"Quite a lot of what passes itself off as dialogue about our society consists of people trying to justify their own choices. Let me propose that if your beliefs or convictions matter more to you than people—if they require you to act as though you were a worse person than you are—you may have lost perspective."
Timothy Kreider, We Learn Nothing, 2012
Gold and silver bounced back nicely after the Non-Farm Payrolls smackdown.
Stocks managed to eke a little upside today driven mostly by energy.
We are still in earnings season, and misses are leading to stocks being hauled out behind the woodshed and thrashed.
The geopolitical risks are changing from a simmer to what may grow to be a running boil.
The Republicans and Democrats are shameless in their pursuits of personal power and money. It is becoming hard not to notice, unless you are a true believer and willfully blind. And there are plenty of those kinds of behaviours on display now.
The increase in wickedness has proven contagious to the weak willed and morally ambivalent. It is almost hard to believe at times as more and more of the nominally principled give up and stand down. No one can serve two masters. They will eventually hate the one and love the other, even as they fool themselves and make allowances for their own 'harmless practicality' which is really just expediency.
"In our own times we see that politicians raised under neoliberalism are unwilling and unable to effectively use real Keynesian policies: they can’t do stimulus, when they try, they give the money primarily to the rich.
They grew to power by being neoliberals; faced with new times they cannot change. In France we saw the main center-left party (really a neoliberal party) implode because it would just not change, and throughout the West center-left neoliberal parties are dying for just this reason. The world has changed, the people who run those parties cannot change...
Our societies have failed to run themselves acceptably since 2008, and the youngs have no attachment to the status quo since it never ever worked for them. Change is thus not only possible, it is now inevitable."
The American dream is now a nation of low paid bartenders and waitresses, living from paycheck to paycheck, and preyed upon by corporate behemoths in healthcare, housing, and finance.
They are a force of nature, a sleeping giant, that awakened may be filled with a terrible resolve.
And because of the increase in wickedness, the love of many will grow cold. But those who stand firm to the end shall be saved.
The Democratic Party establishment has learned nothing from their failed strategies and electoral disasters, and are still lying and denying over and over with condescending smirks.
"Then, in the name of democracy, let us use that power— let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will!"
Charlie Chaplin, The Great Dictator
Stocks managed to rally back off their losses to close largely unchanged.
Gold and silver held relatively steady in price.
Trump named Jay Powell as the new Fed Chair today.
Put another nickel in
In the nickelodeon
All I want is having you
And music, music, music.
Teresa Brewer, Music, Music, Music
"A nickel's not worth a dime anymore."
Yogi Berra
The FOMC did nothing with rates, but remarked that in their judgement the growth in the economy has changed from 'moderate' to 'solid.' The market is looking for a rate increase at the December meeting.
I am solidly willing to speculate that the Fed will flip their judgement faster than a flapjack in a NJ diner in the not too distant future. But let's see what happens.
The markets are widely pricing in a rate increase from the Bank of England this week. Let's see if they get it.
Donald l'Orange will be spilling the beans on his pick for Fed head tomorrow. Presumably it will be someone not currently under indictment. It is said by insiders that his pick will be Jay Powell. As the Wall Street hot money hopheads say, 'Pass that J my way.'
I have included the chart for the little followed industrial metal nickel futures directly below. It has been on a tear of late. And, (want yearn), is taking a crack at the kind of breakout attempt that we have looking for in gold and silver. From what I hear this is an electric car play. Or blockchain. lol
We are still looking for the results and effects of the Non-Farm Payrolls report on Friday.
Here is a link to a paper from Artemis Capital titled Volatility and the Alchemy of Risk. It does a decent job of describing the setup for a hyper-correction that may occur based on the systematic mispricing of risk and market manipulation by the Banks, both global and central. In other words, the third collapse of a major financial asset bubble since the repeal of Glass-Steagall in 1999.
At some point in this correction I expect the Bankers to try and stop it, and restore confidence, in the manner of what was done in 1929. They will have more time and ways to do this than in 1987, if they wish to avail themselves of it. Circuit breakers, cooling off periods and all that. Still, fortunes may be lost, and made.
That no one can see it coming is utter rubbish, although the timing is problematic. But as Walter Bagehot once famously observed, 'Life is a school of probabilities.'
Or in other words, as Dirty Harry phrased it, "you've gotta ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya, punk?" Since we have established the principles of too big to fail (or jail) and government bailouts, they may indeed be feeling rather lucky, playing heads I win and tails you lose with other people's money. And that is the moral hazard of the system as it feeds the snakes of Wall Street today.
Let us pray for those whose hearts are hardened against His grace and loving kindness by greed, fear, and pride, and the seductive illusion and crushing isolation of evil.
We pray that we all may experience the three great gifts of our Lord's suffering and triumph: repentance, forgiveness, and thankfulness. And in so doing, may we obtain abundant life, and with it the peace that surpasses all understanding.
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