MCViewPoint

Opinion from a Libertarian ViewPoint

Posts Tagged ‘Federal Reserve’

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »

Erie Times E-Edition Article-Socialism is no longer just a specter

Posted by M. C. on October 25, 2020

The pandemic has propelled government toward promiscuously picking economic winners and losers. As has been said, governments are not good at picking winners, but losers are good at picking governments.

https://erietimes-pa-app.newsmemory.com/?publink=15304d8cb

In 1906, Werner Sombart, the German economist, explained America’s resistance to socialism in five words, “roast beef and apple pie,” his shorthand for affluence.

In 2020, however, semisocialism has come to a United States that is stunningly wealthier — real per-capita income six times larger than in 1906; today’s superiority of purchasable products, from antibiotics to smartphones — than 114 years ago.

This year is drenched with politics, yet the nation seems oblivious that coming decades of American governance have been irrevocably shaped by what Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute calls “the largest single ‘state surge’ in American history,” a “tidal wave of public resources”: debt.

In June alone, the federal government’s $864 billion budget deficit was larger than the deficit in all of fiscal 2017. And fiscal 2018. In eight years, the Reagan administration almost tripled the national debt, to $2.9 trillion, but that sum is less than Congress has increased the debt in the past nine months. Because both parties have a powerful permanent incentive to disburse more current government services than current revenues will fund, the pre-pandemic deficit in fiscal 2019 was already almost $1 trillion — at full employment, with 2.3% gross domestic product growth.

In 1946, after financing four years of global warfare, the national debt was 106% of GDP.

After nine months of spending to counter COVID-19’s impact on the economy — spending soon to be increased by additional trillions — the debt is about 100% of GDP, heading (according to the Congressional Budget Office) to almost 200% by 2050. And the Federal Reserve has, Eberstadt says, “crossed a Rubicon.”

Wading waist-deep into political policies, the Fed is adopting, Eberstadt says, “the role of managing and even micromanaging the American economy through credit allocation, potentially lending vast sums not only to financial institutions but also directly to firms it judges suitable for government support. The Fed already dominates the markets for U.S.

Treasury debt and mortgage debt as a result of previous, lesser crises.

It is by no means inconceivable that the current crisis will propel it to a comparably dominant position in domestic commercial credit.” If socialism is government allocation of economic resources (and hence of opportunity), then … John Cochrane of Stanford’s Hoover Institution, who blogs as the Grumpy Economist, notes that in the 2008 financial crisis, the Federal Reserve launched “creditor bailouts, propping up asset prices to keep investors from losing money, buying unprecedented assets.”

The risk of moral hazard — incentives for reckless behavior — is obvious.

Today, counter-COVID-19 spending already is approximately five times larger than that triggered by the Great Recession of 2008. By 2020, Cochrane says, “Once again a huge vat of debt had built up; once again, nobody kept any cash around for bad times, once again, the government stepped in and offered an enormous put option, just as, arguably everyone expected.” The Fed has propped up the prices of corporate and municipal bonds, and bailed out airlines, “or rather airline bondholders.”

“This time, however,” Cochrane writes, “I don’t even hear the promise to clean up the moral hazard. We are, apparently, permanently in a financial system in which people should load up on debt and risky assets in good times, and the government will buy them up should prices ever waver. Private gain, public loss.” Central banks buying trillions of assets are thereby “allocating credit.” Which is the essence of socialism.

The Fed buying government and corporate debt creates something difficult to unwind — what Cochrane calls “an entirely governmentrun financial system”: an attribute of socialism. “Modern Monetary Theory,” which Democrats praise and hope soon to practice, and which Republicans have been practicing without acknowledging, says: A nation with fiat money (not convertible into something — e.g., gold — valuable, but accepted by the public as a store of value) need never run short of money. It can borrow and create money as long as interest rates are, and are apt to remain, low. A theory that validates wishful thinking will not lack devotees.

Near-zero interest rates — the no-longernew normal — create, Eberstadt says, “zombie companies” that “can only survive in a lowinterest [rate] environment.” The result is rent-seeking and economic sclerosis, because “America cannot succeed unless a lot of its firms fail — including its largest ones. Bankruptcy and reallocation of resources to more productive ends are the mother’s milk of dynamic growth.”

The pandemic has propelled government toward promiscuously picking economic winners and losers. As has been said, governments are not good at picking winners, but losers are good at picking governments.

George Will is a Washington Post columnist. His email address is georgewill@washpost.com.

George Will

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Of Two Minds – What Could Go Wrong? Plenty

Posted by M. C. on October 9, 2020

https://www.oftwominds.com/blogoct20/go-wrong10-20.html

Charles Hugh Smith

Quite a lot of things can go wrong, especially if the mainstream’s rose-tinted sunglasses induce a delusional confidence in fantasy.

The conventional assumptions are remarkably rosy: the “recovery” is V-shaped in all the ways that count (i.e. the top 10% are once again doing well), the Federal Reserve will never let stocks go down or interest rates rise ever again (never never ever!), and the Federal government will borrow and blow endless trillions in stimulus ($2 trillion every six months seems about right, but since there’s no limit, we’ll double it if that’s needed to bail out every zombie corporation, bloated bureaucracy, skim and scam in the land).

what could go wrong? Gordon Long and I considered the question and came up with: quite a lot of things can go wrong, especially if the mainstream’s rose-tinted sunglasses induce a delusional confidence in fantasy.

