Target Profit Drops 90% in Second Quarter as Inflation Changes Consumer Purchasing


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 17, 2022 | Sundance

In the second quarter of 2021 Target earned $1.82 billion in profit.  In the second quarter this year, target earned $183 million. That’s the result of inflation hitting the middle-class consumer.

Few people are buying electronics, home goods, durables or clothing.  Any retailer that specializes in the sale of non-essential items is going to feel the financial results of working-class families reprioritizing their spending.  Checkbook economics is the economics that matters.

Hopefully, CTH readers are well prepared for this phase of the Joe Biden economy. It will almost certainly get worse.

(Daily Mail) – Target reported on Wednesday that its profits plunged nearly 90 percent last quarter after it was forced to slash prices to clear unwanted inventories of clothing, home goods and electronics.

In early June, Target warned that it was canceling orders from suppliers and aggressively cutting prices because of a pronounced spending shift by Americans as inflation cuts into spending on non-essential items.

US retailers have cut their profit forecasts in recent weeks as consumers squeezed by higher prices for essentials such as food and gas cut back on items like apparel and electronics.

[…] ‘Americans have had to trade down or delay purchases as inflation continues to squeeze household budgets,’ Morning Consult’s retail and e-commerce analyst Claire Tassin told DailyMail.com. (read more)

The cascading impact will flow through multiple sectors, including housing.

(Forbes) – Despite falling mortgage rates providing some relief to potential home buyers, mortgage applications fell to the lowest level since the turn of the century last week—providing fresh evidence that the housing market downturn may have room to run as some experts worry about how the collapse will damage the broader economy.

Mortgage applications fell 2.3% from one week earlier, according to the latest data from the Mortgage Bankers Association, pushing overall applications to the lowest level since 2000 even as rates on the popular 30-year fixed mortgage slipped to a two-month low of less than 5.5%. (read more)

Mike Pence Denounces Calls to Defund the FBI


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 17, 2022 | Sundance

Former Vice President Mike Pence delivered an establishment republican party speech at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH, today.  During his prepared remarks, Pence denounced the effort of some people in the republican party who call for defunding the FBI.

According to Pence he was, “deeply troubled” by the behavior of the justice department and the FBI during their raid on President Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago. Pence continued by saying the FBI “rank and file” should not be attacked or disparaged for the political agenda exhibited by the organization they represent.  It’s a weird statement when you think about it in context.

The FBI as an institution doesn’t do anything; it is the men and women within the institution that take actions based on corrupt political intent.  The only way to address the behavior of the FBI is to do exactly the opposite of what Pence is saying.  Institutions are made up of people. The rank and file within that corrupt system are the people carrying out the corrupt endeavors.  The audio is a little poor, but here is the segment, WATCH:

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National Bank of Romania Hires Fortune Teller


Armstrong Economics Blog/Central Banks Re-Posted Aug 17, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

The National Bank of Romania (BNR) is turning to ancient rituals to predict future economic movements. Gabriela Dima, 64, often referred to as Minerva, holds two majors in psychology and cinematography. She also happens to be a popular fortune teller, a Bucharest fairy, and the newest hire of Romania’s central bank.

Inflation in Romania reached 15.05% this June. Last month, the National Bank of Romania voted to raise interest rates by 100 basis points to 4.75%. What will the bank do next? Perhaps Minerva knows.

Fortune telling has been a long tradition in Romani culture that dates back hundreds of years. Although the church shunned the practice, people remained superstitious and often looked to tellers for advice. Minerva has not disclosed her position at the central bank, but BNR declared that she is indeed employed there. So perhaps she will lighten the sentiment and give some of the population a boost of confidence regarding the future. Either way, her advice will be better than any analyst following Schwab’s Great Reset agenda to topple the global economy.

North Korea Forms Alliance with Russia


Armstrong Economics Blog/War Re-Posted Aug 16, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

On Korea’s liberation day, President Vladimir Putin responded to Kim Jong-Un’s request to join the fight in Ukraine. In a letter to the North Korean dictator, Putin said North Korea had been a friend to Russia since Japan’s defeat during World War II. Kim is calling for “strategic and tactical cooperation, support and solidarity” between the two nations, and Vladimir agrees that it would be in the best interest of both parties.

