"Our dilemma is that we hate change and love it at the same time;
what we really want is for things to remain the same but get better. "
- Sydney J. Harris
So, we rise from the rubble...
Thursday, August 18, 2022
"Getting The Best Deals At Kroger! Price Increases, And Some Empty Shelves! What's Coming?"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 8/18/22:
"Getting The Best Deals At Kroger! Price Increases,
And Some Empty Shelves! What's Coming?"
"In today's vlog we are at Kroger, and are noticing some strange price increases! We are here to check out the best deals we can find! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"
Comments here:
○
Related:
Gregory Mannarino, "Millions Of People Will Die; The Global Economy Is Collapsing Faster- Expect Bigger Lies"
Gregory Mannarino, 8/18/22:
"Millions Of People Will Die;
The Global Economy Is Collapsing Faster- Expect Bigger Lies"
Comments here:
“More to Come…”
“More to Come…”
By Jeff Thomas
“Years ago, when visiting the US, I’d often watch late night television. Just prior to each interval, in order to ensure that viewers would sit through the adverts, the show would run a panel that said, “More to Come.” This, of course, was effective, as the viewer would be anticipating that the best part of the program would come in a later segment and would be more likely to continue watching.
Today, we’re looking at the reverse of that situation. The program we’re watching is The Decline and Fall of the American Empire and those who recognize the decline are viewing with ever-increasing trepidation, the developments that are unfolding there. Even those of us who are not American and don’t live there are glued to our screens, as we’re aware that were viewing the early stages of a collapse that promises to be the greatest social, political and economic event that we’re likely to see in our lifetimes.
Following World War Two, the US was in a boom beyond anything the world had ever seen. The Americans came to the war late, after having built up their manufacturing capacity for war dramatically, at the expense of the Allied powers in Europe. And they did this, essentially for free. It was paid for with the gold from the vaults of the European allies. After the war, Europe was trashed and it would take decades for them to get on their feet again. Meanwhile, the US had been going flat out in production, had first-rate modern factories and, most important, held the majority of the world’s gold.
The 1944 Bretton Woods Agreement ensured that the US dollar would become the world’s default currency and, later, become the petrodollar, ensuring American hegemony over much of the rest of the world. There can be no doubt that, in the first decades after the war, the US had an amazing run and was, arguably, one of the best places to live in the world.
But, unfortunately, as so often happens, American political and industry leaders became full of themselves and couldn’t resist going out on limb to gain even more for themselves. In so doing, they turned the US from the world’s foremost creditor nation into the world’s foremost debtor nation. Worse, when they reached this unprecedented point, they opted to just keep going.
Worse still, it would appear that today’s leaders are aware that the mother of all bubbles that they’ve created is going to pop sometime in the near future, as they’re preparing themselves for the mother of all pushbacks from the populace when the crashes come.
The FBI, CIA, NSA, and a host of other authorities have either been created or expanded, allowing the creation of the world’s foremost police state. And, beginning in 2001 with the Patriot Act, have created a host of laws to assign authority to any of those bodies to exert ever-increasing control over the population. Capital controls, migration controls, higher taxes, confiscation of deposits in banks and quite a bit more have been passed in legislation, including the ability to declare the US in its entirely to be a “battle zone,” through which habeas corpus and the court system can be suspended nationally.
Yipes. (Or, blimey, depending on where you’re from.) At this point, any American who’s paying attention could be forgiven if he’s genuinely frightened at where his government is going with all this.
And so, we come back to the title of this essay – “More to Come.” A regular flow of proposed laws is now coming down the pipeline that would have been considered the stuff of a bad movie a few decades ago, but is now only too real and threatening to the freedoms of the average citizen. Instead of “more to come” meaning that the best is still on the way, the opposite would appear to be the case, and the worst is here, now.
But, how can this be, we ask ourselves. Surely those in power – the politicians, the industrialists, the central bankers, etc., must have seen this coming and, if that’s so, surely they’d have done something to stop it. Well, historically, that’s never been the case. Those in the greatest positions of power have never suddenly reversed an empire when it was about to self-destruct. What they tend to do instead is to guard against becoming casualties of the disaster they’ve created.
So, is that what’s happening this time around? In a word, yes.
The Bernie Madoffs of the world go to jail. However, those who commit the same fraudulent acts from within the system never go to jail. For example, if the heads of a bank commit massive fraud, the bank pays an enormous fine. The fine is then paid by the stockholders. And should the fine be large enough to crash the bank, the bankers can appeal to the government to bail them out, as they’re “too big to fail.” Thus, the taxpayers pick up the bill.
At this point, what we’re witnessing is an era in which laws are regularly being passed to ensure that the creators of the bubble will get a “Get Out of Jail Free” card and others will sustain the losses.
This is the very essence of what happens in an endgame run. Just as a hitman who places a bomb in a building makes his exit before the bomb can go off, the creators of bubbles safeguard themselves before the economic bomb can go off. They have no intention of being around to live with the resultant devastation that they’ve put into play.
Pete Townshend wrote prophetically, “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” in 1971, in which he hopes that the latest gang of leaders will be better than the last. In the final line of the song, he grimly announces, “Meet the new boss – same as the old boss.”
And, in fact, this is the usual outcome. Perhaps the reason why empires collapse much in the same way, time and again, and their citizens consistently fail to see it coming, is that empires general last a long time before collapsing. The Venetian Republic lasted 200 years. The Spanish Empire lasted just over 120 years. Holland lasted 130 years, Russia – 200, the UK, just under 120. And it’s been much the same for the others. In every case, they last longer than a single lifetime, so it’s rare that any individual sees more than one empire collapse in his own lifetime and doesn’t understand that empires don’t end with a whimper. They end with a crescendo, not unlike the Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again.”
We are witnessing the collapse of the world’s foremost empire. This is not mere conjecture. The US has all the symptoms that we’re now coming close to the final stages. And, if history plays out yet again, as it has repeatedly, we can expect that, in the lead-up to the collapse, the controls by governments will become increasingly draconian. As we consider, “more to come,” we should be braced for the likelihood that the worst controls are yet to be revealed.”
