So, we rise from the rubble...
Wednesday, April 27, 2022
Must Watch! "This Is It - Real Estate Is Finished"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 4/27/22:
"This Is It - Real Estate Is Finished"
"It’s all bad news when it comes to real estate. Everyone is laying off their staffs in the mortgage sector. Prices continue to go up and sales are dropping dramatically. People cannot get loans and mortgage applications have dropped 50%. It's Finished!"
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Related:
If you have a mortgage, Good Citizen,
you'd better be aware of the consequences that are coming to you...
When your home value is half what it was and you can't sell it or refinance
it, but are still responsible for 100% of the mortgage, what will you do?
"Global Megabanks Are Tanking – The Same Ones the Fed Bailed Out in 2019"
"Global Megabanks Are Tanking –
The Same Ones the Fed Bailed Out in 2019"
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
Excerpt: "As long-term readers of Wall Street On Parade know well, we have regularly warned that the failure of Congress to meaningfully reform Wall Street by restoring the Glass-Steagall Act poses a national security threat to our nation in times of crisis.
Instead of meaningful reform, Congress has stood by and watched the Fed bail out the global banks repeatedly since 2008 – either with direct loans or by keeping interest rates artificially low (“administered rates”) or through trillions of dollars in asset purchases from the banks (what the Fed prefers to call Quantitative Easing).
The Fed’s balance sheet has ballooned from less than $1 trillion before the financial crisis in 2008 to $9 trillion today as a result of its willingness to perpetually bail out Wall Street. American taxpayers are on the hook for 98 percent of the Fed’s balance sheet and thus have a critical interest in demanding both transparency and accountability from the Fed.
In the fall of 2019 there was no war in Ukraine, there was no pandemic. But for still undisclosed reasons, the Fed decided to funnel trillions of dollars in cumulative repo loans to the trading units of U.S. megabanks and their foreign counterparties. The Fed’s repo loans stretched from September 17, 2019 through July 2, 2020. The Fed has begun releasing the names of the banks and the amounts they had borrowed on a quarterly basis, following a two-year lag. There has been an unprecedented mainstream media news blackout of this information."
Please view this complete article here:
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Full screen recommended.
"US Debt of $30 Trillion Visualized in Stacks of Physical Cash"
"Stagflation Rules with John Rubino"
"Stagflation Rules with John Rubino"
by Kerry Lutz's Financial Survival Network
"John Rubino is back… Interest rates keep rising, 10-year Treasury nearing 3% Housing bubble is bursting. Mortgages above 5% and some sellers are cutting their prices. Massive drag on the overall economy. Stagflation is here. Ukraine war looking like a quagmire, with an outside chance of stupid mistakes causing Russian and NATO forces to start killing each other. Idiots in the US corporate media seem to think the above is okay. Sean Penn… OMG. Nooses tightening around Clintons and Bidens. 5 Clinton campaign aids take the 5th. Florida Federal Judge strikes down mask mandate. Most dangerous job in the world is now Russian General in Ukraine, displacing NYC convenience store clerk after dark. Poison Pills are so yesterday. Twitter Employee Undergoes Therapy Over Elon Musk Takeover. Much, much more."
"The Military Situation In Ukraine"
"The Military Situation In Ukraine"
by Contributing Reporter
Excerpt: "Is it possible to actually know what has been and is going on in Ukraine? Jacques Baud is a former member of the Swiss strategic intelligence and specialist in Eastern countries. He takes a fact-driven down-to-earth approach to analyze the conflict and the role the West plays in it."
Please view this excellent, lengthy, factually accurate full article here,
with my very highest recommendation:
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"UK Backs Right Of Ukraine To Attack Russian Territory -
Kremlin Warns London Of 'Proportional Response'"
by Tyler Durden
Excerpt: "Later in the day Moscow responded by warning of a "proportional response" in such a scenario of aggression laid out by Heappey... "We would like to emphasize that London's direct provoking of the Kiev regime for such actions, in the event that they are implemented, will lead to an immediate and proportional response by Russia", the MoD said.
"As we have warned, the Russian Armed Forces are on round-the-clock standby to launch long-range precision-guided retaliatory strikes against the relevant decision-making centers in Kiev", the ministry asserted, according to a state media translation."