Putin is seeking to “expand the comprehensive and constructive bilateral relations with common efforts” with the hermit kingdom. North Korea needs Russia and China to survive. In 2011, Kim J0ng-Un’s father, Kim Jong-il, visited Russia and negotiated a contract to send North Korean workers to Russia. US sanctions were intended to reverse this proposal but it was largely ignored. Both Russia and North Korea have been banished from doing business with the West entirely, so all bets are off.

This arrangement is certainly more beneficial for North Korea as it is desperate for allies. The move will undoubtedly anger the West, but this is the result of failing to hold diplomatic talks with Russia and imposing endless sanctions.

Argentina Raises Interest Rate to 69.5%


Armstrong Economics Blog/Socialist Re-Posted Aug 15, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Argentina is out of options. I reported on the ongoing widespread protests occurring across the country. The majority of the nation is unemployed, and the currency is basically worthless. The people can no longer rely on the socialistic promises as the government is unable to fund its programs. Basic necessities are no longer available, and the people are suffering.

After inflation reached 60%, the nation decided to stop printing money entirely. The central bank just voted to raise the benchmark rate by 950 bps to 69.5%. Inflation now sits at 71% after prices rose 7.4% in July.

Estimates state that inflation could reach 90% in Argentina by the end of the year. The government has run the economy into the ground, 6 feet under, and it will need a complete overhaul for the people to begin living comfortably again.

Sunday Talks, Devin Nunes and Kash Patel Discuss the FBI Raid on Trump and DOJ Targeting 4.0


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 14, 2022 | sundance 

It’s likely the most important interview this Sunday, ergo Fox News -in an effort to support the overall agenda- doesn’t put it on any of their replay media. The scheme against our republic is so tentacled there are no corporate media out of alignment.  The anti-Trump/anti-MAGA effort doesn’t just stem from ideological communists and leftists, the republican apparatus is 100% part of the enterprise.  Don’t fool yourself, we have yet to see the full scope of the enemy.

If you think masks dropped in the past 6 years, we are only about 60% of the way there…. Many more masks will be dropping and some of them are likely to stun people. Decades of entrenched Machiavellian club manipulation, and years of coat tailing the base by left-wing republicans, has yet to surface.  Remember, two-thirds of the iceberg are hidden under water. [Direct Rumble Link Here]

In this interview Devin Nunes lays out the history of DOJ and FBI corruption under Obama, the originator of the modern Fourth Branch of Government.  Nunes accurately points out the continuum of the DOJ/FBI corruption, but missed one element, the formation of the DOJ-National Security Division. That’s where it all starts.

From Eric Holder and Robert Mueller’s, Fast n Furious gun running operation (08/’09); to the DOJ use of the IRS for targeting (Lois Lerner, Eric Holder ’10, ’11); to the 19 days it took the FBI to reach Benghazi (’12); to the DOJ/FBI using NSA databases for surveillance (2012-2016); to the Crossfire Hurricane operation (Yates/Lynch ’16); to Robert Mueller resurfacing (’17, ’18, ’19); to the DOJ targeting Trump now (’20, ’21, ’22); it has all been one long continuum since the DOJ-NSD was formed.  WATCH:

Kash Patel then overlays the people who use the weaponized DOJ-NSD to create the “ongoing investigation” document blocks.  Including, John Carlin, Mary McCord, Lisa Monaco (DOJ-NSD); as well as Jake Sullivan and Susan Rice (White House).  Again, same names in Obama administration, exit then return with Biden administration; it’s the same continuum.

This was the reason for writing the four-part series outlining the network:

♦Part One outlines the background of the modern Deep State, and the formation of the DOJ-NSD {Go Deep}.

♦In Part Two you see the specifics of how President Trump was targeted by political operatives using the DOJ-NSD {Go Deep}. 

♦In Part Three you see how and why President Trump was blocked from releasing documents against the DOJ-NSD {Go Deep}.   

♦And in Part Four, we outlined exactly what those specifics documents are that likely existed in Mar-a-Lago. {Go Deep}

Everything I research, write and share is free for the taking.

