The Grateful Dead, "Touch of Grey"
So, we rise from the rubble...
Thursday, September 10, 2020
"21st Century Bummer"
"21st Century Bummer"
By Bill Bonner
"In this bright future, you can’t forget your past."
– Bob Marley
SAN MARTIN, ARGENTINA – "What a colossal flop! We’re talking about the 21st century. A failure in almost every way. We now have 30 million people on unemployment – nearly 20% of the labor force. (No offense to Mr. Bonner, but these are official figures, totally inaccurate. View reality here.) We have a budget deficit of nearly 20% of GDP. And, despite already spending $2 for every $1 they collect in taxes, the feds are planning to spend more. We have phony “conservatives” waving the flag… and real radicals trying to tear it down. On both sides are more and more loonies, locked and loaded…
Even many of our own dear readers are ready to go to war with each other. This is from yesterday’s mailbag:
"Hey Dude, we are at WAR! Trump leads the Win-the-War Party! The Neo Repubs are the “What? Me, worry?” Party. And you are like the pet dog nipping at the heels of the soldiers marching past! No matter the cost, we must win the war against socialism and the Ds. There is time enough to purify ourselves after we win! If we lose, it will be a “thousand years” before our experiment is tried again… Meanwhile it is your obligation to support those who are fighting, regardless of technique and strategy… TRUMP!"
Nasty Themes: It is hard to figure out how an administration that declares a moratorium on rent collection, stifles free trade, and runs a deficit of 20% of GDP could save us from socialism… But in this great 21st-century future, wonders never cease. This week, in this “new normal,” we’ve been trying to remember what the “old normal” was like. And was it really better? Or is it just us?
We recalled what it must have been like when we were born. Of course, it was a very different world back then. But don’t the same principles… the same gravity… and the same Constitution still apply? Grace, charm, wit, and civility… or boorishness, blockheadedness, and cruelty – aren’t the choices still the same?
By our reckoning, life in America seemed more or less civilized until the end of the 20th century. Then, several nasty themes took center stage: The hubris of people who thought they were “exceptional,” beyond good and evil… and not subject to the same rules as others… the degeneration of an empire – spending too much… throwing its weight around… depending too much on its military… the disappearance of true “conservatives”… the inevitable failure of a fake (paper) money system; none ever survived a full credit cycle… the disappointment of technology. Back in the 1960s, we imagined the 21st century as a marvel of freedom, flying cars, and Jetson-like machines. Instead, we are cowed by a virus… and held prisoners by iPhones and Zoom calls… with falling GDP growth rates to boot… and the corruption of democracy into demagoguery, with its bread and circuses… its mobs and messiahs… its clowns and carnival barkers…
The 21st century? What a bummer!
Good Old Days: But let’s try to remember what it was like in the late 1990s, before the new century began. The economy was strong… so strong that the government’s tax receipts more than kept up with the Clinton team’s boondoggles. The national debt was actually going down. This was partly because the Tea Party Republicans were still conservative… and able to block spending. The U.S. had troops all over the world. But there was only one important and shameful engagement that we recall – in Kosovo. There were impeachment proceedings against Mr. Clinton and bitter partisan battles in Washington. But we don’t remember the public with knives at each other’s throats.
Downhill: Then came the year 2000… and everything seemed to head down. First, the dot-com bubble blew up… and the Nasdaq collapsed. There was nothing particularly unusual or sinister about it. That’s the way markets work. They correct mistakes. But the future was casting a long shadow… the new technology would disappoint us… and the feds would make a bad situation worse. The Federal Reserve had already gotten into the bad habit of backstopping Wall Street. It cut its key rate from 6.5% down to 1%. This led to the next bubble in mortgage finance/real estate… which blew up eight years later.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration made one of the biggest blunders in U.S. history. Outraged over 9/11, it declared war against a military tactic – terror. (Why not? The feds were already “at war” with poverty, drugs, and cancer.) And then, it attacked a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 – Iraq. The bills from that disaster are still coming in. Brown University released the latest figures last week. Business Insider reports:
"At least 37 million people have been displaced by America’s “global war on terror,” according to a new report from Brown University’s Cost of War project. The number of displaced people could be as high as 59 million, the report states. Displacement has caused “incalculable harm to individuals, families, towns, cities, regions, and entire countries physically, socially, emotionally, and economically,” the report states. The federal government’s price tag for the war on terror is over $6.4 trillion, and it killed over 800,000 people in direct war violence."