Given the weekly and near-daily escalation in both rhetoric and the heavier and more sophisticated weapons that the West is willing to pour into the conflict, the rising concerns of a Russia-NATO collision course are indeed warranted. Commenting on reports that Germany has approved sending anti-aircraft tanks to Ukraine, journalist Glenn Greenwald questions... "Virtually every week, Biden announces new massive aid of cash and weapons to Ukraine. Every week, US/NATO announce greater involvement that, weeks earlier, was deemed unthinkable. It's a full-on proxy war. The risks are mind-boggling. What is being achieved that warrants this?"
Please view this complete article here:
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"There are a multitude of fuses affixed to dozens of powder-kegs and little kids with matches are on the loose. I don’t know which of the fuses will be lit and which powder-keg will blow, but someone is bound to do something stupid, and then all hell will break loose. It could happen at any time. One military miscue. One assassination. One violent act that stirs the world. And the dominoes will topple, setting off fireworks not seen on this planet since 1939 – 1945. I can see it all very clearly."
- Jim Quinn
Gregory Mannarino, "The Economy Continues To Crater Faster! Keep Your Eyes On The SP500 4150 Level"
Gregory Mannarino, AM 4/27/22:
"The Economy Continues To Crater Faster!
Keep Your Eyes On The SP500 4150 Level"
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Related:
"Higher Prices At ALDI! What We Bought For Dinner"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 4/27/22:
"Higher Prices At ALDI! What We Bought For Dinner"
"In today's vlog we are at Aldi and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and pick up dinner where we will be using all Aldi's products. It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"
"History..."
"History is indeed little more than the register of
the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind."
- Edward Gibbon
Tuesday, April 26, 2022
"15 Shocking Facts About The Student Loan Debt Bubble And The Great College Education Scam"
Full screen recommended.
"15 Shocking Facts About The Student Loan Debt
Bubble And The Great College Education Scam"
by Epic Economist
"They have told us that the future of our country walked hand in hand with education - but when the cost of attaining such education causes irreparable financial damages for millions of college graduates, what future do we really have? College tuition has become increasingly burdensome in recent years. In fact, since the 1970s, the cost of tuition for private institutions skyrocketed by 567%, while for public universities, that increase was shockingly higher, exploding by 2,580%, as reported by the National Center For Education Statistics. Almost 30% of the U.S. population currently carries student loan debt. A significant share of these borrowers has been paying their debt for decades. Now, they're reaching their 60s, and they're being forced to use their Social Security benefits to cover their student loans.
Five decades ago, the average tuition for private schools hovered around $4,000. Now, some institutions are charging their students $20,000, $30,000, or even $40,000 a year for tuition and fees, and this sum doesn't even count living expenses. To make things worse, college graduates are facing one of the toughest job markets ever. There's a scarcity of good-paying jobs all around the nation, and despite their degree, a large share of young adults are underemployed, or working in low-wage jobs and earning $25,000 or less, which doesn't even allow them to alleviate their debt burden. At least 33.5% of college graduates are underemployed right now, and about 9% are unemployed, Federal Reserve data show.
According to one estimate, today, a private school student working on a minimum-wage job would have to work 100 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, just to pay for tuition. All of this makes us wonder: when did getting a college degree stopped being about people's education and started being an industry of debt? The system continues to push the notion that a college education is the key to a good future and that there is plenty of financial aid out there for everyone that wants to go to college. But they fail to mention that you'll probably spend the rest of your life trying to get rid of that debt, and that it will leave you financially drained for decades. Not even bankruptcy can get you out of student loan debt. It will stay with you forever until you finally pay it off.
Now, the U.S. economy is facing the biggest student loan debt bubble in the history of the world, and when our new college graduates finally enter the labor market, they rapidly realize that the good jobs they were promised are very few and far between. As millions of Americans wake up to the fact that the tens of thousands of dollars that they have poured into their college educations was not a guarantee of better working opportunities or financial stability, will the great college education scam finally be exposed? How can this nation grow if we limit the growth of our students the moment they enter college? Opting for an education shouldn't result in such acute financial distress. How can our students feel motivated about getting a degree if that means they will struggle financially for decades after graduation? Sadly, if education is indeed the future of our nation and there’s simply no safety net for our students, then we’re doomed to fail.
