The Western establishment media have all of their important talking points aligned as usual.  They have been in sync with COVID for over 2 years now, always shifting the narrative together with the “shifting science”.

And so is the case with the war in Ukraine.  The main talking points are that Putin and Russia are evil and the Ukrainians are good people suffering at the hands of the Russians.

One of the words I have now seen pop up several times from the Western governments and the establishment media is “unprovoked”.  It will be casually thrown into a headline as one of the adjectives to describe the situation.

• On Russia’s Unprovoked and Unjustified Attack on Ukraine

• Australia Condemns Russia’s ‘Brutal and Unprovoked invasion of Ukraine

• The UK and our allies condemn the Russian government’s unprovoked and premeditated war against Ukraine.

There are a lot of adjectives one could appropriately use to describe the war in Ukraine.  You could say that it’s not justified.  I would say it isn’t justified because I don’t think any war can be justified unless you can specifically target the criminals without hurting innocent people.

But to say it was unprovoked is a joke.  Do you know what wars were unprovoked?

The wars that the U.S. government started in Iraq, Syria, and Libya were unprovoked.  Even the war and occupation of Afghanistan for nearly 20 years was not provoked by the ruling government there.  Just because it was suspected that bin Laden was living there when the 9/11 attacks happened is not justification for invading a country.  There was no provocation by the Taliban.

Unprovoked?

The elites in the U.S. have been blaming Russia and Putin for almost everything since at least 2016.  Since Donald Trump unexpectedly defeated Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, they had to make up a giant lie that Trump colluded with Russia to steal the election.

In the 2019/ 2020 race for the Democratic nomination, Russia was accused of trying to help Bernie Sanders get elected.  Tulsi Gabbard, even then, was being called a Russian asset for her opposition to war in Syria.

When the story broke (sort of) about Hunter Biden’s laptop just a few weeks before the 2020 election, the little coverage it got from the establishment media was only to claim that it was a Russian disinformation campaign.  Now, even the New York Times has admitted that it was Hunter Biden’s laptop and that the story was legitimate.  It had nothing to do with Russia.

Almost everything has been blamed on Russia, and sanctions had already been placed on Russia before the war in Ukraine.  That in itself is a major provocation.

But it goes far deeper that this of course.  When the Soviet Union broke up, U.S. officials promised not to move NATO eastward towards Russia’s border.  Even though it wasn’t in a treaty (not that that would have mattered), the U.S. quickly sought to expand NATO eastward.  It was now at the point where Ukraine was supposedly being considered for NATO membership, which had long been a red line in the sand for Putin and Russia.

But that’s not all folks.

In 2013 and 2014, the U.S. State Department helped to fund, plan, and execute a coup in Ukraine, which overthrew the democratically-elected president who was somewhat friendly towards Russia.

Since that time, Ukraine has largely been ruled by U.S. puppets who have allowed the continual abuse and murder of ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine.

The now-sainted Zelenskyy, whose idol is the dictator of Canada, Justin Trudeau, is not necessarily the great guy that the media makes him out to be.  He has jailed opposition leaders and shut down opposition media.  He has continued the policy of making ethnic Russians into second-class citizens of Ukraine.

There have likely been thousands of people killed in eastern Ukraine because the corrupt and evil Ukrainian government allows neo-Nazi groups to shell the areas and make life a living hell for the people there who mostly just want to be left alone (or would prefer to be part of Russia).  But people weren’t displaying the Ukrainian flag in solidarity for any of these people for the last 8 years.

Putin has been clear on what he wants.  He wants eastern Ukraine to be separated from Ukraine so that the people there can live peacefully, and he wants a guarantee that Ukraine won’t be admitted to NATO and that NATO (i.e., U.S.) missiles won’t be placed on its border.

But when Putin asked for a U.S. response to his claims of wanting assurance of safety for Russia (from the U.S.), the foolish and evil elites in the U.S. government basically laughed in his face.

And after all that, we then saw the “unprovoked” Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The war may be criminal.  It may be unjustified.  It may be the wrong way to solve the problems.  It may be a lot of things.  But one thing it is not is unprovoked.

