Wednesday, April 6, 2022

“Get Up Off Your Knees!”

“Get Up Off Your Knees!”
On your knees you may live to see another day, 
but you’ll never live to see better days.
by Robert Gore 

“Zoos are among the saddest places on earth: magnificent but confined creatures on display for gawking crowds, prevented from living out their biological destinies, fed their daily rations, and domesticated beyond where they could ever return to the wild. You have to feel pity and sorrow for these innocent prisoners; they’d flee in a heartbeat if they could.

Humans have made themselves inmates – whether of a zoo, prison, or asylum is hard to say, likely a combination of all three. Animals earn our admiration because they resist losing their freedom. Humans occasionally do too, but usually surrender theirs for promises and trifles. The promises are broken and the trifles grow more trifling as humanity for the most part gives up. Keep people amused and make sure the rations don’t stop and no outrage rousts them to try to reclaim their birthright. When they visit the zoo, the animals stare back at them with contempt.

In this country, we sing, “Sweet land of liberty,” and, “The land of the free, and the home of the brave.” We incant “freedom” and “liberty” during election seasons, but anything beyond that is considered embarrassing, bad form. A legislator denouncing a proposed law as an infringement of freedom would be regarded as a lunatic. Millions of pages of federal, state, and local laws and regulations already infringe freedom. The denouncer might be irrefutably right, but his denunciation would be irrelevant.

While wildlife should be free in the wild, coping with the risks to the best of their capabilities, humans are supposedly unsuited for freedom. Free humans might develop their own talents and capabilities, produce, exchange, exercise their rights, and engage in voluntary association and social intercourse, all unsupervised. You can argue that such activities are generally beneficial. However, there is a special class who are permitted to supervise and coerce the rest of us, to curtail our freedom. This special class ensures fairness or equality or some such thing. Who knows what might happen without them. Think of the dangers!

Just consider the concept of people deciding what’s in their own best interest. A hyphenated word lurks: self-interest. The special people are motivated by everything but self-interest, or so they say. Indeed, nobility of motive justifies their power and the destruction of your liberty. The desire to better your life is selfish, unlike the impulses supposedly animating those holding the guns to your head. After widespread surrender, few champion their right to their own lives, which is selfish after all, or challenge the special people’s moral superiority, which confers their right to hold the guns.

It might mitigate moral condemnation for liberty’s surrender if it had produced some benefit for those waving the white flag. An old bromide has it that liberty is irrelevant when people are starving. Nothing is further from the truth; it’s freedom that feeds people, creates wealth, and advances humanity. The historical record offers ample proof. It’s the absence of liberty that produces starvation, poverty, decay, destruction, genocide, and war. Here too the historical record is clear, one need go no farther back than the last century. During this ascendancy of the special people, humanity fought its two deadliest wars and over a hundred million were murdered, victims of special plans for a better world.

But somehow it’s liberty that’s dangerous. Fortunately the special people still rule, to make sure it doesn’t break out somewhere. Their reign assures that this century will challenge the last for the title: Century of Slaughter. They see their subjects are domesticated draft animals, just smart enough to keep economies running, not smart enough to challenge domestication. However, it’s been free minds and free markets, not draft animals, that have produced the wonders that make modern life modern. Welfare states are halfway houses to totalitarianism. As they grow, liberty shrinks and progress slows, stops, and reverses, the deterioration culminating in either anarchy or tyranny.

Judging from the prevalence of terms like “secular stagnation” and the “end of growth,” we are in the stop phase and reversal is nigh. People have seen their freedom shrink and have borne the consequences, although most don’t make the connection between the two. Incomes have stagnated, opportunities have diminished, life grows ever coarser, and fear of a looming apocalypse pervades the popular consciousness. Many are preparing for a future in which modernity is no longer modern, where access to necessities and conveniences cannot be taken for granted. Guns and gold are at the top of checklists, for a day when the inevitable failure of the special people leads to the inevitable tyranny or anarchy.

The discontent sweeping the planet is recognition that things are wrong on multiple fronts, although recognition of the root cause is rare. The idea that changing the hands on the levers offers solutions is magical thinking. The problems stem from granting the special people the levers in the first place. They may be replaced, but once the replacements have their hands on the levers, they’ll feel special, too. Power assuredly corrupts.

We’re closer to the real solution in the lament: “Why can’t they just leave us alone?” They – the special people – must leave us alone, it’s our moral right. Those who think the collapse will never come, or that freedom can be reclaimed without a fight, delude themselves. The craven adage: It’s better to live on one’s knees than die on one’s feet, offers a false choice. On your knees you may live to see another day, but you’ll never live to see better days. You may die on your feet, but liberty offers the only hope for better days. It’s worth fighting for. It’s worth dying for.”

We are many, they are few...

"Do You Believe..."

“Do you believe,’ said Candide, ‘that men have always massacred each other as they do today, that they have always been liars, cheats, traitors, ingrates, brigands, idiots, thieves, scoundrels, gluttons, drunkards, misers, envious, ambitious, bloody-minded, calumniators, debauchees, fanatics, hypocrites, and fools?”
“Do you believe,” said Martin, “that hawks have always eaten pigeons when they have found them?”
- Voltaire

"Ex Obscurum"

Full screen recommended.
"Ex Obscurum"
by Spadecaller

"From emotional turmoil, hatred, and addiction the miracle of recovery begins in this Spadecaller Video entitled "Ex Obscurum" ("From Darkness"). Featuring original poetry narrated by the author and visual artist, Matthew Schwartz. Composer Samuel Barber's powerful musical score, adapted for the movie "Platoon", (Adagio for Strings, Op. 11) sets the background for this spiritual exodus "From Darkness."

