Tag: stagflation

US Manufacturing is Shutting Down. But It’s Not a Recession!

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Biden says the economy is strong as hell and stagflation is a lie.  But the Empire State Manufacturing Survey is at a new low, -31.  This is at the level it was when the COVID shutdowns literally shut the business world down for a month.

And this is more than economic rumblings.  I know of manufacturing companies that are going to a four day work week and laying off the per diem employees to keep everyone else employed,.at least for now.  This should make for a really interesting presidential election year.  But I’ve stopped assuming that the American people will use logic when it comes to choosing leaders.

Well, prepare for a bumpy ride.  WE may all be counting the pennies in the days ahead and tightening our belts.  Hey buddy, can you spare a dime?

An Economist Points Out the Fed’s Indicator Signaling Stagflation

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This guy says the deepest recession since 1982 is on the way.  So not only is the country splintering into mutually antagonistic identity groups but we’ll also be struggling to survive a huge economic downturn at the same time as our money becomes worthless.  Thanks Joe Biden.

Whiling Away the Hours

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Today will be a lost day.  I’ll be essentially off the grid until 11 pm.  So, I’ll just put together some thoughts now to cover the day.

I was very happy that American Greatness posted my article “You Gotta Laugh.”  And not only because it multiplies the traffic to my site several fold.  But because it’s nice to get the visibility that a larger spotlight can afford.  Let’s face it, Google and Facebook don’t amplify the reach of right-wing sites.  In fact, it would be accurate to say they hide them.  So, it’s a treat when I can have one of my posts sitting at the top of a webpage that gets thousands of visits per hour.  That was fun.

It really does seem that the message on the street is that Joe Biden isn’t popular.  Could this be the long-awaited pivot to dumping Biden from the 2024 race?  How would that be done?  Some are saying that Gavin Newsome will challenge Biden in the primaries.  Others are saying that’s impossible.  Their alternate theory is Biden will be forced out through revelations about his corrupt influence peddling through his crackhead son Hunter.

Well, if challenging Biden in the primaries is impossible, exactly how does the Deep State keep him from running again?  I mean, I could see them earlier on threatening to reveal his corruption as a way to convince him not to seek re-election.  But if he’s already running, will they be able to convince him to drop out.  I guess it’s possible the media companies could cooperate and fabricate a bunch of polls showing Biden so far down that it convinces the American people that Biden is through and thereby convinces Biden too.  But I’m not sure Biden would take the hint.  He may be convinced that presidential immunity is the only thing that can keep him from being indicted.  Maybe he plans suicide as his way out.  Or maybe he’ll use dementia as his shield from prosecution.

And the other big story is the regional banks tottering on the edge of insolvency as depositors pull their money out.  This is round two of this crisis.  2008 was the first occurrence.  And that first round put our government into permanent emergency mode.  It was that bank crisis that force the whole financial system to adopt zero-interest rates and permanent quantitative easing.

But now because of the sanctions against Russia and the Green New Deal, the administration has unleashed dangerously high inflation.  That forced the Fed to increase interest rates and now all these banks are stuck with billions in underwater government bonds.  Checkmate.

So how does Dopey Joe talk his way out of this one?  Will faking a re-election solve his problem or just ensure that a blowup occurs on his watch?  I really can’t tell.  I have a feeling he’s hoping that a miracle will happen in the next year to make his problems go away.  But I think that’s highly unlikely.  What will probably happen is a pretty serious recession.  All the symptoms are there to see.  Maybe things will get so bad that not even the election fixers can throw this one to Joe.  It’s possible.

But the bad guys have called the shots so far.  We’re forced to sit here and watch this farce.  Well, watch it we will.  I’ve become stoical about the whole thing.  I’m sort of fascinated by the scope of the debacle.  I guess when I’m bankrupt and homeless it’ll feel less theoretical.

But until then I’ll be here babbling about the folly of our elites and their hopeless crusade to make the world safe for woke insanity.  See you tomorrow.

Can Powell and Yellen Thread the Needle?

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Trying to disguise the US economy’s virulent case of stagflation by alternately increasing interest rates and printing multi-trillions of dollars of phony money seems to be a very difficult balancing act.  Lately it has resulted in a string of large banks failing as the depositors pull out their cash to find interest bearing government bonds.

Now I hear they’re talking again about minting some “trillion-dollar coins” to get around a battle with the Republican House leadership about balancing the budget.

Will Biden and company be able to blame the crash of the economy on the Republicans?  Well, it wouldn’t surprise me too much.  Do I care?  No, not really.  There doesn’t seem to be any limit to how much damage the Democrats do to this country without any noticeable consequences to their re-election chances.

