Crimea

Looks like this is going to be an interesting weekend. 

2000 Russian troops land in Crimea.

Zero Hedge:  Officers of 76th Russian Shock Troops Operating in Ukraine.

Meanwhile John McNugget says, "We are all Ukrainians".

Shut up. 

Yes, it is undoubtedly because Putin knows he can get away with it that he doesn't hesitate to take Crimea.  However, the Crimeans are, I think, mostly ethnic Russians.  The Ukrainian borders are fairly arbitrary, and partition has discussed as a sensible resolution for a while.

We did not need to intervene in Syria.  Supporting al-Qaeda-linked rebels there would have been a bad idea, as it turned out to be in Libya.  It was also stupid to aid the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.  Fortunately, there, the Egyptian Army proved stronger and certainly wiser than Clinton and Obama. 

The Russians are probably going to intervene, at some point, to keep their boy, Assad, in control of Syria.  This is a good thing for the Syrian Christians and for Israel. 

We invaded Grenada and Panama, and we may some day need to help stabilize Mexico.  Because we share a border with Mexico, we ought to have the right to do to protect our citizens and our national interests.  I think Russia can make a good case for the turmoil in the Ukraine being a serious threat to their ability to keep their oil pipelines to western Europe secure and fully functional.  Both Russia and some European states stand to suffer economically if the flow of oil is interrupted.

Americans need to mind our own business. 

Why Do You Think We Call Them Trolls?

From our Treehouse friends, the NSA is planting operatives on internet sites.  Sundance says:  Many have suspected this for quite some time.    We have known this for quite some time.   Edward Snowden releases new NSA documents which point out – There are paid intelligence and data operatives who professionally troll website content and comment pages based on federal strategies and objectives.


Your tax dollars at work:

Now, thanks to the efforts of National Security Agency whistle-blower Edward Snowden and journalist Glenn Greenwald, readers no longer have to take the word of “paranoid” bloggers who relate tales of paid government trolls lurking in comment sections and other concentrated top-down efforts to muddy the information provided by alternative media.

I noted this back in November.

Welcome to Monopolis

Daniel Greenfield talks about Government Power being an economic inequality.  It's the government monopoly.  We feared Metropolis; we have been absorbed by Monopolis.

If you haven't read it, it's a great article worthy of your time.  The first comment is enlightening as well, from one Blert: 

The ability to levy a hidden wealth tax by way of hyperinflating the currency // officially sanctioned counterfeiting // mega-deficit spending operates as a narcotic on the political and crony classes.

Because the US Dollar is International Money -- Mega-Washington is actually able to -- stepwise -- export its taxes.

This is why the collapse is happening elsewhere, first.

It's NOT a coincidence that nations that super-abuse their own currencies discover that International Money sweeps in.

This is famously evident in the latest travail in Argentina. (An ironical name: the land of silver/ money / silver money!) Buenos Aires has hit the panic buttons. All serious transactions were being Dollarized. This essentially frustrates officialdom's ability to impose a wealth tax on liquidity.

THIS is the reason that the central government is imploding. The citizens, in a round-about-way, had cut its ability to raise revenue -- real world revenue. This flowed back as a concentrated debasement of the official currency -- as towards the end, only the dull and the poor were left to absorb the wealth losses.

&&&

Hyperinflation, as defined here, is NOT a flight from the national fiat currency. It's when ANY central government issues fiat currency/ digital currency to backstop its deficit spending.

Hyperinflation of the national currency ALWAYS starts out modest -- and typically in an era of either outright deflation or wartime. It gets its name for historical reasons: politicians become addicted to it and take it to the limit. That limit is only reached when everyone in sight is rejecting the currency and nominal prices are moving faster than the speed of light.

So, it's the End Stage drama that's fixed in the public mind. Between the first and the last, the government was sustaining the EXACT SAME ECONOMIC POLICIES.

By this standard, most of the planet is hyper-inflating their currencies.

Red China is the exception. She's merely inflating her currency. That inflation is ramping higher and quicker than America's hyperinflation.

Inflation is triggered by money creation within the commercial banking system. Because credit based money is destroyed by default and pay-downs, TPTB often push bankers into easy credit to stimulate macro-economic statistics.

This is but a part of the phenomena described by Daniel.

Both Inflation and Hyperinflation can range between nill and infinity. The former is dominated by credit created money -- in the private market. The latter is solely due to (government) credit and (government) currency being spewed out through a Spigot.