Growing Divide: Then, in the financial crisis of 2008/2009, the feds went into panic mode again. This time, they mounted the most expensive Wall Street rescue ever – with $3.6 trillion created by the Federal Reserve and pumped into asset prices. Stock prices rebounded, and soon went back into bubble territory. But the economy limped along through the weakest recovery ever.
This produced a huge gap between the financialized Wall Street fantasy and the real economy of Main Street. And it caused a growing divide – inequality – between the top 10% of the population, which owns nearly 90% of financial assets, and the bottom 90%, which depends on Main Street employment for its money. The Fed claimed this extraordinary exercise in money-printing and meddling was just temporary… and that it would bring things back to “normal” as soon as the crisis was over.
Never-Ending Crisis: But the crisis never ended. Even before the coronavirus pandemic hit this year, the Fed had the presses running hot in its “Repo Madness” program – in effect, it printed the money needed to fund the Trump administration’s deficits.
Which brings us up to this year – to two even bigger mistakes… bigger deficits… more money-printing… more meddling… more debt… and more disaster ahead. Stay tuned."
"This Is How It Ends: All That Is Solid Melts Into Air"
"This Is How It Ends: All That Is Solid Melts Into Air"
bu Charles Hugh Smith
"How will the status quo collapse? An open conflict - a civil war, an insurrection, a coup - appeals to our affection for drama, but the more likely reality is a decidedly undramatic dissolution in which all the elements of our way of life we reckoned were solid and permanent simply melt into air, to borrow Marx's trenchant phrase. In other words, Rome won't be sacked by Barbarians, or ignite in an insurrectionary conflagration - everything will simply stop working as those burdened with the impossible task of keeping a failed system glued together simply walk away.
If we examine the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Western Roman Empire, we can trace the eventual collapse to the sudden psychological shift from an assumption of permanence that found expression in denial (Rome can't fall, it's eternal...) or in the universal belief that life was unchanging and so everything was forever. This psychological state was replaced by a shocked awareness that what was unimaginable, "impossible" - systemic collapse - was not only entirely possible, it was happening in real time. This change in consciousness arose in individuals in differing ways and velocities, but eventually everyone accepted that some adaptation was now necessary.
Correspondent R.J. and I have been discussing the consequences of the sharp decline in the value of labor which is painfully obvious in the chart below and the many other charts depicting the declining purchasing power of wages and the skimming of the majority of the economic gains by the top 0.1%.
In effect, it no longer pays to work beyond the bare minimum needed to survive as all the value generated by labor above this minimum is either skimmed by the Bezos, Buffetts, Gates, Zuckerbergs et al. or it's paid in higher taxes to the government.
If collecting bread and circuses from the state is an option, then foregoing formal work entirely offers a better lifestyle than those afforded the working poor. While the working poor are crushed by the stresses of low wages, plummeting purchasing power, long commutes and poor working conditions, a consequential slice of the highly paid professional class is crushed by taxes and the stresses of limitless liability, bureaucracy and work.
When physicians, nurses, managers, et al. stop showing up for work, the system breaks down very quickly. Not showing up can take a number of forms: early retirement, sick leave, a demand to work halftime, a workers compensation stress leave, and of course, resignation/quitting.
As in take this job and shove it. Maybe you remember the old Johnny Paycheck tune?* Let me refresh your memory: take this job and shove it, I ain't working here no more. I'm stepping off the rat race merry-go-round, thank you very much. You can find some other sucker to do your dirty work and BS work, all for the greater glory and wealth of your New Nobility shareholders. I'm outta here. So I won't get rich, that dream died a long time ago. What I'm interested in now is getting my life back and getting the heck out of Dodge as things fall apart.
The Aristocrats skimming all the gains are confident that the endless appeals of consumer-paradise consumption will keep the workforce chained to the wheel forever. This confidence reflects the disconnect of the skimming owners of debt/finance from the workforce toiling beneath them.
This is the systemic price of stripping the value of labor to the bone via globalization and financialization, the tireless engines of soaring inequality. The beasts of burden don't rebel, they just no longer show up. They slip noiselessly into the cracks and crevasses and once they're gone, there's nobody left to replace them.
