Michael Lombardi: One
basic rule of economics states that when the demand increases for an
item and supply for that same item declines, its price usually
increases. Let’s apply this to the gold This is a story of how the big
banks pulled gold prices from under our feet, but why their plan for the stock market won’t pan out…
When gold bullion prices went into semi-crash mode in late spring of this year, some stories written by financial analysts suggest big banks colluding together to bring gold bullion prices crashing down. If you remember, The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) came out with a report saying gold bullion prices would go down…and magically, they did!
At about the same time Goldman Sachs gave a “sell” recommendation on gold bullion, JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM) was selling gold bullion on the paper market. The plunge in gold bullion prices started in April—but JPMorgan was selling gold
since the beginning of the year. From January to April, the big bank’s
house account had a net short position of 14,749 100-ounce COMEX gold
contracts—or about 1.47 million ounces of gold bullion. (Source: “Year to Date Delivery Notices,” CME Clearing, August 19, 2013.)
I’ll be the first to admit it: the gold bullion price takedown that started in April sure looks and smells fishy.
Once the sell-off in gold bullion began, no one cared about demand or supply (the reason why gold bullion
prices increase or decline). The fundamentals were thrown out the
window. Irrationality and emotions took over, and investors ran for the
exit.
Gold bullion prices have started to climb back up. They are above $1,300 an ounce and marching towards the next big level at $1,400.
The gold “play” is over for the big banks; they’re onto something else—the stock market.
The wave of optimism towards the stock market continues to gain momentum. Big banks are telling us the stock market is going to go higher.
Some calling for higher stock prices say earnings are good, some say
valuations are good, some say the economy is improving, and others say
investors will move out of the bond market and into the stock market.
Goldman Sachs says the S&P 500 will increase eight percent in the
next 12 months. Its target for the S&P 500 is 1,825. Its reason:
economic growth will pick up its pace. (Source: Bloomberg, August 13,
2013.)
When I look at Goldman Sachs’ latest prediction, I have two questions: Will it and other big banks be right on the stock market like they were on gold?
Economist Dr. Paul
Craig Roberts says the U.S. is trying to gain global support for the
U.S. dollar through trade deals. Not every country thinks the U.S. wi…
Kerry speech to press about Syria Evidence of chemical weapons strike in Syria ‘undeniable’ YouTu
The U.S. will hit the $16.7 trillion debt ceiling in
mid-October, Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew said in a letter urging
Congress to raise the limit “as soon as possible.”
“Extraordinary measures are projected to be exhausted in the middle of October,” Lew said in the letter today to House Speaker John Boehner and other lawmakers.
“At that point, the United States will
have reached the limit of its borrowing authority, and Treasury would
be left to fund the government with only the cash we have on hand on any
given day,” he said. He said the cash balance at that time is forecast
to be about $50 billion.
The Treasury Department had earlier said it probably will be able to
finance government operations by using special accounting measures until
after Congress returns Sept. 9 from its recess. Lew said Aug. 22 a
failure by Congress to raise the debt limit would “have disastrous
effects for our nation” and could put at risk payments to Social
Security recipients and veterans.
Boehner said last month the Republicans wouldn’t increase the debt
ceiling “without real cuts in spending” that would achieve a further
reduction in the deficit. Lew has said the Obama administration won’t
negotiate on the debt limit.
The Bipartisan Policy Center, a nonprofit research group, has
estimated that the U.S. will reach the point where it is unable to pay
its bills sometime between mid-October and mid-November unless Congress
increases the limit. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-26/lew-tells-congress-treasury-will-hit-debt-limit-in-mid-october.html
In a letter to
congressional leaders, Lew said his department will soon run out of the
accounting maneuvers it’s been using to stave off default.
“Congress should act as soon as possible to protect America’s good
credit by extending normal borrowing authority well before any risk of
default becomes imminent,” Lew said in his letter.
The deadline, sooner than what some other forecasters had estimated,
comes amid concern that Congress has no plan for handling the needed
increase in what promises to be a contentious debate between Republicans
and Democrats.
The Obama administration has said it will not negotiate over raising the government’s borrowing limit.
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stocks closed lower in
light volume Monday after Secretary of State John Kerry called Syria’s
actions ‘inexcusable’ and a report said the U.S. would hit its debt
limit in October.
Stocks had been modestly higher after a downbeat U.S. economic
report did little to change the belief that the Federal Reserve would
likely tighten monetary policy in September.
“The market is trying to build in ahead of time” the consensus
view that the central bank would begin cutting back on its $85 billion
in monthly bond purchases next month, and if not then, in December,
Randy Frederick, managing director of active trading and derivatives at
Charles Schwab, said of Wall Street’s pullback the past three weeks.
Stock indexes fell to session lows after Kerry told a nationally televised news conference that
the United States would hold Syria’s government accountable for using
chemical weapons. “By any standard it is inexcusable,” said Kerry of
last week’s attack that the Syrian opposition said killed more than
1,300 people.
All indicators are pointing to an event occurring this fall. The gun
bill, UN arms treaty are all pending in the senate sitting there waiting
for something to happen, the FED and financial institutions are
continually reminding the world that the BIS wants all central banks to
taper come this fall to avoid massive bubbles they are creating and to
avoid an economic collapse. War is coming to cover up the economic collapse
1. The paid mercenary (syrian free army) are losing ground and
Assad’s army has retaken the city of Homs and now moving onto Aleppo.
2. The US has been holding aerial drills with Israel
3. Israel has been conducting nighttime parachute drills
4. The fiscal year for providing the paid mercenaries with weapons ends Sept 30.
5. The US government has been strategically preparing for WWIII. Biden says the US will remain in the Asia-Pacific region. They
are creating an Arc around China by positioning military assets around
the pacific. America’s most capable all-around air weapon, the F-35,
will be deployed first in the Pacific once it achieves Initial Operating
Capability (IOC), Carlisle said. Air Force F-35s probably will head to
four bases: Misawa, Japan; Kadena, Japan; Osan Air Base, Korea; and
Kunsan Air Base, Korea.
