Money Flow Trading Method along with Risk Management

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,
The borrower is the servant of the lender, and one of the primary ways that the elite keep the rest of us subjugated is through the $244,000,000,000,000 mountain of global debt that has been accumulated.
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Every single day, the benefits of our labor are going to enrich somebody else. A portion of the taxes that are deducted from your paycheck is used to pay interest on government debt. A portion of the profits that your company makes probably goes to servicing some form of business debt. And most Americans are continuously making payments on their mortgages, their auto loans, their credit card balances and their student loan debts. But most people never stop to think about who is becoming exceedingly wealthy on the other end of these transactions. Needless to say, it isn’t the 46 percent of the global population that is living on less than $5.50 a day.


The world has never seen anything like this mountain of debt ever before, and one of the central themes of The Economic Collapse Blog is that all of this debt will ultimately destroy our society. According to the Institute of International Finance, the total amount of global debt is now “more than three times the size of the global economy”…


The world’s debt pile is hovering near a record at $244 trillion, which is more than three times the size of the global economy, according to an analysis by the Institute of International Finance.

The global debt-to-GDP ratio exceeded 318 percent in the third quarter of last year, despite a stronger pace of economic growth, according to a report by the Washington-based IIF released on Tuesday.

But it isn’t as if all of this spending has lifted billions of people out of poverty. In fact, 46 percent of the population of the world is “living on less than $5.50 a day” according to the World Bank…

Over 1.9 billion people, or 26.2 percent of the world’s population, were living on less than $3.20 per day in 2015. Close to 46 percent of the world’s population was living on less than $5.50 a day.

Global inequality continues to grow worse with each passing year, and that is because the global financial system is literally designed to funnel as much wealth to the very top of the pyramid as possible.

Of course things could be very different. We don’t actually need to have a debt-based system which systematically makes the rich even richer.

One of the big secrets that nobody is supposed to talk about is the fact that governments don’t actually have to borrow money. For example, the U.S. government could start issuing debt-free “United States notes” tomorrow, and this actually happened for a very brief period of time under President John F. Kennedy in the 1960s just before he was assassinated.


It is highly immoral for us to be borrowing trillions of dollars that we expect future generations to repay, and that is why I have been a huge proponent of shutting down the debt-based Federal Reserve system and ending the debt-based currency known as “Federal Reserve notes”.


But these days, only a small minority of the population seems to care. We are literally debt slaves, and most Americans have seemingly embraced their enslavement. I really like what Devvy Kidd had to say about this in her latest article…


The average American is a debt slave already at birth. And by the time he dies, his debt will have increased exponentially, thus passing on an even bigger debt and greater enslavement to the next generation.

This is a vicious circle that has gone on for just over 100 years. A very small elite has become incredibly wealthy and the masses have become enslaved by private and government debt.

For the majority of people, it will be impossible to extricate themselves from this massive debt stone around their neck. Instead they will add to the debt by taking on more debt.


Wake up!

At least the “yellow vests” in France are willing to take a stand against the systematic tyranny that is raging all around them. In America today, most people don’t really care about much of anything unless it somehow intrudes on the bubble of mindless entertainment that most Americans have constantly surrounded themselves with.

And guess who produces all of that mindless entertainment?

It is produced by giant media corporations that are owned by the same global elitists that control our giant mountain of debt.

The system of our enslavement is far more sophisticated than it was in previous eras of human history, but it is still deeply insidious.

There is one more thing that I would like to mention today. On many previous occasions, I have discussed how the elite have transformed Wall Street into the largest casino on the entire planet, and it is true that some people have made a lot of money in that casino.


But so many others have been deeply burned and have lost everything. Here is just one example…


I had quit day-trading back in November but was still using a swing trading system that damn near never lost (really), until I got completely run over last week. Literally every move I made was wrong, and I managed to completely wipe out my entire gambling account. I want to be clear, we’re not broke or anything near it (still get to claim millionaire status), but holy crap did I decimate my account something stupid.


So, I’m here to tell you that the scary stories you hear from elders who quit trading? They’re true. Trading is a losing game. It’s just gambling.

Most people who claim to be winners just ignore their losses and pretend everything is ok. To be sure, some people really can make a living at it, and good for them. But the odds are massively against you. The system is designed to take your money while you’re stressed, guessing, nervous, angry, depressed, or most of all – desperate.

The game is literally rigged against us, and we need to realize what we are up against.

Tinkering around with the current system is not going to fix anything. We need to ditch this current system and start again from scratch, but it will probably take a horrific collapse before most people start to understand this.

https://newswithviews.com/where-is-t...y-debt-crisis/

“The only difference between death and taxes is that death doesn’t get worse every time Congress meets.” — Will Rogers


Since President Trump took office, an estimated 4.3 million Americans have found jobs in addition to one of our most important job sectors gaining ground: “The manufacturing sector added 284,000 jobs over 2018, a 37 percent increase, making 2018 the best year for manufacturing since 1997.”

Pre-Trump: 95 million Americans not in the labor force – The army of non-workers in the United States, August 7, 2016.

One has to remember that analysts look to the Federal Department of Labor for their statistics. I would highly recommend an alternative to that agency because I believe they lie and fudge numbers all the time for political reasons. Likely President Trump uses numbers given to him by his daily advisers who also rely on liars at that agency. Deceiving is lying.

John Williams outstanding web site, Shadow Government Statistics, Analysis Behind and Beyond Government Economic Reporting is one web site everyone should have on their list if they’re looking for truth and accuracy:
DAILY UPDATE (January 4th to 6th: December Payrolls Reporting Fraud/Nonsense and Revised Unemployment (Detail Posted), Commentary No. 981 (Posted.)

1. “LATEST ECONOMIC RELEASES: (Jan 4) December 2018 Employment and Unemployment, and Payrolls (Bureau of Labor Statistics – BLS) Surging December payrolls were a reporting fraud, a canard, no more than massive prior-period revisions “recalculation of seasonal factors” that shifted growth from past months into the October 2018 to December 2018 timeframe, without showing the headline downside revisions to the earlier months from which the growth was borrowed.

“Unadjusted October and November payroll numbers revised negligibly higher, while the seasonally adjusted data revised sharply higher and surged further in December. The not credible headline December jobs gain of 312,000, was a nonsensical 370,000 net of prior-period revisions.

“The effective reporting fraud and standard gimmick here is that previously reported data, back more than two months (before October) from which much of current headline growth was borrowed, are not reported as revised with the current headline data. That revised reporting is seen only the annual benchmark revision, which will not be published until next month (this reporting gimmick is reviewed regularly by ShadowStats, as last detailed in Commentary No. 979, Supplemental Detail).

“December U.3 Unemployment jumped to 3.86% (headline 3.9%), from a revised 3.70%, previously 3.67% (headline 3.7% in both cases), versus a revised headline 3.8% (3.76%), previously 3.7% (3.74%) in October, in the context of annual revisions to the seasonally adjusted Household Survey (unemployment/employment) data. The broader U.6 rate held at 7.59% in December, versus a revised 7.58% (previously 7.57%) in November and an upwardly revised 7.5% (7.45%), previously 7.4% (7.40%) in October.”

“The ShadowStats Alternate Unemployment rate, which counts the long-term displaced and discouraged workers not accounted for by the government (discouraged workers disappear from the rolls after one year), held at 21.4% in December versus an upwardly revised 21.4% (previously 21.3%) in November.

Detail has been graphed on the Alternate Data Tab (click above or on the mini-graph below). Five years of revised hard data are available there to subscribers.”

Believe me and I’ve said it before, I am very happy for every American who has finally found a job. However, individuals out of steady work for prolonged periods do fall behind on their financial obligations which take a long time to catch-up. The same for people living paycheck to paycheck.

Not to mention there was no real ‘recovery’ after the gutless, ignorant cowards in Congress were caught with their pants down in 2008. A financial meltdown everyone who understood what was actually happening but ignored by the masses out of ignorance or willfully not paying attention.

Congress Will Do Nothing to Stop Coming Financial Disaster, my column, October 4, 2007

Economic Stimulus Package: Macabre Waltz Into the Abyss, my column January 31, 2008

Freddie & Fannie unconstitutional bail out using what? my column, July 17, 2008

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It was all right there for people to see but they kept their eyes shut or had no access to factual information vs propaganda.

When the bomb went off, Congress panicked and started bailouts in violation of the U.S. Constitution. The unconstitutional, privately owned ‘Federal’ Reserve began printing even more worthless paper.

Bailouts: the wound that will keep on hemorrhaging, my column, September 25, 2008: “No one knows what to do. We are in new territory here. This is a different game. We’re not here playing soccer, basketball or football, this is a new game and we’re going to have to figure out how to do it.” Sen. Harry Reid [D-NV], September 17, 2008

“It is exactly that level of ignorance in the U.S. Congress for decades that has brought America to the brink of financial ruin.”


And ruin is exactly what happened with MILLIONS of Americans losing their homes and jobs. Tent cities sprung up, unemployment went up as well as the number of Americans who ended up on food stamps. While Americans were being destroyed, the solution was never even whispered.

I do not like to be the bearer of bad news. I always try to provide constitutional solutions and what we the people must do to restore America to its once prosperous greatness for all Americans. But, at the risk of repeating myself, here we are again.
Subprime credit cards – Credit card delinquencies higher than financial crisis peak at 4,700+ small US Banks, May 28, 2018

No, it didn’t get better: People aren’t paying their credit cards and more accounts are being shut down, and it could be a sign that ‘economic clouds are darkening’, Dec. 5, 2018

The US Is Broke, July 14, 2018

THE AMERICAN DEBT SLAVE
“King Solomon’s words will ring true for almost every American born today. The average American is a debt slave already at birth. And by the time he dies, his debt will have increased exponentially, thus passing on an even bigger debt and greater enslavement to the next generation.

“This is a vicious circle that has gone on for just over 100 years. A very small elite has become incredibly wealthy and the masses have become enslaved by private and government debt.

“For the majority of people, it will be impossible to extricate themselves from this massive debt stone around their neck. Instead they will add to the debt by taking on more debt.”

Why more debt? Why millions of Americans don’t want smaller government, my column, November 8, 2007. I believe I laid it all out there; painful but true.

The Last Hurrah by Egon von Greyerz, August 31, 2018

“This is it! The autumn of 2018 will be momentous in the world economy, markets and politics.

We are now seeing the Last Hurrah for stocks, bonds, the dollar and most asset markets.

“The world economy has been living on borrowed time since the 2006-9 crisis. The financial system should have collapsed at that time. But the massive life support that central banks orchestrated managed to keep the dying patient alive for another decade. Lowering interest rates to zero or negative and printing enough money to double global debt seem to have solved the problem. But rather than saving the world from an economic collapse, the growth of debt and asset bubbles has created a system with exponentially higher risk.


“PROBLEMS START IN THE PERIPHERY – VAT COUNTRIES – VENEZUELA, ARGENTINA, TURKEY

“So here we are on the “Eve of Destruction” when the fake measures that governments and central banks have taken have not saved the world, as the Keynesians believe, but instead created an even bigger bubble that is now about to burst. Curing a sick world by the same means that created the disease in the first place was always bound to fail.

“Global problems of the magnitude that the world will experience in coming years normally start in the periphery. We are seeing multiple examples of local wild fires that will soon spread to the core of the world economy.”


Greyerz – Clients Told They Can’t Take Their Money Or Gold Out Of Banks As Massive Dark Cloud Hangs Over World Economy, Nov. 8, 2018 and this column is also a very worthy read.


The Next U.S. Housing Crisis Has Arrived: Existing Home Sales Post Their Biggest Decline In 4 Years, November 22, 2018


IMF warns storm clouds are gathering for next financial crisis, Dec. 11, 2018 (One of the most corrupt financial institutions on the face of the globe YOUR wallet funds thanks to YOUR Congress vermin)


Inventory of homes for sale is soaring in Las Vegas, Dec. 14, 2018: “If you want a sign of Las Vegas’ housing slowdown, just look at the rising tally of sellers who can’t find a buyer.

“Around 7,000 single-family homes were on the market without offers at the end of November, up a jaw-dropping 54 percent from a year earlier and the highest level in two years, according to Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors data, which the trade group pulls from its resale-heavy listing service.” (Slowing? The patient is nearly dead.)

It’s not staying Vegas, either: New Home Sales Collapse 8.9 Percent Even as Prices Fall, Nov. 28, 2018. This is exactly why I rushed to get my house on the market, October 26, 2018. It sold in the blink of an eye but I knew what’s coming.

The ‘Fed’ raised interest rates in September. I felt they would do it again in December. If I wanted to get out of my big mortgage, which being a widow I felt I should, it was time to make my move just as I did in 2006 and escaped the tragedy millions of Americans experienced.


You see, all this has one thing in common: The Central Bank known in this country as the Federal Reserve which is no more Federal thank Federal Express and has no reserves. And the debt that continues to be fed by YOUR Congressional representative is going to explode and kill us off.

Jim Rickards: The United States Is Going Broke, Nov. 7, 2018

“When is the debt-to-GDP ratio too high? When does a country reach the point that it either turns things around or ends up like Greece?

“Economists Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart carried out a long historical survey going back 800 years, looking at individual countries, or empires in some cases, that have gone broke or defaulted on their debt.

“They put the danger zone at a debt-to-GDP ratio of 90%. Once it reaches 90%, they found, a turning point arrives…

“At that point, a dollar of debt yields less than a dollar of output. Debt becomes an actual drag on growth.

“Again the current U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio is 106%. We are deep into the red zone, that is. And we’re only going deeper. The U.S. has a 106% debt to GDP ratio, trillion dollar deficits on the way, more spending on the way.

“We’re getting more and more like Greece. We’re heading for a sovereign debt crisis. That’s not an opinion; it’s based on the numbers.


“How do we get out of it?
“For elites, there is really only one way out at this point is, and that’s inflation. And they’re right on one point. Tax cuts won’t do it, structural changes to the economy wouldn’t do it. Both would help if done properly, but the problem is simply far too large. Growth would have to greatly exceed current levels, and that’s just not in the cards. There’s only one solution left, inflation.”


