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“They were monsters with human faces, in crisp uniforms, marching in lockstep, so banal you don’t recognize them for what they are until it’s too late.” — Ransom Riggs, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

The U.S. government, in its pursuit of so-called monsters, has itself become a monster.

This is not a new development, nor is it a revelation.

This is a government that has in recent decades unleashed untold horrors upon the world—including its own citizenry—in the name of global conquest, the acquisition of greater wealth, scientific experimentation, and technological advances, all packaged in the guise of the greater good.

Mind you, there is no greater good when the government is involved. There is only greater greed for money and power.

Unfortunately, the public has become so easily distracted by the political spectacle out of Washington, DC, that they are altogether oblivious to the grisly experiments, barbaric behavior and inhumane conditions that have become synonymous with the U.S. government.

These horrors have been meted out against humans and animals alike. For all intents and purposes, “we the people” have become lab rats in the government’s secret experiments.

Fifty years from now, we may well find out the whole sordid truth behind this COVID-19 pandemic. However, this isn’t intended to be a debate over whether COVID-19 is a legitimate health crisis or a manufactured threat. It is merely to acknowledge that such crises can—and are—manipulated by governments in order to expand their powers.

As we have learned, it is entirely possible for something to be both a genuine menace to the nation’s health and security and a menace to freedom.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Australia Pushes New Measure To Detain COVID “Conspiracy Theorists”

September 18, 2020

Australia Pushes New Measure To Detain COVID “Conspiracy Theorists”

Weekend demonstrations have flared up in Australia over the last month, as Aussies have vented their frustrations and attempted to take back control of their communities after a surge in virus cases prompted the government to re-implement some of the world’s most draconian social-distancing measures.

And if there is one thing that terrifies increasingly tyrannical governments, it’s a loss of control of the narrative, which is why the Australian government is getting a jump start on curbing any so-called “conspiracy theorists” daring to spread information that questions the fear-mongering being used to keep Aussie citizens under lock and key.

A new bill is expected to be debated by the Victorian government in the State Parliament this week. It gives local authorities the power to detain “conspiracy theorists” and people who refuse to self-isolate, reported Caldron Pool.

If passed, the COVID-19 Omnibus (Emergency Measures) allows the government to detain anyone labeled as a “high risk” or likely to spread COVID-19 negligently.

A state government spokesman told The Age that the rule could be applied to “conspiracy theorists who refuse to self-isolate or severely drug-affected or mentally impaired people who do not have the capacity to quarantine.” Those arrested under the new rule will be housed in quarantine facilities.

Attorney-General Jill Hennessy said the new bill would “allow us to continue responding to the challenges the pandemic presents, so we can keep protecting Victorians and delivering the services they rely on.”

So far, many of the anti-lockdown demonstrations have been held on the weekends. At least 200 people were fined and 74 arrested at a protest in Melbourne on Sunday. If the bill is passed, some protesters would be rounded up and arrested, and could spend time in a quarantine facility.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What’s to Be Done Now with All These Zombie Companies?

September 15, 2020

What’s to Be Done Now with All These Zombie Companies?

Saving the Zombies in Europe.

Europe’s zombie firms are multiplying like never before. In Germany, one of the few European economies that has weathered the virus crisis reasonably well, an estimated 550,000 firms — roughly one-sixth of the total — could already be classified as “zombies”, according to research by the credit agency Creditreform. It’s a similar story in Switzerland.

Zombie firms are over-leveraged, high-risk companies with a business model that is not remotely self-sustaining, since they need to constantly raise fresh money from new creditors to pay off existing creditors. According to the Bank for International Settlements’ definition, they are unable to cover debt servicing costs with their EBIT (earnings before interest and taxes) over an extended period.

The number of zombie companies has been rising across Europe and the Anglosphere — due to of two main factors:

Central banks’ easy money forever policies, which brought interest rates down to such low levels that even firms with a reasonable chance of default have been able to continue issuing debt at serviceable rates. Many large zombie firms have also been bailed out, in some cases more than once. Spanish green energy giant Abengoa has been bailed out three times in five years.
The tendency of poorly capitalized banks to continually roll over or restructure bad loans. This is particularly prevalent in parts of the Eurozone where banks are especially weak, such as Italy.

