Bill Bonner, "Mixed Messages"

"Mixed Messages"

by Bill Bonner

Crossing the Atlantic on the Queen Mary II - "Day two of our trip passed without incident. The ship is full, so the restaurants and bars also tend to be full. Meals are eaten communally. That is, we sit at big tables and are obliged to talk to other travelers. We are not normally very sociable. But we almost always like people when we get to know them. So far, we have met a librarian from England, a history teacher from Portland, Oregon, and a couple from Seattle. All of them were polite and well spoken. (We avoided touchy subjects - politics… religion… sex… and the decline of the late, degenerate empire.) Meanwhile…

We seem to have been inadvertently added to a very special chat group. President Trump convened a pow wow to talk about his plan for a new currency. On the call was Fed chief Jerome Powell, Treasury head Scott Bessent, J.D. Vance, Elon Musk and a lesser cast that we don’t remember. For an unknown reason, perhaps it was a mistake, we were included. It is not every day that we get invited to join a secret White House policy meeting. Naturally we were thrilled to find out what the honchos were planning. We pass along the conversation to you…from memory.

Scott Bessent: Mr. President, we’ve got a couple of problems. Even with the great work that Elon is doing, federal spending is still higher this year than it was in Biden’s last year. We’ll end up with another $1 trillion deficit — at least. And we have the CBO (Congressional Budget Office) forecasting a lower GDP. We know that our policies will create a Golden Age, as you say. But it won’t happen overnight. And we have some important elections (mid-terms) coming up before voters see the gilt. 

Donald Trump: Don’t worry. The tariffs will take care of it. Beautiful word, ‘tariffs.’ The Fed is going to cut rates. And what with the tax cuts, and lower price of oil, we’re going to see growth

like we’ve never seen before. 

Jerome Powell: Mr. President, this may not be the best time to cut rates. We’re looking at elevated volatility and stubbornly persistent inflation. I think we should hold rates steady for a while. Besides, if we cut rates now it’s likely to signal that we’re not serious about fighting inflation.

Donald Trump: Look, don’t worry about inflation. It’s going to go down tomorrow. Liberation Day. And we’re switching out of the dollar soon anyway. Nobody will care what the inflation rate is, because the dollar will be history.

Jerome Powell: What?

Donald Trump: Didn’t anyone tell you? We’re going to introduce a new electronic currency. It will be called the Trump. And we’ll convert all of that federal debt…what is it, up to $20 trillion now?…to Trump notes. We’ll pay off every penny in Trump notes. No more debt. Then, we’ll have a solid currency that everyone will trust. When we need more money we’ll just print up some more Trump Notes. No more borrowing. No more debt. And if the Fed doesn’t go along…I’ll rain down Hell on it.

Jerome Powell: Excuse me?

Donald Trump: You heard me. Houthis, Hamas, Iran — I’m going to bomb the crap out of them all. And I’m going to have some bombs left over…for the Fed, Canada, campus protesters, law firms that resist me…Rachel Maddow…Thomas Massie…I’m going to get that son-of-a-b!&@#…Hell is going to break loose on all of them…and any of these countries that try to get around our tariffs…or try to get together to fight back. I’ll bomb them too.

Elon Musk: Maybe we should back off some of this bombing talk. People are getting restless. And aggressive. They don’t like your policies so they attack my cars. 

Donald Trump: We’ll get even with them. They’re terrorists. We’ll round them up and deport them.

Elon Musk: But they’re US citizens. You can’t deport them. Where would you send them?

Donald Trump: I’ve got a deal with Budele…Dubele…whatever his name is in El Salvador. We pay them $10,000 for each one and send them them as many prisoners as we want. And once you declare them terrorists, you don’t have to deal with liberal courts and the judges Obama appointed. Judges…Democrats…reporters…Canadians - they’re all terrorists. We’ll deport them all.

Elon Musk: But it’s happening all over the world. Those damned Chinese are selling more cars than we are. And we can’t deport Europeans from Europe…or deport people for not buying our cars.

Donald Trump: No, but we can bomb the hell out of them.

Scott Bessent: Bomb Europe?

Donald Trump: Why not? They’ve been ripping us off for decades. They should have spent a lot more on their own defense. And they’ll be sorry they didn’t. It’s time we got even with them. Bomb them all. But we won’t have to. I’ll talk to them. We’ll make a deal. And if they don’t go along, we sanction them, tariff them, and bomb them. And maybe I’ll decide not to bomb them…or not to tariff them.

J.D. Vance: With all due respect, Mr. President, the strategic importance of this opportunity can’t be overstated. This is our opportunity to bomb the Hell out of Europe - the snobby, snooty leftist parasites. And we should nuke Greenland. Those bastards gave me a very ‘cool’ reception last week…ha ha. 

A young, unidentified female voice: Yeah, and if it weren’t for us, they’d be speaking German.

Jerome Powell: Well, actually, many Europeans do speak German.

The meeting continued. But we had to drop out. We had a dance lesson."

- https://www.bonnerprivateresearch.com

Dan, I Allegedly, "Why the Economy Feels Worse Than Ever"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly, AM 4/1/25

"Why the Economy Feels Worse Than Ever"

"Why does the economy feel worse than ever? In today’s video, I’m sharing my thoughts on the current state of things, from mounting consumer debt and business closures to how AI investments and shifting economic trends are shaping our lives. Big names like Newsmax are making waves, while other businesses struggle to survive. Plus, we’ll dive into surprising stories about the housing market, car purchases, and how tariffs are affecting spending habits (or not). It’s clear—people are stretched thin, and things are changing fast.

