GOV/MIL Main "Great Reset" Thread

[marsh]

Under Joe Biden, Americans see 'most severe' pay cut in 25 years due to inflation

The Fed reports more than half of Americans saw a decrease in wages in the last 12 months.

justthenews.com

Biden's energy policies costing U.S. economy $100 billion a year: study

A new analysis finds the U.S. would be producing significantly more oil and natural gas today if Trump policies had continued.

By Aaron Kliegman
Updated: October 5, 2022 - 11:06pm

President Biden and senior officials in his administration have repeatedly said this year that the U.S. is near "record levels" of domestic oil and gas production. According to a new study, however, that's not exactly the case.

The analysis by economists Stephen Moore and Casey Mulligan found that the Biden administration's policies have caused the U.S. to produce significantly less oil and gas during Biden's presidency than it would have during a second term for former President Trump — to the detriment of the national economy.

"The U.S. would be producing between 2 and 3 million more barrels of oil a day and between 20 and 25 more billion cubic feet of natural gas under the Trump policies," states the report, which was published by the Committee to Unleash Prosperity. "This translates into an economic loss — or tax on the American economy — of roughly $100 billion a year."

The figures are based on production numbers adjusted for the energy price spikes that have occurred since President Biden entered office in 2021.

"Both the domestic and international evidence show that when we adjust for the higher international price for oil and gas, the U.S. is drilling not record amounts of oil and gas, but far below what market conditions would dictate," Moore and Mulligan argue. "It takes a higher oil price to motivate the same supply during the Biden administration."

The new report came out two days before the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its non-member allies, a coalition known as OPEC+ led by Russia and Saudi Arabia, announced Wednesday they're going to slash oil production by 2 million barrels a day, a move that could push up already high global energy prices.

The White House, which had been desperately lobbying OPEC+ members to vote against the proposed production cut, decried the decision.

"The president is disappointed by the shortsighted decision by OPEC Plus to cut production quotas while the global economy is dealing with the continued negative impact of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's invasion of Ukraine," White House officials said in a statement.

Experts say OPEC+ has increased sway in part because Biden's policies have limited U.S. domestic energy production.

"It's frustrating as someone who worked with the Trump administration on energy policy," Moore told Just the News. "We broke the back of OPEC under Trump because the U.S. was the leading energy power. You can't have a cartel without the world's no. 1 producer."

Under Trump in 2019, the U.S. achieved energy independence, becoming for the first time a net energy exporter of oil, gas, and coal. In November of that year, the U.S. oil and gas industry reached peak production at a record 13 million barrels of oil a day, according to the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration.

By comparison, U.S. oil production was at roughly 11.6 million barrels in April 2022 (the latest data available). Production has likely risen a bit since then.

In raw numbers, production is down 1 to 1.5 million barrels today from the Trump peak, according to Moore and Mulligan's estimates. That equates to somewhere from $100 million to $150 million a day in lost revenue for the U.S. oil industry, using the average price this year of roughly $100 a barrel.

But today's oil price is much higher than the price when Trump was president.

During Trump's presidency, the average world price was $54 a barrel, adjusted for 2019 inflation figures. Under Biden, the average was $71 through April 2022 and averaged $86 just in 2022.

The calculation that the U.S. would produce 2 to 3 million more barrels of oil a day comes from estimating what would happen if the Trump supply conditions had remained in place after January 2021 (when he left office) while accounting for the price spikes since then.

"Biden is playing right into OPEC's hands, allowing this cartel to dominate the oil market in ways it couldn't under Trump," Moore said.

Regarding natural gas, production today is near its peak of 3 billion cubic feet under Trump.

However, throughout most of Trump's presidency, the price of natural gas ranged from $3 to $4 per thousand cubic feet. This year, by comparison, the price has ranged from $6 to $8 per thousand cubic feet.

"In other words, prices have doubled, but U.S. production has been basically flat," stated the report, which estimated Trump-era production under Biden-era prices would translate to about 23 billion more daily cubic feet of natural gas.

Taken together, the oil and natural gas figures would mean about $100 billion a year more in U.S. GDP as long as the Trump policies could be continued, according to Moore and Mulligan. They also noted higher production would likely bring down energy prices, resulting in a "win-win for America."

Biden has blamed the oil and gas industry for higher energy prices and lower energy supply, noting companies have been raking in high profits and calling on them to work with his administration to bring down energy costs.

"At a time of war — historically high refinery profit margins being passed directly onto American families are not acceptable," Biden wrote to oil executives this summer. "Companies must take immediate actions to increase the supply of gasoline, diesel, and other refined product."

However, critics argue the real problem is Biden creating a hostile environment for the industry.

Moore and Mulligan cited historically high inflation and "a failure to maintain an investment-friendly business tax code" as two forces hitting the oil and gas industry especially hard because it relies so much on capital.

They also argued this issue is being exacerbated by the Biden administration's energy policies, which aim to transition away from fossil fuels to green, renewable energy.

The administration has announced a "whole-of-government" approach to climate policy, which includes trying to drive financing and investment away from the oil and gas industry.

Part of that effort has included Biden's Special Envoy for Climate John Kerry, who has been pressuring banks and financial institutions not to make loans to U.S. oil and gas companies and embrace the commitment to a future economy of zero carbon emissions.

Such an environment disincentivizes investing in significant oil and gas production, according to experts.

"It might cost a company $5 billion to develop a large new refining facility, which will only pay for itself after 20 years," Richard Morrison, senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, recently told Just the News. "Why would any corporate board green light such an investment when the White House is planning on a carbon pollution-free power sector by 2035 and net zero emissions economy by no later than 2050?"

The U.S. also doesn't have the necessary energy infrastructure to increase production to where it needs to be, according to Moore, who cited Biden canceling pipelines, restricting drilling on federal land and imposing various regulations that raise the price of drilling.

Despite Biden's letter to oil companies this summer, refineries cannot just ramp up output, with U.S. refiners already utilizing over 90% of their current capacity in an effort to meet demand.

Neither the White House nor the Energy Department responded to requests for comment for this story.

As gas prices reached record levels earlier this year amid a global supply shortage intensified by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Biden attempted to make up for a lack of supply by continuously tapping into the country's Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is now at its lowest level of emergency oil reserves since 1984.

"The United States would not have had to sell a single barrel of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve if the Trump drilling policies had remained in place," wrote Moore and Mulligan.

They calculated the amount of domestic oil production lost under Biden is about four times greater (600 million barrels) than the amount of oil extracted (150 million barrels through July 2022) from the SPR.

In other words, the U.S. would've produced much more oil than what it had to deplete from the national reserves — a fact that, Moore argues, has resulted in Biden giving more power to OPEC and Russia.

"The only result of Biden's war on oil and gas is a war on American energy, not energy in these other countries, some of which are our enemies," Moore said.

 

[marsh]

Under Joe Biden, Americans see 'most severe' pay cut in 25 years due to inflation

The Fed reports more than half of Americans saw a decrease in wages in the last 12 months.

justthenews.com

Under Joe Biden, Americans see 'most severe' pay cut in 25 years due to inflation

The Fed reports more than half of Americans saw a decrease in wages in the last 12 months.

By The Center Square Staff
By Casey Harper
Updated: October 6, 2022 - 12:03am

Americans are experiencing the biggest pay cut in decades in large part due to inflation, new data shows.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, one of several regional Fed banks around the country, released new wage and price data, and it isn’t good news for Americans.

“We find that a majority of employed workers’ real (inflation-adjusted) wages have failed to keep up with inflation in the past year,” the bank said. “For these workers, the median decline in real wages is a little more than 8.5 percent. Taken together, these outcomes appear to be the most severe faced by employed workers over the past 25 years.”

The Fed bank reported that more than half of Americans saw a decrease in wages in the last 12 months.

“How severe are the losses for workers experiencing negative real wage growth?” the group said. “For the 53.4 percent of such workers in second quarter 2022, the median decline (that is, half of the declines were larger and half smaller) in real wage growth was 8.6 percent. How does the severity of the real wage decline in second quarter 2022 compare with the declines over the last 25 years? The average median decline over the last 25 years is 6.5 percent, with real wage declines typically falling in the range of 5.7 to 6.8 percent…”

The bank pointed to the Consumer Price Index, which since President Joe Biden took office has elevated to the highest rate in four decades. The Bureau of Labor Statistic’s latest Consumer Price Index surpassed 8% in the previous 12 months.

Some expenses like groceries saw even larger increases.

“The food at home index rose 13.5 percent over the last 12 months, the largest 12-month increase since the period ending March 1979,” BLS said. “The index for other food at home rose 16.7 percent and the index for cereals and bakery products increased 16.4 percent over the year. The remaining major grocery store food groups posted increases ranging from 9.4 percent (fruits and vegetables) to 16.2 percent (dairy and related products).”

Those price increases have outpaced wage gains, meaning some workers who even got a raise this year still didn’t see a large enough increase to offset inflationary price hikes.

“While the past 25 years have witnessed episodes that show either a greater incidence or larger magnitude of real wage declines, the current time period is unparalleled in terms of the challenge employed workers face,” the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas said.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Initial Jobless Claims Suddenly Jumped Last Week​

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 05:35 AM

After Q2's significant weakening in the labor market (surging jobless claims), the last two months have seen seasonally-adjusted initial claims data revert optimistically lower.

However, the last week saw claims increase from a revised lower 190k to 219k, which upticked the 4-week average for the first time in 8 weeks...



We don't know but wonder if this shift is related to Hurricane Ian in any way.

Additionally, as the chart above shows, the number of Americans on continuing claims, which has also been trending lower, ticked up last week from 1.346mm to 1.361mm.

This is not the magnitude of 'bad' news that's required to get The Fed off its 'hawks to the moon' seat, but it is worth keeping an eye on as it perhaps represents a trend change.

This small increase is interesting in context of other reports.

U.S.-based employers announced 29,989 cuts in September, a 46.4% increase from the 20,485 cuts announced in August. It is 67.6% higher than the 17,898 cuts announced in the same month last year, according to a report released Thursday from global outplacement and business and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.



September marks the fifth time this year that cuts were higher in 2022 than in the corresponding month a year earlier.

 

[marsh]

US Buying $290M Worth Of Anti-Radiation Drugs for Use In "Nuclear Emergency" | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

US Buying $290M Worth Of Anti-Radiation Drugs for Use In "Nuclear Emergency"

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 05:19 AM
Authored by Chris Menahan via InformationLiberation.com,

The Biden regime is buying up $290 million in anti-radiation drugs for use in "nuclear emergencies" amid escalating tensions with Russia and heightened threats of a nuclear war.

From Health and Human Services:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE​

October 4, 2022​

Contact HHS Press Office​

202-821-9446​

asprmedia@hhs.gov​

www.hhs.gov/news​

Twitter: @HHSgov​

​

HHS purchases drug for use in radiological and nuclear emergencies​

As part of long-standing, ongoing efforts to be better prepared to save lives following radiological and nuclear emergencies, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is purchasing a supply of the drug Nplate from Amgen USA Inc; Nplate is approved to treat blood cell injuries that accompany acute radiation syndrome in adult and pediatric patients (ARS).​

​

Amgen, based in Thousands Oaks, California, developed Nplate for ARS with support from the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), part of the HHS Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), as well as the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health.​

​

BARDA is using its authority provided under the 2004 Project Bioshield Act and $290 million in Project BioShield designated funding to purchase this supply of the drug. Amgen will maintain this supply in vendor-managed inventory. This approach decreases life-cycle management costs for taxpayers because doses that near expiration can be rotated into the commercial market for rapid use prior to expiry and new doses can be added to the government supply.​

​

ARS, also known as radiation sickness, occurs when a person’s entire body is exposed to a high dose of penetrating radiation, reaching internal organs in a matter of seconds. Symptoms of ARS injuries include impaired blood clotting as a result of low platelet counts, which can lead to uncontrolled and life-threatening bleeding.​

​

To reduce radiation-induced bleeding, Nplate stimulates the body’s production of platelets. The drug can be used to treat adults and children.​

Nplate is also approved for adult and pediatric patients with immune thrombocytopenia, a blood disorder resulting in low platelet counts.​

Repurposing drugs for acute radiation syndrome that also are approved for a commercial indication helps to sustain availability of the product and improves healthcare provider familiarity with the drug.