Download it into a pdf form, modify the internal citations as footnotes, proofread, add, subtract, modify it, change the language, simplify it, do whatever you want to make it your own in whatever format suits your needs. No attribution or citation is needed.

This is a battle to save our nation from a corrupt enterprise. I put no parameters on any tool or intellectual weapon you may find of benefit. That just isn’t me.  Those who have been around a while know where I stand…. which is right next to anyone who is in the fight.  Getting the message out is the urgent and important part; how it arrives, is of no issue for me.

We are not on a last hill; we are far beyond that.  We are on the precipice.

It would be against every intent of the Treehouse for me to put limits on any information that might help.

Love to all and abundant appreciation for most,

Sundance

Sunday Talks, Representative Scott Perry Discusses His Encounter with a Tyranical DOJ


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 14, 2022 | sundance

Representative Scott Perry, R-Penn., appears with Maria Baritomo to discuss his experience with the FBI after agents confiscated his cell phone. Additionally, Mr Perry discusses the Biden administration’s handling of national security issues including China, Iran and the U.S-Mexico border. {Direct Youtube Link}

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Brazen Elitists Don’t Care That You Notice Their Hypocrisy


The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show Published originally on Rumble on August 11, 2022

Clay Travis and Buck Sexton know that the Biden family has no shame. Hunter Biden, a man who is in a class of his own when it comes to felonies, flew all the way across the country to be able to ride in Air Force One with Joe Biden, and take advantage of the great photo op, of course.

Neil Oliver, Think the Unthinkable and Accept That is the Better Reference Point


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 13, 2022 | Sundance

Neil Oliver returns from a vacation to deliver one of his best contemplative monologues to date.  Mr. Oliver rightly says that if you reset your historic reference points, and you begin to recognize that thinking the unthinkable is actually the best reference point for your current state, it is like a key that unlocks the answers.

We are the battered spouses in an abusive relationship with government. Nothing we can do is going to appease the abuser, it is the inherent state of their disposition. WATCH:

[Transcript] – It is hard to think the unthinkable – but there comes a time when there’s nothing else for it. People raised to trust the powers that be – who have assumed, like I once did, that the State, regardless of its political flavour at any given moment, is essentially benevolent and well-meaning – will naturally try and keep that assumption of benevolence in mind when trying to make sense of what is going on around them.

People like us, you and me, raised in the understanding that we are free, that we have inalienable rights, and that the institutions of this country have our best interests at heart, will tend to tie ourselves in knots rather than contemplate the idea those authorities might actually be working against us now. I took that thought of benevolent, well-meaning authority for granted for most of my life, God help me. Not to put too fine a point on it, I was as gullible as the next chump.

A couple of years ago, however, I began to think the unthinkable and with every passing day it becomes more and more obvious to me that we are no longer being treated as individuals entitled to try and make the most of our lives – but as a barn full of battery hens, just another product to be bought and sold – sold down the river.

Let me put it another way: if you have been driving yourself almost demented in an effort to think the best of those in charge – those in senior positions in government, those in charge of the great institutions of State, those running the big corporations – but finding it increasingly impossible to do so … then the solution to the problem might be to turn your point of view through 180 degrees and accept, however unwillingly, that we are … how best to put this … being taken for a ride.

When you find a stranger’s hand on your wallet, in the inside pocket of your jacket … rather than trying to persuade yourself he’s only making sure it doesn’t fall out … it might be more straightforward to draw the conclusion you’re in the process of being robbed.

Once the scales fall from a person’s eyes, the resultant clarity of sight is briefly overwhelming. Or it is like being handed a skeleton key that opens every locked door, or access to a Rosetta Stone that translates every word into a language instantly understood.

Take the energy crisis: If you’ve felt the blood drain from your face at the prospect of bills rising from hundreds to several thousands of pounds while reading about energy companies doubling their profits overnight while being commanded to subsidise so-called renewables that are anything but Green while listening to this politician or that renew their vows to the ruinous fantasies of Net Zero and Agenda 2030 while knowing that the electricity for electric cars comes, in the main and most reliably, from fossil fuels if you can’t make sense of it all and just know that it adds up to a future in which you might have to choose between eating and heating then treat yourself to the gift of understanding that the powers that be fully intend that we should have less heat and less fuel and that in the planned future only the rich will have cars anyway. The plan is not to fix it.

