Steve Bull's Blog, page 1319
September 9, 2017
Hurricane Irma Is Being Called ‘A Lawnmower From The Sky’ And FEMA Warns It Will ‘Devastate’ The Southeast
It looks like Hurricane Irma is going to make landfall in south Florida on Sunday morning. Of course that could still change, but this is what the meteorologists are telling us at this point. But of course the exact spot where Irma makes landfall is not so important because of the absolutely immense size of this storm. Irma is going to cause chaos and devastation over a very large area, and just like Hurricane Harvey the recovery from this storm is literally going to be measured in years.
Down in the Caribbean, the destruction that Irma has caused has been absolutely unprecedented. The president of the island of Saint Martin “estimated that 95 percent of his country had been obliterated”, and one resident of the island described the storm as “a lawnmower from the sky”…
Witnesses described similar scenes on the island’s Dutch half. “It’s like someone with a lawnmower from the sky has gone over the island,” said Mairlou Rohan, a European tourist visiting Sint Maarten, part of the Netherlands.
That is not the sort of terminology that I would use, but without a doubt the devastation caused by this storm has been off the charts.
On Barbuda, at least 90 percent of the buildings have been destroyed…
Gaston Browne, the prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, said Barbuda was “totally demolished,” with 90% of its buildings destroyed. Communication with the island was cut off because of the destruction. As Hurricane Jose approaches the island, Barbuda officials are trying to evacuate the entire population of 1,800.
Now the storm is heading straight for south Florida, and FEMA is using apocalyptic language to describe what might happen…
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U.N. Enablers of ‘Aggressive War’
Special Report: U.N. investigative reports, like a new one condemning Syria for alleged sarin use, are received as impartial and credible, but are often just more war propaganda from compromised bureaucrats, reports Robert Parry.
Many people still want to believe that the United Nations engages in impartial investigations and thus is more trustworthy than, say, self-interested governments, whether Russia or the United States. But trust in U.N. agencies is no longer well placed; whatever independence they may have once had has been broken, a reality relevant to recent “investigations” of Syrian chemical weapons use.
There is also the larger issue of the United Nations’ peculiar silence about one of its primary and original responsibilities, shouldered after the horrors of World War II – to stop wars of aggression, which today include “regime change” wars organized, funded and armed by the United States and other Western powers, such as the Iraq invasion in 2003, the overthrow of the Libyan government in 2011, and a series of proxy wars including the ongoing Syrian conflict.
After World War II, the Nuremberg Tribunals declared that a “war of aggression … is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”
That recognition became a guiding principle of the United Nations Charter, which specifically prohibits aggression or even threats of aggression against sovereign states.
The Charter declares in Article One that it is a chief U.N. purpose “to take effective collective measures … for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace.” Article Two, which defines the appropriate behavior of U.N. members, adds that “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state…”
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America Can’t Afford to Rebuild
Adolphe Yvon Genius of America c1870A number of people have argued over the past few days that Hurricane Harvey will NOT boost the US housing market. As if any such argument would or should be required. Hurricane Irma will not provide any such boost either. News about the ‘resurrection’ of New Orleans post-Katrina has pretty much dried up, but we know scores of people there never returned, in most cases because they couldn’t afford to.
And Katrina took place 12 years ago, well before the financial crisis. How do you think this will play out today? Houston is a rich city, but that doesn’t mean it’s full of rich people only. Most homeowners in the city and its surroundings have no flood insurance; they can’t afford it. But they still lost everything. So how will they rebuild?
Sure, the US has a National Flood Insurance Program, but who’s covered by it? Besides, the Program was already $24 billion in debt by 2014 largely due to hurricanes Katrina and Sandy. With total costs of Harvey estimated at $200 billion or more, and Irma threating to cause far more damage than that, where’s the money going to come from?
It took an actual fight just to push the first few billion dollars in emergency aid for Houston through Congress, with four Texan senators voting against of all people. Who then will vote for half a trillion or so in aid? And even if they do, where would it come from?
Trump’s plans for an infrastructure fund were never going to be an easy sell in Washington, and every single penny he might have gotten for it would now have to go towards repairing existing roads and bridges, not updating them -necessary as that may be-, let alone new construction.