"The US government said the procurement of Nplate was not in response to the war in Ukraine," The Telegraph reported.

"An HSS spokesman told The Telegraph: 'This is part of our ongoing work for preparedness and radiological security. It has not been accelerated by the situation in Ukraine.'"

The State Department last week urged all Americans to leave Russia "as soon as possible" in the wake of the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines.

The official reasoning they gave was to avoid getting conscripted in their mobilization effort but that logic only applied to dual citizens and their advisory was for all Americans.

As I noted at the time, the real reason they told everyone to leave is more likely the risk of a full-blown war breaking out due to the US, Ukraine or Poland being responsible for the belligerent bombing of the Nord Steam pipelines.

While Russia has issued statement after statement warning the US they will use nuclear weapons to defend their territory and are "not bluffing," the US has been shipping billions in high-tech weaponry to Ukraine to attack Russian forces and strike inside of Russia.

View: https://youtu.be/e8gZUQMqDAI
1:58 min

Just last week, Congress voted to send another $12.3 billion in military and economic aid to Ukraine.

Biden said in February after the war broke out that Americans should not be worried about a nuclear war then spent the next eight months antagonizing Russia (and China) with endless provocations to make nuclear war more likely than ever.

 

[marsh]

Is This The Next Major Threat For Oil Demand? | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Is This The Next Major Threat For Oil Demand?

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 06:25 AM
By Tsvetana Paraskova of OilPrice.com

Manufacturing growth in the United States slowed in September to its lowest rate since the pandemic recovery started, in another sign that the U.S. economy is cooling amid aggressive interest rate hikes from the Fed.

If the trend continues in the coming months, it would mean a recession is coming to the United States, analysts say.

Still, most believe it could be a mild recession, or at least a very short one, which may not have a significant impact on oil demand.

Major forecasters, such as the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the U.S. EIA, continue to expect oil demand to grow year over year both in 2022 and 2023.

However, the oil market is focused on fears of a recession instead of on fundamentals, as Saudi Aramco’s chief executive Amin Nasser said earlier this week. The market is currently ignoring the very low global spare capacity and the fact that producers will struggle with oil supply once economies recover, Nasser says.

Economies will rebound sooner or later from the current slowing growth. Some major European economies, including Germany, are teetering on the brink of recession.

The question is whether economies, including in the United States, will see a “harder landing” than the Fed is aiming for. According to Reuters market analyst John Kemp, the latest data on U.S. manufacturing activity, coupled with monetary tightening and fears of recession “greatly increases the probability of a harder landing.”

The U.S. manufacturing sector continued to expand in September, but at the lowest rate since the pandemic recovery began, according to the latest survey of the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) published on Monday.

Demand eased, the New Orders Index contracted, and the New Export Orders Index showed a contraction for the second month in a row, said Timothy Fiore, Chair of the ISM Manufacturing Business Survey Committee.

The good news is that manufacturing expanded for the 28th straight month. The bad news is the expansion was the slowest since May 2020, at the height of the pandemic-driven economic slump.

Commenting on the most recent U.S. economic data, Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, told Reuters, “It all comes back to higher borrowing costs and weaker demand.”

“The mild recession call still holds,” Lee added.

A mild recession may not dent oil demand materially, especially if the gas to oil switching across Europe and Asia accelerates this winter amid a shortage of natural gas.

Yet, distressing signs of a global economic slowdown have emerged in recent weeks.

Last month, FedEx reported quarterly figures below its own expectations due to macroeconomic weakness in Asia and service challenges in Europe. Amid expectations for a continued volatile operating environment, FedEx withdrew its fiscal year 2023 earnings forecast from June.

In addition, global maritime trade growth is slowing in a sign that the global economic slowdown is underway and a recession in major markets could soon materialize, threatening oil demand.

According to shipping data provider Xeneta, the global Xeneta Shipping Index (XSI®) saw in September its first month-on-month fall since January 2022, falling by 1.1%.

“In September, spot rates on many trades fell by their largest margin yet as lower global demand and easing global congestion saw shippers gain a decisive advantage,” Xeneta said in a report last week.

Still, oil and commodity trading giants say oil demand is resilient.

Global oil demand remains resilient despite slowing economies and is likely to hold up even if recessions materialize, executives at some of the largest commodity trading houses said at a conference on Tuesday.

Oil consumption has surprised to the upside in recent months, and there hasn’t been significant demand destruction, as previously expected, economists and researchers at the top traders said at the Argus European Crude Conference in Geneva.

“All the different factors suggest, yes, we may be heading into a slowdown but it will be shorter and shallower than people are expecting,” said Saad Rahim, Chief Economist for Trafigura.

 

[marsh]

Under Bidenomics, A ‘Soft Landing’ For Economy Is No Longer Possible

The chances for a serious meltdown grow as long as failed tax-and-spend policies remain in place.

issuesinsights.com

Under Bidenomics, A ‘Soft Landing’ For Economy Is No Longer Possible

I & I Editorial Board
October 6, 2022Add comment

The Democratic Party’s faithful are whistling past the graveyard, hoping with all their might we’ll avoid an economic slide. As a matter of general economics, we’re already in a recession. And it looks like things will soon get worse, not better.

“We hope we can have what they say, ‘a soft landing,’ a transition to a place where we don’t lose the gains that I ran to make in the first place for middle-class folks, being able to generate good-paying jobs and — expansion,” President Joe Biden told CBS’ 60 Minutes last month.

Good luck with that, Mr. President. Even members of your own party think it’s hogwash.

As economist Larry Summers, who advised both Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, said last week, a soft landing is “really quite unlikely.” We agree, as do most economists of our acquaintance.

Indeed, looking at the repeated economic policy mistakes made by Biden, or whoever now is really calling the shots in the White House, and the far-left Democrat-led Congress, it’s hard not to conclude that the economy’s set for a mighty fall.

Four trends stand out:

Stock and housing market declines. The stock market’s epic plunge has destroyed an estimated $11 trillion in wealth this year alone, while home prices, after peaking in June, have fallen sharply as interest rates jump above 6%. As home equity shrinks in a weakening housing market, consumers’ ability to borrow against their homes will also shrink.

What economists call “the reverse wealth effect” is now in play, meaning consumers and investors are likely to spend a lot less in the coming months.

Why is this happening? The federal government’s $5 trillion COVID spending binge, which the Fed enabled by keeping rates low; a $1.1 trillion “infrastructure” spending program; followed more recently by the laughably named Inflation Reduction Act, which will waste another $1 trillion or so before it’s done all of its damage.

All told, federal spending is up $9 trillion since 2021, an unparalleled increase. Now, with inflation roaring, the central bank is desperate.

Fed rate hikes. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has made it abundantly clear that he will not be stuck with the blame for a chronic inflation problem, with the Fed’s preferred inflation measure, the Personal Consumption Expenditures deflator, now over 6% — well above the target of 2% that the central bank considers “price stability.”

And by the way, consumer price inflation, which average people watch, is now above 8%, a 40-year high.

Powell has now ratcheted up official rates from just north of zero in March to the current 3.25%. And he warns he’ll keep going if necessary. “We will keep at it until the job is done,” Powell said in late September. “I wish there were a painless way to do that. There isn’t.”

So, the Fed’s telling you: Expect more pain.

And you’ll soon be getting it, because every 1% of interest rate hikes boosts federal payments on our $31 trillion national debt by about $300 billion a year. Are you ready for a tax hike? It’s coming.

Soaring energy prices. This week, Biden launched what CNN called a “furious, last-ditch wide-scale effort” to get OPEC+, including Russia, to pump more oil at a time of soaring prices. Recall that Biden earlier called Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s defacto leader, a “pariah state.”

It didn’t work. After CNN reported that OPEC would likely cut output by more than 1 million barrels per day when it met Wednesday in Vienna, the organization, in what can only be called an act of spite, decided to decrease output by 2 million barrels per day.

As a result, winter is going to be cold and very, very expensive as energy costs soar due to foolish green policies that reduce energy supply just when we need it most. Now, thanks to Biden’s economically damaging restrictions on domestic oil producers to appease the Dems’ extremist “Green New Deal” wing, we’ve gone from producing more oil than we need to begging OPEC to boost its output.

As any economist will tell you, the last six recessions have all been preceded by big jumps in oil prices. This time will be no different.

Plunging incomes. A new report from the Heritage Foundation shows the damage done by Bidenomics to the average American family. It tells us “the average American has lost the equivalent of $4,200 in annual income under the Biden administration because of inflation and higher interest rates.” Inflation is to blame for $3,000 of that; higher interest rates the rest.

“This financial catastrophe for American families is the direct result of a president and Congress addicted to spending our money, combined with a Federal Reserve compliantly enabling this addiction by printing more dollars,” the report said, noting that incomes rose by $4,000 during the tax-cutting and deregulating Trump years.

So buckle up. It’s going to be a bumpy ride, with the chances of a soft landing now being next to nil.

If Biden really wants some solid advice, he needs to look no further than former CKE CEO and Trump Labor secretary nominee Andy Puzder.

“So, what could Biden do to reverse the results of his thus far disastrous economic policies?” he asked recently in an op-ed. “Simply, we need to reduce demand, increase supply, and inflation will subside. It’s not like this is a mystery.”

Indeed it’s not. “Reduce demand” simply means cut back government’s obscene spending binge. And “increase supply” means cut taxes and deregulate.

By the way, this is a time-honored strategy that President Ronald Reagan proved works, and that congressional Republicans are now trying to revive. If given a chance, it will work again. Sure, a hard crash might be all but inevitable. But it’s never too late to create the next American boom.

 

[marsh]

The Collectivist War on the Middle Class

Despite posturing as if they care about the American middle class, behind closed doors our political elites, alongside their media servants and the guardians of academia who do the bidding of the collectivist elite, despise them. The war against the ...

www.americanthinker.com

October 6, 2022

The Collectivist War on the Middle Class​

By Paul Krause

Despite posturing as if they care about the American middle class, behind closed doors our political elites, alongside their media servants and the guardians of academia who do the bidding of the collectivist elite, despise them. The war against the American middle class is intentional, for it is only the American middle class that has power to stop global collectivism and the new feudalism emerging across the world. To prevent this from happening, our elites and their allies divide the American middle class to weaken and subdue it, thus enabling their collectivist agenda to continue apace, even as they speak platitudes to their middle-class victims.

There are two middle classes in America: the servile middle class and the independent middle class. The servile middle class is made up of those who work for global corporations and our governments: including local, state, and federal. These middle class and upper middle class livelihoods, northern Virginia being ground zero, are the byproduct of serving the global collective elite who run the corporations and operate the governments these Americans serve.

The independent middle class, by contrast -- the middle class of entrepreneurs, those who work for them, and the upper middle classes who work for the businesses that are targeted for destruction by the collective elite (like oil and natural gas businesses and their employees) -- is free from the parasitic rot of global collectivism and must, therefore, be destroyed. For this middle class exists independent of the collectivist machinery.

The politicization of the servile middle class has become apparent for all to see. Corporations are mandating woke policies that all must accept to continue working for them. Agents of the state are sent to hound and arrest their fellow citizens on behalf of the global collectivist elite. If you are to remain a middle-class American, then you must be a slave to the collectivist elite to keep your relatively comfortable and cushy life.