As the Vital Few 4% realize the system no longer works for them and opt out, this will have an outsized effect on the 64%, most likely urban dwellers highly dependent on increasingly brittle, fragile services that depend on the Vital Few for their functionality. Ideology won't matter. Those dropping out may be Conservative or Progressive or they may have lost interest entirely in politics and all the other circuses that serve to distract the populace from the crises dissolving the glue that held the system together.
While the Federal Reserve and the Billionaire Class push the stock market to new highs to promote a false facade of prosperity, everyday life will fall apart. The New Nobility's primary characteristics are infinite greed and near-infinite hubris, and so they will wrongly assume that the professional and working classes they need to keep slaving away for wages that are losing purchasing power are as greedy and blind as themselves.
But those in the trenches aren't as blind as those out of touch at the top. They will see that their job is no longer tenable and their sacrifice won't be enough nor will be it be valued, so they will figure out how to leave. The police will stop showing up, the hospital will be half-staffed, the garbage collection crews thin out, gasoline deliveries won't be made and so on. Those at the top will claim it's still whole (look, stocks are soaring!) but functionality will have dissipated like mist in Death Valley.
The most competent will realize the impossibility of keeping it glued together and so they will exit first. The most noble will try to keep it going but they will burn out and drop away, leaving the incompetent to oversee the final collapse. All That Is Solid Melts Into Air and the lifestyle you ordered is permanently out of stock."
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Source books:
• "Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation" (recommended by Mark J.)
• "The Fall of the Roman Empire: A Reappraisal" (1976, Michael Grant)
• "The Fall of the Roman Empire" (shorter version, 1990, Michael Grant)
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* Johnny Paycheck, "Take This Job and Shove It"
"Market Fantasy Updates 9/10/20"
"Market Fantasy Updates 9/10/20"
Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
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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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Daily Update (September 8th to 10th)
Gregory Mannarino,
"Covid-19 Pandemic Updates PM 9/10/20
SEP 10, 2020 12:05 AM ET:
Coronavirus Map: Tracking the Global Outbreak
The coronavirus pandemic has sickened more than 27,850,900
people, according to official counts, including 6,378,972 Americans.
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- https://www.zerohedge.com/
SEP 10, 2020 9:14 AM: "Global COVID-19 Deaths Top 900,000, China Confirms Another "Reinfected" Patient"
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Updated 9/10/20, 5:28 A ET
Click image for larger size.
"Is The Pandemic Over?"
"Is The Pandemic Over?"
by Ron Ross
"A curious but fortunate characteristic of virus epidemics is their limited lifespans. No one knows why, but guesses include herd immunity and mutations of the virus. The following graph from the Centers for Disease Control and the National Center for Health Statistics shows the time profile of the COVID-19 weekly death counts from February onward. (For an interactive version of the graph go here.)
Click image for larger size.
In the U.S., the virus got underway in March. For the week ending March 14 the total number of deaths nationwide was 52. During the following month the number of deaths increased rapidly, peaking in the week ending April 18 at a count of 17,026. From that time onward, the death count declined rapidly to a weekly number of 3,684 in late June. A second “wave” began in July. The peak of that second wave was 6,794 deaths during the week ending July 25. After that a steeper decline commenced and accelerated.
The peak death count for Americans under age 25 was 28 (for the week ending April 11) and has been under that number since. Only a single death occurred in that age group during the latest reported week, and there were no deaths recorded in the 25-34 age group.
Virus epidemics behave differently than virtually all other diseases. If you graphed timelines of the number of cancer deaths, fatal heart attacks, and fatal strokes, those timelines would be virtually flat. Virus epidemics, however, have relatively short time profiles, like what we’re seeing with COVID-19. There’s nothing unusual about the fact that the coronavirus death count is dying a natural death. That should have been anticipated, and it should now be widely publicized. Why are we pretending not to know this good news? These facts are easy to find. We ought to be celebrating like we did when WWII ended.
This COVID-19 death profile is extremely significant yet is almost totally ignored by the media. Their focus is on cases, not deaths. The number of cases has not decreased as rapidly as the number of deaths. Only a small percentage of cases now ends in death, and the death count is vastly more important than the case count. The case count may linger, but that problem is becoming increasingly manageable.
