First, very soon you all can expect the Obama regime to start withholding medicine and access to medical care from people in order to quash dissent. I called this immediately in 2009 when it became clear that ObamaCare was going to be imposed. ObamaCare has NOTHING to do with healthcare, “fixing” the “system” or “helping the poor”. You would have to be a complete imbecile to believe that on day one. If you still believe that now, well, let’s just say that mathematical notation has yet to be invented to express the enormity of that level of stupidity.
ObamaCare has to do with controlling human beings, deciding who lives and deciding who dies, and ultimately they want to “force” people to not just die physically, but also to die spiritually and be lost to hell. They want to be God. They are attempting to install, enthrone and coronate themselves as “god”. As I have said before, we are dealing with a collective antichrist.
Other services, such as car insurance, will eventually be withheld in order to quash dissent. Many of you are going to wake up some morning unable to “legally” drive your car because your “data” has indicated that you are “uninsurable”.
Warren makes the point that the slogan already being used by the Obama regime of “If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear,” would be more accurate stated as “If you do not think you have nothing to fear.” Tell me that isn’t accurate. Tell me that the regime through the infiltrated “schools” hasn’t created an entire society of people who refuse to think. Look around you. Your neighbors aren’t just uneducated, they are now, in their current state, uneducable. Objective evidence means NOTHING. Reality means NOTHING. Truth means NOTHING. All that matters is SENTIMENT, and not just sentiment, but irrational, evil, immoral sentiment. So, switch off. Stop thinking. Just let “us” take care of you. Did you watch the ballroom dancing? Did you catch the latest episode of the soap opera du jour? Here, just take your food stamp credit card, go get some McDonalds, and STOP THINKING. And if you do think, you might suddenly find that your foodstamp card doesn’t work anymore….
Finally, the money quote:
“The power of the dying empire is extreme.”
Exactly. Don’t be fooled. It is like a star going supernova. This massive increase in government size and tyranny is the explosion that ends in a dead star – a white dwarf. While the supernova may appear permanent, vibrant and creative while it is happening to those very close to it, it is really the end-stage of death unfolding.
And, as any Star Trek fan can tell you, if a star goes supernova, you need to get the Enterprise very, very far away because your shields aren’t remotely strong enough to withstand it, and there is nothing you can do to stop it once critical mass has been reached. The system is simply too big.
† Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL. †
St. Henry, King and manful wielder of the sword, pray for us!
Now that I am living in the Van Down By The River and have liquidated my estate, I did hold back a few items which are being sold on eBay by the Estate Liquidation Elves back in Colorado. We had some incredibly successful auctions of wooden spoons, rolling pins, and my Colorado license plates. Now we are doing simple, fixed-price “Buy It Now” sales. The silverware has sold out (Thank you!) and we are now working through the china dinnerware at $60 PER PIECE, which includes free shipping. Once the china is sold, we will move to the very exciting mug collection, and then after that the whisks and spatulas! Ooooh. Ahhhhh.
Thanks to one and all who have made purchases. Be assured of my daily prayers for all of my benefactors. In fact, in the examination of conscience I use in preparing for Confession, failure to pray for one’s benefactors is a specifically listed sin, so I am well-reminded to never forget or take for granted those folks who are willing to pay WAYY too much for my random stuff.
My eBay handle is 720ann.
Here is the china listing. It says there are 27 pieces remaining.
Open the fridge, see what is in there, throw it all in a bowl, and then make meatloaf out of it. That’s what this post is.
1. Once again, a standing ovation for Boeing, please. Apparently the pilot had just SLIGHTLY more experience landing a 777, much less at SFO, than I have, essentially flew the aircraft into the ground at which point the aircraft cartwheeled, and 99.5% of the people on board survived, and one of the dead MAY have been run over and killed by a rescue vehicle on the tarmac. Um, THAT is one heck of an awesome airframe. That’s the plane I would want to fly on, please. An Airbus would have probably disintegrated. Remember the old axiom, folks, “If it ain’t Boeing, I ain’t going!”
2. Regarding the group in Northern Colorado that is looking to secede: I hate to be a killjoy here, but after you secede from Colorado, you do realize that you will still be inside the neo-Stalinist nation that used to be the Constitutional Republic called the United States of America, right? If you think the dope-smoking sodomite tyrants in Denver are bad, what exactly is your plan to deal with the collective antichrist that is the FEDGOV? When the Northern Colorado/Western Kansas/Western Nebraska boys start talking about seceding from the UNION, then I’ll sit up and pay attention.
