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Editorial See other Editorial Articles Title: Prelude to Doom Prelude to Doom Looking in the Lion’s Mouth before it Bites End of July 2009 It's the end of the world as we know it. Some of us understand and appreciate this fact and others have their heads stuck in the sands desperately hoping that things can just continue on as they have, certainly we don’t want things to get worse. Only a madman would be hoping things would get worse for himself and his loved ones. But a madman he would not be if the truth be it that the only way a future can be guaranteed, in terms of quality and security, is through going through a purge of many wrongs needing to be made right. System restart, everyone with a computer knows that’s inevitable. Occasionally we have to purge the confusion and denial and everything else that is a lie against the truth. Only then can things return to normalcy. There is so much wrong with our modern civilization it will be a miracle if we can ever make it right. We have accepted the madness of modern day life mostly because we have been addicted to promises and dreams of riches. Also because we are afraid to lose what it is we have. But what is it modern man has that is worth so much? Freedom to drown in debt or to live beyond ones means? The freedom of individuals, companies, banks and nations to feed off the life of other individuals and nations? There is already, and there has always been, a huge amount of suffering on our earth and one of the only things we can be truly certain about is the eventuality of death for everyone and the universal fact that everything does change, except people perhaps. Add to this list of certainties is 8,000 families in America will lose their homes tomorrow (and just about everything else) and that a billion people will go to bed tonight hungry. The US Dollar is suffering from an image problem, tied to the harsh reality of lingering insolvency, growing federal indebtedness, continued syndicate control, and deep fraud. Jim Willie We can also be certain that the US government is broke and does not have the financial muscle to help out its own states many of who feel the noose tightening around their necks. A crisis is brewing in California and other places where too many people are becoming too poor too quickly. The politicians have come to a budget agreement in California but it will drive their state even deeper into crisis. The pain that the settlement will cause its citizens and the national economy is just beginning. California will probably never recover its former glory and if California fails so will the entire US. There is no stopping the downward spiral especially with the fact that policy response to the crisis is a total catastrophe. And the majority of all government budgets rely on far too rosy predictions of tax revenues and other sources of income. States, counties, municipalities, they're falling apart all over the place, and there's no way back for them in their present forms. We are not going back to the unlimited growth scenario with its accompanying unlimited debt model yet most everyone is still planning or pretending it will happen. The tax base will continue to collapse and the states cannot counterfeit (print) money like the federal government can. Dr. Marc Faber says, “The purpose of any crisis is to clean the system. But nothing has been cleaned; it’s gotten worse and worse and worse. This is not the final crisis. The final crisis is one where the whole system will collapse and the whole system will be cleaned.” This week the United States treasury will try to sell 250 billion – that’s a quarter trillion in bonds. At this run rate we would be trying to sell twelve trillion dollars over one year's time, an obviously ridiculous and impossible amount of debt to peddle at any price. Yet the stock market hit 9,000 today meaning, if you have not noticed, now the market goes up with the really bad news. But importantly, bond prices slid meaning interest rates went up and that is real bad news if that kind of movement persists. The financial laws of gravity are exactly that: laws. The narcotics of hope and denial cannot repeal them, just as they cannot make a butterfly turn into a 747. Stewart Dougherty The true scale of the crisis has remained hidden behind a veil of constant and ongoing deliberate distortion of reality. The world we are living in is falling apart at the seams and yet the band plays on for those with money still in their pockets. “This is the biggest Crack-up Boom in history as the whole world is aboard, rather than one irresponsible government. We are looking at mass insanity at the highest levels of leadership and central banks in the world, as well as the broad public sector,” writes Ty Andros. The skies are darkening giving us all indications that it will be a bitter, dangerous, harsh time for all Americans and many people around the world. The German export association BGA has warned of a "massive credit squeeze" by late summer. 