A Bank of America report from July posits that the UK accounts for a staggering one third of all zombie companies in Europe. They represent 20% of all companies in the U.K, up four percentage points since March, according to a new paper by the conservative think tank Onward. In the two hardest-hit sectors — accommodation and food services, and arts, entertainment and recreation — the proportion of zombie firms has soared by 9 and 11 percentage points respectively, to 23% and 26%.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

An Unlikely Sector Leads the Way in Surge of Corporate Leveraged Loan Defaults

September 6, 2020

An Unlikely Sector Leads the Way in Surge of Corporate Leveraged Loan Defaults

oil gas companies

From Birch Gold Group

The economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and recent Fed monetary policy continue to reveal themselves.

The latest “reveal” that’s taking center stage is risky corporate leveraged loans, with defaults soaring to their highest levels since 2010 by issuer count, and since 2015 by rate.

A report by S&P Global Intelligence breaks everything down, starting with a summary:

U.S. loan defaults continued to rise in July, surpassing 4% by issuer count for the first time since 2010, after five constituents of the S&P/LSTA Leveraged Loan Index tripped defaults on $7.7 billion of term loans.

You can see the billions in defaults by year in the chart below, and how the U.S. hasn’t seen an amount even close since 2009 (with four months still remaining in 2020):

us leveraged loan defaulted amount

“With economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic playing an increasing role, default volume over the last 12 months, at $46.35 billion, outpaces the same period of 2019 by 233%,” according to the same report.

Even more sobering than this astonishing surge, it looks like a critical sector of the economy that shouldn’t be defaulting on leveraged loans is the sector that’s contributing the most defaults…

Oil and Gas Companies Reveal How Fragile the Situation Is

It appears things wouldn’t be “so” bad if oil and gas companies weren’t defaulting by more than 30% of their total loan amount. You can see their “contribution” to this dire situation reflected in the chart below:

us leveraged loan default rate by amount

You can also see how oil and gas leveraged loan defaults could also have played a role in the dramatic Dow crash at the end of 2018 in the same chart above.

The S&P Global report notes that some examples of the energy sector carnage include (but are by no means limited to):

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Since 9/11, the Government’s Answer to Every Problem Has Been More Government

September 3, 2020

Since 9/11, the Government’s Answer to Every Problem Has Been More Government

“A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take away everything that you have.”—Anonymous

Have you noticed that the government’s answer to every problem is more government—at taxpayer expense—and less individual liberty?

The Great Depression. The World Wars. The 9/11 terror attacks. The COVID-19 pandemic.

Every crisis—manufactured or otherwise—since the nation’s early beginnings has become a make-work opportunity for the government to expand its reach and its power at taxpayer expense while limiting our freedoms at every turn.

Indeed, the history of the United States is a testament to the old adage that liberty decreases as government (and government bureaucracy) grows. To put it another way, as government expands, liberty contracts.

To the police state, this COVID-19 pandemic has been a huge boon, like winning the biggest jackpot in the lottery. Certainly, it will prove to be a windfall for those who profit from government expenditures and expansions.

Given the rate at which the government has been devising new ways to spend our money and establish itself as the “solution” to all of our worldly problems, this current crisis will most likely end up ushering in the largest expansion of government power since the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

This is how the emergency state operates, after all.

From 9/11 to COVID-19, “we the people” have acted the part of the helpless, gullible victims desperately in need of the government to save us from whatever danger threatens. In turn, the government has been all too accommodating and eager while also expanding its power and authority in the so-called name of national security.

As chief correspondent Dan Balz asks for The Washington Post, “Government is everywhere now. Where does it go next?”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Call for Community-Based Seed Diversity During the COVID-19 Pandemic

August 30, 2020

A Call for Community-Based Seed Diversity During the COVID-19 Pandemic

With every passing day without further action, community seed diversity and access—and therefore food security—is being placed at increasing risk.

While Fighting the Virus, We Must Fight for Our Rights

August 25, 2020

While Fighting the Virus, We Must Fight for Our Rights

These governments around the world are trying to use the pandemic to smother freedoms.

Don’t let democracy sicken and die. ‘The pandemic is killing more than people and economies. It has also come for our freedom.’ Photo via Shutterstock.

Twenty-two million human beings have had COVID-19 as I type this, and 788,000 have already perished. Those numbers will be higher by the time you read these words. So wear a mask, wash your hands, and mind your social distance from others. Listen to the scientists and give the COVID deniers what they deserve — your scorn.

One other thing. Keep a sharp eye on your freedoms. Democracy may soon be added to that gruesome list of the pandemic’s victims.

