Monday, November 1, 2021

"Chilling Bigly"

"Chilling Bigly"
by Jim Kunstler

"Is it so, as some wags say, that industry no longer makes money; only finance does? That’s been the operating theory for much of the West lately. Of course, that invites the question: what then is finance supposed to finance… that is, put money into? Why… industry, of course, and in the broadest sense of the word: the production of goods… goods being things that have value (that’s what‘s good about them). How quaint! But most of the industry that used to be here has gone to other lands.

What about all that money (capital) flowing into technology: Facebook, Google, Amazon? Hmmmm. What does Facebook produce, besides conflict between its users? Okay, it harvests data about them to sell to advertisers. And what are the advertisers advertising? Their products. Who produces the products? Mostly those people in other lands. Facebook users, then, are increasingly not employed, at least not in the production of goods. Perhaps in services like nursing, trucking, garbage pickup, food prep, police, firemen, prison guards, government bureaucracy (is that a service or a dis-service?) and et cetera.

Anyway, those service people are being fired left-and-right now because they refuse to be coerced into taking a vaccine that was never properly tested and has many scary side-effects. By the way, as of Sunday, the “newspaper-of-record” (The New York Times) finally had to come clean, after months of whistling past the graveyard, and admit what the public already knows: mRNA vaccines are dangerous:
While we’re on the subject, what does Google produce? Supposedly, answers to questions, plus, like Facebook, it harvests information about the people who ask the questions and then sells the info, blah blah. And whutabout Amazon? Don’t they sell a lot of products? Yeah, mostly produced by those people in other lands. What Amazon really produces is a phenomenal amount of motion - trucks going hither and thither, at increasing cost now as the price of gasoline and diesel fuel shoots up. To me, that looks like a problem for Amazon’s business model. Another problem is the growing number of people without gainful employment who have little money to buy stuff from Amazon, wherever it comes from.

That last problem has been papered-over for two years by “helicopter money” from the federal government - direct payment to the people for doing nothing, producing neither goods nor services. This has been an impressive trick. The money comes from nowhere and for nothing. The trick is based on simple accounting fraud. The second law of thermodynamics, a.k.a. entropy, suggests that eventually this process will degrade the value of the money (or “money”) issued by the fraudsters.

The hand in play for the moment is the spending legislation proposed by “Joe Biden.” It would generate a whole helluva lot more helicopter money from nowhere for nothing, and would theoretically keep the game going a little bit longer - except the process will only generate more unwanted entropy, causing decay in the value of that “money” and canceling the desired effect of spreading it around. That’s called inflation. If the value of money drops hard and fast, that is called hyperinflation. It would be politically and socially devastating, and probably lead to the downfall of the government. The net effect would be a nation bankrupt at all levels and that will segue into an epic economic depression.

If the legislation doesn’t get passed, the USA will perhaps skip the hyperinflationary intermezzo and move straight into a deflationary depression, which is what you get when nobody has any money. When that happens, especially in a system with money actually based on debt-creation, debts do not get paid (mortgages, car payments, credit cards, perhaps even coupons on US Treasury bonds), and when debts are not paid, money disappears. Poof! No money! It’s a vicious cycle. The more money disappears the more money keeps disappearing. None of this bodes well for the winter ahead.

Add to that the growing breakdown in global trade operations. Even many of those goods produced in other lands aren’t making it to the docks, and the reduced flow of goods that happened to already land on the docks can’t get unloaded and delivered to its various destinations because of disruptions in the US trucking sector. To some degree, those disruptions are cause by bonehead government regulations, especially in California, where most of the stuff from Asia lands. The bonehead regulations (like, outlawing trucks more than three years old) can be thought of as typical government “dis-services.”

Now add to that the rising cost of oil, natural gas, and coal — the global economy’s primary resources - and disruptions in the industries that produce these vital resources and you’ve got another layer of disorder being introduced into the system (entropy again). For the moment, government propaganda tries to divert your attention to a possible shortage of Christmas presents as the nation’s main concern. Don’t be fooled. It’s more about total systemic economic breakdown, as in US citizens having no heat and no food. Also, no gasoline and no parts for fixing broken cars (and trucks).

Do you suppose the capital markets will keep rising as all this spins out? I would suppose that the capital markets will lose 80 to 90 percent of their value when all is said and done. The fabled “One Percent” will finally feel the pain that was previously distributed among the rest of us. Don’t make the mistake of thinking the One Percent can control the situation. They are mere Wizards of Oz, barfing into their laptops. If working-from-home wasn’t a thing, they’d be jumping out of windows on Wall Street.

It’s a grim outlook, I admit, but you could see it coming over the horizon from a thousand miles away. Where I differ from other observers is that I doubt that any sort of extreme government surveillance state can be imposed on the public under these conditions. The people will be too pissed-off and, anyway, the current regime will be broke and out of mojo - possibly to the degree that it has to be shoved aside. “Let’s Go Brandon” is serious business. It’s the end of something.

In the background lurks this virus thing, and the insane vaccination program it prompted. We know that people have been harmed by the vaccinations, but not how many people altogether will be affected moving forward. The possibility, though, is for a nation both broke and sick struggling to get through a dark passage of history. Stay nimble, stay local, stay reality-based, be helpful, be honest, be brave, and be kind to each other. We’ll get through it."