"There Is No Climate Crisis: History Shows Us That The Earth Has Seen Far Worse"
"There Is No Climate Crisis:
History Shows Us That The Earth Has Seen Far Worse"
by Tyler Durden
"Climate science has been so suffocated by ideological zealotry it's becoming difficult just to find normal objective analysis these days. Any piece of data that contradicts the man-made climate change narrative is surrounding by a spin machine that either dismisses the information or obscures it in a deluge of global warming propaganda, inoculating the reader well before they get a chance to digest the news that maybe climate change is not all it's cracked up to be.
Whenever high temperatures are reported in the US or Europe the news is hyperinflated into wild theories of climate Apocalypse by the media, but weather history suggests that the panic is fabricated rather than justified. In fact, any hot weather event you can pick out in recent years is likely overshadowed by a much worse event decades or centuries before “man-made carbon pollution” was ever a thing.
For example, the media is frantic over the current drought and “record temps” in Europe this summer, warning that it could become the “worst drought” in 500 years. Of course, this claim opens the door to a question that climate scientists and propagandists don't want to answer: What happened 500 years ago?
A similar level of global warming hysteria was present during a heat wave in Europe in 2003, as well as in 2018. The few climate scientists still not bought and paid for by governments and the UN have had to point out that these droughts are nothing compared to the living hell that was the drought of 1540. This event is often termed a “mega-drought” because the region suffered historically hot temps while receiving almost no rain for a year.
Temperatures that year averaged 5°C to 7° C above average temperatures in Europe in the 20th century. In US terms, that means daily summer temps of around 104° F. Hundreds of historic accounts written at the time describe around half a million deaths, along with vast wildfires and a winter in Italy that “felt like July.” Keep in mind that carbon levels in Europe in 1540 were 30% LOWER than they are today, yet, the region suffered perhaps the worst warming event in its recorded history.
Today's climate data is based on records held by the NOAA and other institutions, and these records only go back to 1880. So, whenever you hear the mainstream media rant about record temperatures, they are using a tiny sliver of global weather history going back a little over a century. Any honest scientist in this field will tell you that the Earth's climate record is vast compared to the limited data used by global warming ideologues, and the majority of destructive weather crises have occurred well before man-made carbon emissions.
It certainly wasn't carbon pollution from cars, farming and industry that caused the crisis in 1540. Try doing any research on the 1540 event and you will be buried in a pile of mainstream articles that acknowledge the disaster but then try to use it as an example of why we must comply with carbon restrictions and climate authoritarianism in 2022. They say “Look at what happened to Europe in 1540. You don't want that to happen again, do you?”
Of course, humanity had no say or control over the weather in 1540, just as we have no say or control over the weather today. There was no carbon based global warming back then, and there is no carbon based global warming now.
Scientists still have no idea what caused many of the warming events of the past including the crisis of 1540, so why should we have blind faith in their claims that carbon is the cause of warming in recent years? In fact, the NOAA and other climate research institutions still offer no concrete proof of a relationship between carbon emissions and rising temperatures. Their argument is that they have excluded all other possible causes, leaving only carbon as the remainder. This is not science, this is haphazard guesswork. If there was ever a field that defies the logic, reason and analysis commonly associated with the scientific method, it is climate science.
Set aside the fact that billions of dollars in funding are paid out to climate scientists every year, but only those scientists that operate from the assumption that climate change is caused by human beings. That is to say, there are numerous incentives for scientists to discount other causes for global warming. They are not scientists, they are paid political activists. Luckily, temperatures are not that high. The NOAA's own data shows that the average temperature of the Earth has risen less than 1°C in the past century. This is nothing, so why all the panic?
Let's just say that carbon controls are a powerful tool for micromanaging the population and justifying authoritarianism in the name of the “greater good.” If the public is convinced to accept false climate change narratives, then government would have the ability to control every aspect of daily life, from the amount of electricity we use, to the food we eat, to the businesses we can run, to the level of production and the size of the population. This is not fiction this is reality, and it is happening much faster than many people realize, all in the name of saving the planet from a threat that doesn't exist."
○
Related:
"'I See the Future and It’s Hell on Earth,' Warns Trends Forecaster Gerald Celente"
Full screen recommended.
Stansberry Research, 8/5/22:
"'I See the Future and It’s Hell on Earth,'
Warns Trends Forecaster Gerald Celente"
"This time, there will be no getaway plan [for investors]," warns trends forecaster and publisher of the popular Trends Journal, Gerald Celente. The crisis that we are facing now is unprecedented and he believes, " we are in a "new world disorder." he tells our Daniela Cambone. Gerald warns, "When all else fails they take you to war, and this economy has failed."
Comments here:
○
Full screen recommended.
The Atlantis Report, 8/3/22:
Gerald Celente, "We Are Living In The Worst
Financial Crisis In The History Of The World"
Comments here:
"Harry Dent: Don’t Listen To All Of The Clueless Experts - Biggest Market Crash In History This Year"
Full screen recommended.
The Atlantis Report, 8/18/22:
"Harry Dent: Don’t Listen To All Of The Clueless Experts -
Biggest Market Crash In History This Year"
"Harry Dent is a financial newsletter writer, economist, best-selling author and one of the most outspoken financial editors in America. He's been warning investors for years about the stock market, and warns everyone that the biggest market crash in history is coming this year. Prepare now."
Comments here:
Brutal truth if you'll hear it...
Wednesday, August 17, 2022
"The Grim Mathematics of Debt"
"The Grim Mathematics of Debt"
by Brian Maher
"But whence will growth originate? Since the Great Financial Crisis the monetary and fiscal authorities have conjured over $43 trillion from the great void of nothingness. Within the past 24 months alone, the Federal Reserve has plucked - from the same vast void - 50% more dollars than all dollars that ever existed in 256 previous years of American history. Each of these dollars are representations of debt… as are all dollars under the present monetary arrangement.