Several countries have already had key institutions undermined by the COVID-19 pandemic, or its political manipulation. As a result, civil and constitutional rights, like the freedoms of assembly and expression, have been diluted if not cancelled outright — all in the name of fighting the deadly virus. Those rights may or may not be restored.

Let’s run through a list of governments eroding democracy under cover of pandemic — and don’t be surprised to find Canada in there, edging towards membership.

HUNGARY. There, it is beginning to look like a state of permanent emergency. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has completely neutered parliament, after his majority party used the pandemic to grant him the power to suspend existing laws, and all elections and referendums. Under the Anti-Coronavirus Act, journalists may now get up to five years in jail for disseminating false information during a pandemic — i.e., criticizing the government. The conclusion is inescapable. Orbán is no longer a PM, he is a dictator.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Tyranny is Indistinguishable when used by Kings or Career Politicians

August 25, 2020

Tyranny is Indistinguishable when used by Kings or Career Politicians

What is going on in New Zealand and Melbourne is the complete rejection of every principle of liberty, which has degenerated into a tyrannical coup. These are the very same actions by those governments that sparked the American Revolution. We have to wonder about this forecast of Socrates about rising civil unrest on a global scale. I had assumed it would be because of the debt collapse and rising taxation. But we are witnessing such tyrannical actions from Europe to New Zealand and Melbourne that this appears to be using the virus to suppress what they realize will be the collapse of their governments. They are turning our Free World into Venezuela. These tyrannical people in office now will perhaps eventually suspend elections when they realize they themselves would be booted out.

They have suspended all warrants and authorized the police to simply break into anyone’s house if they suspect you are violating COVID regulations. This is precisely the same tyranny that sparked the American Revolution. The king authorized Writs of Assistance which allowed the government to arbitrarily search whatever they suspected for any reason. John Adams, Second President, listened to the 4-hour speech of the defense lawyer James Otis (1725-1783) who argued against the king’s Writs of Assistance in February 1761. History repeats for there are few people in government today that even understand what is at stake with the actions being taken in the name of this virus. This also proves that there is NO DIFFERENCE between kings and career politicians. Liberty cannot exist with pretend representatives of the people.

Here are a few excerpts from that famous speech of James Otis that so moved John Adams and inspired the birth of the American Revolution.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

On Covid-19 And Authoritarian Abuses

August 22, 2020

On Covid-19 And Authoritarian Abuses

Over the last few months there’s been a clique of indie media who’ve been urging their respective followings to bully and cajole other indie media into focusing on Covid-19, lockdowns, mask laws and Covid-related authoritarian agendas in their coverage of world events.

I personally find the idea of fighting with indie media in a world that is dominated by murderous globe-spanning power structures absurd, so I won’t make this about them, but since their attacks are getting more heated now I’m going to try to spell out my own position on the matter here as clearly as possible. I don’t expect this essay to have any effect on this online mobbing behavior’s primary drivers, who appear to operating in bad faith; this is more for my longtime readers who’ve been expressing bafflement that I haven’t made Covid-related abuses a primary focus of my writing.

To sum up the gist of my position in a paragraph: I’ve said from the beginning that “the fears that the ruling class will seize this opportunity to advance preexisting authoritarian agendas are well-founded”, and I’ve repeatedly written entire essays about this. Unless people want me to re-write more or less the same essays over and over again, there hasn’t been much more for me to add to the discussion. The information ecosystem is still too polluted and muddied to see clearly enough to provide a comprehensive, lucid, big-picture understanding of what’s actually going on, so I’ve just been watching and patiently gathering information.

That is what someone who is interested in telling the truth does: they wait until they have enough information about something before they attempt to elucidate their understanding of it. I haven’t been writing about my clear, big-picture understanding of what’s going on with this virus because I simply do not have one, and frankly I don’t believe anyone else does either.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

As the Bubble Slowly Pops, the Economic Chain Reaction Is Now in Progress

August 20, 2020

As the Bubble Slowly Pops, the Economic Chain Reaction Is Now in Progress

bubble

Much has been written about the economic consequences of covid-19, yet, just as in many of the analyses of the Great Depression and the 2008 crisis, the years of accumulating debt preceding the event do not attract the attention they deserve. Covid-19—or to be more precise, the lockdown—has initiated a cascading liquidation of the debt bubble that has been building for a generation. From the early 1980s, each recession has been responded to with iteratively lower interest rates. Following the bursting of the late 1980s credit bubble, Greenspan inaugurated the loosest monetary policy for a generation, creating the dotcom bubble. When this burst in 2000, it was responded to with even lower interest rates, reaching 1 percent from 2003–04, generating the housing bubble. When this burst in 2007/8, the response was 0 percent interest rates, turning a $150 trillion global debt bubble as it was then—already the largest In history—into a $250 trillion global debt bubble.

