GOV/MIL Main "Great Reset" Thread

marsh

On TB every waking moment
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNInkLNhHSQ
8:45 min

They Planned This ( To Stop YOU )​

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The Economic Ninja
1 hour ago

US Debt-Servicing Costs Skyrocket: $1.4 Trillion In Interest Payments On Deck​

Posted on November 4, 2022
By Howard Wang of Convoy Investments

Jerome Powell has been talking tough on inflation and clearly wants to leave a Volcker-like legacy. But the US is far different today than it was in the 80s. The recent Q3 US government borrowing report may throw a wrench in his plans.

US debt servicing costs skyrocketed in Q3 as the rate shock propagated to the $31 trillion worth of federal debt, a number that continues to grow at a $1.5 trillion per year clip. Because of the high debt base, any small changes in average financing rate has a huge impact on ultimate debt costs to the government.

This number will only worsen as we continue to retire cheaper old debt and replace it with costlier new debt.

If the current ~4.5% average yield curve rate propagates to all $31 trillion worth of debt, we are looking at $1.4 trillion per year just in interest payments. This would be 29% of the 2022 FY total Federal tax receipt.

The US government may become the most leveraged and vulnerable player to rate shocks. When you rack up the kinds of debt that our government has, you can lose the luxury of rapidly clamping down on inflation like Volcker did in the 80s. I wouldn’t be surprised if Yellen is, along with the rest of the market, privately begging Powell to slow down.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-d3jFIGxdQ
1:23:48 min

How Elites Will Create a New Class of Slaves | Whitney Webb | The Glenn Beck Podcast | Ep 162​

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Glenn Beck
Premiered 4 hours ago

Journalist Whitney Webb has worked to uncover some of the most dangerous stories of our lifetime, and she joins Glenn to reveal just how eye-opening it’s been. Her new two-volume book, “One Nation Under Blackmail: The Sordid Union Between Intelligence and Crime that Gave Rise to Jeffrey Epstein,” examines Epstein’s elaborate network of corruption and power, from Bill Clinton to Ghislaine Maxwell and many more. Her research into transhumanism has given her a terrifying perspective on the World Economic Forum and tech elites, including Elon Musk. And she tells Glenn the dark truth about Biden’s push for electric vehicles that she noticed while living in Chile.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMfIwJf8mro
11:26 min

Fleeing China’s Insane Zero Covid Lockdowns​

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China Uncensored
Nov 5, 2022

Almost three years into the pandemic, China is treating Covid like Covid just started spreading. Mass testing, state-mandated quarantine, forced lockdowns and routine sanitizing are all still everyday reality in China. In this episode of China Uncensored, we talk about how people are fleeing China's insane zero covid lockdowns, the ridiculous lengths the CCP goes to to test for Covid (i.e. animals, inanimate objects) and how this fear is making people do extraordinary things.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
War Room: The Old Republican Party Of Compromise And Defeat Is Gone 2:26 min

War Room: The Old Republican Party Of Compromise And Defeat Is Gone​

RedpillUSAPatriots Published November 5, 2022

(No summary given.)

^^^^
Congresswoman MTG: The New Republican Party Will Stand For The American People 16:01 min

Congresswoman MTG: The New Republican Party Will Stand For The American People​

Bannons War Room Published November 5, 2022

(No summary given. Notes: Americans first. Investigate and bring accountability Mayorkas, Biden. Confrontational with Corporate America and their radical left views.)

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Bannon: MAGA Must Utilize The Investigative Apparatus To Its Full Extent With The 118th Congress 3:54 min

Bannon: MAGA Must Utilize The Investigative Apparatus To Its Full Extent With The 118th Congress​

Bannons War Room Published November 5, 2022

(Notes: We're coming after the traitors in a perfectly legal basis. On Monday the 14th lay out framework for investigation of Hunter Biden's laptop and the Chinese Communist compromise at highest levels. Investigation of Garland and his/FBI cover up. Joint select investigation of Chinese infiltration - traitors. No violence - use of the rule of law. Two committee investigations - both have subpoena power. All the collaborators are all coming out.)

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Bannon: Americans Compromised By The CCP Shall Be Prosecuted And Impeached For Their Betrayal Of The American People 7:59 min

Bannon: Americans Compromised By The CCP Shall Be Prosecuted And Impeached For Their Betrayal Of The American People​

Bannons War Room Published November 5, 2022

(Notes: includes discussion of True the Vote and imprisonment of Phillips and Engelbrecht. The CCP owns Biden family, CCP owns FBI, Garland going to be impeached. The curtain comes down next week on the old and comes up again on Act 2 the following Monday. )

^^^^^
MTG: Joe Biden's Must Be Investigated And Impeached For His High Crimes Against The American Nation

MTG: Joe Biden's Must Be Investigated And Impeached For His High Crimes Against The American Nation​

Bannons War Room Published November 5, 2022

(Notes: Our Southern border is of direct national security issue. Invasion at southern border and feds failure to perform their duty of protection from invasion. Biden defending Ukraine's borders because he has business interests over there. Rare earth mineral interest for the Green New Deal. The borders that matter here to Americans is the southern border. MTG is not interested in political impeachments. She wants the deep investigations and if there is evidence, then move forward. )
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Rudy Giuliani: The Left's Dismissal Of High Crime Rates Hurt The Innocent The Most 7:02 min

Rudy Giuliani: The Left's Dismissal Of High Crime Rates Hurt The Innocent The Most​

Bannons War Room Published November 5, 2022

(This is our last stop before communism. Crime wave of massive proportions due to their reversal of policies that worked for decades. We need an across the board strategic plan based on COMSTAT. We need from 2-3,000 more police. Get rid of bail area, restore danger element -hold to protect the public. Prioritize going after worst criminals. Let police know we have their backs - liability protections. )

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Liz Joy - Democrats Are Out Of Touch With Horrifying Realities Of New York Life 10:25 min

Liz Joy - Democrats Are Out Of Touch With Horrifying Realities Of New York Life​

ThingsThatMatter Published November 5, 2022
 
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marsh

On TB every waking moment
Tony Lyons Breaks Down The Corruption Of Tony Fauci 11:26 min

Tony Lyons Breaks Down The Corruption Of Tony Fauci​

Bannons War Room Published November 4, 2022

(Notes: 6 strong books with evidence on Fauci's assault on real science, against free speech - use of propaganda and censorship. )

^^^^^
Natalie Winters: The American People Can't Allow Fauci To Lie His Way Out Of Accountability 10:58 min

Natalie Winters: The American People Can't Allow Fauci To Lie His Way Out Of Accountability​

ThingsThatMatter Published November 5, 2022

(Notes: Fauci shuffling to distance himself from culpability.)

^^^^^
Fact Checking Biden & Fauci 54:18 min

Fact Checking Biden & Fauci​

Right2Freedom Published November 5, 2022
‘Friday Roundtable’ Episode 32: Fact Checking Biden + Fauci

Today, panelists view and fact-check claims made in various video clips that feature Fauci, Biden and others. Then, viewers hear updates from Meryl Nass, M.D. and Brian Hooker, Ph.D. on medical board hearings, research papers and other relevant, imperative events and materials.
 
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marsh

On TB every waking moment
There May Not Be a 2024 Election - Martin Armstrong 1:07:33 min

There May Not Be a 2024 Election - Martin Armstrong​

Greg Hunter's USAWatchdog.com Published November 5, 2022

^^^^

There May Not Be a 2024 Election – Martin Armstrong​

By Greg Hunter On November 5, 2022 In Political Analysis No Comments

Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong says, “The cheating in the midterm election next week is going to be so great that it is almost impossible to make a prediction. . . . In a fair midterm election, the Republicans would win the House and the Senate.”

So,m what does his Socrates program see for next week? Armstrong, says, “It’s going to be tight, and the Republicans have a shot at taking the House.

Technically, they should take the House and the Senate. I am just not sure.

The corruption is so bad, it’s crazy. Pennsylvania sent out hundreds of thousands of ballots to people who are not documented or even American.

I’ve gotten emails from people in Canada, they are getting mail-in ballots.

They mailed them to Canada. . . .Where this ends up, who knows? It’s just so corrupt, it is over the top. It doesn’t matter who wins. Nobody is going to accept this thing, and that is the problem.”

The cheating is going to be so in your face President Trump may not even be able to run for President two years from now. Armstrong contends, “We may not even have an election in 2024. It is not looking very good, and it’s probably because this election is not going to be accepted. When it is so over-the-top corrupt, what do you do for the next one? The United States will not exist after 2032. After 2028 and 2029, we are going to have to redesign a government from scratch. America is being destroyed. Republics always end in absolute corruption. We just saw the same thing happen in Brazil. They staged a major effort to take Bolsonaro out. . . . This is a worldwide effort.

They had to get rid of Trump. The other one who stood in their way is Bolsonaro. Then there is Putin (Russia) and Xi Jinping (China). I think you are going to have historians look back at this 50 years from now, and they will call this period ‘The Climate Change Wars’. . . .They are trying to take down as much oil energy capacity as possible.”

Armstrong is still seeing very strong signals on domestic violence everywhere. Armstrong explains, “Our computer is showing it’s going to be a rocket launch for volatility and civil unrest next year.”

Armstrong also contends there will be a major loss of confidence in government around the world. That means gold will start having big demand from big money. Armstrong also predicts, “The whole monetary system as we know it is collapsing. That was what the bond crisis in the UK was about.”

There is much more in the 1-hour and 7-minute interview for 11.5.22.

Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, cycle expert and author of the new book “The Plot to Seize Russia, Manufacturing World War III.” Armstrong is giving the book away if you attend in-person the “2022 World Economic Conference” in Orlando, FL, next weekend.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Dr. Robert Malone On Covid Vaccines: We Are Going To See The Pharmaceutical Industry Behind This 12:59 min

Dr. Robert Malone On Covid Vaccines: We Are Going To See The Pharmaceutical Industry Behind This​

Right2Freedom Published November 5, 2022

Dr. Robert Malone On Covid Vaccines: We Are Going To See The Pharmaceutical Industry Behind This.

^^^^
Dr. Robert Malone - Stripping of Medical Credentials, Ongoing Information Control & Psychological 54:55 min

Dr. Robert Malone - Stripping of Medical Credentials, Ongoing Information Control & Psychological​

Right2Freedom Published November 5, 2022

Dr Robert Malone is the expert the world should have been listening to.
His knowledge and understanding of mRNA technology could of prevented the greatest evil the world has ever seen.

Yet instead of being listened to, he was attacked, silenced and shut down.

Dr Malone has continued to speak the truth, no matter how difficult it may be.
He joins Hearts of Oak for the third time to look at how those who stand up to the Covid narrative are stripped of their credentials as an attempt to remove their right to speak, he also discusses the continuing restriction on the spread of information and finally he looks at how psychological warfare is being used to take down the freedom movement.

Dr. Robert W Malone is the discoverer of in-vitro and in-vivo RNA transfection and the inventor of mRNA vaccines, while he was at the Salk Institute in 1988.
His research was continued at Vical in 1989, where the first in-vivo mammalian experiments were designed by him.

The mRNA, constructs, reagents were developed at the Salk institute and Vical by Dr. Malone.

The initial patent disclosures were written by Dr. Malone in 1988-1989.
He was also an inventor of DNA vaccines in 1988 and 1989. This work results in over 10 patents and numerous publications, yielding about 7000 citations for this work.

Dr. Malone has extensive research and development experience in the areas of pre-clinical discovery research, clinical trials, vaccines, gene therapy, bio-defense, and immunology. He has over twenty years of management and leadership experience in academia, pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, as well as in governmental and non-governmental organizations.

Dr. Malone specializes in clinical research, medical affairs, regulatory affairs, project management, proposal management (large grants and contracts), vaccines and biodefense. This includes writing, developing, reviewing and managing vaccine, bio-threat and biologics clinical trials and clinical development strategies.

He has been involved in developing, designing, and providing oversight of approximately forty phase 1 clinical trials and twenty phase 2 clinical trials, as well as five phase 3 clinical trials.

He has served as medical director/medical monitor on approximately forty phase 1 clinical trials, and on twenty phase 2 clinical trials, including those run at vaccine-focused Clinical Research Organizations.

His proposal development work has yielded clients billions of dollars.

Scientifically trained at UC Davis, UC San Diego, and at the Salk Institute Molecular Biology and Virology laboratories, Dr. Malone is an internationally recognized scientist (virology, immunology, molecular biology) and is known as one of the original inventors of mRNA vaccination and DNA Vaccination.

His discoveries in mRNA non viral delivery systems are considered the key to the current COVID-19 vaccine strategies.

He holds numerous fundamental domestic and foreign patents in the fields of gene delivery, delivery formulations, and vaccines.

He received his medical training at Northwestern University (MD) and Harvard University (Clinical Research Post Graduate) medical school, and in Pathology at UC Davis.

Dr. Malone has close to 100 peer-reviewed publications and published abstracts and has over 11,477 citations of his peer reviewed publications, as verified by Google Scholar.

His google scholar ranking is “outstanding” for impact factors.

He has been an invited speaker at over 50 conferences, has chaired numerous conferences and he has sat on or served as chairperson on numerous NIAID and DoD study sections.
 
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marsh

On TB every waking moment
The Cat is Out of the Bag - The CoVid -19 Virus & Vaccine Was One Big Lie! 33:37 min

The Cat is Out of the Bag - The CoVid -19 Virus & Vaccine Was One Big Lie!​

Right2Freedom Published November 5, 2022

Christine Anderson, MEP-New Press Conference-EU-Action Plan on C-19
Just a few days ago, the Pfizer bomb burst in our EU Special Committee.
Now I also received the new EU Action Plan for 2023. What is written there is just sick. Now pregnant women are to be increasingly "vaccinated"! Anyone refusing will be considered anti-Western and anti-EU. At the same time, the narrative NOW will be expanded on the usual Influenza.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
James Roguski - The WHO Is Now Meeting in Secret to Overtake Your Constitution! 38:41 min

James Roguski - The WHO Is Now Meeting in Secret to Overtake Your Constitution!​

Right2Freedom Published November 5, 2022

James Roguski joins Maria Zeee to reveal how the WHO is now meeting in secret and refusing to issue the public with their hidden suggestions to amendments to the International Health Regulations which seek to enslave us all under a COMPLETE medical dictatorship. You’ll be shocked to see which countries are operating in secret with the WHO!
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

US Space Plane Orbits Earth For 900 Consecutive Days With Mysterious Payloads​

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 05:00 PM

U.S. Space Force's robotic X-37B space plane keeps extending its flight-duration record, orbiting around the Earth for 900 days, according to Space.com.

The reusable space plane designed and built by Boeing is flying its sixth mission, known as Orbital Test Vehicle-6 or OTV-6, which was initially launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on May 17, 2020. It remains unclear when the top-secret mission will end.

On Jul. 7, Boeing Space tweeted the X-37 "has set another endurance record — as it has on every mission since it first launched in 2010."



Many of OTV-6's experiments and activities are classified. But some experimental payloads have been made public, such as the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory's Photovoltaic Radio-frequency Antenna Module, a small device that converts solar power into radio frequency microwave energy.

Space.com expands more on the non-classified experiments and technologies being tested:

"Technologies being tested in the X-37B program include advanced guidance, navigation and control, thermal protection systems, avionics, high temperature structures and seals, conformal reusable insulation, lightweight electromechanical flight systems, advanced propulsion systems, advanced materials and autonomous orbital flight, re-entry and landing."

The X-37B is similar to the retired space shuttle, although the space plane is a fraction of the size, coming in at 29 feet in length and 9.5 feet high, with a wingspan of 15 feet.

Boeing boasts the X-37B as "one of the world's newest and most advanced re-entry spacecraft." It can operate anywhere from 150 to 500 miles in altitudes and de-orbit with landing capabilities.

