kscarbel2

Okay, RWS721LS-1528. You should see "1M2V120C4FM001528" also stamped on the outside of the right frame rail by the steer tire. Now, your dealer can take that, look up the 1QH and 1QK front axle and front spring arrangements respectively, and tell you what axle and springs you have.

The truck's serial number (VIN) is also stamped on the outside of the right-hand frame rail. You can lean over the right steer tire and see it. This is the same number on the driver's door-mounted vehicle identification plate. But the model number is not stamped on the frame. A dealer needs the model number, and the last 5 digits of the serial number, to research the truck.

So Queensland taxpayers, who are NOT asking for autonomous vehicles, have to pay the bill for this farce. And Bosch, who stands to profit from providing the autonomous vehicle technology, is merely “supporting” the show (Bosch people stand by warmly clapping and smiling).

Australasian Transport News (ATN) / November 30, 2016 Bailey says success of such trails depends upon adapting existing traffic systems with new technologies Queensland has announced plans to host the biggest automated vehicle pilot program that will see around 500 fleet and public vehicles test the concept of connected and automated driving (C-ITS) technology in Ipswich. The four-year Cooperative and Automated Vehicle Initiative (CAVI) project will be funded by the state government, and the Motor Accident Insurance Commission and supported by Bosch Australia, Ipswich City Council and Queensland University of Technology’s Centre for Accident Research and Road Safety – Queensland (CARRS-Q). The state government plans to engage with transport industry members and other relevant stakeholders to adapt the existing systems, infrastructure and data to innovative transport technologies. The on-road testing phase of the project is expected to kick off in 2019. The subjects of platooning, driverless vehicles and automated vehicle trials have gained momentum in Australia, with other states including Western Australia and South Australia planning similar trials in the near future. Earlier this month, the National Transport Commission (NTC) released automated vehicle regulation reform roadmap, which recommends a phased reform program to facilitate such trials. Queensland roads and road safety minister Mark Bailey says the state transport department is working with Bosch to secure its "highly-automated driving vehicle", which is co-sponsored by the Victorian government, for the trial. "The Queensland Government’s CAVI project is another example where industry and government will work together to trial and validate the benefits these new technologies will bring to the market," Bosch Australia regional president chassis systems control Mark Jackman says. "Project’s such as these are not just vital for the advancement of road safety and public awareness but also for the further development of technical expertise and capability of Bosch Australia engineers." The vehicles involved in the trial will be retrofitted with C-ITS devices that will provide safety warnings to the driver about current road conditions that may not visible to them at that point on the road. "These C-ITS devices work by providing safety warnings to the driver about a range of conditions – for example, a pedestrian crossing at a signalised intersection, a red light runner or a queue ahead that isn’t visible to a driver," Bailey says. "Our interest in testing these vehicles is to help understand the implications for our infrastructure and drivers, and the improvements to automated vehicle performance when the vehicle can talk to other vehicles and infrastructure. "These rapidly developing technologies have the potential to significantly reduce crashes and crash-related gridlock, as well as reduce vehicle emissions and fuel use over coming decades. "While industry is leading the development of advanced vehicle technologies, the success of these will rely upon connecting to our existing traffic systems." Member for Ipswich Jennifer Howard says the test-bed will be available for use by industry, academics and governments to continue to test new technologies. Member for Ipswich West Jim Madden says the transport department’s move to the planning phase of the pilot "will have a strong focus on safety".

In your case, reference the RD8 column.

The vehicle identification plate for your truck, with your model and serial (VIN) number, is located at the rear of the driver's door.

An earlier move. .

Wilbur Ross Jr. (nicknamed the “King of Bankrupcty”) Post: Secretary of Commerce Previous experience: None Age: 79 (born November 28, 1937) Schooling: Ross attended the elite Catholic college preparatory Xavier High School in Manhattan, later earning a Bachelor of Arts/Science degree at Yale University (also his father's alma mater). Ross’s faculty adviser at Yale helped him get his first summer job on Wall Street. He earned his MBA at Harvard Business School. Marriages: Judith (Nodine) Ross (May 26, 1961-October 1995, divorced); Betsy (McCaughey) Ross (December 7, 1995-August 2000, divorced); Hilary (Geary) Ross (October 9, 2004-present). Background: An American investor, and former banker, known for restructuring failed companies in industries such as steel, coal, telecommunications, foreign investment and textiles. He specializes in leveraged buyouts and distressed businesses. As of August 2014, Forbes lists Ross having a net worth of $2.9 billion. Ross was born in Weehawken, New Jersey, and grew up in an affluent family. His father, Wilbur Louis Ross, Sr., was a lawyer who later became a judge, and his mother, Agnes was a school teacher. 1976-2000 - Ross works 25 years for the investment bank Rothschild Inc. During his tenure, he becomes a top bankruptcy adviser. January 1998 - Ross pledges $2.25 million towards then-wife and Lt. Governor Betsy McCaughey Ross's campaign for Governor of New York. He withdraws the funding in September and files for divorce in November. 2000 - Purchases a small fund he started at Rothschild and opens his own private equity firm, WL Ross & Co. LLC. 2002 - Establishes the International Steel Group (ISG), with himself as chairman of the board, through a series of mergers and acquisitions starting with Bethlehem Steel Corp. December 2003 - ISG goes public. 2004 - Ross forms the International Coal Group (ICG) after purchasing the assets of Horizon Natural Resources in a bankruptcy auction. October 2004 - Merges ISG with Mittal Steel for $4.5 billion. January 2, 2006 - A West Virginia explosion at the Sago Mine, operated by ICG subsidiary Wolf Run Mining Co., leads to the death of 12 miners. Families of the dead and Randal McCloy, the lone survivor, sue ICG and WL Ross & Co. claiming negligence. All of the lawsuits are settled by November 2011. April 2010 - Purchases a 21% stake in Richard Branson's Virgin Money. In November 2011, Ross helps Branson fund a successful bid for the British bank Northern Rock. August 2, 2010 - In an interview with Charlie Rose, Ross states that he's fine with higher taxes on the wealthy as long as the government puts the money to good use. June 2011 - Arch Coal, Inc. acquires International Coal Group (ICG) for $3.4 billion. September 2011 - W.L. Ross & Co. is among a group of five American and Canadian investors who purchase a 34.9% stake in the Bank of Ireland. Ross' share is 9.3%. March 2016 - Ranked number 595 on the annual Forbes World's Billionaires list, with an estimated net worth of $2.9 billion. March 21, 2016 - Nexeo Solutions, a chemical distribution company, announces their merger agreement with W.L. Ross Holding Corporation. The merger is valued at $1,575 million. August 24, 2016 - The SEC announces that W.L. Ross & Co will pay a $2.3 million fine for failing to properly disclose fees it charged. The firm refused to admit to any wrongdoing. “Part of the reason why I’m supporting Trump is that I think we need a more radical, new approach to government – at least in the U.S. – from what we’ve had before,” Ross explained. “I think the reason why the Trump phenomenon has become so important … is because middle class and lower middle class America has not really benefited by the last 10 to 15 years of economic activity and they’re sick and tired of it and they want something different.” Wilbur Ross Jr. / CNBC / June 15, 2016 . . -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ross escalates Trump trade criticism against Beijing The Financial Times / January 18, 2017 Commerce Secretary nominee labels China ‘most protectionist’ major economy The billionaire businessman set to oversee trade policy for President Trump has hit back at Chinese leader Xi Jinping and his bid to become the leading advocate for globalization, calling China the “most protectionist” major economy in the world. The criticism by Wilbur Ross, made at his confirmation hearing to become Trump’s commerce secretary, is the latest in criticism from Trump and his economic advisers against Beijing which has already sparked concerns of a US-China trade war. “They talk much more about free trade than they actually practice,” Ross told the Senate commerce committee on Wednesday. “China is the most protectionist country of very large countries.” Ross’s remarks come a day after President Xi used his appearance at this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos to push back against rising protectionism, widely seen as an effort by the Chinese leader to takeover international leadership in the global economy from the United States. Ross is expected to play a much more prominent role in setting US trade policy than his predecessors at commerce. Trump aids say the former investment banker will lead the new administration’s trade team. That would put the 79-year-old in charge of delivering the “America First” agenda that was at the center of Trump’s presidential campaign. Ross has been Trump’s most outspoken critic of existing international trade relations, saying previous administrations have engaged in “dumb trade” with China and Mexico. At the hearing, Ross said he was a free trader who would be focused on trying to increase US exports to boost economic growth. “I am not anti-trade. I am pro-trade,” Ross said. “But I am pro-sensible trade, not pro-trade that is to the disadvantage of the American worker and the American manufacturing industry.” Despite Trump’s recent threats against automakers that they would face import levies unless they built cars for the US market inside the US, Ross said he was mindful of the lessons of the 1930s when US-imposed tariffs helped extend and deepen the Great Depression. “Tariffs do have a useful role in correcting inappropriate practices,” Ross said. But he added: “I am keenly aware of [1930s-era tariff acts] and the effect that it had. If nothing else we can learn the lessons of history. If it didn’t work very well then it likely wouldn’t work very well now.” Trump threatened during the campaign to impose a 45 percent tariff on Chinese imports. He has also threatened to impose a 35 percent “border tax” on imports from Mexico. Those threats, Ross told senators, had been useful in signaling to countries like China and Mexico that “change is coming” and laying the ground for negotiations. “When you start out with your adversary understanding that he or she is going to have to make concessions, that’s a pretty good background to begin,” he said. Ross said his first priority would be to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and Mexico, as Trump promised during the campaign. The Trump administration is expected to notify those countries within days that it wants to reopen the pact. But he repeatedly singled out China as a major offender in the global economy. “It’s a little weird that we have very low tariffs and China has very high tariffs,” Ross said. “That seems to me to be a bit of an imbalance. It’s one thing to talk about free trade. We would like our trading partners to practice more free trade.” A third of China’s state-owned companies were on the verge of failure, Ross said, supported only by low-cost loans from state-run banks and other subsidies. China also was at the centre of global problems of overcapacity in steel and other industries. Ross promised to take a more aggressive approach towards anti-dumping cases, raising the possibility that he would become the first US commerce secretary since the 1990s to take advantage of rules allowing the “self-initiation” of anti-dumping cases normally brought by industry. Ross also said the Trump administration would crack down further on dumping by countries such as China, blaming it for a collapse in global prices for steel and aluminum.

