"The Grim Calculus of Debt"

"The Grim Calculus of Debt"

by Brian Maher

"An “empire of debt.” This is what our co-founders Bill Bonner and Addison Wiggin labeled the United States… in a 2005 book bearing that very title. The United States is unquestionably an empire in debt - some $31.5 trillion - and mounting with each clock tick. Atop this $31.5 trillion debt floats a $25 trillion economy. Thus the nation’s debt-to-GDP ratio runs to some 125%... the highest since 1946.

Sixty cents of each dollar Uncle Samuel spends, he borrows. The remaining 40 cents he collars in taxes. Contrast these figures with the guns-and-butter 1960s - before old Nixon banged the gold window shut. You will find the mathematics very nearly inverted. Seventy-five cents of each expended dollar the government hauled in through taxes. It borrowed the remaining 25 cents.

Borrowing to Consume, Not to Invest: Has our doddering uncle borrowed to invest in a productive American future? No he has not. He has borrowed largely to satisfy the consumptive needs of the moment. He is a squirrel that has failed to stash his acorns for winter. He has left little for the morrow. Consider the abovesaid 1960s...Merely 15 cents of each government-spent dollar went channeling toward “transfer payments” - that is, channeling from productive hands to nonproductive, consuming hands.

Today the figure approaches a productivity-sapping 50 cents of each dollar. Some 50% of Americans haul aboard at least one federal benefit. Some 63 million receive Social Security payments. Sixty million receive Medicare. Medicaid, 75 million. Five million American households claim housing subsidies. Some 40 million Americans take “supplemental nutritional assistance.” That is, food stamps. Only during the locust years of the Great Depression - from 1931–36 - did government dolings out exceed taxes coming in… as they do now.

Is it any wonder then that the nation sags and groans under $31.5 trillion of debt? We hazard it is not. Do we hector? Do we preach? Do we wag our finger? No we do not. We approach the business with the detached air of an accountant tackling the ledgers. We merely count beans. Yet a distressing calculus fetches our eye…

Rising Interest Rates Means Rising Debt Payments: We note that interest rates are on the increase. Today the 10-year Treasury note yields 3.46%. Two years ago the same 10-year Treasury note yielded 0.677%. And so interest payments on the debt are on the increase. They are devouring larger portions of the federal budget.

Mr. Jeff Deist, president of the Mises Institute: "In fiscal year 2020, at the height of COVID stimulus mania, Congress managed to spend nearly twice what the federal government raised in taxes. Yet in 2021, with Treasury debt piled sky-high and spilling over $30 trillion, Congress was able to service this gargantuan obligation with interest payments of less than $400 billion. The total interest expense of $392 billion for the year represented only about 6% of the roughly $6.8 trillion in federal outlays.

How is this possible? In short: very low interest rates. In fact, the average weighted rate across all outstanding Treasury debt in 2021 was well below 2%… even dramatically rising federal debt in recent years did not much hike Congress’ debt service burden."

And now? If Treasury rates continue to rise, and rise precipitously, the effects on congressional budgeting will be immediate and severe. Even if we laughably assume total federal debt remains static… interest rates of merely 2% or 3% will cause interest expense to rise considerably.

Average weighted rates of only 5% would cost taxpayers more than $1 trillion every year. Historically, average rates of 7% swell that number to more than $1.5 trillion. Rates of 10% — hardly unthinkable, given the Paul Volcker era of the late ’70s and early ’80s — would cause debt service to explode to over $2.3 trillion.

How Much Money Would Be Left Over? And as Mr. Deist notes: "Even a 5% average rate would render debt service the largest annual federal expenditure — greater than Social Security ($1.2 trillion), Medicare ($826 billion) and “defense” spending ($704 billion)."

The historical average, incidentally, comes in at 5.6%. Interest payments of 10% would swamp the entire federal budget. And the lovely illusion that deficits do not matter would crash against hard rocks of mathematical reality. But will interest rates maintain their increase… or will they come floating back downward?

Investor - and speculator - Nick Giambruno believes he has the answer: "Interest rates last peaked in 1981 at over 15%. Then, they fell for 39 years and bottomed in July 2020 at around 0.62%... Since the bottom in 2020, yields have gone up more than 5X. This reflects a significant shift. I think we are now at the very beginning of a new, long-term uptrend in interest rates…The 10-year Treasury is yielding around [3.46%]. That’s still far below the long-term historical average of approximately 5.6%."

That is, the scales will balance at or near the historical 5.6% average. And here this Giambruno fellow raises our hair: "I expect interest rates to reach new all-time highs in this new, long-term cycle. That would mean we’d see the 10-year Treasury yield north of 15%."

Kind heaven, no - 10-year yields north of 15%? Can you imagine it? We only hope that we are under the sod by that time… and roasting in the hell to which we are unquestionably fated.

The Government We Deserve: Yet one question must be answered: How did what was once the world’s greatest creditor nation sink so deeply into debt? It is easy to blame the politicians. But We the People must be as guilty as the politicians we elect. As we have asked before: Were the American people humbugged into so much debt? Or have we freely and knowingly put our names to the contract?

Two possibilities immediately suggest themselves…

1) The elected officials of the United States are colossal rogues who amassed today’s $31.5 trillion debt in full defiance of the thrifty American voter.

Or:

2) The $31.5 trillion debt reflects faithfully the desires of the American voter. He has gotten what he wants. At the very least, he accepts it in exchange for the perceived benefits it showers upon him.

Option 1 mocks our cherished democratic theories. Option 2 stands in full indictment of them. “Every nation gets the government it deserves,” said 18th-century French philosopher Joseph de Maistre. Alas, we must conclude the United States has gotten the government it deserves…"

- dailyreckoning.com

The Daily "Near You?"

Georgetown, Maine, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"We Don't Have A Clue..."