6. The US government is now providing Philippines with military assets in exchange for the use of the island to rotate US armed troops and equipment to secure the pacific region from threats.
7. Japan now has the authority to act against China if provoked.
8. Israel’s navy is now installing a new defense system on its missile boats, the Barak eight systems on its Saar 5 missile boatsthat would protect them from the feared Yakhont Russian anti-ship missile
9. The Russian have setup a base in Armenia and installed missiles that can reach Syria
10. Russia are quietly trying to renew their request to set up an air and naval base in Cyprus with the goal of being better able to deploy troops to Syria
11. We have seen countless drills, US and Japan, US and South Korea,
US and Israel, Russia and China all countries flexing their muscles.
12. Japan just built the largest warship since
world war II. They started building this ship in 2009 and now it is
complete just in time and it just so happens that Japan a pacifist
country (strongly and actively opposed to conflict and especially war)
needs a warship of this magnitude. Part 1 Of The Economic Collapse This Fall
As we know the central bankers are in a tough spot, if they continue
with the money printing the bubbles they are creating are going to
eventually pop and the world will see an economic collapse like it has
never seen before. If the central bankers ease off and start to taper
the world will see an economic collapse, not as bad as all the bubbles
popping at once but bad enough that people will want to blame someone
for this collapse. The advantage that the central bankers see by
tapering is that they think they have control over the collapse. Leading
up to the first part of the collapse the US government has been working
hard to remove the people’s rights and to put into place security to
control the people during this period.
1. Rights of the people have been completely taken away
2. NSA spying on all Americans, tracking keeping tabs on everyone and
placing them on lists to be dealt with during the collapse.
3. DHS in place to deal with the American people when the collapse occurs.
4. The US government has succesfully passed laws that take the rights
away from the people. The NDAA, Patriot Act, Miranda Exception Rule,
Declaring whistle-blowers as traitors etc. The Gun Bill and UN arms
treaty that are pending in the senate waiting for the right event to
have these passed will allow the government control over the one thing
they are most scared of, an armed people.
5. The government needs to control the flow of information, they
already control the mainstream media the internet is the prize. With the
executive order taking control over all communications ans CISPA
pending in the senate, which is waiting for an event to occur so it will
be passed will give the government complete control over the internet
and they will have the ability it down whenever they need to.
The FED along with the government will proceed with tapering in the
fall, all indicators will show that the economy is improving,
unemployment, GDP and inflation look good. The FED will announce that
they will start to taper and before they have the ability to there will
be some type of false flag event that will occur. It could be a cyber
attack on the banks. Using a cyber attack from another country will
allow the banks to close, bail-ins to occur and the entire collapse can
be blamed on another country such as Syria. The focus would be off of
the US and the FED and the blame shifted away to another country. To
remedy this situation the FED will now need to increase the amount of QE
to two times the current amount. Now the FED will be monetizing the
debt at a rate of a 170 billion a month.
During this time the US government will now have what it needs to
wage war on Syria since they are the cause of the economic collapse of
the US. The banks would now need to freeze bank accounts and since
bailouts are not allowed under the Resolving Globally Active, Systemically Important, Financial Institutions document.
Many of the banks have changed their TOS and they are not responsible
for money that is lost due to cyber attacks and the officers and
representatives can not be held responsible.
As the US prepares for war, the US economy and the world starts to
degrade and goes into a depression spiral. War starts to breakout all
over the world, Russia, China, Japan, North Korea and other nations get
involved. WWIII has begun and it allowed the economic collapse to be
covered up.
US national debt can travel from the earth to the sun and back a stunning 83 times. JS Kim zerohedge.com
original artwork above courtesy of @williambanzai7
The first signs of hyperinflation have arrived. As I will explain
later in this article, it began last week with the meeting of POTUS
Obama and his most supportive lobby, the banking industry. Just a few
months into Obama’s first term as US President in early 2009, I penned
an article, “8 Reasons Why the Obama Administration Will Not Solve this Crisis by the End of 2009.”
Although the title of that article title sounds absurd today, idol
worship was so high of Obama immediately following his election not only
in the US but all across Europe, that media commentators across the
world were implying, and sometimes matter-of-factly stating, that Obama
would be well on his way to solving the global monetary crisis by the
end of his first year as POTUS. In direct opposition to the media love
affair with Obama, shortly after his election in 2008, I objectively
studied Obama’s support of a massive bailout plan for banks in his first
months of service and his freshly minted appointments of Timothy
Geithner, William Daley, William Donaldson, Robert Rubin, Roger Ferguson
and Paul Volcker to his economic advisory board and key cabinet
positions. Based upon my findings, I concluded that beyond a shadow of a
doubt, banking cronyism would expand, multiply, and go unprosecuted under Obama’s watch.
The Obama administration has given a lot of lip service with zero
follow-through to prosecution of criminal banking behavior, the most
recent being AG Eric Holder’s following very empty promise: “Let me be very, very, very clear…if we find a bank or a financial institution that has done something wrong…those cases will be brought”(emphasis not only mine but Holder’s as well!)
Unfortunately since that time, though numerous indisputable cases of
banking criminal behavior have been uncovered and presented to Holder,
Holder has shown no spine or willingness to enforce his prior promise.
As a consequence of the refusal of the top attorney in the United States
to enforce the rule of law and to prosecute industry-wide criminal
banking activity, the first signs of hyperinflation have arrived.