Reuters / November 30, 2016 Republicans in Congress hope to convince Trump to support an untested strategy of using the tax code to promote exports while slashing corporate taxes, framing it as a way to fulfill his campaign promises to restore blue-collar jobs. The plan would be one way to help Republican lawmakers reconcile their long-standing goal of tax cuts with the often populist campaign rhetoric of Trump, who has attacked the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and other trade deals as bad for U.S. workers. Critics say it risks running afoul of global trade rules and increasing costs for U.S. consumers, and that any export gains could be short-lived if the strategy causes the dollar to strengthen, wiping out any price advantage for U.S. products in international markets. The export-focused "border adjustability" strategy is part of a larger package of proposals offered in congressional Republicans’ “A Better Way” economic plan from House Speaker Paul Ryan and House tax committee chairman Kevin Brady. "If we have a border adjustable tax system, that can solve a lot of these trade issues that Trump is talking about," says economic analyst and Trump adviser Stephen Moore. “You’re going to tax what’s imported and not going to tax what’s exported. So we’re going to reduce the trade deficit and we’re going to have more companies come in here,” Moore says. The strategy would be implemented by making revenue from sales to non-U.S. residents non-taxable, while preventing importers from deducting the cost of goods bought from non-residents. Brady says border adjustability would "virtually eliminate" any tax incentive for U.S. companies to move operations overseas and encourage foreign investment to return to the United States. "We’ve got a great argument, I think,” he said. Steven Mnuchin, Trump's pick for U.S. Treasury secretary and co-author of the president-elect’s tax plan, described tax reform on Wednesday as “something that happens absolutely within the first 90 days of this presidency.” Wilbur Ross, Trump's nominee for commerce secretary, says the Trump administration’s aim would be to increase exports in part by getting rid of “non-tariff” barriers. The perceived winners under a border adjustability approach would include U.S. manufacturers that export heavily, while large-volume importers, such as U.S. retailers, could be hurt. That distinction was already dividing corporate lobbying groups. While retailers support an overhaul of the tax code, "the tax on imports proposed in the House blueprint is cause for concern for retailers," said Christin Fernandez, spokeswoman for the Washington-based Retail Industry Leaders Association whose members include Wal-Mart, Home Depot and Target. Some version of border adjustability could attract support from Democrats. Senator Ben Cardin, a Maryland Democrat who sits on the Senate Finance Committee and the panel’s tax subcommittee, said he strongly favors the idea. But he called the emerging House plan "very, very questionable" because it would use tax on corporate income rather than a consumption tax. Tax lawyers and other experts have said such an approach risks violating long-standing world trade rules that allow countries to adjust their trading positions through indirect taxes, such as a sales tax, but not with direct taxes like the U.S. corporate tax. "It would lead to uncertainty on how it would be treated internationally. And that’s bad for business," says Cardin. Brady has said border adjustability would be acceptable to the World Trade Organization. Border adjustability is only one component of the "A Better Way" blueprint. It would also slash the corporate income tax rate to 20 percent from a top rate of 35 percent; repeal the corporate alternative minimum tax; and let businesses write off capital investments immediately. Altogether, it’s estimated that the House Republicans' corporate tax plan would reduce U.S. corporate tax revenues by about $891 billion over 10 years, perpetuating a long-term decline in the corporate tax take. Combined with an equally ambitious package of individual income tax cut proposals put forward in the "Better Way" package, the Republican plan could boost the federal deficit by about $3.7 trillion over a decade. Advocates of border adjustability note that U.S. trading partners including China use value-added taxes (VAT) to favor exports over imports and say the House proposal would level the playing field for U.S. companies. But some tax experts have questioned how effective it would be, saying that the increased demand abroad for cheaper U.S.-made goods would boost the dollar's value and cancel out gains for exporters. Still, supporters of the plan believe it could win the favor with Trump, who has railed against U.S. companies that have shifted production abroad and scaled back U.S. operations. Trump has already ruled out U.S. participation in the ambitious Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal and has vowed to renegotiate or quit NAFTA. "When Trump understands how the blueprint works, particularly the border adjustability provision, which will create a huge incentive to make stuff in the United States, I think he'll be delirious," said Ken Kies, one of Washington's most influential corporate tax lobbyists who represents Microsoft, General Electric, Pfizer and Caterpillar.

U.S. to Forgive at Least $108 Billion in Student Debt in Coming Years The Wall Street Journal / November 30, 2016 GAO report offers first full cost estimate of debt-relief programs, berates Education Department over accounting methods The federal government is on track to forgive at least $108 billion in student debt in coming years [at the taxpayer’s expense], as more and more borrowers seek help in paying down their loans, leading to lower revenues for the nation’s program to finance higher education. The Government Accountability Office disclosed the sum Wednesday in a report to Congress which for the first time projected the full costs of programs that set borrowers’ monthly payments as a share of their earnings and eventually forgive portions of their debt. The GAO report also sharply criticized the government’s accounting methods for its $1.26 trillion student-loan portfolio, pointing to flaws that have led it to alter projected revenues significantly over the years. The government says it still expects the program to generate a profit over the long term, but it has repeatedly trimmed expectations for revenues. President Barack Obama has promoted income-driven repayment plans—passed by Congress in the 1990s and 2000s—to stem a sharp rise in borrowers defaulting on their loans since the recession. Enrollment in such plans has more than tripled over the past three years to 5.3 million borrowers, who owe roughly $355 billion. Ted Mitchell, undersecretary at the Education Department, said such programs “are helping millions of borrowers successfully manage loan repayment, particularly those for whom standard repayment may prove challenging.” He added that the administration has proposed changes to reduce costs. Mr. Obama, for example, has called for capping how much debt public-service workers can have forgiven. The most generous version of income-driven repayments caps a borrower’s monthly payment at 10% of discretionary income, which is defined as adjusted gross income above 150% of the poverty level. That formula typically lowers monthly payments of borrowers by hundreds of dollars. Public-service workers—those employed by a government agency or at most nonprofits—have balances forgiven after 10 years, tax-free. Private-sector workers have balances forgiven in 20 or 25 years, with the forgiven amount taxed as ordinary income. President-elect Donald Trump said during his campaign he supported the idea of helping student-loan borrowers. He has proposed setting payments at 12.5% of income and forgiving balances after 15 years [rewarding irresponsibility]. He has also suggested winding down the federal student loan program and shifting lending to the private sector. Growing evidence suggests many of the most hard-pressed borrowers—college dropouts who owe less than $10,000—aren’t taking advantage of the programs, while workers with graduate degrees, such as doctors and lawyers who don’t necessarily need help, are. GAO figures suggest the average balance of borrowers in income-driven repayment plans stands at $67,000. That sum suggests a disproportionate share of those benefiting from the plans are graduate-degree holders, since the government caps lifetime borrowing from federal programs for undergraduates at $57,500. It doesn’t limit how much grad students can borrow. And graduate-degree holders typically have higher incomes and have low rates of unemployment, Labor Department data show. There are still about 8 million Americans in default on their student loans, and the number of defaults among borrowers who recently left school has come down only slowly. Meanwhile, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi (R., Wyo.), who ordered the GAO study, has criticized the Obama administration’s use of executive authority to sweeten terms of the repayment plans, which he said would add to the national debt. “This Administration has been manipulating the terms of the student loan program without the consent of Congress, while shirking its statutory duty to carefully assess the cost impact of those changes,” said Enzi, adding that he was considering legislation to force changes in the government’s accounting methods. In addition to debt forgiveness under income-driven repayment programs, the administration is also moving to forgive loans for borrowers who can show they were lured to enroll at schools—mostly for-profit colleges—that used deceptive advertising. Income-driven repayment plans are also causing concern that as more students become aware of the benefits, they will become less sensitive to tuition increases, enabling universities continually to raise tuition ultimately at taxpayer expense. Higher education costs have increased by an average of 5.2% a year in the past decade, far faster than inflation, which has been running at under 2%. And some borrowers with graduate-school loans are refinancing their debt at lower interest rates with private lenders such as SoFi. Congress, through legislation, has set higher interest rates for grad students than undergrads, to ensure the programs don’t lose money. When private lenders pick off those borrowers, the surpluses dwindle. The GAO estimates that $137 billion of the roughly $355 billion owed under income-driven repayments won’t be repaid. Most of it—the $108 billion disclosed Wednesday—would be forgiven because of borrowers fulfilling their obligations under the plans. The other $29 billion will be written off because of disability or death, the GAO projects, the only other circumstances under which the government takes a loan off its books. The government can garnish wages and Social Security checks for those in default. And that $108 billion only covers loans made through the current school year. The overall sum could continue to grow alongside enrollment increases. The GAO said it could take 40 years to know the full costs of the programs. The GAO report also criticizes how the Education Department has produced budget estimates for the loan program. For example, it said the department has failed to account for inflation when estimating borrowers’ future earnings. And it said the agency failed to account for further increases in enrollment in income-driven repayment plans.

