I was a follower of the Free State Project when it first began.  I never signed up as a committed member (I didn’t want to move), but I followed its progress and spoke about it favorably to others.  I still remember when they were debating which state to choose, and I remember when New Hampshire was ultimately chosen in 2003.

Here we are about 20 years later, and I have to question the progress and the strategy of the whole thing.  To be sure, I was a supporter then, and I still wish everyone well who is doing it.  I am just questioning the effectiveness of it, especially after the last three years.

I followed Harry Browne closely in the early 2000s, and I can recall that someone asked him about the Free State Project.  He questioned the whole strategy and correctly pointed out that many people don’t want to uproot their lives and go to a particular place.  At the same time, he wished them well and hoped that they would make progress.

I am now more in the Harry Browne camp on this subject, especially after COVID hysteria and the recent elections.

The Republican governor in New Hampshire, Chris Sununu, was reelected.  He isn’t a particularly good governor, especially given what happened in 2020 with lockdowns.  It is better than the people of New Hampshire putting in a Democrat, but it’s too bad that the liberty lovers couldn’t get someone from the Republican Party with a more pro-liberty streak in there.

The really disappointing part from the election is in the U.S. House and Senate.  Democrats hold both House seats and both Senate seats from New Hampshire.

I am no fan of most Republicans in Washington DC, but how does the home of the Free State Project manage to elect all Democrats to Congress?  It means a majority of the voters are ok with vaccine mandates, lockdowns, funding for war in Ukraine, student loan bailouts, and all of the other chaos coming out of the Democratic Party.

Perhaps a lot of Free Staters choose not to vote for the lesser of two evils or to vote at all.  At the very least, you would think they would have had some influence by now on the rest of the population.

This was one hesitation I had about the whole thing early on.  I wasn’t sure how residents of New Hampshire would feel about liberty lovers “invading” their state and pushing their politics, even though their ideas consist mostly of getting politics out of people’s lives.

Even worse than the recent elections is the reaction to COVID.  New Hampshire wasn’t particularly bad compared to other states, but it wasn’t great either.  It wasn’t South Dakota.  It wasn’t even Florida, which did have lockdowns in April 2020 but fully opened up in September.

One would think that having a small but decent percentage of the population who consider themselves pro liberty to have had a big impact on lockdowns.  Maybe they did have an impact and it would have been worse than it was.  But it had to have been disappointing for Free Staters to do all that work and end up being locked in their homes because they were deemed non-essential.  New Hampshire should have been showing the way for the rest of the country.

Instead, it was left up to South Dakota (a conservative state) and Florida, which had a governor smart enough and brave enough to quickly realize his errors.  DeSantis had a brief period of acting as dictator, but was heavily opposed by the establishment in later 2020 for daring to open up Florida.

Where was New Hampshire?  Still waiting for advice from Fauci on what they could and couldn’t do?

A Natural Progression to a Free State

In Florida, Ron DeSantis won the governor’s race with nearly 60% of the vote.  Four years ago, he just barely won the election for governor.

This is for a mix of reasons, but most of them point back to COVID hysteria, or lack of COVID hysteria.  Some people who didn’t vote for DeSantis in 2018 (me included) voted for him this time.  It was a reward for being one of the better governors and not locking us down (much).

There are also a lot of people who moved to Florida since that time, and some of them moved specifically to get away from COVID hysteria.  They wanted to go to a state that was open where their kids could go to soccer practice and they probably didn’t have to get a jab to keep their job.

Anyone moving from California to Florida in 2020 or 2021 because of COVID was not going to be bringing leftist politics with them.  It was quite the opposite.

Maybe only 1 or 2 percent of the current population of Florida moved in the last couple of years because of COVID hysteria, but you can bet that almost every one of them voted for DeSantis.

One thing where my mind has changed from 2020 is the importance of politics.  I have long-believed that educating others on the benefits of liberty is the most important thing for libertarians to do, and I still believe that.  However, I underestimated the importance of having the lesser of two evils in office.

DeSantis is not a libertarian, but I realize that Florida would have been in lockdown well into 2021 if he had not won in 2018.  Florida also showed the way for other states to follow.

I also saw how the greater of two evils was bad with Joe Biden as president.  We have gotten vaccine mandates, student loan bailouts, war in Ukraine, and all around chaos.  Courts have struck some of it down.  Biden and company just shrug it off with no consequences and move on to the next dictatorial edict to destroy Western Civilization.

A majority of the people of New Hampshire evidently didn’t care about all of the chaos coming out of Washington DC.  They voted for more chaos.

The people who are part of the Free State Project are generally good people, and they have committed a lot for the cause of advancing liberty.  I don’t live in New Hampshire, so I don’t know what progress has been made.  I would encourage them to do an assessment on the effectiveness of their strategy.

I sincerely wish them well, and I do hope they succeed in bringing much greater liberty to New Hampshire.  With that said, if they don’t see much progress, it may be time to cut their losses and put their efforts somewhere else to greater use.  Maybe they will all have to move to the same city in New Hampshire to have a libertarian town or city within a statist state and a statist country.  Or they could just move to Florida and help make it better.

A missile flew into Poland killing two civilians.  There were almost immediate accusations that it came from Russia.  There were also quick calls saying that Poland is a NATO ally, and therefore must be defended.

The Russian government denied the accusations, and it was discovered quickly that it wasn’t a Russian missile and that the missile came from Ukraine.

For the first time since the war in Ukraine started, the U.S. government actually retreated with its rhetoric.  Maybe the crazies in the Biden White House actually don’t want a full-fledged nuclear war after all.

