So, we rise from the rubble...
Friday, February 19, 2021
"Covid or No Covid"
"Covid or No Covid"
by Jim Kunstler
"The absence of the big orange You-Know-Who at center stage of American life has changed the mood of the scene from a five-alarm fire to just another day in a collapsing civilization. Texas went medieval after an ice storm took the power down for millions, with ramifications accreting by the hour - especially the countless burst water pipes that will take forever to repair. (How many plumbers are there in San Antonio?) Food went scarce overnight. People died in their cars. The political blowback has barely registered yet, except for Senator Ted Cruz slinking back home from a luxury resort in Cancun, whoops, and Beto O’Rourke shooting his mouth off like a cholo with a Saturday night special at a low-rider parade on Cinco de Mayo.
Covid-19 cases are going down fast across the country. If it actually goes away, imagine the giant hole left in the national narrative. No more arguments over lockdowns, kids could go back to school to learn about the scourge of whiteness, and Americans could see each other’s faces again. The “progressives” in power would have to hunt up some new reasons to cancel the bill of rights. That shouldn’t be too difficult for a party adept at making shit up. Right wing extremism would be my bet, even if Antifa and BLM go back to partying in the streets like it’s 2020 when the weather warms up.
What won’t go away is the nation’s fantastic economic mess. In just a few months since Thanksgiving, the financial system has gone through an epic shift, barely noticed by citizens preoccupied with unpaid bills, skipped rents, and empty refrigerators: the stock markets are now based on Bitcoin, which is to say on less than nothing. A whole new dynamic has emerged with publicly-held companies buying the stuff hand-over-fist. An outfit like Tesla, rumored to manufacture electric cars, invested $1.5 billion in the crypto-currency, which has shot up to over $50,000-a-coin in recent weeks. The move was so splendidly shrewd that Tesla’s stock price also shot up, though they don’t make a profit on those cool cars. Of course, $1.5 billion is chump change for the charismatic Elon Musk, whose share of the American GDP can be seen from outer space, like the Great Wall of China.
Other companies are buying Bitcoin on margin, taking advantage of super-low interest rates to make a fast killing. What a great idea! Even better than borrowing to buy back your own company’s stock to jack-up the share value. Don’t be surprised if half of the S & P jumps into the Bitcoin frenzy, bidding it up to six figures. Won’t that do wonders for US productivity and working-class wages? None of that will escape the attention of a “progressive” Congress, which will see a great opportunity to try to compensate for its fiscal profligacy by passing new taxes on “excess wealth” or “windfall profits.” Then, watch the rush-to-the-exits by shareholders in those companies that loaded up on Bitcoin, aggravated by the margin calls on the dough they borrowed to buy the stuff… as well as Bitcoin itself plummeting back to its actual true value: around zero.
Meanwhile, Covid or no Covid, there is now a very large class of people across this land who either can’t or won’t earn a living, and we are seeing last year’s idle chat about “guaranteed basic income” (GBI) rapidly congeal into solid policy proposals to supply just that. It’s insane, you know, having nothing to do with producing things of value, but such is the new faith in monetary techno-magic - of which Bitcoin is the exemplar - that the reigning grand viziers and necromancers of economics are unanimous that it’s actually possible to get something for nothing now. I’m sure enough Republicans would go along with it - in terror of their broke and wrathful voters - to pass GBI.
The wild card, though, is how quickly we will destroy the value of the dollar as all this occurs, that is, provoke a king-hell inflation, so the people will get their GBI in worthless money. Nobody believes it can happen after ten years of quantitative easing and other shucks-and-jives in the accounting thickets that seemed to hardly move the inflation needle, except on Wall Street. But anyone who sets foot in a supermarket these days must feel a little shocked at food prices. A dollar for one measly onion… eight bucks for a little flat of ground beef…. How do people with no jobs or lost businesses feed their families? Do they get a warm tingly feeling knowing that Tesla shares are also up? Or are they out in the old toolshed at midnight, sharpening the pitchforks and soaking rags in kerosene?