In today's video, we compiled stats that reveal that education in America has become a lucrative industry of debt. Here are 15 Shocking Facts About The Student Loan Debt Bubble And The Great College Education Scam."
Gerald Celente, "Trends Journal: America Is Back!"
Full screen recommended.
Strong Language Alert!
Gerald Celente, 4/26/22:
"Trends Journal: America Is Back!"
Gerald's in fine form today... lol
"Markets Vaporized - Big Trouble Ahead; Global Inflation Not Going Away"
Jeremiah Babe, PM 4/26/22:
"Markets Vaporized - Big Trouble Ahead;
Global Inflation Not Going Away"
"It’s Time to Send U.S. Troops to Ukraine ?!"
"It’s Time to Send U.S. Troops to Ukraine ?!"
by Jim Rickards
"It seems that more and more commentators and political figures are calling for an increased U.S. role in Ukraine, even the deployment of ground troops. For example, Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware recently argued, “We in Congress and the administration [must] come to a common position about when we are willing to go the next step and to send not just arms but troops to the aid in defense of Ukraine." Coons later walked back his comments, but he’s not the only one who’s argued for sending troops to Ukraine.
Gen. Philip Breedlove, former NATO supreme allied commander, has suggested that NATO should deploy troops “into western Ukraine to carry out humanitarian missions and to set up a forward arms supply base.” Well, that’s fine, but setting up an arms supply base in western Ukraine drags us right into the middle of the conflict. Do they think Russia is going to just sit back and watch NATO arms pour in to help Ukrainians kill more Russians?
Russian missiles have already destroyed weapons supplied to Ukraine by the U.S. and its NATO allies. What happens if Russia attacks an arms supply base and kills a number of American soldiers? The pressure would be to attack Russian forces in retaliation. The U.S. and Russia would then be on the escalation ladder (more on that below).
Oh, Stop Your Worrying! Meanwhile, retired Gen. Ben Hodges says, "It still does not feel like we are all-in to win. We have exaggerated the potential for a so-called World War III to the point that we're making policy decisions based on an exaggerated fear." But maybe it’s not fear that’s keeping us out of direct involvement in Ukraine, but prudence. These people are gambling that a conventional conflict with Russia wouldn’t escalate into nuclear war. And maybe they’re right. Maybe it wouldn’t. But is that a risk we’re willing to take?
Nuclear warfighting is not a topic that has been much discussed in the past 30-odd years since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. It’s certainly not a topic that nonexperts want to think about because the implications are both horrific and existential. Still, no topic is more critical today.
“Don’t Go There”: The theories around nuclear warfighting were mostly developed in the 1950s and 1960s by scholars such as Herman Kahn, Henry Kissinger and Albert Wohlstetter. I read their work beginning in the late 1960s as part of my studies in international relations and I continued to study the topic through graduate school and beyond.
Scholarly approaches varied in some respects related to doctrines of counterforce (aiming missiles at missiles), countervalue (aiming missiles at cities), first-strike, second-strike and mutual assured destruction. But there’s one rule they all agreed on: Don’t go there. What this means is that nuclear war is not a place where anyone begins an attack and it's not a place where anyone wants to end up. But it can happen anyway.
Climbing the Escalation Ladder: The process by which nuclear war happens is called escalation. Two nuclear powers start out with a grievance of some kind. The grievance may be played out using proxy powers such as Vietnam in the 1960s and Afghanistan in the 2000s. One side escalates the conflict by doing something unexpected or extreme. The other side does not stand still; they take an extreme retaliatory action. The first actor then retaliates to the retaliation and so on. Now we have a dynamic where two sides are climbing the escalation ladder.
Again, it's important to emphasize that neither side really wants a nuclear war, but once they start climbing the ladder, it's hard to stop. Eventually one side pushes the other so far that the only response is to use nuclear weapons. At that point, you're no longer just escalating; you're at the brink of a nuclear launch.
Use It or Lose It: To make matters worse, the other side sensing that their opponent may go nuclear will be under pressure to go nuclear first in order to avoid being hit themselves. This then goes into another branch of theory involving first-strike, second-strike, counterforce and countervalue strategies, etc. I don't have to do a deep dive on these theories in order to make the point that a nuclear war doesn't begin with a nuclear attack. It begins with small steps that spin out of control.