The implications were that if Russia had attacked Poland, that means that the U.S. is obligated to go to war with Russia because it is a member of NATO.

The U.S. government and the establishment media have actually had to acknowledge that this missile did not come from Russia.  It came from Ukraine.

But if Ukraine attacked Poland, doesn’t that mean that the U.S. government has to defend Poland and go to war with Ukraine?

I am being a bit facetious, and I don’t want any war from any side.  But it is an illustration of the hypocrisy and criminality coming out of Washington.

Ukraine will say it was an accident.  But they weren’t admitting to it when Zelensky was trying to up the ante and drag the United States further into the war.  The coverup itself is a criminal activity.

But how do we even know it was an accident?  Ukraine wanted to blame Russia for a missile attack on Poland so that they could drag the U.S. into direct combat (instead of just pouring in tens of billions of dollars).  If the Ukrainian government will lie about who fired the missile, then it wouldn’t be hard to believe that they purposely fired that missile and that it wasn’t an accident.

A Biden/ Deep State Slush Fund Dries Up

It is amazing how so much of the corruption coming out of Washington DC ties back to Ukraine.  Ukraine itself seems like a giant slush fund for the Biden family and the ruling elite in the U.S.

I think Trump’s instincts were correct when he was trying to get information out of Ukraine, which he was later impeached for.  The problem is that Trump was talking to one of the criminals (Zelensky) who was involved in all of the money laundering.

Right after the midterm elections this year, where the Democrats did better than expected, we found out that FTX is going bankrupt.  FTX was considered a major company as a cryptocurrency exchange.

A lot of information is coming out quickly on FTX, but you probably won’t hear the details on CNN or NBC Nightly News.

FTX was a lot more than a Ponzi scheme, although it certainly was that.  It appears that it was a giant slush fund for Biden and company.  This could include some Republicans within the establishment.

FTX donated millions of dollars to deep state politicians in the United States.  But we are also learning that Ukraine “invested” a nice sum of money in FTX.  And where did Ukraine get that money?

So let’s spell out what likely happened here.  Congress, with the support of all Democrats and most Republicans, has authorized tens of billions of dollars to go to Ukraine.  And, of course, Biden has approved this.  It will soon be over 100 billion dollars in total.

Ukraine takes the U.S. taxpayer money and funnels a portion of it into FTX.  FTX then takes a portion of that and funnels it to the campaigns of the establishment politicians who can be counted on to support more funding to Ukraine.

I don’t even know if there is technically anything illegal about it, but it is certainly criminal.  And this is all used to support the oligarchs in the U.S., the oligarchs in Ukraine, and to continue a war with Russia that is only harming the innocent people of Ukraine.

So it looks like FTX was just a giant slush fund that funneled U.S. taxpayer money to the campaigns of the people who are spending U.S. taxpayer money.  The Ukrainian government and FTX were the middlemen.

You’d think they would have had a more indirect trail.  At least when the Clinton family did their money laundering schemes, they would set up a bunch of different third-party companies and foundations to make a more complicated trail.

Anyway, this is how the deep state operates now.  They figure that the so-called mainstream media will cover for them (and they aren’t wrong), and that they can get away with almost anything.  The latter part has yet to be determined.

The deep state is getting sloppy though.  Now Biden is calling for another $37 billion for Ukraine.  These are insane amounts of money.  Now that FTX has run off with investor money and U.S. taxpayer money, it’s time for another middleman.  When the new funding is approved for Ukraine, I’m sure some of that will be poured into some other company or foundation for them to run their criminal activities.

You can’t make this stuff up.  You could write a book or produce a movie with this script and it would seem like too much of a fantasy.  People wouldn’t believe that they could do this right before your eyes and keep getting away with it.

Donald Trump is quickly losing support.  He is losing his base.  He has not lost it all yet, but he will soon find himself alone if he doesn’t change quickly.

This has little to do with the midterm election results, or at least not directly.  The establishment media declared Trump the big loser from the election, as some of Trump’s candidates lost, and the Republicans overall came up short of expectations.

To be sure, Trump only shares a little blame for what happened in the election.  Perhaps his endorsement of Dr. Oz was not the best choice, but Trump did have some decent candidates who won.  J.D. Vance in Ohio is somewhat libertarian leaning, and he won the Senate seat there.  Kari Lake was an impressive candidate, even if she comes up short in Arizona where proper vote counting seems not to be a priority.

The establishment Republicans like Mitch McConnell are more responsible for some of these Republican candidates coming up short on Election Day.  These people did as much as possible to sabotage the so-called MAGA candidates without doing so directly.  They certainly did what they could to not direct money to close races with Trump-endorsed candidates.

So I think there is a little blame that Trump deserves for the underwhelming election performance by Republicans, but I think it is minimal.

The problem with Trump is that his ego is finally getting in his own way to an extent that he is imploding before our very eyes.  He is attacking anyone who hurts his feelings or may potentially challenge him in the future.  He is attacking anyone of significance who is offering some mild criticism or constructive criticism.

Trump Unnecessarily Attacks Ron DeSantis

Before the election, Trump was already going after DeSantis.  He called him Ron “DeSanctimonious”.  This was completely wrong, especially right before the election.

After DeSantis won by a landslide in Florida, Trump upped the ante.  He sees DeSantis as a threat for the Republican nomination for president in 2024.  Trump called DeSantis an average Republican governor.  Trump says that he is the reason that DeSantis ever became governor.  Even if this is true, it is completely unnecessary and almost irrelevant at this point.