What Could Go Wrong? (43 min. video)

1. A key part of the happy story is the US dollar (USD) will continue its decline, which is wunnerful for stocks and exporters: dollar down, stocks up, yea!

The official explanation for this free-fall is the USD will weaken as the Fed eases / prints. The mainstream thinking is that Japan and the Euro bloc are farther along in their socialization of debt (i.e. their central banks are monetizing fiscal deficits) and so the US will have to play catch-up, weakening the USD.

What could go wrong?

US-centric analysts forget the USD is the primary reserve currency and due to Triffin’s Paradox, it doesn’t just serve the US economy, it serves the global economy. You will never hear a Fed representative admit this publicly, because the PR / fantasy is that the Fed only cares about the American public (awww, gosh-darn it, aren’t they sweet?) and keeping inflation low and employment high.

In reality, the Fed’s core interests are enriching and protecting private banking globally, and maintaining U.S. global hegemony via a strong dollar. Recall that geopolitically, no empire ever got stronger by weakening its currency.

The Fed never addresses the USD’s global role and so conventional pundits ignore geopolitical forces: capital flows, the global need for dollars to service debt denominated in USD and reserves, etc.

Also recall that China pegs its currency to the US dollar, not the other way around. That alone tells you the role each currency plays in the global economy.

For the USD to weaken, the yen and the euro would need to significantly strengthen. But there’s a problem with this thesis.

Rather than being stronger, Japan and the EU are weaker than the US. Credit impulse is essentially zero in both Japan and the EU, both their banking sectors are insolvent, their economies have been stagnant for years (EU) or decades (Japan) and their demographic declines are accelerating. Both are export-dependent, an Achilles Heel as world trade / globalization enters a secular decline that could easily gather momentum.

The US needs capital flows into the US economy, so negative rates are a non-starter. Non-US borrowers have USD denominated debts of around $3 trillion, so demand for USD is not optional, it is a function of credit, commerce and reserves.

Simply put, the US is not about to sacrifice the euro-dollar / petro-dollar and its commercial hegemony just to satisfy domestic pleading for negative rates. Furthermore, Japan and Europe have proven that negative rates only weaken the private banking sector–the exact opposite of the Fed’s Prime Directive.

If the USD strengthens substantially, which it tends to do in crises, that will be very negative for equities. (No, no, no, the Fed has our backs! The Fed will never let my precious portfolio drop a single dollar!)

So sorry, but the Fed’s Prime Directives are not related to your portfolio at all. The Fed’s PR is all about domestic stocks, implicitly or explicitly, but when push comes to shove, your portfolio will be sacrificed without any hesitation to protect private banking and USD hegemony. The empire eats first, and only the tragically misguided believe US stocks are all that matters to the Fed.

2. The Fed’s easing, QE, etc. will spark a new round of credit expansion.

What could go wrong?

Credit expansion is on life support. There are very few investment opportunities, which is one reason why corporations have poured earnings into stock buybacks. The Fed can’t create low-risk, high-profit investment opportunities, not can it make poor credit risks into good credit risks.

Banks can’t afford to lend to insolvent households, zombie corporations or small businesses. The credit expansion impulse is impaired by the overhang of bad debt, excessive leverage, zombie corporations, etc. and there’s nothing the Fed can do about it. The Fed is pushing on a string.

Furthermore, the Fed is now encountering political resistance to its “enrich the wealthy and bail out zombie corporations” monetary policies. Its room to bail out the super-wealthy is increasingly constrained politically. The Fed is signaling that its focus is shifting from free money for financiers to funneling new money directly to households.

3. The federal government will borrow and spend trillions, sparking renewed growth.

What could go wrong?

As noted, banks cannot lend to poor credit risks, nor can they force those who don’t want to borrow more to take on new loans. Federal spending doesn’t magically create good credit risks or well-collateralized creditors.

Small businesses cannot lower their fixed costs enough to survive, and many of these costs such as taxes and fees will be rising as cash-starved local governments seek more revenues.

The free money will flow not into productive investments but into demand for goods and services which are constrained by declines in trade, high fixed production costs, retirement of key workers, etc.

Inflation will leap, surprising everyone who believed the “low inflation forever” story. As inflation soars, the purchasing power of the federal spending will plummet accordingly.

As UBI, Fed helicopter money, etc. becomes institutionalized, the working poor will exit low-paying, high-stress jobs, creating labor shortages. Small business won’t be able to pay higher wages and survive, and low-margin corporations will be squeezed as well.

There’s much more in our discussion: What Could Go Wrong? (43 min. video)



My new book is available! A Hacker’s Teleology: Sharing the Wealth of Our Shrinking Planet 20% and 15% discounts (Kindle $7, print $17)

Read excerpts of the book for free (PDF).

The Story Behind the Book and the Introduction.


Recent Podcasts:

What Could Go Wrong? (43 minutes, with Gordon Long)

AxisOfEasy Salon #24: It’s Not a Conspiracy. It’s a Culture. (1 hr)

My COVID-19 Pandemic Posts


My recent books:

A Hacker’s Teleology: Sharing the Wealth of Our Shrinking Planet (Kindle $8.95, print $20, audiobook coming soon) Read the first section for free (PDF).

