Tag Archives: George Soros

Oct 30 2017

A Warning To Alabama GOP, Breitbart, Steve Bannon, S. Gorka, and Crew…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on October 29, 2017 by

Stop me when you see the parallels:

The time was November and December 2009, right about this time of year in the larger political calendar of things…. One party was completely locked out from influence in Washington DC, as the opposing party held the White House, and majorities in both houses of congress…

The 2009 political opposition groups didn’t like what was happening.  There was very large and significant legislation being debated.  Frustrated common sense citizens stopped looking to ineffective congressional representatives to stop the daily usurpation.

Loosely connected but engaged grassroots political types were looking for routes to stop the White House and congress.

There was also a Senate seat up for grabs, and a necessary special election.  The former seat-holder was considered a stalwart by the party in power; and the seat was considered a “gimme” by the state party apparatus.  No-one was contemplating the possibility of the majority party in power ever losing that seat….. EVER.

The candidate appointed to hold the seat for the party in power was arrogant, condescending, and generally didn’t feel they needed to work for the seat.  After all, the seat was held by one party for decades and generally no-one could fathom losing it.

The election outcome was considered so much a forgone conclusion no-one was even polling the state throughout November or December 2009.   It was also because of that herd mindset the next-in-line candidate just spent time on the cocktail circuit meeting with donors, taking their requests and then a few trips to DC for parties, drape-measuring, and generally snobbing around with the upper-minded ‘betters’.

About a month prior to the actual voting the election outcome was so widely anticipated to be a lopsided victory for the party in power the candidate actually took three weeks off, and jetted away to the caribbean for a Christmas/New Year holiday vacation.

However, under the radar, and entirely missed by everyone -including media- small bands of grassroots political peeps discovered the other parties strength was also their weakness.  There was an invisible path to victory, and, more importantly, a hard working candidate who had quietly put in a stunning amount of groundwork.

Around the same time the overly confident political types were obliviously comparing Christmas decor…. tens, then dozens, then hundreds, eventually thousands of very focused volunteers began to assemble when everyone else was busy with the holiday and not paying attention.

Many, including many I got to know personally, gave up their 2009 holidays to drive half-way across the country and help the quiet assembly.  [“Meet at the Old Mill, we ride at midnight”…]

By the time the party in power woke up from their New Years celebrations and looked to the formality of the upcoming election/coronation, well, it was too late.

The rebel alliance had positioned in every town, village, street corner, venue and simultaneously began overwhelming a completely unprepared political apparatus by drawing attention to their goal: Take the seat from the hands of power, and give it back to the people….

Our strategic advantage was their collective arrogance.

Because they fully expected to win the election, they didn’t even have signs, bumper stickers, advertising contracts, or operational infrastructure or volunteers planned for a campaign.  They were completely caught off-guard.

We had thousands of people with home-made signs in the streets daily.  The momentum was on our side and the candidate messaging so focused that by the time the DC apparatus woke up mid-January it was far too late.   The election day was January 19th 2010.

Yes, in Dec. 2009/Jan 2010 the grassroots movement in Massachusetts to elect Scott Brown caught the Democrats completely off-guard.  Martha Coakley lost, Scott Brown won, the political world was stunned; and yes, Democrats lost the Kennedy seat.

Why does this matter now?

Alabama Republicans, and the group planning to help Roy Moore win the Alabama primary, would be wise to pay attention to that historic reminder because republican candidate Roy Moore is acting just like democrat candidate Martha Coakley in November and December 2009.

  • One party in power.
  • A special election in a deeply one-sided state everyone takes for granted.
  • A seat formerly held by a stalwart of the party in power. (Kennedy / Sessions)
  • A disgruntled opposition party whose grassroots strategy is under the radar.
  • No-one in the media paying attention. (A strategy that benefits from stealth)
  • A generally ‘unlikable candidate‘, who spent more time in DC than campaigning in the state where it mattered.  (see below)

See the parallels?

2017: No Democrat can ever win a senate seat in Alabama they say….

2009: No Republican can ever win a senate seat in Massachusetts they said…

Any questions?

