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So, we rise from the rubble...
Tuesday, August 20, 2024
Gregory Mannarino, "It's Way Worse Than You Think"
Gregory Mannarino, AM 8/20/24
"It's Way Worse Than You Think"
Comments here:
"The Only Thing Necessary for Evil to Triumph Is…"
"The Only Thing Necessary for Evil to Triumph Is…"
by Paul Rosenberg
"I’m betting that most of my readers can complete this phrase. The problem is, it isn’t quite true. Edmund Burke, its supposed source, was a good man, but that doesn’t make the saying true. Here’s the passage, in the form most of us know: "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."
Yes, there is a time when good men and women must stand up for what’s right, even when it involves risk, but that moment comes only after evil has already been well established and is powerfully on the move. Fighting evil may be an essential thing, but it isn’t the first problem - it matters only after thousands or millions of mistakes have already been made. And if those first mistakes had not been made, great fights against evil wouldn’t be necessary.
Where Evil Comes From: Let’s begin with a crucial point: Evil is inherently weak. Here’s why that’s true:
• Evil does not produce. It must take advantage of healthy and effective life (aka productive men and women) if it’s to succeed. Evil, by its nature, is wasteful and destructive:
• It requires the production of the good in order to do its deeds.
• How much territory could Caesar have conquered on his own?
• How many people could Joe Stalin have killed with no one to take his orders?
•How many people could Mao have starved to death without obedient middlemen?
With duteous followers, however, evil rulers killed some 260 million people in the 20th century. The truth is that evil survives by tricking the good into doing its will. Without thousands of basically decent people confused enough to obey, evil would fail quickly. The great tragedy of our era is the extent to which evil has been successful in convincing people to service it. Good people having yielded their wills arm evil, accommodate evil, and acquiesce to its actions.
Hannah Arendt summarized it this way: "The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil. People end up supporting evil because they don’t want to make up their minds at all. They want to avoid criticism and vulnerability, so they hold to the middle of the pack and avoid all risk. These people wouldn’t initiate murders by themselves, but in the name of duty, loyalty and/or the greater good, they cooperate with evil and give it their strength. Each plays a part, but not so large a part that they’ll have to contemplate its effects."
Sins of Obedience: People think of murder, lying, and robbery as sins, but none of those has nearly the death toll of obedience. Basically decent men and women obey agents of evil for very mundane reasons. The process often goes like this:Confused and intimidated, they look for what’s being punished and what isn’t.They try not to make waves.They learn that they can avoid making waves best if they adopt the perspectives of their overlords. So they run the overlords’ slogans through their minds as a default program.
In the end, these people don’t make up their minds. Rather, they take on the minds of their overlords and do their will. And so, the vast majority of evil done on Earth traces back to minds and wills that have been abandoned to fear. So… This is what the famous quote should say: "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to obey." We should be painting that on our walls."
"It's Good To Be An Illegal"
"It's Good To Be An Illegal"
by Jim Quinn
Click image for larger size.
WTF is wrong with this country?!!
"The Leaky Faucet Agency"
"The Leaky Faucet Agency"
Nine tenths of government is always a scam, pretending to make
people better off while actually controlling and exploiting them.
But bad government seems to have gotten worse.
by Bill Bonner
"You go out to western Maryland, or if you go out to West Virginia, or if you keep going and you go to a small town in the former steelmaking regions of Ohio, there are people watching their way of life crumble and disappear. There's no politician that has any intention of doing anything about it, or has a plan for doing anything about it."
- Thomas Frank
Poitou, France - "Yesterday, we saw Milton Friedman’s quote... that government spending is the ‘true tax.’ We also saw that he was wrong. The true tax is much more than just the amount the feds spend. It includes amounts they force you to spend. Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs, for example, will cost the average household $1,700 per year (according to the Peterson Foundation estimate). And then, there’s all the time they force you to waste - accumulated regulation, administration, red tape and assorted folderol - which, according to one study, has cut US GDP by $60 trillion.
The numbers are squishy. But the idea is rock solid. Which is why Harris and Trump are both talking nonsense. Both claim that they can make Americans better off. One would introduce more giveaways, debt forgiveness, and price controls. Yesterday, at the Democratic National Convention, Kamala Harris revealed how she would pay for these things. CNN:
"Vice President Kamala Harris will push to increase the corporate tax rate to 28% from the current 21%, her campaign said Monday, the first day of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago…Raising the corporate tax rate would reduce the deficit by $1 trillion over the next decade, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. The watchdog group estimates the price tag of Harris’ economic package would be $1.7 trillion over the next decade."
Let’s see, Harris proposes to spend $1.7 trillion on various swindles. She would also force corporations to collect $1 trillion from their customers, employees, and shareholders to pay part of the bill. How does this make voters better off?
Donald Trump, meanwhile, proposes to make the public pay more for its imported products. How does forcing people to buy inferior products at higher prices help them? He’s also committed to extending his 2017 tax cuts – with a projected cost to the Treasury of $5.2 trillion over the next ten years. That amount will have to be made up later - presumably in higher prices. But this is politics. And politics is like French cheese. The slogans are attractive - ‘Tax cuts!’…‘Make the rich pay!’… Or, ‘make the foreigners pay!’ Later, they turn rancid and foul.
