Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Plague of Illusion and Madness

 

“Foolishness is a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice.   One may protest against evil; it can be exposed and, if need be, prevented by use of force.   Evil always carries within itself the germ of its own subversion in that it leaves behind in human beings at least a sense of unease.

Against such foolishness we are defenseless.  Neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed – in such moments the foolish person even becomes critical – and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental.

In all this the foolish person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack.   For that reason, greater caution is called for when dealing with a foolish person than with a malicious one.  Never again will we try to persuade the foolish person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Prisoner for God: Letters and Papers from Prison, 1944

“War, a struggle between 'our people' and 'the enemy,' creates a polarized world in which 'the enemy' is easily objectified and removed from the community of human obligation.  What the conservatives conceived of as sufficient measures overlapped with what were for the Nazis scarcely the first steps.  Only a minority of nonconformists managed to preserve a beleaguered sphere of moral autonomy that emboldened them to employ patterns of behavior and stratagems of evasion that kept them from becoming killers at all. ”

Christopher R. Browning, Ordinary Men, 1992

"When we are the victims of an illusion we do not feel it to be an illusion but a reality.  It is the same perhaps with evil.  Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty.  As soon as we do evil, the evil appears as a sort of duty. Once a certain class of people has been placed by the temporal and spiritual authorities outside the ranks of those whose life has value, then nothing comes more naturally to men than murder. As soon as men know they that they can kill without fear of punishment or blame, they kill; or at least they encourage killers with approving smiles."

Simone Weil, La Pesanteur et la Grâce, 1947

"When a war breaks out, people say: 'It's too stupid; it can't last long.' But though a war may well be 'too stupid,' that doesn't prevent it from lasting. Foolishness has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves. In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words they were exceptional humans: they did not believe in plagues.

A bubonic plague is not made to fit in a man's mind; therefore we tell ourselves that plagues are a mere bogey of the mind, a bad dream that will pass away. But it doesn't always pass away and, from one bad dream to another, it is men who pass away, and the exceptional first of all, because they haven't taken their precautions.

Our townsfolk were not more to blame than others; they forgot to be human, that was all, and thought that everything still was possible for them; which presupposed that plagues were impossible. They went on doing business, arranged for journeys, and formed views. How could they have given a thought to anything like a plague, which rules out any future, cancels journeys, silences the exchange of views. They fancied themselves free, and no one will ever be free so long as there are plagues."

Albert Camus, The Plague, 1947

Stocks backed off a bit from their nearly parabolic rocket rally today.

We start getting a little more information as the BLS revises, and some say severely lower, the jobs data.

The Fed is meeting starting tomorrow at Jackson Hole, and the jawboning from there may move markets.

Gold managed to bounce higher while silver held its ground.

The Dollar fell to a yearly low  I have included a second Dollar chart so one might see this.

The madness spreads like a plague, overwhelming some and silencing many.

The madness serves none but itself.

Lord, my brothers and sisters are sick, with a sickness unto death.

And I struggle with what to do, as the madness grows, and they surrender themselves to it.

All we can do is provide a little oasis of kindness and sanity, a light in the darkness. And continue praying for us all.

And to remain standing, even in fear and trembling, because that is what this is all about.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Prayer in The Land of the Lotus Eaters

 

"The blessed John the Evangelist lived in Ephesus until extreme old age.  His disciples could barely carry him to church and he could not muster the voice to speak many words.   During individual gatherings he usually said nothing but, 'Little children, love one another.'

The disciples and brothers in attendance, annoyed because they always heard the same words, finally said, 'Teacher, why do you always say this?'   He replied with a line worthy of John: 'Because it is the Lord's commandment, and if it alone is kept, it is sufficient.'"

Jerome, Commentary on Galatians, 4th century

“We are slow to master the great truth that even now Christ is, as it were, walking among us, and by His hand, or eye, or voice, bidding us to follow Him.  We do not understand that His call is a thing that takes place now.  We think it took place in the Apostles' days, but we do not believe in it; we do not look for it in our own case.