Oct 30 2017

Idiots who try to control the world and blame everyone else for their failure


Armstrong Economics Blog/Economics

Re-Posted Oct 30, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

 

COMMENT: Ok Mr. Armstrong, this is nuts; You are starting to freak me out with this forecasting. The last 2 months has blown me away when a few more elements of your methodology lit my bulb a little brighter. This may sound like you paid me to advertise for you but most of us know you’re not like Hillary. My simple approach combined 3 pieces important to me: 1. Basic knowledge of the markets on a global scale, 2. Basic understanding of your models and Socrates reports 3. Basic interpretation of the ArmstrongEconomics Blog. (utmost importance, hints included) Like Erwin said last year “it might save your life.”

He is so right.

Best to all;

RH

REPLY: I assume you are probably talking about this Vertical Market. This report is probably one of the most important I may have ever released. It’s not easy because so many people have been caught up in the Austrian School of economic thought and the Quantity of Money theory. The entire Quantitative Easy has proven that theory to be completely wrong.

I know this is like having to relearn everything. But that is just the way it is. I and my senior staff even are going to private meetings with central banks. Everything we have ever been taught in school is just dead wrong. This whole nonsense of Conspiracy Theories of people who are steering the world economy is just insane. If that were even true, then why call us at all?

The world economy is coming unglued. This is no joke. The sooner people wake up and just follow the money flows and forget the old theories, the sooner you will arrive at clarity. The only economic theories that were spot on were Adam Smith, who had no ax to grind in the observation of the Invisible Hand, and David Ricardo’s Comparative Advantage. Everyone else ever since has been about trying to eliminate the Business Cycle. This has caused a vast mess and we are about to pay the price.

We have insane politicians like the new Prime Minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern who has declared that capitalism is a blatant failure while the former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis says capitalism is ‘merely’ coming to an end because it is making itself obsolete.

Both witnessed the economic collapse, but instead of blaming the government and its socialist attempt to control the business cycle, they blame the people for not performing as they demand. What they are harping on is the disparity of wealth and want to take the wealth from the hated rich and somehow that is going to make it better. They are ignorant of the fact that this hated group they despise so much create the economy and jobs – not Marxism. Their failure to even recognize the collapse of Russia and China under Marxist theory is a tragedy that will only lead to internal class warfare.

I thank God I do not have much longer on the planet. I am compelled to watch idiots try to control the world and blame everyone else for their failure.

Oct 30 2017

What Came First? Cultivation or Cities?


Armstrong Economics Blog/Economics

Re-Posted Oct 30, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

 

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong; I read you One-World-Currency report. It was truly fascinating. From an academic perspective, what came first in the formation of civilization; agriculture or cities? Where does money fit into this historical perspective?

Thank you;

FD

ANSWER: There has been a fair amount of assumption that went into the history we were all taught in school. What has emerged since is a different perspective, to say the least! There are megaliths at Göbekli Tepe which were erected by hunter-gatherers around 9000 BC or about 3,000 years before history starts to be recorded. Göbekli Tepe is a stone-age mountain sanctuary. It has turned everything upside down insofar as it was assumed that the city came first and then agriculture. It appears that agriculture came first which enable people to create cities.

Göbekli Tepe proves that there was a shift from animism, a belief that attributes a soul to plants, inanimate objects, and natural phenomena inasmuch as there is some supernatural power that organizes and animates the material universe, to centralized religion. In other words, there was a shift from an egalitarian society all people are equal to a hierarchical society arranged in order of rank. Clearly, there had to be a profound economic change and yes there would have to be some sort of monetary reward in the form of some resource to create such a shift from an egalitarian to a hierarchical society.

Göbekli Tepe is extremely important despite its obscure purpose and meaning. It is not the meaning that we need argue over. The incredible fact is that such a monument was constructed in the first place 9000BC. The simple fact of its existence proves historical assumption dead wrong. It matters not whether these pillars that are carved were some religious rite or just a decoration. More than 200 pillars in about 20 circles are currently known and only 5% of the site has been excavated. The astonishing fact is economic. Producing more than 200 pillars took a lot of man-hours. That means the workers needed a stable food supply and therefore agricultural cultivate MUST have been existence BEFORE cities were carved out of stone.

The construction of Göbekli Tepe would also have required some division of labor among overseers, technicians, and workers and management. Therefore, this required a hierarchical society. Therefore, social development in creating such structures must have precipitated, rather than resulted from, the shift to agriculture.

The assumption was that cities came first and then cultivation. Obviously, you had to feed the people to construct the cities first. My bet is on cultivation came first and food became money. Money moved from food to clothing. We see the first use of metal as money being Bronze imitating a sheepskin, which was the standard of value; i.e. Jason and the Golden Fleece.