You know what that means? The cost of food and everything else goes up and up and up.
Ron Paul On 2019: Rough Times Ahead, But Liberty Can Still Win, Jan. 1, 2019


President Trump, in between fending off manufactured accusations (Russia Collusion) and stinking Demorats and RINOs in Congress, went after Jerome Powell, head of the beast, the ‘Federal’ Reserve, this last December. Whoa! An American president actually butting horns with the chief thief?


Well…I have to say I’m wondering about that. Trump knows all about currency manipulation and interest rates. As an international businessman dealing in billions, he understands and also knows what inflation will do to an economy. But his financial advisers are snakes who come from the beast or an entity like Goldman Sachs. We all keep saying you can’t empty the swamp by bringing in new alligators to replace the old ones.


While the author of this piece is very unkind to Trump regarding the ‘Fed’ and a fight, he does bring forth very valid concerns which is why I think people should read it: Trump vs. The Fed: When Markets Crash, Who Is To Blame? As Patrick Henry said, “I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided; and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past…Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss.”


Dr. Edwin Vieira has written some of the most comprehensive pieces on the Central Bank and fiat currency. Even if the ‘Fed’ were abolished and audited tomorrow, it can’t stop what’s underway. The big red warning signs are everywhere. It is why he is so keen on constitutional sound money bills for the individual states.


Born out of the 2008 predicted crash came the Tea Party Movement. A glorious thing to see. Millions of Americans who got ‘woke up’ either through personal pain and loss of assets or because they could finally see what out-of-control spending is doing to our country.

After a few years, one didn’t hear much about the Tea Party Movement although an encouraging number of individuals were elected to state houses and Congress backed by the force of the movement. But that seems to have waned badly the past few years.

Now, I don’t claim to know what every Tea Party chapter in America is doing. I have been on many web sites representing Tea Party groups. It seems their focus, like millions of Americans, has been on current political rot and intrigue. One cannot ignore what’s been going on with DOJ & the FBI.


What needs to happen is the Tea Party Movement devote their time and resources in exposing the truth about how Congress can continue borrowing (The candy store known as the ‘Fed’) and why this accelerating debt will destroy us.


I began my journey nearly 30 years ago and it all started when I became aware of the ‘Fed’ other than just a government agency (which it isn’t), what is fiat currency, why it destroys a country and why it will destroy this country. The control of our currency IS the head of the beast and having two chickens in every pot (hey – happy days are here again!) won’t mean squat as it didn’t in 2008 when the bell finally tolled.


Several months ago, I randomly chose ten different Tea Party chapters and sent a complimentary copy of my Why A Bankrupt America booklet to them with a short letter explaining how important it is for Americans to understand not only the problem but the only solution left to us.


Not one of the chapters or individuals purchased a single copy of the booklet. I might as well have thrown my money in the garbage.

When I put the booklet out in February 1993, I did no advertising except being a guest on radio shows; I had no income because I was doing this work without pay and my late husband only made so much at his job. By mid-2004 I had sold, at cost, 1,653,000 copies of the booklet. All done by word of mouth and over-the-fence networking. Very few authors can say the same thing.
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One person buys ten copies for ten family members or friends. Those people know ten people who order and give to ten more or 25 or 50 at a time at gun shows, conventions and conferences. Before you know it, just like the first time I made my booklet available, I shipped 1,653,000 copies.


I decided to put out an updated version last year but I can’t just give them away. I don’t have President Trump’s money. The printer has to be paid, the post office, envelope. The cost is cheap but the facts inside the booklet as well as the solution is priceless in getting the truth out there in a way average Americans (like me because I did not understand this issue at the beginning) can understand it and realize the inferno staring us in the face.
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At the height of the Tea Party Movement it was estimated to have about 4 million members zeroing in on spending and the debt. As time went by, I know many who left their local chapter because they felt the Movement had been compromised at the top. People felt the Tea Party Movement had its moment and you really don’t hear much from them compared to their massive activism and unity at the beginning.


Sept. 12, 2009, Washington, DC, the Nationwide Tea Party Coalition. Look at those numbers:
When I started POWER (Project on Winning Economic Reform) in 1993, people wanted to know how they could join my organization. My response was this is not an organization. It has to be done at the grassroots level and not get entangled with politics and egos. It has to be done by We the People at the ballot box armed with the facts.
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There are very few organizations that I’m aware of going on 30 years I feel have remained independent, strong and dedicated, i.e. Tom DeWeese’s American Policy Center, ALIPAC and the National Association of Rural Landowners (NARLO). I’m know there are more so please forgive me for not mentioning them but I can only squeeze so much into one column.


We all know the devastation after the last crash which led to a severe recession. Perhaps you or a family member or friend lost their job, home or saw their 401(k) take a nose dive that hasn’t recovered. We’re going to see worse this time around. You see the stock market acting like a maniac and Trump adviser, Larry Kudlow saying there isn’t going to be a recession. It leaves me speechless.


Trump is doing what he can with trade and creating jobs. But, as long as the ‘Fed’ controls our currency and money we will never have true economic freedom and prosperity. We will be forced to continue renting our own worthless currency.

If only 50% of the Tea Party chapters in this country ordered copies of my booklet and gets it distributed to their members who hopefully then order and get to their family and friends, we will build numbers just as the first run for my booklet.
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When millions of adults who can still think get educated from reading this ‘primer’ and go after their state legislatures and booting incumbents out in the 2020 primaries we can bring down the monster. The Internet is vast; more than 3 billion pages. Web sites are in the hundreds of thousands in this country, if not millions. If you don’t know where to look or don’t own a computer and a lot of senior age Americans don’t, you can get the facts or solutions.


That’s the beauty of my booklet. It’s in hard copy form that can be read quickly (less than 40 pages) and contains resources to back up what I have written – all in short form. When people find out not a penny of their tax dollars fund a single function of the government but rather it all goes for ‘transfer payments’ it gets their attention in a big way.
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Hopefully, once people read the booklet, they do more research and then become part of the solution and I mean individuals who belong to the two ‘main’ political parties, the Libertarian Party, the Constitution Party or no party. Like Tea Party chapters across this country. Otherwise, if you don’t know how a problem got started you can’t implement the solution.


“Then I say, the earth belongs to each of these generations during its course, fully and in its own right. The second generation receives it clear of the debts and incumbrances of the first, the third of the second, and so on. For if the first could charge it with a debt, then the earth would belong to the dead and not to the living generation. Then, no generation can contract debts greater than may be paid during the course of its own existence.” –Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1789. ME 7:455


As of today, we have dumped $22 TRILLION dollars in unpaid debt onto our children and grand kids. How shameful.
Note: For a thorough, comprehensive education on the Fed, the income tax, education, Medicare, SS, the critical, fraudulent ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment and more, be sure to order my book, Taking Politics Out of Solutions. 400 pages of facts and solutions.
2018 Devvy Kidd – All Rights Reserved

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...all-recessions

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Federal Reserve balance sheet reduction not happening yet even as the Fed applauds its own success

In a surprisingly candid admission, two former Federal Reserve chairs have stated that the Federal Reserve alone is responsible for creating all recessions in the United States.
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First, former Fed Chair Ben Bernanke said that
Expansions don’t die of old age. They get murdered.

MarketWatch
To clarify this statement, former Chair Janet Yellen placed the murder weapon in the Fed’s hands:
Two things usually end them…. One is financial imbalances, and the other is the Fed.


Think that through, and you quickly realize that both of those things are the Fed. Is there anyone left standing who would not say the Fed’s quantitative easing in the past decade was the biggest cause of financial imbalances all over the world in history? Moreover, whose profligate monetary policies led to the Great Financial Crisis that gave us the Great Recession?


So, the Fed loads the gun with financial causes and then pulls the trigger. In fact, I think it would be hard to find a major financial imbalance in the US that the Fed did not have a hand in creating or, at least, enabling. Therefore, if those are the only two causes, then it is always the Federal Reserve that causes recessions by its own admission.

And, yet, those Fed dons look so pleased with themselves.

Yellen went on to say that when the Fed is the culprit, it is generally because the central bank is forced to tighten policy to curtail inflation and ends up overplaying its hand. (She didn’t mention that the Fed’s monetary policy may have a hand in creating financial imbalances.)

Exactly, nor did she mention that the inflation they were “forced” to curtail always happens because of financial imbalances the Fed created or enabled. That is why I call our expansion-recession cycles, rinse-and-repeat cycles. Therefore, the Fed is only forced by its own ill-conceived actions. First you have to create the imbalance, which causes the economy and stocks to inflate, then you have to pull the trigger to shoot that down by tightening into a recession, which the Fed always does:
Bernanke elaborated on Yellen’s point, accusing the central bank of, in essence, murder. It takes an aggressive act on the part of the monetary authority to bring an expanding economy to a halt and cause it to shift into reverse.

Yellen and Bernanke were speaking at the annual meeting of the American Economic Association in Atlanta earlier this month in the company of current Fed Chair Jerome Powell.


As I demonstrated in my two earlier articles this week (“Does Inverted Yield Curve Indicate Recession?” and “What is an inverted yield curve and what does it mean?“), the Fed carries out this act of econocide by getting the yield curve to invert via its forced interest changes. As shown in those articles, every recession has been immediately preceded by a Fed-created inversion of the yield curve — the Fed’s smoking gun.


The Fed Fix is almost in
As noted in those articles, today’s yield curve has already slipped into its penultimate inversion. First (on December third), three-year notes started paying more interest than five-year notes. (The five-year was at 2.83% interest, while the three-year hit just over that at 2.84%.) In essence, investors were betting the economy would be a tad better in five years than it would in three.


Within a matter of weeks, the three-year notes were paying more than seven-year notes. Then, just about Christmastime, they started paying more than eight-year notes, inverting the yield curve even further out. The orange recession indicator light comes on when they take the next step of paying more than ten-year notes; and above that we go full recessionary red! The first three came all within in a month, so the rest may come just as quickly.


In fact, we’re so close that one more rate increase by the Fed could pull the trigger. This is why Powell can be so reassuring about pulling back soon on targeted interest-rate increases. He knows he’s already operating with a hair trigger because of the Fed’s other tightening action in rolling bonds off of its balance sheet.

Like a skilled sharp-shooter, Powell recently said the Fed is “watching and waiting” before it pulls the trigger with its next rate increase. At the same time, he suggested his balance-sheet reduction won’t end for awhile (and, of course, the Fed knows that its balance sheet reduction is skewing the yield curve faster than the Fed’s targeted interest-rate increases.

I’ve said before that those interest-rate increases are now just playing verbal catch-up to what the balance sheet reduction is doing in the open market. In other words, the balance sheet reduction is pulling the Fed’s targeted interest rates up, regardless of what is says, so it is pressed to state it intends an increase just to keep up with the effects of balance-sheet reduction. Last summer the Fed tactic admitted this when…

The Fed raised the target range for its benchmark rate by a quarter point to 1.75 percent to 2 percent, but only increased the rate it pays banks on cash held with it overnight to 1.95 percent. The step was designed to keep the federal funds rate from rising above the target range. Previously, the Fed set the rate of interest on reserves at the top of the target range.

Bloomberg
In other words, the Fed had to change the way it calibrates some interest rates because other factors than their change in their stated target rate were driving rates up. In order to keep bank demand for Fed funds from pushing the rate above 2%, the Fed set its stated rate at 1.95% to create some headroom. That’s explained as…

Officials have said that, as they drain cash from the system by shrinking the balance sheet, a rise in the federal funds rate within their target range would be an important sign that liquidity is becoming scarce…. The increase appears to be mainly driven by another factor: the U.S. Treasury ramped up issuance of short-term U.S. government bills, which drove up yields on those and other competing assets, including in the overnight market.


And that is what is now happening, but they are still planning to keep tightening by reducing their balance sheet. What is not said there is that the major reason the US Treasury is ramping up its issuance of government bills is that the Fed’s unwind is forcing them to refinance maturing bills on the open market as the Fed now refuses to refi those bills. I’ve maintained for a couple of years that the unwind will drive up other interest rates, causing problems throughout the economy.


Gunsmoke and mirrors
So, the Fed’s recent talk about reducing the number of rate increases in the Fed’s interest target is slight of hand because the Fed’s unwind is doing the heavy lifting here, driving up rates faster than the Fed changes its stated target rate. Powell assures everyone the Fed will slow down its interest-rate increases, even as the Fed pushes right ahead with its balance-sheet unwind, which is doing the most to invert the yield curve.


Powells only defense against concerns expressed about balance-sheet reduction was…
“We are looking carefully at that, and the truth is, we don’t know with any precision,” Fed Chairman Jerome Powell told reporters on Wednesday when asked about the increase. “Really, no one does. You can’t run experiments with one effect and not the other.”

Not too reassuring to hear the Fed Head say no one really has any idea what impact its balance-sheet unwind will have on other interest rates. Does the Fed not know, or does the Fed just not want to say what it does know?

For additional cover as to whether the yield-curve inversions the Fed creates will cause a recession this time as they did in all previous times, Yellen, protested, as I noted in an earlier article this week, that this time is different:
Now there is a strong correlation historically between yield curve inversions and recessions, but let me emphasize that correlation is not causation, and I think that there are good reasons to think that the relationship between the slope of the yield curve and the business cycle may have changed.

It’s not every day that the Fed admits total culpability for the death of every expansionary period. Nor that it admits that the inflation its expansionist monetary policies create force it to become the culprit. Nor that it routinely overplays its hand.

Apparently, the Fed Heads are so comfortable with all of this (hence the smarmy looks in their photos above) that the economic murderers can confess in broad daylight every murder they are responsible for with complete impunity, even as they tell you where the bodies are buried. However, because they still have their next economic massacre to commit right before your eyes and don’t want you to stop them, they wish to assure you that “we can’t possibly know what will happen” now or “this time is different. Things have changed.”


The words “I can’t know what will happen” when a gunslinger is twirling his cocked and loaded pistol with his finger on the trigger, should not give you comfort.

Perhaps all these confession now will enable them to smile even bigger when the slaughter is over, and they know they did it this time in broad daylight.