Last week, we looked at Joseph Tainter’s idea... that societies solve problems, and then suffocate under the accumulated solutions. In our private lives, we solve problems all the time. A faucet leaks. We fix it. Problem solved. In public matters, a faucet leaks. The feds set up a commission to investigate. Then, they set up an agency to control it. And then they prohibit you from taking a shower.
A half a century later... after costly studies have been done, bids gathered, and a hugely expensive program has completely redone the plumbing, the Leaky Faucet Agency is still at work. Because everyone involved has a perverse incentive to keep the faucets leaking. Leaky faucets are now the source of jobs, incomes, contracts; the Leaky Faucet Agency (LFA) is now a cabinet-level post... and its chief, whose expensive ‘surge’ in fighting the leaky faucet never worked, is widely proposed as a presidential candidate.
‘Bad government is a normal cost of government,’ says Tainter. Nine tenths of government is always a scam, pretending to make people better off while actually controlling and exploiting them. But bad government seems to have gotten worse.
No Pyramids: The ancient Egyptians used their resources and time to build great pyramids. Instead of producing more food, improving their houses, or just enjoying more leisure time, huge blocks of stone were hauled across the burning desert to create monuments to defunct rulers. They were all the society had to show for hundreds or thousands of years of ‘investment.’
At least they were paid for. America’s great monument is $35 trillion in debt... soon to reach $50 trillion. And unlike the pyramids, it is not an inert Rushmore, meant to glorify past vanities... but an ongoing charge on the labors of 330 million US residents. The interest on the national debt alone now costs each four-member household about $7,500 annually…expected to more than double by 2034.
But the credit-money system makes it possible for Washington to squander not just today’s resources…but tomorrow’s too. It is as if contracts had been let and everyone involved in building a pyramid had gotten paid... the stonecutters, the crew bosses, the architects, the masons, top management, middlemen and day laborers. But they didn’t build anything. They left it to the next generation to build the pyramid - with no money to pay for it! Stay tuned."
o
Download "The Collapse of Complex Societies",
by Joseph A. Tainter, here:
"Into The Great Depression, Part 1: The Roaring '20s & The Creation Of The Fed" (Excerpt)
"Into The Great Depression, Part 1:
The Roaring '20s & The Creation Of The Fed"
by Tumous Malinen
Excerpt: "Something that has been a particular interest of mine is the Great Depression of the 1930s. It continues to be the deepest global economic malaise of modern times, which preceded the most destructive war in human history. The extreme nature of the economic contraction has intrigued me, in addition to the path that led to it. The latter mostly because of the role of the newly created central bank, the Federal Reserve, in it.
I’ve written extensively on the Great Depression in a book I am writing about forecasting financial crises. I think that the similarities between now and the era leading into the Depression are strikingly similar. This is why I decided to publish a series mapping the path of the U.S., and the world, into the deep global economic collapse. I start by mapping the route to the ‘Great Crash’, that is, to the collapse of the U.S. stock market at the end of October 1929.
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Click image for larger size.
In just four trading bays between 23 and 29 October 1929, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) collapsed by 29% wiping out massive amounts of financial wealth. While the 1929 crash did not start the Great Depression, it laid the groundwork for it. Worryingly we seem to be on a similar road that led to the Great Crash, which I will map in this first entry to the series. I will also detail the creation of the Federal Reserve, which played a major role in the financial mania that led to the crash.
What is notable with the period, which preceded the Great Depression, is that many leading nations across the world experienced an economic decline at the same time, which manifested into a global banking crisis. We are seeing signs of the same kind of global slowdown now.
Before we dig deeper, let me inform that I decided to the make my piece on the Systemic Meltdown free to read. This is because, I think that everyone should understand what such an event would entail for the world, and how we could be able to manage it.
Full, highly recommended article is here:
o
"Fools, Drunkards and the United States of America"
"Fools, Drunkards and the United States of America"
by Brian Maher
"Mr. Barry Ritholz of the eponymous Ritholtz Wealth Management: "We were warned that deficit spending would crowd out private capital, choke off innovation and new company formation; it will send the costs of U.S. borrowing skyrocketing higher, making the debt impossible to manage; force the U.S. dollar to be radically devalued against all other currencies, thereby devastating the U.S. economy; cause rampant inflation, spiking prices to levels not seen before; last, act as a drag on the overall economy."
That none of these things occurred makes me wonder why we still pay attention to these deficit hawks. The blind man leaps from a 100-story structure. Ninety floors down he concludes he will plunge forever in safety. ‘Nothing’s happened yet so why should it happen now?’ Thus the United States government can continue to pile up deficits. Yet what if the United States is 90 floors down?