Even the early Roman bronze Aes Signatum (5 pounds of bronze) pictures a bull. Cattle were also a main monetary unit of value prior to metal.

Oct 30 2017

Catalonia (Catalunya) – Legal or not Legal


Armstrong Economics Blog/SPAIN

Re-Posted Oct 30, 2017 by Martin Armstrong
There are many who write in from Spain supporting Madrid against Catalonia. The core of their argument is that the call this movement an independent “socialistic movement” and they argue it is not at all but democratic.
“There’s indeed a strong independence feel in Catalunya, they have been like this for centuries although they never really were able to achieve a country status. … But one cannot claim to be democratic if you plan to force a secession with an election attended by less than half the people who can vote. Most people agreed on the national court’s decision that the referendum was illegal and supported the court rule by no attending to vote, they were 58 percent of the registered voters, those who were against the decision were able to vote anyway.”

Catalonia is an autonomous region in north-east Spain with a distinct history dating back almost 1,000 years. It is a wealthy region that has its own language, parliament, flag and national anthem. It also has its own police force and controls some of its public services.

Maximum of Barcelona

Historically, during the 12th century, Catalonia was taken under the same royal rule as the neighboring kingdom of Aragon. Catalonia has been part of Spain since its genesis in the 15th century when King Ferdinand of Aragon and Queen Isabella of Castile married and united their realms. Nevertheless, the history of Barcelonia extends back into ancient time. It was Maximum of Barcelona (409-411AD) who rose up to be independent of the collapsing Roman Empire.

This idea that Catalonia somehow belongs to Madrid in perpetuity is rather strange. Spain itself did not exist as a country until the marriage of Ferdinand & Isabella during the 15th century. There are coins issued in Barcelona which predate Spain. Back in the 11th century, the Iberian peninsula was divided into three kingdoms; (1) Caliphate of Córdoba in Taifa, (2) The kingdoms of Leon, (3) and The Kingdom of Pamplona and the County of Barcelona. Historically, Barcelona was not conquered by the Arabs who dominated most of Spain during the 11th century. From that period onward, Barcelona has always harbored a sense of independence from the rest of the Iberian peninsula.

So why such intensity against Catalonia? On October 27th, 2017, the Catalan parliament declared independence, in a 70-10 vote. That seems to be a clear majority vote. Granted, this came after an independence referendum on October 1st, 2017, in which just under 90% of Catalan voters backed independence, however, turnout was only 43%. That was, in part, because Madrid sent in troops to try to prevent the vote. Now Madrid has called for a new vote after dismissing the Parliament and thus appears to be setting the stage for a rigged election no different than Russia taking Crimea. The West sanctions Russia for such tactics but not Madrid?

The Supreme Court decision is used by Madrid to claim there is no right for Catalonia to separate. That is clearly a violation of human rights and it is the very same argument the King of Britain made against America so I suppose the United States is a totally illegal entity as well. Someone should serve notice to Trump to hand power back to London and surrender.

Oct 29 2017

Clinton Paid to Have the Dossier Created to Try to Discredit Trump


Armstrong Economics Blog/Politics

Re-Posted Oct 29, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

COMMENT: I am shocked that the Washington Post has come out and admitted that the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid for research that led to Russia dossier that has been the center of all the investigations even though much of it has been discredited.

REPLY: Welcome to the real world of politics. What they do not understand is this is just one of the reason people voted for Trump. They are sick of government for the government against the people. There is just no “We the People” in their vocabulary.

Previously both John Podesta and former Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz denied any knowledge of funding for this dossier. Any surprise at that

Oct 29 2017

GREXIT – Will Greece be Better off or Worse?


Armstrong Economics Blog/Greece

Re-Posted Oct 29, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

GREXIT

QUESTION: I just read an article about Grexit and the MoU that expires in the summer of 2018. Let’s assume Greece exits EU and the Euro, what would happen to Greece and it’s people? What hardships would Grexit bring to the Greek people and what could individual Greeks do to prepare themselves for these hardships?

