Category: Economy

Climate Change Is Not Threatening Human Health

It has become all too common in the media, especially every time another United Nations climate conference like COP28 takes place, to blame every problem on climate change. The media and their go-to climate pundits reach far and wide to connect whatever tragic event is trending in the news to the modest warming of the past hundred or so years, and they do it no matter how tenuous the connection.

Some claims immediately stand out as ridiculous to even the casual observer, like the claim that the oceans are boiling, which is so stupid only someone who has blind trust in favored authorities bordering on pathological would believe it.

Other claims have the appearance of plausibility, at least at first glance, because the logic is relatively straightforward. Even then, existing data often contradicts the climate attribution. Taking a hypothesis, testing it, and then revising it based on the results used to be a thing called the “scientific method,” but apparently many in the media find that too boring and choose to spread unverified claims instead.

One of the common claims made by climate hucksters recently is that climate change is increasingly harming human health.

On the surface this might sound true. One of the examples often cited is that an increase in pollen will torment allergy sufferers. It is true that more plants due to carbon dioxide fertilization and longer stretches of plant-friendly weather certainly results in more pollen from some species. However, alarmism regarding this claim misses the broader point; better growing conditions means a lusher planet that better sustains human and animal life. Allergies are a misery, true, but they are manageable. Starvation is not so easily managed.

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64 US Bank Branches File To Shut Down In A Single Week; Are You Affected?

Big banks such as PNC Bank and JPMorgan Chase have filed to close several branch offices in multiple states amid a troubling pattern of rising branch shutdowns in recent years.

Between Nov. 12 and 18, several banks filed to close branch locations, with PNC Bank with the most filings, according to data from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank filed for 19 branch closures—five in Pennsylvania, four in Illinois, three in Texas, two each in Alabama and New Jersey, and one each in Indiana, Ohio, and Florida.

JPMorgan Chase followed closely with 18 filings—three in Ohio, two each in Connecticut and South Carolina, and one each in 11 states, including New York, Illinois, Florida, and Massachusetts.

Citizens Bank came in third with eight branch closure filings—six in New York, and one each in Massachusetts and Delaware. Minneapolis-based U.S. Bank filed for seven closures—three in Tennessee and one each in Missouri, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Illinois.

Bank of America made five filings—two in New York and one each in Texas, Massachusetts, and California.

Citibank filed for two branch closures, and Sterling, Bremer, First National Bank of Hughes Springs, Windsor FS&LA, and Aroostook County FS&LA made one filing each.

Altogether, banks filed to shut down 64 branches.

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I remember there were nearly riots when gas hit over $2.50 not all that long ago. It’s like there’s an election coming up, or something………

Gas prices have dropped below $3 per gallon in these 11 states.

Gasoline prices are on a downward trend, with 11 states now averaging below $3 per gallon. The steady decline comes amid falling seasonal demand and use of less-expensive winter-grade gas.

Drivers in the states closest to the Gulf Coast’s oil production and refineries are looking at average pump prices just under $3 per gallon, according to AAA data. Those include:

Alabama: $2.95
Arkansas: $2.95
Georgia: $2.85
Kentucky: $2.99
Louisiana: $2.92
Mississippi: $2.84
Missouri: $2.99
Oklahoma: $2.91
South Carolina: $2.93
Tennessee: $2.96
Texas: $2.80

“These states generally have the lowest excise taxes on gasoline…they are near refining centers where the gasoline is produced cutting down on distribution costs,” Andy Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates told Yahoo Finance on Monday.

Meanwhile the national average for gasoline sits at $3.36, compared to $3.78 one year ago.

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Some of the Dystopian Tyranny You Can Expect if the Marxists Win

What with WWIII brewing like a much-needed pot of coffee after a night of swilling Mad Dog (don’t judge), I thought today would be a groovy time to point out what our future looks like if we don’t wake up the “communism can’t happen here” crowd. And I do not have to go far because a lot of it is already taking place.