I’ll also cover why cutting back and saving right now might be the smartest move you can make. Whether it’s understanding what’s happening with companies like Rocket Mortgage, the fate of Foot Locker, or the latest on precious metals like gold, there’s a lot to unpack. We’re in wild times, and I want to help you navigate it all."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Gregory Mannarino, "Expect More And Vastly Accelerated Debt Expansion With Massive Currency Devaluation"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 4/1/25

"Expect More And Vastly Accelerated Debt Expansion

 With Massive Currency Devaluation"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

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Gregory Mannarino, PM 4/1/25

"US Production, Manufacturing, Sales, 

Economic Activity In Rapid Decline"

-  https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

Snyder Reports, 4/1/25

"Economic Trouble Is Coming, Millions Won’t Make It"

Comments here:

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Adventures With Danno, "Finding Great Deals At Meijer!"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures With Danno, 4/1/25

"Finding Great Deals At Meijer!"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"The Iranians Load Missiles 'Onto Launchers In All Underground Missile Cities' After Trump Threatens Them With 'Bombing The Likes Of Which They Have Never Seen Before'”

"The Iranians Load Missiles 'Onto Launchers In All 

Underground Missile Cities' After Trump Threatens Them With

 'Bombing The Likes Of Which They Have Never Seen Before'”

by Michael Snyder

"The Trump administration is assembling an armada of bombers at a military base on the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, and meanwhile the Iranians have loaded their missile launchers and are prepared to instantly respond to any attack. In other words, we have never been closer to an apocalyptic war in the Middle East than we are right now. I really do not understand why more people are not talking about this, because I am convinced that this could become one of the biggest stories of 2025. Once Iranian ballistic missiles start falling in Israeli cities and on U.S. bases throughout the Middle East, there will be no turning back. Unfortunately, it appears that peace is not likely at this point.

On Sunday, the Tehran Times warned the western world that Iran’s ballistic missiles are “loaded onto launchers in all underground missile cities and are ready for launch”…"The state-controlled Tehran Times reported on X Sunday that Iran’s missiles are “loaded onto launchers in all underground missile cities and are ready for launch.” The newspaper issued a stern warning, stating that any escalation would come “at a heavy cost for the US government and its allies.” The Chiefs of Staff of the Iranian Armed Force also issued a statement warning that any act of aggression against Iran will be met with a “severe response.”

So why have the Iranians made such an alarming move? Needless to say, it is because they know that they could soon be bombed into oblivion. I believe that President Trump is not bluffing. In an interview with Kristen Welker of NBC News, he explained that if Iran does not make a deal there “will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before”… “If they don’t make a deal there will be bombing. It will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before,” Trump told NBC News’ Kristen Welker during a phone interview.

I have no doubt that Trump is serious. And to back up his threat, he has assembled “an air armada of B-2 and B-52 bombers” at a base on the island of Diego Garcia…"In the meantime, the U.S. is building an air armada of B-2 and B-52 bombers in the Indian Ocean at the Joint U.S.-U.K. Base of Diego Garcia. CBN News military analyst Chuck Holton explained, “Keep in mind the B-2 bomber was essentially built specifically to bomb the nuclear facilities in Iran. They have the capability of lifting what they call a massive ordnance penetrator; the largest bunker-buster bomb the United States possesses.”

If B-2 and B-52 bombers start bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities that are deep underground, we will officially be at war with Iran. And that war could commence at lot sooner than most people think. The letter that President Trump sent to the Iranians gave them a two month deadline, and a good bit of time has already passed since they received that letter…"It’s been several weeks since US President Donald Trump sent a letter to Iran giving it two months to arrive at a nuclear deal or it would likely face military force. No one knows exactly how Trump will calculate the deadline: two months from when the letter was sent, two months from when the Islamic Republic received the letter, two months from when it responded, or two months from when talks may start."

But after Trump’s deadline, European countries Germany, France, and the UK (the E-3) set June as a deadline for Tehran to reach a nuclear deal lest it face global sanctions being snapped back on it according to a provision of the 2015 nuclear deal it signed with the West.

The Iranians have clearly stated that there will be no negotiations, and the clock is ticking. One very important point that I want to make is that if we do go to war with Iran, it will probably kill any potential peace deal with the Russians.

Meanwhile, Trump is insisting that his administration will “go as far as we have to go” to take control of Greenland…"President Donald Trump said the U.S. will “go as far as we have to go” to get control of Greenland, ahead of a planned visit to the Arctic island by Vice President JD Vance that has prompted criticism from Greenland and Denmark.

Vance, second lady Usha Vance and Energy Secretary Chris Wright will lead the U.S. delegation to visit the Pituffik military space base in the northwest of the island, having scaled back plans for a broader and longer visit. The American group was originally planning to visit the Greenlandic capital, Nuuk, and a dog sled race."

Honestly, I do not understand his reasoning. We already have a military base in Greenland. Why do we need the entire country? According to Trump, “we can’t have great international security” unless we control it, and he is also claiming that “the world needs us to have Greenland”…“We need Greenland. And the world needs us to have Greenland, including Denmark. Denmark has to have us have Greenland. And, you know, we’ll see what happens. But if we don’t have Greenland, we can’t have great international security.”

If this is going to happen, it isn’t going to happen peacefully, because the new prime minister of Greenland is being quite defiant…"Greenland’s new prime minister has issued a strong message to Donald Trump following the US president’s claims over the island. In a defiant message, Jens-Frederik Nielsen said: “We must listen when others talk about us. But we must not be shaken. President Trump says the United States is ‘getting Greenland.’

