Audacious Oligarchy: The Rules Are For the Little People

“The essence of oligarchical rule is not father-to-son inheritance, but the persistence of a certain world-view and a certain way of life.  A ruling group is a ruling group so long as it can nominate its successors.  Who wields power is not important, provided that the hierarchical structure remains always the same.”

George Orwell


"We've become, now, an oligarchy instead of a democracy.   I think that's been the worst damage to the basic moral and ethical standards to the American political system that I've ever seen in my life."

Jimmy Carter


"Financial predators are usually narcissistic and audacious.  They regularly have an extreme sense of entitlement coupled with high self-efficacy.  Many of them have a charismatic quality and are preternaturally persuasive.  Financial predators are commonly shameless and quite adept serial liars. They perceive themselves having near unlimited guile and resourcefulness to extricate themselves out of any compromising situations."

Russ Alan Prince, Forbes


"Most of them became wealthy by being well connected and crooked. And they are creating a society in which they can commit hugely damaging economic crimes with impunity, and in which only children of the wealthy have the opportunity to become successful.  That’s what I have a problem with."

Charles Ferguson, Predator Nation


"People of privilege will always risk their complete destruction rather than surrender any material part of their advantage. Intellectual myopia, often called stupidity, is no doubt a reason. But the privileged also feel that their privileges, however egregious they may seem to others, are a solemn, basic, God-given right. The sensitivity of the poor to injustice is a trivial thing compared with that of the rich."

John Kenneth Galbraith

I cannot stress enough that this elitist attitude towards society is a learned mindset, that comes with a sense of extreme entitlement, and not some inherited tendency.   As it succeeds it can become contagious among those who are morally weak and easily influenced.

Who would not be tempted to believe people when they tell them that because of where they went to school and who they know that they are special, and entitled to bend the rules for their own benefit?

And unfortunately the corrupting power of easy money is in its ascendancy in US society, now as it has been at certain times in the past, and is to be found in the halls of established power on both sides of the aisle.

The oligarchy funds think tanks and personalities to persuade and lure in the disgruntled and the gullible in order to clear the way for the domination of society by a powerful and wealthy few.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Risk On - You Never Can Tell

"While everyone enjoys an economic party the long-term costs of a bubble to the economy and society are potentially great. They include a reduction in the long-term saving rate, a seemingly random distribution of wealth, and the diversion of financial human capital into the acquisition of wealth. As in the United States in the late 1920s and Japan in the late 1980s, the case for a central bank ultimately to burst that bubble becomes overwhelming. I think it is far better that we do so while the bubble still resembles surface froth and before the bubble carries the economy to stratospheric heights. Whenever we do it, it is going to be painful, however.”

Larry Lindsey, Federal Reserve Governor, September 24, 1996 FOMC Minutes


“I recognise that there is a stock market bubble problem at this point, and I agree with Governor Lindsey that this is a problem that we should keep an eye on... We do have the possibility of raising major concerns by increasing margin requirements. I guarantee that if you want to get rid of the bubble, whatever it is, that will do it.”

Alan Greenspan, September 24, 1996 FOMC Minutes


And in some ways, it creates this false illusion that there are people out there looking out for the interest of taxpayers, the checks and balances that are built into the system are operational, when in fact they're not. And what you're going to see and what we are seeing is it'll be a breakdown of those governmental institutions. And you'll see governments that continue to have policies that feed the interests of -- and I don't want to get clichéd, but the one percent or the .1 percent -- to the detriment of everyone else.

Neil Barofsky in a 2012 interview with Bill Moyers


"Donald Trump wasn’t actually a successful businessman at all, not in the normal sense anyway.  He was an economic magician (or, in classic American terms, a con man) who regularly ground business after business — a set of casinos (at a time when other casinos were thriving), hotels, an airline, and a series of other endeavors ranging from Trump Steaks to Trump Vodka to Trump University — into the dust of bankruptcy or failure. What made him such a magician was that, in case after case, his greatest 'business' skill proved to be jumping ship, dollars in hand, leaving those who trusted him, had faith in him, believed in him holding the bag.

