Obama Leads Us Towards An Argentinian Collapse

This is by far the best piece I have read describing the present course of American Politics and the disintegrating economic future that awaits us.
Read This Carefully And Decide If You Are A Democrat Or An American!
You Can No Longer Afford To Be Both!

"THE PERON PATTERN

America is heading down the road to socialism - and ruin. Numerous proposals have been enacted to reverse the economic downturn. First, in the spring of 2008 came the $180 billion stimulus program. Then, the 2008 summer $345 billion housing bailout. This was followed by the 2008 fall $700 billion bailout of Wall Street.

Now, the House and Senate have passed a nearly $800 billion stimulus package. Hence, more than $2 trillion will have been spent in a futile attempt to revive the economy.

We are imposing upon our children and grandchildren the burdensome costs of our addiction to big government. And this doesn't even take into account Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's plan for the taxpayer to absorb another $2 trillion to $4 trillion in debt to clean up the financial system. In other words, America is being buried under a mountain of debt - a debt that will trigger soaring inflation, crushing taxes and high interest rates. This is a recipe for economic disaster.

President Obama is playing Franklin D. Roosevelt to George W. Bush's Herbert Hoover. In the 1930s, it was FDR who expanded his New Deal liberalism from the activist policies of Hoover. Mr. Obama is building upon the massive budget deficits and reckless government spending of the Bush administration. Unlike Mr. Bush, however, Mr. Obama is shrewdly erecting an enduring majority electoral coalition - just as FDR did.

The stimulus plan has something for every important Democratic special interest group - labor, the teachers unions, big-city bosses, environmentalists, Hispanics, and African-Americans. Key constituencies will benefit from school construction, infrastructure projects, public works, retooling federal buildings with green technologies, expanding Medicaid and unemployment insurance, and more money for strapped states and localities. The plan is primarily designed not to stimulate the economy, but the size and scope of government. More citizens will be dependent upon government largesse. This empowers the Democratic Party and its liberal elite.

As National Review's Jonah Goldberg has rightly noted, modern American liberalism is a form of fascism - otherwise known as national socialism. Its goal is to establish a centralized corporatist state, in which a ruling class manages to transfer power from the private to the public sector.

Liberalism champions huge entitlements, expensive social programs and the regimentation of nearly every aspect of people's lives - from smoking bans and university admissions policies, to prayer in schools and how much right-wing talk-radio one can listen to. It seeks to dominate not only politics and the economy, but culture and the arts as well.

Liberalism fuses statism with class-based populism. It is perpetually at war against some perceived national enemy, whether it be the "rich," conservative Republicans or traditional Christians. It designates an entire group of people - in America, it is unborn babies - as being less than fully human and lacking basic rights. It believes that politics, not religion, is the salvation of humanity. It constructs mass movements based on charismatic, messianic leaders, such as Woodrow Wilson, FDR, John F. Kennedy and Mr. Obama, bestowing upon them almost divine, saintly qualities. It is obsessed with using activist government in the service of social engineering. Since liberalism is consumed with power, it contains the seeds of its own destruction; it is the ideology of national suicide.

The disastrous path on which America is currently embarked was tried in another country - in the Western Hemisphere: Juan Peron's Argentina. During the 1940s until a 1955 coup ousted him from power, Peron presided over a fascist state.

What is not commonly known about Argentina is that prior to World War II, it was an economic powerhouse. Beginning in the 1880s and continuing through the 1920s and 1930s, it was regarded as one of the most prosperous and advanced nations in the world.

Argentina had a strong industrial base, thriving agricultural exports and a broad and expanding middle class. Like America, it served as a magnet for immigrants from all over the world, especially Italians. Within 15 years, however, Argentina went from being one of the richest to one of the poorest countries.

This was due largely to Peronist policies. Upon coming to office, Peron, along with his popular wife, Eva, established a corporatist state characterized by lavish social spending, elaborate welfare programs, protectionism, confiscatory taxation and runaway deficits.

Peron used strident class warfare rhetoric, attacking big business, the banks, corporations and the propertied class. He greatly strengthened labor unions, making them pivotal allies of his regime.

