– This Is The Cartoon Germany Hands Out To Sexually Frustrated Refugees
Global News
Albert Edwards, Strategist At Societe Generale: Here Comes the Biggest Stock Market Crash in a Generation
– Analyst: Here Comes the Biggest Stock Market Crash in a Generation:
You don’t have to listen very hard to hear the bears growling on Wall Street, London, or Paris these days. Indeed, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down another 300 points on Wednesday to just under 16,200
With the U.S. stock market sagging, oil off to its worst start ever, and the China’s economy continuing to deteriorate, bearish analysts have a wealth of evidence to point to.
And they don’t come much more bearish than Albert Edwards, strategist at Société Générale. He’s not had much nice to say about the global economy in years, and recent events have only hardened his convictions that the world is headed for disaster, and will take the prices of equities down with it. How much? Edwards predicts the U.S. stock market could plunge as much as 75%. That would be worse than during the financial crisis, in which stocks from their peak to trough dropped a brutal 62%.
Zombies Keep Walking Into Traffic, Distracted By Their Mobile Phones
Addiction to mobile devices is a growing problem in America. It’s gotten to the point where people are so distracted that they will walk right into traffic, fall off train platforms, or even fall right off a cliff.
As Americans plug their entire existence into their mobile devices, they give away the now, sacrificing the present moment, and sometimes sacrificing their lives.
Read moreZombies Keep Walking Into Traffic, Distracted By Their Mobile Phones
Switzerland follows Denmark’s lead to seize assets from refugees to pay for upkeep
– Switzerland follows Denmark’s lead to seize assets from refugees to pay for upkeep:
Switzerland says it will introduce legislation which will force refugees to hand over cash and valuables to the authorities to help pay for their upkeep. The move by the Swiss follows a similar plan implemented by Denmark.Refugees arriving in the Alpine nation will have to turn over any assets they possess which are worth more than 1,000 Swiss francs ($997).
“If you have property worth more than 1,000 Swiss francs when you arrive at a reception center you are required to give up these financial assets in return for a receipt,” an information sheet for refugees states, as cited by Reuters.
Read moreSwitzerland follows Denmark’s lead to seize assets from refugees to pay for upkeep
Hyperinflation & Gold – World’s Most Famous Case Of Hyperinflation
The World’s Most Famous Case of Hyperinflation (Part 1)
The Money Project is an ongoing collaboration between Visual Capitalist and Texas Precious Metals that seeks to use intuitive visualizations to explore the origins, nature, and use of money.
The Great War ended on the 11th hour of November 11th, 1918, when the signed armistice came into effect.
Though this peace would signal the end of the war, it would also help lead to a series of further destruction: this time the destruction of wealth and savings.
The world’s most famous hyperinflation event, which took place in Germany from 1921 and 1924, was a financial calamity that led millions of people to have their savings erased.
The Treaty of Versailles
Five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the Treaty of Versailles was signed, officially ending the state of war between Germany and the Allies.
The terms of the agreement, which were essentially forced upon Germany, made the country:
- Accept blame for the war
- Agree to pay £6.6 billion in reparations (equal to $442 billion in USD today)
- Forfeit territory in Europe as well as its colonies
- Forbid Germany to have submarines or an air force, as well as a limited army and navy
- Accept the Rhineland, a strategic area bordering France and other countries, to be fully demilitarized.
“I believe that the campaign for securing out of Germany the general costs of the war was one of the most serious acts of political unwisdom for which our statesmen have ever been responsible.”
– John Maynard Keynes, representative of the British TreasuryKeynes believed the sums being asked of Germany in reparations were many times more than it was possible for Germany to pay. He thought that this could create large amounts of instability with the global financial system.
The Catalysts
1. Germany had suspended the Mark’s convertibility into gold at the beginning of war.
This created two separate versions of the same currency:
Goldmark: The Goldmark refers to the version on the gold standard, with 2790 Mark equal to 1 kg of pure gold. This meant: 1 USD = 4 Goldmarks, £1 = 20.43 Goldmarks
Papiermark: The Papiermark refers to the version printed on paper. These were used to finance the war.
In fear that Germany would run the printing presses, the Allies specified that reparations must be paid in the Goldmarks and raw materials of equivalent value.2. Heavy Debt
Even before reparations, Germany was already in significant debt. The country had borrowed heavily during the war with expectations that it would be won, leaving the losers repay the loans.
Adding together previous debts with the reparations, debt exceeded Germany’s GDP.
3. Inability to Pay
The burden of payments was high. The country’s economy had been damaged by the war, and the loss of Germany’s richest farmland (West Prussia) and the Saar coalfields did not help either.