We already know the federal government colluded with Big Tech to censor Americans who dared question the origins of COVID and the efficacy of the clot-shot and even shut down the New York Post for breaking the Hunter Biden laptop story. We’ve seen pro-lifers have their doors kicked in by FBI SWAT teams. This will get even worse if We the People don’t raise our voices.

Your environmental, social, and governance (ESG) score will light up like Hunter’s crackpipe if you tweet that “a man in a dress isn’t a woman,” and your digital currency card will be denied when you try to buy toilet paper.

FACT-O-RAMA! A woman I know, now 81, who moved from Poland to the U.S. in 1974 told me Stalin would stop sending toilet paper to Poland when he was angry at the nation for not falling in line.

Your three-bedroom home will be deemed an extravagance now that your kids have moved out and may be confiscated and handed over to a large family from Sudan. After all, building more housing than necessary is a threat to “climate change.” Besides, you’ll be comfy-cozy in your federally approved living pod.

Check out this Canadian commie prag stating that “you don’t have an absolute right to own private property in Canada.” Stop saying “It can’t happen here.”

Your dog will be killed because we all know puppy kibble makes the weather bad.

Unless you have a herd of cattle, your Sunday steaks will be replaced with a tempting cricket salad.

Enough of my bloviating. Watch this video by the World Economic Forum (WEF), which is nothing more than a group of wealthy, unelected jackpuddings who are “predicting” that by 2030 you will be a serf. Your enslavement includes such greatest hits as:

  • we will own nothing and be happy
  • we will stop eating meat
  • the U.S. will not be a superpower because “a handful of countries will dominate”
  • a billion people will be displaced — to the West — otherwise, somehow, the clouds will suffer

FACT-O-RAMA! The mass migration to the West began decades ago. Do you see how far along the WEF plan has come along? Are you waking up yet? If you are reading this, Im sure you are. Now let’s work on our “normie” friends and relatives.

According to KGB defector Yuri Bezmenov, the first step we see after the fall of liberty won’t affect true Americans. Antifa and knuckleheads like the professors who are now waving Hamas flags will be the first to be purged. That “BLM” shirt your lavender-haired, non-binary sibling-in-law wears won’t protect zher from prison, or even a firing squad. It will actually push zhim to the front of the line.

Bezmenov put it this way:

Your leftists in the United States. All these professors and all these beautiful civil rights defenders. They are instrumental in the process of the subversion only to destabilize a nation. When their job is completed, they are not needed anymore. They know too much. Some of them, when they get disillusioned, when they see that Marxist-Leninists come to power, obviously they get offended, they think that they will come to power. That will never happen, of course. They will be lined up against the wall and shot.

I won’t get into what our Jewish friends and gay community will face if Islam takes over the Western world.

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Burning Down (The Economic) House?
Food Prices UP 20% Under Bidenomics, Credit Card Delinquencies Now Higher Than During Covid As Credit Card Debt Grows To All-time High To Cope With Inflation

Is Biden trying to burn down the economic house? Under Bidenomics, America’s middle class and low wage workers are suffering from a wild, wild life in terms of inflation.

First, food prices are up 20% since December 2020. Talk about destruction of middle class wealth!

That is in addition to gasoline prices are up 64% under Biden while rent growth is up 252%. Well, Biden waived through millions of illegal immigrants and rent had to rise. Biden and Washington DC’s broken borders is Livin’ La Vida Loco.

To cope with inflation (that Paul Krugman claims is over but the last inflation report showed that the tinders of inflation are hard to extinguish), consumers have turned to credit cards to survive. In fact, credit cards have expanded 38% since April 2021 despite rapidly rising interest rates. And credit card delinquency rates are rising and are now above Covid-era economic shutdown levels.

Despite Krugman and Yellen’s screaming that inflation has been crushed, US household are anticipating FASTER inflation. To paraphrase the Emperor of Austria from “Amadeus,” “You are passionate Krugman and Yellen, but you do not persuade.”

And Billions Biden has just recorded the third largest deficit in history.

The Great Reset is a Globalist Trojan Horse using the cover of “Climate Change” to destroy American Economic Power and transfer power to the IMF

The World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset” (which Biden is implementing) is Neo Marxism packaged in a way that if you oppose it you either want to destroy the environment or you are a racist.