Peronism transformed the Argentine state. The bloated bureaucracy and massive government intervention fostered widespread corruption. Central economic planning destroyed productivity and growth. Investment capital fled. Inflation and interest rates soared. The middle class was wiped out. The independent judiciary was undermined and eventually smashed. The fawning media class became co-opted by Peron's allies. His -and Eva's - cult of personality fostered a climate of violence and political persecution of the regime's enemies. Argentina degenerated into the Latin American basket case that it is today.

The failure of Peronism should serve as a warning: Socialism and a sky-rocketing national debt can permanently impoverish even the wealthiest nations. America is not immune from the laws of economics. Prosperous republics - ancient Rome, the Italian city-states, Argentina - have seen their wealth squandered, never to recover.

Mr. Obama is taking the first dangerous steps toward an American version of Peronism. His followers see him as a political messiah, a revolutionary change agent who will foster national cohesion and unity. He and the Democrats are plundering the state, using it as a vehicle to reward supporters (and punish foes). He is our Dear Leader, whose image is everywhere from magazine covers to T-shirts to baseball caps. His wife, Michelle, is the Eva Peron of our time - glamorous, chic, a fashion trend-setter who is beloved by the media.

Most ominously, Mr. Obama is repeating the statist populism that didn't work in Argentina, and will not work in America. Professor Philip Jenkins wryly observes that the United States of America risks becoming "the United States of Argentina." He is right. Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it. " Jeffrey T. Kuhner Washington Post

Obama Leads Us Towards An Argentinian Collapse

The Green Bank Scam

How is a statement like this possible:
"The Green Bank is a job-creation engine that will finance the transition to the clean energy economy at no cost to consumers." From: The Roanoke Times
Someone, in this case it is called 'The Green Bank', will pay money for something, in this case our transition to a clean energy economy, and it will cost the consumers nothing? Dollars will exchange hands but the consumer, you and I that pay our electric bills every month, will not pay for this new service?

This is the kind of rhetoric that not only bothers me but once again proves just how ignorant and, well stupid (not a word I toss around lightly) the American Citizen is becoming, or even more worrisome it proves how dumb Americans actually are. Let's pretend we care about our new 'Green Bank', green is the word of the new century and since we all must jump on the band wagon to save our planet, country, state and neighborhood we all want, no need to be part of The Green Movement. So money, dollars, will be spent to fund this 'Green Bank' but the consumer won't pay for it. I must have woken up in the land of 'instantly created money from thin air' (actually I did because Quantitative Easing, the little trick the Federal Reserve has been using for the past couple months does just that because when China and the rest of the world refuse to buy our Treasury Bills we just wave a magic wand and buy them ourselves with money that in fact was created out of thin air). But for this Green Bank if consumers of electricity (by my own calculations it must be over 98% of the population because the last time I visited someones home without electricity it was in a dream and I was a small monkey, but that is another story) don't finance this transition who will pay, who will drop dollars on the table for our Green transition?

For the average American if they are told their electric bill will not increase they will probably believe it. But where does this money come from?

'The Green Bank' is a group of more than 50 businesses so business supplies the money for The Green Bank. Where do businesses get their money? They sell a product or service to a consumer. How will 'Green Bank' businesses raise extra capital to fund The Green Bank? They can either produce their products or services at a lower cost while charging the same amount of money (thus creating extra income) or they can produce their goods at the same cost and charge the consumer more. I don't see the cost of doing business going down so it is the consumer who will pay more to fund 'The Green Bank'!

So while the electric bill might remain the same in order to fund 'The Green Bank' some consumers of some products will pay more!

Of course The Federal Government can always chip in some money to 'The Green Bank' and with a straight face we can be told our electric bill will not increase. It's just our taxes that will go up, but since raising taxes is taboo in Washington I think it is just easier to create the money out of thin air.

A Green Economy is a wonderful idea but don't blow wind up my skirt and tell me it will cost the consumers nothing. Someone must pay.

