China's growth addiction

August 14, 2015 - Daily News Briefing

Beijing is taking extraordinary measures to boost the economy. If growth falters, faith in one-party rule might falter.

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Huge, fiery blasts at a warehouse for hazardous chemicals killed at least 50 people and turned nearby buildings into skeletal shells in the Chinese port of Tianjin, raising questions Thursday about whether the materials had been properly stored. Hundreds of people were injured in the explosions shortly before midnight local time Wednesday, which sent out massive fireballs that turned the night sky into day and shattered windows several kilometers away. Twelve of the dead were from among the more than 1,000 firefighters sent to the mostly industrial zone to fight the ensuing blaze.

A massive truck bomb ripped through a popular Baghdad food market in a predominantly Shiite neighborhood early Thursday morning, killing at least 67 people, police officials said.The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the blast, saying it targeted a gathering place of Shiites and vowed more attacks. The truck detonated in the Jameela market in the Iraqi capital's crowded Sadr City neighborhood shortly after dawn, according to two local police officers. They also said that at least 152 people were wounded in the attack. The market is the main center for produce and food sales in the Iraqi capital.

Greece's ruling Syriza party edged towards a formal split on Thursday, hours before rebel leftist lawmakers plan to vote against a new bailout deal to keep the country afloat. With opposition support, the government is asking parliament to approve a 85 billion euro bailout deal that Greece needs to avoid defaulting on a debt repayment next week. The vote, expected in the early hours of Friday, will test the strength of a rebellion by anti-austerity Syriza lawmakers, which could raise pressure on Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to call snap elections as early as September. Parliament, however, is expected to approve the bailout agreement by a comfortable margin since opposition parties have promised their backing for the government to ensure Greece does not return to financial chaos.

Pilot reports of drone sightings so far this year are more than double last year, government regulators say, raising concern about the potential for a deadly collision. There have been more than 650 reports this year by pilots of drones flying near manned aircraft, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement Thursday. There were 238 unmanned aircraft sightings in all of 2014. The reports come from pilots of a variety of aircraft, including many large airliners. The concern is that if a drone collides with an aircraft engine, it could disable the engine much like birds do sometimes when they get chewed up by engines. Also, a high-speed collision with a drone might damage the surface of a plane, changing the airflows in a way that makes the plane difficult to maneuver.

A US government weather forecaster on Thursday raised the likelihood that El Niño conditions would last into the Northern Hemisphere's early spring to 85 percent, boosting the probability that drought-stricken California could see increased rains. The Climate Prediction Center, a National Weather Service agency, last month forecast an 80 percent chance that conditions would last through early spring. The CPC still says there is a more than 90 percent chance that El Niño conditions would last through the Northern Hemisphere winter. The new forecast marginally raises the risk that the El Niño phenomenon, the warming of Pacific sea-surface temperatures, will unleash a period of extreme and potentially damaging weather across the globe.

US retail sales rebounded in July as households boosted purchases of automobiles and a range of other goods, suggesting solid momentum in the economy early in the third quarter. The upbeat report from the Commerce Department on Thursday should strengthen expectations of a Federal Reserve interest rate hike as early as next month. Retail sales increased 0.6 percent last month. June's retail sales were revised up to show them unchanged instead of the previously reported 0.3 percent drop.

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