OPEC backs biggest oil cut since 2008 crisis
OPEC agreed on Thursday to cut oil output by an extra 1.5 million barrels per day (bpd) in the second quarter of 2020 to support prices that have been hit by the coronavirus outbreak, but made its action conditional on Russia and others joining in.
Notice that this and pretty much every other news report you read never explains the thermodynamic implications of what they report, because they are ignorant of, and/or deny, the relationships between wealth creation, credit availability, and fossil energy consumption.
Oil producers today cut production by about 1.5%.
Why? Because demand for oil is falling and the world has limited storage capacity. Oil must be burned at about the same rate it is produced. If they don’t curtail production prices will fall below the cost of production and everyone will lose money, except of course shale oil producers who have always lost money.
Why is oil demand falling? Because the oil powered machines that produce and deliver almost all of the things we use and eat are slowing down, which means economic growth is slowing or possibly declining.
What happens if economic growth stops or declines? Our banking system becomes fragile because the design of our debt backed fractional reserve monetary system requires growth to function.
Put more simply, money and debt retain value, and credit remains plentiful, only in the presence of economic growth.
Why are credit and debt important? Because our standard of living depends on them. For example, today you can save 5% of the price of a house, get credit for 95% in the form of a mortgage, and immediately enjoy 100% of the house. Your mortgage, in turn, funds someone else’s retirement portfolio. Without plentiful credit, most people will not enjoy their own home, or car, or iPhone, and most people will not be able to retire.
I explained the importance of growth and why we can’t have it forever in more detail here.
How have our leaders responded? Canada announced an emergency interest rate cut yesterday in the hope of stimulating economic growth. Our prime minister is planning to spend more printed money to stimulate growth.
Will it work? Does providing alcohol to an alcoholic work? Yes, for a while, unless he’s already too drunk, but doing so makes his bottom more painful.
How do you know when an alcoholic is too drunk? You offer him free liquor and he does not drink.
How do you know when an alcoholic has not yet bottomed out? He kills his hangover the next day with a drink.
How do you know when it’s too late to save an alcoholic? He dies from an overdose.
How do you know when an alcoholic is clean? He decides to promote and vote for a birth lottery.
<Edit Mar 8>
I’m going to go out on a limb and say the correction has begun that those of us with defective denial genes have anticipated since the rocket scientists that lead us “fixed” the too much debt crisis in 2008 with more debt. They’ll try again this time but I suspect the alcoholic is too drunk to drink. I don’t know if the drunk will respond if they try extreme measures like intravenous white lightning. Assuming he doesn’t, my guess is 20-50% of paper wealth will vaporize in this step down. There are more steps to follow in coming years until the alcoholic bottoms out when his preferred drink, oil, is gone. There’d be much less pain for all if he’d sober up now.
un-Denial 
As Martenson likes to say, “case, case, cluster, cluster, boom”.
http://www.bccdc.ca/about/news-stories/stories/2020/information-on-novel-coronavirus
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https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2020/03/05/because-the-economy-stupid/
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Excellent, as usual, Rob. Just read it aloud to Connie and we both loved it.
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P.S. I’m a recovering alcoholic and greatly appreciated your metaphor. 🙂
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How long does it take for an alcoholic to notice you tricked him with apple juice?
I’m guessing about the time it takes a container ship to travel from Shanghai to Los Angeles.
https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/lights-are-no-ones-working-how-china-faking-coronavirus-recovery
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Russia says nyet. How long before high cost producers start to fail? Will governments nationalize them?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil/oil-plunges-to-lowest-since-2017-after-russia-rejects-steep-opec-cut-idUSKBN20T090
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Time to make some popcorn.
https://www.reuters.com/article/mideast-stocks/mideast-stocks-equity-markets-plunge-after-opec-deal-collapses-idUSL8N2B10I1
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Saudi Arabia slashes April crude oil prices after OPEC’s supply pact collapsed.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-oil-prices/saudi-arabia-slashes-april-crude-oil-prices-after-opecs-supply-pact-collapsed-idUSKBN20U0Y4
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Yes, I was going to post that Guardian live feedjust reported Saudi’s cut price to $30/b from 57 or so. That’s the opposite of a supply cut of course. Exxon and Shell lost at least a quarter of market cap as the stock market digested this.
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Despite Vox reporting about a year ago [ https://www.vox.com/2019/2/17/18225938/biologists-are-trying-to-make-bird-flu-easier-to-spread-can-we-not ] on the extreme risks of gain-of-function research, they published an article [ https://www.vox.com/2020/3/4/21156607/how-did-the-coronavirus-get-started-china-wuhan-lab ] two days ago condemning “conspiratorial claims” that COVID-19 may have been bioengineered despite the extraordinary evidence linking the current COVID-19 outbreak and this form of research on coronaviruses at Wuhan’s BSL-4 lab. This virus should not exist. I should no longer be astonished at human stupidity and denial, but I guess I still am.
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Thanks. I agree with VOX that we should ignore political pundits who for the most part are idiots with an agenda.
I do not think we should ignore really smart apolitical scientists familiar with the relevant research. I’m an engineer and not a biologist, but this analysis by J.C. seems very credible to me. Note that J.C. does not think the virus was engineered, nor that the Chinese had ill-intent. Just research conducted by multiple countries including China that probably should not be taking place due to the risk, and one virus under study got away from the lab, as others apparently have in the past. I observe that the VOX article debunking the claims did not address any of the evidence presented by J.C..
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Rob, my understanding is that gain-of-function research IS/INVOLVES bioengineering. I will have to read further on this matter as I could very well be mistaken. Thank you for the link to the JC On a Bike video- I viewed it and it is tremendously good, as is the article upon which it is based.
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If you learn anything new that seems probable, please let us know.