Of course, there is one major difference this time. In all previous times, the Fed didn’t have the most massive balance-sheet unwind pushing interest rates all around so it had to rely more on its conventional tool of incremental changes in the its targeted interest rate. The new existence of that big gun mean it can who you it is putting away the little gun to disarm you because it has a cannon pointing at you from just inside the woods to your left. Thus, Powell said disarmingly,
More rate hikes wasn’t a pre-set plan and the forecast of two moves was conditional on a “very strong outlook for 2019.”


MarketWatch
In other words, keep your eye on the rate hikes I keep talking about (the little gun), not on the big balance sheet reductions that we put on autopilot so we don’t have to talk about them. Like a great hunter, Powell said the Fed can be patient.

Some analysts believe the Fed’s runoff of its balance sheet is hurting financial markets and want the central bank to end the program.

Gee, ya think? A runoff that intends to force the US government to refinance an additional $2 trillion over the next 3-4 years on the open market might be hurting financial markets more than a quarter-point increase in the Fed’s interest target every few months?

One analyst who disagrees with Powell is Peter Boockvar, chief investment officer at Bleakley Advisory Group:
“It’s no coincidence that accidents begin to pick-up the deeper you get into tightening … QE inflated markets to very high valuations. It’s wishful thinking to believe QT isn’t going to have an impact.”

By shrinking its balance sheet, the Fed is draining the liquidity that sent stocks booming.

CNN
Some of the Fed’s colleagues at other central banks also agree and express concern about what this will do to them:
Last month, Irjit Patel, the governor of the Reserve Bank of India, pleaded with the Fed to slow plans to shrink its balance sheet. If the Fed doesn’t shift course, “a crisis in the rest of the dollar bond markets is inevitable,” he wrote in an op-ed in the Financial Times.

Other Fed members are just as aware of the Fed’s institutional murder rates as Bernanke and Yellen. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard told the Wall Street Journal this month that a recessionary risk is being telegraphed by what is now happening in the yield curve and that the Fed is causing the flattening of the curve toward inversion. So, these guys all appear to be well aware of what they are doing.

However, to maintain the distraction, Bullard also said,
In separate remarks to reporters …. he was open to a revisiting the balance sheet runoff but doesn’t think it is damaging markets as some argue. Bullard [said] that if the balance sheet runoff was impacting bond market as some suggest, then yields would be moving higher instead of the steady decline seen since November.

The latter would be happening, except that money has been pouring rapidly out of stocks and into bonds due to the rate increases the unwind created in September and October. What he ignores is the fact that rate increases were so substantial they sucked massive amounts of money out of the stock market in a flood of capital flight because all of a sudden treasury interest looked quite enticing. That, of course, pushed those rates down some in November.

So, “Nothing to see there, folks. Keep your eye on the little gun; and, oh, did we tell you that we have murdered every economic expansion in history?”

Who’s your daddy?

Now that we’ve heard the confessions from the murderers and have experienced the diversions that will allow the next murder to happen as much in plain sight as the confessions just happened, let’s look at the case from another angle: What has been keeping the stock market alive and hopping over the past decade?

Let me lay out evidence that it is clearly the Fed.

Exhibit A: What turned around the market’s major crash in 2009? The Fed’s QE1. Does anyone think the market would have turned around without that massive intervention? Was that intervention with hundreds of billions of dollars mere window-dressing, or was it the greatest financial intervention to a financial crisis the world had ever seen?

Exhibit B: What turned the market around the next time it “corrected” as soon as QE1 ended? Was it not instant QE2? More hundreds of billions of dollars?

Exhibit C: What saved the market when Republicans played roulette with the nation’s credit rating in the summer of 2011 and shot themselves in the foot politically when Standard & Poor’s gave the nation its first credit downgrade before Republicans even had the chance to let the nation default? Was it not the immediate promise of an ever bigger, indefinitely ongoing new kind of QE called Operation Twist, which morphed into QE3?

Exhibit D: Then, when markets tumbled in 2015 and 2016, because the Fed was backing off from monetary stimulus, their colleagues in other countries jumped in with their own QE. More than $5 trillion worth in 2016! All told, the world’s central banks have pumped in $15 trillion since then.

But now they are all stopping!

Exhibit E: The prosecution presents a full picture of all central-bank stock salvation:
https://ei.marketwatch.com/Multimedi...0-ac162d7bc1f7

The Fed may claim that it does not attempt to rescue markets and that it looks only at economic indicators, yet somehow every time the market took a major plunge in the graph above, the Fed was instantly on the scene with a new invention of monetary stimulus in massive doses. Of course, “correlation is not causation.” Correlation is pretty interesting, though, especially when it happens at every plunge, except the one at the top that is plunging much further than any other time on this graph … because one thing IS different: No one is stepping in with salvation this time.

If the Fed has been the salvation of the market again and again, lifting it higher and higher, what happens if the Fed and other CBs let the stock market drop?

Do you think they won’t do that? The highest authorities in the Fed just told you they did it every other time. First, they create massive “financial instability,” as Yellen said, otherwise known as “bubbles,” which grow due to the Fed’s infinite capacity to create monetary stimulus. They let these grow until inflation finally “forces” them to tighten until they crash them.

The prosecution presents Exhibit F:
https://ei.marketwatch.com/Multimedi...2-ac162d7bc1f7

This one is the Fed and all its major partners in crime. When did stock markets start to plunge all over the world? Wasn’t it as soon as global QT started to reverse at the end of that graph in 2018? Ah, but “correlation is not causation.” Except that it kind of is when you keep finding correlation everywhere you turn.

If the defense wants to argue the US market is not utterly dependent on the Fed’s constant protection, let me ask, “What did the market do in September of 2018 when the Fed removed one little word from its market-soothing speeches? Accommodative.

Just as it watched its balance sheet-reduction up to full rewind speed.” It took its biggest plunge by far in the entire ten-year recovery period. As nearly everyone was saying, nothing bad suddenly emerged in the economy. All that changed was the Fed to merely implying it would be less accommodative to market concerns as it moved to full unwind.


If you still think the Fed isn’t going to kill the economy this time, I have one more question for you: When was the last time the Fed raised rates in the middle of a major market “correction?” How about never. Yet, now it is raising rates and reducing money supply via balance-sheet reduction at the same time that it hints it is removing accommodation.


But balance-sheet reduction doesn’t matter, right?

“We don’t believe that our issuance [new bond to replace those rolling off the balance sheet] is an important part of the story of the market turbulence that began in the fourth quarter of last year. But, I’ll say again, if we reached a different conclusion, we wouldn’t hesitate to make a change,” Powell said. “If we came to the view that the balance sheet normalization plan — or any other aspect of normalization — was part of the problem, we wouldn’t hesitate to make a change.”
MarketWatch


In other words, “Don’t look at the big gun. Nothing to see there.” Said the people who have just told you that none of their expansions ever ended until they murdered it!

Does the Fed have motive?

Don’t ask me why the Fed will kill its own recovery. It is enough that it admits it always does. So, I’ll leave determining which of the many possible “why’s” up to you. Maybe the Fed will cop an insanity plea and say that even it doesn’t know why it does the things it does. Whatever their actual motive, this sure has the Fed’s unswerving M.O. all over it. It has their fingerprints and their multiple confessions of guilt.


Still, let me lay out a couple of motives that are popular among those many people attribute to the Fed just to show there are plenty of possible motives out there:
Maybe the Fed’s member banks, who own and run the Fed (as its only shareholders and as governing board members who have huge influence over who the additional government-appointed board members are), like to repossess things. That would be a motive.


Or maybe they want to create a new cashless, digital, global monetary system. That would be a motive.


Or maybe, if they can crash things as perennially as Japan has done for score or more of years, they can get permission to start buying stocks directly, and use their infinite money supply, as Japan, has done to take major ownership in all the stocks of the nation.


Numerous conspiracy theories spend entire books making a strong case for different motives. I won’t land on one, but will note that all that matters is that there are plenty of motives to choose from.

Sure, Yellen protested that “correlation isn’t causation,” but, on the other, she admitted causation by saying that, when the Fed is the culprit, it is generally because the central bank is forced to tighten policy to curtail inflation — inflation that only the Fed causes by creating trillions of dollars monetary stimulus.

There only struggle this time to stay within their M.O. is that they have failed to create inflation in the general economy that they are supposed to govern. Maybe that is why they have pushed the expansion into the longest in history because they are obsessed with following their usual M.O., and inflation didn’t cooperate this time to “force” them to tighten into recession (their cover story).


So, we have multiple confessions of murder by known Fed ringleaders. We have numerous pieces of circumstantial evidence that support their confessions. We have many possible motives. And, even the fact that the Fed continued pushing expansion longer than it has with more and more rounds of QE can be explained by its M.O.

How many times has the Fed said they don’t understand why they couldn’t get inflation to rise to their 2% target for years. They could hardly claim inflation concerns when everyone knew CPI was under the target they’ve always said they want. Now it’s there. So, everything is in place.


I rest my case.


(This article covered just the first of numerous major economic headwinds I laid out for 2019 in my first subscriber-only Premium Post. When you consider how potent just this first headwind is, 2019 looks really interesting.)


If you liked this article, please take a second to support David Haggith on Patreon!
http://thegreatrecession.info/blog/w...ron_button.png

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

The Wall Street Journal continues to counter the liberal mainstream media's Trump Derangement Syndrome, dropping uncomfortable truth-bombs and refusing to back off its intense pressure to get to the truth and hold those responsible, accountable (in a forum that is hard for the establishment to shrug off as 'Alt-Right' or 'Nazi' or be 'punished' by search- and social-media-giants).


And once again Kimberley Strassel - who by now has become the focus of social media attacks for her truth-seeking reporting - does it again. Confirming what we detailed yesterday - that The Justice Department was fully aware that the notorious Steele Dossier was connected to Hillary Clinton and might be biased, a crucial detail which was omitted just weeks later from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant used to spy on the Trump campaign - Strassel makes the aggressive and correct statement that the Justice Department official’s testimony raises new doubts about the bureau’s honesty.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...8_14-28-24.jpg


Via The Wall Street Journal,
Everybody knew.
Everybody of consequence at the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Justice Department understood fully in the middle of 2016 - as the FBI embarked on its counterintelligence probe of Donald Trump - that it was doing so based on disinformation provided by Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

That’s the big revelation from the transcript of the testimony Justice Department official Bruce Ohr gave Congress in August. The transcripts haven’t been released, but parts were confirmed for me by congressional sources.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...im-48255_0.jpg

Mr. Ohr testified that he sat down with dossier author Christopher Steele on July 30, 2016, and received salacious information the opposition researcher had compiled on Mr. Trump. Mr. Ohr immediately took that to the FBI’s then-Deputy Director Andy McCabe and lawyer Lisa Page. In August he took it to Peter Strzok, the bureau’s lead investigator. In the same month, Mr. Ohr believes, he briefed senior personnel in the Justice Department’s criminal division: Deputy Assistant Attorney General Bruce Swartz, lawyer Zainab Ahmad and fraud unit head Andrew Weissman. The last two now work for special counsel Robert Mueller.


More important, Mr. Ohr told this team the information came from the Clinton camp and warned that it was likely biased, certainly unproven.

“When I provided [the Steele information] to the FBI, I tried to be clear that this is source information,” he testified.

“I don’t know how reliable it is. You’re going to have to check it out and be aware. These guys were hired by somebody relating to—who’s related to the Clinton campaign, and be aware.”

He said he told them that Mr. Steele was “desperate that Donald Trump not get elected,” and that his own wife, Nellie Ohr, worked for Fusion GPS, which compiled the dossier. He confirmed sounding all these warnings before the FBI filed its October application for a surveillance warrant against Carter Page. We broke some of this in August, though the transcript provides new detail.

The FBI and Justice Department have gone to extraordinary lengths to muddy these details, with cover from Democrats and friendly journalists.
A January 2017 memo from Adam Schiff, the House Intelligence Committee’s top Democrat, flatly (and incorrectly) insisted “the FBI’s closely-held investigative team only received Steele’s reporting in mid-September.”

A May 2018 New York Times report repeated that claim, saying Mr. Steele’s reports didn’t reach the “Crossfire Hurricane team,” which ran the counterintelligence investigation, until “mid-September.”

This line was essential for upholding the claim that the dossier played no role in the unprecedented July 31, 2016, decision to investigate a presidential campaign. Former officials have insisted they rushed to take this dramatic step on the basis of a conversation involving a low-level campaign aide, George Papadopoulos, which took place in May, before the dossier officially came into the picture. And maybe that is the case. Yet now Mr. Ohr has testified that top personnel had dossier details around the time they opened the probe.

The Ohr testimony is also further evidence that the FBI misled the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in its Page warrant application. We already knew the bureau failed to inform the court it knew the dossier had come from a rival campaign. But the FISA application additionally claimed the FBI was “unaware of any derogatory information pertaining” to Mr. Steele, that he was “reliable,” that his “reporting” in this case was “credible,” and that the FBI only “speculates” that Mr. Steele’s bosses “likely” wanted to “discredit” Mr. Trump.

Speculates? Likely? Mr. Ohr makes clear FBI and Justice officials knew from the earliest days that Mr. Steele was working for the Clinton campaign, which had an obvious desire to discredit Mr. Trump. And Mr. Ohr specifically told investigators that they had every reason to worry Mr. Steele’s work product was tainted.

Strassel concludes succinctly - and ominously for anyone who still believes that 'we, the people' have any freedom left, that the testimony has three other implications.

First, it further demonstrates the accuracy of the House Intelligence Committee Republicans’ memo of 2018 - which noted Mr. Ohr’s role and pointed out that the FBI had not been honest about its knowledge of the dossier and failed to inform the court of Mrs. Ohr’s employment at Fusion GPS.

Second, the testimony also destroys any remaining credibility of the Democratic response, in which Mr. Schiff and his colleagues claimed Mr. Ohr hadn’t met with the FBI or told them anything about his wife or about Mr. Steele’s bias until after the election.

And third, the testimony raises new concerns about Mr. Mueller’s team. Critics have noted Mr. Weissman’s donations to Mrs. Clinton and his unseemly support of former acting Attorney General Sally Yates’s obstruction of Trump orders. It now turns out that senior Mueller players were central to the dossier scandal. The conflicts of interest boggle the mind.

