The White House Changed the Definition of a Recession


Armstrong Economics Blog/Economics Re-Posted Jul 26, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Governments have a way with words. Namely, they can change the definition of a word at the stroke of a pen. The definition of “vaccine” changed under the CDC’s guidance from “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease” to “a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases.” This permitted the COVID experimental injection to be called a “vaccine.”

According to some on the top US court, only a specialized biologist can define the term “woman.” “Mothers” has changed to “birthing people,” and words seem to have lost all meaning.

Now, the White House is changing its definition of “recession.” A recession was typically categorized as two consecutive quarters of GDP contraction, albeit not the best measure. Still, this was the tried and true formula for the government to determine the health of the overall economy. The White House now says that data from every facet of the US economy must be considered and foreshadows what to expect for Q2. The White House will not admit that the US is in a recession under Joe Biden. They will downplay the next GDP reading for Q2 and cite their newly formed definition for a “recession.”

Weber Manufacturing Announces Layoffs Due to Collapsed Sales, U.S. Economy Shrinking, CEO Resigns


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 26, 2022 | Sundance

It is only one U.S. company; however, the makers of Weber Grills and products released their sales data, and the background shows a severe economic contraction that has resulted in their operating loss of $51 million in the quarter that ended March 31, 2022.  NOTE THE DATE.

July 25 (Reuters) – Weber Inc (WEBR.N) on Monday replaced top boss Chris Scherzinger with an insider and warned that mounting inflationary and supply chain pressures could hit the grill maker’s financials and workforce, sending its shares down 20% in premarket trading.

The company withdrew its fiscal 2022 net sales and core earnings forecasts, saying higher consumer prices and geopolitical uncertainty were squeezing store traffic as well as margins.

Weber, which also suspended its quarterly cash dividend, said it was pursuing a number of initiatives, which may include job cuts, reducing expenses and tightening its inventory levels.

The company also forecast a net loss for the quarter ending June 30, citing weak store traffic and higher discounting. In the quarter ended March 31, Weber’s net sales decreased 7% and net loss came in at $51 million compared with a net income last year. (read more)

Weber is a good company with strong fundamental products.  Unfortunately, the layoffs that are likely to soon surface are not going to be isolated to Weber.  The contraction of economic activity is going to start surfacing in the balance sheets of multiple companies this quarter.

We can expect to see a bloodbath of employment layoffs in this quarter (July, Aug, Sept) at the same time as the federal reserve continues to raise interest rates to support the new energy “transition.”

As noted in Weber’s financials, the consumer contraction started escalating more than six months ago.  Companies can only hide a severe drop in income for a short period, and then eventually cost-cutting decisions must be made.

Tucker Carlson Outlines the Ukrainian Blacklist of American Critics, Including Rand Paul, Glenn Greenwald, Tulsi Gabbard and Col Douglas McGregor


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 26, 2022 | Sundance

The non-democratic, socialist and totalitarian Ukraine government of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has created a blacklist of western voices that are considered “Russian propagandists” for their criticism of the Ukraine-Russia conflict. [Details Here]

The overwhelming commonality of the people on the list is their advocacy for citizens of nations who are providing support for Ukraine to have a democratic voice on the issue. The Zelenskyy government has stated it will not permit any criticism of their country and demands that all western nations continue to send billions of dollars to provide an appropriate lifestyle for all Ukrainian government officials.

Currently the burden of financing the continuation of the Ukraine government has fallen upon U.S. taxpayers who have provided approximately $60 billion so far for the pay and pension benefits of Ukraine officials and their families. President Zelenskyy says we have a moral obligation to continue this funding, and any voice who would question the process is now blacklisted within Ukraine and labeled a Russian propagandist.

Tucker Carlson discussed the issue with two of the people targeted by Zelenskyy, former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and journalist Glenn Greenwald. WATCH:

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Even CNN Panel Cannot Support the Biden Administration Redefining Terms Because their Economic Policy Sucks


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 25, 2022 | Sundance

No credit to the CNN team for calling out the obvious; I mean, this is the same panel who redefined “insurrection” to fit their needs; however, the Biden administration’s efforts to redefine economics are so pathetic even the narrative engineers at CNN cannot support them.  WATCH:

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Biden Puts His Economic Credibility On The Line Ahead of Thursday BEA Report, I Do Not Think We Will See a Recession


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 25, 2022 | Sundance

The White House is expending a tremendous amount of communication effort over the past 48 hours trying to convince the American public that the economy is good, and we are not in a recession.