The real national debt, despite having been falsely frozen at the
falsely advertised figure of $16.699 trillion for more than 90
consecutive days for no other reason than it has reached the designated
limit, clocks in at a whopping $220 trillion
if you include all unfunded, off-balance liabilities such as Medicare
and Social Security (Source: Economist Laurence Kotlikoff). original artwork above courtesy of @williambanzai7
Furthermore, this figure of true national debt does not even feel
obscene in relative terms once you consider that the Alan
Greenspan/Robert Rubin/Bill Clinton administration let the global
derivative market run unregulated in the name of multi-billion dollar
short-term profits to bankers and irresponsibly explode into the
unresolvable $1,200,000,000,000,000 to $1,500,000,000,000,000 market
that exists today. Let it be known for the record that CFTC Chairman Brooksley Born urgently lobbied for strict regulations of the globa...
and warned Summers and Greenspan that letting bankers exploit
derivatives for profit at the expense of sound banking principles would
create the very crisis we are suffering today. What was Born’s reward
for such a prescient and wise prediction? A cussing out and screaming
fest courtesy of Larry Summers (from Born’s own testimoney) and a forced
resignation by Summers and Greenspan. Yes, the same Larry Summers that
President Obama has adamantly defended and is Obama’s first choice to
supplant Ben Bernanke as the next chairman of the Rothschilds Private
Bank (aka the Federal Reserve).
Neither the government lies about the the unchanging nature of the
“official” national debt for over 90 consecutive days now nor the
government lies about the true scope of the national debt is stunning.
What is stunning, however, is just how gigantic is the US National Debt
when you start putting the figure in relatable terms. No one really
understands how incredibly large is a sum of $1 billion, let alone a
trillion or a couple hundred trillion, so it helps to illustrate the
absurdity of this unresolvable debt by painting this debt in a different
light. Let’s assume for argument’s sake that the estimate of $220
trillion of real US national debt is too aggressive (although Kotlikoff
insists this figure is accurate) and counter estimates of $100 trillion
are too conservative. Let’s split the difference and say the true US
national debt is $160 trillion dollars. If one were to lay $1 bills side
by side, a current US National Debt of $160 trillion would reach from
the earth to the moon 239,000 miles away not 100 times, not 500 times,
not 1000 times, not even 10,000 times, but 32,358 TIMES AND BACK. Our
national debt would travel to the sun 93 million miles away AND BACK,
not just once, not just twice, not 10 times, not even an unfathomable 50
times, but EIGHTY-THREE complete round trips! Explained a third way, if
you were driving the fastest commercial car in the world (as concluded
by Top Gear test drivers; make sure you check out the link here to the
awe-inspiring Pagani Huayra test drive), the Pagani Huayra,
continuously at its top speed of 372 kms/hour and never, for not even
one-second, let up on this top speed and never stopped to change the
tires, it would take you until the year 9643 (or more than 7,629 YEARS)
before you would pass the last dollar bill of US national debt laid out
side by side in 1$ bills. Finally, if you were an alien capable of
flying your UFO at the speed of light (670.6 MILLION miles per hour),
you would not pass the last dollar of US debt until 23 hours, 1 minute,
and 14 seconds later (if the entire debt were laid out side by side in
$1 bills)! These FACTS should alert any reasonable logical man, woman
and child that massive inflation is the fate of the USD in future years.
This simple fact should also alert you to why so many Asians have
been buying gold like it is going out of style ever since the April 12,
2013 banker raid on the paper gold derivatives markets, and why I find
it so amusing that some Western financial journalists still question
whether or not the latest surge in gold and silver prices is just a
“dead-cat” bounce. It is quite obvious that journalists that write about
gold and silver tanking again have never sspent one minute inside any
Asian country, especially during the last five months, where I have
personally witnessed manic physical (NOT paper) gold buying in
Singapore, Hong Kong, China and Thailand. While true, that the global
fiat currency breakdown and real gold and silver money takeoff will be
disorderly and very volatile, there is no question that we are still in
the midst of a massive gold and silver bull run. And what happened on
April 12? US President Barack Obama held a closed-door, off-limits
meeting in the White House with the following 15 globalist bankers:
Lloyd Blankfein, Chairman and CEO Goldman Sachs Jacques Brand, CEO Deutsche Bank Michael Corbat, Chief Executive Officer Citigroup Jamie Dimon, Chairman, CEO and President J.P. Morgan Chase Sergio Ermotti, CEO UBS James Gorman, Chairman and CEO Morgan Stanley Gerald Hassell, Chairman and CEO Bank of New York Mellon Corporation Jay Hooley, Chairman, President and CEO State Street Corporation Abby Johnson, President, Fidelity Financial Services, Fidelity Investments Steve Kandarian, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO Metlife Brian Moynihan, President and CEO Bank of America/Merrill Lynch John Strangfeld, CEO, Prudential John Stumpf, Chairman, President and CEO Wells Fargo Jim Weddle, Managing Partner, Edward Jones Bob Benmosche, President and CEO American International Group
Just hours after this meeting, the bankers flooded the gold
derivative markets with 400 tonnes of paper (non-existent physical)
gold, and the infamous banker gold price raid of 2013 was on its way.
Last week, on August 19, 2013, Obama met with the following banking
industry regulators:
Securities and Exchange Commission’s Jo White Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s Gary Gensler Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Richard Cordray Rothschilds Private Bank’s (U.S. Federal Reserve) Ben Bernanke Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s Thomas J. Curry Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s Martin J. Gruenberg Federal Housing Finance Agency’s Edward DeMarco The National Credit Union Administration’s Debbie Matz US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew
Immediately after this meeting was announced, fierce speculation that
gold was about to get slammed yet again predominated internet gold
forums. We immediately countered that speculation on our twitter feed
by suggesting that this meeting was NOT about slamming gold prices but
about fowarding the agenda to seize assets from within the US global
banking system, “Cyprus” style, to recapitalize failing US banks.
