Lake Village, Indiana, USA. Thanks for stopping by!
So, we rise from the rubble...
Friday, June 16, 2023
"On The Meridian Of Time..."
“On the meridian of time there is no injustice: there is only the poetry of motion creating the illusion of truth and drama. If at any moment anywhere one comes face to face with the absolute, that great sympathy which makes men like Gautama and Jesus seem divine freezes away; the monstrous thing is not that men have created roses out of this dung heap, but that, for some reason or other, they should want roses. For some reason or other man looks for the miracle, and to accomplish it he will wade through blood. He will debauch himself with ideas, he will reduce himself to a shadow if for only one second of his life he can close his eyes to the hideousness of reality. Everything is endured – disgrace, humiliation, poverty, war, crime, ennui – in the belief that overnight something will occur, a miracle, which will render life tolerable.”
- Henry Miller
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“In the time of your life, live - so that in that good time there shall be no ugliness or death for yourself or for any life your life touches. Seek goodness everywhere, and when it is found, bring it out of its hiding place and let it be free and unashamed.
Place in matter and in flesh the least of the values, for these are the things that hold death and must pass away. Discover in all things that which shines and is beyond corruption. Encourage virtue in whatever heart it may have been driven into secrecy and sorrow by the shame and terror of the world. Ignore the obvious, for it is unworthy of the clear eye and the kindly heart.
Be the inferior of no man, or of any men be superior. Remember that every man is a variation of yourself. No man's guilt is not yours, nor is any man's innocence a thing apart. Despise evil and ungodliness, but not men of ungodliness or evil. These, understand. Have no shame in being kindly and gentle but if the time comes in the time of your life to kill, kill and have no regret.
In the time of your life, live - so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite delight and mystery of it.”
- William Saroyan,
"The Time of Your Life" (1939)
"RFK Jr. Says He Must "Be Careful" The CIA Doesn't Assassinate Him"
"RFK Jr. Says He Must "Be Careful"
The CIA Doesn't Assassinate Him"
by Steve Watson
"During a discussion with Joe Rogan, Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. admitted that he is putting his life in danger by speaking out about the assassinations of his uncle and his father, and that he “takes precautions” to ensure the CIA doesn’t kill him. Rogan asked RFK Jr. what he thought would happen if he managed to get into office, to which Kennedy replied “I gotta be careful.I’m aware of that, you know, I’m aware of that danger. I don’t live in fear of it - at all. But I’m not stupid about it, and I take precautions,” he added.
Kennedy spoke about his Uncle JFK being “at war” with the military industrial complex, and asserted that the intelligence agencies were “trying to trick him” into launching military excursions into Cuba and Vietnam. RFK Jr. again spoke about JFK eventually concluding that he must “shatter” the CIA “into a thousands pieces” and “scatter it to the winds.”
“JFK learned very early on that the purpose of the CIA and the intelligence apparatus was to create a constant pipeline of new wars for them, for the military industrial complex,” Kennedy noted, adding that JFK was adamant that “it’s not the United States’ jobs to dictate what kind of governments other countries have.”
RFK Jr. continued, “in October of 1963 he heard that some of his Green Berets had been killed… and he said I want a total casualty list from Vietnam. His aide came to him and said 75 Americans have died, he said that’s too many and he signed that day a national security directive ordering all troops out of Vietnam… the first thousand over the next month and then the rest by the beginning of 1965, and um and then a month later he was killed.” Watch:
"Russia/Ukraine 6/16/23"
Col. Douglas Macgregor Straight Calls, 6/16/23
"The Ukrainians Got Obliterated Far
From The Russian Security Line"
"Ukraine news today and in-depth discussion of current geopolitical events in the United States of America. Colonel Douglas Macgregor's Ukraine Russia war update, Russian offensive, Ukraine counter offensive, war update."
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Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 6/16/23
"NATO's Bad Plan & the Ukrainian Offensive,
Larry Johnson fmr. CIA"
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"Scott Ritter, 6/16/23
"The Latest Russian Spring Offensive"
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Jim Kunstler, "Call the Exorcists!"
"Call the Exorcists!"
by Jim Kunstler
“Modern states are powerful things, vast machines built of human components that act according to their own logic and towards their own ends.” - Eugypius on Substack
"As a Jewish American, and a connoisseur of my people’s folklore, I bring to your attention the troublesome figure of the dybbuk (dih-bik), a disembodied demon that, because of its sins, wanders restlessly among us and can enter the flesh of a living person, who will then afflict and torment the community until properly exorcised by a minyan of rabbis garbed in white burial shrouds wielding sacred oaths.
Thus, I give you Andrew Weissmann, Esq., attorney at law, the American chief dybbuk, on the scene for decades now, sowing mischief and woe, leading an unholy host of fellow dybbukim calling itself Lawfare to infest the courts and meddle in elections. Think: Michael Sussman, an imp of RussiaGate; Michael Bromwich, former DOJ Inspector General (!) and then advisor to one Christine Blasey Ford (remember her?), David Laufman, erstwhile DOJ counter-intel goblin and Blasey Ford “beach friend” errand boy, Marc Elias, engineer extraordinaire of ballot harvesting operations in the 2020 election and many related pranks, Dan Goldman, lead counsel for the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment against Donald J. Trump…dybbuks all!
The dybbuk Weissmann is best known, of course, for directing the Special Counsel’s “Russian Collusion” campaign (2017 – 2019) in the mental absence of its nominal chief, Robert Mueller, an endeavor that, in the end, could not find any instance of then-President Trump colluding with said Russians - but did, via a firehose of media leaks, succeed in casting a Trump derangement spell over half the US population. Dybbuk Weissmann lately haunts the MSNBC cable news channel as a “legal analyst.”