"Economic Market Snapshot AM 11/1/21"

"Economic Market Snapshot AM 11/1/21"

"Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will
do the most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone."
- John Maynard Keynes
"The more I see of the monied classes,
the better I understand the guillotine."
- George Bernard Shaw

MarketWatch Market Summary, Live Updates

CNN Market Data:

CNN Fear And Greed Index:
A comprehensive, essential daily read.
 October 31st to Nov 1st, Updated Daily
Financial Stress Index
"The OFR Financial Stress Index (OFR FSI) is a daily market-based snapshot of stress in global financial markets. It is constructed from 33 financial market variables, such as yield spreads, valuation measures, and interest rates. The OFR FSI is positive when stress levels are above average, and negative when stress levels are below average. The OFR FSI incorporates five categories of indicators: credit, equity valuation, funding, safe assets and volatility. The FSI shows stress contributions by three regions: United States, other advanced economies, and emerging markets."
Daily Job Cuts
https://wallstreetonparade.com/
Oh yeah...

Gregory Mannarino, "AM/PM 11/1/21"

"Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
Your guide:
Gregory Mannarino, 
Gregory Mannarino, AM 11/1/21:
"Alert: Fed. 'Inflation Is Transitory' Narrative
 Now Changing To 'Contained'"
Gregory Mannarino, PM 11/1/21:
"Is There A Trap Door Under The Stock Market?"

"Streets of Philadelphia, Kensington Ave, October 31, 2021"

Full screen recommended,
"Streets of Philadelphia, Kensington Ave,
October 31, 2021"
"Violent crime and drug abuse in Philadelphia as a whole is a major problem. The city’s violent crime rate is higher than the national average and other similarly sized metropolitan areas. Also alarming is Philadelphia’s drug overdose rate. The number of drug overdose deaths in the city increased by 50% from 2013 to 2015, with more than twice as many deaths from drug overdoses as deaths from homicides in 2015. A big part of Philadelphia’s problems stem from the crime rate and drug abuse in Kensington.

Because of the high number of drugs in Kensington, the neighborhood has a drug crime rate of 3.57, the third-highest rate by neighborhood in Philadelphia. Like a lot of the country, a big part of this issue is a result of the opioid epidemic. Opioid abuse has skyrocketed over the last two decades in the United States and Philadelphia is no exception. Along with having a high rate of drug overdose deaths, 80% percent of Philadelphia’s overdose deaths involved opioids and Kensington is a big contributor to this number. This Philly neighborhood is purportedly the largest open-air narcotics market for heroin on the East Coast with many neighboring residents flocking to the area for heroin and other opioids. With such a high number of drugs in Kensington, many state and local officials have zoned in on this area to try and tackle Philadelphia’s problem."

Sunday, October 31, 2021

"You Better Wake Up, Because The Shortages Are Getting A Lot Worse"

Full screen recommended.
"You Better Wake Up, 
Because The Shortages Are Getting A Lot Worse"
by Epic Economist

"For months, experts have been warning us that shortages are only getting worse. Industry after industry is deeply hurting and executives say that there's no end in sight for the supply chain crisis. To make things worse, the vast majority of our manufacturers are extremely reliant on technology to keep their operations running, which has become pretty standard in our modern world. But due to a global chip shortage, thousands of industries are now struggling to increase production to meet demand. And we're being told this is just the beginning. In January, many were expecting the global semiconductor shortages to be over by the end of 2021. Here we are at the end of the year, and so far, things have gone from bad to worse. Even the corporate media is alarmed by the fact that one of the core parts for global production is simply missing everywhere.

The Wall Street Journal recently published a piece entitled: "The Global Chip Shortage Is Far From Over As Wait Times Get Longer,” in which it revealed that companies are facing extended delays to get the chips they need to make their machines and products work. It's an unprecedented situation for the auto industry and it has become particularly worrying for other industries as well given that now millions of products need chips to function. We're rapidly getting to a point where waiting times can't even be measured in weeks anymore. The truth is that the global semiconductor shortage shows no signs of easing, and in the meantime, the automotive industry continues to face a crunch like no other, with many of the biggest carmakers in the world blaming the shortage for disappointing financial results.

Considering that the scarcity of chips has collapsed new car production and car dealers around the country are seeing their inventories drop to alarmingly low levels, consumers have been turning to the used car market. Consequently, as demand has skyrocketed in recent months, used car prices just hit absolutely insane levels. With far fewer new cars hitting the market, over the past 12 months, prices for used cars have jumped by more than 24 percent in the US, and consumers are engaging in bidding wars that have been pushing those prices even higher.

There's a similar phenomenon happening with farm equipment. Since the chip shortage has broken down production, farmers are turning to used equipment to fulfill their needs. Just like we're witnessing with used cars, many pieces of used farm equipment are now selling for simply insane prices. According to farm equipment dealer Joel Everett, one used 2009 John Deere tractor was at a recent auction in Strawberry Point, Iowa, for tens of thousands of dollars more than its regular price when it was brand new. Of course, all of those increased costs for farm equipment will ultimately result in higher food prices.

Already, food prices are rocketing at a very brisk pace. Crop failures, harvest setbacks, rising consumer demand, and prolonged supply chain disruptions have all contributed to this painful increase, and the latest spike has affected almost all types of foodstuffs, adding to inflationary pressures across the entire economy. Day after day, more people come forward to expose the empty shelves that they see on a regular basis. And as food supplies get tighter, we are going to see even more shortages erupt in the months ahead, and price hikes will be particularly painful.

In the USDA website, they added a section specifically telling us that there are “no nationwide shortages of food although in some cases the inventory of certain foods at your grocery store might be temporarily low before stores can restock". Don't you think it's particularly annoying when they deny our problems exist or say it's all "temporary". What does that even mean? People need to eat today, not in a couple of months, not in a couple of years. If the government refuses to admit the struggles we're all facing, this means that we're on our own. To be honest, we have always been on our own. So we can't afford to ignore the signs that are telling us that things will only get harder from now on. We must wake up and start acting before it's too late."