Guns Don't Kill People - Bullets Kill People

"The 2009 Small Arms Survey reported that the Untied States alone was responsible for about half of the worldwide increase in legal international gun sales between 2000 and 2006. The U.S. now accounts for over half of the world's imports of pistols and revolvers and 45 percent of shotguns." From MercuryNews

And the crowd chants "USA USA USA"

How many Americans own guns?
The anti-gun lobby estimates about 150-200 Million guns in the Country.
The Census records about 350 Million people in the Country.
On average that would be over one gun per household.

But I know we can do better than that!

Ukrop's Leaves Roanoke

I guess it's time to shop at Ukrop's on Franklin Road because the store will close! Ok, maybe the store will close (if it doesn't it will just keep sucking money from the corporate headquarters) but if I owned Ukrop's I would be ready to at least dump their presence in Roanoke.
"The rumors have circulated for weeks within the grocery industry concerning the potential sale of Ukrops Supermarkets to Ruddick Corporations wholly owned subsiderary Harris-Teeter. The there has not been an "official" confirmation of the sale, rumors circulated when Harris-Teeter evidently applied for the required ABC permits for 29 stores in the greater Richmond area." From AOF
If Harris Teeter applied for the ABC permits for the Richmond area stores then this is more than a rumor. You don't go infront of the ABC Board just because you want to test the waters. You go because ABC controls the purse strings of profits. The concept of Ukrop's in Roanoke never latched on to our citizens. It could have been the fact that there is a Kroger two stop lights away that most of the potencial Ukrop's shoppers had been patronizing for years prior to the new store, perhaps it was the fact that next door to Krogers was a new Fresh Market, a different feeling, slightly upscale grocer, or maybe, just maybe it was the fact that Roanokers like to buy alcohol on Sundays (we are known internartionally as the Sabboth Sippers, and if we aren't I think it is a good time to start that rumor).
The fact is Ukrop's never established a consistent market share in Roanoke and if Harris Teeter is truely pursuing the Richmond area stores our Ukrop's will close.
Personally, one way or the other I don't see our store surviving much longer.
I guess I should go shop there sometime this week.
Like most Roanokers it would be my first time walking in their door.

The World Prepares For The Fall Of The Dollar

A fantastically depressing graph from The Market Oracle



This is four months of the U.S. bailing water out of a sinking ship while the rest of the world slowly cuts the tow rope that connects our two economies.

Is Gas More Expensive Or Is The Dollar Worth Less

Let's take a tour down the mathematical highway of time.

Silver sold for $3.14/oz in 1973 or one dollar equaled about one-third of an ounce of silver. Today one dollar will only buy about 1/13 of an ounce of silver (silver at $13/oz.) This implies that the dollar has lost about 75% of it’s purchasing power over the last 36 years, or that it will buy only about one-fourth as much of anything.

In 1964 (when US coins still contained silver) a 'silver dime' would buy a 12-ounce bottle of Coke from a vending machine. Three dimes would buy a gallon of gasoline.

In 2009 the same 1964 silver dime will still buy a 12-ounce bottle of Coke from a vending machine, and three 1964 dimes will still buy a gallon of gasoline (with a little change to spare!) Of course you’ll have to exchange it for a couple Federal Reserve Notes.

Or we can look at it this way:
In 1960 a Gallon of Regular Gasoline cost $0.29 or 0.21 oz of Silver
In 2009 a Gallon of Regular Gasoline cost $2.69 or 0.20 oz of Silver

The same amount of Silver will buy you the same amount of Gasoline.
Clearly the $DOLLAR$ has become less valuable! Data From SB

Let's All Watch The U.S. Fall - Do Da - Do Da

This chart says it all.
The United States is crumbling while
China is rising

Follow The Leaders Towards Gold

In the first half of 2008 the United States Mint sold 180,000 one-ounce American Eagle gold bullion coins.

In the first half of 2009 the United States Mint sold 680,500 one-ounce American Eagle gold bullion coins.