The Federal Open Market Committee released its latest statement on monetary policy.  As was widely expected, the Federal Reserve is raising its target federal funds rate by a quarter percent.  The federal funds rate will now be in a range of 0.25% to 0.50%.

This drove up some yields.  The 2-year yield briefly hit 2%.  We will see in the coming days if this flattens the yield curve more, as shorter- term rates should rise a bit.  There is also the anticipation of several more rate hikes this year.

The Fed is in a bind.  We are getting hit with price inflation at about 8%, so the Fed has to start tightening or else risk losing control of the dollar.  At the same time, by tightening and increasing rates, an inverted yield curve becomes more likely, which is the warning sign of a recession.

It is also interesting that most everybody is focused on rates (meaning the federal funds rate, which is the rate the Fed can directly control).  Meanwhile, there is far less talk about the actual money supply.  While higher rates and a lower money supply tend to go hand-in-hand (or at least they did in the past), it is the money supply that ultimately dictates price inflation in the long run.

In the FOMC statement, it states, “In addition, the Committee expects to begin reducing its holdings of Treasury securities and agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities at a coming meeting.”

Of course, “a coming meeting” could mean a year from now.

The odd thing is that the Fed is just now finishing up its taper.  In other words, up until now, the Fed was continuing to add assets to its balance sheet (i.e., create money out of thin air).

So now the Fed is talking about reducing its holdings at some meeting in the future?  Why didn’t it stop its money creation before now?  What is different now than a couple of months ago, other than the fact that price inflation is even higher?

In the Implementation Note with the statement, it says, “Roll over at auction all principal payments from the Federal Reserve’s holdings of Treasury securities and reinvest all principal payments from the Federal Reserve’s holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) in agency MBS.”

So the Fed will apparently stop creating new money for now, but will continue to roll over maturing debt.  It’s rather curious why the Fed would immediately start raising its target rate just as it finishes its massive balance sheet expansion.  One would think that the Fed would have stopped printing digital money long before.

The Fed’s balance sheet has gone from about $4.1 trillion to nearly $9 trillion over the last two years (March 2020 to March 2022).  Why didn’t the Fed stop adding to its balance sheet months ago?

They are trying to play a balancing game.  They can’t let price inflation get more out of control than it already is, but they also don’t want to risk imploding the economy and the Everything Bubble.

My prediction is that any significant increases in long-term yields will be short lived.  When recession fears increase, investors will still turn to Treasury securities for safety.  This goes along with the inverted yield curve where short-term rates go higher than long-term rates.

The only reason long-term yields would continue to rise is because there is a fear of even higher price inflation.  But if the Fed keeps raising its target rate and starts to consider a reduction in its balance sheet, this may be enough to prick the bubble.

At some point, something has to give.  The price inflation rate is unacceptably high at this point to most Americans.  I think the Fed is ok with it for a little while as long as it stays below 10%.  But let’s remember that price inflation just over 7% will result in prices doubling every 10 years.

We seem to be entering a period like the 1970s stagflation, but before Volcker became head of the Fed and forced interest rates well into double digits.  There are some key differences though.

We are starting from a point now where short-term rates are near zero.  If the Fed ever has to raise its target to rate into the double digits, we will be facing continued and steep increases.

The U.S. government is also in far greater debt now than in the 1970s.  Higher interest rates will mean higher servicing costs on the $30 trillion national debt.

We also have much bigger bubbles now than in the 1970s.  We may have bigger bubbles now than anything we’ve ever seen in this country.

At the same time, it is important to recognize that even during the 1970s stagflation, there were periods where stocks went on a bull run.  It may have been a tough time for Americans, but life still mostly went on.

The stakes may be higher now and the numbers a lot bigger, but we can hope that life will go on.  Times may be tough ahead, but we are not likely to turn into some third-world country, even if the U.S. dollar ceases to be the world’s reserve currency.

We don’t know if we will get higher price inflation or an economic downturn in the next year or two.  Maybe we’ll get both.  This is why I recommend a permanent portfolio, which helps you protect your wealth in any economic environment.

It is important to have a rainy day fund, even if it is sitting in the bank and losing 8% percent per year to inflation.  In a recession, cash is typically king.  In an inflationary recession, who knows?  But it is still good to have some liquidity for emergencies.