“Let me make this clear: The U.S. is not getting that. We don’t belong to anyone else. We decide our own future. We must not act out of fear. We must respond with peace, dignity and unity. And it is through these values that we must clearly, clearly and calmly show the American president that Greenland is ours. It was like that yesterday. That’s how it is today. And that’s how it will be in the future.”

So how is this going to play out? Does Trump actually intend to use the U.S. military to invade Greenland? Surely he can’t be seriously considering that, because such a move would turn the entire world against us.

In addition, a military invasion of Greenland would probably kill any potential peace deal with the Russians. If you have read my books, you already understand why a peace deal with the Russians is vitally important. This is our one and only opportunity to avoid the kinetic phase of World War III, and we must not blow it."

- https://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

Musical Interlude: Ludovico Einaudi, "Divenire"

Full screen recommended.

Ludovico Einaudi, "Divenire"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“This colorful skyscape features the dusty, reddish glow of Sharpless catalog emission region Sh2-155, the Cave Nebula. About 2,400 light-years away, the scene lies along the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy toward the royal northern constellation of Cepheus.

Astronomical explorations of the region reveal that it has formed at the boundary of the massive Cepheus B molecular cloud and the hot, young, blue stars of the Cepheus OB 3 association. The bright rim of ionized hydrogen gas is energized by the radiation from the hot stars, dominated by the bright blue O-type star above picture center. Radiation driven ionization fronts are likely triggering collapsing cores and new star formation within. Appropriately sized for a stellar nursery, the cosmic cave is over 10 light-years across.”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

Chet Raymo, “Asperges Me, Domine”

“Asperges Me, Domine” *

by Chet Raymo

“Greystone Books publishes a series of "Literary Companions" to natural environments - mountains, rivers and lakes, deserts, gardens, and the sea, so far. Now they come to my environment - night - and have been kind enough to include a chapter from “The Soul of the Night”, the chapter called "The Shape of Night." I am in lovely company, admired companions of several generations - Diane Ackerman, Timothy Ferris, Annie Dillard, Henry Beston, Loren Eiseley, Louise Erdrich, Pico Iyer, and Gretel Ehrlich, to name but a few - all connoisseurs of darkness.

Our earliest mammalian ancestors were presumably nocturnal- to escape the predations of dinosaurs - but for most of human history we have been afraid of the dark, huddling in caves around stuttering fires, curled together in darkness like mice in a burrow. Night belonged to animals with big, dark-adapted eyes and sharp teeth, to footpads and graverobbers, to werewolves and vampires. Ironically, it was with the coming of electric illumination that it became reasonably safe to go out and about at night, even as the illumination erased the best reason to do so.

William Blake called day Earth's "blue mundane shell... a hard coating of matter that separates us from Eternity." At night we peer into infinity, awash in a myriad of stars. We creep to the door of the cave and look up into the Milky Way and catch a glimpse of divinity - everlasting, all-embracing, utterly unknowable. Night - that cone of shadow, that wizard's cap of spells and omens- is the chink in Earth's shell through which we court Ultimate Mystery the way Pyramus courted Thisbe.

Which is why, I suppose, that whenever I think of "the porch" of people who visit here, I imagine Carolina rockers on a southern summer verandah, far from city lights, Vega, Deneb and Altair swimming in the Milky Way, fireflies flickering on the lawn. At some point the conversation ceases and we simply sit, rock, and listen to the sounds of the night - the whippoorwill, the bullfrog, the cricket and the owl- and let starlight fall upon our heads like a sprinkling of holy water.”

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

•

* “Wash me, Lord. Sprinkle me with hyssop and I shall be clean.”

- The Catholic Mass

"The Only Time..."

“Go without a coat when it’s cold; find out what cold is. Go hungry; keep your existence lean. Wear away the fat, get down to the lean tissue and see what it’s all about. The only time you define your character is when you go without. In times of hardship, you find out what you’re made of and what you’re capable of. If you’re never tested, you’ll never define your character.”

- Henry Rollins

"Delusions And Truth..."

How America loves to view itself in the world...

How most of the rest of the world sees us...

Any questions?

"Economy Snapshots 3/31/25"

Jeremiah Babe, 3/31/25

"All Hell Is About To Break Loose; Gold Smells Big Trouble; 

Financial System Is A House Of Cards"

Comments here:

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Michael Bordenaro, 3/31/25

"Nobody Is Buying Anything, Here's Why"

According to the most recent core inflation report, inflation continues to rise. At the same time, consumer spending is falling flat when factoring inflation in, which means our economy has essentially stopped growing and people are done spending money."

Comments here:

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o

Full screen recommended.

Steven Van Metre, 3/31/25

"Credit Markets Are Crashing - You've Been Warned!"

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o

Full screen recommended.

Canadian Prepper, 3/31/25

"Warning! Silver Is About To Explode!"

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The Daily "Near You?"

Kingston, Saint Andrew, Jamaica. Thanks for stopping by!

"If You Look..."

"We have got some very big problems confronting us and let us not make any mistake about it, human history in the future is fraught with tragedy. It's only through people making a stand against that tragedy and being doggedly optimistic that we are going to win through. If you look at the plight of the human race it could well tip you into despair, so you have to be very strong."

- Robert James Brown

"Empathy Triggers"

"Empathy Triggers"

by John Robb

“We are drowning in information, while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely.”