This might require a doctorate degree in economics or a Sparky Space Calculator from a box of Cracker Jacks but either way I hope you can figure out why the number of Gold Coins sold almost quadrupled in one year. Even I know, from years of studying my vast collection of Richie Rich comic books that people like money but the wealthy like gold. Even Scrooge McDuck, a very serious protector of his fortunes, kept most of his wealth in gold coins (he also enjoyed swimming through them and we all know that when you try to do the back stroke in dollar bills it is just not as satisfying) and since a single gold coin will run you about $1000 it is usually those with excessive disposable income that purchase gold.

Now when I throw on my Junior Detective Badge (also acquired from a box of Cracker Jacks) I notice a peculiar and disturbing trend displayed in the above numbers. The sphincter pucker factor of people with money has quadrupled because they had the ability to buy gold in early 2008, they watched 20%-40% of their portfolios vanish in late 2008, and even though gold is not considered a profitable investment they rushed to gold in early 2009.

Either 'The Markets' are so unsafe and unstable that 'The Wealthy' placed their money in gold to ride out the storm or "The Markets' are so unsafe and unstable that 'The Wealthy' placed their money in gold to make more money. Even with my Junior Detective Badge back in the top drawer of my desk I can postulate that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

The truth is people are scared and the last place they want their wealth is in The Markets. So they have bought Gold. To me this emphatically yells, "Stay Away From The Markets!" or "The Markets Will Crash And Burn" or perhaps it is a whisper that floats across the breeze and prickles our ears with, "when the wealthy decide to preserve their wealth with gold perhaps we should listen...."

One World Currency Without A Conspiracy

"Russian President Dmitry Medvedev illustrated his call for a supranational currency to replace the dollar by pulling from his pocket a sample coin of a 'united future world currency'. Medvedev has repeatedly called for creating a mix of regional reserve currencies as part of the drive to address the global financial crisis, while questioning the U.S. dollar’s future as a global reserve currency." From Bloomberg

Nothing to see here... It will all be ok.... Move along...
The $DOLLAR$ is strong.
But if the Chinese pull one from their pocket... and then India...

Why Silver Is A Good Investment

For the past year I have been studying the price trends of Silver & Gold and in the process I have learned some interesting facts.

Silver Is Consumed Industrially, While The Vast Majority Of Gold Ever Refined Is Still Above-Ground: The world is currently consuming through industrial products and processes around 800 million ounces of silver annually. However, annual world silver production is approximately 500 million ounces and annual recycling efforts provide another 150 million ounces, leaving a 150 million ounce deficit that must come from existing inventories. The total amount of Silver mined each year is far less than the total amount of Silver required by demand, be it industrial or personal.

The Current Global Recession Is Unlikely To Reduce The Net Cumulative Deficit in Silver: 75% of all silver production is actually the by-product of primary mining for such base metals as copper, lead, and zinc and even gold. A percentage reduction in demand for these primary products will reduce the annual production of silver also.

The Growth In Digital Photography Is Not About To Diminish Net Silver Demand From Traditional Film Photography: Film photography accounts for approximately 28% of total annual demand for silver. This is one of my favorite 'Silver Facts' and even with our current recycling abilities this 28% of total demand will never be reintroduced into the supply. A quarter of all Silver used each year by industry or individuals simply disappears. Even with the advent of digital cameras unit sales of films and papers containing silver have continued to grow by 5% to 10% per year.

Net Demand For Silver Likely To Increase, Not Decrease, Even During Current Global Recession: Military and security technology sectors will require a significant increase in silver usage/demand as the United States and her allies strive to minimize military and domestic casualties by using electronic technology to seek and destroy terrorists and enemies. Silver is the best conducting naturally-occurring material with superb heat and durability characteristics, and price will be no object in the years and campaigns ahead.

All of these factors contribute to the inevitable reality of higher Silver prices. Silver is consumed and lost, the 75% of Silver production that is a by-product of the search for other metals will diminish as the demand for these other metals falls during this Recession/Depression, the 28% of all Silver demand per year for the production of photographic film will not decrease, and because Silver is an incredibly valuable metal in the production of electronic technology there is only one direction the price of Silver can move over the next few years. Quotes and Stats from GSB

Personally, I like Silver.