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The Long-term Cycle of Monetary Crisis
QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I have been following you for all my adult life and that has exceeded 20 years by now and am shocked to say, I found your article on how things evolve GOLD-Oil-Dollar. I must say this is a eye-opening evolution you are talking about. Has this always been the case with things changing coming into play and then vanishing?
ANSWER: Absolutely. I have written about how gold vanished from use with the Dark Age following the fall of Rome. Gold did not reappear in coinage for nearly 600 years. The first gold coin to reappear in Britain came during the 13th century issued by Henry III.
The Gold Cups of Mycenae
The same thing took place with the Dark Age in Greece. This is when the Mycenae ruled known as the Heroic Period of which Homer wrote. Scholars thought it was just fiction written by Homer until the ancient city of Troy was discovered. Troy VIIaappears to have been destroyed by war around 1184 BC. However, scholars did not believe the writings of Homer because Homer was born sometime between the 12th and 8th centuries BC. He remains famous for his work The Iliad and The Odyssey. So once again there is about 600 years separating the Heroic Age and the Hellenistic Age.
If we turn to Japan, here too we find that the emperor abused his power to issue money and once again we find money vanish for about 600 years. Each new emperor devalued all previously issued coinage to 10% of his new coinage. People simply refused to accept coins because they were devalued and were no a store of value.
Therefore, throughout economic history we always have long-term structural reform. Do not expect either gold or oil to always be a valuable component.
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September 8, 2017
Huge Solar Flare Sparks Widespread Blackouts, May Deter Korean Missile Launch This Weekend
The sun just released a massive solar flare.
In fact, as SHTFplan.com’s Mac Slavo details, this is the largest solar flare emitted in the past decade, and the earth has already been affected by blackouts.
NASA has reported a huge solar flare was emitted by the Sun and it is the most powerful one since 2006.
This solar flare has already caused some radio blackouts on Earth and it may cause aurora visible as far south as London. On the morning of September 6, scientists watched as two X-flares were unleashed by the sun.
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The stronger flare was the second of the two emitted by the Sun yesterday morning and it was seen by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). At 5:10 AM EDT, the Sun unleashed an X2.2 flare, with X-class denoting the most intense flares. Then, at 8:02 AM EDT, a much bigger flare measuring X9.3 was unleashed. By comparison, the last time we saw a flare this big was in 2006, which measured at X9.0. The number shows the intensity, with X2 being twice as intense as X1, X3 three times as intense, and so on.
The loops of plasma emitted during these two flares were ten times the size of planet Earth. Scientists got to watch the massive coronal mass ejection from these flares, which can be seen below in the gif provided.
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If You Think Your Friday Evening Commute Is Bad…
As the “biggest evacuation in US history” continues, stunning images are showing what a nightmare shifting 650,000 people out of state looks like.
The mass exodus began yesterday…
But, as you drive home tonight from work, ready for beer-0-clock, spare a thought for these poor displaced folk stuck in this utter disaster…
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As they flee this…
And it’s only going to get worse…
The Four-Wheeled Patriot Act
Whenever Congress does something unanimously (or nearly so) you can rest assured it’s in their interests, not ours.
The USA Patriot Act comes to mind.
Another is the Safely Ensuring Lives Future Deployment and Research in Vehicle Evolution Act – aka the SELF DRIVE Act – which was rubber stamped through Congress the other day. This is the law that exempts automated cars from the safety requirements that apply to autonomous cars – that is, the cars which are independent of government control and controlled by us.
Just as the Patriot Act was written, not to “fight terrorism,” but to make it easier for government to terrorize us, by circumventing or simply ignoring the Bill of Rights.
Same operating principle behind both.
There is irony – and malevolence – here.
Irony, because the same government that endlessly croons about “safety” – when it suits – is willing to back burner safety when it suits. If a car company dared to even suggest that it might be a good idea to install air bag Off switches in new cars (and it would be a very good idea, if safety is a concern, given how dangerous air bags are; not can be, but are) that company would be the focus of great abuse if not threatened prosecution.
Meanwhile, the SELF DRIVE Act will exempt automated cars from the necessity – under laws that apply to autonomous cars – of having things like steering wheels and brake pedals and other controls by which a human might intervene to save himself in the event the automated car makes a mistake.