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Doug Nolan, my favorite debt analyst, on the bubble.
http://creditbubblebulletin.blogspot.com/2020/03/market-commentary-modern-day-bank-run.html
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Corals, as all species, except humans, have not evolved to deny reality.
https://www.gc.cuny.edu/News/All-News/Detail?id=54308
h/t Apneaman
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Notice, as usual, the news media that informs us never contemplates physical limits to growth. It seems “why?” is not in their vocabulary.
https://apnews.com/b273d554d3656420507d61d5536020c6
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New site for global stats on COVID2019.
https://covid2019.app/
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On the one hand B.C. to date has done more COVID-19 tests than all of the US. On the other hand, they should have closed YVR airport a month ago when they saw China building emergency hospitals and bulldozing streets.
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Dr. Liz Specht, a chemical and biomolecular engineer, calculates that hospital beds in the US will be full by about May 8 and the US government’s stockpile of masks will be gone in about 2 days when all healthcare workers start wearing them. I can’t imagine Canada’s numbers will be much better.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1236095180459003909.html
h/t Chris Martenson
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Circuit breakers blew a fuse tonight.
Will central banks tomorrow be able to print faster than the machines trying to sell?
https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/stock-futures-fell-fast-enough-to-trigger-a-halt-2020-03-08
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“Just by chance you crossed the diamond with the pearl
you turned it on the world
that’s when you turned the world around”
Chance?
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For some strange genetic reason my brain does not understand anything that has even a hint of poetry. I prefer clear non-obfuscated sentences that use the minimum number of words required to communicate an idea. These lyrics by Steely Dan (thank god for google) are the exact opposite. Even some artsy poet expert dude doesn’t seem to understand what Steely Dan is saying.
http://www.yachtrock.com/captains-blog/2016/10/4/the-story-of-the-lyrics-of-steely-dans-kid-charlemagne
If you’re asking did I write this high on acid, the answer is no. It’s just that there’s so little discussion of reality in our culture that seeing it for the first time can seem like an acid trip. 🙂
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Admirers of the Maximum Power Principle (MPP) theory which explains the behavior of all life, including humans, may enjoy this podcast interview by physicist Sean Carroll that explains the brain’s function as modelling the world to minimize free energy.
https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2020/03/09/87-karl-friston-on-brains-predictions-and-free-energy/
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Joe Rogan’s interview today with Michael Osterholmis, an expert in infectious disease epidemiology, will wake a lot of people up that have been snoozing or denying. I’m glad I’ve finished preparing. Expect a run on food soon.
Big takeaway points for me:
1) May be as bad as the 1918 Spanish flu.
2) Very hard to prevent transmission (washing hands not good enough, must stop breathing the same air as other people)
3) Infected people spread the virus for several days before showing or feeling any signs of sickness.
4) US is totally unprepared with no plans and a limited stockpile of supplies and drugs that are mostly made in China. (I don’t know about Canada’s readiness but I’m betting it’s not much better.)
5) Expect it to be worse in North America than China because obesity worsens the outcome and 50% of people here are obese.
6) Not a short term problem, expect many months of troubles.
7) Lots of false or misleading information is circulating.
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Thanks Rob. I don’t often do Joe, but this is one of the exceptions for sure.
Woe the diabetic, middle aged obese smoker eh?
My mom is 74 & I need to go help her a bare minimum of once a month. I help her with her monthly Big pension cheques shopping – push her buggy, load the van & carry 2-3 loads of groceries & supplies from the underground parking up the stairs to her condo. Mom’s got a bad knee & struggles with stairs. I also take out her recycling & garbage. I’m also her mechanic (80%). Mom still drives, but only in the daytime & not in heavy rain or snow, so I sometimes have drive her to important appointments. Last week she called because her radiant heat was dead, so I headed over. She has a programmable digital thermostat. Takes 2 AA batteries. They died. She is clueless about that sort of thing & shit breaks (entropy) all the time. My point? How do I prep/self quarantine & fulfill a son’s duty? Hell if I know. I think it’s always been extremely hard for the hyper social ape to isolate come plague time. Power to you if ya can.
In 1918 in the US the rural-urban split was 50/50 & in 2019 was 19.3% rural (US census). City or country there are way way less people who grow any food at all now. Not many have big barrels of sacks of flour, rice, beans, etc like was normal for almost all country folk in 1918. Most country folk today go shopping all the time. They are still largely dependent on JIT. My Baba who died in 1985 lived 5 clicks from downtown Calgary & her entire back yard was a massive productive garden. She canned like crazy. They had a huge basement pantry with hundreds of big glass nason jsrs full of beets, carrots, green beans, jams, etc. She even kept making peasant noodles, egg-flour-water-salt, right up to her last years. They were not poor. Gov pensions & CN Rail pension, mortgage long paid. Their frugality & preps came from having lived in the Ukrainian as peasants/working class & lived through WW1, Spanish flu, Great Depression, harsh Commie policies & famine.
Experience is a great teacher & best prepper motivator ever.
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You’re in a tough spot Apneaman. I wish you well.
I regularly help my elderly aunt and uncle, both with serious health problems, who live at home on their own. They have a constant stream of health workers and other people through their home which worries me. I’ve been over encouraging and helping them to stock up. I told them they should get what they need now because I’ll be avoiding the stores shortly. They live much like your Baba. They have a small 33′ wide city lot on which they grow a huge crop of tomatoes, raspberries, and rhubarb. They buy produce in bulk and can every year. My uncle has a friend with an acreage where they grow veg, eggs, chickens, and turkeys. I usually help with the slaughter in the fall. My aunt sells the eggs to her network of city friends. They bake and make their own snacks. Waste nothing. Recycle. Drive little. Fly none. Entertain themselves with local live concerts. I love and admire them very much.
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Thanks.
Me & millions of other Gen-Xers with aging Boomer parents are in tough spots. Such is life.
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Mac10 explains that the herd that was in denial is getting ready to stampede.
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/meltdown-in-progress.html
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Datagasm demonstrates that a picture is worth many words.
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It’s sad that the only budget response our leaders consider these days is money printing. How about, for example, redirecting funds from non-essential spending like the military, or increasing taxes on the wealthy? Relying on money printing will not end well. Where are the adults?