The plan is to break it, and leave it broken. If you struggle to think the best of the world’s richest – vacuous, self-obsessed A-list celebrities among them – endlessly circling the planet on private jets and super yachts, so as to attend get-togethers where they might pontificate to us lowly proles about how we must give up our cars and occasional holiday flights – even meat on the dinner table … if you wonder how they have the unmitigated gall … then isn’t it easier simply to accept that their honestly declared and advertised intention is that their luxurious and pampered lives will continue as before while we are left hungry, cold and mostly unwashed in our unheated homes.

Here’s the thing: if any leader or celeb honestly meant a word of their sermons about CO2 and the rest, then they would obviously lead by example. They would be first of all of us willingly to give up international travel altogether … they would downsize to modest homes warmed by heat pumps. They would eschew all energy but that from the sun and the wind. They would eat, with relish, bugs and plants. They would resort to walking, bicycles and public transport.

If Net Zero and the rest was about the good of the planet – and not about clearing the skies and the beaches of scum like us – don’t you think those sainted politicians and A-listers would be lighting the way for us by their own example? If the way of life they preach to us was worth living, wouldn’t they be living it already? Perhaps you heard Bill Gates say private jets are his guilty pleasure.

And how about food – and more particularly the predicted shortage of it: the suits and CEOs blame it all on Vladimir Putin. But if the countries of the world are truly running out of food, why is our government offering farmers hundreds of thousands of pounds to get out of the industry and sell their land to transnational corporations for use, or disuse unknown? Why aren’t we, as a society, doing what our parents and grandparents did during WWII and digging for victory? Why is the government intent on turning a third of our fertile soil over to re-wilding schemes that make life better only for the beavers? Why aren’t we looking across the North Sea towards the Netherlands where a WEF-infected administration is bullying farmers off their land altogether, forcing them to cull half the national herd.

Those Dutch farmers are among the most productive and knowledgeable in the world, holding in their heads and hands the answers to all manner of questions about how best to produce food, and yet their government is so intent on scaring them out of the business that a teenage boy in a tractor, taking part in a protest to defend ancient rights and traditions, was fired on by police.

Why do you think it matters so much, to the government of the second most productive population of farmers in the world, to gut and fillet that industry? Why? Why have similar protests, in countries all across Europe and the wider world, been largely ignored by the mainstream media – a media that would have crawled on its hands and knees over broken glass just to report on a BLM protester opening a bag of non-binary crisps. Why the silence on the attack on farming?

And while we’re on the subject of farmland ownership, why is computer salesman Bill Gates buying so much farmland in the US – more than a quarter of a million acres in 19 states at the last count, while simultaneously promoting the production and sale of fake meat? And why have so many small planes crashed into massive food processing plants in the US, sparking fires and thereby hobbling the production and distribution of yet more of the very stuff of life? Why is this happening to farmers and farming … all across the hitherto developed world …?

Isn’t the simple obvious answer … the answer that makes most sense and that is staring us in our trusting faces … that power for the power-hungry has always rested most effectively upon control of food and its supply? Why are the powers that be attributing this to a cost-of-living crisis when everyone with two brain cells to rub together can see it’s a cost of lockdown crisis – the inevitable consequence of shutting down the whole country – indeed the whole world – for the best part of two years. Soaring inflation, rising interest rates, disrupted supply chains.

Might they be calling it a cost-of-living crisis as part of their bare-faced attempt to distract us from the fact that while ordinary individuals face a life and death struggle in the coming months, the corporations have celebrated their share of the greatest transfer of wealth in history? Doesn’t that seem more likely? However unthinkable, might it not be more compelling to ask why our government, and governments around the world, have effectively stood by and held the coats of huge corporations while those money magnets pulled almost all of the world’s wealth into their already creaking coffers?

