"Any Life At All..."

"In a universe devoid of life, any life at all would be immensely meaningful. We ARE that meaning. "And what we see, "says the poet Mary Oliver, "is the world that cannot cherish us, but which we cherish." As though life itself is the great, universal, unrequited love of all time. But there is even more to this. Deep mystery. We are the universe aware of itself. We let the miracle get lost in distractions. On a planet so rich with living companions, much of humanity sentences itself to solitary confinement. Late at night, I used to lie in my boat listening to radio calls from ships to families ashore. There was only one conversation, and it boils down to, "I love you and I miss you: come home safe." Connections make us individuals. Ironic, isn't it? The more connected, the more unique our life becomes."

- Carl Safinao

The Poet: Stephen Levine, "Half Life"

"Half Life"

 "We walk through half our life

as if it were a fever dream,

barely touching the ground,

our eyes half open,

our heart half closed.

Not half knowing who we are,

we watch the ghost of us drift

from room to room,

through friends and lovers

never quite as real as advertised.

Not saying half we mean

or meaning half we say,

we dream ourselves

from birth to birth

seeking some true self.

Until the fever breaks

and the heart can not abide

a moment longer

as the rest of us awakens,

summoned from the dream,

not half caring for anything but love."

- Stephen Levine

"There Arrives A Point..."

"When swimming into a dark tunnel, there arrives a point of

no return when you no longer have enough breath to double back.

Your only choice is to swim forward into the unknown and pray for an exit."

- Dan Brown

Judge Napolitano, "Col. Doug Macgregor - Ukraine, Russia Latest"

Full screen recommended.

Judge Napolitano, Judging Freedom 7/28/22:

"Col. Doug Macgregor - Ukraine, Russia Latest"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

The Daily "Near You?"

Rotterdam, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands. Thanks for stopping by!

Bill Bonner, "The Fed's Secrets"

"The Fed's Secrets"

Plus, what China wants to know,

 $280 billion pigs, Madoff's playbook and more...

by Bill Bonner

"Yesterday was a big news day. First, the Fed did not “pivot” away from its tightening program. The BBC: "US makes major rate rise to tame soaring prices." That news was widely anticipated. It leaves the Fed’s key rate about 7.5% BELOW the consumer price inflation level. So, the Fed may be properly described only as making the noose… it’s still a long way from putting it around his elite friends’ necks. Investors bid up stocks on the news, probably guessing that the Fed chief might change his mind before he actually hangs anyone.

Which brings us to our second big headline: “Senate Passes Bill to Pork Up Semiconductor Industry.” Don’t bother to look it up. As far as we know, no reputable media outlet wrote an honest headline on the subject. It fell to us to clarify what was really going on.

Spooky Money: But empires need enemies. China is a good one. It’s big. It’s powerful. And it’s a plausible candidate to replace the US as the world’s number one hegemon. The whole military/industrial/media/academic/think tank/surveillance complex is all a-flutter over the possibilities – hundreds of billions’ worth of new weapons… research and analysis reports up the kazoo… and, of course, the aforementioned boondoggles for high tech industries.

And don’t forget the spooks. Already, FBI agents are looking under the beds for Chinese agents. The Wall Street Journal was on the case yesterday: “China tried to build a network of informants inside the Federal Reserve System…" Oh those wily, inscrutable, clever Chinese. They’re going to steal the Fed’s secrets… and infiltrate its policymaking… steering it to dumber and dumber policies.

Excuse us… but we need to take a break to laugh… and catch our breath. The idea that the Chinese may learn Fed secrets, or pervert Fed policy, is like suggesting that it might be trying to steal Bernie Madoff’s business plan. How it worked was obvious; its failure was inevitable. Besides, why bother? Want to know something about the US economy? Just go on the Internet. There are reams of data... tomes of theories… endless research. Almost all of it free.

All They Want: The Chinese can have all they want – all the scientific-sounding formulas, the large numbers, the Greek symbols and the crackpot theories. The public gets the wrong idea from all this folderol; apparently, the Chinese do too. People think the Fed team are like nuclear engineers… or maybe surgeons. They believe the Fed must have expertise… some tricks… some gnostic awareness – above and beyond normal humans – that enables them to pull the right lever at exactly the right time. That’s why the mainstream press refers to Powell’s ‘skill’ as a central banker that will be needed to avoid a recession.

But Mr. Powell has no known skill. And he has only one thing to work with – liquidity, both cash and credit. He adds it. Or subtracts it. Everything else is detail. And if he had any idea of what he was doing he wouldn’t have been adding liquidity when the economy was entering an inflationary cycle… and wouldn’t now be 750 basis points ‘behind the curve.’ He’d be ahead of it… inflation would be under control… and he could lower rates when the economy goes into recession.

But here’s Senator Rob Portman, missing the point completely: “I am concerned by the threat to the Fed… the broad threat from China to our monetary policy. The risk is clear.” Risk? If the feds were really afraid of Chinese competition, they’d give them keys to the Fed’s inner sanctum… and hope they would learn all they could."

Joel’s Note: "News across the wires this morning tells us what everyone without a PhD. in economics and a pay stub from the Federal Reserve already knew… the economy is shrinking. Data from the Commerce Department showed the US economy contracted by 0.9% in the second quarter (the “experts” had forecast a 0.4% increase).

