"Supply Chain Collapse Will Make Americans Panic As Extensive Shortages Emerge"

Full screen recommended.

"Supply Chain Collapse Will Make Americans

Panic As Extensive Shortages Emerge"

by Epic Economist

"Supply chains remain chaotic, volatile, and unpredictable. The maritime and logistics industry has been in a continuous loop of problems, and now U.S. ports are dealing with a massive flood of empty containers as land capacity issues persist. Companies fear that the renewed congestion will be translated into extensive product shortages on Thanksgiving, Halloween, and Christmas. Meanwhile, consumers are set to face some serious sticker shock given that a new series of disruptions are adding to inflationary pressures all around the globe.

Global supply chains are set for further disruption as hundreds of thousands of workers around the world demand better pay in face of soaring inflation. Many countries are currently seeing slower port operations as labor standoffs continue, including Germany and the U.S. More recently, transport unions in the UK organized a strike that led to the temporary closure of the nation’s biggest port.  “Even minor interruptions to port operations can have a major impact on container line network efficiency and cause a domino effect up and down supply chains,” explained Christian Roeloffs, CEO & Co-founder of Container xChange. The strike will also impact U.S. companies and industries that export to the U.K. In August 2021, a total of $66.7 million in US exports were processed in the Port of Felixstowe.

At the same time, in the U.S., land capacity problems are creating port and terminal congestion, a lack of railcars, and the unavailability of truckers and chassis, impacting all trade participants. A massive backlog of empty containers is slowing the processing of new imports arriving at ports every day, spreading fresh fears among exporters and importers over whether the huge volume of cargo will be delivered on time. “Further delays to move cargo could mean shipments don’t arrive by Christmas,” according to cargo brokers and shipping executives.

FMC Chairman Daniel Maffei said that the excessive amount of empty containers and the need for them to be removed are a chief cause of the current congestion woes. “When ocean carriers continue to bring thousands of containers per month to a port and only pick up a fraction of that number, it creates an untenable situation for terminals, importers and exporters, trucking companies, and the port itself,” Maffei said in a statement. Robert Lewis-Manning, the president of the Chamber of Shipping, compared the shipping containers to Lego bricks. "They're piled up and there's just no more place to put them,” he emphasized.

The situation is creating a nightmare scenario for several U.S. industries, but things have been particularly dire in the nation’s auto industry, with parts shortages stalling production amid increased demand.  On Friday, Renault’s CEO said that there will be no sudden let-up in the supply chain shortages that have been plaguing the autos industry, which has been facing an “emergency period” due to the ongoing semiconductor shortage.

U.S. consumers are also set to face more challenges. Ultimately the longer wait times, and delays will result in extra costs that will be passed along to consumers, at a time Americans are coping with rising costs for housing, energy, and more. The latest Consumer Pulse Survey found that consumer confidence has plummeted to a new low, with one third of Americans saying that they are feeling pessimistic and that we may be headed toward one of the worst recessions we’ve ever seen. Conditions will continue to deteriorate as we approach the busy holiday season, impacting millions of businesses and consumers in the U.S. and all across the globe. The supply chain chaos has only just begun, and we will be extremely lucky if another collapse doesn’t occur before year’s end." 

- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

"Another Massive Bailout Today As You Go Broke; Economic Disaster Has Begun; Credit Scores Collapse"

Jeremiah Babe, 8/24/22:

"Another Massive Bailout Today As You Go Broke; 

Economic Disaster Has Begun; Credit Scores Collapse"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: Deuter, "Endless Horizon"

Full screen recommended.

Deuter, "Endless Horizon"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"How did galaxies form in the early universe? To help find out, astronomers surveyed a patch of dark night sky with the Very Large Telescope array in Chile to find and count galaxies that formed when our universe was very young. Analysis of the distribution of some distant galaxies (redshifts near 2.5) found an enormous conglomeration of galaxies that spanned 300 million light years and contained about 5,000 times the mass of our Milky Way Galaxy. Dubbed Hyperion, it is currently the largest and most massive proto-supercluster yet discovered in the early universe.

A proto-supercluster is a group of young galaxies that is gravitationally collapsing to create a supercluster, which itself a group of several galaxy clusters, which itself is a group of hundreds of galaxies, which itself is a group of billions of stars. In the featured visualization, massive galaxies are depicted in white, while regions containing a large amount of smaller galaxies are shaded blue. Identifying and understanding such large groups of early galaxies contributes to humanity's understanding of the composition and evolution of the universe as a whole."

- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap181023.html

"It Is Only When..."

"Happily men don't realize how stupid they are, or half the world would commit suicide. Knowledge is a will-of-the-wisp, fluttering ever out of the traveller's reach; and a weary journey must be endured before it is even seen. It is only when a man knows a good deal that he discovers how unfathomable is his ignorance. The man who knows nothing is satisfied that there is nothing to know, consequently that he knows everything; and you may more easily persuade him that the moon is made of green cheese than that he is not omniscient."