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Paywalled
‘We’re hustlers’: Amid coronavirus fears, this couple has made more than $100,000 reselling Lysol wipes
“VANCOUVER—As Manny Ranga and his spouse, Violeta Perez, loaded up their Ford F-150 pickup exterior a Costco close to downtown Vancouver this week, some passersby couldn’t assist however cease and stare.
What stood out wasn’t simply the sheer quantity of the couple’s buy. It was the truth that it was all the identical product: Stacks upon stacks of Lysol disinfecting wipes.
“Is that each one for you?” one stranger requested.
“Cleansing firm,” Perez answered.
She was technically appropriate — they’d simply cleaned out the shop.
The couple say they’ve made a bundle previously three weeks hitting up each Costco retailer within the area every day, shopping for up as many Lysol wipes and liquid cleaners as they will — spending 1000’s of at a time — after which reselling them, totally on Amazon, to non-public people and corporations.
Amid the rising coronavirus outbreak, the hoarding and reselling of sure family provides to make a fast buck has turn into a world phenomenon, contributing to frenzied panic shopping for by customers who’ve been fed a gentle weight loss program of pictures of empty retailer cabinets on social media.
Ranga, 38, stated one six-pack of wipes that goes for $20 at Costco can fetch 4 occasions that on-line. (A verify of Amazon on Thursday confirmed six-pack was going for $89 underneath their vendor identify “Violeta & Sons Buying and selling Ltd.”)
After shelling out about $70,000 in bulk buys, Ranga stated they’ve made greater than $100,000 in gross sales.
“It’s a giant alternative with all these merchandise,” he stated.
Amazon was stated to be cracking down on “dangerous actors” who have been elevating costs on primary wants merchandise by blocking or eradicating provides. “There isn’t any place for worth gouging on Amazon,” the corporate stated, in line with media studies.
The federal government in Japan, in the meantime, reportedly launched new guidelines making the reselling of face masks for revenue against the law punishable by a one-year jail time period or a hefty nice.
Ken Whitehurst, government director of the Shoppers Council of Canada, stated Thursday that whereas it’s not clear what impression large-scale shopping for and promoting of merchandise is having on the general provide chain in Canada, he takes a dim view of people that would exploit feelings.
“It makes you queasy within the abdomen when individuals exploit an emergency solely for the aim of constructing few additional ,” he stated.
Retailers can all the time train casual provide administration by limiting how a lot of a product could be purchased at one time, he stated. Whereas there are legal guidelines geared toward addressing “unconscionable pricing,” authorities authorities will sometimes solely intervene in the event that they know that important security pursuits of the general public are being compromised.
The truth that the Japanese authorities stepped in with new guidelines on reselling masks sends a sign that it is a state of affairs the place “residents are in it collectively,” he stated.
“My statement is the Japanese authorities is making a press release that … people who find themselves doing this must cease and take into account the contribution they might be making to public hysteria.”
After filling up the mattress of his pickup with stacks of wipes, Ranga drove again to the couple’s Vancouver dwelling to unload the merchandise. Perez, 37, stayed behind, holding watch over a second trolley-load, whereas munching on a Costco scorching canine.
“Somebody’s making some huge cash,” stated a curious passerby.
Perez defined their enterprise enterprise was sparked a couple of weeks in the past once they went to the shop to purchase provides, together with hand sanitizer. A girl stopped them exterior the shop and provided to pay them double what they’d paid, she stated.
The couple, who describe themselves as dwelling builders, instantly noticed a possibility.
Manny Ranga and his say they’ve made a bundle in the past three weeks buying cleaning supplies and Lysol wipes in bulk, then reselling them on Amazon.
“The whole lot we do, we’re within the second,” she stated. “We’re hustlers.”
It’s easy provide and demand, Perez stated. And proper now, there’s “excessive demand.”
Daily, whereas a nanny cares for his or her three younger youngsters, the couple followers out throughout the area, hitting up Costcos in Vancouver, Richmond and Burnaby working with fast effectivity.
Timing, she stated, is the whole lot. Present up later within the day and generally a variety of inventory is gone.
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Perez stated whereas some Costco workers have responded to their day by day visits with a “good for you” perspective, some retailer managers greet them extra icily and have informed them buyer complaints are mounting.
The shop close to downtown Vancouver threatened to impose limits on how a lot might be bought at one time, Perez stated.
“It’s not honest,” she stated. “We’re not the one ones who do it.”
The Star reached out to Costco for remark however didn’t obtain a response.
The enterprise has became an all-consuming affair. Perez stated her husband opened a Fed-Ex account and acquired tape weapons and different delivery provides.
If consumers are native, he’ll make deliveries in particular person. In any other case, he’ll ship them by the submit workplace.
Perez stated she truly needed her husband to attend a pair extra weeks earlier than promoting, however he was too “excited” to get began.
Later, on the couple’s dwelling, as Ranga transferred one other truckload of wipes into his storage, he defined why he’s primarily specializing in wipes and cleansing liquids and never different in-demand merchandise, comparable to rest room paper.
Rest room paper packages are “too large” and “tougher to ship.” As a result of the six-pack wipes already are available in protecting wrap, he can simply slap on a delivery kind and ship it off.
His dwelling storage isn’t the one place the place he shops his merchandise; there’s additionally a automotive wash in south Vancouver the place he drops off provide, he stated.
Archipelago Auto Spa proprietor Jerry Hu later confirmed to the Star that he helps Ranga promote a number of the cleansing merchandise.
However it seems, he’s received his personal facet gig, too — promoting face masks.
Hu pointed to 1 nook of his automotive wash the place there was a small stack of stock. He stated he’s received about 50 containers left after shopping for 1000’s from suppliers in the US after which promoting them on WeChat and different social media channels.
Lots of his earlier consumers resold them to locations in China, he stated. Now his prospects are shopping for for home use.