For those keeping score at home, that’s two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. If it looks like a recession… and it sounds like a recession… and it hurts like a recession… just remember, it’s definitely not a recession. In fact, things couldn’t be rosier. “America is better positioned to lead the world than we ever have been,” said the president himself just a few weeks ago. “We have the strongest economy in the world.” Recession? What recession?"

- bonnerprivateresearch@substack.com

"I Do Not Say..."

"I do not say that democracy has been more pernicious on the whole, and in the long run, than monarchy or aristocracy. Democracy has never been and never can be so durable as aristocracy or monarchy; but while it lasts, it is more bloody than either. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. It is not true, in fact, and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men, under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty."  

- John Adams

"Why the Fed Can’t Stop Inflation"

"Why the Fed Can’t Stop Inflation"

by Brian Maher

"Consensus opinion projected the Federal Reserve would elevate its target rate 75 basis points yesterday. The monetary authority greeted expectations, precisely - 75 basis points it was, announced at 2 p.m. Eastern. Thus the federal funds rate presently ranges between 2.25–2.50%. This rate of course falls miles and miles beneath the 9.1% (official) consumer price inflation currently going. Assume today’s blazing inflation endures. Mr. Powell and mates will need to get much better water on the inferno. This, they intend to accomplish. Today they muttered that they “anticipate that ongoing increases in the target range will be appropriate”... as inflation “remains elevated.” Yet the stock market was up and away on the news…

Powell Gives the Market Hope: The Dow Jones closed the day 436 points higher than where it started the day. The S&P 500 closed 102 points higher, while the Nasdaq Composite enjoyed itself a truly lovely spree - up a delirious 469 points on the day. Why did the stock market react to yesterday’s 75-basis-point hike with such bounce?

The Federal Reserve did telegraph additional hikes yesterday, it is true. Yet they also hinted they may soon back off, that they may kink the hoses some. Fire Chief Powell: "As the stance of monetary policy tightens further, it likely will become appropriate to slow the pace of increases while we assess how our cumulative policy adjustments are affecting the economy and inflation… recent indicators of spending and production have softened." There you have your explanation for yesterday’s stock market extravagance - by our reckoning at least.

Bad News Is Good News Again: Affirms BlackRock’s Gargi Chaudhuri: "The reason this is providing some relief to the equity market is the Fed is acknowledging that there can be an impact on growth, to the economy, based on their policy. They’re recognizing there are two sides of this: There’s a growth trade-off to fight inflation. That recognition is something we had today that we didn’t hear before."

Adds Goldman strategist Christian Mueller-Glissmann: "The market has shifted to bad-news-is-good-news again, the whole idea that central banks will pivot because the data is so bad. We’re going back to a template that we know well." We do know the template well - overly well. But is the Federal Reserve throwing water on the wrong target?

It’s a Supply Problem, Not a Demand Problem: It is attempting to throttle demand. Yet as Jim Rickards has noted, today’s inflation owes primarily to supply chain delinkages, not overabundant demand - that is, to supply limitations. The Federal Reserve can attempt to choke demand all it pleases. Yet it is incapable of mending the shattered supply chains. It is akin to taking aspirin for a bellyache or penicillin for a broken jaw. It is the wrong fix. So long as supply chains are discombobulated, inflation will run loose.

Rate increases will therefore fail to douse inflation’s flames. They will likely, however, give a good soaking to the economy. The required gallons would overtake, inundate and drown the thing.

Toward a Hair-Curling Recession: Recession is a near inevitability. As our former colleague David Stockman styles it: "[What we’re seeing] is powerful inflationary momentum that will take years to vanquish… The only thing that can slow down the inflationary freight train, therefore, is gobsmacking three-digit rate increases capable of shutting down new borrowing completely, thereby materially draining demand from overheated domestic product and labor markets."

Today’s 0.75% elevation therefore fails Mr. Stockman’s rigid requirements. This noted Cassandra continues, wringing troubled hands: "That’s not about to happen, of course. Instead, what lies ahead is a tangle of start-and-stop anti-inflation maneuvers by the Fed that will only prolong the inflationary disaster now upon us, even as the latter is inexorably destined to end in a hair-curling recession."

Can the Federal Reserve attain rates much above 3% - perhaps 3.5% - without lethal economic consequences? We are not half so convinced it can. We therefore believe 3–3.5% will represent high water. Levels will drop thereafter. Incidentally - or not incidentally - the market believes the Federal Reserve will commence rate cuts in Q1 2023. 

The Economy Can’t Breathe on Its Own: Like a man hooked to a respirator, the economy cannot breathe on its own. It is too dependent on central bank oxygen. The Federal Reserve plugged in the oxygen during the Great Financial Crisis… and never took it out. It attempted a weaning some years back but in late 2018 the market began to gasp and wheeze dreadfully. To yank the oxygen now - after even greater respiratory support - is to commit a suffocation, a murder.

The Lost Opportunity: The economy might breathe freely today had Dr. Bernanke and his successors only let the economy recapture its own wind post-crisis. The initial gasping might have been frightful, it is true. Yet the market would have coughed out the excesses of the previous boom - and gradually filled its lungs with the invigorating oxygen of honest capitalism - of profit and loss, of creative destruction. Alas, it was not to be. And so the economy remains on artificial ventilation, where it will likely remain until the end of the chapter, world without end.