So Far, So Good: We concede that there is a high degree of justice in Mr. Ritholz’s comments. For decades deficit hawks, so-called, have yelled wolf. The national debt has scaled $1 trillion, they shrieked. The dollar is doomed, the world will heave it overboard, the United States economy is destined for the gutter. They repeated the wails at $2 trillion… $5 trillion… $10 trillion… $20 trillion… $25 trillion… $30 trillion.
United States national debt presently totters at $35 trillion. Total United States debt - both public and private - comes in at $101.5 trillion. Yet the dollar remains king and the American economy has yet to gutter. There have been shakes, there have been wobbles. And it is entirely possible the United States economy has already wandered into recession. Recent unemployment data indicates that it has. Yet we do not believe the heavens will come falling down upon our hapless and helpless heads.
Not Weimar Germany: Meantime, despite Mr. Ritholz’s soothings, inflation has enjoyed itself quite an inning since 2022. Yet it has not proved the inflationary hell of cataclysmic lore. We believe moderate inflation will continue to cling to the American economy - but nothing nearing hyperinflation.
Is the United States the Germany of the Weimar Republic? You can moan and sob about its present condition - and perhaps with justification. Yet the United States is not the Germany of the Weimar Republic. Nor, in our telling, will it be anytime soon. It enjoys too many natural advantages. As Germany’s iron chancellor Bismarck once noted, and as we are fond to repeat: “God has a special providence for fools, drunkards and the United States of America.”
America’s Natural Advantages: As we have argued before: God filled two oceans - one Atlantic, one Pacific - to moat the United States off from marauders. Against its land borders north and south He positioned two geopolitical bantamweights. He blessed it with vast tracts of wealthy, fertile land… an extended capillary system of internal waterways… natural harbors from which to send items out… and to take items in. What other nation has enjoyed such natural, God-granted riches? We struggle in vain to conceive of one.
Has God given the United States a Baltimore… a Detroit… a Cleveland? Has He populated its capital with an endless roster of rogues, rascals, cadges, chiselers, grifters and swindlers? Well, friends, maybe He has. Yet even God Almighty must be granted space for error. Perhaps it is not even error - but intention. It appears He has a mischievous, even puckish sense of humor, this God. We hazard He delights in pulling noses and yanking chains.
Yet the cardinal fact cannot be denied. He has showered America with immense natural extravagance. As we have likewise argued before, only Americans themselves could make a botch of this God-spawned idyll. Yet it appears they are determined to do precisely that.
Reality Will Soon Set In: We return to the above said Ritholz. He puts his tongue out at the concept that deficit spending “will send the costs of U.S. borrowing skyrocketing higher, making the debt impossible to manage.” Yet he might have another guess. Reports the Peterson Foundation: "The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that interest payments will total $892 billion in fiscal year 2024 and rise rapidly throughout the next decade — climbing from $1 trillion in 2025 to $1.7 trillion in 2034.
In total, net interest payments will total $12.9 trillion over the next decade. Relative to the size of the economy, interest will rise from 3.4% of gross domestic product (GDP) in fiscal year 2025 to 4.1% in 2034. The previous high for interest relative to GDP in the post-World War II era was 3.2% in 1991 - that ratio would now be exceeded in 2025." Here you have it in graphic form:
Click image for larger size.
More: In fiscal year 2024, the federal government will spend more on interest than on defense as well as non-defense discretionary, which includes funding for transportation, veterans, education, health, international affairs, natural resources and environment, general science and technology, general government and more.
In fiscal years 2024–2027, interest payments will exceed the amount that the federal government spends on Medicare… According to its latest long-term projections, CBO projects that interest will become the largest category in the federal budget in 2051 - exceeding the amount spent on Social Security that year. What then, Mr. Ritholz? Will deficits finally matter?
Debt Beyond Endurable Limits: Under present and anticipated conditions, we do not believe the United States economy can push along much. Like a pack mule loaded beyond endurable limits… the United States economy is debt-loaded beyond endurable limits. The legs are unequal to the burden upon the back. Yet we do not believe the legs will buckle under - not fully. We concede the possibility that the legs may buckle fully.
But we refer you once again to America’s vast advantages. They will likely keep the beast upright, though vastly hobbled. We embrace instead the gradualist theory of decline, likely unfolding in grass-growing and paint-drying motion.
An Endless “Damp and Drizzly November”: In our estimation this economy presents a future not necessarily of collapse but of gray and twilight, of habitual malaise… Of, in Herman Melville’s phrasing, a “damp and drizzly November”… month upon month… year upon year. May artificial intelligence and other technological wizardries catapult us out from the languor - and into an infinitely productive and prosperous future?
It is possible. Yet is it likely? We are far from convinced that it is. Thus we are reduced to hope. And as Herr Freddy Nietzsche observed: “Hope… is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.”
"The Day Arrives: Putin Must Pull the Chain on Kyiv"
"The Day Arrives:
Putin Must Pull the Chain on Kyiv"
by Phil Butler
"It is time for Russia to fully mobilize against the nagging threat posed by the NATO-backed Ukrainian state. President Putin’s pragmatic approach to keeping NATO off Russia’s borders will undoubtedly be shifted given the recent Ukraine Army incursions at Kursk. Many of us suspected it would come to this. Russia must finally flush the Kyiv-NATO experiment down the tubes.