Supporters of the World Economic Forum and sympathizers of the Fabian Society are using the facade of “Climate Change” to subvert democracies worldwide and impose a “Great Reset”  to eradicate national frameworks and create globalist, borderless, godless, neo-Marxist, multicultural, open societies. The destruction of the centrality of the U.S. dollar in the Global Financial System and the transfer of Economic Power to the International Monetary Fund is key in the Globalist’s strategy. They are using “Climate Change” as a cover to replace democracy and capitalism with a neo-Marxist global tyranny.

The Biden regime has embraced the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset. Critical Race Theory is an integral part of the Great Reset by which education and social contracts are being modified.

On December 3, 2020 Justin Haskins wrote in the Hill “According to the Great Reset’s supporters, the plan would fundamentally transform much of society. As World Economic Forum (WEF) head Klaus Schwab wrote back in June, “the world must act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions. Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed. In short, we need a ‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.”

“Internationally, the Great Reset has already been backed by influential leaders, activists, academics and institutions. In addition to the World Economic Forum and United Nations, the Great Reset movement counts among its the International Monetary Fund, heads of state, Greenpeace and CEOs and presidents of large corporations and financial institutions such as Microsoft and MasterCard…

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Bidenomics! Average American Can’t Afford Homes In 99% Of Country

It’s time for your daily dose of Bidenomics — where the rules are made up and the points don’t matter.

In today’s lesson, we’ll learn how the fact that the average American can’t afford to buy a home in 99% of the country is evidence of a historic economy.

On Thursday, CBS reported that real estate data provider ATTOM reviewed median home prices in 575 counties across the country and concluded that the average income earner — somebody who makes $71,214 a year — could afford to buy a home in just 1% of those areas in 2022.

Chief Economist at Redfin, Daryl Fairweather, told CBS, “The only people who are selling right now are people who really need to move because of a life event — divorce, marriage, new baby, new job, etc. That lack of new inventory is keeping prices high.”

Part of the reason why homeowners are holding onto their homes is because of high interest rates — which were hiked to historic levels in hopes of slowing down runaway Bidenflation.

That inflation was caused in part by massive government spending. The president’s solution has been more government spending.

Last week, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) blamed part of the problem on corporations buying single-family homes as well.

“They have access to lower interest rates,” Vance told ABC6. “They have access to cheaper money, and they completely crowd out the availability for homes for people who want to just buy a piece of their community.”

Some of those companies have ties to the Chinese Communist Party — something Vance says is nonsensical to allow.

“I look around and say, ‘What are we doing when we’re letting the Communist Chinese Party buy up homes that should be going to Ohio citizens?’ It just doesn’t make any sense.”

Overlooked in the housing crisis has been the role that legal and illegal immigration has played. As flagged by The Washington Examiner last spring, several studies have shown that immigration, lawful or not, impacts both rental and home-owning prices. In short, the millions who enter the country each year drive up demand, which drives up prices.

“I think it’s very hard to talk about the housing crisis in Ohio or across the country without talking about the immigration problem,” Vance said last week “When you let, let’s say, 10 million or 15 million people into the country illegally, those people all need homes.”

Given the fact that one of the most basic elements of the American dream is out of reach for the American people, you’d think Washington might want to address it. Instead, the vast majority are concerned with either making the southern border more accessible, or they’re focused on providing aid to Ukraine. Or both.

Given the enormity of the housing crisis, you would hope that the Republican Party would jump on solving it, thereby securing electoral victories in the process. Aside from Vance and a handful of others, not many in the GOP seem too concerned about it.

So, instead, Biden will continue to bloviate that the American economy is booming, we need to accept millions of foreigners each year, and that we have a duty to spend billions in Ukraine. If you haven’t picked up on it, Bidenomics is code for “America Last.”

Final Second Quarter GDP Estimate Remained Unchanged at 2.1%

The third and final estimate for real gross domestic product (GDP) in the second quarter of 2023 was unrevised. It showed that the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 2.1%, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).