We have likened Jerome Powell to the ancient Sisyphus of Greek mythology. The poor fellow kept pushing his boulder up the steep hill, only to have it roll back down with each attempt. He can never summit the hill. Unfortunately, neither can the economy…"

- dailyreckoning.com

○

Related:

"Welcome to STAGFLATION:

FED Forced to Hike Rates Into a Slow Economy"

"Oh Goody! Now We Get To Have Rampant Inflation And A Housing Collapse At The Same Time!"

"Oh Goody! Now We Get To Have Rampant Inflation 

And A Housing Collapse At The Same Time!"

by Michael Snyder

"Under normal circumstances, this would never happen. Normally, you would never have raging inflation and a housing crash at the same time. But thanks to the Federal Reserve that is precisely what we are now facing. The Fed has created a colossal inflation monster which is going to be exceedingly difficult to tame, and meanwhile the most epic housing bubble in the history of our country is starting to burst. This combination is going to cause immense pain for U.S. consumers in the months ahead, and there is no short-term hope on the horizon.

If you have been to the grocery store lately, you have probably noticed that prices are a lot different than they were just a few short months ago. Unfortunately, some of our largest corporations are telling us that they are going to continue to pass cost increases along to consumers…"Consumers looking for relief from higher prices might have to wait a while. The makers of Coca-Cola beverages, Dove shampoo, Huggies diapers and Big Macs have been raising prices as their costs increase on everything from wood pulp to wages. The executives behind these global brands on Tuesday said they would keep passing along those costs to shoppers, for now. Consumers are continuing to buy even as inflation takes a toll on households, these executives said."

In a desperate attempt to get the inflation spiral that they created under control, officials at the Federal Reserve keep raising interest rates. In fact, on Wednesday we witnessed another historic interest rate increase…"The Federal Reserve on Wednesday enacted its second consecutive 0.75 percentage point interest rate increase as it seeks to tamp down runaway inflation without creating a recession. In taking the benchmark overnight borrowing rate up to a range of 2.25%-2.5%, the moves in June and July represent the most stringent consecutive action since the Fed began using the overnight funds rate as the principal tool of monetary policy in the early 1990s."

Fed officials seem to think that they can tame inflation just like Paul Volcker and his minions did in the early 1980s. But the truth is that the environment is completely different this time around. In the early 1980s, the money supply was relatively stable. Today, we are coming off two years in which our leaders behaved very foolishly. Our politicians borrowed and spent trillions of dollars that we did not have, and the Federal Reserve pumped trillions of fresh dollars that they created out of thin air into the financial system. No matter how high the Fed pushes interest rates, it isn’t going to make all of that new money magically disappear.

In addition, we are dealing with some very serious long-term supply issues that would have been unimaginable in the early 1980s. I expect that those supply issues will intensify over time, and this will especially be true if more military conflicts erupt around the globe.

If officials at the Fed think that they can solve our inflation crisis by just crushing demand, they are simply being delusional. But raising interest rates will certainly do one thing. It will absolutely eviscerate the housing market, and that is already starting to happen. "On Wednesday, we learned that pending home sales in the U.S. were 20 percent lower this June than they were last June…"Signed contracts to purchase existing homes dropped 20% in June compared with the same month a year ago, the National Association of Realtors said Wednesday."

That is the slowest pace since September 2011, with the exception of the first two months of the coronavirus pandemic lockdowns, when sales plunged briefly and then rebounded sharply. On a monthly basis, pending home sales fell a wider-than-expected 8.6% in June. A Dow Jones survey of economists had predicted a 1% drop. Those numbers are absolutely horrible, and they were much worse than expected. And everyone agrees that this is happening because the Federal Reserve is raising interest rates.

At this point, things are particularly bad in “Zoomtowns” such as Boise, Idaho…"During the pandemic-fueled housing boom, Boise emerged as one of America’s hottest “Zoomtowns,” communities that experienced a spike in population from an influx of remote workers. Now, the housing boom around Idaho’s capital city has ground to a halt. Buyers are balking at record prices and mortgage rates that last month hit a 13-year high. Sixty-one percent of listings in the Boise metro area had a price cut in June, the highest rate out of 97 metro areas surveyed, according to brokerage Redfin Corp. Home builders who couldn’t keep up with demand last year are cutting back on construction."

If you are trying to sell a house right now, I feel really bad for you. As mortgage rates go even higher, even more potential buyers will be pushed out of the marketplace. Meanwhile, we are starting to see an alarming surge in foreclosures as the overall economy slows down. Just check out these very alarming figures…"Looking specifically at foreclosure starts, this metric was up 26.6% in June on a monthly basis, but up 440.91% year-over-year. Starts also represented the highest share (4%) of serious delinquencies since March 2020, but less than half the rate in the years leading up to the pandemic."

440 percent on a year over year basis? Are you kidding me? We haven’t seen anything like this since 2008. And we all remember what happened in 2008. A new housing crash is here, and the Federal Reserve is making things even worse by dramatically hiking interest rates. What in the world are they thinking? You don’t raise interest rates when a recession has already begun. That is completely and utterly insane. But that is precisely what they are doing.