Sure enough, not only did gold and silver fail to get heavily slammed
after this meeting as many people were worried about, but both have
since risen considerably higher in the interim. Finally, a few days
later, the Rothschilds Private Bank (known in some circles as the US
Federal Reserve) announced that they were going to begin cutting back on
QE measures by $15 billion next month, eventually ending QE measures
all together by June 2014. Besides my intense skepticism of this claim,
and I would need proof that the Rothschilds Private Bank is actually
cutting back QE without any concealed backdoor mechanisms to continue
QE, there was one hugely notable development in the gold and silver
markets. Normally anytime, Ben Bernanke whispered even a hint or
suggestion of QE tapering, the gold and silver markets would crash on
such an announcement. However, this time, the mass media reported not a
peep about the massively significant decoupling of gold price behavior
from QE tapering announcements, and the subsequent continued rise in
gold price. For once, gold price behavior reacted intelligently to the
insanity of Central Banking monetary policy and it ignored the
propaganda of Central Bankers and continued to rise. Why is this
development so significant in my opinion? It is massively significant
because it signals a further breakdown of confidence in the monetary
system. Every other instance that Chairman Bernanke even hinted about
tapering QE, it gave the Federal Reserve and their puppet bullion banks
an opportunity to suppress the price of gold that they successfully
relished. This time around, I don’t believe that their propaganda was
any less effective than all the prior times Bernanke falsely warned
about QE tapering. So what has changed? People no longer care what
Bernanke and other bankers say about QE because their confidence in fiat
currencies, as illustrated by the largest single day drop of the Indian
rupee last week, is starting to finally, and justifiably crack. And the
first sign of a loss of confidence in fiat currencies and a vote for
the solid valuation of gold (and silver) money is the first sign of
potential hyperinflation ahead.
Watch the above video for illustrations of the US national debt round trip abilities to the sun and moon! (Republishing rights:this article may be republished only if it
is republished in its entirety with all links and the author attribution
below intact. All violations of these republishing terms will be
considered a copyright violation) About the author:JS Kim is the founder
and Managing Director of SmartKnowledgeU, a fiercely independent
research & consulting firm with a focus on intelligent, dynamic
investment strategies to avoid the wealth destruction of quantitative
easing and Central Banks’ currency wars. Sign up for our free newsletter
on our homepage to learn the best ways to buy gold and buy silver. Follow us on twitter @smartknowledgeu
Anthony Gucciardi
High level government documents reveal that the Pentagon is preparing
in full force for ‘large scale economic meltdown’ and massive revolt
via the US public — exactly what we are criticized for doing.
You see the Pentagon and agencies like the Department of Defense
(DoD) are in full scale emergency readiness in their own words for
‘cataclysmic’ events that are believed to ultimately ignite riots in the
face of chaos and economic collapse, and it’s all out in the open. And
it’s one of the reasons that we’re seeing such a massive amount of
spying on activists of all kinds, alternative news writers and personalities, and basically anyone preparing for themselves.
The US government is dedicated to logging such information into a
major database in order to ‘prepare’ for the coming collapse that they
are predicting in their own documents for all to see. Collapse
predictions that have turned into ‘war games’ by the Pentagon, which in 2010 were
orchestrated to prepare for what the Pentagon dubbed ‘large scale
economic breakdown’ and the disappearance of essential services like
food.
In this same ‘war games’ exercise dedicated to domestic response,
exercises were ran in order to prepare for ‘domestic order amid civil
unrest’. MILITARY TO STOP ‘DOMESTIC RESISTANCE’
A thread that is seen throughout these tests is the concept that
civil unrest will unfold and prompt military action against the public.
One of the largest examples of this is the US Army’s Strategic Studies
Institute paper that talks about about the ‘threat of domestic crises’
that are expected to lead to massive unrest throughout the nation.
Spurring more paranoia into the notion that every citizen is a terrorist,
the report starts talking about everything from economic collapse to a
loss of functional political order brought upon by a ‘hostile group
within the United States’ that could access weapons.
In such scenarios, the report discusses how the DoD would then be ‘forced by circumstances’ to come in and stop ‘purposeful domestic resistance or insurgency”:
“DoD might be forced by circumstances to put its broad
resources at the disposal of civil authorities to contain and reverse
violent threats to domestic tranquility. Under the most extreme
circumstances, this might include use of military force against hostile
groups inside the United States. Further, DoD would be, by necessity, an
essential enabling hub for the continuity of political authority in a
multi-state or nationwide civil conflict or disturbance.”
To go along with this, and the idea of the military coming in to stop
domestic resistance in the midst of an economic collapse, the Pentagon
has gone and created a force consisting of 20,000 troops whose sole purpose is to be available for civil unrest and catastrophes – all based on the 2005 Homeland Security program toprepare for ‘multiple, simultaneous mass casualty incidents‘. Yet again we see this link.
But don’t worry, changes have been made just one month ago to allow
for the Pentagon to directly have absolute authority over domestic
emergencies and ‘civil disturbance’ at large. As reported in a Long Island news publication and properly summarized by The Guardian as further preparation for some form of domestic meltdown:
“Federal military commanders have the authority, in
extraordinary emergency circumstances where prior authorization by the
President is impossible and duly constituted local authorities are
unable to control the situation, to engage temporarily in activities that are necessary to quell large-scale, unexpected civil disturbances.”
What does this mean exactly, to engage in the activity necessary to
quell large-scale civil disturbances? Well, for one it is the blank
check ability to go ahead and stop major protests amid domestic turmoil.
The kind of protests we’re seeing around the world, from Egypt to Brazil. The kind of protests where citizens have had enough.
