"The Growing Wave of Corporations Committing Suicide"

"The Growing Wave of Corporations Committing Suicide"

by International Man

"International Man: Recently, several large corporations have made self-destructive moves. A prominent example is the Bud Light marketing fiasco which saw year-over-year sales plummet 17%. As a result, Bud Light’s parent company lost nearly $5 billion in market cap around the same time. It should have been obvious that Bud Light’s marketing program featuring a trans activist wouldn’t go over well with its customers. Yet, they went ahead anyways. What is your take on this?

Doug Casey: It’s shocking that a tiny percentage of the population has such an outsize influence in all areas of life. LGBTQ+ wield power not just in academia and the media but in business and corporations.

What’s amazing is not only the tiny number of people LGB-whatever represents but the fact that many or most of them are highly neurotic. Some of them appear to be psychotic. They have severe psychological problems, yet they’re being held up as models to influence other people. The fact that the suits who run major corporations go along with the ridiculous charade proves that not only do they have extremely bad judgment, but they’re despicable cowards.

The founders of great corporations wouldn’t have put up with this bizarre nonsense. They were entrepreneurs with ethics and courage. But corporate suits are just managers who don’t want to jeopardize their gigantic salaries and huge stock options by running counter to whatever seems to be the fashionable meme of the month. Way too many top managers are beneficiaries of the Peter Principle - or just competent self-promoters.

And it’s not just the corporations; the US military has fallen into this psychological pit as well, kowtowing to these insane activists. You have to love the US Navy’s campaign to recruit gay sailors. It’s as if they’ve chucked "Anchors Aweigh "for the Village People’s "In the Navy."

It’s further proof that the country is dividing in many ways. And as I’ve referred to in the past, there’s some indication that an actual civil war is brewing in the United States.

International Man: Likewise, Fox News recently fired Tucker Carlson, its most-watched show. Not surprisingly, Fox News’ ratings have tanked since Tucker left. What do you make of this?

Doug Casey: I’ve been asking myself why they dropped him. Was it from antagonism to what he’s saying? Or was it just stupidity? Or could it have seemed like good business sense at the time since Tucker’s candor had lost all his major corporate sponsors?

Our friend David Stockman, in his recent editorial (link), points out that even though Tucker was the most watched show of its type on TV, all of his big corporate advertisers, a couple dozen of them, dropped him because he was politically incorrect. Of course, a shortsighted corporate suit could argue that even though he had giant ratings, the show itself then wasn’t directly profitable.

But as it turned out, most of Fox’s viewership was hanging on Tucker’s coattails. Why else would someone listen to the simultaneously vapid and strident Sean Hannity or the well-intentioned but painfully low-IQ Jesse Watters? Fox betrayed its core audience, making itself the media version of Bud Light.

What’s the matter with these corporations that they throw away whole demographics? Even if the lack of advertising hurt the economics of Tucker’s show, they should have realized that what amounted to a yellow-livered betrayal could destroy their whole network by antagonizing their viewers, who now want to punish them.

Maybe Tucker can’t live on My Pillow ads alone, but it seems likely he’ll get a new show, taking all Fox’s viewers with him. Unfortunately, he’s the only one on television who’s saying the things he’s saying, which is really shameful because the things that he’s saying are simply common sense - which is to say AntiWoke.

International Man: In another example of the trend, Disney has seen its sales drop after promoting cultural themes in its movies that many find distasteful. The company has also taken it upon itself to wade into divisive cultural issues. Again, it should have been obvious that these moves would not help the business. What is really going on here?

Doug Casey: It’s not just Disney. Interestingly, blacks make up only 13% of the US population. But if you look at the ads on TV, all of them, almost without exception, feature black people and very often a black and white couple, which is very unusual in real life. There’s nothing wrong with interracial marriage, and it’s nobody’s business but the people involved. Promoting the concept seems like Woke propaganda.

Ads that you see everywhere present a false picture of reality. And movies conflict with reality and are becoming ahistorical. For example, casting a black woman to play Ann Boleyn in a recent TV series or a black woman to play Cleopatra - which Netflix did. Or the popular play about Alexander Hamilton, which makes a lot of people think he was black.

When you make a movie, a historical movie, you want it to be as historically accurate as possible. That means that if characters are Chinese, you want to use Chinese people. If they’re black, you want to use black people. If they’re white, you want to use white people. Instead, they’re promiscuously casting blacks in all kinds of roles where the person wasn’t black. Does that mean a white person could or should play Malcolm X or Shaka Zulu?

It’s part of an ideological agenda that’s acting to destroy the current culture and replace it with something else. I’m not sure what that something else actually is, but it has heavy elements of Marxism, racism, and collectivism. But destroying a culture - especially Western Civ, which is responsible for almost everything that’s valuable and constructive around us - is much more vicious than destroying a country’s financial markets or even its economy. That’s what they’re doing, intentionally or not. In the process, they seem to be trying to foment real antagonism between races, often disguised as trying to promote harmony.