And Strassel concludes unequivocally, the Ohr testimony is evidence the FBI itself knows how seriously it erred. The FBI has been hiding and twisting facts from the start.

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/i...he-deep-state/

5149
Blog/Politics
Posted Jan 19, 2019 by Martin Armstrong
https://d33wjekvz3zs1a.cloudfront.ne...s-Building.jpg
This entire affair of desperately trying to paint Trump in league with Putin to defeat Hillary is beyond any comprehension. Not a single left-wing press from the New York Times to CNN will ever report the truth that the release of Hillary’s emails NEVER involved altered or forged documents. They were all REAL! So this entire conspiracy they are so desperate to create against Trump is astonishing. I would agree if there was any proof that the release of the emails was a fraud or fake and they traced to Putin. To paint Trump in a conspiracy for releasing emails that exposed the truth behind Hillary should warrant us sending a thank you card to Putin if he was ever actually involved.


I cannot imagine how unethical and intentionally misleading the New York Times actions were by reporting their latest questionable piece with a bold headline: “F.B.I. Opened Inquiry Into Whether Trump Was Secretly Working on Behalf of Russia.” They claimed that after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, the feds began investigating whether the President was an intelligence threat. This simply says that some people in the FBI tried to use their power to investigate and were most likely politically motivated. They did not claim Trump was such an agent, only that they investigated to see if he was. This suspicion of an anti-Trump political member of the FBI in the Deep State and then told the New York Times emerged after Trump complained about Comey to Russian diplomats and then told NBC’s Lester Holt that he had the “Russia thing” in mind when he axed the director. Even the Russian Dossiers on Trump ended up being funded by Hillary to smear her opponent.


For the record, our DIRECT SOURCES from inside the FBI are really disgusted with this entire affair and believe that Comey and crew have done serious harm to the image and independence of the FBI. They used the agency for political purposes and have dragged its image into the mud. The New York Times nor CNN would ever print such a posture for they want to paint the FBI as 110% behind Comey and against Trump. They are contributing to the collapse in faith and trust in government with long-term implications to shift the financial capital from the USA to China post-2032. There is no putting confidence back once lost. It is no different from a personal level. If you catch a once friend stealing and lying to you, you will not be so willing to trust them again.
https://d33wjekvz3zs1a.cloudfront.ne...out-Lights.jpgOur computer projected Trump would win as it did with BREXIT entirely based on economics – NOT my personal opinion so we do not run ads claiming I am the man who forecast Trump because it was not a personal lucky guess. It is simply impossible to have “manipulated” the election to change the outcomes. Even Obama publicly stated that there was no infiltration of the voting system by anyone.

The Obama Administration plainly said: “We stand behind our election results, which accurately reflect the will of the American people.” So the allegation here is NOT that Russia altered the election, but tried to “influence“ the election the same as the United States does everywhere from Canada to Europe.

Remember Obama went to London at the request of David Cameron and the EU Parliament joining the scare tactics to influence the BREXIT vote to get British to surrender their sovereignty to Brussels. In fact, the Obama Administration intervened in the elections of Canada, Britain, and France.

So the theory is based upon the fact that because the emails were released, people naturally voted for Trump v Hillary. That does not explain the fact that Trump had beaten 17 career politicians. This same anti-career politician movement which is spreading worldwide also enabled Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) to beat an incumbent opponent. This is the same trend in motion and it has nothing to do with left or right no less Russia. This is 50 years of lies and raising taxes at the expense of the people.


These claims are getting really outrageous. Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s office had to come out and make an EXTREMELY RARE public statement which disputed the fake news coming from BuzzFeed News that alleged President Donald Trump directed his former attorney, Michael Cohen, to lie in his testimony before Congress.

This is all leading to the total collapse in government. All of these clowns do not realize that in desperately trying to get rid of Trump, they are undermining the entire political-economic system. Perhaps now you can see just how the West will Fall by 2032. There is no going back now. It is approaching that fateful moment when it will be time to just turn out the lights.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index2766.htm

January 19, 2019
Europe Collapses Into Panic As Defiant And Unstoppable President Trump Racks Up Victory, After Victory, After Victory
By: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers
A very interesting new Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) report circulating in the Kremlin today noting the raging populist protests continuing throughout the European Union, states that as the “Yellow Vest” protests continue to roil France for the 10th straight week as their citizens rebel against their nation’s leftist-socialist government, British Prime Minister Theresa May suffered an historic defeat over her plan to carry out her nation’s populists citizens order for their country to leave the EU—a defeat compounded, yesterday, when EU leaders were left in disbelief when May presented them with the exact same exit plan her Parliament had just voted down—and all of whom collapsed into panic after President Donald Trump used his “Art Of The Deal” skills to full effect this past week with his surprise tariff cut offer to China—that the Chinese immediately responded to by offering to go on a staggering buying spree of $1 trillion worth of American products and services. [Note: Some words and/or phrases appearing in quotes in this report are English language approximations of Russian words/phrases having no exact counterpart.]

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/ukat1.jpg

According to this report, as the American people are being pummeled on an hourly basis by their leftist-socialist mainstream propaganda media establishment into believing President Trump is driving their country to brink of chaos and ruin, nothing could be further from the truth as even during this past month’s US government shutdown, it has in no way affected the US economy that the Federal Reserve says “is strong, and continues to look strong”.
Not just this astonishing economic victory for the American people is President Trump able to celebrate, either, this report details, but, also, at the same he celebrated his nation’s “Religious Freedom Day” this past week, a US Federal Court jury trial awarded a Christian woman $21.5 million after her company fired her for refusing to work on Sunday during her day of religious worship.
Even more victories for the American people being piled up by President Trump, this report continues, are coming from other US Federal Court rulings—all of whose Federal Judges know their rulings will now be appealed to Trump appointed judges—most particularly on the US Supreme Court where Trump has already appointed two of them, with a third being expected soon as US Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg is reported to be near death—and has caused, this past week alone, a US Federal Court to rescind their order banning Texas from kicking the abortion provider Planned Parenthood out of Medicaid—and another US Federal Court to make a ruling saying social media giants like Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc., must abide by the First Amendment, as championed by retired US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy who previously ruled in Packingham v. North Carolina that social media is now part of “the modern public square” and denying access violates the First Amendment.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/ukat2.png

With the US Senate confirming President Trump’s judicial appointments to US Federal Courts at a record pace in 2018, this report notes, more than 130 positions on the US District Court and US Court of Appealsare vacant that will give him an even greater victory than he has now—a staggering accomplishment celebrated, yesterday, by over 100,000 pro-life marchers in Washington D.C. who “went nuts” with joy while Trump spoke to them via a giant video-screen—that was totally ignored by the entire leftist mainstream media who choose to cover pro-abortion marchers—with Facebook going so far as to actually ban all ads from a pro-life motion picture about the infamous “Roe v. Wade” decision that legalized the killing of babies in their mothers wombs—but against whom a defiant and unstoppable Trump is preparing to slam with the largest corporate fine ever seen in American history.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/ukat3.jpg

As the American leftist mainstream propaganda media intensifies their pretext for ousting President Trump, aided by their nation’s most prominent news media outlets—that are supposedly the Fourth Estate (the press; the profession of journalism) defenders of democracy—but who are complacently giving their assent, indeed encouragement, to this abuse of power, this report concludes, they have now resorted to outright blatant lies to damage him—best exampled by this past week’s made up story about Trump giving orders to his lawyer Michael Cohn to lie to the US Congress that MSNBC and CNN used to throw the word impeachment around over 200 times in barely 24-hours—that quickly ended, though, when the Office of Special Counsel issued a terse statement exposing this story for the lie it was—and that saw CNN switching their coverage to make the case that Vice President Mike Pence’s wife should immediately be denied Secret Service protection because she teaches children at a Christian school—and all occurring while Trump continues to rack up victory, after victory, after victory for the American people.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/ukat4.jpg

January 19, 2019 EU and US all rights reserved. Permission to use this report in its entirety is granted under the condition it is linked back to its original source at WhatDoesItMean.Com. Freebase content licensed under CC-BY and GFDL.
[Note: Many governments and their intelligence services actively campaign against the information found in these reports so as not to alarm their citizens about the manybucatastrophic Earth changes and events to come, a stance that the Sisters of Sorcha Faal strongly disagree with in believing that it is every human beings right to know the truth. Due to our missions conflicts with that of those governments, the responses of their ‘agents’ has been a longstanding misinformation/misdirection campaign designed to discredit us, and others like us, that is exampled in numerous places, including HERE.]
[Note: The WhatDoesItMean.com website was created for and donated to the Sisters of Sorcha Faal in 2003 by a small group of American computer experts led by the late global technology guru Wayne Green (1922-2013) to counter the propaganda being used by the West to promote their illegal 2003 invasion of Iraq.]
[Note: The word Kremlin (fortress inside a city) as used in this report refers to Russian citadels, including in Moscow, having cathedrals wherein female Schema monks (Orthodox nuns) reside, many of whom are devoted to the mission of the Sisters of Sorcha Faal.]

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...?itok=LY4e264-
by Tyler Durden
Sat, 01/19/2019 - 13:50



Authored by Tom Luongo,
Nancy Pelosi (D – Boomers) has a problem. Scratch that, she has a number of problems, not counting her own ethical and moral shortcomings.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...losi-eveil.jpg

Pelosi is the Queen of Projection. She projects an air of invincibility while also projecting her weaknesses onto her political opponents. So, even though Nasty Nancy just got back her Speaker’s gavel, she does so at the weakest moment in the Democratic party’s history since World War II.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...bined-2017.jpg

Democrats Are Close to Terminal Decline
The traditional three-headed coalition of the Democrats has been shattered. The middle class Union guys are gone. By the time Trump is done with her over border security Pelosi’ll lose a bigger swath of the Hispanic vote than she already has.
All that will be left is her warmongering, globalist, shills for the MIC and the Deep State. Bicoastal Smug Liberals.


Internal Revolt
But, the hollowing out of the middle class is Pelosi’s biggest problem. Betraying the former Bernie Bros was the beginning. The Democrats under her leadership give lip service to bank reform which, in turn, has the hard-core Socialist left fired up.
That’s what rock-star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez represents. She is the face of what’s left of Occupy Wall St. And she has a strong, knee-jerk, anti-incumbent, anti-establishment momentum behind her.

It doesn’t matter that she’s 28 years old, has little to no life experience or a firm grasp on reality. This is politics and these are chaotic times. She already has an acronym (AOC) and a nickname. She’s important.

Warhorses like Pelosi don’t know how to change their ways this late in their game. They think they can buy off people like AOC and outmaneuver her.
Pelosi faced a serious challenge to her party leadership in the run up to being elected Speaker of the House again. And she paid for that smooth vote with AOC’s appointment to the House Financial Services Committee.

When you’re going for the kill-shot on Trump there can be no weaknesses perceived.

But the big betrayal by the Pelosi Set is on war and empire. The same arguments animating the GOP insurrection against Trump by neoconservatives keeps Pelosi’s Smug Liberal interventionists happy.

The leadership of both parties love the Empire. They work non-stop to keep that gravy train flowing. It’s how they stay in power, amass incredible personal fortunes and why the country at large — left, right and center — hates their guts.

Do you think AOC wins her primary if the DNC hadn’t been so thoroughly despicable to Bernie Sanders’ supporters?

Or such full-throated supporters of questionable foreign interventions?

Pelosi is betting her political farm on border security. She does so because it is the one issue which galvanizes both her corrupt leadership with the populist, socialist Left represented by AOC.

They all hate what they perceive as bigotry.

Gabbard: The Anti-Pelosi
And it is also a distraction from the real issue that Trump put front and center, the Democrats’ weakness on foreign policy.

By announcing the pull out of U.S. troops from Syria and Afghanistan he reminded everyone just how much Pelosi et.al. love spending your money bombing brown people overseas for their profit.

As I said, appearance of strength is all that matters in politics at this level. Pelosi cannot afford to look at all weak during a government shutdown she started to oppose Trump and regain the White House in 2020.

So, while Pelosi is focused on being the establishment’s mouthpiece for taking down Trump to regain control over the vast government machinery, rebellions are happening within her own party.

Enter Tulsi Gabbard. Gabbard has real promise as the anti-war/anti-empire insurrectionist within the Democrats. She is a leftist version of Ron Paul in that she’s hated by everyone who thinks they are someone.

Because nothing unites the DNC and the RNC like the threat of peace getting an audience on the national stage.

When “anti-incumbent” is the watchword of the day, Gabbard throwing her hat into the 2020 Presidential race is a big deal. Gabbard will get support from anti-war Republicans, Independents and Libertarians.


They will cross party lines to vote for her in primaries, hurting the anointed ones.

She will successfully fund-raise on ending useless and counter-productive engagements in the Middle East. With her part of the Presidential conversation it forces her opposition to adopt her positions while simultaneously supporting Trump’s struggle against his own staff.

Trump should give her a lifetime membership to Mar-a-Lago.
Yes, she’s a mess economically, but that’s not where her value lies. She’s everything the current Democratic party isn’t: attractive, conscientious, brave and committed to peace.


Pelosi’s Corner
And that is a nightmare for Pelosi. She’s positioned herself as being against whatever Trump is for. That makes her an easy foil for him.
With Gabbard in the race Trump can go hard on foreign policy and create havoc in the Democratic primaries. As long as he stays in the game, Gabbard is his stalking horse.


Don’t underestimate the political points he scored with canceling Pelosi’s overseas trip. This is the Donald Trump we asked for — end politics as usual.
Confront the banal hypocrisy of our ruling class.

And, most importantly, call out the cheap virtue signaling hacks like Pelosi get a free pass on every day in the media.

Trump made it clear that if Pelosi wants to conspire with foreign leaders against him that she can do it on her own dime.
And having the shutdown as the excuse in a perfect game of brinkmanship made it even more effective.

Pelosi acts like she has Trump dead to rights on petty corruption thanks to Mueller’s songbird Michael Cohen. I don’t discount how hard they are gunning for Trump now. But like Theresa May in the U.K. over Brexit, there is only so much people will take in service of petty party infighting.