He had a history of screwing anyone who relied on him, whether we’re talking about the investors in his Atlantic City casinos or a bevy of small business types and others who worked for him — plumbers, waiters, painters, cabinet makers — and were later stiffed. In other words, Americans elected a bankruptcy king as their president and character will tell.

There really are no secrets here. In the end, Donald Trump clearly cares about nothing but himself (and perhaps his family as an extension of that self).   Whether in his first or second term (should he win again in 2020), if things start to head south economically, count on this: he’ll repeat his well-documented history and jump ship, leaving the American people, including that beloved base of his, holding the bag."

Tom Engelhardt, Donald Trump Will Bankrupt America


"Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,
Atoms or systems into ruin hurled,
And now a bubble burst, and now a world."

Alexander Pope

It was risk on today, as stock gapped open higher and pushed upwards with a mind to making yet another blow off top, sooner rather than later.

The dollar and the metals declined in this devil-take-the-hindmost burst of good feelings and animal spirits.

Let's see how far they can take this, and how low it can go again this next time. You never can tell.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - End of the First Quarter - Non-Farm Payrolls Report Next Week

"During my eighty-seven years I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions. But none of them has done away with the need for character in the individual or the ability to think."

Bernard Baruch


"Like liberty, gold never stays where it is undervalued."

John S. Morrill

Stocks had an upbeat finish to the end of the first quarter.

What a surprise.

Gold and silver gained back a little from the option expiration mugging of yesterday.

There will be a Non-Farm Payrolls Report next week.

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 - Another Option Expiration on the Comex, Indeed

Dolly's stealthy surveillance of Le Propriétaire

"But this I said to them, 'Listen to my voice; then I will be your God and you shall be my people. Walk in the ways that I have given you, so that you may prosper.'   But they did not obey or show respect.   Rather, they walked on in the hardness of their evil hearts, and turned their backs, not their faces, to me...

They have not listened to me or given me due attention; they have stiffened their necks and become worse than their fathers.  When you speak these words to them, they will not listen to you either; when you call to them, they will not answer.   Say to them: 'You are the nation that does not listen to the voice of the Lord, its God, or take His counsel.  Truth has perished by your hand, and is no longer even on your lips.'"

Jeremiah 7:23-28


"God has a way of standing before the nations with judgment, and it seems that I can hear God saying to America,  'You're too arrogant!  And if you don't change your ways, I will rise up and break the backbone of your power, and I'll place it in the hands of a nation that doesn't even know my name.  Be still and know that I'm God.'"

Martin Luther King,  It's a Dark Day In Our Nation

Today was an option expiration for gold on the Comex. Couldn't you tell?

The explanation was that the Dollar's strength had become too much to ignore, and 'gold had become a crowded trade.'

I suspect that with this kind of smackdown in the futures markets that the gold trade is quite a bit less crowded.

And that really was the point of this— a good, old fashioned wash and rinse keying off the option expiration.

Do I hear the train?   Waiting for my son

Stocks had another ranging day, and while they managed to finish in the green it was not an impressive performance by any means.

The economic numbers are not impressive and more indicative of a looming recession.  I expect the denial of this to be quite strong, and then strident, until it comes upon us.   And then they will look at each other and say, 'who could have known?'

For those of you who have sent their well-wishes, be assured that Dolly is back in the saddle, managing me and her mischief with artful stealth.   I include a snapshot of her monitoring my activity in the kitchen.

As you know, we had received her from a rescue group called Best Friends, who take dogs and cats that for one reason or another are not likely to be adopted from kill shelters and finds them a caring home.

In Dolly's case she had been so horribly neglected and abused that she needed a month of care before she could undergo surgery to repair the damage she had sustained.   It was funny, but the Queen picked her, and with the complicity of my son compelled me to accept this little one.  Little did we know that in about three months the dosctors would discover the queen's brain tumor.

As I have said before, every good thing I have had or have been came from her, she being an answer to my prayers for a good and faithful companion. 

How then can I stop from singing?

Have a pleasant evening.