V.V. Putin and Job: Vladimir Putin is considered by most experts as the most sensible and realistic leader Russia has ever had. Furthermore, most honest experts consider him the only true statesman among a cadre of corporate-owned politicians in the Western world. However, pragmatic and logical actions do not exclude total war when a threat level reaches a threshold. And Washington playing coy about why Ukraine’s forces hit the flanks of Russia’s Karkov line and pushed across the border adds insult to injury. Injury to peace for all of Europe and the world.
The escalating situation on the Eurasian Steppe has a complexion now akin to every other attack on Russia since before The Great Game. Few recall the moment in history when the British Empire created a worldwide strategy to try and contain Russia. Given the U.S. role and the inclusion of a more unified Central Europe against all Russian interests, the strategies of the 19th century have been brought forward and magnified a hundredfold. In biblical history, the apostle James wrote about Job’s patience in helping believers during intense persecution. I do not think Russia’s president will allow his people to be persecuted any longer, even though he has shown the perseverance and humility of Job. Perhaps when the evildoers are smitten, Russia and Mr. Putin can forgive them. But not before the smiting. This all reminds me of another time.
This Great Game was a period of distrust, diplomatic intrigue, and regional wars like those we’ve seen in Georgia, Afghanistan, and now in Ukraine. Back then, the containment policy by the West never erupted in a full-scale war directly between Russian and British colonial forces. Later, however, the Brits, Americans, and Germans amped up the age-old obsessively with surrounding and dismantling Russia. The West created the situation and the conditions that led to Russia being forced to denazify and demilitarize Ukraine. No study of the subject can result in any other conclusion. The point is that Russia has very few choices—and only one logical one. Ukraine must be decapitated and either partitioned or absorbed by Russia altogether.
Zelensky: A Curse On Humanity: I am sure this seemingly drastic strategy has crossed V.V. Putin’s desk a hundred times in the past few years. And I suspect his logic will now shift. The Biden White House, run by the elites who are the prodigies of the British/American empire (Money Empire), is now feigning innocence in the Kursk incursion. Biden also pretended America was reticent to allow Ukraine to use long-range missiles from NATO states for attacks inside Russia. It’s ludicrous for anyone familiar with the situation! Nothing Ukraine’s Zelenskyy has done since his election has been undertaken without consent by his masters in London, New York, and Brussels.
Putin’s Russia must crush Zelensky by whatever means necessary. This is the only logical course of action in such a conflict. Zelensky told BBC and other media the other day that “Moscow must “feel” the consequences of its invasion of Ukraine.” The problem for President Putin is the need to put Russia on a complete war footing. Already, the Russian defence complex has been ramped up. Reservists and new enlistees are being added to Russia’s active duty forces. This actor in a clown suit, a mockery of Ukrainians and the world’s people, must be forced to heel in front of humanity. The end Sadaam Hussein and Gadaffi faced is probably too gentle for a person of this nature.
Looking briefly at the events leading up to the current crisis, we find one side playing by the old rules. For instance, France and Germany lying to the Russians and the world about the Minsk Accords is the milestone that best crystalizes what’s happening. When former German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted the West was duping the Russians to reinforce Ukraine (via NATO), I’m sure Putin and others in Russia’s hierarchy believed the world would take notice. And the majority did. In the Middle East, across Asia, Latin America, and especially Africa, key people began to galvanize their understanding that the United States and its partners fully intend to rule the world completely. However, three-fourths of the planet’s population sits on the same side as Russia. The recent BRICS events tell us the multipolar system of world detente is upon us. And this is why Washington is prompting the Ukrainians into a suicide mission. It’s all or nothing, and unfortunately, Russia is now being forced into reacting like Israel would respond. By this, I mean, ‘if you kill one of ours, we will kill a hundred of yours.”
The Outer Reality: I guess I’ve studied Vladimir Putin as much as anyone. The thing that strikes me most about the man is his self-control. Unlike any other leader I can think of, Putin seems to be a person of what German spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle termed “mindfullness,” or a deep concern for inner reality in all his dealings. Tolle discussed this when describing Christ’s teachings about turning the other cheek. He asserted that Christ used a parable to describe how we should deal with the world around us. For Putin, like America’s own Abraham Lincoln, I believe his inner reality has finally been shocked by the forces arrayed against him.
You see, this situation is about more than the survival of Russia. Russia is the centrepiece of an emerging multipolar world where no single nation will govern policy, economics, or resources. At least, this is the potential. Pitted against this is a cabal whose lineage and soul wreaks of medieval usurping of power and the degradation of everything and everyone it touches. For lack of a better term, let’s use the term “Technofeudalism”, created by Greek economist Yanis Varoufakis. He says that the tech giants have overthrown regular capitalism. And I would add that these tech giants were created by, and are controlled by, the old family ruling elites – or spawn of the age of The Great Game. Spawn is a strong word, I know, but as our world disintegrates and as these elites snatch at what’s left of our human legacy, logic dictates that we all become soldiers against tyranny.