"Streets of Philadelphia: On a Cloudy Day, April 6, 2022"

Full screen recommended.
"Streets of Philadelphia: On a Cloudy Day, April 6, 2022"

"The Notion Of Democracy..."

The Bosses of the Senate
"Democracy has become a weapon of moneyed interests. It uses the media to create the illusion that there is consent from the governed. The notion of democracy is often no different than living under a plutocracy or a government by wealthy elites.”
- Oswald Spengler, "The Decline of the West"
Hat tip to Jesse's Cafe Americain,

The Daily "Near You?"

Clarkson, Kentucky, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"Nothing Happens..."

"Nothing happens to anyone that he is not fitted by nature to bear."
- Marcus Aurelius

The Poet: Mary Oliver, “Evidence”

“Evidence”

“Where do I live?
 
If I had no address, as many people do not,
 
I could nevertheless say that I lived in the 
same town as the lilies of the field,
 
and the still waters.


Spring, and all through the neighborhood 
now there are
 strong men tending flowers.
Beauty without purpose is beauty without virtue.

But all beautiful things, inherently, have this function -

to excite the viewers toward sublime thought.

Glory to the world, that good teacher.

Among the swans there is none 
called the least,
 or the greatest.
I believe in kindness. Also in mischief.
 
Also in singing, 
especially when singing is not necessarily prescribed.

As for the body, 
it is solid and strong and curious and full of detail;
 
it wants to polish itself; it wants to love another body;

it is the only vessel in the world that can hold,
 
in a mix of power and sweetness:

words, song, gesture, passion, ideas,
ingenuity, 
devotion, merriment, vanity, and virtue.
Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.”

- Mary Oliver
“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for! To quote from Whitman, ‘O me! O life! of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless - of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?’ Answer: That you are here - that life exists, and that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?”
- “Dead Poets Society”

"I Hope I End Up..."

“I don’t want to pass through life like a smooth plane ride. All you do is get to breathe and copulate and finally die. I don’t want to go with the smooth skin and the calm brow. I hope I end up a blithering idiot cursing the sun- hallucinating, screaming, giving obscene and inane lectures on street corners and public parks. People will walk by and say, “Look at that drooling idiot. What a basket case.” I will turn and say to them, “It is you who are the basket case! For every moment you hated your job, cursed your wife and sold yourself to a dream that you didn’t even conceive. For the times your soul screamed yes and you said no. For all of that. For your self-torture, I see the glowing eyes of the sun! The air talks to me! I am at all times!” And maybe, the passers by will drop a coin into my cup.”
- Henry Rollins

Bill Bonner, "Parable of Plenty"

"Parable of Plenty"
by Bill Bonner

“Them that has, gits.”

San Martin, Argentina - "And so it came to pass in the Year of Our Lord, 2008, the Fed panicked. In its hysteria, it bestowed on the rich such gifts as the world had never seen. The US stock market rose 5 times higher. Or, people with capital assets added about $84 trillion to their wealth since 2007.

Many times over the past 14 years have we bemoaned the unfairness of it. The Fed had no wealth to give. Its generosity towards those in the wealthiest zip codes had to be exercised at the expense of others – namely, those in the others. This was accomplished via what is known as the “inflation tax.” The Fed and other central banks ‘printed’ some $25 trillion in new money, which was funneled into the financial markets by buying bonds (owned mostly by the rich)… and then used to buy stocks and other financial assets (also owned mostly by the rich). The rich got richer as their assets increased in value.

Money-printing and bond-buying had other effects too. They queered the financial system, added $50 trillion to America’s trash pile of debt, accustomed the economy to below-zero (adjusted for inflation) interest rates, and caused consumer prices to rise at the fastest rate in 40 years.

But our theme today is only this: there’s always more to the story. And it’s usually the part that few want to hear. For whatever virtuous, practical and high-minded thing the Fed thought it was doing, it was actually shifting wealth from those who earned it to those with brokerage accounts. Unintended consequences? Perhaps.

More Gittin’: Meanwhile, the Covid story has disappeared from the headlines. Thank God… we were getting tired of it. Now we have a new crisis… a new bete noire – Russia. This time, ‘them that has’ – the influencers… the deciders – have put us on the side of the angels… to do battle against the devilish Russkies. But there’s more to that story too… and more gittin’ to be gotten by those who already have.

Two full years have passed since the Covid-19 first made landfall in the US. As more of the story comes out, we see that it too was largely a transfer from the poor to the rich. For instance, wasn’t it strange that some countries – even those with very low standards of public health… in Asia and Africa, for example… had very low rates of Covid? Why? About a year ago came this report from CNN: "The risk of death from Covid-19 is about 10 times higher in countries where most of the population is overweight, according to a report released Wednesday by the World Obesity Federation.

Researchers found that by the end of 2020, global Covid-19 death rates were more than 10 times higher in countries where more than half the adults are overweight, compared to countries where fewer than half are overweight. The team examined mortality data from Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and the World Health Organization (WHO) and found that of 2.5 million Covid-19 deaths reported by the end of February, 2.2 million were in countries where more than half the population is overweight.

