FRIDAY WRAP: Kamala, Boeing guilty of fraud, solar production boom, and bony boneless wings

Introduction

IT’S FRIDAYYYYY!!! And we are LIVE, and ALIVE. This is Ari the Data Queen, joined by AnalystHole Matt Moscardi, Jessie the Money Whisperer, and Hazelnut Rallis. On today’s weekly wrap up:  Kamala, Kamala, Kamala… oh, and other stuff?

Story of the Week (DR):

1. Harris campaign joins TikTok after Biden signed ban MM (DR Overruled)

1. Gen-Z covering

2. The Secret Battle for the Future of the Murdoch Empire

1. Rupert Murdoch, the patriarch, has moved to change the family’s irrevocable trust to preserve his media businesses as a conservative force. Several of his children are fighting back.

2. When Murdoch dies, control of the family’s companies, including the broadcaster Fox and the newspaper publisher News Corp, will be shared among his four eldest children via the trust.

3. Under the arrangement, Prudence, Lachlan, James and Elisabeth will each get an equal say in how the businesses are run.

4. But Murdoch now wants Lachlan to have majority control when he dies. A sealed court document obtained by The Times notes Murdoch’s concern that a “lack of consensus” among the children “would impact the strategic direction at both companies including a potential reorientation of editorial policy and content.” (None of the children’s economic stakes would be affected.)

5. In other words, Lachlan, who is chairman of News Corp and executive chairman and C.E.O. of Fox, should be given control to ensure that the family’s properties stay conservative, according to a sealed court document obtained by The Times.

6. Lachlan was the only one of the four elder children to attend Murdoch’s marriage to Elena Zhukova, his fifth wife, last month.

7. James has been a particular thorn in his father’s side, according to The Times. The former Fox executive and his wife, Kathryn, a climate change activist, have occasionally made public criticisms of the company’s move further to the right.

8. Murdoch believes that Fox’s conservative success made James and his siblings multibillionaires. The father’s representatives have referred to James among themselves as the “troublesome beneficiary.”

3. Boeing pleads guilty to fraud in fatal 737 Max crashes, fined $243.6 million AB CD

1. The Justice Department submitted an agreement with Boeing on Wednesday in which the aerospace giant will plead guilty to a fraud charge for misleading U.S. regulators who approved the 737 Max jetliner before two of the planes crashed, killing 346 people.

2. The detailed plea agreement was filed in federal district court in Texas. The American company and the Justice Department reached a deal on the guilty plea and the agreement’s broad terms earlier this month.

3. The finalized version states Boeing admitted that through its employees, it made an agreement “by dishonest means” to defraud the Federal Aviation Administration group that evaluated the 737 Max. Because of Boeing’s deception, the FAA had “incomplete and inaccurate information” about the plane’s flight-control software and how much training pilots would need for it, the plea agreement says.

4. The deal calls for the appointment of an independent compliance monitor, three years of probation and a $243.6 million fine. It also requires Boeing to invest at least $455 million “in its compliance, quality, and safety programs.”

5. The role and authority of the monitor is viewed as a key provision of the new plea deal, according to experts in corporate governance and white-collar crime. Cassell has said that families of the crash victims should have the right to propose a monitor for the judge to appoint. The agreement calls for the government to select the monitor “with feedback from Boeing.”

6. In Wednesday’s filing, the Justice Department said that Boeing “took considerable steps” to improve its anti-fraud compliance program since 2021, but the changes “have not been fully implemented or tested to demonstrate that they would prevent and detect similar misconduct in the future.”

7. That’s where the independent monitor will come in, “to reduce the risk of misconduct,” the plea deal states.

4. CrowdStrike backlash over $10 apology voucher

1. CrowdStrike is facing fresh backlash after giving staff and firms they work with a $10 UberEats voucher to say sorry for a global IT outage that caused chaos across airlines, banks and hospitals last week.

2. The cybersecurity company - whose software update on Friday affected 8.5 million computers worldwide - said in an email to its partners that it recognised the incident had caused extra work.

3. "To express our gratitude, your next cup of coffee or late night snack is on us!" CrowdStrike wrote, directing people to use a code to access the $10 credit.

4. The tech news website TechCrunch reported that some recipients encountered an error message when trying to make use of their voucher, which said they had been cancelled by the issuing party and were no longer valid.