And yet, this shape-shifting fiend turns up again now in the Biden family global bribery matter, of all things. See if you can follow the convoluted tale coming out of Dybbuk Central a.k.a. Ukraine and the FBI. You may already know that in May, 2014, R. Hunter Biden, son of then-vice president Joe Biden, was appointed to the board of the Ukrainian natgas company Burisma, where he was paid $80,000-a-month for his expertise (he had none) in the global gas industry. As it happened, at exactly the same time Veep Joe Biden was appointed as then-President Barack Obama’s “point man” in Ukraine after the 2014 Maidan Coup, engineered by Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and the CIA, that ousted elected President Viktor Yanukovych.
By and by, Ukraine elected a new American-friendly president, Petro Poroshenko. Burisma was owned by an oligarch name of Mykola Zlochevsky. Apparently, the $80-K-a-month for Hunter Biden was not enough. The friendly American veep, Joe Biden, pressed Burisma’s Zlochevsky to provide $5-million payment each to Hunter and himself for additional Biden family services in Ukraine.
President Petro Poroshenko had a political confident and fixer (problem solver) named Oleksandr Onyshchenko, then a member of Ukraine’s parliament. In the 2015-16 time-frame, Onyshchenko conveyed a message to Zlochevsky that paying large sums of money to the Bidens might not be a good idea. Somehow, Onyshchenko’s complaints about the Bidens’ grift operation made it into the leading Kiev newspaper. As we all know, in November, 2016, Donald Trump was elected US President. Catastrophe! Freak-out in the US embassy in Kiev!
December, 2016, American Ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanowicth, sent panicky emails to the folks back home about Onyshschenko’s allegations of Biden bribery. One of the recipients was a CIA agent implanted in the National Security Council name of Eric Ciaramella, later known as the Ukraine Phone Call Whistleblower.
Now, you may recall that in the summer of 2019, the owner of a Delaware computer repair shop, one John Paul Mac Isaac, came into possession of a laptop abandoned by Hunter Biden - under law, being left 90-days after repairs were made - and seeing its startling contents, tried to give it to the FBI, but was rebuffed. By then, CIA agent Eric Ciaramella had blown his whistle over a phone call Mr. Trump made to new Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky inquiring about the Bidens’ doings there. Later that fall, with impeachment proceedings started against President Trump, FBI agents came back at Mr. Mac Isaac and took the computer into the agency’s possession.
Consider that FBI Director Christopher Wray must have known about the laptop coming into his HQ and what it contained - and known that throughout the impeachment and Senate trial proceedings of Mr. Trump, And, of course, Mr. Wray did not volunteer any of this evidence about the Bidens to Mr. Trump’s defense attorneys. Nor did then-Attorney General William Barr, Mr. Wray’s superior. Odd, a little bit?
Spool back a few years now: turns out that in December, 2016, Oleksandr Onyshchenko, had gone to the FBI with a hoard of audiotapes made by Burisma chief Zlochevsky of phone calls between Veep Joe Biden and Ukraine President Poroshenko. Zlochevsky was now freaked-out that President-elect Donald Trump might have a whole different attitude toward Ukraine than the Obama-Biden admin had. The Burisma chief had gotten a hold of the tapes as, shall we say, an insurance policy in case his sketchy Ukrainian government and their even sketchier US State Department and CIA handlers happened to give him any guff about his operations. By then, Mr. Onyshchenko had been officially designated an FBI Confidential Human Source. Turns out he had been playing both sides, informing the American Intel Community about dark matters in the upper echelons of Ukraine for some time, was trusted, and was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the US for his efforts.
Now, guess who got into the act at just moment (Dec 16, 2016) that Confidential Human Source Mr. Onyshchenko came forward with Zlochevsky’s Poroshenko-Biden tapes: the American Lawfare dybbuk Andrew Weissmann - of all people! What was poor naïve Mr. Onyshchenko thinking when he handed evidence of Democratic Party bigwig Veep Joe Biden’s moneygrubbing over to Barack Obama’s Department of Justice?
And guess what happened to the audiotaped evidence of the extravagant gifts to Hunter and Joe Biden: pffffftttttt…! It went up in a vapor. Dybbuk Weissmann, then working as the chief of the DOJ’s fraud division, made the whole thing go away. Just. Like. That. Dybbuk Weissmann made sure that the DOJ and the FBI officially discontinued having any interest in whatever the Biden family might have been up to in Ukraine.
And guess what happened next to Mr. Onyshchenko: he was charged with lying and corruption by his own (Ukrainian) government and became an international fugitive when the US Intel Community demurred to let him escape to the United States. And guess who is now in fear of his life.
And, by the way, subsequent phone call recordings dating from December 19, 2016, are now circulating freely in the US of then-Ukraine President Poroshenko thanking then-Veep Joe Biden for getting the US DOJ off the case. As reported by Stephen McIntyre on Twitter (@ClimateAudit): Biden re-assured Poroshenko that the FBI had “stopped” and there was “no reason [for FBI] to talk to him again.” Biden undertook to “check that [with FBI] and confirm that with you.”
So fast forward to the present moment. Senator Chuck Grassley made a speech on the Senate Floor this week revealing the existence of all these tape recordings that detail $5-million plus $5-million bribes from Mr. Zlochevsky to the Biden family. Podcaster Dan Bongino has played them on his show several times this past week (episodes 2020, 2031, and 2032). Go there and listen for yourself.
Note, too, that dybbuk Andrew Weissmann is still at large in our land dybbuking-up a storm again just this past week with an article in The Atlantic titled "Jack Smith’s Backup Operation" suggesting that if Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Mar-a-Lago papers case against Donald Trump happens to fizzle, yet another case can be opened against the former President in the New Jersey federal district court. Isn’t it about time to call in that minyan of rabbinical exorcists and expel this demon from America’s body politic?"