Musical Interlude: David Gates, "Suite: Clouds and Rain"

David Gates, "Suite: Clouds and Rain"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Point your telescope toward the high flying constellation Pegasus and you can find this expanse of Milky Way stars and distant galaxies. NGC 7814 is centered in the pretty field of view that would almost be covered by a full moon. NGC 7814 is sometimes called the Little Sombrero for its resemblance to the brighter more famous M104, the Sombrero Galaxy. Both Sombrero and Little Sombrero are spiral galaxies seen edge-on, and both have extensive halos and central bulges cut by a thin disk with thinner dust lanes in silhouette. In fact, NGC 7814 is some 40 million light-years away and an estimated 60,000 light-years across. That actually makes the Little Sombrero about the same physical size as its better known namesake, appearing smaller and fainter only because it is farther away. 
In this telescopic view from July 17, NGC 7814 is hosting a newly discovered supernova, dominant immediately to the left of the galaxy's core. Cataloged as SN 2021rhu, the stellar explosion has been identified as a Type Ia supernova, useful toward calibrating the distance scale of the universe."

Chet Raymo, “In A Dark Time…”

“In A Dark Time…”
by Chet Raymo

“I’ve quoted a few of these lines before, from a poem by Charles Simic:

“It’s like fishing in the dark.
Our thoughts are the hooks,
Our heart the raw bait.
We cast the line past all believing
Into the night sky
Until it’s lost to sight.”

In a sense, that’s the story of my life: a long love affair with the night sky. My first book of popular science was “365 Starry Nights”. My first book of personal prose was “The Soul of the Night: An Astronomical Pilgrimage”. “An Intimate Look at the Night Sky” followed much later, but every book in between, fiction and non-fiction, cast a line into the night sky.

What is it about the starry night that gives rise so effectively to what might be called the “religious instinct”? The dark, precisely. The unplumbable depth. The hiddenness. The silence. The infinity. The abyss of time. I can calculate the number of thimblefuls of water in the sea, but I have no way of knowing how many galaxies there are in the universe, or whether the universe is finite or infinite, or even how many universes might exist. Or where the universe came from. Or where it’s going.

I stand barefoot on the terrace in the dark of night, and looking is a kind of prayer. A prayer without words. Without supplication. A silent acknowledgement of ignorance. Heartfelt ignorance. An ignorance that is a receptacle aching to be filled.

“My heart the bait.”

The dark night of the soul. The starlit valley of shadow. The knowing that unknows. There, just there, hanging between Cassiopeia and Perseus, the barely visible blur of the double cluster, the rent veil of the temple.

“The line’s long unraveling
Rising in our throats like a sigh.”

“Sheeple”

“Sheeple”
by CCRider

“I get so disgusted with people at times I can barely control my emotions. Standing in line at a grocery store earlier today there was a young mother and her daughter I would guess to be about three years old, both (of course) wearing masks. I have no doubt the mother was of normal intelligence and cared deeply for her child. I pitied them both. In front of her was a lady in a powered shopping cart who was morbidly obese. Her cart was loaded with processed foods, high-fructose corn syrup soda and other poisons. She was wearing a mask and surgical gloves.

How often have you wondered how people will so instinctively follow absurd and self-destructive dictates? Why does propaganda work so well? It can’t be stupidity. Hitler led Germany to slaughter and dismemberment and the Germans are among the smartest people in the world. It boggles the mind and depresses the spirit. It’s not enough to simply call them sheeple. That doesn’t satisfy the intellect. There has to be a reason. It turns out there is a good reason and it’s uncomplicated and the answer has been available for hundreds of years.

Only Murray Rothbard could have found an obscure original thinker five hundred years earlier who explains in the simplest terms why people can be made to so slavishly adhere to the ridiculous and dangerous dictates of a single ‘authority’ figure. Frenchman E’tienne de La Boe’tie wrote a book that explains this phenomenon. Its title is ‘Discourse on Voluntary Servitude”. I came across it when I was first enthralled by Rothbard’s writings 40 years ago. It played a major role in my hatred of government ever since.

The following interview gets into the details of this book. Like Rothbard himself, James Corbett has the ability to fix laser-like on the most logical path to understanding. Here he is interviewed by Keith Knight on the subject. Knight is a wonderful interviewer who did his homework. It’s 45 minutes long but if you listen to the first 6 minutes I think you will be hooked.

Keith Knight of “Don’t Tread on Anyone” interviews James Corbett about “The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude”, the 16th century treatise on tyranny and obedience by Étienne de La Boétie. James and Keith highlight some of the book’s key insights and detail how they apply every much to our situation today as they did when they were written.”
Watch this video here:

Freely download “The Politics of Obedience:
The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude”, by Étienne de la Boétie, here:

"I Have Accepted The Fact..."

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

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

“The Pig Farmer”

“The Pig Farmer”
by John Robbins

“One day in Iowa I met a particular gentleman – and I use that term, gentleman, frankly, only because I am trying to be polite, for that is certainly not how I saw him at the time. He owned and ran what he called a “pork production facility.” I, on the other hand, would have called it a pig Auschwitz. The conditions were brutal. The pigs were confined in cages that were barely larger than their own bodies, with the cages stacked on top of each other in tiers, three high. The sides and the bottoms of the cages were steel slats, so that excrement from the animals in the upper and middle tiers dropped through the slats on to the animals below.