In all, the United States groans and gutters under $92 trillion of debt, public and private combined. As the overloaded pack mule cannot push along, the economy cannot push along under this impossible burden. The buckling legs are unequal to the task.
The Broken Keynesian Multiplier: Since the aforesaid Great Financial Crisis the United States economy has expanded a cumulative $4.05 trillion. That is, the economy can boast only $4.05 trillion of growth for the $43 trillion of debt it has taken aboard. That is, each dollar of growth required nearly $11 of debt-financed “stimulus.” And so the Keynesian “multiplier” - the promised miracle of water into wine - is reduced to a sad, sad jest. It has been proven the false magic of a false prophet.
George Mason University economists Garett Jones and Veronique De Rugy: "The multiplier looks at the return in economic output when the government spends a dollar… If the multiplier is above one, it means that government spending draws in the private sector and generates more private consumer spending, private investment and exports to foreign countries. If the multiplier is below one, the government spending crowds out the private sector, hence reducing it all."
The multiplier sags far below one. Thus the miracle of water into wine yields vinegar. How did the nation arrive at such a dismal pass?
The Long, Twisting Path to Insolvency: The long and meandering roadway stretches to the Great Depression. The way became clearer in 1971 - when old Nixon scissored the dollar’s remaining gold tethers. But after 2008 all obstacles were cleared away…Anti-inflationists yelled that the trillions and trillions of quantitative easing would yield a terrible inflation. It did not - the anti-inflationists were boys yelling wolf - and disinflation prevailed for the following decade.
Meantime, doomsdayers shrieked that ballooning deficits would reduce the economy to wreckage. Yet doomsday never dawned. The economy pegged along at a languishing gait, yet it did not wreck. And so the inflationists and the spenders took tremendous heart.
A Dream Come True: They believed they could fabricate a near infinity of dollars without inflationary evils and tally fantastic deficits without economic destruction. With all seeming checks removed, they carried on with predictable abandon. Manna, it was, as if from heaven itself. Turn a child loose in the candy store… or a drunkard in a liquor store… and you have the flavor of it.
When the pandemic flattened the economy in 2020 the federal government spewed trillions and trillions of dollars in relief. The previous decade’s experience instructed policymakers that inflation was a phantom menace and that interest rates would remain caged - regardless.
Mr. Brian Riedl, senior fellow with the Manhattan Institute: "When the 2020 pandemic necessitated a major federal response, both parties eagerly passed a $3 trillion bill that would have been unfathomable even a year earlier. Up to this point, the most expensive recent federal expansions had been implemented during recessions, with the goal of sustaining demand. But progressive lawmakers, economists and commentators saw the lack of negative macroeconomic consequences as proof that monetary and fiscal expansions had become a free lunch that could be greatly expanded - even during non-recessionary times.
After all, if rising inflation and interest rates have been permanently defeated, then why listen to those paranoid deficit scolds stopping us from ending poverty and building a comfortable social democracy?
No Free Lunch: But the iron laws of economics will reimpose themselves in time. The child’s candy is not free; the drunkard’s liquor is not free; the diner’s lunch is not free. Soon or late the bill comes slamming upon the table. And that time may be now. That is, the era of “free-lunch economics” may be through. Riedl: "We may soon look back on the 2009–2021 period as the era of “free-lunch economics,” when hubristic politicians and economists declared that traditional fiscal and monetary trade-offs no longer existed in any meaningful form. Advocates portrayed a new economy liberated from restraints, one in which money-supply expansions and congressional deficit spending could finance benefits that would make even Western Europeans envious, with no economic drawbacks. As in foreign policy, this utopian vision proved to be an illusion. Reality has intruded."
Reality presently takes the form of ghastly inflation and stagnant growth: "The “free-lunch” experiment has collapsed. Inflation has jumped past 8% for the first time in 40 years - reaching 9.1% in June officially, (over 17% according to Shadowstats)… real wages are falling and economic growth is dipping. Budget deficits are now projected to soar past $2 trillion within a decade, even assuming peace, prosperity and the scheduled expiration of most of the 2017 tax cuts.
Concludes Mr. Riedl: "For more than a decade, progressive lawmakers, economists and activists sold Americans a fantasy in which the printing press and ambitious deficit spending could buy a European-style welfare state without incurring costs. With Washington already facing $112 trillion in baseline deficits over the next three decades, adding trillions more in unfinanced benefits was never realistic. Congress must come back to reality: There is no free lunch."
Little Reason for Hope: Will Congress return to reality… and accept the honest costs of lunching? We harbor very little confidence that it will. And why should we? Where is the evidence? Prior even to the pandemic, the Congressional Budget Office estimated Congress would need to hack the budget 10% per year. The hackings, twinned with tax hikes, were the only route back to fiscal health. Can you imagine Congress spending 10% less money each year?
As we have written before: The pig in his sty will first sprout wings and take to the aerial ways. Nor will Congress raise the necessary funds to keep the show going. Thus debt - already a millstone heavy upon the neck - will weigh more and more. It will form an impossible drag upon growth.
A Grim Lesson: American GDP growth averaged some 1.7% from 2008–2021. Meantime, CBO currently projects American economic growth to peg along at an average 1.8% per annum for the next decade. In contrast, average annual growth of 3% or more was common before the great gale of 2008. A 1.2% disparity may not appear dramatic - and one year to the next it is not. But multiply the business by five years, 10 years, 20 years or more. You will acquire a grim lesson in the meaning of compounding interest - negative compounding interest. If America does not lick its debt, it is a lesson it will learn plenty good… and plenty hard…"
"Supply Chain Shock Triggers Perfect Storm At US Ports As Shipping Disruptions Break The System"
Full screen recommended.
