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71 Comments

    1. Very bad news. Trump is not the only person who is sorry he appointed Jeff Sessions.

  2. I enjoyed the Greg Hunter interview and like your idea that we should at least be told where the $40T went, but then I began to muse about what such an accounting would look like. Would it include as assets (12) Solar Warden carriers, the depreciation on same, etc., and if so, wouldn’t we see that same money flowing through Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics, KBR, Halliburton, etc.? In turn, wouldn’t it be flowing through their banks, eventually ending up in the already recognizable economy? I don’t think it’s there, which suggests the ‘open’ economy leads somewhere invisible to us. This then begs the question of what is the transcendent currency, which as its very term implies, must flow for it to have any purpose. Money, like a river, has a velocity and area, which multiply to a quantity in a given time. That quantity must pass through other measurement places, even if we cannot see where it eventually goes. Where might we take such a downstream measurement?

    1. If you look at how much was flowing through investment and LBO firms in 1998-99, I think there is plenty right here on earth in the open economy.

      Step one = amount leaving government = grab back by common law right of offset and escrows
      Step two = hold private banks and defense contractors liable – offset against liabilities or exercise ownership of shares
      Step three – identify investment firms who received – assert ownership of assets
      Step four – identify assets – seize assets.

      between 1989 and 2010, U.S. attorneys seized an estimated $12.6 billion in asset forfeiture cases. The growth rate during that time averaged +19.4% annually. In 2010 alone, the value of assets seized grew by +52.8% from 2009 and was six times greater than the total for 1989. Then by 2014, that number had ballooned to roughly $4.5 billion for the year, making this 35% of the entire number of assets collected from 1989 to 2010 in a single year. Now, according to the FBI, the total amount of goods stolen by criminals in 2014 burglary offenses suffered an estimated $3.9 billion in property losses.

      http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-07-19/feds-just-expanded-civil-asset-forfeiture-laws-nationwide

    1. Balance the budget by all means necessary except decent food and education.

    1. Looks like the folks who did not want Obamacare repealed did not like what he was writing. If you look at the number of deaths in the last few weeks, the Midianite thing is accelerating. I expect a lot more killing

      1. That’s why to me all this talk from Republican politicians about wanting to repeal Obamacare is bogus. The healthcare industry loves Obamacare and all of the additional revenue it has brought to them, and these same companies can contribute heavily to the Congressional re-election funds. The Republican politicians don’t want to lose these additional campaign funds, so any healthcare program that we end up with will still keep tons of money flowing from the people’s pockets into the healthcare industry.

        1. There is no doubt that vested interests want to squeeze what they can out of Obamacare.

  5. Catherine,
    I’m surprised at your apparent support of Duterte’s and Widodo’s policy of shooting drug dealers, many of whom don’t have the benefit of due process. Fro what I can tell (and I could be wrong), this policy appears to be aimed at the lower rungs of the drug trade and if it doesn’t include the top rungs, it’s a total waste of time. How many bankers/money launderers is he going to have shot? How many ship captains and owners is he going to have shot? How many politicians is he going to have shot? How many military/intelligence officers will he have shot? It’s virtually guaranteed that some of these type of people are involved in the drug trade. Where does it end?

    A large number of drug dealers are drug addicts supporting their own habit. I’m not excusing their behavior, but shooting them down like animals has its problems.

    Furthermore, this whole policy presumes that the police are not in on the racket to various degrees! That’s a big assumption. It’s entirely possible that the police start to take over the racket, if they have not done so already. Is he going to have police officers who are corrupt shot? Whose to say that some politician doesn’t accuse a rival of being a drug dealer and have him shot? This could lead to their society being totally ruled by the law of the jungle; this is extremely dangerous and is a playground for psychopaths.

    If I have misconstrued your remarks, please let me know. Thanks.

    Chad

    1. Your points are well taken. However, someone in Duterte’s position can not protect his productive citizens from the CIA with due process. He is up against the most powerful machinery in the world – one that has mastered the art of buying everyone. What he can do is cut off their cash flow and make sure his citizens know that drug dealing will not be tolerated. More later.

  6. Addendum: And this policy presumes that these presidents have not been or are not currently in the drug trade or have been beneficiaries of it. And this policy presumes that it is not being done on behalf of legal drug dealers known as big Pharma to get rid of the competition. And lastly, it presumes that their drug laws make rational sense. If the Philippines and Indonesia still have marijuana as a totally illegal drug for adults and alcohol as a legal drug for adults, that alone is a sign of irrationality. For adults, marijuana has a number of positive benefits (e.g. pain relief) and some negative consequences and alcohol is the exact opposite. Why aren’t countries trying to model Portugal, country that seems to do much, much better than numerous other western countries, when it comes to the drug trade?

    1. What you point out is that we do not know enough about the Philippines to know what we would do if in Duterte’s place. I believe first and foremost in the rule of law. However, I also know what it is like to go up against an enemy who has 24/7 satellite, telecommunications and payment system capacity with entrainment and an infinite amount of money that does not play by the rules.

      FYI – I was pushed repeatedly to run for president in NH in the early 2000’s – a ridiculous notion as I am not a politician and would never put myself in that role. It is not the highest and best use of my contribution. Finally someone demanded to know what I would require to be willing to do it. The first item I listed was 250 license to kill on my say so. The other person was deeply offended and exploded with rage.

      The reality that number would be in the 1,000’s today, reflecting the nature of the enemy and what they respect.

  7. Catherine,
    Got it. Not to beat a dead horse, his solution, IMHO, is to do something similar to what Portugal has done. His current policy is fighting force with force and it won’t work in the long run, because of the circumstances that you describe. At best, it is a delaying action. He may win a pyrrhic victory where he succeeds in significantly reducing the trade, but centralizing it, thereby making it easier for foreign and native entities to control it. He would also do well to encourage people to eat properly according to their old culture and use native herbs. My understanding is that his lineage goes back quite a ways into native filipino culture. Please see an evaluation of Portugal’s policy below. Nothing is perfect, but they seem to be doing better than many other countries. Be well.

    Chad

    https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/greenwald_whitepaper.pdf

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