Who’s on First
Behind the curtain, the long list of those who support the USA against ISIS has no substance. Why? This is a religious war and therein lies the problem. The Muslin community is throughout Europe and the great fear is their citizens run to join ISIS and then return creating a sort of home-grown terrorists organization. Nobody wants to send troops on the ground and meanwhile the only one with a clear strategic position is Putin who brilliantly realizes he needs to keep his hand in the pot supporting Syria.
The whole place is just confusing. The USA supported Iraq in its fight against Iran, then Cheney Pushed Iraq War For Halliburton Profit under the pretense we needed to save the people bringing them democracy, which we ourselves do not have in reality. Of course this was a Three-Stooges affair where one slaps the other and he slaps the third one. We claimed we needed to drive out terrorists from Iraq who were not actually there until we invaded to drive them out attracting them from other regions. Cheney has pissed off so many people and the civilian casualties only inspire hatred. Just ask yourself if someone invaded your country and killed your family, wouldn’t you hate them? Many in China and Korea still hate the Japanese. Their defeat does not eradicate that human feeling. Americans do not harbor such widespread dislike of Germans or Japanese because neither invaded the USA. There is a huge difference when there is an invasion. War has tremendous unintended consequences.
The Middle East political landscape is like Abbott and Costello’ classic routineWho’s on First – just confusing. Today, ISIS is extreme Sunni so Iran being Shite supports Iraq against ISIS; but Iran is our enemy? So we now have an enemy supporting our friend who is against another enemy ISIS! OK, we really want Iran to lose, but somehow not against ISIS. Then there is Assad in Syria another enemy who we want to lose so we can help Saudi Arabia get a pipeline through Syria to compete with Putin, another enemy, but Assad is against ISIS, who was originally funded by USA and Saudi Arabia, fighting yet another enemy.
We are just scratching the surface here. Exactly who is our enemy and who is our friend varies so we clearly want our enemies to lose, but not against other enemies we do not fully understand. That is why we mess with Russia trying to get them to overthrow Putin where we have converted Putin into the symbol of the state of Russia and only increased his support domestically. We do not talk to Russia or Putin because the policy makers in Washington are confused still trying to figure out who is an enemy or a friend and what happens when two enemies fight and how we can explain to the American people why we need to kick somebody’s ass as soon as we can figure out who’s on first.
When everything is regulated, it becomes technical and loses all common sense
COMMENT: Loved your candid picture of the little boy in Brussels taking a leak on Europe. It is so true living here.
REPLY: Well, it is a shame but all governments are the same. Once they have power, they keep grabbing more and believe the world cannot exist without them. On the lighter side, if that fountain was in the USA, the people who designed it, built it, and looked at it, would all go the prison for child pornography. The number of 18 year olds charged as child molesters because their girlfriend was 17 just illustrates how prosecutors lack common sense. If they can fit it into the law – they do. Police even sought a search warrant to take pictures of 17 year-old’s erection.
If there was a bank run and everyone took out their money in cash, the cops couldconfiscate it arguing people do not normally carry cash only criminals and get away with it. When everything is regulated, it becomes technical and loses all common sense.
ECB Exceeds it Powers At the Threat to Germany
The storm brewing in Europe with the European Central Bank (ECB) is its plan to buy bad debt from banks in the version of stimulating the economy. Of course this is indirect and will never save Europe – but it may tear it apart. The ECB and all who support them, have argued in their comments, that this program known as OMT, is simply monetary policy and is covered by the mandate of the ECB. Although the opposite is evident and is stated in the very purpose of adopting this to stimulate the economy, no government will ever see a limitation to their power for whatever it is from the NSA to ECB, they can always justify their actions.
The ECB claims buying bad debt is monetary policy, even if it still operates as obvious economic policy. The high Court must will now have to decide if the ECB is exceeding its authority. Quite frankly, buying in bad debt will do nothing for there is no guarantee that the banks will then lend this out to small business to create jobs. In the USA, small business could not borrow even with collateral. This is a stupid idea that will only fail in the end anyhow.
The ONLY way to stimulate the European economy is
- (1) return sovereignty to member states,
- (2) reduce regulation (including cow farting), and
- (3) reduce taxes abandon VAT and replace it with a simple sales tax.
Herein lies the problem. Once in power, they see all solutions with expanding power – never reducing it.
The Return of Mercenaries
Private armies for hire are becoming popular on all sides. For government, this is the greatest invention since taxes – no social benefits. Mercenaries fighting for the USA get about $141,000 a year. Even in Ukraine there are a number of mercenaries from Europe and other countries is on the rise. They fight on the side of Kiev against the Russian rebels in the east. They are often Chechens who just hate Russians, but they are also appearing from France, Poland, Spain, Italy, Denmark and the Baltic States. Who finances their use is unclear since most seem to be unpaid. The generally fight in the Ukrainian in the right-wing battalion Azov (pictured above). Many are there to prevent the revival of the Soviet Union as they see it.
Gold v Equities
QUESTION: Hi Mr. Armstrong …
In the Metals report you mentioned that the further Gold fell, the greater the rally would be thereafter.
So don’t the same principles apply to what is currently happening in equities? Support areas are being breached, but don’t a lot of investors watch the same areas so the “heard” mentality is taking over for now? These investors are in panic mode
It seems a huge, very quick rally can occur any time now, as nothing has really changed regarding capital flows, etc. so perhaps a buying opportunity is taking place now?
Thank You !
AH
ANSWER: Normally this would be true. The Global Market Watch proves that patterns are universal across all markets. The difference between equities this time and gold, the latter is retail while the former is at historic lows for retail participation – very strange. There is no bubble in equities despite the high levels. Therefore, we appear to be more in a preparation stage for a Phase Transition that is required to get the bubble.
Eventually, all private assets will align against the Sovereign Debt Crisis. That is historically just how it all fits together.
IMF Forecasts are Always Wrong – This Spectacularly So
When it comes to forecasting, the IMF is virtually always wrong to a large extent. Indeed, often they are spectacularly wrong as was the case with the financial crisis of 2007-2009. Why anyone ever bothers to listen is really baffling. They never admit mistakes and are clueless about forecasting any change in trend. What is in motion, just stays in motion. The IMF is going to make another spectacular mistake and it appears they are really going to be so wrong this time, if they were in private business, they would surely be out of business. It is debatable whether or not they can even beat a broken clock that is at least correct twice each day.
The head of the IMF is a lawyer, Christine LaGarde. The mere fact that lawyers are appointed to run just about everything in government demonstrates why formal education is a waste. Would you hand all your money over to your attorney to manage your pension? How about to person who is the newscaster at the local TV station? Yet we hand the world economy over to lawyers who want to be presidents and who are appointed to run the IMF. Therein lies our problem. These people then are clueless and experiment with the world all the time. We just pay the price for their dreams of power.