The Wall Street Journal / November 30, 2016 As a McDonald’s Corp. franchisee in the Pittsburgh area, Jim Delligatti in the mid-1960s believed the burgers-and-fries menu needed something bigger and jazzier. He came up with the Big Mac, tested it in one of his restaurants and saw it swiftly become a national sensation, heralding an era of ever-increasing reliance on novelty in fast food. Mr. Delligatti died Monday at his home in Fox Chapel, a suburb of Pittsburgh, his family said. He was 98 years old. He came up with the idea for the Big Mac in 1965 and first served it at his Uniontown, Pa., McDonald’s outlet in 1967. The hamburger features two beef patties, a mildly tangy sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions slathered over a soft sesame-seed bun sliced into three layers. The original price was 45 cents, compared with an average of about $5 today. McDonald’s put the Big Mac on its national menu in 1968. Mr. Delligatti acknowledged that the Big Mac was derived from double-deck hamburgers made popular by rival fast-food restaurants. “This wasn’t like discovering the lightbulb,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 1993. “The bulb was already there. All I did was screw it in the socket.” Even so, his initiative helped launch McDonald’s on a long-running diversification of a menu once limited to little more than basic hamburgers, fries, shakes and soft drinks. The corporate headquarters initially opposed Mr. Delligatti’s plan to use a triple-deck bun with sesame seeds, said Michael Delligatti, one of his sons. But the elder Mr. Delligatti went ahead with the new bun anyway. Without it, he thought, the Big Mac would be too sloppy. In recent years, the Big Mac’s appeal has faded as McDonald’s has struggled to find ways to entice customers back from rivals whose food is widely seen as fresher, healthier and hipper. The Big Mac “has gotten less relevant,” a top McDonald’s franchisee wrote in a memo to other operators in July. Only one in five millennials has tried a Big Mac, the memo said. “We still sell lots of Big Macs,” said Michael Delligatti. He added that he didn’t oppose tinkering with the original formula, such as by adding Sriracha sauce. Mr. Delligatti didn’t receive royalties on Big Mac sales. “All I got was a plaque,” he once said. Michael James Delligatti was born Aug. 2, 1918, in Uniontown, about 45 miles south of Pittsburgh. His father worked as a shoe cobbler and candy maker. The younger Mr. Delligatti attended school in Uniontown and in Fairmont, W.Va., then served in the U.S. Army in Europe during World War II. After the war, he hitchhiked to California and found work in drive-in restaurants there. In 1953, he and a partner opened Delney’s Drive-In Restaurant in Pittsburgh. Two years later, Mr. DelliGatti met Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald’s, at a restaurant trade show in Chicago. He became a franchisee of McDonald’s in 1957, opening an outlet in Pittsburgh, the first in western Pennsylvania. Mr. Delligatti is survived by his wife, Ellie, two sons, five grandchildren and eight great grandchildren. His two sons and two of his grandchildren are McDonald’s franchisees. In all, the family owns and operates 21 McDonald’s restaurants in western Pennsylvania. In 2007, the family opened a McDonald’s Big Mac Museum Restaurant in North Huntingdon, Pa., near Pittsburgh. Mr. Delligatti also innovated by coming up with an early version of the chain’s breakfast offerings—hotcakes and sausages initially aimed at steelworkers returning home from overnight shifts. He wasn’t alone among franchisees in coming up with a hit product. McDonald’s said other franchisees invented the Egg McMuffin and the Filet-O-Fish. Mr. Delligatti’s charitable contributions included backing for the Ronald McDonald House in Pittsburgh, which provides a refuge for families traveling to the area to get medical care for their children. .

New Trump hires pledge tax and regulation shake-up The Financial Times / November 30, 2016 Mnuchin and Ross vow to stand firm on campaign promises as Democrats decry choices Donald Trump’s new economic team has vowed to push ahead with his far-reaching policy proposals to slash taxes, loosen bank regulation and shake up US links with China and other trading partners. The pledges to stand firm on Trump’s bold campaign promises came as the president-elect on Wednesday nominated former Goldman Sachs banker Steven Mnuchin as Treasury secretary and confirmed the private equity mogul Wilbur Ross as his choice for commerce secretary. Mnuchin told CNBC Americans should expect the “largest tax change since [Ronald] Reagan”. The two Wall Street insiders, set to be co-heads of the Trump economic team, said Trump’s policies would return the US economy to a sustained annual growth rate of 3-4 per cent while lifting wages and creating more “good jobs”. Trump’s transition team also nominated Todd Ricketts, co-owner of the Chicago Cubs baseball team, as deputy commerce secretary. Mnuchin, 53, a hedge fund manager and Hollywood movie producer, will play a central role in transforming tax, Wall Street and the US’s international financial ties for a president who has embraced the private sector and been sceptical of globalism. Democrats quickly condemned his selection, portraying Mnuchin as a creature of Wall Street who “preyed on” homeowners during the last financial crisis and would not put the interests of ordinary Americans first. Senator Sherrod Brown, a senior Democrat, said: “This isn’t draining the swamp — it’s stocking it with alligators.” Mnuchin said on CNBC the Trump administration would create “huge economic growth” by pushing ahead with its plan to reduce the US federal corporate tax rate from 35 per cent to 15 per cent, a goal it will need to negotiate with Congress. On personal taxation he disputed the findings of analysts who say most of the benefits of Trump’s tax plan would go to the wealthy, saying “there will be no absolute tax cut for the upper class” because lower rates would be offset by caps on the deductions people can claim. But Kyle Pomerleau of the Tax Foundation, which publishes research on tax policy, said the richest 1 per cent of Americans would still get a net cut. “The Trump administration would need to alter the current tax plan to satisfy the goal of no net tax cut for the top 1 per cent,” he said. Managing US-China ties will be one of the Treasury secretary’s biggest challenges. While Mnuchin did not drop Trump’s pledge to label China as a currency manipulator in his first 100 days, he made clear that he would want the US Treasury to investigate first. “If we determine that we need to label them as a currency manipulator that’s something the Treasury would do,” he said. Under current standards set by a 2015 law the US Treasury has said China does not meet the definition of being a currency manipulator. Mnuchin would also be the third Treasury secretary after Robert Rubin and Hank Paulson to have worked at Goldman Sachs. He has known Mr Ross, who was interviewed alongside him, for three decades. On trade, Ross said the president-elect’s threat to impose defensive tariffs on Chinese and Mexican imports would not be a first resort but part of the US’s negotiations as it aimed to boost American exports. Rejecting the “protectionist” label applied to Trump, he said: “It’s not really something that’s meaningful. There’s trade, there’s sensible trade, and there’s dumb trade. We’ve been doing a lot of dumb trade. And that’s the part that’s going to get fixed.” Following Trump’s vow to dismantle the Dodd-Frank reforms imposed on Wall Street after the last financial crisis, Mnuchin — who bought a collapsed mortgage lender in 2009 — said his priority would be “to strip back parts of Dodd-Frank that prevent banks from lending”. He refused to comment on whether Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve chair, should finish her term after being sharply criticised by Trump during the election campaign. He said, however, that “she’s done a good job”. While Treasury secretaries usually steer clear of commenting on monetary policy to protect the Fed’s independence, Mnuchin said interest rates would likely stay low for a few years, but added that the recent rise in bond yields made sense. Mnuchin, who chairs the Dune Capital hedge fund and Dune Entertainment Partners, left Goldman 15 years ago to produce films in Hollywood. Trump said he was a “world-class financier, banker and businessman” who would play a "key role in developing our plan to build a dynamic, booming economy that will create millions of jobs”. Mnuchin pushed back at criticism from Democrats that he had taken advantage of homeowners since the financial crisis by buying IndyMac, the collapsed mortgage lender. He said that the move to scoop up the group “saved a lot of jobs” and that as part of the pact, he “bought the worst mortgage portfolio in the history of time”. He added that “all the loans we had to foreclose on we did not originate”. Separately, Mnuchin told Fox Business that it made“no sense” for the government to continue owning the mortgage insurers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which Washington bailed out in the 2008 financial crisis. “We’ve got to get Fannie and Freddie out of government ownership,” he said: “In many cases this displaces private lending in the mortgage markets.” High-profile US investors including John Paulson, Bill Ackman and Richard Perry amassed big stakes in the two companies, and sued over the government’s 2012 “sweep” of their profits. The value of their positions had been dropping for years, until Mr Trump’s election spurred speculation that he would relax the government stranglehold. Common shares in Fannie and Freddie have more than doubled, with each rising more than 44 per cent on Wednesday, boosting hedge funds locked in the trade: Mr Perry’s Perry Capital said in September it would shut down. But for Mr Paulson and Mr Ackman, whose funds have both dropped in value by more than 15 per cent this year, the move is providing a much-needed fillip. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Key quotes from Steven Mnuchin from CNBC interview Defending his company’s role buying IndyMac during the 2007 financial crisis We bought the worst mortgage portfolio in the history of time. On his role as a Democrat donor in earlier elections Like the president-elect I lived in New York and gave money to certain Democrats . . . I didn’t say I backed them. I gave money to them. On the state of the economy The problem has been for the last eight years, there’s been no economic growth. What we saw travelling with the president-elect, at all these rallies, is that for the average American worker they’ve gone nowhere. Our job is to make the average American worker have wage increases and have good jobs. That’s the priority of this administration.” On Janet Yellen Look, I think she’s done a good job at the Fed. I am not going to comment on whether she should or she shouldn’t (continue). On China If we determine that we need to label them as a currency manipulator, that’s something the Treasury would do. On Dodd/Frank The number one problem with Dodd/Frank is it’s way too complicated and it cuts back lending. So we want to strip back parts of Dodd/Frank that prevent banks from lending . . . That will be the number one priority on the regulatory side. On losing friends in California when he joined the Trump team This was never a gamble from my perspective. I’ve known the president-elect for over 15 years. I believed in his policies and I thought he would win. But I did this because I believed in it, despite the fact there were a lot of people in California and New York that wanted to stop being friends. They’ve all come back. .