Yesterday it was Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. Today National Economic Council Chairman Brian Deese, White House Economist Jared Bernstein and even Joe Biden himself, all declaring that despite the economic contraction you may feel, see and even quantify, we are not in a recession.  WATCH:

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The action of the recession deniers reminds me of the famous Ralph Waldo Emmerson quote:

The louder he spoke of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons.”

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The Recession Deniers

Pretending Has Consequences – Western Media and Western Govt Continue Saying, Falsely, Global Food Crisis Caused by Russia


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 25, 2022 | Sundance 

As oft repeated, in order for severe ideologues to retain their insufferably bad policy they must pretend not to know things.  However, in the case of food shortages, the pretending about the origin of the problem has severe consequences.

Vladimir Putin’s military action against eastern Ukraine had nothing to do with the severe food shortages and inflation in Sri Lanka {link}.  Nor does Putin have any influence over the Dutch government trying to stop food production {link}.  Additionally, Putin has no control over Justin Trudeau’s decision to limit harvest yields by blocking the use of nitrogen-based fertilizer {link}. More importantly, it was not Vladimir Putin who forced all the western politicians to sign up for a new ‘climate friendly’ energy program that is destroying the ability of western farms to generate higher yield crops.

You do not need to be a farmer to understand that nitrogen/phosphorus-based industrial fertilizer has been the reason why farm yields have generated massive amounts of food on a global basis.  The United States, Canada, the U.K. and places like the Netherlands have massively increased their ability to generate food for export, in large part due to the success of improved fertilizer and crop saving modern pesticides.  Take those farming advancements away under the guise of climate change and you get a global Sri Lanka.

Those western climate and energy policies create downstream consequences.  The decision to chase a new global energy policy under the name “Build Back Better,” in combination with short-sighted EU sanctions against Russia, and you get food shortages. And boy howdy are they trying to avoid taking responsibility for it.

It was not Vladimir Putin who told British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz their proactive recommendation to switch from crop-based biofuels to human food would be blocked.  That G7 decision was made by Justin Trudeau and Joe Biden. {link} Even more significantly, it was not Russia who threatened the multinational energy companies about investing in Africa for expanded natural gas supplies for their fertilizer needs. That threat came from the same western government alliance, per their instructions from the World Economic Forum group {link}.

It was predictable {JUNE 21st} {June 30th} and {July 6th} that western government leaders would seek to avoid responsibility for the food crisis they created, and now we see more western media trying, desperately, to frame the Putin is to blame for global food shortages in order to protect them.

NEW YORK, July 25 (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine shocked the world, forced Western countries to respond, and is driving up the cost of energy and food across the globe. High prices in the United States may spell electoral disaster for President Joe Biden’s administration in November’s congressional elections. However, the most urgent economic, social, and human crises are unfolding in poorer countries where populations face war, spillover-driven inflation, and more expensive foreign-currency debt. (more

Joe Biden, NATO, the G7, the European Union, the World Bank, USAID, and every western leader in the United States and Europe has stated there will be food shortages.

They are not saying there might be shortages; their statements are emphatic, there will be shortages.

Accept this basic cornerstone.  Then ask why not a single proactive step has been taken by any of the aforementioned institutions or governments to alleviate what they declare is a certainty.  Why?

Simple question, “why?”

If all of the western nations, non-govt organizations and heads of state, are aware of a coming food crisis, why is there no proactive response?

It is a question that even the most hardcore leftists will not answer, because there is only one answer.  No action is being taken because they do not want to take action.  No effort to avoid the crisis is being done, because they do not want the crisis avoided.

Peel all the layers of obfuscation and causation away, and what we find is the epicenter of the food shortage is directly the result of the Build Back Better agenda.  A post-pandemic western government deliberate decision to radically change global energy development.  In succinct terms, the climate change agenda.