This is also why entrepreneurship and “capitalism” are attacked by the collectivist totalitarians and is represented as a history of rape, theft, and pillage -- something to be ashamed of and something that “good” and “honest” (read: servile) people living in the twenty-first century shouldn’t be engaged in. By becoming an entrepreneur, a small business owner, and employer of many workers, you perpetuate the system of racist capitalism built on theft, exploitation, and slavery! Not only that, but you’re also engaged in exploiting your workers as we speak.

America’s middle class is also intensely patriotic. This too is problematic for the collectivist elite. Patriotism, by definition, is anti-globalist and anti-collectivist. Patriotism is particular; patriotism values the particular love of country and the particular defense of what one has and doesn’t want to lose. No surprise, then, that patriotism is pilloried and excoriated in the media, in education, and even by politicians who call it xenophobia and racism.

When you consider the potential power of the American middle class if it was united, it begins to make sense why our politicians, our media, and our educational system is set on dividing the middle class. Dividing the American middle class and causing it to go to war with itself it weak and susceptible to exploitation by global collectivists. The call to unity rings hollow and propagandists in the media, Bolshevik educators, and government officials bought by global collectivists teach Americans to hate each other over crimes and sins they have not committed.

Furthermore, shutting down small businesses puts middle-class Americans out of work who must then turn to woke corporations or the government (which serves the interests of the global collectivist elite) to survive. Thus, these middle-class Americans are made slaves to the global collectivist system. This is not accidental but intentional.

By destroying all small businesses, local churches, private and religious schools, and all the institutions that are not owned by the state or woke corporations Americans are forced to submit to their enemies who now control them through indoctrination -- also called “public education” -- and their paycheck (say something they do not like or approve and you will get fired). You survive, but as a slave and servant to the global collectivist system.
Some life. Some “freedom.”

The globalist and collectivist war against the middle class is only intensifying. As the world becomes more interconnected, the battle between patriotic middle-class Americans and the globe-trotting collectivist elite will become much more heated. So long as the American middle class still retains independence, owns its own shops and homes, and has the ability to send their children to private and religious schools for education, the middle class will be targeted as the clear and present danger to the global collectivist system.

Middle-class Americans must stand up and resist the punishing tentacles of the global leviathan. True liberty and real democracy, national democracy, depends on it. Don’t be fooled into thinking otherwise.

If there is any future for liberty and democracy instead of collective bureaucracy and global managerialism, that future rests in the hand and spirit of the American middle class, especially the American middle class in “Flyover Country,” the last region of the United States where an independent and self-sufficient middle class exists, unlike the woke middle class serving global corporations or the Deep State on the American coasts.

 

[marsh]

POSOBIEC: The Biden admin made a secret deal with OPEC. 2:39 min

POSOBIEC: The Biden admin made a secret deal with OPEC.​

The Post Millennial Clips Published October 6, 2022

(OPEC countered with a 2 million barrel cut in production.)

 

[marsh]

Biden Turns To Venezuela For Oil After OPEC Slashes Production

The Biden administration proposed a deal that will ease sanctions on Venezuela, a founding member of OPEC, to allow Chevron to pump oil in the country.

dailycaller.com

Biden Turns To Venezuela For Oil After OPEC Slashes Production

Daily Caller News Foundation logo

JACK MCEVOY
ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT REPORTER
October 05, 2022

The Biden administration proposed a deal that will ease sanctions on Venezuela, allowing Chevron to pump oil in the country after the consortium agreed to its largest production cut since the COVID-19 pandemic, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

The U.S. will unfreeze hundreds of millions of dollars of Venezuelan state funds held up in American banks and in exchange, the country will allow Chevron to produce oil on its lands, according to the WSJ, which cited sources familiar with the deal. The proposal comes after OPEC agreed earlier on Wednesday to cut oil production by two million barrels a day, a decision the White House called “shortsighted,” according to a statement.

The Biden administration believes that if Chevron and other U.S. companies are allowed to resume working in Venezuela — a founding member of OPEC — it could signal an increase in global supplies, which could lower oil prices, the WSJ reported. OPEC and its Russia-led allies cut production in order to keep prices steady as they fear that demand for oil could drop amid growing concerns of a global recession.

The White House is scrambling to respond to rising gas prices as it is concerned that price hikes at the pump could hurt the Democrats’ chances in November’s midterm elections. Energy analyst Patrick De Haan predicted on Wednesday that OPEC’s cuts could raise domestic gas prices by 15 to 30 cents.

Significant sanctions have been levied against Venezuela’s oil industry in recent years as the U.S. opposes President Nicholás Maduro’s authoritarian leadership and has accused his regime of human rights abuses, according to The Congressional Research Service. Fewer U.S. sanctions could kickstart Venezuela’s oil industry and increase its influence on the global oil market, according to the WSJ.

Venezuela will use its frozen assets to pay for food, medicine as well as equipment that is needed to repair its water infrastructure and electrical grid, according to the WSJ. However, Maduro’s regime will only receive these funds if it agrees to negotiate with opposition leader Juan Guaidó, whom the U.S. declared to be the country’s rightful leader in 2019.

The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

 

[marsh]

White House Pivots On Key Oil Issue In Just About 24 hours

The Biden admin changed its mind on a critical oil issue in one day, with Biden backtracking the comments of White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

dailycaller.com

White House Pivots On Key Oil Issue In Just About 24 hours

DIANA GLEBOVA
WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT
October 05, 2022

The Biden administration changed its mind on a critical oil issue in one day as it walked back previous comments from White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

A White House statement released Wednesday said Biden will “continue to direct releases from the [strategic petroleum reserve] as appropriate.”

Tuesday afternoon, Jean-Pierre said, “we’re not going to be considering new releases at this time.”

In March, Biden ordered the release of 1 million barrels of crude oil a day — 180 million — in an attempt to fight record-breaking gas and oil prices. Now the strategic petroleum reserve has been depleted from 640 million barrels to less than 450 million barrels, Forbes reported in September — its lowest level since 1984.

Biden’s announcement comes after OPEC+ voted to cut oil production by 2 million barrels per day, despite Biden administration attempts to dissuade Middle East allies from cutting supplies, CNN reported.

The president visited Saudi Arabia to plead with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, one of the leaders of OPEC, to increase oil production in a bid to lower skyrocketing gasoline prices.

Jean-Pierre called Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the OPEC+ decision one of “self interest” and a “mistake.”

Going against the White House’s efforts, OPEC+ oil ministers said they chose to cut “in light of the uncertainty that surrounds the global economic and oil market outlooks,” CNN reported.

White House officials were “panicking” over OPEC’s potential cut, as gas prices have started to rise again less than a month away from the midterms, according to the outlet.

OPEC’s decision to “cut production quotas is short sighted while the global economy is dealing with the continued negative impact of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine,” Jean-Pierre said in a press briefing Wednesday, saying the likely impact will primarily hit low- and middle-income countries.

Biden told CNN White House correspondent Arlette Saenz that he was “concerned” about the cuts, calling them “unnecessary,” while White House officials say Biden is “disappointed” and will “consult Congress on additional tools and authorities to reduce OPEC’s control over energy prices.”

 

[marsh]

EXCLUSIVE: House Republicans Call On Biden Admin To Carry Out Federal Oil And Gas Leasing

Republican Rep. Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma is calling on the DOI to alleviate the nation's energy crisis by auctioning federal land for oil and gas leases.

dailycaller.com

EXCLUSIVE: House Republicans Call On Biden Admin To Carry Out Federal Oil And Gas Leasing

Daily Caller News Foundation logo

JACK MCEVOY
ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT REPORTER
October 05, 2022

Republican Rep. Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma and 14 other House Republicans are calling on the Department of The Interior (DOI) to follow the law and alleviate the nation’s energy crisis by conducting federal oil and gas lease sales.

Bice and the Republicans said that the Interior is disregarding the Mineral Leasing Act as the DOI’s Bureau of Land Management fails to hold auctions for oil and gas leases during every quarter of President Joe Biden’s term, according to a letter the representatives sent to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. Federal lease sales are at their lowest level in nearly 80 years under Biden as the administration has consistently blocked sales to further its climate targets.

“We are in an energy crisis of their own making,” Bice told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “In their rush to pursue the Green New Deal, this administration is failing states while simultaneously spreading misinformation about the oil and gas industry.”

Biden placed a moratorium on issuing new oil and gas leases on Jan. 26 as part of a comprehensive effort to limit fossil fuel production on federal land and combat the “climate crisis.” Biden’s executive order stated that the suspension would stay in place “pending completion of a study and reconsideration of oil and gas permitting and leasing practices.”

After the DOI completed its review of leasing practices in November 2021, the Interior proposed its Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program in July and hinted that it could cancel future lease sales for the next five years. The Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management (BOEM) found in late August that cutbacks on offshore drilling auctions would increase energy costs, forcing the nation to rely on foreign oil.

Biden promised during his campaign to halt oil and gas drilling on federal lands as part of his aggressive climate agenda that seeks to achieve net-zero emissions economy-wide by 2050.

In September, the administration accepted 307 leasing bids, worth a total of nearly $190 million, as part of Lease Sale 257 in the Gulf of Mexico after a federal judge invalidated the original lease sale in February, according to a BOEM press release. The government was required to auction federal lands and waters for drilling, including one by the end of this year, in accordance with provisions in the Democrats’ $740 billion climate, tax and health care spending bill that Biden signed into law in August.

The DOI declined to comment on the matter.

 

[marsh]

‘Corruption In The Deep State’: Kudlow, Guests Hammer Biden’s Expanded IRS, Racial Equity Push

Fox Business host Larry Kudlow and columnists Deroy Murdock and Liz Peek lambasted the Biden Administration Wednesday over its economic agenda.

dailycaller.com

‘Corruption In The Deep State’: Kudlow, Guests Hammer Biden’s Expanded IRS, Racial Equity Push

Daily Caller News Foundation logo

HAROLD HUTCHISON
REPORTER
October 05, 2022

Fox Business host Larry Kudlow and columnists Deroy Murdock and Liz Peek lambasted the Biden administration Wednesday over its economic agenda.

“Why don’t we have an advisory committee to restore economic growth?” Murdock said in response to a question about the Treasury Department establishing an advisory committee on racial equity, drawing a reaction from Kudlow. “Perhaps a commissar on how to free up the supply chain mess? Or maybe a commissar to end the labor shortage? If we had an economy humming along at 5% growth, inflation disappeared…maybe we could have time for all this touchy-feely nonsense.”

WATCH:

Video on website 7:41 min

We’re in the middle of a recession, high inflation, shortages and everything else and this is the garbage Biden and Democrats are wasting our money on,” Murdock continued. “It is horrifying and I wish they would stop right now.”

The discussion then turned to the expanded IRS and federal authorities’ arrest of five agency employees for alleged theft of $400,000 in COVID relief.

“We’re learning every day about the corruption in the deep state,” Murdock said. “People taking money. People spying on other folks. Keep in mind we talk about the 87,000 IRS agents. Every single solitary House and Senate Democrat voted for 87,000 IRS agents. All Republicans voted against it.”

The Treasury Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News.

 

[marsh]

https://www.agweb.com/news/business/conservation/3-big-carbon-questions-farmers

3 Big Carbon Questions For Farmers​

[IMG alt="A study from Trust In Food, Farm Journal’s sustainable agriculture initiative, shows even the most carbon-conscious farmers see signs their participation in current market options would require investments of time, effort and resources without the needed returns.