In an analysis of data and studies from more than 160 countries, the researchers found that Covid-19 mortality rates increased along with countries' prevalence of obesity. They note that the link persisted even after adjusting for age and national wealth.

In the US, the average person consumes 3,800 calories per day. And the US suffered one of the highest death tolls from Covid in the world – nearly 3,000/million. In Bangladesh, where ‘plus-size’ clothes are missing from the fashion racks, the disease was barely noticed, with only 175/million."

But while shutting down the world economy in 2020 may or may not have reduced the death toll for well-fed people, it almost certainly increased the number of poor people who died of starvation. We have no figures and no proof. But 9 million people are said to die from malnutrition and hunger-related diseases each year. All it would take would be an 11% increase… and a million more people would die.

And now, here’s more bad news for hungry people. Fox News: "Goya Foods CEO Bob Unanue warned on "Fox & Friends Weekend" Sunday that the war between Russia and Ukraine is having a "devastating effect" on food supply as shortages are expected to contribute to higher inflation."

President Biden said last month that a food shortage is "gonna be real" following the sanctions that were placed on Russia by the U.S. government as a result of Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion into Ukraine. "With regard to food shortage, yes we did talk about food shortages, and it's gonna be real," Biden said during a press conference at a NATO summit in Brussels, Belgium, following a meeting with other world leaders. "The price of the sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia," he added. "It’s imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well."

Unintended Consequences: The price of wheat has shot up from $7.50 a bushel in January to over $10 today. A poor person in Bangladesh may have been able to afford 1,500 calories per day last year… and stayed alive, barely. With the cost/calorie up by a third… his daily allotment may now fall to only 1,000 calories per day – not enough to survive.

In Iraq, before the US invasion, an estimated 500,000 children were said to have died because of US sanctions. Then-Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, thought that was a fair price to pay for the benefits of the sanctions, whatever they were. A half a million deaths were “worth it,” she told “60 Minutes” in 1996.

And now, the fat countries congratulate themselves on their tough sanctions against Russia. Foreign policy ‘experts’ explain what a great and glorious war it is. America’s defense industry jefes look for lavish vacation homes in Aspen or North Carolina’s Outer Banks. Politicians look forward to more campaign contributions. And skinny people tighten their belts."

"A Recession is Going to Happen - But First, More Free Money"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 4/6/22:
"A Recession is Going to Happen - But First, More Free Money"
"Over 1000 investors business feel that a worldwide recession is imminent. They feel that Europe will feel it first. But first, more free money. Student loan payments are extended once again and there is free rent."

"How It Really Is"

Uh huh...

"The Wealth Effect And The 92%"

"The Wealth Effect And The 92%"
by Addison Wiggin

“Just as sound money goes hand in hand with liberalism, free trade, capitalism, and peace, so is inflationism part and parcel of imperialism, militarism, protectionism and socialism.”
– Ludwig von Mises

"Yesterday, we left off with a paper published by the San Francisco Fed blaming our current inflationary environment on wanton government spending during the government imposed lock downs. Today we introduce another paper issued by the San Fran Fed, this one authored by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who was the Fed Governor in San Fran in 2005. In it, she describes “the wealth effect” a component in the Federal Reserve’s strategy for keeping the economy afloat.

The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) described the Fed policy like this: “The ‘wealth effect’ is the notion that when households become richer as a result of a rise in asset values, such as corporate stock prices or home values, they spend more and stimulate the broader economy.”

Does it work? Depends on your point of view. Wolf Richter, from whom we borrowed the chart below, describes it as “the greatest economic injustice committed in recent US history.” In introducing his Wealth Effect Monitor, Richter points out that “since March 2020, the Fed printed $4.9 trillion and repressed short-term interest rates to near-zero in order to inflate asset prices so that the asset holders would get immensely more wealthy, in line with its doctrine of the Wealth Effect.
Yesterday, Wolf updated his monitor. The average wealth (assets minus debts) per household, defined by the Census bureau by category in Q4, 2021:

• Top “1%” household (red): $36.2 million.
• The 2% to 10% household (yellow): $4.68 million.
• The “next 40%” household (purple): $775,000.
• The “bottom 50%” household (green): $59,000.

Looking at the chart, following along with their “wealth effect” strategy, the Fed helped “the wealthy got immensely wealthier. Everyone else paid for it via rampant inflation.” In an attempt to salvage their academic experiment in financial cosmetics, they heaped nothing but adversity on over 92% of the population. (We encourage you to take a deeper look at Wolf’s “Wealth Effect Monitor”, here.)

Janet Yellen’s explanation of the Wealth Effect came prior to the massive bailouts in 2008. Jeffrey Tucker explains in Friday’s Daily Prophecy, the difference between those bailouts to the same policy choices during the pandemic: “The state of denial dates back to 2008. Last time there was a huge crisis and the Fed unleashed monetary expansion on a dramatic scale, they observed continued downward pressure on prices. Then, the entire point of the policy was to re-capitalize the banking system. There was no macroeconomic agenda. The Fed wanted to save the system from collapse. The markets loved it.”

