"It is a dark day in our nation when high-level authorities will seek to use every method to silence dissent."
Alfred Rathel, Nemesis
Martin Luther King, A Dark Day In Our Nation, Riverside Church, 30 April 1967
"The metals made it through another Non-Farm Payrolls report reasonably well. I will not be surprised at all to see the gold bulls take a sharp gut check at least once next week."
Jesse, 5 April 2019
"Nemesis, the goddess of retribution and vengeance, the punisher of pride and hubris, waits impatiently for her meeting with us."
Chalmers Johnson
I think most would agree that today qualifies as a 'sharp gut check' for the gold bulls.
The Dollar was up marginally. Silver was knocked down to the 15 handle.
Stocks were wobbly and weak.
But there are some more IPOs hovering in the wings so as long as volumes stay light the professionals will continue to prepare and maintain the launch pad for the latest round of flying pigs To that end Uber filed its IPO after the close.
Julian Assange was turned over by the Ecudorian government and arrested in the UK today. There is a comment and an illustrative story from history here.
It was funny in a very sad sort of way watching the Hillarians on MSNBC tying themselves into moral knots trying to justify the arrest and detention of Assange, obvious agent of Russia. I could only bear a brief peek or two, because it is a difficult thing to watch grown people debasing themselves so cravenly for money and access to power.
I will be watching to see what, if anything, the current crop of Democratic hopefuls have to say about this. I suspect that most if not all will fall into line under the Lady Pelosi and her minions. I suspect they will be the usual corporatists sell outs— that has been their hallmark since the 1990s. Change is coming, but slowly.
Money and power are powerful drugs, to paraphrase Rick James.
Trumpolini took the CEO defense today, saying he doesn't know anything about Wikileaks. “I know nothing about Wikileaks, it’s not my thing.” It sounded better when the Enron boys claimed they didn't anything about what was happening all around them in their own organizations.
When the president says it— well it can be a little unnerving, But as we all should realize by now, he is not cleaning up the swamp— he is picking the best and juiciest parts and trying to private label them. And going along with all the rest to get along.
Let's see if this smackdown on gold is just a one time thing to clean out the specs who were leaning into their leveraged metals positions and miners, or not.
The backbone of the power of the US, the enabler of its grossly oversized military presence around the world, is the Dollar, or more precisely, the petro-dollar. And to that end, the US tolerates and even nurtures the TBTF banks to help it enforce its financial will, through sanctions and attacks on other currencies.
I think we all understand this, but it is good to keep it in mind when we see things happening that simple graft and the usual soft corruption seem inadequate to explain, like the multi-trillion dollar bailouts and the lack of meaningful prosecution for serious, serial felonies.
Praying for those who disappoint us and let us down, or themselves and their sworn office and obligations down, is difficult. But it can be rather therapeutic if you can do it well, with humility, mindful of your own weakened nature and imperfect actions.
'Only when it's dark enough can you see the stars.'
Have a pleasant evening.