Because of the war in Ukraine, the world is closer to this apocalyptic state than at any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. That doesn’t mean both sides would launch ICBMs at each other right out of the gate. Any nuclear conflict would likely begin with tactical nuclear weapons, which are lower-yield devices designed to take out enemy troop formations, military bases, etc.
Russia has already warned that it may use tactical nuclear weapons. The U.S. and NATO seem to believe Russia is bluffing and it is therefore safe to continue escalating. Again, maybe that’s true, but maybe it isn’t. Unlike the U.S., which regards any nuclear weapons deployment only as a last resort, Russian military doctrine is much more open to the use of tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield.
And it’s believed that Russia has about 2,000 tactical nuclear weapons, while the U.S. has under 250. Given Russia’s conventional inferiority against the U.S. and NATO (totally untrue - CP), it’s not surprising that Russia fields so many tactical nukes. To be clear, I’m not predicting nuclear war. I’m simply pointing out the risks involved once both sides get on the escalation ladder toward nuclear war. It’s easier to get on than to get off.
Stumbling Into War: Meanwhile, there are credible reports that British special forces are in Ukraine instructing the Ukrainians in sabotage and other special operations tactics. Similar reports are circulating about U.S. and French special forces in Ukraine. The U.S., U.K. and France are all members of NATO. If any of those troops are killed or confront Russia forces, it could be viewed as a war between Russia and NATO, which is tantamount to World War III. Russia is investigating the claims. By itself, these special forces may seem like a small escalation. But it’s exactly the kind of action that can escalate into something far worse.
The White House would do well to study the same work that I learned in the late 1960s. Instead, it seems like no one is home at the White House. We’re playing with fire as the potential for escalation continues. And unfortunately, so does the potential march toward a nuclear war we’re told not to worry about. I don’t know about you, but I’m a little worried."
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Related:
Musical Interlude: Deuter, "Atmospheres"
Full screen recommended.
"Relax, find yourself in enchanted and blissful serenity..."
Deuter, "Atmospheres"
00:00 ⋄ Uno05:45 ⋄ Deux
11:58 ⋄ Drei
18:27 ⋄ Four
25:15 ⋄ Cinque
31:58 ⋄ Sei
36:33 ⋄ Sieben
42:22 ⋄ Huit
50:55 ⋄ Nine
57:27 ⋄ Dieci
"A Look to the Heavens"
NGC 1300 spans over 100,000 light-years and the Hubble image reveals striking details of the galaxy's dominant central bar and majestic spiral arms. In fact, on close inspection the nucleus of this classic barred spiral itself shows a remarkable region of spiral structure about 3,000 light-years across. Unlike other spiral galaxies, including our own Milky Way, NGC 1300 is not presently known to have a massive central black hole.”
- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120325.html
"A Grim Warning About What's Coming..."
Canadian Prepper, 4/26/22:
"A Grim Warning About What's Coming..."
Gregory Mannarino, "'We Are Dancing On The Titanic' - Multiple Warnings On The Economy/Market"
Gregory Mannarino, PM 4/26/22:
"'We Are Dancing On The Titanic' -
Multiple Warnings On The Economy/Market"
"You Think..."
"You think you will never forget any of this, you will remember it always just the way it was. But you can't remember it the way it was. To know it, you have to be living in the presence of it right as it is happening. It can return only by surprise. Speaking of these things tells you that there are no words for them that are equal to them or that can restore them to your mind. And so you have a life that you are living only now, now and now and now, gone before you can speak of it, and you must be thankful for living day by day, moment by moment, in this presence. But you have a life too that you remember. It stays with you. You have lived a life in the breath and pulse and living light of the present, and your memories of it, remember now, are of a different life in a different world and time. When you remember the past, you are not remembering it as it was. You are remembering it as it is. It is a vision or a dream, present with you in the present, alive with you in the only time you are alive."
~ Wendell Berry
"The Illusion of Freedom: We’re Only as Free as the Government Allows"
"If you want a vision of the future, imagine a
boot stomping on a human face forever."