Compared to the first quarter, the deceleration in real GDP in the second quarter primarily reflected a slowdown in consumer spending, a downturn in exports and a deceleration in federal government spending that were partly offset by an upturn in private inventory investment, an acceleration in nonresidential fixed investment, and a smaller decrease in residential investment.

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The Biden Admin Just Declared ‘War on Consumers’

In the Biden administration’s whole-of-government attempt to force a transition to supposedly “green” and ethical energy that’s anything but — just ask the whales off the coast of New England or forced/child laborers in EV battery supply chains in Africa — another department is jumping into the crusade.

On Tuesday morning, the U.S. Department of the Treasury released its “Principles for Net-Zero Financing & Investment” to press ahead with “best practices for private sector financial institutions that have made net-zero commitments and promote consistency and credibility in approaches to implementing them.”

These principles, the Treasury Department and Secretary Janet Yellen say, are key to “supporting the mobilization of more private sector capital to address the physical and economic impacts of climate change and to seize on the historic economic opportunity presented by the green transition.”

To that end, Yellen and her department heralded “a number of announcements from civil society including a $340 million commitment” from the likes of the Bezos Earth Fund, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Climate Arc, ClimateWorks, Hewlett Foundation, and Sequoia Climate Foundation over the next three years “to support the continued development of research, data availability, and technical resources intended to help financial institutions develop and execute robust, voluntary net-zero commitments” and “facilitate the transition planning efforts of non-financial sectors of the economy.”

According to the Treasury Department, the “climate crisis is propelling a massive economic shift and is hitting the most vulnerable countries and communities first and hardest” and there’s an “increasing demand for technologies, products, and services that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, support a clean energy future, and help adapt to a changing climate across all sectors.” Notably, however, that demand is not high enough to see the market move truly voluntarily to meet it. As such, “[i]n the United States, government support is playing a role in accelerating this transition,” the Treasury Department admitted as it pushes for more net-zero agreements and investment, as seen in the principles released on Tuesday.

“This announcement from the Department of the Treasury forcing financial institutions to adopt net-zero principles should come as no surprise to American consumers as the Biden Administration openly declares war on consumers,” reacted Will Hild, the executive director of Consumers’ Research.

“Treasury Secretary Yellen, with her announcement of these new net-zero principals at the Bloom Transition Finance Action Forum, has made it abundantly clear that the Treasury Department is working with and for ESG activists like Michael Bloomberg to make the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) goals for financial institutions into U.S. government policy, leaving consumers with nothing,” Hild added. “The Biden Administration is littered with former BlackRock employees such as Brian Deese and Eric Van Nostrand who are pushing these liberal, progressive, net-zero, and ESG policies on Americans, rather than focusing on reducing costs at the grocery store and gas pump and tamping down inflation.”

“Make no mistake, the Biden administration is running cover for the financial industry’s net zero cartel, protecting megalomaniac CEOs like Larry Fink and leaving consumers with nothing,” said Hild.

As summarized by the Treasury Department, the principles established to reinforce the woke, economically damaging priorities of the left are:

PRINCIPLE 1: A financial institution’s net-zero commitment (commitment) is a declaration of intent to work toward the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Treasury recommends that commitments be in line with limiting the increase in the global average temperature to 1.5°C. To be credible, this declaration should be accompanied or followed by the development and execution of a net-zero transition plan.

PRINCIPLE 2: Financial institutions should consider transition finance, managed phaseout, and climate solutions practices when deciding how to realize their commitments.

PRINCIPLE 3: Financial institutions should establish credible metrics and targets and endeavor, over time, for all relevant financing, investment, and advisory services to have associated metrics and targets.

PRINCIPLE 4: Financial institutions should assess client and portfolio company alignment to their (i.e., financial institutions’) targets and to limiting the increase in the global average temperature to 1.5°C.

PRINCIPLE 5: Financial institutions should align engagement practices — with clients, portfolio companies, and other stakeholders — to their commitments.

PRINCIPLE 6: Financial institutions should develop and execute an implementation strategy that integrates the goals of their commitments into relevant aspects of their businesses and operating procedures.