1 Forbes Nobody in all of history has been able to find a solution to the problems of a malignant, distorted, big-government “services” economy choking on obscene levels of both public and private debt. Sheer incompetence and unlimited greed has all but destroyed The United States of America and the global fabric of the financial system but everything is still ok if you talk to most Americans. But some are starting to get angry and for good reason. State expenses are tough to cut dramatically without having serious effects on public services and the public lifestyle. John Paul Mitchell Collapsing financial fundamentals are strangling countries, states, counties and cities in the USA and elsewhere around the world. California has already passed the point of no return with an uncertain future and an economy larger than most countries and other states are not far behind. The contraction in economic activity is about to accelerate as states start cutting back on just about everything in a rush to balance their budgets. This is going to be a subject more frequently reported in the coming months. Municipal bankruptcies and service interruptions will be the most significant factor to affect American citizens over the next few years but that still hard for most to imagine. Things are really bad, about to get worse, then terrible and then the real crisis and panic will set in and then we are in for a real nightmare. America’s financial position with the rest of the world has deteriorated dramatically as of late. Three decades of massive trade deficits have turned the United States from the world’s top lender to the world’s largest debtor and now it cannot possibly pay its debts and its economy is dropping like a stone and deflating like a hot air balloon. Only in the world of fantasy can the American government go on with its fiscal madness yet that is exactly what it will continue to do until the last possible moment. Then it too will have to cut its budget and that’s when the end game time will come. Before that happens it will be the States that fold. If states begin to file for bankruptcy then we have to anticipate widespread panic as state funded services and programs will be closed down quite quickly. Confusion amongst political leadership and the citizenry could easily flourish and then it would be no surprise, not long after the states file bankruptcy, that we would see martial law declared by the President of the United States, as a means to bring order and peace. Banks are aggressively cutting credit lines back while at the same time increasing interest rates at the flimsiest excuse, all in an attempt to cut their exposure to people who would otherwise "charge and run" as a last act of desperation before they sink under the waves. If you can get away with it like the federal government can it’s a good moment, if one has no hope to pay ones debts, to "charge and run," especially if you have somewhere to run to. Sooner or later, or already - creditors will begin to cut back on the biggest credit line on the planet, the one extended to the US Federal Government. Meanwhile it is still running like a mad dog let go from its leash and just cannot seem to manage without at least one or two wars to fight. Whether it is countries, states or individuals, the more in denial we remain the worse the consequences will rain down on us as we are caught unprepared to face reality. Throughout this financial crisis the United States is accumulating a huge amount of debt (even though consumers are paying down a bit on their personal debts) and that’s crazy since the problem was mountains of debt in the first place. Thus the crisis is only threatening more intensely as time goes on as the amount of debt that will eventually have to be defaulted on staggers on to levels that are incomprehensible even to minds familiar with mathematics and the laws of gravity. America’s gold cannot protect it from the national wealth wipeout that intensifies each and every day as $5,479,000,000.00 is borrowed (5.479 billion) to fund the federal deficit. Vallejo, a city on San Pablo Bay just north of San Francisco, has reduced its police force from 155 to 115, closed three fire stations, and halted capital projects that include road and sidewalk maintenance. Christian Science Monitor During this entire crisis a small group of men and women have amassed enormous wealth and power at the expense of the millions who are now unemployed and whose homes have been foreclosed. To be specific here lets mention the news that Goldman Sachs made more money this last quarter then at any other time in its 140 year old history earning 3.4 billion, which it will promptly share with its employees in the form of lush bonuses. Yes it is literally raining money on certain people’s lives. “The entire world notices the circus acts under the US Government and Wall Street tents. Goldman Sachs sits in position as parasitic octopus, public serpent, sponsored vampire, take your pick on the description. The Wall Street syndicate openly denies the people, the states, and almost all but the largest businesses,” writes Jim Willie. “The financial events of the past year demonstrate beyond any reasonable doubt that the United States government is now of Wall Street, by Wall Street and for Wall Street, in general, and of, by and for Goldman Sachs, in particular. This inversion of power and privilege was partly brought about by an explosion in government debt. The government relies on Wall Street to roll over existing and sell new debt issues. Debt is now hitting the market like a