Perhaps Ol’ Woke Joe Biden will explain where all this is going in his upcoming State of the Union Address scheduled for next Tuesday, according to the Associated Press. Oh, you didn’t know about that? I wouldn’t blame you. There is absolutely no buzz about it in the mainstream media, like, they’d rather not think about it. Yes, the alleged President goes before a joint session of Congress in a few days, with every other dignitary in government on hand in the chamber except the lone “designated survivor,” off in a secret bunker somewhere. Won’t that be something? With the whole world watching on TV, too, including, no doubt, a few foreign heads-of-state who Veep Kamala Harris confabbed with last week because the, ahem, president was too busy… or something like that."
Gregory Mannarino, AM 2/19/21: “Expect A Massive Debt Market Implosion On An Epic Scale To Occur”
Gregory Mannarino, AM 2/19/21:
“Expect A Massive Debt Market Implosion
On An Epic Scale To Occur”
Greg Hunter, "Weekly News Wrap-Up 2/19/21"
"Weekly News Wrap-Up 2/19/21"
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com
"YouTube is censoring people like never before. USAWatchdog.com was the latest causality in Big Tech’s quest to silence any narrative it does not want. USAW was abruptly taken off YouTube last week for good without reason other than Community Guidelines were broken for the third time. The channel had more than 260,000 subscribers and more than 90 million video views. The three main narratives you cannot talk about or even question are the massive election fraud that stole a landslide win from President Trump, Covid lies and vaccine questions, and any challenge to the official Climate Change narrative. USAWatchdog.com has questioned them all and will continue to do so with or without YouTube.
President Trump went on NewsMax to talk about the passing of radio legend Rush Limbaugh. He will be greatly missed. The President also talked about the election fraud and the “tabulations” of the 2020 Election. Trump did not back down an inch that the election was stolen. Trump also said, “What happened was a disgrace,” and “This is what you find in third world countries.” Trump would not answer when asked if he was going to run again in 2024 now that he was acquitted on the Democrats’ second impeachment attempt in four years.
Bitcoin (BTC) broke $50,000 per unit this week, but the overall markets are not doing that much celebrating. Big money management firms are worried that the market is out of control. Meanwhile, big money keeps piling into (BTC) and some wonder if this is some sort of bad omen for what may be coming. One top brokerage CEO is worried about the market reaching a breaking point and said he was scared of a “domino bankruptcy.”
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he talks
about these stories and more in the Weekly News Wrap-Up.
Thursday, February 18, 2021
"Texas Facing Humanitarian Crisis: Winter Storm Has Brought America To Its Knees"
Full screen recommended.
"Texas Facing Humanitarian Crisis:
Winter Storm Has Brought America To Its Knees"
by Epic Economist
"In just a few days, panic and chaos took over Texas as a huge polar vortex split and started to dump Arctic air down to the Gulf of Mexico, freezing wellheads, halting the flow of natural gas to power stations, and, consequently, triggering electric shortages due to the unprecedented demand, which not only overwhelmed the grid but also sent prices to sky-highs. The epic failure of the power grid has left millions of Texans without power, gas, heat, and with no access to water or food right in the middle of a winter of record cold temperatures. Many have been stating that the situation in Texas right now is so distressing that it seems it is turning into a humanitarian crisis. And analysts have been questioning if cold weather can cause a serious emergency on such short notice, is our country really prepared to handle its long-term troubles? That's what we're going to discuss in this video.
Despite all of our technological progress and modernized systems, record low temperatures have brought much of the U.S. to its knees. There has been a major disruption on Texas' power grid, where numerous pipes that weren't designed to handle such icing temperatures have burst, and citizens were left without power and heating in their homes for days. At least 15 million Texan homes were severely affected by the breakdown and people have been desperately scrambling to find shelters to survive the freezing temperatures. The biggest part of the state is on the ERCOT power grid, which is independent from the standard U.S. power supply system, and this crisis has clearly shown how extremely vulnerable and flawed the ERCOT electric network can be during an emergency.
The domino effect of blackouts and power outages has caused some critical infrastructure problems, also interrupting the operations of cellular networks and water treatment plants. Evidently, Texas isn't the only state suffering due to the ravaging chillwave. The Southwest Power Pool, which controls a grid spanning 14 states, has ordered rotating power outages to happen over the next several days. As a consequence of the power shortages, the tremendous amount of demand for a limited amount of supply has sent natural gas prices to insanely high levels.