I will be following the yield curve with particular attention over the next few months.  If it inverts, you should prepare for a hard recession.

It has been two years since the world was shut down.  It has been a little over two years since the big lie started by the power elite and the so-called experts in the medical establishment.

We should never forget the death and destruction that has been wrought on society by these people.

Nobody should have ever been locked down.  All of the lockdowns, mandates, and restrictions imposed by government were immoral.

If there was any role for the state, it should have been advisory only.  Even here, you should never listen to what politicians and bureaucrats in positions of high power tell you.  It is often wise to do the opposite.

The most any government should have done is to advise people to stay home if they were sick and for elderly and people in bad health to be cautious in their activities.  That’s it.

Nobody should have been prohibited from visiting elderly relatives.  Nobody should have been prohibited from having a wedding or a funeral.  Nobody should have been forced to stay home.  Nobody should have been forced to close their business.  Nobody should have been prohibited from dining in a restaurant unless the restaurant owner voluntarily chose to close down.

No child should have been prevented from interacting with friends or going to school because of edicts coming down from mayors and governors.  No child should have missed a soccer practice or dance recital because of this.

Lies, Misinformation, and a Lack of Courage

We were lied to from the very beginning.  In February 2020, the “experts” (with their sham models) and the lying establishment media gave us an exaggerated death rate out of China.  It was never anywhere close to 3 or 4 percent.  It may have been that high for really sick people going into the hospital in China, but that doesn’t mean that is the death rate for the average person who gets infected.

In the U.S., the statistics were rigged from the beginning.  The government specifically gave instructions to inflate the death count.  If you tested positive for COVID and then died within a certain timeframe, then you were deemed to have died of COVID.

The government also incentivized mistreatment and death by paying hospitals more to classify patients as COVID.  And then they were incentivized to give patients Remdesivir and put patients on a ventilator, which has killed many people (and continues to this day).

I knew we were in trouble in the second week of March when most of the world bought into the lies and panicked.  When professional sports leagues stopped sporting events, that was the really bad sign.

And let’s not forget the role corporate America played (and continues to play) in doing the bidding of the establishment.  Almost every major corporation went along with the charade.  There were very few who stood up and spoke the truth.  There was a major lack of courage in 2020.

Courage is the distinguishing factor for the few people who did stand up.  Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida stupidly followed the establishment and issued stay-at-home orders in April 2020.  By September, he fully opened up Florida to the degree it was possible.  While he did educate himself greatly on the issue, it was really his courage that made it possible for him to stand against what most others were doing and allow freedom in Florida.

Vaccine Passports

If the lockdowns and restrictions weren’t enough, then we were hit with vaccines and vaccine mandates.  It’s hard to say how deep the lies go here.  Some claim that the vaccines were already in development before COVID even became a thing.  I have no idea, but I do know there have been massive lies.

In the Pfizer trial, it is claimed that one vaccinated person died of COVID and two non-vaccinated people died.  Out of thousands of people, this was the evidence that the vaccine is effective.  What isn’t widely mentioned is that if you look at overall mortality (see page 23), more vaccinated people died than those in the control group.  This is what really matters.  I don’t care if I don’t die of COVID if I die of something else.

And speaking of control groups, the corrupt companies working hand-in-hand with Washington DC ruined the control group.  They said that it was too important to get vaccinated, so the non-vaccinated people in the studies were allowed to take the jab.  So now there is no official longer-term study of the effects of the vaccine.  We can only do our own guesses based on our experience and observations around us, and by looking at unreliable data like in VAERS.  The main reason VAERS is unreliable is because the majority of side effects aren’t reported to it.

Isn’t it amazing that the universal vaccine cards were ready to go on day one?  How come people didn’t just walk in and get the jab?  Why were they walking out on day one with proof that they received the first dose of the COVID vaccine? In 2020, when someone suggested that the power elite were instituting vaccine passports, they were called a nutcase conspiracy theorist.

To this day, many people are required to show proof that they have received a COVID vaccine (a vaccine passport) in order to remain employed in their current job.  Foreigners are required to show their vaccine passport in order to enter the country.  We are still living under a soft tyranny.