Fast forward to the pandemic lockdowns. Different story, same policy solution with a disastrous effect. “The expansions of 2020 and 2021 were entirely different,” Tucker maintains, “Congress spent money it did not have. Trillions and trillions. That spending was debt financed. The Fed stepped up to buy the debt. The money was dropped directly into bank accounts of both business and consumers. It became very hot. The Fed felt it had no real choice. They pointed to Congress as the culprit.” Hence, the San Fran’s report placing the blame at Congress’ feet.

Now the Fed is between a rock and a hard place. If they try to “normalize” interest rates, our Wiggin Sessions guest this week Christopher Leonard suggests, the Fed could “nuke the entire economy.” Get Mr. Leonard’s full explanation, right here."

"Follow your bliss,"

Greg Hunter, "Petro-Ruble Takes Down Dollar & Drives Up Gold"

"Petro-Ruble Takes Down Dollar & Drives Up Gold"
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com

"Precious metals expert and financial writer Bill Holter said that at the end of last year, both the lies and money printing were going to get much worse. Holter predicted, “The risk for a meltdown from these levels, the risk has never been higher or could be higher than it is right now. You have got everything going in the wrong direction.” Fast-forward to today, and you see huge inflation, economies wrecked and Russia demanding payment for oil and gas in rubles. Holter explains, “This is the biggest news since 1973 when oil started being backed by the U.S. dollar. There is nothing bigger. Understand, Gaddafi (Libya) did this. Saddam Hussein (Iraq) talked about the gold dinar, or a gold backed currency, and what happened? They got killed, and their countries got invaded and their gold stolen. This time is different because you are not going to have the U.S. military go into Moscow, depose Putin and steal their gold. From a Russian standpoint, they are selling Russian goods, they want to be paid in rubles and they want to buy gold. They are not provoking a war, and they are not provoking the west, but they have created a currency war between the ruble and the dollar. What happens with the arbitrage is the world does the dirty work by making a profit if western gold is too cheap. It’s brilliant.”

So, the dollar will get creamed in buying power? Holter says, “It’s already getting creamed in buying power. This will ultimately affect all financial markets. It’s going to affect credit markets. Don’t forget, the dollar is a creation of credit. This is basically a natural way of destroying a financial Ponzi scheme. All Putin is saying is I want what’s best for Russia. We are going to sell our goods, we want to be paid in our currency and we are making it real by basically backing it with gold. We want real and fair settlement. In what world would anyone have imagined that it was the ruble that took the dollar down? That’s what it looks like is going to happen.”

Holter says get ready for extreme financial problems in the not-so-distant future. Holter warns, “I think we are headed for a calamity in the very near future. I think, at this point, it’s a coin flip that we do or don’t go through a Mad Max world for a spell. Is that spell a week, two weeks, two months or more? I don’t know. I do fully expect disastrous times. This is going to be 2008 on steroids.”

Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with financial writer and precious metals expert Bill Holter of JSMineset.com. (There is much more in the 48 min. interview)

"Is Dollar Tree Still Worth It? - Best vs Worst Deals!"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 4/6/22:
"Is Dollar Tree Still Worth It? - Best vs Worst Deals!"
"In today's vlog we are shopping at Dollar Tree to find the best and worst deals since they increased their store prices to $1.25 per item. It is getting rough out here as stores around the country continue to raise their prices!"

"Why Most People Will Not Survive: Stimulus Check Update, Chip Shortage, Housing Market Crisis"

Full screen recommended.
Ron Yates, 4/6/22:
"Why Most People Will Not Survive: 
Stimulus Check Update, Chip Shortage, Housing Market Crisis"

Gregory Mannarino, "Forget Russia/Ukraine. The Real War Is Against You!"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 4/6/22:
"Forget Russia/Ukraine. The Real War Is Against You!"

"20 Facts About The Emerging Global Food Shortage That Should Chill You To The Core"

"20 Facts About The Emerging Global Food Shortage
 That Should Chill You To The Core"
by Michael Snyder

"A very alarming global food shortage has already begun, and it is only going to get worse in the months ahead. I realize that this is not good news, but I would encourage you to share the information in this article with everyone that you can. People deserve to understand what is happening, and they deserve an opportunity to get prepared. The pace at which things are changing around the globe right now is absolutely breathtaking, but most people assume that life will just continue to carry on as it normally does. Unfortunately, the truth is that a very real planetary emergency is developing right in front of our eyes.

The following are 20 facts about the emerging global food shortage that should chill you to the core…

#1 One of France’s most important government officials is telling us that we should brace ourselves for an “extremely serious” global food crisis…"France’s Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said the EU must get to grips with the prospect that the war in Ukraine could prompt an “extremely serious” global food crisis."

#2 Joe Biden recently admitted that food shortages are “going to be real”, and his administration is now openly using the word “famine” to describe what is coming…"The Biden administration is worried Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will cause famine in parts of the world, White House Council of Economic Advisers Chair Cecilia Rouse told CNBC on Friday."

#3 It is being reported that food prices at German supermarkets will soon go up between 20 and 50 percent…"Just days after Germany reported the highest inflation in generation (with February headline CPI soaring at a 7.6% annual pace and blowing away all expectations), giving locals a distinctly unpleasant deja vu feeling even before the Russian invasion of Ukraine broke what few supply chains remained and sent prices even higher into the stratosphere…

On Monday, Germany will take one step toward a return of the dreaded Weimar hyperinflation, when according to the German Retail Association (HDE), consumers should prepare for another wave of price hikes for everyday goods and groceries with Reuters reporting that prices at German retail chains will explode between 20 and 50%."