Eventually a real political revolt occurs. Just ask Italian Democrats or Emmanuel Macron.
So Pelosi has to be careful how she plays her hand here. She’s losing to Trump on the wall. Every day the argument against it looks both silly and hysterical. $5.7 billion is less than one week’s interest on the national debt.


But, she’s pot committed to her position that ‘walls are immoral.’ What she may find out here is that if you back someone like Trump into a corner and promise to destroy everything he has, then he then has nothing left to lose.


And that is when he is most dangerous to not only her but to everyone she’s beholden to. After that her own people’s knives come out.

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http://kunstler.com/what-is-liminali...gl-dEB9tn1zNxk

What is Liminality? Guest Essay by Jasun Horsley
White Male Edgeman
Radical changes of identity, happening suddenly and in very brief intervals of time, have proved more deadly and destructive of human values than wars fought with hardware weapons.
—Marshall McLuhan, Laws of Media: The New Science


Probably most people reading this—especially if they spend a lot of time on the Internet—are aware of the growing phenomenon of “social justice warriors” with hair-trigger mouths and clicking mice, fiercely practicing intolerance in the name of tolerance.


Earlier this year, in the small (pop: 6000) Canadian town where I live, a group called Culture Guard were scheduled to speak at the local Royal Canadian Legion. The subject was a nationwide, multi-leveled educational program called SOGI (Sexual Orientation Gender Identification), ostensibly directed towards encouraging “tolerance.” Culture Guard is a conservative organization whose mission is to uphold citizen-driven democracy and community values and expose what they call the “tyranny of politically correct idiotology.”

The event was cancelled after the Legion received 900+ email complaints, including threats. Much to my surprise, the reaction on Facebook to this was mostly gushing gratitude that this diabolical hate group had been righteously silenced. Two fairly typical comments: “Hope we’ve run these poisonous haters out of town” and “No bible thumping flatlander would dare show their face because hate has a weak foundation.”

Apparently, nothing is more immoral to the new moralists than old-style moralism, and if you aren’t in a state of fear or loathing these days—possibly both—you probably aren’t participating in “the debate.” We have entered a liminal zone in which up can become down, right turn left, and virtue trades places with vice in the time it takes to say “What’s your pronoun?”


Legions of Unreason (The Outer Limits of Liminality)
The attributes of liminality are necessarily ambiguous. . . Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention and ceremonial.”
—Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (95)


When the town hall is overrun by legions of unreason, the desire to map the exits can be overwhelming. The problem is that, nine times out of ten, the proposed solutions only compound the problem. This has become ever more apparent to anyone paying attention to the evolution of progressivism and identity politics, with its endlessly replicating contortions and contradictions.


One concept I have found invaluable for navigating the increasingly incoherent—and explosive—social landscape is that of liminality. This is an anthropological term (coined in the early twentieth century by folklorist Arnold van Gennep) that refers to the quality of ambiguity or disorientation in the middle stage of religious rites. Later on, anthropologist Victor Turner used it to describe how ceremony masters usher ritual participants from one state to another, as in a coming of age ritual. The liminal stage is the intermediary one in which the initiate is on the threshold (l?men) between his or her old status and a new, as-yet unknown one. More recently, the philosopher Rene Girard (among others), applied the term to sociopolitical and cultural conditions. And not a moment too soon, since we have now entered a time in history when ambiguity and disorientation have assumed epic proportions.


A few examples from the anthropological database: People trapped in a liminal situation are increasingly unable to act rationally, because the structures upon which their rationality is based have disappeared. (Check.) Being in a liminal state spells crisis for most people. Emotions run wild, making clear thinking all but impossible. (Check.) This leads to “mimetic” (imitative) behavior by those trapped in the liminal space. (Check. 4 out of 4.)


In the politics of liminality, the future is unknown; since no one has gone through the process before, there is no one to lead people out of it. This allows for false ceremony masters—politicians, pundits, sophists, and general snake oil salesmen—to fill the void and offer bogus solutions or ways out of the liminal state, to alleviate the disorientation and helplessness of others, thereby perpetuating liminality indefinitely. (Check. Check. Check. Check.)


Conditions of permanent liminality can be maintained by schismogenesis—literally, the creation of a split, a polarity that, if unchecked, pushes the poles further and further apart. (Check!!)

The problem that isn’t being addressed by the snake oil salesmen is that the problems underlying liminality are not primarily social problems but psychological ones. This means they can’t be addressed with social reforms or new ideologies. In fact, those social reforms, policies, and “new” ideologies are, as Freud said of religion, symptoms of the problem itself. And multiplication of symptoms does not indicate that a cure is underway.


Rene Girard, Mimetic Violence & Scapegoating
Everybody tends to merge his identity with other people at the speed of light. It’s called being mass man.
— Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Me: Lectures and Interviews (p. 268)


In periods of sustained liminality, as now, the structures we rely on become by their nature unreliable. This makes most people extremely anxious, hence highly susceptible to influence and manipulation. A single Tweet can set us off; even a Tweet that fails to get retweeted becomes proof that the world is going to Hell—or that we are. In a liminal zone of “fluid” identities permeated by multiculturalism and pansexuality, the ideological snake oil business booms.


These kinds of interpersonal flame-wars seem like a distorted case of what Turner called “rites of status reversal,” when “the underling comes uppermost.” Turner writes: “at certain culturally defined points in the seasonal cycle, groups or categories of persons who habitually occupy low status positions in the social structure are positively enjoined to exercise ritual authority over their superiors; and they, in their turn, must accept with good will their ritual degradation” (Turner, 102, 167). This exact scenario played out recently at Evergreen College. Even the fact this article is written by a “privileged” white man and depends on the works of other white men as primary sources makes it ipso facto offensive to some people.


Which way is up and which way is down? What is acceptable behavior? What constitutes maleness or femaleness? What’s a paraphilia and what’s a sexual orientation? When does pride become narcissism? Everything is suddenly “up for grabs” (sometimes literally, cf. #MeToo movement). In “Violence in the media,” media prophet Marshall McLuhan wrote, “Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence.”

The primary consequence of liminality is increased mimesis or imitation (c.f. Girard) because, when old values no longer hold good, no one knows how to act without referring to others. This creates a free-for-all—a climate of social contagion—in which mimetic violence potentially escalates; this in turn creates the corresponding need for a scapegoat—an other—to unify the attention of the group and stabilize the community. Within larger communities such as a nation, an individual scapegoat is not enough, so entire groups are targeted.


This potential for mimetic violence in every community is why the idea of universal values (morality) is fundamental to social stabilization—to the extent that, in Adam Smith’s days, “social” and “moral” were often interchangeable (see Steven Hitlin 2013). In order to provide the guidance, support, and reassurance of stability, a societal system—the institutions it creates and the values it upholds—must give the impression of being unchanging, solid, and fundamental. They can’t be merely the products of human minds trying to work out the best way to organize a community; they must assume the status of holy writ, natural law, or scientific fact.

As above, so below: ideologically-oriented individuals depend on developing convictions and feeling-opinions that assume the solidity, inflexibility, and force of metaphysical beliefs. This is especially so when the beliefs run counter to previously accepted or established beliefs. Witness the secular metaphysics of gender identification, which proposes an empirical—and invisible—“reality” that transcends not just social conventions but biological truths—rendering them obsolete artifacts of an oppressive former regime.

“Let us be willing to remold society by redefining what it means to be a human being in the 20th century, moving into a new millennium.” (Hillary Clinton)


The Mass Man: Collective Negative Identity & the Abolition of Individuality
When the whole world is globalized, you’re going to be able to set fire to the whole thing with a single match.
—Rene Girard

In times of artificially perpetuated liminality, as now, a particular kind of collective identity arises as a compensatory mechanism, a negative identity that affirms itself by negating what it is “not.” When the other is identified as not merely a single individual but a large, somewhat amorphous group of individuals, it becomes unclear where exactly the line between the community-identity being affirmed and the “other” being negated lies.


The surest way to avoid becoming the other—to avoid being negated by one’s community—is to participate in the negation of the designated other. To refuse to do so is to implicitly affirm the other, which is to negate one’s own identity—i.e., affiliation with one’s group. Witness the piece of ritual theater that played out at Evergreen State College, when participants at a 2016 Equity Council meeting were enjoined to get in an imaginary canoe—representing the Sate Equity Plan—as a way to signal their solidarity with the campus activists. While an Indian drumbeat and a recording of crashing surf played in the background, the audience was warned there was a “binary choice” between being allies of the State Equity Plan or “becoming enemies.”


So how exactly do we end up with a total intolerance of difference in the name of tolerating diversity? It is not easy to map a burning building while trapped inside it, but what seems to be occurring now is the growing substitution of (rightist) conservative morality with (leftist) ideological correctness. In a kind of funhouse mirror opposition to “the Right,” “the Left” has gradually assumed a position of anti-authoritarian authoritarianism. Girard described this as “mimetic rivalry” and it’s starkly observable in the form of “SJW” progressives looking more and more like “Alt-Right trolls.” The message—and the admonishment—of “The Left,” lest we forget, is all about inclusivity.


Inclusivity demands that all the marginals (what Turner called “the edgemen”) be ushered into the mainstream by creating a mono/multiculture with equality for all—not counting the deplorables, of course, who are ideologically unfit for inclusion. Ironically, and inescapably, this Borgian Prime Directive subtly or not so subtly endorses, and eventually enforces, homogeneity. Like the Starship Enterprise boldly going where no sane society ever went before, individualism is magnanimously imposed upon the collective.


We see this in how socially marginalized people—usually following a period of perceived or actual persecution—are encouraged to identify and take pride in their marginalized status (gay pride, black pride, transgender pride, etc.), and to assert their right to exist separately from the larger social community, as individuals. This leads to their being incorporated into the larger collective, integrated, or assimilated into the multi/monoculture. The right to be different is asserted, then, not as an end in itself, but as the means of becoming the same.


As this homogenization-in-the-name-of-individuality agenda advances, the potential for mimetic violence increases. In Turner’s “status reversal” rituals, taboo-breaking and totem-smashing was consciously enacted in a kind of Community Theater (which is what ritual is). Today, the performance appears to have gone beyond method, into unconscious voluntary possession—hence the legions of mutually-combusting contradictions that sizzle like matchheads beneath the kindling of every ideological identification.


All this is symptomatic of unconscious, divided, behavior, or schismogenesis. The progressives in my town guarding the culture from its former guardians didn’t realize that the SOGI agenda is self-devouring because sexual orientation is cancelled out, negated, by gender identification. They might be appalled to know, for example, that gender reassignment surgery is booming in the notoriously “homophobic” Iran [ref]—because changing “sex” is a practical, no-nonsense (and irreversible) way to eradicate homosexuality. Or by the fact that the supposedly radical trans-agenda is both ideologically and financially supported by most, if not all, the major corporations (PDF) and government institutions in the world. [ref] The progressives have joined the patriarchy party and don’t even know it.


Right-wing libertarianism advocates the primacy of the individual; Left-wing socialism speaks for the primacy of the collective. Liminality is the collapse of categories, however, and as the category of “individualized sameness” expands to include more and more orientations and identifications, things like biological facts—and eventually any kind of fact, since facts, like numbers, tend to assert the reality of difference—become scapegoats sacrificed on the altar of oneness for all. The old values become the expendable “deplorables,” because the ideology of equality can only extend its assimilation agenda by erasing all differences between people. The final ritual sacrifice is the idea of individuality itself—or possibly the individual him- or herself, if Girard is right about human sacrifice being “the revelatory yet menacing dynamic that animates the whole of this civilization” (Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, p. 138).

All this goes a way to explaining why every disagreement has started to feel like a battle—not just for our sanity, but for our very existence, and why the feeling of being in an unsafe space is contagious. As a white male “edgeman” mostly content to be condemned to the margins, I am starting to feel like an endangered minority, myself, caught inside an electronic effigy of McLuhan’s mass-man, waiting for that fatal spark.

COMMENTS FROM BENJAMINIS: PLEASE READ THE LAST 5 PAGES ON MY THREAD AND YOU WILL BE MORE AWARE OF REALITY THEN EVER BEFORE. Reading includes listenting to many of the video's that I have shared from different expert sources and THEY ALL say the same thing in different ways.

G-D Bless and Be Well !!!

May G-D Bless YOU and protect you. AMEN !!!

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,
Trade is a fundamental element of human survival. No one person can produce every single product or service necessary for a comfortable life, no matter how Spartan their attitude. Unless your goal is to desperately scratch an existence from your local terrain with no chance of progress in the future, you are going to need a network of other producers. For most of the history of human civilization, production was the basis for economy. All other elements were secondary.

At some point, as trade grows and thrives, a society is going to start looking for a store of value; something that represents the man-hours and effort and ingenuity a person put into their day. Something that is universally accepted within barter networks, something highly prized, that is tangible, that can be held in our hands and is impossible to replicate artificially. Enter precious metals.

Thus, the concept of “money” was born, and for the most part it functioned quite well for thousands of years. Unfortunately, there are people in our world that see economy as a tool for control rather than a vital process that should be left alone to develop naturally.

The idea of “fiat money”, money which has no tangibility and that can be created on a whim by a central source or authority, is rather new in the grand scheme of things. It is a bastardization of the original and much more stable money system that existed before that was anchored in hard commodities. While it claims to offer a more “liquid” store of value, the truth is that it is no store of value at all.

Purveyors of fiat, central banks and globalists, use ever increasing debt as a means to feed fiat, not to mention the hidden tax of price inflation. When central bankers get a hold of money, it is no longer a representation of work or value, but a system of enslavement that crushes our ability to produce effectively and to receive fair returns for our labor.

There are many people today in the liberty movement that understand this dynamic, but even in alternative economic circles there are some that do not understand the full picture when it comes to central banks and fiat mechanisms. There is a false notion that paper currencies are the life blood of the establishment and that they will seek to protect these currencies at all costs. This might have been true 20 years ago or more, but it is not true today. Things change.

https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...rswaiting1.jpg

The king of this delusion is the US dollar. As the world reserve currency it is thought by some to be “untouchable”, a pillar of the globalist structure that will be defended for many decades to come. The reality, however, is that the dollar is nothing more than another con game on paper to the globalists; a farce that they are happy to sacrifice in order to further their goals of complete centralization of world trade and therefore the complete centralization of control over human survival.