He stated his revenue margins have ranged from 20 to 30 per cent.
Requested if he felt dangerous that he was probably depriving prospects of key provides throughout a well being disaster, Ranga famous that there are a lot of individuals shopping for provides and hoarding it for themselves. At the least he’s placing it again out for consumption.”
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/03/12/were-hustlers-amid-coronavirus-fears-this-couple-has-made-more-than-100000-reselling-lysol-wipes.html
Fucking scum bags. If they were shot & robbed I’d laugh.
This behavior only increases the fear, anger & panic. It also makes the case for invoking anti gouging measures. Left unchecked it helps create/worsen the conditions that will bring on martial law. File under knock on effects.
Early days of Covid are exposing the fragility of the fantasy system.
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I’m surprised Costco doesn’t set a limit on key supplies. People seem a little more civilized here in the Comox Valley. They were calmly lined up for toilet paper yesterday.
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How a Guy From a Montana Trailer Park Overturned 150 Years of Biology
Biology textbooks tell us that lichens are alliances between two organisms—a fungus and an alga. They are wrong.
“He has shown that largest and most species-rich group of lichens are not alliances between two organisms, as every scientist since Schwendener has claimed. Instead, they’re alliances between three. All this time, a second type of fungus has been hiding in plain view.
“There’s been over 140 years of microscopy,” says Spribille. “The idea that there’s something so fundamental that people have been missing is stunning.”
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-a-guy-from-a-montana-trailer-park-overturned-150-years-of-biology?utm_source=pocket-newtab
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Cool. Kind of like Varki discovering over a lunch conversation our origin and most of our wacky behaviors.
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Forget toilet paper, it’s time to panic buy stocks because there’s no need for a functioning economy for stocks to go up, just plentiful denial and some money printing, maybe. 😦
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Mac10 nails it, but doesn’t understand the underlying energy cost driver:
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/margin-call-in-trump-casino.html
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Related
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Good talk. She’s discussing genetic denial of unpleasant realities without knowing that’s what she’s talking about.
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Four Reasons Civilization Won’t Decline: It Will Collapse
https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/03/13/four-reasons-civilization-wont-decline-it-will-collapse/
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Thanks. I too am leaning towards a fairly steep decline. Everything we’ve done over the last 20 years in response to systemic overshoot problems has increased the steepness of our decline.
The author, like most, confuses capitalism with our monetary system. There’s nothing inherently wrong with capitalism as long as it does not use a debt backed fractional reserve monetary system, and as long as there are taxation policies in place to prevent the wealth gap from growing to a socially destabilizing level.
He also blames the elite without acknowledging that most non-elite want to become elite.
He also fails to mention that nothing will improve without rapid population reduction.
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Comedy cutting through the denial…
h/t Apneaman
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Our idiot leaders are panicking.
https://wolfstreet.com/2020/03/15/panicked-fed-slashes-rates-to-near-0-throws-700-billion-qe-on-top-after-1-5-trillion-shock-and-awe-repos-fizzled-stock-futures-plunge-5-hit-limit-down/
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JC’s back and asks how come the news media can spend 10 minutes explaining why we should vote for Joe instead of Bernie, but can’t spend 2 minutes to explain the implications of printing $1,500,000,000,000 to prop up the stock market?
Is it stupidity or denial? I suspect both.
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FWIW
http://www.covid-19canada.com/
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Nice big picture essay today by Paul Arbair.
https://wordpress.com/read/blogs/102935372/posts/1582
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Mac10 recaps the monkey zoo today.
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/black-monday.html
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I think a couple of other countries (oz for sure) have already helicopter dropped money. I hope Trudeau sends my MMT cheque soon – while there are still supplies in the stores.
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Nate Hagens with his take on the virus. He expects a 10% drop in GDP this year, followed by a short term recovery, followed by a much bigger 30+% decline over the next decade due to limits to growth.
“This is a depression, not a recession, but we will likely recover in the short term.”
“The economic impacts will be much larger than the expected deaths of a few million people”.
“It’s all about declining energy benefits. November 2018 is now cemented as the date of global peak oil”.
No discussion of the only policy that will help in the long term, rapid population reduction.
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Andrew Nikiforuk’s essays are always worth reading as he has a good grasp of the big picture. His essay published a few days ago is excellent. h/t Apneaman
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/03/13/COVID-19-Brought-By-Globalization/
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I’m torn on Chris Martenson. On the one hand he is an honest aware hard working source of good data about the virus. Martenson has put out a video almost every day since about 2 months ago when it was obviously a big problem in China on it’s way to us, and when almost no one else was talking about it. On the other hand, he’s using this crisis as an opportunity to grow his business. All of us have strengths and weaknesses so I can live with the two views given that I think he is honest with good ethics.
In today’s video he takes his gloves off by calling out the US’s corrupt corporate democracy. It seems he is trying to motivate the average citizen to revolt against their system. Good on him. If I lived in the US I would go bat shit crazy if the proposed corporate bailouts for cruise ship companies and airlines, and other grossly undeserving companies, goes ahead.
This one’s worth a watch as it also includes new insights into what’s behind the decisions our leaders are making, or in some cases, not making.
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I hear you. It’s almost like “Disaster Capitalism” lite or sumthin. He is American after all & “prospering” is a tenet of the faith down there. It’s practically considered a right of the exceptional people/nation. Way down south they don’t wish you a Happy New Year, they wish you a prosperous one. It’s kinda hard to blame them when they’ve been cramming all that shit in their heads going back to the first assholes off the first boat. I also don’t see much evidence for free will period. Funny that I can’t stop blaming & judging & mocking much of the time. There’s my cognitive dissonance right there. Thanks evolution —- bastard!
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Curious to know how you think Martenson is “using this crisis as an opportunity to grow his business”? Without a doubt his YT viewership is up enormously but I haven’t noticed any obvious attempt by him to cash in on that.
Please elaborate.