"Supply Chain Shock Triggers Perfect Storm At US Ports
As Shipping Disruptions Break The System"
by Epic Economist
"Port congestion remains a huge hurdle for the U.S. supply chain as billions of dollars of products are at anchor or landlocked, and a shift from West Coast ports to East Coast ports is creating new pressures and a series of chokepoints in the system. Millions of U.S. businesses are panicking with the extended shipping delays, soaring costs of materials and commodities, and spiking shipping rates amid a drastic sales slowdown. Consumers are about to get shocked by the coming wave of price increases as grocers and retailers announce plans to raise costs of essential goods up to 30 percent. The current outlook is extremely gloomy, and industry giants are telling us to brace for some serious shockwaves as peak shipping season begins for volatile supply chains.
In a repeat of 2021’s supply chain chaos, U.S. ports are now handling a deluge of imports while hundreds of ships are still waiting offshore and thousands upon thousands of empty containers are piling up everywhere, worsening congestion at both coasts. The record volume of imports – which is also clogging up other key US container ports such as Los Angeles and Savannah, Georgia – is one of the main reasons why logistics experts remain cautious about the state of the US supply chain. With capacity still tight, there’s no room for error in the system. But new problems continue to surface very quickly, resulting in severe disruptions and causing shippers a lot of pain.
The offshore traffic jam is once again as bad as it’s ever been. As more container ships from China continue to arrive at the U.S. coast, it is estimated that the number of waiting vessels reached 201 on Monday. Delivery delays can easily become a financial burden to many shippers. Time is money, and a vessel or container at rest takes both out of the supply chain. “Global shippers should be prepared for volatility in the coming quarters,” warned Peter Sand, chief shipping analyst at ocean and air freight research firm Xeneta. With disruptions and uncertainty sweeping across every facet of the worldwide supply chain, the vast majority of companies are in panic mode, and executives expect current conditions to continue or even worsen by the end of the year, a new report shows.
A fresh study by QIMA, a global quality control, and compliance service provider, uncovered that nearly two-thirds of global businesses with international supply chains see these disruptions remaining unchanged or worsening by the year’s end. That number jumps to 81 percent for U.S. firms. The study notes that U.S. companies are experiencing a broad array of issues. But of course, these problems are not only causing shortages. For grocers and food retailers, they mean that food inflation is set to hit between 15 and 20% this year. When supply chains get choked up like that and farmers can’t make ends meet, food becomes expensive, fast.
This summer, Kraft Heinz announced plans to hike prices by as much as 30%, and other companies are expected to follow the same move while U.S. consumers cope with rising costs for housing, energy, and more. The issues we are seeing now reveal that most businesses are not adequately ready to cushion against the global supply shocks. Unfortunately, there’s no going back from the extensive disruptions we’ve seen so far, and U.S. companies are bracing for more shockwaves as the situation at ports aggravates. The supply chain breakdown is set to reach catastrophic levels during this peak shipping season, and the distortions we're witnessing right now are just a hit of what's coming next."
CanadianPrepper, "Worldwide EMERGENCY! Stockpiles Dwindling"
CanadianPrepper, 8/17/22:
"Worldwide EMERGENCY! Stockpiles Dwindling"
"The dominoes continue to fall as countries
hoard grain to prepare for what's coming."
Comments here:
"Target Stores Crushed By Inflation; Prepare For An Economic Crash Now"
Jeremiah Babe, 8/17/22:
"Target Stores Crushed By Inflation;
Prepare For An Economic Crash Now"
Comments here:
"A Look to the Heavens"
"Galaxies of the Virgo Cluster are scattered across this deep telescopic field of view. The cosmic scene spans about three Full Moons, captured in dark skies near Jalisco, Mexico, planet Earth. About 50 million light-years distant, the Virgo Cluster is the closest large galaxy cluster to our own local galaxy group. Prominent here are Virgo's bright elliptical galaxies from the Messier catalog, M87 at the top left, and M84 and M86 seen (bottom to top) below and right of center.
M84 and M86 are recognized as part of Markarian's Chain, a visually striking line-up of galaxies vertically on the right side of this frame. Near the middle of the chain lies an intriguing interacting pair of galaxies, NGC 4438 and NGC 4435, known to some as Markarian's Eyes. Of course giant elliptical galaxy M87 dominates the Virgo cluster. It's the home of a super massive black hole, the first black hole ever imaged by planet Earth's Event Horizon Telescope."
"Weaponizing the Bureaucracy: Who Will Protect Us from the Government’s Standing Army?"
"Weaponizing the Bureaucracy:
Who Will Protect Us from the Government’s Standing Army?"
by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead
“A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive
will not long be safe companions to liberty.”
- James Madison
"The IRS has stockpiled 4,500 guns and five million rounds of ammunition in recent years, including 621 shotguns, 539 long-barrel rifles and 15 submachine guns.
The Veterans Administration (VA) purchased 11 million rounds of ammunition (equivalent to 2,800 rounds for each of their officers), along with camouflage uniforms, riot helmets and shields, specialized image enhancement devices and tactical lighting.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) acquired 4 million rounds of ammunition, in addition to 1,300 guns, including five submachine guns and 189 automatic firearms for its Office of Inspector General.
According to an in-depth report on “The Militarization of the U.S. Executive Agencies,” the Social Security Administration secured 800,000 rounds of ammunition for their special agents, as well as armor and guns.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) owns 600 guns. And the Smithsonian now employs 620-armed “special agents.”
This is how it begins. We have what the founders feared most: a “standing” or permanent army on American soil. This de facto standing army is made up of weaponized, militarized, civilian forces which look like, dress like, and act like the military; are armed with guns, ammunition and military-style equipment; are authorized to make arrests; and are trained in military tactics.
Mind you, this de facto standing army of bureaucratic, administrative, non-military, paper-pushing, non-traditional law enforcement agencies may look and act like the military, but they are not the military. Rather, they are foot soldiers of the police state’s standing army, and they are growing in number at an alarming rate.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the number of federal agents armed with guns, ammunition and military-style equipment, authorized to make arrests, and trained in military tactics has nearly tripled over the past several decades. There are now more bureaucratic (non-military) government agents armed with weapons than U.S. Marines. As Adam Andrzejewski writes for Forbes, “the federal government has become one never-ending gun show.”