ZeroHedge has posted a very detailed article attempting to show "the speed at which one of the nation's wealthiest states has been transformed into a third-world country". The article has reported several statements of local residents. One of them disclosed that central Texas is looking like a "refugee situation of sorts," saying that what he's seeing on the ground is nothing short of a disaster in the making. Many other readers commented saying that their families are camped out in the homes of those who still have power, and revealed that parents are dropping off their young children in residences that still have heat while they try to figure out how to fix the damages caused in their own homes.
Some groups started lighting charcoal grills indoors and running vehicles in garages, which has resulted in a growing number of carbon monoxide poisonings in the area. Additionally, another Texan resident signaled that over the next days much more chaos might arise. His statement reads: "Next week when things thaws out, all of that sewage is going to coat the entire state. But the worst part of it is that the current virus disease can transmit through sewage. Texas is about to become a science experiment in herd immunity. I think Texas might be on its way to becoming a Third World country." Stores are having trouble restocking their shelves and many people have affirmed to be running out of food. Huge lines are being seen outside grocery stores across the state, but customers are reporting shortages in several items and saying most stores are placing limits to what one can purchase, which is making the lives of those with big families incredibly difficult.
As there's no clear end in sight for the ice storm, analysts have been arguing that the power grid collapse in Texas is morphing into a humanitarian crisis that is far from over. Likewise, economic experts underlined that the country's infrastructure is so vulnerable that all it took was a few days of very cold weather to collapse the entire power grid of one of the nation's wealthiest states. Considering our leaders have been failing to control the health crisis for over a year, and failing to support our workers, businesses, and our economy, their unresponsiveness to this crisis shouldn't come as a surprise. As Snyder perfectly put into words: "I would encourage you to get prepared for all of the strangeness that is in front of us, because as we have seen, the system is not nearly as stable as most people thought it was."
"Texas Was 'Seconds And Minutes' From Complete Disaster"
"Texas Was 'Seconds And Minutes' From Complete Disaster"
by Tyler Durden
"One week ago, long before almost anyone else realized just how serious the situation in the plains states in general and Texas in particular would be as a result of the cascade of soaring nat gas prices, we warned that all hell was about to break loose. But not even we had any idea just how close to total collapse the system nearly was.
On Thursday, ERCOT officials said that the Texas power grid was “seconds and minutes” away from a catastrophic failure that could have left Texans in the dark for months. They should know: ERCOT is the entity that operates the power grid that covers most of the state.
The Texas Tribune reports that as millions of customers throughout the state begin to have power restored after days of massive blackouts, officials with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, said Texas was dangerously close to a worst-case scenario: uncontrolled blackouts across the state.
Maybe if they had read our warnings, none of what happened this week would have been a surprise. Alas, that was not the case. So in hopes to front run a wave of lawsuits, they spun their quick reaction as the only thing that prevented an even more catastrophic scenario: according to the Tribune, "the quick decision that grid operators made in the early hours of Monday morning to begin what was intended to be rolling blackouts - but lasted days for millions of Texans - occurred because operators were seeing warning signs that massive amounts of energy supply was dropping off the grid."
"The #TexasPowerGrid is 90% self-contained, they can't simply get power from other states. This is why all the states are connected, so the demand of the grid can be met. Right now, acc to @ERCOT_ISO, Texas's electricity demand is FAR exceeding current generation capacity. /8 pic.twitter.com/0LS9ky8ui8" - Liam Kent 🦞 (@l___kent) February 17, 2021
As natural gas fired plants, utility scale wind power and coal plants tripped offline due to the extreme cold brought by the winter storm, the amount of power supplied to the grid to be distributed across the state fell rapidly. At the same time, demand was increasing as consumers and businesses turned up the heat and stayed inside to avoid the weather. “It needed to be addressed immediately," said Bill Magness, president of ERCOT. “It was seconds and minutes [from possible failure] given the amount of generation that was coming off the system.”