Few people today understand that so-called “conspiracy theories” are as often as not accurate. Take Varoufakis’ term and consider that British writer and futurist H. G. Wells defined the term “new world order” as a synonym for establishing a technocratic world state and of a planned economy back in the 1940s. In the 1950s, German-born American banker James Warburg told the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations that: “We shall have a world government, whether or not we like it. The question is only whether world government will be achieved by consent or by conquest.”
And here we are. Vladimir Putin, perhaps the greatest statesman of our time, will be forced into rallying every resource opposed to the American hegemony in order even to mediate peace talks with this cabal of bloodletters. For my part, seeing North Korean, Chinese, Belarussian, and Iranian troops on the border alongside Russians would seal the issue, one way or another. Given the weight of such an unwinnable conflict, even Washington and London would have to take pause. The Kyiv experiment must be flushed out of the human laboratory. And I believe Mr. Putin knows it."
Adventures With Danno, "Very Frustrating Trip To Meijer!"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 8/20/24
"Very Frustrating Trip To Meijer!
This Was Absolutely Ridiculous & More Price Increases!"
"In today's vlog, we are at Meijer and are noticing not only more price increases on groceries but also found a lot of trickery in some of the sale prices as well. It's getting rough out here as many families are struggling to put food on the table."
Comments here:
o
Adventures with Danno, PM 8/20/24
"Is Walmart For Real? This Is Hard To Believe"
Walmart says they are lowering prices
but are very vague on grocery price changes.
Comments here:
Monday, August 19, 2024
Canadian Prepper, "Alert! Russian General's WW3 Nuclear Warning From Kursk!"
Full screen recommended.
Canadian Prepper, 8/19/24
"Alert! Russian General's WW3 Nuclear Warning From Kursk!"
Comments here:
Jeremiah Babe, "Warning! American Food Is Becoming Dangerous; Democratic National Convention On High Alert"
Jeremiah Babe, 8/19/24
"Warning! American Food Is Becoming Dangerous;
Democratic National Convention On High Alert"
Comments here:
Musical Interlude: Deuter, "Memories of an Angel"
Full screen recommended.
Deuter, "Memories of an Angel"
"A Look to the Heavens"
"What will become of our Sun? The first hint of our Sun's future was discovered inadvertently in 1764. At that time, Charles Messier was compiling a list of diffuse objects not to be confused with comets. The 27th object on Messier's list, now known as M27 or the Dumbbell Nebula, is a planetary nebula, one of the brightest planetary nebulae on the sky - and visible toward the constellation of the Fox (Vulpecula) with binoculars.
It takes light about 1000 years to reach us from M27, featured here in colors emitted by hydrogen and oxygen. We now know that in about 6 billion years, our Sun will shed its outer gases into a planetary nebula like M27, while its remaining center will become an X-ray hot white dwarf star. Understanding the physics and significance of M27 was well beyond 18th century science, though. Even today, many things remain mysterious about planetary nebulas, including how their intricate shapes are created."
Chet Raymo, “What Not to Believe”
“What Not to Believe”
by Chet Raymo
“In Stacy Schiff's biography of Cleopatra, I came across this epigraph from Euripides: "Man's most valuable trait is a judicious sense of what not to believe." I have no idea which of Euripides' plays the quote is from, but it strikes me as a suitable source for reflection. Credulity is the default state of a human life. Children are born to believe, to accept as true what they are told by adults. An innate credulity has survival value in a dangerous world. If a grown-up says "There are crocodiles in the river," it is probably best to stay out of the water.
Skepticism, on the other hand, must be learned. I was late in realizing that I didn't have to believe the received "truth." My best teacher was a somewhat older Panamanian secular Jew I went to graduate school with at UCLA. We took our brown-bag lunches together in the university's botanical garden, and spent the hour talking about physics, religion, and the "meaning of life."
Moises was the first person I had encountered after sixteen years of Catholic education who mentioned the word "skepticism." "Why do you believe that?" he would ask, and often I had no answer except that it was what my family and teachers told me was true. The idea that I might actually examine the basis for my beliefs was a rather new concept. In matters of religion, like almost everyone else in the world, I had embraced uncritically the faith story into which I was born.
And thus began my search for "a judicious sense of what not to believe." When later, as a teacher, I wrote a little column for each issue of the college newspaper, I called it "Under a Skeptical Star," from a line of the Scots poet/scholar William MacNeile Dixon: "If there be a skeptical star I was born under it, yet I have lived all my days in complete astonishment." A liberating sense of what not to believe opened the door to a vastly more interesting world whose diverse and astonishing riches I continue to explore to this day."
"What Are The Facts?"
“What are the facts? Again and again and again – what are the facts? Shun wishful thinking, ignore divine revelation, forget what “the stars foretell,” avoid opinion, care not what the neighbors think, never mind the un-guessable “verdict of history” – what are the facts, and to how many decimal places? You pilot always into an unknown future; facts are your single clue. Get the facts!”