Flatten the Hysterics

It all started with two weeks to flatten the curve.  I had to listen to people, some of whom are somewhat otherwise intelligent, make stupid remarks and trying to smugly explain transmission rates and how we need to spread out the illness so as not to overwhelm the hospital system.

These are the same people who warned about the dangers of opening up the beach.  Yes, you read that right – the beach.  I have never heard of a virus spreading at the beach before, but all of these intelligent nitwits were all of a sudden repeating the talking points that it was dangerous to leave your house.

When people make a mistake, it is often better to give them an out and not make them admit for past errors.  Sometimes it is easier to just move on and pretend that these mistakes were never made.  And for some people who have little power or influence who naively bought into the talking points, I am willing to let it go with them.

But for the people with a platform or those who were outspoken who helped ruin our lives, I want to rub in their face how wrong they were for the rest of their lives.  I don’t want anybody to ever listen to these people again about anything.  I don’t want people to forget those who ruined their lives.

And let’s be real here.  At the top, this wasn’t a mistake.  If it was a mistake, they would have at least gotten something right.  If you are just dumb or ignorant, sometimes you will stumble into something correct.  But when you are consistently wrong while doing significant damage to others, this isn’t a mistake.  It is evil, and I want everyone to know it.

Two weeks to flatten the curve was a big fat lie.  It quickly changed into shutting down society if it can just save one life. They acted as if the only thing to life is not dying.  It was as if they were saying, “It’s ok if we do long-term mental damage to children, as long as they don’t get grandma sick.”

Of course, nothing worked anyway.  A virus is going to do what a virus is going to do.  Even if it were a really deadly virus, it would have made more sense to allow young and healthy people to continue to live their lives as normal and gain natural herd immunity.  This would have been the greatest protection for the elderly and the highly vulnerable.

It has now been two years to flatten the curve.  Most of the hysteria has subsided, but it still exists, and there are still harmful government mandates.  Even if everything goes back to normal (pre 2020) in a year from now, we should never forget the evil people who tried to destroy our civilization.

There is a lot going on in the financial markets.  Gold surged past $2,000 per ounce.  Oil prices are skyrocketing even more after Biden announced that the U.S. would ban the import of Russian energy (gas and oil).  The price of gasoline may be hitting $5 per gallon by the end of the week.

While price inflation surges, the yield curve is flattening, with the Fed expected to raise its target rate next week.

The U.S. government is placing sanctions on Russia while corporate America joins in to follow the establishment narrative by withdrawing services from Russia.  McDonald’s is closing in Russia for now, and many financial services are halting their services in Russia.

The average Russian may go to the store and find they can’t pay with their credit card.  I don’t remember any of this happening to Americans when the U.S. government invaded Iraq or any other number of countries.

These sanctions do hurt the Russian people quite a bit.  But they also hurt Americans.  Biden will try to blame the economic problems on Putin, even though they were already there before this.  The sanctions will just make things worse.

I wonder about the longer-term impacts to the U.S. dollar.  The U.S. government is playing a dangerous game, and I don’t know if they know it.  The biggest danger is obviously a war, and particularly a nuclear war.  But even if there isn’t an actual war with Russia, there is a financial war, and the dollar may end up being the biggest casualty.

Russia, China, and the Dollar

The U.S. dollar is still considered to be the world’s reserve currency.  A lot of business in the world is done in dollars. This is especially true when it comes to buying oil.

Russia has essentially been forced to abandon the dollar.  The Russian central bank had already sold off much of its U.S. treasuries years ago when sanctions were imposed.

The U.S. government and others are now essentially stealing assets from individuals, as well as from the government and central bank.

You have to believe that the Chinese are paying close attention to what is going on.  The Chinese government owns about $1 trillion in U.S. government debt.

What if China has a squabble with Taiwan or Hong Kong?  What if the Americans don’t approve of something and decide to freeze their assets?  Do the Chinese want to be stiffed out of $1 trillion plus interest of assets?  The question answers itself.

You have to wonder if the Chinese will start selling off U.S. debt.  Or maybe they will stop rolling over any maturing debt.

Even the Japanese government may take notice.  They tend to go along with the U.S. government, but it’s got to make them nervous that one wrong move could cost them over one trillion dollars, which they hold in U.S. government debt.