Will You Be Richer or Poorer?: Profit, Power, and AI in a Traumatized World
(Kindle $5, print $10, audiobook) Read the first section for free (PDF).

Pathfinding our Destiny: Preventing the Final Fall of Our Democratic Republic ($5 (Kindle), $10 (print), ( audiobook): Read the first section for free (PDF).

The Adventures of the Consulting Philosopher: The Disappearance of Drake $1.29 (Kindle), $8.95 (print); read the first chapters for free (PDF)

Money and Work Unchained $6.95 (Kindle), $15 (print) Read the first section for free (PDF).


If you found value in this content, please join me in seeking solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.

Be seeing you

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

The Rutherford Institute :: Since 9/11, the Government’s Answer to Every Problem Has Been More Government | By John W. Whitehead |

Posted by M. C. on September 1, 2020

In other words, in the eyes of the U.S. military, noncombatants are American citizens a.k.a. domestic extremists a.k.a. enemy combatants who must be identified, targeted, detained, contained and, if necessary, eliminated.

https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/john_whiteheads_commentary/since_9_11_the_governments_answer_to_every_problem_has_been_more_government

By John W. Whitehead

“A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take away everything that you have.”—Anonymous

Have you noticed that the government’s answer to every problem is more government—at taxpayer expense—and less individual liberty?

The Great Depression. The World Wars. The 9/11 terror attacks. The COVID-19 pandemic.

Every crisis—manufactured or otherwise—since the nation’s early beginnings has become a make-work opportunity for the government to expand its reach and its power at taxpayer expense while limiting our freedoms at every turn.

Indeed, the history of the United States is a testament to the old adage that liberty decreases as government (and government bureaucracy) grows. To put it another way, as government expands, liberty contracts.

To the police state, this COVID-19 pandemic has been a huge boon, like winning the biggest jackpot in the lottery. Certainly, it will prove to be a windfall for those who profit from government expenditures and expansions.

Given the rate at which the government has been devising new ways to spend our money and establish itself as the “solution” to all of our worldly problems, this current crisis will most likely end up ushering in the largest expansion of government power since the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

This is how the emergency state operates, after all.

From 9/11 to COVID-19, “we the people” have acted the part of the helpless, gullible victims desperately in need of the government to save us from whatever danger threatens. In turn, the government has been all too accommodating and eager while also expanding its power and authority in the so-called name of national security.

As chief correspondent Dan Balz asks for The Washington Post, “Government is everywhere now. Where does it go next?”

When it comes to the power players that call the shots, there is no end to their voracious appetite for more: more money, more power, more control.

This expansion of government power is also increasing our federal debt in unprecedented leaps and bounds. Yet the government isn’t just borrowing outrageous amounts of money to keep the country afloat. It’s also borrowing indecent sums to pay for programs it can’t afford.

The government’s primary response to this COVID-19 pandemic—flooding the market with borrowed money in the amount of trillions of dollars for stimulus payments, unemployment insurance expansions, and loans to prop up small businesses and to keep big companies afloat—has pushed the country even deeper in debt.

By “the country,” I really mean the taxpayers. And by “the taxpayers,” it’s really future generations who will be shackled to debt loads they may never be able to pay back.

This is how you impoverish the future.

Democrats and Republicans alike have done this.

Without fail, every president within the last 50 years has expanded the nation’s debt. When President Trump took office on January 20, 2017, the national debt—the amount the federal government has borrowed over the years and must pay back—was a whopping $19.9 trillion. Despite Trump’s pledge to drain the swamp and eliminate the debt, the federal debt is now approaching $27 trillion and is on track to surpass $78 trillion by 2028.

For many years now, economists have warned that economic collapse would be inevitable if the national debt ever surpassed the size of the U.S. economy. The government passed that point in June 2020 and has yet to put the brakes on its spending.

In fact, the Federal Reserve just keeps printing more money in order to prop up the economy and float the debt.

At some point, something’s got to give.

As it now stands, the U.S. is among the most indebted countries in the world.

Almost a third of the $27 trillion national debt is owed to foreign entities such as Japan and China.

Most of the debt, however, is owed to the public.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

The Biggest Threats to Your Personal and Financial Freedom Today

Posted by M. C. on August 13, 2020

International Man: In the US, and much of the West, most people are willingly handing over their dwindling freedoms for the promise of safety or security.

Is there any hope that something will reverse this trend?

Doug Casey: Again, trends in motion tend to stay in motion. Until they stop.

But what generally stops them? Something big. Usually, a crisis or a collapse.

https://internationalman.com/articles/the-biggest-threats-to-personal-and-financial-freedom/

International Man: The world has become increasingly unfree. Recently, the global pandemic has justified all kinds of draconian measures by governments.

How do you see this trend evolving?

Doug Casey: It’s clearly a worldwide trend. The only exceptions are obscure places like North Macedonia, Belarus, and Nicaragua—and they have plenty of other, much more serious problems—and of course, Sweden, which is almost unique among advanced countries in not falling victim to the mass hysteria. Life there has gone on more-or-less normally since March as a result.

It’s not just the national governments, which are bad enough. States, provinces, cities, and counties have taken advantage of the hysteria to “do something” and lock down. For example, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio is putting armed guards around main entrances to New York to keep people out.

Numerous cities around the world, like Melbourne, Australia, have actually turned themselves into police states. This virus scare has gotten quite out of control. The average person thinks we’re living in a Steven King novel.