International Man: Bud Light, Disney, and Fox News are prominent examples of this trend, but by no means the only ones. Alleged profit-driven corporations are choosing to sabotage their earnings to make ideological statements. What is causing this trend, and where is it headed?

Doug Casey: It’s said that corporations put profits above all. But people run corporations, and humans have a tendency to do things that they consider to be morally right. Stalin, Mao, and Hitler all thought what they were doing was morally correct. Moral righteousness motivates people much more than money does.

Since the population has been corrupted by numerous mutually reinforcing negative trends over the last three generations, it’s going to be hard to turn this trend around. Certainly not unless you not only reform current intellectual notions but the current notions of morality and what’s right and wrong.

I’m not a church-going person, but previous ideas of what was morally right and wrong were handed down to Americans by their religion, Christianity. That’s changed now. The new religion is Greenism and Wokeism. Those things are now setting the moral tenor of society. This trend is in motion and still accelerating."

- internationalman.com

The Daily "Near You?"

New Britain, Connecticut, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

'Life Has No Victims..."

“Life has no victims. There are no victims in this life. No one has the right to point fingers at his/her past and blame it for what he/she is today. We do not have the right to point our finger at someone else and blame that person for how we treat others, today. Don’t hide in the corner, pointing fingers at your past. Don’t sit under the table, talking about someone who has hurt you. Instead, stand up and face your past! Face your fears! Face your pain! And stomach it all! You may have to do so kicking and screaming and throwing fits and crying – but by all means – face it! This life makes no room for cowards.”

- C. Joybell C.

'They Don't Always Do That..."

"When people pile up debts they will find difficult and perhaps even impossible to repay, they are saying several things at once. They are obviously saying that they want more than they can immediately afford. They are saying, less obviously, that their present wants are so important that, to satisfy them, it is worth some future difficulty. But in making that bargain they are implying that when the future difficulty arrives, they’ll figure it out. They don’t always do that.” 

– Michael Lewis, “Boomerang”

Gerald Celente, Trends Journal 5/10/23

Gerald Celente, Trends Journal 5/10/23

"Judge Andrew Napolitano: Future Of US Debt: 

You Pay The Bill... Trillions To Infinity"

"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/

Contents here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

"Danger Within: The Government Is Turning 

America Into a Constitution-Free Zone"

"They Hit the Pause Button and the Music Stopped" (Excerpt)

"They Hit the Pause Button and the Music Stopped"

by Jeffrey Tucker

Excerpt: "In the great search for metaphors to justify the largest-scale violations of human rights in our lifetimes, the disease managers finally hit on the term “pause button.” We were merely pressing it for a while to get our bearings, un-overload hospitals, gather personal protective equipment, flatten the curve, and generally figure out what to do in the presence of a new virus. They had to pause you so that they could figure it out.

Here is a typical headline, this one from the Los Angeles Times: "San Diego State Hits pause Button as COVID-19 Cases Grow." We all know what a pause button is in real life. The music is playing and then it is not. But you can press the button again and the music will play. Society, then, in all its unfathomable complexity, was rendered as a song on Spotify playing on a machine over which our masters in public health held the controls. It was like a smartphone: push and release. No big deal. Well, it did turn out as a pause, not for 15 days, or even 30, but all the way for three years. The pause button jammed.

The pause button pertained not just to earth but heaven too. Three years ago, during Lent, Christians could not go to their parishes to confess their sins as they had for 2,000 years in preparation for Easter. The most important Eucharistic services of the year – during which time the faithful receive grace from a host with real presence of God – were flat-out canceled, as were the other sacraments. One supposes that they assume God too is under their control.

Incredibly, the complaints were few, particularly from the clergy who chose compliance over faith. Those who shut their doors for one or even two years are now paying a heavy price for the decision. The leadership essentially announced that they were not essential. Parishioners and congregations decided to take them at their word.

But it wasn’t just worship services. It was everything. And by everything we can include supply chains, industrial manufacturing, artistic creativity, seasonal changes in fashion, and the timeline of history itself. Commercial life came to a standstill. Unless you wanted liquor or weed – all the better to calm down a locked-down population – you were pretty much out of luck."

Full article here:

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

How It Really Is"

 

Gregory Mannarino, "Shocker! Inflation Continues To Rise With No End In Sight!"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/10/23

"Shocker! Inflation Continues To Rise With No End In Sight!"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpMlPIsOcSE

"Our Response to Mr. Kennedy"

"Our Response to Mr. Kennedy"

The policy change that enabled the decline

 of America’s Main Street economy...

by Bill Bonner and Joel Bowman

Dublin, Ireland - "Recall from yesterday…we got a call from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who is running for president. He is curious, a rare quality for a politician. He wanted to know – what do we think? Why do we think that way? Herewith, we try to condense 25 years’ of on-the-go observations and guesswork into a carry-on bag.

Dear Robert,

Three little charts are all you need. It took us 25 years to shuck off the nonsense and delusions of contemporary macro economics. Here, in less than 1,000 words, is the ‘executive summary.’