Transport Engineer / December 1, 2016 Keyway has added 24 Volvo FMX tippers to its 70 strong tipper truck fleet. The plant hire, recycling and earth moving specialist also took delivery of two STGO Cat2 (up to 80 tonnes) 500bhp Volvo FH tractor units and two FM 8x2 rigids with King beavertail bodies. All the South West-based operator’s new tippers were specified with day cabs and B-Ride high rear suspension. “We’ve not traditionally run Volvo trucks, but the automated manual I-Shift transmission and incredible support from [dealer] Truck and Bus Wales & West convinced us this was the way to go,” comments Keyway managing director Eamonn McGurk, adding that he is “extremely happy” with the result. “The Volvo FMX with 420bhp engines and Thompsons or Boweld bodies - both with cab operated tailgates - are proving to be a solid investment, offering good fuel economy as well as winning praise from our drivers,” he continues. McGurk says safety was also critical for all his new trucks, and reckons that features on the FMX, FH and FM ticked all the boxes. “The all-round visibility is excellent and we’ve bolstered this with both sensor and camera systems,” he explains. “In future, we will add factory-fit low-level nearside windows too, as we think this is a very positive development in truck design.” .

Transport Engineer / December 1, 2016 ALE “widening trailers” used to move a 231-tonne transformer from Stafford to Ellemere Port. The transformer was transported using 12 axle lines of the new widening trailers, narrowed in, with an AL34 girder frame. The trailers were launched in May this year and can be narrowed in or widened to 4.3 meters (14.1 feet) while loaded. The heavyweight cargo was moved in three stages over three days, from Stafford to Congleton, then to Kelsall and, finally, to Ellesmere Port for onward shipment. Tom Irvine, senior project manager, says that narrowing the trailers and using them under a girder frame showcased their flexibility for different transport applications. Related reading - http://www.bigmacktrucks.com/topic/37559-ale-introduces-new-prime-mover/#comment-265043.

Scania Group Press Release / November 30, 2016 South African mining transport company Reinhardt Transport explains how its partnership with Scania has improved their business. .

Kenworth Truck Company Press Release / November 30, 2016 Kevin Keeney feels he hit the jackpot when it comes to trucks and productivity. In the past few months, the vice president of Arcadia, California-based Food Express has put into service Kenworth T680s powered by the Paccar [DAF] MX-11 engine, and has seen a dramatic change. “It’s been a trifecta in improvements,” Keeney said. “There’s less weight so we can carry 1,500 pounds more product; increased fuel economy of up to 1 mpg; and driver acceptance that we’ve never seen before. With the success we’ve experienced with our initial order of 26 T680s, we have another 26 on order now. We see the Kenworth T680 as our new flagship.” Food Express has made its mark hauling flour, malt barley, corn starch and sugar throughout states west of the Rockies. With a fleet of 200 tractors and 360 trailers, the company has offices and terminals in six locations. Its business is divided into local hauls – such as in the Phoenix area – and in longer hauls originating from Southern California and Arizona. The initial T680s, purchased through Inland Kenworth – Montebello and financed through Paccar Financial, are in service in Phoenix and Fresno. In addition to T680 day cabs, Keeney said the company also purchased T680s with 40-inch sleepers. “That’s as a safeguard for our longer runs,” he said. “It gives our drivers space for naps, or downtime during weather delays. The 40-inch sleeper is the perfect size, and is very light in weight compared to other sleeper units in our fleet.” According to Keeney, in early 2016 the company decided to offer a challenge to five truck makers. “We wanted to start with a clean slate and find a truck that could lower our weight and offer other improvements,” Keeney said. “So, we worked with five dealerships and challenged them to build a truck that would fit our needs. To make it an apples-to-apples comparison, if we found a component we liked and wanted to incorporate it, we shared it with all the dealers.” The end result – Food Express chose the T680 day cab. “It was more than 1,500 pounds lighter than the previous generation of trucks we had in service,” said Keeney. “The biggest contributor to the weight loss was the MX-11 engine, which provides the power and torque we need, in a package that saves us 400 pounds.” The T680 day cabs, in a 6x2 configuration, use the MX-11 engine spec’d at 430 hp with 1,550 lb.-ft of torque and driven through an Eaton Fuller Advantage™ 10-speed automated manual transmission (AMT). Since Food Express charges by the truckload, Keeney said he uses the weight savings as a value-added service for his customers. “They now get more payload hauled, and we view it as a customer retention tool,” he said. “If we can haul more than our competitors, our customers see great value in that, and in our company.” While the weight savings fills the customer satisfaction ‘bucket’ for its clients, Food Express is reaping rewards of its own in terms of vehicle performance and reduced operating costs. “The MX-11 is huge for us,” he said. “Not only are we seeing better fuel economy, but the power in that engine is remarkable. Paccar did a wonderful job with this engine – we’ve been very impressed. We have the Grapevine Hill that borders the San Joaquin Valley and Los Angeles. It’s a five-mile hill with a 6 percent grade and the T680 with MX-11 engine averages 3 mph faster up that hill than our other trucks. Impressive. That shows how potent that engine is.” The T680 has been a hit with drivers, according to Keeney. “The drivers love the truck – the wide cab gives them lots of room and the visibility is so much greater. And, it’s so quiet. The combination of the Paccar MX engine and the insulation package really means a nice driver environment. If you were to poll our drivers, the T680 would be the truck that comes out on top. The Kenworth brand itself lends itself to pride and driver satisfaction. The quality of the T680 just puts it over the top.” The Keeney family has roots deep into trucking – Kevin’s dad, Walter, is the president of the company, and his mom, Joanna, is secretary-treasurer. “My grandfather started in trucking back in the 1930s,” said Keeney. “And, it’s a family affair now at Food Express. My folks have no plan to leave – we don’t retire in my family. And my four kids are all actively involved in the business. My daughter is our safety manager, one son is in operations, another in administration, and my youngest son is in maintenance. It makes for an interesting balance, being ‘dad’ on one hand, and their supervisor on the other. But, the trucking industry is in our blood; it’s been great to us and it will be for the years to come.” .