With energy prices exploding to record highs, and with demand soaring, grid operators had to "act quickly" to cut the amount of power distributed, Magness said, because if they had waited, “then what happens in that next minute might be that three more [power generation] units come offline, and then you’re sunk.”
Magness said on Wednesday that if operators had not acted in that moment, the state could have suffered blackouts that “could have occurred for months,” and left Texas in an “indeterminately long” crisis. In other words, the millions of households left without power - in some cases for days - were sacrificing for the greater good. So by manually shutting down entire parts of the grid, ERCOT avoided the worst case scenario: one where demand for power overwhelms the supply of power generation available on the grid, causing equipment to catch fire, substations to blow and power lines to go down.
If the grid had gone totally offline, the physical damage to power infrastructure from overwhelming the grid would take months to repair, said Bernadette Johnson, senior vice president of power and renewables at Enverus, an oil and gas software and information company headquartered in Austin. “As chaotic as it was, the whole grid could’ve been in blackout,” she said. “ERCOT is getting a lot of heat, but the fact that it wasn’t worse is because of those grid operators.” If that had occurred, even as power generators recovered from the cold, ERCOT would have been unable to quickly reconnect them back to the grid, Johnson said. And since nobody can disprove a negative, one just has to take them at their word that dozens of people died so that millions more could live... or something.
Grid operators would have needed to slowly and carefully bring generators and customers back online, all the while taking care to not to cause more damage to the grid. It’s a delicate process, Johnson explained, because each part of the puzzle - the generators producing power, the transmission lines that move the power and the customers that use it - must be carefully managed. “It has to balance constantly,” she said. “Once a grid goes down, it’s hard to bring it back online. If you bring on too many customers, then you have another outage.”
And while that may justify the widespread blackouts, it does not explain why the Texas grid was so underprepared for just this scenario. ERCOT officials have repeatedly said that the winter storm that swept the state caught power generators off guard. The storm far exceeded what ERCOT projected in the fall to prepare for winter. Right, but that's why they are paid the big bucks: to predict worst case scenarios (kinda like the Fed) - it is here that everyone failed so abysmally. Which means that it has to be spun into some heroic task.
“The operators who took those actions to prevent a catastrophic blackout and much worse damage to our system, that was, I would say, the most difficult decision that had to be made throughout this whole event," Magness said. Nine grid operators are working at any given time who make these sorts of decisions, said Leslie Sopko, a spokesperson for ERCOT. “At the end of the day, our operators are highly trained and have the authority to make decisions that protect the reliability of the electric system,” she said in a statement.
The good news is that the Texas nightmare is coming to an end: ERCOT said it made "significant progress" overnight Wednesday to restore customer power to many Texans, and remaining power outages are likely due to ice storm damage to the distribution system. Some areas that were taken offline will also need to be restored manually, according to ERCOT. ERCOT warned that emergency conditions remain, and that “some level of rotating outages” may be necessary over the coming days to keep the grid stable."
"Will the Truth Really Set You Free?"
"Will the Truth Really Set You Free?"
by Brian Maher
“You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” - John 8:32 informs us. No, said Thomas Huxley. John was far from the facts. “You shall know the truth,” countered Huxley... “and the truth shall make you mad.” “Mad” is angry by one definition. By another it is lunatic. Both definitions may pertain today.
You shall know the truth about America’s finances… and it shall make you mad. One-fifth of all United States dollars ever issued have entered existence within the past year. One dollar in five ever issued - within the past year! That fact may stagger you. It may flabbergast you. It may even appall you. It will certainly madden you. Meantime, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet has expanded 80% since February last, from $4.1 trillion… to $7.4 trillion.
$82 Trillion in Debt: One enormity piles upon another. Consider: United States national debt has leapt over 20% since last January. That debt careens towards $30 trillion with each clack of the cuckoo clock. Then to $35 trillion, to $40 trillion… and beyond… to some distant oblivion. Total United States debt, public and private, runs to $82 trillion. A mad $82 trillion - that is - for a $21 trillion economy.
But let us gaze briefly beyond these fair shores, to the world beyond… Total global debt stacks to $277 trillion. Here we range towards figures beyond all comprehension. The number 277,000,000,000,000 does not clarify. It clouds. It stupefies. It staggers. It dulls the critical senses. It therefore requires… perspective.