PRINCIPLE 7: Financial institutions should establish robust governance processes to provide oversight of the implementation of their commitments.

PRINCIPLE 8: Financial institutions should, in the context of activities associated with their net-zero transition plans, account for environmental justice and environmental impacts, where applicable.

PRINCIPLE 9: Financial institutions should be transparent about their commitments and progress towards them.

The voluntary net-zero commitments the Biden administration is seeking to foist on the private sector, however, may put companies which join them in legal jeopardy.

As Townhall has reported previously, state attorneys general from across the U.S. have put insurance and financial service companies on notice that their net-zero commitments may constitute a violation of antitrust and consumer protection laws.

One recent letter to signatories of a net-zero commitment led by Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti noted how such net-zero alliances see companies “colluding to limit consumer choices and manipulate market outcomes in support of international climate activists,” moves that “could violate [his state’s] antitrust and consumer protection laws.” As AG Skrmetti rightfully noted, “[d]ecisions about energy policy should be made by our elected representatives, not by transnational corporate alliances.”

Already, an earlier warning to insurance signatories to a net-zero pact saw several companies back out of the agreement rather than face additional scrutiny from state attorneys general for their activities that may have constituted antitrust violations.

Despite such warnings about net-zero priorities being potentially in violation of state law, the Biden administration and its climate alarmist allies in the private and nonprofit sector are plunging ahead with more agreements — an unsurprising development from the administration that has not allowed federal law or the U.S. Constitution curb its ambitions, leading to a series of high-profile losses before the Supreme Court for its attempts to force an energy transition.

EVs Are Supposed to Be Cheap to Maintain—Our Kia EV6 Isn’t So Far
The EV6’s first service visit left us scratching our heads and $200 poorer.

Our 2022 Kia EV6 recently went in for its first scheduled service, something we initially assumed would be an easy, mundane task. Electric vehicles, after all, have simple powertrains with fewer moving parts than their gas-powered counterparts—and no oil changes! This is supposed to make EVs cheaper to maintain. So you can imagine my surprise when it came time to pick up our EV6 and I was slapped with a $230 invoice. Thank goodness for company credit cards.

The shocking bill capped off what began as a crummy Sunday morning. While I was loading the EV6 for a day at the beach with my pup, I noticed a completely flat driver’s side rear tire thanks to a screw. It was in a spot on the tread that looked patchable, but since the EV6 doesn’t have a spare tire (only a liquid seal kit that would’ve ruined the tire), I decided to take advantage of Kia’s free roadside assistance and have it towed to my local dealership with a service department that was open on Sundays. Big kudos to them for that.

Requesting roadside service was easy and quick, with the tow truck arriving at my house within 30 minutes. Once we arrived at the dealership, it was quickly determined the tire was not patchable and needed to be replaced. Thankfully, they had one in stock. Our EV6 was just a few hundred miles away from needing its first service, so I requested to have that done while I was there.

According to the owner’s manual, the 8,000-mile service includes a tire rotation and inspection. The list of items to inspect includes brakes, suspension, drive shafts, the 12-volt battery, in-cabin air filter, and more. Nothing out of the ordinary. Which is why we left scratching our heads at the $230 bill, including an “EV service port cleaner” procedure that I didn’t request but was performed nonetheless for $51. If we subtract that interesting port cleaning service, the total for this routine service visit was $179. Still a pretty penny for what amounted to a peek under the frunk and shuffling around a few tires (one of which was getting worked on anyway).

We appreciate this dealership taking us in on a Sunday and Kia’s quick and free roadside tow, but the excessive service cost soured the experience. Thankfully, our encounter appears to be an anomaly. For starters, the same service performed on our otherwise identical long-term Hyundai Ioniq 5 only set us back about $50. And numerous EV6 forums show other owners paying anywhere between $20 and $50 for the first service. We found none over $100, and some were complimentary. Which is what it should be. What better way to build rapport and loyalty than providing free inspections? If such a dealership exists in the L.A. area, we’ll be sure to go there for our next service visit.

 

Evergrande.

The news was all over the media. The default wasn’t yesterday; they got in trouble in 2021 and had sought a “moratorium” in the first week of 2022!