If it were just a matter of politics, people would be more apt to resist because people recognize the arbitrariness of political opinions. Interestingly, the hysteria also breaks along political lines. Conservatives tend to view it as overblown or even a scam. Liberals tend to see it as a crime if you aren’t masked up and locked down. The virus is a psychological litmus test.

Power mongers are using biology and medicine as excuses to take charge in the name of science. They’re saying that you don’t have a choice because you are affecting the health of others, not just yourself. Minor bureaucrats like Fauci and second string politicians like de Blasio have jumped on it, fanning the flames of a panic. It’s made them into “big men.”

Like the global warming scare, the COVID hysteria is corrupting the idea of science and the credibility of scientific methodology in the eyes of the average man. And incidentally, the overlap between those who want the State to “do something” about global warming, and “do something” about the virus is extremely high.

It’s actually quite insane. COVID as a disease is only serious if you’re elderly or obese or have other serious conditions, which is why the average age of a COVID victim is about 80.

In fact, the deaths from COVID are probably not going to be much greater than they are from a bad annual flu, especially accounting for the fact that many deaths from things like motor accidents are often counted as COVID if the victim also had COVID. Like most things that become politicized, it’s hard to believe anything. The statistics are completely unreliable. What we’re dealing with is mass hysteria, similar to what happened in Salem in the late 17th century.

The matter should be just between you and your doctor. This is how the vastly more serious flu epidemics of the late 1960s and the late 1950s were dealt with. In the big scheme of things, they were non-events, as COVID should be.

This time is different. Your doctor doesn’t count. It’s the doctor with political connections, that counts.

How do I see this trend evolving?

Toward more centralized power, of course. The trend has been in motion for over 100 years, starting with World War I. It’s been in motion for a long time, and it’s accelerating at this point. Trends in motion tend to stay in motion until they reach a crisis point.

The powers that be have discovered that a medical emergency is almost as effective as an actual war to get people used to doing as they’re told. It’s quite amazing how anxious the average American is to act like a whipped dog, roll over on his back, and wet himself. Those who don’t wear their masks—which serve little or no medical purpose; they’re basically virtue-signaling devices—are bullied and shamed. It’s gotten quite out of hand. The woke SJWs are in charge.

International Man: Let’s talk about one of the biggest threats to financial freedom—the Federal Reserve and every other central bank.

The currency printed by these institutions isn’t real money. That is to say, it wasn’t a result of a market process of people voluntarily coming to the conclusion to use a specific good as money. Government decrees, laws, and regulations made central bank currency money.

How can individuals protect themselves from this enormous swindle?

Doug Casey: It’s not just the US government. Every central bank in the world is printing up currency units not just by the billions, but by the trillions.

What you have to do is figure out where that money is going to go, and try to get there first. In this environment, rational investing is becoming increasingly impossible. The economy and society will become more chaotic. It has become foolish to have a long-term horizon, and to make other than hit-and-run-style investments. You’re forced to be a speculator.

I would point out that in a normal free market society, speculators would be chronically unemployed. Why? Speculating, more than anything else, is capitalizing on politically caused distortions in the market. There would be very few in a true free market.

But now, as powerful as governments are, distortions and politically caused misallocations of capital are everywhere. With regulations and tons of money being thrown at the markets, you’re forced to speculate. It’s too bad because speculation is not productive in itself; it’s a zero sum game. It’s very different from investing, which is allocating capital to create more wealth through innovation and production.

However, we don’t make the rules. That, unfortunately, is something our betters have arrogated to themselves. We’re just playing the game. If you don’t want to get hurt, it’s important to learn to play the game successfully.

That means orienting your mindset to that of a speculator. Most people will confuse speculating with gambling, however, and they’ll wind up losing everything. They’ll wind up much worse off by treating the stock market like a casino.

The simplest thing you can do at this point—other than watching where the money is going and getting there first—is continuing to buy gold and silver and setting them aside. At a minimum, that will preserve your capital.

Unfortunately, neither metal is no longer a giveaway bargain. On the other hand, the trend is clearly in motion, and it’s accelerating. They’re going much higher. Gold would have to go to about $3000 to equal—in real terms—it’s peak of $800 back in 1980. And the situation is vastly more precarious now than it was then. I expect the current bull market to take it much higher.

Right now, the best speculations are mining companies. They have done extremely well, but relative to the gains in the underlying metals, they’re lagging.

That’s true because none of the big fund managers own gold stocks. Why not? They don’t understand gold. They think that it’s a pet rock.

But at some point, soon, they’re going to pile into these mining stocks. They’re now hugely profitable and becoming more so. Even the biggest ones are relatively small-cap companies in today’s world. Most miners are not just small-cap, and they’re not even micro caps. They’re nano caps. The market caps of every gold producer in the world adds up to around $200 billion. That’s only a bit more than the cash that Apple alone has in its treasury.

These things could be more explosive than they have ever been in the past. To use a phrase, I coined to describe past gold-stock bull markets: It’s going to be like trying to funnel the contents of Hoover Dam through a garden hose.

It’s really a pity that the average American is being swindled by the Fed, and the government in DC, and a pity that almost nobody owns gold or silver physically, and many fewer own mining stocks. But let’s try to take advantage of the unfortunate reality.

International Man: In the US, and much of the West, most people are willingly handing over their dwindling freedoms for the promise of safety or security.