"While there are rumors or theories that the X-37B might be a testbed for orbital weapons or could be used to capture adversary satellites, experts doubt these claims, arguing that the plane is far too small and not maneuverable enough to be used for these roles," Space.com said.

It's anybody's guess when the top-secret space plane will return to Earth.

Here's a list of the previous flights:
  • OTV-1: launched on Apr. 22, 2010 and landed on Dec. 3, 2010, spending over 224 days in orbit.
  • OTV-2: launched on Mar. 5, 2011 and landed on Jun. 16, 2012, spending over 468 days in orbit.
  • OTV-3: launched on Dec. 11, 2012 and landed on Oct. 17, 2014, spending over 674 days in orbit.
  • OTV-4: launched on May 20, 2015 and landed on May 7, 2015, spending nearly 718 days in orbit.
  • OTV-5: launched on Sept. 7, 2017 and landed on Oct. 27, 2019, spending nearly 780 days in orbit.
Meanwhile, Space Force detected last week that China's secretive reusable spaceplane released a mystery object in orbit.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Xi's Eviction Of Hu From Communist Congress Supports Reform Agenda


SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 04:00 PM
Last month's Chinese Communist Party's National Congress brought a moment of high visual drama, when former president Hu Jintao was suddenly escorted by ushers from the carefully-scripted proceedings, as current President Xi Jinping looked on.

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1585874027817623552
.13 min

State media said 79-year-old Hu was "not feeling well," but a close analysis of the video by The New York Times seems to indicate that, as he was being removed, other officials were trying to prevent him from seeing a document that listed the new members of the powerful Central Committee, which was about to be announced.

While Hu dominated headlines, he wasn't the only official to nudged away from the center of power: Hu Jintao's protege, 59-year-old Hu Chunhua, was demoted from the Politburo Standing Committee. He'd long been considered as a potential future Chinese leader.

The standing committee is now dominated by Xi loyalists, leaving China-watchers debating over what it portends for the future of Chinese governance and foreign policy -- and tensions over Taiwan.

Some have interpreted it to mean Xi is angling for perpetual leadership of the country. However, Nikkei Asia's Ken Moriyasu, is skeptical: "China is not North Korea. It is hard for a politician like Xi, with little to show in terms of achievements, to stay atop the country for so long."

Moriyasu likewise doubts that Xi's maneuvering portends an invasion of Taiwan. Rather, he think Xi has some unpopular policies in mind, and wants a team around him that will see those policies through the controversies that accompany them.

"That's a reform cabinet in disguise. It's a common prosperity cabinet," Lauren Johnston, associate professor of the China Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, tells Moriyasu.

Common prosperity is a term Xi uses to encapsulate a policy agenda focused on reducing income inequality, writes Moriyasu:

At an August 2021 meeting of the party's committee for financial and economic affairs, Xi spoke of raising the pay of low-income groups, promoting fairness, making regional development more balanced and stressing people-centered growth.

Any governmental emphasis on ending income inequality carries an implicit threat to reduce higher incomes, either via taxation or outright caps. Xi's rhetoric implies he'd like to use both avenues. He's promised to "reasonably regulate excessively high incomes and encourage high-income people and enterprises to return more to society."

"Xi wants young, hardworking people to be able to get somewhere as the middle class, getting a job, buying a home. If 85% of a youth's wages is going to rent," Johnston says, "it's not sustainable."

President Xi's right-hand man, Li Qiang (Kevin Frayer/Getty Images via WSJ)
Li Qiang has emerged as Xi's number-two. He'd previously demonstrated his loyalty to Xi by strictly carrying out Xi's draconian zero-Covid policies as party chief of Shanghai. "Li Qiang showed himself willing to take on the rich elites in China's richest city," says Johnston.

The same resilience will be essential when Xi goes after "excessively high incomes." Worries over such an agenda have already taken a toll on Shanghai stocks.

Between the Biden administration's assault on China's semiconductor market to high youth unemployment, real estate woes and the lingering effects of zero-Covid policies on the Chinese economy, the five years between now and the next Chinese Communist Congress will be challenging for Xi, according to Zhu Jianrong, a professor at Toyo Gakuen University in Tokyo.

"Xi now has his back against the wall. He got his team and will now have to deliver," says Zhu. Otherwise, a fourth term as party chair will be unlikely.

Zhu says a war over Taiwan doesn't make sense in the context of Xi's broader agenda:

"The unification of Taiwan and the effort to build a modern socialist country contradict each other. The goal is to win without fighting. China will prioritize catching up with the U.S. in overall national power while avoiding a full-front conflict until then at all costs. It's a new version of Deng Xiaoping's 'biding time' strategy."
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Beating Back The Jungle Of Red Tape

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 03:30 PM
Authored by Ron Shultis via RealClear Wire,

Besides “tax increase,” few terms rile up Americans more than “red tape.” Like a vine or weed that spreads out of control, red tape conjures up visions of a fast- and ever-growing jungle of rigid, excessive, and bureaucratic regulations that bring action grinding to a halt. And these regulations have consequences: The average regulatory cost for a new business in its first year is more than $83,000. Here in Tennessee, it would take an individual spending 40 hours a week eleven weeks to read all of Tennessee’s 114,000-plus regulations, totaling more than eight million words. These regulations ensnare businesses and individuals and deprive us of our freedoms and future prosperity. State leaders must implement broad regulatory reform to ensure no Tennessean suffers from backbreaking regulations and better unleash the state’s economy.

A regulatory reform agenda will include many layers of improvements. First, make it easier to “count” the number and cost of current regulations. Fortunately, a recently passed law will require all bureaucracies to report by the end of 2023 and every eight years afterwards a list of every regulation on the books.

From there, state lawmakers should seek to “cap” either the total number or cost of regulations. In Wisconsin, the legislature can require an independent economist to calculate the cost of proposed regulations on businesses and another review after the fact to confirm estimates to cap the impact of regulations on the economy. Ideally, the cap is lower than the current total, forcing leaders to “cut” those that are too onerous or outdated. For the best example of how reducing regulatory burdens can unleash our economy, look to our neighbors in the north: After a poor economic decade in the 1990s, the Canadian province of British Columbia decided to try something drastic.

Starting in 2001, for every new proposed regulation, bureaucracies had to repeal at least one regulation — with the goal of reducing regulatory requirements by one-third within three years. The province exceeded that goal, cutting regulations by roughly half. The result was that the province’s economy transformed from lagging Canada’s as a whole to its fastest growing province since 2002.

After adopting a “count, cap, and cut” approach, state policymakers should provide tools to create more regulatory flexibility. Currently few options exist for those just seeking clarity if their business is subject to certain regulations. If an innovative small business wants some guidance on whether regulations apply to them or not, they often must hire legal counsel and go before an administrative law judge, an intimidating process for most. To solve this problem, regulators should be empowered to issue no-action letters (NALs).

NALs allow an agency to state that it will not punish a business owner or person if they engage in some action. Without a similar tool, regulators often can only punish a new company who can then appeal to begin the process of working with them. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. NALs provide additional tools to regulators to provide the clarity and flexibility people need, especially businesses in a highly innovative world.

Finally, to prevent regulations from ever growing out of hand again, the burden to prove the necessity of new regulations should be on the government. Currently, the burden typically falls on Tennesseans in court to prove a regulation is unduly onerous. If the government is going to impose costs on Tennesseans, it should be on them to prove that the regulation is necessary to protect the public.

Reforming regulations does make news headlines like tax cuts or recruiting new businesses with taxpayer money. However, if Tennessee lawmakers wish to engage in broad regulatory reform, they will be rewarded. The example of British Columbia shows that while regulatory reform is unlikely to grab headlines, it can transform economies in just a few short years. A holistic regulatory reform agenda will include many layers but with a three-tiered approach, first “counting, capping, and cutting” then providing more flexibility, and then finally shifting the burden of proving new regulations to where it belongs our state’s leaders can beat back the jungle of red tape and unleash prosperity for Tennesseans like never before.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Luongo: The Oil Nationalization Two-Step

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 01:30 PM
Authored by Tom Luongo via Gold, Goats, n' Guns blog,

Blood rack, barbed wire​
Politicians’ funeral pyre​
Innocents raped with napalm fire​
Twenty-first century schizoid man​
- King Crimson, “21st Century Schizoid Man”

You’ve all heard me rant about the “Straussian Two-Step,” which is nothing more than a retread of the Hegelian Dialectic.

Here’s the formal definition:

An interpretive method, originally used to relate specific entities or events to the absolute idea, in which some assertible proposition (thesis ) is necessarily opposed by an equally assertible and apparently contradictory proposition (antithesis ), the mutual contradiction being reconciled on a higher level of truth by a third proposition (synthesis ).​

In modern politics it’s used to create a false reality by asserting something that is partially true (at best) or a truth that you yourself as a person in power created.

In today’s case it’s a manufactured energy crisis across the West.

In order to see the Straussian Two-Step however you have to work backwards. This process is not an a priori deduction or an exhaustive fit of investigative journalism.

Rather it is an inductive conclusion based on awareness of the motivations of those in power and seeing how they lead a mass of people to a pre-ordained conclusion. In other words, schizo-posting.

Thesis
So, say your goal is to legitimize the state takeover, or advance another step forward the state takeover, of an industry. Let’s use oil and gas for today’s lesson.

The first thing you do is manufacture a crisis that will disrupt the supply of the product you want to takeover. In this case, it started with COVID-19, which disrupted far more than just the energy sector.

More than 2 million barrels per day of refining capacity was lost world wide thanks to COVID-19. Given the current hostility to new refineres (more on this later), those barrels are not coming back.

Don’t forget, that for a “Straussian Two-Step” this big you will have to brainwash and/or gaslight two entire generations into hating themselves for being rich, wasteful, spoiled, alive or worse, just plain white.

So, they are already primed to hate all the things at play here — capitalism, Big Oil, Banks, Old White Guys (rich or poor) — and enrage your useful idiots by pushing their already tenuous hold on reality to the literal breaking point.

“I can’t even….” isn’t the most common phrase uttered on Tik-Tok for nothing.

That’s the Thesis part.

So, when the crisis hits thanks to natural gas disruption you forbid buying of from a particular country…

— Hello, Vlad? We’re in a helluva pickle, would you mind invading Ukraine…? Nyet…? Well, we’ll see about that….​
— MISSING PAGES FROM THE RETURN OF DR. STRANGELOVE WORKING SCRIPT.​
… you demonize not only Vlad but the industry itself for price gouging and preying on the widdle guy during a war.

There’s a word for this… chutzpah.

Antithesis
Predictably, you then allow your fake political opponents …

[enter Cocaine Mitch from Stage Right]

… to produce the opposite argument. In this case, the counter is obviously we need free markets to produce oil and gas. The refiners are just responding to the market.

That fake opposition, of course, also blames Vlad for this crisis to ensure the market’s champion looks not only patriotic but also suitably bought and paid for by Big Oil, Old White Guys, etc.

Both sides of this argument have now been framed 90 degrees away from the real source of the problem, government intrusion into the flow of oil and gas to your homes.

This is a crisis that if left solved to human ingenuity and, yes, the studious application of greed, would be over in a matter of weeks as refineries shut down during COVID would come back online, supply chains reorganized etc.

While the crisis phase would be over quickly, the long term investment cycle set off in refining would take longer to structurally immunize the industry against future supply shocks to accomplish.

And if you’re daft enough to believe government has any of that investment path mapped out on their whiteboards in their noble service to humanity, I can’t even…

If I could buy stock in psychoanalysis right now I’d be long AF.

Prices may not return to normal for years but the market, without intervention by rapacious morons both in government and running them from behind the curtain, would eventually grind the arbitrage out of the fuel industry nearly entirely.

Guess who wins there folks? That’s right you. But, again, you hate yourself for being, well, yourself.

Once the crisis is here and the rhetorical groundwork laid after months of repeating these lies about the cause of the crisis — PUTLER DID IT — it’s easy to move the conversation to where you really want it to go.

Remember the goal. Destroy free markets, nationalize oil and gas.

This means also preparing the next move to get rid of another aspect of the free market while zeroing in on the current crisis. In this theoretical case, we’re looking at the massive diesel crack spreads of refineries, fueling the perpetual motion machine of Marxism’s inherent envy.

Moreover, this situation exploded on the eve of a crucial election to put into the mouths of the crisis actors we call colloquially, “Members of Congress.”

Synthesis
Their solution? Put windfall profit taxes on refiners who are taking advantage of the vulnerable and needy common man. They are evil ‘price gougers’ by accepting the bids from the market for the fruits of their labors which occurred precisely because of artificially inducing a shock to the system.

In the case of diesel fuel in the US this is clearly a manufactured crisis. COVID took a lot of refineries in the Northeast (PADD-1) offline. And given the hostility of the Biden administration and environmentalists to the oil industry as a whole, as I alluded to earlier, those refineries are not coming back online anytime soon.

Don’t take my word for it, take it from the ones who own the refineries.

“Building a refinery is a multi-billion dollar investment. It may take a decade. We haven’t had a refinery built in the United States since the 1970s. My personal view is that there will never be another refinery built in the United States.”

According to Wirth, oil and gas companies would have to weigh the benefits of committing capital ten years out that will need decades to offer a return to shareholders “in a policy environment where governments around the world are saying ‘we don’t want these products to be used in the future’”.

Why would they? If it were your money would you begin the insane process to build an oil refinery in the US today even with crack spreads at $70+ per barrel? Of course not. By the time you filed the first Environmental Impact Assessment application form the spreads could be back to $20 because it’s politically advantageous for the “Straussian Two-Steppers” to take the pressure off for a few months.

Government is keeping the market in a supply/demand mismatch on purpose. That’s the only conclusion you can draw. Because if “Biden” wanted to solve this problem he wouldn’t be draining the SPR, he’d be rolling back regulations on refining oil or offering some of that ‘infrastructure money’ to help the industry rebuild post-COVID.

No matter how committed you are to saving the planet from Climate Change civilization is directly downstream of energy production.

If he wanted lower gas prices he wouldn’t be trying to expand subsidies to poor people, pandering for their votes, he’d be going to the negotiating table with Putler and working out a mutually unappetizing solution to everyone’s interests in Ukraine.

High Bid Wins the Prize
Diesel fuel demand is mostly inelastic, since it’s simply necessary for our daily life. Any supply disruption will cause massive price spikes because people will fall all over themselves bidding up the price of available supply to get what they can.

This is the one thing morons leftists can’t wrap their head around. Producers aren’t withholding supply and ‘raising prices’ in an open market economy. That’s propaganda. The reality is that consumers bid up the price for everything in demand or withhold those bids when the cost/benefit isn’t in their favor.

There is no need to control this. The things under supply shock will flow to those who have the means to bid for them and producers get the signal there is money to be made increasing supply. It is this give and take that always alleviates shortages, unless they are not allowed to do so because ‘rules.’

As the late, great Gary North told us over and over again, “Everything’s for sale, high bid wins.” If you have anyone to blame for higher diesel crack spreads you need only look in a mirror. Because we could have spare refining capacity by now if it weren’t cost prohibitive, even at these prices, to bring the idle plants back on line.

Remember, everything’s for sale and high bid wins. Everyone does the cost/benefit analysis.

This is the dynamic at play when I use the term cost-push inflation. A supply shortage pushes the bids for basic goods up out of necessity and pouring money into the system through government handouts only accelerates this effect.

Low cost or free dollars flow to the things people need the most and that is the main source of our inflation today.

So, when you see the headlines full of scaremongering like the US only has 20 days of diesel fuel left, this undergirds the bids for limited supply. The futures markets are stripped of their power to coordinate supply over time and producers are stuck being demonized by low quality agitprop from the likes of AOC and Lizzie Slapaho.