That is to say, the dollar is a stepping stone for them, nothing more.
The real goal of the globalists is an economic system in which they can monitor every transaction no matter how small; a system in which there is eventually only one currency, a currency that can be tracked, granted or taken away at a moment's notice. Imagine a world in which your “store of value” is subject to constant scrutiny by a bureaucratic monstrosity, and there is no way to hide from them by using private trade as a backstop. Imagine a world in which you cannot hold your money in your hand, and access to your money can be denied with the push of a button if you step out of line. This is what the globalists really desire.


Some people might claim that this kind of system already exists, but they would be fooling themselves. Even though fiat currencies like the dollar are a cancer on free markets and true production, they still offer privacy to a point, and they can still be physically allocated and held in your hand making them harder to confiscate. The globalists want to take a bad thing and make it even worse.


So, the question arises – How do they plan to make the shift from the current fiat paper system to their “new world order” economy?

First and foremost, they will seek a controlled demolition of the dollar as the world reserve currency. They have accomplished this in the past with other reserve currencies, such as the Pound Sterling, which was carefully diminished over a period of two decades just after WWII through the use of treasury bond dumps by France and the US, as well as the forced removal of the sterling as the petro-currency. This was done to make way for the US dollar as a replacement after the Bretton Woods agreement in 1944.


The dollar did not achieve true world reserve status, though, until after the gold standard was completely abandoned by Nixon in the early 1970's, at which point a deal was struck with Saudi Arabia making the dollar the petro-currency. Once the dollar was no longer anchored to gold and the world's energy market was made dependent on it, the fate of the US economy was sealed.


Unlike Britain and the sterling, the US economy is hyper-dependent on the dollar's world reserve status. While Britain suffered declining conditions for decades after the loss, including inflation and high interest rates, the US will experience far more acute pain. A complete lack of adequate manufacturing capability within US borders has turned our nation into a consumer based society rather than a society of producers. Meaning, we are dependent on the demand for our currency as a reserve in order to enjoy affordable goods from outside sources (i.e. other manufacturing based countries).


Add to this lack of production ability the fact that for the past decade the Federal Reserve has been pumping trillions of dollars into financial markets around the globe. This means trillions of dollar held overseas only on the promise that those dollars will be accepted by major exporters as a universal store of value. If faith in that promise is lost, those trillions could come flooding back into the US through various channels, and the buying power of the currency would crumble.


There is a delusion within the American mainstream that even if such an event were to occur, the transition could be handled with ease. It's fantastical, I know, but never underestimate the cognitive dissonance of people blinded by bias.

The rebuilding of a production base within the US to offset the crisis of losing the world reserve currency would take many years; perhaps decades. And this is in the best case scenario. With a plummeting currency and extreme price inflation, the cost of establishing new production on a large scale would be immense. While local labor might become cheap (in comparison with inflation), all other elements of the economy would become very expensive.

In the worst case scenario there would be complete societal breakdown likely followed by an attempted totalitarian response by government. In which case, forget any domestically funded economic recovery. Any future recovery would have to be funded and managed from outside the US. And here is where we see the globalist plan taking shape.

The banking elites have hinted in the past how they might try to “reset” the global economy. As I've mentioned in many articles, the globalist run magazine The Economist in 1988 discussed the removal of the dollar to make way for a global currency, a currency which would be introduced to the masses by 2018. This introduction did in fact take place as The Economist declared it would. Blockchain and digital currency systems, the intended foundation of the next globalist monetary structure, received unprecedented coverage the past two years. They are now a part of the public consciousness.


Here is how I believe the process will unfold:
The 2008 crash in credit and housing markets led to unprecedented stimulus by central banks, with the Federal Reserve leading the pack as the greatest source of inflation. This program of bailouts and QE stimulus conjured an even bigger bubble, which many alternative analysts have dubbed “the everything bubble”.


The growing “everything bubble” encompasses not just stock markets or housing, but auto markets, credit markets, bond markets, and the dollar itself. All of these elements are now tied directly to Fed policy. The US economy is not only addicted to stimulus measures and near-zero interest rates; it will die without them.

The Fed knows this well. Chairman Jerome Powell hinted at the crisis that would evolve if the Fed ever cut off stimulus, unwound its balance sheet and hiked rates in the October 2012 Fed minutes.

Without constant and ever expanding stimulus measures, the false economy will implode. We are already seeing the effects as the Fed cuts tens-of-billions per month in assets from its balance sheet and hikes interest rates to their “neutral rate of inflation”. Auto markets, housing markets, and credit markets are in reversal, and stocks are witnessing the most instability since the 2008 crash. All of this was triggered by the Fed simply exerting incremental rate hikes and balance sheet cuts.


It is also important to note that almost every US stock market rally the past several months has taken place while the Fed's balance sheet cuts were frozen. For example, for the past two-and-a-half weeks the Fed's assets have only dropped by around $8 billion; this is basically a flatline in the balance sheet. It should not be surprising given this pause in cuts (in tandem with convenient stimulus measures by China) that stocks spiked through early to mid-January.
That said, Fed tightening will start again, either by rate hikes, asset cuts, or both at the same time. The Fed's purpose is to create a crisis. The Fed's goal is to cause a crash. The Fed is a suicide bomber that does not care what happens to the US system.
But what about the dollar, specifically?

The Fed's tightening policies do not only translate to crisis for US stocks or other markets. I see three primary ways in which the dollar can be dethroned as the world reserve.

1) Emerging economies have become addicted to Fed liquidity over the past ten years. Without continued access to the Fed's easy money, nations like China and India are beginning to seek out alternatives to the dollar as a world reserve. Contrary to the popular belief that these countries would “never” be able to decouple from the US, the process has already begun. And, it is the Fed that has actually created the necessity for emerging markets to seek out other sources of liquidity besides the dollar.

2) Donald Trump's trade war is yet another cover event for the loss of reserve status. I would note that the primary rationale for tariffs was to balance the trade deficit. The trade deficit with China has done the opposite and is continually expanding each month. This suggests much higher tariffs on China would be required to reduce the imbalance.

It must also be understood that the trade deficit with China has long been part of a larger agreement. China is one of the largest buyers of US debt in the world and has continued to utilize the dollar as the world reserve currency. If the trade war continues through this year, it is only a matter of time before China, already seeking dollar alternatives as the Fed tightens liquidity, will start using its US treasury and dollar holdings as leverage against us.

Bilateral agreements between multiple nations that cut out the dollar are being established regularly today. If China, the largest exporter/importer in the world, stops accepting the dollar as the world reserve, or if they start accepting other currencies in competition, then numerous other nations will follow their lead.

3) Finally, if the war of words between Trump and the Fed becomes something more, then this could be used by the establishment to undermine faith in US credit. If Trump seeks to shut down the Fed entirely, the globalists are handed yet another perfect distraction for the death of the dollar. I can see the headlines now - The “reset” could then be painted as a “rescue” of the global economy after the “destructive actions of populists” who “bumbled into fiscal destruction” because they were blinded by an “obsession with sovereignty” in a world that “requires centralization to survive”.


The specifics of the shift to a global currency are less clear, but again, we have hints from the globalists. The Economist suggests that the US economy will have to be taken down a few pegs, and that the IMF would step in as the arbiter of forex markets through its SDR basket system. This plan was echoed recently by globalist Mohamed El-Erian in an article he wrote titled “New Life For The SDR?”. El-Erian also suggests that a global currency would help to combat the “rise of populism”.


The Economist notes that the SDR would only act as a “bridge” to the new global currency. Paper currencies would still exist for a time, but they would be pegged to the SDR exchange rates. Currently, the dollar is only worth around .71 SDR's. In the event of the loss of world reserve status, expect this exchange rate to drop significantly.


As the global crisis deepens the IMF will suggest a “reset” to a more manageable monetary framework, and this framework will be based on blockchain technology and a cryptocurrencywhich the IMF has likely already developed. The IMF hints at this outcome in at least two separate white papers recently published which herald a new age in which crypto as the next phase of evolution for global trade.


I predict according to the current pace of the trade war, Fed liquidity tightening and de-dollerization that threats to the dollar's world reserve status will hit the mainstream by 2020. The process of "resetting" the global monetary system would likely take at least another decade to complete. The globalist preoccupation with their "Agenda 2030" sustainable development initiatives suggests a decade long timeline.


Without ample resistance, the introduction of the cashless society will be presented as a natural and even “heroic” response by the globalists to save humanity from the “selfishness” of destructive nationalists. They will strut across the world stage as if they are saviors, rather than the villains they really are.

* * *

Comments from Benjaminis: NOW YOU know WHAT THEY HAVE DONE to us ... SO NOW IT IS OUR move !!!

Good Morning

For those that understand economics and want to follow what this excellent article discusses it will let you see the options available for the US Dollar and none of them are very good. How this will affect you must be discussed with your own financial experts. My only role here is bringing it to your attention.

http://www.gata.org/files/MyrmikanRe...01-14-2019.pdf


Benjaminis

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

Authored by Steven Guinness,
Engaging in double speak has become a routine means of communicating amongst politicians. Whilst obfuscation is used to confuse the public and distort their understanding of events (notably Brexit), occasionally a granule of truth winds its way into the narrative which serves to offer a more accurate picture of where members of parliament stand on an issue.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...986473_640.jpg


Brexit has dominated political discourse in the UK ever since the original referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU was announced three years ago. Most recently, we have seen an attempt by Conservative party ‘rebels‘ to remove Prime Minister Theresa May from office fail, the withdrawal agreement negotiated by May’s government comprehensively rejected by MP’s, and a subsequent vote of no confidence in the government defeated.


What these events have done is solidify the impression that parliament is at an ‘impasse‘ over Brexit. But as I have argued in previous articles, what this ‘impasse‘ is actually doing is creating the necessary conditions for a second referendum (a ‘people’s vote‘) to become a reality. Gradually all other options are withering away to leave going back to the ballot box as the only remaining solution. A referendum therefore assumes the appearance of being an organic occurrence rather than a premeditated outcome.


Here is how a referendum could find itself in the statute book in the next few weeks:
The next significant parliamentary event is Monday, January 21st, when Theresa May will make a statement to parliament outlining a ‘plan B‘ for how she proposes to gain approval for a revised version of her defeated withdrawal agreement. Whilst it is unknown what she will suggest, it is a safe assumption that it will exacerbate rather than quell division amongst MP’s.


The key aspect to whatever Theresa May puts before parliament is that it will be amendable, meaning MP’s can table amendments to the plan in an attempt to influence the next steps in the Brexit process. One of those amendments is expected to call for a second referendum. Conservative MP Sarah Wollaston, a supporter of the People’s Vote campaign, is due to table the amendment.


For it to be successful, three things need to happen.
Firstly, the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, is responsible for determining which amendments are selected for debate. Bercow, a supporter of the EU, has previously accepted amendments that allow parliament to assume more control over the legislative direction of Brexit. Thus it would come as no surprise if he chose an amendment that called for a second referendum.


Secondly, for the amendment to pass through the House of Commons, it would need to command the support of Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party. Corbyn’s preference has been for a general election rather than a second Brexit referendum. But the defeat of his no confidence motion in the government has eliminated this option. Back in September last year, the Labour party voted to keep the prospect of a second vote ‘on the table‘ should attempts at forcing a general election fail. Now that they have, it is likely that Labour will soon adopt a ‘People’s Vote‘ as official party policy.


Thirdly, to gain a majority in the House, the amendment would require around twenty disgruntled Conservative ‘remainers‘ to support it. Again, this appears increasingly likely.


January the 29th is when MP’s will vote on Theresa May’s ‘plan B‘. It represents the first opening for a referendum to be called. If we surmise that over the next few weeks a second vote will officially be in the works, it would then become about what question parliament would put to the British people. This is the area in which politicians have been practising to deceive.



A proportion of MP’s are openly demanding that Theresa May rule out a no deal exit from the EU. One of them is Labour’s Chuka Umunna. Seen as the leading political figure behind the People’s Vote campaign, Umunna has consistently communicated via Twitter that to prevent no deal from happening, parliament must ‘extend Article 50 and give Brexit back to the people‘.


If you are wondering at this point what Umunna recommends asking the UK electorate a second time round, the answer might surprise you. Speaking to Sky News presenter Sophy Ridge this month, he advocated for the option of remaining in the EU, and also for a ‘hard‘ Brexit:
I do think you have to have an option that would please the likes of Peter Bone (Conservative supporter of Brexit), that is a hard Brexit so to speak.


Those two choices, in some way, shape or form, would need to be presented to the British people.
For some time now the term ‘hard Brexit‘ has been perceived as the UK dropping out of the EU with no withdrawal agreement in place.

Umunna is not a lone voice in advocating for a ‘hard‘ Brexit option. Over the months, former Prime Minister Tony Blair has called for a ‘clean break‘ choice on a future ballot paper, as have Gina Miller (founder of Best for Britain) and Conservative MP Justine Greening.

The Independent’s ‘Final Say‘ campaign also endorses a no deal option, whether parliament approves a withdrawal deal or not.

Then there is the man who conceived Article 50, Lord Kerr. Kerr recently appeared on LBC radio where, in regards to what the public could vote on, he told presenter James O’Brien:
Do they want the deal, do they want no deal crash out or do they want our existing deal with the European Union?


Kerr and Umunna are not strangers to each other. They shared a platform together back in November 2017 – on behalf of the anti Brexit group Open Britain – where Kerr proclaimed that Article 50 was reversible and that Britain could change it’s mind on Brexit at any stage prior to withdrawal.

The European Court of Justice have since ruled that the UK can revoke Article 50 unilaterally, but would still require the approval of all twenty seven member states in order to extend the deadline beyond March 29th.


Ask those calling for a ‘People’s Vote‘ their perspective on a no deal outcome, and they will tell you how it would be the height of irresponsibility.

An eventuality that the House of Commons should in no way countenance. Why, then, does Chuka Umunna and company wish to see this option dismissed by MP’s, but presented as part of a referendum? It is a question that no broadcaster has thought to raise.