George Orwell, "1984"
"The Illusion of Freedom:
We’re Only as Free as the Government Allows"
by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead
“Rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away. They’re privileges. That’s all we’ve ever had in this country, is a bill of temporary privileges. And if you read the news even badly, you know that every year the list gets shorter and shorter. Sooner or later, the people in this country are gonna realize the government doesn’t care about you, or your children, or your rights, or your welfare or your safety. It’s interested in its own power. That’s the only thing. Keeping it and expanding it wherever possible.” - George Carlin
"We’re in a national state of denial. For years now, the government has been playing a cat-and-mouse game with the American people, letting us enjoy just enough freedom to think we are free but not enough to actually allow us to live as a free people.
Case in point: on the same day that the U.S. Supreme Court appeared inclined to favor a high school football coach’s right to pray on the field after a game, the high court let stand a lower court ruling that allows police to warrantlessly track people’s location and movements through their personal cell phones, sweeping Americans up into a massive digital data dragnet that does not distinguish between those who are innocent of wrongdoing, suspects, or criminals.
Likewise, although the Supreme Court gave the go-ahead for a death row inmate to have his pastor audibly pray and lay hands on him in the execution chamber, it refused to stop police from using hidden cameras to secretly and warrantlessly record and monitor a person’s activities outside their home over an extended period of time.
For those who have been paying attention, there’s a curious pattern emerging: the government appears reasonably tolerant of those who want to exercise their First Amendment rights in a manner that doesn’t challenge the police state’s hold on power, for example, by praying on a football field or in an execution chamber.
On the other hand, dare to disagree with the government about its war crimes, COVID-19, election outcomes or police brutality, and you’ll find yourself silenced, cited, shut down and/or branded an extremist.
The U.S. government is particularly intolerant of speech that reveals the government’s corruption, exposes the government’s lies, and encourages the citizenry to push back against the government’s many injustices. For instance, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, the latest victim of the government’s war on dissidents and whistleblowers, is in the process of being extradited to the U.S. to be tried under the Espionage Act for daring to access and disclose military documents that portray the U.S. government and its endless wars abroad as reckless, irresponsible, immoral and responsible for thousands of civilian deaths.
Even political protests are fair game for prosecution. In Florida, two protesters are being fined $3000 for political signs proclaiming stating “F—k Biden,” “F—k Trump,” and “F—k Policing 4 Profit” that violate a city ban on “indecent” speech on signs, clothing and other graphic displays.
The trade-off is clear: pray all you want, but don’t mess with the U.S. government. In this way, the government, having appointed itself a Supreme and Sovereign Ruler, allows us to bask in the illusion of religious freedom while stripping us of every other freedom afforded by the Constitution.
We’re in trouble, folks. Freedom no longer means what it once did. This holds true whether you’re talking about the right to criticize the government in word or deed, the right to be free from government surveillance, the right to not have your person or your property subjected to warrantless searches by government agents, the right to due process, the right to be safe from militarized police invading your home, the right to be innocent until proven guilty and every other right that once reinforced the founders’ belief that this would be “a government of the people, by the people and for the people.”
Not only do we no longer have dominion over our bodies, our families, our property and our lives, but the government continues to chip away at what few rights we still have to speak freely and think for ourselves.
On paper, we may be technically free. In reality, however, we are only as free as a government official may allow. We only think we live in a constitutional republic, governed by just laws created for our benefit. Truth be told, we live in a dictatorship disguised as a democracy where all that we own, all that we earn, all that we say and do - our very lives - depends on the benevolence of government agents and corporate shareholders for whom profit and power will always trump principle. And now the government is litigating and legislating its way into a new framework where the dictates of petty bureaucrats carry greater weight than the inalienable rights of the citizenry.
With every court ruling that allows the government to operate above the rule of law, every piece of legislation that limits our freedoms, and every act of government wrongdoing that goes unpunished, we’re slowly being conditioned to a society in which we have little real control over our lives. In our quest for less personal responsibility, a greater sense of security, and no burdensome obligations to each other or to future generations, we have created a society in which we have no true freedom.
Government surveillance, police abuse, SWAT team raids, economic instability, asset forfeiture schemes, pork barrel legislation, militarized police, drones, endless wars, private prisons, involuntary detentions, biometrics databases, free speech zones, etc.: these are mile markers on the road to a fascist state where citizens are treated like cattle, to be branded and eventually led to the slaughterhouse.