“We don’t have a clue what’s really going down, we just kid ourselves that we’re in control of our lives while a paper’s thickness away things that would drive us mad if we thought about them for too long play with us, and move us around from room to room, and put us away at night when they’re tired, or bored.”

- Neil Gaiman

Chet Raymo, “Hanging On”

“Hanging On”

by Chet Raymo

“I change the desktop image on my laptop every now and then, generally when I come across a new image I like. In the last year or so you’ll remember that I wrote about Caravaggio’s “The Rest on the Flight Into Egypt” and Vermeer’s “The Milkmaid.” Live with an image for a while and it’s inevitable that you learn something from it. Here is the painting I’ve had as my desktop in recent weeks, Winslow Homer’s “Snap the Whip”, 1872, one of America’s sentimental favorites.

A simpler, more innocent time. Boys at recess, barefoot in the grass. Hand-me-down clothes. Autumn wildflowers, trees turning to red and gold. A fumbling Ulysses S. Grant is in the White House, the country is at peace after a horrendous civil war, and the Panic of 1873 and subsequent depression is still in the offing. Anyway, all of that political and economic stuff is a bit of a pother and far away. The sun is high in the sky, there’s an apple in the pocket, and only the oldest boy is thinking yet about the eternal mystery that is girls.

Yes, a lovely sentimental anecdote to the busy rancor of our own time, the incessant noise of the television, the attack ads, the news of war. How blissful to be twelve years old again, fit and healthy with the grass between your toes. Never mind that these boys had a life expectancy at birth of about 40 years, and that many of them had probably already lost a sibling or parent; when the sun’s out, and it’s recess, and you’ve got eight pals to play with…

But that’s not why I like the painting. I love the way the arc of the whip reflects the curve of the hill. The vanishing point of the red schoolhouse and three white shirts – everything converges on the two adults in the distance, the grown-up world that inevitably awaits.

Between the three boys who anchor the whip and the six who resist the centrifugal force that breaks the chain is the schoolhouse, the open door and window bracketing the anchor’s grip. Maybe it’s because I was a teacher all my life, but I like to think that the “message” of the painting has to do with education, with what goes on when the boys and girls are called back inside by the teacher’s bell – the glue that holds a civil society together when the whiplash of events threatens to tear us apart. Not indoctrination. Rather, reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic, the basic skills that enable an individual to explore the world creatively. History, geography and science, with their lessons of diversity, tolerance and respect for empirical fact. The ameliorating influence of poetry and art. And one of these boys, maybe the oldest in the center, will become a teacher himself, maintaining an unbroken chain of accumulated knowledge that anchors us to the past and propels us together into a mutually supportive and secure future.”

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

"The Motive..."

"All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves."

- Blaise Pascal

The Poet: Mary Oliver, "What I Have Learned So Far"

"What I Have Learned So Far"

"Meditation is old and honorable, so why should I

not sit, every morning of my life, on the hillside,

looking into the shining world? Because, properly

attended to, delight, as well as havoc, is suggestion.

Can one be passionate about the just, the

ideal, the sublime, and the holy, and yet commit

to no labor in its cause? I don't think so.

All summations have a beginning, all effect has a

story, all kindness begins with the sown seed.

Thought buds toward radiance. The gospel of

light is the crossroads of- indolence, or action.

Be ignited, or be gone."

~ Mary Oliver

"How It Really Is"

 

Americans... such a kind, compassionate people!

And what about you, Good Citizen? How are you doing?

Yeah, I know...

“You go up to a man, and you say, “How are things going, Joe?” and he says, “Oh fine, fine… couldn’t be better.” And you look into his eyes, and you see things really couldn’t be much worse. When you get right down to it, everybody’s having a perfectly lousy time of it, and I mean everybody. And the hell of it is, nothing seems to help much.”

- Kurt Vonnegut

"A Top Russian Official Quoted The Book Of Revelation To Describe What Will Soon Happen To America"

"A Top Russian Official Quoted The Book Of 

Revelation To Describe What Will Soon Happen To America"

by Michael Snyder

"The Russians continue to threaten us with nuclear annihilation. Why are so few people in the western world alarmed by this? I think it is because our leaders are assuring everyone that the Russians are all talk and that the odds of a nuclear war actually happening are extremely low. Meanwhile, both sides just continue to take steps to escalate the war in Ukraine. We are engaged in an extremely bizarre game of “nuclear chicken”, and both sides truly believe that the other side will blink first. And so we continue to creep closer and closer to a cataclysmic nuclear conflict, and once the missiles start flying there will be no turning back.

I simply do not understand why our leaders are not taking Russian threats more seriously. The Russians warned that they would take military action in Ukraine if an agreement to avoid war could not be reached, and that is precisely what happened. And now the Russians are repeatedly threatening us with nuclear war. In fact, Dmitry Medvedev just warned that if the U.S. does not back down our “land will be on fire and the concrete will melt”…"If the West continues its “unrestrained pumping of the Kiev regime with the most dangerous types of weapons,” Russia’s military campaign will move to the next level, where “visible boundaries and potential predictability of actions by the parties to the conflict” will be erased and the conflict will take on a life of its own, as wars always do, Medvedev argued.

"And then the Western nations will not be able to sit in their clean homes, laughing at how they carefully weaken Russia by proxy. Everything will be on fire around them. Their people will harvest their grief in full. The land will be on fire and the concrete will melt,” Medvedev wrote, before citing a Bible verse from Revelations 9:18."

In case you are wondering, this is what Revelation 9:18 says…"A third of mankind was killed by these three plagues - by the fire and by the smoke and by the brimstone, which came out of their mouths."

Medvedev also addressed the fact that U.S. politicians don’t seem to be taking Russian threats very seriously…“Yet still the narrow-minded politicians and their stupid think tanks, thoughtfully twirling a glass of wine in their hands, talk about how they can deal with us without entering into a direct war. Dull idiots with a classical education,” Medvedev wrote."