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Many but not all of Martenson’s videos include a plug to become a paying member of his site for access to virus related information “too sensitive” to discuss in his public videos. He’s not the only doomer trying to cash in and I still think on balance he’s a good man.
Out of curiosity I checked in recently to see if climate change was front and center in his forums and it’s still not. In the early days of Peak Prosperity I decided not to join because climate change was a taboo topic despite it being an even bigger long term threat than peak oil. Most American’s deny the reality of climate change and he chose to prioritize membership revenue over speaking the truth.
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It’s not a new thing for Chris. His site has a paywall. Apparently if you sign up you’ll be given access to special secret information. I think Chris also mails a limited edition Jr Doomer decoder ring to all his paid subscribers. Chris is clever. Chris knows people desire exclusivity & will pay for it. I don’t know what information is behind the paywall, but I’ll wager I could find all or most of it for free. That being said, I give kudos to Chris on the flip side. His free stuff, which is plenty & most of it is very informative. If the average pleb never read anything Chris wrote & only watched his Crash Course on youtub, they would know more about what really makes the world go around & have a fairly good idea of what’s coming. Of course it all depends on if the information can make it through their cognitive bias brain filters.
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Read Dave Cohen in denial. People losing their shit all over.
https://peakwatch.typepad.com/decline_of_the_empire/
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Yes I also noticed Cohen has gone insane when he said we had recovered from the 2008 crisis. Our idiot leaders fixed the 2008 too much debt crisis (which was rooted in overshoot) by adding more debt thus worsening our overshoot. Now we pay the price for not living within our means.
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What happens if this next round of bailout does not work? Anarchy, mass death, war. Unlike 2008, reforms are too late to matter much. Not that I believed at the time Obama & Co would try, but there was still some room to slow down without radical changes. Do the masters of the universe have any other choice at this time?
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I don’t know if bailouts this time will work. I do know that if they do work we will have civil society destroying inflation a few years later. Inflation caused citizens of a wealthy technologically advanced democratic country to support Hitler and his war and his genocide.
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When the tide goes out, we get to see who’s naked.
Profits from having more revenue than expenses will once again matter.
Good riddance Tesla and all the other companies that never had to return a profit since the idiots in charge dropped the cost of money to zero.
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Aussie billionaire investor warns of a near total shutdown of the world economy over the next two to six months, calling on governments to increase stimulus packages while taking emergency measures to avoid a depression.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/banking-and-finance/aussie-billionaire-investor-warns-of-devastating-economic-collapse-20200319-p54bll.html
First collapse and deflation, then hyperinflation, and then history might repeat itself? Rob, any comment?
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That Aussie billionaire’s not too bright. We are in a depression. We don’t need stimulus with printed money that will only make the next crisis even worse. We need wise husbandry and deployment of real resources. How about, for a start, shutting down 50% of the military and using the saved funds for local food production? The laid off military people can cultivate the fields for minimum wage which they should be grateful for receiving.
There’s no longer a need for a large military because we’ve already burned all the good booty and a war will only burn up what remains even faster.
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As for the virus, I have no confidence. I’m undecided. Different numbers. Different infectious disease experts saying different things. I get the biology & precautionary principle, but I’m in limbo on how bad it will be. If the body count is not at least 2-3 times as high as the seasonal flu it will result in even less confidence & more skepticism by the herd. My old jr high buddy is convinced it’s a plot perpetrated by the infamous “They”.
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I’m erring on the side of caution until we better understand the data. I see preliminary numbers I do not like. Could be good for my young son with a good job who cannot afford to buy a home because of the giant bubble the morons in charge inflated.
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Hell Rob, I never knew you had a son. Maybe you mentioned it before & I missed it. I’ve found knowing at least some basic personal details of my online friends helps me to better understand where they’re coming from. Hey, if there’s a significant die-back a better paying position might open where your son works. Like a mini black death scenario.
Births minus deaths is at least 250,000 a day. Any infectious disease will have to take out that many per day just to break even & 365 days of that is a little over 91 million. Doing the math is why I don’t buy any Covid for depopulation. It’s not good at killing, but it seems good enough to rock the global economy although it was a house of cards long before the Covid kid rode into town. A strong fart could have knocked it over.
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I agree, any pin would have popped it, although this is a doozy of a pin.
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$25,000,000,000,000 vaporized so far.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/median-us-stock-now-down-50-its-highs-world-loses-25-trillion-mont
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After we’ve developed herd immunity and/or a vaccine (best case 12-24 months from now), and if the economy attempts to resume operating at a level similar to that a month ago, we are likely to experience energy shortages, which means we will probably never fully bounce back. Hope for the best but plan for a much leaner world in the future.
Here’s a nice explanation of why we should expect 12-24 months of disruption to the economy.
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-51963486
Chris Martenson in his YouTube video today explained that we need 75-80% of the population to have been infected to achieve herd immunity. Italy, the worst suffering country in the world, has only 0.8% of it’s population infected so far which means it has 1000 times as far to go to achieve herd immunity.
Steve St. Angelo here explains that the coming contraction of US oil production will be swift.
https://srsroccoreport.com/u-s-oil-price-collapse-u-s-economic-collapse/
Tim Watkins elaborates further in an essay today…
https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2020/03/20/the-post-viral-economy/
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Mac10 with some very nice prose on capitalism. I’d change the last word from delusions to denial.
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/this-is-real-capitalism.html
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I want to see a much leaner world now. I want to the herd humbled & scared. Mass printing money to try & maintain the ponzi consumer orgy is probably the worst case scenario for the youth because it will only make the next consequence worse. It’s a big clusterfuck. What I want to see don’t matter. I’ll just wait and see. The only I feel certain about is their massive propaganda machine, MSM, think tanks, etc, will continue to blame it all on the virus. The Covid kid was framed!
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The dialogue in our society is incredibly shallow. Everyone clamoring for bailouts. Not one asking where is the money going to come from?
There is no money. We have no savings. We have no surplus. Even before the crisis we were borrowing at insane unsustainable levels, now we need more, a lot more. The next crisis, as a consequence will be worse, much worse.