The latest reported weekly death count (August 29) was 370. That’s out of a population of 330 million people. In a single week, between August 8 and August 15, the number of deaths dropped 85 percent (from 3,169 to 455). The COVID-19 death rate in the U.S. is now barely more than one per million and dropping like a rock. Coronavirus deaths are currently half the number of weekly vehicle fatalities. We’re now seeing the pandemic in our rearview mirror."
"What Keeps You Going..."
“What keeps you going isn’t some fine destination but just the road you’re on, and the fact that you know how to drive. You keep your eyes open, you see this damned-to-hell world you got born into, and you ask yourself, ‘What life can I live that will let me breathe in and out and love somebody or something and not run off screaming into the woods?’”
- Barbara Kingsolver
Wednesday, September 9, 2020
“Stock Market On Borrowed Time; Wall St Melting Up; Debt Destruction; US Households Broke”
“Stock Market On Borrowed Time; Wall St Melting Up;
Debt Destruction; US Households Broke”
"Vitamin D Is A Powerful Bullet Against Covid-19"
"Vitamin D Is A Powerful Bullet Against Covid-19"
by Adam Taggart
"Several recent studies show that Vitamin D is a powerful weapon in preventing and treating covid-19. We all should be taking it. It’s now been clinically proven that people deficient in Vitamin D are statistically more likely to contract the coronavirus if exposed. And similarly, those with greater Vitamin D levels are statistically less likely to get it. And a new study out of Spain shows that Vitamin D (via Calcifediol) is one of the most effective treatments that reduces the impact of those infected with covid-19. When combined with a prudent standard of care including early delivery of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin, the results are pretty staggering.
How staggering? Of 50 patients treated this way, only one (2%) required admission to the ICU vs the control group where 50% of patients required admission. Following the recent insights about the Bradykinin pathway of transmission, we are now really starting to gain the upper hand on understanding effective ways to prevent and treat covid-19. Which should enable us to save lives AND re-open our economies."
"The New Puritans Are On The Prowl"
"The New Puritans Are On The Prowl"
by Simon Black
"In the spring of 1692, Giles Corey was 80 years old when his wife was accused of witchcraft. The entire town was in such a frenzy that even Giles started to believe that his wife might be a witch. Soon after, another person in the town was accused of witchcraft. Then another. And another. And another. It wasn’t until Giles Corey himself was accused of being a wizard that he realized the whole thing was a scam.
But it didn’t matter. The Puritan preachers in this small New England town (Salem, Massachusetts) took every accusation seriously. They felt it was their duty to protect the townsfolk from the systemic witchcraft that was so pervasive in Salem. So everyone who was accused of witchcraft was quickly punished.
That included Giles Gorey, who, at the age of 81, was tortured for three days in September of 1692, in an attempt to extract a plea. He had been accused, therefore he must be guilty. And Corey was laid in a field with boards placed on top of him, and large rocks piled on top of the boards to slowly crush him to death. Rumor has it the only words he spoke during the torture were, “More weight.”
These days we have a new breed of Puritans. Their religion is wokeness, and they too see witches everywhere. What’s really incredible is that these Puritan witch hunters are really just a small percentage of the population. Most people are completely sane and normal. But this tiny group happens to be the loudest. And because of that, they’ve completely upended everything – culture, business, politics, and even science.
They tell us what words we can/cannot use. Some of the largest corporations in the world have already bent the knee, cancelling movies, music, and even food, because it offends the mob. Disney cancelled the song “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah” because it’s offensive. Yet they graciously thanked the Chinese Communist Party in their recent release of Mulan! And the same doctors and public health officials who tell us that we have to wear masks tell us that it’s OK to not wear a mask when rioting, because hate is a much bigger public health crisis.
Wokeness is such bizarre logic. But it never stops. Just this morning I saw articles lamenting the lack of diversity in the wine industry; and another claiming that National Parks aren’t welcoming enough to certain minorities. Even 2+2=4 is now a controversial statement to some mathematics educators, who find the expression grounded in imperialistic, heteronormative toxic masculinity.
But it’s not enough to simply bow out and avoid their intolerance. That makes YOU a target. You have to denounce family members, grovel to the Twitter mob, raise a fist in solidarity, participate in the chants and rituals… otherwise you put yourself and your family at risk. They’ll come for your job, your business, and your dignity. (And they'll be leaving, if they can, a lot faster than they arrived.. - CP)
I have no idea how far this will go, or how much more ridiculous it will become. This is clearly not the first time in history that a small number of crazy people end up causing havoc and devastation to an entire society.