Trailer/Body Builders / November 29, 2016 Chevrolet and GMC are partnering with Power Solutions International, Inc. (PSI) to introduce heavy-duty pickups and full-size vans powered by 6.0-liter V-8 compressed natural gas (CNG) and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG)-capable engines starting in the first quarter of 2017. Chevrolet also will offer CNG and LPG versions of its new Isuzu-sourced “Low Cab Forward” commercial truck. The announcement follows the selection of PSI, based in Wood Dale, Illinois, as General Motors Fleet’s preferred upfitter for CNG and LPG trucks. PSI is one of North America’s largest and most experienced providers of integrated turnkey alternative-fuel powertrain solutions. Ship-through will be offered, allowing customers to seamlessly order and take delivery from the same dealer. GM will supply vehicles equipped with the 6.0L V-8 engine with hardened valves and valve seats to PSI, which in turn will install the fuel system and other hardware and ship directly to Chevrolet and GMC dealers in all 50 states. All PSI-modified vehicles are covered by Chevrolet and GMC’s five-year/60,000-mile (whichever comes first) limited powertrain warranty. The expanded lineup brings GM Fleet’s portfolio of alternative fuel, hybrid and EVs to more than a dozen trucks, cars and crossovers. Other recent additions include the Chevrolet Bolt EV, a Duramax 2.8-liter B20-capable Duramax diesel for the Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana vans and all-new available 6.6-liter B20-capable Duramax diesel engines for the Chevrolet Silverado HD and GMC Sierra HD. “Expanding choice is the key to helping more commercial and government fleets reduce their fuel consumption, fuel costs and emissions using alternative fuels and EVs versus using traditional gasoline,” said Ed Peper, U.S. vice president of GM Fleet. “There are no ‘one size fits all’ solutions for fleet managers.” GM Fleet’s partnership with PSI follows customer demand and ongoing investment by companies across the nation in CNG refueling infrastructure. This month, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) announced 55 routes that will serve as the basis for a national network of “alternative fuel” corridors spanning 35 states. Though the network is nearly 85,000 miles long, more miles will be added in the future to accommodate electric, hydrogen, propane and natural gas vehicles as additional fueling and charging stations are built. Currently four of the top five “Green Fleets” operate CNG-powered vehicles. All of the top 25 fleets use at least two fuels.

Ohio DOT, Otto Initiate 'Smart Mobility Corridor' Heavy Duty Trucking / November 30, 2016 The State of Ohio is investing $15 million to install advanced highway technology along its "Smart Mobility Corridor" - a 35‑mile stretch of U.S. 33 northwest of Columbus. It was used Wednesday, Nov. 30 for a demonstration run by Otto, a developer of self-driving vehicle technology . Gov. John Kasich announced the project today at a ceremony in suburban Dublin. He said the state’s partnership with leading automotive research centers and local governments in the region will create an ideal proving ground to safely test innovative technologies that will change the way people and products are transported in Ohio and across the world. After the event, Otto's self-driving tractor pulled an Ohio Department of Transportation tanker trailer from Dublin to East Liberty. A driver was in the cab, ready to take over if anything went amiss, but it didn't, ODOT said. Otto also plans to run its truck on the Ohio Turnpike later this week. “Some of the world’s foremost automotive researchers are working here in Ohio, at both ends of this corridor, and this project provides them with the perfect location and state-of-the-art infrastructure for safely testing autonomous and connected vehicle technologies,” Kasich said. “Ohio has been at the heart of automotive manufacturing and innovation since the industry’s earliest days. Those ties strengthen with each passing year and innovations developed here will continue to build on our state’s historic role as a world leader in transportation technology,” he said. The Smart Mobility Corridor, 35 miles of four-lane, limited access highway, will be equipped by the ODOT with high-capacity fiber optic cable to instantaneously link researchers and traffic monitors with data from embedded and wireless sensors along the roadway. These links will allow testing smart transportation technologies on a highway that carries up to 50,000 vehicles per day through rural and urban settings in a full range of weather conditions. This data will also provide more frequent and accurate traffic counts, weather and surface condition monitoring, and incident management improvements, said ODOT spokesman Matt Bruner. “Data collected on this corridor will allow automotive innovators to test and refine jobs‑creating technologies that are going to help move people and products more safely and efficiently than ever before,” said ODOT Director Jerry Wray. “By being one of the first – and best positioned – states to embrace autonomous and connected vehicle technology, Ohio can also be among the first to benefit from its rewards, giving Ohioans a safer, better driving experience and offering businesses reduced transportation costs, faster access to markets and increased efficiencies,” he said. ODOT’s partners in the project include Honda R&D Americas, the Transportation Research Center at East Liberty, and Ohio State University’s Center for Automotive Research. Local governments along the route, including the City of Dublin, City of Marysville and Union County, are cooperating. The Smart Mobility Corridor will also align with work underway to develop Columbus as a hub for intelligent transportation, spurred by a $40 million “Smart City” grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation and more than $90 million committed to date by private-sector partners. Work to install sensors and a fiber optic network along the corridor is scheduled to begin in May 2017 and last throughout the summer. Traffic disruptions are not expected during installation. The Smart Mobility Corridor is a key component of the state’s new Smart Mobility Initiative, a collaborative effort between ODOT, the Ohio Department of Public Safety, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Case Western Reserve University, University of Cincinnati, University of Dayton, Wright State University, The Ohio State University, Transportation Research Center, and Ohio Turnpike and Infrastructure Commission. The state’s investment announced today also complements another U.S. Department of Transportation grant, $6 million awarded to Dublin, Marysville, and Union County, and matched by local funds, to expand their fiber optic networks linking to U.S. 33, install highway sensors, and retrofit government vehicles to send and receive data. As autonomous and connected vehicle research expands throughout the state, the Ohio Turnpike with its existing fiber-optic network is set to become the centerpiece of a contiguous, interstate highway test corridor eventually stretching from New York to Detroit and Chicago.

Transport Topics / November 30, 2016 A semi-autonomous truck operated by Otto has completed the first of multiple test runs planned in Ohio this week as the state announced a $15 million investment in highway sensors and cable to support testing of advanced transportation technologies. The Otto truck traveled in daytime traffic on public highways from Columbus to Bellefontaine on Nov. 29 to transport an empty de-icer tanker for the Ohio Department of Transportation, marking the first load delivered by self-driving truck in the state, an ODOT spokesman said. The truck traversed Interstates 70 and 270 and U.S. Route 33 with the help of Otto’s self-driving software and sensor technology, which tracks lane markings and detects other vehicles and objects on the road. The vehicle was manned by two drivers, but completed the main portion of the trip on Route 33 primarily with the self-driving system engaged. Ohio’s investment, announced by Gov. John Kasich at a Nov. 30 press event, will fund the installation of high-capacity fiber-optic cable and wireless sensors to capture research data along the state’s Smart Mobility Corridor, a 35-mile stretch of Route 33 between Dublin and East Liberty northwest of Columbus. Kasich said the corridor will provide automotive researchers “with the perfect location and state-of-the-art infrastructure for safely testing autonomous and connected vehicle technologies.” Otto’s self-driving truck was set to embark on another demonstration run on the Smart Mobility Corridor at the conclusion of that event and also is scheduled to travel on the Ohio Turnpike on Dec. 1. The Ohio demonstrations followed Otto’s delivery of 51,744 cans of beer for Anheuser-Busch on Oct. 20 in Colorado, which Otto hailed as the world’s first commercial shipment by a self-driving truck. Unlike the delivery in Colorado, the Otto truck was not accompanied by a police escort in Ohio. “This delivery serves as a proof of concept of how Otto’s technologies can be deployed here in the state,” said Ognen Stojanovski, Otto’s head of policy and government relations. “We hope to continue working closely with the state into the future.” The installation of sensors and a fiber-optic network along Route 33 is scheduled to begin in May. “Data collected on this corridor will allow automotive innovators to test and refine jobs creating technologies that are going to help move people and products more safely and efficiently than ever before,” ODOT Director Jerry Wray said. ODOT said the Smart Mobility Corridor also will align with work to develop the city of Columbus as a hub for intelligent transportation through a $40 million “Smart City” grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation and more than $90 million from private-sector partners. Otto, founded in January by former Google engineers, was acquired in August by Uber Technologies Inc., which also is testing self-driving cars in Pittsburgh. . .

The one-ton Kia Ceres four-wheel drive truck was exported to the Philippines, Latin America, Australia and Turkey. .