When central banks set interest rates it fundamentally distorts the pricing mechanisms of credit markets, just like price setting in other parts of the economy. Friedrich von Hayek won the Nobel Prize in 1974 for articulating that interest rates, like other prices, should be set by the market rather than central planning committees. We are not surprised when the government setting the price of food in Venezuela leads to food shortages, so we should not be surprised that 0 percent interest rates leads to a shortage in yield for investors, leading to a $250 trillion global debt bubble.

(Below is a speech I gave in the European Parliament in 2018 in which I adumbrated these points for a political audience):

Max Rangeley Speech in the European Parliament on the Coming Economic Collapse

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

New York City Police Use Pandemic To Create COVID-19 Checkpoints

August 17, 2020

New York City Police Use Pandemic To Create COVID-19 Checkpoints

A recent article in The New York Post revealed how the NYPD used the pandemic to justify creating COVID-19 checkpoints.

“New York officials have stopped 353 cars at entrances to the Big Apple to warn travelers of the mandatory two-week quarantine rule. The stops were made from Wednesday through Friday at bridges and tunnels, according to Mayor Bill de Blasio’s office.”

Police are using the pandemic as an excuse to circumvent the Fourth Amendment by asking a vehicle’s occupants to answer questions like have they spent more than 24 hours during the previous 14 days in any state on New York’s restricted list?

The city has the audacity to claim that these stops are “quick and educational.” There is nothing quick and educational about being stopped and questioned by government officials.

Is there anything educational about fining people $10,000 dollars?

“Travelers who violate the quarantine rule could face up to $10,000 in fines. There are currently 35 states plus Puerto Rico on the list.”

Earlier this year, The Orlando Sentinel called COVID-19 checkpoints security theater, and worried about the cost to taxpayers. COVID-19 checkpoints have also been set up in Rhode Island, North Carolina, Colorado, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas.

Penn Station COVID-19 checkpoint

credit: WKZO

A WKZO article shows U.S. military personnel conducting a COVID-19 checkpoint at Penn Station.

“A few dozen travelers got off a train from Miami at New York City’s Penn Station on Thursday and were greeted by a team of public health workers and mayoral office staff who handed them informational fliers about the state’s new COVID-19 quarantine rules.”

Government officials use COVID-19 as an excuse to question and interrogate visitors.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

An unexpected systemic crisis is for sure

August 16, 2020

An unexpected systemic crisis is for sure

Downturns in bank credit expansion always lead to systemic problems. We are on the edge of such a downturn, which thanks to everyone’s focus on the coronavirus, is unexpected.

We can now identify 23 March as the date when markets stopped worrying about deflation and realised that monetary inflation is the certain outlook. That day, the Fed promised unlimited monetary stimulus for both consumers and businesses, and the dollar began to fall.

The commercial banks everywhere are massively leveraged and their exposure to bad debts and a cyclical banking crisis is now certain to wipe many of them out. In this article we look at the global systemically important banks — the G-SIBs — as proxy for all commercial banks and identify the ones most at risk on a market-based analysis.

Introduction

In these bizarre markets, the elephant in the room is systemic risk — visible to all but simply ignored. This is partly due to everyone in government and central banks, as well as their epigones in the investment industry and mainstream media, believing our economic problems are only a matter of Covid-19. In other words, when the pandemic is over normality will return. But Covid-19 has acted like a conjurer’s distraction: it has deflected us from the consequences of Trump’s trade wars with China and the liquidity strains that surfaced in New York last September when the repo rate soared to 10%.

The liquidity strains and the severe downturn in the stock markets that followed earlier this year before mid-March have been buried for the moment in a tsunami of central bank money. Liquidity problems following last September’s repo crisis and the S&P 500 index collapsing by one third between 19 February and 23 March were a clear signal that the multiyear cycle of bank credit expansion had already peaked. Ever since the last credit crisis in 2008, the banks had recovered their lending confidence and expanded bank credit, a classic expansionary phase.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The COVID Bait & Switch

August 16, 2020

The COVID Bait & Switch

QUESTION: Do you really think that the Democratic leadership is trying to hurt people?