Are our governments more interested in enabling, in aiding and abetting the rich, than in lifting so much as a finger to protect our livelihoods, our ways of life? I’m only asking. What about the money in our pockets? Why is it getting harder and harder to use good old cash, notes and coins? Why are we being nudged further and further away from spending-power we can see and hold, and towards a digital alternative that exists only on the hard drives of the banks that run the world? Why is that do you think?

Rather than dismiss as yet another conspiracy theory the idea of cash being ultimately replaced with transactions based on the exchange of what amount to glorified food stamps that will only be accepted if our social credit score demonstrates that we’ve been obedient girls or boys … how about taking the leap and focussing on the blatantly obvious … that if we are not free to buy whatever and whenever we please, free of the surveillance and snooping of governments and the banks that run them, then we have absolutely no freedom at all.

And while we’re on the subject of money and banks, why not pause to notice something else that is glaringly obvious – which is to say that the currencies of the West are teetering on the abyss, and that one bank after another is revealed, to those who are bothering to watch, as being as close to bankruptcy as its possible to be without actually falling over the edge.

Then there’s the so-called vaccines for Covid – I deliberately say “so-called” because by now it should be clear to all but the wilfully blind that those injections do not work as advertised. You can still contract the virus, still transmit the virus, still get sick and still die. Denmark has dropped their use on under-18s. All across the world, every day, more evidence emerges – however grudgingly, however much the various complicit authorities and Big-Pharma companies might hate to admit it – of countless deaths and injuries caused by those medical procedures.

And yet here in Britain and just about everywhere else, governments continue to try and get those needles into as many arms as possible, even the arms of the smallest and youngest. The ripe stink of corruption is everywhere. I trusted authority for most of my life.

Now I ask myself on a daily basis how I ignored the stench for so long. Across the Atlantic, the Biden Whitehouse sent the FBI to raid the home of former president Donald Trump. Meanwhile Joe Biden and his son Hunter – he of the laptop full of the most appalling and incriminating content – fly together on Airforce 1. No raids planned on the Obamas, nor on the Clintons. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi flew to Taiwan and onwards to China. Her son Paul, an investor in a Chinese tech firm and with seats on the board of companies dealing in lithium, was along for the ride, into that part of the world where three quarters of the world’s lithium batteries are made. Taiwan leads in that technology.

It is hard to think the unthinkable. It’s hard to think that all of it, all the misery, all the suffering of the past and to come might just be about money, greed and power. It is hard to tell yourself you’ve been taken for a fool and taken for a ride. It’s hard, but the view from the other side is worth the effort and the pain. Open your eyes and see. (link)

North Korea Asks to Join the War


Armstrong Economics Blog/War Re-Posted Aug 10, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

The proxy war with Russia has strengthened the West’s enemies. North Korea is offering to send 100,000 soldiers – all volunteers – to fight alongside Russia. Despite being a small nation, North Korea boasts the fourth largest military in the world, with over 1.3 million active troops and 600,000 reservists.

North Korea is attempting to align closely with Russia and has even offered to help repair the Donbas region after the war. A spokesperson for the hermit kingdom announced full support for Russia in April. “We are sending our full support and showing solidarity to the justified struggle of the Russian people to protect the autonomy and security of the country and to defend national interests,” they stated.

In May, Russia blocked attempts by the UN and US to pass further sanctions on North Korea. In July, North Korea stated that they officially recognized the People’s Republic of Donetsk and the People’s Republic of Luhansk as Russian territories. Russia has responded favorably to North Korea’s vocal support.

“Highly qualified, hardworking, and ready to work in the most difficult conditions, [North] Korean builders will be an asset in the serious task of restoring social, infrastructure and industrial facilities [in the Donbas] destroyed by the retreating Ukrainian forces,” Russia’s ambassador to North Korea, Alexander Matsegora, said.

North Korea is a nuclear power with a military state. The tyrannical government indoctrinates children from a young age to hate the West. Kim Jong-Un can send cheap laborers to Russia at a moment’s notice, and he is certainly desperate for allies. This may entice China to step up its efforts as they have a monopoly on trade with their neighboring country and are increasingly growing frustrated with America after Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. As the cycle of war turns up, new players are joining the fight.