- E.O. Wilson

"Empathy triggers are used to mobilize network swarms, which is, as we have seen with the response to the invasion of Ukraine, a key element of network warfare. Let’s figure out how they work. What does an “empathy trigger” look like?

Here’s a widely shared picture from 2022 that shows a pregnant Ukrainian woman on a stretcher in front of a building shattered by a Russian bombardment (both she and her baby died).

Pictures with descriptions like this are something we have seen in traditional media (TV, newspapers, magazines, etc.) for a century, and although they have an impact on us, that impact is muted. It feels slightly removed due to the nature of the medium.

However, everything changes when that picture and description of a victim are in a social media post. Due to the nature of the medium, instead of simply evoking sympathy or sadness, it can often trigger a strong empathic reaction. For example:

Empathy triggers like these, distributed to tens of millions of people online, can mobilize millions into action for protest or war. An excellent example of this is the smartphone video of George Floyd:

Social networking has rewired us. “Empathy triggers” work so well because social networking and smartphones have fundamentally changed how our brains process news. It has rewired us. Here’s how:

Scan. We can’t read all the news we receive, there’s too much of it, and it would be impossible to make sense of it all even if we did. Instead of reading it, we scan it, looking for novelty and patterns.

Social cue. We don’t simply read the news and form opinions in isolation anymore. Online, the news is packaged as a social cue that lets us figure out what other people are thinking.

Addiction. The news isn’t just a one-way flow of information anymore. Online, it’s interactive, with social feedback loops and induced hormone release (cortisol in fear of getting it wrong and dopamine for getting it right) that make it addictive.

Addictively scanning our news feed for social cues doesn’t just make us more vulnerable to empathy triggers; it encourages us to seek them out.

Another contributing factor is that empathy isn’t simply sympathy; it’s a powerful pre-verbal form of communication. A form of communication that humanity has only recently learned to mitigate with reason in large group settings. Here’s how empathic communication works: "Empathic communication is an involuntary process if you are not actively resisting it. As a result, this form of communication is usually limited to children (it’s critical for socialization) and for intimate groups (family).

In empathic communication, we build an internal model of the other person's feelings based on cues (face, body, screams, etc.). We feel what the victim feels: their fear, anger, and pain. Our faces grimace in pain like the victim, and we can feel the knee on our necks (George Floyd). We connect at a deep level. When we empathize with victims, they are no longer strangers; we form a fictive kinship with them. They are now part of our tribe, and they are being threatened. When we combine these elements - addictive social cue scanning and involuntary connections that produce fictive kinship - we get a powerful tool for mobilizing a networked swarm."

- WigginSessions@email.5minforecast.com

"The Long Dark"

"The Long Dark"

by Chris Floyd

"We are in the Long Dark now. Both hope and despair are the enemies of our survival. We must live in the awareness that we might not see the light come back, without ceasing to work - with empathy, anger and knowledge - for its return.

We must be here, in the moment, experiencing its fullness (whatever its horrors or joys), yet be elsewhere, removed from the madness pouring in from every side, the avalanche of degradation. We must be here, now, but also in a future we can’t see or even imagine.

We must see that we are lost, with no clear way forward, no sureties or verities to cling to, no roots to anchor us, no structures within or without that will always keep their coalescence in the chaotic, surging flow.

We must live in discrete moments of illumination and connection, pearls hung on an almost invisible string winding through the darkness. Striving, always striving, but not expecting; striving without hope, without despair, without any certainty at all as to the outcome, good or bad.

These are the conditions of the Long Dark, this is what we have to work with, this is where we find ourselves in the brief time we have in this vast, indifferent, astounding universe. As I once wrote long ago, quoting the old hymn: “Work, for the night is coming.”

So do we counsel fatalism, a dark, defeated surrender, a retreat into bitter, curdled quietude? Not a whit. We advocate action, positive action, unstinting action, doing the only thing that human beings can do, ever: Try this, try that, try something else again; discard those approaches that don't work, that wreak havoc, that breed death and cruelty; fight against everything that would draw us down again into our own mud; expect no quarter, no lasting comfort, no true security; offer no last word, no eternal truth, but just keep stumbling, falling, careening, backsliding, crawling toward the broken light.

And what is this "broken light"? Nothing more than a metaphor for the patches of understanding – awareness, attention, knowledge, connection – that break through our darkness and stupidity for a moment now and then. A light always fractured, under threat, shifting, found then lost again, always lost. For we are creatures steeped in imperfection, in breakage and mutation, tossed up – very briefly – from the boiling, chaotic crucible of Being, itself a ragged work in progress toward unknown ends, or rather, toward no particular end at all. Why should there be an "answer" in such a reality?

What matters is what works – what pulls us from our own darkness as far as possible, for as long as possible. Yet the truth remains that "what works" is always and forever only provisional – what works now, here, might not work there, then. What saves our soul today might make us sick tomorrow.

Thus all we can do is to keep looking, working, trying to clear a little more space for the light, to let it shine on our passions and our confusions, our anger and our hopes, informing and refining them, so that we can see each other better, for a moment – until death shutters all seeing forever."

- http://www.chris-floyd.com/home/

ͦ

Full screen recommended.

Leonard Cohen, "Anthem"

"No Ways Tired On A Sea of Lies"

"No Ways Tired On A Sea of Lies"

by Chris Floyd

"I think we are living in a world of lies: lies that don't even know they are lies, because they are the children and grandchildren of lies. One of the hardest things to accept is that the reality of our world is buried under so many layers of official deception and well-cultivated public ignorance about our history and our political system. Even if you break through somehow, momentarily, and hold up a fragment of the truth, most people have no context for dealing with it. It's like a bolt from the blue, they can't process the information. And so the sea of lies closes over us again, and again, and again. And yet the reality of our future appears on the horizon, denial be damned, an irresistible tsunami of destruction, changing all our lives forever.

