Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Madness of Crowds - Panem et Circenses

“In reading The History of Nations, we find that, like individuals, they have their whims and their peculiarities, their seasons of excitement and recklessness, when they care not what they do. We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first...

Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one.”

Charles Mackay


“The true measure of a man is not his intelligence or how high he rises in this freak establishment.  No, the true measure of a man is this: how quickly can he respond to the needs of others and how much of himself he can give.”

Philip K. Dick


"When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.”

Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves To Death

Stocks finished mixed on the day as the earnings reports for the 2Q are starting to roll in.

Their valuations seem a bit thick at these levels, and are vulnerable to news that does not support ideal pricing.

Gold finished unchanged, while silver was off a few cents.

The dollar finished slightly higher.

There will be a stock option expiration on Friday.

There were some intraday postings, of videos from Thomas Frank and Glenn Greenwald respectively.  You can scroll down to watch them.

Watching or reading any of the specialty news outlets is like observing a group of people who exist within isolated conclaves,  on ideological islands, engaging in insular feedback loops of simulated conversations, and bending the events of the day to fit their particular hysteria of the moment in their own parallel universe.

One can only step back and wonder what it is that has driven them to run in a mad herd from one place to another, seemingly without self-awareness.  And unless you drink deeply of the particular flavor of their kool-aid, it makes little sense because it has become unmoored from the common experience.

Truly, life imitates high school.

Need little, want less, love more. For those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.

Have a pleasant evening.

Debate on the Trump-Putin Summit Between Cirincione and Greenwald

The original posting with transcript of this debate between Joe Cirincione and Glenn Greenwald about the Trump-Putin Summit can be found here.

Thomas Frank: The Catechism of Tech, Bank, and Globe, Which Is Nothing But an Excuse For an Out-of-Touch Elite

"Back in 1941, Franklin Roosevelt set down his understanding of American political history, in which there were two schools of political belief.

'The liberal party believed in the wisdom and efficacy of the will of the great majority of the people, as distinguished from the judgement of a small minority of either education or wealth.'

What Roosevelt could not foresee was a party system in which the divide fell not between the few and the many, but between the small minority of education and the small minority of wealth. Enlightened technocrats on one side, and resentful billionaires on the other. Get that great majority back together, and they would be unstoppable."

Thomas Frank

In order to change and regain their party's historical mandate, the Democrats have to abandon their patterns of behaviour adopted and set down in the 1990's.

They may have to get rid of their consultants, and most importantly their methods of fund raising almost exclusively among the professional moneyed class with which they closely identify.

And above all, they must take Hillary Clinton and her class of big money politicians aside, and bid them good luck and goodbye.

They must embrace genuine change,  instead of attempting to imitate reform by continually softening their image with professionally applied makeup, and a cynically thin veneer of identity politics and tribalism.

This is how they have managed to avoid discussing this vast inequality of ours, and addressing, with practical solutions rather reframing the questions with diversionary rhetoric, the slow demise of the long ignored working poor and middle class, which is their traditional base, and their party majority.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - On Top of the World - Le Dénouement, à la Chinoise

“On top of the world,
Or in the depths of despair—
Happy alone is the soul that loves."

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,  Klärchens Lied, aus Egmont

Stocks were on a wild tear higher.

Let's chalk this one up to the words of Fed Chair Jay Powell who sees a strong economy permitting more interest rate increases.

Gold and silver were taken out to the woodshed and beaten lower, with the Dollar slightly higher.

Stocks are putting in another blow off top. Don't try and get in front of them, but this one will end up like the rest.

Our defining character is fraud in the service of Mammon.

And the Deep State is howling a hurricane.

Trumpolini is fortunate in his opposition.  Which is too bad, because he brings out the worst in his followers.  And unfortunately the opposition tries to answer in kind.   Too bad. Darkness cannot defeat darkness.

Little Dolly has been sitting in my lap, shivering with fear, since a cold front bringing thunderstorms has started rolling through. 

As a reminder, there will be a stock options expiration at the end of this week.

And a Comex precious metals option expiration next week on Thursday, the 26th.

The struggle to cover the physical gold withdrawals from the Hong Kong Comex listed warehouses continues. Not to mention the less visible, like Singapore.

There is certainly nothing happening with the gold warehouses in New York.  It is locked down tight, like a morgue.

Gold is flowing from West to East. It is the most striking phenomenon of modern monetary developments. And yet so few see it, and fewer remark on it.

Smells like teen spirit. Or is that desperation? The price action tells us something. What is it?

This is quite a wild party being thrown for us by the elite—   a bonfire of the vanities, we suspect. Part three, le dénouement.

And they all fall down.

Need little, want less, love more. For those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.

Have a pleasant evening.