8,777,576 Years! Imagine the scene: A diabolical fiend orders you to print $1 each second of each day you live. How much time would you require to print $1 trillion? The answer is 31,688 years. How many years would you require to print $277 trillion in $1 increments? The answer is 8,777,576 years - nearly nine million years. That is, to retire the world’s debt... you must clear your calendar for the following 8,777,576 years.
But your tormenter showers you with mercy. He reduces your sentence by 100. He permits you to retire the world’s debt with $100 bills... rather than $1 bills. Thus your enslavement is reduced to 87,776 years of ceaseless agony. Now you have some faint understanding of $277 trillion. A $100 bill per second will bring you to $277 trillion - after 87,776 years hard at the grindstone. Yet we are informed $277 trillion of debt is inadequate to the world’s needs. The world requires madder wine, madder music… and madder men… It requires additional debt.
"The Time to Go Big Is Now": Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has instructed her G7 fellows, "The time to go big is now." You are fully aware what going “big” means, of course - spending “big.” Big spending must not be limited to pandemic relief. For the world’s needs are many... The planet roasts. And the United States must help recalibrate Earth’s oven settings, explains Ms. Yellen: “We understand the crucial role that the United States must play in the global climate effort.” We do not know the precise number of dollars required to tinker the temperature dials. Yet we hazard the figure is handsome.
Madam Secretary further affirms the United States must aid the poorer countries clobbered by the pandemic. A costly undertaking, again.
Where Does the Money Come From? Where will Janet Yellen locate the monies to restore prosperity… to recalibrate the earthly temperature… to succor the world’s poorer nations? She will not locate them in the national strongbox. The thing is empty - our spies have smuggled a look. How then can the United States give out what it has not taken in? It must go upon the borrow, of course, as is its custom. It must plunge deeper into debt today so that it… and the world… will rise in wealth tomorrow.
Will the dose work the cure? It is unlikely. To understand why you must penetrate the “veil of money.” Mr. Lance Roberts of Real Investment Advice: "While in theory, “printing money” should lead to an increase in economic activity and inflation, such has not been the case. A better way to look at this is through the “veil of money” theory. If money is a commodity, more of it should lead to less purchasing power, resulting in inflation. However, this theory began to fail as Governments attempted to adjust interest rates rather than maintain a gold standard…beginning in 2000, the “money supply” as a percentage of GDP has exploded higher without a resulting rise in inflation or economic growth."
When Debt Turns Deflationary: But why little inflation or economic growth? Here Mr. Roberts lowers his axe to the root of the tree: “Monetary policy is ‘deflationary’ when ‘debt’ is required to fund it. Does a greater paradox exist? The harder the Federal Reserve goes at inflation, the more elusive the target. It is hell-mad for inflation. It gets deflation instead. The bugaboo in this dreadful tale is monetary velocity - as Jim Rickards has documented in these pages.
As a man obese with blubber struggles to move… an economy obese with debt struggles to move. The more calories the man hauls in, the slower his going. The more debt the economy hauls in, the slower its going.
More Debt, Less Growth: The economy has guttered along in low gear 20 years running. And for the reasons listed. Roberts: "In 2000, the Fed “crossed the Rubicon,” whereby lowering interest rates did not stimulate economic activity. Instead, the “debt burden” detracted from it. With each monetary policy intervention, the velocity of money has slowed along with the breadth and strength of economic activity...
Despite perennial hopes that economic growth and inflation would arise from lower rates, more government spending, and increased “accommodative policies,” each iteration led to weaker outcomes. To no surprise, monetary velocity increases when the deficit reverses to a surplus. Financial surpluses allow revenues to move into productive investments rather than debt service.
In an economy saddled by $82 Trillion in debt, the debt is no longer productive as more debt is issued to cover ongoing spending needs. This is why “monetary velocity” began to decline as total debt passed the point of being “productive” to becoming “destructive.”