Steven Mnuchin (pronounced mah-NEW-chin) Post: Secretary of the Treasury Department The Treasury secretary is the chief navigator of the nation’s economy, overseeing the collection of taxes, the imposition of foreign sanctions, managing the public debt and serving as the chief connection between the administration and the financial markets and the business community. Previous experience: None Age: 53 (54 in December) Schooling: Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale University Background: Steven Terner Mnuchin is an American banker, film producer, and political fundraiser. He was made partner at Goldman Sachs at age 31 and remained there for 17 years. Mnuchin’s father worked at Goldman Sachs for 33 years, and his brother Alan was a Goldman Sachs vice president. Mnuchin made a $40 million fortune at Goldman Sachs, and more at his own private-equity fund. He then founded the motion picture firm, RatPac-Dune Entertainment. Co-Founder, Co-Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Dune Capital Management LP. Finance Chairman of Trump campaign from May 2016. Co-founded OneWest Bank Group LLC in 2004 and served as its Chairman and CEO Founder of Dune Real Estate Partners LP An Investment Professional of Soros Fund Management LLC. Chairman and CEO of IMB Holdco LLC. CEO at SFM Capital Management from 2003 to 2004. Executive Vice President at SFM from February 2001 Co-Chief Information Officer at SFM from February 2001 to December 2001. Member of the Executive Office at SFM from December 1999 to February 2001. Responsible at SFM for overseeing mortgages, U.S. governments, money markets, and municipals in the fixed income, currency, and commodities division from December 1998 to November 1999. Head of the Mortgage Securities Department at SFM from November 1994 to December 1998. Chief Information Officer at Goldman Sachs from December 2001. Entertainment Business: Mnuchin financed American Sniper, Gravity, Avatar, and Life of Pi. Non-Executive Co-Chairman of Relativity Media, LLC since October 2014. Past chairman of CIT Bank, National Association. Past chairman of OneWest Bank N.A. Past vice chairman of ESL Investments, Inc. since 2003 and serves as its Director. Director of CIT Bank, National Association. Independent Director of Sears Holdings Corporation since 2005. Director on the Yale Development Board. Member of the Board of Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles (MOCA), New York Presbyterian Hospital, the Los Angeles Police Foundation, Life Trustee of New York Presbyterian Hospital and UCLA Health System Board. Vice chairman of CIT Group Inc. from January 2, 2016 to March 31, 2016 and previously served in the same role from August 8, 2015 to December 12, 2015. Director of CIT Group Inc. since August 2015. He is divorced twice and currently engaged. If confirmed by the Senate, Mnuchin will join a list of prominent bankers who moved from Wall Street to Washington, including two of his former bosses at Goldman, Henry Paulson and Robert Rubin, who were both top Goldman executives before joining the treasury department. Rubin, who served under Bill Clinton from 1995 to 1999, was a former co-chairman of Goldman and Paulson was CEO between 1998 and 2006 before a three-year stint in government that spanned the financial crisis. Mnuchin’s close ties to an industry he would be in charge of regulating have the potential to complicate his confirmation and could undermine Trump’s populist message. While campaigning, Trump frequently lambasted big banks, Goldman Sachs in particular, advocating the reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall legislation that once separated retail and investment banks. Mnuchin was deeply involved in running a bank that had been at the heart of the subprime housing bust, eventually selling it for billions of dollars in profit. Mnuchin has given mostly to Democrats in recent years. He gave the maximum $2,300 to Hillary Clinton’s presidential primary bid in 2007. When her campaign failed, he donated the maximum to then-Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential run. Mnuchin also has given to several other Democratic presidential campaigns over the years, including those of John Edwards, John Kerry and Al Gore. After leaving Goldman Sachs, Mnuchin worked for billionaire investor George Soros, a well-known Democratic donor. He then founded his own private-equity fund, Dune Capital Management. Among its most notable investments was the purchase of IndyMac from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation during the depths of the financial crisis in 2009. Dune led a consortium of investors including John Paulson, Chris Flowers, George Soros and Michael Dell, who bought the failed subprime lender for about $1.6 billion, and Mnuchin oversaw the rebuilding of its business as CEO of the renamed OneWest. Under Mnuchin, the bank more than doubled its branches and increased its assets. But it also faced criticism from advocacy groups who complained about aggressive foreclosure tactics. At one point, activists marched to Mnuchin’s home in the Bel Air area of Los Angeles to protest its treatment of customers. In 2014, OneWest was sold to financial services firm CIT Group for $3.4 billion. Mnuchin is on CIT’s board of directors. He owns $100 million in company stock. . . . ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ “So much for draining the swamp,” said Adam Hodge, communications director for the Democratic National Committee, on Tuesday. “Nominating Steve Mnuchin to be Treasury secretary — a billionaire hedge fund manager and Goldman Sachs alumnus who preyed on homeowners struggling during the recession — is a slap in the face to voters who hoped he would shake up Washington.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Trump reverses stance by turning to Goldman alumni for key roles The Financial Times / November 30, 2016 President-elect’s change of heart over Wall St bank veterans is a political gamble It is less than four weeks since Donald Trump ran an attack ad on Hillary Clinton, using an image of Goldman Sachs chief Lloyd Blankfein to illustrate how the Democratic candidate favored big business over small people. But since winning the presidential election, Trump has turned to Goldman veteran after Goldman veteran. Stephen Bannon, appointed head of strategy, was a former M&A banker at Goldman Sachs. Steven Mnuchin, Trump’s pick for Treasury secretary, had 17 years in various roles at Goldman Sachs. Gary Cohn, Goldman Sach’s president and chief operating officer, could complete a hat-trick of appointments if he caps a 25-year career at the bank with a move into government. Cohn had a lengthy meeting with Trump on Tuesday afternoon. So far at least, “it’s not been a swamp-draining exercise,” said Doug Landy, a partner at US law firm Milbank. But analysts note that Trump has gone where other administrations led. Goldman people have played outsized roles in previous governments, whatever the political climate around ties to Wall Street. Robert Rubin and Hank Paulson both ran Goldman before becoming Treasury chiefs under presidents Bill Clinton and George W Bush, respectively. During the 2008-09 financial crisis and its aftermath, the corridors of power were stuffed with so many ex-Goldman people — including Neel Kashkari, a former assistant secretary of the Treasury for Financial Stability, and Gary Gensler at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — that people began to refer to “Government Sachs”. Goldman is by no means the only springboard into positions of power and influence. Citigroup has also been a rich source of state appointees in recent years, from Jack Lew, the current Treasury secretary, to Stanley Fischer, vice-chairman of the Federal Reserve. But Goldman appointees, above all, seem to carry a certain cachet. “They’re obviously very competent people and they work long and hard on connections,” said Simon Johnson, a professor of global economics and management at MIT. “They figured out before the competition that finance is about connections, and how to position yourself. The business of government is extremely profitable, and they’re good at it.” Goldman’s network spreads well beyond the US. Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England, is a Goldman alumnus, as is Mario Draghi at the European Central Bank. In the summer José Manuel Barroso, ex-president of the European Commission, took up a position as non-executive chair of Goldman Sachs International, the bank’s largest subsidiary. Analysts note that Mnuchin is by no means assured of becoming the 77th Treasury secretary. Isaac Boltansky at Compass Point in Washington said the confirmation hearings will be “bumpy,” given his Goldman ties and his involvement in the crisis-era purchase of IndyMac, the fourth largest bank failure in the history of the US. They also note that the president-elect is taking a gamble with such an obvious reversal of his earlier stance. During the campaign, Trump made much of the highly paid speeches Clinton gave to Goldman and other Wall Street banks. He also accused his rival for the Republican nomination, Ted Cruz, of being “controlled” by Goldman. Maxine Waters, a Democratic ranking member of the House of Representatives’ financial services committee, said on Wednesday that Trump showed “his true colors” by backing Mnuchin. . . ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Donald Trump’s nominee for Treasury secretary made millions buying failed IndyMac and has résumé at odds with president-elect’s campaign rhetoric The Wall Street Journal / November 30, 2016 On a muggy morning in July 2008, hundreds of customers stood outside IndyMac Bank branches in Southern California, trying to pull their savings from the lender, which was doomed by losses on risky mortgages. Steven Mnuchin didn’t know much about IndyMac as he watched the scenes on CNBC from his Midtown Manhattan office. But he immediately saw an opportunity and began figuring out how to buy the bank. Regulators seized IndyMac, foreshadowing a vicious banking crisis. Six months later, Mnuchin and his investment partners acquired IndyMac with a helping hand from the U.S. government. The deal eventually earned him hundreds of millions of dollars in personal profits. The former Goldman Sachs partner, Hollywood financier and hedge-fund manager now is President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for Treasury secretary. Like other Trump cabinet picks, Mnuchin has a résumé that is at odds with much of the president-elect’s populist rhetoric on the campaign trail. Trump is building a cabinet that combines traditional Republican Party leanings with unconventional elements, including people who made their fortunes by taking big investment risks. IndyMac was the defining deal of Mnuchin’s career. He knew that the government needed to sell the failed bank—and he played hardball. In an interview Tuesday, Mnuchin said he is proud of the transformation at Pasadena, Californina-based IndyMac. “We turned around a huge economic disaster,” he said. Mnuchin, 53 years old, has no experience in government or running a large organization, though he was a campaign loyalist and fundraiser for Trump. Mnuchin’s political views are a secret even to some of his associates. If confirmed by the Senate, the defining traits he will bring as the 77th Treasury secretary include a Wall Street pedigree, long relationship with Trump, and a history of moving fast to seize opportunities that might terrify others. In the interview, Mnuchin said the new administration’s goal would be to achieve annual economic growth of 3% to 4%. He said his top policy priorities would be to overhaul the federal tax code, roll back certain financial regulations, review trade agreements and invest in infrastructure. Mnuchin is regarded within the Trump transition team’s inner circle as a skilled team player. Trump’s advisers say Mnuchin will fuse traditional Republican Party support for lower taxes and less regulation with the president-elect’s populist stances on trade and infrastructure. “Trump, like Ronald Reagan, would go outside of the box,” says Mnuchin. He said Trump won’t hesitate to call up corporate chiefs to lean on them about jobs, factory closures and other matters. The IndyMac deal will likely be a feature of Mnuchin’s confirmation process. Senator Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate committee that will hold hearings on the proposed appointment, said Tuesday that Mnuchin has a “history of profiting off the victims of predatory lending.” Foreclosures on the homes of delinquent IndyMac borrowers sparked protests outside Mnuchin’s mansion in the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles. The bank, which was renamed OneWest Bank and is now part of CIT Group, is under civil investigation by the Department of Housing and Urban Development for loan-servicing practices. Mnuchin, whose father spent his entire career at Goldman, came of age on Wall Street in the 1980s as the business of slicing loans into securities was booming. As a mortgage banker at Goldman, he saw the savings-and-loan crisis and efforts by the government to wind down hundreds of insolvent financial institutions. Colleagues recall Mnuchin’s ability to quickly weigh the risks involved in particular trades. He made partner in 1994 and oversaw Goldman’s mortgage-trading desk before becoming chief information officer. Dinner parties Like other partners, he earned tens of millions of dollars when Goldman became a publicly traded company in 1999. He bought a 6,500-square-foot apartment in a famous Park Avenue building. Mnuchin and Trump were soon in the same philanthropic and social circles, attending dinner parties at each other’s Manhattan homes and mingling at the U.S. Open tennis tournament and the Metropolitan Museum of Art Gala. The reserved Mnuchin never struck colleagues as a political animal but contributed regularly to political campaigns. Mnuchin said he has been a registered Republican for “as long as I can remember,” yet he also gave a total of $7,400 since 2000 to Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaigns. Mnuchin donated to the campaigns of Democrats Barack Obama, John Edwards, John Kerry and Al Gore. The only Republican presidential candidate Mnuchin gave money to was Mitt Romney in 2012. In 2002, Mnuchin left Goldman and wound up running an investment fund set up by billionaire investor George Soros. Soros was a big contributor to the super PAC backing Hillary Clinton in her unsuccessful presidential campaign this year and has donated to other groups Mnuchin and two former Goldman colleagues struck out on their own in 2004 with a new hedge fund, Dune Capital Management LP, which received financial backing from Soros. Mnuchin soon steered Dune into the business of financing Hollywood films, which began to elevate his public profile. He also was part of a group that lent money to Trump for a Chicago condominium project. When IndyMac unraveled in 2008, the images of customers lined up around corners and across parking lots became an enduring symbol of the financial crisis. Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. officials descended on IndyMac’s headquarters on July 11 and shut down the bank. It was the second-largest bank failure of the crisis, surpassed only by Washington Mutual Inc. in September 2008. Federal officials expected to suffer as much as $8 billion in losses from IndyMac. That left regulators looking for someone to take over the bank and mitigate the damage. Speed was essential, since the FDIC was bracing for a wave of additional bank failures. Mnuchin assembled an all-star cast drawn from his years on Wall Street, including Soros, hedge-fund manager John Paulson, billionaire Michael Dell’s investment firm and several former Goldman executives, including J. Christopher Flowers. They signed up on the basis that Mnuchin would personally run the bank. By now, he knew that few bidders would be willing to buy all the failed bank’s assets. And he knew he was taking a giant risk. At the end of 2008, Mnuchin persuaded the FDIC to sell IndyMac for about $1.5 billion. The deal included IndyMac branches, deposits and assets. The FDIC also agreed to protect the buyers from the most severe losses for years. That loss-sharing arrangement turned out to be a master stroke. Mnuchin threw himself into managing IndyMac, where he became chairman and CEO of the parent company. He moved from New York to California. To accomplish his goal of a quick turnaround, Mnuchin needed to deal with IndyMac’s bad mortgages and other assets, a job made easier by the FDIC’s agreement. Mnuchin set out to refashion OneWest as a plain-vanilla lender that eschewed the unconventional mortgages that got IndyMac in trouble. It was a major provider of Alt-A loans, a category between prime and subprime that often involved borrowers who didn’t fully document their income or assets. He began scouting opportunities for OneWest to buy other small lenders. Before long, OneWest had doubled the number of branches that IndyMac had when it failed. OneWest often paid more than other banks for deposits, helping it attract new customers while interest rates were unusually low. Sharing the losses Banks often go out of their way to avoid losses, even when borrowers are in violation of loan terms. The loss-sharing agreement took away some of the disincentives, since future losses would be borne partly by the government. In October 2011, dozens of activists gathered outside his mansion to protest OneWest’s evictions, waving signs and shouting angry slogans. Mnuchin said he was rattled, and OneWest agreed to pay for security services at his home. Mnuchin said Tuesday it was “unfortunate that anyone was foreclosed, [but] all these loans were originated under previous management.” In 2013, OneWest had more than $300 million in profits, nearly equal to what IndyMac earned in 2006. It had a loss of $767 million in the first half of 2008. Mnuchin’s next step was to sell. He toyed with the idea of taking OneWest public. Then a better option came along. Another Goldman veteran, former Merrill Lynch & Co. Chief Executive John Thain, had taken over commercial lender CIT Group Inc. and was trying to fortify its finances. OneWest was a source of stable deposits. In July 2014, CIT agreed to buy OneWest for $3.4 billion, a bounty of more than $3 billion, including dividends. Mnuchin’s take was several hundred million dollars, according to a person familiar with the matter. He stayed on at CIT. After the sale, newly discovered accounting problems forced CIT to take a $230 million charge. It inherited another problem from nearly $40 million of loans OneWest made in 2014 to struggling film studio Relativity Media LLC, in which Mnuchin was a big investor through his Dune Capital hedge fund. Relativity filed for bankruptcy less than a year later, and CIT struggled to get the loans repaid. A film-financing company that also was owed money by Relativity accused OneWest of getting favorable repayments because of Mnuchin’s dual roles at the bank and the studio. Mnuchin left CIT amid a management shake-up announced last year, receiving a $10.9 million severance payment. His exit came just as Trump’s bid for the Republican nomination was gaining momentum. “The timing worked out well,” said Mnuchin. Before formally launching his presidential bid, Trump turned to Mnuchin for advice over dinner. Mnuchin helped write a tax-cutting plan and tried to rein in some of Trump’s populist rhetoric, including his vow to not “let Wall street get away with murder.” “I don’t think he has negative views on Wall Street,” Mnuchin said of Trump in the earlier interview. When Trump delivered his victory speech after the New York primary in April, Mnuchin stood behind him and took photos of the crowd with his cellphone. The next morning, Trump asked if he would consider taking the role of national finance chairman, an operation that had previously relied largely on Trump’s own bank account. Mnuchin agreed. Mnuchin had no previous experience in political fundraising and the finance operation endured early setbacks. It eventually got on track. Mnuchin, who divorced his second wife in 2014, brought his fiancée, Scottish actress Louise Linton, on the Trump campaign plane, where she got to see a draft of one of his foreign-policy speeches, she wrote in an Instagram post. Since Election Night, Mnuchin has been commuting from Los Angeles to New York and has been a regular presence inside Trump Tower as the president-elect works on the transition team. Trump’s financial agenda, which Mnuchin would lead as Treasury secretary, has ignited a broad stock-market rally. CIT shares are up about 13%, increasing the value of Mnuchin’s stake by about $11 million. It is now worth more than $100 million. .