God beholds you.  He calls you by name.  He sees you, and understands you, as He made you.  He knows what is in you, all your peculiar feelings and thoughts, your dispositions and likings, your strengths and your weaknesses.  He views you in your day of rejoicing and in your day of sorrow.  He sympathizes in your hopes and your temptations.  He interests Himself in all your anxieties and remembrances, all the risings and fallings of your spirit.

God has created me to do Him some definite service;  He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another.  I have my mission — I may never know it in this life but I shall be told it in the next.   I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons.  He has not created me for naught. 

Therefore I will trust Him.  Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away.  If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him.  If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.  He does nothing in vain.  He knows what He is about.   He may take away my friends.  He may throw me among strangers.  He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me -- still He knows what He is about.”

John Henry Newman

"Watch therefore and pray always, that you may escape all these things that will come to pass, and be among those standing with the Son of Man.”

Luke 21:36

It was risk on, and stocks were in rally mode, going out near their highs.

The Democratic convention starts today, and the Fed will be meeting in Jackson Hole later this week.

A gathering of vultures.

The Dollar fell back down to the lower bound of its recent range.

Gold and silver gained in the overnight and managed to hold on to some gains.

Everyone has forgotten about the confrontations of escalation overseas.

"A true opium of the people is the belief in nothingness after death, the huge solace, the huge comfort of thinking that for our betrayals, our greed, our cowardice, our murders, we are not going to be judged.”

Czeslaw Milosz

Why would we care?  

Not when our mages of the media and high priests of power and finance can prophesy illusions.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - La Grande Illusion - Blood for Power and Profit

 

"The present war crisis is something we have made entirely for and by ourselves.  There is in reality not the slightest logical reason for war, and yet the whole world is plunging headlong into frightful destruction, and doing so with the purpose of avoiding war and preserving peace!  This is a true war-madness, an illness of the mind and the spirit that is spreading with a furious and subtle contagion all over the world."

Thomas Merton, The Root of War, The Catholic Worker, October 1961

"In all these instances the large multinational bankers were actively supporting both sides.  It is a shocking fact that both British and American banks continued to do business with the Nazis even after the War was well underway, even as Germany was invading Europe and bombing London."

BBC, Banking with Hitler, 1998

“A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small 'inside' group knows what it is about.  It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many.  Out of war a few people make huge fortunes."

Major General Smedley Butler, War Is a Racket

"An expensive arms race, under cover of the military metaphysic, and in a paranoid atmosphere of fright, is an economically attractive business.  To many utopian capitalists, it has become the Business Way of Life."

C. Wright Mills, The Causes of World War III, 1960

"Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.  All the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.  War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it."

George Orwell, Facing Unpleasant Facts, 1999

We had the stock option expiration today, and is customary, the reversal of some recent trends.

Gold and silver were the big story.  The recent bout of price suppression, as seen in the heavy selling of the metals on the New York open, negating the overnight gains in Asia, was relaxed.  And the metals rocketed higher.

The Dollar fell, again reversing its recent trend.

VIX fell back down to a more the recent levels of its almost continuous mispricing of risks.

And if you think that 'the market is always right' you have not been paying attention of the history of our century.  The omniscient and efficient market is a perennial and well-worn canard.

As usual, signs and portents signalling rate cuts by the Fed have been driving the trade, which is largely 'technical' and inwardly focused.

Next week the Fed will be having its annual meeting in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.  They generally have their meetings in nice places, well-removed from the economic carnage which their willful errors have been inflicting on the broader economy

I strongly suspect that before too long we are going to see a major development in the ongoing wars in the Ukraine and the Mideast, which covers multiple locations.

Greed for money and power.  It is the first child of pride, and all the plagues and illnesses that it brings. 

In fifty years or so, historians may be more capable of objective analyzing the madness that has set the world on fire, once again.  It is uncannily familiar to the madness of the last century.  

The faces may changes, and some times with remarkable irony, but the means and motives remain the same.

Try to distance yourself from the current deluge if false narratives and propaganda, to remain focused on what really matters.

Need little, want less, love more.  For those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.