These are the facts, and they can't be altered. But how to respond to this catastrophe? Shall we weep, moan, rend our garments, cover ourselves with sackcloth and ashes? Shall we sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of republics? Shall we cower in the shadows and sing glamorous dirges for the Lost Cause, for vanished glories and broken dreams?

Or shall we come out fighting, unbowed, heads high, laughing fools to scorn, rejecting at every turn the moral authority of murderers and thieves to rule our lives, determine our reality, act in our name? Let's dispense with lamentation - give not a single moment to that emotional indulgence - and get right back to work, more determined than ever to bear down harder, dig deeper and excavate the radioactive nuggets of truth still glowing beneath the slag-heap of ruin.

Let's fight, let's reject, let's resist - without violence, the weapon of the stupid, the hormonal secretion of evolutionary backsliders in thrall to the chemical soup in their heads, dull primitives dressing up their ape-lust for power with scraps of religion, philosophy and cant. Let's fight these pathetic, malfunctioning wretches who lay their hands on our world and rape it like beasts in a mindless rut. Fight them with the truths we find, exposing their crimes and deadly hypocrisies to the people they've suckered, perverted and betrayed.

This is not an insurmountable task, no matter how impervious the Machine - that monstrous conglomeration of judicial bagmen, Congressional rubber stamps, psychopathic media moguls, dopehead radio ranters, sex-crazed theocrats, war profiteers, think-tank bleaters, Wall Street sharks, oilmen, Moonies, and woman-haters - might appear at the moment.

I don't know what else we can do, except to keep on telling as much of the truth as we can find, to anyone who will listen: reclaiming reality, fragment by fragment, one person at a time. It's an endless task - maybe a hopeless task - but the alternative is a surrender to the worst elements in our society - and in ourselves. It's worth the fight. Let's take it on. In the words of the old spiritual, let us be in no ways tired. The road back to sanity starts now."

- http://chris-floyd.com/

"How It Really Should Be"

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete

 when everything the American public believes is false." 

- William J. Casey, former CIA Director

Adventures With Danno, "Strange Prices At Aldi"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures With Danno, 3/31/25

"Strange Prices At Aldi"

Comments here:

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o

Meanwhile, elsewhere...

Full screen recommended.

Different Russia, 3/31/25

"Russian Shops: Full Shopping Cart for $150,

 Is it Expensive for Russians?"

Comments here:

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Dan, I Allegedly, "They Want to Tax Your Sleep - Make it Stop!"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly, AM 3/31/25

"They Want to Tax Your Sleep - Make it Stop!"

"Can you believe it?! Maryland just introduced a "Sleep Tax" – targeting mattresses with an outrageous 6% state tax ON TOP of sales tax. They claim it's about recycling, but we all know it's just another desperate money grab from a state drowning in financial mismanagement. From abandoned mattresses on highways to wild stories about mattress stores allegedly being tied to organized crime, this tax has sparked some insane conversations. What's next? Taxes on toothbrushes, lamps, or maybe even pillows?"

Comments here:

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o

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly, PM 3/31/25

"They Stole Her Lottery Jackpot - Unbelievable!"

"A Texas woman won $83M in the lottery but didn’t get a dime! Here’s the shocking reason why—and it’s not what you’d expect. In today’s video, I’m breaking down her wild story, sharing my thoughts on lottery courier services like Jackpocket, and why this situation is a serious warning for all of us. I’ll also chat about real estate scams, the state of insurance in California, and how AI might take over industries faster than we think. Don’t miss this one!"

Comments here:

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"The Erosion of Trust: The Secrecy State Sucks"

"The Erosion of Trust:

 The Secrecy State Sucks"

by John Wilder

“We’re drowning in secrecy, and the lifeguard’s on their payroll.” 

– The X Files

“Hello, is this the anonymous NSA hotline?”

“Yes, John Wilder, how can we help you?”

As near as I can tell, in 1970 the U.S. government was still highly trusted. Sure, there was Vietnam, but we had landed men on the Moon and I’d suggest that, while trust wasn’t as high as it had been in the 1950s with the “super science will save us” feeling that culminated in Apollo, it was still pretty high.

I think the Nixon takedown is when the mistrust started to metastasize, though I’m open to other suggestions. Regardless, this is the time when the lid comes off. The Nixon takedown was big – the tapes showed Nixon’s complicity in a petty break-in to get information from the Democrats that was entirely unnecessary due to Nixon’s popularity. Plus it was sloppy – I think they picked the locks with Twizzlers™.

But the even bigger impact was a collapse in trust. At least one person who was there at the time, Geoff Shepard, thinks that Nixon was taken down by the security apparatus, more commonly known as the Deep State now when prosecutors colluded with judges and suppressed evidence in order to get Nixon out of office. Does that remind anyone of the Russian Collusion Hoax?

Add in revelations in the seventies about Operation Mockingbird coming in 1976, where it was alleged that the CIA, operating in the United States, had manipulated the news media (over 400 journalists) to influence the American public. Oh, and the CIA program MKUltra, a program that tested drugs and psychological torture on hundreds if not thousands of unwitting civilians. Like Ted Kaczynski. If he hadn’t been MKUltra’d, perhaps he would never have developed fascination with the US Postal System.