The aforementioned owner of this nightmare weighed, I am sure, at least 240 pounds, but what was even more impressive about his appearance was that he seemed to be made out of concrete. His movements had all the fluidity and grace of a brick wall. What made him even less appealing was that his language seemed to consist mainly of grunts, many of which sounded alike to me, and none of which were particularly pleasant to hear. Seeing how rigid he was and sensing the overall quality of his presence, I – rather brilliantly, I thought – concluded that his difficulties had not arisen merely because he hadn’t had time, that particular morning, to finish his entire daily yoga routine.

But I wasn’t about to divulge my opinions of him or his operation, for I was undercover, visiting slaughterhouses and feedlots to learn what I could about modern meat production. There were no bumper stickers on my car, and my clothes and hairstyle were carefully chosen to give no indication that I might have philosophical leanings other than those that were common in the area. I told the farmer matter of factly that I was a researcher writing about animal agriculture, and asked if he’d mind speaking with me for a few minutes so that I might have the benefit of his knowledge. In response, he grunted a few words that I could not decipher, but that I gathered meant I could ask him questions and he would show me around.

I was at this point not very happy about the situation, and this feeling did not improve when we entered one of the warehouses that housed his pigs. In fact, my distress increased, for I was immediately struck by what I can only call an overpowering olfactory experience. The place reeked like you would not believe of ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, and other noxious gases that were the products of the animals’ wastes. These, unfortunately, seemed to have been piling up inside the building for far too long a time.

As nauseating as the stench was for me, I wondered what it must be like for the animals. The cells that detect scent are known as ethmoidal cells. Pigs, like dogs, have nearly 200 times the concentration of these cells in their noses as humans do. In a natural setting, they are able, while rooting around in the dirt, to detect the scent of an edible root through the earth itself. Given any kind of a chance, they will never soil their own nests, for they are actually quite clean animals, despite the reputation we have unfairly given them. But here they had no contact with the earth, and their noses were beset by the unceasing odor of their own urine and feces multiplied a thousand times by the accumulated wastes of the other pigs unfortunate enough to be caged in that warehouse. I was in the building only for a few minutes, and the longer I remained in there, the more desperately I wanted to leave. But the pigs were prisoners there, barely able to take a single step, forced to endure this stench, and almost completely immobile, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and with no time off, I can assure you, for holidays.

The man who ran the place was – I’ll give him this – kind enough to answer my questions, which were mainly about the drugs he used to handle the problems that are fairly common in factory pigs today. But my sentiments about him and his farm were not becoming any warmer. It didn’t help when, in response to a particularly loud squealing from one of the pigs, he delivered a sudden and threatening kick to the bars of its cage, causing a loud “clang” to reverberate through the warehouse and leading to screaming from many of the pigs. Because it was becoming increasingly difficult to hide my distress, it crossed my mind that I should tell him what I thought of the conditions in which he kept his pigs, but then I thought better of it. This was a man, it was obvious, with whom there was no point in arguing.

After maybe 15 minutes, I’d had enough and was preparing to leave, and I felt sure he was glad to be about to be rid of me. But then something happened, something that changed my life, forever – and, as it turns out, his too. It began when his wife came out from the farmhouse and cordially invited me to stay for dinner. The pig farmer grimaced when his wife spoke, but he dutifully turned to me and announced, “The wife would like you to stay for dinner.” He always called her “the wife,” by the way, which led me to deduce that he was not, apparently, on the leading edge of feminist thought in the country today.

I don’t know whether you have ever done something without having a clue why, and to this day I couldn’t tell you what prompted me to do it, but I said Yes, I’d be delighted. And stay for dinner I did, though I didn’t eat the pork they served. The excuse I gave was that my doctor was worried about my cholesterol. I didn’t say that I was a vegetarian, nor that my cholesterol was 125.

I was trying to be a polite and appropriate dinner guest. I didn’t want to say anything that might lead to any kind of disagreement. The couple (and their two sons, who were also at the table) were, I could see, being nice to me, giving me dinner and all, and it was gradually becoming clear to me that, along with all the rest of it, they could be, in their way, somewhat decent people. I asked myself, if they were in my town, traveling, and I had chanced to meet them, would I have invited them to dinner? Not likely, I knew, not likely at all. Yet here they were, being as hospitable to me as they could. Yes, I had to admit it. Much as I detested how the pigs were treated, this pig farmer wasn’t actually the reincarnation of Adolph Hitler. At least not at the moment.

Of course, I still knew that if we were to scratch the surface we’d no doubt find ourselves in great conflict, and because that was not a direction in which I wanted to go, as the meal went along I sought to keep things on an even and constant keel. Perhaps they sensed it too, for among us, we managed to see that the conversation remained, consistently and resolutely, shallow. We talked about the weather, about the Little League games in which their two sons played, and then, of course, about how the weather might affect the Little League games. We were actually doing rather well at keeping the conversation superficial and far from any topic around which conflict might occur. Or so I thought. But then suddenly, out of nowhere, the man pointed at me forcefully with his finger, and snarled in a voice that I must say truly frightened me, “Sometimes I wish you animal rights people would just drop dead.”

How on Earth he knew I had any affinity to animal rights I will never know – I had painstakingly avoided any mention of any such thing – but I do know that my stomach tightened immediately into a knot. To make matters worse, at that moment his two sons leapt from the table, tore into the den, slammed the door behind them, and turned the TV on loud, presumably preparing to drown out what was to follow. At the same instant, his wife nervously picked up some dishes and scurried into the kitchen. As I watched the door close behind her and heard the water begin running, I had a sinking sensation. They had, there was no mistaking it, left me alone with him. I was, to put it bluntly, terrified. Under the circumstances, a wrong move now could be disastrous. Trying to center myself, I tried to find some semblance of inner calm by watching my breath, but this I could not do, and for a very simple reason. There wasn’t any to watch.