Have a pleasant weekend.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Our Poisoned Chalice - Option Expiration Tomorrow

 

"When clouds appear, wise men put on their cloaks;
When great leaves fall, the winter is at hand;
When the sun sets, who doth not look for night?...

Bloody thou art; bloody will be thy end,
Shame serves your life, and does your death attend."

William Shakespeare, Richard III

"Why doesn't 'greed is good' work?  Because rather than work harder, a certain portion of the population, not necessarily the most productive and intelligent, will immediately seek rents and extraordinary income obtained by unnatural advantages, by gaming the system, by cheating and coercion, by the subversion of the rule of law, which saps the vitality of the greater portion of the population which does in fact work harder, until they can no longer sustain themselves.  And then the lawless few seek to expand their reign of greed, and colonies and empires are born."

Jesse, Modern Economic Myths and The Failure of Financial Engineering, 21 February 2010

"...we but teach
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice
To our own lips..."

Shakespeare, Macbeth

"Where are the princes of this world, and those who lorded it over the creatures of the earth? Those who made sport of the birds of the air, and hoarded up riches in which they trusted, and for whom there is no limit to their greed, those who schemed to get wealth, and were always anxious about their possessions.

But now there is no trace left of them. They have vanished down into the bowels of the earth, and others have risen to take their place."

Baruch 3:16-19


The market liked the economic data from this morning, as can clearly be seen on the daily US Dollar chart.  

Stocks followed suit, and rallied higher, and went out near those highs.

Gold and silver had also rallied along with everything else, but gave back a little more at the end.

There will be a stock option expiration tomorrow.

VIX continued to fall from its recent high.

I will be very surprised if we do not get a proper wash and rinse out of this, most likely attributed to some geopolitical event that no one could have seen coming.

Except they do.  They just don't care.

I also suspect that some who have sold their souls to power and madness are going to falter, and fall in a rather scandalous, spectacular manner.   

And no one could have seen that coming either. 

Sic semper avaritia.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Testifying Through the Emptiness and Indifference

 

And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.   Ephesians 4:32

"Kindness is love expressed in practical ways; it is putting the needs of others before our own.  It is intentionally considering ways to meet other people’s needs.  Being tenderhearted means showing compassion toward those around us.

We show forgiveness because we, too, fall short of God’s ideal.  Knowing that God has graciously saved us from destruction motivates us to forgive others when they offend us.  We must set aside the self-centered attitude that leads to impatience and criticism of others.

Jesus did not say that the world will know Him by our miracles, by our grand testimonies, or by our vast Bible knowledge.  The world will know Him by the love that Christians show to one another. Ask God to give you kindness, a tender heart, and a forgiving spirit."

Henry Blackaby, Showing Grace

“No one in the world can change Truth.  What we can do and and should do is to seek truth and to serve it when we have found it.  The most deadly poison of our times is indifference.

The real conflict is the inner conflict. Beyond armies of occupation and the catacombs of extermination camps, there are two irreconcilable enemies in the depth of every soul: good and evil, sin and love.  And what use are the victories on the battlefield if we are ourselves are defeated in our innermost personal selves?”

Maximilian Kolbe, died for love, Auschwitz, August 14, 1941

"There are children of God and the children of the devil.  Those who do not do what is right and who do not love their brothers and sisters are not the children of God.  For this is the message you have heard, that we should love one another.  Do not be astonished, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you.

We know that we have passed from death to life because we love one another.  Whoever does not love remains in death.  All who hate are murderers, and murderers do not have eternal life in them.  We know love because He laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.  How does God’s love abide in anyone who has worldly goods and sees a brother or sister in need, and yet refuses to help?

Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will comfort our hearts before him."

1 John 3:10-19

 

Stocks managed to turn in a positive performance despite a lackluster trade off mundane economic data.

Gold and silver were under heavy pressure, and the Dollar did very little.

The VIX continued to slide back down to its comfortable complacency.

The markets are staggering to the weekend, and the growing unease about geopolitical events.

Today is the memorial day for Maximilian Kolbe, the saint and martyr for love of others.

His example shines down through the dark selfishness and cruel indifference of the servants of power.

A fitting reminder as we sink back into that sort of madness today.

Have a pleasant evening.