A Breed Apart Without Conscience - Psychopaths and Systemic Crisis

Psychopaths are social predators who charm, manipulate, and ruthlessly plow their way through life, leaving a broad trail of broken hearts, shattered expectations, and empty wallets.  Completely lacking in conscience and in feelings for others, they selfishly take what they want and do as they please, violating social norms and expectations without the slightest sense of guilt or regret.

Psychopaths often come across as arrogant, shameless braggarts—self-assured, opinionated, domineering, and cocky.  They love to have power and control over others and seem unable to believe that other people have valid opinions different from theirs.

What makes psychopaths different from all others is the remarkable ease with which they lie, the pervasiveness of their deception, and the callousness with which they carry it out.

The most debilitating characteristic of even the most well-behaved psychopath is the inability to form a workable team.

The majority of people and therefore workplaces are easy prey, because we still want to believe that people are inherently good.  We don't really want to believe that such people exist...Wherever you find money, prestige and power you will find them.

We are far more likely to lose our life savings to an oily-tongued swindler than our lives to a steely-eyed killer.

Robert D. Hare, Without Conscience

And this is why people must come together, to create a system of laws and transparency, of checks and balances, of objective oversight.

It is difficult to believe that we have to remind otherwise intelligent adults, who might be temporarily, but too often enthusiastically, blinded by some utopian ideology too often crafted by devious intents, that not everyone is good, law-abiding, and honest.

But If Not...

Excerpt of the Sermon "But If Not" by Martin Luther King

The God of the Markets

"O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king.

But if not, even if he does not preserve us, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the images of gold you have set up and commanded us to worship."

Daniel 3:16-18

Now I want you to notice first, here, that these young men practiced civil disobedience.

Civil disobedience is the refusal to abide by an order of the government or of the state or even of the court that your conscience tells you is unjust. Civil disobedience is based on a commitment to conscience. In other words, one who practices civil disobedience is obedient to what he considers a higher law.

And there comes a time when a moral man can't obey a law which his conscience tells him is unjust. And I tell you this morning, my friends, that history has moved on, and great moments have often come forth because there were those individuals, in every age and in every generation, who were willing to say "I will be obedient to a higher law." These men were saying "I must be disobedient to a king in order to be obedient to the king."

And those people who so often criticize those of us who come to those moments when we must practice civil disobedience never remember that even right here in America, in order to get free from the oppression and the colonialism of the British Empire, our nation practiced civil disobedience.  For what represented civil disobedience more than the Boston Tea Party.

And never forget that everything that Hitler did in Germany was legal. It was legal to do everything that Hitler did to the Jews. It was a law in Germany that Hitler issued himself that it was wrong and illegal to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. But I tell you if I had lived in Hitler's Germany with my attitude, I would have openly broken that law. I would have practiced civil disobedience.

And so it is important to see that there are times when a man-made law is out of harmony with the moral law of the universe, there are times when human law is out of harmony with eternal and divine laws. And when that happens, you have an obligation to break it.

And I'm happy that in breaking it, I have some good company. I have Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. I have Jesus and Socrates. And I have all of the early Christians who refused to bow...

And this is what I want to say finally, that there is a reward if you do right for righteousness' sake...Don't ever think you're by yourself. Go on to jail if necessary but you'll never go alone.

Take a stand for that which is right, and the world may misunderstand you and criticize you, but you never go alone, for somewhere I read that "One with God is a majority," and God has a way of transforming a minority into a majority.

Walk with him this morning and believe in him and do what is right and he'll be with you even until the consummation of the ages. Yes, I've seen the lightning flash, I've heard the thunder roll, I've felt sin breakers dashing trying to conquer my soul but I heard the voice of Jesus saying still to fight on, he promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone; no, never alone, no, never alone. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone.

Where you going this morning, my friends, tell the world that you're going with truth. You're going with justice, you're going with goodness, and you will have an eternal companionship. And the world will look at you and they won't understand you, for your fiery furnace will be around you, but you'll go on anyhow.

But if not, I will not bow, and God grant that we will never bow before the gods of evil."

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - FOMC Tomorrow

'Life is a school of probabilities.'

