimate — the smallest acres harvest since 2008.
The unexpected cut to US harvested corn acres means grain supplies are a lot tighter than realized. A report Thursday showed the corn area in the world's largest producer is at the smallest since 2008 with crops failing in states such as Texas and Nebraska. That's due to persistent drought conditions in the western part of the country that could also hit harvests for wheat plants that are currently dormant for the winter. -- Bloomberg
The crop-failed lands reduced total harvest corn acreage to levels not seen since 2008. ........more below
The recently-released tranche of additional documents tied to Jeffrey Epstein include remarks by a woman identifying as one of the victims of the late disgraced financier and convicted sex trafficker, in which she refers to Donald Trump as a witness to the killing and disposal of the body of her infant.
The US Department of Justice released the documents numbering tens of thousands, which include FBI tips and complaints implicating Trump, on Wednesday.
Reports emerging on Friday across various outlets, including the UK edition of American online newspaper The International Business Times, pointed to inclusion in the documents of an FBI intake form dated March 3, 2020 recording a complaint from the unnamed woman.
The complainant said she had been trafficked at age 13 in the early 1980s and described an incident in 1984 involving the killing of her newborn child aboard a yacht in Mona Lake, Michigan.
According to the document, the woman said her uncle had carried out the killing and disposed of the ...
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has warned that the United States cannot turn the sovereign Latin American country into a colony and steal its natural resources.
Speaking on the television channel Venezolana de Television on Friday, Maduro called on American politicians gathered in Washington, DC, to abandon the failed projects that the White House has been trying to implement in his country for the past 25 years.
Maduro said if US politicians are ready to engage in dialogue on a respectful basis, “we will always find here a president who represents his people, to reach out, to seek paths to peace, cooperation and prosperity.”
In the meantime, he said, the nation will never believe the lies the US is fabricating.
“It is impossible for the US government to fabricate such a virtual reality,” Maduro repeated in English, emphasizing that the Venezuelan people have demonstrated the ability “to lead the country on the right path.”
US seizure of oil tankers
This episode reveals the ...
The Russian leader said in 2008 that it could lead to “long-term conflict” with Washington, according to transcripts of the talks
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned his then-US counterpart, George W. Bush, almost two decades ago that attempts to make Ukraine a member of NATO could split the country apart and result in a confrontation between Moscow and Washington, records of conversations between the two leaders have revealed.
On Tuesday, the US National Security archives published verbatim transcripts of several exchanges between Putin and Bush throughout the 2000s.
During their first meeting in Slovenia in June 2001, the Russian president questioned the need for NATO’s enlargement, but stressed that he “can imagine us [Moscow and Washington] becoming allies,” according to the files.
His tone stiffened significantly by the time of their last meeting in the Russian city of Sochi in April 2008, a year after Putin delivered his famous speech at the Munich Security Conference, ...