Nixon’s fall opened the floodgates, and 1976 was the year the dirty laundry really started showing up, skidmarks and all. Also, in 1976 the Select Committee on Assassinations came to the conclusion that JFK’s assassination was the result of a conspiracy, but couldn’t figure out who was responsible. I mean, it’s congress, right?

1976 was a year when trust began to evaporate, and that trust evaporation was really about seeing what people did behind the cloak of secrecy. Gallup™ polls showed that trust in government in that year was 36%, down from 73% in the 1950s.

Now, do I believe that secrets can and should exist? Yes, I do. I remember coaching a game of PeeWee football, and wanting to see if a particular trick play was legal, so I went into the rules, and found this gem, “Deception is the heart of football.” I had never thought of it that way, but that’s 100% correct, and the same would be the case in war, so, yeah, there are the need for some secrets.

It's clear, however, that we’re doing secrecy wrong. I’d like to think that we were on the right track to defang the security state, but it’s actually headed the wrong way. In 2001, the Patriot Act was passed into law in October, not six weeks after the 9/11 attack. The law was 342 pages, and was amazingly complex, since most of what it did was amend other existing laws, you know, turning “shall not” into “shall”.

Don’t worry, though, we’ve got a special court that was established under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Oh, the FISA court gives the government a yes 99.9% of the time – over 78,000 requests, and only TWELVE denied? Well, they said no at least once, so they’re not a rubber stamp or anything. What’s the motto of the FISA court? “Yes, Daddy.” And you don’t want me to get into what their Tinder® profile says.

In 2013, Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor, blew the whistle on the U.S. government’s mass surveillance programs. Snowden leaked classified documents to journalists at The Guardian and The Washington Post. The revelations were huge: emails, chats, browsing histories of anyone that the FBI or CIA or NSA wanted to look at. And the NSA used the “Five Eyes” sources, so if they were prohibited from snooping on a person, boom, just have the Aussies do it for us. And it’s certain they are still doing it. Secrecy has enabled these nightmares.

Speaking of still doing it, those 51 former intelligence officials that said Hunter’s laptop was Russian disinformation? It’s the Security State trying to get its preferred candidate elected. And why are Epstein’s records still not public? Saving it for a rainy day?

Although I don’t have any evidence for this statement, I am nearly certain that the Deep State is still committing horrors under the cloak of classified information, things that no politician sees. It is certain that this information is used for political blackmail and control on a regular basis. Paging Epstein, anyone?

The government still echoes the worst of Project Mockingbird, putting pressure on the social media outlets to censor information they don’t like, from COVID to anything pro-Trump. The FBI flagged over THREE THOUSAND accounts for censorship. Secrecy has gone from a tool to keep us safe to a weapon to keep us in line.

The physicist Eric Weinstein thinks that string theory (in physics) was created to stop actual, useful research in physics. Why? To distract the Russians (and now Chinese) because you can’t classify physics, and someone in .gov thinks that there are some significant physics applications they don’t want the world to see, especially related to quantum gravity.

Do we need to end secrecy entirely? Certainly not, but when the CIA still holds that lemon juice as invisible ink is a state secret, we live in Clown World. Here are my suggestions:

First, no secrets, at all, after sixty years. Okay, maybe fusion bomb design, but even the Pakistanis can figure out atomic bomb design when they can’t figure out can openers, so we’ve got one secret. Maybe set up a board that will allow one secret per year related to technology that the other side hasn’t figured out yet. But only big things. Like time travel. Or the feared anti-PEZ™ bomb that eats all the PEZ© and leaves small pictures of Rosie O’Donnell everywhere.

Second, after sixty years, absolutely no redactions in the released documents.

Third, someone needs to watch the watchers. There needs to be an oversight board, and protection for whistleblowers like Snowden that show blatantly illegal conduct. How do we prevent them from being co-opted by the Security State? That’s a hard question. Maybe have a clean AI review them?

Fourth, reform and fragment the CIA, the NSA, and most of the FBI. Certainly, take guns away from them (and the ATF, but that goes without saying). After Ruby Ridge and Waco, it’s obvious these children can’t be allowed to play with firearms unsupervised.

We need to break the glowie machine so that it can’t police itself. Transparency in government isn’t a luxury; it is survival for freedom. We need to demand Sunlight. From a CIA document (declassified): “The free society must have confidence that its oversight mechanisms have adequate access to secret material to make judgements, and that this judgmental process is being exercised independently. There has to be trust that secrecy is not being used against the best interests of the free society; that the activities which are being protected by secrecy are being conducted effectively. It is this confidence and this trust in the oversight mechanisms which has broken down.”

This was made public in 1996, when things were certainly better than they are today.Me? I think that if we can build trust with Sunlight, maybe well get back to some of that super-science optimism of the 1950s. On to Mars, maybe using quantum gravity propulsion..."                                                                -  https://wilderwealthywise.com/

Jim Kunstler, "Convergence Calling"

"Convergence Calling"

by Jim Kunstler

“The current conflict between Europe and America is not reducible 

towards contrasting approaches towards Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.” 

- Frank Furedi on Substack

“Contrary to Western media's trash talk, Russian military has 

not been degraded. If anything, it has been significantly upgraded.” 

- Alex Krainer

"You’re going to see what a truly consequential span of weeks, looks like, as Western Civ goes into full churn on April’s doorstep. Remember, TS Eliot called it the “cruelest month.” Too many uncomfortable things are converging, too many ongoing operations are unwinding, too many tensions are breaking.