- W. Somerset Maugham

○

“It takes considerable knowledge just to

realize the extent of your own ignorance.”

- Thomas Sowell

"Mass Layoffs Are BOOMING! A New Housing Market Crash Is Starting To Pick Up Speed As Well"

Full screen recommended.

"Mass Layoffs Are BOOMING! A New Housing 

Market Crash Is Starting To Pick Up Speed As Well"

by Financial Argument

"A new housing market crash is occurring as massive corporate layoffs have hit record levels in recent months. It was already clear that the US retail industry was in a recession for a long time. Walmart’s layoffs and announcement that it has cut its annual profit targets actually confirm this. Apart from that, a lot of data confirms that American citizens are now spending less. Americans, three-quarters of whom live paycheck to paycheck, have little to do in the face of rising inflation and economic decline.

The layoff waves began with tech layoffs and are now about to become a tsunami that will afflict millions of Americans, spreading across nearly all industries. My experience with the causes of financial crises tells me that the basic start of foreclosures that lead to housing market crashes is when people lose their income, and we are in this scary process right now.

Moreover, these are white-collar workers and their salaries are higher. These are the people who buy stock and buy houses. But many of them are people who will soon be unable to pay their bills. And there are many more things that will trigger the housing market crash. This bubble in size has never been seen before in the history of the world, is about to burst and it will be very painful."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

○

Related:

“Tsunami Of Shutoffs: 

20 Million US Homes Are Behind On Power Bills"

Excerpt: "At least 20 million households -- or about 1 in 6 American homes -- are behind on their power bills as soaring electricity prices spark what is said to be the worst-ever crisis in late utility payments, according to Bloomberg, citing data from the National Energy Assistance Directors Association (Neada)."

Full article here:

- https://globalintelhub.com

The Poet: Kahlil Gibran, “A Poet’s Voice XV, Part Four”

“A Poet’s Voice XV, Part Four”

by Kahlil Gibran

“You are my brother, but why are you quarreling with me? Why do you invade my country and try to subjugate me for the sake of pleasing those who are seeking glory and authority? Why do you leave your wife and children and follow Death to the distant land for the sake of those who buy glory with your blood, and high honor with your mother’s tears?

Is it an honor for a man to kill his brother man? If you deem it an honor, let it be an act of worship, and erect a temple to Cain who slew his brother Abel. Is self-preservation the first law of Nature? Why, then, does Greed urge you to self-sacrifice in order only to achieve his aim in hurting your brothers? Beware, my brother, of the leader who says, “Love of existence obliges us to deprive the people of their rights!” I say unto you but this: protecting others’ rights is the noblest and most beautiful human act; if my existence requires that I kill others, then death is more honorable to me, and if I cannot find someone to kill me for the protection of my honor, I will not hesitate to take my life by my own hands for the sake of Eternity before Eternity comes.

Selfishness, my brother, is the cause of blind superiority, and superiority creates clanship, and clanship creates authority which leads to discord and subjugation.

The soul believes in the power of knowledge and justice over dark ignorance; it denies the authority that supplies the swords to defend and strengthen ignorance and oppression– that authority which destroyed Babylon and shook the foundation of Jerusalem and left Rome in ruins. It is that which made people call criminals great mean; made writers respect their names; made historians relate the stories of their inhumanity in manner of praise. The only authority I obey is the knowledge of guarding and acquiescing in the Natural Law of Justice.

What justice does authority display when it kills the killer? When it imprisons the robber? When it descends on a neighborhood country and slays its people? What does justice think of the authority under which a killer punishes the one who kills, and a thief sentences the one who steals?

You are my brother, and I love you; and Love is justice with its full intensity and dignity. If justice did not support my love for you, regardless of your tribe and community, I would be a deceiver concealing the ugliness of selfishness behind the outer garment of pure love.”

- http://www.poemhunter.com

"The Madman"

"The Madman"

by Kahlil Gibran

"It was in the garden of a madhouse that I met a youth with a face pale and lovely and full of wonder. And I sat beside him upon the bench, and I said, “Why are you here?” And he looked at me in astonishment, and he said, “It is an unseemly question, yet I will answer you. My father would make of me a reproduction of himself; so also would my uncle. My mother would have me the image of her seafaring husband as the perfect example for me to follow. My brother thinks I should be like him, a fine athlete. And my teachers also, the doctor of philosophy, and the music-master, and the logician, they too were determined, and each would have me but a reflection of his own face in a mirror. Therefore I came to this place. I find it more sane here. At least, I can be myself.” Then of a sudden he turned to me and he said, “But tell me, were you also driven to this place by education and good counsel?”