The howler came when Trump criticized DeSantis for locking down Florida.  It’s true that DeSantis did institute lockdowns in April 2020.  DeSantis quickly realized his mistake and reversed course.  By September 2020, Florida was completely open, while most other states still had lockdowns or significant mandates.

The biggest joke is that Trump recommended these lockdowns, and Trump had Fauci and Birx at his side throughout most of 2020.  Trump even criticized Brian Kemp, the governor of Georgia, when he relaxed restrictions in the late spring of 2020.

Trump was a total disaster when it came to COVID.  The best you can say about him is that he isn’t Biden.  But Trump, like most of his presidency, had the wrong people at his side.  In fact, he had the people who most opposed him.  If Trump had realized his mistake (like DeSantis) early on and corrected course, I would have more praise than criticism for him on this issue.  But instead, Trump was completely duped by the COVID hysteria, and he played into his enemies’ hands.

And now Trump wants to criticize DeSantis for COVID lockdowns?  What next?  Will Trump blame DeSantis for allowing Florida to provide COVID vaccines?

If there is one thing to criticize DeSantis for regarding COVID, it’s that he listened to Trump in the first place.

Trump Goes After Candace Owens

In this video, Candace Owens explains why Trump went after her.

Candace Owens has becomes quite popular amongst conservatives, and I see a bigger libertarian streak in her every time I see her.

As she explains, she questioned Trump on the vaccines, but she thought their disagreement was from a place of good faith.  When some people went to Owens wondering if Trump was just being a shill for big pharma, she said that Trump comes from a different generation where they grew up without the internet and they were told that all vaccines were great.

While she has a strong disagreement with Trump on the vaccines, she was actually defending Trump on this issue to a certain extent.  She was saying that he is coming from a position of good will, and the vaccine companies aren’t just bribing him.

So Trump reads an article (or maybe just the headline) and gets the message that Candace Owens says that Trump is too old to understand the internet.  Again, she was actually trying to defend him, but Trump has too big of an ego to understand this or to accept any mild criticism or disagreement.  So the next time they see each other in person, Trump is rude to her.

Unless Trump apologizes to Candace Owens (which we know won’t happen), I don’t think he will win back her support.  And she isn’t the only conservative who Trump has gone after lately.

These Aren’t Republican Primary Debates

If Trump thinks his path to the Republican nomination and the White House is by fighting with his base, he is misjudging.  Or to use a Trumpism, he is misjudging “bigly”.

In 2015, Trump could get away with attacking “Low Energy Jeb”, “Lyin’ Ted Cruz”, and “Lil’ Marco Rubio”.  It was effective partially because many of these people were seen as establishment candidates.  More importantly, he was running against them for the Republican nomination, and many of these words came from debates.

DeSantis has not announced that he is running for president in 2023/ 2024.  I don’t even know if he wants to be president.  He has a young family, and he was just re-elected governor in Florida.

If Trump is running – and I am pretty sure he is – DeSantis might just choose not to get involved.  He will stay on standby just in case Trump is indicted, or he has health issues, or something else crazy happens.

I have read some diehard Trump supporters criticizing DeSantis for not speaking up right now.  They say he could put a stop to all of the fighting by announcing that he won’t be running for president.  But why is this DeSantis’s responsibility?  Trump could stop it all by just not attacking.

If anything, this makes it more likely that DeSantis will run for president this time around because more Republicans are going to start to favor DeSantis over Trump.  Trump is doing this to himself.

DeSantis was campaigning hard and just won re-election.  As far as I’m concerned, he doesn’t need to say anything.  If Trump wants to hang himself, then go ahead.  Why interrupt someone when they are making a fool of themselves?

The Republican primaries have already started in Trump’s head, but he is overplaying his hand.  He should have kept quiet on DeSantis until DeSantis actually announced a run for the presidency (if that were to happen).  Even then, Trump’s criticism of DeSantis shouldn’t have been from a harsh place.  Trump could sell his message just by saying that the establishment (i.e., the ruling elite) fear him far more than they fear DeSantis, which is probably true.

If you had asked me two weeks ago, I would have said that Trump was the big favorite to be the Republican nominee in 2024.  After Trump’s two-week implosion, I give him 50% odds at best, and that is only if he wises up.

The establishment has been trying to take down Trump for the last 7 years.  They have tried almost everything.  Yet Trump has done to himself in the matter of 2 weeks what the establishment couldn’t do to Trump in 7 years.

This may be the tragic downfall of Trump.  I have my many criticisms of the man, but I didn’t want to see him go down like this.

I want to see the ruling elite be further exposed and for the country to have a big shift towards peace and greater liberty.  I don’t care if this happens through Trump, DeSantis, or someone else, or no particular person at all.

I do think Trump has been good for liberty with respect to exposing the establishment and also awakening many Republicans on foreign policy and civil liberties.  I don’t think this will be rolled back, even if Trump falls hard.

It’s too bad Trump has gone down this road of self destruction, but the exposure of the evils of the establishment will not fade away.

With all of the election news, there was also economic news this week with the release of the October CPI report.

The CPI rose 0.4% in October 2022, while the annual rate now stands at 7.7%.  The less volatile median CPI rose 0.5% in October, and the year-over-year median CPI remained at 7%.

The consumer price inflation report was a little better than expected, and investors cheered.  It is important to note that price inflation is still going up at a significant pace.  It is just going up at a slightly slower pace than before.