And going by the Pentagon documents mixed with the DoD papers, it
appears the military believes America may take to the streets amid an
economic collapse or ‘domestic disturbance’ of large caliber. And you
can be sure that virtually all citizens that question the government are
the targets of military intervention, as we see in the DoD’s ownArmy Modernisation Strategy, detailing ‘anti-government and radical ideologies that potentially threaten government stability‘ as a major threat.
Yes, you read that right. The DoD is classifying ‘anti-government and
radical ideologies’ as something that threatens government stability.
When a major ‘domestic disturbance’ comes along that all of these
documents are discussing, such as perhaps in the form of mass protests,
it’s the ‘anti-government extremists’ they will be coming after. This post originally appeared at Story Leak
First of all, who are they? Mostly the 1%. But the top 2-5% have also done quite well, increasing their inflation-adjusted wealth by
75 percent from 1983 to 2009 while average wealth went down for 80
percent of American households. The rest of the top 20% have been
prosperous, realizing a 32 percent gain in inflation-adjusted wealth
since 1983. The facts to follow are primarily about the richest 1%, with
occasional dips into the groups scrambling to make it to the top. 1. Accumulating almost all the wealth
As evidence of the extremes between the very rich and the rest of us, the average household net worth for the top 1% in 2009 was
almost $14 million, while the average household net worth for the
bottom 47% was almost ZERO. For nearly half of America, average debt is
about the same as average asset ownership.
The extremes are just as filthy at the global level. The richest 300 persons on earth (about a third of
them in the U.S.) have more money than the poorest 3 billion people.
Out of all developed and undeveloped countries with at least a
quarter-million adults, the U.S. has the 4th-highest degree of wealth inequality in the world, trailing only Russia, Ukraine, and Lebanon. 2. Creating their own wealth
In another alarming testament to wealth at the top, the richest 10% own almost 90 percent of stocks excluding pensions. Consider what that means. The stock market has historically risen three times faster than the GDP itself. Since the recession, as the U.S. economy has “recovered,”62 percent of the gain was due to growth in the stock market, which surged as much in four years as it did during the “greatest bull market in history” from 1996 to 2000.
Many stock owners see a couple thousand dollars added to their fortunes every time they go online.
But that’s not enough for the very rich. Thanks in good part to the derivatives market, the world’s wealth has
doubled in ten years, from $113 trillion to $223 trillion, and is
expected to reach $330 trillion by 2017. The financial industry has
figured out how to double or triple its buying power while most of the
world has proportionately less. 3. Taking ALL the income gains
If the richest 1% had taken the same percentage of total U.S. income in 2006 as
they did in 1980, they would have taken a trillion dollars less out of
the economy. Instead they tripled their share of post-tax income. And
then they captured ALL the income gains in the first two years of the post-recession recovery. 4. Donating a smaller share than the poorest Americans
Two dependable sources provide pretty much the same information. Barclays reported
that those with earnings in the top 20% donated on average 1.3 percent
of their income, whereas those in the bottom 20% donated 3.2 percent.
And according to the New York Times,
the nonprofit Independent Sector found that households earning less
than $25,000 a year gave away an average of 4.2 percent of their
incomes, while those with earnings of more than $75,000 gave away 2.7
percent. 5. Making enough to feed 800 million people
India just approved a program to spend $4 billion a year to feed 800 million people. Half of Indian children under 5 are malnourished.
In 2012,
three members of the Walton family each made over $4 billion just from
stocks and other investments. So did Charles Koch, and David Koch, and
Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett, and Larry Ellison, and Michael
Bloomberg, and Jeff Bezos.
It’s not the obligation of any one of these individuals to feed the
world. The disgrace is in the fact that our unregulated capitalist
system allows such outrageous extremes to exist.
Here’s more to provoke outrage. The 400 richest Americans made $200 billion in just one year. That’s equivalent to the combined total of the federal food stamp, education, and housing budgets. 6. Taking two-thirds of a trillion dollars in subsidies
Even all that is not enough for the very rich. About two-thirds of nearly$1 trillion in individual “tax expenditures” (tax
subsidies from special deductions, exemptions, exclusions, credits,
capital gains, and loopholes) goes to the top quintile of taxpayers. An
astounding 75 percent of dividend and capital gain subsidies go to the richest 1%.
And that doesn’t include business subsidies, like the $16.8 billion
per year in agricultural benefits paid out to big companies and to
wealthy individuals who happen to have farms in their portfolios. The
filthiest fact, in terms of detestable extremes, is that much of
Congress wants to cut the $4.35 a day food benefit to hungry Americans, almost half of them children, so that money can keep flowing to the top.
Republished from: AlterNet
Video first released on 8/25/13
“Fascism has come to America. I don’t say that as an inflammatory
statement, I use it as a statement of fact. The merger of state and
corporate powers, by definition, is called fascism. I can back up that
statement by four simple words: “Too Big To Fail.” In capitalism there
is no too big to fail. So it’s been a corporate takeover, a military
industrial complex so big that if you take out one underpinning of a
“too big to fail,” the entire system collapses.”
Founder of The Trends Research Institute, Gerald Celente is a
pioneer trend strategist. He is the author of the national bestseller Trends 2000: How to Prepare for and Profit from the Changes of the 21st Century
and publisher of the internationally circulated Trends Journal
newsletter. Gerald Celente is a political atheist. Unencumbered by
political dogma, rigid ideology or conventional wisdom, Celente, whose
motto is “think for yourself,” observes and analyzes the current events
forming future trends for what they are – not for the way he wants them
to be. Gerald Celente has earned his reputation as “The most trusted
name in trends” by accurately forecasting hundreds of social, business,
consumer, environmental, economic, political, entertainment, and
technology trends.
“The poor we shall always have with us,” said the Bible, and lately
there are more of the poor than ever—over 50 million at last count. But
that doesn’t stop wealthy Americans from saying things that reek of
insensitivity and callousness toward those less fortunate than
themselves, which nowadays is pretty much everybody.