I am concerned that economic conditions in America could soon very closely resemble my first novel. Economic activity is slowing down everywhere that you look, layoffs are on the rise, the housing market is collapsing, but meanwhile prices for essentials such as food and energy continue to keep rising. The people that are going to get hurt the most by all of this are those at the bottom of the economic food chain. A very dark chapter in American history has begun, and the months ahead are going to be filled with pain."

- http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

"Bank Run at Sydney Bank - When Will This Come to the US?"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly 7/28/22:

"Bank Run at Sydney Bank - 

When Will This Come to the US?"

"It was just a matter of time until China’s banking problem affected another country. Now Sydney, Australia is having problems with banks. People are desperate to get their money out. When will this come to the United States? The fed raised interest rate 3/4 of a point and businesses have accepted the fact that we have an economic slowdown."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"How It Really Is"

Any questions?

"Stocking Up At Kroger! Massive Couponing!"

Full screen recommended.

Adventures with Danno, 7/28/22:

"Stocking Up At Kroger! Massive Couponing!"

"In today's vlog we are at Kroger, and are buying things! We shop around Kroger showing what we think are the best deals with a massive variety of digital coupons! With grocery prices increasing due to inflation, and other reasons, we are traveling around to find the best sales, and deals, so you don't waste your money! It's getting rough out here with prices skyrocketing, and stores struggling to get in products."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Gregory Mannarino, "The Economy Is Now Officially In A Recession, And It's About To Get Much Worse"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 7/28/22:

"The Economy Is Now Officially In A Recession, 

And It's About To Get Much Worse"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Gerald Celente, "Our Freedom Is Lost; The Government Lies, Cheats and Steals"

Gerald Celente, "Trends Journal"

"Our Freedom Is Lost;

 The Government Lies, Cheats and Steals"

"The Trends Journal is a weekly magazine analyzing global current events forming future trends. Our mission is to present Facts and Truth over fear and propaganda to help subscribers prepare for What’s Next in these increasingly turbulent times."

- https://trendsresearch.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Canadian Prepper, "This Is Downright Terrifying. They Finally Got Me"

Canadian Prepper, 7/27/22:

"This Is Downright Terrifying. They Finally Got Me"

- https://canadianpreparedness.com/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: 2002, "Deep Still Blue"

Full screen recommended.

2002, "Deep Still Blue"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Stars can be like artists. With interstellar gas as a canvas, a massive and tumultuous Wolf-Rayet star has created the picturesque ruffled half-circular filaments called WR23, on the image left. Additionally, the winds and radiation from a small cluster of stars, NGC 3324, have sculpted a 35 light year cavity on the upper right, with its right side appearing as a recognizable face in profile. 

This region's popular name is the Gabriela Mistral Nebula for the famous Chilean poet. Together, these interstellar clouds lie about 8,000 light-years away in the Great Carina Nebula, a complex stellar neighborhood harboring numerous clouds of gas and dust rich with imagination inspiring shapes. The featured telescopic view captures these nebulae's characteristic emission from ionized sulfur, hydrogen, and oxygen atoms mapped to the red, green, and blue hues of the popular Hubble Palette."

- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap210208.html 

“The Immutable Laws of Nature, and Murphy’s Other 15 Laws”

“The Immutable Laws of Nature, and Murphy’s Other 15 Laws”

by Peter McKenzie-Brown

“The Immutable Laws of Nature”

• Law of Mechanical Repair: After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you’ll have to pee.

• Law of Gravity: Any tool, nut, bolt, screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible place.

• Law of Probability: The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.

• Law of Random Numbers: If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal; someone always answers.

• Law of Variable Motion: If you change traffic lanes or checkout queues, the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are in now.

• Law of the Bath: When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone will ring.

• Law of Close Encounters: The probability of meeting someone you know increases exponentially when you are alongside someone you don’t want to be seen with.

• Law of the Damned Thing: When you try to prove to someone that a machine or device won’t work, it will.

• Law of Biomechanics: The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.

• Law of the Spectator: At any theatrical, musical or sporting event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle always arrive last. They are the ones who will leave their seats several times to go for food, for beer, or to the toilet and who leave before the end of the performance or game. Those who occupy the aisle seats come early, never move once, have long gangly legs or big bellies and stay seated beyond the end of the performance. The aisle people also are very surly folk.

• Law of Coffee: As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your partner will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.

• Murphy’s Law of Lockers: When only 2 people are in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers.

• Law of Plane Surfaces: The chance that a slice of marmalade toast will land face down on a floor is directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpet or rug.

• Law of Logical Argument: Anything is possible when you don’t know what you are talking about.

• Law of Physical Appearance: If clothes fit, they’re ugly.

• Law of Public Speaking: A closed mouth gathers no feet

• Law of Commercial Marketing: As soon as you find a product that you really like, it will cease production or the store will stop selling it.

• Law of Psychosomatic Medicine: If you don’t feel well, make an appointment to see to the doctor and by  the time you get there, you’ll feel better. If you don’t make an appointment you’ll stay sick.