Thanks for your blog.
Greetings from Greece!
Cheers,

J

ANSWER: Things will be much brighter once Greece gets out of the Euro. Brussels is desperately trying to keep Greece in the Eurozone for their survival, not what is best for Greece. The major data is published by various agencies that are directly or dependent upon government and they will always champion staying in the Eurozone. If you look beyond those headlines, you see a different picture. Most of our clients in Britain who were against BREXIT, now report that things are much better. The manufacturing industry experienced a job boom in the last quarter. Compared Q3 2016, the job market data with that for 2017 showed that the manufacturing sector witnessed a 24% increase in advertised vacancies over the past 12 months. Jobs have been created in Britain at a faster pace since the BREXIT vote, despite the headlines of the fake news.

I have explained before that when Britain abandoned the gold standard in 1931, they instantly recovered from the Great Depression. This was the case study that George Warren used to demonstrate to Roosevelt that the dollar had to be devalued to reverse the economic decline. Maintaining the gold standard back then was the equivalent of “austerity” imposed upon Europe by Germany. Everyone just gets this whole issue of currency and the Quantity of Money dead wrong. The Austrian School of economics predates the massive government debt era. Today, the government is the biggest borrower within society and they compete against the private sector reducing economic growth.

The refugee crisis alone has devasted Greece. The London Financial Times reported in June that bookings were off as much as 70% for tourists. Greece has to suffer refugees that have devastated its tourist business and that has been one of its primary economic sectors.

Bring on GREXIT and you will stop the refugees as well if they cannot get into the EU by going to Greece. The rest of the EU will not help Greece of Italy pay for these refugees. There is no benefit to remaining in the Eurozone. It is time to slam the door of Brussels.

Oct 28 2017

CNN’s Sketchy Dossier “Reporting”…


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on October 28, 2017 by

Notice how the New York Times and Washington Post are staying away from the CNN story about the upcoming Robert Mueller indictments.  There’s a good reason for that…

….Things That Make Other Things Make Sense:

Back January 10th, 2017, when CNN first began emphasizing the Russian Dossier and how it related to the ‘vast Russian conspiracy’ CTH knew from the way it was being pitched that something was sketchy about CNN’s reporting.   It wasn’t just the story they were selling; it was a very specific cast of characters selling it.   We immediately NOTED IT HERE.

Jake Tapper, Jim Scuitto, Evan Perez and Carl Bernstein was the CNN crew assembled to talk about the Clinton/DNC funded -and Fusion GPS contracted- Christopher Steele ‘dossier’.  Evan Perez had some rather sketchy stories in the weeks prior to their January 10th narrative roll out.  Again the back story is important –SEE HERE–

Well, fast forward to now – and today The Daily Caller is reporting that Evan Perez is actually close friends with the people behind Fusion GPS.  VERY close friends. Like, ‘go on vacation together’ type friends:  VERY IMPORTANT READ

DAILY CALLER – CNN’s reporting on the Trump-Russia dossier has left out at least one crucial fact: the close ties between the network and the opposition research firm at the center of the dossier controversy.

CNN’s reporting on the dossier, led by justice correspondent Evan Perez, has been favorable to the firm, Fusion GPS, and hyped the dossier’s credibility. Left out of Perez’s reporting, which has relied largely on unnamed sources, is his personal closeness to Fusion GPS’ operatives. (continue reading)

The Plot Thickens:

Read Gateway Pundit Story HERE

Oct 28 2017

Lessons in Swamp Manuevers: Trump -vs- Clinton -vs- Mueller -vs- Sessions -vs- Rosenstein -vs- Comey, etc.


Re-Posted from The Conservative Tree House on October 27, 2017 by

The leak from a sealed grand jury indictment within the special counsel Robert Mueller investigation, writ large, has everyone a-twitter…  Perhaps, a reminder is in order.

First lesson from the DC Swamp – Everything is about politics.  It’s not about the law; it’s not about the judiciary; it’s not about what’s legal, or the illegality of behavior;  only politics.  These are not legal issues, the entities involved are not connected to legal or illegal application of laws as they relate to the rest of American society.

You cannot view the current action through the transactional prism of modern judicial proceedings as they relate to you and me. These are political cases, that use the venue of the legal system.  They use the legal system to play out the optics and narrative of political battles for ideological wins and losses.

The closest reminder you might have familiarity with would be the case against George Zimmerman (never about the legal system); or the case against officer Darren Wilson; again it was never about the legal system.  Those were political cases run through the matrix of the legal system.  So too is this entire DC partisan dysfunctional investigative construct -surrounding all of the current DC cases- not about the application of law, it is about politics. Period.