“What are they saying that’s so upsetting to you?” I said finally, pronouncing the words carefully and distinctly, trying not to show my terror. I was trying very hard at that moment to disassociate myself from the animal rights movement, a force in our society of which he, evidently, was not overly fond. “They accuse me of mistreating my stock,” he growled. “Why would they say a thing like that?” I answered, knowing full well, of course, why they would, but thinking mostly about my own survival. His reply, to my surprise, while angry, was actually quite articulate. He told me precisely what animal rights groups were saying about operations like his, and exactly why they were opposed to his way of doing things. Then, without pausing, he launched into a tirade about how he didn’t like being called cruel, and they didn’t know anything about the business he was in, and why couldn’t they mind their own business.

As he spoke it, the knot in my stomach was relaxing, because it was becoming clear, and I was glad of it, that he meant me no harm, but just needed to vent. Part of his frustration, it seemed, was that even though he didn’t like doing some of the things he did to the animals – cooping them up in such small cages, using so many drugs, taking the babies away from their mothers so quickly after their births – he didn’t see that he had any choice. He would be at a disadvantage and unable to compete economically if he didn’t do things that way. This is how it’s done today, he told me, and he had to do it too. He didn’t like it, but he liked even less being blamed for doing what he had to do in order to feed his family. As it happened, I had just the week before been at a much larger hog operation, where I learned that it was part of their business strategy to try to put people like him out of business by going full-tilt into the mass production of assembly-line pigs, so that small farmers wouldn’t be able to keep up. What I had heard corroborated everything he was saying.

Almost despite myself, I began to grasp the poignancy of this man’s human predicament. I was in his home because he and his wife had invited me to be there. And looking around, it was obvious that they were having a hard time making ends meet. Things were threadbare. This family was on the edge. Raising pigs, apparently, was the only way the farmer knew how to make a living, so he did it even though, as was becoming evident the more we talked, he didn’t like one bit the direction hog farming was going. At times, as he spoke about how much he hated the modern factory methods of pork production, he reminded me of the very animal rights people who a few minutes before he said he wished would drop dead.

As the conversation progressed, I actually began to develop some sense of respect for this man whom I had earlier judged so harshly. There was decency in him. There was something within him that meant well. But as I began to sense a spirit of goodness in him, I could only wonder all the more how he could treat his pigs the way he did. Little did I know that I was about to find out…

We are talking along, when suddenly he looks troubled. He slumps over, his head in his hands. He looks broken, and there is a sense of something awful having happened. Has he had a heart attack? A stroke? I’m finding it hard to breathe, and hard to think clearly. “What’s happening?” I ask. It takes him awhile to answer, but finally he does. I am relieved that he is able to speak, although what he says hardly brings any clarity to the situation. “It doesn’t matter,” he says, “and I don’t want to talk about it.” As he speaks, he makes a motion with his hand, as if he were pushing something away.

For the next several minutes we continue to converse, but I’m quite uneasy. Things seem incomplete and confusing. Something dark has entered the room, and I don’t know what it is or how to deal with it. Then, as we are speaking, it happens again. Once again a look of despondency comes over him. Sitting there, I know I’m in the presence of something bleak and oppressive. I try to be present with what’s happening, but it’s not easy. Again I’m finding it hard to breathe. Finally, he looks at me, and I notice his eyes are teary. “You’re right,” he says. I, of course, always like to be told that I am right, but in this instance I don’t have the slightest idea what he’s talking about. He continues. “No animal,” he says, “should be treated like that. Especially hogs. Do you know that they’re intelligent animals? They’re even friendly, if you treat ’em right. But I don’t.”

There are tears welling up in his eyes. And he tells me that he has just had a memory come back of something that happened in his childhood, something he hasn’t thought of for many years. It’s come back in stages, he says. He grew up, he tells me, on a small farm in rural Missouri, the old-fashioned kind where animals ran around, with barnyards and pastures, and where they all had names. I learn, too, that he was an only child, the son of a powerful father who ran things with an iron fist. With no brothers or sisters, he often felt lonely, but found companionship among the animals on the farm, particularly several dogs, who were as friends to him. And, he tells me, and this I am quite surprised to hear, he had a pet pig.

As he proceeds to tell me about this pig, it is as if he is becoming a different person. Before he had spoken primarily in a monotone; but now his voice grows lively. His body language, which until this point seemed to speak primarily of long suffering, now becomes animated. There is something fresh taking place. In the summer, he tells me, he would sleep in the barn. It was cooler there than in the house, and the pig would come over and sleep alongside him, asking fondly to have her belly rubbed, which he was glad to do.

There was a pond on their property, he goes on, and he liked to swim in it when the weather was hot, but one of the dogs would get excited when he did, and would ruin things. The dog would jump into the water and swim up on top of him, scratching him with her paws and making things miserable for him. He was about to give up on swimming, but then, as fate would have it, the pig, of all people, stepped in and saved the day. Evidently the pig could swim, for she would plop herself into the water, swim out where the dog was bothering the boy, and insert herself between them. She’d stay between the dog and the boy, and keep the dog at bay. She was, as best I could make out, functioning in the situation something like a lifeguard, or in this case, perhaps more of a life-pig.

I’m listening to this hog farmer tell me these stories about his pet pig, and I’m thoroughly enjoying both myself and him, and rather astounded at how things are transpiring, when once again, it happens. Once again a look of defeat sweeps across this man’s face, and once again I sense the presence of something very sad. Something in him, I know, is struggling to make its way toward life through anguish and pain, but I don’t know what it is or how, indeed, to help him.

“What happened to your pig?” I ask.