“Murphy’s Other 15 Laws”

1. Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

2. A fine is a tax for doing wrong. A tax is a fine for doing well.

3. He who laughs last, thinks slowest.

4. A day without sunshine is like, well, night.

5. Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.

6. Those who live by the sword get shot by those who don’t.

7. Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.

8. The 50-50-90 rule: Anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there’s a 90% probability you’ll get it wrong.

9. It is said that if you line up all the cars in the world end-to-end, someone would be stupid enough to try to pass them.

10. If the shoe fits, get another one just like it.

11. The things that come to those who wait, may be the things left by those who got there first.

12. Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

13. Flashlight: A case for holding dead batteries.

14. God gave you toes as a device for finding furniture in the dark.

15. When you go into court, you are putting yourself in the hands of twelve people who weren’t smart enough to get out of jury duty.”

- http://www.24hgold.com/

The Poet: Robert Frost, “Acceptance”

“Acceptance”

“When the spent sun throws up its rays on cloud

And goes down burning into the gulf below,

No voice in nature is heard to cry aloud

At what has happened.

Birds, at least must know

It is the change to darkness in the sky.

Murmuring something quiet in her breast,

One bird begins to close a faded eye;

Or overtaken too far from his nest,

Hurrying low above the grove, some waif

Swoops just in time to his remembered tree.

At most he thinks or twitters softly, ‘safe!’

Now let the night be dark for all of me.

Let the night be too dark for me to see

Into the future. Let what will be, be.”

- Robert Frost

"The Human Condition"

"The Human Condition"

by Meanings of Life

“We are all of us born, live and die in the shadow of a 

giant question mark that refers to three questions: 

Where do we come from? Why? And where, oh where, are we going?”

- Tennessee Williams

"Man remains largely unknown of himself. What are we, in our innermost recesses, behind our names and our conventional opinions? What are we behind the things we do in our lives, behind what we see in others and what others see in us, or even behind things science says we are? Is man the crazy being about whom Carl Gustav Jung spoke ironically, when he demanded a man to treat? Is man the Dr. Jerkyll that contains in himself a criminal Mister Hyde, and more than a personality, and contradictory feelings?

Are we the result of our dreams, as Prospero, in the Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” asked? Are we able to raise our nature and become the dignified beings evoked by Pico de la Mirandola (It’s the seeds a man cultivates that "will mature and bear fruit in him. If vegetative, he will become a plant; if sensual, he will become brutish; if rational, he will reveal himself a heavenly being; if intellectual, he will be an angel and the son of God")?

Almost two centuries ago, Spencer characterized the contradictory features of natives from the African east coast: "He has at the same time good character and hard heart; he is a fighter, conscientious, good in a precise moment, and cruel, pitiless and violent in the other; superstitious and rudely irreligious; brave and pusillanimous, servile and dominator, stubborn and at the same time fickle, relied to honor views, but without signs of honesty, niggard and economical, but careless and improvident".

It’s probably a good definition of a certain primitive man, to whom we are undoubtedly connected. But we are also cultural and ethic beings. We are able to change our values and behaviors. As William James says, human beings can change their lives through their mental attitudes. We can grow ethically. We can dominate part of our own instincts. And that’s why we can be different from the indigenous African described by Spencer. More: our thought dignifies us ("All the dignity of man consists in thought", says Blaise Pascal). We are, in many senses, the conscience of the Universe, and its utmost elaborated product. As Edgar Morin says, "in the core of our singularity, we carry not only all the humanity, all the life, but also all the cosmos, including its mystery, present in the heart of our beings".

We are creators, creator beings, and, in a sense, we can create, or recreate ourselves. All goes through our mind. It is our mind that constructs our truths and errors, and also the most sublime things in the Universe. And yet evil and stupidity exist in us. Sometimes we fall, we are stroked, and life reveals its cruelty, and we may think as Mark Twain, and say that it was a pity that Noah had arrived late to the ark. In our innermost recesses, there is also the cruelty and the inhumanity of life. Charles Darwin showed that we are descendants of inferior life forms: we have been long ago a "bush and a bird, and a fish silently swimming in the waters", to use the poetic terms used by Empedocles in its "Purifications."

From a genetic and evolutionist point of view, we contain in us the survival reflexes and the aggressiveness of the life forms that preceded us: "All that threatened the cave man - dangers, darkness, famine, thirst, ghosts, demons – all has passed to the interior of our souls, all troubles us, grieves us, threatens us from inside." (Morin). Besides, we are also beings that can differ significantly from each other. We are equal, but also different. "The awake involve a common world, but dreams deviate each one to its own world," Heraclites rather enigmatically declares. He thought we can’t help sleeping and living in illusory worlds, even when awake.

For all these reasons, Blaise Pascal’s celebrated definition of the human being, despite the hard language, not exactly agreeable to our ears, is undoubtedly one of the most powerful that can be applied to the rather unknown being that we can’t help being to ourselves: "What a chimera then is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, imbecile worm of the earth; depositary of truth, a sink of uncertainty and error; the pride and refuse of the universe! Who will unravel this tangle?"

- http://www.meaningsoflife.com/

This website no longer exists, sadly...

The Daily "Near You?"

