Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Quad Witching Stock Option Expiry - Everybody Hurts

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

Hunter S. Thompson


"And Jesus, having heard this, said, 'This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son may be be shown in glory through it."

John 11:4

Things in Washington are becoming so odd on both sides of the aisle that normal ways of doing the business of the people are out the window. It is like Disneyland on the Potomac—  and Trump is goofy.

I grew up in the 50s and 60s and have seen some seriously weird stuff in my day.   And this is weirdness turned pro.

Stocks were on a tear for the quad witching December stock option expiration.

The underlying reason seems to be market enthusiasm for the news that it appears that the Senate has the votes to pass their 'tax reform' bill.

I think it is just wonderful that those humanitarians on Wall Street and saints among the one percent will celebrate such a tax reform windfall for the middle class. Isn't that what Dandy Don said it is?

Gold and silver managed to get a little back, closing just about where one might have expected. I would imagine that this price capping will continue until the year end unless *something happens.* 

This is not the government doing this, contrary to what some of the perennial anti-government folks seem to believe.

But there is no doubt that government regulators are turning a blind eye, in general, to the market antics of a bunch of crooks and conmen across a broad array of markets.   We see the truth of this in the occasional wristslap, no prosecution settlement for fraud.

And why should the government do anything about blatant market manipulation— all regulation is bad, right?

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Next week is the last trading week before Christmas.

Please remember to feed the birds, and to love the poor in spirit.  Poverty of the soul is a terrible thing. Especially in the very proud, frantically trying to fill the great holes in their being with things, not understanding that they are slowly but surely wasting away, with the sickness unto death.

Have a pleasant weekend.

Nomiki Konst: Signs of a Revolution Within the Democratic Party

"Now that the queen [Hillary] is gone, ding dong, people are actually starting to say what they believe, and feel."

Nomiki Konst

Here is some additional insights from her about what is going on in the attempts to reform the Democratic National Committee after the recent scandals regarding favoritism and internal irregularities by 'the Hillary people.'

Although she is cited as an investigative reporter, which she is, Nomiki Konst is also a political insider in the Democratic Party organization. And she is quite knowledgeable.

It seems that one of the major obstacles to change is the very powerful group of consultants, who as you may know have dominated the Democratic National Budget, and taken by far most of it for themselves.

And before you ask, no, I have not yet been able to find out exactly who these 'five consultants' are. Or how they have been able to exert such a powerful control over things. But it does seem that now that Hillary Clinton has fallen from her most powerful position in the party, the consultants are much less in a position of power.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - It's Cold Outside

"There must be renewed recognition that societies are kept stable and healthy by reform, not by thought police; this means there must be free play for so-called subversive ideas—  every idea subverts the old to make way for the new.   To shut off subversion is to shut off peaceful progress and to invite revolution and war...

All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out."

I. F. Stone

Stocks finished off a bit, and gold and silver gave back some of the gains from yesterday.

The FCC voted to overturn 'net neutrality.'

And so the third-worldisation of the US continues.

Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md) just said that the Dems 'do not need a message' for the 2018 mid-term elections.  It is enough just to run on a referendum on Trump.

They'll never learn. Because they don't want to.  It's the credibility trap.

Have a pleasant evening.

DNC Spent $700+ Million on Five Consultants And Deprived Their State Organizations of Basic Funding

"For twelve years this nation was afflicted with hear-nothing, see-nothing, do-nothing government. The nation looked to government but the government looked away. Nine mocking years with the golden calf and three long years of the scourge! Nine crazy years at the ticker and three long years in the breadlines! Nine mad years of mirage and three long years of despair!

And, my friends, powerful influences strive today to restore that kind of government with its doctrine that that government is best which is most indifferent to mankind."

Franklin D. Roosevelt, October 1936


"DNC Chairman Perez and allied power brokers keep showing that they’re afraid of the party’s progressive base.   No amount of appealing rhetoric changes that reality."

Norman Solomon, After the Unity Reform Commission


“In a room where people unanimously maintain a conspiracy of silence, one word of truth sounds like a pistol shot.”

Czesław Miłosz

I guess this sort of nonsense is what happens when you allow a powerful private interest like Hillary, Inc. to take over your organization and shape its mission for their own purposes.

The result is an imperious, top down operation where only a few insiders can follow the money because they control it.  And the grass roots initiatives and state organizations starve from neglect.

Budgetary and fiduciary oversight and transparency within your own organization is fundamental to any good governance.   But not within a credentialed oligarchy, which is what the DNC had apparently become.

It seems to have started out as the ascendance of the self-proclaimed elite, the knowing, and their super-delegates.  But in reality, all they had in addition to their professional pedigrees and places of power was the unique talent of betraying their duties in order to amass enormous amounts of money.  They maintained and expanded their power by distributing the party's funds selectively, ruthlessly, and with a Machiavellian intent for the accumulation of personal wealth and power.

Surprising that a community organizer wouldn't understand that.   Of course it seems like he understood very little about reform, financial or otherwise.   Or wanted to.

Who are these five consultants and what did they do to earn their $700 million?  Were these no-bid contracts?  Who approved them?

Whatever it was, it could not have had much to do with effectively winning elections.  But it had everything to do with the arrogance and self-delusions of a few largely isolated from those who they were sworn to serve and protect.

Until change comes with meaningful reform it's—  DNC RIP