Productive vs. Destructive Debt: Mr. Roberts distinguishes between “productive” debt and “destructive” debt. Since 1980, he reminds us, debt has switched from productive to non-productive. The lion’s take has gone to fund “social welfare” and to service existing debt. That is, debt has gone largely to non-productive uses. And so debt has pulled… rather than pushed.
Here Roberts cites Woody Brock’s "American Gridlock": "Country A spends $4 Trillion with receipts of $3 Trillion. This leaves Country A with a $1 Trillion deficit. In order to make up the difference between the spending and the income, the Treasury must issue $1 Trillion in new debt. That new debt is used to cover the excess expenditures but generates no income leaving a future hole that must be filled.
Country B spends $4 Trillion and receives $3 Trillion income. However, the $1 Trillion of excess, which was financed by debt, was invested into projects, infrastructure, that produced a positive rate of return. There is no deficit as the rate of return on the investment funds the “deficit” over time."
Lest you doubt… the United States is not “Country B.”
A World Gone Mad: Roberts reminds us: "As this money is used for servicing debt, entitlements, and welfare, instead of productive endeavors, there is no question that high debt-to-GDP ratios reduce economic prosperity over time. In turn, the Government tries to fix the “economic problem” by adding on more “debt."
Fix the problem by hosing in more debt? As well fix a flood by hosing in more water. It is mad. Yet the world is mad. We should therefore be unsurprised that greater madness is the choice of a mad world. Yet we must consider this alarming possibility, however reluctantly: It is the world that is sane. It is we who are mad. As wrote the late Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa: “In a mad world, only the mad are sane.”
Must Watch! “Desperation Rises As Jobs Collapse; Fake Economy Ending; Massive Money Printing; World Ending?”
Jeremiah Babe,
“Desperation Rises As Jobs Collapse; Fake Economy Ending;
Massive Money Printing; World Ending?”
Full screen recommended.
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Related, highest recommendation:
"What Poisoned America?"
by Charles Hugh Smith
"America's financial system is nothing more than a toxic waste dump
of speculation, fraud, collusion, corruption and rampant profiteering."
"What Poisoned America? The list of suspects is long: systemic bias, special interests dominating politics, political polarization, globalization and the offshoring of productive capacity, over-regulation, the rise of rapacious cartels and monopolies, Big Tech's gulag of the mind, the permanent adolescence of consumerism, permanent global war, to name a few."
Please view this complete article here:
Gerald Celente, “Italy’s Prime Minister Draghi Proves It: Banksters In Control”
Gerald Celente, “Trends Journal”:
“Italy’s Prime Minister Draghi Proves It: Banksters In Control”
"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).”
"Feeling Overwhelmed: Breathing into Order"
"Feeling Overwhelmed: Breathing into Order"
by Madisyn Taylor, The DailyOM
"Always know, the Universe works in perfect order and you are never given more thank you can handle. Sometimes we may feel like there is just too much we need to do. Feeling overwhelmed may make it seem like the universe is picking on us, but the opposite is true: we are only given what we can handle. Difficult situations are opportunities to be our best selves, hone our skills and rise to the occasion.
The best place to start is to take a deep breath. As you do, remind yourself that the universe works in perfect order and therefore you can get everything done that needs to get done. As you exhale, release all the details that you have no control over. The universe with it‘s infinite organizing power will orchestrate the right outcome. Anytime stress begins to creep up, remember to breathe through it with these thoughts. Then, make a list of everything you need to do. Note what needs to be done first, and mark the things others may be able to do for you or with you. Though we often think no one else can do it correctly or well, there are times when it is worth it to exhale, let go of our control, and ask for help from professionals or friends. With the remaining things that feel you must do yourself, take another breath and determine their true importance.
Sometimes they are things we’d like to do, but aren’t really necessary. After taking these quick steps, you will find you have a plan laid out, freeing you from frenzied thoughts circling in your head. With calming deep breaths, you are now free to focus more fully on our priorities. Herbal teas or flower remedies along with wise choices about caffeine and food can help keep us from becoming frantic too. But with nothing further from us than our breath, we can breathe in our best intentions and let the rest go with an exhale. Keeping ourselves centered and breathing into and through life’s challenges helps us learn what we are truly capable of doing, and we will find we have the ability to rise to any occasion. Remember you aren’t being picked on, and you are never alone."