- Robert A. Heinlein
“It seems to me what is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas. If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you. On the other hand, if you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of skeptical sense in you, then you cannot distinguish the useful ideas from the worthless ones.”
- Carl Sagan
And always remember...
"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains,
however improbable, must be the truth."
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, "Sherlock Holmes"
Hey, who lied and told you any of this was easy?
"Thanks To The Cost Of Living Crisis, U.S. Household Debt Has Soared To The Highest Level Ever Recorded"
"Thanks To The Cost Of Living Crisis, U.S. Household
Debt Has Soared To The Highest Level Ever Recorded"
by Michael Snyder
"Our entire economy is fueled by debt. In fact, if going into more debt was suddenly banned the U.S. economy would instantly hit a brick wall. For the vast majority of us, our lifestyles simply cannot be funded by what we actually make. So we use debt to bridge the difference, and this has particularly been true during the cost of living crisis. Total household debt has now reached a grand total of 17.8 trillion dollars, and we continue to pile up more with no end in sight…
"A quarterly report published this month by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on household credit and debt found that between the first quarter of 2021 and the second quarter of 2024, credit card debt surged 48.1% while household debt - which includes mortgages and auto loans - rose by 21.6%. In dollar terms, credit card debt rose from $770 billion in early 2021 to $1.14 trillion in the most recent quarter, while household debt increased from $14.64 trillion to $17.8 trillion in the same period.
I did not realize that credit card debt had risen by more than 48 percent since the first quarter of 2021. That is extremely alarming, because it indicates that millions upon millions of households are literally living on the edge of financial disaster. And the fact that delinquency rates have been climbing just underscores how serious things have become…"Amid American households’ rising debt burdens, delinquency rates have grown as well. In the last 12 months, about 9.1% of credit card debt balances and 8% of auto loan balances moved into delinquency - the highest levels since early 2011 and the end of 2010, respectively."
The primary reason why U.S. households are racking up so much debt these days is because the cost of living crisis has made it very difficult to make ends meet. One voter that was interviewed by Fox News admitted that her money “went a lot further four years ago”… “My family’s income hasn’t changed, but our comfort level has significantly decreased,” stay-at-home mom and homeschool teacher Persson said. “Money went a lot further four years ago. We were able to cover our bills and still have money saved. The economy has plummeted with the current administration, and to add on to that, where I live in California, the cost of living is much higher. Additionally, 44% of the survey respondents said they aren’t making enough take-home pay to cover their daily expenses."
Did you catch that last sentence? Almost half of the entire nation is not “making enough take-home pay to cover their daily expenses” at this point. Wow. According to a recent survey that was conducted by CNN, the cost of living crisis is a major issue for approximately two-thirds of the country…
"However, there are still times when the truth seeps out. CNN commissioned a well-constructed poll of about 2,000 random people to find out where they stand on personal finances. The headline number: nearly 40 percent of Americans are struggling to pay their bills. That is up from 28 percent from only three years ago, and a higher number than back in 2008–09, the period known as the Great Recession."
Two-thirds of people say that the number one issue they face is the cost of living and paying their bills. The typical American is spending nearly $1,000 more per month compared with three years ago just to pay living expenses. That is according to Moody’s, but it also fits with the intuition we all have."
This is why household debt levels have been exploding. Most people are just trying to find a way to make it from one month to another. Unfortunately, economic conditions are really starting to deteriorate and large employers are conducting mass layoffs all over the nation. For example, General Motors just announced that over 1,000 salaried employees will be getting the axe…
"General Motors is laying off more than 1,000 salaried employees globally in its software and services division following a review to streamline the unit’s operations, CNBC has learned. The layoffs, including roughly 600 jobs at GM’s tech campus near Detroit, come less than six months after leadership changes overseeing the operations, including former Apple executive Mike Abbott leaving the automaker after less than a year in March due to health reasons."
Considering all of the credit card debt that is being piled up, you would think that Mastercard would be doing well, but they have also decided to fire lots of workers…"Approximately 3% of Mastercard’s workforce are facing layoffs, with the payment services company slated to finish a “majority of the notifications” in the third quarter, the company said in a Friday statement to FOX Business."
Not to be outdone, Cisco has determined that it is time for “7% of the company’s workers” to hit the bricks…"Cisco is embarking on a restructuring to “allow it to invest in key growth opportunities and drive more efficiency in its business.” That effort will involve laying off 7% of the company’s workers, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing."
Last but not least, Intel has started the process of laying off approximately 15,000 workers: "Intel’s layoffs, announced Aug. 1, will result in some 15,000 employees losing their jobs. They will arise out of a “comprehensive reduction in spending” that the tech giant said it was pursuing to “resize and refocus.” The company aims to trim costs by $10 billion in 2025 through its overall cost-reduction plan."