The lordly indifference of the fabulously wealthy has left us with a
rich cornucopia of blithely cold-hearted remarks and actions. Which of
these rich folks made the most some objectionable, offensive or
downright heartless comments? See for yourself. 1. Mark Zuckerberg
The Facebook CEO recently launched a “super-PAC,” aka
influence-peddling organization, to represent his interests and that of
his fellow Silicon Valley billionaires. A number of them refused to join on
moral and ethical grounds, however (good on ya, Vinod Khosla and Josh
Miller), leaving only the more venal among them on Zuckerberg’s roster
of supporters.
The super-Pac’s prospectus boasts
that Zuckerberg and his fellow tech moguls have certain “tactical
assets, including the fact that “We control massive distribution
channels” and “We have individuals with a lot of money. If deployed
properly this can have huge influence in the current campaign finance
environment.”
In other words, “We can corrupt the political process even more than it already has been.”
During Facebook’s initial public offering, Zuckerberg made this claim in
a letter to potential investors: “We expect governments will become
more responsive to issues and concerns raised directly by all their
people rather than through their intermediaries controlled by a select
few.”
We now learn that Zuckerberg doesn’t have a problem with
“intermediaries controlled by a select few” after all, as long he’s
doing the selecting.
But then, that particular statement’s the least of Zuckerberg’s post-IPO worries. The Facebook IPO resulted in a rash of lawsuits against Facebook, a $10 million fine for the exchange that handled it, and a series of ongoing government investigations.
The super-PAC’s first initiative is supposed to be immigration
reform. But the group’s been running ads and making other efforts to
support a hard-right political agenda, directly and through subsidiaries
called Americans for Conservative Action and Council for American Job
Growth. One ad features conservative Republican Marco Rubio. Others oppose Obamacare and promote the environmentally destructive Keystone XL pipeline.
That’s not “disruptive,” to use a favored Silicon Valley term.
It’s destructive. And it’s sleazebag politics as usual. That super-PAC
prospectus also boasts that “Our voice carries a lot of weight because
we are broadly popular with Americans,” but it’s been doing its best to
change that.
Zuckerberg’s fond of saying “Move fast and break things.” Yeah—like democracy. 2. Peter Shih
Whatever his other faults, Zuckerberg chooses his public words pretty
carefully. That’s not true of Zuckerberg wannabe Peter Shih. Shih’s
recent product of tech incubator ycombinator makes him more of an incubating tycoon than a present-day one.
Listen to what Shih had to say in a recent blog rant against San Francisco. The post, titled ” 10 Things I Hate About You: San Francisco Edition,” managed to be profoundly offensive to … well, just read the excerpts yourself:
“I hate how the weather here is like a woman who is constantly PMSing.”
“I’m referring to all the girls who are obviously 4′s and behave
like they are 9′s. Just because San Francisco has the worst Female to
Male ratio in the known universe doesn’t give you the right to be a
bitch all the time.”
“Stop giving [homeless people] money, you know they just buy alcohol
and drugs with it right?…. I’m seriously tempted to start fucking with
people and pay for homeless guys to ride the Powell street cable cars in
the middle of the day, that ought to get the city’s attention.”
Shih also complains about “public transit being non-existent past
midnight and the transvestite to taxi ratio being quite literally off
the charts.” You can’t condemn a whole group of people because one
person’s offensiveness is “off the charts.” But Shih is representative
of the tech subculture, at least when it comes to some of its least
flattering attributes – like excessive self-regard and the improper
application of testosterone-fueled energy.
Republished from: AlterNet
(Reuters) - Exchange operator Deutsche Boerse (DB1Gn.DE)
said trading on its derivatives platform Eurex had been halted for over
an hour on Monday, without giving an immediate explanation for the
failure.
Deutsche Boerse said in a
statement on its website that trading resumed at 0922 Central European
Time, with a company spokesman declining to comment further.
The
market impact of the trading glitch appeared to have been limited. A
public holiday in London meant most traders in Europe's largest equity
market were not at their desks, and trading volumes remained well below
their daily average.
Global markets have faced technological glitches recently. Last week the Nasdaq (NDAQ.O) stock exchange halted trading for three hours citing a "connectivity issue".
Earlier this year, the Chicago Board Options Exchange delayed the start of trading there for half a day.
Deutsche Boerse last week said its cash and derivatives markets were available for 99.99 percent of the time in 2012.
(Reporting by Edward Taylor and Blaise Robinson; editing by Ludwig Burger and Keiron Henderson)
All historians are familiar with how Hitler was able to seize and
consolidate power within the German Reichstag. He simply had his
henchmen burn the German legislative building to the ground and then
blame the Communists, one of the Nazis' chief rivals. Subsequently,
Hitler assumed total dictatorial power, as a pretense to protect the
German people, and he was able to eliminate the Communists and the rest,
as they say, was history.
Obama Is Under Immense Pressure
Obama is under enormous pressure from the Banksters to take out the
Iranian regime. The need to take down Iran is necessitated because the Petrodollar is in real trouble due to Iran’s insistence on selling oil to India, China and Russia in exchange for gold.
Gold is a four letter word to the Banksters. The Banksters must maintain
their fiat currency schemes. Subsequently, the Banksters must dominate
the purchase of oil and the distribution of gold for three reasons:
(1) The Banksters thrive on fiat currency which is
backed by virtually nothing, coupled with fractional reserve practices
to acquire real material wealth based on their creation of worthless
paper; the introduction of gold threatens this Ponzi scheme;
(2) Since Bretton Woods,
the world has been forced by the Banksters to play in their Ponzi
scheme game by first purchasing Federal Reserve dollars which is in turn
used to purchase to oil. Saddam Hussein failed to play by the
Petrodollar rules by selling oil for Euros and paid for his disobedience
with his life; and,
(3) Once the Banksters collapse the currencies of the world, they want
to be the ones controlling gold, the only remaining currency, in a
post-economic Armageddon.