#4 Rationing has already begun in Spain…"In Spain, the country started experiencing sporadic shortages of different products like eggs, milk and other dairy products almost immediately following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine. In early March, major supermarkets like Mercadona and Makro began rationing sunflower oil."

#5 Rationing has also already started in Greece…"In Greece, at least four national supermarket chains have started rationing food products like flour and sunflower oil due to critically low supplies caused by the crippled supply chains coming out of Russia and Ukraine."

#6 The head of BlackRock is warning that this will be the very first time this generation “is going to go into a store and not be able to get what they want”…"On Tuesday, BlackRock Inc. President Rob Kapito told an audience in Austin, Texas, hosted by the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners Association, that an entire younger generation is quickly finding out what it means to suffer from shortages, according to Bloomberg. “For the first time, this generation is going to go into a store and not be able to get what they want,” Kapito said. “And we have a very entitled generation that has never had to sacrifice.”

#7 Since this time last year, some fertilizer prices have gone up by as much as 300 percent.

#8 Many farmers in Africa will not be able to afford fertilizer at all this year, and it is being projected that this will reduce agricultural production by an amount capable of feeding “100 million people”…"With prices tripling over the past 18 months, many farmers are considering whether to forgo purchases of fertilizers this year. That leaves a market long touted for its growth potential set to shrink by almost a third, according to Sebastian Nduva, program manager at researcher group AfricaFertilizer.Org. That could potentially curb cereals output by 30 million tons, enough to feed 100 million people, he said."

#9 Russia is normally one of the biggest global exporters of fertilizer…"Russia is a key global player in natural gas, a major input to fertilizer production. Higher gas prices, and supply cuts, will further drive fertilizer prices higher. Russia is one of the biggest exporters of the three major groups of fertilizers (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium). Physical supply cuts could further inflate fertilizer prices."

#10 In a typical year, Russia and Ukraine collectively account for approximately 30 percent of all global wheat exports.

#11 Half of Africa’s wheat imports usually come from either Russia or Ukraine.

#12 Other nations rely on wheat exports from Russia and Ukraine even more than Africa does…"Armenia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Eritrea have imported virtually all of their wheat from Russia and Ukraine and must find new sources. But they are competing against much larger buyers, including Turkey, Egypt, Bangladesh and Iran, which have obtained more than 60 percent of their wheat from the two warring countries."

#13 One Russian official is warning that his nation may soon only export food to “friendly nations”…"A Russian government official has threatened that Russia will limit its vital food exports to only nations it considers “friendly”. Dmitry Medvedev, a senior Russian security official who previously served as the nation’s president, has threatened that Russia may soon cut off the West from food exports."

#14 On Friday, it was announced that another 5 million egg-laying chickens in Iowa would have to be put down because of the bird flu.

#15 The death toll from the bird flu in Iowa alone will be pushed beyond 13 million as a result of this latest incident.

#16 Overall, this is what the total national death toll from the bird flu currently looks like: “22 million egg-laying chickens, 1.8 million broiler chickens, 1.9 million pullet and other commercial chickens, and 1.9 million turkeys”.

#17 China’s agricultural minister has announced that the winter wheat harvest in China could be “the worst in history”.

#18 We are being warned that the winter wheat harvest in the United States will be “disastrous” due to severe drought.

#19 During a recent interview, one prominent U.S. farmer stated that most Americans won’t like it when “your grocery bill is up $1,000.00 a month”.

#20 The head of the UN World Food program says that what the planet is now facing is unlike anything that we have seen since World War II… “Ukraine has only compounded a catastrophe on top of a catastrophe,” said David M. Beasley, the executive director of the World Food Program, the United Nations agency that feeds 125 million people a day. “There is no precedent even close to this since World War II.”

We have been warned over and over again that this day was coming, and now it is here. Like I said at the beginning of this article, I hope that you will share this information with as many people as possible, because this crisis really is going to affect every man, woman and child on the entire planet.

In my entire lifetime, I have never seen anything like this, and conditions are getting worse with each passing day. A truly nightmarish global food crisis really is upon us, and hundreds of millions of innocent people are going to deeply suffer as a result."

Tuesday, April 5, 2022

"I Won't Buy A House Now, Hold Off; Households Are Running Out Of Money; Mortgage Rates; Gas"

Jeremiah Babe, PM 4/5/22:
"I Won't Buy A House Now, Hold Off; 
Households Are Running Out Of Money; Mortgage Rates; Gas"

Gerald Celente, "And The Loser Is Freedom, Peace And Justice"

Full screen recommended.
Strong language alert!
Gerald Celente, "The Trends Journal":
"And The Loser Is Freedom, Peace And Justice"
"The Trends Journal is a weekly magazine analyzing global current events forming future trends. Our mission is to present Facts and Truth over fear and propaganda to help subscribers prepare for What’s Next in these increasingly turbulent times."

As only Gerald can, lol

"35 Shocking Facts About Housing's New Crisis"

Full screen recommended.
"35 Shocking Facts About Housing's New Crisis"
by Epic Economist

"We’re in the middle of the greatest housing bubble in history, and prices are about to go even higher before a crash occurs to push them back down. Ordinary Americans are facing huge challenges to afford their mortgage or rent payments, and that is causing a lot of financial stress for millions of families out there. Hundreds of thousands of hard-working Americans may lose their homes in the coming months as they become unable to keep up with soaring costs and rising interest rates.