The notification from the FBI through the DOJ to allow the unknown 2010 FBI witness to testify to congress about the Uranium One investigation has initiated a responsive action from Robert Mueller to save and use his political leverage.  This is not about laws broken; this is about political leverage to be retained.

The gamesmanship currently being pitched through the media is about political leverage.  That leverage in DC is traded like baseball cards amid the upper tier of those who float in an entirely divergent orbit from everyone else.

Repeat: this is not about law. It’s about politics.

If Mueller waited any longer to construct his political cases against those he is investigating he would open himself up to scrutiny from within his attachment to the Uranium One deal.

If the mystery FBI witness testified to congress before Mueller announced an indictment it would look like Mueller was retaliating against that testimony.  So Mueller plays the hand he’s carrying.

Now, by going first, regardless of the testimony from the FBI witness, any negative outcome therein would look like retaliation against him for indictments announced prior to the testimony.

See how that works?

Remember, this is not about laws, lawfulness, or the judicial system.  These participants operate above that system.  They are in a political system above the law; they use the landscape of the judicial system to advance politics.  Pause and repeat as needed.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller is simply attempting to retain his leverage within the game.  Going first allows him to keep and use that leverage.  If Mueller had waited he would have lost that leverage.

Congress has now lost leverage.  Regardless of what the FBI informant says to them regarding the Uranium One deal it is useless against the optic of retaliation for the special counsel investigation.

Conversely, those who were getting sick and tired of this investigation dragging on also know how the game is played.  They knew if they brought in the angle of the FBI informant it would force Mueller to act fast.  Again, this is politics, not legal.

Mueller has protected himself from the leverage congress was assembling and now he has cards to trade for any outcomes therein.  Mueller knew by planting the leak tonight his leverage would have all weekend to grow and establish itself through the media.

This is the exact same hand James Comey played when he intentionally leaked his memo notes to the New York Times right before he was fired.  Comey was losing leverage; Comey needed to gain back leverage to protect his interests.

Changing and trading leverage is politics.

Establish enough leverage and you can break any law with impunity.

Nothing more.

Enjoy your weekend….

 

Oct 28 2017

CIA & FBI Still Stalling on JFK Documents – Why?


Armstrong Economics Blog/Politics

Re-Posted Oct 28, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

The CIA and FBI have had 50 years to go over these documents. Nevertheless, they waited to the last day to object. That tactic was deliberate to push Trump into a corner. He gave them six months to review. Many of the documents listed as “classified” are not even legible, raising more concerns that these have been deliberately altered to protect someone or something.

At this point, no matter what they release, still 60%+ of American will just not believe them. After 50 years to go by and claiming they are still a danger to “survivors” is an absolute joke. The files released also show intense defense by both the CIA and FBI to claim they had nothing to do with anything. That simply brings to mind Shakespeare. Hamlet then turns to his mother and asks her, “Madam, how like you this play?”, to which she replies “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” Indeed, the CIA and FBI seem to protest too much asserting their innocence in this affair.

It is also clear from documents that the CIA questioned the official storyline of the assassination in the years followed. An unnamed CIA author noted in a 1975 memo that the agency, the FBI and the Warren Commission failed to investigate key clues into assassin Lee Harvey Oswald’s ties to Cuba.

Then we have FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover who in a memo dated Nov. 24, 1963, the same day that Oswald was killed by a questionable retribution of Jack Ruby, expressed concern that Oswald’s death would result in uncertainty among U.S. citizens over his guilt.

“The thing I am concerned about, and so is [Deputy Attorney General Nicholas] Katzenbach, is having something issued so that we can convince the public that Oswald is the real assassin,”

Hoover wrote.

At this point, there have been way too many delays and the only reason for that is to protect something or someone. If it were Oswald alone, then why hide documents?

Oct 28 2017

Spain Demonstrates to the World Democracy Means Nothing


Armstrong Economics Blog/SPAIN

Re-Posted Oct 28, 2017 by Martin Armstrong

 

The Madrid government sacked Catalonia’s president and dismissed its parliament on Friday, hours after the region declared itself an independent nation in Spain’s gravest political crisis since the return of democracy four decades ago. The Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who seems to think he has the power of Franco, called for new elections and fired the Catalan police chief. The crisis in Spain is a reflection of the crisis in the EU as a whole. This unprecedented dictatorial array of measures to seize control of the administration in Barcelona is so undemocratic, it is guaranteed to send warning signals to many other regions of the EU especially Italy.