It should be obvious that by endorsing a ‘hard‘ Brexit option, it intensifies the risk of no deal rather than mitigates it.

The People’s Vote campaign continues to promote that the only way to prevent leaving the EU without an agreement is to consult the public. This is nonsense if we consider that in the event of a referendum, the electorate will likely be granted the option of leaving on World Trade Organisation terms. Sections of MP’s would view this option as reckless, but in my view the argument that ‘hard Brexiteers‘ need to have their voice heard in a referendum would win enough support.


As noted previously, Lord Kerr is on the Executive Committee of the Trilateral Commission, whereas Chuka Umunna is a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations. What we are witnessing are representatives of globalist institutions frequenting both sides of the argument. On one hand they have successfully managed to implant into people’s consciousness that no deal would be disastrous, yet on the other have advocated that those same people should have the choice of engineering said disaster.


In the background as ever are the Bank of England. This week governor Mark Carney addressed the Treasury Select Committee and expressed how the recent rise in the value of sterling ‘would appear to reflect some expectation that the process of resolution would be extended and that the prospect of no-deal may have been diminished‘. Carney was quick to point out, however, that this was not his opinion, rather it was ‘the market’s initial take‘.


With the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos next week, I would expect warnings over a ‘disorderly Brexit‘ to be re-emphasised as the potential for a second referendum gains ground.


Unfortunately, as campaigners hyper focus on securing a remain option for a future vote, they continue to perpetuate the belief that a ‘People’s Vote‘ would kill off any prospect of a ‘hard‘ Brexit. The danger of this misguided logic should now be self evident.

COMMENTS FROM BENJAMINIS: They still try to CONTROL our Lives. Do We Keep Letting Them ? HELL NO !!!

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ed-call-or-put

It was only a few weeks ago markets priced a cut by the Fed, while the markets now are pricing a small hike in December. It looks like the Trump call, replaced by the Powell putnow has been replaced by a call for the Fed to rise rates should all go back to “normal”.
Markets have rebounded violently, volatility is down again and credit markets are easing up. The below chart shows the SPX (orange) and the Fed rate expectations (white). It seems these days everybody is looking at the SPX intra day chart, including the Fed. The question is when does the bounce become a barometer of the great economy and the Fed needs to call that hike trade again?


The moves are so violent, even more to the upside than the downside, so we continue to love gamma. VIX has come off massively over past weeks, but we are getting even more interested in long plays on the Eurostoxx 50 volatility, V2X. Europe is still a huge mess. Note the V2X versus VIX ratio as of late.


As the SPX has been rebounding, the US 5 yr 5 yr breakeven rate has joined the spike move higher.

Given the fact the Fed’s “natural” preference here is to continue hiking (see the Dot Plot below) we would start looking actively for long convexity trades here.
https://i.gyazo.com/8eb0364a2c2504a7...713d5b82c8.png
Source: charts by Bloomberg

https://seekingalpha.com/article/423...oadblock=false

Summary
If the market had failed at the 50% retracement line, it would have confirmed the beginning of the bear market.


However, the market climbed above the lows from October and November and the 50-dma clearing the first two levels of very tough resistance.

Importantly, while the market did break above the first level of resistance, it is currently NOT confirming the change to a bear market just yet.

Last week, we discussed the continuation of the rally from the December 24th lows.
"The rally, as we laid out two weeks ago, continues to work within the expected range back to 2,650-2,700."
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...019_thumb1.png


"Importantly, the previous deep 'oversold' condition which was supportive of the rally following Christmas Eve has now been fully reversed back into extreme 'overbought' territory. While this doesn't mean the current rally will immediately reverse, it does suggest that upside from current levels is likely limited."

As I discussed previously, what was needed for the bulls to gain control of the narrative were several important issues:

1. Central bank activity to reverse from restrictive to accommodative,
2. Washington to back off of "tariffs" and "trade war" rhetoric, and
3. the Federal Reserve to continue its more "dovish" stance.

Those issues were fulfilled with headlines from this past week (click a headline to read the article):

1. Exclusive: Trump meets with Cabinet officials to revive infrastructure push - sources
2. Stocks close higher for fourth day as optimism mounts over U.S.-China trade
3. Is This The Real Reason Why Stocks Are Surging?

https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...819_thumb1.png

(Chart courtesy of ZeroHedge)
Between a more dovish Federal Reserve, "hopeful" headlines from Washington D.C. and a "S*** Ton" of liquidity, it was not surprising to see stocks hit our first level of major overhead resistance at 2,670 as shown in the first chart above.

Of course, the question now is what happens next?

Passing The First Big Test
As noted last week:
"Over the next couple of weeks, the market is going to face the 'test' that has defined the 'bear markets' of the past."
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...019_thumb1.png

If the market had failed at the 50% retracement line, it would have confirmed the beginning of the bear market. However, the market climbed above the lows from October and November and the 50-dma clearing the first two levels of very tough resistance.

Importantly, while the market did break above the first level of resistance, it is currently NOT confirming the change to a bear market just yet. As shown in the chart below, the 2015-2016 correction ended when the market broke above and successfully retested the 200-dma. That put the market back on a bullish price trend above that running moving average.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...019_thumb1.png


Currently, despite the sharp rally from the December 24th lows, the market remains in a downtrend and below the 200-dma. Such continues to suggest the correction remains intact and a retest of lows is likely over the next couple of months.

This complies with my statement from last week:
"In order for the bulls to regain control of the market narrative, it will require a push back above the November highs and the 200-dma. Only then can the 'bear market correction of 2018' be officially declared 'dead.'"

However, given that "no one" can actually predict the future with any degree of accuracy, all we can do is make some educated guesses about where the markets go over the next few months. The chart below represents the four of the most probable outcomes out of a multitude of possibilities (In other words, these are my "best guesses" as to where prices head to next).
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...819_thumb1.png


Pathway #1: While this is the most "hoped" for outcome, it is also the one with the lowest probability of coming to fruition. While there is a reasonable argument to be made provided Central Bank liquidity continues, the Administration drops the "trade war" rhetoric, and the Government "shut down" ends, there is a tremendous amount of downward pressure on prices currently keeping probabilities low. (Probability 10%)


Pathway #2: Given the extreme overbought condition of the market, a pullback is likely. The most bullish would be a retest of the Oct/November lows that works off the short-term overbought condition. This would provide the best opportunity for a push above the 200-dma. Given the overbought short-term condition of the market, the compressed rise in prices, and extension from the lows, a correction is likely to entail a bigger draw down. (Probability 20%)


Pathway #3: Like Pathway #2, it is likely the market pulls back but breaks the previous support line instead. Such leads to additional selling pressure but the market finds support at the previous 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level. Such would set the market up for a subsequent rally, but the odds are the rally will fail at the 200-dma keeping downward pressure on the markets near-term. (Probability 40%)


Pathway #4: Is a resumption of the "bear market" trend in the weeks ahead that retest lows much like what was seen during the 2015-2016 correction process. (Probability 30%)


I know. That isn't really helpful in terms of positioning near term, but the reality is that, currently, the majority of outcomes still lean to the "bearish"side of the ledger.

1. Price dynamics remain weak.
2. Volume on the rally has been extremely weak.
3. Fundamentals continue to weaken.
4. Economic data continues to deteriorate.
5. The rally gives the Federal Reserve room to return to a more "hawkish" stance.
6. Furthermore, the Fed is still set to reduce its balance sheet by $17 billion in January; $46 billion in February; $34 billion in March, and the Fed Funds target range will remain at 2.25-2.50 over the same period.
7. Despite rumors, there is little evidence currently the White House will back off of tariffs, back down from the "border wall" to end the shutdown, and the Democrats are extremely unlikely to go along with an infrastructure bill until Trump is out of the "Oval Office" in 2020.

ZeroHedge had a very good summation on these points as well.

"There are three things, among others, that leap out to me as problematic for a seamless return to the Goldilocks scenario:

1. We used to marvel at how markets were willing and able to ignore geopolitical events. I don't think that's any longer possible let alone likely. Populism and cross-border distrust has only gotten worse.
2. Two years ago volatility was actively suppressed and you were able to set your portfolio on autopilot. I don't think the central banks have the firepower anymore to pull this off and the impetus to supplement with fiscal stimulus just isn't there.
3. There is also more credible discussion of the probability of recessions. Forward-looking indicators in the U.S. have disappointed. In 2017, the Fed was able to slip in three rate hikes without the market batting an eye. Now the discussion has swung around to policy mistakes and inverting yield curves.
4. As a bonus worry, government dysfunction in general is appalling and getting worse. It's much harder to be optimistic we are just going through a rough patch for the global order of things. Shutdowns and fraying coalitions seem to have become the norm.

None of this might be today's actionable news. But it's important to keep reminding yourself that there is nothing static about global realities nor what, in the long run, are reliable correlations and havens. While not learning from the past is folly, forgetting the context of the moment is equally dangerous."


Conclusion
There is no doubt the rally from the recent lows has been "breathtaking."
However, as noted, the rally is currently running in defiance of the underlying fundamentals which are likely to "matter" sooner rather than later.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...5_1_thumb1.jpg

With earnings season underway, there is support in the short-term for asset prices, but remember that earnings are only beating sharply downgraded estimates (This is the equivalent of companies scoring a 71 after the level for an "A" was reduced from 90 to 70).
While the S&P 500 recovered more than half of its prior bear-market loss in only 17 days, this type of rally is often met with short-term weakness.

The weight of evidence suggests a retest of support at which time portfolios can be re-evaluated.
However, while many are suggesting the "bear market" is now officially over, the reality is that it is entirely too soon to make such a commitment. The current rally remains within an overall downtrend and is entirely consistent with the beginnings, not the endings, of more major bear market cycles.

We continue to run our portfolios with higher levels of cash, fixed income, and tighter stops on our current long-equity exposure until such time as the weight of evidence suggests differently.

See you next week.

The Real 401(k) Plan Manager
A Conservative Strategy For Long-Term Investors
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...9-1_thumb1.png

There are four steps to allocation changes based on 25% reduction increments. As noted in the chart above, a 100% allocation level is equal to 60% stocks. I never advocate being 100% out of the market as it is far too difficult to reverse course when the market changes from a negative to a positive trend. Emotions keep us from taking the correct action.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...ift_thumb1.png

The Rally Continues
As I noted last week:

"This week, the market is indeed pushing up into short-term overbought levels and is testing the underside of important previous resistance.
One thing to note in the chart above is the horizontal dotted line that I have had drawn on the chart for the past 18-months. I noted originally that the markets break above the long-term trend channel would eventually be challenged. The recent correction has challenged that important level, if we break that confluence of support, we will be in a much more important bear market cycle."

That continues to be the case this week, and the current rally is pushing into exhaustion territory.
On Monday, take some action with respect to the following, if you haven't already:

1. If you are overweight equities, reduce international, emerging market, mid-, and small-capitalization funds on any rally next week. Reduce overall portfolio weights to 75% of your selected allocation target.
2. If you are underweight equities, reduce international, emerging market, mid-, and small-capitalization funds on any rally next week but hold everything else for now.
3. If you are at target equity allocations, hold for now.

Continue to use rallies to reduce risk towards a target level with which you are comfortable. Remember, this model is not ABSOLUTE - it is just a guide to follow.

Unfortunately, since 401(k) plans don't offer a lot of flexibility and have trading restrictions in many cases, we have to minimize our movement and try and make sure we are catching major turning points.

We want to make sure that we are indeed within a bigger correction cycle before reducing our risk exposure further.

Current 401(k) Allocation Model
The 401(k) plan allocation plan below follows the K.I.S.S. principle. By keeping the allocation extremely simplified, it allows for better control of the allocation and a closer tracking to the benchmark objective over time. (If you want to make it more complicated you can, however, statistics show that simply adding more funds does not increase performance to any great degree).
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...8-2_thumb1.png


401(k) Choice Matching List
The list below shows sample 401(k) plan funds for each major category. In reality, the majority of funds all track their indices fairly closely. Therefore, if you don't see your exact fund listed, look for a fund that is similar in nature.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...ist_thumb1.png

Editor's Note: The summary bullets for this article were chosen by Seeking Alpha editors.



Comments124 | + Follow

Lance, one quick question...the dollar amount of the balance sheet drawdowns for Jan, Feb, Mar you mention seems not consistent with the $50 billion per month plan. Where did these numbers come from? Thanks
20 Jan 2019, 07:47 AMReply2Like
https://static3.seekingalpha.com/ima.../small_pic.png
TimNeuman
Comments2712 | + Follow
The oft-repeated $50 B is a 'cap', i.e., it would never exceed that amount. My understanding is that the Fed has never actually reached that amount in any month. As is the case with much of the lazy and sloppy journalism one sees at CNBC, for example, this point has always been missed.


20 Jan 2019, 09:20 AMReply1Like
https://static.seekingalpha.com/imag.../small_pic.png
Brad Denny
Comments197 | + Follow
Very fine, historically and numerically based analysis (as opposed to opinion). Thank you.

20 Jan 2019, 09:27 AMReply1Like
https://static1.seekingalpha.com/ima.../small_pic.png
TheDudeInvests
Comments776 | + Follow
Forgive my redundancy - however - the outcome of the Central Bankers Grand Experiment is a complete unknown. We have NO historic data to model. All the great minds of our time can do is speculate, compare, and hypothesize. There are many offshoots of QE that are yet to be uncovered. Economists have no idea what the end results will be.


20 Jan 2019, 09:30 AM

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...cial-us-policy

Authored by Erik D'Amato via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity,
If there’s one thing everyone in today’s Washington can agree on, it’s that whenever an official or someone being paid by the government says something truly outrageous or dangerous, there should be consequences, if only a fleeting moment of media fury.
With one notable exception: Arguing that the US should be quietly working to promote the violent disintegration and carving up of the largest country on Earth.
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b...s/nato-war.jpg


Because so much of the discussion around US-Russian affairs is marked by hysteria and hyperbole, you are forgiven for assuming this is an exaggeration. Unfortunately it isn’t. Published in the Hill under the dispassionate title “Managing Russia’s dissolution,” author Janusz Bugajski makes the case that the West should not only seek to contain “Moscow’s imperial ambitions” but to actively seek the dismemberment of Russia as a whole.