ANSWER: It is not just the Democrats. We are looking at politicians around the world. It makes no sense with such a low death rate that is equivalent to the flu and all the forecasts of Neil Ferguson have proven false that they would continue these lockdowns. It makes no sense. They are either deliberately hurting people or they have been bribed by the consortium to further the Great Reset. I am open to any other explanation. Even moderate Democrats are not comfortable with what is taking place. This is a deliberate agenda to destroy the economy to rebuild it GREEN. The serious mistake here is that they think they can recreate the economy in their vision. They do not even know how it works.

Let us not forget that the entire justification for these lockdowns was the forecast of Ferguson who claimed 3 million Americans would be killed. The justification for masks, social distancing, and lockdowns was to save lives because the curve had to be flattened because there would be a shortage of bed space in hospitals. That NEVER took place. So why do we still have lockdowns?

This has been a bait & switch. You have an elite group cheering the destruction as an opportunity to rebuild the world economy the way they think it should run. They are threatening fund managers to divest from China in hopes of bringing them to their knees to accept their agenda. That is NOT going to succeed. We are staring in the eyes of absolute ruthless tyranny and the markets are starting to perform in anticipation of a major financial crisis.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Here’s Why the “Impossible” Economic Collapse Is Unavoidable

August 15, 2020

Here’s Why the “Impossible” Economic Collapse Is Unavoidable

This is why denormalization is an extinction event for much of our high-cost, high-complexity, heavily regulated economy.

A collapse of major chunks of the economy is widely viewed as “impossible” because the federal government can borrow and spend unlimited amounts of money because the Federal Reserve can create unlimited amounts of money: the government borrows $1 trillion by selling $1 trillion in Treasury bonds, the Fed prints $1 trillion dollars to buy the bonds. Rinse and repeat to near-infinity.

With this cheery wind at their backs, conventional pundits are predicting super-rebounds in auto sales and other consumption as consumers weary of Covid-19 and anxious to blow their recent savings borrow and spend like no tomorrow.

As for the 30+ million unemployed–they don’t matter. Conventional analysts write them off because they weren’t big drivers of “growth” anyways–they didn’t have big, secure salaries and ample wealth/credit lines.

What this happy confidence in near-infinite money-printing and V-shaped spending orgies overlooks is what I’ve termed denormalization, an implosion of the Old Normal so complete that the expected minor adjustment to a New Normal is no longer possible.

The “New Normal” Is De-Normalization

We’re already in a post-normal world because the expansion of globalization and financialization needed to fuel the Old Normal has reversed into contraction. This reversal is an extinction event for all sectors and institutions with high fixed costs: air travel, resort tourism, healthcare, higher education, local government services, etc. because their fixed cost structures are so high they are no longer financially viable if they’re operating at less than full capacity.

Only getting back to 70% of previous capacity, revenues, tax receipts, etc. dooms them to collapse.

And there’s no way to cut their fixed costs without fatally disrupting all the sectors that are dependent on them.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Coronavirus: have we already missed the opportunity to build a better world?

August 14, 2020

Coronavirus: have we already missed the opportunity to build a better world?

Many people like to say that the coronavirus is teaching us a lesson, as if the pandemic were a kind of morality play that should lead to a change in our behaviour. It shows us that we can make big shifts quickly if we want to. That we can build back better. That social inequality is starkly revealed at times of crisis. That there is a “magic money tree”. The idea that crisis leads to change was also common during the financial crunch over a decade ago, but that didn’t produce any lasting transformations. So will post-COVID life be any different?

At the start of lockdown, in the middle of the anxiety and confusion, I started to notice that I was enjoying myself. I was cooking and gardening more; the air was cleaner, my city was quieter and I was spending more time with my partner. Lots of people started to write about the idea that there should be #NoGoingBack. It seemed that we had taken a deep collective breath, and then started to think about coronavirus as a stimulus to encourage us to think how we might address other big issues – climate, inequality, racism and so on.

Being an academic, I decided to put together a quick and dirty book on what life might look like after the crisis. I persuaded various activists and academics to write short pieces on working at home, money, leadership and lots of other topics. The idea was to show that the world could change if we wanted it to. The book is out now, but it already feels, only four months after I imagined it, like the document of a lost time. The city noises are back, and jet trails are beginning to scar the sky. Has the moment been lost?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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