Is there any hope that something will reverse this trend?

Doug Casey: Again, trends in motion tend to stay in motion. Until they stop.

But what generally stops them? Something big. Usually, a crisis or a collapse.

Here’s an example. You would have thought that the trends in Venezuela and Zimbabwe would have stopped years ago. You’d think those people could see how bad things were getting and say, “Wait a minute, we’re going down the wrong path.” But that’s not the case.

Neither Venezuela nor Zimbabwe is going to turn around until there’s a complete and utter collapse followed by serious violence. That’s the case almost everywhere—trends in motion stay in motion until they reach a crisis. I don’t think you can reverse the trend with half measures, like voting.

Why don’t I think you can reverse the trend?

It’s because, over the last roughly three generations, almost everybody has gone to college. Meanwhile, colleges have been transformed from places where you received an education, something useful, to institutions of mass indoctrination. The tenets of cultural Marxism, socialism, and statism have filtered down to high schools and even grade schools.

When people are at a crucial time in their life, late teens and early twenties, and they’re taught something. It’s very hard for them to unlearn it. It’s very much like when I started playing polo. I thought I knew how to ride a horse because I could stay on when it went faster than a walk.

As a result, I picked up all kinds of bad habits and cost myself years, having to unlearn bad habits. Whereas, if I just learned the proper way to do things to start with, I would have been far ahead in the game.

That’s the problem with kids going to college and high schools, and even grade schools, today. They’re hit with instruction that’s often not just wrong, but the opposite of the truth. It’s very hard for them to unlearn it.

As Will Rogers liked to say, the problem isn’t even what people don’t know. It’s what they think they know that just ain’t so.

It’s reinforced by ads that corporations put on television, and the huge amounts of money they give to left-wing organizations. You’d think they’d be interested in defending capitalism—but that’s incorrect. Lenin was correct when he commented that the capitalists were so stupid that they’d sell him the rope he’d use to hang them.

That’s on top of Hollywood, the propaganda coming out of thousands of NGOs, and mostly everything that politicians say.

I don’t think the trend is going to turn around. In fact, it’s accelerating, and it’s going to continue accelerating until we reach a nasty crisis.

Editor’s Note: As these trends continue to accelerate, what you do right now can mean the difference between coming out ahead or suffering crippling losses.

That’s exactly why bestselling author Doug Casey and his team just released a free report with all the details on how to survive an economic collapse.

It will help you understand what is unfolding right before our eyes and what you should do so you don’t get caught in the crosshairs.

Click here to download the PDF now.

Be seeing you

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Are You Loving Your Servitude? – LewRockwell

Posted by M. C. on August 4, 2020

Their weak-kneed toadies at the Federal Reserve have dutifully fulfilled their mandate of no banker or hedge fund left behind. While Main Street is beset with potholes, boarded up small business storefronts (if they haven’t been looted and burned), homeless drug addicts, and the unemployed lining up at local food banks, Wall Street is being paved in gold…

If you think the world doesn’t make sense and you don’t understand why people aren’t acting rationally, don’t worry. You are the one who is sane. It’s the rest of the world that is crazy. Don’t lose faith. There are others out there who refuse to embrace their servitude. Don’t follow the crowd. Think for yourself. Question everything. Prepare for the worst, because it’s coming. Use your time wisely. Keep your loved ones close. And befriend like minded people. The future of our country hangs in the balance.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2020/08/jim-quinn/are-you-loving-your-servitude-2/

By

The Burning Platform

In Part One of this article I laid out the argument Huxley’s dystopian vision of the future had played out over many decades, but now I observe Orwell’s darker vision in motion since the start of this century.

All the “solutions” being imposed by those in power don’t solve anything, because they aren’t designed to solve anything. These are nothing but short-term emergency sustaining maneuvers to keep the dying patient alive, while the criminals ransack his house, extracting whatever wealth he has saved. Throwing $1,200 bones and $600 a week bribes to what they consider the Main Street riff raff, while funneling trillions into the pockets of Too Big To Trust Wall Street banks, billionaire oligarchs, connected mega-corporations, and pliable corrupt politicians, is just what the doctor ordered for the ruling class.

Their weak-kneed toadies at the Federal Reserve have dutifully fulfilled their mandate of no banker or hedge fund left behind. While Main Street is beset with potholes, boarded up small business storefronts (if they haven’t been looted and burned), homeless drug addicts, and the unemployed lining up at local food banks, Wall Street is being paved in gold, with its inhabitants eating caviar, drinking champagne, and celebrating their brilliance in owning a central bank, guaranteed to enrich them.

The paths being chosen by those in power offer no exit or happy endings. Driving the annual deficit over $4 trillion, pushing the national debt to $26.5 trillion (don’t forget the $200 trillion of unfunded welfare liabilities), because you chose to shut the country down for a bad flu, has virtually guaranteed a multi-year economic contraction and eventual financial collapse. The Fed has propped up a zombie economy and horribly managed zombie corporations with zero interest rates and purchasing of their bad debt.

Free markets have been extinguished, price discovery has vanished, success is determined by who you know, and interest rates can never rise again, or the debt Ponzi collapses instantaneously. The $600 a week in unemployment produced an economic recovery mirage, as money that has no possibility of being repaid, was spent by millions on grocery deliveries, crap from Amazon, and buying bankrupt stocks on Robinhood by unemployed day traders.