And I answered, “No, I am a visitor.”

And he answered, “Oh, you are one of those who live in the madhouse on the other side of the wall...”

The Daily "Near You?"

La Crosse, Wisconsin, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"The Point..."

"What is the point? We assume that every time we do anything we know what the consequences will be, i.e., more or less what we intend them to be. This is not only not always correct. It is wildly, crazily, stupidly, cross-eyed-blithering-insectly wrong!"

- Douglas Adams, “The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide”

"Our Economy is a Crime in Progress"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly, 8/24/22:

"Our Economy is a Crime in Progress"

"You can ignore everything, but things are getting bleak. There is so much happening between the real estate market, inflation and retail crime that it’s destroying entire cities already. People need to prepare themselves for what is about to happen."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Bill Bonner, "Termites in the Woodwork"

"Termites in the Woodwork"

The Feds created another housing crisis. 

Now the cracks are beginning to appear...

by Bill Bonner

Poitou, France - "Bloomberg: 'Home Sellers Are Slashing Prices in Pandemic Boomtowns.' "Redfin found that 70% of homes for sale in Boise, Idaho, had their price cut in July, the highest share of 97 metros." The American middle class stores its wealth in its houses. But now termites have gotten into the woodwork. In July, new house sales hit a 6-year low. Existing house sales are down 20% from last year. And the median sales price has already dropped 5% since last year.

The housing market is slower to register changes than the stock market. It takes time to match up buyers with sellers and for trends to express themselves. Already, the supply of houses for sale has risen to almost 11 months’ worth of inventory. That is the highest level since 2009. This suggests that house prices will fall a lot more before they find their bottom. And America’s middle class will be poorer.

But wait. Really? So what if prices go down? A house is still a house… with the same sagging gutters… the same cracking paint… and the same leaky faucets. What has changed? Today, let us ramble around in monetary wonderment; maybe we’ll see something useful.

Supply and Command: The Fed caused the mortgage finance crisis – 2007-2009 – by leaving interest rates too low for too long. In response, central banks lowered interest rates still further… and left them there for even longer. Naturally, asset prices soared again – including house prices. The median house sold for $220,000 in 2009. Now, it is about $440,000 – twice as much.

An asset is a claim on money. And money is a claim on the output of others. If you own a stock of the Ford Motor Company, for example, the stock itself is of no use to you. It is only because you can convert it to money that it has any value. And the money only has value because it can be exchanged for goods and services.

When the Fed poured 4 trillion of new money into the asset markets (by buying bonds) after 2009, it multiplied prices for Dow stocks by 5 times… giving stockholders 5 times as much buying power (demand). But the Ford assembly lines didn’t produce 5 times as many cars and trucks. GDP only rose by 60%, not 400% (5X). The stockholder could buy more cars, houses, or Chinese-made gadgets; he had 5 times as much money. The poor assembly-line worker did not.

This left an imbalance – and an inherent unfairness – that had to be corrected. Sometime… somehow… the books must balance out. For every credit there must be a debit… every buyer must find a seller… and for every naif with $5 in his pocket, there must be some shyster ready to take it from him. And then came the Covid shutdowns, supply chain disruptions, mass resignations, and the Ukrainian-Russo war to make the supply situation worse.

More and Less Valuable: So, near the end of 2021, consumer prices were on the rise. ‘Inflation’ was in the news… and the Fed vowed to do something about it. But the markets were already doing something, matching up supply and demand, by raising consumer prices and lowering asset prices. In the first half of 2022, investors suffered some of their worst losses ever. And consumer price inflation hit levels not seen in the last 4 decades. That is where we are now. Like a half-wit defusing a bomb… the Fed is hoping to bring things back somewhere close to ‘normal.’ Without blowing up the whole economy.

The Fed is raising rates. This has the effect of driving up mortgage rates… and lending rates generally, with the 10-year Treasury yield back over 3%. This is why the dollar hit parity with the euro yesterday; between a 3% yield in dollars or zero in euros, the choice was easy. Investors moved their money to dollars… and the dollar rose. And it’s why house prices are now in decline; as mortgage rates rise, prices must fall.

So, where are we? The dollar is becoming more valuable… and less valuable at the same time. Stocks are going up and down; direction, uncertain. Consumer prices are going up at an 8.5% rate per year… with several countertrends. Interest rates are going up. And the economy is in recession. But the Fed has barely begun a serious ‘tightening cycle.’ At 2.5%, its key lending rate is way below the CPI (consumer price index). And the Fed’s balance sheet is still expanding, albeit very slowly. Yes, the Fed is tightening… and not quite tightening too. What to make of it? Stay tuned…"

"Joel’s Note: Did you happen to catch Dan Denning’s update to Bonner Private Research members last Friday? It dovetails nicely with Bill’s observations above. Here, a choice snippet…"The Fed has bought over $1.3 trillion in mortgage-backed securities (MBS) since the beginning of the pandemic. It currently holds $2.7 trillion worth - or about 31% of all the assets on its balance sheet. The balance sheet has actually grown by 1% this year, despite promises of Quantitative Tightening. And that’s after growing 19% in 2021 and 77% in 2020!

