"We must scrupulously guard the civil rights and civil liberties of all our citizens, whatever their background. We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization."
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Speech to The American Committee for Protection of Foreign Born, January 9, 1940
"I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest."
Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech, 10 December 1986
"Surely, there is at this day a confederacy of evil, marshalling its hosts from all parts of the world, organizing itself, taking its measures, enclosing the Church of Christ as in a net, and preparing the way for a general Apostasy from it. Whether this very Apostasy is to give birth to Antichrist, or whether he is still to be delayed, as he has already been delayed so long, we cannot know; but at any rate this Apostasy, and all its tokens and instruments, are of the Evil One, and savour of death."
John Henry Newman, The Patristical Idea of Antichrist, 1838
"Laws exist to protect society from the actions of aberrant personalities. It does not shock us when they wield a gun. Why then does it surprise us when they utilize a pen, a glib personal patina, a reckless disregard for others, and a persistent, amoral cunning? Until there is reform and a restoration of justice there will be no sustained and genuine recovery."
Jesse, A Brief History of the Greatest Financial Fraud in History, 15 December 2008
"Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe."
Frederick Douglass, Speech on the twenty-fourth anniversary of Emancipation, April 1886
"When we join together in serving our local community, we add strength to our national community, we help to fortify the structure of our whole Union. Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough."
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Radio Address from Washington, D.C., October 13, 1940.
There will be a minor stock option expiration on this coming Friday.
I did not listen to the news while I was in China for the past couple of weeks. So I do not have much to offer at this time.
The primary force that will be driving the markets is the macro conditions proceeding from the ongoing conflicts in Iran and the Ukraine.
The US and much of the West is lurching towards a generational economic crisis.
Have a pleasant evening.