3.
Ann,
Re-reading some of your older posts and indeed the men have gotten pansified. But it doesn’t help when a man who’s realized that he’s got to get out of the system has a wife who throws a royal fit when he tries. There are a lot of men out here who have to choose between obeying their wives or greasing their tank’s treads with their wives who stand in the way. A comannding officer’s second-in-command should be there to help, not hinder.
Yes, dear. Life is hard when your wife is carrying your testicles around in her purse. CRY. ME. A. RIVER.
Let me tell you what your first clue should have been, gentlemen: (And remember, my average reader is about 65 years old) When your blushing bride told you there was NO WAY she was going to say “love, honor and OBEY” at your wedding back in ’71. There’s your sign, boys. Having been blessed/cursed with THREE large brass testicles that I have had to carry around for my entire adult life, and fully appreciating the disorder therein, a good girl should be falling all over herself to find and marry a man worthy of her obedience, and to publicly pledge said obedience to him in front of God and everyone.
Here is the admonition of the priest to the bride, straight out of the Sarum Missal:
Vis habere hunc virum in sponsum & ei obedire, & seruire, & eum diligere, honorare, ac custodire sanum & infirmum, sicut sponsa debet sponsum, & omnes alios propter eum dimittere, & illi soli adh†rere quamdiu vita vtriusque vestrum durauerit?
Obedire, y’all. O. BE. DI. RE. Obey.
The Old School? It is the Best School.
The husband is asked if he will cherish and take care of his blushing bride. But Kathy is required to pledge obedience to this chap who is agreeing to TAKE CARE OF HER. Darn right. If some dude agrees to take care of you for the rest of your life, I think it is appropriate for you to agree to not chop-block, hamstring and otherwise kneecap the brother while he is cherishing and taking care of you. Oh, and there’s also that little thing about, er, actually LOVING your husband, and thus trusting him, and thus honoring him and wanting him to be the best man he can be, and thus not cutting his testicles out on your honeymoon night and carrying them around in your purse for the next fifty years.
Curse you, you filthy feminists. Curse you to the deepest, darkest cinders.
4. This concept via KD at Market-Ticker.org. Simple math, people. Simple math.
If we call the economy of the U.S. $15 Trillion, and the Obama regime and Federal Reserve dilute the currency by $1 Trillion per year (which they are at minimum), this results in a 6.66% reduction in purchasing power annually (1 divided by 15). Thus, personal income AND spending must increase at 6.66% annually in order for the economy to merely tread water at the consumer level. Any “growth” rate LESS than the dilution rate is therefore ECONOMIC CONTRACTION.
Just stop and think about that. I know you can do it.
5. Cool musical interlude: Hank Snow, Canada’s single greatest export, singing “Now and Then There’s a Fool Such As I”. Elvis’ cover is quite good, too.
† Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL. †
Can’t tell for sure which saint this is, but I like the whole, “Oh, hello. I was just inspecting my weapon systems,” vibe this image has. Saints and all aspiring saints must remember that ASSAULT WEAPON care and maintenance is a must. Keep your boomsticks clean, the sights zeroed and the bayonets sharpened.
1. Yes, I saw that Corzine was “charged” by the CFTC. This is essentially meaningless. First, it is a purely civil action. These oligarch psychopaths LAUGH at the whole “civil action” paradigm. Second, the $100 million fine that the CFTC is going after comes NOT from Corzine, but from whatever is left of the MF Global Holdings estate, IF there is anything left at all. Not one red cent would come from Corzine, who was worth at least $600 million at the time of the collapse in the fall of 2011. Third, even if Corzine gets the dreaded “registration ban” (eyeroll), he will just jump right back into the markets as a silent partner.
The whole farce is a total nothingburger. With cheese.
Meanwhile, let me share a note that I received from an old floor trader buddy, and let me show you what the human toll is not just on the MF Global clients directly, but also on all of the thousands and thousands of decent people who can no longer make a living in the now-destroyed markets:
Ann,
I have been unable to find gainful employment in the industry I loved and was so very passionate about. As a result I have taken a job as a cook at the *City* Airport Hilton. While humbling, my hands get cut and burned constantly, it is honest work and I work hard.
All the best to you, bless you, J
This chap used to help hedge the price risk on the food you eat, thus helping to keep food prices and production stable. Now he is a short-order cook. I, personally, aspire to janitorial work someday.