Food prices continue to go up.  When you go to the grocery store, your prices overall will continue to go higher.

Still, with this mildly good news that price inflation seems to be retreating a little bit, stock investors went wild.  The bulls came out in full force, probably expecting that the Fed will stop its tightening sooner rather than later.

The Dow went up by about 1,200 points on the day.  This was a monster rally in the face of uncertainty and concerning economic issues.

On the same day that the CPI numbers were released, the bond market went crazy too.  But it went crazy in a way that should make the stock bulls feel very uncomfortable.

The yields in the bond market point to even bigger trouble ahead, despite what the Fed might do.  Long-term yields plummeted in just one day, while short-term yields stayed around the same.

In other words, the yield curve further inverted from what it already was.  The 10-year yield fell 30 basis points to 3.82%.  The 3-month yield finished the day at 4.28% on November 10.

There is now a 46 basis point spread between the 10-year yield and the 3-month yield.  So while stocks soared on Thursday, the bond market is saying, “Hang on a minute.”

This has recession written all over it, and the Fed isn’t even done tightening yet.  Consumer prices are still rising at 7.7% annually according to the government’s own statistics.  The Fed will be tightening to get inflation under control (that it created) in the face of an oncoming train in the form of a recession.

If you are still heavily invested in stocks at this point, you should take the gift from Thursday and sell.  Stocks are going to have their big up days, but it is going to be more down days in the year ahead.

There was no massive red wave of Republican victories across the United States on Tuesday.  It was a mixed bag overall, but there were definitely winners and losers.

As I write this, neither major party has a clear majority in the House or Senate.  It looks like the Republicans will get a very slim majority in the House.  In the Senate, it looks like Georgia is headed for a runoff, which will favor the Democrats.  It will probably end up being 50/50 in the Senate, which means that the Democrats will get the deciding vote with Harris as vice president.

As I write this, there is still only 67% reporting in the Arizona Senate race and the Arizona governor race.  There is only 77% reporting in the Nevada Senate race.  In some California House races, the reporting totals are well under 50%.  This is almost a full day after the polls closed.

If you don’t want accusations of fraud and “threats to our democracy”, then maybe you can report all of the vote totals in a timely manner.  But obfuscation and confusion is the name of the game.

The Winners

Unfortunately, despite losing seats in the House, the Democrats are in the win column because it should have been so much worse.  This will only embolden the party of chaos and destruction, which means the American people as a whole take a loss.

It’s not that I think the Republicans would have been great in any way, but they would have been a roadblock to Biden and company’s destruction agenda.  Hopefully the Republicans will at least get a majority in the House so as to slow things down and create some gridlock.

On the Republican side, Ron DeSantis is the huge winner, along with the state of Florida.  DeSantis went from getting about 50% of the vote in 2018 to getting about 60% this time around.  He absolutely crushed his opponent.  He won by 1.5 million votes.

In fact, all of Florida did well for Republicans.  It is at least encouraging that DeSantis was rewarded for the being one of the few governors who locked down the least during COVID.  The only one who beats him on that front is Kristi Noem of South Dakota, who also had a big victory.

It looks like Florida is a red state now, and it is largely owed to DeSantis.  There were a lot of people who moved to Florida in the last 2 years to escape the craziness.  From personal experience, I can tell you that I did not vote for DeSantis in 2018, but I voted for him this time.  I know DeSantis is not a libertarian, but I wanted a strong message sent that COVID lockdowns and mandates are not acceptable.

For the Senate, I ended up voting for the Libertarian Party candidate and not for Marco Rubio.  I actually would have voted for Rubio if I thought he was in any danger of losing, only because I want the Republicans to have a majority in the Senate.  Or more accurately, I want the Democrats to lose the majority in the Senate.

The Losers

I already mentioned that the American people in general are on the losing side from the election (whether they know it or not).  They will be the ones suffering from inflation, government spending, the threats of war with Russia, the threats of more COVID mandates, and all of the totalitarian tactics being thrown at them by Biden and company.

Aside from the American people, I think Donald Trump was the big loser on Tuesday.  If you think about it, DeSantis did not seek Trump’s endorsement.  He did not want Trump out campaigning for him in Florida.  It would have only hurt DeSantis.

Trump had a victory with J.D. Vance winning in Ohio.  It is still not clear what will happen with Kari Lake in Arizona.

Trump completely bombed with his endorsement of Dr. Oz in Pennsylvania, who went down to a guy who makes Joe Biden look articulate.

Trump made two huge errors leading up to the election because he can’t control his own ego.  First, he took an unnecessary swipe at Ron DeSantis.  He referred to him as “Ron DeSanctimonious”.

Second, Trump announced that he would be making an announcement on November 15.  So while the headlines weren’t blaring that Trump is seeking the presidency in 2024, he was saying this without directly saying it.

This was right before the mid-terms.  This could only hurt the Republicans across the country.  Of course, we don’t know what impact it had, but it doesn’t look good.

2024

With Trump candidates not having a great showing in the election, and with DeSantis coming out looking great, you have to wonder how this will impact the next two years.

It is becoming clearer to Republicans who support Trump that DeSantis is more likable and more polished than Trump.  And if Trump is going to pick a fight with DeSantis because he sees him as a threat, it just looks bad for Trump.  He looks insecure, which he probably is.

As a Floridian, I would rather see DeSantis stay as governor.  I would like for libertarians to put some mild pressure on him to improve things in Florida.

I think DeSantis will stay on the sidelines for a while and watch what happens.  He will see in the coming months how much momentum Trump has within the Republican Party.  He will get a sense of whether he should enter the race for the presidency.