Nationalization: The Next Two-Step
Windfall profit taxes are already on the way in Germany, 90% of all profits taxed away to the state. Energy production, when that bill passes, will be nationalized in Germany. The end of rational energy pricing will be gone.

Germany will become another energy subsidizing hellscape like we see all over the world.

The choice in front of German energy companies now is Uniper’s fate, nationalization through bailout, or remain ‘private’ but on a government-mandated cost-plus business model the profits from which will never outcompete the depreciation curve.

Today here in the US the Democrats are pushing for outright nationalization of all oil and gas production. That was the goal all along, the thesis. The fake antithesis is the “Drill baby, Drill,” crowd on Capitol Hill, crying crocodile tears over the loss of the Keystone XL pipeline for more than a decade.

The synthesis this time around will be finally getting through their long-sought after billionaire’s tax in the form of a windfall tax starting with evil Big Oil. Even if they don’t get it, it’s not like they don’t have other things on their to-do lists to get it done.

They are starting here again because they know no one will seriously consider outright nationalization (the next synthesis) unless there’s a war with Russia…
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Is Big Tech Funding Literal Migrant "Roadmaps" To Enter The US From Central America?​

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 01:00 PM

The medical aid nonprofit Doctors Without Borders is providing and distributing maps for migrants that show routes through Central America to reach the United States, according to a new report by the Daily Caller.

And the kicker? The organization providing the maps is funded by "a number of prominent tech companies".

Called “shelters for people on the move” in Spanish, the map lists clinics and aid areas along routes to the U.S.

It shows paths that start in Guatemala that lead to the U.S.-Mexico border and lists clinics and shelters along the Mexican border that migrants can stop at during their trip. These clinics and shelters are across the border from major U.S. cities like El Paso, Texas and San Diego, California, the report says.



Meanwhile, Doctors Without Borders has gotten sizeable donations from companies like Google and Amazon, the report notes. It has also received millions in donations from the foundations of billionaires like Elon Musk and Michael Bloomberg.

Doctors Without Borders spokeswoman Jessica Brown told The Daily Caller: “As a medical humanitarian organization providing medical and mental health care to people on this migration route, MSF [Médecins Sans Frontières] prints and distributes these maps to ensure that people know where to find shelter and humanitarian assistance and how to access mental health services along the migration route."

Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) Director of Government Relations and Communications RJ Hauman concluded: “The fact that an international medical NGO with billions in the bank is making literal roadmaps to guide migrants from Central America to our southern border is not only an affront to its core mission, but a globalist attack on our sovereignty.”
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Rickards: A Bodyguard Of Lies​

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 12:30 PM
Authored by James Rickards via DailyReckoning.com, Gold

The all-important midterm elections are just one week away. I’ve said a lot about them, and will have more to say about them in the days to come.

But today, I want to talk about something even more important: truth vs. official lies. More specifically, I want to talk about truth and propaganda.
It’s said that truth is the first casualty of war. And Churchill once said that in wartime, truth is so precious that it needs to be surrounded by a bodyguard of lies.

That’s why propaganda plays such a large role in modern warfare.
The fact is wars are conducted in part through lies and propaganda. For example, in the early days of World War I, the British cut the undersea communications cables that ran from Germany to the U.S.

The British wanted to control the flow of information and issue what we call today “misinformation.” And so they created inflammatory accounts of German atrocities to sway public opinion, like German soldiers skewering Belgian babies on bayonets.

While there will always be individual acts of atrocity in wartime, these reports were largely propaganda.

Here in the U.S. itself, President Wilson had special police forces who arrested anyone reporting negative news on the progress of the war. Sound familiar?

It’s like the social media companies today canceling or censoring anyone who reports that the vaccines don’t work or masks don’t work. The media call it “misinformation” (even though it’s scientifically valid) and move on.

The same is true with the war in Ukraine. The propaganda machine kicked into overdrive early on.

Bodyguard of Lies

The CIA and MI6 leaked a steady stream of anti-Russian lies to prop up morale. These lies were reprinted in warmonger media outlets like The Washington Post, The New York Times and NBC News.

That means it’s almost impossible for U.S. citizens to get the real story through mainstream media outlets. Still, there is some honest reporting going in if you know where to find it.

You just have to filter the sources and find those with good pipelines of information (including inside the government) who do not have a hidden agenda and are willing to speak the truth.

It’s not necessary to rely on Russian sources (the Russians are certainly not above propaganda, although they’re generally more truthful than the U.S. media, believe it or not). There are excellent analyses to be found among Swiss sources, German experts who are not in favor of the war and some on-the-ground reporting from the front lines on specialist websites.

Get Ready for the Russian Counteroffensive

Some of the best sources are found among retired U.S. military officers who are experts on warfare, still have good contacts inside the military and intelligence communities, and who consider the war in Ukraine to be highly detrimental to U.S. national security and the economy.

One top commentator who fits this description is Colonel (Ret.) Douglas Macgregor, who wrote a recent commentary about the war. Macgregor points out that Russia is preparing for a full-scale counterattack to roll-back recent Ukrainian gains near the Donbas and Kherson.

The Russians have been consolidating their positions: resupplying, mobilizing troops, and preparing for winter warfare at which they excel. It’s just a matter of waiting for the ground to freeze so trucks and armor can maneuver without getting bogged down.

The attack could come as early as November or December at the latest. Yet, that is not Macgregor’s main concern.

Is the 101st Airborne Division Being Used as Bait?

His fear is that the U.S. will double down in the face of this attack and deploy U.S. troops to the battle. The Pentagon recently deployed units of the 101st Airborne Division to Romania, just miles from its border with Ukraine.

Airborne forces are generally light infantry that lack the firepower of, say, armored units or mechanized infantry.

But if these forces did get directly involved in the fighting, heavier reinforcements would be on the way. From there, it could be a short step to nuclear war with Russia.

To some, that might sound unrealistic or even paranoid. They’ll say it’s just scare-mongering. But this is a legitimate possibility, and there’s a real chance of it happening. The fact is, we’ve been on the path of escalation with Russia since 2008 and the tempo of escalation has accelerated since the war began in February.

All experts on nuclear warfighting agree that if a nuclear war begins, it will be the result of escalation to the point that one side feels it is cornered and has no choice but to use nukes. That point is getting closer by the day.

Macgregor calls on Congress to stop the White House, but he’s not optimistic that’ll happen.

Nuclear War? It’s Not the End of the World

The possibility of nuclear war between the U.S. and Russia is a shocking development after thirty years, during which nuclear weapons and nuclear war between superpowers were almost forgotten.

What is as disconcerting is the fact that the discussion of nuclear war is casual, almost flippant, and carries none of the seriousness with which the topic was formerly addressed. It also carries no comprehension of the existential consequences and sheer horror that the use of nuclear weapons entails.

It’s almost as if the warmongers in and around the White House were playing a game of chicken without realizing the other driver had no intention of changing course.

Now the U.S. elites have started psychological operations (psyops) aimed at Putin with nuclear weapons as the bait. They claim that Putin has threatened to use tactical weapons in Ukraine and possibly other parts of Eastern and Central Europe.

That’s a lie; Putin never said that.

When asked, both Putin and Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev said that if attacked, Russia would defend itself by all means necessary, including the possible use of nuclear weapons. That’s not news. That has been Russian or Soviet policy since the early 1950s. It has also been U.S. policy since then.

Neither side has ever renounced the first use of nuclear weapons.

Putin’s expected answer to a question posed has been turned into a threat he never made. This is U.S. and UK propaganda at its worst (and most dangerous). This lie about Putin’s intentions quickly morphed into another psyop about a “false flag” operation.

That’s when you stage an attack disguised to look like an attack by your enemy in order to justify your own “retaliation,” which you were planning all along. Recently, the narrative that Putin would use nukes or conduct a false flag operation morphed into a related narrative that Putin would use a “dirty bomb.”

He Said, He Said

In effect, Putin would detonate a dirty bomb and then blame the Ukrainians and Americans. A dirty bomb is not a nuclear weapon, but it does employ radioactive material wrapped around conventional explosives. When detonated, the radioactive material is dispersed and can poison or kill any people or livestock in the area.

Not to be outdone, the Russians countered by saying the U.S. or Ukraine would conduct the false flag by detonating a dirty bomb and then blaming the Russians as an excuse to escalate Western involvement in Ukraine.

At this point, we have both sides warning the other side will conduct a false flag with a dirty bomb in order to justify their own pre-planned escalation. If a dirty bomb does go off, each side will blame the other and the truth will be a casualty of war.

Meanwhile, a senior Russian foreign ministry official has warned that U.S. satellites, which have been providing critical targeting information to Ukraine’s armed forces, may be “legitimate” targets of Russian forces.

How would the U.S. respond if Russia starts taking out its satellites? We may soon find out.

Is Your Portfolio Ready for Nukes?

By the way, I’m not apologizing for Putin or defending his invasion of Ukraine. I’m just looking at the current situation and objectively analyzing where things could go next, based upon the facts.

And I’m not making a specific prediction; I’m just giving you a warning because the media doesn’t seem to want to.

It might seem like an inappropriate question given the potential for widespread death and destruction, but is your portfolio ready for nukes?

In a nuclear confrontation, stocks and bonds could become worthless as exchanges are closed around the world. At best, they will retain some value as illiquid private equity tokens.

The best assets in this catastrophic scenario are land, gold, silver, food, water, and heat for your home.

Nothing else will matter much.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Manchin Massacres Biden Over "Outrageous" Coal Plant Closure Comments, "Divorced From Reality"​

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 09:00 AM

Senator Joe Manchin is pissed after President Biden said his administration would 'shut down' all of America's coal plants and replace them with 'wind and solar' - comments that couldn't come at a worse time for Democratic candidates in battleground states that are home to blue-collar Americans and the coal plants they work in, given next week's midterm elections.

"Folks, it’s also now cheaper to generate electricity from wind and solar than it is from coal and oil. Literally cheaper. Not a joke. I was just — and so we can accommodate that transition," Biden said last week during a speech at communications company ViaSat in San Diego County.

"I was in Massachusetts about a month ago on the site of the largest old coal plant in America. Guess what? It cost them too much money. They can’t count. No one is building new coal plants because they can’t rely on it, even if they have all the coal guaranteed for the rest of their existence of the plant. So it’s going to become a wind generation. And all they’re doing is — it’s going to save them a hell of a lot of money, and they’re using the same transmission line that transmitted the coal-fired electric on. We’re going to be shutting these plants down all across America and having wind and solar," Biden continued.

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1588622773534052352
.33 min

As the National Review notes, "Biden’s message could disadvantage Democrats just three days before midterms, considering that many of the battleground states that will determine the balance of power in Congress are home to coal plants and the blue-collar Americans who work in them.

Pennsylvania has 24 plants, Ohio has 15 plants, and Michigan has 13 plants."

In particular, Biden's comments stand to hurt Pennsylvania Senate Candidate John Fetterman, who has flip-flopped on Fracking between 2018 and 2022 - finally admitting during a debate last month that he's for it.

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1585067309642944512
.43 min

Manchin is livid
"President Biden's comments are not only outrageous and divorced from reality, they ignore the severe economic pain the American people are feeling because of rising energy costs," West Virginia Democratic Senator Joe Manchin fired back.

"Comments like these are the reason the American people are losing trust in President Biden," he continued, adding "Let me be clear, this is something that the President has never said to me. Being cavalier about the loss of coal jobs for men and women in West Virginia and across the country who literally put their lives on the line to help build and power this country is offensive and disgusting."




Of course, a pissed off Manchin won't have anywhere near the same impact as it once did, assuming Republicans take back the House, Senate, or both chambers in next week's midterm elections.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

How The Soviets "Fixed" Inflation, But Wrecked The Economy

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 10:30 AM
Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

Price inflation and the resulting business cycles are monetary phenomena, and without increases in the money supply—i.e., monetary inflation—there is no price inflation. If the world were a very simple place, we would see this relationship clearly displayed: when the money supply increased, we would also see a general increase in prices soon thereafter. The world, however, is not a very simple place and an economy can include countless factors that can mask, delay, and otherwise obscure the connection between monetary inflation and price inflation.

For example, monetary policymakers in the US have long benefited from the disinflationary effects of global trade and increasing worker productivity. This means that, for decades, consumers should have seen prices of most goods and services falling. Instead, relentless monetary inflation over the past three decades has resulted in positive price growth that is seemingly mild, and policymakers can claim victory over inflation. Moreover, new money can enter the economy in a variety of ways, often manifesting as asset-price inflation rather than as noticeably high price increases in food or household goods.

Governments also have many tools at their disposal to delay or hide the effects of monetary inflation, sometimes for many years. Price controls and subsidies, for example, can obscure the true costs of goods and services for the end consumer. These tactics cause shortages, bubbles, and other problems, but these can often be blamed on "greed" or "capitalism."

One particularly interesting case of how governments can hide price inflation for decades is the Soviet Union. Under the Soviet regime, the money supply—denominated in unbacked fiat money, of course—was continually expanded to increase wages and create the impression of prosperity. This would have led to price inflation quickly, but for the shortage economy and demand-killing government policies endured by the average Soviet citizen. As is so often the case, the regime was able to cover up the effects of inflation for a time, but the policies ultimately proved to be disastrous.

Preventing Inflation through State Control of the Economy
As a regime increases the money supply, demand will generally rise. But rising prices will become acute only if there are actually products and services on which consumers and enterprises can spend their new money. Thus, a regime wishing to avoid price inflation can keep increasing the money supply so long as it also reduces demand by limiting the availability of goods. This prevents improvements in the standard of living, but it can indeed keep down price inflation.

This cannot be easily done in a country where the population expects to live under a relatively free economy. In an unhampered or partially interventionist economy, a lack of widespread price controls often means a large number of goods and services will continue to be supplied, albeit at higher prices, in an inflationary environment. But, because the USSR oversees a heavily controlled, command economy, the regime could more easily dictate prices, limit imports, and force consumers to save rather than spend.

Ultimately, though, by the late 1980s, the regime was forced to "open up" its economy to market forces as a restive population increasingly demanded a standard of living more in line with what existed in the West. However, once the regime ceased controlling prices and savings, prices exploded, government revenues cratered, and the Soviet regime ended its days in an orgy of money printing and hyperinflation.

How the Soviet Regime Manipulated Price Inflation
The fact that the Soviet regime preferred shortages to inflation has its roots in the hyperinflationary history of the Soviet economy. By the middle of the twentieth century, Soviet planners were already well aware of the dangers of hyperinflation. With the end of the czarist regime, and the cessation of the First World War, the new socialist regime took over a country that was already broke and highly dysfunctional. Hyperinflation soon followed. The Bolsheviks attempted to do away with money altogether, but this naturally failed, and a number of monetary reforms followed. By the late 1920s, however, the regime was engaging in widespread price control efforts, including the highly unusual tactic of peacetime rationing. This limited price inflation for many goods and set the stage for the "repressed inflation" that would become a mainstay of the Soviet system for decades. Prices nevertheless began to rise rapidly in many areas, and the Second World War brought on a new wave of price inflation and prices spiraled upward. This was followed by another currency reform—i.e., devaluation—of the Soviet ruble in 1947. Efforts at price controls were redoubled and overall prices actually declined during the 1950s.

Throughout much of the 1950s and early sixties, the regime was perennially concerned about price inflation. In fact, Soviet ideology stipulated that inflation did not actually exist in the USSR. As claimed by Vasily Garbuzov, the Soviet Minister of Finance in 1960:

In the Soviet Union there is not and cannot be any inflation; the possibility of inflation is fully precluded by the very system of planned socialist economy. In our country both wholesale and retail prices are established by the government and, therefore, the purchasing power of the ruble is controlled on a planned basis. ...The stability of Soviet currency is guaranteed by the monopoly of currency and the monopoly of foreign trade which is one of the most important advantages of the socialist economic system.​

This is propaganda, of course, but in a sense, Garbuzov was right. A socialist state really could moderate the price effects of monetary inflation by throttling back the standard of living and consumption options whenever it seemed prices were rising.