The smart people still exist. But we aren’t playing any longer. We’re just watching. If you want to be ruled by imbeciles and psychopaths, and you insist upon destroying and running off every genuinely talented, decent, competent person, then so be it. We’ll just be sitting in the back, watching.
2. On the topic of the markets, let me share some insights I have picked up over the last several weeks from various sources and see if this sheds light on this for all of you out there who haven’t spent your life hip-deep in this stuff so you can understand what is going on. Maybe.
First, the people who actually know what is going on view the equities (stocks) and bond markets as utterly worthless trash that is only being marketed to two classes because these are the only classes of investors left who are dumb enough to still not recognize any of this: Pension plans and individual investors. Yes, that’s right. Pension plans are just slightly more “astute” than Joe Schmoe trading his $100k account through Edward Jones.
Understand that the entire stock market is nothing more than a massive facade and bubble, being blown every single day by the Federal Reserve to the tune of $4 billion per day. Yes, the Fed “prints” money out of thin air, and then pumps it directly into the stock market. Why is the Dow at 15000 while the U.S. and global economies are being intentionally strangled to death by the neo-Stalinists in Washington and Europe? Because almost all of the money flowing into it is coming from the Fed, which is conjuring it out of thin air. Again, to the tune of $4 billion PER DAY. If the Fed was removed or stopped, the Dow would collapse to 5000 – maybe lower – very quickly.
And the bond markets are the same. Prices are being propped up (and thus yields suppressed) because of this fake, Fed-bubble money being the only real player in town. Anyone with a lick of sense is long, long since out of the stock and bond markets.
Here’s a little anecdote I have been meaning to publish for a while. The day Obama was inaugurated in January 2009, super-prime farmground in south-central Illinois was selling at an all-time high of $5500 per acre, which everyone in the ag world thought was crazy-insane high. That same ground 4 1/2 years later is now selling for over $20,000 per acre. If you’re wondering where all of the super-rich are going with their wealth, there’s your answer. They are buying up productive farmground, leasing it back to the farmers who stay on as renter-caretakers or glorified sharecroppers, and everyone’s happy. The farmers aren’t leaving, they’re just restructuring their businesses from owning to renting.
So who are these people who are “in-the-know” in the financial markets? As I have said, it is all down to the High Frequency Trading guys. Now here is where it all comes together and gets incestuous. The HFT guys are the same guys who are developing and writing the code and algorithms for massive data (“cloud”) mining and surveillance. They have exhausted the profit potential in the High Frequency Trading itself, because they have run off all of the non-HFT liquidity and thus they were all just trying to poach off of each other, which makes basically no money. So, what they are now doing is developing code that processes ALL news data on the planet, and then the algorithms look for micro-trends, and then attempt to generate volatility and then poach the volatility in sectors or commodities that these micro-trends are indentified in. So yes, all of this “data cloud” and surveillance algorithm stuff that the government is involved in is being developed by the government’s operational arm on Wall Street. Or is the government the operational arm of Wall Street? Discuss.
The term that has been coined for this monstrosity is “Big Data”, and make no mistake, “Big Data” is Wall Street, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Google and the FEDGOV all together. In terms of the markets, the only way for firms to make money is in developing and selling “Big Data”, poaching derivatives with HFT, and commissions from suckers like you, both personally and through your pension and retirement products.
Now for you wonky trading people. Let’s talk about derivatives. The bid-ask spreads are now totally absent from first, second and even third level derivatives. Even HFT algorithms can’t make a self-sustaining return if the bid-ask spread is a half-cent. In order to find any spread margins and thus make trading viable, these companies have to keep drilling ever lower and creating new levels of derivatives. Every time they drill down and bundle a set of derivatives on, say the seventh level removed from the actual commodity or product (the underlier), to create the new eighth derivative level, inefficient liquidity re-emerges in the new eighth level AND AND AND they evade regulation, because each new derivative level is the “wild west” until such time as an entire regulatory regime is created. The lag on that is massive, so each new derivative level buys time for Big Data.
With each new level of derivatives created, the foundations of the market in total become ever more porous and weak. We are now basically digging an eighth or ninth sub-basement underneath this skyscraper, and using styrofoam packing peanuts as the foundation material.
When the HFT stops, and when the Fed stops pumping billions upon billions of dollars PER DAY into the markets, the structure will instantly collapse because the foundations have been underdug and undermined multiple times, and we are now teetering on foam. In my 2.5 hour YouTube economics lecture (with the epic pink tie) I referred to this as “going no-bid”.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Anyone who is still in these markets is either stupid or on drugs.
† Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL. †
Evil never stops. It never relents. It never loses zeal or enthusiasm. It never gets tired. It cannot be reasoned with. If you “dialog” with evil, it will win every time because it will only drag you down to its level through the lie of “compromise”. Evil cannot be “encountered” in any constructive way other than on the field of battle, at which point total victory achieved as quickly as possible is the only goal, the only acceptable outcome, and all tactics must serve that goal.
Anything less is a massive failure in charity; towards God, towards one’s fellow man (including the human enemy), and towards one’s self.
Unless and until the men of the apostasized Christian world (that’s YOU) relearn this and accept the curse of war as a chastisement for their sickening, horrific sins and cowardice, you will be destroyed by the forces of evil so that men who love God can eventually inherit your patrimony. Justice demands this. You cannot continue as the moral degenerates and cowards that you are and expect to keep your property and freedom, much less to be “blessed”.
You can start by canceling your cable or satellite feed.
Yeah, it is pretty sad that the Pope has to be rhetorically frontrun, but, as I have been saying since literally day one of the Franciscan pontificate, a South American Jesuit who isn’t terribly intelligent and who is also in love with the idea of his own dazzling, dazzling “humility” is a disaster, and when one sees a disaster coming, one prepares as much as one can.
Hence this repost about the First Beatitude, which Pope Francis clearly does not understand but is using as the foundation of his whole schtick as the “Leader of the Diocesan Community of Rome”.
If I’m not mistaken, he has already said that his first Encyclical will be titled “Blessed Are the Poor”, which in and of itself is problematic. The First Beatitude is NOT “Blessed are the poor” full stop. The First Beatitude is “Blessed are the poor IN SPIRIT.” Big, big, big, enormous, hugantic difference. Oh, but you know that a not-too-bright South American Jesuit with Liberation Theology / Marxist leanings would conveniently leave off the modifying prepositional phrase “in spirit”. Well, let’s frontrun that and really get our heads around the First Beatitude and the true poverty that Our Blessed Lord is referencing therein.
This post was originally from December 22, ARSH 2011. I had shut down Barnhardt Capital Management a month before and was interviewed by Peter Schiff on his radio show. That video is below. By the way, this was the first interview in which I publicly stated that Jon Corzine had committed a capital crime that merited execution. That is at the 15:05 mark. Mr. Schiff’s physical response in the video pretty much sums up where we are as a civilization. Anyway, that’s the backstory. Off we go:
Bravo to the many folks who picked up on exactly the remark by Mr. Schiff that will be the subject of tonight†s essay. You all will TOTALLY get this † you†re already most of the way there. We just need to flesh it out a bit.
And seeing the multitudes, He went up into a mountain, and when He was set down, His disciples came unto Him. And opening His mouth, He taught them, saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5: 1-3
The First Beatitude is another grossly misread and misunderstood verse, with the misunderstanding being a recent phenomenon, spurred by a conscientious perversion of the meaning of the verse by Marxist infiltrators beginning in the 20th century.
Most people read this verse and see the words †blessed† and †poor† and think that Jesus is saying that poor people are morally superior to rich people. You can see why Marxists jumped all over this verse. They have twisted it into a class warfare battle cry. Other people see the words †blessed† and †poor† and also the prepositional modifier †in spirit†, have no idea what to make of it, glaze over, start thinking about football or Zumba class, and just smile and nod like the Stepford Christo-zombies that they are.
I†m a huge fan of punctuation. Especially properly-utilized apostrophes. But I†m also a fan of ellipses and the humble comma.
I think that we can understand the First Beatitude with far more ease if we slip a set of ellipses in between the subject, †the poor†, and the prepositional phrase, †in spirit.† Thus:
Blessed are the poor . . . in spirit.
Does that help? Our Lord isn†t saying that poor people are by definition morally superior to rich people. Not at all. What He is saying is that a person who is detached from their wealth and is willing to †push their chips all-in†, to use a poker metaphor, is truly blessed. So, given this, ANYONE within the wealth spectrum, rich or poor, can possess this virtue. This also means that anyone within the wealth spectrum can LACK this virtue. There are two separate classifications that we need to address and combine in order to understand this dynamic: poor in spirit and poor in fact, and their antipodes, rich in spirit and rich in fact. If we form a matrix of these characteristics, there are four possible output combinations. Let†s go through each.