When I read that statement, I immediately thought of National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. He is one of the chief warmongers in the Biden administration, but most Americans don’t even know who he is. Personally, I am shocked that someone like Sullivan can even get a job in Washington, but at this point he is one of the key architects of our foreign policy. There are times when Sullivan makes John Bolton look like a radical anti-war peace activist in comparison, and Biden considers his advice to be highly valuable. That is quite frightening, because if Sullivan has his way we are likely to end up in a nuclear war with Russia.

At this point, the Russians do not believe that they are fighting a war with just Ukraine. All over Russian television, there is talk about the vast numbers of “British and American soldiers” that are now on the front lines of the conflict…"Watching Russia’s channels over the last 24 hours reveals two trends. The first is that talk of “Ukrainian Nazis” has decreased - instead it’s now about “shared past and history” of two nations. Second, they simply cannot accept they’re losing to Ukrainians; instead, they talk about fighting a huge force of British and American soldiers, or as they often call them: “Anglo-Saxons”.

Officially, the U.S. and UK governments have not sent any troops to Ukraine. But somehow tens of thousands of highly trained U.S. and British fighters are now involved. Many of them are uploading videos of their exploits to social media, and this is something that even the Daily Mail is admitting…"In a compilation of footage uploaded to social media, soldiers with British accents can be heard speaking to one another while wearing blue armbands to identify themselves as Ukrainian forces. One clip appears to show soldiers moving ‘POWs’ through a compound, while others show soldiers hurling grenades, running to take cover, and climbing through windows."

Whether these troops were officially sent by the U.S. and UK governments doesn’t really matter. What matters is that the Russians now believe that they are fighting troops from NATO countries that have been armed with NATO equipment. If the Russians perceive that this is the big showdown with NATO, they may decide that it is better to go for the jugular sooner rather than later. Because the side that strikes first has the best chance of surviving a nuclear war.

In a scenario in which the Russians decide to strike first, they would move large numbers of their super silent “black hole” submarines into position just off our coastlines. This is something that I have warned my readers about over and over again. These submarines would simultaneously launch their nukes, and within just a couple of minutes a host of key strategic targets would be destroyed all over the country.

Our missile silos and our air bases would be among those strategic targets, but once his advisers finally got him out of bed the president would inevitably order a strike of our own. Unfortunately, Minuteman III missiles that went into service in the 1970s still form the backbone of our strategic nuclear arsenal, and Russia has the most advanced anti-missile systems on the entire planet. The Russian S-400, A-135 and S-500 anti-missile systems would likely intercept much of what we throw at them, but inevitably some targets would be hit. But overall, the Russians would hurt us a whole lot more than we hurt them, and they know this.

So why won’t we take the threats that they are making more seriously? Of course there are ultimately no “winners” in a nuclear war, and that is what western leaders are banking on. As I have discussed previously, studies have determined that only about 20 percent of the U.S. population would die immediately if there was a full-blown nuclear exchange with Russia. But the ensuing nuclear winter caused by such a conflict would result in billions of people starving to death worldwide.

So I am pleading with leaders on both sides of this war to find a peaceful way out of this mess while they still can. Unfortunately, both sides have become absolutely obsessed with “winning” the conflict in Ukraine, and it appears that it is just a matter of time before it goes nuclear."

-https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

○

A Must Read related article:

"Is War What You Asked For?"

"Longer-Range Missiles For Ukraine Would 

Make US "A Party To The Conflict": Kremlin"

"'Prologue To Third World War':

 Kremlin Reacts To Security Guarantees For Ukraine"

"The Kharkov Game-Changer"

"This is Getting Crazier and Crazier"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly 9/15/22:

"This is Getting Crazier and Crazier"

"People don’t realize what the possibly averted train strike would do to our Konomi. Most people think that just because they don’t ride on the train it doesn’t affect them. Everything gets delivered through freight trains and this would stop. We would have $2 billion a day in damages at a minimum."

- www.iAllegedly.com

"Rail strike averted after Biden announces tentative deal - CNN"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

Related:

"Tapped Out Debt Donkeys Burning Through Savings While Running Up Credit Cards As The Fed Destroys The Purchasing Power Of Their Wages. This Won’t End Well"

"This winter, New Yorkers should expect an additional 

40% increase in their already-expensive heating bills."

"Americans Continue To Pile On More And More Debt"

"Massive Price Increases At Publix! This Is Ridiculous!"

Adventures with Danno, 9/15/22:

"Massive Price Increases At Publix! This Is Ridiculous!"

"In today's vlog we are at Publix, 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! "

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Gregory Mannarino, "SEC Now Warning Of Debt Market Liquidity Issues; Economy Cratering Faster"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 9/15/22:

"SEC Now Warning Of Debt Market Liquidity Issues;

Economy Cratering Faster"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"This Is What The Collapse Of Civilization Looks Like"

Full screen recommended.

Tucker Carlson, 9/14/22:

"This Is What The Collapse Of Civilization Looks Like"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

Related:

"Violence In California Reaches “Epidemic” Levels 

As Our Society Rapidly Deteriorates All Around Us"

Greg Hunter, "Deep State Naked Running Through Streets"

"Deep State Naked Running Through Streets"

By ’s USAWatchddog.com

"Award-winning journalist Alex Newman, author of the popular books “Deep State” and “Crimes of the Educators,” says Deep State globalists are not happy with the progress of the “controlled demolition of all western societies.” They want their so-called “Great Reset,” but people are waking up at such a fast pace their propaganda is not working. Newman explains, “Censorship is the move that these Deep State people are making. They want to silence all dissent, all criticism, except dissent and criticism that furthers their narrative that furthers inflaming the division and furthers the civil war narrative. This is very, very dangerous. As my friend, Patrick Wood, the founder of “Citizens for Free Speech,” says, when they are able to silence our free speech, that’s when the killing starts. So, we should be very, very concerned about this.”