"So What Comes Between Now & 2032?" (Excerpt)
"So What Comes Between Now & 2032?"
by Martin Armstrong
Excerpt: "The Five Eyes (FVEY) is an intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States demonstrates one thing – the rest of the West is not included. Yet 2032 is more than just the culmination of the current 51.6-year wave of the Economic Confidence Model. It is the subsequent set of 309.6 years waves from the peak in the Roman Empire which all historians draw the line in history as the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161-180AD). That was when Marcus sent an ambassador to the Emperor of China.
If you read Marcus Aurelius’s "Meditations", you are left with the feeling that there is nothing new. History repeats because human nature itself has never changed and people will always act in their own self-interest no matter what century. All we have ever witnessed through time in the memorial is fake news steeped in opinion rather than fact."
Full, extensively illustrated article is here:
Bill Bonner, "Hard Country, Soft Money"
"Hard Country, Soft Money"
When sales go down, prices go down,
and real interest rates go up...
By Bill Bonner
Youghal, Ireland - "A cab driver in Dublin: “Are ye from America? I went there once. In the 1980s, that was in New Jersey. In Hoboken. I only intended to stay for a while, but they were paying up to $300 per day for people to work there. On construction. It was a rough place.
One time, I was out at a bar until after midnight. As I was walking home, I got a tap on my shoulder. It was a policeman. “Don’t you worry, Paddy," he said to me. “But check your pocket…that man over there (he pointed out a man on the opposite side of the street) just picked your pocket." So, I checked. And my money was gone. But I only had $11 in my pocket.
The policeman arrested him. And then they were going to have a trial. And they wanted me to testify. But I didn’t want to give up a day’s work for the $11 that was stolen from me…which I had already gotten back. But they told me it was my duty. So, I went to the trial and testified. And the man was convicted of petty theft. And then I got a shocker. The judge gave him an 11 month sentence. One month in jail for every dollar he had stolen. I knew then that it was time to go home. America is a hard country.”
“I’d Rather Be A Hammer…” All week long we’ve been puzzling over how hard America has become. Its military/industrial/prison…etc…complex controls the government. Look in its pockets and you will find almost every member of Congress – Republican or Democrat. Check the list of donors to prominent US think tanks…there, you will find our most prominent ‘defense companies.’
The press and the universities are in on it too – convinced that every nail needs a hammer. At home and abroad, we pound away…targeting ‘terrorists’ in wheelchairs…and locking up dimwits for unauthorized visits to the nation’s Capitol. How that fits into the deep currents of history…and the Primary Trends of our markets…is our main concern. So, let’s see.
The Fed pauses…the Stansberry Wire reports: "After 15 months of consecutive interest rate hikes, Federal Reserve officials decided to pause at their recent meeting. However, they indicated that they are likely to resume tightening measures in the future to address concerns about inflation. In a statement released by the Federal Open Market Committee, they mentioned that keeping the target range steady during this meeting allows them to evaluate additional information and its impact on monetary policy."
Cracked Rear View: What is this ‘additional information’ that the Fed is likely to receive? The whole idea of being ‘data dependent’ is a fraud. The ‘data’ is history. It is only the future that the Fed can influence. And so far, the Fedsters have proven very bad at forecasting. That’s why we have 5% inflation… because the Fed’s 1,000 economists didn’t see it coming. Expecting 2% – they kept its key lending rate far too low for far too long…resulting in far too much debt…and an economy that is far too fragile to survive honest interest rates.
So, it ‘pauses’ – with its key rate only about even with inflation…the real yield on the 10-year Treasury bond still negative…and the S&P 500 still more expensive than it was in 1929. In other words, the Fed is still encouraging people – especially the government and its aforementioned military/industrial…etc…complex – to borrow, spend and invest. And it is hoping that the inflation rate keeps coming down so it can go back into Full Inflation Mode.
But today we will guess about what it is that the Fed has not seen coming this time. The country may be hard. And the money may be soft. But it’s not nearly as soft as it used to be. Here’s Fortune: "Deutsche Bank puts U.S. recession chances near 100%—avoiding hard landing “unprecedented.” “Avoiding a hard landing would be historically unprecedented,” warned group chief economist David Folkerts-Landau in a research report entitled "The Clock is Ticking" published on Wednesday.
What happens in a recession? Sales go down. Prices go down. And real interest rates (after inflation) go up. The higher real rates, along with lower sales and profits, make it harder for companies to pay their bills. Zerohedge tells us what comes next: "The End Of Easy Money: Bankruptcy Filings Pile Up At Fastest Rate Since 2010." "A cleansing process, long overdue, to whittle down the corporate debt overhang and clear out deadwood, at the expense of investors...
It’s turning into a banner year for corporate bankruptcy filings, after years of Easy Money that caused all kinds of excesses, fueled by yield-chasing investors, in an environment where the Fed had repressed yields with all its might. Those yield-chasing investors kept even the most over-indebted zombies supplied with ever-more fresh money. But that era has ended. Interest rates are much higher, and investors are getting a little more prudent, and Easy Money is gone. Companies that couldn’t quite make ends meet when they could borrow money at 3%, explains Wolf Richter, are now forced to borrow at 7%. Unable to refinance…or to carry more expensive debt…they are going belly up."
Dear readers, their quick minds stimulated by the emergency, will have no trouble following the balls as they ricochet across the table. Many of these companies owe money to banks as well as to bond holders. Many of these creditors have creditors of their own. And the US government too, recently released from its debt ceiling ankle bracelet, and eager to keep the money flowing to its favorite cronies, fantasies and incompetents, is now in need of nearly a trillion more dollars in funding.
Alas…“the Easy Money is gone.” Tune in on Monday for more of the story."