DeSantis has some appeal to independents that Trump doesn’t have.  I think Tuesday night showed this.

Trump is 76 years old now, and the establishment is out to get him.  Of course, they will be out in full force to get DeSantis too if he runs for president.  But Trump’s future is not certain at this point, and I think DeSantis will be ready to step in the presidential race should anything change.

I don’t think Trump is lost at this point, but he definitely took some punches on Tuesday night.  If he keeps misplaying his hand, he will find that DeSantis has become the leader of the Republican Party.

Emily Oster, writing for The Atlantic, has suggested that we just declare a pandemic amnesty.  If you want the full side of her story, you’ll have to read it for yourself.

She tells a story from April 2020 when her family went hiking.  At one point, another child got close to her then-4-year-old son, and he yelled, “social distancing”.

Oster then writes that these precautions were misguided and that outdoor transmission was rare.  She then declares, “But the thing is: We didn’t know.”

But the thing is, Emily, some of us did know.  And we weren’t even doctors or scientists.

You didn’t need a PhD in virology to tell you that a virus doesn’t typically transmit outside.  You also didn’t have to be an expert statistician to realize that even if you did contract COVID, it was less harmful than the flu for younger people.

(I say that with the caveat that it became more dangerous for those who sought medical treatment, as the Emily Osters of the world would advocate that you be put on Remdesivir and a ventilator.)

It sounds like Emily might have to ask for amnesty from her son one day.  He was only 4, and he was yelling “social distancing” to another child.  I wonder where he learned that.  Now that he is likely full of mRNA and spike proteins, I’m sure Emily has taught him to be less paranoid about a virus that was no threat to him whatsoever in the first place.

Emily is suggesting that we just put everything behind us and call it a day.  Who cares about the lockdowns, the beatings, the beratings, the closed businesses, the lost jobs, the fear instilled in so many people, and the vaccine injuries?  Oh well, let’s just declare a truce, now that me and my cohorts have ruined your life.

In her article, Emily said that we lacked definitive data on the efficacies of the vaccines.  She then declares that, “The mRNA vaccines have won out.”

So she wants some kind of amnesty, presumably for herself and those on her side, yet she is still spreading misinformation.  What is your definitive data, Emily, that says mRNA vaccines have won out?  Is it the tens of thousands of deaths reported to VAERS?  Is it the fact that they don’t stop transmission or infection?  Or is it that they greatly weaken your immune system over time?

How can we declare an amnesty when you haven’t even come close to reaching the truth yet?

An Amnesty From Violence?

I think there are times when it is best to agree to disagree and just move on.  And sometimes one side was wrong and the right side doesn’t have to rub it.  Sometimes people do just make mistakes that should be forgiven.

Of course, when someone makes a mistake, they should usually issue some kind of an apology or admission of being wrong before there is forgiveness.

But the COVID policies of the last 2 and a half years go way beyond this.  It would have been one thing if we had just been sold hysteria over a virus and people had been unnecessarily fearful.

The biggest problem is that many of us didn’t buy into the hysteria, and we wanted to live our lives as normal, but we were not allowed.

The “experts” in Emily’s camp were advocating all of the bad government policies that put a boot on our collective throats.

Most people were told they had to stay at home except for “essential” activities.  Businesses deemed “non-essential” were forced to shut their doors or be punished.  If they tried to defy, then people with guns would show up to tell them to obey or else.

We were forced to wear masks in many places because of government orders.  We were forced to fund bailouts for those being impacted by the lockdowns.  We were forced to fund research and development of vaccines, and then more money to market them.

And the big topper is that many millions of Americans were forced to get injected with these so-called vaccines or else lose their livelihood.

Was Emily and company ever advocating on my behalf saying that I shouldn’t have to get a needle in the arm or lose my job?  Was she saying that vaccination should be strictly voluntary?

Emily and company put us through absolute hell for more than 2 years.  There have been many lives ruined due to the fear, the lockdowns, and the vaccine mandates.

Virtually all government action involves the initiation of violence or threat of violence.  You may not see the violence, but if you disobey, it is there.

If someone sticks a gun in your belly and demands your money, what would your reaction be a year later if he asks for amnesty?  Maybe you could forgive the person.  Maybe you could show some grace.  But it doesn’t mean there are no consequences.

You Want Amnesty?

If Emily really wants amnesty, I am willing to consider it for her under a few conditions.

First, admit that you were wrong and vow to never spout off again about something you don’t know about.

Second, find another job where you aren’t influencing others because you got almost everything wrong.

Third, take a vow that you will never again advocate the use of force (including government force) ever again for any political or social goals.

If you do that, I am willing to show you some grace and leave you alone.  Although just remember that some of us wanted to be left alone in 2020 and 2021 from people like you, but you wouldn’t permit it.

For anyone who was COVID fearful but was against using government force in imposing their views, I am willing to move on.

But if you were advocating the use of violence to impose your will on others, I can’t just forgive and forget without there being any consequences for your actions.

The FOMC raised its target federal funds rate this week by 75 basis points.  This is being done by the Federal Reserve to fight the inflation that it created in the first place.

While the Fed is indicating that it could slow down in its tightening depending on economic data, the fact remains that price inflation is still high, even according to the government’s own statistics.

I have said that the only things that will get the Fed to reverse course before inflation is under control is for bank failures or major turmoil in the bond market.  The Fed is not going to reverse course just because we are in a recession or the stock market is dropping.