You lament, as we do, the decline of America’s decent, middle class Republic. Basically, we’re talking about the kind of country we had in the ‘50s and early ‘60s. It was not perfect by any means, but by almost all measures the US was on top of the world…and pulling ahead. Real wages were rising, inflation was low, and consumers bought ‘Made in America’ not because it was a political slogan, but because American-made goods were the cheapest and best on the market.

It seemed inevitable, back then, that we would all be rich, happy, free and healthy by now. But something went wrong. Growth rates in the 21st century are less than half those of the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Real wages have been going down for the last 2 years and, measured correctly, the typical working stiff is worse off today than he was 50 years ago. Today, it takes him twice as long to buy an average car or an average house.

It would be reckless to try to pin the blame on a single person or a single thing. And many things are beyond our human control. But there was one major policy change that enabled the decline of America’s Main Street economy.

First, between 1968 and 1971, gold was removed from the US currency. For the first time, dollars could multiply much faster than the things they could buy. Second, in the 1990s, the Fed began manipulating interest rates to boost asset prices. These two moves destroyed America’s prosperity.

Gold – or something like it – is essential to a capitalist economy. It links our ‘money’ to the real world of time, work, and resources. Before 1971, if you wanted more money, you had to earn it by producing more goods or services (GDP). Then, you had ‘capital’ that you could invest to build new shops and factories to produce even more goods and services. That was how the US became the richest nation on earth.

But the post-1971 dollar led to a new form of wealth – financial wealth. It was capitalism without real capital. Instead, it was based on credit provided by the Fed and the banks. (Note: when you borrow from a bank, it doesn’t take the money out of its vault. It just creates the money, as credit, in an electronic ledger entry. The more you borrow, the more debt…and the more the ‘money supply’ goes up too.)

Fatal Financialization: This is what became known as the “financialization” of the economy. People found that money could be made without adding to goods and services. Investing, speculating, leverage, Mergers and Acquisitions, IPOs, buybacks – all were ways to get rich, without adding a penny to the world’s real wealth. Emblematic of this era was Jack Welch. As chairman of GE, Welch turned the company – an old, industrial powerhouse – into a new financial wunderkind. He bought one new company every week, putting GE deeper and deeper into debt. Welch himself became famous for his hard-driving success. By 2000, GE stock was over $350 a share. And by 2005, Welch’s book, “Winning,” was, of course, a bestseller.

Deals, deals, deals…Wall Street brokered the deals and earned its cut. But what real wealth was added? It was hard to say. Here, we see what happened. The real economy stumbled along, while the ‘financial economy’ – powered by trillions of new dollars that no one ever earned or saved – soared.

We see here, in Chart #1, the two economies parting company:

Penthouses and Outhouses: ‘Financial wealth’ is very different from real wealth. Real wealth must be earned. Until the 1980s, both rich and poor earned money and gained ground equally. Then, the new financial system tilted the playing field in favor of the elite. Those with good connections, good credit, business school diplomas, brokerage accounts, and business-class seats benefited most. The rich got much richer…while real wages stagnated. Here’s Chart #2.

More and more, money was made by manipulating credit, not by learning a trade or building a business. “We think; they sweat” was the delusional motto. Things of real value could be made cheaper and better by the Chinese, Koreans, Mexicans or Japanese. Let them do the hard work! All Americans had to do was to borrow the money to buy their products. It worked well, for a while. Dollars were sent overseas to purchase real goods and services. Then, rather than come back to the US, where they would have driven up domestic prices, they were often locked away overseas as ‘reserves.’

Ambitious mommas wanted their sons to get in on it; they should grow to be hedge fund managers on Wall Street, not engineers in Detroit. But while the automotive engineer helped produce a better, safer car…what did financial engineering produce? To be continued…with our third chart…and more on why the drift to the downside cannot be easily corrected…"

Joel’s Note: "Another way to think about the hollowing out of the American middle class over the past half century is through the cracked lens of inflation. As Bill notes above, the dollar was finally severed from its gold backing in 1971. Since then, it’s been off to the races for the world’s de facto reserve currency…

Consumer price inflation averaged 4.38% in 1971 (going by the old methodology, no longer in use). This morning’s consumer price inflation (CPI) report from the Department of Labor shows inflation at 4.9%, up 0.4% for the month. The Fed’s preferred “core” measure (which excludes unnecessary items like food and energy) was up 5.5% for the year.

During the intervening 52 years, the greenback has lost an average of nearly 4% of its value per year (going by the official numbers). What does that mean, in terms of actual purchasing power – at the pump, the grocery store, the diner – for the average American worker?

For one thing, it takes about $7.45 in “today’s money” (such as it is) to purchase the same amount of goods and services as a single dollar would have bought you back in 1971. That is to say, one 2023 dollar is worth less than one-seventh of its 1971 counterpart, or about 13% of its quinquagenarian ancestor. Here’s a look at what happened to $10,000 over the same time period.

Looked at from the other direction, prices have gone through the roof…

What you see there is a cumulative price increase of over 645%. Higher and higher everyday prices: That’s your government’s promise to you."