Greg Hunter, "Weekly News Wrap-Up, 6/16/23"
"Weekly News Wrap-Up, 6/16/23"
Trump Surrounded, War Closer, Dollar Trouble
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com
"Donald Trump has been charged with 37 felony counts in the infamous “Classified Documents Case” brought by the Biden Department of Justice. Trump appears to be surrounded by evil. It is more of “get Trump at any cost” because the Democrats, let alone Joe Biden cannot beat Trump in the 2024 Presidential Election. As I have said many times before, the real Biden approval rating is just 9%, not the 40% you hear of from the Lying Legacy Media (LLM.) A 9% approval number might make it impossible to cheat Biden in. So, it looks like the Democrats are going to get the GOP front-runner, Donald Trump, any way they can. Trump is ahead of the field by a very wide margin. By the way, the LLM made sure you did not hear from Donald Trump after this historic indictment because they cut him off. The LLM is non-news that lies by omission too.
The Ukraine war continues to go badly for the Ukrainians. The so-called “counter offensive” you may have heard about is over almost before it started because the Russians cremated the Ukrainians and NATO – once again. Now, Putin is warning that Ukraine is not going to be a country in the not-so-distant future. Is a much bigger war coming? It sure looks that way.
Dr. Paul Craig Roberts (PCR) was on USAWatchdog.com this week to talk about the Trump indictment. PCR called them “A gang of criminals trying Trump.” PCR also took time to comment on the U.S. dollar and all the countries shunning use of the dollar in global trade. Dr. PCR, who was a former Assistant Treasury Secretary, is warning of a “coming collapse of the dollar.” This is what is coming if enough countries ditch use of the U.S. dollar according to PCR. Is this why the Fed is not cutting interest rates and only “pausing” the increases? There is much more in the 52-minute newscast."
Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he talks about
these stories and more in the Weekly News Wrap-Up for 6/16/23.
Thursday, June 15, 2023
Musical Interlude: Moby, "Love Of Strings"
Full screen recommended
Moby, "Love Of Strings"
Life, magnificent Life...
"A Look to the Heavens"
"Also known as the Cigar Galaxy for its elongated visual appearance, M82 is a starburst galaxy with a superwind. In fact, through ensuing supernova explosions and powerful winds from massive stars, the burst of star formation in M82 is driving the prodigious outflow of material. Evidence for the superwind from the galaxy’s central regions is clear in this sharp composite image, based on data from small telescopes on planet Earth.
The composite highlights emission from filaments of atomic hydrogen gas in reddish hues. The filaments extend for over 10,000 light-years. Some of the gas in the superwind, enriched in heavy elements forged in the massive stars, will eventually escape into intergalactic space. Triggered by a close encounter with nearby large galaxy M81, the furious burst of star formation in M82 should last about 100 million years or so. M82 is 12 million light-years distant, near the northern boundary of Ursa Major.”
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Fascinating...
"Hubble showed us what our modern day Universe looks like. JWST's big goal was to teach us how the Universe grew up. Here's where we are now."
"Here's A Question..."
“Here’s a question every angry man and woman needs to consider: How long are you going to allow people you don’t even like – people who are no longer in your life, maybe even people who aren’t even alive anymore – to control your life? How long?”
- Andy Stanley
“That goes for old wounds, too, you know. I really wish we’d had the chance to talk before this,” he says, cracking the window so the smoke can escape. “There’s a Longfellow quote I have stuck on my bulletin board at the church office – ‘There is no grief like the grief that does not speak’ – and it’s true. I’ve found that keeping pain inside doesn’t give it a chance to heal, but bringing it out into the light, holding it right there in your hands and trusting that you’re strong enough to make it through, not hating the pain, not loving it, just seeing it for what it really is can change how you go on from there. Time alone doesn’t heal emotional wounds, and you don’t want to live the rest of your life bottled up with anger and guilt and bitterness. That’s how people self-destruct.”
- Laura Wiess
"Gerald Celente, Trends Journal 6/15/23"
Gerald Celente, Trends Journal 6/15/23
"Ukraine Losing Counteroffensive"
"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."
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Col. Douglas Macgregor, 6/15/23
"The Russian Offensive - What’s Left Of Ukrainian Army?"
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Full screen recommended.
Redacted, 6/15/23
"Ukraine Confirmed Using NATO Weapons Inside Russia"
"Patrick Lancaster reports for Redacted from inside of Russian territory where soldiers captured NATO weapons left behind by fleeing Ukrainian troops. This is something we were told wasn't happening. Debunked."
Comments here:
"The Commercial Real Estate Tsunami Just Shifted Into Another Gear"
"The Commercial Real Estate Tsunami
Just Shifted Into Another Gear"
By Michael Snyder
"What is going to happen to our banking system as trillions of dollars worth of commercial real estate loans go bad? Many months ago, I warned that the greatest commercial real estate crisis in U.S. history was coming. At the time, a lot of people didn’t believe me and that was fine. As with so many other things, all I needed to do to be proven right was to wait. Sadly, a commercial real estate tsunami is now here, and it appears to be accelerating even faster than many of the experts had been anticipating. Just within the past few weeks, there have been several more high profile defaults, and San Francisco has become the epicenter of this crisis.
On Monday, we learned that Westfield has decided to purposely default on a $558 million dollar loan on the San Francisco Centre mall…"Shopping center giant Westfield is walking away from its San Francisco Centre mall, becoming the latest major company to leave the California city amid rampant crime problems. Westfield confirmed to FOX Business Monday that the company and partner Brookfield Properties earlier this month stopped making payments on a $558 million loan securing the San Francisco Centre property."
Do you remember in 2008 when millions of Americans that were underwater on their mortgages simply walked away from them? Well, now the same thing is happening, except that instead of homes we are talking about shopping malls and office buildings. The San Francisco Centre mall was the most important retail destination in downtown San Francisco.