He sighs, and it’s as though the whole world’s pain is contained in that sigh. 
Then, slowly, he speaks. “My father made me butcher it.”

“Did you?” I ask.

“I ran away, but I couldn’t hide. They found me.”

“What happened?”

“My father gave me a choice.”

“What was that?”

“He told me, ‘You either slaughter that animal or you’re no longer my son.’”

Some choice, I think, feeling the weight of how fathers have so often trained their sons not to care, to be what they call brave and strong, but what so often turns out to be callous and closed-hearted. “So I did it,” he says, and now his tears begin to flow, making their way down his cheeks. I am touched and humbled. This man, whom I had judged to be without human feeling, is weeping in front of me, a stranger. This man, whom I had seen as callous and even heartless, is actually someone who cares, and deeply. How wrong, how profoundly and terribly wrong I had been.

In the minutes that follow, it becomes clear to me what has been happening. The pig farmer has remembered something that was so painful, that was such a profound trauma, that he had not been able to cope with it when it had happened. Something had shut down, then. It was just too much to bear. Somewhere in his young, formative psyche he made a resolution never to be that hurt again, never to be that vulnerable again. And he built a wall around the place where the pain had occurred, which was the place where his love and attachment to that pig was located, which was his heart. And now here he was, slaughtering pigs for a living – still, I imagined, seeking his father’s approval. God, what we men will do, I thought, to get our fathers’ acceptance.

I had thought he was a cold and closed human being, but now I saw the truth. His rigidity was not a result of a lack of feeling, as I had thought it was, but quite the opposite: it was a sign of how sensitive he was underneath. For if he had not been so sensitive, he would not have been that hurt, and he would not have needed to put up so massive a wall. The tension in his body that was so apparent to me upon first meeting him, the body armor that he carried, bespoke how hurt he had been, and how much capacity for feeling he carried still, beneath it all.

I had judged him, and done so, to be honest, mercilessly. But for the rest of the evening I sat with him, humbled, and grateful for whatever it was in him that had been strong enough to force this long-buried and deeply painful memory to the surface. And glad, too, that I had not stayed stuck in my judgments of him, for if I had, I would not have provided an environment in which his remembering could have occurred.

We talked that night, for hours, about many things. I was, after all that had happened, concerned for him. The gap between his feelings and his lifestyle seemed so tragically vast. What could he do? This was all he knew. He did not have a high school diploma. He was only partially literate. Who would hire him if he tried to do something else? Who would invest in him and train him, at his age? When finally, I left that evening, these questions were very much on my mind, and I had no answers to them. Somewhat flippantly, I tried to joke about it. “Maybe,” I said, “you’ll grow broccoli or something.” He stared at me, clearly not comprehending what I might be talking about. It occurred to me, briefly, that he might possibly not know what broccoli was.

We parted that night as friends, and though we rarely see each other now, we have remained friends as the years have passed. I carry him in my heart and think of him, in fact, as a hero. Because, as you will soon see, impressed as I was by the courage it had taken for him to allow such painful memories to come to the surface, I had not yet seen the extent of his bravery.

When I wrote “Diet for a New America,” I quoted him and summarized what he had told me, but I was quite brief and did not mention his name. I thought that, living as he did among other pig farmers in Iowa, it would not be to his benefit to be associated with me. When the book came out, I sent him a copy, saying I hoped he was comfortable with how I wrote of the evening we had shared, and directing him to the pages on which my discussion of our time together was to be found. Several weeks later, I received a letter from him. “Dear Mr. Robbins,” it began. “Thank you for the book. When I saw it, I got a migraine headache.”

Now as an author, you do want to have an impact on your readers. This, however, was not what I had had in mind. He went on, though, to explain that the headaches had gotten so bad that, as he put it, “the wife” had suggested to him he should perhaps read the book. She thought there might be some kind of connection between the headaches and the book. He told me that this hadn’t made much sense to him, but he had done it because “the wife” was often right about these things.

“You write good,” he told me, and I can tell you that his three words of his meant more to me than when the New York Times praised the book profusely. He then went on to say that reading the book was very hard for him, because the light it shone on what he was doing made it clear to him that it was wrong to continue. The headaches, meanwhile, had been getting worse, until, he told me, that very morning, when he had finished the book, having stayed up all night reading, he went into the bathroom, and looked into the mirror. “I decided, right then,” he said, “that I would sell my herd and get out of this business. I don’t know what I will do, though. Maybe I will, like you said, grow broccoli.”

As it happened, he did sell his operation in Iowa and move back to Missouri, where he bought a small farm. And there he is today, running something of a model farm. He grows vegetables organically – including, I am sure, broccoli – that he sells at a local farmer’s market. He’s got pigs, all right, but only about 10, and he doesn’t cage them, nor does he kill them. Instead, he’s got a contract with local schools; they bring kids out in buses on field trips to his farm, for his “Pet-a-pig” program. He shows them how intelligent pigs are and how friendly they can be if you treat them right, which he now does. He’s arranged it so the kids, each one of them, gets a chance to give a pig a belly rub. He’s become nearly a vegetarian himself, has lost most of his excess weight, and his health has improved substantially. And, thank goodness, he’s actually doing better financially than he was before.

Do you see why I carry this man with me in my heart? Do you see why he is such a hero to me? He dared to leap, to risk everything, to leave what was killing his spirit even though he didn’t know what was next. He left behind a way of life that he knew was wrong, and he found one that he knows is right.