Trump’s Carrier win comes with an asterisk The Washington Post / November 9, 2016 As news broke that President-elect Donald Trump reached a deal to save nearly 1,000 jobs at an Indianapolis plant on Tuesday evening, factory worker Brian Reed prepared to lose his job of 24 years just a mile away. Reed assembles roller bearings at Rexnord, an industrial supplier that plans to send his job and 294 others from the Midwest to Mexico. The 45-year-old father worries about the mortgage, college tuition for his daughter and health insurance for his son, a football player. He hopes Trump will try to save his family's livelihood, too. "We are counting on him," Reed said. "The working class elected him. Now take a stance." This week, Trump steered national attention to Carrier, the air conditioning manufacturer that had intended to move roughly 1,400 jobs from Indiana to Monterrey, Mexico. Carrier now says it will keep nearly 1,000 of those jobs in the state's capital after coming to an agreement with Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who is governor of Indiana. Carrier and Trump's transition team refused to share details of the agreement. The deal followed Trump’s pledge at an April rally in Indianapolis to rescue the jobs. "That’s what is going to happen," he said at the time. "It’s not like we have an 80 percent chance of keeping them or a 95 percent. 100 percent." Yet, the situation in Indianapolis highlights just how intractable the outflow of manufacturing jobs is in much of the nation. For every factory Trump publicly targets, there’s another downsizing somewhere else, sometimes just around the corner. Since 1969, Indiana has lost more than 235,000 manufacturing jobs, shedding nearly a third of such positions, data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis shows. Rexnord is at least the third manufacturer in Indiana this year to reveal Mexico relocation plans. Carrier announced its decision nine months ago, along with United Technologies Electronic Controls, its parent company, which said it will lay off 700 workers by 2018. Local and state officials had pleaded with the companies to keep their operations running, but the appeals proved fruitless. Mayor Joe Hogsett turned his focus to containing the economic fallout from the manufacturing exodus, creating a task force to, among other acts of aid, help laid-off employees with job training. He urged Rexnord last week to pay back more than $300,000 in tax incentives because of the looming closure, set for June. The city plans to hire an “economic recovery coordinator,” said city spokeswoman Taylor Schaffer, and before annoucement of the deal with Trump, she said it planned to use the $1.2 million in tax incentives that Carrier returned to help displaced workers. A letter to Rexnord that the mayor publicly released this month noted his own futile effort to keep the company in town. “Despite every offer I have made and the good-faith efforts of your employees, Rexnord has decided to cast aside the quality and experience of your longtime, dedicated Indianapolis employees to chase cheap labor in Mexico,” Hogsett wrote in a publicly posted letter to the company. Rexnord, headquartered in Milwaukee, is packing up its Indianapolis operations to resettle in the same Mexican city that Carrier had picked for its new domicile. It expects to save $15.5 million during its first year south of the border, said Chuck Jones, president of United Steelworkers Local 1999, which represents both Carrier and Rexnord. That cushion is estimated to grow by $200,000 a year, according to figures the manufacturer shared with the union. To reverse course, Jones said, Indianapolis employees would have had to slash their hourly pay from an average of $25 to $5. Trump has pledged to bring back American jobs that were offshored, promising to generate 25 million as president. He spoke to workers who have lost their paychecks to the forces of trade and technology, and they responded enthusiastically. Men in economically shabbier counties, particularly older white men, overwhelmingly voted him into the White House. “Our politicians have aggressively pursued a policy of globalization — moving our jobs, our wealth and our factories to Mexico and overseas,” Trump said in his June jobs speech. “It doesn’t have to be this way. We can turn it all around — and we can turn it around fast.” Economists have pushed back on that point. Since North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) took effect in 1994, quashing tariffs and tripling the product exchange between the United States, Canada and Mexico, about 4.5 million American manufacturing jobs have disappeared — a consequence they ascribe to both globalization and automation. Though Trump argues that NAFTA shoved jobs south of the border, wiping out some of the best-paying jobs Americans can find without a college degree, proponents of the move say it brought prices down for American families, stretching their dollars while boosting the economy. Derek Scissors, who studies global economies at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-leaning think tank, said Trump’s promises to resurrect manufacturing jobs thus far appear impossible to keep. Renegotiating NAFTA or imposing new double-digit tariffs, two of Trump’s trade proposals, wouldn’t restore the American manufacturing landscape of the past, he said. “You can’t make the world go backward 20 or 30 years,” Scissors said. “You could bring some jobs back, but it’s going to cost a lot. It would drive up prices.”

