Steve Bull's Blog, page 1271
October 30, 2017
New York Times Acknowledges US Global Empire
One big advantage the war party has is the public’s ignorance about the activities of the far-flung American empire. Athough frustrating, that ignorance is easy to understand and has been explained countless times by writers in the public choice tradition. Most people are too busy with their lives, families, and communities to pay the close attention required to know that the empire exists and what it is up to. The opportunity cost of paying attention is huge, considering that the payoff is so small: even a well-informed individual could not take decisive action to rein in the out-of-control national security state. One vote means nothing, and being knowledgeable about the U.S. government’s nefarious foreign policy is more likely to alienate friends and other people than influence them. Why give up time with family and friends just so one can be accused of “hating America”?
In light of this systemic rational ignorance, we must be grateful when a prominent institution acknowledges how much the government intervenes around the world. Such an acknowledgment came from the New York Times editorial board this week. The editorial drips with irony since the Times has done so much to gin up public support for America’s imperial wars. (See, for example, its 2001-02 coverage of Iraq and its phantom WMD.) Stlll, the piece is noteworthy.
The Oct. 22 editorial began:
The United States has been at war continuously since the attacks of 9/11 and now has just over 240,000 active-duty and reserve troops in at least 172 countries and territories.
That alone ought to come as a shock to nearly all Americans. The UN has 193 member states — and the U.S. government has a military presence in at least 89 percent of them! The Times does not mention that the government also maintains at least 800 military bases and installations around the world. That’s a big government we’re talking about. And empires are bloody expensive.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Low Interest Rates Subsidize Wealthy Households
When the economy begins to sink into recession, politicians, mainstream economists, policy wonks, and the Federal Reserve begin beating the economic stimulus drum.
Politicians, however, disagree over the type of stimulus to implement. The center-left party proposes greater expenditures on public assistance programs. The center-right party supports permanent tax rate reductions. The center-left party opposes tax cuts because they say it benefits the rich. The center-right party opposes raising government expenditures because it increases government debt. This discord generally results in a temporary compromise where government expenditures are boosted and tax rates are cut. This compromise is called “discretionary fiscal stimulus.”
While the debate over discretionary fiscal stimulus has to overcome Senate filibusters and heated House debates, the central bankers at the Fed quickly implement monetary stimulus. Boosting aggregate demand is the intended purpose of it and discretionary fiscal stimulus. In mainstream economic theory, greater aggregate demand lowers unemployment and raises GDP. In spite of grave warnings from Austrian-school economists, the Fed pursues these goals by lowering interest rates via an expansion credit.
Although the political parties disagree over the type of fiscal stimulus to implement, both support the Fed’s monetary stimulus. Perhaps they do so because lower interest rates lower the cost of the budget deficits their discretionary fiscal stimulus produces. The lower interest rates also reduce the interest Americans pay on their debts. The total of this debt is unevenly distributed across the richest 1 percent, the next 9 percent, and the bottom 90 percent of Americans (as ranked by wealth), according to the following table.
Total household debt averaged $11.295 trillion dollars over the four quarters in 2013, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Multiplying this value by the percentages in the above table indicates that the richest 1 percent, the next 9 percent, and the bottom 90 percent have aggregate debts of $610 billion, $2.383 trillion, and $8.302 trillion, respectively. These values are listed in the Total Debt column below.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Nobody Called Anyone An Ignorant Slut
Salvador Dalí The discovery of America by Christopher Columbus 1959Let’s get one thing straight: Donald Trump is as American as apple pie (even if both are imports). He’s brash and loud and abrasive and entirely focused on money, he’s given to exaggeration, he stretches the truth, he constantly seeks to appear bigger and richer than he really is; he ticks all the boxes of what it is to be American.
Trump’s role in US society is that he’s a mirror for America, he’s not just holding up a mirror, he is the mirror. But many Americans don’t like what they see reflected in him. They’re really just looking at themselves, and their society, but they don’t want to acknowledge that. They just want to get away from the mirror, or preferably, break it. But when someone holds up a mirror to you, the idea is for you to learn something, not break it.
Of course not every individual American fits the picture, but he’s very much the almost perfect reflection of what the country, the society, has become. And one point in which Trump is different from other ‘leaders’ is that he doesn’t try to look different from what he is, he doesn’t play a role like just about every other politician does.
He has that in common with Bernie Sanders, which is ironic given how different the two men are. Neither tries to, or even has the ability to, concoct a cool and calculated attempt at pleasing their viewers and listeners and voters at every twist and turn. With both Bernie and the Donald what you see is what you get.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Idiots who try to control the world and blame everyone else for their failure
COMMENT: Ok Mr. Armstrong, this is nuts; You are starting to freak me out with this forecasting. The last 2 months has blown me away when a few more elements of your methodology lit my bulb a little brighter. This may sound like you paid me to advertise for you but most of us know you’re not like Hillary. My simple approach combined 3 pieces important to me: 1. Basic knowledge of the markets on a global scale, 2. Basic understanding of your models and Socrates reports 3. Basic interpretation of the ArmstrongEconomics Blog. (utmost importance, hints included) Like Erwin said last year “it might save your life.”