This is just the beginning. A lot more layoffs are coming. So if you have a job that you greatly value, try to hold on to it with all your might. Meanwhile, we continue to get more economic numbers that indicate that the U.S. economy is rapidly heading in the wrong direction. In fact, we just learned that the Conference Board’s index of leading economic indicators has fallen for the 29th month in a row…"And now, we have US Leading Economic Indicators down for their 29th straight month – at a level worse than the trough of COVID lockdowns…"
How can anyone claim that our economy is moving in the right direction when our most important leading economic indicators have been falling for more than two years? Let’s be honest. Economic conditions are not good right now, and the outlook for the future is absolutely dismal. We have been living on a sugar high. We have accumulated the largest mountain of household debt in the history of the world, the largest mountain of business debt in the history of the world, and the largest mountain of government debt in the history of the world. Now all of those bubbles are starting to burst, and that means that a tremendous amount of pain is dead ahead."
Adventures with Danno, "Metal Wire Found In Perdue Chicken!"
Adventures with Danno, PM 8/19/24
"Metal Wire Found In Perdue Chicken!"
"Perdue chicken has recalled over 167,000 pounds of frozen,
ready to eat chicken due to metal wiring being found in products."
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“Dreams and Obsessions”
“Dreams and Obsessions”
by Paulo Coelho
“Your theory about every person could reach everything in life is really optimistic. But if the person tried once and was despaired and disappointed what is he going to do?” - Antoine Rigal, Lyon, France
“There is sometimes a bit of confusion in regards to a passage in my book "The Alchemist": “When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.” Some people sometimes want things that in the end won’t truly help them. Life is strange: the happier people can be, the unhappier they are. I have some friends that think they exist because they have “problems” to solve. Without “problems” they are nobody. The Universe is merely an echo of our desires, regardless of whether they are constructive or destructive ones.
One has to also keep in mind the difference between a dream and an obsession. I mention personal legend in "The Alchemist", and I wrote a book about obsession, "The Zahir". When you follow your personal legend, you walk your path and learn from it. The objective doesn’t blind you to the road that takes you there. On the other hand obsession is what prevents you from admiring the teachings of life. It’s like trying to get to your objective without passing through the challenges.
I realized that despite the fear and the bruises of life, one has to keep on fighting for one’s dream. As Borges said in his writings “there is no other virtue than being brave”. And one has to understand that being brave is not the absence of fear but rather the strength to keep on going forward despite the fear.”
- http://paulocoelhoblog.com/
The Poet: Mary Oliver, “October”
“October”
"There’s this shape, black as the entrance to a cave.
A longing wells up in its throat
like a blossom
as it breathes slowly.
What does the world
mean to you if you can’t trust it
to go on shining when you’re
not there? and there’s
a tree, long-fallen; once
the bees flew to it, like a procession
of messengers, and filled it
with honey.
I said to the chickadee, singing his heart out in the
green pine tree:
little dazzler,
little song,
little mouthful.
The shape climbs up out of the curled grass. It
grunts into view. There is no measure
for the confidence at the bottom of its eyes-
there is no telling
the suppleness of its shoulders as it turns
and yawns.
Near the fallen tree
something- a leaf snapped loose
from the branch and fluttering down- tries to pull me
into its trap of attention.
It pulls me
into its trap of attention,
And when I turn again, the bear is gone.
Look, hasn’t my body already felt
like the body of a flower?
Look, I want to love this world
as thought it’s the last chance I’m ever going to get
to be alive and know it.
Sometimes in late summer I won’t touch anything, not
the flowers, not the blackberries
brimming in the thickets; I won’t drink
from the pond; I won’t name the birds or the trees;
I won’t whisper my own name.
One morning
the fox came down the hill, glittering and confident,
and didn’t see me- and I thought:
so this is the world.
I’m not in it. It is beautiful."
- Mary Oliver
"Why You Should Pretend Today Is the End"
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"Why You Should Pretend Today Is the End"
by Ryan Holiday
"What would the world look like if everyone lived like it was their last day on earth? Chaos. It might seem liberating but in truth would be quite terrible. Who would follow the law? Who would care about anyone but themselves? What would get done? At the end of that day, you’d be grateful the world was not ending.
It was not that kind of nightmare that philosophers envisioned when they encouraged their pupils to meditate on their mortality. Memento mori - the ancient practice to keep death in mind - was not designed to promote anarchy. Certainly it wasn’t a pass to forsake order or other people - to find an orgy to join somewhere before it’s too late.
Instead Memento mori was supposed to make things cleaner, simpler, well-ordered. The great Stoic Seneca wrote that we should “balance life’s books each day. The one who puts the finishing touches on their life each day is never short of time.” An analogy might be a soldier about to leave on deployment. Not knowing whether they’ll return or not, what do they do? They get their affairs in order. They handle their business. They tell their children or their family that they love them. They don’t have time for quarreling or petty matters. And then in the morning they are ready to go - hoping to come back in one piece but prepared for the possibility that they might not.