Obama Is In Deep Trouble
If Obama wants to complete his second term, he must get help from the
globalists in managing the enormous Watergate-type of scenarios which
surfaced in May of 2013 that included (1) The Ed Snowden NSA spy
revelations; (2) The IRS harassing Tea Party members at the behest of
Obama; (3) The administration’s spying on AP reporters; (4) the Michael
Hastings murder (June 2013); and, (5) The Benghazi Affair which refuses
to go away. Any of these five events provides sufficient cause for
Obama’s removal from office as they dwarf Nixon’s misdeeds in the
Watergate Scandal.
The country is three months removed from the near simultaneous
revelations, the likes never seen in this quantity and severity in
American history. I stopped believing in coincidences a long time ago.
The release of the scandalous information related to these events is
being orchestrated and controlled by the overlords and their media
minions. Why?
Obama is dragging his feet on Middle East intervention and the
globalists are attempting to move him off of the mark with some friendly
blackmail.
As previously stated, Iran is undermining the Petrodollar. Iran must be
taken down. Sadly America, if the Banksters do not get their way and
conduct a regime change in Iran, the dollar will collapse and America
will witness its darkest days ever. Conversely, China and Russia have
threatened to “nuke” the United States if they invade Syria and Iran
over the issue of gold for oil. Make no mistake about it: Iran is the
chief prize. Egypt is a tragic, but useful distraction because of the
loss of life. The events in Syria are merely a means to an end and only
serves as the preliminary event in preparation for the main event, the
destruction of Iran. Syria must be taken down first, then Iran will
surely follow. Mark my words, Assad will be hanging from a noose, Saddam
style, in a few short months.
Why Attack Syria Before Iran?
If Iran is the prize, then why is the United States on the precipice of
attacking Syria? Simple, all roads to Tehran run through Damascus. Syria
is one of Iran’s few remaining allies and controlling Syria is the key
to a successful invasion of Iran. Most importantly, capturing Syria
largely blocks a Russian land force military incursion into Syria so
long as the U.S. is successful in quickly setting up its short- and
medium-range missile batteries inside of Syria. These batteries are a
crucial element in blocking Russian military troop movements into Syria.
For Obama to take out Syria, he has to neutralize their
command-and-control structure. This means taking out their aerial
surveillance capabilities, its Air Force, controlling the movement of
their tanks and other heavy military equipment as well as isolating
Syrian military units from the air and preventing them from reinforcing
Damascus. This leaves Assad vulnerable.
Once the Syrian military is isolated and divided, the CIA-backed
al-Qaeda forces will turn the tide of the CIA-backed Syrian civil war
and this will effectively take care of Assad in the same manner that
they took care of Gaddafi in Libya.
In order to launch a successful air campaign, the U.S. needs a pretext
so horrific, so terrible that global opinion will demand a military
incursion to “save the innocent Syrian people.” To accomplish this
goal, Obama has already done what he does best, create a Reichstag
moment (i.e. false flag).
The CIA Backed al-Qaeda Lights the Fuse
Syria has just experienced its Reichstag moment. Three Damascus hospitals supported by Doctors Without Borders
state that they are treating 3,600 patients who are exhibiting
neurotoxic symptoms, which occurred in one brief, three-hour period on
August 21, 2013. Of the 3,600 patients, 355 have died. This is Syria’s
Reichstag moment as Assad is being framed for this chemical weapons
attack.
The Assad forces have been widely accused for perpetrating this crime
against humanity through the purposeful release of neurotoxic agents.
However, only a fool with no common sense would believe that Assad is
behind the chemical weapons attacks. Assad would avoid at all costs
doing that one thing that could invite U.S. or NATO intervention into
Syria. The use of chemical weapons by Assad would provide NATO with the
pretext to launch airstrikes which would tip the balance of power in
Syria in the same manner as it did in Libya.
As I write these words, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel is moving American
attack forces into range of Syria and are awaiting a “presidential
decision.” Russia is showing signs of backing down as they have
encouraged Assad to allow UN inspectors into Syria. My assessment is
that Russia and China will stand down with regard to American airstrikes
into Syria because they know that this chemical weapons false flag
attack, perpetrated by the CIA-backed al-Qaeda forces has proven
successful and these two nations cannot be seen as supporting such a
criminal regime.
China and Russia have one main objective, save Iran; and they can still
stand down in Syria and be able to discourage an American-led invasion
of Iran. The Chinese and Russians will also still possess the nuclear
option at their disposal in protecting their “gold for oil” investment
in Iran. Subsequently, the U.S. will continue to support al-Qaeda-backed
Syrian rebels as they overthrow Assad and consolidate their gains over
the next few weeks. As in Iraq, look for BP and EXXON to control Syrian
oil and prevent any further undermining of the Petrodollar in Syria as
in Iran.
Think Like a Genocidal Maniac
Once
one covers the establishment’s game plan related to a multitude of
issues, their next moves become relatively simple to predict because the
Banksters predictably use the same playbook time after time. In order
to predict their next moves, we have to, God forbid, think like the
genocidal maniac Banksters.
As the United States consolidates its holdings in Syria, negates Russian
land force incursions and begins to bring money into the Federal
Reserve and the Bank for International Settlements through their
soon-to-be Syrian holdings, plans will be implemented to manipulate an
excuse for an invasion of Iran.
Ask yourself, what could be the one thing that Iran could be accused of
doing that would gather the support of the world for invading Iran and
force the Chinese and the Russians to stand down? The answer is
undoubtedly a false flag operation, the likes that the world has never
seen. What could be so horrific, so terrible that Iran could be framed
as the perpetrator? The globalists have already set the stage for the
next false flag event. What has Iran been repeatedly accused of? They
have been accused of attempting to develop nuclear weapons. The American
public has already been conditioned to associate nuclear weapons with
Iran, even though many legitimately question this association.