A study from Trust In Food, Farm Journal’s sustainable agriculture initiative, shows even the most carbon-conscious farmers see signs their participation in current market options would require investments of time, effort and resources without the needed returns.(Farm Journal)

By MARGY ECKELKAMP October 6, 2022

The future of voluntary carbon markets for agriculture is still coming into focus. As such, farmers continue to assess the landscape and weigh their opportunities.

1. ARE FARMERS SIGNING UP FOR CARBON PROGRAMS?​

All programs require field-level data and the farmer’s ability and willingness to share data. Enrollment requires the intersection of interest, incentive and execution. As a result, a new term, “carbon curious,” is being used to describe farmers exploring the space.

The Purdue Ag Barometer started in 2021 asking about farmers’ interest in carbon sequestration. Jim Mintert, agricultural economist at Purdue University, says the number of respondents who claimed to engage in carbon discussions in 2021 and 2022 were between 2% and 5%. However, in August it jumped to 9%.

“We’re seeing an increase in the curiosity level, but not many people signing up,” Mintert says.

While the conversations have picked up, only 1% of those in August’s survey said they’ve signed a carbon contract.

2. WILL MY EXISTING PRACTICES QUALIFY?​

Today’s carbon programs require a change in practice. So, companies with markets are looking to expand the pool of farmers who qualify.

One such company is Land O’Lakes and their sustainability business Truterra, which is working to build a wider funnel of farmers who could enroll in carbon markets and other new revenue streams.

“We know there are barriers to growers making practice changes to more of a regenerative approach,” says Jason Weller, vice president, Truterra. “Often, farmers are weighing the risk to the profitability in spending money and perhaps taking a yield drop. So, we thought how could we help share that risk?”

The company offers a $2 per acre incentive for first-time practice changes, such as planting cover crops, reducing tillage and more.

3. HOW MUCH CAN FARMERS BE PAID?​

Each carbon contract outlines how farmers can be paid for a ton of carbon sequestered over a given time. Payment, terms, timing and other details vary by program, which leaves farmers weighing the benefit.

“At $10 dollars per ton, it’s not a very front-and-center topic,” says Ben Reinsche, owner of Blue Diamond Farming Company in Jesup, Iowa. “At $60 per ton, you have my full attention. If the potential is greater than $100 per ton, it’s a priority, and I really need a plan.”

Like all business-driven decisions on the farm, farmers are using a lens of return on investment.

Carbon Market Roadblocks​

A study from Trust In Food, Farm Journal’s sustainable agriculture initiative, shows even the most carbon-conscious farmers see signs their participation in current market options would require investments of time, effort and resources without the needed returns.

 

[mzkitty]

Desperate Haitians looting:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1578141111964426241

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1578141111964426241

 

[marsh]

Dutch state could FORCE buyouts of 600 farmers within a year to meet climate goals

Farmers warning about more protests saying this is "unacceptable"

petersweden.substack.com

Dutch state could FORCE buyouts of 600 farmers within a year to meet climate goals​

Farmers warning about more protests saying this is "unacceptable"​

Peter Imanuelsen
54 min ago

You might have heard about the massive farmers protests happening in the Netherlands. Tens of thousands of farmers have taken to the streets to oppose new government climate goals that will force thousands of farmers out of business.

Farmers even sprayed manure at a local town hall, see the video of that below.
Despite all of these protests, they are now talking about state forced buyouts of 500-600 farms as early as within the next year. In other words, the state could be forcing farmers to sell their land to the state.
This is insane.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1541491070760095744

View: https://twitter.com/Kees71234/status/1541491070760095744

Farmers are now warning that more protests will take place if the government goes ahead with plans to force hundreds of farmers to sell their land to the state.

The government appointed mediator, Johan Remkes, says that the government should focus on forced buyouts of large nitrogen emitters near vulnerable nature areas, claiming that there is no other way to meet the target of cutting nitrogen emissions by 50% before 2030.

Wait a minute, 2030? Why exactly that year? Couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the UN Agenda 2030?

I just wrote an extensive article talking about Agenda 2030 and a major point of importance there is ”climate action”. Hmm.



”There are no longer any good routes available for the short-term approach...The least bad route is a targeted closure of 500 to 600 peak polluters within a year” Johan Remkes said.

Farmers are saying that forced buyouts are ”unacceptable”.

”Forced purchase of peak emitters is an absolute no-go for us” said Mark van der Oever of the Farmers Defence Force.

And farmers are talking about more protests if these plans go ahead.



Oh, your farmland has been owned by your family for generations? Sorry, the state will be taking it now and your business and livelihood will be taken from you.

You know who else seized farmers land? There was this guy called Mao who had the Communist idea of taking the land from the people. There were also these Communists in the Soviet Union who had a similar idea, and we all know how that turned out. Not very good at all.

And this is all happening under the excuse of meeting new climate goals. I have said this before and I will say it again. It is called Climate Communism.



We are in the middle of massive inflation on food prices and an energy crisis. So what does the state do? They want to force farmers to shut down in order to meet climate goals.

You literally cannot make this up. We are living in clown land.

Naturally this is barely making the news in the rest of the world, so please make sure to share this article everywhere!

 

[marsh]

https://www.agweb.com/markets/market-outlooks/cash-grain-prices-fall-central-and-eastern-corn-belt-basis-collapses-slow

Cash Grain Prices Fall in Central and Eastern Corn Belt as Basis Collapses: Slow Barge and Rail Traffic During Harvest to Blame​

Video on website 3:57 min barges backed up passing through Louisiana

By MICHELLE ROOK October 6, 2022

The combination of slower barge traffic on the Mississippi, slower rail movement and increasing harvest pressure have combined to pull cash grain prices down in the central and eastern corn belt as the basis has collapsed, that is a stark contrast to the west.

Last year at harvest farmers saw some of the strongest basis and cash prices in years, but that’s not the case in the central and eastern corn belt this fall. Basis is collapsing partially due to lower barge movement with Mississippi water levels the lowest since 1988. Nick Tsiolis, is the founder of Farmer’s Keeper, specializes in helping farmers with cash grain marketing. He says cash basis has fallen apart at river terminals. "If you’re looking anywhere in aggregate markets around the river that are feeding it or certainly directly on the river we’ve seen that wide out quite a bit."

In areas like Decatur, Illinois soybean prices at area processing plants were at $16.64 on September 20, with basis $1.84 over the board. But the cash bid on October 5 was down by $3.00 to $13.64, with a negative 10-cent basis. Tsiolis says its not a surprise with less barges moving and higher barge freight rates.

" I think its about $3 right now to load a barge and get it out of the CIF to St. Louis so it make sense as we see those effects pushed out into wider markets that that would be there."

And Tsiolis says this market environment could last for a while this fall as the prospects are not good for any improvement in water levels on the Mississippi. "I also think producers need to ready for a compounding effect there because not only is a lack of rain going to cause river levels to stay low but its also gonna make harvest continue progressing faster and faster here."

Cash basis levels haven’t broken as much in the west due to the grain deficit in drought areas. Cash basis was historically strong there all summer and that continues so far this fall, even amidst harvest. USDA shows Kansas corn basis ranging from a positive 40-cents to as high as $1.50 above the futures in the south.

Daniel O’Brien, Kansas State University Ag Economist says end users are bidding up grain prices. "The livestock feeders, ethanol plants, some of those exporters as well trying to scramble for supplies." And he says that problem won’t ease anytime soon. "What happens from March to August, September when we’re waiting for new crop at that time? We’ll have to supplement our supplies with out of state corn." Tsiolis says they’re already moving lower priced grain to deficit areas of the west as the strong cash bids are attracting grain to those markets.

From a marketing perspective, Tsiolis says farmers in areas that have seen a substantial drop in cash prices may have to store their crop and wait for basis to improve as eventually the strong basis in the west will lift levels farther east.

Or they can find an end user in those drought areas to sell to.

 

[marsh]

https://www.agweb.com/markets/pro-farmer-analysis/low-water-levels-mississippi-river-threatens-shipments

Low Water Levels on Mississippi River Threatens Shipments​

By PRO FARMER EDITORS October 6, 2022

A logjam of ships, tugboats and barges due to low water levels on the Mississippi River is threatening to grind trade of grains, fertilizer and other goods to a halt, Bloomberg reports. Ingram Barge Company, the largest U.S. barge operator, declared force majeure in a letter to customers due to “near-historic” low water conditions on the Mississippi River. As of Wednesday afternoon, the Coast Guard said there was a queue of 122 vessels at Stack Island and 15 vessels at Memphis. Due to increased groundings, the number of vessels in tow is being restricted.

USDA’s Grain Transportation Report notes, “In recent weeks, barge carriers and shippers have dealt with increasingly severe low water levels—reducing shipping capacity and resulting in record rates. Beginning in July, the average level of the Mississippi River at New Orleans was well below the 5-year average and continued to drop. With lower water levels, vessel operators and shippers have had to use lighter loads per barge because of draft restrictions and fewer barges per tow. American Commercial Barge Line said tonnages per southbound barge have been reduced by 20% to 27%. Moreover, the number of barges per tow have been reduced by 17% to 38%. The industry has also experienced groundings and intermittent outages. As of Oct. 4, the cost per ton to ship from St. Louis to the Gulf was $90.45/ton, up 218% from last year and up 379% from the 3-year average.

Over the past 5 weeks (week ending October 1), 2,466 barges have been unloaded in New Orleans, down 25% from the 5-year average. Further compounding these issues, the U.S. Coast Guard is implementing speed and overnight-hour restrictions on the Lower Mississippi River, from mid-October to mid-November, to accommodate a pipeline removal. However, some industry analysts believe the impacts of the additional closures and other restrictions may be overshadowed by already reduced navigability from historically low water levels.”

 

[marsh]

https://www.agweb.com/news/crops/crop-production/mosaic-shares-recovery-details-after-hurricane-ian

Mosaic Shares Recovery Details After Hurricane Ian​

The company expects the necessary repairs to its facilities will be complete in one to two weeks.(Mosaic)

By MARGY ECKELKAMP October 6, 2022
Mosaic’s North American Phosphates operations were negatively impacted by damage caused by Hurricane Ian.

The company says its facilities in central Florida experienced modest damage from flooding and high winds due to the storm. Its early assessments are leading the company to announce its production of phosphates could be down 200,000 to 250,000 tonnes through the fourth quarter.

Josh Linville, StoneX's vice president of fertilizer says the market has largely shrugged off the potential loses as a quarter million tons of fertilizer is "not that large of a deal" when it comes to the markets.

The company expects the necessary repairs to its facilities will be complete in one to two weeks.

Additionally, port and rail closures will delay the timing of shipments for the business–pushing scheduled shipments from September into October. As of now, the company says phosphate sales volumes will total 1.60 to 1.65 million tonnes for the third quarter. But they will release more details in their third quarter investor call, which has a date yet to be announced.

According to the Florida state mining commission, there are a total of 27 phosphate mines–covering more than 450,000 acres in the state. Nine of those mines are currently active. A single phosphate mine can range in size from 5,000 to 100,000 acres.

In response to Hurricane Ian, the Mosaic Company Foundation is donating $100,000 to the most effected areas of Hardee, Manatee and DeSoto counties. This is in addition to the $55,000 the foundation gave in storm preparation funds. Also, the foundation gave $300,000 toward an employee-to-employee assistance fund, which will be dispersed to employees who need assistance with hurricane recover efforts. The company will double match any contributions made by Mosaic employees to this fund.