While Americans have to jump through an increasing number of hoops in order to own a gun, federal agencies have been placing orders for hundreds of millions of rounds of hollow point bullets and military gear. Among the agencies being supplied with night-vision equipment, body armor, hollow-point bullets, shotguns, drones, assault rifles and LP gas cannons are the Smithsonian, U.S. Mint, Health and Human Services, IRS, FDA, Small Business Administration, Social Security Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Education Department, Energy Department, Bureau of Engraving and Printing and an assortment of public universities.
Add in the Biden Administration’s plans to grow the nation’s police forces by 100,000 more cops and swell the ranks of the IRS by 87,000 new employees (some of whom will have arrest-and-firearm authority) and you’ve got a nation in the throes of martial law. The militarization of America’s police forces in recent decades has merely sped up the timeline by which the nation is transformed into an authoritarian regime.
What began with the militarization of the police in the 1980s during the government’s war on drugs has snowballed into a full-fledged integration of military weaponry, technology and tactics into police protocol. To our detriment, local police - clad in jackboots, helmets and shields and wielding batons, pepper-spray, stun guns, and assault rifles - have increasingly come to resemble occupying forces in our communities.
As Andrew Becker and G.W. Schulz report, more than $34 billion in federal government grants made available to local police agencies in the wake of 9/11 “have fueled a rapid, broad transformation of police operations across the country. More than ever before, police rely on quasi-military tactics and equipment. Police departments around the U.S. have transformed into small army-like forces.”
This standing army has been imposed on the American people in clear violation of the spirit - if not the letter of the law - of the Posse Comitatus Act, which restricts the government’s ability to use the U.S. military as a police force.
A standing army - something that propelled the early colonists into revolution—strips the American people of any vestige of freedom. It was for this reason that those who established America vested control of the military in a civilian government, with a civilian commander-in-chief. They did not want a military government, ruled by force. Rather, they opted for a republic bound by the rule of law: the U.S. Constitution.
Unfortunately, with the Constitution under constant attack, the military’s power, influence and authority have grown dramatically. Even the Posse Comitatus Act, which makes it a crime for the government to use the military to carry out arrests, searches, seizure of evidence and other activities normally handled by a civilian police force, has been greatly weakened by exemptions allowing troops to deploy domestically and arrest civilians in the wake of alleged terrorist acts.
The increasing militarization of the police, the use of sophisticated weaponry against Americans and the government's increasing tendency to employ military personnel domestically have all but eviscerated historic prohibitions such as the Posse Comitatus Act. Indeed, there are a growing number of exceptions to which Posse Comitatus does not apply. These exceptions serve to further acclimate the nation to the sight and sounds of military personnel on American soil and the imposition of martial law.
Now we find ourselves struggling to retain some semblance of freedom in the face of administrative, police and law enforcement agencies that look and act like the military with little to no regard for the Fourth Amendment, laws such as the NDAA that allow the military to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens, and military drills that acclimate the American people to the sight of armored tanks in the streets, military encampments in cities, and combat aircraft patrolling overhead.
The menace of a national police force - a.k.a. a standing army - vested with the power to completely disregard the Constitution, cannot be overstated, nor can its danger be ignored. Historically, the establishment of a national police force accelerates a nation’s transformation into a police state, serving as the fundamental and final building block for every totalitarian regime that has ever wreaked havoc on humanity.
Then again, for all intents and perhaps, the American police state is already governed by martial law: Battlefield tactics. Militarized police. Riot and camouflage gear. Armored vehicles. Mass arrests. Pepper spray. Tear gas. Batons. Strip searches. Drones. Less-than-lethal weapons unleashed with deadly force. Rubber bullets. Water cannons. Concussion grenades. Intimidation tactics. Brute force. Laws conveniently discarded when it suits the government’s purpose.
This is what martial law looks like, when a government disregards constitutional freedoms and imposes its will through military force, only this is martial law without any government body having to declare it. The ease with which Americans are prepared to welcome boots on the ground, regional lockdowns, routine invasions of their privacy, and the dismantling of every constitutional right intended to serve as a bulwark against government abuses is beyond unnerving.
We are sliding fast down a slippery slope to a Constitution-free America. This quasi-state of martial law has been helped along by government policies and court rulings that have made it easier for the police to shoot unarmed citizens, for law enforcement agencies to seize cash and other valuable private property under the guise of asset forfeiture, for military weapons and tactics to be deployed on American soil, for government agencies to carry out round-the-clock surveillance, for legislatures to render otherwise lawful activities as extremist if they appear to be anti-government, for profit-driven private prisons to lock up greater numbers of Americans, for homes to be raided and searched under the pretext of national security, for American citizens to be labeled terrorists and stripped of their rights merely on the say-so of a government bureaucrat, and for pre-crime tactics to be adopted nationwide that strip Americans of the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty and creates a suspect society in which we are all guilty until proven otherwise.
All of these assaults on the constitutional framework of the nation have been sold to the public as necessary for national security. Time and again, the public has fallen for the ploy hook, line and sinker. We’re being reeled in, folks, and you know what happens when we get to the end of that line? We’ll be cleaned, gutted and strung up."
An Absolute Must-Watch! "Celente and the Judge Podcast - August 17, 2022"
Full screen recommended.
"Celente and the Judge Podcast - August 17, 2022"
Gerald Celente and Judge Andrew Napolitano
discuss current events and circumstances.
Comments here:
Gregory Mannarino, "Expect Another 'Crisis' To Hit! Much Bigger Than Anything Before... Here's Why"
Gregory Mannarino, PM 8/17/22:
"Expect Another 'Crisis' To Hit!
Much Bigger Than Anything Before... Here's Why"
Comments here:
"Doug Casey On The (Domestic) War on Terror 2.0"
"Doug Casey On The (Domestic) War on Terror 2.0"
by International Man
"International Man: Previously, Big Tech companies like Twitter and Facebook de-platformed the sitting president of the US. These companies have censored and de-platformed others for deviating from the mainstream message on their platforms. Are we seeing the beginning of widespread censorship in the country? What comes next?