Are the Deep State’s destructive plans going all that well? Newman says, “They are in this do or die moment, and we have been here a little while. We are at the stage now where the agenda is out in the open. A few years ago, when we were saying they were going to be doing these things, we were called conspiracy theorists and extremists and whatever. Now, they are actually doing those things, and now they are saying it is dangerous and extreme not to approve of these things. So, now if you don’t agree with the ‘Great Reset’ or the Green New Deal or the Biden regime, they say you are dangerous. I think we are in the phase right now where they are basically running naked through the streets. Everybody can see them. So, it’s a very risky time for them. It’s a do or die moment for them if enough people wake up. If you look at the trend line people are waking up so rapidly that if this continues, they are going to be in major trouble. That’s why we are seeing the clampdown on free speech. 

The war on free speech shows how successful we have been and how unsuccessful they have been. If their propaganda was effective and they thought lying to us through CNN, NBC and ABC was good enough, they would not be worried about what people were saying on Facebook. They would not be worrying about what you were Tweeting out to your 10,000 or 30,000 followers. They would be confident and relaxed, and they would really not be all that concerned. The fact they are whipping themselves into a frenzy about all this ‘misinformation’ online shows you they are very, very concerned about the collapse of their narrative. 

You point out the real approval rate for Biden is 11% or 12%, and they recognize their agenda is not popular. They realize people don’t like this, and if people realize they are not the only ones that don’t like this and everyone does not like this, then they are in very big trouble.”

Newman says we are “fighting demonic spirits and not simply flesh and blood” as it says in the Bible. Newman contends one of the biggest failing narratives of the Deep State are the people who got the CV19 shots and are sick or dead. Newman says, “I think the truth on this is going to come out, and I think this is another reason we are in such a dangerous time. A lot of the people who lined up and got their shots are madder than a wet hen right now. They are wondering who is responsible for this? This is a catastrophe of unprecedented proportions, and that is what the data is showing now. We are seeing excess mortality numbers that are unprecedented. Nothing in human history has resulted in things like this. Millions of people are dying, and millions of people are being debilitated by this around the world and especially around the Western world. We are seeing massive numbers of infertility and miscarriages, and I think the worst is yet to come." There is much more in the 46 min. video interview.

https://usawatchdog.com/

Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with hard hitting journalist Alex Newman, founder of LibertySentinel.org and author of the recent book “Deep State.”

- https://rumble.com/

"Be Ready For A September Stock Market Crash As People Believe That It Is Starting To Happen Again"

Full screen recommended.

"Be Ready For A September Stock Market Crash

 As People Believe That It Is Starting To Happen Again"

by Epic Economist

"Do you remember the panic waves that plunged Wall Street into chaos in September 2008? Well, several indicators are signaling that it’s happening all over again. And market strategists are saying that once selling starts to spiral out of control, it’s going to be nearly impossible to stop it. On Monday, the Dow Jones Industrial fell to the lowest level since June 2020, marking the seventh biggest single-day decline in history. The drop was actually larger than anything we witnessed back in 2008. It was fueled by a sudden shift in sentiment as investors got extremely disappointed by the monthly inflation report because it showed that the recent efforts to tame inflation growth aren’t working, and that means more rate hikes are coming. Major market players are alerting us that we haven’t hit bottom yet, and a much more dramatic stock market crash is about to occur.

Wall Street is in a very sour mood right now. Another mass selloff took place on Tuesday, and things are starting to look quite frightening. The Dow went on a free fall yesterday, and other indexes followed suit. In a single day, the Dow slid 1,276 points, losing 3.94% and closing at 31,104.97. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite actually performed even worse, plunging 4.32% and 5.16%, respectively.

All 11 sectors of the S&P 500 recorded losses, with only five stocks finishing in positive territory. Tech stocks suffered the most, with Facebook-parent Meta skidding 9.4% and chip giant Nvidia shedding 9.5%. The sharp declines marked the worst day for stocks since the burst of the health crisis. Of course, a single bad day does not make a full-blown meltdown, but it might indicate that one is rapidly approaching.

The collapse was mostly driven by worries about inflation. Inflation figures for the month of August were so much worse than expected that at this point traders see a one-in-five chance for a full percentage point next week. That would be quadruple the usual move, and no one in the futures market was predicting such a hike just a day earlier.

According to the CME Group, “traders now see a better than 60% likelihood the Fed will pull its federal funds rate all the way up to a range of 4.25% to 4.50%. A day earlier, they saw less than a 17% chance of such a high rate.” Furthermore, veteran investor and GMO co-founder, Jeremy Grantham, who cautioned about an epic "superbubble" across stocks, bonds, and housing, repeated his warning of an impending burst in a research note released this week. Grantham dismissed the latest rebound in stocks as a brief reprieve, arguing that previous superbubbles have always been followed by market declines of at least 50%. "Each cycle is different and unique - but every historical parallel suggests that the worst is yet to come," he added.

Another remarkable warning came from billionaire John Catsimatidis, who said soaring interest rates will cause more harm than good, and eventually, they’ll push financial markets and the economy other the edge, sparking another global financial meltdown. In an interview with Fox Business, Catsimatidis urged the Fed to stop monetary tightening. “So I call upon the Federal Reserve…If we keep raising interest rates, we’re going to destroy the rest of the country. Somebody has to stand up and say it doesn’t have to happen. And they’re going to destroy the rest of the country. And there is a recession, it could turn into a depression,” he said.

The outlook never looked so gloomy. Risks are growing and investors can feel it. We encourage you to brace yourself for a catastrophic stock market crash because that is precisely what each and every piece of evidence is telling us to do."

- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

“Oh My…They’re Lying. Prepare For Total Chaos”

Canadian Prepper, 9/14/22:

“Oh My…They’re Lying. Prepare For Total Chaos”

“People need to accept reality and stop deluding themselves.”