So how is it that nobody gave a crap for the last two years? You’d be carried out on your shield by now and long-ago eaten by worms if you shorted the US market into the original default 2 years ago.

Witness Lahaina. HE, the power company, spent basically all of their money on “green” initiatives rather than basic maintenance and hardening to reduce wildfire risk. They were trading close to $40 before the fires and yesterday touched close to $10; a wild-eyed 75% collapse. That’s a utility and of course now there is a serious financial risk from lawsuits — richly-deserved, if the article in the WSJ is all factual.

But that’s a microcosm of all the distortions that have been embedded in the so-called “green economy”; the virus was also part of it, and the government had their foot on the scale in the “rah-rah” side of it because everyone loves a higher stock market.

The problem is that how you got it matters.

If you got it because the company expanded its business organically, it beat others in the market because they were at least two of “better, faster, cheaper” then you’ve got a sustainable and reasonable price.

If you got it because the government subsidized bad behavior — uneconomic things that cannot work over time because they violate the laws of thermodynamics and are predicated on feelings and political promises then you get a crash because there is nothing under any of the so-called “improvement” beyond hot air.

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Don’t Throw Away Those Silica Gel Packets! Here Are 14 Smart Ways to Reuse Them.

Those tiny little packs of dessicant that come in your new pack of shoes or your vitamins have many uses around your home. Anywhere that moisture is a problem, silica gel packets can help alleviate the issue. Keep them stored in an airtight container away from pets and children (they are a choking hazard) and whip them out in the following scenarios.

Around the Kitchen
  • Keep vitamins from moisture damage. (It’s good to just keep those silica packs that come in the vitamin containers; save them once the vitamins are finished.)
  • Keep dry food and pet food fresh and crispy with a silica gel pack taped to the lid of your storage container.
  • Put a few silica gel packs in the bottom of your clothes hamper to absorb moisture from clothes or damp towels.
  • A pack of silica gel will help dry out wet shoes or boots.

Around the House

  • Reduce condensation on windows by setting a silica gel pack on the window sill. (Remember to keep them away from children and pets)
  • Help dry out a non-water-resistant cell phone by putting it in a sealed bag with several silica gel packs.
  • Protect important documents and photos from moisture with a silica gel pack inside the box or file cabinet.
  • Boxes of paper memories — like old papers, photos or notebooks — in storage? Silica gel packs stored in the same container will adsorb moisture.
  • Store silica gel packs with your tools to help prevent rust damage.
  • Store some in your medicine cabinet if you keep medication in there. The silica gel packs will help keep humidity down.
  • Keep razors from moisture damage by storing them in a sealed container with a silica gel pack.
  • Placing a few silica gel packs between your dashboard and windshield in the car will help keep fogging to a minimum.

When You Travel

  • Keep luggage dry while it’s in storage by tossing a silica gel pack in each suitcase.
  • Toss a few silica gel packs in a Ziploc bag if you can’t dry your bathing suit before packing it.

Bonus Tip: To “reactivate” silica gel packs that are saturated with moisture, place them on a baking sheet in a 200 degree oven away from the heating element for two hours.

Economic Expert: ‘Transitory’ Inflation Enters 31st Month, and It’s Not Going Away.

“Our income is falling even as the thieves who took away our prosperity continue to masquerade as people we can trust to solve the problems that they created,” Jeffrey Tucker observes soberly about America’s economic and monetary situation.

Tucker, Brownstone Institute founder and president, wrote an op-ed that was published Friday in The Epoch Times. He noted that the inflation problem continues and the dollar is likely to lose half its value by the 2030s. Basically, Biden’s economic policies and the Federal Reserve created a crisis, and it’s not getting any better.

“The Consumer Price Index came out this morning and it showed no improvement over last month,” Tucker wrote. “It is still rocking at 3.2 percent with new strength in food and medicine. The sticky index is frustratingly high too at 5.4 percent.”