We are overdue for a systemic check on the government’s overreaches and power grabs. Where we find ourselves now is in the unenviable position of needing to rein in all three branches of government - the Executive, the Judicial, and the Legislative - that have exceeded their authority and grown drunk on power.
The American kleptocracy (a government ruled by thieves) has sucked the American people down a rabbit hole into a parallel universe in which the Constitution is meaningless, the government is all-powerful, and the citizenry is powerless to defend itself against government agents who steal, spy, lie, plunder, kill, abuse and generally inflict mayhem and sow madness on everyone and everything in their sphere.
Unfortunately, there is no magic spell to transport us back to a place and time where “we the people” weren’t merely fodder for a corporate gristmill, operated by government hired hands, whose priorities are money and power.
As I make clear in my book "Battlefield America: The War on the American People" and in its fictional counterpart "The Erik Blair Diaries", our freedoms have become casualties in an all-out war on the American people. If we continue down this road, there can be no surprise about what awaits us at the end."
"Something Like Reverence..."
"When the pain of leaving behind what we know outweighs the pain of embracing it, or when the power we face is overwhelming and neither flight nor fight will save us, there may be salvation in sitting still. And if salvation is impossible, then at least before perishing we may gain a clearer vision of where we are. By sitting still I do not mean the paralysis of dread, like that of a rabbit frozen beneath the dive of a hawk. I mean something like reverence, a respectful waiting, a deep attentiveness to forces much greater than our own. "
- Scott Russell Sanders
"Pentagon Chief Admits The Real Strategic Goal In Ukraine: Quagmire For Russia"
"Pentagon Chief Admits The Real Strategic Goal
In Ukraine: Quagmire For Russia"
by John Burroughs
"Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin provided a revealing and disturbing glimpse into a darker element of US policy at a press conference held April 25 at the Poland/Ukraine border. The press event followed a trip to Kiev by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Austin.
Austin was asked how he defines "America's goals for success" in Ukraine. He first said that the US wants to see "Ukraine remain a sovereign country, a democratic country, able to protect its sovereign territory." But then he added: "We want to see Russia weakened to the degree it cannot do the kind of things that it has done in invading Ukraine." I had feared that geopolitical strategizing is affecting the US approach, but this is the first public indication of that I have seen.
It cannot be said too strongly: The US government must not be guided by any notion that a quagmire in Ukraine would drain Russian resources, diminish Russian influence and power globally, and possibly lead to regime change. The United States instead should do all within its power to help bring the war to a close rapidly in order to limit suffering; to eliminate risks that the conflict will widen and escalate, possibly to nuclear war; and to limit the negative global economic and food security repercussions.
A broader reason for determined efforts to end the war is the need to work toward restoring a relationship with Russia enabling cooperation on nuclear arms control and disarmament, climate protection, public health, and other vital matters of global concern.
US energy in helping bring the war to a close is also appropriate in view of the political responsibility of the United States, together with NATO, since the late 1990s in helping to create the conditions for a crisis. Actions having this effect included precipitously withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2003, subsequently establishing missile defense facilities in Romania and Poland, and opening the door to Ukraine's membership in NATO in 2008.
In a recent paper, "End the War, Stop the War Crimes", Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy outlines already widely discussed elements of an approach to ending the war. In brief, Russia and Ukraine should quickly agree to a cease-fire to enable negotiation of a settlement.
Negotiations should then aim to end the war immediately and to resolve the overarching disputes concerning governance of the Donbas region and the status of Crimea. A long-term consultative mechanism could be put in place to resolve time-intensive or recurring issues and to help maintain peace and human security. Ukraine appears ready to forswear any possibility of joining NATO, so long as some form of guaranteed neutrality can be established, but seeks to join the European Union. The overall aim should be the preservation of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity in accordance with the UN Charter.
We are ruled by idiots. https://t.co/Z2PLZArxYw
- Moon of Alabama (@MoonofA) April 26, 2022
In addition to any role they can play, behind the scenes or not, in bringing about a cease-fire and negotiating a settlement, the United States and other states must be ready to lift war-related sanctions and to accept and support some form of neutrality for Ukraine should Ukraine choose that.