Bud Day, the Air Force fighter pilot and Medal of Honor recipient who would spend over 5 years in the “Hanoi Hilton” as a POW with the Stoic James Stockdale, took the news that he would be deployed to Vietnam with order and discipline. He visited his father’s grave and made things right with his old man. In less than a week, he found a new home for his wife, a school for his young son, took them shopping and applied for the family’s first credit card. He put together a briefcase with their marriage license, his birth certificate, insurance policies, bank account numbers, even a list of the pallbearers he’d like at his funeral. He and his wife sat down and had a conversation about all the contingencies that might happen while he was gone, including what it would mean to go MIA. What happens if that happens she asked him? For this one, there was only one option - to pray for him.
But the rest of us? Do we live in such an orderly, prepared fashion? Of course not. We’re just taking things as they come. We’re like the character in Raymond Chandler’s "The Long Goodbye": “Mostly, I just kill time,” he says, “and it dies hard.”
What do we have to show for this time we kill? Rounds of golf, years spent at the office, time spent watching mediocre movies, a stack of mindless books we hardly remember reading, and maybe a garage full of toys. We have a list of places we’ve crossed off a travel bucket list. We have a bunch of meaningless obligations that we endured because we didn’t have strong enough priorities to say no. We are like this because we think we will live forever, because death is such an unpleasant thought that we refuse to think it.
“You can leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say,” Marcus Aurelius would remind himself. I carry a coin in my pocket with that saying on it (which I had minted at a century old mint in Minneapolis) so I can remember it. So I can touch this little piece of bronze and think memento mori and ask myself these questions:
If today was my last day before they shipped me off to the front, what would I do? How would I live? I’d have a list and I’d check those things off. I’d handle my business. I’d make time for my family - after I made sure they were taken care of in my absence. I wouldn’t make time for bullshit, I wouldn’t let other people impose on me. Not today. I’d see the cost too clearly. I’d be a little afraid, but I’d know I didn’t have a choice and so I’d proceed anyway.
One day we will get those orders - you’re shipping out tomorrow and not coming back. No one knows how much notice we’ll get either: a week, a year, five minutes, or none at all. It could come right now. It could happen before you get to the end of this article. Are you going to be proud of how you spent your time before that?
Don’t live each day as if the world is ending. That would be a disaster. Live your life as if you’re not sure whether your time on this earth is ending or not. Get your shit together. Handle what’s important. Take care of others. Enjoy yourself. Be at peace.”
"Acceptance..."
"Acceptance is a crucial step forward for those who prefer the idea of living this life over simply existing within it. Accept all that you've said and what you've done, because you cannot change your past. Accept the idea of the unknown, because the future is the unknown waiting patiently to reveal itself. Accept the person you have become thus far in your journey, because you are the only person who will be there with you when you finish it. Do all of this so that you may never find yourself having to accept regret that haunts you at two a.m., leaving you sweaty and broken hearted. All you have is this minute; not this hour, or this day, or this year. Live in this minute so that you won't get stuck simply existing with your guilty past, or with nothing but anxiety for the future."
- Margaret E. Rise
"The Only Time You Are Alive..."
"The country seems bigger, for you can see through the bare trees. There are times when the woods is absolutely still and quiet. The house holds warmth. A wet snow comes in the night and covers the ground and clings to the trees, making the whole world white. For a while in the morning the world is perfect and beautiful. You think you will never forget.
You think you will never forget any of this, you will remember it always just the way it was. But you can't remember it the way it was. To know it, you have to be living in the presence of it right as it is happening. It can return only by surprise. Speaking of these things tells you that there are no words for them that are equal to them or that can restore them to your mind. And so you have a life that you are living only now, now and now and now, gone before you can speak of it, and you must be thankful for living day by day, moment by moment, in this presence.
But you have a life too that you remember. It stays with you. You have lived a life in the breath and pulse and living light of the present, and your memories of it, remember now, are of a different life in a different world and time. When you remember the past, you are not remembering it as it was. You are remembering it as it is. It is a vision or a dream, present with you in the present, alive with you in the only time you are alive."
- Wendell Berry
Travelling with Russell, "I Went to Moscow's Most Beautiful Park: Krasnaya Presnya"
Full screen recommended.
Travelling with Russell, 8/19/24
"I Went to Moscow's Most Beautiful Park: Krasnaya Presnya"
"Join me for a wonderful afternoon in Krasnogvardeyskiye Prudy Park in the centre of Moscow, Russia. Krasnaya Presnya Park was founded in 1932 on the site of the Student's estate and is a monument of history and architecture."
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Dan, I Allegedly, "Credit Lines Slashed! 94 Banks At Risk of a Bank Run"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, 8/19/24
"Credit Lines Slashed! 94 Banks At Risk of a Bank Run"
"We dive deep into the brewing banking crisis as banks are slashing credit lines across the board. This alarming trend is affecting even the most reliable customers, like Jon from Ohio, who shared his shocking experience with me. As banks face increasing troubles, with more than 94 banks now at risk, it's crucial to stay informed and prepared. From credit cuts to banking layoffs and even real estate turmoil, these issues are impacting many lives. Join me as we unravel these financial challenges and discuss how to safeguard your finances. Sometimes lines are cut as much as 90% off. Plus, the list of banks in trouble has grown to 94."
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