As we face the 31st month of “transitory” inflation, we’ve also have almost that long a period in the Federal Reserve’s “war on inflation by raising rates higher and faster than in the whole history of the institution,” Tucker continued. “That said, in real terms, federal funds rates are still barely above zero. That’s because inflation is still rocking and eating away the dollar’s purchasing power.”

The purchasing power of the U.S. dollar is declining at a somewhat less rapid rate than it was as of a year ago, Tucker noted. But the dollar is still declining, not hitting the Fed’s target. “Prices are nowhere near going back to 2019 levels but instead it all keeps getting worse,” he wrote. “We have now lost 16 cents from its value at the start of Trump’s last year of his presidency. The mad money printing has taken a terrible toll. All of the value of the transfer payments from 2020 and 2021 have completely vanished.”

According to Tucker, “the Fed has done everything it knows to do in order to bring this under control,” although the Fed also created the problem to begin with by “enabling” a Congressionally-authorized spending spree. And the “clean-up” after the “fire” didn’t go particularly well; we all know that from our own experience. Tucker gave a technical explanation of velocity, or “a measure of the pace at which money is spent,” and how the pace of spending now is fueling inflation and is not likely to improve soon. But velocity isn’t under the Fed’s control, either.

Tucker insisted, “If velocity continues to increase like this, we are looking at years of price increases at 3 percent and higher. And that is presuming no sudden surprises.” Unfortunately, he noted, Americans seem to be getting used to the inflation pain. It hurts, but we’re starting to accept it as normal. That’s how “transitory inflation” turns into a permanent state of affairs, Tucker stated:

At the current pace of decline, we can expect the 2020 dollar to keep falling in value, so that it will be worth half its value by the time we reach the 2030s. Keep in mind that this is a tax that wrecks the standard of living of the middle class and the poor while enriching the people and institutions that can afford to endure the storm…

This is exactly what has happened to gas prices. In the long sweep, it has only increased in price but right now it feels not so bad. This is entirely in your head. The reality is that you are being pillaged.

Gas prices could eventually reach their old highs but by this time, you will have been so bruised and bloodied that you will be no longer screaming in pain. In short, our masters are trying to acculturate us to suffering so that we will no longer have the strength to protest.

One thing Tucker does not address is how the dollar is weakening internationally even as the Chinese yuan rises, and multiple countries start to turn from the U.S. dollar as standard world reserve currency. Could that “de-dollarization” pushed by Communist China also spell serious trouble for the future value of the dollar? Probably.

Ultimately, however, the conclusion is the same: it’s ordinary Americans who suffer most from inflation and the dollar’s loss of value.

 Lilly and Scowcroft Were Wrong in 1989. Let’s Not Be Wrong in 2023
A Lifeline to China is a Mistake.

Brent Scowcroft was a great American, as was Lawrence Eagleburger. Both served our country well throughout their lives. Except once.

June 4th, 1989, the Communist Party of China unleashed a slaughter and then round-up of activists and students who had bravely demanded a more democratic China. Less than 6 weeks later, while bodies of students were still in Beijing morgues, Scowcroft and Eagleburger, encouraged by James Lilly, and of course with the full backing of then President George H. Bush, undertook a secret mission to Beijing to let the butchers know, “we’ve got your back”.

Alternative historical timelines are somewhat useless, however, judgments about the actions of government officials are open to scrutiny, and I am more than willing to argue that the olive branch along with the tarp, to cover the bodies of the Tiananmen students, delivered by Mr. Eagleburger and Mr. Scowcroft, was a mistake. China was on the ropes, the Soviet Union was going down fast, and what could have been the end of the Communist Party, or at least a serious shake-up, was an opportunity missed for reasons that really don’t add up, other than then President Bush, and policy hands like Ambassador James Lilly, thought stability in China was preferred over change. A move where the only recorded beneficiary was the Carlyle Group.

We are now at that crossroads again, and once again, we have the engagement crowd telling us that it’s much better for us for to let the Party of Xi escape, with our assistance, rather than face the music of the last nine years of economic mismanagement.

Whether it’s slithering Hank Greenberg, Kissinger, or even our newest US China policy maker, Australian Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd, the bail out China brigade is out in full force.

I disagree.