- https://bonnerprivateresearch.substack.com/

"Maybe It Was One Too Many"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly 5/10/23

"Maybe It Was One Too Many"

"Maybe the Fed should not have raised interest rates.

 What if this last time was just too much damage for the economy?"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com

"Strange Prices At Big Lots! This Is Crazy!"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures With Danno, 5/10/23

"Strange Prices At Big Lots! This Is Crazy!"

"In today's vlog we are at Big Lots, and are noticing some strange 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/

Gerald Celente, Trends Journal, 5/9/23

Full screen recommended.

Strong language alert!

Gerald Celente, Trends Journal, 5/9/23

"Drone Strike On Kremlin OK; 

Drone Strike On White House - America Goes To War"

"Imagine for a moment if a drone hit the White House, there would be an immediate aerial attack on the suspected perpetrator and the U.S. would be at war. There would be “Shock & Awe 2.0.”

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"I Have Never Seen Things This Bad And It's Getting Worse; Biggest Bubble In History About To Burst"

abe, 5/9/23

"I Have Never Seen Things This Bad And It's Getting Worse; 

Biggest Bubble In History About To Burst"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Best Buy Will Probably Disappear Soon As Perfect Storm For Bankruptcies Hits Major Retailers"

Full screen recommended.

"Best Buy Will Probably Disappear Soon As 

Perfect Storm For Bankruptcies Hits Major Retailers"

By Epic Economist

"Long gone are the days when Best Buy ruled as the top electronics retailer in the U.S. The retail giant is not only losing ground on the market – in March, it reported a 45% decline in its annual net income from 2022, while domestic revenue fell by $13.5 billion – but after reports of mass store closings and plunging consumer demand, it looks like the company is hanging by a thread. What went wrong? A lot, according to retail experts. The chain’s business model, internal operations, and financial health are crumbling, but tracking down Best Buy's biggest failure requires a much deeper look at the way the company conducts its business.

For the longest time, shoppers have been reporting customer service failures at the retailer’s stores. They have been taking to social media to rant about bad experiences with pushy or unhelpful employees, not to mention the inefficiency of the company’s delivery service.

On top of that, experts at RetailCustomerExperience.com highlight that the electronics retailer lacks one of the most important aspects of its business: innovation. It isn’t offering anything different from what other bigger market players do, failing to differentiate itself in this tough market. Meanwhile, operational costs continue to pile up. Best Buy expanded rapidly in the '90s by purchasing smaller chains and transforming them into its big-box format, a strategy that seemed successful — until it wasn’t. "The problem with the creation of the big stores is that Best Buy is now saddled with the costs of that vast square footage," Chen added. And Best Buy didn’t consider the long-term outlook. "They did not realize how fast disruptive forces would turn their stores into liabilities instead of assets," he continued.

Now, the chain is starting to retreat from physical retail as it tries to weather the storm. After announcing a large number of store closings in April, a few days ago it just revealed plans to shut down another 70 locations this year. Financial analyst James Zeoli revealed that the company's chief executive officer, Corie Barry, said during a March 1 earnings call that hundreds of locations were candidates for closure this year. "Although this occurred pretty abruptly, it's not a surprise," Zeoli said.

The troubles of the electronics store chain remember a situation described in Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises.” One character asks another how he went bankrupt. “Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly,” he said. Now it feels like Best Buy is doing the same, just as many big box retailers have done in the last decade.

First comes the financial imbalances, poorly managed by executives and further exacerbated by stock market volatility, then the economic scenario dramatically changes and sales growth collapses. At the same time, consumers discover new exciting retailers that provide what the company is not providing. The financial collapse comes later. But if history is any guide, the second part, once it starts, will be quick.

As with many large retailers unable to cope with innovation and new consumer expectations, the company will continue to sputter on fumes, slowing down bit by bit until one day it just stops moving."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: The Moody Blues, "The Voice"

The Moody Blues, "The Voice"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“What makes this spiral galaxy so long? Measuring over 700,000 light years across from top to bottom, NGC 6872, also known as the Condor galaxy, is one of the most elongated barred spiral galaxies known.

The galaxy's protracted shape likely results from its continuing collision with the smaller galaxy IC 4970, visible just above center. Of particular interest is NGC 6872's spiral arm on the upper left, as pictured here, which exhibits an unusually high amount of blue star forming regions. The light we see today left these colliding giants before the days of the dinosaurs, about 300 million years ago. NGC 6872 is visible with a small telescope toward the constellation of the Peacock (Pavo).”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160426.html

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

"What Keeps You Going..."

"It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succor of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till."

- J.R.R. Tolkien, "The Lord of the Rings"

o

Sam: "It's like in the great stories Mr. Frodo, the ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were, and sometimes you didn't want to know the end because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end it's only a passing thing, this shadow, even darkness must pass. A new day will come, and when the sun shines it'll shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something even if you were too small to understand why. But I think Mr. Frodo, I do understand, I know now folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going because they were holding on to something.

Frodo: What are we holding onto, Sam?

Sam: That there's some good in the world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for."