The conclusion of “Joe Biden’s” Ukraine War fiasco looms. You can tell because The New York Times published a gigantic piece Sunday detailing how the Pentagon and the CIA actually ran all of Ukraine’s tactical operations out of a base in Wiesbaden, Germany - after building a colossal Ukraine war machine post our 2014 color revolution in Kiev. Since the very start of the hot war in 2022, we did all the targeting for the weapons we gave them and planned their every move. What a surprise! (Not.)

The motive behind all that, as conceived by US neo-cons and NATO neo-morons, was to “weaken” Russia, bust it up, and seize its resources. All the sanctions piled on only induced Russia into an import-replacement campaign that actually strengthened its economy, while the war led to a revolution in Russian war-fighting tactics and advanced weaponry. Now, the whole thing is ending in Ukraine’s defeat and the West’s humiliation.

The Times could have published this in 2023-24, but it would have been a major embarrassment for “Joe Biden” and his shadow managers moving into the election. They put it out just now because the jig is up and the paper desperately needs to pretend that it’s ahead of events to preserve the last shreds of its credibility.

Mr. Trump, the uber-realist, knows that the Russians are going to roll up in Ukraine this spring and there is increasingly not much that can be done about that, except to try to put the best face on it - which is, that it wasn’t his war. As long as the coke freak Zelensky remains in charge, Ukraine will be negotiation-unworthy, as the Russian phrase goes. So, US-Russia peace talks were largely diplomatic showbiz. Both Putin and Mr. Trump were painfully aware of this, and hence, Mr. Trump’s latest performative bluster about “more sanctions” will probably not amount to anything.

And also hence, the synchronized idiocy on display in France, Germany, and the UK. They were all-in on the neo-con scheme that is now falling apart and its failure has driven them plumb crazy. As the US drops out of the stupid proxy war, they declare their intention to take it from here and go beat-up Russia. Their war-drums are teaspoons beating on so many quiches.

Soon-to-be chancellor Friedrich Merz proposes an 800-billion-Euro debt spree to finance the re-arming of Germany, which, just now, is utterly incapable of war. He is insane. German industry is collapsing from a lack of affordable natural gas (as arranged by “Joe Biden” blowing up the Nord Stream pipelines, danke schön). Turning Volkswagen factories to missile production will not help the German people one bit. It probably will remind them about the Weimar hyper-inflation, though.

Macron pledges to put French boots on the ground in Ukraine. Ain’t gonna happen. Today, his stooge judiciary found political rival Marine LePen guilty of a Mickey Mouse offense in order to bar her from running against him in the next election. Ain’t gonna work. He will provoke the biggest national uprising since the Bastille. His government will be too busy putting down French Revolution 2.0 to play war games in history’s graveyard of armies. Maybe he’ll try nukes. I’m sure that’ll work - if you’re eager to see Russian hypersonic “hazelnuts” rain down on the Île-de-France.

And then, there is the amazing idiot PM Keir Starmer in the UK, calling on his “coalition of the willing” to step up and intervene in the lost cause that is Ukraine. How many hands went up on that call? For practical purposes, the Brits have no war-fighting capacity whatsoever, and no resources for generating such capacity. And, anyway, they are facing some dreadful combo of a civil war / internal jihad against their own indigenous population, plus an economic collapse cherry-on-top.

In short, Europe has so many incipient existential problems that the whole story is about to shift its focus from the already-sealed fate of Ukraine to the very dark prospects for the core nations of Old-World Western Civ. I wouldn’t plan a vacation there this year.

Meanwhile, expect a pile-up of consequence in our own sore-beset USA in the upcoming cruelest month. Today, the DOGE team visits the CIA. It could spell an end to decades of mad frolics emanating from that gigantic black box of black ops. Director John Ratcliffe has cordially invited Mr. Musk’s technicians and he is probably eager to discover exactly what mischief has been hidden from him by the immense, secretive, foul bureaucracy he lately assumed command over.

The Epstein materials recently recovered out of the FBI’s rogue New York offices of the agency are considered so critical by Director Patel that he assigned 1000 agents to review and process the docs full-time. That includes redacting names of many additional sex-trafficked children. Expect to see the release of a lot of that in the next thirty days with dire reverberations in the celebrity realms of politics, finance, and showbiz.

JudgeGate is moving toward its climax at the same time. Tuesday this week, Rep. Jim Jordan’s House Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on the DC circuit’s lawfare offensive against Mr. Trumps executive authority. It would be nice hearing from DC district judges James Boasberg, Amy Berman Jackson, Tanya Chutkan, Beryl Howell, and Amir Ali, who have been zealously active in what looks like a coordinated lawfare campaign against the chief executive. Norm Eisen is not a judge, but he is the central conductor of the lawfare orchestra, and he has a bit of ‘splainin’ to do. One can even imagine something like a RICO referral emerge from that rather brazen operation. Anyway, the whole matter is going to land in the Supreme Court before April is out.

Also expect a lot of movement in the Covid-19 story coming out of the newly-reorganized CDC, NIH, FDA, NIAID, and other corners of the public health bureaucracy. Evidence is piling up fast of tragic and awful blowback from the Covid vaccine. There is too much to be ignored any longer and momentous decisions must follow, starting with taking the Pfizer and Moderna shots off-line. The entire regime of data collection, processing, and public release is about to change and the nation will be shocked by what gets disclosed.

Then there are the financial markets. They do not like the kind of shifts in public perception that return of consequence must bring. Gold alone is sending out a very vivid distress signal for everything else pretending to be an asset or a form of collateral. The equity markets have been wobbling for weeks. Look out below as the Easter eggs roll."