I’m only pointing this out to remind you this is the greatest monetary experiment in American history. And one of its worst and most predictable consequences is going to be another bursting housing bubble. That will reduce the net worth and real wealth of millions of Americans at exactly the worst time - when inflation is high and growth is low. Here, take a look at this chart:

Source: US Federal Reserve

By pumping up another housing bubble, the Fed has driven up rents all across the country. The chart above shows rents rising nationally at 6.3%, according to Fed data. Zillow’s Observed Rent Index says rents were up 12.4% in June, year-over-year. Remember, shelter (including rent) is 33% of the CPI calculation.

The median monthly rent is over $2,000, according to CoreLogic. That data comes from major urban areas like Austin, Miami, and Las Vegas, where rents average $2,074/month, $2,488 month, and $2,110/month, respectively. Worse, price-to-rent and price-to-income ratios are higher now in many parts of the country than they were in 2008.

It’s setting up for an absolute catastrophe. Now you know why ‘Inflate or Die’ is our explanation of the Fed’s dilemma. It needs to get consumer price inflation down - to prevent more social instability in America. But the only way it can do that is by hiking interest rates up so much that it will crash asset prices (as is already evidence in the housing market).

They are trapped in a plan of their own incompetent design. Unless, that is, you believe this is a part of a Controlled Demolition of the American middle class. Cold, hungry, and poor people are much easier to control. If you’re rich, powerful, and psychopathic or totalitarian, then maybe everything is proceeding to plan."

- bonnerprivateresearch@substack.com

Gregory Mannarino, "Bank Of America Warns; Global Bond Yields Continue To Rise - Debt Market Is Unstable"

 Gregory Mannarino, AM 8/24/22:

"Bank Of America Warns; Global Bond Yields 

Continue To Rise - Debt Market Is Unstable"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

Related:

"Housing Bubble 2.0 is Bursting, And The Resultant Financial 

Crash is Going to Make 2008 Look Like a Walk in The Park"

"How It Really Is"

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

Full screen recommended.

Adventures with Danno, 8/24/22:

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

"In today's vlog we are at Aldi, 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/

○

Related:

Poplar Preparedness, 8/24/22:

"Food Shortage News World Update; Empty Shelves 2022"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

"I Was As Afraid As The Next Man..."

"I was as afraid as the next man in my time and maybe more so. But with the years, fear had come to be regarded as a form of stupidity to be classed with overdrafts, acquiring a venereal disease or eating candies. Fear is a child's vice and while I loved to feel it approach, as one does with any vice, it was not for grown men, and the only thing to be afraid of was the presence of true and imminent danger in a form that you should be aware of and not be a fool if you were responsible for others."

- Ernest Hemingway, "True at First Light"

"Into the Black Hole"

"Into the Black Hole"

by Jim Rickards

"The war in Ukraine has been dragging on for six months with no end in sight. Russia is slowly and systematically advancing, while the Ukrainian military is being ground down in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. On balance, Russia is winning the war, although progress is slow.

Russia will next likely move to take Odesa, a strategically key Black Sea port. Russia has staged missile attacks on Odesa in recent days. If Russia ultimately takes Odesa, it removes Ukraine’s access to the sea, effectively rendering it completely landlocked. But there don’t appear to be any plans for an imminent Russian attack on Odesa. At any rate, a negotiated peace settlement is nowhere in sight. Neither side will accept the other’s demands.

Meanwhile, a car bomb killed the daughter of “Putin’s brain” this past weekend near Moscow. Alexander Dugin is an ardent Russian nationalist whose thinking is said to have influenced Putin. His daughter was killed in the blast, although many suspect he was the intended target. Russia blames Ukraine for the attack, which Ukraine denies. How Russia responds remains to be seen.

What’s the Endgame? As the war drags on with no end in sight, there’s also no end in sight to the flow of U.S. aid to Ukraine. It’s an open-ended commitment with no clearly defined objective. Both the Democratic and Republican parties support the spending, except for a minority who are vilified as Putin stooges and apologists.

Supporters talk about standing up for democracy, but Ukraine is a corrupt oligarchy that’s just about as corrupt as Russia. It’s far from a model democracy. But the aid’s for a good cause, they say. We’re helping defeat aggression and assisting a weaker nation stand up against a much stronger attacker. Well, that’s fine, but there’s little to no oversight to supervise the transfers. Where's the U.S. aid to Ukraine going?