But sales have been declining for some time, and just like Park Hotels & Resorts, Westfield is identifying rapidly deteriorating conditions in the downtown area as one of the primary reasons for leaving the city…“Given the challenging operating conditions in downtown San Francisco, which have led to declines in sales, occupancy and foot traffic, we have made the difficult decision to begin the process to transfer management of the shopping center to our lender to allow them to appoint a receiver to operate the property going forward.”
Westfield’s move comes less than a week after Park Hotels & Resorts announced it had handed two prominent hotels back to the bank. The real estate investment trust said it was abandoning the Hilton San Francisco Union Square and Parc 55, saying the city’s streets are unsafe and expressing doubts about the area’s ability to recover.
San Francisco was once such a beautiful city. But now one of the wealthiest cities in the entire world is being systematically transformed into a hellhole, and it is all thanks to the “progressive” policies of the city’s leaders… "Westfield’s struggles will pile fresh pressure on city leaders, after multiple retailers and hotels shuttered in downtown San Francisco as it continues to battle soaring crime, open drug use and homelessness. The famously progressive city has been condemned for its ‘harm reduction’ policies, which critics say have effectively legalized drug taking. Meanwhile, its police department remains short-staffed after woke lawmakers called for defunding in the wake of George Floyd’s murder."
Even Twitter has decided to walk away. The company has not been paying rent on “Twitter headquarters” for months, and Elon Musk has confirmed that there is no plan to ever restart payments…"Twitter ceased paying its rent in November, the report says, and CEO Elon Musk has said he doesn’t intend on restarting payments. Those payments would go to Columbia Property, a REIT that Goldman has lent $1.7 billion to, in a consortium with (of course) Deutsche Bank."
Sadly, this is only just the beginning. As retailers and businesses leave the downtown areas of our major cities, a lot more defaults will inevitably happen. In New York City, the office occupancy rate was close to 100 percent before the pandemic. Now it is hovering around 50 percent.
Of course this commercial real estate tsunami is not the only crisis that we are facing. The residential real estate bubble has also started to burst, and sales have been falling all over the nation for months. Higher interest rates will continue to put downward pressure on home prices, and many analysts are extremely concerned that foreclosure filings have begun to surge…"May foreclosure-related filings, which include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions, were up 7% from April and up 14% from a year ago, to 35,196 properties, according to the real estate data group ATTOM."
Meanwhile, large companies all over America continue to conduct mass layoffs. As I discussed in a previous article, the number of announced job cuts in the United States during the first five months of this year was 315 percent higher than the number of announced job cuts during the same period last year. And we are being told that the number of media industry layoffs so far this year is the largest figure ever recorded…"The media industry has announced at least 17,436 job cuts so far this year, marking the highest year-to-date level of cuts on record, according to a new report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas."
Despite everything that I just shared with you, many of the “experts” in the mainstream media continue to insist that the economy is in fine shape. I honestly do not know how they can say that with a straight face. But they are saying it.
Just like in 2008, they simply do not want to believe what is happening right in front of their eyes, and they aren’t interested in ominous warnings about our long-term future either. In the short-term, our economic problems are going to continue to intensify in the months ahead. In the long-term, we are going to have a real nightmare on our hands. But for now, millions upon millions of Americans continue to trust those that are telling them that brighter days are ahead, and so they are doing nothing to prepare for the great storm that is rapidly approaching."
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Full screen recommended.
"Every Store Is Closed In San Francisco"
The Poet: Rainer Maria Rilke, “Sunset”
“Sunset”
“Slowly the west reaches for clothes of new colors
which it passes to a row of ancient trees.
You look, and soon these two worlds both leave you,
one part climbs toward heaven, one sinks to earth,
leaving you, not really belonging to either,
not so helplessly dark as that house that is silent,
not so unswervingly given to the eternal as that thing
that turns to a star each night and climbs -
leaving you (it is impossible to untangle the threads)
your own life, timid and standing high and growing,
so that, sometimes blocked in, sometimes reaching out,
one moment your life is a stone in you, and the next, a star.”
- Rainer Maria Rilke
"Where Your Gaze Lingers..."
“Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. Why? Because this storm isn’t something that has nothing to do with you, this storm is you. Something inside you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn’t get in, and walk through it, step by step. There’s no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time. Just fine white sand swirling up the sky like pulverized bones.
You have to look! That’s another one of the rules. Closing your eyes isn’t going to change anything. Nothing’s going to disappear just because you can’t see what going on. In fact, things will be even worse the next time you open your eyes. That’s the kind of world we live in. Keep your eyes wide open. Only a coward closes his eyes. Closing your eyes and plugging up your ears won’t make time stand still.”
- Haruki Murakami
“Closing your eyes won’t make the awfulness go away. It may be that nothing will. But dwelling on it, dreading the evil, playing out the misery in your head – doesn’t this feed the monster? You can’t close your eyes to life, but you can choose where your gaze lingers.”
- Richelle E. Goodrich
Greg Hunter, "Gang of Criminals Trying Trump – Dr. Paul Craig Roberts"
"Gang of Criminals Trying Trump –
Dr. Paul Craig Roberts"
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com
"Dr. Paul Craig Roberts (PCR), former Assistant Treasury Secretary and international award-winning journalist, is worried about freedom and liberty. PCR says with the latest arrest and prosecution of President Trump, freedom and liberty is dead in America. PCR explains, “What they do makes it clear they have no claim that they are representatives of justice holding lawbreakers responsible. They are the lawbreakers — they themselves. You go to trial and it’s the criminals who are trying you, and that’s what’s happened in the United States. This is happening to President Trump. This is exactly what is happening to him. The Department of Justice, which is a gang of criminals, is trying Trump, and they are getting away with it. I can’t predict, but we are going to find out by the next presidential election, whether we are a country or not. What’s going to happen? Are people going to wake up and stop this? If this coup stays in place, the United States no longer exists.”