 

[marsh]

6 Popular Myths Debunked

Watch now (22 min) | Climate, renewables, sprawl, homelessness, drugs, and the fate of the republic

michaelshellenberger.substack.com

Video 21:57 min

6 Popular Myths Debunked​

Climate, renewables, sprawl, homelessness, drugs, and the fate of the republic​

Michael Shellenberger
6 hr ago

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvgW4IH6V9M
32:17 min

Democrats PANIC After OPEC Sides With Russia Raising Gas Prices, Signaling CRUSHING Midterm Defeat​

Tim Pool

Democrats PANIC After OPEC Sides With Russia Raising Gas Prices, Signaling CRUSHING Midterm Defeat. Republicans may not have the solutions but Democrat and Biden failures over the Ukraine Russia war mean dems will lose bigly in the midterms. Oil prices, gas prices, food prices, shortages, all because Democrats and the establishment are desperate to wage war in Ukraine instead of minding their own business. Several Democrats are now on record saying the top national security matter for the US is defeating Putin and Russia.

^^^^

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdvyjn5HIPM
10:43 min

Oil Cartels Join Forces With Russia, Gas Prices Will Skyrocket, Biden Has Screwed Us​

Timcast IRL

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nS9NMaAH14
4:29 min

A New Food Shortage Coming​

The Economic Ninja

The Economic ninja talks about A new food shortage is starting up and will affect baking recipes the holiday season. A butter shortage is starting to look serious as SHTF 2022 gets worse

Prepare for the Butter Shortage

Holiday baking might look a little different this year.

thetakeout.com

Prepare for the Butter Shortage​

Holiday baking might look a little different this year.​

By
Dennis Lee
Yesterday 7:00AM

Brace yourself for bad news: It looks like we might be heading for a butter shortage, and the timing couldn’t be worse for holiday bakers. FOX Business reports that butter sitting in cold storage facilities amounts to just over 282 million pounds as of August of this year. That sounds like a lot, but it’s significantly down from the amount stored during the same period in 2021, which was over 362 million pounds.

Here are a few of the problems plaguing our nation’s butter supply:

Periods of extreme heat nationwide have caused cows to produce less milk

• Cow feed has grown more expensive as the price of corn has risen due to global supply chain disruptions
• The West is dealing with reduced production schedules
• The Midwest is having trouble with maintaining cream supplies for butter making
• The Northeast’s demand for butter is inching up, straining producers’ manufacturing capabilities

In real world terms, this is all wreaking havoc on butter prices. While overall grocery prices went up 13.5% in August, butter prices went up an astonishing 24.6%, making it the ingredient that suffered the biggest price hike. And there doesn’t seem to be any relief in sight for the rest of the year.

Freezing butter is easy, and it works​

If you’re a prolific holiday baker, you could stock up now, because being prepared now might save you a ton of future hassle, and prices might creep even higher as demand spikes around the holiday season—in which case you can consider this a money-saving investment.

Butter freezes well; take it from butter producer Land O’Lakes, who says that all you need to do is keep the sticks wrapped in their original packaging, inside the box, and put the entire box in a resealable plastic bag. Of course, this is the mild doomsday prepper in me talking, but at least it’s a practical approach.

Keep in mind, though, that if you’re going to hang onto a few sticks, there’s no need to overdo it. Panic-induced hoarding doesn’t help anything.

The best butter substitutions​

Alternatively, you can consider using a butter substitute for the foreseeable future. Cooking resource AllRecipes suggests substitutes such as margarine (though it has its drawbacks, since it’s a water and oil emulsification), plant-based butter, vegetable-based oils, and (depending on the recipe) lighter products like applesauce, bananas, and Greek yogurt. Each bring their own unique qualities to the dish, and they’re not all going to give you the same results as butter, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

“I recommend looking into recipes that are oil-based, of which there are many!” says Takeout contributor Stacey Ballis. “Not to mention, oil-based recipes are easier and faster because you don’t have to wait to soften butter or use the creaming method.”

To that point, try this recipe for Wacky Cake, which was invented during an era in which butter, eggs, and milk were all being rationed. The use of vegetable oil results in a cake that’s plenty moist without any of those ingredients.

Keep an eye on the prices of your staple items as we head toward the end of the year. Inflation is an issue for everyone, but we all need to eat, too; it’s worth knowing how to subsist on the next best thing when it’s tough to get what you want.

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYf_w5j4kfo
19:47 min

It’s Worse Than We Thought, What 'THEY' Just Did To US! (OPEC)​

Neil McCoy-Ward
(No summary given. Did not watch.)

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B84YoVI6QKU
42:25 min
(starts at 13:00 min)

Scaling solutions for humanitarian impact: The Humanitarian and Resilience Investing (HRI) approach​

Streamed live 9 hours ago

World Economic Forum

With over 1 billion people living in fragile settings across the world, and 274 million people in need of humanitarian assistance this year, the need to find new ways to increase resilience and drive sustainable humanitarian impact has never been greater. Humanitarian and Resilience Investing (HRI) is capital invested in ways that measurably benefit communities and strengthen economies in humanitarian and fragile contexts, while creating a financial return. It is a new approach to complement established humanitarian action or interventions with market-driven solutions that provide long-term and sustainable impact on vulnerable people and economies. This session brings together leaders of key organisations in the HRI ecosystem to reflect on the potential of public and private collaboration for sustainable humanitarian impact and announce the launch of a challenge on UpLink.

 

[marsh]

Lipid Nanoparticles, Created By CCP And Present In Covid Vax, Are Changing Human Beings At The Core 15:49 min

Lipid Nanoparticles, Created By CCP And Present In Covid Vax, Are Changing Human Beings At The Core​

Bannons War Room Published October 6, 2022

(No summary given. Did not watch.)

 

[marsh]

Dave Walsh On OPEC's Oil Production Cut

Dave Walsh On OPEC's Oil Production Cut: American Energy Independence Would Save America From Biden's Created Energy Crisis

rumble.com

8:44 min

Dave Walsh On OPEC's Oil Production Cut​

Bannons War Room Published October 6, 2022

(No summary given. Did not watch. We empowered them the minute we signaled in Jan 2021 that we would cut offshore and new oil exploration in US.)

^^^
Dave Walsh: America Must Take On The OPEC Cartel By Increasing Oil Production At Home 13:12 min

Dave Walsh: America Must Take On The OPEC Cartel By Increasing Oil Production At Home​

Bannons War Room Published October 5, 2022

 

[marsh]

Flu Hitting The COVID Jabbed Like A Truck - High Fevers, Terrible Headaches - Much More Significant .32 min

Flu Hitting The COVID Jabbed Like A Truck - High Fevers, Terrible Headaches - Much More Significant​

Red Voice Media Published October 6, 2022

(No summary given. )

 

[marsh]

Ep. 2893a - The [CB]/[Biden] Admin Fell Right Into The Economic Trap, Exposed For All To See starts at 1:48 of 16:04 min

Ep. 2893a - The [CB]/[Biden] Admin Fell Right Into The Economic Trap, Exposed For All To See​

X22 Report Published October 6, 2022

The [CB]/[Biden] admin are now trapped in their own agenda. Trump set everything up from the beginning and now the people can see the truth. Energy drives the economy and Trump made the country energy independent, now the system is collapsing and the [CB][Biden] admin only had to do one thing, make the country energy independent once again.

 

[marsh]

Oh SH*T, it's starting. Putin LAUNCHES massive military move | Redacted with Clayton Morris 2:14:20 min starts at 15:30 min

Oh SH*T, it's starting. Putin LAUNCHES massive military move | Redacted with Clayton Morris​

Redacted News Published October 6, 2022

Confirmed US has boots on the ground in Ukraine despite Biden administration denials. Russian parliament makes Donbass annexation official. Putin launching massive military mobilization. Michael Tracey joins us to talk about the bombshell report from The Intercept that the US has a large military presence in Ukraine.

 

[marsh]

CBDCs: One World Digital Currency to Rule Them All 56:48 min

CBDCs: One World Digital Currency to Rule Them All​

The JD Rucker Show Published October 6, 2022

The notion of the "Digital Dollar" can be appealing to many who don't understand what that actually entails. But even as we warn the nation against supporting such a freedom-busting maneuver, that's not the financial endgame. A digital dollar, digital yuan, or any other digital currency is just a stepping stone to the one-world digital currency that is currently in the works.

^^^^
It Begins: "Project Icebreaker" Is the One-World Currency Test-Run of CBDCs in Three Western Nations 18:29 min

It Begins: "Project Icebreaker" Is the One-World Currency Test-Run of CBDCs in Three Western Nations (Norway, Israel, Sweden)​

The JD Rucker Show Published October 6, 2022

Conspiracy theorists have been screaming about Central Bank Digital Currencies since before most of us had ever heard of them. They are the pathway for the Globalist Elite Cabal to achieve their coveted one-world currency that is controlled by the powers-that-be. We know this, but making "normies" aware of the risks has turned into a race between CBDC truthers and the extremely powerful Cabal who are in the process of selling the concept to the masses.

Even those who are not conspiracy theorists are speaking out. The primary concern that I've heard in mainstream channels is that CBDCs do not solve a recognizable problem. There is no inherent benefit for the people as digital payments and cryptocurrency have precluded the need for fast and secure transactions. Businesses do not really gain from it with foreign exchange working in near-real-time for their international transactions. Even most governments do not gain an actual benefit if their intention is to keep their currencies sovereign and their people free.

And therein lies the conspiracy. Governments and their world banking partners WILL benefit from CBDCs in the form of absolute control over the people. We've discussed the freedom-killing component of CBDCs many times as we foresee social credit scoring and "responsibility nannies" robbing us of our financial freedoms for the sake of whatever cause the Cabal wants to impose. The second benefit for the government/banking public-private partnership is the sovereignty issue. CBDCs can solve the challenge that they have with rolling out a one-world currency.

In the draconian future that's fast approaching, CBDCs will begin as individual replacements for currencies. There will be a digital dollar, digital yuan, digital shekel, etc. But at some point they will determine that the diverse systems pose roadblocks for achieving a globalist financial system. This is when they will reveal that the only solution is the One-World Central Bank Digital Currency.

 

[marsh]

It Begins: “Project Icebreaker” Is the One-World Currency Test-Run of CBDCs in Three Western Nations

Conspiracy theorists have been screaming about Central Bank Digital Currencies since before most of us had ever heard of them.

noqreport.com

It Begins: “Project Icebreaker” Is the One-World Currency Test-Run of CBDCs in Three Western Nations​

It's shocking that there are still those who think Central Bank Digital Currencies are part of conspiracy theories. They're real. They're happening right now. And we need to spread the word.

by JD Rucker
October 6, 2022

Conspiracy theorists have been screaming about Central Bank Digital Currencies since before most of us had ever heard of them. They are the pathway for the Globalist Elite Cabal to achieve their coveted one-world currency that is controlled by the powers-that-be. We know this, but making “normies” aware of the risks has turned into a race between CBDC truthers and the extremely powerful Cabal who are in the process of selling the concept to the masses.

Even those who are not conspiracy theorists are speaking out. The primary concern that I’ve heard in mainstream channels is that CBDCs do not solve a recognizable problem. There is no inherent benefit for the people as digital payments and cryptocurrency have precluded the need for fast and secure transactions. Businesses do not really gain from it with foreign exchange working in near-real-time for their international transactions. Even most governments do not gain an actual benefit if their intention is to keep their currencies sovereign and their people free.

And therein lies the conspiracy. Governments and their world banking partners WILL benefit from CBDCs in the form of absolute control over the people.

We’ve discussed the freedom-killing component of CBDCs many times as we foresee social credit scoring and “responsibility nannies” robbing us of our financial freedoms for the sake of whatever cause the Cabal wants to impose.

The second benefit for the government/banking public-private partnership is the sovereignty issue. CBDCs can solve the challenge that they have with rolling out a one-world currency.

In the draconian future that’s fast approaching, CBDCs will begin as individual replacements for currencies. There will be a digital dollar, digital yuan, digital shekel, etc. But at some point they will determine that the diverse systems pose roadblocks for achieving a globalist financial system. This is when they will reveal that the only solution is the One-World Central Bank Digital Currency.