The aid is being stolen off the top or diverted to corrupt officials. Goods are often stolen and resold on the black market. Weapons are also sold on the black market. In all, very limited amounts of aid are actually going to the war effort.

Massive Corruption: One Ukrainian volunteer fighting in the Donbas has said: "In Ukraine, people cheat each other even in war. I’ve watched the medical supplies donated to us being taken away. The cars that drove us to our position were stolen. And we have not been replaced with new soldiers in three months, though we should have been relieved three times by now…If I had known how much deception there was in this army, and how everything would be for us, I never would have joined. I want to go home, but if I flee, I face prison."

Here’s what a Ukrainian journalist has to say: "The corruption related to the war aid is shocking. The weapons are stolen, the humanitarian aid is stolen and we have no idea where the billions sent to this country have gone."

Of course, your tax money is paying for this swindle.

Wartime Sacrifice? Here’s an idea of where at least some of the billions have gone. Last month, the Ukrainian parliament voted to give itself a 70% pay raise, while the army is collapsing and the Ukrainian people are suffering. So much for wartime sacrifice. Moreover, Western admirers of Ukrainian president Zelenskyy have praised him as a modern Winston Churchill, defyingly resisting an evil aggressor. But Zelenskyy is no Churchill.

He’s succeeded in presenting himself as a strong wartime leader, standing up to the big, bad Putin. But in reality, he’s a corrupt oligarch with millions of dollars hidden offshore. His acting skills have enhanced his propaganda efforts, but it doesn’t take much training to see how phony he is. Innocent civilians, including women and children, are dying under his failed leadership and inability to come to terms with Putin before the invasion began.

The True U.S. Objective in Ukraine: But the same journalist who complained about the widespread corruption has figured out the real U.S. strategy in Ukraine: "It is obvious that the U.S. doesn’t want Ukraine to win the war. They only want to make Russia weak. No one will win this war, but the countries the U.S. is using like a playground will lose."

That’s exactly right. The U.S. has no vital interest in Ukraine worth going to war over. Its real aim is to weaken Russia through a protracted war in Ukraine. The longer it drags on, the better, no matter how many Ukrainians have to die in the process. In other words, the U.S. is willing to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian.

That may sound overly cynical, but it really isn’t. It’s just an objective assessment based upon the facts on the ground. But don’t take my word for it. As Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has said, “We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.”

Sanctions Are a Complete Failure: Meanwhile, the sanctions regime against Russia has proven to be a complete failure. Sanctions have had zero impact on Russian advances on the battlefield and Russian goals in Ukraine. In fact, Putin has run rings around the sanctions. Instead of the ruble collapsing, it has strengthened in the face of Western sanctions. And boycotting Russian exports of oil and natural gas was pointless because Russia just sold the same energy to China and India instead of Europe. It’s a world market, after all.

European countries like Germany are so dependent on Russian energy that they’re facing severe shortages and a bleak winter without it. Germany faces a catastrophic winter in which factories will have to be closed, homes will have to reduce heat to 50 F and hot showers may be a thing of the past. It’s all because Germany made a political decision to side with the climate alarmists and Greens despite the lack of scientific evidence supporting their claims. They became utterly dependent on Russia as a result.

When reality collides with ideology, reality wins every time. Now Germany will pay the price. Meanwhile, global food shortages and possibly famine are real possibilities this winter because Ukrainian and Russian grain won’t be delivered. The tragedy is that all of this could have been prevented had the U.S. and NATO guaranteed Russia that Ukraine would never be invited into the alliance. That’s not a defense of Putin’s invasion, by the way, which I condemn. It’s just reality. Now the world is living with the results."

- dailyreckoning.com

"People Aren't Laughing Now - Economy Is Gone; Housing Crash Has Started"

Jeremiah Babe, 8/23/22:

"People Aren't Laughing Now - 

Economy Is Gone; Housing Crash Has Started"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

"The Average US Household Pays 47%

 More For Electricity Than A Year Ago"

Yeah, all the "Oh, that could never happen here!" is gone, isn't it? 

And the smug, dismissive smirks are all gone now too, aren't they?

 Wait'll they see what's coming...

"15 Reasons Why The United States Is Going To Hell In A Handbasket"

Full screen recommended.

"15 Reasons Why The United States Is 

Going To Hell In A Handbasket"

by Epic Economist

"The United States is going to hell in a handbasket, and today we brought you 15 facts that prove so. Most people out there still don't realize that we're being controlled by a system led by people who are not interested in preserving our constitutional rights, our personal freedom, or our self-reliance. They want us divided, angry at each other, financially dependent, and constantly scared so they can rule us more easily. That's why our country is facing such a steep moral, economic, financial, and political decline.