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

“FED Is Going To Crash The Housing Market; Walmart Euphoria Could End; You Can’t Afford A Cellphone”

Jeremiah Babe, 9/14/22:

“FED Is Going To Crash The Housing Market; 

Walmart Euphoria Could End; You Can’t Afford A Cellphone”

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: Justin Hayward, "I Heard It"

Full screen recommended.

Justin Hayward, "I Heard It"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Many spiral galaxies have bars across their centers. Even our own Milky Way Galaxy is thought to have a modest central bar. Prominently barred spiral galaxy NGC 1672, featured here, was captured in spectacular detail in an image taken by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. Visible are dark filamentary dust lanes, young clusters of bright blue stars, red emission nebulas of glowing hydrogen gas, a long bright bar of stars across the center, and a bright active nucleus that likely houses a supermassive black hole.

Light takes about 60 million years to reach us from NGC 1672, which spans about 75,000 light years across. NGC 1672, which appears toward the constellation of the Dolphinfish (Dorado), has been studied to find out how a spiral bar contributes to star formation in a galaxy's central regions."

- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200406.html

The Poet: Charles Bukowski, “Mind and Heart”

“Mind and Heart”

“Unaccountably we are alone,

forever alone,

and it was meant to be

that way,

it was never meant

to be any other way -

and when the death struggle begins

the last thing I wish to see is

a ring of human faces

hovering over me -

better just my old friends,

the walls of my self,

let only them be there.

I have been alone but seldom lonely.

I have satisfied my thirst

at the well of my self

and that wine was good,

the best I ever had,

and tonight, sitting,

staring into the dark

I now finally understand

the dark and the

light and everything

in between.

Peace of mind and heart arrives

when we accept what is:

having been born into this strange life

we must accept

the wasted gamble of our days,

and take some satisfaction in

the pleasure of leaving it all behind.

Cry not for me.

Grieve not for me.

Read

what I’ve written

then forget it all.

Drink from the well

of your self and begin again.”

- Charles Bukowski

"Be That Thing..."

“In Rome just as America, in the forum just as on Facebook, there was the temptation to replace action with argument. To philosophize instead of living philosophically. Today, in a society obsessed with content, outrage, and drama, it’s even easier to get lost in the echo chamber of the debate of what’s “better.” We can have endless discussions about what’s right and wrong. What should we do in this hypothetical situation or that one? How can we encourage other people to be better? (We can even debate the meaning of the above line: “What’s a man? What’s the definition of good? Why doesn’t it mention women?”) Of course, this is all a distraction. If you want to try to make the world a slightly better place, there’s a lot you can do. But only one thing guarantees an impact. Step away from the argument. Dig yourself out of the rubble. Stop wasting time with how things should be, would be, could be. Be that thing.”

- Ryan Holiday

Gerald Celente, "Judge Andrew Napolitano: Monarchy And Fascism, It's The American Way"

Full screen recommended.

Gerald Celente, 9/14/22:

"Judge Andrew Napolitano: 

Monarchy And Fascism, It's The American Way"

"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."

- https://trendsresearch.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

"The "iron law of oligarchy" states that all forms of organization, regardless of how democratic they may be at the start, will eventually and inevitably develop oligarchic tendencies, thus making true democracy practically and theoretically impossible, especially in large groups and complex organizations."

- https://en.wikipedia.org/

Freely download "The Iron Law Of Oligarchy", by Robert Michels, here:

- https://www.academia.edu/

Free Download: Ayn Rand, “Atlas Shrugged”

"If you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world on his shoulders, if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater his effort the heavier the world bore down upon his shoulders - what would you tell him to do?"

"I... don't know. What could he do? What would you tell him?"

"To shrug."

- Ayn Rand, “Atlas Shrugged”

○

"Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard - the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money - the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law - men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims - then money becomes its creators' avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they've passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.

Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed."

An excerpt from “Atlas Shrugged,” by Ayn Rand.

Full text of “Francisco’s Money Speech” is here:

- https://www.capitalismmagazine.com/

Freely download "Atlas Shrugged", by Ayn Rand, here:

- https://antilogicalism.com/

Gregory Mannarino, "IMF Warns Of 'Debt Explosion' As The WH Celebrates The Inflation Reduction Act"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 9/14/22:

"IMF Warns Of 'Debt Explosion' 

As The WH Celebrates The Inflation Reduction Act"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

-https://www.youtube.com/

"Doug Casey on Class Warfare, "Eat the Rich" Sentiment, and What Happens Next"

"Doug Casey on Class Warfare, 

"Eat the Rich" Sentiment, and What Happens Next"

by International Man

"International Man: Politicians looking for ways to finance their extravagant spending increasingly complain that the wealthy aren't paying their "fair share." It's a trend in motion that is accelerating. This rising anti-wealth sentiment seems to be taking the US into dangerous territory. Our friend Rick Rule once said, "Eat the rich? Prepare to starve." What is your take?

Doug Casey: Once upon a time, government apologists liked to say that the rich had to be taxed in order to help the poor. That's no longer the case. Nobody in America is starving. Even poor people have flat-screen TVs, air conditioning, and refrigerators. The poor live better than medieval royalty. What's going on is the institutionalization of envy, a terrible vice. It's different from jealousy.

 Jealousy says, "You have something that I want. I want one too. Give it to me."

Envy says, "You have something that I want. If I can't have it, I'll destroy it, so you can't have it either." Envy is the moral flaw that underlies all socialist economic theories. Socialist feelings and morality underly the economic lies, race hatred, class hatred, sex antagonism, and political polarization tearing the US and the West apart. Envy and socialism have become secular religions. The country has been divided into two different and mutually antagonistic worldviews.