The article below by Ken Macon over at Reclaim The Net breaks down the latest news on Project Icebreaker, a collaboration between Israel, Norway, and Sweden to test out the formative version of a one-world currency. I’m covering it today on The JD Rucker Show.

Norway, Sweden, and Israel partner to test CBDCs

A new report is coming next year.

reclaimthenet.org

Norway, Sweden, and Israel partner to test CBDCs​

A new report is coming next year.​

By Ken Macon from Reclaim The Net​

The central banks of Israel, Norway, and Sweden, as well as the Bank of International Settlements (BIS), have teamed on a project, called Project Icebreaker, to test the feasibility of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) for cross-border payments.

Project Icebreaker’s purpose is to enable fast cross-border payments using CBDCs at a significantly lower cost compared to existing systems.

The project will create a hub where the participating banks can test key functions and feasibility of their proof-of-concept CBDCs.

Sweden’s central bank, Sveriges Riksbank, is considering issuing a CBDC they have named e-krona.

“Sveriges Riksbank is collaborating in this experiment as part of the e-krona project,” said Mithra Sundberg, head of the e-krona division of Sveriges Riksbank.

“By interlinking our current e-krona platform, developed in a test environment, with the other countries we gain valuable lessons regarding cross-border payments using a CBDC. We also gain better understanding of important design and policy choices needed to secure cross-border functionalities if we decide to issue an e-krona.”

Israel also hopes that Project Icebreaker will help with the development of a digital shekel.

“The results of the project will be very important in guiding our future work on the digital shekel,” said Bank of Israel deputy governor Andrew Abir.

“Efficient and accessible cross-border payments are of extreme importance for a small and open economy like Israel and this was identified as one of the main motivations for a potential issuance of a digital shekel.”

A report on Project Icebreaker is expected in the first quarter of 2023.

 

[marsh]

Climate groups demand Big Tech censor climate change "misinformation"

14 groups call for new policies.

reclaimthenet.org

Climate groups demand Big Tech censor climate change “misinformation”​

14 groups call for new policies.

• By Cindy Harper
• Posted 9:44 am

Several climate change advocacy groups, including Friends of Earth and Greenpeace, have asked social media companies to treat “misinformation” about climate change like they do “hate speech” and opinions about Covid that go against government-backed authorities.

In a letter released on Tuesday, the groups also asked social media companies to be transparent about how they tackle climate disinformation and suggested that the company should report it under Europe’s Digital Service Act, which requires platforms to moderate “harmful” content.

We obtained a copy of the letter for you here.

The groups also demand that the platforms disclose data on content moderation of climate-related content.

“Social media companies bear responsibility for the role in amplifying and perpetuating climate disinformation but transparency, that would quantify the exact extent, has been lacking from platforms,” wrote the advocacy groups.

Most social media companies started moderating climate change content in 2020. However, critics still feel these companies are not doing enough and want even more censorship.

 

[marsh]

Hurricane damaged EV cars catch fire, smolder for days despite firefighters' efforts .30 min

Hurricane damaged EV cars catch fire, smolder for days despite firefighters' efforts​

The Post Millennial Clips Published October 6, 2022

Hurricane damaged EV cars catch fire, smolder for days despite firefighters' efforts.

 

[marsh]

"OPEC's Action Is Testimony To A Staggering US Geopolitical And Geoeconomic Error" | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

"OPEC's Action Is Testimony To A Staggering US Geopolitical And Geoeconomic Error"

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 07:05 AM
By Michael Every of Rabobank

Yesterday was all about oil, geopolitics, and geostrategic errors; and, in the background, domestic politics, accepting past errors, and trying to make amends for them. Ironically, it all happened on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which back in 1973 jump-started a Middle East war, and then the energy crisis that led to the collapse of the post-WW2 Western political-economy model, and ushered in global neoliberalism.

OPEC+ lined up with Russia to slash output by 2m barrels a day from November and through 2023, pushing energy prices up, and seeing a slew of calls for oil to again top $100 in the near future. That was as US gasoline inventory data dropped 4.7m barrels to the lowest level since November 2014 despite apparent demand destruction.

The White House response was furious. The official statement said President Biden was “disappointed by the short-sighted decision” to cut production. The White House Press Secretary accused OPEC+ of “aligning with Russia” Off the record the response was probably blunter given such a cut had been flagged as a “hostile act”. Yet Saudi Arabia’s message to the White House also couldn’t have been blunter.

The Saudis have moved from swing producers who help the US at times of trouble to ones who cut to keep prices high; under a leader building Western-style tourist resorts and holding raves(!) That’s testimony to a staggering US geopolitical and geoeconomic error, compounded by its multi-layered domestic energy policy failures. The longer-term question is if it will prove to be the same kind of massive error for OPEC+ to have made itself a geostrategic problem for the US.

The near-term US policy responses underway are to double down on what is not working:

• Another 10m barrels will be released from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is not bottomless, and may be needed in a geopolitical emergency at some point.
• To “explore any additional responsible actions to continue increasing domestic production in the immediate term.” But there is no immediate private-sector response possible if the longer-term outlook is still to shut fossil fuels down.
• Calling on US energy companies to bring pump prices down by closing the historically large gap between wholesale and retail gas prices - which is already slim for most retailers.
• To consult with Congress on additional tools and authorities to reduce OPEC’s control over energy prices. This is even whispered to include the so-called NOPEC bill floated in 2007 but never enacted, which is designed to remove the state immunity shield and allow the international oil cartel, OPEC, and its national oil companies, to be sued under US antitrust law for anti-competitive attempts to limit the world's supply of petroleum.
• To accelerate the clean energy transition, without the minerals or supply chains to do so, by increasing “reliance on American-made and American-produced clean energy and energy technologies”.
• Despite the White House’s Kirby talking about ‘reducing dependence on foreign oil production’, the Wall Street Journal reports the ‘US Looks to Ease Venezuela Sanctions, Enabling Chevron to Pump Oil’: so a tiny gain in oil and a massive loss of deterrent power and loss of face.

Do you see the geopolitical and geoeconomic tectonic plates shifting? Do you see how this influences markets? If not, you are in the wrong game.

No Fed pivot is possible against a backdrop where oil prices march higher on supply destruction in response to demand destruction as monetary policy is tightened. The Fed’s Daly and Bostic both made that clear yesterday --"no cuts in 2023”-- but the geopolitics does the work for them if you choose to see it. Indeed, that backdrop, together with decent ADP employment and the ISM non-manufacturing report, saw bond yields up as a result: US 2s were up from 4.08% to 4.19% before closing at 4.14%; 10s were up from 3.62% to 3.78% before closing at 3.74%.



Fed hiking rates to crush oil demand and send US economy into recession fast.

OPEC+ cutting supply to offset reduced US oil demand and send US economy into recession even faster so Fed is forced to cut rates.

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 5, 2022
So to further atonement.

Some draw comparisons between Biden, who has apparently decided to run again in 2024, and Carter. Both preside(d) over soaring inflation led by energy prices. So did Nixon, whose problems started with the 1973 Yom Kippur War and the massive, deliberate, geopolitical supply-destruction-led surge in oil prices that followed it.

Carter tried to get US hostages out of Iran by force, and failed, while the Arab press reports Biden is about to send $7bn to a cash-strapped Tehran regime failing to keep its own people under control as a quid pro quo for the release of two US hostages.

But more importantly, Carter, a progressive, started the US neoliberal journey, while Biden, far less of a progressive, has appointed figures determined to take policy in a less Borkian (“bigger is always better”) direction. And while Nixon ‘went to China’, Biden is going back home.

As journalist @lhfang argues of the US, “There’s a consensus around a desire for an economy that is less dominated by the rich and special interests, less monopoly power, less greed and mindless consumerism. You see this sentiment on the left and right, but there’s no clear language to describe this sentiment.” To which area expert Matt Stoller replies, “The anti-monopoly movement spans both parties, and is changing policy on trade and antitrust. There isn’t yet a shared political language.”

Recall what I have been arguing about our need for an ideological “-ism” that explains what to do in a chaotic world where nothing works the way it used to? And how until you settle on one, you have difficulty moving ahead with the policy you need to see? In the interim we will continue to get starkly different responses that won’t work… as we see on the combination of US energy and foreign policy.

In the long run, the “-ism” that will work best for the US is going to be a dressed up, watered down version of mercantilism. Even the green energy policies it is promoting are that.

In the UK, we see the opposite reaction to the failure of the consensus: fundamentalism – of the neoliberal variety. (Such an impulse is often the case with religions like neoliberalism.)

PM GaLizriel gave a Party Conference speech in which she said “I have a Tempest in me!” she would get the UK “through the Tempest”. Well, someone is using magic to conjure a storm and torment the survivors of a shipwreck, as happens in the Shakespeare play of the same name. Her key policy pitch was: “I’m not going to tell you what to do, or what to think or how to live your life. I’m not interested in how many two-for-one offers you buy at the supermarket.” So, we will fight a geopolitical and geoeconomic war individually, fuelled by biscuits: how empoweringly British!

In Europe, there is still not enough atonement. Germany’s Economic Minister came close to accusing the US and other allies of “war-profiteering” over the prices at which it is selling them LNG to keep them warm this winter. As Bloomberg’s Javier Blas points out, Europe is outbidding poorer, Asian buyers for LNG to compensate for its own enormous geostrategic and energy policy errors, so far less well-off people are suffering for it: and yet it still has the temerity to suggest it should be given ‘mates’ rates’ to ease its own pain.

Things also do not sit well within the EU either over Germany’s EUR200bn energy subsidy, on top of their previous EUR65bn subsidy. Rather than planning one EU ‘war economy’ with rationing, we instead face 27 rival European war economies all fighting each other for market share. Germany is saying its deeper pockets, the product of having benefitted most from the euro, mean it can out-subsidise its energy-uncompetitive industry while everyone else in Europe loses theirs. Is it any surprise that following the lead of Italy, Spain and Belgium are both warning of risks to the Single Market from such German actions?

The same is true if the ECB steps in to help along some of the lines being muttered about: if it is going to keep its balance sheet constant by selling some assets (i.e., German debt?) to buy others (i.e., Italian debt? Which it is already the main buyer of) then it is an extension of the differentiated credit regime I have been arguing will become inevitable in my “MMT *and* higher rates” view. Yet the ECB would differentiate between countries, not sectors within a country. That will be desperately political and desperately unpopular with some.

Do you see the geopolitical and geoeconomic tectonic plates shifting? Do you see how this influences markets? If not, you are in the wrong game.

But there is still time to atone.

 

[marsh]

The Top 3 Outcomes As The Elites Try To Reset The International Monetary System | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

The Top 3 Outcomes As The Elites Try To Reset The International Monetary System

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 01:20 PM
Authored by Nick Giambruno via InternationalMan.com,

It’s self-evident the fiat currency system centered on the US dollar is self-destructing at an alarming rate...

After more than 50 years, it’s long past the end of its shelf-life, like a carton of spoiled milk.

Even the elites running the system can see that and are openly talking about what they’d like to see come next.

That’s why there’s all this talk about a “reset” as the current international monetary system falters.

The way I see it, there are three possible outcomes.

Outcome #1: Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and the International Monetary Fund’s Special Drawing Rights (SDR) replacing the US dollar as the world’s new reserve currency. This is the elites’ preferred outcome.​

​

Outcome #2: A reluctant re-monetization of gold. Central bankers don’t want to go back to gold, but they will have no choice if their fiat system collapses, forcing their hands.​

​

Outcome #3: Bitcoin is the wild card. A Bitcoin standard could spontaneously emerge regardless of what the elite want. Bitcoin is an entirely new asset people are adopting as money because of its superior monetary properties, notably its total resistance to inflation.​

It’s good to keep Bitcoin’s long-term monetization trend in mind. However, both gold and Bitcoin will likely do very well in the short and medium-term as fiat currencies lose value.

