“National Socialism was a revulsion by my friends against parliamentary politics, parliamentary debate, parliamentary government—against all the higgling and the haggling of the parties and the splinter parties, their coalitions, their confusions, and their conniving. It was the final fruit of the common man's repudiation of 'the rascals'. Its motif was, 'Throw them all out.'
I fooled myself. I had to. Everybody has to. If the good had been twice as good and the bad only half as bad, I still ought to have seen it. But I didn't want to see it, because I would have then had to think about the consequences of seeing it, what followed from seeing it, what I must do to be decent. I wanted my home and family, my job, my career, a place in the community.”
Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free
"The wealth of another region excites their greed; and if it is weak, their lust for power as well. Nothing from the rising to the setting of the sun is enough for them. Among all others only they are compelled to attack the poor as well as the rich. Plunder, rape, and slaughter they falsely call empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace."
Tacitus
"It is always the soul that dies first, even if it's departure goes unnoticed. And it always carries the body along with it. Man is nourished by the invisible, man is nourished by that which is beyond the personal. He dies from preferring the opposite."
Jacques Lusseyran
Stocks were falling sharply earlier in the day, but a steady bid underneath brought them back into the green by the end of the day, led by the SP500.
Gold and silver managed to gain back a little from recent losses thanks in part to continued decline in the Dollar DX Index.
Trumpolini and the corporate Democrats have agreed that $2 Trillion would be a nice size for an infrastructure project.
The key to this exercise is how big of a role, and piece of the rentier action, that the oligarchs can carve out for themselves.
The US inspired/financed/managed coup in Venezuela was heating up today. It's all about the oil.
That is not stimulus. That is a rescue. What are they not telling us? Hint: The Recovery™ is paper thin at best, and a charade.
Apple's earnings are anticipated after the bell. They may be important after the Google miss last night.
A crash is coming. And it could be terrific.
Have a pleasant evening.