Over the past 10 years, home prices rose by almost 70 percent, and we can say for sure that incomes did not increase accordingly. The cost of living in the United States continues to escalate to stratospheric levels, but on the other hand, working conditions continue to deteriorate and most middle-class jobs do not offer enough financial support for workers to purchase a home. In fact, even middle-class renters are also cost-burdened by surging prices, and affordability is set to get much worse this year as the inventory of vacant homes and apartments plunges to the lowest level in decades while demand stays elevated.

More and more families are getting completely priced out of the market. Meanwhile, wealthy investors have been buying entire neighborhoods and engaging in bidding wars, oftentimes offering millions above the original asking price – something most families can not do. That is helping the housing bubble to grow even larger as prices are propped up by financial speculators. On top of that, supply chain issues have been contributing to the spike in construction costs. Shortages of raw materials and shipping disruptions have pushed the price of key building materials such as plywood and lumber to record triple-digit increases over the past 12 months. 

We all grew up thinking someday we would have our own homes where we would comfortably live with our families. But that dream has been removed from our reach. Tonight, many parents are going to have to sleep in their cars with their children because they’ve been evicted from their homes. A job loss or one unexpected health expense can push you into a debt spiral that can make you lose everything you own. And in the current economic environment, where living expenses continue to hit one new high after the other while our buying power continues to collapse, afford surging housing costs has become a privilege. 

This new housing crisis is impacting the future of the younger generations, who will have to wait much longer to start building equity. And this is the best-case scenario because when we consider today’s labor market and the lack of good jobs, it is safe to say that many people will not have the chance to buy a home at all. Conditions will continue to get worse in the real estate market this year, and we'll all have to make heroic efforts to be able to cope with the challenges ahead. A new housing crisis is brewing and in today’s video, we complied some shocking stats that expose what’s truly going on in the housing market. Here are 35 shocking facts about the new housing crisis."

Liquid Mind, "My Orchid Spirit (Extragalactic)"

Full screen recommended.
Liquid Mind, "My Orchid Spirit (Extragalactic)"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Colorful NGC 1579 resembles the better known Trifid Nebula, but lies much farther north in planet Earth's sky, in the heroic constellation Perseus. About 2,100 light-years away and 3 light-years across, NGC 1579 is, like the Trifid, a study in contrasting blue and red colors, with dark dust lanes prominent in the nebula's central regions.
In both, dust reflects starlight to produce beautiful blue reflection nebulae. But unlike the Trifid, in NGC 1579 the reddish glow is not emission from clouds of glowing hydrogen gas excited by ultraviolet light from a nearby hot star. Instead, the dust in NGC 1579 drastically diminishes, reddens, and scatters the light from an embedded, extremely young, massive star, itself a strong emitter of the characteristic red hydrogen alpha light."

Chet Raymo, “Very, Very, Very, Very, Very...”

 “Very, Very, Very, Very, Very...”
by Chet Raymo

"In a short story that was published posthumously in the New Yorker, the inestimable Primo Levi meditated on the limits of language. The story was called “The Tranquil Star.” He writes "The star was very big and very hot, and its weight was enormous," and realizes immediately that the adjectives have failed him: “For a discussion of stars our language is inadequate and seems laughable, as if someone were trying to plow with a feather. It's a language that was born with us, suitable for describing objects more or less as large and long-lasting as we are; it has our dimensions, it's human. It doesn't go beyond what our senses tell us.

Until fairly recently in human history, there was nothing smaller than a scabies mite, writes Levi, and therefore no adjective to describe it. Nothing bigger than the sea or sky. Nothing hotter than fire. We can add modifiers: very big, very small, very hot. Or use adjectives of dubious superlativeness: enormous, colossal, extraordinary. But, really, these feeble stretchings of language don't take us very far in grasping the very, very, very extraordinarily diminutive or spectacularly colossal dimensions of atomic matter or cosmic space and time. We can overcome the limitations of language, Levi say, "only with a violent effort of the imagination."

I spent more than forty years trying to find ways to violently stretch the imaginations of my students (and myself) to accommodate the dimensions of the universe revealed by science. I would project onto a huge screen a photograph of a firestorm on the Sun, then superimpose a scale-sized Earth, which fit comfortably inside a loop of solar fire. I would take the class into the College Quad here near Boston, where I had set up a basketball to represent the Sun, then gathered 100 feet away with a pinhead Earth; we walked together with our pin in the great annual journey of the Earth, and looked through a telescope at the marble-sized Jupiter than I had previously installed at the other end of the long Quad (the next closest star system would have been a couple of basketballs in Hawaii). We walked geologic timelines that took us from one end of the campus to the other.

In one of my Globe essays I used this analogy: “Imagine the human DNA as a strand of sewing thread. On this scale, the DNA in the 23 pairs of chromosomes in a typical human cell would be about 150 miles long, with about 600 nucleotide pairs per inch. That is, the DNA in a single cell is equivalent to 1000 spools of sewing thread, representing two copies of the genetic code. Take all that thread - the 1000 spools worth - and crumple it into 46 wads (the chromosomes). Stuff the wads into a shoe box (the cell nucleus) along with - oh, say enough chicken soup to fill the box. Toss the shoe box into a steamer trunk (the cell), and fill the rest of the trunk with more soup. Take the steamer trunk with its contents and shrink it down to an invisibly small object, smaller than the point of a pin. Multiply that tiny object by a trillion and you have the trillion cells of the human body, each with its full complement of DNA.”