- Samwise Gamgee, "The Lord of the Rings"

o

"What keeps you going isn't some fine destination but just the road you're on, and the fact that you know how to drive. You keep your eyes open, you see this damned-to-hell world you got born into, and you ask yourself, 'What life can I live that will let me breathe in and out and love somebody or something and not run off screaming into the woods?'"

 - Barbara Kingsolver

o

“For this is what we do. Put one foot forward and then the other. Lift our eyes to the snarl and smile of the world once more. Think. Act. Feel. Add our little consequence to the tides of good and evil that flood and drain the world. Drag our shadowed crosses into the hope of another night. Push our brave hearts into the promise of a new day. With love: the passionate search for truth other than our own. With longing: the pure, ineffable yearning to be saved. For so long as fate keeps waiting, we live on. God help us. God forgive us. We live on.”

- Gregory David Roberts, “Shantaram”

"Life Is Hard?"

"Life is hard? True - but let's love it anyhow,

though it breaks every bone in our bodies."

- Edward Abbey

"When I hear somebody sigh, "Life is hard," 

I am always tempted to ask, "Compared to what?"

- Sydney Harris

The Daily "Near You?"

Davisburg, Michigan, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"If Liberty Means Anything At All..."

"If you want to tell people the truth, make

them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you."

- Oscar Wilde

"What Happened To The Streets Of Philadelphia? Street View"

Full screen recommended. Vomit bag optional.

Kimgary, 5/9/23

"What Happened To The Streets Of 

Philadelphia? Street View"

"Problems with drugs and crime on Kensington Ave, Philadelphia's most dangerous street. In Philadelphia as a whole, violent crime and drug abuse are major issues. The city has a higher rate of violent crime than the national average and other similarly sized metropolitan areas. The drug overdose rate in Philadelphia is also concerning. Between 2013 and 2015, the number of drug overdose deaths in the city increased by 50%, with more than twice as many deaths from overdoses as homicides. Kensington's high crime rate and drug abuse contribute significantly to Philadelphia's problems.

Because of the high number of drugs in the neighborhood, Kensington has the third-highest drug crime rate by neighborhood in Philadelphia, at 3.57. The opioid epidemic has played a significant role in this problem, as it has in much of the rest of the country. Opioid abuse has skyrocketed in the United States over the last two decades, and Philadelphia is no exception. In addition to having a high rate of drug overdose deaths, 80% of Philadelphia's overdose deaths involved opioids, and Kensington is a significant contributor to this figure. This Philadelphia neighborhood is said to have the largest open-air heroin market on the East Coast, with many neighbors migrating to the area for heroin and other opioids. With such a high concentration of drugs in Kensington, many state and local officials have focused on the neighborhood in an attempt to address Philadelphia's problem."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

Bruce Springsteen, "Streets of Philadelphia"

“The Worst Crash in Human History Is Here”

Strong language alert!

Gerald Celente, Trends Journal 5/9/23

“The Worst Crash in Human History Is Here”

"In this video, Gerald Celente discusses the current state of the banking crisis and why now is the time to get on-trend. He shares insights on the current state of democracy, the media, and the economy, including the commercial real estate sector and the gold market. Celente also touches on the possibility of war and provides updates on the situation in Ukraine. If you want an in-depth analysis of socioeconomic and geopolitical trends, as well as trend forecasts, you won't want to miss this video. Tune in to gain a unique perspective on the issues that are affecting our world today."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Be All That You Can't Be"

"Be All That You Can't Be"

By Jim Quinn

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

Our enemies tremble... in hysterical laughter.

o

Hat tip to The Burning Platform for this material.

"How It Really Is"

 

Bill Bonner, "So, Mr. Kennedy Called..."

"So, Mr. Kennedy Called..."

Presidential hopeful RFK, Jr. reaches 

out to Bill for some insights

by Bill Bonner

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children…”

~ Dwight Eisenhower, 1953

Dublin, Ireland - "Presidential hopeful Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. called us last week. So began the following line of thought. Dwight Eisenhower spoke those words above at what must have been near the peak of American power and prosperity. And yet, Eisenhower urged restraint. He reminded citizens that every penny spent by the government had to come from somewhere, taking away things people actually wanted – housing… automobiles… food and medicine.

Back then, you couldn’t get something-for-nothing anymore than you can today. But who says so now? Who urges humility…who speaks of trade-offs? Who bothers to look at the price tag? And who would dare to tell the voters that they have to pay it?

There’s always more than a little flimflam in public spending. It’s the hope of getting something-for-nothing that keeps the whole hullabaloo going. But the cost of the US empire is now nearly $1.5 trillion per year. That’s 5 million houses we don’t get to live in. Or 50 million new cars. Or 397 billion happy meals. It’s about $17,000/family/year. Did anyone tell the voters? Are they okay with this? The point of today’s message is that at least one politician seems ready to ask.