No matter if Bitcoin or gold ultimately wins the long-term competition to be the world’s dominant money, it will be an enormous improvement over fiat currency, which is a fraud of historic proportions.

So I am rooting for both gold and Bitcoin. Right now, I want to be exposed to gold, Bitcoin, and the stocks of companies that produce them.

However, for this analysis, I am concerned with the coming monetary reset the elites are trying to pull off as the current monetary system fails, which seems to be a more immediate trend.

As unfortunate as it is, central banks still wield enormous control over money and finance. Over the long term, Bitcoin has a realistic chance to render central banks and fiat currency obsolete. However, in the more immediate time frame, central banks are in a position to reset the monetary system and try to bridge the gap to a new one they hope to control.

The way I see it, they would prefer to extend the life of the fiat currency system with CBDCs and SDRs. So, they’ll try that first. Although, I don’t think that will be viable.

Simply put, if the current fiat currency system is not viable, then fiat on steroids—CBDCs and SDRs—will not be viable either. CBDCs and SDRs will enable even more currency debasement, which would be positive for monetary alternatives like gold and Bitcoin.

So, ultimately, I think they will have to reluctantly turn to gold, which they are familiar with and have a degree of control over.

Don’t Be on the Wrong Side of the Biggest Wealth Transfer in History
As this all unfolds, we are looking at the biggest wealth transfer in history… and those holding US dollars and other fiat currencies will be on the losing end.

All the value stored in US dollars, euros, and other fiat currencies will be siphoned out and transferred elsewhere.

This process is already well underway.

For example, from the start of the Covid hysteria in March 2020 until today, the Federal Reserve has printed more money than it has for the entire existence of the US. It’s the biggest monetary explosion that has ever occurred in the US.

During that period, the US money supply increased by a whopping 41%.

In other words, if your after-tax wealth did not grow more than the 41% hurdle rate since March 2020, you are on the wrong side of the wealth transfer and losing ground.

You’re on the road to serfdom.

As bad as the situation with inflation is right now, it’s nothing compared to what is ahead of us.

The coming money printing could be unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.

The key is to position yourself on the receiving end of this wealth transfer. That way, you can avoid disaster and set yourself up for enormous potential gains.

Owning free-market monetary alternatives like gold and Bitcoin—and the companies that produce them—is an excellent way to do that.

I think one thing is sure, though.

Outcome #1 and Outcome #2 would be terrific for the price of gold.

CBDCs and SDRs will enable even more inflation, which would be positive for gold.

Central banks going back to a monetary system based on gold would, of course, be positive for gold.

Let’s look at a conservative scenario and presume the US government has the 261 million ounces of gold it claims to have.

If the US government used a 25% gold backing for the dollar—using the M2 measure of the money supply—it would imply a gold price of $20,773 per ounce.

If the US government backed the dollar 100% with gold, it would imply a gold price of $83,091 per ounce.

These numbers might seem shocking, and they are. But so is the amount of money printing recently that has ballooned the money supply.

Further, these numbers are constantly rising because the Fed continues to create new dollars out of thin air, and the ounces of gold the US government owns have remained constant since 1971.

Also, consider this.

The last time the international monetary system experienced a paradigm shift of this magnitude was in 1971.

Then, gold skyrocketed from $35 per ounce to a high of $850 in 1980—a gain of over 2,300% or more than 24x.

I expect the percentage rise in the price of gold to be at least as significant as it was during the last paradigm shift.

That’s because this coming gold bull market could be fundamentally different than other cyclical bull markets. It will be riding the wave of an incredibly powerful trend: the re-monetization of gold. It could lead to the biggest gold market ever.

While this megatrend is already well underway, I believe the most significant gains are still ahead.

 

[marsh]

Most Americans In Over 25 Years Suffer 'Real' Pay Cut Under Biden Admin; Fed Report Shows | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Most Americans In Over 25 Years Suffer 'Real' Pay Cut Under Biden Admin; Fed Report Shows​

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 04:20 PM

As The Wall Street Journal recently reported "...vast numbers of Americans find their cost of living is rising faster than the income they’re bringing home," under the Biden administration.

How 'vast'?

Well The Dallas Fed just issued a report showing that, rather shockingly, a majority of employed workers’ real (inflation-adjusted) wages have failed to keep up with inflation in the past year.

For these workers, The Dallas Fed finds that the median decline in real wages is a little more than 8.5 percent...



All individuals to the left of the dashed line experienced wage growth that was less than the CPI inflation rate - that is 53.4% of all Americans.

And, taken together, these outcomes appear to be the most severe faced by employed workers over the past 25 years...



While this is all Putin's fault - or price-gouging retail gas station owners - we do note The Dallas Fed researchers conclusion perhaps explains why the Democrats face an uphill battle into the Midterms... "While the past 25 years have witnessed episodes that show either a greater incidence or larger magnitude of real wage declines, the current time period is unparalleled in terms of the challenge employed workers face."

 

[marsh]

Shoplifting In California Is Out Of Control Due To Zero Consequences: District Attorney | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Shoplifting In California Is Out Of Control Due To Zero Consequences: District Attorney

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 12:20 PM
Authored by Jamie Joseph and Siyamak Khorrami via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Shoplifting in California is getting out of control because of recent criminal justice reform laws, a district attorney told EpochTV’s “California Insider.”

District Attorney of El Dorado County Vern Pierson said that while property crimes, including shoplifting, are illegal, state laws such as Proposition 47 and Proposition 57 allow many criminal activities to go undeterred.

Passed by voters in 2014, Prop. 47 downgraded certain thefts and drug offenses from felonies to misdemeanors. Its most well-known statute raised the minimum amount of stolen goods from $400 to $950 for a theft case to be classified as a felony, which critics consider to be the main cause of a rise in petty theft across the state.

It also allows felons currently serving prison terms to petition for resentencing under the new classifications. Those who have already served their terms can also have their past convictions reclassified as misdemeanors.

“The practical reality is that most retailers have learned if they call law enforcement for a theft of less than $950, either law enforcement will not respond, or if they respond at most, what they will do is issue a citation [for court appearance],” Pierson said.

He noted that most theft suspects don’t show up in court, for which there are little or no consequences.

As such, most retailers in California have a policy that prevents their employees from reporting low-level property crimes, which is why the data for such incidents may be inaccurate, according to Pierson. Some stores stop reporting petty theft altogether because police “can’t do much.”

A store can be sued by an attempted robbery suspect who’s physically confronted by its employees.

“We’re a very litigious society here in California, and the stores and their insurance carriers really are afraid of being sued for trying to stop a crime that has little or no consequence,” he said.

Prop. 57, passed in 2016, allows certain criminals who are classified as “non-violent” to be released early. It also prohibits prosecutors from charging juveniles as adults without a judge’s approval and those who were tried as adults for crimes committed when they were juveniles to appeal their sentences.

As an emergency measure to reduce the jail population during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Judicial Council of California in April 2020 removed cash bail for some defendants. Although the statewide zero-bail order expired in June, courts still have to consider each defendant’s ability to pay while setting bail amounts, following a California Supreme Court ruling in March 2021.

The Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan research group, reported upticks in the number of property and violent crimes last year in four of the state’s largest cities—Los Angeles, Oakland, San Diego, and San Francisco.

An analysis by the group also found “some evidence” that Prop. 47 affected property crime, as personal property thefts grew by 9 percent from 2014 to 2016, with thefts from motor vehicles accounting for about three-quarters of this growth.

“We have this increased lawlessness that comes from [the perception that] ‘I can take other people’s property because nothing will happen to me,’” Pierson said.

He noted that data generated by car insurance companies will be able to show a more accurate picture of property crimes statewide since they require individuals to file a police report when making a claim.

“What we’ve seen in the last six or seven years is … auto burglaries and auto thefts are up dramatically,” Pierson said. “And that’s a truer set of data for where crime actually is in California.”

 

[marsh]

DACA Ruled Illegal After Appeals Court Cites 'Severe Deficiencies' | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

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DACA Ruled Illegal After Appeals Court Cites 'Severe Deficiencies'

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 03:00 PM

A federal appeals court on Wednesday ruled that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program is unlawful.

The program was designed to shield certain immigrants known colloquially as "anchor babies" from deportation.

In its ruling, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a July 2021 decision by a Texas federal judge, US District Judge Andrew Hanen, who declared DACA illegal and blocked new applications, while allowing current beneficiaries to continue receiving protection.

The 5th Circuit maintained the same policy, and sent the case back to Hanen so he can review a revised set of rules that the Biden administration announced in august, to determine whether those rules are legal.

The Biden administration’s new final rule to “preserve and fortify” DACA codifies the existing policy, with limited changes, into federal regulation. It was subject to public comments as part of a formal rule-making process intended to improve its chances of surviving lawsuits challenging it. It’s set to be effective Oct. 31 to replace the 2012 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) memorandum that had created DACA. -Epoch Times​

As Jonathan Turley notes;

Writing for a unanimous three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit (with U.S. Circuit Judges James Ho and Kurt Engelhardt), Chief Judge Priscilla Richman found that President Obama did indeed circumvent Congress and evaded the limits imposed in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) when it enacted DACA in 2012. The court declared:

“Under the first factor, DACA’s deficiencies are severe. The district court’s excellent opinion correctly identified fundamental substantive defects in the program. The DACA Memorandum contradicts significant portions of the INA. There is no possibility that DHS could obviate these conflicts on remand.”​

The court, however, did not change the status of the roughly 600,000 people from 150 countries enrolled under DACA. It sent the case back to the trial court for further proceedings.

The Biden Administration fought to block any judicial review by challenging the standing of Texas to bring the action. However, it did little to refute the claims of injury raised by the state, including an expert who estimated that DACA recipients overall impose a cost of more than $250,000,000 on Texas per year and another $533,000,000 annually in costs to local Texas communities.

In addition, the court noted that:

“Texas contends that the rescission of DACA would cause some recipients to leave, thereby reducing the financial burdens on the State. It cites a survey of over three thousand DACA recipients in which twenty-two percent of respondents said they were likely or very likely to leave the country if DACA ended.130 The Government presents evidence that many recipients would remain without DACA, but that does not controvert Texas’s showing that some would leave.”​

The Fifth Circuit also rejected the common claim that this is nothing more than the exercise of prosecutorial discretion not to prosecute cases:

“As our court held in DAPA, “‘[a]lthough prosecutorial discretion is broad, it is not “unfettered.”’ Declining to prosecute does not transform presence deemed unlawful by Congress into lawful presence and confer eligibility for otherwise unavailable benefits based on that change.”​

​

Even if the INA were ambiguous, DACA would fail at step two because it is an unreasonable interpretation of the INA. Like DAPA, DACA “undoubtedly implicates ‘questions of deep “economic and political significance” that [are] central to this statutory scheme; had Congress wished to assign that decision to an agency, it surely would have done so expressly.’”​

​

There is no “clear congressional authorization” for the power that DHS claims.”​

U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen will now get the case back. He previously decided that the Department of Homeland Security had implemented DACA in violation of the APA.

In response, the Biden administration has developed a new DACA rule and published it on the Federal Register to satisfy the public notice-and-comment process. The new rule is scheduled to become active on Oct. 31.

The case could ultimately find its way to the Supreme Court but such a move could only magnify the bad precedent already created in the case for the Administration.

* * *
And according to the Daily Caller, the Biden administration says it will take legal action after the 5th Circuit decision.