It's this Spigot effect that's causing wealth concentration to take-off like a rocket. Whereas commercial banks issue loans broadly through the entire nation -- spewing money out everywhere as a result.... The central government issues its credits/ debt to a select few (primary dealers) and spews the results upon favored players. (See Daniel, above)

This destruction of the currency has game ending impacts. Every Chinese dynasty since the creation of paper -- and paper money -- ended by savaging the currency. (Exceptions: Mongol invasions, etc.) Such debasements are the cause and consequence of massive cronyism, corruption, and show piece architecture. (The edifice complex is apparently a universal trait of the vainglorious. I give you the immense estate of Ukraine's ex-president.)

Congress is in narcosis -- a financial narcosis.

At the present, the prognosis is for a Philip Seymour Hoffman ending.

As Argentina shows, some societies never learn. Do NOT expect the dependency classes to figure any of the above out.

Concentrate on family.

blert

I copied the comment in its entirety with no changes.  A lot of this we have referenced in one way or another before.  I like the way Blert brings it all together in a way that does not sound like a breathless promotion of an Alex Jones/Glenn Beck episode.   

Military Pork

As noted yesterday, these are the days of cutting back with a prominent and controversial cutback being to the U.S. military.  At least it is being suggested, but Representatives with military installations or defense contractors in their Districts are going to squeal.  My hearing was damaged in my youth while castrating pigs.  The unrelenting screeching of our Congressional Porkists will make those protesting piglets sound like the soothing tones of Barry White in comparison. 

This is a big deal to "conservatives" because "conservatives" are supposed to be for a strong defense. 

I want the men and women who have served in the military to be well compensated in terms of pensions, benefits, and medical care. 

Do we need 450,000 active service personnel?  No.  We do not need troops on the ground in Afghanistan, in Iraq, anywhere in the Middle East, in Europe, in Korea, in Okinawa, and most certainly not in Africa. 

We need a Navy.  We can probably change the configuration.  We need an Air Force, again, change the configuration with more unmanned aircraft -- focus on technology.  We need a missile defense system.  We have the computing power to do this easily.  We need to control our air space all the way up to our satellite orbits. 

Obviously, we need some well-trained and well-equipped combat forces with a somewhat traditional role. 

This is always the problem with government.  Any reconfiguration, re-engineering, modification, reduction, change, whatever you want to call it, runs into entrenched interests that want to keep things the way they have always been.  In this regard the government is always going to lag the private sector or be led by private sector marketing.  I'll bet we spend billions on gadgets and gizmos and gee-whiz technology not just in the military but in all government venues.  They procure this technology not because it is needed but because it is available, and they don't have to worry about the cost-benefit because they are not trying to turn a profit or generate revenues.

Government departments worry only about justifying their budgets.  The more they spend this fiscal year, generally, the more they get in the next fiscal year. 

It is a shame taxpayers -- many of whom are, admittedly, employed by government -- won't face the reality of this self-perpetuating system.  It's the Blob.  The more it assimilates, the bigger it gets and the more it can assimilate.  

I think we could make significant reductions in other government departments without gutting the military, but I'm not sure that the military is not a good place to start reductions.  To me, it seems a positive development that we managed to stay out of the Syrian civil war.  There doesn't seem to be much of a movement toward trying to intervene in Ukrainian politics or in Venezuela, and that, too, is positive.  If we don't meddle in other people's business, perhaps we could take care of our own. 

 Maybe we could control our southern border if we weren't watching the 38th Parallel in Korea.  

Cutting the benefits of long-serving military personnel who sacrificed so much for their country would be about the last thing I would do.  We need active-duty personnel in the Air Force, Navy (including, of course, the Marines) and Coast Guard, but we could probably get by without much of a "standing army".  The National Guard and Reserve could be enhanced and enabled to serve quite well.  We are not involved or likely to be involved in any conflict that requires massive numbers of ground troops -- so long as we mind our own business. 

We know who our enemies are.  Get them out of the United States and keep them out.  Bring all of our troops home and keep them home.

The Days of Cutting Back

First, if you haven't already read it, here is Karl Denninger's opus on the Market Ticker.  I think he will continue to post things from time to time, but no one can blame him for cutting back.

Second, Breitbart reports that the Federal Reserve may be cutting back on monetary backing for the ECB.  There are a number of links in the article that lead to more original source material. 

Gold, crude, and coffee are all up in USDs, but the dollar hasn't slipped much against other world currencies.

I have a feeling this does not bode well.

In times like these, check your supplies.  Not a comprehensive list:

Water
Rice
Beans
Salt
Spices
Sugar
Flour
Yeast/Baking Powder/Baking Soda
Corn meal
Powdered milk
Canned milk
Vinegar
Oil/Shortening -- personally, I highly recommend good ol' lard.  It keeps.  It's good for what ails you.  I don't believe any of that crap about cholesterol.