"I Realized..."
"Lifes impermanence, I realized, is what makes every
single day so precious. It's what shapes our time here.
It's what makes it so important that not a single moment be wasted."
- Wes Moore
The Poet: James Broughton, "Having Come This Far"
"Having Come This Far"
"I've been through what my through was to be,
I did what I could and couldn't.
I was never sure how I would get there.
I nourished an ardor for thresholds,
for stepping stones and for ladders,
I discovered detour and ditch.
I swam in the high tides of greed,
I built sandcastles to house my dreams.
I survived the sunburns of love.
No longer do I hunt for targets.
I've climbed all the summits I need to,
and I've eaten my share of lotus.
Now I give praise and thanks
for what could not be avoided,
and for every foolhardy choice.
I cherish my wounds and their cures,
and the sweet enervations of bliss.
My book is an open life.
I wave goodbye to the absolutes,
and send my regards to infinity.
I'd rather be blithe than correct.
Until something transcendent turns up,
I splash in my poetry puddle,
and try to keep God amused."
- James Broughton
"Economic Market Snapshot PM 2/18/21"
"Economic Market Snapshot PM 2/18/21"
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"Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will
do the most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone."
- John Maynard Keynes
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"Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
Your guide:
Gregory Mannarino, PM 2/18/21
"Is A Correction STILL About To Occur?
Plus Updates"
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"The more I see of the monied classes,
the better I understand the guillotine."
- George Bernard Shaw
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MarketWatch Market Summary, Live Updates
CNN Market Data:
CNN Fear And Greed Index:
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A comprehensive, essential daily read.
Feb 18th to 19th, Updated Daily
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Financial Stress Index
"The OFR Financial Stress Index (OFR FSI) is a daily market-based snapshot of stress in global financial markets. It is constructed from 33 financial market variables, such as yield spreads, valuation measures, and interest rates. The OFR FSI is positive when stress levels are above average, and negative when stress levels are below average. The OFR FSI incorporates five categories of indicators: credit, equity valuation, funding, safe assets and volatility. The FSI shows stress contributions by three regions: United States, other advanced economies, and emerging markets."
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Daily Job Cuts
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And now, the End Game...
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Oh yeah...
"The U.S. Government Is Flat Broke"
"The U.S. Government Is Flat Broke"
by Bill Bonner
"Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination,
The more you’re slip sliding away..."
– Paul Simon
RANCHO SANTANA, NICARAGUA – "On Monday, we reported the latest figures from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). They were shocking… but not surprising. We remind you that they are just part of a Big Picture. It is the picture of a degenerate empire, slip sliding since 1999… and now, desperately trying to hold itself together with printing-press money. But it’s gone so far down this road, it can’t turn around. Each time there is a “crisis,” it has to print more. And the more it prints, the worse the next crisis becomes.
Big Story: Meanwhile, the people are distracted. Waiting for the stimmy checks or gawking at the clowns in their capital city… they hardly notice. Do you really think it matters that Janet Yellen is a woman rather than a man? Or how many BIPOCs attend cabinet meetings? Will those be the big stories of our time? Or how about “Russian aggression”… or Chinese cunning? Or the impeachment of Donald Trump? Or the weather in Texas?
What really matters to a nation? Money and war. War and money. Let either one get out of control, and you are headed for trouble. Which is why this is the story of our time… the big story of the 21st century… the story of how a great empire slid into the ditch. But it’s not an original tale. So today, we skip ahead… guessing how it might turn out.
Flat Broke: First, let’s recall the basic numbers from the CBO... The budget deficit will total $2.3 trillion – 10.3 percent of GDP – in FY 2021 and total $12.3 trillion (4.4 percent of GDP) over the next decade.
• Debt will reach a new record as a share of the economy, growing from over 79 percent of GDP at the end of FY 2019 to over 102 percent of GDP by the end of 2021… and will grow another $13.6 trillion by the end of 2031, ultimately reaching $35.3 trillion.