PCR says, “What is being done is a lesson is being taught to all future political candidates. If you try to represent the people instead of the elite, we are going to destroy you – period. So, if they succeed in destroying Trump, and if the people permit that and don’t rise up and prevent it, then what you have from now on in the United States is tyranny. If democracy cannot put into office someone who stands for the people who elected that person, then there is no democracy and there is no rule of law. If you have no rule of law, you have the rule of whoever is in power. In other words, it is the total end of any claim there is any freedom, any civil liberty or any accountability. This is extremely serious. This is an all-out assault. The elite are attempting to completely destroy any accountability that would ever get in the way of their agendas. So, this is only to be the agendas of the elite, and never ever any agenda of the people.”
PCR also warns, “The United States is the Constitution. If the Constitution is destroyed, the United States is destroyed. So, if they destroy it, they have destroyed us.”
PCR, who was an Assistant Treasury Secretary in the Reagan Administration, also talks about the coming collapse of the U.S dollar and extreme inflation that is not a matter of if but when. It could be sooner than you think. There is much more in the 57-minute interview."
Join Greg Hunter on Rumble with Dr. Paul Craig Roberts.
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"Hell is empty and all the devils are here."
- William Shakespeare, "The Tempest"
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Bill Bonner, "MISC in Action"
"MISC in Action"
A closer look at America's
Military Industrial Snoop Complex (MISC)...
by Bill Bonner
"While we are laughing, the seed of some trouble is put into the wide arable land of events. While we are laughing it sprouts, it grows and suddenly bears a poison fruit which we must pluck." ~ John Keats
Youghal, Ireland - "es, those were the days…the 1960s…‘We’d sing and dance forever and a day….for we were young, and sure to have our way.” Jimi Hendricks…a ’64 Corvette…Apollo 11…surfin’ safaris…Ruby Tuesday – America was on top of the world…we were on top of America…and we expected things to get better and better. But we didn’t have our way. Then, as the Rolling Stones put it, “we shouted out…who killed the Kennedys? And after all…it was you and me.”
The Great and the Good: The Stones were being poetic. “You and me” did not kill the Kennedys. Charles de Gaulle attended JFK’s funeral, along with other world leaders. When he returned to France he told friends that the CIA had done it. DeGaulle, a soldier, and like Jack Kennedy, a war hero, knew how dangerous the “Deep State” could be. Only two years before, he had barely escaped a coup d’etat, led by retired general Maurice Challe.
Looking back, the death of the Kennedys appears as an important ‘pivot’ in American history. The Kennedy brothers were idealists. They hoped for…and thought they could create…a good country. Lincoln had said that it was by being good that we might be made great. But in politics, “good” and “great” soon part company.
We pause to recall why we care. Most of the news is merely ‘noise.’ To understand what is really going on you have to look beneath the surface chop…down to the deep currents of history.
The Kennedys thought the promise of America should be fully realized. They thought the government would help make it so. That seems to be where all the idealists and do-gooders wash up. Birds gotta fly. Church bells gotta ring. And governments gotta do what governments do…and it has little to do with improving the lot of the common man. At least, that is our ‘cynical’ analysis after watching more or less carefully for the past 60 or so years.
At a more practical level, ‘don’t fight the Fed’ was probably the simplest and most effective investment rule of the last 40 years. So…figure out what the Fed’s gotta do…and get ready for it.
Inflate or Die: You’ll remember that the Fed (and the whole government) is stuck between a rock of inflation and a hard place of stopping it. ‘Inflate or Die,’ is how we put it. Once you have printed money and caused a fake boom, you either have to continue printing…or you stop the presses and the boom dies. Both courses of action are hazardous. Let inflation rip…and you destroy the economy and the middle class. But let the boom die, and you have the rich, the deciders and the elite at your throat…including the most powerful industry group in the world – America’s Military, Industrial, Spook Complex (MISC).
Yesterday, the Fed decided to neither inflate nor die…but simply to await events. Tomorrow, we will look at the events most likely to confront the Fed in the months ahead. Today, we continue looking back at the Kennedys and the events of the last half century.
Bobby Kennedy, like his brother, and like Cato the Younger of ancient Rome, rejected the promise of a great empire. As he rose in the polls, LBJ withdrew from the presidential race. This left Kennedy in position to get the Democratic nomination. Then, in the Ambassador Hotel, on June 5, 1968, Bobby was shot and killed.
With Bobby Kennedy’s death, the last political obstacle was removed. From then on, it was clear sailing for the MISC. The Cold War…which the Kennedys tried to stop…burned hot for another 23 years. And then, despite the lack of any war…or any real enemy…the warmongers got even more of the public’s money. When the Berlin Wall fell, the Pentagon was spending about $270 billion a year. Now, the ‘empire budget’ – including support of international institutions such as the World Bank – is an estimated $1.3 trillion.
MISC in Action: Good soldiers in the Pentagon saw the problem. A real fighting force must be lean…efficient…and decisive. But when they tried to curb an ineffective, expensive weapon…or refused to lard-up the Pentagon with cumbersome, bureaucratic programs…they were overridden by lobbyists, politicians and the top-heavy brass. The insiders knew the real story: the MISC had nothing to do with defense.
But now, the MISC faces another challenge. This time, it is a financial threat. Next year, the interest on the national debt (much of it incurred by the MISC) will surpass the Pentagon’s budget. Since the days of Jimmy Carter, a growing economy…and falling interest rates…have allowed the feds to finance both guns and butter. No hard choices were necessary. But now, real interest rates are rising; it won’t be so easy. The feds will have to choose – either protect asset prices and the wealth and power of the elite…or, protect the value of the dollar and the commitments made to lenders as well as to the taxpayers. Which way will it go? Guns or butter? Stay tuned…"
"More Banks Closing Than Ever"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly 6/15/23
"More Banks Closing Than Ever"
"We have heard that over 10,000 bank branches have closed in the last four years. Now we’re hearing that more bags are closing branches faster than ever. They want to blame AI, but it’s desperation to stay in business."