Doug Casey: A friend of mine sent me a quote from Ayn Rand the other day. Rand was without doubt one of the greatest intellectuals of the 20th century. In fact, people’s reaction to her and her ideas acts as a litmus test for how they feel about almost everything in life.
Rand said, "Once a country accepts censorship of the press and of speech, then nothing can be won without violence. Therefore, so long as you have free speech, protect it. This is the life and death issue in this country: do not give up the freedom of the press, of newspapers, books, magazines, television, radios, movies, and every other form of presenting ideas. So long as that’s free, a peaceful intellectual turn is possible."
She’s 100% correct. Media platforms and Big Tech are overreaching at this point. By doing so, they’ve brought the whole situation to a head. It’s going to go one way or another and probably wind up with violence, especially as the economy falls apart, and inflation gets out of control. Or we will have catastrophic deflation. Or both.
It could evolve into a situation similar to that of Germany in the early 1920s when right-wing and left-wing groups were fighting in the streets. As I’ve been saying for several years, a police state is a near certainty, and some form of civil war is a real possibility. The best solution is secession, a peaceful breakup. But that seems impossible for any number of reasons.
International Man: You once said, "In the US, politics has become a contest of who gets to impose their will on the rest of the country." With the midterm elections just a few months away, what do you think will happen if the Dems get unchecked power?
Doug Casey: Every country across space and time has the same assortment of people, by character anyway. We have the same kind of people in the US as did the French in 1789 or the Russians in 1917. Our own versions of Robespierre, Napoleon, Lenin, and Trotsky are coming out of the woodwork, and they can see that this is the moment to act. They’re much more interested in power than anything else.
Our own versions of those types are coming to the fore. The average American is confused and rolling over - he doesn’t have any philosophy or ideology to counter them. So, we could have a variation of what happened in France or Russia. That possibility is abetted by communication platforms like Facebook, Amazon, Google, and others. They’re extremely important because the average person spends many hours a day, sometimes all day, on his electronic device.
These people control all medias of communication. It’s Mussolini’s dream given reality on a grand scale. He described fascism as a system wherein the corporations and the State act in concert. Corporations create wealth (which the State is incapable of), and the State controls the power. It’s a natural thing that money and power would work together - they can reinforce each other. That’s what we’re getting here in the US, now more than ever. It’s just going to crush all the little people.
International Man: After the September 11th attacks, politicians initiated the Forever War on Terror. The government gave us the TSA, the Patriot Act, and all kinds of permanent restrictions, surveillance, and curtailments of civil liberties. Now, we’re hearing loud calls about creating a War on Terror 2.0, this time focused on so-called domestic terrorists, referring to Trump supporters and others. The mainstream media is already heavily promoting the "domestic terrorism" narrative. What are your thoughts on this?
Doug Casey: It amazed me how after the 9/11 disaster, they were able to come out with the 600-page Patriot Act in a couple of weeks. How is that possible? The Patriot Act is as thick as a telephone book. How could it be composed within days and then approved within hours? Of course, none of the Congress critters read it. That’s proof of how utterly corrupt and irresponsible they are.
This event on January 6th could be equivalent to the Reichstag fire in 1933, which Hitler used as an excuse to pass lots of emergency laws and effectively take control of the reins of the state. These people make no bones about it, saying things like, "Never let a good crisis go to waste." From their point of view, this crisis isn’t just good; it’s fantastic.
I’m sure that Congress will pass a draconian domestic terrorism law. It will suppress the "deplorables" and other opposition, who will no longer be able to communicate or organize effectively. If they gather in large enough groups, these laws will quash them as a public danger, as insurrectionists. That, combined with the lockdowns from the Covid hysteria and the oncoming economic collapse, means we’ve entered a new stage of American history.
International Man: If the government launches a War on Terror 2.0 - as it seems it will - where does it ultimately go? Recall the conviction of Bernard Von NotHaus in 2011, who the government accused of committing "a unique form of domestic terrorism" for circulating warehouse receipts for gold and silver. Given all that we’ve talked about today, what can the average person do to protect themselves?
Doug Casey: In researching my next novel, which will be called "Terrorist", I discovered that there are over a hundred separate definitions of terrorism used by various government agencies - and I’m sure that there are going to be more. They’re going to broaden the definition of terrorism.
Nobody thinks terrorism is a good thing - although it’s actually just a tactic, like artillery barrages or frontal assaults. But if you can convince somebody that the enemy is a terrorist, it’s really all over for them.
We’re in a situation pretty much like Martin Niemöller described in Germany of the 1940s. He famously said, "First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a communist. Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me."
It’s an accurate statement, except it seems to imply the National Socialist Workers Party - the so-called Nazis - weren’t socialists. That said, the smartest thing to do, if you’re identifiable as somebody in the enemy camp, is to make yourself scarce. In "Gone With The Wind", when the War Between the States started, Rhett Butler could see that it was going to turn into a disaster. So rather than stick around and be washed away by the tidal wave that he saw coming, he spent most of the war in England as a blockade runner.
That’s the situation that we’re moving into today. It’s going to be hot and heavy if you’re not part of the ruling class in the US. This has happened in so many countries in the world’s history, not just France, Russia, and Germany. It happened in China in 1947 and Vietnam in 1975. For reasons I’ve detailed elsewhere, now it’s the US’ turn on the dance card.
Among other many things, a huge number of Americans are graduates of higher education indoctrination camps. They really want to see radical changes in the US, and they’re going to try to make it happen."
○
And just who do you think all this is for? YOU!
"How Many of Biden’s New IRS agents Will Be Packing Heat -
And How Many Of Us Will They Target?"
Excerpt: "An audit notice from the IRS is scary. Up to 87,000 more IRS agents in the “Inflation Reduction Act” President Joe Biden signed Tuesday is troubling. And the IRS stockpile of 4,600 guns and 5 million rounds of ammunition is downright unnerving. How many of the new agents will be packing heat? Democrats won’t say.