Lots of elephants in the room, and not a single adult.
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Wolf Richter on the deflating bubble…
https://wolfstreet.com/2020/03/21/its-just-day-22-of-coronacrash-and-its-already-such-a-mess/
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Doug Nolan on the improbability and deadly risks of trying to reflate the bubble.
Nolan’s almost an adult. He gets most of the story expect the all important connection to energy cost.
http://creditbubblebulletin.blogspot.com/2020/03/weekly-commentary-please-dont.html
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Something looks off. Shortly before I hit the sack at midnight, I read an update on Italy – over 4k dead. Same numbers this morning. It could be they are overwhelmed. They look overwhelmed to me.
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Luigi Fiora explains that although Italy is bad, most other countries will soon be worse.
https://cassandralegacy.blogspot.com/2020/03/coronavirus-for-nonm-italians-aka-your.html
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George Mobus on economic collapse.
https://questioneverything.typepad.com/question_everything/2020/03/happy-vernal-equinox-2020-a-black-swan-trigger-for-the-collapse.html
h/t Apneaman
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The EU was created with strong budget rules to prevent a repeat of the Weimar hyperinflation that caused the election of Hitler.
They just revoked the rules.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-fiscal/eu-executive-moves-to-formalize-suspension-of-eu-budget-rules-idUSKBN2180DR
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_the_Weimar_Republic
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Bag of tricks almost empty. They are not out of choices, just out of choices to preserve the hierarchy & their position in it.
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Gail Tverberg, a smart aware person who is a leading expert on the relationship between the economy and energy, takes a contrarian view and thinks we would be much better off to let the virus burn through the population rather than our current plan to contain it which will collapse the economy.
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https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/
h/t Apneaman
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So EU has decided to print much more money and give a fistful of euros to Italy. But is there any difference to what the U.S.A is doing? If everyone does it, no country will go Weimar or Zimbabwe. Helicopter money will be the new manna from heaven. What could possibly go wrong? Cheers!
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Mac10 this morning says some important things for us to ponder. He thinks there is good evidence that stimulating the economy with printed money and lower interest rates is not effective any more. His views align with my hunch that the alcoholic is too drunk to drink more.
Governments are unlikely to stop printing money so the question is how does this all play out?
My guess is that credit becomes scarce and expensive causing supply lines to break down causing governments to nationalize and manage key components of the economy. Followed some months or years later by civil society destroying inflation.
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/in-idiots-we-trust.html
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Very good interview with Wolf Richter, a financial analyst I trust.
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Wolf Richter explains some of the new ways the Fed will print money.
https://wolfstreet.com/2020/03/23/what-are-all-the-feds-corporate-investor-bailout-programs-and-spvs/
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An unprecedented effort! We’re fighting the apocalyptic evil! Fed announces unlimited bond purchases in unprecedented move aimed at preventing an economic depression. Thanks to Fed, money will surely keep on flowing to companies, households and cities (not only in the USA; of course the rest of the world will do the same and then money just keeps on flowing from heaven.)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/23/fed-unlimited-credit-coronavirus/
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We are being lied to about possible sources of the virus. Why?
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Nate Hagens, one of my favorite thinkers, published a big picture essay yesterday on the implications of the virus and what we should do in response. It’s a must read.
I agree with most of what Nate says although I worry that the implications a few years from now of printing many trillions of dollars to bailout everything will be worse than the cure. I’d prefer we triage today which companies need to survive and which should be left to die. Displaced people should be put to work by the government in critical functions like food production.
I also wish Nate would discuss the need for rapid population reduction (the non-virus democratically supported type). Fewer people on this planet is the only path to a reasonable future that I can see.
Neither of my wishes will of course happen because of our genetic tendency to deny reality, and our tendency to deny that we deny reality.
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-03-25/an-overview-of-the-systemic-implications-of-the-coronavirus/
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Mac10 articulates what I have been quietly thinking to myself. There’s a pretty good chance that the infinite printed money stimulus we just unleashed may not work for long.
It might be a good time to convert any surplus cash you have into things you will need to survive in a simpler world, for two reasons. First, because supply lines from far away factories that make all of our stuff may stop functioning meaning what you need may not be available. Second, because in the not too distant future money will buy much less, meaning you may not be able to afford what you need.
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/03/mmt-modern-monetary-thermonuclear.html
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/3/18/1928623/-Reports-reveal-what-officials-are-being-told-about-COVID-19-and-it-s-not-what-they-are-telling-us
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plenty of eggs + no egg carton factory = egg shortage
https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2020/03/26/liebigs-law-writ-large/
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Here’s a very intelligent articulate person, with a shitload of facts and references, making a very persuasive case that the virus is man-made and much worse than most expect.
Where are the journalists asking intelligent questions? In denial as usual.
https://harvardtothebighouse.com/2020/03/23/no-monkey-ever-reheated-a-frozen-burrito-what-the-expanse-tells-us-about-the-covid-19-pandemic/
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What do you make of this Rob-from half a million dead to less than 20000. Perhaps the Oxford report was more accurate?
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2238578-uk-has-enough-intensive-care-units-for-coronavirus-expert-predicts/
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I don’t know. Chris Martenson talked about the 20,000 number yesterday. Several countries are using the same number which is suspicious. He thinks it’s been plucked from thin air by people wanting to believe it’s true rather than analyzing real data.
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Yep-I don’t know either. There are some big time academic reputations on the line here. Time, as always, will tell – if we’re still here when the telling is told.
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I think one of the biggest mistakes in modern history made by our leaders was not prosecuting any of the rampant fraud of 2008.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/forced-liquidation/
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More evidence from JC that we are not being told the truth.
My guess is that scientists with good intentions, and a desire for fame and fortune, by being the first to find a cure for common human viral sicknesses, made a mistake and released a deadly virus, and they are now trying to cover their tracks and mislead us, to protect their reputations and research grants.