The politicians who doled out this $600 per week to millions of people they purposely forced into unemployment are now trapped. Any politician who votes to not extend the payments will be scorned by the corporate media talking heads as heartless and uncaring. With elections just over three months away, it’s now just a matter of how big the newest debt financed debacle will be (somewhere between $1 and $3 trillion).

Trump will sign whatever comes his way, because not doing so would guarantee a loss in November. Financially, none of this can work. The Federal government, with their co-conspirators at the Fed, can get away with running massive deficits for as long as the USD is accepted around the world as a safe investment. The record price of gold and the 9% decline in the USD since April are early warnings another financial crisis looms. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Mask Propaganda Intensifies: It’s “NOT Your Right To NOT Wear A Mask”

Posted by M. C. on August 1, 2020

It surprising that people aren’t just returning to their lives and ignoring these tyrants. Just how much enslavement will it take to get Americans to wake up? The masks are not for your good, and they never were.

https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/mask-propaganda-intensifies-its-not-your-right-to-not-wear-a-mask_07302020

Mac Slavo

This is nothing new, but for some strange reason, the political puppets need you all to wear a mask. Jim Murren, the head of Nevada’s coronavirus task force says it is “not your right to not wear a mask.”

This lacks logic on all fronts. It’s still difficult to figure out why they are so desperate to get as many people as possible in face masks unless this isn’t about logic at all, but control. Murren, who heads the Nevada COVID-19 Response, Relief, and Recovery Task Force, made the comments at the Las Vegas Global Economic Alliance’s Las Vegas Perspective event on Tuesday.

It surprising that people aren’t just returning to their lives and ignoring these tyrants. Just how much enslavement will it take to get Americans to wake up? The masks are not for your good, and they never were. Just listen to Fauci say it:

Mask propaganda and the third wave are the newest brainwashing ideals being pushed by mainstream media. But what if it’s more sinister than we could imagine?

Are Face Masks & COVID Rituals Occultist Symbols For Submission?

We should all be aware by now that this is a spiritual battle for your mind. Look around.  You’re surrounded by propaganda, and if you can’t remove your cognitive biases for just a moment to realize it, you are going to have a hard time in the upcoming months. Be aware, but prepare.

This is all by design, and once you realize the government is nothing more than theater to distract you from what the Federal Reserve is doing, you will be able to see how to prepare and be ready for what’s coming. Never succumb to fear,  but you need to know what’s happening.  You need to open your eyes ad be aware of the global take over so you can prepare to the best of your ability. These psychopaths feed on fear, so instead of being afraid, learn, grown, become self-reliant, and store food and water. 

Greg Mannarino: It’s Critical To Understand That The Goal Is “Full Control By The Federal Reserve”

It’s All Been Planned: Prepare For The Great Reset

None of this is ending anytime soon because there are not enough people who see the truth. Once people wake up to what’s happening, we can begin to work together to create a better world without this master-slave relationship we all have with the current ruling class puppets doing the bidding of the Federal Reserve.

Be seeing you

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Greg Mannarino: It’s Critical To Understand That The Goal Is “Full Control By The Federal Reserve”

Posted by M. C. on July 22, 2020

Basically, we don’t control the outcome of elections. The central banks do. If for one second, the Federal Reserve sees Biden as being more “on board” with their epic distribution of debt and credit, he WILL be the next president.  Trump could still  be reelected because he’s been incredibly effective at helping the central bank take over the planet.

“That’s the game. They don’t want you to be able to think, they don’t want you to be able to speak, or anything. It’s they’re in control and that’s it.” BUT as I have repeatedly pointed out, and Mannarino says too, once you know this, you’re in control!

https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/greg-mannarino-its-critical-to-understand-that-the-goal-is-full-control-by-the-federal-reserve_07172020

Mac Slavo

SHTFplan.com

Greg Mannarino, who is asking people to put politics aside and look at the reality of the situation, is once again, trying to teach the public a powerful lesson. We do not elect presidents. They are selected and the Federal Reserve will make the decision.

Mannarino says that once you understand this, you stand to beat the system and will be able to generate a lot of wealth. However, this will take putting your politics aside and understanding what’s really happening as opposed to what you WANT to happen. The only reason there are two political parties is to give people the illusion of choice. This should go without saying, but so many are still stuck in a paradigm that will wholly enslave and impoverish them unless they wake up to it, and soon! It’s “critical” to use Mannarino’s word.

Basically, we don’t control the outcome of elections. The central banks do. If for one second, the Federal Reserve sees Biden as being more “on board” with their epic distribution of debt and credit, he WILL be the next president.  Trump could still  be reelected because he’s been incredibly effective at helping the central bank take over the planet.

It All Comes Back To The Federal Reserve: The NWO Is Being Shoved Down Our Throats

“The easy money hasn’t even begun to pour into this market,” says Mannarino as he explains that the Wall Street banks continue to buy the market on their quest to won the world. “99% of the people have NO IDEA what the Fed is doing!” They are literally buying debt with cash they create out of thin air. What happens when those debts do not get repaid? The central bank then owns your asset. This isn’t rocket science, people. But it is time to wake up to what’s happening. How much longer can people stick their heads in the sand and ignore the reality of the situation in favor of a political central bank puppet?