Poor in spirit and poor in fact:
This is a person who does not have any great wealth, but is also content and still maintains a spirit of generosity and gratitude. This condition is exemplified by the parable of the Widow†s mite in Mark 12: 41-44. The poor widow gave the smallest tithe, but it was greater than the tithes of the rich because, †she of her want cast in all she had, even her whole living.† The widow was detached even from what little she had, even though on a percentage basis it far, far exceeded what the rich tithed. The widow was both poor in fact, and poor in spirit.
Rich in spirit and poor in fact:
This is the person who lives beyond their means and is preoccupied with the APPEARANCE and ACQUISITION of wealth. (Cough, cough. Ring any bells? Ahem.) This is the person who leverages himself out the gazoo so that he can have the 4000 square foot house and the luxury car . . . even though he only makes $65k per year. This would also be the welfare denizen who scoffs at honest work and lives off of the government, but has a 55† LCD TV and PlayStation, and has multi-thousand dollar hair extensions and intricately manicured fingernails. No. Way. Girl. I did NOT just go there. Oh yes I did.
This is the rich person who is very much attached to their wealth, and places the preservation of their wealth as their top priority. And as so many of you picked up on in the Peter Schiff interview below, this is Mr. Schiff†s failing. If you scroll down and fast-forward the video to the 15:43 mark, here is the exchange that utterly exemplifies this condition:
Schiff: Let me ask you, your call for a strike, what exactly does that entail? If people wanted to follow what you†re saying, how would we have a strike? What would people do?
Ann: Close all of your securities accounts, bring all of your money home and stop trading all markets: futures, stocks, everything. Man up, act like you†ve got a pair and shut it down.
Schiff: Well, that would put me out of business. I mean, if all of my customers would close down their . . . .
And there you have it. Peter Schiff, like almost everyone else in our culture, can†t fully acknowledge the objective reality of what is happening, and thus can not respond in a fully virtuous way because he is, first and foremost, attached to his wealth and simply can not bring himself to push his wealth †all-in† in service to justice and truth. If we take him at his word in the video clip above, he will not tell his clients that they are at risk, recommend that they liquidate, or shut down his firm because he is attached to and has defined himself by his firm and the wealth that it generates for him.
Now please understand the distinction here: Mr. Schiff†s firm and the wealth it has amassed Mr. Schiff is not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself † no more so than my firm and the wealth that it generated for me over the years was †bad†. Not only are these things not necessarily bad, they actually have the potential to be good! What IS bad is the inordinate ATTACHMENT and unwillingness to LAY DOWN that †good thing† in service to a GREATER GOOD, which in this case is justice and truth. I was willing to lay my †good thing† down because I understood the First Beatitude and the promise of Christ that in laying down my †good thing† I might later inherit a far better thing, namely a wee little corner of the Kingdom of Heaven. As a trained arbitrageur, I recognize a good swap when I see it. Wink.
This is what Christ meant when He said, †And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven. And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: Who then can be saved? And Jesus beholding, said to them: With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible.† Matthew 19: 24-27
Our Lord isn†t saying that the rich are intrinsically evil purely because they are rich. That is what the Marxists want you to believe. He is saying that it is EXTREMELY difficult for wealthy people to maintain DETACHMENT from their wealth, and the richer people become, the more attached they tend to be to their wealth. But He goes on to say that there is hope! All things are possible through Him! Let†s all pray that Peter Schiff, and all wealthy people of good will, by the power of the Holy Spirit, are able to detach themselves from their wealth and shove that camel through that needle, because IT CAN BE DONE.
Poor in spirit, rich in fact:
Very simply, this is a person who is at any level of financial comfort above †poor† who is willing to push their wealth †all-in† if that is what is required to follow Christ fully. (The truly blessed then learn that The Van Down By The River not only isn’t so bad, it can be the best thing ever. But that requires a huge leap of faith. Trust me, I know.)
And that, ladies and gents, is how Peter Schiff, with an assist by the Holy Spirit, taught you all about the First Beatitude. The Lord truly does move and work in mysterious ways.
(I think maybe Mr. Schiff is the guy in the lower-left with his head down in his hand. “Oh, what He’s saying is HAAAAARD.”)
† Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL. †
Our Lady, bedecked in helmet and chainmail, holding Our Lord. Suited and booted. Ready for battle. Ooh-rah.