Bleach

If you stored wheat and other grains and have a grain mill, that's even better, probably.

Oatmeal
Peanut Butter or similar comfort foods
Canned goods of your preference

Soap, shampoo, laundry detergent, dish washing detergent,
Other cleaning supplies and disinfectants
Wipes
Toilet Paper
Paper Towels

Boots, Work
Sharpen your tools.
Adhesives
Tape, Wire, Cordage, and fasteners of various sorts
Lubricants

Dirttime (an interesting site), talks about Cold Steel Weapons (not about Cold Steel knives).  They fill your hand.

If I lived in an area that might be subject to rioting, I might invest in a few pieces of plywood and perhaps some 2x4s to keep around in case I needed to reinforce doors or cover windows. 

Consider small items that might store and barter well.  

And keep in mind that I have been expecting this for four or five years -- so it may be another four or five years before it happens.  It may be forty.  I take nothing away from the cleverness of international bankers or the corruptness of politicians.  Plan accordingly.

EPA Rules Against Renewables

Try and imagine humans surviving without fire.  Humans have been burning whatever the local environment offered as combustible material -- peat to buffalo chips to whale blubber -- as long as we have been on the planet.  Without doubt, the most common fuel for our fires has been wood.  We have heated and cooked with wood.  My grandmother never cooked on anything else.  My mother fed us off a wood stove for half her life.  Wood heat kept me warm every winter until I headed off to college. 

But wood smoke, don't you know, is a pollutant:

A federal proposal to clean up the smoke wafting from wood-burning stoves has sparked a backlash from some rural residents, lawmakers and manufacturers who fear it could close the damper on one of the oldest ways of warming homes on cold winter days.

Proposed regulations from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would significantly reduce the amount of particle pollution allowed from the smokestacks of new residential wood-powered heaters.

The Missouri legislature has a bill to thwart the bureaucratic regulation of wood-burning stoves and furnaces.  This would be a good thing.  If there really is some problem with wood stove pollution then it should be debated publicly and regulated by statute -- not by regulatory fiat. 

I have seen smoke from chimneys hug the ground or fly straight up toward the clouds.  The heated air expelled through the chimney will create a current that carries the particles, the carbon dioxide, water vapor and other combustion products until it cools enough to be dissipate.  When that happens, the heavier materials will end up on the ground.  Probably, if you were heating every house in Kansas City and Jackson County with wood-burning furnaces, it would get pretty smoky. 

We aren't, and we won't.  The price and supply of wood, including wood pellets, will see to that.   

According to the linked article there are only about 12 million wood stoves in the United States -- 9 million of which are less than half the "efficiency" required by the EPA.  Existing stoves would be grandfathered in -- but that is hardly the point.  This is about control through intimidation:

Some manufacturers contend the EPA's proposed standards are so stringent that the higher production costs would either force them out of business or raise prices so high that many consumers could no longer afford their products.

"There's not a stove in the United States that can pass the test right now — this is the death knoll of any wood burning," Reg Kelly, the founder of Earth Outdoor Furnaces in Mountain Grove, told Missouri lawmakers during a recent hearing.

We know Reg.  He's one of us.  Believe me, Reg is not worried about his furnace business.  He'll make it fine without that little sideline.  Like the rest of us, he believes in what is right, believes in liberty, and the smell of seasoned oak when you come in from the cold.

When to Grin

GRIN

If you're up against a bruiser and you're getting knocked about-- Grin.
If you're feeling pretty groggy, and you're licked beyond a doubt-- Grin.
Don't let him see you're funking, let him know with every clout,
Though your face is battered to a pulp, your blooming heart is stout;
Just stand upon your pins until the beggar knocks you out-- And grin

This life's a bally battle, and the same advice holds true, Of grin.
If you're up against it badly, then it's only one on you, So grin

If the future's black as thunder, don't let people see you're blue;
Just cultivate a cast-iron smile of joy the whole day through;
If they call you "Little Sunshine," wish that they'd no troubles, too-- You may--grin.

Rise up in the morning with the will that, smooth or rough, You'll grin.
Sink to sleep at midnight, and although you're feeling tough, Yet grin.
There's nothing gained by whining, and you're not that kind of stuff;
You're a fighter from away back, and you won't take a rebuff;
Your trouble is that you don't know when you have had enough-- Don't give in.

If Fate should down you, just get up and take another cuff;
You may bank on it that there is no philosophy like bluff And grin.

-- Robert Service from Songs of a Sourdough