Russia's war on Ukraine is already causing appalling suffering and devastation. It is playing with fire - even nuclear fire - to allow the war to go on indefinitely and potentially to widen and escalate, at least partly with the aim of weakening Russia. The right course is to making ending the war on acceptable, if not perfect, terms the highest priority."
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Related:
"'NATO Expansion' In Reality Means Placing
Territories Under US Command: Lavrov"
Russian FM Lavrov: "The risk of nuclear war is real, but there are many who are willing to artificially inflate it."
- Vera Van Horne (@VeraVanHorne) April 25, 2022
“There Was A Tale He Had Read Once..."
“There was a tale he had read once, long ago, as a small boy: the story of a traveler who had slipped down a cliff, with man-eating tigers above him and a lethal fall below him, who managed to stop his fall halfway down the side of the cliff, holding on for dear life. There was a clump of strawberries beside him, and certain death above him and below. What should he do? went the question. And the reply was, Eat the strawberries. The story had never made sense to him as a boy. It did now.”
- Neil Gaiman
"They Want More..."
"When people pile up debts they will find difficult and perhaps even impossible to repay, they are saying several things at once. They are obviously saying that they want more than they can immediately afford. They are saying, less obviously, that their present wants are so important that, to satisfy them, it is worth some future difficulty. But in making that bargain they are implying that when the future difficulty arrives, they’ll figure it out. They don’t always do that.”
– Michael Lewis, “Boomerang”
Bill Bonner, "Queen of the Bubbleheads"
"Queen of the Bubbleheads"
by Bill Bonner
San Martin, Argentina - "You don’t necessarily get what you want or expect; but you usually get what you deserve. Corollary: What should happen usually does happen. But not necessarily when it is s’posed to happen.
When the feds went into full moron mode in 2020, it was easy to forecast that inflation would be coming. But it was impossible to know when. In the space of 18 months, the Fed increased its balance sheet by $4 trillion. And the federal government handed out trillions in its various gimme/stimmie programs. Businesses, meanwhile, were closed. Output was discouraged.
Was this not a recipe for inflation? Only a Fed economist wouldn’t have seen it coming. And now, inflation is here… at levels not seen since the 1970s.
Another thing that was obviously going to happen was that the high flying, wealth-destroying tech companies were going to fall to earth. Investors wouldn’t pay extravagant prices for money-losing companies forever. Eventually, the bubble would pop. And it seems to be popping now.
Sinking ARRK: Cathie Wood is the queen of the bubbleheads. Look what’s happening to her. The Wall Street Journal: "Shares of the popular ETF, which is known by its ticker ARKK, have declined 45% so far in 2022 - including 21% in April alone - as rising interest rates punish stocks that are valued on the prospect of robust future growth."
With few exceptions, people do not invest in stocks for fun. They invest to make money. In an honest market, they make money from earnings, either paid out as dividends or retained by the company. But in the fraudulent market of 2009-2022, many billion-dollar companies earned no money at all. They took in capital – either as equity or debt – and gave nothing back.
Zoom, for example, hit it big time when the feds shut down the economy. All of a sudden, ‘zoom’ became a verb! And everybody wanted to do it. They zoomed in the morning. They zoomed at noon. And then they just kept zooming until late at night. With business associates… with family members… with friends. Trapped down in Argentina, we zoomed along with everyone else. But, along with other zoomsters, we paid nothing for the privilege. Zoom was a great service. The challenge for the company was how to make money at it.
As long as the Fed was mainlining credit into Wall Street arteries, it didn’t matter how much money a company earned. Prices rose. And investors hoped to make money from capital gains, not earnings.
Face to Face Losses: But now, the Fed is no longer buying bonds. It is letting its portfolio of bonds ‘run off;’ they are expiring at maturity. And the Fed is also talking tough, threatening to raise interest rates, which would make it harder for these money-losing companies to raise more debt-financing. Also, with the economy returning to normal, zooming is becoming less attractive. Now, we can have meetings face to face.
What should happen in these circumstances? The high fliers should crash. And they have. In terms of price-to-sales, Zoom sold for as much as 124. Now it is available for 7. Palantir was at 46; now at 15. Lemonade at 107, now trading for 9. RobinHood made its reputation by allowing low-cost, rapid stock trading. The price rose to 26 times sales. Now, it’s only 4.