Foreign speculators began to lose confidence in Germany’s ability to pay, and started betting against the Mark.
Foreign banks and businesses expected increasingly large amounts of German money in exchange for their own currency. It became very expensive for Germany to buy food and raw materials from other countries.
Germany began mass printing bank notes to buy foreign currency, which was in turn used to pay reparations.
4. Invasion of The Ruhr
After multiple defaults on payments of coal and timber, the Reparation Commission voted to occupy Germany’s most important industrial lands (The Ruhr) to enforce the payment of reparations.
French and Belgian troops invaded in January 1923 and began The Occupation of The Ruhr.
German authorities promoted the spirit of passive resistance, and told workers to “do nothing” to help the invaders. In other words, The Ruhr was in a general strike, and income from one of Germany’s most important industrial areas was gone.
On top of that, more and more banknotes had to be printed to pay striking workers.
Hyperinflation
Just two calendar years after the end of the war, the Papiermark was worth 10% of its original value. By the end of 1923, it took 1 trillion Papiermarks to buy a single Goldmark.
All cash savings had lost their value, and the prudent German middleclass savers were inexplicably punished.
Learn about the effects of German hyperinflation, how it was curtailed, and about other famous hyperinflations in Part 2 (released sometime the week of Jan 18-22, 2016).
US Intelligence director’s personal e-mail, phone hacked
– US Intelligence director’s personal e-mail, phone hacked:
“Crackas With Attitude”: We routed Clapper’s calls to Free Palestine Movement.
The same individual or group claiming to be behind a recent breach of the personal e-mail account of CIA Director John Brennan now claims to be behind the hijacking of the accounts of Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence confirmed to Motherboard that Clapper was targeted and that the case has been forwarded to law enforcement.
U.S. Government Program Seeks To Build Smart Nuclear Bomb
A jet fighter drops a mock B61 model 12 bomb that zeroes in on the target zone, as part of a $10 billion United States government program that seeks to build a smart atom bomb of great precision.
– As U.S. Modernizes Nuclear Weapons, ‘Smaller’ Leaves Some Uneasy:
…
The United States military is replacing the fixed tail section of the B61 bomb with steerable fins and adding other advanced technology. The result is a bomb that can make more accurate nuclear strikes and a warhead whose destructive power can be adjusted to minimize collateral damage and radioactive fallout.
As Mr. Obama enters his final year in office, the debate has deep implications for military strategy, federal spending and his legacy.
The B61 Model 12, the bomb flight-tested last year in Nevada, is the first of five new warhead types planned as part of an atomic revitalization estimated to cost up to $1 trillion over three decades. As a family, the weapons and their delivery systems move toward the small, the stealthy and the precise.
Read moreU.S. Government Program Seeks To Build Smart Nuclear Bomb
How To Tap A Birch Tree – Birch Sap – Birkensaft Zapfen (Videos)
Just don’t boil/cook (= kill) nature’s perfect water!
The second video mentions that research has shown that birch sap has cancer healing properties. Not if you buy it bottled and pasteurized! Have to drink it fresh to have that anti-cancer effect.
For the same reason bottled (pasteurized) juices, incl. coconut water, are pretty much useless.
The tree has to defend itself against fungi, bacteria and viruses and so its cancer fighting properties should not be surprising for those that know that every cancerous tumor is full of parasites.
Birch sap is nature’s distilled water with lots of organic minerals, vital nutrients and vital energy in it.
Same method can be used with maple trees.
In a survival situation this knowledge might be very useful.
Try this during springtime and enjoy the sap!
* * *
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjlfu608L70
* * *
The birch in this video has been growing like that, because it is probably growing above a water vein:
* * *
Video is in German, but the (relatively non invasive, compared to drilling) branch-bottle method is self-explanatory…
At 14:46 into the video you see the results…
Baltic Dry Crashes Under 400 – US Freight Volumes Fall For First Time In 3 Years
– US Freight Volumes Fall For First Time In 3 Years As Baltic Dry Crashes Under 400:
For the first time in three years and before that the recession, the total volume of freight moved by road, rail, pipeline, inland waterways and air has fallen Y/Y. Meanwhile, on the high seas, the Baltic Dry has collapsed under 400.
Norway Pushes Panic Button: “We’re In A Crisis Now, We Can’t Deny That”
– Norway Pushes Panic Button: “We’re In A Crisis Now, We Can’t Deny That”:
Slumping crude prices are weighing heavily on Norway’s economy as the government looks to its $830 billion sovereign wealth fund to plug budget holes and pay for fiscal stimulus. Officials hope a weaker krone can serve as a shock absorber but with Mario Draghi stuck in easing mode, that may prove to be an increasingly dubious proposition.