If and when we enter a recession, it is possible that prices will come down.  Or perhaps more accurately, prices will go up at a slower pace.

But what happens if we enter a hard recession with price inflation still raging at 7 or 8 percent?

The Fed has not faced a situation like this since the 1970s and early 1980s.  We know how that one went.  The Fed, under Paul Volcker, engaged in a tight money policy with high interest rates in order to get price inflation under control.  It also drove the economy into multiple recessions.

While the official inflation numbers were higher at that time, so were interest rates.  Right now, we have a situation of very negative real interest rates, even after the Fed hikes.  Price inflation is still vastly exceeding long-term and short-term rates.

Another difference between now and the late 1970s is that the debt is far worse.  The official debt, not including unfunded liabilities, sits at $31 trillion.  As interest rates go higher and some of this debt is rolled over into higher interest debt, the interest payments for the government (i.e., the American taxpayer) will surge.

We also have about 14 years of extremely loose monetary policy.  The Fed exploded the money supply after the 2008 financial crisis hit, but we never had the consequences of significantly higher consumer prices until recently.  So we have a lot of misallocated resources that are going to correct at some point.

On top of this, the yield curve is inverted.  The 3-month yield is now higher than the 10-year yield.  The 2-year yield has been higher than the 10-year yield for several months, and it now sits over 50 basis points higher.

So the biggest recession indicator has been triggered, and the Fed is raising rates and reducing its balance sheet with this going on.  There is little doubt at this point that there will be a recession in 2023.

After an incredibly strong month for the Dow in October, stocks resumed their fall this week.  We should expect a lot of volatility going forward, but I think the damage to stocks has only begun.

The Everything Bubble has reached its peak and has started to fall.  It may be a fall for the ages.  It is also incredible because just about every asset class has seen a bubble at once.  The only major exception I can think of is precious metals.

This means that your wealth is not really safe anywhere.  The best you can do is diversify and stay out of debt.  I still recommend a permanent portfolio setup, although even that will see its down days.

The name of the game right now is wealth preservation.  If you have something saved up, try to keep it.

I think there will be opportunities to make money down the road when everything gets beaten down.  I’m sure there really will be bargains when there is blood in the streets.

If the government resumes creating money any time soon, then that could change the whole game.  But I don’t expect it in the next several months unless major financial institutions get into trouble.

For now, prepare for a major recession ahead.  If the Fed reverses course, then it will be time to look for more speculations in mining stocks and other assets.

As I write this, Election Day is just over a week away.  Even the mainstream (i.e., establishment) media is admitting there may be a red wave.

The “red” is referring to Republican, but the quality of the Republicans up for election matters.

First, I do believe there will be this red wave.  I think the Republicans will easily take a majority in the House of Representatives.  The Senate is a bit more unclear.

I know there has been a lot of talk about voter fraud since the 2020 election.  There has also been a lot of censorship of talk about voter fraud.  There are some who are wondering if that will be a factor in these mid-term elections.

There is voter fraud in virtually every national election, at least to some degree.  It is just a question of whether it is limited in scope and if it has any impact.

For the House, there are 435 elections.  It is quite difficult to have widespread fraud to make a major difference.  There could certainly be fraud that tips the scale in five or ten races.  But if the Republicans get a massive wave of voters compared to the Democrats, then it won’t matter much.  They will still pick up a majority.

It could matter in the Senate.  It would be something similar to what was seen in the 2020 presidential election.  In all of the really close states, vote counting seemed to stop in the middle of the night, and it was generally the big cities (Detroit, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Phoenix) where things seemed to get strange.

This could certainly happen with the races for senators and governors.  It is hopeful that it won’t be as bad, as I do think local Republicans are a little bit more prepared than last time, even though these big cities are dominated by Democrats.

Why It Does Matter

It is very important that Republicans at least take control of the House.  I say this as someone who thinks that elections are overhyped and that both major parties are bad.

The last two years have been horrific.  They have been far worse than I could have imagined, and I am a cynical libertarian.  Joe Biden declared that 100 million people had to get medical injections or they would not be allowed to work.  They would not be allowed to feed their families.

Luckily there was enough pushback in a substantial minority not getting jabbed.  It was also fortunate that the Supreme Court struck down a large portion of the mandate, even though millions of people still ended up being subjected to it.

There are many other things aside from the vaccine mandates.  Biden has been funneling tens of billions of dollars to Ukraine and the military-industrial complex in order to prolong the war in Ukraine.  Russia is not going to leave Ukraine until they get assurance that U.S. missiles won’t be on the Russian border and the ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine are protected.

There is not one Democrat in Congress who has opposed funding this war.  While most Republicans have also been guilty of supporting the funding, at least some Republicans have spoken against it.

There are many other bad things Biden and the Democrats have done and continue to do.  They continue to spend like crazy and promote their so-called green agenda.  They continue the culture war and are actively trying to tear down Western Civilization.

Biden just declared that some student loan debt would be forgiven.  He can just declare anything, and if it is struck down by the courts, “Oh well, nothing lost.”  There are no consequences for him acting like a dictator.

This is why we need a red wave.  There have to be consequences for this recklessness.  Imagine if the Democrats keep control of Congress.  They will just be that much more emboldened to continue with their destruction.

Most Republicans will not be great.  I heard Blake Masters (Senate candidate in Arizona) on Ron Paul’s show and on Dave Smith’s show.  He was good compared to most other people running for national office, but he was wishy-washy at times.  Whenever he used the word “basically”, I cringed.  When someone says, “I basically opposing getting involved in Ukraine”, it probably means they don’t really oppose it.  He is probably acting along the lines of Rand Paul.  He won’t be really bold on some things, but he will be far better than most politicians.