It's a question of what's right and wrong, what's good and evil. It's not a question of economics, about what's more productive. This is a much more serious division. It amounts to a religious war between the Left, who want to overthrow and transform society, and the Right, who want to more-or-less maintain traditional values, but lack any real ideology.

The Left is proposing all manner of outrageous, destructive, and genuinely stupid ideas. Free stuff for everybody. Not just food, shelter, schooling, and medical care provided at the expense of producers - which they've basically achieved. But now a guaranteed annual income. Everybody is supposed to get a thousand dollars a month, according to the silly twit and wannabe US president Andrew Yang. They won't have to do anything, just exist, presumably hanging out at Starbucks playing with their iPhones all day. They'll genuinely be what Yuval Noah Harari, the World Economic Forum's mincing court intellectual, has called a permanent class of useless eaters.

At some point, however, people who work, create, produce, and believe in traditional values will react. Maybe they'll explode in a violent counter-revolution. Maybe they'll quietly go on strike, as did Ayn Rand's heroes in "Atlas Shrugged." Or maybe they'll roll over and be transformed into serfs - which is what The elite would prefer and expect. But something wicked this way comes.

International Man: What do you make of the hiring of 87,000 new IRS agents in the context of this trend?

Doug Casey: Those people aren't being recruited just to collect taxes, although that's absolutely one of the things that they will do. They will amount to a national police force, one that has a different mandate than the FBI, the ATF, the DEA, or other Praetorian agencies. The tax authorities have a right to look at any economic activity everywhere and anywhere.

As a moral issue, they'll try to turn nonpayment of tax on the part of producers into a crime against society. I shudder to think of the type of amoral creatures being recruited - at fat salaries and with immense powers - to investigate the lives of their countrymen. They'll be exactly analogous to Germany's Gestapo or Stasi.

These new IRS agents will have little to do with the poor. The poor are increasingly irrelevant, except for their votes. As it's been throughout history, the uneducated lower classes basically do hand-to-mouth labor. They're mainly interested in bread and circuses, and that's what they'll get. Their numbers are growing in this country for the first time.

The new IRS agents won't have much to do with the elite either; they can afford tax lawyers and accountants to fend them off. They'll take a few casualties for show and the sake of "fairness," but the elite are the main beneficiaries of the hundreds of billions of dollars that the government is pouring on society. This is all going to be paid for by the middle class, the people who actually produce and save.

These new IRS agents are a direct attack on the middle class. The elite hate the middle class and what they stand for - independence, stability, and traditional values. The fact that they're doubling the size of the tax police is truly extraordinary. As the economy continues to decline, you can expect class warfare - along with race and sex warfare - to increase.

As I explained last week, this is an important part of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). Hundreds of billions of dollars that the government will spend through their Inflation Reduction Act will be financed - intentionally - by the creation of new dollars.

The reason why they say it's "inflation reduction" is because the same number of dollars will theoretically be taken out of society through taxes. The new dollars will be placed with the people and companies the government likes. They say it won't be inflationary because the same number of dollars will be taken out of the economy from people and companies that they don't approve of. So, theoretically, the net number of dollars in society will stay the same, and the general price level will stay the same because the money supply will stay the same.

That's their economic argument. But the moral argument is far more important. MMT allocates hundreds of billions to those the Left approves of and will take that much away from the middle class through taxes. It's diabolically clever. As I said, this amounts to a religious war because the people behind MMT are actually evil.

Unfortunately, "evil" is a word which has been discredited; people no longer take it seriously. It's been overused by emotional and often corrupt Bible thumpers, hell, and brimstone preachers. But evil really does exist. Evil is the intentional act of destroying something good.

International Man: With financial markets falling and the US dollar's purchasing power plummeting, many people are feeling poorer and are looking for someone to blame. What is your view on this dynamic and how it could affect the political situation?

Doug Casey: The speech Biden gave on September 1 was intended to be shocking and disturbing. It mimicked a scene out of V for Vendetta or 1984. They went out of their way to have Biden deliver it in Philadelphia, where the US was founded, and use red lighting against a dark background to fan emotions. These people are serious. Biden's words were full of hate and venom, calling out half the country as the enemy - the speech was unprecedented. It was a warning and an overt threat.

Look at the scene. The red background was over the top. Placing a couple of Marines in the background said, "I have power, and I'll use it against the enemy." Theatrics such as these are unprecedented. It amounted to a declaration of civil war. It was followed up by the outrageous raid on Trump's home and the FBI perp-walking about 50 of his prominent supporters, with dawn raids, in subsequent days.

These people truly want to overturn society. They're actually a reincarnation of the Jacobins and could turn out to be just as violent and dangerous. They're working to create an active environment of class warfare in the US. They've succeeded in fomenting race hatred, where people identify not as human beings but as people of color and anti-white. And sex warfare, wherein people are no longer either men or women - albeit a few with aberrations of varying degree - but as one or more of 50 or 60 genders.

These people hate the middle class, with their traditional cultural and religious values. This is why Trump is so popular and why they identify with him. It's not because many of his ideas are particularly good; he's essentially a populist with no philosophical center.

The elite and wannabe elitists hate Trump because he's a cultural traditionalist. These people want to overthrow traditional culture itself and eliminate the middle class. In the ideal world of the WEF types, the vast majority of people, the deplorables, would be serfs and the kulaks serving the nomenklatura ruling on the top, assisted by their apparatchiki.

I know it sounds outrageous, but that's what's on their minds. We've seen this before in history when Leftist intellectuals get control of real power, the apparatus of the State. They truly want to overturn the very basis of civilization. The Jacobins in revolutionary France, the Bolsheviks in Russia, the Nazis in Germany, the Maoists during China's Great Cultural Revolution, and the Pol Pot regime in Cambodia. It can happen anywhere when conditions are right. It seems to be happening now in the US and other Western countries. Let's hope it blows over. But don't plan your life around that…

International Man: Historically, the size and power of the middle class made the US different from other countries. But now, the US middle class is shrinking and feeling squeezed. Where is this trend going, and what can the average middle-class person do about it?