Comments here:
"Massive Price Increases At Kroger! This Is Ridiculous! What's Next?"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, 6/15/23
"Massive Price Increases At Kroger!
This Is Ridiculous! What's Next?"
"In today's vlog, we are at Kroger and are seeing some overwhelming price increases on groceries. With inflation being as high as it has ever been, we are struggling to find items that fit most of the populations budget!"
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Wednesday, June 14, 2023
"McDonalds Is In Deep Trouble As Biggest Fast Food Chains In USA Face Collapse"
Full screen recommended.
Investing Future, 6/14/23
"McDonalds Is In Deep Trouble As Biggest Fast
Food Chains In USA Face Collapse, with Clayton Morris"
"Now, this is very serious, folks. A new report by Tucker Carlson at Fox News has exposed that the McDonald's business model is in its dying days. Believe it or not, the biggest fast food chain in the entire world is facing rising unrest among franchisees that generate over two-thirds of its revenues in the U.S. They say the company is on a destructive path. One of them has gone bankrupt and filed for bankruptcy just 45 days ago. An insider familiar with the matter is saying that systemic risks are rapidly growing for the food service retailer, given that about 30 percent of franchisees are currently insolvent. To make things worse, by the end of 2023, 2,000 McDonald's restaurants may disappear from U.S cities. Pressure from regulators, labor tensions, and financial losses may force the fast food giant to sharply reduce its brick and mortar footprint this year as it faces a reckoning after years of mismanagement, according to the analysis.
A new report released by Franchise Consulting Group, in partnership with VF Franchise Consulting, titled "McDonald's Model in Dying Days: 30% of Franchisees Insolvent," reveals that some really big risks are facing the world's biggest fast food chain. Analysts say that for the first time in over 40 years, the ranks of McDonald's franchisees are dwindling, and hundreds of them are on the verge of bankruptcy. The report notes that management is struggling to justify higher fees and other charges to franchisees that are already coping with rising wages and the unrelenting climbing costs for ingredients and packaging, which have been eroding profits over the past few years.
Franchisees operate 95% of McDonald's locations in the U.S. and generate about 70% of revenue in the country. The National Owners Association estimates that McDonald's restaurants, on average, will generate less cash for a second straight year in 2023. To further complicate the situation for operators that aren't financially sound, in an emailed statement, McDonald's acknowledged that inflation has trimmed profitability for franchisees last year. But executives argued that the higher operating costs were necessary to keep the company aligned with its long-term expansion goals.
Squeezed by higher costs and grumbling at new operating rules, franchisees are joining a meeting this month with the company's board to press their case in person. The session will give U.S. operators an opportunity to share with the board of directors why we believe we are on a destructive path, one group of owners said in an email newsletter to about a thousand members. Backed by analysts, many of them fear the franchise system is nearing a major crisis, some going so far as to suggest that the business model is doomed.
What also came to the fore is that franchisees are in disagreement with the direction of CEO Chris Kempczinski. Franchisees have been complaining about the erratic nature of McDonald's corporate decision-making process and view Oak Brook's leadership as inconsistent and characterized by jumping from one failed marketing scheme to another. "The CEO is sowing the seeds of our demise. We are a Quick Serve fast food restaurant, not a fast casual like Five Guys or Chipotle," said one franchisee. "The system is very lost at the moment," said another franchisee. "Our menu boards are still bloated. We're still trying to be too many things to too many people. Things are broken from the franchisee perspective."
Comments here:
"Debt Is Eating The System Alive; FED Is Losing Control; Death Of The Dollar"
Jeremiah Babe, 6/14/23
"Debt Is Eating The System Alive;
FED Is Losing Control; Death Of The Dollar"
Comments here:
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"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”
"A Look to the Heavens With Chet Raymo"
“Learning And Yearning”
by Chet Raymo
“This photograph of the Eagle Nebula made by a rather modest telescope - the 0.9 meter instrument at Kitt Peak, Arizona - appeared on APOD. I sat in front of the computer screen for ten minutes, breathless. One tiny corner of the Milky Way Galaxy, one of tens of billions of galaxies that we can potentially see with our telescopes! At the center are the so-called "Pillars of Creation" from a famous Hubble photograph.
I recall when the Hubble photograph appeared in the media hundreds of viewers claimed to see the face of Jesus in the billowing clouds. Which prompted these observations from "Skeptics and True Believers": "In an article on the psychological basis of belief, the psychologist James Alcock proposed that two aspects of the human brain might be called the "yearning unit" and the "learning unit." He probably didn't mean these terms to be taken literally, as referring to separate compartments of the brain, but yearning and learning are certainly central to the way we interact with the world. It is hard to imagine how we can be fully human without a little of each. Finding the proper balance between the two is a task that can keep us occupied for most of our lives.
We yearn when we dream of fulfillment, of greater happiness, of knowing more. We yearn when we love, when we laugh, when we cry, when we pray. Yearning is wondering what is around the next bend, over the rainbow, beyond the horizon. Yearning is curiosity. Yearning is the driving force of science, philosophy, and religion.
Learning is listening to parents, wise men, shamans. Learning is reading, going to school, traveling, doing experiments, being skeptical. Learning is looking behind the curtain for the Wizard of Oz, touching the stove to see if it's hot, not taking anyone's word for it. In science, learning means trying as hard to prove that something is wrong as to prove it right, even if that something is a cherished belief.
Yearning without learning is seeing Elvis in a crowd, the fossilized footprints of humans and dinosaurs together in ancient rocks, weeping statues. Yearning without learning is buying tabloid newspapers with headlines announcing "Newborn baby talks of Heaven" and the like. Yearning without learning is looking for UFOs in the sky and the meaning of life in horoscopes.