If true, it’s a pretty big mistake to be responsible for killing millions and sending the global economy into a depression.
They’re gonna need an extra big dose of reality denial to continue functioning as normal humans, but I’m sure their genes are up to the task.
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Canada today has the highest growth rate of infections of any country in the world, probably because a million of our citizens left the country for spring break in March.
That’s about 2 months after anyone with a functioning brain should have voluntarily stopped travelling.
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It’s a rare treat to see Ajit Varki’s MORT theory mentioned in broadly read media…
https://www.laweekly.com/op-ed-stay-fcking-home/
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Germany has been one of the few countries in the world trying to hold back the money printing tide, because they understand the implications of hyperinflation (Hitler). The Wuhan virus has made it impossible to buck the trend.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/german-state-finance-minister-found-dead
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A lot of people think that shutting down the economy will do more harm than the virus. Let’s assume they are right and we tell everyone to go back to their normal business. What then? It seems to me we’d have to close the hospitals to COVID-19 cases and tell everyone that gets sick to stay home where they will either recover or die with minimal health care. Is this their plan?
How about instead telling everyone they must wear a mask when out of their homes, provide education on the proper way to wear them, and provide free masks to every household in the country? Then tell non-vulnerable people to go back to work, with their masks on.
Instead we have the idiot Canadian health minister telling the public not to wear masks unless they are symptomatic. It’s March 30 and our minister still does not understand anything about the disease, or she’s lying. She’d make a excellent economist.
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The Alberta government just announced they will invest $1.5 billion in building the Keystone XL pipeline. In the good ol’ days energy made enough profit to fund itself and provide plentiful taxes to our governments. Today governments must print money to keep the energy industry alive. The thermodynamics of this predicament guarantees inflation, unless our house of debt collapses first. We are on a path to making do with less via less money or lots of worthless money.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/30/a-barrel-of-oil-is-now-cheaper-than-a-pint-of-beer-in-canada.html
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Every idiot given enough time will eventually be forced to acknowledge the truth. Watch our leaders flip flop on masks over the next week, only about 3 months too late. Most of them will keep their jobs unlike the people they harmed.
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Alice Friedemann summarizes an exponential change soon to go in the opposite direction of the virus.
http://energyskeptic.com/2020/antonio-turiel-explaining-peak-oil-the-easy-way/
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Nice summary of why this time is different.
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4335420-after-pandemic-possible-sovereign-defaults-and-hyperinflation
h/t Panopticon
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Nice essay today by Raúl Ilargi Meijer on the sorry state of world leadership.
We don’t have brave intelligent leaders. We don’t have intelligent leaders. We don’t even have leaders.
We have reactive ass covering managers, at best.
Ilargi calls them little managers. I call them idiots in denial.
https://www.theautomaticearth.com/2020/04/little-managers/
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One number that does not lie is oil consumption because oil drives almost all wealth creation.
Oil consumption has dropped from 100 million barrels per day in 2019 to 65 million barrels today due to the Wuhan virus shutdown.
There has never been so large and so fast a decrease in the creation of wealth we need to pay the interest on the debt that has enabled us to deny that we hit limits to growth years ago.
Buckle up. Something’s going to break.
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Useful and inexpensive items like specialty batteries are still shipping from China via AliExpress. I expect this flow may soon stop, or the prices may soon rise, so best to stock up now.
Doug Nolan explains how the Wuhan virus crisis will likely transform into a financial crisis, starting in the periphery and moving towards the core.
http://creditbubblebulletin.blogspot.com/2020/04/weekly-commentary-king-of-sovereign.html
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Some quotes and links of late, many from Panopticon’s Climate and Economy blog:
“Otherwise we run the risk of complete economic chaos as supplies shrink and shortages emerge, with widespread unemployment and poverty, with associated social and political unrest.” ( https://qz.com/india/1830822/coronavirus-may-push-indias-struggling-economy-off-the-cliff/)
And Timothy Lenton: The coronavirus pandemic has reshaped the way we live, work, and interact in a matter of weeks. It has also shown that governments are able—and in many cases are expected—to take swift, significant action on crises. “Under these extraordinary circumstances, there can be quite decisive action from governance and policy that changes the way we’re all living day to day,” Lenton said. “It is possible to change large-scale patterns of human behavior, pretty quickly.”
the climate crisis cannot be solved incrementally, Lenton said, because it’s
taken too long to spur action: Many warming-related changes are already
underway. Global greenhouse gas emissions must be dramatically reduced and
eventually eliminated. “If we’re going to avoid the worst of bad climate
tipping points, then we’re going to need to find some positive tipping points
in society and ourselves to transform the way we live—in a generation”
Reported in https://newrepublic.com/article/157078/climate-crisis-will-just-shockingly-abrupt
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Thanks. The Wuhan virus illuminates how the human brain works. To save a few million people from COVID-19 we instantly shut down many high carbon emitting activities in most countries. To save most of our 8 billion from climate change we’ve done nothing for 30 years in any country. The only difference is that in one case death is a few weeks away, and in the other case death is a few decades away.
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Just finished reading “Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs” by by Michael T. Osterholm and Mark Olshaker. It’s excellent and highly recommended. When you hear our idiot leaders saying about the Wuhan virus that “no one could see this coming”, tell them to read this book. The predictions it makes about what we currently experiencing are remarkably accurate.
It remains a mystery why Osterholm deliberately misled us a couple weeks ago on the Joe Rogan show.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30841977-deadliest-enemy
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how do you mean he ‘misled’ listeners on Rogan? do yo have the link and min: for that? thanks
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Also posted above.
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Here’s some useful information. The best material for making homemade masks is blue shop towels, which are readily available.
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Who knew? A common first step in vaccine production is to grow viruses in live chicken eggs. How will vegans react when vaccinations are mandatory and they learn that chicken babies were murdered to keep us healthy? We’re gonna need military personnel to hold people down for their shots.
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Nouriel Roubini makes a strong case that we are heading into a global great depression.