However, regardless of how you feel about the validity of “climate change,” the cause of diminished food supplies is purposeful.  It is not climate change causing food shortages. It is the purposeful action taken under the guise of mitigating climate change that is causing the shortage of food.

The collective Build Back Better energy policy of western governments’ is the reason for massive increases in energy costs, massive oil price jumps, gasoline price increases, significant increases in chemical costs, increases in diesel fuel costs, shortages of fertilizer created using natural gas, and the end result is lower crop yields, higher farming costs and eventually, food shortages.  They know this.

All of the organizations and government who have been decrying the future shortage of food, know it is the radical shift in energy resource development that is creating the crisis.  This acceptance of reality begins the framework to understand just how entrenched and committed these western leaders are toward their beloved climate change agenda.

We do not yet know the scale of food shortage, but we do know -and everyone admits- there will be severe shortages on a global basis.

Western leaders will not and cannot accept the blame for what they are doing.  So, they will blame-cast, excuse and justify what is likely to surface.  Food shortages blamed on the Ukraine conflict, Russian aggression, climate change and any various iteration of justification that does not identify the true cause, their energy ideology.

I’m not so sure that people fully understand what the entire system of western government would be willing to do to avoid being blamed for avoidable death on a potential scale that is quite alarming.  All of the western leaders, institutions and governments are on the same boat.   They are all in this together.

JustInflation


Armstrong Economics Blog/Canada Re-Posted Jul 25, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Consumer price gains hit their highest level since January 1983 in Canada. The news comes one week after the Canadian central bank surprised the markets by implementing a 100 basis point rate hike. June’s 8.1% inflation rate acted as another indicator that the Canadian economy is in trouble. The BoC is expected to raise rates by an additional 75 bps at the next meeting, but the central bank cannot solve this problem alone.

Canada is expected to post a 2% deficit in GDP this year, making it the poorest among the G7 nations. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland announced that the nation would pull back on pandemic spending, which doubled Canada’s national debt. The Bank of Canada is relying on Freeland and the Trudeau Administration to reduce spending. Who will vote for Trudeau if he stops providing free handouts?

Rising interest rates are hiking up the price of debt servicing. Canada is still pushing for additional health and military spending and sending endless funds to Ukraine. Inflationary pressures will lead the people to look to the government for additional relief as they have provided it in the past.

Gas prices have increased 54.6% in the past year, natural gas and oil rose 38.8%, and food has spiked 8.8%. The hashtag #JustInflation has been spreading across social media as people are increasingly frustrated with Trudeau’s lack of response to the rising cost of living.

Germany to Bail Out Uniper


Armstrong Economics Blog/Energy Re-Posted Jul 25, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Germany and Finnish parent company Fortum signed a $15.24 billion deal to save energy company Uniper. In return, Germany will take a 30% stake in the company. Uniper reported only receiving a fraction on contracted gas from Russia’s Gazprom since mid-June, and it seems shipments may continue to slow or cease entirely. Uniper has been purchasing gas elsewhere at a premium, dampening their profits.

“We are living through an unprecedented energy crisis that requires robust measures. After intensive but constructive negotiations, we found a solution that in an acceptable way met the interest of all parties involved,” said Fortum’s President and CEO Markus Rauramo.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz said saving Uniper is of “paramount importance” for the German economy. Sholz said the “government plans to introduce mechanism to pass through 90% of replacement costs for missing Russian gas to consumers as of October 1.” The costs will be passed on to the consumers, of course.

Save the Planet – No more Showers!


Armstrong Economics Blog/Climate Re-Posted Jul 25, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

While you are eating your bugs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner with hot sauce from the black market, stop showing they waste water and take electricity/gas to heat the water. Only wash four places with a hand-towel using cold water only!