Doug Casey: What was the average man supposed to do when the Jacobins brought out the guillotines in France in 1793? What should the average middle-class person have done in Russia in 1917? What should the average middle-class person have done in Germany in 1933? There's not much you can do when actual forces of evil are in control. There's very little that you can do except get out of Dodge.

Here in the US, we still have a large middle class. Many are fat, dumb, indoctrinated, or addicted to Prozac and Zoloft. But millions of others are, to coin a phrase, mad as hell and aren't going to take it anymore. The things we've been talking about could turn into a genuine civil war.

The recent global hysteria has inflicted a debilitating blow to an already fragile financial situation. It will soon cause significant economic, political, and social problems.What to do? Diversify your political jurisdictions. Don't roll over like a whipped dog; speak up, and resist. Maintain your ethics. Insulate yourself as best you can from evil and stupidity."

- internationalman.com

Bill Bonner, "The Ultimate Negative Feedback Loop"

"The Ultimate Negative Feedback Loop"

When "transitory" inflation just won't quit, 

what's a Fed Head to do?

by Bill Bonner

"Inflation represents the ultimate negative feedback loop."

~ Milton Friedman

Youghal, Ireland - "The best war is the one you don’t fight. And the best inflation is the kind you never have. Yesterday’s 8.3% inflation print (which is how they describe it in the financial press) disappointed investors. They had their hearts set on a lower print. Because then, they reasoned, the Fed could go back to doing what it does best: inflating the economy.

Bloomberg: "Inflation Surprise Puts Onus on Fed to Hit Brakes Even Harder." "What started as a pandemic-driven supply shock has morphed into widespread inflation rooted just as much in resilient demand, underscored by unexpectedly high numbers that dashed hopes price gains were ebbing." We all need editors – at Bloomberg as well as everywhere else. What the writer was trying to say was that inflation may have begun as a pandemic-driven supply shock. But now, consumers keep buying and prices keep going up.

2+2 = ? Investors put 2 and 2 together. The Fed will be forced, they realized, to stick with its program of rate hikes. CNBC: "Dow tumbles 1,200 points for worst day since June 2020 after hot inflation report." "The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 1,276.37 points, or 3.94%, to close at 31,104.97. The S&P 500 dropped 4.32% to 3,932.69, and the Nasdaq Composite sank 5.16% to end the day at 11,633.57."

But so far, the pain is limited. Stocks down, but not catastrophically. There are few bankruptcies. Mortgage rates are still below 6%. And as far as we know, only one corporate CFO has committed suicide. Business Insider: "The Bed Bath & Beyond CFO fell from the 18th floor on Friday, the NYPD confirmed to Insider."

The Fed is expected to raise its key rate by 75 basis points (0.75%) at its meeting next week, putting more pressure on debtors. Some people are urging the Fed to go easy, fearing – correctly – that they might drive the economy into a deeper recession. Others take the contrary view, also correct, that inflation is a bigger danger than recession and that the Fed will have to make the latter worse in order to stop the former. Bloomberg: "Jeffrey Gundlach of DoubleLine Capital is worried the Fed will choke off economic growth by raising interest rates too fast. Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers is among those saying the central bank needs to hike even faster to restore its credibility."

What to do? When our phone didn’t ring yesterday, we knew who wasn’t calling; Jerome Powell didn’t want our advice. But had we been asked, we would have given it to him straight: “Jay, buddy, you and your bunch of hopeless clowns created this mess. You dropped interest rates way too low and left them there for way too long. But you should never have been interfering with the credit markets in the first place…Jay… Jay… are you still there? Jay? The SOB hung up on me!”

Pobre Jay: The press this morning is showing photos of Jerome Powell. The poor man is under pressure. He thinks the current inflation is demand-driven. If he is to stop it, he will have to suppress demand by raising interest rates and sticking with his QT (quantitative tightening, in which the Fed shrinks its bond holdings).

He knows, too, that he is way behind the inflation curve. He was hoping that inflation would come down fast, so he could raise rates more gently. He might expect, for example, that inflation would fall to 4%... so that he could slide his rates up to 6% – and all would be hunky dory again. But inflation isn’t cooperating. It’s not dropping as fast as he had hoped. Normally, the Fed lends at positive rates (about 2% above inflation). To do so today would mean a Fed Funds rate over 10%. But the US has a pile of debt $90 trillion high. And every increase in interest rates shakes the ground on which it stands. It is only a matter of time until it falls over. The best debt crisis is the one you never have to face. Jerome Powell may not be so lucky."

- bonnerprivateresearch@substack.com

The Daily "Near You?"

McAllister, Montana, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"They Have Been Destroying Our Culture For Decades, And We Can See It Degenerating Right In Front Of Our Eyes"

"They Have Been Destroying Our Culture For Decades, 

And We Can See It Degenerating Right In Front Of Our Eyes"

by Michael Snyder

"Our culture has been completely and utterly turned upside down. If Americans from 1776 could visit us today, they would be absolutely horrified. Everything that they considered to be good is now considered to be evil, and everything that they considered to be evil is now considered to be good. We may pay lip service to the Constitution that they gave us, but the truth is that we have completely rejected all of the values that were the bedrock of their society. As a result, our culture is rapidly degenerating and we can see evidence of this all around us.

Have you ever heard a politician say that “America is great because America is good”? At one time, that was actually true. But now our country has been taken over by people that are unashamedly evil. They control the education of our children, they control most of our news and entertainment, they run most of our large corporations, and they occupy most of the major positions of power in our largest cities. Sadly, they also completely dominate the halls of power in Washington. Over time, the American people allowed them to creep their way in, and now they are “the elite”. And they are literally destroying our culture.