Unless the engagement fellows have figured out a way to increase the Chinese birth rate, solve the problems of communism, and found some path for the Communist Party to allow an investment that is not a gift, then we are wasting our time.

Xi put them in this mess, and it’s his mess to sort. The idea that we need some type of Marshall Plan to help the Communist Party save itself, so they don’t turn into bad guys and invade the rest of Asia is sadly lacking an understanding of exactly what totalitarians have done throughout history.

I’m not advocating to isolate, or to even cut off trade with China, but if they want to trade, then they can trade like adults, and not always based on the premise that the United States and the European Union are their supplicants.

It’s been the common thread from the China hands for the last 30 years that China is a place that only changes on its own, and we, the West, can only watch and encourage them to go in the better direction. Sounds right to me. Xi made the mud, let him, on his own, clean it up.

Biden and Obama: The two Democratic presidents of the country’s only credit downgrades

Former President Barack Obama once explained how he would have arranged for a third term as president. He jokingly explained how it essentially involved having a puppet as president in which there would be a “frontman or frontwoman” with Obama directing them what to do while in “his basement in his sweats.” Three years into the Biden administration and these comments make Obama look like a soothsayer.

“If I could make an arrangement where I had a stand-in, a frontman or frontwoman, and they had an earpiece in, and I was just in my basement in my sweats, looking through the stuff, then deliver the lines, but somebody else was doing all the talking — I’d be fine with that,” Obama said to Stephen Colbert in 2020.

After the news of the Fitch downgrade, Obama’s joke now seems like an accurate description of the Biden presidency, mainly since only two presidents have overseen the country suffer credit downgrades: Joe Biden and Barack Obama. Biden’s was this past week with Fitch; Obama’s was with Standard & Poor in April 2011. Both downgrades occurred during each president’s third year in office. And, naturally, both presidents sought to blame Republicans each time. Blaming the GOP was a hallmark of the Obama legacy.

Obama’s downgrade in 2011 was the first time the United States was given a credit rating below AAA. S&P decided to lower the country’s rating to AA+ because the federal government failed to provide a credible plan to confront the soaring national debt at the time, CNN Money reported. S&P also blamed political gridlock, squabbling, and “dysfunctional policymaking” for the decrease.

“The downgrade reflects our opinion that the … plan that Congress and the administration recently agreed to falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government’s medium-term debt dynamics,” S&P declared at the time. “The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed.”

Fast forward 12 years later, and Obama’s vice president in 2011, Joe Biden, is now in charge. Once again, a credit agency downgraded the nation’s rating to AA+ from AAA. Coincidence? I don’t think so. The Fitch decision was based on “a steady deterioration of governance over the last 20 years” — the majority of that time occurring during the Obama and Biden presidencies.

Additionally, Fitch explained other factors behind its decision, including “repeated debt limit standoffs and last minute resolutions” and a “high and growing general government debt burden.” Other reasons included the government lacking a “medium-term fiscal framework” and having a “complex budgeting process.”

One of the most essential factors in the Fitch decision was a scathing indictment of “Bidenomics.” For all the rampant celebratory propaganda Democrats have spread regarding the economy under the Biden administration, projections call for “weak 2024 GDP growth” and a mild recession at the end of this year and into the first quarter of 2024.

Fitch also predicted “GDP growth slowing to 1.2% this year” and an anticipated “growth of just 0.5% in 2024.” It’s “Bidenomics” at work. And it should be noted that Biden’s weak GDP growth prediction is similar to the underwhelming Obama economy in 2011, the time of the last credit downgrade, which resulted in a measly 1.5% GDP growth. This is why Democrats are trying to deflect from this reality and pin the blame on Donald Trump or things like January 6th. They want to hide the truth of the adverse outcomes they helped create.

It’s no coincidence that both credit downgrades happened under Democrats — especially Democrats who were part of the same presidential administration. Democratic policies have been hampering the country for quite some time. It’s as if their entire party is immune to accepting responsibility for their political actions, no matter how often they misled the public into believing the opposite. Democrats should look at themselves instead of blaming Republicans for their failures.