If you are still thinking like a genocidal maniac, there are two
variables to consider, a nuclear detonation on American soil and/or a
massive and virulent chemical weapons attack launched against America
citizens. I believe it is likely that the Boston Marathon bombing was
the dress rehearsal for what is coming. As in Boston, we will see
alleged Iranian terrorists quickly apprehended. Summary execution of the
so-called perpetrators will follow an imaginary standoff and evidence
will be planted so that there is no question of Iranian guilt. Look for a
group of U.S. veterans to be implicated as well as it will solidify the
justification for the imposition of martial law. DHS will then take to
the streets in their new 2700 armored vehicles.
Predicting Dates Is Normally a Fool’s Errand
Syria will fall in September. A false flag event would likely happen in
October and it will be game over in Iran by Thanksgiving. I do not
predict dates, ever. However, in this instance, I am going to make an
exception.
There are two dates that loom large in our future over the next four
months that have the globalists highly concerned. The globalists do not
want to raise conscious awareness of the Bankster-controlled organized
crime syndicate which hijacked our government in 2008.
The
first date that the globalists are concerned about is the lead up to
November 23rd. This is the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination.
The forces behind the JFK assassination were big oil, the
military-industrial complex and radical fringe elements of the military
and Secret Service. The plot was organized by the CIA and facilitated by
the Operation Mongoose forces of the CIA and the Mafia-backed forces
seeking to overthrow Castro. A whole new generation, who has never
looked at the JFK assassination, will be awakened to the undue influence
to some of the aforementioned forces that still wield their perverse
influence over America in 2013.
The second date that must be very troubling to the globalists is the
100th anniversary of the creation of the Federal Reserve. Talk shows and
websites will be abuzz with revelations about these criminal bankers
and the fact that dollar is actually worth about 3 cents. People who
have never heard of fractional reserve currency and a fiat currency will
hear about it from November 24-December 23. The Banksters do not want
to contend with an increasingly awake America. This would make the
subjugation of this country much more difficult.
These are the reasons that the globalists are expediting their timetable
for subjugation of this country. This is why Obama’s hand is being
forced by holding five Watergate-type scandals over his head at the same
time. Following the coming false flag attacks, the country will be in
lockdown, and resistance against these tyrants will be increasingly
difficult, and November 23rd and December 23rd will be dates that will
come and pass without much fanfare.
Conclusion
These events are only possible if a we have a psychopathic, genocidal
set of maniacs calling the shots. The more awake among us know that this
is the case.
America presently has some very disturbing variables which have been
simultaneously put into play. World War III is a definite possibility.
False flag attacks on American soil is a likely event over the next 60
days. These are times of unparalleled danger in America.
Please take some common sense steps which involves acquiring storable
food and water and a means to protect your family and your resources.
Educating your neighbors to these events is critical in the development
of neighborhood defense groups which will be needed to protect against
the looters that will surely accompany the coming crises. Your survival
could very well depend on educating your neighbors because you will need
their help in the coming weeks and months.
Dave is an award winning psychology, statistics and research
professor, a college basketball coach, a mental health counselor, a
political activist and writer who has published dozens of editorials and
articles in several publications such as Freedoms Phoenix, News With Views and The Arizona Republic.
Durable Goods Crater On Plunge In Airplane, Manufacturing And Computer Orders: Biggest Miss Since August 2012
And so that the great CapEx spending surge is delayed once more: supposedly to H3 2013 this time. Moments ago the Commerce Department reported the
latest Durable Goods numbers which were a total disaster: the headline
print plunged by 7.3% on expectations of a -4.0% decline driven by a
drop in Airplane orders (to be expected following last month’s noted bumper Paris Air show spike as
Boeing reported only 90 new plane orders compared to 273 in June).
Well, airplanes orders did indeed slide by 52.3%, but it was weakness in
Transportation (-19.4%) and Computer (-19.9%) orders as well as
Manufacturing (-9.8%) that took the market by surprise. This was the biggest miss to expectations since August 2012.
Excluding transportation, the drop was “only” -0.6%, however with the
expectation of a +0.5% increase, and the prior month revised from
unchanged to -0.1%, one can see that the expected revenue pick up for
the remainder of 2013 in the S&P500 will be merely the latest myth
to never take place.
The chart below showing the Year over Year change in headline Durable Goods says it all. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-26/durable-goods-crater-plunge-airplane-manufacturing-and-computer-orders-biggest-miss- US durable goods plunge in July, cast shadow over Q3
Orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods recorded their
biggest drop in nearly a year in July and a gauge of planned business
spending on capital goods tumbled, casting a shadow over the economy
early in the third quarter. http://www.cnbc.com/id/100987214 September Swoons & Octoberphobia http://mrtopstep.com/2013/08/september-swoons-octoberphobia/
zerohedge @zerohedge 1 min
Horrible Durable goods wasn’t horrible enough to send S&P soaring?
zerohedge @zerohedge 1 min
BATS GLOBAL MARKETS, DIRECT EDGE AGREE TO MERGE. Market crashes in celebration Recession’s pain reaching deep into the economic recovery http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-08-21/business/41431709_1_sentier-research-4-percent-households
and publisher of the internationally circulated Trends Journal
newsletter. Gerald Celente is a political atheist. Unencumbered by
political dogma, rigid ideology or conventional wisdom, Celente, whose
motto is “think for yourself,” observes and analyzes the current events
forming future trends for what they are – not for the way he wants them
to be. Gerald Celente has earned his reputation as “The most trusted
name in trends” by accurately forecasting hundreds of social, business,
consumer, environmental, economic, political, entertainment, and
technology trends.