Now, I still believe that, even in the midst of such mindless chaos, the world is still abundant with opportunity. I’ve just always felt that it’s best to tackle those opportunities… and face obvious risks… from a position of strength. This is the core idea behind having a ‘Plan B’– to put yourself in a position of strength, regardless of whatever happens (or doesn’t happen) next.
This includes things like expanding your network and meeting like-minded people– which is more important than ever. It means taking care of your finances – protecting your assets, avoiding roller coaster rides in markets and currency devaluations, legally cutting your taxes, and expanding your income. It also means having a place to go, just in case you might ever need to hit the eject button.
This doesn’t mean having a doom-and-gloom mentality. It’s a sensible, rational precaution in light of such clear risk. And it’s not a decision you’ll be in the mental state to think through when the mob is at your doorstep. This is really the most important part of a Plan B: thinking through what’s important to you, and what you *might* need to do… now – while you’re in a rational state. Waiting until panic sets in means making emotional decisions later… and emotional decisions tend to be very bad decisions. So take advantage of the relative calm, and make some key decisions now."
"Covid-19 Pandemic Updates PM 9/9/20"
SEP 9, 2020 12:11 PM ET:
Coronavirus Map: Tracking the Global Outbreak
The coronavirus pandemic has sickened more than 27,613,700
people, according to official counts, including 6,354,614 Americans.
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Updated 9/9/20,2:28 PM ET
Click image for larger size.
"A September Stock Market Crash?"
"A September Stock Market Crash?"
by Epic Economist
"Every month of 2020 has brought a different disaster in extraordinary proportions. Many of us have been waiting to see what events would be unfolded in September, considering everything that has been piling up until now. The evidences are pointing to an imminent stock market crash, which is likely to be triggered by the end of the month. Even the most enthusiastic market supporters are now admitting that the proportions of the bubble that has been created throughout the summer are completely ground-breaking and it probably wouldn't be sustained for much longer without bursting.
As we mentioned in previous videos, many signs are stressing that it is only a matter of time before a major stock market crash comes.In today's video, we're going to show you how these signs have developed over the past days, and - SPOILER ALERT- things have gotten even uglier. It's impossible to escape from a stock market crash at this point, so stay with us and enjoy your daily dose of gloominess.
Over the last trading sessions, stock prices have dramatically plummeted. Analysts have been discussing that things can stabilize for a little while before everything starts to collapse again, as we know, it's the calm before the storm. Whether the crash will be triggered this month, the next, or towards the end of the year, it is happening and it will drag things down the rock bottom.
Last Tuesday, some indicators already outlined a considerable decline in the markets. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped another 632 points, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. Much more alarming was the fact that the Nasdaq fell further 4.1 percent, meaning it has now shrunk over 10 percent since last week, when it had hit a brand new record high.
This has only happened two times since 2001. It is very unusual for the Nasdaq to fall at such a fast pace over the course of three trading sessions, and the index is now officially in correction territory, with some pretty daunting losses. The six biggest tech stocks have been hit particularly hard, with losses adding up to 1 trillion dollars during a three-day stretch, right after coming off a huge rally that peaked last week.
As reported on the news, "Apple, which hit a $2 trillion market cap on Aug. 19, is down about $325 billion in that time period. Microsoft’s down $219 billion, Amazon fell $191 billion, Alphabet cratered by $135 billion, and Tesla, which fell 21% on Tuesday to mark its worst single-day loss in its history, is down $109 billion in the last three days. Finally, Facebook is off by $89 billion."
That is to say, in less than a week, one trillion dollars were gone and if you have trouble imagining how much would that be, we'll quote once again the clever and spot-on comparison Michael Snyder has made in the latest article of his blog: "A trillion dollars is a serious amount of money. If you had started spending a million dollars every single day when Jesus was born, you still wouldn’t have spent a trillion dollars by now. So we are talking about a giant pile of money that is almost unimaginable."