We used to be a nation that promoted morality and the belief in God. But today, we're a country where the most perverse and ungodly acts are seen as "normal". Depravity is not only accepted but promoted and glorified. To make things worse, those who are brave enough to speak up against this growing immorality are accused of inciting hatred. Consequently, those who defend honorable values are being increasingly silenced while degenerates continue to infiltrate our society. Right now, everywhere we look we and our children get instantly bombarded with obscene images in books, magazines, movies, music, and TV. This constant flow of promiscuity has corrupted the minds of the American people and continues to expose younger generations to perversion and depravity.

A Harris poll conducted with thousands of American adults found that more and more Americans described themselves as "not very religious," and according to a Daily Mail report, titled: "Americans starting to lose faith: Belief in God and miracles declines as Darwinism becomes more popular.” Today, more people believe in the theory of evolution than in the word of God. For decades, we have been abandoning the religious principles that this nation was built on. Those beliefs have held us together and made us strong. But now, it appears that we're banning God from our country and our lives.

Social issues are being constantly inflamed by operatives of the federal government to keep our population tense, divided, and on edge. The mainstream media uses these problems to keep everyone occupied pointing fingers and fighting with each other. In that way, we don't see what's really going on in our country, our economy, and our freedom. As Creekmore brilliantly noted, "they want to keep us divided so that they can better lie to and control us." Another important aspect considered by the writer is that our society used to be filled with individuals that practiced self-reliance and personal responsibility, but times have surely changed. Today, millions of people are extremely dependent on the system and Government programs not only exclude those who are self-reliant, but frequently trap individuals and families into long-term dependence, leaving them incapable of escaping their condition for generations to come.

The truth is that no political party, government agency, or philanthropic corporation is actually making any real effort to avoid the total collapse of our democracy. In this video, we revisit an analysis published by the writer and long-time prepper, M.D. Creekmore, and we also compile a series of reasons why things are going terribly wrong in America."

- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Gerald Celente, "Support War, Support Satan"

Full screen recommended.

Strong language alert!

Gerald Celente, 8/23/22:

"Support War, Support Satan"

Comments, Chat here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: 2002, "Return to Freedom"; "Elysian Fields"

Full screen recommended.

2002, "Return to Freedom"

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Full screen recommended.

2002, "Elysian Fields"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“Riding high in the constellation of Auriga, beautiful, blue vdB 31 is the 31st object in Sidney van den Bergh's 1966 catalog of reflection nebulae. It shares this well-composed celestial still life with dark, obscuring clouds recorded in Edward E. Barnard's 1919 catalog of dark markings in the sky. All are interstellar dust clouds, blocking the light from background stars in the case of Barnard's dark nebulae. For vdB 31, the dust preferentially reflects the bluish starlight from embedded, hot, variable star AB Aurigae.

Exploring the environs of AB Aurigae with the Hubble Space Telescope has revealed the several million year young star is itself surrounded by flattened dusty disk with evidence for the ongoing formation of a planetary system. AB Aurigae is about 470 light-years away. At that distance this cosmic canvas would span about four light-years.”

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

“Some Things You Need To Know”

“Some Things You Need To Know”

by Marc Chernoff

“I know you’re reading this. And I want you to know I’m writing this for you. Others will be confused. They will think I’m writing this for them. But I’m not. This one’s for you.

I want you to know that life is not easy. Every day is an unpredictable challenge. Some days it can be difficult to simply get out of bed in the morning. To face reality and put on that smile. But I want you to know, your smile has kept me going on more days than I can count. Never forget that, even through the toughest times, you are incredible. You really are. So smile more often. You have so many reasons to. Time and again, my reason is you.

You won’t always be perfect. Neither will I. Because nobody is perfect, and nobody deserves to be perfect. Nobody has it easy, everybody has issues. You will never know exactly what I’m going through. And I will never know exactly what you’re going through. We are all fighting our own unique war. But we are fighting through it simultaneously, together.

Whenever somebody discredits you, and tells you that you can’t do something, keep in mind that they are speaking from within the boundaries of their own limitations. Ignore them. Don’t give in. In this crazy world that’s trying to make you like everyone else, find the courage to keep being your awesome self. And when they laugh at you for being different, laugh back at them for being the same.

Remember, our courage doesn’t always roar aloud. Sometimes it’s the quiet voice at the end of the day whispering, “I will try again tomorrow.” So stand strong. Things turn out best for people who make the best out of the way things turn out. And I am committed to making the best of it along with you.”

- http://www.marcandangel.com/

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The Alan Parsons Project, "Prime Time"

Amen...