CONSUMER DROWNING SORROWS AT THE BAR
– CONSUMER DROWNING SORROWS AT THE BAR:
Month after month I watch as the MSM mouthpieces try to spin declining consumer spending in a positive light. They are practically out of excuses. They are befuddled, because month after month they report “awesome” job gains and can’t understand why all these gainfully employed Americans aren’t buying shit they don’t need like they used to. These faux journalists, spouting propaganda for their ruling class bosses, are willfully ignorant of the fact the job gains are in low paying part-time jobs and the fact that Obamacare and record high rents are sapping any discretionary income households would use to buy stuff.
Despite the propaganda from the media and happy talk from the Liar-in-Chief, the country is currently in a recession and the Fed has no ammo to fake another recovery. We are going down and going down hard. When 70% of your economy is based on Americans buying shit they don’t need from China on credit cards, a dramatic slowdown in consumer spending equals recession. When sales actually fall from November to December during the holiday season, you are in recession. We’ve arrived.
Here’s the Thing About Terrorism Obama Won’t Tell You
– Here’s the Thing About Terrorism Obama Won’t Tell You:
Our wildly inflated fear of terrorism is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
One in 3.5 million: That’s your annual risk of dying from a terrorist attack in the United States, at least according to Cato analyst John Mueller. Rounded generously, that comes out to roughly 3 one-hundred thousandths of a percentage point, or 0.00003 percent.
And this, according to a recent Gallup poll cited by The New York Times, is the percentage of Americans “worried that they or someone in their family would be a victim of terrorism”: 51.
So that’s 51 percent of Americans who think a terrorist attack against themselves is sufficiently likely to warrant their personal concern, versus a 0.00003 percent chance it might actually happen. If you’ll forgive my amateur number crunching, that means Americans are overestimating their personal exposure to terrorism by a factor of approximately 1.7 million.
It’s no wonder people play the lottery.
Read moreHere’s the Thing About Terrorism Obama Won’t Tell You
Oregon Fire Chief Catches FBI Agents Posing As Militia – Quits His Job In Protest
H/t reader quodgy:
“Dirty tricks in Oregon. Judge & FBI manipulating events….but on behalf of whom?”
– Watch: Oregon Fire Chief Catches FBI Agents Posing as Militia – Quits His Job in Protest:
This week, Harney County Fire Marshall Chris Briels resigned after discovering undercover FBI agents posing as militia members near the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, which has been the site of a standoff for weeks now. According to Briels, he found FBI agents who were impersonating militia members lurking around the town’s armory. When he inquired about the undercover operation with county Judge Steve Grasty he was told to back off.
Just before this discovery was made, there were reports of people who looked like militia harassing locals, which is uncharacteristic of the protesters who initially assembled at the refuge. It turns out that these militia members suspected of harassing locals were actually undercover FBI agents.
Read moreOregon Fire Chief Catches FBI Agents Posing As Militia – Quits His Job In Protest
Declassified Emails Reveal NATO Killed Gaddafi to Stop Libyan Creation of Gold-Backed Currency
– ‘We Came, We Saw, He Died’ – Revisiting the Incredible Disaster That Is Libya
– Declassified Emails Reveal NATO Killed Gaddafi to Stop Libyan Creation of Gold-Backed Currency:
Washington, D.C. – In spite of French-led U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973 creating a no-fly zone over Libya with the express intent of protecting civilians, one of the over 3,000 new Hillary Clinton emails released by the State Department on New Year’s Eve, contain damning evidence of Western nations using NATO as a tool to topple Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi. The NATO overthrow was not for the protection of the people, but instead it was to thwart Gaddafi’s attempt to create a gold-backed African currency to compete with the Western central banking monopoly.
The emails indicate the French-led NATO military initiative in Libya was also driven by a desire to gain access to a greater share of Libyan oil production, and to undermine a long term plan by Gaddafi to supplant France as the dominant power in the Francophone Africa region.
The April 2011 email, sent to the Secretary of State Hillary by unofficial adviser and longtime Clinton confidante Sidney Blumenthal with the subject line “France’s client and Qaddafi’s gold,” reveals predatory Western intentions.
WalMart To Fire 16,000 As It Closes 269 Stores Globally
– WalMart To Fire 16,000 As It Closes 269 Stores Globally:
The last 12 months have not been kind to WalMart.
When the world’s largest retailer bowed to pressure to raise wages for its lowest-paid employees, the living wage crowd cheered. In short order, it became apparent that the reverberations from the $1.5 billion endeavor would spell trouble for the company.