Engagement, criticism and limited sanctions have simply reinforced Kremlin perceptions that the West is weak and predictable. To curtail Moscow’s neo-imperialism a new strategy is needed, one that nourishes Russia’s decline and manages the international consequences of its dissolution.

Like many contemporary cold warriors, Bugajski toggles back and forth between overhyping Russia’s might and its weaknesses, notably a lack of economic dynamism and a rise in ethnic and regional fragmentation. But his primary argument is unambiguous: That the West should actively stoke longstanding regional and ethnic tensions with the ultimate aim of a dissolution of the Russian Federation, which Bugajski dismisses as an “imperial construct.”
The rationale for dissolution should be logically framed: In order to survive, Russia needs a federal democracy and a robust economy; with no democratization on the horizon and economic conditions deteriorating, the federal structure will become increasingly ungovernable...

To manage the process of dissolution and lessen the likelihood of conflict that spills over state borders, the West needs to establish links with Russia’s diverse regions and promote their peaceful transition toward statehood.

Even more alarming is Bugajski’s argument that the goal should not be self-determination for breakaway Russian territories, but the annexing of these lands to other countries. “Some regions could join countries such as Finland, Ukraine, China and Japan, from whom Moscow has forcefully appropriated territories in the past.”

It is, needless to say, impossible to imagine anything like this happening without sparking a series of conflicts that could mirror the Yugoslav Wars. Except in this version the US would directly culpable in the ignition of the hostilities, and in range of 6,800 Serbian nuclear warheads.

So who is Janusz Bugajski, and who is he speaking for?
The author bio on the Hill’s piece identifies him as a senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, a Washington, D.C. think-tank. But CEPA is no ordinary talk shop: Instead of the usual foundations and well-heeled individuals, its financial backers seem to be mostly arms of the US government, including the Department of State, the Department of Defense, the US Mission to NATO, the US-government-sponsored National Endowment for Democracy, as well as as veritable who's who of defense contractors, including Raytheon, Bell Helicopter, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin and Textron. Meanwhile, Bugajski chairs the South-Central Europe area studies program at the Foreign Service Institute of the US Department of State.


To put it in perspective, it is akin to a Russian with deep ties to the Kremlin and arms-makers arguing that the Kremlin needed to find ways to break up the United States and, if possible, have these breakaway regions absorbed by Mexico and Canada. (A scenario which alas is not as far-fetched as it might have been a few years ago; many thousands in California now openly talk of a “Calexit,” and many more in Mexico of a reconquista.)
Meanwhile, it’s hard to imagine a quasi-official voice like Bugajski’s coming out in favor of a similar policy vis-a-vis China, which has its own restive regions, and which in geopolitical terms is no more or less of a threat to the US than Russia. One reason may be that China would consider an American call for secession by the Tibetans or Uyghurs to be a serious intrusion into their internal affairs, unlike Russia, which doesn’t appear to have noticed or been ruffled by Bugajski’s immodest proposal.


Indeed, just as the real scandal in Washington is what's legal rather than illegal, the real outrage in this case is that few or none in DC finds Bugajski’s virtual declaration of war notable.


But it is. It is the sort of provocation that international incidents are made of, and if you are a US taxpayer, it is being made in your name, and it should be among your outrages of the month.

COMMENTS FROM BENJAMINIS: The EVIL Continues...

https://www.theburningplatform.com/2...e/#more-190482

On Thursday Buzzfeed News delivered the latest “bombshell” Russiagate report to fizzle within 24 hours of its publication, a pattern that is now so consistent that I’ve personally made a practice of declining to comment on such stories until a day or two after their release. “BOOM!” tweets were issued by #Resistance pundits on Twitter, “If true this means X, Y and Z” bloviations were made on mass media punditry panels, and for about 20 hours Russiagaters everywhere were riding the high of their lives, giddy with the news that President Trump had committed an impeachable felony by ordering Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about a proposed Trump office tower in Moscow, a proposal which died within weeks and the Kremlin never touched.


Then the entire story came crashing down when Mueller’s office took the extremely rare step of issuing an unequivocal statement that the Buzzfeed story was wrong, writing simply, “BuzzFeed’s description of specific statements to the special counsel’s office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen’s congressional testimony are not accurate.”

According to journalist and economic analyst Doug Henwood, the print New York Times covered the Buzzfeed report on its front page when the story broke, but the report on Mueller’s correction the next day was shoved back to page 11. This appalling journalistic malpractice makes it very funny that NYT’s Wajahat Ali had the gall to tweet, “Unlike the Trump administration, journalists are fact checking and willing to correct the record if the Buzzfeed story is found inaccurate. Not really the actions of a deep state and enemy of the people, right?”

This is the behavior of a media class that is interested in selling narratives, not reporting truth. And yet the mass media talking heads are all telling us today that we must continue to trust them.

“Those trying to tar all media today aren’t interested in improving journalism but protecting themselves,” tweeted NBC’s Chuck Todd. “There’s a lot more accountability in media these days than in our politics. We know we live in a glass house, we hope the folks we cover are as self aware.”

“Mueller didn’t do the media any favors tonight, and he did do the president one,” griped the odious Chris Cuomo on CNN. “Because as you saw with Rudy Giuliani and as I’m sure you’ll see with the president himself, this allows them to say ‘You can’t believe it! You can’t believe what you read, you can’t believe what you hear! You can only believe us. Even the Special Counsel says that the media doesn’t get it right.’”


“The larger message that a lot of people are going to take from this story is that the news media are a bunch of leftist liars who are dying to get the president, and they’re willing to lie to do it, and I don’t think that’s true” said Jeffrey Toobin on a CNN panel, adding “I just think this is a bad day for us.”

The mass media, including pro-Trump mass media like Fox News, absolutely deserves to be distrusted. It has earned that distrust. It had earned that distrust already with its constant promotion of imperialist wars and an oligarch-friendly status quo, and it has earned it even more with its frenzied promotion of a narrative engineered to manufacture consent for a preexisting agenda to shove Russia off the world stage.


The mainstream media absolutely is the enemy of the people; just because Trump says it doesn’t mean it’s not true. The only reason people don’t rise up and use the power of their numbers to force the much-needed changes that need to happen in our world is because they are being propagandized to accept the status quo day in and day out by the mass media’s endless cultural engineering project.

They are the reason why wars go unopposed, why third parties never gain traction, why people consent to money hemorrhaging upward to the wealthiest of the wealthy while everyone else struggles to survive. The sooner people wake up from the perverse narrative matrix of the plutocratic media, the better.


-----------------------------------------------------
The corrupt establishment will do anything to suppress sites like the Burning Platform from revealing the truth. The corporate media does this by demonetizing sites like mine by blackballing the site from advertising revenue. If you get value from this site, please keep it running with a donation.
https://www.paypalobjects.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif




COMMENTS FROM BENJAMINIS: WE THE PEOPLE ...

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index2767.htm

January 20, 2019
Child’s Secret Message From Trump To Putin Halts Russia’s Planned Destruction Of US Warship


By: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers


A jaw-dropping new Ministry of Defense (MoD) report circulating in the Kremlin today states that the planned electronic-destruction of the USS Donald Cook that’s just sailed into the Black Sea was ordered halted by President Putin after the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) analyzed as “highly probable” a warning issued by top President Trump associate Roger Stone that a coup to throw Trump from power and install Hillary Clinton as president is underway—a plot, however, whose doubts about were raised within the SVR during the confirmation hearing for Trump’s new US Attorney General William Barr when he had his 8-year-old grandson Liam sit behind him and conspicuously display a note in child’s handwriting with the words “I think Rusha's people are fine...it is the government is the problem”. [Note: Some words and/or phrases appearing in quotes in this report are English language approximations of Russian words/phrases having no exact counterpart.]

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/bark1.jpg

William Barr has grandson display message (above) warning American “Deep State” government is “problem”, not the Russian people

According to this report, in April-2014, the leftist-socialist Obama Regime provocatively ordered the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS Donald Cook to sail into the Russian-protected waters of the Black Sea—with it then being met with superior Russian electronic countermeasures that left it dead in the water, and its crew so demoralized, 27 of them requested to be relieved from active service.


With credible coup threats against President Trump becoming harder to ignore, with some warning he may only have 11-days left in power, this report continues, the assaults against him have accelerated over the past few days with the “Deep State” aligned Washington Post publishing an article titled “The Shabbiest U.S. President Ever Is An Inexpressibly Sad Specimen”—the equally “Deep State” aligned MSNBC cable news network warning their leftist-socialist viewers that Trump is preparing to order his tens-of-millions of supporters into the streets of the US to start a civil war—and top Democrat Party US Congressman Eric Swalwell declaring “all evidence I’ve seen shows Trump is a Russian agent”—a convoluted mangling of logic as his “evidence” needs no proof with his stating all he has is “I haven’t seen a single piece of evidence that he’s not”—all of which were followed by someone of not sound mind thinking it would be a good idea to sail the USS Donald Cook back into the Black Sea where, like in 2014, Russian military forces are prepared to destroy it.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/bark2.jpg

With the war between President Trump and his “Deep State” enemies threatening to explode into a global conflagration, this report notes, Trump appointed William Barr to be his US Attorney General—with virtually none of the American people knowing that Barr is a feared CIA master operative who has rampaged through the “Deep State” establishment for decades protecting both his intelligence agency and US presidents from all threats and investigations—while at the same time, keeping the US and former Soviet Union from blowing each other up by keeping hidden all of their secrets.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/bark3.png

In US Attorney General nominee William Barr having his grandson Liam display a message showing he had no animosity towards Russia, this report details, he then truthfully told his US Senate questioners that China, not Russia, was the greatest threat facing the United States—a position that’s grounded in his deep Christian faith that, in 1992, led him to blast America’s public schools for no longer providing moral instruction, with his asserting that public schools had undergone a “moral lobotomy” he blamed on “extremist notions of separation of church and state”—and his, also in 1992, attacking “modern secularists” for ushering in cultural decline and his remarking “the secularists of today are clearly fanatics” and stating “to the extent that a society’s moral culture is based on God’s law, it will guide men toward the best possible life”.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/bark4.png

With America having now having become the world’s new “socialist frontier”—a great historical irony as that unlike the Russian people who understood the perils of socialism and fought the Bolsheviks in a bloody three-year civil war that by some estimates took fifteen million lives, the freedom-loving Americans keep voting themselves into socialism, this report concludes, President Putin has determined that with the feared master CIA operative William Barr by his side, President Trump will not only be able to survive the “Deep State” coup plot threat against him, but also win reelection next year—an assessment confirmed as being true by Lord Ashcroft who runs the globally respected Lord Ashcroft Polls organization in London—and whose just released poll of over 15,000 Americans shows Trump’s hopes of securing six more years in the White Houseare actually being boosted as Democrats stage a Jeremy Corbyn-style lurch towards socialism—with his explicitly stating: “Young Democrats blinded by their hatred of the Donald risk picking a presidential candidate so Left-wing that all they will guarantee is six more years of Trump”.

http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/bark5.jpg

January 20, 2019 EU and US all rights reserved. Permission to use this report in its entirety is granted under the condition it is linked back to its original source at WhatDoesItMean.Com. Freebase content licensed under CC-BY and GFDL.

Good Morning Mr. Benjamin,

Wondering if you have the "Money Flow Trading Method" as a strategy described anywhere in this thread? Posting a collection of articles has been helpful to stay on top of current news but I would be curious about the "trading method" aspect on how you leverage this information into your own trading strategy.

p.s. I am currently investigating the "Money Coming In and Money Going Out" concept that is imprinted on compelling Price Movements (i.e. Divergence from Mean) hence the question.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-...ops+to+zero%29

Authored by Jennifer Sherlock via ValueWalk.com,
Rather than carrying around cash and cards, you can just tap your phone to pay. Currently, the three most established systems are from Apple, Samsung and Google. Mobile payment systems use a method called tokenization to keep card details secure. Once you add your card to the app, it generates a virtual account number, and your real card is never given to the merchant. The card network then verifies the payment. If you lose your phone, all three allow you to remotely wipe the device which will also remove all of your card details. So if waving your phone like a wand to make a payment at your favorite store doesn’t wow you, the solution may be right under your nose. But what will make this futuristic technology that is already present, even better?


First it was automated tellers in 1969, and now fifty years later there is another change, and it’s not in traditional banking.
Bitcoin ATMs are now being used to transact in Bitcoin for all those who have ever been a bit curious about cryptocurrency.
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KryptoNatasha [CC BY-SA 4.0], from Wikimedia Commons

These ATMs are on the rise, and right in your own backyard. They’re on spots like Liberties Parcel, The Bourse Building, Queen Village Food Market, and restaurants like Spread Bagelry at 36th and Chestnut, and Cavanaugh’s Rittenhouse.

Yes, there is Apple Pay, and credit card chips, but now there is cryptocurrency. The first Bitcoin ATM went into service in 2013, and now there are more than 4,000 Bitcoin ATMs worldwide according to coinatmradar.com.

More than half of them are in the U.S., and 70 right here in Philadelphia.
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Bitcoin ATMs don’t require users to have a traditional checking, or savings account. People can insert cash, and instantly buy Bitcoin. A small but growing number of ATMs are also dispensing cash when customers sell their Bitcoin. That’s important for lower income areas where many American families don’t believe in traditional banks because of the high fees.

Managing Partner of Straight Up Capital, Sean Keefe, said,
“E-commerce is over. Cryptocurrency is the future. Companies like Overstock.com are only doing Bitcoin transactions, and other digital conglomerates like Amazon, and Facebook know the war chest is coming. Just like aol.com was a brand name in the mid-90’s, Bitcoin is just the start of many brands to come that will offer the same service. It’s only a matter of time before everyone will have a Bitcoin option on their mobile devices.”


So why are users in support of the new cryptocurrency?

1. Processing fees are less than credit card transactions.
2. Once the transaction is complete, it’s final.
3. Get money in real time. Don’t have to wait to have access to funds.

Many Bitcoin ATM users are using the machines to send money overseas, and to avoid international wire fees.