Propaganda Campaign Attempts to Mask the Economic Risks and Reality
by ilene - March 10th, 2010 5:35 pm
Propaganda Campaign Attempts to Mask the Economic Risks and Reality
Courtesy of JESSE’S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
The propaganda campaign by the US government is trying to mask the fact that the economic recovery plan is failing and that America is rapidly losing confidence in Team Obama.
You cannot have a sustained recovery without changing the underlying conditions that caused the failure in the first place.
In addition to the media blitz dissected by Yves Smith in the essay excerpted below, I have never seen such a load of rubbish being put forward with regard to the markets in US financial assets and commodities, and I have seen quite a bit in the last twenty years. In particular, the campaigns against gold and silver in particular are heavy-handed, obvious, and reaching the point of hysteria.
The shorts are trapped, hopelessly trapped, and unable to deliver on their massive short positions. They are only able to manipulate the price in short term bursts, and continue to dig themselves deeper as the world demand continues to drain them.
Whoever heard of a bubble in which the major money center banks are so perilously short it? A bubble requires a broad participation and belief, and the encouragement of the market makers. And now a statement from an "SEC official" that there is a gold bubble. This, from the very people who allegedly could not see the tech, housing and credit bubbles until they fell on top of them.
And of course there are the funds and the wealthy, who mouth the same party line while lining their portfolios with huge positions and personal holdings.
Various exigencies can compel the big players to make statements swearing gold and silver are no good, no store of value against all the evidence of history. But the fact remains that the US dollar reserve currency regime is falling apart, tumbling like the humpty-dumpty construct that it is. And the status quo is shitting their collective pants about it, and the likely backlash from the public when their deceptions are exposed.
Don’t expect the Ancien Régime fiancier to fall easily, quietly, or quickly. But it will change; change is the only inevitability. And we all suspect what…
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Consumers Ask – What Recovery?
by ilene - February 24th, 2010 2:23 pm
Consumers Ask – What Recovery?
Courtesy of Tom Lindmark at But Then What
So, a weak consumer confidence survey confirms what anyone with an ounce of sense and the ability to engage in social conversation with a broad swath of Americans could have told you months ago. A lot of people are hurting and those that aren’t know too many who are and are, therefore, terrified that they could be next in line.
Outside of New York and Washington, things are bleak even for those who are employed. Everyone is looking over their shoulders just to make sure that the ax isn’t poised above their neck. Supposedly secure occupations like teachers, cops and firemen don’t look so untouchable any longer. Cities and states that government workers were counting upon to come through with their retirement packages are teetering and just to make the potion more distasteful, new taxes, fees and surcharges are being piled onto already stretched budgets.
John Carney has a good post up about what went wrong or more appropriately why all the great thinkers got this recovery talk all wrong. Here’s a bit of what he has to say, but take a couple of minutes and read the whole post:
Why was it different this time? The problem this time is that we’re in what the Keynesians would call a “liquidity trap.” Consumers, having been savaged by the housing bubble and its consequences, continue to be fearful of the future. Government regulation is making consumer spending more difficult by increasing capitalization requirement for banks and squeezing consumer access to credit. Huge debt overhangs from the boom still have many people trying to pay down debts instead of engaging in new spending. To put it briefly, the supply of funds to fuel economic growth is still very low because cautious Americans do not have faith in the recovery.
Economic planners will describe the situation as an “excess liquidity preference” and recommend more government spending to push the economy toward higher employment. Unfortunately, unless we’re really lucky, much of this government spending will likely be long-term destructive because it will direct funds in the wrong directions because it isn’t subject to market discipline. In any case, the current political atmosphere seems particularly unwelcoming to additional deficit spending. So we’d better hunker down and get ourselves adjusted to an economy with a
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the site