This was necessary because the money supply continually expanded as wages rose. In their 1985 study on the Soviet economy, Igor Birman and Roger Clarke wrote:

The reason for the excess supply of money is that the state has consistently 'over-paid' the population in the form of wages, pensions, stipends etc., which exceed production (plus net imports and minus net exports) of consumer goods at the currently ruling retail prices (fixed by the state). While there has indeed been a steady rise in retail prices (despite the stability of the official index) this has been very far from sufficient to equalise the real effective demand of the population with the available supply of goods. In other words, the state generates excessive purchasing power in the hands of the population.​

In an unhampered economy wages are closely tied to the productivity of workers, so wages would not grow out of proportion to the amount of goods and services available in the economy. In a socialist, economy, however, the price of labor—i.e., wages—were arbitrarily set like all other prices. Wages under socialism are also paid out of the public treasury and can be increased to the liking of the regime itself. This often meant rising wages because higher wages were politically popular. Rising wages potentially created the impression of prosperity, even when the economy wasn't actually more productive. Also, as Birman and Clarke note

During the last two decades [i.e., 1965 to 1985] it has pursued the 'confidence trick' policy of trying to stimulate productivity by higher money wages without raising the supply of consumer goods by nearly sufficient to translate the increase in money wages into increased real incomes.​

Increasingly, after 1965, the Soviet money supply was out of proportion to the productive capability of the economy. In a relatively free economy, this would quickly lead to price inflation, but the Soviet regime had ways of shifting the economic burden elsewhere.

Thus, prices were kept under control not through fiscal disciple, but through price controls. This led to shortages because, if wages were rising while goods prices could not, demand quickly exceeded supply. Soviet citizens often found they had very little to spend their money on, with the result being the long queues and empty store shelves we now associate with the Soviet economy.

By this mechanism, the regime can continue to inject new money into the economy but also prevent ordinary people from spending "too much" money and thus ratcheting up consumer prices. The downside, of course, is that the standard of living goes down considerably, as historian Steven Efremov notes:

The system of price controls had deleterious effects both for Soviet consumers and for the economy as a whole. ... Shortages of most foods led to lower quality diets, and many consumer products that were routinely available in the West, such as telephones, cars, and modern washing machines were amazingly rare in the Soviet Union. Living conditions were less comfortable in many ways, with less housing space per person, no central heating, no air conditioning, and often no sewer connections or hot water.​

The result was essentially forced savings. Efremov continues:

When consumers could not find anything they wanted to buy, many chose to save a portion of their income every year. This effect was cumulative over the years, as unsatisfied demand from each year was carried over to the next and the population's savings continued to grow.​

In some respects, this was good for the regime because this unspendable savings could also be tapped for buying the government's debt. But this stored up money—known as the "monetary overhang" increased much more rapidly than did the production of goods and services, and Efremov concludes "the money supply had grown to become many times larger than what was needed for regular circulation." This would come back to haunt the regime when the economy began to open up and consumers could finally spend the money, causing prices to soar.

An additional method of pushing down official inflation numbers was to subsidize consumer goods. Retail price subsidies were introduced in in the Soviet Union in 1965 as part of a major economic reform package. Soviet authorities then began to implement price subsidies of "basic foods such as meat, milk, bread, sausages, sugar, and butter."1 The purpose was to keep prices stable. These subsidies survived subsequent economic reform efforts and became a larger and larger part of the economy heading into the 1980s, with government spending rapidly increasing to push down prices through subsidies.

Spending Rises and the Economy Stagnates
None of this worked to actually help the Soviet standard of living.

To combat the effects of monetary expansion and falling standards of living, the Soviet regime perennially attempted to increase production to narrow the gap between money growth and productivity growth. Due to the impossibility of economic calculation under socialism, however, Soviet central planning could not coordinate goods and capital efficiently, and the productivity of workers stagnated.

Another result was further declines in government revenue. Although taxes were levied and some revenue could be collected on imports, government monopolies—i.e., government-owned enterprises—controlling a variety of goods and services produced much of the income the regime relied on. These enterprises could theoretically increase revenues with increased output, but output often stagnated as wages—i.e., production costs—rose.

Government budgets thus increased alongside falling revenue. Byung-Yeon Kim notes, for example, that "retail price subsidies ... rose from 4 per cent of state budget expenditure in 1965 to 20 per cent in the late 1980s."2

Yet, the availability of consumer goods certainly did not keep up. Rather, consumer had few places to spend their money and "the share of forced savings in total monetary savings increased from 9 per cent in 1965 to 42 per cent in 1989."3

Measured by the prevalence of shortages, it is clear the Soviet economy was in a state of stagnation by the late 70s. Shortages became even worse. Kim concludes:

Consumer market conditions in the official retail network deteriorated rapidly in the years 1965-78. This is most likely to have been caused by stable consumer prices faced with rising consumer purchasing power. Even though the rapid deterioration halted during the period 1979-83, this was not sufficient to restore equilibrium. Further worsening of consumer market conditions occurred after 1984. In particular, shortages in the consumer market intensified significantly in 1989 because household money income increased much faster than the availability of consumer goods.4​

The wage increases continued with little positive effect. Throughout the 1980s, Soviet state-owned enterprises raised wages in an attempt to create a "wealth effect" and to placate dissatisfied workers. Yet, with few goods available to buy, rising wages ceased to be much of an inducement to harder work. Birman and Clarke note that after a time, rising wages "become ineffective—additional unspendable money is no longer an incentive to work harder or more productively." Worker productivity suffered. This problem only accelerated as the decade wore on and, as Igor Filatochev and Roy Bradshaw note, "wages increas[ed] four times faster than labour productivity throughout 1989 and 1990."

The 1980s: A Time of Growing Deficits and Money Printing
All of this spending on wages and subsidies combined to create conditions under which government deficits rose, leading for even greater monetary expansion. Kim concludes:

Although the budget deficit was officially recorded only from 1985 onwards, many reliable Soviet and western sources have maintained that a sizable deficit already existed well before the 1980s.5​

Up until the 1970s, there had been a connection between revenues and spending to the point that deficits were manageable. As time went on, borrowing to address deficits became increasingly expensive for the regime, and printing money—above and beyond the need for wages—was increasingly viewed as a way out:

[P]rinting of money began well before the late 1980s, that is, from 1977 onwards, and tended to increase during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Overall, the Soviet budget tended to destabilize the consumer market, at least after 1977, by putting money into circulation. In particular, a sharp increase in printing money in the late 1980s suggests that the Soviet economy was then on the verge of collapse.6​

Amount of Deficit Financed by Printing Money

1667698342437.png

Source: Byung-Yeon Kim, "Causes of Repressed Inflation in the Soviet Consumer Market, 1965-1989: Retail Price Subsidies, the Siphoning Effect, and the Budget Deficit," The Economic History Review 55, no. 1 (Feb. 2002): 121

Hyperinflation Sets In
By the late 1980s, the Soviet economy was already primed for price inflation, yet so-called repressed inflation continued to be a sizable factor pushing down official inflation rates until the mid 1980s. With the advent of perestroika and some limited promarket reforms, Soviet citizens were increasingly able to purchase more goods and import more goods. Decades of forced saving led to runaway inflation as shortages became less acute in many cases. That "monetary overhang" came out of savings accounts and drove price inflation to disastrous heights.

It took some time for the official numbers to catch up with reality. The regime's official numbers had long understated even the moderate levels of price inflation in earlier periods, but after the mid-80s, the gap between official inflation and estimated real inflation grew considerably. Efremov summarizes the divergence, noting that in 1988 official inflation was 0.6 percent but 6 percent in the real marketplace. By 1989, official inflation was 2 percent, but it was really 8 percent. In 1990, it was 5.3 percent, but really 20 percent. And then the wheels started to really come off in 1991, with 96.3 "official" inflation that was really 200 percent.

The Soviet Union collapsed shortly thereafter, and the new regime did not issue falsified inflation numbers anymore. Instead, the real inflation rate in 1992 was estimated to be more than 2,300 percent. Hyperinflation continued for three more years until the old Soviet ruble finally ceased to exist.

A Socialist Guide to Lowering Price Inflation
The Soviet experience provides an example of how expanding the money supply forces a choice. In response, an inflationist regime can commit to reining in monetary inflation to tackle rising prices. Or, a regime can "solve" an inflation problem by destroying demand via price controls and shortages. The latter choice requires lowering the standard of living and gradually reducing consumer choices again and again. Yet, even this draconian option fails to prevent hyperinflation in the end.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Is Following ESG Criteria Breaking the Law?​

Experts Say ESG Policies Create Legal Hazard for Companies
By Kevin Stocklin

November 3, 2022 Updated: November 4, 2022

Analysis
One problem for CEOs who direct their companies to follow the goals of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria is that in doing so, they may be breaking the law. According to legal experts, ESG initiatives can cause companies to break antitrust, civil rights, and Employee Retirement Income Security Agency (ERISA) laws.

“The way ESG is being implemented is completely antidemocratic, which is to say that they are just flouting laws,” George Mason University law professor Todd Zywicki told The Epoch Times. “They’re flouting democratically elected laws and bringing things about that are often illegal.”

Violation of Antitrust Laws​

According to a report titled “Liability Risks for the ESG Agenda” (pdf), by Washington D.C. law firm Boyden Gray, companies that take part in coordinated actions against other companies or industries could be violating U.S. antitrust laws. The report states, “Federal law prohibits companies from colluding on group boycotts or conspiring to restrain trade, even to advance political or social goals.”

It cites the Sherman Act of 1890, which prohibits “every contract, combination … or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce.” Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote on this subject, commenting that “antitrust laws in general, and the Sherman Act in particular, are the Magna Carta of free enterprise. They are as important to the preservation of economic freedom and our free-enterprise system as the Bill of Rights is to the protection of our fundamental personal freedoms.”

Hundreds of the world’s largest corporations have signed joint pledges through international clubs such as Climate Action 100+, the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), the Net Zero Banking Alliance, the Net Zero Asset Managers Alliance, and others to reduce the use of fossil fuels.

GFANZ, which includes 550 global corporations as members, states that “all members have independently committed to the goal of net zero by 2050, in addition to setting interim targets for 2030 or earlier and reporting transparently on progress along the way.” GFANZ banking members include Bank of America, Citibank, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, BlackRock, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs.

Climate Action 100+ includes 700 investment companies representing $68 trillion in assets; it also includes 166 companies with a combined market capitalization more than $10 trillion. Among the hundreds of members of Climate Action 100+ are some of the world’s largest and most powerful companies, including Boeing, BP, Caterpillar, Chevron, Dow, Exxon, Ford, Honda, Lockheed Martin, Mercedes, Nestle, Nissan, PepsiCo, Proctor & Gamble, Raytheon, Siemens, Coca Cola, Toyota, United Airlines, American Airlines, Walmart, BlackRock, State Street, Goldman Sachs, Fidelity, PIMCO, and Allianz. It also includes America’s largest state pension funds, such as CalPERS, CalSTRS, New York City Pension Funds, and New York State Common Retirement Fund.

The Boyden Gray report notes that the argument that ESG advocates make—that companies which follow ESG guidelines are better investments —“relies heavily on bandwagon effects.” In other words, if enough asset managers collaborate to shift their investments toward ESG-compliant companies, the shares of those companies become more valuable; and even more so if governments subsidize industries like wind and solar, while punishing fossil fuel companies.

Violation of Civil Rights Laws​

Beyond antitrust, another area where ESG may run afoul of America’s laws is where the push for racial and gender equity violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, or national origin. In step with ESG social justice goals, United Airlines announced in April 2021 that it would set racial and gender quotas when hiring pilots.
The company stated that “our flight deck should reflect the diverse group of people on board our planes every day. That’s why we plan for 50 percent of the 5,000 pilots we train in the next decade to be women or people of color.”

A number of recent court rulings have underscored the validity of U.S. laws regarding racial discrimination. In June 2021, a federal judge ruled that the Biden administration’s farming grants, which gave preference to racial minorities, were illegal. In a separate case, the courts ruled that COVID-relief grants by the Biden administration that excluded white restaurant owners were also illegal.

But America’s civil rights laws go beyond government policy to include private industry as well, opening companies up to lawsuits from employees. In August, for example, American Express became the latest company to face an employee lawsuit for racial discrimination. Brian Netzel, a decade-long employee who was fired in 2020 on what he claims are racial grounds, stated in his class-action lawsuit that American Express “gave preferential treatment to individuals for being black and unambiguously signaled to white employees that their race was an impediment to getting ahead in the company.”

In October 2021, a white male employee was awarded $10 million by a jury that agreed with his claim that he was fired as part of a race-based policy by his employer, Novant Health. After five years of positive work reviews, David Duvall was fired “without warning or cause as part of an intentional campaign to promote diversity in its management ranks; a campaign [Novant] has boasted about publicly,” his suit stated.

“It’s been well known for decades that quotas are illegal,” Zywicki said. “But when you start looking at things like racial sensitivity training, they’re engaging pretty much in rampant stereotyping, negative stereotyping of certain groups, and they are engaging in rampant preferences for others. All of this runs pretty clearly up against existing civil rights laws.”

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs, a component of ESG, are coming under fire, both as mandatory employee training and as hiring criteria.

It was reported on Nov. 2 that University of North Carolina’s School of Medicine “forces applicants, students, and professors to constantly prove their commitment to the tenets of diversity, equity, and inclusion as a prerequisite to advancement, rather than basing such decisions on merit alone.” This was based on a report by a nonprofit called Do No Harm, which charged that one of UNC’s main criteria for hiring and promotion of teachers was “a positive contribution to DEI efforts.”

Stanley Goldfarb, the chairman of Do No Harm, stated in a letter to the school that “it is inappropriate to require that candidates for promotion and tenure demonstrate their commitment to a political ideology. Forcing candidates to declare their support for DEI when many undoubtedly oppose it would compel dishonesty.” This report comes amid a case before the U.S. Supreme Court wherein UNC was charged with having unconstitutional race-based admission standards.

Violation of Fiduciary Laws​

A third area where ESG clashes with U.S. law regards the legal obligation of fund managers and corporate executives to act in good faith and in the best interests of investors and shareholders.

The Employee Retirement Income Security Act, passed in 1974 to address corruption and misuse of pension money, requires that private pension fund managers invest “solely in the interests of participants and beneficiaries.” It set what is called a “prudent expert” standard of care for fund managers and allows fund beneficiaries to sue managers for failing to uphold this standard.

While ERISA applies to corporate pension funds, many U.S. states have applied similar language to public pension funds. Currently, 24 states forbid ideological investing for their public pension funds, including ESG.

An August letter to BlackRock, signed by 19 state attorneys general, for example, charged that BlackRock had a “duty of loyalty” to state pensioners who invested in its funds and that “your actions around promoting net zero, the Paris Agreement, or taking action on climate change indicate rampant violations of this duty, otherwise known as acting with ‘mixed motives.’”

In response, BlackRock wrote that “one of [its] most critical tasks as a fiduciary investor for our clients is to identify short- and long-term trends in the global economy that may affect our clients’ investments.” The letter states that “governments representing over 90 percent of global GDP have committed to move to net-zero in the coming decades. We believe investors and companies that take a forward-looking position with respect to climate risk … will generate better long-term financial outcomes.”