He is so right.
Best to all;
RH
REPLY: I assume you are probably talking about this Vertical Market. This report is probably one of the most important I may have ever released. It’s not easy because so many people have been caught up in the Austrian School of economic thought and the Quantity of Money theory. The entire Quantitative Easy has proven that theory to be completely wrong.
I know this is like having to relearn everything. But that is just the way it is. I and my senior staff even are going to private meetings with central banks. Everything we have ever been taught in school is just dead wrong. This whole nonsense of Conspiracy Theories of people who are steering the world economy is just insane. If that were even true, then why call us at all?
The world economy is coming unglued. This is no joke. The sooner people wake up and just follow the money flows and forget the old theories, the sooner you will arrive at clarity.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
October 28, 2017
In Shocking, Viral Interview, Qatar Confesses Secrets Behind Syrian War
A television interview of a top Qatari official confessing the truth behind the origins of the war in Syria is going viral across Arabic social media during the same week a leaked top secret NSA document was published which confirms that the armed opposition in Syria was under the direct command of foreign governments from the early years of the conflict.
And according to a well-known Syria analyst and economic adviser with close contacts in the Syrian government, the explosive interview constitutes a high level “public admission to collusion and coordination between four countries to destabilize an independent state, [including] possible support for Nusra/al-Qaeda.” Importantly, “this admission will help build case for what Damascus sees as an attack on its security & sovereignty. It will form basis for compensation claims.”
A 2013 London press conference: Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr Al Thani with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. A 2014 Hillary Clinton email confirmed Qatar as a state-sponsor of ISIS during that same time period.
As the war in Syria continues slowly winding down, it seems new source material comes out on an almost a weekly basis in the form of testimonials of top officials involved in destabilizing Syria, and even occasional leaked emails and documents which further detail covert regime change operations against the Assad government. Though much of this content serves to confirm what has already long been known by those who have never accepted the simplistic propaganda which has dominated mainstream media, details continue to fall in place, providing future historians with a clearer picture of the true nature of the war.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Facebook censored me. Criticize your government and it might censor you too.
Facebook is apparently clamping down on the distribution of political advertisers using the social media platform. Buzz60
Facebook said my post’s image of a violent FBI raid ‘incorrectly triggered our automation tools.’ But it wasn’t the first time an iconic image vanished.
(Photo: Karen Bleier, AFP/Getty Images)
Responding to Russian-funded political advertisements, Facebook chairman Mark Zuckerberg declared last month that “we will do our part to defend against nation states attempting to spread misinformation.” But Facebook is effectively sowing disinformation by kowtowing to foreign regimes and censoring atrocities such as ethnic cleansing in Myanmar. In the name of repressing fake news and hate speech, Facebook is probably suppressing far more information than Americans realize.
Facebook blocked a post of mine last month for the first time since I joined it nine years ago. I was seeking to repost a blog article I had written on Janet Reno, the controversial former attorney general who died last year. I initially thought that Facebook was having technical glitches (no novelty). But I checked the page and saw the official verdict: “Could not scrape URL because it has been blocked.”
More: Trump owes Orwell for ‘1984.’ Big Brother is his role model.
More: Fake news is a test for citizens. Here’s how to pass it.
“Pshaw!” I said, or some other one-syllable epithet. I copied the full text of the article into a new blog post. Instead of using “Janet Reno, Tyrant or Saint?” as the core headline, I titled it: “Janet Reno, American Saint.” Instead of a 1993 photo of the burning Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, I substituted an irreproachable official portrait of Reno. Bingo — Facebook instantly accepted that crosspost.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
“What Happens When The Market Can No Longer Pretend”: Charting Today’s Minsky Moments Dynamics
Back in July, Deutsche Bank’s derivative strategist Aleksandar Kocic believed he had found the moment the market broke, which he defined as a terminal dislocation between market and economic policy uncertainty: as he wrote 4 months ago, it was some time in 2012 that markets “lost their capacity to deal with uncertainty.”
It was also some time in 2012 that traders and market participants realized central banks have not only taken over the market, but have no intention of ever leaving as the alternative is a crash that wipes out 8 years of artificial “wealth effect” creation and puts the very concept of fractional reserve and central banking in jeopardy.
This intention was confirmed last week when as Kocic again wrote overnight, it became clear – once again – that Central Banks’ main agenda “is management of the risk of policy unwind” which has two different aspects, especially for those who still believe there is such as a thing as a “market.” Kocic explains:
On one hand, it is reassuring that Central Banks are cognizant of severity of the risk and are showing appropriate flexibility in adjusting their reaction functions to incorporate these realities.