Learning without yearning is pedantry, scientism, dogmatic belief. Learning without yearning is believing that we know it all, that what we see is what we get, that nothing exists except what can be presently weighed and measured. Learning without yearning is science without a heart, without a dream, without a hope of beauty. Yearning without learning is seeing the face of Jesus in a gassy nebula. Learning without yearning is seeing only the gas."
We yearn when we dream of fulfillment, of greater happiness, of knowing more. We yearn when we love, when we laugh, when we cry, when we pray. Yearning is wondering what is around the next bend, over the rainbow, beyond the horizon. Yearning is curiosity. Yearning is the driving force of science, philosophy, and religion.
Learning is listening to parents, wise men, shamans. Learning is reading, going to school, traveling, doing experiments, being skeptical. Learning is looking behind the curtain for the Wizard of Oz, touching the stove to see if it's hot, not taking anyone's word for it. In science, learning means trying as hard to prove that something is wrong as to prove it right, even if that something is a cherished belief.
Yearning without learning is seeing Elvis in a crowd, the fossilized footprints of humans and dinosaurs together in ancient rocks, weeping statues. Yearning without learning is buying tabloid newspapers with headlines announcing "Newborn baby talks of Heaven" and the like. Yearning without learning is looking for UFOs in the sky and the meaning of life in horoscopes.
Learning without yearning is pedantry, scientism, dogmatic belief. Learning without yearning is believing that we know it all, that what we see is what we get, that nothing exists except what can be presently weighed and measured. Learning without yearning is science without a heart, without a dream, without a hope of beauty. Yearning without learning is seeing the face of Jesus in a gassy nebula. Learning without yearning is seeing only the gas."
Chet Raymo, “The Journey”
“The Journey”
by Chet Raymo
“Here’s a deep-deep sky map of the universe from the March 9, 2006 issue of Nature. The horizontal scale is a 360 view right around the sky; the vertical gaps at 6 hours and 24 hours are the parts of the universe that are blocked to our view by the disk of our own Milky Way Galaxy. The vertical scale – distance from Earth – is logarithmic (10, 100, 1000, etc.) measured in megaparsecs (a parsec equals 3.26 light-years). Across the top is the Big Bang, and the oldest and most distant thing we can see, the cosmic microwave background, the radiation of the Big Bang itself. A few relatively nearby galaxies are designated at the bottom. All that stuff in the middle that looks like smoke or dusty cobwebs are quasars and galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.
A smoke of galaxies! (2 trillion galaxies according to latest estimates.- CP) A universe cobwebbed with Milky Ways! Each galaxy itself a smoke of stars, hundreds of billions of stars, many or all of them with planets. My book, “Walking Zero,” is about the human journey from the omphalos of our birth into the world of the galaxies, a journey many of us are disinclined to make. Here is how the Prologue to the book begins:
“Each of us is born at the center of the world. For nine months our physical selves are assembled molecule by molecule, cell by cell, in the dark covert of our mother’s womb. A single fertilized egg cell splits into two. Then four. Eight. Sixteen. Thirty-two. Ultimately, 50 trillion cells or so. At first, our future self is a mere blob of protoplasm. But slowly, ever so slowly, the blob begins to differentiate under the direction of genes. A symmetry axis develops. A head, a tail, a spine. At this point, the embryo might be that of a human, or a chicken, or a marmoset. Limbs form. Digits, with tiny translucent nails. Eyes, with papery lids. Ears pressed like flowers against the head. Clearly now a human. A nose, nostrils. Downy hair. Genitals.
As the physical self develops, so too a mental self takes shape, not yet conscious, not yet self-aware, knitted together as webs of neurons in the brain, encapsulating in some respects the evolutionary experience of our species. Instincts impressed by the genes. The instinct to suck, for example. Already, in the womb, the fetus presses its tiny fist against its mouth in anticipation of the moment when the mouth will be offered the mother’s breast. The child will not have to be taught to suck. Other inborn behaviors will express themselves later. Laughing. Crying. Striking out in anger. Loving.
What, if anything, goes on in the mind of the developing fetus we may never know. But this much seems certain: To the extent that the emerging self has any awareness of its surroundings, its world is coterminous with itself. We are not born with knowledge of the antipodes, the plains of Mars, or the far-flung realm of the galaxies. We are not born with knowledge of Precambrian seas, the supercontinent of Pangea, or the Age of Dinosaurs. We are born into a world scarcely older than ourselves and scarcely larger than ourselves. And we are at its center.
A human life is a journey into the grandeur of a universe that may contain more galaxies than there are cells in the human body, a universe in which the whole of a human lifetime is but a single tick of the cosmic clock. The journey can be disorienting; our first instincts are towards coziness, comfort, our mother’s enclosing arms, her breast. The journey, therefore, requires courage – for each individual, and for our species.
Uniquely of all animals, humans have the capacity to let our minds expand into the space and time of the galaxies. No other creatures can number the cells in their bodies, as we can, or count the stars. No other creatures can imagine the explosive birth of the observable universe 14 billion years ago from an infinitely hot, infinitely small seed of energy. That we choose to make this journey – from the all-sustaining womb into the vertiginous spaces and abyss of time – is the glory of our species, and perhaps our most frightening challenge.”
"Visiting the World-Famous Gorky Park: Russia Day 2023"
Full screen recommended.
Travelling with Russell , 6/14/23
"Visiting the World-Famous Gorky Park:
Russia Day 2023"
"Join me on a walk in the world-famous Gorky Park in Moscow, Russia. During the tour I am going to show you some of my faovrite spots in the park. Russia Day 2023 in Gorky Park, together with 1000s of visitors to the park."
Comments here:
Simply incredible...look at this place!
And how are things where you live, Good Citizen?
How's your life? Yeah...
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