Mannarino says this is NOT political, he’s a “market guy.” But it’s time to face reality. “Keep politics out of it. I’m not talking about this as a political thing. I’m talking about strictly from a market standpoint!” Mannarino adds: “I’m telling you how the markets work!” And unfortunately, people need to realize that the central bank chooses the president and the vast majority of the congress and senate to make sure their quest for world domination is not defeated.

Trump has already demanded more easy money in the form of suppressed rates, but if the Federal Reserve thinks they will achieve their agenda to own the planet with Biden, he’ll be elected. We DO NOT have a say in this, and voting is a waste of time. The central banks WILL put whoever they want in office. “I just want you to understand how these markets work. Keep politics out!” Mannarino says.

“That’s the game. They don’t want you to be able to think, they don’t want you to be able to speak, or anything. It’s they’re in control and that’s it.” BUT as I have repeatedly pointed out, and Mannarino says too, once you know this, you’re in control! Empower yourself instead of playing into the false left vs. right paradigm. “You’re in control. Let me explain that to you. If you realize, that by understanding and having a clear picture of what the bigger picture is here, and you know what is: full control of the global markets by the Federal Reserve, who is running the entire charade right now. It’s simple. It’s the Wall Street banks and the Fed that are running the world. And they will do whatever they want. They will get whoever they want in office. That’s it.”

And it really is that simple, folks. Wake up. Life is a lot easier once you look beyond political and past the smoke in mirrors circus of political theatre.

The Federal Reserve’s Controlled Demolition Of The Economy Is Almost Complete

“If you have the intelligence to be able to see through the facade of this, I will keep you on the right side of this “thing” that’s enveloping the entire world. BUT, if you gotta ‘rah, rah, rah’ and gotta stick to whatever [political] party you believe in [bowing, subservient motions] you’ve got your faith in the wrong place,” Mannarino says toward the end.

Understand where we are. Your beliefs, left or right, literally don’t matter. Stop serving the ruling class and start serving yourself and your family and others and see how quickly your life will improve for the better. It’s past time to think critically, and if you cannot manage to do that, it’s going to be a bumpy rest of 2020 for you.

Yes, waking up is uncomfortable, but imperative to truly understand what’s going on and empower yourself to realize no one owns you. Apocalypse means “the lifting of the veil,” and it’s time for Americans to realize they’ve been sold a pack of lies bundled under the name “democracy” and the illusion of choice.

Be seeing you

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

Erie Times E-Edition Article – Short on coins

Posted by M. C. on July 8, 2020

Another government screw-up or an intentional step toward a cashless society?

The same government that is controlling your health can’t keep nickels and dimes in the till.

https://erietimes-pa-app.newsmemory.com/?publink=2ba69efcc

How a coin shortage is impacting Mich. retailers, grocery stores

At Barrel’s and Vines, an upscale Royal Oak, Michigan, gas station, signs are posted urging customers to have the correct change or use debit or credit whenever possible.

Normally, owner Ken Lucia keeps boxes of rolled coins to fill register tills to use as change at both Barrel’s and Vines locations on Woodward.

But the COVID-19 pandemic has coins — quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies — in short supply.

Retailers get their boxes of coins from banks. But, Lucia said, the supplies are low at banks.

“Our bank will only allow us to buy one roll of coin at a time,” he said. “The banks have cut down on giving boxes of change out.”

A box of quarters has 50 rolls or $500 worth, while a box of pennies has 100 rolls or $50 worth, Lucia said.

In mid-June, the Federal Reserve announced a nationwide coin shortage, which it blamed on the pandemic..

“The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly disrupted the supply chain and normal circulation patterns for U.S. coin,” the government said in a statement. “In the past few months, coin deposits from depository institutions to the Federal Reserve have declined significantly and the U.S. Mint’s production of coin also decreased due to measures put in place to protect its employees. Federal Reserve coin orders from depository institutions have begun to increase as regions reopen, resulting in the Federal Reserve’s coin inventory being reduced to below normal levels. “

On June 15, the Federal Reserve Banks and their coin distribution locations began to allocate available supplies of pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters to depository institutions as a temporary measure.

The temporary coin allocation methodology is based on historical order volume by coin denomination and depository institution endpoint, and current U.S. Mint production levels. Order limits are unique by coin denomination and are the same across all Federal Reserve coin distribution locations. Limits will be reviewed and potentially revised based on national receipt levels, inventories, and Mint production.

Barrels and Vines is a gas station that sells beer, wine and liquor and has a restaurant inside called Saroki’s Pizzeria, that also utilizes the change. Lucia said he began to see the coins run low in mid-April.

But now the coin shortage appears to be worse.

“Some banks have been more lenient than others,” Lucia said.

The shortage makes it tough for retailers.

To conserve coins, Lucia said, he has resorted to rounding sales up or down.

“I try to give out change in onesies and twosies, not in multiples,” he said.

For example, if the sale is $4.79, he will ask customers if they mind losing a penny and round up, giving them 20 cents. Or, he will round down to $4.75 and give them a quarter.

Constance Nobis, director of Retail Market Operations at Comerica Bank, said the bank is limiting what it gives to customers because its supply from the Fed has been cut by 90%.

“It’s a supply chain issue,” Nobis said. “Normally there’s a lot of recycling. Customers bring in coin to the bank, we ship it to the Fed and we fill our order out for customers.”

Nobis said the shortage is temporary.