State attorneys general disagreed, stating that despite climate-change rhetoric, “governments are not implementing policies to require net zero … In particular, the United States has not implemented net-zero mandates. Despite doing everything in his power at the beginning of his presidency to shut down fossil fuels, even President Biden is appearing to reverse course given the harm his inflationary policies have inflicted on the American people.”

In October, Swiss bank UBS downgraded the shares of BlackRock, stating that “as [BlackRock’s] performance deteriorates and political risk from ESG has increased, we believe the potential for lost fund mandates and regulatory scrutiny has recently increased.”

In addition to the risk that ESG asset managers violate their fiduciary duty to investors, there is also the risk that corporate managers violate their duty to act in the best interest of the shareholders of the company.

“There was a shareholder action against Coca-Cola when they had their ‘act less white’ campaign,” Zywicki said. “Some shareholders filed a lawsuit and basically said when you do that you are risking litigation, you’re risking liability for this company. Just pretending like the laws don’t apply to this situation isn’t going to get you off the hook.”

In March, Disney took a political position against Florida’s “Parental Rights in Education” law, declaring that a provision of the law that banned teaching of sexual topics to children in kindergarten through third grade was “a challenge to basic human rights.” In response, America First Legal (AFL) issued a letter to Disney on behalf of shareholders, accusing the company of “wasting corporate assets and compliance violations.”

AFL charged that in pursuing a political ideology both externally and internally among its employees, as well as actively putting sexual content into its own movies and shows, Disney’s executives “have chosen to discriminate, create a hostile work environment, and drive away creative, loyal, and talented employees; alienate the company’s core customers; and violate the law, all for the purpose of advancing a very narrow political and social agenda promoting, inter alia, sexualizing content provided to young children. Accordingly, management has placed the company’s assets, including its brand, reputation, and good will, at risk.”

The U.S. Department of Labor, which regulates private pension funds, issued a directive following a 2019 executive order by then-President Donald Trump to enforce ERISA rules regarding pension funds and ESG investing. It stated that “providing a secure retirement for American workers is the paramount, and eminently worthy, ‘social’ goal of ERISA plans; plan assets may not be enlisted in pursuit of other social or environmental objectives.”

The Biden administration has since reversed this directive, allowing pension money to be invested in ESG funds.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

French Nuclear Reactor Power Outlook Worsens Ahead Of Winter, Electricity Prices Erupt​

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 04:35 AM
France's nuclear troubles are mounting due primarily to routine maintenance of the country's 56 aging reactors. A new update from French electric utility company Electricite de France SA, commonly known as EDF, said an outlook for nuclear power generation was slashed ahead of winter, causing chaos in energy markets.

EDF is the world's largest owner of nuclear plants. It reported Friday that its fleet of nuclear reactors is expected to produce between 275 and 285 terawatt-hours of energy this year, down from the range of 280 and 300 terawatt-hours.

2022-11-04_08-07-02.png
Source: Bloomberg

The reduced outlook comes amid a series of strikes at nuclear plants across the country that delayed planned maintenance work. Nuclear power generation has been sliding all year due to technical issues, and about half of the country's 56 reactors are shuttered.

2022-11-04_08-04-54.png
Source: Bloomberg

"The situation changed drastically this year, when France swung from being one of Europe's largest exporters of electricity to a net importer because of issues with its reactors. The outages worried officials that France and the broader region might run short of electricity in the winter, when power demand in Europe peaks," Bloomberg said.

News of nuclear troubles sent French power contracts sky-high, surging as much as 24%. Dutch natural gas futures, Europe's benchmark, briefly moved higher on the news but gave up all gains and slid on the continued warm spell across Europe.

2022-11-04_08-27-24.png
Source: Bloomberg

Two weeks ago, we wrote in a note that "Germany May Stave Off Worst Of Energy Crisis As Mild Temps Forecast Through Mid-November." Then, earlier this week, we noted the warm spell across Europe is about to end.



Weeks of mild weather and ample EU NatGas stockpiles have delayed the energy crisis, though it will only take a few cold snaps before it reemerges.



"Therefore, we see little reason why spot gas prices will not rise again as Europe will need to compete for available LNG cargoes and supplies against Asia, particularly as China reopens in the future," analysts at Sanford C Bernstein & Co. wrote in a note to clients on Friday.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Governor Of Dutch Central Bank States Gold Revaluation Account Is Solvency Backstop

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 06:20 AM
By Jan Nieuwenhuijs of Gainesville Coins GOLD

The Governor of the Dutch central bank stated the gold revaluation account ensures the solvency of his central bank in an interview on television about prospective losses. The significance of this statement is that if any European central bank will cover losses by using its gold revaluation account in full, the ECB has to put a floor under the gold price. And if more losses need to be covered than the current gold revaluation accounts of European central banks allow, the ECB will need to revalue gold.

Introduction
A discussion has commenced in the Netherlands after Klaas Knot, Governor of the Dutch central bank (DNB), wrote a letter to Sigrid Kaag, Dutch Minister of Finance, on September 9, 2022. The letter is titled: “DNB foresees deterioration of capital position.” Knot warns Kaag of DNB losses due to interest rate hikes—decided by the European Central Bank (ECB) but applied by all National Central Banks (NCBs) of the Eurosystem. In recent years Quantitative Easing (QE) has made DNB, and all other NCBs, create an abundance in bank reserves to buy government bonds. Now the ECB is raising interest rates DNB has to pay banks more and more interest over their excess reserves. These expenditures cause DNB to suffer losses to the detriment of its capital position (equity). Note, all NCBs in the Eurosystem face similar challenges.

For this year DNB expects a small loss but for the years 2023 through 2026 a loss of €9 billion euros is expected. Though, it could be more. DNB’s equity is currently €11.3 billion. If the losses exceed €11.3 billion, DNB’s equity will become negative. Although it’s possible for a central bank to operate under negative equity, it does hurt credibility—a central bank’s most valuable asset. And once credibility is lost people will dump the currency issued by said central bank.

For this reason, Knot wants to discuss with the Dutch state (DNB’s sole shareholder) the possibilities of funding a recapitalization of DNB. In other words, if taxpayers can bail-out their central bank.

The Gold Revaluation Account as a Solvency Backstop
A gold revaluation account (GRA) is basically an accounting item that records the unrealized gains of a central bank’s gold. Because most of Europe’s monetary gold was accumulated during Bretton Woods at $35 dollars an ounce, the respective GRAs are substantial. Monetary gold in the Eurosystem is marked to market and the gold price today is much higher than $35.

Below is a simplified balance sheet of a central bank. On the asset side there are international reserves (gold and foreign exchange), a bond portfolio, and discount loans to commercial banks. On the liability side there is the monetary base (reserves and currency), a deposit account for the government, a GRA, and equity.

1667699650666.png

Interestingly, there is no limit on a GRA because gold is the only international reserve asset that can’t be printed. Denominated in fiat currencies, which can and are printed, the gold price doesn’t have a ceiling and it can inflate balance sheets likewise.

The GRA can be seen as equity but technically it isn’t at this point because it’s prohibited from being used. The current laws in the E.U. dictate: “there shall be no netting of unrealized losses in any one security, or in any currency or in gold holdings against unrealized gains in other securities or currencies or gold.” At this stage the GRA just swells and shrinks in sync with the rise and fall of the price of gold. But all this might change.

On Sunday October 30, 2022, Knot was interviewed by Buitenhof about DNB’s losses. When the solvency of DNB’s balance sheet was questioned Knot brought up the GRA.

Interviewer: So, what you're saying is that the higher the interest rate by the European Central Bank, the more expensive it gets for us ...​
Knot: Yes, that is correct ...​
Interviewer: ... and the more money is needed. Hold on, I want to finish my question, so we all understand. And the higher the probability the Dutch taxpayer has to pay to fix the balance sheet of the Dutch central bank of which I always thought, "that's solid, it can't fail." This story is new to me.​
Knot: The balance sheet of the Dutch central banks is solid because we also have gold reserves and the gold revaluation account is more than 20 billion euros, which we may not count as equity, but it is there.​
Interviewer: But you don't want to sell the gold?​
Knot: No, we're definitely not going to sell.

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1587814774573830144
.38 min

Using the GRA to cover losses doesn’t require selling gold, it requires changing the accounting rules. The reason it’s now prohibited from being used is because once fully run down a declining gold price will cause the GRA to become negative, eating into DNB’s net worth. The very thing DNB is trying to avoid. In the interview Knot thus appoints the GRA as a solvency backstop, but this implies putting a floor under the gold price.

This February I published an article about the possibility of European central banks revaluing gold and subsequently using their GRAs to cancel sovereign bonds as debt relief for governments. My analysis was based on an email exchange between me and the German central bank in which they stated they don’t rule out this possibility. In October I revealed that European central banks have equalized, proportionally to GDP, their gold reserves among each other in the past decades. This was done for all to enjoy the same relative gain in their GRAs when revaluing gold. According to my assessment, revaluing gold will only be done in an insurmountable crisis. After the gold revaluation sovereign debt would be cancelled, the gold price stabilized, and the eurozone effectively moves towards a new version of a gold standard.

In the 1930s GRAs had been used for several purposes. After devaluing against gold central banks eventually re-pegged their currencies to gold at a higher price, leaving GRAs to be used as they saw fit. As far as I know, no central banker has openly discussed using a GRA—to cover its own losses or cancel sovereign bonds—since Bretton Woods. Remarkably, in Buitenhof it wasn’t the interviewer that brought up the GRA, it was Knot! Since the word is out, central banks in Europe officially stand ready to change the rules and use their GRAs to guarantee their own solvency. In addition, once the rules are changed, it allows them to revalue gold and bail-out their governments too.

In final, the current trend is clear: financial challenges, caused by unconventional monetary policy, lead to more focus on gold’s role in overcoming these challenges. And I will be closely monitoring these developments.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Russian Oil Price Cap Will Not Apply To Resold Cargoes


SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 07:30 AM
By Michael Kern of OilPrice.com

The United States and its Western allies have agreed that a cargo of Russian oil will only be subject to the price cap mechanism at the first sale of the oil to a buyer on land, sources familiar with the ongoing discussions told The Wall Street Journal on Friday.

This means that the upcoming price cap will not apply to the resale of the same Russian cargo. The price cap will not apply to a cargo of Russian crude processed into gasoline when the gasoline is sold, either.

However, intermediary sales and trades of Russian oil happening at sea should be subject to the price cap, according to the Journal’s sources.

The U.S. and the G7 allies and Australia are working on setting the details of the price cap before the December 5 deadline, after which the EU embargo on imports of Russian crude oil by sea enters into force. The G7 group of the most industrialized nations and the EU are looking to introduce a price cap on Russian oil, aiming to reduce Vladimir Putin’s oil revenues for his war chest. The allies will ban maritime transportation services for Russian oil unless the products are purchased at or below a certain price cap.

Reports emerged this week that the G7 members had agreed to set a fixed price for Russian oil exports as a cap rather than a price set as a discount to a benchmark, Reuters reported, citing an unnamed source familiar with the discussions. The price itself has yet to be determined, the source said, adding that, according to the G7, “This will increase market stability and simplify compliance to minimize the burden on market participants.”

Earlier, a price range in the mid-$60s was mentioned as a possible target for the cap as it represented the range in which Russian oil has traded before the last rally.

While considering all the parameters of a price cap, the U.S. Treasury issued this week guidance that says Russian crude oil loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading for maritime transport prior to December 5 will not be subject to the price cap if the oil is unloaded at the port of destination before January 19, 2023.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Escobar: Berlin Goes To Beijing - The Real Deal

SATURDAY, NOV 05, 2022 - 06:30 PM
Authored by Pepe Escobar,

The Scholz caravan went to Beijing to lay down the preparatory steps for working out a peace deal with Russia, with China as privileged messenger...

With his inimitable flair for economic analysis steeped in historical depth, Professor Michael Hudson’s latest essay, originally written for a German audience, presents a stunning parallel between the Crusades and the current “rules-based international order” imposed by the Hegemon.

Professor Hudson details how the Papacy in Rome managed to lock up unipolar control over secular realms (rings a bell?) when the game was all about Papal precedence over kings, above all the German Holy Roman Emperors. As we know, half in jest, the Empire was not exactly Holy, nor German (perhaps a little Roman), and not even an Empire.

A clause in the Papal Dictates provided the Pope with the authority to excommunicate whomever was “not at peace with the Roman Church.” Hudson sharply notes how US sanctions are the modern equivalent of excommunication.

Arguably there are Top Two dates in the whole process.

The first one would be the Third Ecumenical Council of 435: this is when only Rome (italics mine) was attributed universal authority (italics mine). Alexandria and Antioch, for instance, were limited to regional authority within the Roman Empire.

The other top date is 1054 – when Rome and Constantinople split for good. That is, the Roman Catholic Church split from Orthodoxy, which leads us to Russia, and Moscow as The Third Rome – and the centuries-old animosity of “the West” against Russia.

A State of Martial Law
Professor Hudson then delves on the trip by “Liver Sausage” Chancellor Scholz’s delegation to China this week to “demand that it dismantle its public sector and stops subsidizing its economy, or else Germany and Europe will impose sanctions on trade with China.”

Well, in fact this happens to be just childish wishful thinking, expressed by the German Council on Foreign Relations in a piece published on the Financial Times (the Japanese-owned platform in the City of London). The Council, as correctly described by Hudson, is “the neoliberal ‘libertarian’ arm of NATO demanding German de-industrialization and dependency” on the US.

So the FT, predictably, is printing NATO wet dreams.

Context is essential. German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in a keynote speech at Bellevue Castle, has all but admitted that Berlin is broke: “An era of headwinds is beginning for Germany – difficult, difficult years are coming for us. Germany is in the deepest crisis since reunification.”

Yet schizophrenia, once again, reigns supreme, as Steinmeier, after a ridiculous stunt in Kiev – complete with posing as a unwitting actor huddled in a bunker – announced an extra handout: two more MARS multiple rocket launchers and four Panzerhaubitze 2000 howitzers to be delivered to the Ukrainians.

So even if the “world” economy – actually the EU – is so fragilized that member-states cannot help Kiev anymore without harming their own populations, and the EU is on the verge of a catastrophic energy crisis, fighting for “our values” in Country 404 trumps it all.

The Big Picture context is also key. Andrea Zhok, Professor of Ethical Philosophy at the University of Milan, has taken Giorgio Agamben’s “State of Exception” concept to new heights.

Zhok proposes that the zombified collective West is now completely subjugated to a “State of Martial Law” – where a Forever War ethos is the ultimate priority for rarified global elites.

Every other variable – from trans-humanism to depopulation and even cancel culture – is subordinated to the State of Martial Law, and is basically inessential. The only thing that matters is exercising absolute, raw control.

Berlin – Moscow – Beijing
Solid German business sources completely contradict the “message” delivered by the German Council on Foreign Relations on the trip to China.

According to these sources, the Scholz caravan went to Beijing to essentially lay down the preparatory steps for working out a peace deal with Russia, with China as privileged messenger.

This is – literally – as explosive, geopolitically and geoeconomically, as it gets. As I pointed out in one of my previous columns, Berlin and Moscow were keeping a secret communication back channel – via business interlocutors – right to the minute the usual suspects, in desperation, decided to blow up the Nord Streams.

Cue to the now notorious SMS from Liz Truss’s iPhone to Little Tony Blinken, one minute after the explosions: “It’s done.”

There’s more: the Scholz caravan may be trying to start a long and convoluted process of eventually replacing the US with China as a key ally. One should never forget that the top BRI trade/connectivity terminal in the EU is Germany (the Ruhr valley).

According to one of the sources, “if this effort is successful, then Germany, China and Russia can ally themselves together and drive the US out of Europe.”

Another source provided the cherry on the cake: “Olaf Scholz is being accompanied on this trip by German industrialists who actually control Germany and are not going to sit back watching themselves being destroyed.”