When I look at many of the things happening in our world, I sometimes fear we won’t make it. But when I remember this man and the power of his spirit, and when I remember that there are many others whose hearts beat to the same quickening pulse, I think we will. I can get tricked into thinking there aren’t enough of us to turn the tide, but then I remember how wrong I was about the pig farmer when I first met him, and I realize that there are heroes afoot everywhere. Only I can’t recognize them because I think they are supposed to look or act a certain way. How blinded I can be by my own beliefs.

The man is one of my heroes because he reminds me that we can depart from the cages we build for ourselves and for each other, and become something much better. He is one of my heroes because he reminds me of what I hope someday to become. When I first met him, I would not have thought it possible that I would ever say the things I am saying here. But this only goes to show how amazing life can be, and how you never really know what to expect. The pig farmer has become, for me, a reminder never to underestimate the power of the human heart.

I consider myself privileged to have spent that day with him, and grateful that I was allowed to be a catalyst for the unfolding of his spirit. I know my presence served him in some way, but I also know, and know full well, that I received far more than I gave. To me, this is grace – to have the veils lifted from our eyes so that we can recognize and serve the goodness in each other. Others may wish for great riches or for ecstatic journeys to mystical planes, but to me, this is the magic of human life.”

The Daily "Near You?"

Ocean Shores, Washington, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

The Poet: Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things”

“The Peace of Wild Things”

“When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

- Wendell Berry

"If We're Lucky..."

“Maybe we accept the dream has become a nightmare. We tell ourselves that reality is better. We convince ourselves it’s better that we never dream at all. But, the strongest of us, the most determined of us, holds on to the dream or we find ourselves faced with a fresh dream we never considered. We wake to find ourselves, against all odds, feeling hopeful. And, if we’re lucky, we realize in the face of everything, in the face of life the true dream is being able to dream at all.”
- Dr. Meredith Grey, “Grey’s Anatomy”

“We Are All Like Elephants”

“We Are All Like Elephants”
by Marc Chernoff
 
“In many ways, our past experiences have conditioned us to believe that we are less capable than we are. All too often we let the rejections of our past dictate every move we make. We literally do not know ourselves to be any better than what some opinionated person or narrow circumstance once told us was true. Of course, an old rejection doesn’t mean we aren’t good enough; it just means some person or circumstance from our past failed to align with what we had to offer at the time. But somehow we don’t see it that way – we hit a mental barricade that stops us in our tracks.
 
This is one of the most common and damaging thought patterns we as human beings succumb to. Even though we intellectually know that we’re gradually growing stronger than we were in the past, our subconscious mind often forgets that our capabilities have grown. Let me give you a quick metaphorical example…
 
Zookeepers typically strap a thin metal chain to a grown elephant’s leg and then attach the other end to a small wooden peg that’s hammered into the ground. The 10-foot tall, 10,000-pound elephant could easily snap the chain, uproot the wooden peg and escape to freedom with minimal effort. But it doesn’t. In fact the elephant never even tries. The world’s most powerful land animal, which can uproot a big tree as easily as you could break a toothpick, remains defeated by a small wooden peg and a flimsy chain.
 
Why? Because when the elephant was a baby, its trainers used the exact same methods to domesticate it. A thin chain was strapped around its leg and the other end of the chain was tied to a wooden peg in the ground. At the time, the chain and peg were strong enough to restrain the baby elephant. When it tried to break away, the metal chain would pull it back. Sometimes, tempted by the world it could see in the distance, the elephant would pull harder. But the chain would not budge, and soon the baby elephant realized trying to escape was not possible. So it stopped trying.
 
And now that the elephant is all grown up, it sees the chain and the peg and it remembers what it learned as a baby – the chain and peg are impossible to escape. Of course this is no longer true, but it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that the 200-pound baby is now a 10,000-pound powerhouse. The elephant’s self-limiting thoughts and beliefs prevail.
 
If you think about it, we are all like elephants. We all have incredible power inside us. And certainly, we have our own chains and pegs – the self-limiting thoughts and beliefs that hold us back. Sometimes it’s a childhood experience or an old failure. Sometimes it’s something we were told when we were a little younger. The key thing to realize here is this: We need to learn from the past, but be ready to update what we learned based on how our circumstances have changed (as they constantly do).“

"How It Really Is"


"Markets, A Look Ahead: Yet Another 'Crisis?'. Really?"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 10/31/21:
"Markets, A Look Ahead: Yet Another 'Crisis?' Really?"
Related:

You've Been Nudged...!, "Top 1% Now Have More Collective Wealth Than Entire Middle Class"

Full screen recommended,
You've Been Nudged...!, 
"Top 1% Now Have More Collective Wealth Than Entire Middle Class"

Musical Interlude: Warren Haynes, Gov't Mule, "Forevermore"

Warren Haynes, Gov't Mule, "Forevermore"
And some songs you just feel...

Saturday, October 30, 2021

"My Bank Closed, Doors Locked; Crisis Looms"

Jeremiah Babe, PM 10/29/21:
"My Bank Closed, Doors Locked; Crisis Looms"

Musical Interlude: Buddy Brown, "Empty Shelves Joe"

Full screen recommended.
Buddy Brown, "Empty Shelves Joe"

"Bidenvilles For Christmas"

"Bidenvilles For Christmas"
by MN Gordon 

“I used to be a conspiracy theorist. But then all the conspiracies I followed turned out to be true.” The remark was made by a friend and Wealth Prism Letter subscriber over a recent phone conversation. We’ll have more on this in just a moment. But first, some of what prompted the comment…

Here in the land of fruits and nuts things have always been a little whacky and wild. The people and the politics in the state’s urban centers have the uncanny ability to bring out the worst in each other. The coronavirus travesty has only magnified these character failings. For example, all the stimmy checks, generous unemployment payments, and eviction moratoriums have had a predictable outcome. They’ve created a burgeoning class of people who would rather loaf and invite their soul over plying their time and talents toward something gainful.