A Modest Start: Here at Bonner Private Research, our beat is money, not politics. We’ve never said anything nice about politicians because they, almost without exception, are a nuisance. They pass laws that reduce output. They spend money they don’t have…and divert resources from useful investments to their favorite bamboozles. They impose regulations that benefit a small group of insiders (such as the people who make steel or silicon chips) at the expense of everybody else.

But we wrote about Robert F. Kennedy, Jr because we saw him breaking with the Biden/Clinton/Schumer ‘woke and war’ agenda. He’s proposing to…shut down many of America’s overseas bases and reduce the military/industrial/ spook budget…allow whistleblowers to tell the truth without going to jail…block the feds from creating a new form of central bank digital currency that they could use to control how we spend our money.

Much more would have to be done to rescue the Republic…but that’s a start! And what could we add that might be helpful? We’ve been writing this column for nearly 25 years. Long-term sufferers know ‘where we’re coming from.’ They understand how cutting the link between gold and the dollar, in 1971, changed our monetary system. They know, too, that new, flexible dollars – along with the Fed’s artificially low interest rates – created today’s inflation/debt problem. They know that America’s elites – both Republican and Democrat – have become predatory, incompetent and corrupt. They see how the Fed is trapped between “Inflate or Die;” either it continues to inflate…or America’s $93 trillion debt bubble collapses.

Uncommon Knowledge: Our readers are well aware that investors and speculators have gained about $50 trillion in ‘excess’ wealth from the Fed’s fake interest rates. They recognize that inflation is not an act of nature, but a government policy. And they understand that the elites – who control the government – would prefer inflation rather than see their stocks, bonds and real estate marked down and their power and status greatly reduced.

Our readers are well aware that inflation helps to hold asset prices up (at least in nominal terms) but it destroys the middle class….and how, with no independent middle class, America’s democracy – such as it is – is finished.

But what does RFK, Jr. know? He ‘had it all’ – good looks, brains, money. He was one of the ‘privileged elite.’ Private schools, Harvard... his grandfather was Ambassador to Britain. His uncle was president of the US. Another uncle was a US senator. And his own father was US Attorney General. He went to the London School of Economics – a bastion of ‘Fabianism’…a hesitating, gradualist form of socialism. And he made his career as a lawyer, mostly litigating against large corporations for environmental infractions. But wait. Is that how it works? Is that what gives you happiness, peace, contentment in life? Your connections? Your status? Money?

Uncivilizing America: A friend of ours ‘had it all’ too. He was rich. Good looking. With a beautiful house. A lovely wife…children…he was a partner in a large, successful financial firm…and a commissioner of the SEC. Apparently, ‘all’ was not enough. He shot himself.

And you might think twice before trading lives with RFK,Jr. Both his father and his uncle were shot dead. How come? He must wonder.

Lyndon Johnson had the blood of thousands of Americans and maybe a million Vietnamese on his hands. Nobody shot him. George W. Bush’s hands are stained red too – a million corpses in the Middle East, and yet, he still breathes. And there is Joe Biden…providing billions of dollars, and the latest weapons, to keep the Russo-Ukrainian War going; where’s his Sirhan Sirhan…his Lee Harvey Oswald?

No doubt, RFK,Jr.’s wondering mind took him down some blind alleys to some dead ends. He got arrested for heroin possession. He went into rehab. His ex-wife hung herself. He probed ‘conspiracy theories’ and believes the CIA was involved in JFK’s murder. This is not Mike Pence’s resume!

And he’s still wondering…at least enough to ask us what we thought. So, we sent him a copy of our new book, “Uncivilizing America” (out this week and already Number One in the economics category at Amazon!). We hope it will give him a coherent framework for thinking about economic issues.

The problem is time. Mr. Kennedy must have little ‘free’ time. After all, running for president is not a part-time job. And it took us nearly 25 years to work out what is going on (and even now…there are plenty of air pockets in our pensée). So, if he is willing to give us a little attention, how can we take best advantage of it? Stay tuned as we pack a quarter century of accumulated observations and guesswork into an overnight bag."

- https://bonnerprivateresearch.substack.com/

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/9/23

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/9/23

"Putin Calls Out West For A Real War 

Against Russia - Tony Shaffer"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

Hindustan Times, 5/9/23

"Putin's Nuke Warning For West On Victory Day; 

'International Terror Unleashed'"

"Russian President Vladimir Putin tore into the West for unleasing 'international terrorism' against Moscow in his victory day speech. The Russian President said, 'the world is once again at a decisive turning point.' Putin also sounded a mega victory call and thanked Russian fighters in Ukraine. This as Russia flaunted its nuclear might in a big deterrent for the western powers."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

Hindustan Times, 5/9/23

"Russia Flexes It's Military and Nuclear Might"

"Russia paraded RS-24 Yars intercontinental ballistic missile on the Red Square as part of the 'Victory Day' celebrations in Moscow with convoys of armored vehicles and marching troops in tow. Russian President Vladimir Putin presided over the mega celebrations at Red Square in the capital Moscow."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

"There are a multitude of fuses affixed to dozens of powder-kegs and little kids with matches are on the loose. I don’t know which of the fuses will be lit and which powder-keg will blow, but someone is bound to do something stupid, and then all hell will break loose. It could happen at any time. One military miscue. One assassination. One violent act that stirs the world. And the dominoes will topple, setting off fireworks not seen on this planet since 1939 – 1945. I can see it all very clearly."