Moscow knows very well what the imperial aim is when it comes to the EU reduced to the role of totally dominated – and deindustrialized – vassal, exercising zero sovereignty. The back channels after all are not lying in tatters on the bottom of the Baltic Sea. Additionally, China has not provided any hint that its massive trade with Germany and the EU is about to vanish.

Scholz himself, one day before his caravan hit Beijing, stressed to Chinese media that Germany has no intention of decoupling from China, and there’s nothing to justify “the calls by some to isolate China.”

In parallel, Xi Jinping and the new Politburo are very much aware of the Kremlin position, reiterated again and again: we always remain open for negotiations, as long as Washington finally decides to talk about the end of unlimited NATO expansion drenched in Russophobia.

So to negotiate means the Empire signing on the dotted line of the document it has received from Moscow on December 1st, 2021, focused on “indivisibility of security”. Otherwise there’s nothing to negotiate.

And when we have Pentagon lobbyist Lloyd “Raytheon” Austin advising the Ukrainians on the record to advance on Kherson, it’s even more crystal clear there’s nothing to negotiate.

So could this all be the foundation stone of the Berlin-Moscow-Beijing trans-Eurasia geopolitical/geoeconomic corridor? That will mean Bye Bye Empire. Once again: it ain’t over till the fat lady goes Gotterdammerung.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
(Brazil)

Brazil, Official says Military Tribunals are being set up to charge corrupt election fraudsters! .32 min

BRAZIL, OFFICIAL SAYS MILITARY TRIBUNALS ARE BEING SET UP TO CHARGE CORRUPT ELECTION FRAUDSTERS!​

Brazil, This official explains the current situation to those present: "After the state of war comes martial law.
After 7 p.m., no one will be allowed to leave his apartment. Military tribunals will be set up where all corrupt persons will have to answer. Victory will be ours."
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Propaganda. Group agreements. Interesting. 11:50 min

PROPAGANDA. GROUP AGREEMENTS. INTERESTING.​

In this video we look at the ideas of Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud and a pioneering mind behind the field of public relations and modern propaganda - particularly his ideas on how group psychology can be used to manipulate the masses.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Rebels get kicked off of the property at the World Health Summit 7:20 min

Rebels get kicked off of the property at the World Health Summit​

Rebel News Published November 5, 2022

^^^^

Rebels get kicked off of the property at the World Health Summit​

Guillaume and I were kicked off of the property while gathering input from attendees as they left the globalist conference, and I think I know the 'high level guest' who was responsible for it.
  • By Tamara Ugolini
  • November 05, 2022
  • News Analysis
Germany is poising itself to be a key player in promoting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as it becomes a "hub for Global Health.”

For instance, The Center for Global Health is housed at the Technical University in Munich, while Berlin houses the Centre for Global Engagement in partnership with the Berlin University Alliance that collaborates “efforts into the complex web of global science.”

Berlin’s top university research hospital, Charité even houses the German Alliance for Global Health Research that was launched on February 1st, 2020, a mere few weeks before the global coronavirus pandemic was declared by the World Health Organization.

This research is meant “To ensure healthy living and promote well-being for all people of all ages" is the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) No. 3. The German Alliance for Global Health Research will better link the various disciplines of global health research in Germany and at the same time address actors from politics, business and civil society in order to increase the contribution of the German research community to this SDG and further develop global health as an academic discipline in Germany.”

The Dean of this hospital, which organizes the yearly summit is none other than Professor and Doctor Axel Pries. He also happens to be the President of the World Health Summit.

Pries and I had a brief interaction outside of the Berlin Hotel, where the 3-day globalist health summit was coming to an end. He appeared suspicious of my skepticism as I posed questions to Reza Afshari who was trying to get cozy with him, and asked me what angle I was taking with my reporting and the basis of my questions.

Pries stared at me like a deer in headlights as I answered, refusing to respond himself, before asking if I was accredited media or not.

Interestingly, less than five minutes later, we were asked by hotel security to leave the property.

Pries was clearly denoted as one of the “high level guests” that had exclusive access to the hotel restaurant, as evidenced by this photo, that even the lower tier attendees of the summit were prevented access from.

His globalist ideals are on full display when he authors for the Global Governance Project, an aptly named organization that promotes collective governance. A quote from his publication titled ‘In times of crisis’
reads that “sustainable development goal (SDG) number 3, that’s good health and wellbeing for all, cannot be attained if we try to control one disease at a time in one country separate from the others.”

Arguably, the disregard of health at the local level is exactly where the knee-jerk hysterical COVID response plans failed.

In this arm’s length German Government media publication, deutschland, an interview with Pries repeats a similar sentiment:

“In October 2020, the Federal Government developed a strategy to promote global health and increased its contributions supporting the World Health Organization (WHO). In 2020 and 2021, Germany was its largest donor, making it possible for the new WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence to be located in Berlin. However, Berlin's increasing role in global health is not based on financial support alone. Berlin is a vibrant international research centre and home to the Charité, the largest university hospital in Europe. Furthermore, the World Health Summit, one of the world's most important conferences on global health, is held every year in Berlin.”

These are the people vying to be in charge of your health, refusing to speak to media that asks real questions about global health architecture and pandemic response. The same people who, presumably, are responsible for our removal from the property.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Propaganda Exposed [UNCENSORED]​

Ty & Charlene Bollinger discuss their new nine part docu-series​

Robert W Malone MD, MS
1 hr ago

Docu-series “Propaganda Exposed [UNCENSORED]” Blows the Lid off Collusion, Corruption, and Conspiracy between Government, Tech & Pharma

By Ty & Charlene Bollinger
November 5, 2022

Throughout the course of human history, healers have been revered and even worshiped. From Hippocrates, “The Father of Modern Medicine,” in 400 B.C., to Anton van Leeuwenhoek, who first discovered blood cells in 1670, to Sir Alexander Fleming, who discovered penicillin in 1928, physicians have still been hailed as pioneers and champions of healing.

Becoming a doctor is widely considered one of the most noble professions; the respect that a white lab coat and stethoscope can command is comparable to that of a cassock or war medal. It is one of the only professions in which its members demand that their title be used in everyday life.

This praise and admiration is not without merit. Doctors save lives. The amount of cumulative knowledge that it takes to repair an artery, replace a joint, or arrive at a seemingly impossible diagnosis requires a lifetime of dedication that is hard to manufacture. Each generation of healers stands upon the shoulders of the last, and the human race has benefited tremendously.

Furthermore, these healers have benefited greatly from breakthroughs in science and technology that have led to the creation and discovery of numerous drugs, therapies, and surgical interventions. These healing modalities have undoubtedly saved the lives of millions of Americans.

After all, where would we be without penicillin or appendectomies? Even our ability to sterilize wounds and prevent infection has drastically increased the average lifespan. But not all treatments are created equal. For every breakthrough, lifesaving discovery, dozens more turn out to be harmful, ineffective, or even deadly.

The Truth About Modern Medicine​

For nearly as long as modern medicine has existed, so have egregious ethical violations. When you hear the term “medical experimentation,” your mind may recall the horrendous experiments conducted in Nazi Germany on Jews, communists, homosexuals, and an assortment of other “undesirables” under the Third Reich. While these experiments were undoubtedly appalling, they were neither the first nor the last of their kind.

In fact, the history of unethical experiments in the United States and abroad is long and harrowing. Children, soldiers, minorities, prisoners, and even entire cities have been forcibly or unknowingly subjected to dangerous, cruel, and often lethal experiments… all in the name of science.

The doctors and scientists responsible for the development and administration of these drugs are both trained and constrained by the corrupt system that now controls them. Western medicine as we now know it exists in orbit around the pharmaceutical industry. Medical schools teach doctors how to match symptoms with prescriptions, hospitals negotiate with insurance companies based on the cost of drugs, and the race is ongoing to create the latest and greatest drug that will cure what ails ya.

The healers of today are no longer the heroes of old. The healers of today are trained, funded, and accountable to the pharmaceutical industry. That corruption is largely enabled by a system of governmental oversight that is nothing more than an instrument used by the medical industrial complex to approve and sell their products while limiting their liability.

Worse, these governmental puppets are now using the private tech and media industries to ensure that only the official narrative is put forth; those with dissenting opinions or contradicting data are silenced, censored, and calumniated.

This was once considered to be a conspiracy theory. To insinuate that these institutions could be involved in a global conspiracy that has cost tens of millions of lives and undermined the very foundations of our democracy was tantamount to blasphemy.
Until now…

The Emperor is Naked​

Over the past few weeks, shocking evidence has emerged that demonstrates a rigorous effort by tech industry, medical corporations, media outlets, and government agencies to silence dissenting opinions, attack specific people and organizations, and control what information you can silence dissenting opinions, attack specific people and organizations, and control what information you can access.

On August 31, 2022, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt and Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry filed a lawsuit alleging that at least 45 federal officials across multiple agencies within the Biden administration colluded with Facebook and Twitter to adjust their algorithms to “censor freedom of speech” on a number of topics, including the COVID-19 pandemic (Google, LinkedIn, and others are also implicated in the petition).

The following is an excerpt from that document, which you can read in its entirety here:

Under the First Amendment, the federal Government should have no role in policing private speech or picking winners and losers in the marketplace of ideas. But that is what federal officials are doing, on a massive scale – a scale whose full scope and impact is yet to be determined.

Secretary Mayorkas of DHS commented that the federal Government’s efforts to police private speech on social media are occurring “across the federal enterprise.” It turns out that this statement is true, on a scale beyond what Plaintiffs could ever have anticipated.

The limited discovery produced so far provides a tantalizing snapshot into a massive, sprawling federal “Censorship Enterprise,” which includes dozens of federal officials across at least eleven federal agencies and components identified so far, who communicate with social-media platforms about misinformation, disinformation, and the suppression of private speech on social media—all with the intent and effect of pressuring social-media platforms to censor and suppress private speech that federal officials disfavor.


This shocking discovery was followed by a damning report published by The Intercept that sheds further light on just how far this conspiracy goes. In particular, the DHS sub-agency CISA, or the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, has been most active in efforts to combat “mis-, dis-, and mal- information,” or what it abbreviates as “MDM.”

The report makes use of recently leaked or unsealed internal documents, giving a view into the kinds of conversations corporate executives and government officials have had over how to handle potentially harmful online narratives and sensitive topics.

In the March meeting, Laura Dehmlow, an FBI official, warned that the threat of subversive information on social media could undermine support for the U.S. government. Dehmlow, according to notes of the discussion attended by senior executives from Twitter and JPMorgan Chase, stressed that “we need a media infrastructure that is held accountable.”

It’s been treated as a crime against humanity to question any of the ‘COVID measures’ forced on all humanity by governments worldwide — especially COVID vaccination, which is itself a crime against humanity — and yet it’s dangerous to say as much.

But history has shown that these suspicions are not unfounded. In fact, there is an extensive and well-documented history of corruption and unethical practices by the same pharmaceutical companies and government agencies that we’re told to trust.

Pfizer’s Criminal Track Record​

In 2009, Pfizer (and its subsidiary Pharmacia & Upjohn Company) paid $2.3 BILLION to settle criminal and civil liabilities for illegal promotion of their pharmaceutical products. The amount included payment of more than $102 million in civil settlement to six whistleblowers of the company’s fraudulent practices.

Bextra, an anti-inflammatory drug that was withdrawn from the market in 2005 due to safety concerns, was marketed by the company for various off-label uses. The company also illegally promoted several other drugs, including antipsychotic drug Geodon, antibiotic Zyvox, and anti-epileptic drug Lyrica.

Healthcare providers received payments for prescribing these drugs to patients for off-label use… literally bribing doctors to prescribe untested and unapproved drugs to patients.

False claims were submitted to government healthcare programs, allowing them to bypass the insurance programs. Pfizer had to pay approximately $1 BILLION to Medicare, Medicaid, and other government insurance programs under the settlement.

And those are just a few examples.

In 1993, anti-seizure drug gabapentin was widely prescribed for off-label uses such as treatment of pain and psychiatric conditions. Courts ruled that Pfizer utilized propaganda campaigns, paid for favorable research and coverage, and suppressed unfavorable research regarding the drug. Several regulatory bodies found the drug ineffective for the associated ailments, and Pfizer paid $430 million in one of the largest settlements to resolve criminal and civil health care liability charges.

A “whistleblower suit” was filed in 2005 against Wyeth, which was acquired by Pfizer in 2009, alleging that the company illegally marketed sirolimus (Rapamune) for off-label uses, targeted specific doctors and medical facilities to increase sales of Rapamune, tried to get transplant patients to change from their transplant drugs to Rapamune, and specifically targeted African-Americans.

According to the whistleblowers, Wyeth also provided doctors and hospitals that prescribed the drug with kickbacks such as grants, donations, and other money. In 2013, the company pleaded guilty to criminal mis-branding violations under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. By August 2014, it had paid $491 million in civil and criminal penalties related to Rapamune.

In June 2010, health insurance network Blue Cross Blue Shield filed a lawsuit against Pfizer for allegedly illegally marketing drugs Bextra, Geodon, and Lyrica. Blue Cross alleged that Pfizer used kickbacks and wrongly persuaded doctors to prescribe the drugs. According to the lawsuit, Pfizer handed out ‘misleading’ materials on off-label uses, sent over 5,000 doctors on trips to the Caribbean or around the United States, and paid them $2,000 honoraria in return for listening to lectures about Bextra.

An internal marketing plan revealed that Pfizer intended to train physicians “to serve as public relations spokespeople.” The case was settled in 2014 for $325 million. Fearing that Pfizer was “too big to fail” (and that prosecuting the company would result in disruptions to Medicare and Medicaid), federal prosecutors instead charged a subsidiary of a subsidiary of a subsidiary of Pfizer, shielding them from virtually all financial responsibility.

In 2013, Pfizer agreed to a $964 million settlement for selling insulation laden with asbestos.

That same year, Pfizer withdrew “between $400,000 and a million dollars” worth of ads from Harper’s Magazine following an unflattering article on their depression medication.

In 1994, Pfizer agreed to pay $10.75 million to settle claims by the United States Department of Justice that the company lied to get approval for defective heart valves that killed roughly 500 people.

In 1996, an outbreak of measles, cholera, and bacterial meningitis occurred in Nigeria. Pfizer representatives and personnel set up a clinical trial and administered an experimental antibiotic, trovafloxacin, to approximately 200 children. Local officials reported that more than fifty children (over 25%) died in the experiment, while many others developed mental and physical deformities.

Bribing Doctors​

Sadly, this unethical (and often criminal) behavior extends beyond corporations to the very men and women we trust with our health and wellbeing. It’s important to mention that the overwhelming majority of doctors are kind, honest, hardworking folks who have a genuine desire to help their fellow man.

But many have been captured by the medical industrial complex.

Most doctors receive gifts from Big Pharma in one form or another. A 2018 survey published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine found that nearly three out of four doctors have financial ties to Big Pharma. The vast majority of these relationships were with representatives of prescription drug or medical device manufacturers. Gifts included drug samples, meals, and payment for consulting or advisory roles.

Since 2013, federal law has required that payments to doctors by medical device and pharmaceutical companies be publicly reported. The database (which you can access here) has published over 78 million records from 2015 to 2021, reflecting $63.23 billion in gifts and payments.

