Notes From All Over, Part 2 -- February 6, 2020

The gloves come off: Oval Office, 12:00 noon ET, today. Same time Rush Limbaugh usually starts his 3-hour show. He was last on his show, Monday, earlier this week; said he would be back today. Was honored with Presidential Medal of Freedom, Tuesday night in Nancy Pelosi's chamber. [Later: I'm listening to the speech: wow, the gloves are off. Amazing.]

GDP, by country, these are 2018 numbers, two years ago;

• global: $84 trillion
• US: a "staggering" $21 trillion
• China, #2: $14 trillion, two years ago
• then it trails off remarkably:
• Japan, #3: $5 trillion -- a distant third
• Germany, #4: $4 trillion -- if Japan was a distant third, how does one talk about Germany's GDP?
• UK #5: $3 trillion
• five biggest economies account for about half of the total global GDP
• US growth rate in 2019: 2.3 percent
• US: consumer spending accounts for more than 2/3rds of the country's GDP (which means the more gasoline costs, the higher the GDP -- what's wrong with that metric? LOL) 

Market: all three major indices hit new all-time highs. 

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Iowa Caucuses

Are you kidding me.

It's February 6, 2020, Thursday. The Iowa caucuses "closed" early evening, Monday, February 3, 2020, and we still don't the final results. We're close but not there yet. At 97%.

• Buttigieg: 26.2%
• Sanders: 26.0%

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Federal Judgeships

If the US House isn't getting anything done, they can't send anything to the US Senate. That gives the US Senate a lot of free time.

To confirm new federal judges.