At 7.5 percent, California’s tied with Nevada for the highest unemployment rate in the country. For perspective, the U.S. unemployment rate in September was 4.8 percent. Moreover, unemployment claims in California now account for one-third of the nation’s total claims. Yet the state, while the most populous, only accounts for a little over 12 percent of the nation’s total people.

At the local level, San Francisco and Los Angeles have been in an exhilarating competition for what city can be most stupid. Los Angeles recently sprinted into the lead. Just this week, for instance, and with a nod to Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward, the City of Los Angeles announced a universal basic income pilot program. It’s called Big:Leap. The mechanics of the Big:Leap program are simple enough. Roughly 3,200 low-income families will be chosen at random to receive $1,000 a month for one year starting in January.

Mayor Garcetti calls the program, “an instrument of racial equality.” Why the colon mark is inserted into the syntax is a mystery. And how the program will help people in poverty is equally mysterious. Poverty, remember, for a majority of people that live with it, is more of an attitude than a financial condition. Giving someone free money for a year does nothing to adjust their attitude of poverty. Rather, it reinforces their dependence.

So it was with this backdrop, among other mad happenings, that one friend and reader offered the following anecdotes and observations…

Tin Foil Hats: “As I was saying, I used to be a conspiracy theorist. But then all the conspiracies I followed turned out to be true. Turns out the Wuhan flu, for example, did in fact originate inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology. And now we know the National Institute of Health did fund the Wuhan lab’s dangerous gain of function experiments. Fauci lied, again!

And we all know what happened to Seth Rich." “What happened to Seth Rich?” we asked, trying to recall if there was something we should know. “Let’s just say, Vince Foster. And leave it at that.

But there is one thing I can’t quite put a finger on. Do you think U.S. supply chain disruptions, and the massive logjams at the ports, are deliberate? I mean, could the lunatics in government be trying to further collapse the economy so they can create an even larger population of dependents? The deranged push to get everyone vaccinated, in some way, seems to be part of this.

These ports – LA and Long Beach – have been in operation for over 100 years. There have been world wars, economic depressions, dock worker strikes. You know… Bloody Thursday, Harry Bridges, and all that. But nothing ever backed up the cargo ships quite like this. Why now? Have you been down to Bluff Park or up to Signal Hill? The view of them all littered offshore with Catalina in the background is absolutely nuts.

I’m telling you, if something doesn’t give in the next 30 to 60 days we’ll all be up the creek without a paddle. And that’s exactly where Empty Shelves Joe wants us. And that’s exactly why I’m thinking this is deliberate.

Now I’d put my old tin foil hat on to shield my brain from mind control. But, as I said, these conspiracy theories all keep coming true. This one seems no different.”

[At this point we could tell our friend was just warming up. So, we settled back into our chair and made ourselves comfortable…]

Bidenvilles for Christmas: “I heard you were in Reno last week, yeah? You know what they say about Reno? It’s so close to Hell you can see Sparks.

Speaking of being close to Hell. What the eff’s up with the LBC? I mean, the city’s always had a seedy underbelly. Most port cities do. My dad graduated from Poly High in the early 60s. I remember him telling me the area just east of where Ocean Blvd. crosses the LA River used to be called The Jungle. It was the city’s preeminent oceanfront slum. And when the Pike and the Cyclone Racer slipped into decay and disrepair in the mid-60s it turned really ugly. The amusement seekers disappeared. But the carnies, winos, and pyromaniacs remained.

That was back when Long Beach was still a Navy town. Every now and again some sailor would get snockered at Clancy’s or Joe Jost’s and stumble down “Whore Alley” over there and get rolled and roughed up by the souteneurs and hustlers. But at least it was contained. Seems like The Jungle has now spread like a virus to infect the entire city.

Like in front of the library at the end of your block. Have you been by there at night, lately? It’s a full blown Bidenville – with barrel fires and everything. So is the lot behind the vacant Sears across the street. Several months ago I heard they were going to convert that old Sears building to a homeless shelter. But I don’t know what ever came of it.

What I do know is that Long Beach city officials are trying to out-stupid Los Angeles and San Francisco. They’re now talking about sanctioning homeless encampments. Can you believe it? Government sanctioned Bidenvilles? Maybe the city will deliver them for Christmas. Ho ho ho!

In truth, this is more Governor Newsom’s and Mayor Garcia’s doing than Biden’s. But I still call them Bidenville’s. Anytime I can hold this illegitimate President in ill-repute, I do. Let’s go Brandon! You know what that means, don’t you?”

Musical Interlude: 2002, "Courting the Moon"

Full screen recommended.
2002, "Courting the Moon"
"This song is from our latest album, 'Hummingbird.' A Mayan legend says that the hummingbird is actually the sun in disguise, and he is trying to court a beautiful woman, who is the moon."

"A Look to the Heavens"

“Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,000 light-years away toward the constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major) and covers slightly more of the sky than a Full Moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated distance. The massive star that created the bubble, a Wolf-Rayet star, is the bright one near the center of the nebula. Wolf-Rayet stars have over 20 times the mass of the Sun and are thought to be in a brief, pre-supernova phase of massive star evolution. 
Fast winds from this Wolf-Rayet star create the bubble-shaped nebula as they sweep up slower moving material from an earlier phase of evolution. The windblown nebula has an age of about 70,000 years. Relatively faint emission captured by narrowband filters in the deep image is dominated by the glow of ionized oxygen atoms mapped to a blue hue. Presenting a mostly harmless outline, SH2-308 is also known as The Dolphin-head Nebula.”