- Jim Quinn

- https://austincountynewsonline.com/

Gregory Mannarino, "High Probability Of A US Debt Default, Here's Why"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/9/23

"High Probability Of A US Debt Default, Here's Why"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Gregory Mannarino, PM 5/9/23

"Have We Reached A Maximum Debt Saturation Moment?

 We Shall Soon See"

-  https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"The Economy Is Bananas"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly 5/9/23

"The Economy Is Bananas"

"The banks are failing all around us. Interest rates are going to continue to climb. The debt ceiling is about to crater. Credit is harder to get. What’s next?"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Massive Sales At Meijer This Week! Take Advantage Of This!"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures With Danno, 5/9/23

"Massive Sales At Meijer This Week! 

Take Advantage Of This!"

"In today's vlog, we are at Meijer and are noticing that they have a lot of great sales on groceries this week!! We are stocking up and showing the best deals as we take you shopping with us. It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products and prices continuing to skyrocket!"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"State Of Emergency, Moscow Burns, Record Wildfires Raging; Nuclear Plant Evacuated"

Full screen recommended.

Canadian Prepper, 5/8/23

"State Of Emergency, Moscow Burns, 

Record Wildfires Raging; Nuclear Plant Evacuated"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Economy Flatlining; Excessive Spending Is Over"

Jeremiah Babe, 5/8/23

"Economy Flatlining; Excessive Spending Is Over"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: Peder B. Helland, "Dance of Life"

Full screen a must for this beautiful video!

Peder B. Helland,

"Dance of Life"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“A now famous picture from the Hubble Space Telescope featured Pillars of Creation, star forming columns of cold gas and dust light-years long inside M16, the Eagle Nebula. This false-color composite image views the nearby stellar nursery using data from the Herschel Space Observatory's panoramic exploration of interstellar clouds along the plane of our Milky Way galaxy. Herschel's far infrared detectors record the emission from the region's cold dust directly.

The famous pillars are included near the center of the scene. While the central group of hot young stars is not apparent at these infrared wavelengths, the stars' radiation and winds carve the shapes within the interstellar clouds. Scattered white spots are denser knots of gas and dust, clumps of material collapsing to form new stars. The Eagle Nebula is some 6,500 light-years distant, an easy target for binoculars or small telescopes in a nebula rich part of the sky toward the split constellation Serpens Cauda (the tail of the snake).”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160728.html

"I Have Accepted The Fact..."

“One can fight evil but against stupidity one is helpless… I have accepted the fact, hard as it may be, that human beings are inclined to behave in ways that would make animals blush. The ironic, the tragic thing is that we often behave in ignoble fashion from what we consider the highest motives. The animal makes no excuse for killing his prey; the human animal, on the other hand, can invoke God’s blessing when massacring his fellow men. He forgets that God is not on his side but at his side.”

“There is no salvation in becoming adapted to a world which is crazy.”

- Henry Miller

"Life Comes at You Fast, So You Better Be Ready"

"Life Comes at You Fast, So You Better Be Ready"

by Ryan Holiday

"In 1880, Theodore Roosevelt wrote to his brother, “My happiness is so great that it makes me almost afraid.” In October of that year, life got even better. As he wrote in his diary the night of his wedding to Alice Hathaway Lee, “Our intense happiness is too sacred to be written about.” He would consider it to be one of the best years of his life: he got married, wrote a book, attended law school, and won his first election for public office.

The streak continued. In 1883, he wrote “I can imagine nothing more happy in life than an evening spent in the cozy little sitting room, before a bright fire of soft coal, my books all around me, and playing backgammon with my own dainty mistress.” And that’s how he and Alice spent that cold winter as it crawled into the new year. He wrote in late January that he felt he was fully coming into his own. “I feel now as though I have the reins in my hand.” On February 12th, 1884 his first daughter was born.

Two days later, his wife would be dead of Bright’s disease (now known as kidney failure). His mother had died only hours earlier in the same house, of typhoid fever. Roosevelt marked the day in his diary with a large “X.” Next to it, he wrote, “The light has gone out of my life.”

As they say, life comes at you fast. Has the stock market not been an example of that? In December, 2019 the Dow was at 28,701.66. Things were good enough that people were complaining about the “war on Christmas” and debating the skin color of Santa Claus. In January, the Dow was at 29,348.10 and people were outraged about the recent Oscar nominations. In February, when the Dow reached a staggering 29,568.57, Delta Airlines stock fell nearly 25% in less than a week, as people argued intensely over a message from Delta’s CEO about passengers reclining their seats. Even in early March, there were news stories about Wendy’s entering the “breakfast wars” and a free stock-trading app outage that caused people to miss a big market rally.