It is presumed automated cars will never make a mistake, that their systems and technology are immune to defects, wear and tear and so forth.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Hurricane Irma Prompts Oil Storage, Port Shutdowns
Hurricane Irma has prompted the shutdown of at least two oil storage complexes in the Caribbean, with a combined capacity of 18.6 million barrels, S&P Platts reports. One of these, a 14-million-barrel terminal on the island of St Eustatius operated by NuStar Energy sustained damages to some of its tanks and other equipment, the company said.
The other facility, Buckeye Partners’ Yabucoa storage complex in Puerto Rico, was shut down on Tuesday and the company is now preparing its 26.2-million-barrel storage facility on Grand Bahama Island for the hurricane. Statoil, which also has a storage site in Freeport on Grand Bahama, is monitoring developments but has not yet closed the facility.
The hurricane, which has already caused 14 deaths in the Caribbean, is moving toward Florida and is expected to make landfall on Sunday, passing through the Bahamas and Cuba en route. Some 1.2 million people have been affected by Irma so far, according to Red Cross data, and this number could shoot up to 26 million as a result of the damage done by the storm.
In Florida, ports will start closing today ahead of the storm, and this could disrupt the supply of oil products, Platts notes. Florida receives 97 percent of its oil products by sea, with throughput at Port Everglades, in eastern Florida, at 121.07 million barrels last year. Port Everglades is among the terminals that will be closed. Related: China Declares Support For Punitive Action Against North Korea
Already in some parts of the state, fuel retailers are reporting shortages as people stock up on gasoline ahead of Irma’s arrival and evacuate. Meanwhile, two more storms are brewing in the region, with the U.S. National Hurricane Center expecting Jose to intensify to a major hurricane by the end of the day today. The other one, Katia, is in the Gulf of Mexico, expected to reach the Mexican coast late today or early tomorrow.
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From Homes to Refineries, Finding Pollution and Loss in Harvey’s Path
When Harvey’s rain, for the most part, stopped falling on August 30, I started making my way from Louisiana to Texas to document the pollution inevitably left in the storm’s path. That day I got as far as Vidor, a small town in southeast Texas where the floodwaters were still rising.
Getting there was no easy matter. I was forced to drive west in the eastbound lane of the interstate because the lanes I should have been driving in were flooded up to the top of the highway divider. All the while, I tried not to worry about the water rushing through cracks in the cement divider, which had the potential to give way.
Parts of Vidor were only accessible by boat or in a high-clearance vehicle. I hitched a ride in a monster truck, which pushed water over cars stuck in the floodwaters as we passed by a Mobil gas station, also submerged. I noted the irony considering ExxonMobil’s history of funding climate science denial and Harvey’s intensity tied to climate change.
Mobil gas station in Vidor, Texas, on August 31.
Home in Vidor, Texas, flooded up to its roof.
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Bank of Canada Shuts Out Free Market Economists from Key Policy Conference – Peter Diekmeyer
Next week’s Bank of Canada policy conference appears set to deliver standard talking points. Not a single free market economist has been invited and a BOC spokesperson confirmed that the alternative-financial press is also being shut out.
The BOC event, titled Monetary Policy Framework Issues: Toward the 2021 Inflation Target Renewal , takes place during a critical time for Canada’s central bank.
Bank of Canada economists emerged from the 2008 financial crisis red-faced, after having failed to predict the event in advance, despite the clear warning signs and having some of the country’s most respected practitioners on staff.
The BOC then had to bail out Canada’s big five banks, whose solvency the monetary authority is charged with overseeing.
Questions regarding Poloz’s “trickle down”economics
Things do not appear to have improved much under the reign of Stephen Poloz, its current Governor.
The Bank of Canada ranks last among the G-7 central banks in terms of its gold holdings, this during a time of record high Canadian household debts and one of the planet’s biggest housing bubbles.
There are also increasing questions regarding Mr. Poloz’s “trickle down” economics strategy, which consists of leveraging “considerable economic stimulus” to boost asset prices, in the hope that a resulting “wealth effect” will trickle down to the poor and the young.
Government-financed academics, officials and a government financed NGO
A quick look at the presenters at the upcoming event reveals the usual “broad range of opinions” that Canada’s central bank consults.
The 20 panelists, almost all of whom are financed or regulated by government, include:
Four Canadian government employees
Eight academics from Canadian universities, which draw the vast majority of their funds from government.
One presenter from a Canadian think tank that received a reported $30 million in government money
One representative representing Canada’s big banks, which were bailed out by governments during the last financial crisis.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