Kari Lake, running for governor of Arizona, is really good.  I understand she isn’t a libertarian, but she is good on a lot of major issues.  But the most important thing is that she is really bold.  She shows courage.  She is like Trump in a lot of ways, except less sloppy.

There are several other decent candidates running for office this November.  This is encouraging.  The Republicans are becoming less hawkish on foreign policy, and they are mostly less bad on other issues compared to Democrats.

I know that Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham are total disasters.  But I also know that there are people out there like Marjorie Taylor Greene who will not hold back and will be mostly good for liberty.

So the red wave does matter.  We need the opposition to Biden and his destructive policies.  We need more gridlock.

And slowly, the Republicans are getting a little better.  The establishment Republicans are losing ground, and they know it.

I think the Republicans will take the House.  They may take the Senate.  I hope the decent ones get elected.  It will be a step in the right direction.

There are already many signs pointing to a recession ahead.  We are, after all, in the Everything Bubble.

The last piece of confirmation I have been looking for just came.  The 3-month yield is now higher than the 10-year yield.  The mostly inverted yield curve points to a major recession in 2023.

Some people look at the 2-year vs. 10-year yields for inversion.  These have been inverted for several months.  The 2-year has frequently been 40 basis points or more higher than the 10-year yield.

I prefer to see an inversion of the 3-month yield and the 10-year yield for recession confirmation.  Of course, nothing is guaranteed.  We should have seen a deep recession in 2020 after the curve inverted in 2019.  But we got COVID hysteria and trillions of dollars of fresh money from the Fed, which delayed and exacerbated the inevitable.

Now we have high consumer price inflation, even according to the government’s own statistics.  The Fed can’t just create trillions of dollars more in new money to fight the next recession; otherwise they risk losing control of the dollar.  The Fed may be made up of a bunch of Keynesians, but they don’t want hyperinflation.

So the yield curve is now inverted while the Fed continues to hike its target interest rate and slowly draining its balance sheet.  If you think stocks have fallen hard in 2022 so far, hold on to your hat.  Things may have just gotten started.  The same goes for housing in most areas.

The Numbers

The 3-month yield closed above the 10-year yield on October 18, 2022 by 3 basis points (.03%).  The 10-year yield jumped the next day, and it was no longer inverted.

On October 25, the 10-year yield started to go back down, while the 3-month yield continued higher.  In just 3 days, the 10-year yield has dropped almost 30 basis points from 4.25% to 3.96%.  The 3-month yield now sits at 4.13%.

In fact, as of this writing, the yield on a 30-year bond is actually slightly lower than on a 3-month Treasury bill.  Who in their right mind would accept a lower interest rate for 30 years as compared to 3 months?

The answer is somebody who expects long-term rates to fall due to a really bad recession.

The bond market is typically thought of as the smart market.  The stock market doesn’t have this reputation unless you talk to a bullish stock investor.

Of course, markets themselves are neither smart nor stupid.  But the mania investors go into stocks.  Bond investors are not just trying to make a quick buck.  They are often just trying to preserve capital.

The bond market tends to be a better predictor of the future economy.  And there is no clearer sign that a recession is on the horizon than an inverted yield curve.

More Confirmation

I already thought a recession was coming.  The speculative mania in stocks, real estate, crypto, and nearly everything else has been extraordinary up until this year.  It all came on the heels of the Fed’s easy money policies.

With consumer price inflation nearing double digits, the limits seem to have been reached.  The major inversion of the 2-year and 10-year yields was already pointing to trouble ahead.  I wasn’t sure if we would see an inversion of the 3-month and the 10-year.  It took some time, and here we are.

And the Fed isn’t done raising rates.  There is another meeting next week where we will see another major hike to fight the inflation that the Fed itself created.

I’m not sure that people are quite prepared for what we are about to see.  Government spending is already through the roof.  While a major recession should point to lower interest rates (as investors seek safety in U.S. Treasury securities), who is going to buy this debt at low interest rates in the long run if not the Fed?

The Fed is actually slowly selling off debt at this point.  What will happen to the trillion-dollar deficits?  If interest rates continue to go up, the burden of the interest payments on the debt will become quite significant.

If we are facing a major recession and a popping of the Everything Bubble, what happens if price inflation doesn’t come down to the Fed’s 2% number?  Imagine if the Fed is still raising its target rate in the middle of a brutal recession.  The last time anything like this was seen in the United States was in the 1970s and very early 1980s.

There are warning signs everywhere that things are going to get bad.  The inverted yield curve with the Fed continuing to tighten monetary policy by itself is enough to know just how ugly things could get.

Stocks will not go straight down.  In fact, if you like to day trade, it will be a dream for people who know what they are doing.  There will be many up days too.  There will be a lot of volatility.  But there will be more and bigger down days than up days.

As someone who follows the Austrian school of economics, I am hesitant to make predictions about the future.  We can’t predict human action with certainty.

In this case, I think it is a near certainty that there will be a recession in 2023, and it is going to get ugly.  The best hope is that the Fed allows it to happen and the government is forced to scale back its spending.  The system needs to be cleansed of the malinvestment that has occurred, particularly since 2008.

I often refer to the “establishment” in my writings.  Admittedly, it is not an easy term to define.  Sometimes I will refer to the “ruling elite” as a substitute.  Occasionally I will also use the term “deep state”.