Richmond Hill, Georgia, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

Gregory Mannarino, "Economy In Collapse; FED Raises Rates; Stock Market Takes Off!"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 7/27/22:

"Economy In Collapse; FED Raises Rates; 

Stock Market Takes Off!"

- https://traderschoice.net/

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

○

Related:

"A Storm Of Indicators Show The US Consumer Is Tapped Out"

"Humanity Is In the Midst Of A ‘Mutational Meltdown’ That Is Causing Us To Become Smaller, Slower And Dumber"

"Humanity Is In the Midst Of A ‘Mutational Meltdown’ 

That Is Causing Us To Become Smaller, Slower And Dumber"

by Michael Snyder

"We like to think of ourselves as the pinnacle of human existence, but the truth is that humans have been getting smaller, slower and dumber for quite a while. So why is this happening? Over time, human DNA has accumulated an enormous amount of deleterious mutations, and each new generation adds even more. Our DNA is essentially an “instruction manual”, and these deleterious mutations are essentially “spelling mistakes” in that manual. Eventually there will be so many mistakes that our “instruction manual” is simply not functional any longer, and that is a major problem. What this means is that the clock is running down on the human race, and that is a reality that most people don’t want to face.

I know that a lot of you are already confused, and so let me take this one step at a time. According to a recent BBC article, human brains are now significantly smaller than they were thousands of years ago…"Your ancestors had bigger brains than you. Several thousand years ago, humans reached a milestone in their history – the first known complex civilisations began to emerge. The people walking around and meeting in the world’s earliest cities would have been familiar in many ways to modern urbanites today. But since then, human brains have actually shrunk slightly.

The lost volume, on average, would be roughly equivalent to that of four ping pong balls, says Jeremy DeSilva, an anthropologist at Dartmouth College in the US. And according to an analysis of cranial fossils, which he and colleagues published last year, the shrinkage started just 3,000 years ago."

So does that mean that we are getting dumber? Well, yes, that is what some scientists believe. The following comes from NPR…"The experts aren’t sure about the implications of this evolutionary trend. Some think it might be a dumbing-down process. One cognitive scientist, David Geary, argues that as human society grows increasingly complex, individuals don’t need to be as intelligent in order to survive and reproduce."

Whether we want to admit it or not, brain size matters. A chicken is never going to be as smart as a dog, and a dog is never going to be as smart as a human. And as our brains continue to shrink, humans will just keep getting dumber and dumber. If you doubt this, just go back and try to read the writings of our founding fathers. Most Americans today can barely understand what they were trying to say, and that is extremely unfortunate.

It turns out that we are also getting slower… A book by anthropologist Peter McAllister, "Manthropology: The Science of the Inadequate Modern Male," analyzes fossilized footprints left behind by six male Australian Aborigines some 20,000 years ago – and concludes that one of them was running at 37 kph, only 5 kph slower than Usain Bolt was traveling at when he ran the 100 meters in world record time of 9.69 seconds in Beijing. This is without hours of deliberate training or spiked running shoes; this was barefoot and in soft mud. Given modern conditions, the same man – dubbed T8 – could have, says McAllister, reached speeds of 45 kph. The book also refers to Tutsi initiation ceremonies from just a century ago. Young men had to jump their own height as part of the ceremony – with some of them jumping as high as 2.52 meters; the world record is 2.45 meters."

Other scientists have come up with similar conclusions. In fact, one researcher at Cambridge University claims that even our very best athletes would “pale in comparison” to our ancestors from thousands of years ago…"‘Even our most highly trained athletes pale in comparison to these ancestors of ours,’ Dr Colin Shaw told Outside Magazine. ‘We’re certainly weaker than we used to be.’

The study looked at skeletons dating back to around 5,300 BC with the most recent to 850 AD – a time span of 6,150 years. It then compared the bones to that of Cambridge University students, and found the leg bones of male farmers 5,300 BC were just as good as those of highly-trained cross-country runners."

But at least we have gotten taller over time, right? Wrong. We may be taller than many of the impoverished people that lived through the Middle Ages, but that was just because of a lack of proper nutrition. If you go back several thousand years, our ancestors were much larger and much taller than we are today…"An earlier study by Cambridge University found that mankind is shrinking in size significantly. Experts say humans are past their peak and that modern-day people are 10 percent smaller and shorter than their hunter-gatherer ancestors."

And if that’s not depressing enough, our brains are also smaller. The findings reverse perceived wisdom that humans have grown taller and larger, a belief which has grown from data on more recent physical development. The decline, said scientists, has happened over the past 10,000 years. They blame agriculture, with restricted diets and urbanisation compromising health and leading to the spread of disease.

Dr. John Sanford has had work published in over 80 scientific publications and he has been awarded more than 30 patents. He has done extensive research in this area, and he uses the term “genetic entropy” to describe what is happening to humanity. The following is how one reviewer summarized his perspective…

"Imagine an instruction manual of tens of thousands of pages in which random changes have been made every time it is copied. Who would trust such a manual? How many changes would it take to make the manual unusable? How long before the manual no longer makes a functional product? It is a testimony to the nature of our genome that we are still alive in spite of the level of decay. Again, Sanford points to the accumulation of deleterious mutations and argues that our genomes are not evolving to something greater; we are decaying and degenerating. In other words, our genomes at one point were in far better shape than they are at present. The decay process has taken a huge toll. This process he terms “genetic entropy.” He suggests that this decay trend is not only real, but it is an inevitable result of the random, natural accumulation of mutations in our genome."