All across the spectrum of promising tech start-ups, the up-and-comers are up-and-coming apart. Teladoc is down 77%. Block, minus 57%. Exact Science has lost 85%. Unity Software has fallen 58%. And Twilio, down 66%.
Another way to look at this is this: people usually get what they’ve got coming. So, we have to ask ourselves: who has what coming next? Stay tuned..."
"Fed Chair Powell Telegraphs the Perfect Storm for Wall Street’s Megabanks: Rapid Rate Hikes Hitting $234 Trillion in Derivatives"
"Fed Chair Powell Telegraphs the Perfect Storm for Wall Street’s
Megabanks: Rapid Rate Hikes Hitting $234 Trillion in Derivatives"
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
Excerpt: "The Federal Reserve (the Fed) is the central bank of the United States. It sets monetary policy, including control of the benchmark short-term interest rate known as the Federal Funds rate, or in Wall Street jargon, the “Fed Funds” rate. This is a key rate because it signals the rate at which overnight loans are made between financial institutions and the direction of interest rates in general.
Unfortunately, over time, the Fed has also been granted a supervisory role by Congress over Wall Street’s megabanks alongside its ability to bail them out when its crony brand of supervision fails. There was an epic failure in the Fed’s supervision of the Wall Street megabanks in the leadup to the 2008 financial crash and the September 2019 repo blowup. In both cases, the Fed made trillions of dollars in cumulative loans at below-market interest rates to the trading units of these megabanks in order to resuscitate them and cover up its own failure to properly supervise the banks.
The convulsions the stock market experienced last Thursday and Friday, that investors will continue to witness in the days ahead, are inextricably tied to the failure of Congress to strip the Fed of a supervisory role over these global megabanks.
There is no better snapshot of the Fed’s failure as a banking supervisor than this one fact that is called out every quarter in the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s "Report on Bank Trading and Derivative Activities." Table 14 of this report (see page 19) shows that the 25 largest bank holding companies in the U.S. are sitting on $234 trillion notional (face amount) in derivatives but just five bank holding companies are responsible for $200.18 trillion of that exposure or 86 percent of the total. Those mega bank holding companies are: JPMorgan Chase (ticker JPM), Citigroup (C), Goldman Sachs (GS), Morgan Stanley (MS) and Bank of America (BAC).
The table also clearly shows that the most dangerous form of these derivatives – the same credit derivatives that blew up Wall Street in 2008 – are also concentrated at those same five bank holding companies."
Please view this complete article here
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Related:
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"The Largest Market Crash Will Burst This Year;
David Rosenberg’s Last Warning"
"It seems like everyone in the market right now is really frightened about the coming change in monetary policy. This will be the first time in over a decade that the market will have to say goodbye to all that excess liquidity that made indexes skyrocket to one record high after the other. And don't be mistaken: this loss of liquidity in the market caused by a hawkish Fed will hit more than just winning tech stocks. They aren't the only one leveraged by excess liquidity - the entire market is. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand the consequences. The market is likely to crash by up to 90% when the Fed finally removes all of that easy money from the market. Right now, bubbles are already popping everywhere, showing that intrinsic value matters after all. All signs are there for people to see, and we must start acting before it's too late."
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A market crash of far less than 90% will trigger a tsunami of margin calls of
the $2.4 QUADRILLION derivatives, absolutely bankrupting everyone.
Everyone...
"Las Vegas Gamblers Keep Spending; More FED Magic Tricks; Debt Avalanche Risk; Stock Market Madness"
Full screen recommended.
Jeremiah Babe, 4/26/22:
"Las Vegas Gamblers Keep Spending; More FED Magic Tricks;
Debt Avalanche Risk; Stock Market Madness"
"What No One is Talking About - Power and Food Rationing"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 4/26/22:
"What No One is Talking About - Power and Food Rationing"
"From the economy to bank closures there is so much going on right now. Large stores are rationing cooking oil and limiting some food purchases. Power could be rationed in California."
"Massive Price Increases At Meijer! - This Is Getting Ridiculous!"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 4/26/22:
"Massive Price Increases At Meijer! - This Is Getting Ridiculous!"
"In today's vlog we are at Meijer and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and a lot of empty shelves! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"
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