Traditional American values have been banished to the remote fringes of our society, and they have been replaced by values that represent the exact opposite of what our society once believed. At this point, the elite have become so bold that they want to begin sexual indoctrination in kindergarten, they are attempting to normalize some of the most extreme forms of sexual deviancy imaginable, and they are pushing to set up vending machines “that will distribute drug supplies” even in very remote rural areas of the nation…

The Biden administration will be spending $3.6 million to set up vending machines in rural Kentucky that will distribute drug supplies as part of a project run by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). “Our kiosk, or KyOSK (KY Outreach Service Kiosk), will be supplied with injection equipment, naloxone, fentanyl test strips, hygiene kits, condoms, and other supplies,” according to the project. The vending machines will allow drug users to procure items like syringes without having to come into contact with health experts. In addition to drug paraphernalia, the kiosks will also distribute “food kits, water, socks and gloves, feminine hygiene products, wound care, and resources/guides,” the National Institute on Drug Abuse told the Free Beacon:

"In our schools, reading, writing and arithmetic have been replaced by sex, drugs and political correctness. When many of our impressionable young kids finally become adults, they behave like wild animals because they have absolutely no moral foundation."

Over the weekend, there were brawls in stadiums all over the country as the NFL kicked off a new season. And if you visit your favorite local restaurant, there is also a chance that you might find yourself in the middle of a mass brawl…

A mass brawl broke out at the Mi Sueño restaurant in Providence, R.I. on Sunday. pic.twitter.com/VBjWCZsmZp

- Andy Ngô 🏳️‍🌈 (@MrAndyNgo) September 13, 2022

These days, the police often don’t even respond to such incidents because they are not deemed serious enough. But if you actually behead someone, that will be enough to get their attention…"A Northern California mother of two who was beheaded with a sword last week has been identified and the father of one of her children has been accused of committing the brutal murder. The family of 27-year-old Karina Castro has confirmed that she was beheaded on the street outside her home in broad daylight on Thursday by a man with a sword, KGO-TV reported. The man who police say killed her is 33-year-old Jose Raphael Solano Landaeta, the father of Castro’s 1-year-old daughter."

Could you picture something like that happening on American streets in 1776? Of course not. But these days even our wealthiest cities have been transformed into crime-ridden, drug infested hellholes. For example, just consider what has happened to San Francisco… The city is now famous for its depravity and decline. With multiple “poop tracking” apps to help residents avoid stepping in human fecal matter piled on the sidewalks as well as entire neighborhoods and street corners overrun with homeless people and Fentanyl addicts, it’s very hard for the city to play itself off as a destination of dreams (though they still try). Much like LA and the city of Portland, wherever the political left takes full control these are the kinds of unfortunate scenes you are likely to witness on a regular basis in San Francisco:

Full screen recommended.

Recent estimates project at least 20,000 homeless will reside in the city in 2022, and poverty levels will remain around 11.3% of the population. Previous homeless estimates date back to 2019, and surveys were skipped in 2020 due to the covid lockdowns. The Bay Area’s crime rates are FAR above the national average according to FBI stats, with property crime more than double that of the rest of the US.

Everywhere you look, the thin veneer of civilization that we all rely upon on a daily basis is disappearing. Our once civilized society has been replaced by one that is absolutely teeming with predators, addicts, perverts and serial criminals of various types. Sadly, the sentence above even describes the man currently residing in the White House and his family.

In such an environment, it is difficult for anyone to feel truly safe. When I came across the following story about the murder of a notorious rapper, I thought that it really summed up where we are as a society today…"Rapper PnB Rock posted a video to his Instagram showing off diamond chains just before being shot and killed in a robbery at a chicken eatery in Los Angeles after his girlfriend gave away their location by tagging it in a post.

The rapper, 30, was shot to death around 1 p.m. on Monday at a Roscoe’s Chicken & Waffles in south Los Angeles, police said, days after revealing he’d been the target of several recent failed robbery attempts. In the video posted to his Stories on his since-deleted Instagram, Rock is seen wearing a Louis Vuitton sweatshirt with massive diamond chains around his neck as he raps into the camera while driving around with his influencer girlfriend Stephanie Sibounheuang just before the fatal shooting."

In the days ahead, it won’t matter which side you are on. Everyone will be a target. Things didn’t have to turn out this way. If we would have clung to the values of our forefathers, our nation would be a far different place today. But instead we have consistently chosen wicked leaders that have put us on a course that leads to national suicide, and only a very small portion of the population is loudly objecting to this. If you love this country, what has happened to us should deeply, deeply sadden you. The elite thought that they were setting up their version of a “utopia”, but instead what they have given us is an endless nightmare."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

"How Will Inflation Madness Affect the Markets?"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly 9/14/22:

"How Will Inflation Madness Affect the Markets?"

"Today I’m at the Waldorf Astoria in Laguna Niguel, California. I was lucky enough to run into Bob Kudla of Trade Genius Academy. We cover so much in regards to inflation, banking and Bob shares his expertise on the market."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Reflect On What Happens..."

"Reflect on what happens when a terrible winter blizzard strikes. You hear the weather warning but probably fail to act on it. The sky darkens. Then the storm hits with full fury, and the air is a howling whiteness. One by one, your links to the machine age breakdown. Electricity flickers out, cutting off the TV. Batteries fade, cutting off the radio. Phones go dead. Roads become impassible, and cars get stuck. Food supplies dwindle. Day to day vestiges of modern civilization - bank machines, mutual funds, mass retailers, computers, satellites, airplanes, governments - all recede into irrelevance. Picture yourself and your loved ones in the midst of a howling blizzard that lasts several years. Think about what you would need, who could help you, and why your fate might matter to anybody other than yourself. That is how to plan for a secular winter. Don't think you can escape the Fourth Turning. History warns that a Crisis will reshape the basic social and economic environment that you now take for granted."

  - Strauss and Howe, "The Fourth Turning"