Or this description from 'Waking Zero': “The track of the Prime Meridian across England from Peace Haven in the south to the mouth of the River Humber in the north is nearly 200 miles. If that distance is taken to represent the 13.7 billion year history of the universe, as we understand it today, then all of recorded human history is less than a single step. The entire story I have told in this book, from the Alexandrian astronomers and geographers to the present-day astronomers who launch telescopes into space, would fit neatly into a single footprint. If the 200 miles of the meridian track is taken to represent the distance to the most distant objects we observe with our telescopes, then a couple of steps would take us across the Milky Way Galaxy. A mote of dust from my shoe is large enough to contain not only our own solar system but many neighboring stars.”


But as hard as one tries, the scale of these things escape us. If one could truly comprehend what we are seeing when we look, say, at the Hubble Ultra Deep Field Photo above, which I have done my best to convey to myself and others in a dozen ways, it would surely shake to the core some of our most cherished beliefs. Just as our language is contrived on a human scale, so too are our gods.”

"It'll Do..."

Deputy Wendell: "It's a mess, ain't it, sheriff?"
Sheriff Ed Tom Bell: "If it ain't, it'll do till the mess gets here."
"No Country For Old Men"

Oh, the mess is here alright...

"Memento Mori"

"Memento Mori"
by Ryan Holiday

"Were all the geniuses of history to focus on this single theme, they could never fully express their bafflement at the darkness of the human mind. No person hands out their money to passersby, but to how many do each of us hand out our lives! We're tight-fisted with property and money, yet think too little of wasting time, the one thing about which we should all be the toughest misers."  - Seneca

Born with a chronic illness that loomed large throughout his life, Seneca was constantly thinking about and writing about the final act of life. "Let us prepare our minds as if we'd come to the very end of life," he said. "Let us postpone nothing. Let us balance life's books each day. The one who puts the finishing touches on their life each day is never short of time."

Most interestingly, he quibbled with the idea that death was something that lay ahead of us in the uncertain future. "This is our big mistake," Seneca wrote, "to think we look forward to death. Most of death is already gone. Whatever time has passed is owned by death." That was Seneca's great insight - that we are dying every day and no day, once dead, can be revived.

So we should listen to the command that Marcus gave himself. He wrote,"Concentrate every minute like a Roman on doing what's in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice. And on freeing yourself from all other distractions." The key to this kind of concentration? "Do everything as if it were the last thing you were doing in your life."

That's the power of Memento Mori - of meditating on your mortality. It isn't about being morbid or making you scared. It's about giving you power. It's to inspire, to motivate, to clarify, to concentrate like a Roman on the thing in front of you. Because it may well be the last thing you do in your life.

The Stoics were philosophers, but more than that they were doers. They didn't have room for big words or big ideas, just stuff that made you better right here, right now. As Marcus Aurelius said: "Justice, honesty, self-control, courage, don't make room for anything but it - for anything that might lead you astray, tempt you off the road, and leave you unable to devote yourself completely to achieving the goodness that is uniquely yours."

“Requiem for a Ladybug”

“Requiem for a Ladybug”
by Frankly Francis

“You lie still less than a foot away on top of the soft mouse pad that protects me from carpal tunnel syndrome. I noticed this morning, through eyes not yet clarified by my first coffee of the day, your presence in my study. Odd, I thought, that you would even be present now. It is certainly past your time of the year in these parts.

I had the presence of mind to reckon that your life must be short. Rather than remove you from my space, both physical and mental, I decided that if these were your final moments then my study could be your Hospice and I your companion.

Your flight and movement were a little chaotic, seemingly random. You nestled in the heat of the light in the globe of my desk lamp, you circled my cranium, you landed in various spots, and in and on various objects on my desk while I got about the business of the day.

Sometimes I could see you, other times I did not know where you were. Then you would rise again to a new location. I wondered if you had any purpose in this, if there was more going on than my conscious programming allowed me to realize.

Perhaps it was, in your reality, some last business to be done? Or perhaps a ritual of your species’ existence? I hoped that if there is any pleasure in being a Ladybug that it was satisfying in some way, even so far from your natural habitat. Then you landed on your final resting spot and moved no more.

For me, my study is a place of many good things. I hope in your last moments it was to you as well. Rest in Peace my little Ladybug. And thanks for reminding me of the preciousness and fragility of life.”

"None Of You Understand..."

The Daily "Near You?"

Bullhead City, Arizona, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

Gregory Mannarino, "Alert! The FED Is Selling Yet Another Epic Lie"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 4/5/22:
"Alert! The FED Is Selling Yet Another Epic Lie"

"Peter Schiff's Last Warning: The Crash Will Be WORSE Than 2008"

Full screen recommended.
Freenvesting, "Peter Schiff's Last Warning: 
The Crash Will Be WORSE Than 2008"

"Peter Schiff was warning about the 2008 financial crisis before it happened. “The crisis that’s coming is going to be far worse than anything that was experienced in 2008,” says the economist. Peter D. Schiff is an economist, stock broker, financial specialist, host of the Peter Schiff Show Podcast, and author. He is the CEO and chief global strategist of Euro Pacific Capital Inc. Mr. Schiff has also written a number of books on investing over the years. He educates people all over the world about free market economics and the principles and benefits of individual liberty, limited government and sound money."