The IRS arsenal of 4,600 guns includes 3,282 pistols, 621 shotguns, 539 rifles, 15 fully automatic weapons and four revolvers. It’s unclear who agents plan to shoot at. A recent IRS job posting says applicants must “be willing to use deadly force.”
Democrats voted in lockstep to take $80 billion from taxpayers to supersize the IRS. A possible 87,000 new agents are a force larger than the combined personnel on all 11 US aircraft carriers. Four times the number of Border Patrol agents. Enough to fill every seat in Madison Square Garden four times. Why does the IRS have guns and play police officer?"
View complete article here:
○
Related:
"A Person Who Has Remained A Person..."
"A person who has not been completely alienated, who has remained sensitive and able to feel, who has not lost the sense of dignity, who is not yet for sale, who can still suffer over the suffering of others, who has not acquired fully the having mode of existence briefly, a person who has remained a person and not become a thing, cannot help feeling lonely, powerless, isolated in present-day society. He cannot help doubting himself and his own convictions, if not his sanity." - Erich Fromm
And so, sometimes, we all get like this...
Full screen recommended.
Pet Shop Boys, "Numb"
So...
"I think of the trees and how simply they let go, let fall the riches of a season, how without grief (it seems) they can let go and go deep into their roots for renewal and sleep. Imitate the trees. Learn to lose in order to recover, and remember that nothing stays the same for long, not even pain, psychic pain. Sit it out. Let it all pass. Let it go. " - May Sarton
Then...
"Be like the sun for grace and mercy. Be like the night to cover others' faults. Be like running water for generosity. Be like death for rage and anger. Be like the Earth for modesty. Appear as you are. Be as you appear." - Rumi
"Will Nuclear War Be The End Of Our Civilization?"
"Will Nuclear War Be The End Of Our Civilization?"
by Michael Snyder
"Can we please not have a cataclysmic nuclear war which would result in most of the population of the world starving to death? I don’t think that is an unreasonable request. There are nine guys that collectively control virtually all of the nuclear weapons on the planet. If something goes wrong and some of them start firing their weapons, billions of people could end up dead. In fact, a brand new study that was just published on Monday came to the conclusion that approximately two-thirds of the entire population of the globe could starve to death if there is a nuclear war between the United States and Russia. So that is definitely something that we should try to avoid at all costs.
Unfortunately, Joe Biden and his all-star team of warmongers have been relentlessly provoking both Russia and China ever since Biden first entered the White House. Now we have a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, and thanks to Nancy Pelosi’s recent antics we are now dangerously close to a war with China over Taiwan.
Of course Russia and China both have nuclear weapons, and a major conflict with either one of them would bring us to the brink of the unthinkable. Most Americans assume that if a nuclear war ever happened most of the population would be instantly blown to bits and would not need to worry about what comes afterwards. But that isn’t true at all.
Yes, if you live near a military base, a missile silo or some other strategic target you will probably be immediately wiped out by a nuclear blast. However, as I have discussed in previous articles, other studies have determined that only about 20 percent of the U.S. population would die right away if there is a nuclear war with Russia. That doesn’t mean that most of the population would survive. In the end, starvation would kill far more people than anything else.
And that is precisely what this brand new study is saying. A nuclear exchange between the United States and Russia would result in massive amounts of soot being sent into the atmosphere, and all of that soot would partially block the sunlight coming in for many years. According to the study, global temperatures would be reduced “by more than 58ºF” in the aftermath of a full-blown nuclear conflict… "The largest scenario examined, a week-long war involving 4,400 weapons and 150 Tg, or 330.6 billion pounds, of soot – such as one that would occur between the U.S., its allies and Russia – would kill 360 million people directly – and more than 5 billion from starvation, the study said. The density of the soot would reduce global temperatures by more than 58ºF."
It would truly be a “nuclear winter”, and very little would be grown for years. Things would be particularly nightmarish in the northern hemisphere. Almost everyone north of the equator would be facing starvation, but meanwhile those south of the equator would fare relatively better…"In the most extreme situation studied, every country aside from Australia, Argentina, Uruguay, Oman, Brazil, Paraguay and few others, would starve. “The first time I showed my son the map, the first reaction he had is, ‘let’s move to Australia,’” Xia said."
If you are considering moving south of the equator, now is probably the best chance you are going to get. Because our world is only going to get crazier and crazier in the years ahead. Once the nukes start flying, it will be too late to relocate, and even if you are able to survive you will suddenly find yourself in a society that will be unrecognizable. The following comes from an excellent opinion piece in the Connecticut Mirror…"Think of everything our ancestors created and passed down to us… incinerated. Think of all the art, literature, music, poetry that humans created through the millennia…up in smoke. The genius of Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Beethoven… destroyed. Think of everything you worked for, planned for, hoped for… gone."
We must do all that we can to avoid such a fate. Unfortunately, our leaders just can’t help themselves. On Sunday, U.S. Senator Ed Markey and other members of Congress visited Taiwan. This new visit came just 12 days after Nancy Pelosi’s infamous trip to Taiwan, and once again the Chinese are responding furiously. The following comes from Zero Hedge…"China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) started fresh drills around Taiwan on Monday in response to a congressional delegation that visited the island.
Wu Qian, a spokesman for China’s Defense Ministry, said the military exercises were a “resolute counterstrike and solemn deterrence to the consecutive provocations by the US and Taiwan that undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”
Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said it detected five PLA vessels in the area and 30 PLA aircraft, including 15 that crossed the median line that separates the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. China used to avoid crossing the median line, but since Pelosi visited Taiwan on August 2, PLA aircraft have regularly breached the unofficial barrier."
Senator Markey knew that his visit would make tensions in the region even worse. So why did he do it? We can be tough with the Chinese without constantly provoking them. Even if a military conflict with China did not go nuclear, it would still have consequences that would be absolutely horrific for our nation.