 

[marsh]

Industry Insiders On Real Story Behind High Gas Prices: Structural Problems, Hostile Policies, And Inaction | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

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Industry Insiders On Real Story Behind High Gas Prices: Structural Problems, Hostile Policies, And Inaction

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 10:05 AM
Authored by Allen Zhong via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

High gas prices in America are caused by a mismatch between U.S. oil production and refining, bad policies or political hostility, and the Biden administration’s inaction, according to experts and oil industry insiders.

Inflation in the United States has been running high since March when the yearly Consumer Price Index (CPI) reached 8.5 percent, the highest level since 1981.

A dramatic increase in energy prices has drawn special attention.

Between May and August, energy prices rose between 20 percent to 40 percent year-over-year.

President Joe Biden and the Democrats have proposed different solutions to the high energy prices, including a windfall tax for oil companies, urging gas stations to cut prices, imposing an oil export ban, and allowing countries to buy Russian oil with a price cap.

However, oil industry insiders and experts said most of those proposed measures either will not work or won’t lower the gas prices in America permanently.

Michael Wirth, chairman and CEO of U.S. oil giant Chevron, rejected the idea of taxing oil companies’ profits.

“Windfall profits taxes have been tried before in this country. They didn’t achieve the goal that was desired. It is pretty basic that if you want more of something, you tend not to tax it. If you want less of something, you put taxes on it,” he said during an interview with CNN on Sept. 13.

Oil Export Ban Could Be Disastrous
As inflation soared, Democrats have been calling for the White House to impose an oil export ban. But experts and a refinery owner warned this will not cut gas prices and may bring disastrous results.

U.S. crude oil exports have been increasing since 2011, and decreasing oil imports during the same time period caused net crude oil imports to decrease.



However, most of the oil in the recent export surge is light sweet oil which is also known as “shale oil.” However, the refineries in the United States were designed to refine heavy crude oil, aka conventional oil, Senior Vice President of American Energy Alliance Dan Kish told The Epoch Times.

According to an analysis by the Dallas Federal Reserve, the United States exported on average 3 million barrels of mainly light sweet crude oil per day at the end of November 2021 and imported more than 6 million barrels of mostly heavier crude oils from Canada and other foreign suppliers each day.

The U.S. refiners don’t have the capacity to process the exported crude oil, the authors of the analysis said.

Even if the U.S. bans oil exports, which are mostly shale oil, it’s impossible for refineries to update their facilities to refine shale oil after decades of political hostility against the oil industry.

Updating the facilities means the refineries need to invest billions of dollars and get extra emission-related permits.

It’s an impossible task under the Biden administration, Kish said.

“They’ve made the fossil fuel business in North America the enemy of the people, that’s why the prices keep trending up,” he said.

John Catsimatidis, a billionaire who is also an oil refinery owner, holds a similar view.

“Why should anybody spend a billion, two billion, three billion, if you’re not sure of the policy of the country you’re doing business in the next five, ten years? Because you have to get a return on investment. So it’s the way the United States succeeds, the way companies succeed, if you have confidence in Washington, if they have confidence in the administration that if they spend a billion dollars or two billion dollars, that there’s going to be return of investment,” he told The Epoch Times.

Kish warned that an oil export ban will have disastrous results.

“If there’s a ban on exports, what would happen is we would end up with endless amounts of oil in the Gulf Coast. The oil couldn’t efficiently be used by our refineries. In order to make those refineries take that kind of oil, we would have to invest huge amounts of money which would drive up the price of the gasoline and the diesel on the jet fuel,” he said.

The two biggest oil companies in the United States, Exxon Mobil and Chevron, already voiced objections to the proposed oil export ban.

“The risk in an action like that has unintended consequences. And, in fact, the U.S. is both an exporter and importer of products. An export ban runs the risk of taking supplies that are needed in other parts of [the] world and reducing those, which can drive oil prices up, which then can affect the price of imports into this country,” Wirth responded to a call for banning oil exports from Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm and congressional Democrats.

Exxon CEO Darren Woods also rejected the call for an oil export ban in a letter to the Energy Department citing the same reasons, reported The Wall Street Journal.

The only ones who would temporarily benefit from an oil export ban are those refiners who specialize in refining light sweet crude oil, according to the Dallas Federal Reserve.

However, “as the price of domestically produced crude oil declines and storage fills, it would not be long before some domestic oil producers become unprofitable and cease operations,” reads the analysis.

Biden Suspended Critical Infrastructure
On his first day in the White House, President Joe Biden signed an executive order to revoke President Donald Trump’s permit for the Keystone XL Pipeline.

It turned out to be one of the most fatal moves for U.S. energy security and gas price stability because Canada is one of the most important sources of the conventional crude oil that most U.S. refineries can handle and the Keystone XL pipeline is what is needed to transport the Canadian crude oil.

“Keystone XL pipeline was going to supply about 800,000 barrels a day of Canadian oil and about 100,000 barrels a day of North Dakota oil, which is the right oil [heavy oil],” Kish said.

 

[marsh]

Why The US Will Not Ban LNG Exports | ZeroHedge

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Why The US Will Not Ban LNG Exports

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 08:26 AM
By Josh Owens of OilPrice.com

Despite the rise in U.S. energy bills, the White House will not limit in any way, let alone ban, exports of natural gas this winter, as it aims to help Europe with the energy crisis, two sources involved in the discussions told Reuters on Tuesday.

The U.S. has been sending increased volumes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Europe since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent halt of Russian pipeline gas supply to most of its customers in Europe.

In fact, American LNG has been crucial in meeting demand in Europe, which is scrambling for gas supply and willing to pay up for spot deliveries, outbidding most of Asia.

High demand in Europe, high natural gas prices, and increased export capacity made the United States the world’s largest LNG exporter in the first half of 2022, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in July. The United States is shipping record volumes of LNG to Europe to help EU allies in their efforts to fill gas storage ahead of the winter amid growing uncertainty about Russian gas supply. Most U.S. LNG exports went to the EU and the UK during the first five months of 2022, accounting for 71%, or 8.2 Bcf/d, of the total American LNG exports, according to the EIA.

For the first time ever, the European Union imported in June more LNG from the United States than gas via pipeline from Russia, as Moscow slashed its supply to Europe.

In September, as much as 70% of all U.S. LNG exports in September were headed to Europe, up from 63% in August, per Refinitiv Eikon data cited by Reuters on Monday.

But high prices and low inventories in the United States have had the White House considering a possible limit to LNG exports. An analysis found that curbs on exports would fracture U.S. relations with its key ally, the EU, Reuters’ sources said today, adding that a total ban was never seriously considered.

 

[marsh]

War Breaks Out As "OPEC+ Takes On The Entire West" | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

War Breaks Out As "OPEC+ Takes On The Entire West"​

THURSDAY, OCT 06, 2022 - 08:48 AM

This time, it's war.

One day after we wrote that "OPEC Is Taking On The Fed", the oil cartel did just that when it announced that it was cutting output by 2mmb/d the despite a furious diplomatic campaign by the White House hoping to avoid the inevitable, and warning that any cut would be seen as a "hostile act" by the Soros administration. Of course, despite Biden's fondest wishes that OPEC+, which of course counts Russia among its members, would help Democrats win the midterms by keeping the price of gas low, this was not going to happen...

... and not just for political reasons, but also due to the Fed's increasingly challenging monetary policy. Yesterday, we summarized the dynamic as follows:

• Fed hiking rates to crush oil demand and send US economy into recession fast.
• OPEC+ cutting supply to offset reduced US oil demand and send US economy into recession even faster so Fed is forced to cut rates.

This morning, Rabobank's Michael Every expanded on this, laying out the feedback loop OPEC and the Fed find themselves in:

Fed pivot is possible against a backdrop where oil prices march higher on supply destruction in response to demand destruction as monetary policy is tightened...

So what happens next? For one answer we go to Goldman Sachs which overnight expanded on the "OPEC+ takes on the Fed" concept and revised it to "OPEC+ takes on the West" (available to pro subs in the usual place)...

.... in which Goldman writes that the OPEC+ cut represents a return to the Old Oil Order, where core-OPEC acts under the rational behavior of a dominant producer with pricing power: "In that sense, while exceptional, this cut is also logical as it maximizes the group's revenues today with minimal sacrifice of future profits." In addition, Goldman notes that "the speed at which such an agreement was formed suggests the accord was a political statement as well" adding that various OPEC+ members have expressed their displeasure at US SPR releases, broader Western price caps/’Buyers’ cartel’, as well as security concerns and a potential return to the JCPOA.

Bottom line for traders: Goldman raises its 4Q22-1Q23 oil forecasts "conservatively" by $10/bbl, to $110/$115 respectively, "but acknowledge price risks are skewed potentially even higher." Why? Because as Goldman notes, "recent fundamental developments reinforce these clear upside risks.

Global stocks are reversing their recent builds, especially adjusting for soaring oil on water related to the redirection of Russian flows. China remains drawing at an unsustainable rate, merely delaying this tightening to ex-China balances. The latest DOE US demand estimate confirm that this summer's demand soft patch was seasonal (WFH related), with demand rebounding since. Further, comments by Russia on the side of the OPEC+ conference comfort us in our expectation that exports are likely to decline as Europe implements both its physical embargo as well as its price cap (we expect Russian production to sequentially decline by 0.6 mb/d by spring 2023, even more conservative a forecast than the Russian oil ministry itself at -0.8 mb/d)."

Of course, Goldman warns that such a large OPEC+ effective cut will "likely warrant another response from the US administration"; and according to Michael Every some possible responses include:

• Another 10m barrels will be released from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is not bottomless, and may be needed in a geopolitical emergency at some point.
• To “explore any additional responsible actions to continue increasing domestic production in the immediate term.” But there is no immediate private-sector response possible if the longer-term outlook is still to shut fossil fuels down.
• Calling on US energy companies to bring pump prices down by closing the historically large gap between wholesale and retail gas prices - which is already slim for most retailers.
• To consult with Congress on additional tools and authorities to reduce OPEC’s control over energy prices. This is even whispered to include the so-called NOPEC bill floated in 2007 but never enacted, which is designed to remove the state immunity shield and allow the international oil cartel, OPEC, and its national oil companies, to be sued under US antitrust law for anti-competitive attempts to limit the world's supply of petroleum.
• To accelerate the clean energy transition, without the minerals or supply chains to do so, by increasing “reliance on American-made and American-produced clean energy and energy technologies”.
• Despite the White House’s Kirby talking about ‘reducing dependence on foreign oil production’, the Wall Street Journal reports the ‘US Looks to Ease Venezuela Sanctions, Enabling Chevron to Pump Oil’: so a tiny gain in oil and a massive loss of deterrent power and loss of face.

To these, Goldman would also add a coordinated IEA SPR release (should prices go high enough) as a possibility. Under the current ‘energy emergency’ conditions, there are minimal constraints on the current US administration in releasing additional barrels.

However, as the 2023 fiscal year begins, it provides access to c.70mb of future budgetary planned sales. These sales are typically given a drawdown window (e.g. FY 23-25) but no constraints on the distribution of the inventory releases over this time.

To this end, the Biden administration has already announced they will continue releasing the SPR "as appropriate" as well as saying it would work with Congress to potentially enable the "NOPEC" bill that has circulated through Congress since 2008.

Needless to say, as this increasingly hot war between OPEC+ and the West (i.e., Fed) escalates, the total amount of oil available to the West will go down, not up, forcing the Fed to hike even more to offset the decline in supply with even less demand (and perhaps even forcing to US to turn "kinetic" in delivering Democracy to Ryadh), a cycle which will go on until the Fed finally breaks something in the hyperfinancialized US economy in which financial assets were 630% of GDP at least check...



... or in other words, OPEC+ doesn't have to defeat the entire west: just its weakest financial institution whose collapse will drag down everything else. At that point global commodity producers, including Russia, will have effectively defeated the world's former superpower.