If we analyze this data according to history, this is a marker for a downturn of at least two-thirds in stock prices in the long run. Also, historically, it is during the fall that the market faces the biggest waves of volatility. So, at the moment, all we can do is wait to see what will be the trigger that will push the stock markets over the edge, because there are so many determinants to this crisis that are stacking up that it won't take too long before everything finally collapses. Are you preparing yet? Fell free to share your thoughts on the comment section down below."
Epic Economist website: https://www.epiceconomist.com
"A Look to the Heavens"
“In the center of this serene stellar swirl is likely a harrowing black-hole beast. The surrounding swirl sweeps around billions of stars which are highlighted by the brightest and bluest.The breadth and beauty of the display give the swirl the designation of a grand design spiral galaxy.
Click image for larger size.
The central beast shows evidence that it is a supermassive black hole about 10 million times the mass of our Sun. This ferocious creature devours stars and gas and is surrounded by a spinning moat of hot plasma that emits blasts of X-rays. The central violent activity gives it the designation of a Seyfert galaxy. Together, this beauty and beast are cataloged as NGC 6814 and have been appearing together toward the constellation of the Eagle (Aquila) for roughly the past billion years.”
"The Democrats are Indeed Looking for a Coup d’etat"
"The Democrats are Indeed Looking for a Coup d’etat"
by Martin Armstrong
"The Democrats are approaching the military to remove Trump as long as the major press declares Biden the winner. They also have the intelligence agencies in their back pocket. Based upon our computer projections for Panic Cycles starting in November and running into February, yet predominantly in December and February, I do not see the Democrats accepting a loss should Trump win. They will turn the nation into a street fight rather than a court battle. They will assume they will lose in the Supreme Court, so they are actually trying to stage a coup d’etat and blame a Trump victory on another Russian interference. If Biden loses, the plan is to blame Russia and ask the military to remove Trump.
Since the media and Big Tech is in league with the Great Reset, once they call the election for Biden, they will most likely cut off all avenues of Trump’s communication. Trump’s social media accounts will be suspended, and other than Fox News, we can even witness the refusal of the big three to report on the truth.
From currencies to stock indexes, we are staring at Panic Cycles from November into February in various markets. Even Crude Oil is showing Directional Changes in December & February. Even gold is showing turning points in November and February.
Never in all my years have I witnesses the computer correlating on a global scale around the US presidential elections. The civil unrest will escalate. Both sides will not accept a loss. This election is tearing the population apart. This is less about Trump than it is about pushing this Great Reset through the United States."
Freely Read Online: Gregory David Roberts, “Shantaram”
“Sometimes we love with nothing more than hope.
Sometimes we cry with everything except tears.
In the end that’s all we have – to hold on tight until dawn.”
- Gregory David Roberts, “Shantaram”
“Shantaram”
by Gregory David Roberts
“Crime and punishment, passion and loyalty, betrayal and redemption are only a few of the ingredients in “Shantaram,” a massive, over-the-top, mostly autobiographical novel. Shantaram is the name given Mr. Lindsay, or Linbaba, the larger-than-life hero. It means “man of God’s peace,” which is what the Indian people know of Lin. What they do not know is that prior to his arrival in Bombay he escaped from an Australian prison where he had begun serving a 19-year sentence. He served two years and leaped over the wall. He was imprisoned for a string of armed robberies peformed to support his heroin addiction, which started when his marriage fell apart and he lost custody of his daughter. All of that is enough for several lifetimes, but for Greg Roberts, that’s only the beginning.
He arrives in Bombay with little money, an assumed name, false papers, an untellable past, and no plans for the future. Fortunately, he meets Prabaker right away, a sweet, smiling man who is a street guide. He takes to Lin immediately, eventually introducing him to his home village, where they end up living for six months. When they return to Bombay, they take up residence in a sprawling illegal slum of 25,000 people and Linbaba becomes the resident “doctor.” With a prison knowledge of first aid and whatever medicines he can cadge from doing trades with the local Mafia, he sets up a practice and is regarded as heaven-sent by these poor people who have nothing but illness, rat bites, dysentery, and anemia. He also meets Karla, an enigmatic Swiss-American woman, with whom he falls in love. Theirs is a complicated relationship, and Karla’s connections are murky from the outset.