But it is interesting to speculate on exactly when the economy may collapse catastrophically.  Banks collapsing, even somewhat large ones doesn’t seem to worry the Masters of the Universe.  Apparently, we only need five or fewer ludicrously large banks to handle all the corrupt financial operations needed to facilitate wealth being sucked out of the rest of the country and into the coffers of the obscenely rich.

So, if it’s not collapsing banks, what will signal the final chapter of the country’s death spiral?  I suspect it will occur when the last of the middle-class disappears into poverty.  After all that was always this county’s strength.  And in fact, all the way back to 5th century BC Athens a large flourishing middle class was the engine of a healthy democracy.  Now that we’re no longer a democracy it makes sense that the priorities of the aristocracy will sooner or later kill off the golden goose that created their wealth.

And when that happens, I expect the aristocracy to start reducing their ranks to make their shrinking rents from the serfs stretch a little farther.  That’s going to be a rude shock for the bugmen who have groveled and scraped to remain in the various concentric circles of the outer hive.  Being forced out of the hive as winter sets in will be truly sad.  But the death by freezing of drones is a fact of life.

Of course, it’s likely the House Republicans will fold before much damage is done and give Biden his trillions out of fear but I have an almost morbid fascination with guessing when the death blow will fall.  Maybe the day is close now when the rot to the commercial sector becomes so pervasive that even the major banks like Morgan Stanley and Bank of America just can’t make the math work any longer.

At that point will the “people” finally revolt and beyond the scope of even ballot harvesting norms could the Democrats be hurled out of power?  I guess it could happen.  At that point probably the ultra-rich will gather up their assets in the form of tons of gold and platinum ingots and fly off to New Zealand to ride out the cannibal zombie apocalypse and plan their return to a pristine continent swept clean by the four horsemen of the apocalypse.

Well anyway, let’s just enjoy the spectacle of “experts” explaining how bank runs are really a sign of strength in the banking sector.  And someone please put Jim Cramer out of his misery.

Disaster Accomplished

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I watched Dementia Joe’s latest weasel speech.  Biden’s handlers must have told him that the best way to sell the message that his humiliating rout out of Kabul was a great success was to shout it from the podium as loud as he could.  This speech was long and stupid.  Much of it was the same boilerplate he gave us a few days ago when he told us he wouldn’t leave anyone behind.  Now he’s telling us that the hundreds of Americans trapped behind enemy lines got what they deserved because they were warned.

Joe also told us that the mission went as planned.  He specifically says that there was no way that civilians could have been successfully and completely evacuated before the rout.  And since he is the greatest military strategist since Napoleon, we have to take his word for it.  And he waved the flag for the soldiers killed at the airport and he patted himself on the back for ending the war.  But it mostly sounded like a salesman trying to convince a customer that the broken Timex he had received was exactly as good as the Rolex he had paid for.

I think it’s good that the American people have had a chance to see Joe during a crisis.  It will show them just how he’ll handle any difficult task.  He’ll botch it.  He’ll blame other people.  Then he’ll tell you there was no other way it could have ended.  Disaster accomplished!  Joe is always the hero in all his stories.  He’s the smartest, the bravest and the most honorable.  If you don’t believe him, he’ll tell you again only louder.

I’m trying to guess what the next disaster will be.  I’d say most likely it will be a hostage drama involving ISIS-K and one of the Left Behind Americans in Kabul.  Joe can yell at the top of his lungs that the hostage got what she deserved and that he’ll avenge the death by sending a drone strike from “over the horizon.”  Of course, the drone will probably kill another half dozen Afghani kids and miss the terrorists but once again it will be disaster accomplished.

Three more years of this may be enough even for the stupid suburban white women who voted for Joe.  There are indications that stagflation is taking hold in the economy.  If memory serves me correctly, the last time that word was used was when Jimmy Carter was bumbling his way through the late seventies.  Twenty percent mortgages and 8% unemployment are a powerful combination.  So powerful that even the Karens may rethink their hatred of Donald Trump.

But it’s way too early to say what new catastrophe Joe will step in next.  He still has to clean up the Hurricane Ida debacle and who knows, with his luck cholera will break out and make everybody forget COVID.  Or maybe the price of oil will spike and gasoline will reach ten dollars a gallon.  Now that sounds like something that Joe can really sink his porcelain teeth into.  I wonder who he’ll blame?  Probably Trump for not finishing that darn pipeline.