And that was just in the news. Think about what you busied yourself with at home during that same period. Maybe you and your wife were looking at plans to remodel your kitchen. Maybe you were finally going to pull the trigger on that Tesla Model S for yourself - the $150,000 one, with the ludicrous speed package. Maybe you were fuming that Amazon took an extra day to deliver a package. Maybe you were frustrated that your kid’s room was a mess.

And now? How quaint and stupid does that all seem? Depending on the day you look, years of market gains can now be taken back. 47 million people are projected to be added to the unemployment rolls in the US. The US death count from what was dismissed as a mere respiratory flu and the left’s latest hoax is now inching towards 1,000,000 and there are millions more confirmed cases worldwide. There have been runs on supplies. Store shelves are empty while prices skyrocket. The global economy has essentially ground to a halt.

Life comes at us fast, don’t it?  It can change in an instant. Everything you built, everyone you hold dear, can be taken from you. For absolutely no reason. Just as easily, you can be taken from them. This is why the Stoics say we need to be prepared, constantly, for the twists and turns of Fortune. It’s why Seneca said that nothing happens to the wise man contrary to his expectation, because the wise man has considered every possibility - even the cruel and heartbreaking ones.

And yet even Seneca was blindsided by a health scare in his early twenties that forced him to spend nearly a decade in Egypt to recover. He lost his father less than a year before he lost his first-born son, and twenty days after burying his son he was exiled by the emperor Caligula. He lived through the destruction of one city by a fire and another by an earthquake, before being exiled two more times.

One needs only to read his letters and essays, written on a rock off the coast of Italy, to get a sense that even a philosopher can get knocked on their ass and feel sorry for themselves from time to time.

What do we do? Well, first, knowing that life comes at us fast, we should be always prepared. Seneca wrote that the fighter who has “seen his own blood, who has felt his teeth rattle beneath his opponent’s fist… who has been downed in body but not in spirit…” - only they can go into the ring confident of their chances of winning. They know they can take getting bloodied and bruised. They know what the darkness before the proverbial dawn feels like. They have a true and accurate sense for the rhythms of a fight and what winning requires. That sense only comes from getting knocked around. That sense is only possible because of their training.

In his own life, Seneca bloodied and bruised himself through a practice called premeditatio malorum (“the premeditation of evils”). Rehearsing his plans, say to take a trip, he would go over the things that could go wrong or prevent the trip from happening - a storm could spring up, the captain could fall ill, the ship could be attacked by pirates, he could be banished to the island of Corsica the morning of the trip. By doing what he called a premeditatio malorum, Seneca was always prepared for disruption and always working that disruption into his plans. He was fitted for defeat or victory. He stepped into the ring confident he could take any blow. Nothing happened contrary to his expectations.

Second, we should always be careful not to tempt fate. In 2016 General Michael Flynn stood on the stage at the Republican National Convention and led some 20,000 people (and a good many more at home) in an impromptu chant of “Lock Her Up! Lock Her Up!” about his enemy Hillary Clinton. When Trump won, he was swept into office in a whirlwind of success and power. Then, just 24 days into his new job, Flynn was fired for lying to the Vice President about conversations he’d had with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States. He would be brought up on charges and convicted of lying to the FBI.

Life comes at us fast… but that doesn’t mean we should be stupid. We also shouldn’t be arrogant.

Third, we have to hang on. Remember, that in the depths of both of Seneca’s darkest moments, he was unexpectedly saved. From exile, he was suddenly recalled to be the emperor’s tutor. In the words of the historian Richard M. Gummere, “Fortune, whom Seneca as a Stoic often ridicules, came to his rescue.” But Churchill, as always, put it better: “Sometimes when Fortune scowls most spitefully, she is preparing her most dazzling gifts.”

Life is like this. It gives us bad breaks - heartbreakingly bad breaks - and it also gives us incredible lucky breaks. Sometimes the ball that should have gone in, bounces out. Sometimes the ball that had no business going in surprises both the athlete and the crowd when it eventually, after several bounces, somehow manages to pass through the net.

When we’re going through a bad break, we should never forget Fortune’s power to redeem us. When we’re walking through the roses, we should never forget how easily the thorns can tear us upon, how quickly we can be humbled. Sometimes life goes your way, sometimes it doesn’t.

This is what Theodore Roosevelt learned, too. Despite what he wrote in his diary that day in 1884, the light did not completely go out of Roosevelt’s life. Sure, it flickered. It looked like the flame might have been cruelly extinguished. But with time and incredible energy and force of will, he came back from those tragedies. He became a great father, a great husband, and a great leader. He came back and the world was better for it. He was better for it.

Life comes at us fast. Today. Tomorrow. When we least expect it. Be ready. Be strong. Don’t let your light be snuffed out.

- https://ryanholiday.net/

"If Tomorrow Starts Without Me"

"If Tomorrow Starts Without Me",

 read by Tom O'Bedlam

"Dog's Last Day"

- https://www.youtube.com/shorts/-JTxAIq-1K4

So sadly beautiful...

The Daily "Near You?"

Burley, Idaho, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"Regret..."

"Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time;

it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable."

~ Sydney J. Harris