Speaking of the axle-back variant, the hood is shorter, to allow for a shorter BBC for legal B-double work. Shorter by 155mm (6.1 inches). The Trident's front axle is set back farther than the Titan and Super-Liner, 1297mm (51.1") versus 1058mm (41.7") respectively. The axle-forward Trident's front axle is set back 737mm (29"). https://www.macktrucks.com.au/~/media/files au/brochures/trident_ab.ashx?as=1 https://www.macktrucks.com.au/~/media/files au/brochures/trident_af.ashx?as=1 https://www.macktrucks.com.au/~/media/files au/brochures/titan_brochure.ashx?as=1 https://www.macktrucks.com.au/~/media/files au/brochures/superliner_brochure.ashx?as=1 As for the dimensions of the U.S. market Titan, they no longer publish any specifications on their website. It's all a Volvo secret.......http://www.macktrucks.com/trucks/titan-series/

Keith Lamont Scott protests cost Charlotte taxpayers $4.6 million The Charlotte Observer / October 21, 2016 Protests following the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott cost city taxpayers $4.6 million, mostly in police overtime, the city of Charlotte said Friday. Included in that total cost was $122,000 in property damage to city-owned buildings like the NASCAR Hall of Fame and the Convention Center, as well as police equipment and vehicles. The Charlotte Area Transit System had $26,000 in property damage. That total doesn’t include private property damage. Several uptown buildings had windows smashed and some stores were looted, mostly in around the EpiCentre entertainment complex on Trade Street. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police spent most of the money – at $3.9 million. Almost all of that was for overtime. CMPD also had $60,000 in property damage, which included the destruction of police cars. The Fire Department spent $350,000 on overtime and other operating expenses. The city said it doesn’t anticipate any of the expenses will be reimbursed by the state or federal government. The city said it will use reserves to cover the costs. The $4.6 million covers a three-week period from Sept. 20 through Oct. 7. Scott was shot and killed by police in the parking lot of an apartment complex near UNC Charlotte on the afternoon of Sept. 20. Protests started that night, and early in the morning of Sept. 21, protestors had shut down Interstate 85. Some police cars were damaged in the protests. On the following day, there were protests uptown. The protest began peacefully, but then descended into violence that night. One protestor was shot and killed by another protestor, police said. On Sept. 22, the National Guard and State Highway Patrol arrived to reinforce CMPD. The City Council voted unanimously earlier this month on measures that it hopes it will restore trust with the community. It will hire an outside consultant, The Police Foundation, to review CMPD’s procedures. It has pledged to build 5,000 units of low-income housing in three years and to spend $1 million on a jobs program.

District attorney exonerates officer, denounces rumors in killing of Keith Scott The Charlotte Observer / November 30, 2016 In an emphatic declaration, Mecklenburg District Attorney Andrew Murray said Wednesday he found no legal wrongdoing in the shooting death of a Charlotte man by police, and denounced pervasive rumors spread by social media about the case. Murray laid out in painstaking detail the evidence gathered in the Sept. 20 fatal shooting of Keith Lamont Scott, 43, by officer Brentley Vinson. “I’m extremely convinced that Mr. Vinson’s use of deadly force was lawful,” Murray said. Evidence in the case shows that Scott stepped out of his SUV with a gun in his hand, Murray said, and ignored at least 10 commands from the five officers on the scene to drop it. Murray said that Scott bought the gun – a Colt .380 semi-automatic that had been stolen in Gaston County – 18 days before the confrontation for $100. One bullet was found in the chamber of the cocked gun, the safety was off and Murray said Scott’s DNA was found on the grip and slide. The person who sold the gun to Scott admitted to doing so when confronted by state and federal law enforcement, according to a prosecutor’s report on the shooting. “The seller said that Scott asked him to find him a weapon because he was having problems with his wife and her family, specifically his nephew,” the report said. Murray said that speculation in the community that Scott was unarmed – initial reports from a family member on Facebook said he was holding a book – were untrue [a lie]. “A reading book was not found in the front or back seats of Mr. Scott’s SUV,” Murray said. Officer Vinson’s Smith & Wesson M&P .40 was examined after the shooting and four bullets were missing, Murray said. Analysts determined that the four shell casings found on the scene were fired from Vinson’s weapon. Scott suffered three gunshot wounds. Guns taken from the other officers at the scene had not been fired, he said. People who claimed on social media that they had seen the shooting and Scott was unarmed later recanted – three people who’d made the claim told State Bureau of Investigation agents in interviews that they hadn’t actually seen the shooting, Murray said. Murray said he ran the evidence in the case past 15 veteran prosecutors in his office and they were unanimous in their recommendation that there was insufficient evidence to charge Vinson in the case. Two of those prosecutors were African-American and one was Latino, Murray said. In the aftermath of Scott’s death, Charlotte was roiled by two nights of rioting and nearly a week of street demonstrations. After street violence, dozens of arrests and the death of one man in uptown, Gov. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency. CMPD was the original agency investigating Scott’s shooting, but the SBI took over when his wife, Rakeyia Scott, exercised her right under N.C. law to have the independent agency do the inquiry. Scott, father of seven, a former shopping mall security officer and the son of a police detective, suffered from traumatic brain injury sustained during a motorcycle crash in South Carolina in November 2015. Medical records obtained during the SBI inquiry showed that Scott had difficulties with aggression and anger management. “Scott was battling an array of psychiatric disorders, including depression, anxiety, hallucinations and paranoia,” the report said. “Two weeks prior to his death, Rakeyia Scott told her husband’s therapist that his temper and impatience had increased, and as she stated, ‘something has to give.’” Scott was a convicted felon who was sentenced in 2005 to seven years in prison in Texas for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. . . . .