1. A CrowdStrike spokesperson said Uber had blocked the cards after high usage rates triggered a fraud alert.

Goodliest of the Week (AB):

1. Stanley Black and Decker to sell leaf blower silencer designed by four engineering students CD

1. SUBURBAN PEOPLE REJOICE! Four engineering students at Johns Hopkins have created a silencer module for leaf blowers 

2. reducing the overall noise pollution of the devices by 37%

3. completely removing the high-pitched whining that annoyed them the most

2. Chase to Bar Customers From Using Credit Cards for ‘Pay Later’ Loans

1. The nation’s largest credit card issuer, will bar customers from using its credit cards to repay buy now pay later.

2. Chase said that buy now, pay later installment loans “are a form of credit” and the bank does not allow their credit cards to be used to make a payment towards a credit loan

3. US solar production soars by 25 percent in just one year MM DR

1. the construction of solar plants has boomed in the US and the Energy Information Agency is predicting that solar production could rise by as much as 42 percent by the end of 2024, since it has increased 25% in the first 5 months of the year

2. Wind and solar have produced 1.3 times as much electricity as coal so far in 2024

3. Solar and wind deployments are expected to dwarf everything else over the coming year

4. Microsoft’s World of Warcraft Workers Vote to Unionize

1. Adding more than 500 workers to the unionized video game staff at Microsoft, who promised regulators to remain neutral on organizing efforts so they could buy Activision Blizzard (who produces World of Warcraft) for $69B

2. Total is now more than 1,750, Communications Workers of America said

Gen Z-iest of the Week (CD): 

1. Business Insider: Elon Musk's transgender daughter says he was an absent and 'cruel' father

1. Jenna Wilson, 20, said Musk was a "cruel" father who was only around "maybe 10% of the time," despite sharing custody of Wilson and her twin brother

2. Musk believed Wilson to be "dead, killed by the woke mind virus."

3. Not tricked into signing: Wilson also said he read the medical forms twice — once with her and once alone — before he eventually signed them.

4. Cut legal and relational ties with father in 2022

2. Daily Mail: Labour says Tory law against 'cancel culture' at woke universities could be axed because it is a 'burden'

1. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson announced she is considering repealing the legislation designed to protect freedom of speech. 

2. Boris Johnson pledged the law in response to concerns about the rise of 'no-platforming' on campuses.

3. Claire Coutinho blasted a 'culture of intimidation', saying some institutions were stifling debate with an 'intellectual sedative'.

4. What I want to see: how this would be enforced?? Why now???

3. FOX Business: Harris campaign joins TikTok after Biden signed ban (this week, July 26th) MM AB DR

1. https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/harris-campaign-joins-tiktok-after-biden-signed-ban 

2. The presumptive Democratic nominee for president joined the app on Thursday, where Harris-themed memes about coconut trees and "Brat summer" have been viral for weeks. Within hours, her account amassed 1.3 million followers.

1. Intimidated by Brat summer </3

2. Washington Post on Instagram: “Girl, so confusing: the Kamala Harris meme decoders have entered the chat”

3. Harris' decision to join in on the fun reflects the importance Democrats place on reaching young voters: most TikTok users in the U.S. are under 30. While the vast majority of TikTok's 170 million American users say they're on the platform to be entertained, more than one third use the app to keep up with politics, according to Pew Research, a larger share than those on Facebook or Instagram

4. The Biden White House has heavily courted social media influences to advocate for the president's policies. Gen Z content creators have been invited to tour the White House and Biden campaign headquarters. In 2022, a group of 30 leading TikTok stars attended a news briefing on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. And the New York Times has reported extensively on Biden's efforts to host TikTok creators with State of the Union watch parties and exclusive invitations to Democratic fundraisers, as well as access to party officials and a special room to film videos at the upcoming DNC convention.

5. Republicans have made similar efforts to increase their presence on social media. Nearly 100 conservative influencers were given credentials at the RNC convention in July to generate buzz about former President Trump's re-election campaign. The convention's digital team set up a Creator Hub for them and provided time to go to the convention floor to film videos and interviews, Axios reported. 

6. Did mention: Trump joined TikTok in June. His first post featured Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) President Dana White at a UFC title fight in New Jersey and garnered more than 2.3 million likes and 38 million views in just one day. Trump's account now enjoys 9.2 million followers.