Roberts is not reluctant to wax poetic; in fact, some of his prose is downright embarrassing. Throughout the novel, however, all 944 pages of it, every single sentence rings true. He is a tough guy with a tender heart, one capable of what is judged criminal behavior, but a basically decent, intelligent man who would never intentionally hurt anyone, especially anyone he knew. He is a magnet for trouble, a soldier of fortune, a picaresque hero: the rascal who lives by his wits in a corrupt society. His story is irresistible. Stay tuned for the prequel and the sequel.” – Valerie Ryan
Freely read “Shantaram” online, by Gregory David Roberts, here:
- https://readanybook.com/online/565858
There is a download option for registered users.
- https://readanybook.com/online/565858
There is a download option for registered users.
"Inflation Is Stealth Austerity"
"Inflation Is Stealth Austerity"
by Charles Hugh Smith
"Austerity - bad. Inflation - good. Oh wait - they're the same thing: both are a reduction in purchasing power. The only difference is a reduction via austerity is upfront while inflation is a stealth reduction, obfuscated by "official" distortions and Federal Reserve mumbo-jumbo.
Consider $1,200 in wages, unemployment, stimulus, Social Security payment, etc. If this payment gets cut by 10% - $120 - as a result of austerity, pay cut, reduction in hours worked, etc., recipients scream bloody murder. But if inflation reduces the purchasing power of the $1,200 by 10%, nobody does anything but grumble that "prices keep rising while my income stays the same." This is the classic boiled frog syndrome: inflation is like the heat being turned up so gradually that the poor frog doesn't realize he's about to expire.
Inflation is stealthy because the loss of purchasing power is difficult to monitor. Your $1,200 only buys what $1,080 bought in the recent past; 10% inflation reduced your income exactly the same as if austerity had subtracted the $120 upfront.
Governments and central banks love inflation because the theft goes unnoticed. The public tolerates inflation because it's easy to passively accept this erosion in their standard of living and difficult to generate the political heat that an outright cut would spark.
Though it's being openly engineered by the Federal Reserve, inflation appears to be a force nobody controls - unlike austerity which is so clearly a political decision. If Inflation robbed 10% of everyone's income overnight, people might be roused from their passivity to protest. But since the theft occurs slowly - what's 1% a month? - and unevenly across a spectrum of goods and services, this theft doesn't rouse the same political storm as upfront austerity.
Inflation is a form of sacrifice that few recognize as sacrifice. It seems like everyone's income is eroded equally, but this isn't true: the wealthy closest to the Fed's money spigots are earning multiples of inflation from asset inflation, stock buybacks, etc. Inflation is a pinprick to the wealthy and a stilletto in the kidneys of the bottom 95%.
To the political Aristocracy, inflation is wonderful because they don't need to ask anyone to sacrifice 10% of their income as they do with austerity; they just steal the 10% a dribble at a time and throw up their hands as if inflation is some mystery force completely beyond their control.
Ironically, austerity - an honest, upfront political decision and sacrifice - is decried, while the dishonest, stealth cut of inflation is passively accepted, even as the Federal Reserve has made a cloaked political decision to reduce the purchasing power of everyone's income except for the New Nobility (the top 0.1%) that the Fed slavishly serves.
Rather than decry austerity, which demands an open political discussion of trade-offs, we should decry inflation's stealthy reduction of purchasing power, a Fed policy that benefits the few at the expense of the many.
Here is the Chapwood Index of inflation, which carefully measures "apples to apples" costs of essential goods and services in each city:
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As inflation erodes purchasing power, workers' share of the economy has declined dramatically - a double-whammy of declining purchasing power and standard of living."
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"Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the capitalist system was to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the process impoverishes many, it actually enriches some. The sight of this arbitrary rearrangement of riches strikes not only at security but [also] at confidence in the equity of the existing distribution of wealth.
Those to whom the system brings windfalls, beyond their deserts and even beyond their expectations or desires, become "profiteers," who are the object of the hatred of the bourgeoisie, whom the inflationism has impoverished, not less than of the proletariat. As the inflation proceeds and the real value of the currency fluctuates wildly from month to month, all permanent relations between debtors and creditors, which form the ultimate foundation of capitalism, become so utterly disordered as to be almost meaningless; and the process of wealth-getting degenerates into a gamble and a lottery.
Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."
- John Maynard Keynes
Musical Interlude: Yanni, “Standing in Motion”, "Live At The Acropolis"
Yanni, “Standing in Motion”, "Live At The Acropolis"
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Please view in full screen mode.
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