tidal wave, given the country’s record-shattering deficits and costly Wall Street bailouts. If the paper cannot be sold at expected interest rates, then the debt-addicted system will go into seizure,” writes Stewart Dougherty. The worst of the economic crisis has not yet hit. Paul Craig Roberts Actually you have to be an astrophysicist and understand black holes and how you cannot see them even when they are right next to you because they don’t emit light. There is a black hole eating the entire financial system and there is no stopping it. You get too close to a black hole and it becomes impossible to escape its gravity. This process is most visible in the moment with the US fiscal deficit running into falling tax revenues yielding the need to borrow trillions of dollars that few and fewer investors and countries want to lend. But it’s invisibly sucking in planets of banks and loans and credit and with them everything and eventually everyone else. The White House is being forced to acknowledge the wide gap between its once-upbeat predictions about the economy and today's bleak landscape. Associated Press The crisis staring America in its face and threatening to bring it to its knees are the astounding unemployment numbers that are building up month by month. The employment situation is an unmitigated disaster with things about to get worse. Forget about the numbers the government publishes or at least double them to begin to get an idea of how bad things already are. The roof is caving in on struggling American families that have already seen the value of their homes and retirement accounts decimated. Those thousands of American families a day going into foreclosure are ripping the guts out of America. Foreclosures. I’ve never been foreclosed on. I can only imagine what it must feel like, be like. Having to tell your little children that they will never see their home again. That they will now live with grandma, or in a smaller place, or a tent. No one will say it but sooner or later the federal government is going to have to cut back on its own employment as even its unhinged printing press and Federal Reserve System cannot continue to support its megalomania. The federal government has devoted $4.7 trillion to help the financial sector through its crisis, a level of assistance equal to about one-third of the overall U.S. economy, special inspector general Neil Barofsky reported in July. Under the worst of circumstances, the report said, the government's maximum exposure could total nearly $24 trillion or $80,000 for every American. What is presently occurring will soon blow up in America’s and the world’s face with the press no longer able to hide the elephant stampeding around the living room. But the boys at Goldman Sachs are happy making new fortunes and giving bonuses like there is no tomorrow. For them it’s a wonderful time to get richer. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain. Napoleon Bonaparte There is no avoiding the necessary contraction in GDP to bring the system back into balance, and the longer we continue to allow our government and media to lie about what has happened, who is responsible, and what has to happen before the economy can clear and recover the worse off we will be. At some point reality must be faced, and we may as well do it now while we still have civil order but that’s not the way its going to be so reality will continue to darken until what is fragile, the entire financial system, shatters. James Corbett says, “The banksters and bureaucrats are sharpening their knives, preparing to butcher what's left of the carcass of the United States,” and that is true as they cut the skin right off the taxpayers back. This is nothing new. Many years ago Congressman Louis T. McFadden who, for more than ten years, served as chairman of the Banking and Currency Committee, stated that the international bankers are a "dark crew of financial pirates who would cut a man's throat to get a dollar out of his pocket... They prey upon the people of these United States." www.youtube.com/watch?v=V...4&feature=player_embedded www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoQrYa_NKQQ&feature=related Listen to Max Keiser nailing Goldman Sachs to the wall in a barrage of truth, which few still have the courage to face. When interest rates rise the stage will be set for the next colossal bust. The US economy is lurching towards economic Armageddon with long-term interest rates on course to double, crippling the country’s ability to pay its debts and potentially plunging it into something deeper and blacker than the Great Depression. Think I am exaggerating? In a 2003 paper, Thomas Laubach, the US Federal Reserve’s senior economist, calculated the impact on long-term interest rates of rising fiscal deficits and soaring national debt. Applying his assumptions to the recent spike in the US fiscal deficit and national debt, long-term interest rates will double from their current 3.5pc.2 We are on the brink of something far worse than the Great Depression. We are at one of those moments of history where many people’s destinies will change. Our horizons will contract drastically as we move towards a far more local world than we have now. The mass media has been able to successfully calm the masses these last six months but the fundamental crisis is building behind the curtains and ready to explode into full view. It is the end of July and the unfolding story presented here is like looking into a lions mouth just before he is about to bite. China knows the dollars’ days are numbered and they must liquidate the once preferred reserve asset before it eventually collapses leaving them with nothing but worthless paper.3 Mike Hoy The only thing holding up America at this point is the continued willingness and need of China, Japan, Brazil and Russia’s to continue to buy US Treasuries to fund the federal budget deficit, which has gotten truly obscene. There are even rumors going around that the Federal Reserve is so desperate that they are lending money to foreign central banks so they can use these funds to buy treasury notes that no one else wants to buy. The congress recently confronted Helicopter Ben to no avail, about the half a trillion dollars loaned out by the Federal Reserve to central banks of other countries so they could turn around and lend that money to their local banking systems. One easily gets dizzy trying to follow the labyrinths, the money trails and financial instruments stacked to the stratosphere of hundreds of trillions. Derivatives are what line the walls of financial black holes. They have appropriately been described as weapons of mass destruction; they are something that just cannot be maintained. Their very existence is a blasphemy against sanity. They were used to destroy. And the news is China is turning its back on the United States and no one was ever under the illusion they were really friends. Reality already looks like an advancing line of thunderstorms ready to break loose yet no one can predict exactly how and when events will rain down on us in full force. It makes sense that this next drop off the cliff will make the 2008 journey down look like a walk around the park. More than several people are predicting the financial system will crumble again in the September/October period.4 Without sustainable growth, "billions of people will be condemned to poverty and much of civilization will collapse.” This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet – obtained by The Independent ahead of its official publication in August. Backed by a diverse range of leading organizations such as Unesco, the World Bank, the US army and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 State of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe. We are not going to go back to the sustainable growth model but into constant contraction with no bottom in site. The growth model of the world economy is broken and steadily contracting though not quite in free fall as it was at the end of 2008. So the big boys are telling us about a civilization collapse so don’t be surprised if that is exactly what we get. Paul Krugman asks, “Is America on its way to becoming a boiled frog? I’m referring, of course, to the proverbial frog that, placed in a pot of cold water that is gradually heated, never realizes the danger it’s in and is boiled alive. Real frogs will, in fact, jump out of the pot — but never mind. The hypothetical boiled frog is a useful metaphor for a very real problem: the difficulty of responding to disasters that creep up on you a bit at a time. And creeping disasters are what we mostly face these days.” "Unless we demonstrate a strong commitment to fiscal sustainability in the longer term, we will have neither financial stability nor healthy economic growth," Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke recently told Congress. And of course the last thing you will see from the federal government in the United States is a strong commitment to fiscal sustainability so truly we can expect the worst. One thing has become crystal clear during this crisis - the monetary elite take care of its banking system and largest corporations first and foremost. This is done to "save the system" - but it becomes clear, if one looks closely, that the banking system is in a long-term bubble, worldwide, and this is what central bankers are desperately blowing back up. Not the system nor the economy, but the bank distribution system that facilitates fiat money. All of the world’s paper currencies will eventually be inflated away, and in this case that will happen once the credit bubble has finished deflating and the international debt financing model is broken. Meaning expect continued deflation before the monster of hyperinflation takes over. It is going to be a hairy ride but we should allow some time as deflation and depression are self-reinforcing, and during that downward spiral it will be impossible to inflate though the Federal Reserve will try to do so in absolute desperation. If the state takes more of our money, we will be forced to make decisions on street lights or more public safety or other untenable forces. Craig Whitton Assistant city manager of Vallejo Ca. We are in new and unchartered territory though with both inflation and deflation forces at war and we are likely to get punched where it really hurts with food prices that are going to soar into the stratosphere as world agricultural production goes through its own independent crash. We have a lot more to worry about than a financial collapse. Strauss & Howe offer a