Unfortunately, this process appears to be accelerating. Some researchers have estimated that the number of new mutations per generation is currently somewhere around 100, but other researchers claim that it is now closer to 300. In any event, the reality of the matter is that human DNA is steadily becoming corrupted over time, and it is getting worse with each passing year. Eventually we would get to a point where our DNA is so corrupted that the human race simply would not be able to continue.

As I have warned my readers over and over again, time is running out for humanity. But as I noted at the beginning of this article, most people don’t want to hear this sort of a message. Most people would like to believe that things are just going to get better and better and that the future is full of lollipops and rainbows. Sadly, that isn’t the truth.

The truth is that the human race and everything around us is in an advanced state of decay, and we desperately need help from someone greater than ourselves."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

"We All Do What We Can...."

“All sins, of course, deserve to be treated with mercy: we all do what we can, and life is too hard and too cruel for us to condemn anyone for failing in this area. Does anyone know what he himself would do if faced with the worst and how much truth could he bear under such circumstances?”

- Andre Comte-Sponville

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Joe South, “Walk A Mile In My Shoes”

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"Fed Killing Off Economy - Brace For Impact; Cancel Your Escrow Now; Stop Buying Dumb Stuff"

Full screen recommended.

Jeremiah Babe, 7/27/22:

"Fed Killing Off Economy - Brace For Impact; 

Cancel Your Escrow Now; Stop Buying Dumb Stuff"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"How It Really Is"

 

"US Home Prices Tumble as Demand Craters - People are Not Shopping"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly 7/27/22:

"US Home Prices Tumble as Demand Craters - 

People are Not Shopping"

"The largest home builders have more inventory than expected. People are canceling homes at a higher rate than they ever have. Prices on average for new construction have dropped 9 1/2%. The average consumer is not shopping. Have you heard of pink sauce? This is something that is taken over the Internet and the seller could be in big trouble."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Greg Hunter, "Whole World is a Banana Republic"

"Whole World is a Banana Republic"

By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com

"A few months back, precious metals expert and financial writer Bill Holter predicted the economy was going to tank, and today, the U.S. is officially in a recession. Holter says it’s not just America buckling under enormous debt, but the entire world. Holter explains, “This is only the start. They are trying to debate whether or not we are in a recession, but it’s pretty much a lock. Yes, we are in a recession. And this is not just the U.S. This is a global problem. Let me put his into perspective. If you add up all the global GDP’s, we are roughly $100 trillion. The problem is there is well over $350 trillion in debt worldwide. When I graduated college anything above 100% debt to GDP was considered a banana republic. Look where we are today. Globally, it’s 350% debt to GDP. What that tells me is the world is a banana republic.”

So, it’s no surprise big money is getting out of fiat currencies like the U.S. dollar. Less than a month ago, Holter, who is also a precious metals broker for Miles Franklin, brokered what looks like the biggest U.S. silver coin deal in history. Just the Silver Eagle portion of the deal was 650,000 coins, which was only part of the $50 million deal. Only $27 million of that could be bought in U.S. incremented silver coins. (The rest was used to buy gold U.S. coins.) Holter says that cleared out the wholesale market for U.S. silver coins, including so-called junk silver. Holter contends, “That shows you how thin it really is. By the way, a fair portion, 15% or so, was future deliveries from the mint. So, we basically cleaned up the next four to eight weeks of Silver Eagle deliveries. They belong to us, and we are still waiting for delivery from the mint. The client wanted U.S. coin. In the U.S., that is the best form of silver ownership. We did not touch bars, generics or foreign sovereigns. So, there is still much more out there to be bought, but how much? I think $1 billion would buy all the available silver in the U.S. Think about it. A billion dollars today is not even the mustard on a ham sandwich. Make no mistake, this deal was a big hit to the inventory of U.S. silver coins. This paper Ponzi scheme is going to come down, and the best place to hide is gold and silver.”

On housing, Holter says it has topped and predicts, “Now, there are no bids, and homeowners are lowering the price. It was a virtuous cycle to the upside. Now, it’s reversed, and it will be a virtuous cycle to hell on the downside. I say hell because there is so much debt outstanding, it will create margin calls across the board.”

Holter is still predicting a Mad Max apocalyptic future that looks more and more like a real possibility. Holter says, “We have had free and carefree times for the last 40 years. Now, you are going to see the reverse. Debt is a two-edge sword, and after 40 years, we are going to see the dangerous side of the sword. There is going to be starvation. This is going to be unlike anything anyone has even written about from a fictional basis. I’ll be surprised if we make it through this year with the real economy functioning as it is right now. Supply chains will break down. We will have some dire markets leading to market closures and bank closures.”

Holter adds, the derivative market will take down the central banks because it is thousands of times larger than all central bank capital combined. “When the system goes down, it will go down fast, and it will be uncontrollable,” predicts Holter." There is much more in the 44 min interview.