“As more banks open and they are able to take those coin deposits in and the Fed is going to increase what they are minting,” she said.

In the meantime, she said, the bank is urging customers to bring in coin. It’s also doing centralized ordering, doing half boxes and rationing.

“Primarily gas stations and party store owners are frustrated with lack of coin and we have been able to get them about 50% of what they are asking for,” Nobis said.

That shortage may have an impact on the way you pay at grocery stores and other retailers.

At most of Meijer’s selfscan checkouts, the retailer has temporarily switched to credit, debit and SNAP/EBT card use only. Self-scan will also accept Meijer gift cards.

But customers using cash must use a cashier staffed checkout.

“While we understand this effort may be frustrating to some customers, it’s necessary to manage the impact of the coin shortage on our stores,” a Meijer spokeswoman said.

Be seeing you

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

Inequality is Overstated—and Overrated | Mises Wire

Posted by M. C. on June 16, 2020

There are two problems with this line of thinking. The first is that net worth totals are dollar values of two different kinds of things—capital goods and consumption goods, of which capital goods make up the larger part. Capital goods can not be alchemically transformed into consumption goods. The second problem is that efforts to turn the savings of some into consumption goods for others will in the end reduce the amount of consumption goods for everyone.

https://mises.org/wire/inequality-overstated-and-overrated?utm_source=Mises+Institute+Subscriptions&utm_campaign=4ef0911661-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_9_21_2018_9_59_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8b52b2e1c0-4ef0911661-228343965

Whining and complaining about inequality is a growth industry. Thomas Piketty’s book (or perhaps a large virtue-signaling paperweight), about how the rich are getting richer, achieved bestseller status and is now a movie.

Understanding the flaws in the wealth inequality argument is increasingly important, because the communist wing of the Democratic Party is now openly advocating a wealth tax. In this article I will explain why measures of wealth inequality overstate actual inequality in terms of the standard of living of wealthy people relative to the rest.

Some of the complaining about inequality focuses on income and some on wealth. I will first focus on why both matter and why looking at only one or the other gives an incomplete picture. Depending on where someone sits on the net worth spectrum, their consumption opportunities will depend to a lesser or greater extent on the balance between their wages, their savings, and their time preference.

Measuring Wealth vs. Measuring Income

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

How Make Your Vote Count – LewRockwell

Posted by M. C. on June 13, 2020

Do Not Consent

Voting in the state’s elections continues the racket.  And it will continue.  Your vote would consent to it.   Don’t do it.   Would you vote for new leaders in the Mafia or Ku Klux Klan while believing that doing so will encourage those organizations to play nice?

Don’t let the enemies of freedom get away with equating the state with government.  Government can and should exist without the state.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2020/06/george-f-smith/how-to-make-your-vote-count/

…The message I’m delivering is pro-government-in-the-market sense only, anti-state.

To sum up, my advice is:

Do not consent to the coercive agencies that are currently installed at all levels of our current system of government, from federal to local.  At the federal level they include the usual enemies such as the DEA, NSA, IRS, and the Federal Reserve.

Do not consent to what’s called taxation, to the right of some people to confiscate your wealth, however great or modest your wealth may be.

Do not consent to the current institutions that thrive on “wars” of all kinds, whether it’s a war on a bug, a drug, or an unfortunate condition of human existence, most of which the state created and intensify the problems they’re alleged to fix, that are done in your name and with your expropriated money.

Do not consent to the vast military – industrial – congressional – media – educational complex that claims to be a defender of your liberty as it murders families overseas and destroys their society’s infrastructures — again, with your expropriated wealth.

Do not consent to the idea that you need to surrender your right to self-defense, including defense against the state.

Do not consent to the criminal invasions of your privacy that the state has made legal.

Do not consent to the state’s educational system as it attempts to train obedient servants of the state while continually dumbing-down the requirements for advancement.

Do not consent to any government that claims the right to enlist your sons or daughters in a war or project against their will.

Do not consent to the state’s war on market giants that achieved their status because consumers voluntarily traded their money for the products or services the businesses offered.  Remember, consumers can and have shut down market giants by taking their business elsewhere.

Do not consent to the practice of state – business “partnerships” that create unfair competitive advantages for the business or industry, while cheating consumers with higher prices and/or inferior products or services — a practice best described as crony capitalism but which for anti-market purposes is usually called capitalism.

Do not consent to any state institution that attempts to dictate how we should live, what we can or cannot consume, read, watch, say, or listen to.

Do not consent to any government that does not secure your property rights, including your right to life.

Voting in the state’s elections continues the racket.  And it will continue.  Your vote would consent to it.   Don’t do it.   Would you vote for new leaders in the Mafia or Ku Klux Klan while believing that doing so will encourage those organizations to play nice?

Don’t let the enemies of freedom get away with equating the state with government.  Government can and should exist without the state.

In this book I’m speaking to adults who wish to take full responsibility for their lives, regardless of their age, medical condition, race, sex, or anything else, who are fighters not wimps, who want to lay the foundation for a better life not just for themselves but for their families and the generations to come, who want to end the acrimonious fighting over the levers of power that would force the winner’s agenda on the rest of us.  If you are in agreement then express your conviction with a thumbs-up to the movie Do Not Consent, coming in late July, on my YouTube channel, GFS543.

In the meantime, I hope this book will convey the message the movie will dramatize.

Be seeing you

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | 1 Comment »

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »