How do they do it? If everything is 'so bad', how does the 'system' appear to be holding together? In a nutshell, the answer to this question is 'life is still good' for most, although these numbers are dwindling rapidly as process unfolds. Even for those where life is not so good, again, most are still eating and have a roof over their heads, but again here, these numbers are dwindling a well. So, it's important to understand the upshot of all this is with the exception of the top 1% people's economies are in decline, and this deterioration is accelerating as late cycle characteristics / consequences of a mature fiat currency economy(s) take hold. Therein, US government debt held by the pubic is up some 90% since just 2009, and if Obamacare is rammed through, the rate at which this debt is shoved down America's throat it will accelerate higher yet again. (i.e. accelerated public debt financing will be required to fund Obamacare on top of the fact it's the biggest nominal tax grab in history.)
Von Misses termed accelerating inflation moving into hyper-shift as a 'crack up boom', which eventually becomes noticeable by the populous in spite of their best efforts to ignore (denial) outsized purchasing power declines. And again, increasingly, as process unfolds, cognitive dissonance is replaced with replaced with fear, anger (think 5 stages of loss), and frustration (especially those under 30), where exponentially growing numbers will become unable to keep pace with rising costs and are essentially priced out of existence. Because there's nothing like increasing hunger to wake the complacent, where once awakened, people tend to be at least a little cranky. People have put all their faith in government these days, and once this trust is shattered, with an extended government shutdown the possible trigger in this respect, things could spiral out of control for not just an overly complacent public, for the 'powers that be' as well.
Because the people tasked with making everything look 'just fine' have been using up every trick in the book to pull off this farce, and this will literally be impossible to keep up much longer no matter what intensified trickery these nut bars come to with moving forward. They have already taken things to the limit in this regard; with the net result being you have unknowingly been committed to the suicide mission they are unwittingly imposing on collective society in a drunken stupor of avarice for power and money. Certainly present shenanigans concerning the debt ceiling and the rest of governments confusing mess (the present intensifying embroil) is our current example of this.
You may remember this is not my first discussion on the 'suicide mission' theme, revisiting my thoughts on the subject from a few years back entitled Journey To Babel, borrowed from an on old Star Trek episode in order to make this point, attached here. Let's take the trip back shall we, with the following:
"On stardate 3842.3, the starship USS Enterprise, under the command of Captain James T. Kirk is transporting Federation ambassadors to the Babel Conference to discuss the admission to the Federation of the Coridan system. The system is a prime source of dilithium crystals but is also underpopulated and unprotected. Mining rights are disputed by many warring species who have strong reasons for keeping Coridan out of the Federation.
Formal negotiations are to take place on a neutral planetoid called Babel, but preliminary diplomacy begins aboard the Enterprise. Meanwhile, Communications Officer Lt. Uhura has detected an encoded transmission beamed from the Enterprise to a fast-moving vessel at the extreme edge of sensor range. The unidentified vessel closes in to attack the Enterprise, moving at extreme speed; far faster than the Enterprise can lock weapons on it. Kirk orders Thelev (a member of the Andorian delegation) brought to the bridge and questions him about his and the attacking ship's motives, though Thelev is evasive.
The ongoing attack damages the Enterprise and Kirk decides to try a ruse, shutting down internal power to make the Enterprise appear crippled. This lures the attacker to slowly approach and the Enterprise damages it with a surprise phaser counterattack. The disabled ship self-destructs, and Thelev reveals that both he and the ship were on suicide missions; he then collapses and dies from a delayed-action poison.
In the aftermath, Spock speculates that Thelev and the attacking ship were of Orion origin and the speed and power of the latter were consistent with a suicide mission, with all energy dedicated to attack and none for defense. Thelev's mission aboard the Enterprise, Kirk and Spock presume, was to sow distrust among the Federation members and weaken the Enterprise (by killing Kirk) prior to the attack. (i.e. to confuse and confound.)
Taken from the Wikipedia synopsis of the Star Trek Original Series in the 60's, the above encapsulates salient features (for our purposes) of an episode that was entitled 'Journey To Babel', where not surprisingly (considering Roddenberry's incredible talent and intellect), a meaningful sophistry (manufactured parallel) can be drawn between it and today's monetary system, it too on an undeclared and unavoidable suicide mission. Indeed, in what will come as a 'big surprise' to most once it unravels, you should know our present fiat currency based economy(s) are well within the time of what would appear as a suicide mission to sane trustees of a nations wealth. (i.e. think the Austrian School) And eventually it will be understood by all (when some degree of hyperinflation arrives) that the bad actors in charge of our money (economies, markets, etc.) today are nothing more than marauding power barons, interested solely in furthering their own hidden agenda(s). (i.e. much like the Andorians.)
Unfortunately for us however, we do not have James Kirk and Mr. Spock to take care of the bad guys. Nope - they have been allowed to run free since that faithful day on Jekell Island when the Federal Reserve was created, that group of 'bad guys' whose sole purpose is to defraud the citizenry of the United States (and world). And since 1971, when Nixon abandoned what was left of the global gold standard, they now do their dirty work (clandestine wealth confiscation via currency debasement) unrestrained by any measure associated with Mother Earth (historically currencies have been commodity based in order to maintain harmony with the natural world), where in doing so, have set us on what amounts to a suicide mission with respect to the larger economy due to years of excessive and unchecked growth in currency (of increasing varieties these days), GDP, etc. Yes, they have fostered quite the bubble economy for us to survive, where increasing money printing sponsors serial pockets of price increases, speculation, and popping noises eventually as all good things (heavy on the sarcasm) must come to an end. (i.e. God will come down on the Tower of Bable one day and confound their speech [fraud].)"
Of course nothing has changed since last year, and in fact, things have become worse in many respects despite higher stock prices. Because higher stock prices are just an illusion in order to plicate an increasingly embattle public, a public that is for the most part unaware what is happen to them, being used by the establishment to further the interests of the top 1%. But how can this be - how can stocks be going up if things are getting worse? Call it what you want - I will call it Kabuki Theatre -- Kabuki Theatre with the help of a money machine (think central banks) pumping up the balloon with increasing amounts of fiat currency. Here's the routine - create a fake embroil - provide relief - create another embroil - provide relief.
So fear mongering and fake embroils are created with the help of establishment agents (think the Matrix) like CNBC presstitutes that causes unaware speculators to short the stock market - and subsequently be squeezed out there positions when some good news magically appears. (i.e. likely some bogus government statistic.)
Now, while it's true the S&P 500 (SPX) is up some 20% this year (and more than doubled from 2009 lows), unfortunately the average hedge fund manager has been duped by this ruse (they've been short and buying expensive puts), only up a paltry 3%. The sad part of this is the government is using Psychology 101 on us, and for the most part it's been working, which is bring us closer and closer to financial / societal / system collapse. Again, the idea here is to get you to associate 'big government' with all the things they want, which in addition to being your 'sugar daddy', include your doctor, via repetitive conditioning, when in actuality they are attempting to rape the patient. What's worse, some day a dysfunctional government will no longer be able to provide any form of relief, which increasing factions of our bloated and dumbed down society are now discovering.
Thus, growing numbers are now coming to the realization they have been duped, and in fact unwittingly become victims of the establishment's suicide mission they have imposed on all of us in their avarice for wealth and power. All we need now is for reality to take over for the hope that's been driving stocks higher and the increasing complexity that has been holding things together will 'do a 180', with the secular bear market in stocks reasserting itself. And no amount of Kabuki Theatre can change that because it's mathematical - and it can seen in the charts. So, while it's true stocks still appear poised for higher prices (and gold for lower trajectories), what's important for you to know is the final sequence of the cyclical / counter-trend moves in stocks and precious metals that has gripped pricing these past few years, as defined in stock index to gold ratios, is set to reverse soon. (See Figure 1)
Figure 1
How can I be so sure stocks are heading higher and gold lower? The answer to this question is found in the positioning of the Rate Of Change (ROC) indictor on the monthly SPX / Gold Ratio plot pictured above, where once it break higher from indicated 'sine resistance', it should have another strong advance higher. What this means is all the shenanigans associated with Washington the increasingly intense (but still manufactured) embroils that have the masses hypnotized right now will at some point in the not too distant future be magically resolved, triggering yet another relief rally in stocks. And hey, when stocks are going up nobody needs precious metals right (wink - wink), so expect the goon squad on Wall Street to be big sellers here once again, as well. Again, we are still anticipating a move in the Dow / Gold Ratio to the 233-month exponential moving average (EMA) before secular trends reassert themselves. (See Figure 2)
Figure 2
Now some of you may think I've been harping on this Dow / Gold Ratio thingy too much of late, however it should be noticed no other technical condition in the markets neither better encapsulates the general condition of the macro, nor of the lengths the bureaucracy, and its price mangers, will go to keep the masses placated. One must remember that's the job of government in these 'tough times' - to keep the populous 'dazed and confused' so that their exploitation goes unnoticed. I bring this up because in reference to the above charts / relationships someone asked not too long ago, 'what would cause present trends to reverse once again?' In simple terms, my answer was that markets posses' similar characteristics of the physical world, because they are derivatives of it, and that energy and masse play roles in this regard. The task is to find the proper mathematical measure to follow, which again, is the 233-month EMA on the above.
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