On the other hand, this is less good because it does not allow the market to reposition and, thus, normalize. By soliciting feedback from the markets, Central Banks are further encouraging bad behavior making things potentially worse by postponing the resolution further into the future.
This is also the “nightmare scenario” envisioned by Eric Peters: a world in which central banks inject more and more liquidity and “stimulus”, and yet inflation does not rise, resulting in greater and greater financial inflation, i.e., asset bubbles, and a Fed chair who is confused about the “mystery” of inflation.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
SIGNIFICANT DEVELOPMENTS IN THE PRECIOUS METALS MARKET: Where We Go From Here
As the U.S. Stock Market Bubble continues upward toward a giant pin, there are some interesting developments that precious metals investors will find quite interesting. Yes, there’s still a lot of life left in the precious metals, even though pessimistic market sentiment has frustrated a lot of gold and silver investors.
Also, even though precious metals investment demand in the U.S. has fallen 40+% compared to the same time last year, it continues to be strong in other parts of the world. For example, German physical gold bar and coin demand increased 8% in the first half of 2017 versus the same period last year, while U.S. fell by 45%. Moreover, flows into European Gold ETF’s hit a record during the second quarter of 2017:
Now, if we look at what is going on with gold and Central Bank demand, Russia takes the first place. According to the article by Smaulgld, Russia Steps Up Gold Purchase With Massive Buy In September:
In September 2017, the Central Bank of Russia added 1.1 million ounces (34.2138 tons) of gold to her reserves, raising her total to 1779.119 tons or 57.2 million ounces.
Central Bank of Russia has added 5.3 Million ounces (approximately 165 tonnes) in 2017 through September.
If you haven’t already checked out Louis’s work at Smaulgld.com, I highly recommend you do. So, as the German public and Russian Central bank continue to increase their gold holdings, Americans have cut back considerably, or worse… have been liquidating. Furthermore, the U.S. gold market is suffering another supply deficit this year. As of July 2017, U.S. gold mine supply and imports totaled 288 metric tons (mt) while exports were 290 mt. Thus, we have exported ALL of our gold mine supply and imports overseas. (NOTE: 1 Metric Ton = 32,150 troy oz.)
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Declassified JFK Papers Reveal Yet ANOTHER False Flag
The JFK assassination papers which were declassified yesterday reveal:
The minutes of the March 5, 1962 Special Group Augmented meeting state that “Mr. Johnson (U. Alexis Johnson) [U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Thailand and Czechoslovakia and Under Secretary for Political Affairs at the U.S. State Department] was asked to have a list prepared of various situations which would serve as a plausible pretext for intervention.”
***
On April 12, 1962, General Lansdale [a Major General and CIA officer] forwarded to Maxwell Taylor [then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Kennedy] an “advance copy” of the Joint Chiefs’ paper on “Pretexts,” stating “I am informed that the Chiefs approved this.” The paper, captioned “Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba (TS), ” set forth 9 “pretexts.” These included:
“We could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington. The terror campaign could be pointed at Cuban refugees seeking haven in the United States. We could sink a boatload of Cubans enroute to Florida (real or simulated). We could foster attempts on lives of Cuban refugees in the United States even to the extent of wounding in instances to be widely publicized. Exploding a few plastic bombs in carefully chosen spots, the arrest of a Cuban agent and the release of prepared documents substantiating Cuban involvement also would be helpful in projecting the idea of an irresponsible government.”
This is yet another false flag attack which government officials admit was either planned or actually carried out.
Catalonia and Spain Enter Dangerous Uncharted Territory
Emotions are running high on both sides of the divide.
Today was one of the strangest days of my life. I woke up in a constitutional monarchy called Spain and will go to bed, the same bed, in a newly proclaimed republic. Catalonia’s impossible dream has finally come true, but it could be extremely short lived, and it could have very damaging long lasting consequences.
Spain’s Senate responded to the Catalan parliament’s declaration of independence this afternoon by ratifying the activation of Article 155 of Spain’s Constitution, the nuclear button everyone has been waiting for. This will allow the central government to take full rein of the region’s institutions and levers of power, including parliament, the police force, the exchequer (already done), public media, the Internet, the education system, and telecommunications — at least in theory.
There is no telling just yet how Mariano Rajoy’s government intends to stamp its authority on 2.5 million of the Catalans now in open rebellion, or for how long. Given the law’s ambiguity, there are few constraints on its application, but trying to subdue a region where most of the 7.5 million-strong population are hostile to the basic notion of direct rule from Madrid is going to be a tall order, especially if the EU, which refuses to recognize Catalonia, expects Rajoy’s government to bring Catalonia back into line through “the force of argument rather than the argument of force.”
The force of argument is not exactly Rajoy’s forte. In all likelihood, his government’s first act will be to try to arrest the Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, suspend his ministers, and assume direct authority over the regional government. To do that, it will probably have to take full control of Catalonia’s regional police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