Walter Bagehot

Stocks were largely unchanged today. There are going to be watching Jay Powell's first FOMC meeting as Chairman when they issue their decision and guidance tomorrow afternoon.

Gold and silver were off a bit, based on a stronger 'King Dollar' as Larry Kudlow likes to say.

I thought it was interesting that China has apparently given some signals that in response to any US trade tariffs they might be inclined to take some action in the debt and currency markets.

The Fed is widely expected to raise their benchmark rate by 25 bp tomorrow. To do anything else would likely shock the markets.   Since they are raising rates for their own purposes, to get as far off the zero bound as possible before this latest asset bubble collapses, I imagine that they will keep pressing on until the economy starts to sputter so obviously that there will be no denying it.

I hope this is not one of those scenarios where the first undeniable indication of a serous problem will be a heart attack in the equity and bond markets.

So they will be updating their wording and 'dot plots' possibly, and traders will be watching to see if they indicate three or four rate hikes in 2018.  It's not clear to me that it makes a beans worth of practical difference whether the Fed raises three or four times this year.  But this is the kind of thing that these money-printed, risk-mispricing markets like to do.

It appears that this latest nor'easter named Toby is going to be much less benign than originally forecast, and is going to be clobbering the NYC metro and tri-state area tomorrow with about a foot of snow.

Dolly and I are enjoying some home made soup, and snuggling down for a long winter's day tomorrow.  I think the young man will be spending the night since NYU will be closed tomorrow.  He and Dolly have a remarkable rapport.

This is the fourth nor-easter we have had in three weeks. Its nice not to have to go anywhere if you don't want to.  Just like its nice not to have to play in these utterly crooked markets.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Hey Mister Tangerine Man

Hey Mister Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning, I'll come followin' you

Take me for a trip upon your magic swirlin' ship
All my senses have been stripped
And my hands can't feel to grip
And my toes too numb to step
Wait only for my boot heels to be wanderin'

I'm ready to go anywhere I'm ready for to fade
On to my own parade cast your dancin' spell my way
I promise to go under it.

Bob Dylan, Hey Mister Tambourine Man

Stocks took a dive today, with a broad wave of selling with about 450 of the SP 500 stocks going lower.  What was odd about this was that there did not seem to be any flight to safety, with bonds and the precious metals flat, and the US Dollar lower.

The catalysts for the selloff were relatively slight for such a broad reaction.

 Facebook is implicated in a misuse of its users profile information by Cambridge Analytica who used it to craft tailored political campaign messaging in the last Presidential election.

There is also quite a bit of tension on the international and domestic political horizons that are making the markets edgy at these levels.

There is also a two day FOMC meeting this week, with an expected 25 bp rate increase almost certain. But all eyes will be on the 'dot plots' this Wednesday afternoon to try and discern if there will be three or four rate increases this year.  The markets are already starting to price in four.

The stock market bubble has been fueled by the Fed and the US monetary and fiscal policies.  They have been pumping quite a bit of money, top down, with most of it (if not all) being snagged by the one percent and put to their own uses, which do not favor broad demand or real GDP growth.  We have seen the usual growth of monopolies, non-productive deal-making, and paper asset bubbles.

So at the end of the day, the reason for today's big selloff is that there is another financial asset bubble in equities as noted here previously, led by the FANG tech stocks.

Narrowly led bubbles lead to wild volatility swings before they finally revert to the mean.  And that reversion in this case is likely to be in the neighborhood of a 20%+ stock market correction.

Financial reform is not only being neglected, the GOP with the help of corporate Democrats are rolling back the mild financial reforms from the widely disappointing Obama Administration.   This is not going to end well.  And they are driving huge deficits to benefit their cronies and donors.  Not that Obama did not essentially do the same thing for Wall St.

Hillary was in India saying the usual tone deaf and elitist things that are so popular among Beltway Liberal Democrats these days.   There are rumours she will run again in 2020.  She may still have the raw power within her hapless and self-referential party to get nominated, but barring a GOP selection of some even more outrageously bad candidate I don't think her chances will be good.   She is the poster child for the kinds of things that the public wants to change.

The times they are a-changin'. And at some point the winds of change may start blowing a hurricane.

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And it's ragin'.
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'.

Tomorrow is the first day of Spring.

Have a pleasant weekend.