From Wikipedia, “The Establishment is a term used to describe a dominant group or elite that controls a polity or an organization.”

In the case of the United States, it isn’t only politicians that are part of the establishment.  It can include people with wealth or influence, including the media.

It is easy to identify certain people as belonging to the establishment.  But there is no clear-cut definition, and the lines definitely get blurred.

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are establishment people, as is Joe Biden.  George W. Bush was not as favored by the media, but him and Dick Cheney certainly hold a place as part of the establishment.

I do not consider Donald Trump as part of the establishment.  Some will claim that he is, but I don’t think the establishment forces would be so desperate to tear him down if that were the case.

Ronald Reagan is a bit trickier.  I would characterize him as someone that wasn’t really part of the establishment, but the establishment could at least deal with him.  They would have preferred Walter Mondale, but they could accept Reagan, as he wouldn’t fly too far off the establishment path.

Sometimes the establishment will allow some opposition so as to satisfy their opponents.  I don’t mean their political opponents, but rather the general population who do not generally accept the establishment narratives.

You have to wonder how things would have played out if the establishment (including much of the media) had not so vehemently opposed Donald Trump and had not been so desperate to get anything to stick to him.

The Trump supporters would have been more satisfied, and they would probably be a lot quieter than they are now.  They probably would have accepted a large degree of the status quo with some changes around the edges.

Instead, the establishment declared an all-out war against Trump, which has only emboldened his supporters.  You now have many Trump supporters questioning whether the FBI and Department of Homeland Security should even exist because they see these agencies as corrupt to the bone.

So in that sense, the establishment overplaying its hand with Trump has actually moved some people in a more libertarian direction, which isn’t insignificant in the long run.

Not Everyone Wants Destruction Like Biden

The curious thing about the Biden White House is that it has created an environment of chaos and destruction.  The Biden handlers are purposely trying to tear down Western civilization.  It has gotten even more absurd lately where they are willing to risk a nuclear war for their little games.

Biden has been terrible on almost everything.  To this day, he is creating havoc with his mandates for “vaccination”.  His economic policies are terrible, as the government spending continues.  His foreign policy is mostly terrible, as he funnels tens of billions of dollars to Ukraine (and the military-industrial complex) to continue the war.  One of the few decent things Biden has done is to end the occupation of Afghanistan, but even there he managed to bungle the withdrawal.

The disaster of Biden really culminated when he gave a primetime speech attacking “MAGA Republicans”.  It wasn’t a speech attacking Donald Trump.  It was a speech attacking Trump supporters, which is a major difference.  And now he is using the “Justice Department” and the FBI to go after any influential Trump supporter.

While Biden is the president of total chaos, not everyone who is part of the establishment is like Biden and his handlers.

Henry Kissinger, who is famous as a long-time war hawk, has warned to tamp down tensions with Russia.  The 99-year-old man is more worried about nuclear war than the idiots and criminals in the Biden administration.

There are many establishment Republicans in Congress who will not be as destructive in office as Biden and many of the Democrats.  They may not be particularly good on important issues, but they also aren’t necessarily purposely trying to tear down civilization.

There are differences, and this should be recognized.  Marco Rubio is part of the establishment, but he is generally better than Lindsey Graham.  And while Rand Paul can play ball with establishment forces at times, he is better than Marco Rubio.

In terms of political parties, the Republicans are better than the Democrats these days.  Surprisingly, even on foreign policy, the Republicans are not as bad as the Democrats.  At least there is some opposition from Republicans on sending money and weapons to Ukraine.

If you really want to look at how the establishment is not uniform, look at the Federal Reserve right now.  The Fed is on a mission to get inflation under control (that it created).  Some people theorize that the Fed will control monetary policy to help incumbents or to help certain politicians who are part of the ruling elite.

But Jerome Powell and company are doing absolutely no favors for Biden and the Democrats right now.  They are continuing to raise interest rates and engage in a policy of tight money, which is hurting the stock market and exposing the bad economy.  They are doing this for the longer run goal of controlling inflation.

This can only hurt the Democrats in the short run.  The Fed is working against the Democrats for this election.  It just tells you that the Fed doesn’t really care if the Republicans or Democrats control Congress.  If anything, they might want Republican control for a little sanity.

Again, just because you are part of the establishment or the ruling elite, it doesn’t mean you have the goal of total chaos.  Most people in powerful positions just want to maintain the status quo of being part of the ruling elite.  They don’t want total chaos.

I say all of this to give hope to people.  The crazies running the Biden White House are not the inevitable rulers for years to come.  The FBI raids of Trump supporters do not have to last forever.  Even within the FBI, there are some decent people who see what is happening.

It is easy for libertarians to just throw up their hands and declare that everything is corrupt and that everyone working for the federal government is corrupt.  This is not at all true.  And even within the establishment, there are varying degrees of evil, and there are varying goals.

Sometimes it isn’t so bad if the establishment on one side fights the establishment on the other side.  Meanwhile, more and more people are learning the truth about how the ruling elite are not there to protect them and help them.

There are a lot of reasons to be pessimistic these days, but there are reasons for long-term optimism as well.  We are not destined to be ruled by Biden and his goons for a long time to come.  More and more people are awakening to the evils of the establishment, which is why the establishment is working so hard to shut us up.

The establishment feels threatened, which is why they are fighting so hard right now.  The process in the years to come isn’t going to be pretty, but there is a real chance that we could come out the other side with much greater liberty than any of us have had in our lifetimes.