Read moreWalMart To Fire 16,000 As It Closes 269 Stores Globally
Meet Heidi Cruz (Ted Cruz’s Wife): Region Head For Goldman Sachs And Former Member Of The CFR
In 2003, she worked for the Bush administration on economic policy.[1][11] Eventually becoming the director for the Western Hemisphere on the National Security Council under National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice in 2003.[1][10][12] She left Washington DC in 2004 to support her husband’s run for elective office in Texas.[13] In 2005, she joined Goldman Sachs, serving as a private wealth manager[14] and is currently the Region Head for the Southwest Region in the Investment Management Division of Goldman Sachs in Houston.[1][10][15] She had served as vice president for seven years before the promotion in 2013.[16] She took a leave of absence without pay for her husband’s 2016 presidential campaign.[13]
Here It Comes: New York Fed President Says “If Economy Weakens Further, Would Consider Negative Rates”
Remember when the Fed’s dots – less than a month ago – suggested there would be 4 rate hikes in 2016? Ah, the memories. Well, you can not only forget that (now that the market is estimating the next rate hike will come in October if ever), but it appears that the Fed will follow Kocherlakota’s advice after all and not only cut rates (the possibility of a January rate cut now is 10%), but will pass go, and collect negative rates:
- DUDLEY: IF ECONOMY WEAKENED, WOULD CONSIDER NEGATIVE RATES
After today’s atrocious, recessionary data, one can be certain that the Fed is furiously considering negative rates.
S&P Enters The Latest European Scandal: Downgrades Poland’s Credit Rating From A- To BBB+
– S&P Enters The Latest European Scandal: Downgrades Poland From A- To BBB+:
Over the past week, Poland’s relations with Europe have gone from cordial to abysmal, when first Poland’s new Eurosceptic government compared the EU and Merkel to Nazis, with Polish weekly Wprost releasing the following cover saying “they want to supervise Poland again”…
… only for Brussels to retaliate and launch an “unprecedented” review of Polish media laws, a move which Poland angrily responded is far beyond the EU’s domain.
Well, as so often happens, whenever there is a political spat in Europe, the rating agencies are quickly involved (thing S&P and Moody’s downgrades and upgrades of Greece depending on how well the vassal nation is “behaving”), and moments ago S&P downgraded Poland from A- to BBB+ outlook negative, precisely due to Poland’s new media law which has been the topic of so much consternation over the past week.
In other words, S&P is now nothing more than a lackey for Brussels, threatening to send Polish yields higher if Poland does not fall in line.
Read moreS&P Enters The Latest European Scandal: Downgrades Poland’s Credit Rating From A- To BBB+
World’s Largest Miner Books Massive $7.2 Billion Writedown On US Shale “Assets”
– World’s Largest Miner Books Massive $7.2 Billion Writedown On US Shale “Assets”:
“Yeah well, considering you’ve got a book value of $20 billion and you haven’t reported an operating EBIT gain in the last two years, I think they’ve been lucky to get away with such a modest amount. I think they’ll be having the same discussions with their auditors in July.”
This Guy Sought Refugee Status in Canada to Escape Police Brutality in America: “We Are Being Exterminated at an Alarming Rate Here” (Video)
British Columbia, CA — Kyle Lydell Canty decided last year that he would flee to Canada after he says, police in his native country were targeting black people for extermination.
While in Canada, Canty filed for refugee status.
According to VICE, at an Immigration and Refugee Board hearing in October, where he represented himself, Canty argued that black people are “being exterminated at an alarming rate” in the US, and presented exhibits meant to demonstrate the human rights conditions in his home country, including videos of his own and others’ experiences of being harassed by cops, various news reports, and the handbook from the UN refugee agency UNHCR on determining refugee status.
Financial collapse leads to war
– Financial collapse leads to war:
[With the new year, a sea change seems to have occurred in the financial markets: instead of “melting up,” the way they used to, they have started “melting down.” My original prediction is that this will lead to more armed conflict. Let’s see if I was right.]
Scanning the headlines in the western mainstream press, and then peering behind the one-way mirror to compare that to the actual goings-on, one can’t but get the impression that America’s propagandists, and all those who follow in their wake, are struggling with all their might to concoct rationales for military action of one sort or another, be it supplying weapons to the largely defunct Ukrainian military, or staging parades of US military hardware and troops in the almost completely Russian town of Narva, in Estonia, a few hundred meters away from the Russian border, or putting US “advisers” in harm’s way in parts of Iraq mostly controlled by Islamic militants.