- https://usawatchdog.com/

Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with 

financial writer and precious metals expert Bill Holter of JSMineset.com

- https://rumble.com/

"We Are Going To See Energy Prices Go Absolutely Nuts This Winter Just As We Plunge Into A Horrifying Global Economic Crisis"

"We Are Going To See Energy Prices Go Absolutely Nuts This

 Winter Just As We Plunge Into A Horrifying Global Economic Crisis"

by Michael Snyder

"How would you feel if your power bill went up by 50 percent this winter? How about 100 percent? Unfortunately, these kinds of price increases are already being announced. The world was heading into a major energy crisis even before the war in Ukraine started, and now that conflict threatens to create an extremely severe energy crunch that would have been unimaginable just a couple of years ago. If some sort of a miracle doesn’t happen, it is going to be a really, really cold winter for countless people in the western world.

The Russians have been trying to use energy as leverage, and on Monday they announced that the amount of natural gas flowing through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline will be reduced “to just 20% of its capacity”…"The Biden administration is working furiously behind the scenes to keep European allies united against Russia as Moscow further cuts its energy supplies to the European Union, prompting panic on both sides of the Atlantic over potentially severe gas shortages heading into winter, US officials say.

On Monday, Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom said it would cut flows through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany in half, to just 20% of its capacity. A US official said the move was retaliation for western sanctions, and that it put the West in “unchartered territory” when it comes to whether Europe will have enough gas to get through the winter."

In essence, Vladimir Putin is “turning the screws”, and it may just be a matter of time before he cuts off the gas completely. The Europeans never should have allowed themselves to become so dependent on Russian energy, and now a major crisis is staring them in the face.

Last Wednesday, a modest rationing plan for the member states of the EU was introduced…"The “Save Gas for a Safe Winter” plan announced Wednesday sets a target for the 27 member states to reduce their gas demand by 15% between August and March next year. That reduction is based on countries’ average gas consumption during the same months over the previous five years. The plan is focused on curtailing demand by businesses and in public buildings, rather than private homes. Among the proposed measures, the EU Commission is encouraging industry to switch to alternate energy sources — including coal where necessary — and to introduce auction systems that compensate companies for reducing their gas consumption."

Of course such a plan is going to be almost impossible to enforce, and even if all of the member states meet their goals it still won’t be enough if the Russians stop the flow of gas entirely. The U.S. has been ramping up exports to Europe in an effort to help, and one official is openly admitting that this could cause a dramatic increase in prices here in the United States… “This was our biggest fear,” said the US official. The impact on Europe could boomerang back onto the US, spiking natural gas and electricity prices, the official said. It will also be a major test of European resilience and unity against Russia, as the Kremlin shows no signs of retreating from Ukraine."

Sadly, we are already starting to see the price of natural gas rise to very alarming levels. According to Wolf Richter, the price of U.S. natural gas has “more than doubled” over the past year…"So here we go again. This morning, natural gas futures jumped to $8.29 per million Btu, adding to the jumps over the past week. The price has regained much of the lost spike, and is up about 30% from a month ago, and has more than doubled from a year ago."

Ouch. Needless to say, U.S. consumers are going to be feeling a tremendous amount of pain this winter. For example, just check out the rate hikes that were just announced in New Hampshire…"Electricity bills in New Hampshire are about to get higher. Eversource is raising its energy supply rate by about 50% on Aug. 1. With customers using, on average, 25% more energy in the summer, a typical customer could expect to see a $70 monthly increase, the utility said. The energy service rate for New Hampshire Electric Co-op will go up 77%, Liberty Utilities will jump 100% and Eversource’s rate will rise by 112%.

In the coming months, we will see similar rate hikes all over the nation. So are you ready for your power bill to soar into the stratosphere? And all of this comes at a time when the percentage of U.S. adults that are “having difficulties paying their bills” has just hit a brand new high…"The share of Americans who report having difficulties paying their bills has surpassed its 2020 pandemic peak in a US Census Bureau survey, underscoring the toll of soaring prices on budgets. Four in ten adults said it has been somewhat or very difficult to cover usual household expenses in a poll conducted end of June and early July. That’s the highest since the Census started asking the question in August 2020. It implies that more than 90 million families are struggling, up from about 60 million a year ago."

As I discussed yesterday, a recession in the United States is already here. Will the entire world soon follow? On Tuesday, the IMF warned that we could be on the verge of a major global economic slowdown…"The global economy is already in trouble, yet risks keep piling up. In a report released Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund once again lowered its world economic forecast as it predicted major slowdowns in the three biggest economies: the United States, China and Europe. Those downturns, combined with the ongoing war in Ukraine, inflation surging faster than expected, and tighter monetary policy around the world have continued to slam the already fragile global economy, it said."

It is often said that “energy is the economy”, and global supplies of energy just keep getting tighter and tighter. There isn’t any short-term help on the horizon, and if we stay on the path that we are on this new global energy crisis is just going to get worse and worse. Of course there is also the possibility that something could come along that could greatly accelerate our energy problems. A Chinese invasion of Taiwan is likely to happen at some point, and I have been warning that a war between Israel and Iran will erupt sooner rather than later. In either case, our new global energy crisis would rapidly evolve into a global energy nightmare.

So enjoy this relatively quiet summer while you still can, because I have a feeling that this upcoming winter is going to be quite crazy."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/