- https://www.kunstler.com/

Bill Bonner, "Sea Of Red"

"Sea Of Red"

by Bill Bonner

"Most Holy Spirit, who didst brood

upon the chaos dark and rude,

and bid its angry tumult cease,

and give, for wild confusion, peace:

O hear us when we cry to thee

for those in peril on the sea."

- Traditional Hymm

Somewhere in the North Atlantic -  "Bon Voyage! A man in a wheelchair, pushed by his gray-haired wife, rolled into the dining hall. Already, there were hundreds of people, similarly aged, having dinner. The staff - almost all from the Philippines, rushed from one table to another. We’re on our way back to the Old Country… back to Ireland, that is. And we’re headed back the old way… on the sea instead of in the air. The Queen Mary was leaving New York at a convenient time, so we signed on. Here’s the view as we cast off… looking out from the Brooklyn Maritime Terminal.

You arrive at the terminal. Luggage handlers quickly take your bags while you join a long line of people waiting to go through security and check-in. This is not a luxury experience. Maybe it would be different if we had signed up for one of the upper-deck suites. But they were sold out…so we waited in line.

Once aboard, the atmosphere is not exactly high-tone either. The décor is vaguely art deco…but a little garish, like Las Vegas, with vivid colors and Trump-style, oversized columns and staircases. The cabins (at $2,200) are small, but comfortable. The price seems too low…for an 8-day cruise. But you soon realize that there are many ways to spend money aboard.

The main restaurant is a huge eatery…where you are seated at large tables with other sojourners. Some people like the communal approach. They make friends and enjoy the company, organizing themselves for drinks or card games later. Your editor, however, makes a poor dinner companion. Others are rarely interested in the decline of the late, degenerate empire. (Neither is he, but it is his only subject of conversation.) We will be on the ship for eight days on our way to Southampton, UK. Stay tuned…

Meanwhile…When your boat is sinking, you either bail it out…or buoy it up. Cut spending…or increase income. When you have too much debt, those are the only two choices available. Neither of them appeals to Republicans. Or Democrats. Spending more than they can afford has become a habit. And not one they want to give up. It buys them votes. And campaign contributions. And sinecures. But doom approaches as they neither bail nor buoy. Spending goes up, while Donald Trump cuts taxes. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: "Tax Cut Extensions Would Add $37 Trillion to Debt by 2054."

In a recent letter, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that extending and reviving various provisions from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) would boost debt in Fiscal Year (FY) 2054 from 166 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) under CBO’s March 2024 baseline to 214 percent of GDP, on a dynamic basis.

Based on these estimates, we find that extending the TCJA would add over $37 trillion to the debt over the next 30 years, including $4.5 trillion over the next ten years and $15.0 trillion over the next 20 years. In real 2031 dollars – adjusted for inflation to be roughly comparable to the ten-year score – we estimate the extensions would add $23.5 trillion to the deficit over the next three decades, the equivalent of 2.4 percent of GDP.

How can this make sense? The politicians must have prescription-quality rose-colored glasses to protect tender eyes from the glaring danger. They say the tax cuts, along with lower oil prices from their ‘Drill baby Drill’ energy policy, will lift growth rates enough to compensate. Yes, a Golden Age will soon be upon us.

Or maybe not. As to the growth, Washington’s own ‘Congressional Budget Office’ has its doubts. Associated Press: "Weak population gains and increased government spending will result in slower overall economic growth over the next 30 years, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Thursday. The CBO’s latest long-term budget and economic outlook report - for a timeframe that spans 2025 to 2055 - projects publicly held debt to reach 156% of gross domestic product, or GDP, in 2055. That’s down from the agency’s March 2024 long-term budget projection, which said publicly held debt would be equal to a record 166% of American economic activity by 2054."

The mix of slower population growth and unfettered spending will also result in weaker economic growth over the next three decades than what the CBO projected last year. Lower birthrates also mean that the United States is becoming more dependent on immigrants working to sustain growth. Let’s see…lower tax collections…lower growth…more debt. What to make of it? We won’t mention it to anyone here on the ship. But it sounds like we will all soon be ‘in peril on the sea.’"

- https://www.bonnerprivateresearch.com/

"Eternal Father," 

The Navy Hymn For Sailors And Marines

"Economic Market Snapshot 3/31/25"

"Economic Market Snapshot 3/31/25"

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Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...

Only the consequences are real - to you!

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"It's a Big Club, and you ain't in it. 

You and I are not in the Big Club."

- George Carlin

o

Market Data Center, Live Updates:

- https://www.marketwatch.com/market-data 

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- https://www.asktraders.com/analysis/

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Comprehensive, essential truth.

- http://www.shadowstats.com/

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Financial Stress Index

"The OFR Financial Stress Index (OFR FSI) is a daily market-based snapshot of stress in global financial markets. It is constructed from 33 financial market variables, such as yield spreads, valuation measures, and interest rates. The OFR FSI is positive when stress levels are above average, and negative when stress levels are below average. The OFR FSI incorporates five categories of indicators: credit, equity valuation, funding, safe assets and volatility. The FSI shows stress contributions by three regions: United States, other advanced economies, and emerging markets."

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- https://www.dailyjobcuts.com/

Job cuts and much more.

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- https://www.zerohedge.com/

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- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

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- https://wallstreetonparade.com/

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- https://www.whatreallyhappened.com/

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- https://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/

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Commentary, highly recommended:

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

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"The more I see of the monied classes,

the better I understand the guillotine."

- George Bernard Shaw

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Oh yeah... beyond words. Any I know anyway...

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And now... The End Game...

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