1. Kamala currently has 1.6 million (top post 10 million views, 16 hours ago)

1. Trump: top post 164.7 million views, June 1

7. Trump, as president, issued an executive order to ban TikTok, but it was challenged in court. He has since reversed his position, arguing "there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it" and that if the app were banned, Facebook would benefit, which he calls "an enemy of the people." (poor Zuck </3)

8. NPR June 2nd: Trump joins TikTok after previously trying to ban the app

1. https://www.npr.org/2024/06/02/nx-s1-4989327/trump-tiktok-ban 

2. Trump calls it an 'honor' to join TikTok after previously trying to ban the app

3. Trump's emergence on the platform comes as the former president's own social media platform, Truth Social, faces new pressure after a New York jury found him guilty on Thursday of falsifying business records in order to influence the 2016 presidential election. Trump has long denied any wrongdoing and has made clear he will appeal the historic verdict.

4. While some Trump supporters have doubled down and bought more shares of the former president's social media platform, the stock fell 5% overall on the day after the verdict, and in the first quarter alone the company lost over $300 million.

Assholiest of the Week (MM):

1. Data

1. There are just THREE banks in the state that are publicly traded and stuck - which leaves 171 publicly traded US banks that can just LEAVE

2. There is ONE insurer in the state that is publicly traded, leaving 41 insurers that can just stop insuring there!

3. Headline: The Treasury Department warns that an anti-woke Florida banking law is a national security risk - MSN and Another home insurance company is getting out of Florida

1. Asshole: Anyone staying in Florida

2. Florida debanked itself and deinsured itself by inserting the culture war into regulation

1. Banks operating in Florida are not allowed to ask anything about political “speech”, “leans”, or “affiliations” - ISIS is a political affiliation!  And a religious one!

2. So banks can’t ask basic due diligence questions that conflict with US federal regulations and intelligence - meaning they can’t give the loan for fear they could fund a terrorist, and they can’t NOT give the loan in Florida because it’s “discrimination”

3. Insurers can’t consider climate change

1. Property insurers are fundamentally forced to model climate costs

2. Legislation capped amounts companies can raise rates, but also considerations of climate change - so insurers basically can’t charge enough to cover the costs of replacement and pull out!

2. Boeing investors CD

1. 77% FOR CEO and Chair who’s been there for 15 years

2. 88% and 86% for two longest tenured directors

3. Stock jumps 2% on news they’re guilty

4. Headline: Boeing pleads guilty to fraud in fatal 737 Max crashes, fined $243.6 million

1. Asshole: Fucking investors

2. The company pleads guilty to fraud, they killed hundreds, they’ve had parts fall off the plane, they’ve paid billions in fines, they’ve clocked billions in losses, THEY STILL GET VOTED IN, and the reaction to the news they are, officially, fraudsters, is stock is up 2% AND THEY ALL KEEP THEIR MONEY AND JOBS?

3. Data:

1. No data, just an asshole: Robby Starbuck DR AB

1. Headline: Harley-Davidson Sparks Boycott Call for Going 'Totally Woke'

2. Starbuck is orchestrating or involved in Deere and Tractor Supply retracting DEI commitments and efforts, now Harley-Davidson

3. Everyone is Vivek now!  Look ma, I can hate gays and brown people on TV too!

1. Credit where credit is due - he is targeting brands typically used by rural or rural adjacent white people - to dismantle DEI

4. Meanwhile Kamala Harris is the nominee and raised over $150m in three days by a country that might be less racist than you think, shitbird

Headline-iest (ALL):

1. MM: Can boneless wings include bones? High court weighs in

1. A divided Ohio Supreme Court ruled Thursday that consumers should not expect boneless wings to be free of bones.

2. The 4-3 decision came after a guest of a restaurant filed legal action when he suffered serious medical complications because a bone from a boneless wing got stuck in his throat.

2. AB: Champagne sales down worldwide in 2024, industry executives cite lack of 'cheer'

3. DR: Terex to acquire ESG for $2 billion

4. CD: 

Exhausting-est of the Week (JS):

Who Won the Week?

1. DR: KH (and the country)

2. AB: Kamala Harris drives record fundraising after Biden exit, $81M largest 24-hour total in U.S. history. 

3. MM: Climate change!  The highest temperature ever was recorded this week, then was broken… the next day!  

4. CD: Democratic Party

1. AP News: Harris says she's 'ready to debate Donald Trump'

2. CNN: Trump campaign says it won’t commit to Harris debate until she’s confirmed as nominee 

3. → Biden flip

Predictions

1. DR: KH starts to win CEO hearts

2. AB: 

3. MM: Kamala’s win in November sparks a sudden slate of black female CEOs at fortune 500 companies - I predict at least three new black female CEOs announced in 2025

4. CD: Bloomberg Kamala donation