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Excellent stuff, thanks for posting.
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Ventured out for groceries for the first time in 4 weeks today. I wore a mask and gloves and felt pretty safe due to good social distancing behavior in the stores. The shelves were well stocked but I have a hunch we are in the lull before the storm.
The organic farm I work at has planted potatoes for the first time this year in part due to my doomish encouragement. Fresh veg is good for health but calories are also important for survival.
Sales at the farmer’s market are way down. I spent the last week building a farm stand on wheels for self serve sales near the highway. Will be interesting to see if people are honest in times of need.
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Intravenous white lightning it is. Will the drunk respond? Maybe, maybe not. Regardless, central banks are trapped now and cannot stop until the drunk is dead, which guarantees a much worse outcome than the pain of a hangover and living within our means.
http://creditbubblebulletin.blogspot.com/2020/04/weekly-commentary-when-money-died.html
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We will miss him. Our old friend Moral Hazard, who had been on life support since 2008, finally gave up the ghost in April 2020. Having lived a long and useful life he was finally taken from us by Covid19 and the comorbidities of the accumulated financial shenanigans of the last few decades.
Let her rip you bankers, traders, hedgies – anything goes from here on in as long as it’s big enough. Don’t worry though Moral Hazards little brother, Moral Hazard for the not so rich and downright poor, is still in robust health and promises he will be with us until the very end.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/seen-everywhere-in-last-us-crisis-moral-hazard-is-nowhere-in-this-one/ar-BB12vT5K?ocid=spartanntp
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New documentary: Tracking Down the Origin of the Wuhan Coronavirus
Much compelling evidence here that the virus is man made. Must watch with a filter to ignore the capitalism good, communism bad, patriotic bullshit.
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Mac10 on the fireworks display scheduled for next year…
https://zensecondlife.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-coronavirus-is-lehman-times-10.html
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One of my heroes, Dennis Meadows, with a new short essay.
https://www.chelseagreen.com/2020/limits-to-growth-covid-epidemic/
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Oil consumption has fallen by 33% over the last 3 weeks in the US and could fall another 10+% over the next 3 weeks. That suggests to me the federal reserve will need to print about $1 trillion per month for every month of the lock down to avoid crashing the monetary system because our idiot leaders allowed debt levels to get too high in the “good times”.
I doubt the per capita ratios are much different in Canada.
This cannot end well, even if they find a vaccine, which is not a sure thing.
https://srsroccoreport.com/first-stage-of-oil-demand-destruction-u-s-supply-of-petroleum-products-down-7-million-barrels-per-day/
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Today’s report from Chris Martenson is very good. He discusses new emerging data that suggests you REALLY don’t want to get sick with the Wuhan virus.
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My friend Panopticon is still providing daily proof that climate change remains a bigger threat than the Wuhan virus despite the news media focusing 100% on the latter. The Wuhan virus will probably kill millions over the next few months, and climate change will probably kill billions over the next few decades.
https://climateandeconomy.com/2020/04/15/15th-april-2020-todays-round-up-of-climate-news/
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Today’s excellent essay by Tim Watkins discusses many important aspects of sustainability that we deny.
I personally remain confident that only voluntary rapid population reduction can improve the outcome of our predicament. And this won’t happen because genetic reality denial prevents our uniquely powerful intelligence from overriding our genes’ desire to execute the Maximum Power Principle. Which means we should configure our lives to expect the worse.
https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2020/04/15/is-this-sustainable/
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Our news media was 3 months late on the virus story. I’m betting they’ll be even later on the implications of the money printing story. It takes a 2 by 4 across the head for these morons to acknowledge reality.
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Nobel prize winning discoverer of the HIV virus says Wuhan virus is man made.
https://www.gilmorehealth.com/chinese-coronavirus-is-a-man-made-virus-according-to-luc-montagnier-the-man-who-discovered-hiv/
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Kunstler can turn a phrase.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/flight-path/
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“The massive slump on the stock markets and the flight to safe investments is a reaction to these shocks, but may trigger further shocks and intensify the downward dynamic in the real economy. The extent of these shocks depends heavily on expectations and thus on psychological factors. Economic policy measures must be tailored and targeted to these specificities. The timing and communication of the measures are crucial. The most important goal is to secure the public’s trust so that the health crisis does not turn into a systemic economic crisis that affects the labor market, banks, and financial markets, thus further weakening domestic demand.”
https://www.ifo.de/en/themen/coronavirus
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I think they’re missing a key point. We have hit limits to growth and therefore total wealth must and will decline soon. We are social monkeys that compete for status. If all the monkeys become poorer together we’ll be ok. If, on the other hand, the rich monkeys get bailed out and the poor monkeys lose everything we’ll have pitchforks in the streets, despots, and war. We need wise aware monkey leaders to ensure we all become poorer together. Instead we have moron monkeys that deny reality leading us.
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The Fatal Road to +4°Celsius
Extreme GHG and T°C rise rates exceed climate tipping thresholds
Andrew Glikson
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-fatal-road-to-4-degrees-celsius.html
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Kyle Bass on the Chinese government’s responsibility for the epidemic.
And why Hong Kong’s high debt load will make them toast this year.
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h/t Dave Lysak
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Monkeys think highly of themselves and like to assume an intelligent strategy behind things they see other monkeys doing. I look for simpler explanations because most monkeys deny reality and are not very bright or strategic. My guess is that the Saudi’s are broke and are desperate for cash so they’re selling their oil at whatever price the market will pay.
https://wolfstreet.com/2020/04/20/us-crude-oil-gets-annihilated-under-targeted-saudi-attack/
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https://wolfstreet.com/2020/04/20/holy-wtf-moly-wti-crude-oil-may-contracts-collapse-to-negative-35/
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Excellent point! We humans are meaning-making-machines. We love to make up a story so we can feel secure because we “understand”. Whether or not the story is actually true does not seem to matter to most of us.
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More evidence that the Wuhan virus may have been engineered.
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