We need to find a peaceful way out of this mess before a line is crossed that will never be able to be uncrossed. And thanks to the foolish policies of our leaders, we are now deeply engaged in a proxy war in Ukraine that could have easily been avoided. A diplomatic solution was available before the war started, but our politicians refused.
During the four years that Trump was in the White House, we were never on the brink of a major war. Now we find ourselves facing the possibility of fighting both Russia and China at the same time. And if someone decides to use nuclear weapons, billions of people could end up dead. Sadly, we are now closer to nuclear war than we have been in decades, and that should deeply alarm all of us."
"Your Pension and Social Security Could Be Gone"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 8/17/22:
"Your Pension and Social Security Could Be Gone"
"You’re starting to see that there have been trillions of dollars lost in people's retirement and 401(k) accounts. This is getting exponentially worse by the month. Will Social Security be there when we retire? Homebuilders are about to go bankrupt all around us."
Comments here:
"How It Really Is"
American compassion and concern at it's finest, until the new
reality viciously slaps the stupid smug smile from their faces...
And it will.
"Strange Day At Walmart! Crazy Prices, And Someone Drives Car Through The Front Door!"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 8/17/22:
"Strange Day At Walmart! Crazy Prices,
And Someone Drives Car Through The Front Door!"
"In today's vlog we are at Walmart and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and a giant hole where someone had driven their car through the front entrance of Walmart on purpose!"
Comments here:
Gregory Mannarino, "Global Inflation Continues To Surge With No End In Sight"
Gregory Mannarino, AM 8/17/22:
"Global Inflation Continues To Surge With No End In Sight"
Comments here:
"Every Generation..."
"Every generation of humans believed it had all the answers it needed, except for a few mysteries they assumed would be solved at any moment. And they all believed their ancestors were simplistic and deluded. What are the odds that you are the first generation of humans who will understand reality?"
- Scott Adams, "God's Debris: A Thought Experiment"
○
Of course, everyone has their own unique perspective...
Full screen recommended.
Steve Cutts, "Man"
○
"Don't worry about saving the earth. The earth will be fine.
However, humans will probably become extinct and no
longer habitate the earth. Which is probably a good thing. "
- Blake Newman
"The Economy – At Seneca’s Cliff?"
"The Economy – At Seneca’s Cliff?"
by John Wilder
"It would be some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid."
- Lucius Anneaus Seneca, "Letters to Lucilius", n. 91
"I have written before about Ugo Bardi’s (Living Italian Economist) theory that he called Seneca’s Cliff. Seneca’s Cliff is a restatement of something Seneca (Dead Roman Dude) philosophized about. It was a simple idea: stuff gets built only slowly. But when it comes down? It comes down all at once, like falling off of a cliff, hence Bardi calling it Seneca’s Cliff.
A house is a good example of Seneca’s Cliff. A house is built over time – in most cases it takes several months to build one. But if there’s a fire, that same house can be burned to the ground in a manner of minutes. There are exceptions, of course: in a Mexican neighborhood in Canada, the house might be saved by a hose, eh.
So, that’s Seneca’s Cliff. I wrote about it myself back in the day, when I was trying to write a novel. It started, “The world had been a web...” This is a metaphor that has always stuck with me – the web of interconnections required to maintain society as we know it.
The world is a web. As I write this, I’m writing it on a laptop that was built halfway around the world, with components and materials sourced on nearly every continent. Dude, I got a Dell®, but the Dell™ came from everywhere. When everything works, that’s great. People communicate with each other through price and supply and demand and produce things like computers and cars and wedding rings and beer and PEZ® and the burrito that Amber Heard ate before she left a “grumpy” in the bed.
Unfortunately, we’ve been working at a world that’s based in efficiency, too. Efficiency is nice if you’re a company that’s trying to put together a lot of iPads® or Funko Pops©, but in reality efficiency sucks. Why do you have two lungs? Two kidneys? Two bellybuttons? Because those are really, really important. I have a buddy who lost 90% of his lung capacity in one lung due to the flu back in ’92. Guess what? He conducts a full life like it never happened. He coached a wrestling team, and rides bicycles long distances.
When something is important, you don’t want an efficient system, you want an inefficient system. This is why the water department can make more water than it needs to. But our global systems, at the top level, are efficient. We don’t produce 10% extra oil. We don’t have that capacity. In spring and fall we generally have plenty of excess electricity generation, but tell me how summer looks? Lots of spare capacity?
No, not so much. Sure, there are substitutes for lots of things – we can have Wheaties® instead of Rice Krispies™. But in the end, we have to produce enough food to feed 7.96 billion people, and enough energy to grow the food and move it from place to place as well as make clothes and iPods© and pantyhose.
But this means that we’re in a world where there is simply less food because there is less energy, and also because war took out production of a significant amount. This was added to by the Biden sanctions on Russia. They are strange sanctions, indeed. So far their result is that it actually resulted in more cash going to Russia every month. Oh, higher prices on energy mainly to Europe and the United States. The shortages we’re seeing now in food, which will soon become much worse will have an even larger impact.
It has already created stress in the developed world. But in fragile places, like most of the Middle East and all of Africa, food prices will increase to the point where many of the poorer governments will simply cease to exist as the revolutions start. The last time this happened, mass migration into Europe was the result. It’s possible that this time, violence will be exported to Europe, as well.
These are the conclusions if things go well, based on where we are now. From everything I’ve seen, we’re not on the trajectory of things going well. The capital markets are slowly failing in the West. Why? All the spending from the decision to print all the cash to paper over the previous holes in the economy that were caused from all the cash printed to paper over the holes before that is a game we can’t play anymore. The holes are too big.
The delicate web that keeps goods moving is stressed now, and strands are missing, putting a greater strain on the whole web. It took hundreds of years to build up this economy. How fast will it fall down Seneca’s Cliff?"
○
Related, highly recommended:
by Ugo Bardi
○
Freely view "Moral Essays," by Lucius Anneaus Seneca, here:
○
Freely download "Seneca's Letters to Lucilius" here:
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)