Dr. Aaron S. Kesselheim, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and lead author of the survey, says this may be influencing doctors’ behavior. According to the study, “Free samples are used as a marketing tool and have been linked to prescribing of high-cost, brand-name drugs over lower-cost generic alternatives.” He suggests that money paid for public speaking and consulting engagements may have an even more acute impact on doctor behavior. “Social scientists will tell you that any amount of money will influence people, but I think larger sums can influence behavior more,” Dr. Kesselheim said

We trust our physicians to make the best recommendations for our health, but the majority of these doctors are receiving gifts from Big Pharma that may influence the treatments they recommend. For example, an orthopedic surgeon in Manhattan received almost $2,000,000 from companies that manufacture hip and knee replacement products between 2015 and 2017. Not coincidentally, the surgeon, Dr. Geoffrey Westrich, performs hundreds of hip and knee replacements each year. In 2017, this doctor received $870,573.39 in general payments from pharmaceutical and medical device companies, including $448,000 for “consulting fees”, $28,580 for non-educational speaking engagements, and over $23,000 in travel and lodging.

The Most Important Documentary of Our Lifetime​


It’s time for the world to learn the truth, and that’s why Ty and Charlene Bollinger created their groundbreaking new docu-series: Propaganda Exposed [UNCENSORED] which seeks to uncover the lies of the mainstream media and medical industry and educate viewers on the truth about how we are slowly losing our freedoms, as well as what we can do to take them back.

Propaganda Exposed [UNCENSORED] shares the story of Big Pharma corruption, conflicts of interest, and explains why current medical interventions are so heavily skewed toward patented drugs. The docu-series also covers the sordid history of medical experimentation in the USA in an attempt to help the viewer understand how we got here, why we are now losing our health freedom, what we can do about it, and so much more.

Some notable experts featured in the 9-episode docu-series include Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Dr. Robert Malone, Dr. Judy Mikovits, Dr. Peter McCullough, Dr. Omar Hamada, Del Bigtree, Mike Adams, Dr. Russell Blaylock, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, Zach Vorhies, John Schneider, Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, Dr. Carrie Madej, Sayer Ji, Dr. Alan Keyes, Dr. Irvin Sahni, and many others.

This docu-series will cover everything from cancer and cannabis to fluoride and the Federal Reserve. Most importantly, it will expose the TRUTH about COVID, vaccines, and the real-life conspiracies that are actively underway RIGHT NOW.

Here’s a breakdown of all 9 episodes:


In total, over 60 doctors, scientists, health experts, and freedom fighters are featured in this eye-opening docu-series which will change lives, influence friends and family, and quite possibly “wake up” enough people to create a “tipping point” for truth and liberty.

“Throughout human history, those who tell inconvenient and uncomfortable truths have been ostracized, demonized, and attacked by those in power. What we have experienced in the past two years is no exception to that rule. I am not surprised that history is once again repeating itself. However, Ty and I feel that it is important to continue exposing these schemes meant to silence us all into submission.”
—Charlene Bollinger.

The global release of Propaganda Exposed [UNCENSORED] is November 9th and is free to the world. To reserve your spot, please visit this link.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Media Must Take Responsibility For Greta Climate Panic​


Michael Shellenberger
11 hr ago


For years, the media told us that Greta Thunberg was driven by a love of nature. As I noted yesterday, it’s now clear she is more driven by a hatred of capitalism. Overconfident and smug, Thunberg inadvertently let her green mask slip at a book event in Britain. Now, some in the news media are turning against her.

The marketing of Greta Thunberg by her parents and cynical media elites over the last three years was appalling. Thunberg became the primary vehicle for an anti-human, pro-scarcity, and anti-capitalist agenda that contributed significantly to the energy crisis ravaging Europe.


Thunberg’s defenders say she was a model of youth engagement. What she did required courage, they say. We should applaud her.
But Thunberg incited panic, made outrageously false claims, and triggered a wave of climate anxiety.

“Around the year 2030,” she said in 2019, “we will be in a position where we set off an irreversible chain reaction beyond human control that will most likely lead to the end of our civilisation as we know it.”

Thunberg repeatedly attacked the two main sources of emissions reductions, nuclear energy, and natural gas.


Nuclear is “extremely dangerous, expensive, and time-consuming,” she said, at the very moment Germany, Belgium, and Sweden were shutting down nuclear plants.

Thunberg repeatedly encouraged dangerous behavior. “I want you to panic... If standing up against the climate and ecological breakdown and for humanity is against the rules then the rules must be broken.”

Two days later, two male Extinction Rebellion protesters stood on top of a train, to block it from moving forward, in the London Tube. Angry commuters kicked and beat one of the young protesters and another young man filming the event.

I was frightened by the scene and watched it several times. My thought each time was that the commuters could quite easily have killed the two men. Many in the crowd were gripped by a sudden, uncontrollable fear and wildly unthinking behavior. In other words, they were in a panic

Time and again, Thunberg used fear and anger to bully people. “This is all wrong,” she screamed at the U.N. “I shouldn’t be standing here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet you all come to us young people for hope? How dare you!”

Thunberg’s behavior over the last three years was obnoxious. Her parents should never have allowed it. Her handlers and hosts should never have allowed it. Instead, they encouraged it and smeared anyone who dared to raise concerns about it.

It was clear from the beginning of Thunberg’s stardom that she suffered from an anxiety disorder, and yet she, her handlers, and her parents all suggested that it stemmed from her profound concern over climate change. That turned out to be a lie.

Thunberg’s mother admitted as much in 2020 when she decided she needed to publish her own book. The media lapped it all up without ever asking: is this healthy psychologically for the Thunbergs and the rest of the society?

Of course, it wasn’t. Thunberg, more than anyone else, contributed to a wave of climate anxiety disorders.


And yet the media egged her on and insisted that anybody who dared question whether it was ethical or healthy for the world’s most influential teenager to urge panic was a “climate denier” who was somehow psychologically threatened by a child. The gaslighting was grotesque.

Let’s be clear about what occurred. The news media weaponized a teenage girl suffering from severe anxiety disorders to advance a radical, anti-capitalist agenda. That’s textbook psychopathic behavior: lack of empathy, lack of control (panic), and anti-social behavior.

And they’re not done. Thunberg Inc. and the media are now delivering her up as a savior from the mass psychopathology they created. You couldn’t make it up. This isn’t just cynical it’s also inhumane.

At this point, it’s pointless to blame Thunberg and her handlers. They clearly have an agenda, and Thunberg’s made it clear that it’s a radical anti-capitalist one.

Image
The problem is the news media which has uncritically championed her and shouted down anyone who raises concerns.

The news media don’t owe Thunberg more puff pieces. They owe her an apology. Her parents, too, owe her an apology. And they all owe the public an apology, not just those of us who are parents, but certainly us. What they did, and are doing, is unethical at multiple levels.

Happily, some are starting to do that. They are still a minority, for now. Many journalists still abdicate their ethical and professional duties because they think Thunberg is a child, even though she’ll be 20 years old on January 3.
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Beyond changing news media coverage from uncritically fawning to balanced and critical, journalists should reflect upon their irresponsible coverage of Thunberg and climate change. It was actively harmful not just to Thunberg but to billions around the world.

Around one-third of people in the world think climate change will make humans extinct. That’s pseudoscience on the same level as believing that Earth is flat. People didn’t come to that belief on their own. It was drilled into their brains over 30 years.

Climate change is real, but it’s not the end of the world. Emissions have dramatically declined in rich nations and globally over the last decade, thanks mainly to natural gas and nuclear. We need more of both

In other words, we need to do more of what we have been doing over the last 50 years, in terms of emissions reductions and adaptation. What we should not do to do is panic or weaponize teenagers with anxiety disorders. That’s unethical in itself and actively harmful.

Some in the media can see the winds shifting and are starting to pivot, but most have proven to be untrustworthy. I am filling in the gaps with evidence-based reporting and temporarily reducing an annual subscription's price by 50%.

Much more must be said to properly process the outrageously irresponsible media coverage of climate change over the last 30 years. Hopefully, Thunberg’s admission that she is motivated more by hatred of capitalism than a love of nature will trigger greater self-reflection.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Why Spike Protein Causes Abnormal, Foot-Long Blood Clots, 200 Symptoms​

In this two-part paper, we aim to give an overview on COVID-19 related abnormal blood clots, how they form, how to detect them early, and how they're being treated

Dr. Yuhong Dong
Dr. Jordan Vaughn
Nov 5 2022

Strange Clots
Since mid-2021, unusual, lengthy blood clots found in the vessels of COVID-19 patients and jab recipients have been reported across the world.

Epoch Times Photo
Fibrous Clots found in corpses by Richard Hirschman (Courtesy of Richard Hirschman)

“We as embalmers are seeing some strange clots since the COVID outbreak. These clots are very rubbery feeling and very long as they exit the veins that we use during the embalming procedure. They really appear to be like earthworms. I have never seen this in my career until now,” Larry Mills, a licensed embalmer and funeral director in the State of Alabama, told The Epoch Times.

Other embalmers confirmed similar findings and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Richard Hirschman, Alabama funeral director and embalmer since 2001, was one of the first to bring attention to this phenomenon. He said that prior to COVID perhaps 5 to 10 percent of people had these clots. Now more than half of the bodies he sees have them.

One embalmer, licensed since 2001, said in an interview, “I can tell you with certainty that the clots Richard has shown online are a phenomenon that I have not witnessed until probably the middle of last year. That is pretty much all I have to say about it. I have no knowledge as to what is causing the clots, but they did seemingly start showing up around the middle of 2021.”

Where do these strange, fibrous clots come from? How do they form?

A Condition With Over 200 Symptoms​

Doctors have realized, since the early days of the pandemic, that COVID-19 is not just a lung disease, but also an endothelial and vascular disease.

Physicians have summarized a list of unusual clinical observations of COVID-19 including but not limited to severely hypoxic (low oxygen) patients despite relatively normal lung compliance upon examination, thrombotic complications, and consistent autopsy findings of blood clots (thrombi) in the microcirculation of the lung.

After an acute COVID-19 infection, over 200 different lingering symptoms have been reported for long COVID, which can persist for about 6–24 months.

This is perhaps the largest number of symptoms reported with a medical condition so far.

The most frequent symptoms include breathlessness, fatigue, brain fog, cognitive dysfunction, muscle aches and pains (myalgia), sleeping difficulties, and anxiety or depression.

The chronic, relapsing nature of long COVID is mainly caused by immune dysregulation, hyperinflammation, oxidative stress, and mitochondrial dysfunction.

But how could it be, and why? Clues have emerged since 2020.

Blood Clots Causing Symptoms​

In November 2020, a report with findings of increased microclots in COVID-19 patients versus healthy or diabetic patients could reasonably explain the breathlessness, fatigue, and post-exertional malaise syndrome.

Epoch Times Photo


Moreover, a large scale cohort UK study based on 48 million adults in England and Wales found that in the first week after a COVID-19 diagnosis, the risk of an arterial blood clot was nearly 22 times higher than in someone without COVID-19, and 33 times higher for a venous clot condition.

An artery clot is the kind that could cause a heart attack or ischemic stroke by blocking blood flow to the heart or brain.

This has led to an estimated 10,500 additional cases of clot-related problems, i.e. about 7,200 additional heart attacks or strokes, and 3,500 additional cases of pulmonary embolism, deep vein thrombosis, or other venous problems.

Even though that risk drops sharply to less than four times higher than someone without COVID in the second week, it remains high (2x) even up to 49 weeks after the initial diagnosis. This is especially so in regards to the risk of deep vein thrombosis. These are clots that form in large veins.

Epoch Times Photo

Epoch Times Photo

Epoch Times Photo
Knight R, Walker V, Ip S, Cooper JA, Bolton T, Keene S, Denholm R, Akbari A, Abbasizanjani H, Torabi F, Omigie E, Hollings S, North TL, Toms R, Jiang X, Angelantonio ED, Denaxas S, Thygesen JH, Tomlinson C, Bray B, Smith CJ, Barber M, Khunti K, Davey Smith G, Chaturvedi N, Sudlow C, Whiteley WN, Wood AM, Sterne JAC; CVD-COVID-UK/COVID-IMPACT Consortium and the Longitudinal Health and Wellbeing COVID-19 National Core Study. Association of COVID-19 With Major Arterial and Venous Thrombotic Diseases: A Population-Wide Cohort Study of 48 Million Adults in England and Wales. Circulation. 2022 Sep 20;146(12):892-906. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.122.060785. Epub 2022 Sep 19. PMID: 36121907; PMCID: PMC9484653.

Spike Protein: The First Domino Toppled​

Blood is a liquid that circulates under pressure through the blood vessels in our whole body, like the water flowing through the house that you then use to shower, do the dishes, and so on.

Following a vascular injury, any blood “leaking out” must rapidly be converted into a gel (a “clot”) to fill in the hole and minimize further blood loss.
Epoch Times Photo
(Shutterstock)

Normally, the plasma portion of blood contains a collection of soluble proteins that act together in a series of enzyme activation events that result in the formation of a fibrin clot. This process is protective, as it prevents excessive blood loss following injury.

Unfortunately, the blood clotting mechanism can also lead to unwanted blood clots inside blood vessels (pathologic thrombosis), e.g. heart attack or stroke, both of which are a leading cause of disability and death in the world.

COVID-19’s way of causing abnormal blood clots has spurred many discussions since early 2020.

It appears that the virus’s unique spike protein triggers the cascade via many “non-traditional” pathways.

The spike protein’s direct invasion of the epithelium cells is the first domino toppled.

Subsequent cascade effects finally cause the blood clotting.

Spike Protein Impairs Epithelium Cells​

SARS-CoV-2 enters our cells via a protein receptor called the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2).

Epoch Times Photo
Rendering of SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins binding to ACE2 receptors. (Shutterstock)

Endothelial cells (ECs), express an abundance of ACE2. ECs reside on the inner surface of every blood vessel across our entire body, making them a direct target of the virus infection.

Studies showed that spike protein itself can damage the structure and function of ECs, including impairing the mitochondria and downregulating the protective molecule ACE2 on ECs.

Researchers observed that both the S1 and S2 parts of the spike protein can induce human ECs to express a peak of pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL6, IL1B, TNF-alpha, and chemokines CXCL1, and CXCL2).

Subsequently, the release of cytokines initiates the switch-like molecule (E-selectin) on the endothelial cell membrane, allowing them to attach with immune cells, thereby initiating subsequent disease processes.

Additional studies on the spike protein showed that it activates the EC inflammation dependent on integrin ⍺5β1 and NF-κB signaling pathways and subsequent expression of leukocyte adhesion molecules.

Cytokines are small proteins secreted by cells (mainly T cells and macrophages). They have many specific names, and serve as a communicator between cells (cell signaling) for further action. Cytokines are the “mailmen” of the body that connect and communicate between cells.

The spike protein can induce a breakdown of connecting proteins between endothelial cells of blood vessels, which disrupts the integrity and function of our blood vessels.

Brain ECs also strongly express ACE2. Spike protein has similar toxic effects on brain ECs, inducing neurological symptoms (brain fog, cognitive decline).

Spike Proteins Trigger the Clotting Cascade​

Many other cells, including lung epithelial cells, enterocytes lining the small intestines, and cardiac pericytes, all express ACE2.

Spike proteins don’t only activate epithelial cells (EC) and promote localized inflammation. They also promote systemic inflammation as ACE2 is almost everywhere inside our major organs and tissues.

Part 1 of 2
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Part 2 of 2

Consequently, more pro-inflammatory genes are expressed. More and more immune cells are attracted and sent to the injured or infected tissues (vessels in the lung, heart, gut, etc).