The Solution to this Insanity


Armstrong Economics Blog/Q&A Re-Posted Jul 25, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

QUESTION: Hi Martin, thank you as always for your incisive explanations of what’s going on in the ever-roving mind’s eye of SOCRATES.
In your July 24 interview with Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog, you started to explain that a form of “Great Reset” is necessary–because taxpayers’ $ has been spent hog-wild and wilder for 90 years, with no intention or capacity forever repaying.
Question 1: What is the “simple Reset” financial solution you started to explain on Greg’s show? One that presumably does not involve badgering Russia into more than a conventional proxyish war.
Question 2: Would you please explain how exacerbating warfare in Ukraine economically / politically benefits NATO, EU & WEF Schwab, etc in regards to their Great Defect, excuse me, Reset? What does military escalation do for a broke Europe? They aren’t the USA arms dealers’ beneficiaries.
Question 3: In their feverish dreams, how would the UN exert any sensible control over the world or the Western world’s, economy that helps the Reset shamble forwards?
Would the UN remain ruled by the Security Council, and would “they” try to reset the Security Council to be ruled by domino economic vassal nations numerically?
In other words, will the idiots that are “they”, try to eliminate Russia and then China from the Security Council as surely as “they” bumped Russia from the SWIFT banking system with its boomerang backlash across the globe?
Suppose only a few UN bureaucratic flacks can even speak Mandarin or Cantonese or Russian. How can they expect that an outer, world organization tool can exert control over the ever-changing turbulence that is these two countries?
How does US benefit by denuding itself of weaponry in Europe to the degree that Taiwan is near impossible for us to defend? How does the USA benefit by easing China’s possible overthrow of the only democratic Chinese nation?
Has anybody bothered to calculate & report on how much the vast digging up, refining, manufacturing then wanton exploding of natural resources as weapons & objects of weapons, across Ukraine, Europe, Syria, etc., has “contributed” to the so-called carbon pollution, climate change, Global Warming or Storming? How many cow farts must be forever silenced in the Netherlands and beyond, to make up for this pollution?
Fun Bonus Question: Has SOCRATES ever been assigned the task of determining the possibilities that we all are spiraling in a global “1984” software program? And if so, what adjustments at these points in the cycles, might nudge the program dominoes away from cycling into catastrophes & endless French, Russian & Chinese style revolutionary slaughters, pogroms, exterminations, starvations, chaos, etc before emergence into.
I feel that something swift & unpredictable will be upon us with an astonishing speed that shatters “boxes” of expectations. To add spice to the world’s pizza, in my meditations last week I heard the words “free energy” out of the blue. Any SOCRATES insights on this?
Would the deliverer of free energy use this to control populations ever more tightly, or to free us from such centralized mischief?
Thanks again Martin for hearing me muse out loud..
SU

ANSWER: Back in 2015, I held the Solution Conference. I was frightening again Klaus Schwab and I saw what was coming. So I did a Solution Conference to lay out what is now facing us today. Schwab’s “Great Reset” is authoritarian. He is like Marx and believes that we are like ants on a farm who need to be controlled. We are to become “hackable” biological entities. I really think these people got too excited watching the Matrix and thought what a great idea. Create a fake world and control everything.

Now even Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Canada is following the same directives from his fearless leader, Schwab is a good graduate of the WEF. Trudeau and his political counterpart in the Netherlands, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, are both trying to shut down agriculture. Schwab wants us to eat bugs. Saskatchewan and Alberta Ministers of Agriculture are expressing profound disappointment in the federal government’s fertilizer emissions reduction target. You can bet they will not be eating bugs. Trudeau has now moved on from his attack on the oil and gas industry. Now he is attacking farmers.

The “simple Reset” is to do a debt-to-equity swap. That is the financial solution one must adopt to save a debt-ridden corporation. The same must be done with world governments and Scwab’s way is to default, seize authoritarian power, and institute guaranteed basic income to replace failed pensions. They believe this, with police and military, will prevent a civil uprising where people storm the parliaments or congresses.

The endless warfare in Ukraine was deliberately created. The Western press will not report the truth and they will always point the finger at Putin. NATO only exists as long as Russia remains an enemy. The EU benefits from this since it provides the excuse to default and blames Putin. WEF benefits for Schwab gets to impose his dream of Marxism by sheet force. Then these people are using the Climate Change claims to then justify the United Nations will step up and claim it is the peacemaker and thereby rule the world. Their theories are just nuts. I have a bust of Socrates on my shelf. Schwab has Lenin.