Gold Daily And Silver Weekly Charts - Struggling

"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."

Saul Bellow

The precious metals futures on the Comex were struggling most of the day, with both gold and silver ending just a little higher.

The Comex warehouse activity is not worth mentioning.

Gold is moving from West to East. China is clearly executing some longer term plan with regard to gold and its own fiat money as a reserve currency.

Let's see what happens.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Fight For the Right to Party

"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

Charles Mackay

Techs were struggling most of the day, as the SP 500 showed some futures driven resilience.

The Empire Manufacturing number came in high side, but the actual Industrial Production came in negative, with last month being revised in half. Go figure.

There will be an FOMC decision on Wednesday. With the Alibaba IPO in play, I don't think we will see the markets fall appreciably unless there is a serious break in the geopolitical stability.

Have a pleasant evening.

 

Mark Crispin Miller: Forbidden Thoughts and Fighting For the Truth

Mark Crispin Miller is professor of media studies at New York University. He is known for his writing on American media and for his activism on behalf of media reform. His books include Boxed In: The Culture of TV, Seeing Through Movies, Mad Scientists, a study of war propaganda, and Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Elections. He was a contributor to the documentary 'Orwell Rolls Over In His Grave.'

He graduated from Northwestern University with a BA in 1971, Johns Hopkins University with an MA in 1973, and a Ph.D. in 1977.

He talks overall about certain stories that are not considered to be appropriate for discussion in the mainstream media.  He sees 'conspiracy theory' as a method of shutting down discussion, and traces its use as a rhetorical device to a memo in 1967.

He more specifically discusses the 2000 election of G. W. Bush, and what he considers related stories that are ruled off the table in a presentation to the 911 Architects and Engineers for Truth.

I don't agree with all of his specific issues perhaps, but found his discussion of 'process' in the mainstream media to be interesting.  More often than not the 'discussions' of situations which we are given in the media are often highly uninformative, if not misleading either by omission or intent.

And I also feel that the First Amendment is being tested now as it has been in the past. It seems to be curtailed for individuals who are shuffled off to 'free speech zones' while wealthy corporations are being given privileges that the Constitution maintains for individuals and was not intended for powerful legal constructs that provide limited liability and anonymity.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Le Comité de Salut Public

 

"The tendency of things is, indeed, to make matters worse still. The poor are every year becoming poorer, and more dependent upon those who feast upon their sufferings; while the wealth and power of the realm are annually concentrating in fewer hands, and becoming more and more instruments of oppression.”

John C. Cobden, 1854

Retail sales came in a bit hot today, triggering a 'good news is bad news' selloff in stocks, at least according to the spokesmodels on bubblevision.

The retail sales results were really not all that impressive,  just coming in-line for sales ex-auto. And who the heck knows what adjustments were used to cook up the hot auto sales number?  These one shot numbers are a flash in the pan.

I think the sell off today, ahead of the weekend, is due to the cumulative jitters of the markets, given the drumbeats to war in Iraq, Syria, Ukraine, and the potential 'Yes' vote in Scotland for independence. 

"The White House is characterizing the U.S. mission against Islamic State militants as a war, similar to the one waged against al-Qaida and its affiliates."

The skeptical part of me wonders if this is the 'wash and rinse' that I suspected they might try to sneak in ahead of the actual Alibaba IPO.   In our economy war is a good thing, to the extent that it is good for business. 

It must be good.  We seems to look for wars all the time, and even in the most unlikely of places, on the suspicion that someone there must be up to no good.   The US did a rather effective stop and frisk with extreme prejudice on Iraq, for example.  They are still trying to get their lives back together. 

And apparently Obama wants to do the same thing to Syria.  We lift things up, and put them down.  And that includes not only tyrants, and vicious rebels, but whole nations and peoples.

So let's see what happens next week.  Besides the FOMC two day meeting, which will provide us their guidance on the afternoon of Wednesday Sept 17th.  A calendar for next week is included below.

Nothing particularly interesting occurred in the Comex warehouses for precious metals yesterday.

In other news of the day, the Fed has just formed the Committee on Financial Stability led by Vice-Chair Stanley Fischer.

When this news came out it reminded me of the (in)famous Comité de Salut Public, or Committee on Public Safety which became the de facto executive government during the worst parts of the French revolution.

I would bear in mind that this unelected committee of the Fed has no standing to make laws, and is part of a private organization which unfortunately has been given too many discretionary regulatory powers by the ideologically crippled, do-nothing Congress.

And in cheerier news, Golem XIV is back from his holiday.   Welcome back.

I am looking forward to hearing more about the momentous vote in Scotland next week as the election day approaches.  So many English nouveau riche and political parvenu of the master class have issued nearly hysterical screeds against it that I know it must be of some importance.

As they advise, we must always 'be afraid, be very afraid.'   And have only a little hope.  After all, government is complex, and these matters are best left to the ruling class.

"Hope. It is the only thing stronger than fear. A little hope is effective. A lot of hope is dangerous. A spark is fine, as long as it's contained."

President Snow, The Hunger Games

Have a pleasant weekend.