Chet Raymo, "As Time Goes By"

"As Time Goes By"

by Chet Raymo

"Is time something that is defined by the ticking of a cosmic clock, God's wristwatch say? Time doesn't exist except for the current tick. The past is irretrievably gone. The future does not yet exist. Consciousness is awareness of a moment. Or is time a dimension like space? We move through time as we move through space. The past is still there; we're just not there anymore. The future exists; we'll get there. We experience time as we experience space, say, by looking out the window of a moving train. Or is time…

Physicists and philosophers have been debating these questions since the pre-Socratics. Plato. Newton. Einstein. Most recently, Lee Smolin. Without resolution. What makes the question so difficult, it seems to me, is that time is inextricably tied up with consciousness. We won't understand time until we understand consciousness, and vice versa. So far, consciousness is a mystery, in spite of books with titles like "Consciousness Explained". Will consciousness be explained? Can consciousness be explained? If so, will it require a conceptual breakthrough of revolutionary proportions? Or is the Darwinian/material paradigm enough? Are we in for an insight, or for a surprise?

As I sit here at my desk under the hill, looking out at a vast panorama of earth, sea and sky, filled, it would seem, infinitely full of detail, so full that my awareness can only skim the surface, I have that uneasy sense that it's going to be damnably difficult to extract consciousness, as a thing, from the universe in its totality. I think of that word "entanglement," from quantum theory, and I wonder to what extent consciousness is entangled, perhaps even with past and future.

Who knows? Perhaps consciousness, or what I think of as my consciousness, is just a slice of cosmic consciousness, in the same way that the present is a slice of cosmic time. As a good Ockhamist, I am loathe to needlessly multiply hypotheses. But time will tell. Or consciousness will tell. Or something.”

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

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The Alan Parsons Project, "Time"

"Making Your Best Guess"

"Making Your Best Guess"

by Arthur Silber

"We are not gods, and we are not omniscient. We cannot foretell the future with certainty. Most often, cultural and political changes are terribly complex. It can be notoriously difficult to predict exactly where a trend will take us, and we can be mistaken. We do the best we can: if we wish to address certain issues seriously, we study history, and we read everything that might shed light on our concerns. We consult what the best thinkers of our time and of earlier times have said and written. We challenge everyone's assumptions, including most especially our own. That last is often very difficult. If we care enough, we do our best to disprove our own case. In that way, we find out how strong our case is, and where its weaknesses may lie.

Barring extraordinary circumstances, we cannot be certain that a particular development represents a critical turning point at the time it occurs. If we dare to say, "This is the moment the battle was lost," only future events will prove whether we were correct. We do the best we can, based on our understanding of how similar events have unfolded in the past, and in light of our understanding of the underlying principles in play. We can be wrong."

- http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/

Must View! Gregory Mannarino, "Economic Collapse! Just When You Thought It Can't Possibly Get Worse... It Does"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 8/23/22:

"Economic Collapse! Just When You Thought 

It Can't Possibly Get Worse... It Does"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"I Cannot Believe..."

"I cannot believe that the purpose of life is to be “happy.” I think

the purpose of life is to be useful, to be responsible, to be compassionate.

It is, above all, to matter and to count, to stand for something,

to have made some difference that you lived at all.”

- Leo C. Rosten

Greg Hunter, "World in the Process of Bankrupting"

"World in the Process of Bankrupting"

By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com 

"Precious metals expert and financial writer Bill Holter says, “nothing is getting better” and points out the proof is everywhere that we are clearly headed for a financial calamity, the likes of which we have never seen before. Holter, who is also a precious metals broker, is seeing a big pick-up in business because big money is looking for a place to hide in the physical world. Holter explains, “We are getting more orders and larger orders. I think this is natural because I think people know something is wrong, and when something is wrong, you want to get defensive. I think people are finally making the connection the world is in the process of bankrupting, and you want your capital in something that cannot bankrupt. By definition, that is gold and silver.”

Holter says evil is trying to take over everywhere. Holter contends, “The consensus is the fact that we have a 2nd Amendment and we still have guns here is the only reason they have not snapped the trap shut yet. The United States is ‘the last bastion.’ Just look at Australia. Look at New Zealand. Look at Canada. Look at Britain. Can you have guns there? No, they have taken them away. What did they do? They forced the population into lockdown. They forced the population to get the jab. The result is you are going to see the West vastly depopulated and degraded in the next 1, 2 or 5 years. They have total control over their population. Whereas, that is not the case yet in the U.S.”

Holter has long said when the overloaded debt system breaks, it will break “fast and ugly.” “Credit will dry up overnight,” and “The world runs on credit,” according to Holter. His math shows a dark time ahead even for the prepared. Holter explains, “All you have to do is wake up in the morning and read the news, and you know it has gotten worse than the day before. That’s day after day. I have talked about ‘Mad Max’ for several years. When I first started talking about it, I got all kinds of grief, and they called me a nut case. It is certainly looking more and more now as the likely scenario. It just goes back to the West and, including China, it is not in the West, but it too is extremely levered (or indebted). When you over-lever a financial system, you over-lever an economy. At some point, the only thing that can happen is something bad. It’s either default or hyperinflation of the currency to pay the debt back. As far as timing, I would be shocked if we make it through the end of this year and people would still consider the system normal.”

