"The technocrats at the helm of the Titanic have more than a hunch that the vessel is accelerating towards the iceberg. Having run out of policy bullets, they have opted to promote a continuous programme of fear and propaganda in a bid to manage the unmanageable. Crucially, they know what to most of us appears counterintuitive: that the breakdown of our obsolete mode of production can only be delayed through 1) A steady stream of global emergencies, 2) The controlled inflationary demolition of the increasingly unproductive real economy, and 3) The authoritarian makeover of liberal democracy.
Joining the dots means understanding that the purpose of the Ukrainian emergency is to keep the money printer switched on while blaming Putin for worldwide economic downturn.
Let us not forget that the stock market is a sort of derivative of the debt market, which therefore needs to be handled with extreme care. While the 'assisted suicide' of the real economy via negative supply shocks exacerbates consumer price inflation, the latter provides temporary relief to the mega debt bubble, thus postponing the crash.
The bottom line is that if Central Bank monetary injections were to end, a rapid increase in key interest rates would threaten a market crash, with defaults across the globe. So, either everyone plays according to the script, or the whole show is cancelled, and the system with it."
Fabio Vighi, Money Without Value In a Rapidly Disintegrating World
"The social principles of Christianity preach cowardice, self-contempt, abasement, submission, humility, in a word all the qualities of the canaille.”
Karl Marx
"It seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. The fact that the foolish person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with him as a person, but with slogans, catchwords, and the like that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the foolish person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings.
Only the humble believe in Him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that He does wonders where people despair, that He takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly. God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; He loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken."
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."
Karl Marx, Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, 1843
"But in truth the whole course of Christianity from the first, when we come to examine it, is but one series of troubles and disorders. Every century is like every other, and to those who live in it seems worse than all times before it. The Church is ever ailing, and lingers on in weakness.
Religion seems ever expiring, schisms dominant, the light of Truth dim, its adherents scattered. The cause of Christ is ever in its last agony, as though it were but a question of time whether it fails finally this day or another. The Saints are ever all but failing from the earth, and Christ all but coming; and thus the Day of Judgment is literally ever at hand.
God alone knows the day and the hour when that will at length be, which He is ever threatening; meanwhile, thus much of comfort do we gain from what has been hitherto,—not to despond, not to be dismayed, not to be anxious, at the troubles which encompass us. They have ever been; they ever shall be; they are our portion.
'The floods are risen, the floods have lift up their voice, the floods lift up their waves. The waves of the sea are mighty, and rage horribly; but yet the Lord, who dwelleth on high, is mightier.'"
John Henry Newman, Via Media, Feb. 24, 1837
“Religion used to be the opium of the people. To those suffering humiliation, pain, illness, and serfdom, religion promised the reward of an after life. But now, we are witnessing a transformation: a true opium of the people is the belief in nothingness after death, the huge solace, the huge comfort of thinking that for our betrayals, our greed, our cowardice, our murders, we are not going to be judged.”
Czeslaw Milosz, Discreet Charm of Nihilism
"Sometimes God must first break a heart to enter it. And it is what remains afterwards, when the crisis is passed, that offers us the way to becoming fully human.
And we are then called to stand up and witness to the fully human life, in grace that is given, not cheaply by ourselves, but by our resolve and determination to follow Him in our calling. Where there is sickness bring healing, where there is despair bring hope. Little acts of goodness spread like ripples in a pond. A candle in the darkness allows others to find and ignite their own— and then there is light."
Jesse, Resist the Temptation to Despair, 26 October 2016
"Humanism was not wrong in thinking that truth, beauty, liberty, and equality are of infinite value, but was wrong in thinking that we can get them for ourselves, without grace."
Simone Weil
Stocks rallied hard this morning on the better-than-expected PPI numbers.
But alas, the bubblonians could not maintain their momentum, and stocks drifted down into the red or slight better than unchanged.
Gold and silver lost ground.
VIX rose slightly.
The Dollar chopped sideways after losing all its overnight gains on the PPI number.
Have a pleasant evening.