• Four major trust funds are on a path toward insolvency. CBO projects Highway Trust Fund insolvency in FY 2022, Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund insolvency in FY 2026. Social Security Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund insolvency appears likely in calendar year 2032 and Social Security Disability Insurance Trust Fund insolvency in the mid-2030s.
• Debt could be even higher than projected. If policymakers enact $2 trillion of additional fiscal relief, extend expiring tax provisions, and grow annual appropriations with GDP, debt would total 120 percent of GDP by 2031.
Now, let’s add some numbers of our own. This year, the feds will collect about $3.8 trillion in taxes. But they will spend $380 billion on interest on existing debt (at the lowest rates in history) and about $4 trillion on “transfer payments” (depending on how much stimmy the feds give out). You see the problem clearly, as we do.
More than 100% of the feds’ revenue is spent before they ever begin governing. The “transfer payments” are things such as Obamacare, Social Security, and supplemental unemployment benefits – moving money from one pocket to another. But that leaves nothing for the Department of Defense. Nothing for the fight against COVID-19. Nothing for the thousands of boondoggles and bamboozles finagled over the years.
In other words, the federal government is flat broke. It has not a single penny with which to fulfill its core responsibilities. Not a farthing for the courts. Not a peso for the Pentagon. And not a dollar for infrastructure… research… climate change… or anything else.
The Way It Works: But those numbers – as awful as they are – will get much worse. And then, they will spin out into absurdity. Because the CBO’s estimates do not take economic setbacks, political jackassery, and market corrections into account. They assume things go on pretty much as they are, with no significant missteps… market crashes… interest rate increases… virus attacks… or recessions.
That is not the way it works. Things go wrong. And the first thing to go wrong (which could begin any moment) is that the markets will blow up. They are in Bubbleland now, searching for sharp objects. Then, in a panic, the authorities will rush out more stimmy checks.
No Alternative: And here, Dear Reader, let us interrupt to connect a simple – but important – set of dots. There are no “decisions” to be made. There are no choices. There are no real alternatives. No “solutions.” It’s “inflate or die,” remember?
And nobody wants to die… neither Republicans nor Democrats… nor any of the vast army of apparatchiks, hangers-on, lobbyists, members of Congress, media… deep staters… insiders… elite cronies… nor the whole kit and kaboodle, the upper 10%, who control the government and have the most to lose when its system of fake-money finance blows up.
Once you start down that road… you can’t even slow down. Because any attempt to raise interest rates to a more normal level… or ease off on the printing press… or cut the deficits… or trim the debt... will bring the very crisis the elite are so desperate to avoid.
So, what happens? It just gets wackier and wackier. And the more slip sliding you do, the nearer your destination you get. Tune in tomorrow for more wackiness – on Wall Street."
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Related:
Gregory Mannarino, AM 2/18/21: “Critical Must Know Updates: Economic Freefall, Markets, More”
Gregory Mannarino, AM 2/18/21:
“Critical Must Know Updates: Economic Freefall, Markets, More”
"Ah, You Miserable Creatures!"
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great!
You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything!
Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough. "
- Frederic Bastiat
Any questions?
"Covid-19 Pandemic Updates 2/18/21"
"Covid-19 Pandemic Updates 2/18/21"
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Feb 18, 2021 7:54 AM ET:
The coronavirus pandemic has sickened more than 110,001,100
people, according to official counts, including 27,873,039 Americans.
Globally at least 2,431,300 have died.
Feb. 18, 2021 7:54 PM ET:
Coronavirus in the U.S.: Latest Map and Case Count○
"The COVID Tracking Project"
Every day, our volunteers compile the latest numbers on tests, cases,
hospitalizations, and patient outcomes from every US state and territory.
- https://covidtracking.com/
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Every day, our volunteers compile the latest numbers on tests, cases,
hospitalizations, and patient outcomes from every US state and territory.
- https://covidtracking.com/
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Feb. 18, 2021, 8:27 AM ET
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Where I Live:
2/18/2021: "Cases are very high but have decreased over the past two weeks. The numbers of hospitalized Covid patients and deaths in the Pinal County area have also fallen. The test positivity rate in Pinal County is very high, suggesting that cases are being significantly undercounted. We’ve recommended additional precautions below."
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So far so good... Maybe.
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