Timestamps:
00:00 - Introduction
00:48 - The Primary Factor
01:40 - 2 Ways Money Will Be Taken Away From You
04:58 - What’s Happening Now
07:30 - The Problem Nobody Understands
11:41 - Who Gets Rich During Inflation?
15:23 - “The Government Will Take Most Of What You Have…”
16:25 - How To Invest In This Environment?

"Global Crisis with Food Shortages and Real Estate Crashing"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 4/5/22:
"Global Crisis with Food Shortages and Real Estate Crashing"
"These problems are global. Everything is affected right now. This includes our banking system, real estate, food shortages and massive inflation. People need to prepare for what is coming. The signs are everywhere and people just want to go about their day."

"This Brave Ahab"

"This Brave Ahab"
by Bill Bonner

San Martin, Argentina - "Oh to be as carefree… as optimistic… and as brain dead as an American stock market investor! By our reckoning, US stocks are about $25-$30 trillion overvalued. Typically around 80% of GDP, the Wilshire 5000, which captures all US publicly-traded equities, is now almost at 200%.

What would it take to drive investors away from the stock market? A tsunami washing over Manhattan? A nuclear war? The dead rising from their graves? Already, there’s a war on… and one of the combatants has nukes in his arsenal. Inflation is already at 8%; it looks like it will hit double digits soon. The bond market has just delivered its most reliable recession signal – the dreaded ‘inverted yield curve.’

And the Biden Team has just proposed the highest income tax rates in the developed world. Fox News: "The budget blueprint that President Biden unveiled last week includes several tax hikes on the ultra-wealthy and corporations that would push the top U.S. rates on both individual and corporate income to the highest level in the developed world, according to a new analysis published by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation." Hey… it probably won’t pass! And now, the Fed is determined to stamp out inflation by raising rates.

Cometh the Clouds: Higher interest rates will put the refinancing machine into reverse. Instead of refinancing debt at lower rates, debts will be refinanced at higher rates, causing the overall debt pile (and the economy) to shrink. Many households and businesses will find that when the weather was fair and the going was good, they went a little too far. Cometh the clouds and they will be unable to refinance debt. Instead, they will default. Far and wide… public, private, questioning… asset prices will go down.

Uh oh. You’d think that would make stock gamblers a little nervous. But no… here’s the head-scratcher headline from MarketWatch: "US stock futures edge higher as investors prepare for steep rise in interest rates."

And here’s Larry Lindsey. MarketWatch again: “I do think we’re going to have a recession, probably in the next quarter,” Lindsey said, in an interview on CNBC. “Inflation is eating into consumer spending power, they’re going to have to cut back,” he said. The former Fed governor also said the U.S. central bank was “nowhere close” on being able to control inflation.

Among serious commentators (of whom, there are no more than a half dozen), the prevailing view is that the Fed will have no choice. After having recklessly goosed up stock prices for the last 14 years, the Fed must now reckon with its mistakes and goose them down. It pushed down interest rates far too low (below zero!) for far too long (almost 14 years).

The phony and unnatural interest rates created a whole phony and unnatural economy that now depends on ultra-cheap credit. The ultra-cheap credit created a culture of rampant speculating and borrowing… which led to an Everest of debt, public and private – now about $87 trillion, or roughly $50 trillion more than in 2007.

With so much debt, investors, business, households and the government are desperate to keep interest rates low. To that end, the Fed has had to make more and more cash and credit available. It and other central banks added some $25 trillion in new money since the Wall Street bailout of 2008-2009.

All this easy credit and money printing has produced the inevitable inflation… made much worse by Covid shutdowns, trade barriers, and sanctions – especially against one of the world’s largest energy exporters, Russia.

All The World’s Central Bankers: And now… faced with double-digit inflation, what’s a poor central banker to do? He has no choice. Not in Europe. Not in Britain. And not in America. He has to take the knife between his teeth and climb the rigging. David Stockman: "The fools in the Eccles Building will have no choice but to throw on the monetary brakes far harder than now planned or expected during the next 8 months. That’s because the inflation menace will be in their face via the “incoming data” at 8-10% on a Y/Y basis or higher, while the negative GDP of recession will not show up until Q4 2022 or early next year."

All the world’s major central bankers – save for those in Russia, where the key lending rate is already 20% – are in the same boat. All followed the same course. All now find themselves on rough seas…and all must now batten down the hatches, take down the sails, and ride out the storm. That would be the reasonable thing to do. That is what investors should expect.

But investors are still sans-soucis. They are still comfortably ensconced in their deck chairs… enjoying the fading light and waiting for another drink. Whatever happens – earthquake… WWIII… plague – they still believe that Captain Powell will make sure that nothing bad happens to them. And you know what? They may be right. This brave Ahab… on the high seas of high finance… may be just mad enough, weak enough, or just plain dumb enough, to turn a very bad situation into an even worse one. More to come…"

"Massive Price Increases At Meijer! Empty Shelves Everywhere! - What's Next?"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, AM 4/5/22:
"Massive Price Increases At Meijer! 
Empty Shelves Everywhere! - What's Next?"
"In today's vlog we are at Meijer and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and a lot of empty shelves! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"

"How It Really Is"