A number of subsequent events collectively contribute to the clotting cascade:
  1. Complement-mediated inflammation of epitheliums (endothelialitis): Spike proteins docking on ACE2 ECs activates the complement pathway and coagulation cascade, resulting in a systemic endothelialitis (lung injury) and procoagulant state (tendency to develop blood clots).
  2. As the complement destroys the endothelium, the procoagulant von Willebrand factor (vWF) and FVIII are released. A significant increase of vWF can form multimers that promote thrombus growth. vWF is secreted mainly from endothelial cells and from a-granules of platelets (megakaryocytes derived). This is comparable to the string in the “beads and string” of a necklace where the beads represent platelets.
  3. Platelet storm: Platelets are a small fragment of the megakaryocytes. The complement anaphylatoxins C3a and C5a activate platelets and increase the production of tissue factor further promoting a clotting forming state.
    ACE2 receptors are present on platelets, and this may contribute to the massive platelet aggregation, which is a characteristic of severe COVID-19 infection.
  4. Activation of neutrophils leads to formation of neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), a process sometimes referred to as NETosis, which contributes to thrombosis.
  5. EC injury is compounded by toll-like receptor (TLR) activation by viral RNA recognition, with resulting increased reactive oxidative species (ROS) production. The increased ROS further upregulates the expression of vWF.
  6. Spike protein can induce expression and secretion of a series of clotting proteins which cascades into the clotting process, including factor (F)-V, thrombin, and fibrinogen to promote clotting process.

Spike Protein Dysregulates RAAS, Worsening the Clotting State​

Due to the spike protein directly interacting with ACE2 expression, COVID-19 patients showed an elevated level of serum angiotensin II indicating a dysregulation of the RAA system (renin angiotensin aldosterone system, or RAAS).

Traditionally, people think angiotensin II is a neurohormone that stimulates the constriction of vascular smooth muscle cells and is responsible for salt and water balance.

However, there have been abundant studies supporting the idea that angiotensin II is capable of initiating and upregulating inflammatory responses, worsening the clotting state.

Epoch Times Photo


In a regulated and self-limited immune response, these mechanisms help to calm down the local injury, with subsequent healing and returning to a resting EC state.

However, for predisposed COVID-19 patients or vaccinated people, the factors strengthening clot formation are way heavier than healing mechanisms, all of which lead to an escalating thrombotic cascade.

Here is a short summary of the first scene of the clot story: spike induced endothelial disruption, massive amounts of vWF released, a subsequent platelet storm, hypoxia induced upregulation and activation of vWF, fibrous network from neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), as well as increased angiotensin II level, all adding up to initiate thrombogenesis.

This is how the clotting mechanism comes to be. Furthermore, the upcoming second scene takes another pivotal part in the whole story.

A COVID vaccine instructs the cells to produce large quantities of spike proteins. Normal biochemical and physiological processes are “hijacked” in order to make an abnormal amount of these spike proteins.

These abnormal amounts of spike protein have more surprising direct effects on clots.

Spike Proteins Directly Disrupt the Clot Dissolving Mechanism​

In a normal healthy person, the body will, in the presence of a blood clot, break it down by a process of fibrinolysis. This is a natural healing and balancing mechanism to prevent an abundance of blood clots.

During this process, Tissue Plasminogen activator (TPA, coming from the endothelium) helps plasminogen change into plasmin and then generate d-dimer (a small protein fragment left when a blood clot dissolves).

It has been discovered that fibrinogen in blood can clot into an abnormal “amyloid” form of fibrin that (like other β-rich amyloids and prions) is relatively resistant to proteolysis (fibrinolysis).

This is strongly manifested in the platelet-poor plasma (PPP) of individuals with long COVID. The extensive fibrin amyloid microclots can persist.

In an outstanding study by Grobbelaar published in Bioscience Reports in August 2021, the biomarker S1 (or the intruding part of the spike protein) alone can induce fibrin resistance to fibrinolysis, leading to unopposed microclot formation.

When spike protein S1 was added to healthy PPP, it resulted in structural changes to β and γ fibrin(ogen), complement 3, and prothrombin. These proteins were substantially resistant to trypsinization in the presence of spike protein S1.

Hence, the results suggest that the presence of spike protein in circulation may contribute to the hyper clotting status, and may cause substantial impairment of the clot dissolving process.

Such lytic impairment may result in the persistent large microclots that people have reported and which have been found in plasma samples of COVID-19 patients.

These microclots block up capillaries, and thus to limit the passage of red blood cells, and hence oxygen exchange, which can actually underpin the majority of these symptoms.

Spike Proteins Form Amyloid-Like Substance​

Furthermore, to everyone’s surprise again, spike proteins are identified to present seven amyloidogenic sequences and are able to form amyloid-like substances.

In other words, these spike proteins are similar to those beta-amyloid or tau or alpha-synuclein like substances which may cause neuronal loss in Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease patients.

Their structure makes it easy to form tighter string-like bonded structures with longitudinal twisting as well as cross binding, forming a fibrous-like structure visible under the microscope.

Researchers have found that plasma samples from long COVID patients still contain large anomalous (amyloid) deposits (microclots), which are resistant to fibrinolysis (compared to plasma from controls and diabetes), even after trypsinization (cell dissociation after an enzyme breaks down proteins).

After a second trypsinization, the persistent pellet deposits (microclots) were solubilized. Various inflammatory molecules substantially increased in both the supernatant and trapped in the solubilized pellet deposits of COVID-19, versus that of the control samples.

Of particular interest was a substantial increase in α(2)-antiplasmin (α2AP), various fibrinogen chains, as well as Serum Amyloid A (SAA) that were trapped in the solubilized fibrinolytic-resistant pellet deposits.

Significant abnormal amyloid microclot formation that are resistant to fibrinolysis, increased α2AP, and the surge of acute phase inflammatory molecules may therefore be central contributors in both COVID-19 infection and as well as COVID vaccine-related syndrome.

Spike Protein Inhibits Another Anti-Clot Mechanism​

Spike protein is just one surprise after another.

It’s been reported that the spike protein can competitively inhibit the bindings of antithrombin and heparin cofactor II to heparin, causing abnormal increase in thrombin (clotting) activity.

SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins at a similar concentration (~10 μg/mL) as the viral load in critically ill patients can directly cause blood coagulation and thrombosis in the zebrafish model.

To summarize, these unexpected negative effects of spike protein on the dissolving process of blood clots, plus its amyloid nature, all may be the key contributory factors to the abnormal, lengthy fibrous clots observed in COVID-related conditions.

Spike Protein Is the Smoking Gun​

There is clinical evidence that the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein has been detected in clots retrieved from COVID-19 patients with acute ischemic stroke and myocardial infarction.

Recent research conducted by cardiologists from the University of Colorado sheds light on the crucial role of spike protein in the pathology of COVID and COVID vaccine-related injuries.

They analyzed seven COVID-19 patients and six mRNA vaccinated patients with myocardial injury and found nearly identical alterations in gene profiling patterns that would predispose them to clotting state, inflammation, and myocardial dysfunction.

In other words, regardless of whether the myocarditis was caused by the virus or vaccine, the expression of genes responsible for prothrombotic state in response to spike protein, inflammation, and myocardial dysfunction, exhibited similar changes.

Based on gene analysis, COVID-19 and post-mRNA vaccine injury have a common molecular mechanism.

The altered genes pattern includes down-regulation in ACE2, ACE2/ACE ratio, AGTR1, and ITGA5, and up-regulation in ACE and F3 (tissue factor).

What is more alarming and not reported before is that microvascular thrombosis has been found in post-vaccinated patients, indicating that spike protein itself is able to trigger blood clots in susceptible patients.

Tip of the Iceberg​

Based on the causal relation between ChAdOx1-S vaccines (the AstraZeneca adenovirus COVID vaccine) and thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, the product information for ChAdOx1-S has been updated to include thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome as a very rare side effect.

This has been named as vaccine induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT), due to the fact that in almost every patient in these reports, high levels of antibodies to platelet factor 4 (PF4)–polyanion complexes were identified in their body.

These unusual blood clots in combination with thrombocytopenia were reported predominantly in women aged under 60 years. Accordingly, several European countries restricted the use of adenovirus vaccines in younger age groups.

This risk has been recently systematically analyzed in an international network cohort study from five European countries and the United States, confirming pooled 30 percent increased risk of thrombocytopenia after a first dose of the ChAdOx1-S vaccine, as well as a trend towards an increased risk of venous thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome after Ad26.COV2.S (the Janssen COVID vaccine) compared with BNT162b2 (the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID vaccine).

However this may be only the tip of the iceberg. There are many more events that could be attributed to the clotting issues including sudden death, cardiovascular events, cardiac death, stroke, disabilities, thrombotic events, etc.

Blood vessels are in all our organs. The vessel problems could explain a wide range of symptoms from the dysfunction to mild decline of our brain, heart, lung, and extremities.

With additional reporting by Enrico Trigoso.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

America’s Diesel Fuel Shortage Could CRIPPLE the Supply Chain by Thanksgiving​

Arsenio Toledo
November 5, 2022

The supply of diesel in the United States is still in a precarious position, and an insider in the auto industry warned if the crisis continues for longer it could permanently damage the already-weakened supply chain by Thanksgiving.

Automobile industry expert Eric Peters noted in an interview with radio host Kate Dalley that there will likely be a massive shortfall in diesel in the coming weeks “and that’s going to be felt economy-wide.”

“Most people don’t appreciate the importance of diesel macro in the economy because most people drive a gas-powered car,” he said. “They don’t understand that everything that they buy pretty much is shipped from where it was made or where it was grown via a diesel-powered heavy truck and involved diesel-powered machinery to produce it.”

“If the supply of [diesel] goes down even 10, 20 percent, that is going to result in significant ramifications, generally speaking, across the entire economy,” Peters added. “Unless the numbers are completely inaccurate, and they may well be, I do think it’s inevitable that we’re going to see some of these dislocations right around Thanksgiving.”

Peters is referring to a report released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) in October suggesting that the U.S. has just around 25 days of diesel supply remaining, which would put the country at zero diesel supply around the fourth week of November, right before Thanksgiving.

Diesel inventories running on fumes​

America’s diesel inventories are at their lowest level since the massive economic downturn caused by the 2008 Great Recession. Elaine Levin, president of Powerhouse, an energy risk management consultancy firm, noted that the diesel industry is “running on fumes.”

“That is a problem for everybody who needs to put it in the truck and burn it,” Levin said. She noted that if the supply of diesel decreases further, or does not improve beyond the EIA’s latest warning, prices will likely remain elevated throughout the winter.

The total distillate inventory figure for the U.S., which makes up roughly 85 to 90 percent of all diesel inventories, including other distillates such as heating oil, showed that the country has 106.78 million barrels left, up very slightly from the EIA’s report that showed 106.35 million barrels.

Levin noted that the figure for distillate inventories is uncomfortably close to the 100 million barrel mark. Once supplies hit this mark, it will start to create what Peters called “dislocations” in the fuel distribution system, as there won’t be enough to go around. It could lead to some places being prioritized for diesel deliveries over others.

As of Thursday, Nov. 3, the national average price per gallon of diesel was $5.311, or $1.672 higher than a year ago. Texas had the lowest average price at $4.715 per gallon, or $1.394 higher than a year ago, and California had the highest average state-level price at $6.3 per gallon, or $1.543 higher than a year ago.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Glenn Beck warns: Forecasted DIESEL SHORTAGE could spell DISASTER​

NOVEMBER 04, 2022
PHOTO BY DAVID MCNEW/GETTY IMAGES

President Joe Biden and the Democrats are doing everything they can to convince you that they’re doing a great job, and you don't need to worry about "petty" things like the cost of gas and food.

But it's not petty to be concerned about the price of fuel right now or your bank account or the potentially disastrous diesel fuel shortage that the Energy Information Administration (EIA) has warned is coming — just as the nation heads into colder months.

On the radio program this week, Glenn Beck broke down the many ways the EIA-forecasted diesel shortage would be devastating for America and why the Biden administration's policies are at fault (though the administration will never admit it.) If that's not what you voted for, he warned, make the madness stop at the ballot box on Election Day.

Watch the video clip below to hear Glenn break down the timeline. Can't watch? Download the podcast here.

View: https://youtu.be/WUN4NMpkOCA
13:35 min
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Germany’s Gas Storage Could Be Depleted After A ‘Few Freezing Cold Days,’ Energy Regulator Warns​

Reuters: “Germany’s gas storage facilities could be quickly emptied if this winter gets really cold.”

Posted by Vijeta Uniyal Saturday, November 5, 2022 at 06:00pm

With winter fast approaching, it will only take a “few freezing cold days” to empty Germany’s stored gas reserves, country’s energy and gas regulatory agency warns.

While Germany’s gas storage levels are currently well over 90 percent of their capacity, these “storage facilities could be quickly emptied if this winter gets really cold,” Reuters reported Friday citing Klaus Mueller, head of Germany’s national energy regulatory authority (Die Bundesnetzagentur).

As Russia ceases to be Europe’s main gas and oil supplier following the Western sanctions in response to its invasion of Ukraine and the blowing up of the Russo-German Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea five weeks ago, Germany struggles to keep its citizens warm and its economy running in the winter months.

Reuters reported German regulator’s grim warning:

Germany’s gas storage facilities could be quickly emptied if this winter gets really cold, warned the head of the country’s network regulator in an interview with Spiegel weekly on Friday.

“Just a few freezing cold days are enough for a dramatic increase in gas consumption,” Klaus Mueller said.

Mueller’s Bundesnetzagentur would be in charge of gas rationing if it came to it, a scenario Germany wants to avoid at all costs via regular pleas to cut consumption by at least 20%.

As of Nov. 2, Germany’s gas storage levels stood at 99.3% and Mueller said that Europe’s top economy could keep going for around 9-10 weeks were it solely to rely on those tanks – provided it’ll be a mild winter as was the case in 2021/2022.

Search for new gas suppliers and other energy sources comes at a high price, with household energy bills soaring since the slashing of the cheap gas supply from Russia.

Describing the “skyrocketing” energy prices, German state broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported Wednesday:

To fill the gap left by Russia, Germany has had to buy gas and other energy alternatives on the expensive spot market. This has led to higher prices for consumers. Today an annual gas contract for a German household costs 173% more than it did a year ago, according to energy price portal Check24. That’s €3,726 ($3,702.15) for an average annual consumption of 20,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh), compared to €1,365.

With ordinary Germans struggling to pay their energy bills, many are turning to firewood to heat their homes.

Authorities are reporting a surge in timber theft from German forests. “More wood is being stolen from German forests. The reason is the high energy prices and the shortage of firewood. The Forestry departments are responding with more controls, and forest owners are reporting of increasingly brazen thefts,” the Germany’s main state-run TV channel ARD reported recently.

The energy crisis is not limited to Germany alone, and isn’t going to end anytime soon. Entire Europe faces a massive energy crunch as the year comes to a close, latest news reports suggest.

The Associated Press reported Thursday that if the supply crunch continues, “Europe could face a severe natural gas shortage next year.”

Judging by the current trends, “Europe could face a shortfall of 30 billion cubic meters of gas next summer, the key period for filling supplies ahead of the winter heating season, when there is stronger demand for the fuel,” the AP added.

View: https://youtu.be/NLB8N1R__FQ
2:54 min
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Study: Majority of Americans living ‘paycheck-to-paycheck,’ average debt at $25k​

Some Americans have turned to gambling to shore up finances.

By Just the News staff
Updated: November 5, 2022 - 5:46pm

The majority of Americans are living paycheck-to-paycheck, a new study finds, with considerable debt loads driving some of them to gamble in an attempt to earn more money.

The study, commissioned by NY Sports Day, found that "more than half [of Americans] (51%) are living paycheck to paycheck right now," while 42% of Americans "would not be able to cover an unexpected $1,000 expense."

The study revealed that "on average, Americans are in the red by about $25,139," while nearly 10% of U.S. citizens "admitted to trying to get out of debt by playing the lottery."

The majority of generational cohorts in the U.S. are pessimistic about the "financial future" as well, with more than 50% of Gen Xers, Millennials and Gen Zers lacking confidence about their future finances.
 
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