Jesse's Café Américain

25 January 2015

Syriza Wins Greek Election, Leader Alexis Tsipras Declares 'End to Vicious Cycle of Austerity'

This is from the live updates at The Guardian Newspaper here.

Here’s summary of a momentous election result for the future of Greece and Europe:
The anti-austerity far left party Syriza has won the Greek election by a decisive margin, but just short of an outright majority. With more than three-quarters of the results in Syriza is projected to win 149 seats in the 300 seat parliament.

Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras said his party’s victory marked an end to the “viscious cycle of austerity”. Referring to the neoliberal conditions set by the IMF, the European Commission and the European Central Bank, he said: “ The verdict of the Greek people renders the troika a thing of the past for our common European framework.”

Outgoing prime minister Antonis Samaras conceded defeated by acknowledging some mistakes. But he added: “We restored Greece’s international credibility”.

To Potami, the centre-left party could be the kingmakers in the new parliament, with a project 16 seats. Its leader Stavros Theodorakis has not ruled out a deal with Syriza. “It’s too early for such details,” he said.

The far-right Golden Dawn party is projected to come third in election, despite having more than half of its MPs in jail. Speaking from prison its leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos said the result was a “great victory” for the neo-fascist party.

Syriza victory has been greeted with alarm in Germany. The ruling CDU party insisting that Greece should stick to the austerity programme. But Belgium’s finance minister said there is room for negotiation with Syriza.

Leftwingers across Europe have hailed Syriza win. Spain’s anti-austerity party Podemos said Greece finally had a government rather than a German envoy. Britain’s Green Party said Syriza’s victory was an inspiration.

'Historic Blizzard' For New York Metro Area, New England - 2 To 3 Feet of Snow - Updated Maps

The 'euro model' was the first to predict this, but the other models seem to be coming along to their forecast. The euro model is still assuming a heavier snowfall in the NYC metro area, to 3 feet. The Canadian and American models are coming along but are still assuming a move further to the east.

Update - The latest report from the National Weather Service shows a broad area of NY, NJ, and New England receiving 2 to 3 feet of snow with high winds.

If you live in this area please keep aware of changing developments. This *may* be a quite impressive snowstorm/blizzard depending on the air flows and storm movements.

Snowfall accumulations are still being estimated with two to three feet for New York City, Long Island, and New England. Accumulations in NJ will vary depending on how far east the storm center moves before turning north. Ranges are from 6 to 18 inches, depending on how close one is to NYC.

This storm Juno is bringing a weather phenomenon known as 'bombogenesis' which is defined as a drop of 24 mb in air pressure in a less than 24 hour period. It is a 'bomb' of a low pressure system, hence the name.

The snow is expected to start late Monday, and continuing on growing with intensity into Tuesday afternoon, tapering off into Tuesday evening for New York City. The storm is expected to severely hamper travel on Tuesday and possibly Wednesday.

"Blizzard watches have already been issued from parts of southern New England, including Boston and Providence, to New York City and northeast New Jersey. A winter storm watch is in place for the Philadelphia metro area.

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(MORE: Blizzard Facts and Myths)

Now is the time to prepare and make sure you have the supplies you need for this potentially historic winter storm. Do not proceed with any travel plans in the affected areas late Monday and Tuesday or you could put yourself in great danger."

European Model Forecast

Current Official National Weather Service Forecast

24 January 2015

European 'QE' In a Nutshell - Propagating the Western Trickle Down Policy Errors

This is about it in a nutshell. 'Stimulus' American style comes to Europe.

Printing money and giving it to your cronies inflates asset prices, lines the pockets of the well-heeled heels, but does little for the real economy.

But it doesn't produce broad inflation (or aggregate demand) so we can do it many times! Success!

"At last the euro’s lords and masters have accepted that something must be done about their zone’s lamentable growth. They will unleash a massive bond-buying programme totalling a reported €1tn. The former BBC economic pundit Stephanie Flanders told the world it was “Santa Claus time”; the European Central Bank (ECB) has ridden to the rescue.

No it has not. Europe’s great and good, partying on the slopes of Davos, are like courtiers at the Congress of Vienna. They are blinded by snow and celebrities. Santa Claus gives presents to people; the ECB gives presents to its banks. It is merely tipping large sums of money into the vaults of precisely the institutions whose crazy lending caused the crash of 2008, and which have been failing Europe’s economy ever since.

Quantitative easing is a gigantic confidence trick. It was promised that it would yield new investment. It has not. It was promised that it would “pump money into the economy”. It has not. It was also feared that printing money would lead to hyper-inflation. It has not, for the simple reason that no one gets to spend the money. It is a bookkeeping transaction between a central bank and a commercial bank. It means nothing as long as banks are told to build up their reserves.

Money in circulation matters. The whole of Europe, including Britain, is chronically short of demand, which is why deflation is such a menace. If no one can afford to buy anything, no one will sell anything or invest money in making anything..."

Simon Jenkins, QE for the eurozone is a gigantic confidence trick. It should fool no one

23 January 2015

China Withdraws 70 Tonnes Gold From Shanghai Week Ending 16th January - Third Highest Ever

"It is the Soviet Union that runs against the tide of history by denying human freedom and human dignity to its citizens."

Ronald Reagan, Speech to the British House of Commons, 8 June 1982

"The center of world power is the unchallenged superpower, the United States, attended by its Western allies...For a small but growing chorus of Americans this vision of a unipolar world led by a dynamic America is a nightmare...Our best hope...is in American strength and will-- the strength and will to lead a unipolar world, unashamedly laying down the rules of world order and being prepared to enforce them."

Charles Krauthammer, The Unipolar Moment, 1990

"The enormous gap between what US leaders do in the world and what Americans think their leaders are doing is one of the great propaganda accomplishments of the dominant political mythology."

Michael Parenti

"The genius of American power is expressed in the movie The Godfather II, where, like Hyman Roth [Meyer Lansky!], the United States has always made money for its partners. America has not turned countries in which it intervened into deserts; it enriched them. Even the Russians knew they could surrender after the Cold War without being subjected to occupation."

Robert Kagan, July 17, 2003

Robert Kagan is a famous neo-con figure in US government circles. He is the husband of Victoria Nuland. Nuland, as Assistant Secretary of State for Europe, is famed for her partnering skills and diplomatic insights, summing up concerns for collateral damage from the crisis in the Ukraine with 'f*uck the EU.'

China withdraw around 70 tonnes of gold bullion from the Shanghai Gold Exchange for the week ending 16th January.

This is the third highest amount of gold offtake from Shanghai ever.

As a result of price rigging, gold is flowing steadily from West to East. Because, whether the public realizes it or not, the world is very actively engaged in the evolution of the monetary basis of world trade, which has been referred to here and other places as the currency wars.

I have little doubt that the Western central banks think that their triumph is unstoppable, an inevitability. And so they firmly stand against all evolution and change, preferring to fight tooth and nail to maintain the US dollar supremacy.

I believe that this currency war has its genesis in the grandiose schemes of the highly influential neo-cons and financiers in the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations, together with their attendant counterparts overseas.

I suspect that they may be in for a surprise. Events have a way of rising to an occasion of hubris.

Now, putting aside any moral or practical political discussions about this, let us just consider one thing. Let us assume for a moment that all this circumstantial and direct evidence is correct, and there is a currency war underway. And that the Banks have been engaged, for many years, in the systematic rigging of the price of gold.

This is not impossible, a conspiracy fantasy, or even all that improbable for that matter, since we know that many of these same actors did a similar thing for much the same motives in the famous London Gold Pool.