chilling warning: “History offers no guarantees. Obviously, things could go horribly wrong – the possibilities ranging from a nuclear exchange to incurable plagues, from terrorist anarchy to high-tech dictatorship. We should not assume that Providence will always exempt our nation from the irreversible tragedies that have overtaken so many others: not just temporary hardship, but debasement and total ruin.” Some people waste time trying to decide whether politicians will wake up from their madness and have the strength to face the truth, or not. They will not because they cannot since they are not of the truth, they don’t live it. If you can see the truth about denial and the fact that the world’s leadership are all doing exactly the wrong thing you will begin to understand that we will soon enter a period of personal and financial survivalism. Stewart Dougherty writes, “If you believe that the nation will not face reality, then you must immediately begin to put your affairs in order. Those who think ahead will be able to survive the whirlwind that denial will unleash. But those who stand before such a tornado, unprepared, have poor and more likely tragic prospects.” Yes get ready to get local, go local. We will be lucky if we still have the World Wide Web after all the dust clears. Travel will certainly be curtailed and resources and overall wealth will be even further concentrated in few and fewer hands. Clearly we could see a sea of have-nots pitted against a receding island of the upper middle class. On the FOFOA site we read, “Through the process of watching this slow-motion train wreck (still ongoing), the consensus opinion about danger in the system has shifted from an imminent threat to a long-term threat but all signs are pointing to a crisis moment coming down the tracks in the fall of 2009. When the rubber band breaks this time it will snap back with a speed and fury that will make your head spin. In fact, I think that the longer this drags out (and I'm only talking weeks and months now), the more abrupt the correction will be. While at one time it may have happened over a month, it could now happen overnight! The laws of economics can only be violated for a limited time frame. I look forward to a new beginning for the entire system. A healthy start like we have not seen in generations.” Bill Bonner concludes, “In our book, recovery is impossible anyway. Because the pre-crisis economy had reached the terminal stages of the credit cycle. It was like someone in the terminal stages of a fatal illness. After they have died, you don't wish that they could recover...and be just like they were before they died. They were sick and dying then! No, you sign the book of memories and condolences and turn the page. You let new life take the place of the dead. You move on. But the feds have their ghoulish agenda. They have the poor thing on life-support. One tube feeds the oxygen of easy credit. Another drips in more 'stimulus.' The economy rattles every time it breathes. Dead companies, such as GM, say they are reborn. But take away the tubes...and they collapse.” Mark Sircus Ac., OMD Director International Medical Veritas Association publications.imva.info Special Note: In the spirit of my compendium Survival Medicine for the 21st Century I would tell people it’s a good time to stock up on medical basics like magnesium chloride, iodine, sodium bicarbonate, clay and other basic items like lots of vitamin C in the best form possible. The millions of people who are going to be forced into swine flu vaccines in the near future had better know and have on hand these substances that can mitigate the damages these vaccines will bring. It’s essential to have on hand a well stocked medicine cabinet. Spirulina can double as a nutritional medicine and a survival food and there has never been a time like now to plant a garden and learn how to use probiotics and magnesium oil to treat and fertilize the soil. It’s also a good time to buy gold and stash some cash and to communicate with people around you that you trust about what is going on. 1 www.forbes.com/2009/07/15...-markets-economy-ecb.html 2 www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/5754447/US-lurching-towards-debt-explosion-with-long-term-interest-rates-on-course-to-double.html 3 news.goldseek.com/GoldSeek/1248073740.php 4 www.henrymakow.com/perhaps_we_should_prepare_for.html Legal Notice:The Author specifically invokes the First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and of the press without prejudice. The information written is published for informational purposes only under the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment of the Constitution for the United States of America, and should not in any way be used as a substitute for the advice of a physician or other licensed health care practitioner. The statements contained herein have not been evaluated by the FDA. The products discussed herein are not intended to diagnose, cure, prevent or treat any disease. Images, text and logic are copyright protected. ALL rights are explicitly reserved without prejudice, and no part of this essay may be reproduced except by written consent. ©2009 by Mark Sircus Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
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