When the system does break, that’s when it turns “ugly.” Holter explains, “As far as how are things going to work when this thing goes down? My question would be is anything going to work? Will your bank be open? Will your broker be open? Will there be a store open or a restaurant or any place to buy goods? That gets back to Jim Sinclair’s ‘Get out of the System’ (GOTS). Become your own central banker. Stock up on the things you think you are going to need. Is it going to last two weeks or two years? It could last two years. One thing for sure, our life in the United States is going to be drastically changed to a lower standard of living. You are watching the breakdown in real time.” There is much more in the 41 min interview.

-https://usawatchdog.com/

Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with 

financial writer and precious metals expert Bill Holter of JSMineset.com:

- https://rumble.com/

The Daily "Near You?"

Mira Loma, California, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

Judge Napolitano, "Col. Douglas Macgregor, Reinforcing Failure in Ukraine"

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 8/23/22:

"Col. Douglas Macgregor, Reinforcing Failure in Ukraine"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

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Related, excellent:

"Will Ukraine Be Partitioned Next And, If So, How?"

"Dmitri Medvedev posted this “future map of the Ukraine after the war” on his Telegram account. This maps shows a Ukraine partitioned between her neighbors and a tiny rump Ukraine left in the center."

"50% of All Businesses are Planning Layoffs - People Are Still Wasting Money"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly, 8/23/22:

"50% of All Businesses are Planning Layoffs -

 People Are Still Wasting Money"

"Half of all businesses are planning layoffs. It makes no difference where you are out in the world. We are seeing inflation run rampant. Now in the United States we are seeing that housing is headed towards a major collapse. People are using their credit cards more than ever to get by."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

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While 30% of all small businesses say they will close permanently...

What then, Good Citizen? How will that affect you?

Must View! Gregory Mannarino, "No Accident - We Are Way Beyond A Recession! Expect A Severe Depression To Hit Hard"

Gregory Mannarino, 8/23/22:

"No Accident - We Are Way Beyond A Recession!

Expect A Severe Depression To Hit Hard"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"How It Really Is"

 

And they'd fail this, too...

"Crazy Shopping Trip To Meijer! Massive Price Increases! What's Next?"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures with Danno, 8/23/22:

"Crazy Shopping Trip To Meijer! 

Massive Price Increases! 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!"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

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Related:

Poplar Preparedness, 8/23/22:

"Crops Plowed Under; Billions in Losses; 

Food Shortages & Empty Shelves"

Comments here: 

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Record Number Of Americans Are 'Suffering', Surpassing 2008 Crisis Levels; Gallup Poll Finds"

"Record Number Of Americans Are 'Suffering', 

Surpassing 2008 Crisis Levels; Gallup Poll Finds"

by Tyler Durden

"A plethora of data points show the consumer is absolutely miserable: real wages trend lower, cost of living skyrockets, the employment market softens, savings rate collapses, credit cards maxed out, and the US economy falls into the "technical definition" of recession. Capturing the plunge in consumer sentiment (at record lows) is a new Gallup survey that reveals a record number of Americans are "suffering."

Gallup's Life Evaluation Index measures the quality of life of Americans by asking respondents if they're "thriving," "struggling," or "suffering." The survey is between 0 to 10. Those who check four or below are classified as suffering; seven or higher is thriving. The poll found that 5.6% of Americans rate their lives as "suffering," the highest since the index's inception in 2008.

The percentage of respondents classified as thriving fell to 51.2% in July from a record high of 59.2% in June 2021. The number of people thriving is at an 18-month low. The lowest reading of respondents thriving was 46.4%, which was only measured twice, the first in November 2008 and the second in the early covid months (April 2020).

For the last 16 consecutive months, consumers have been crushed by four-decade high inflation as it eats away wage gains.

Elevated suffering rates come as the $6 trillion-plus in covid stimulus funds from 2020 has cycled through the retail chain and out of people's pockets. It's gone, and the massive increase in economic activity triggered is also over. The hangover stage of the covid helicopter money period is materializing - the suffering will only worsen from here until another round of stimmy checks is seen."

It's time to exit the rat-race. This is amazing... 

Full screen recommended.

- Council Estate Socialism (@RickyDHale) August 21, 2022

- https://www.zerohedge.com/

"I Have No Words for This... Prepare NOW"

Jeremiah Babe, 8/22/22:

"I Have No Words for This... Prepare NOW"

"UK prepares its military for deployment for conflict with Russia, Russia on high nuclear alert rotating VIPs out of the cities, climate chaos EVERYWHERE, commodity shortages, markets crashing, Europe braces for civil unrest amidst energy and food inflation. China Water crisis video - China lying about temperatures! Scary drought footage:"

- https://www.youtube.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/