"America is different. America is special. America is rich. And, yet, we've somehow find ourselves in the grip of the same sort of crisis and the same sort of oligarchs. It's a small group with a lot of power. A lot of wealth. They don't necessarily - they're not necessarily always the household names that spring to mind, in this kind of context. But they are the people who could pull the strings. Who have the influence. Who call the shots.
The powerful people are the insiders. They're the people who pay themselves the massive bonuses at the end of the last year. Now, those bonuses are not the essence of the problem, but they are a symptom of an arrogance, and a feeling of invincibility, that tells you a lot about the culture of those organizations, and the attitudes of the people who lead them. But it really shows you the arrogance. They think it's over. They think it's won."
Bill Moyer's Journal, Interview with Simon Johnson, February, 2009
"Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, or even a duty. Sin is not a distance, it is a turning of our gaze in the wrong direction. Power is as pitiless to the man who possesses it, or thinks he does, as it is to its victims; the latter it crushes, the former it intoxicates. The truth is, no one really possesses it. Power is as pitiless to the man who possesses it, or thinks he does, as it is to its victims; the latter it crushes, the former it intoxicates. The truth is, no one really possesses it."
Simone Weil, War and the Iliad, 1939
"The perpetrators were scholars, doctors, nurses, justice officials, the police and the health and workers’ administration. The victims were poor, desperate, rebellious or in need of help. They came from psychiatric clinics and children's hospitals, from old age homes and welfare institutions, from military hospitals and internment camps."
Aktion T4 Commemorative Tablet, Tiergartenstraße 4, Berlin
“Violence does not necessarily take people by the throat and strangle them. They are required merely to become accomplices in its lies.”
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Nobel Prize in Literature Speech, 1970
"Many of us like to ask ourselves, 'What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?' The answer is, you're doing it. Right now. This is what the ruling class has decided is normal."
Aaron Bushnell, Last words, 26 February 2024
Stocks meandered around today, despite some efforts from the powers that be to stir up another rally.
The Dollar fluctuated, ending the day at almost exactly the same place as yesterday's close.
VIX is wallowing in complacency.
It's reaction to the inevitable wake-up call may be quite noticeable.
Gold and silver were hammered, as an afterthought to the Non-Farm Payrolls gambit.
Miners were on the receiving end of aggressive sell programs.
I get the feeling that Club Trump likes the more squishy and malleable items like crypto.
Very fitting.
How does Trump know that he's lying?
He doesn't care.
Well, this is the way of the world.
Have a pleasant evening.