What will be the result of these brutal sanctions?  Aside from the immediate impact of less trade and more hardship on people, it will result in more countries buying and selling without the use of U.S. dollars.

If this is coupled with the selling off of U.S. government debt by foreign countries (especially Japan and China), we could see the dollar get hit hard.

There is no reason for the U.S. dollar to continue as the world’s reserve currency.  In today’s world, countries can use their own currencies and convert it into the currency of other countries they are trading with.  Why go through the middleman – the U.S. dollar?

This means that life could get even more expensive for the American consumer.  It means that the U.S. government will not be subsidized as much by foreign countries buying the debt.  Politically, it means that the U.S. government will have less clout in the world.

The U.S. government is shooting itself in the foot.  All of these sanctions and outright theft will only lead to a faster decline of the U.S. dollar.

There will no longer be a world reserve currency unless people are wise enough to turn back to gold.

It is funny how, all of a sudden, the American people are so very concerned about the plight of Ukrainians.  Have Americans become anti war and more caring about people on the other side of the world?

Unfortunately, the answer is no.  I think most Americans really are generally good people.  While they are ethnocentric and naturally care more about their own lives and those around them (as it should be), most don’t wish harm on innocent people in foreign lands.

The reason for the sudden shift in Americans caring greatly for those suffering the plight of war is because the establishment is gaslighting them.

As with COVID and so many other things, the establishment media doesn’t typically outright lie.  They are usually factually correct, yet not truthful.  They will only tell you half the story.  Sometimes they won’t tell you any part of the story.

For example, how often have you heard it mentioned from the establishment media that the U.S. government helped to fund and plan the overthrow of the democratically-elected government in Ukraine in 2014?

How often have you heard it directly said that the Ukrainian government has been killing ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine for the last 8 years?

Have you heard the media talk about the president of Ukraine and how he has thrown his political enemies in jail in Ukraine?

I am anti war no matter what.  The only way war can be justified is if you can specifically target the aggressors without civilian casualties.  So from this standpoint, it is wrong what Putin is doing to Ukraine, even if he is trying to minimize civilian casualties.

However, it is understandable, given that he is a politician, that he would resort to war.  He has been warning NATO, and the U.S. in particular, to stop expanding NATO towards Russia and that the Russian people feel threatened with missiles near the border.  Putin has tried to talk and negotiate, almost to a fault.  Instead of a mature response, U.S. politicians just try to humiliate him.

So Putin finally had enough.  From a statist standpoint, it is completely understandable why he is doing what he is doing.

It isn’t “what aboutism” to point out the incredible hypocrisy of so many Americans and much of the world in shedding fake tears for the Ukrainian people.  If you also sympathized with the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, and Yemen, then I will take you seriously.  Otherwise, you are just acting as a hypocrite, even if misinformed.

I think most Americans would sympathize with the people of Yemen if they knew what was going on.  If they knew that the U.S. government was helping Saudi Arabia to starve people in an already-poor country and they saw images on the news of kids dying of malnutrition, then I think Americans would be willing to pay tribute to Yemen just as they have done with Ukraine.

But the media isn’t truthful.  They don’t tell you this story because it isn’t Putin who is the bad guy.  The bad guy (or guys) is in Washington DC.  It’s the same reason that you don’t get the same obsessive coverage over civilian casualties and suffering in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and other places that the U.S. government has invaded and/ or bombed.

I don’t remember the United States being sanctioned over starting a war.  I don’t remember American athletes not being able to participate in events.  I don’t remember hearing the media giving non-stop coverage to mass civilian casualties, which wouldn’t have required made-up stories and photographs.

Again, I don’t think most Americans are bad people.  But they are being ignorant by believing what the media is telling them.  It is especially strange to see some of the conservative/ right wing who didn’t believe the COVID narrative but then are willing to believe everything they are told about Putin and Ukraine.

With the shift from COVID to Ukraine, it is sickening to watch Fox News.  It is still just as bad to watch CNN or any of the other “news” networks.

All of the people who opposed Trump because he wasn’t enough of a war hawk are now showing up in your face to tell you how bad Putin is and how we need to help Ukraine.  It is particularly curious to watch some people who criticized the hoax that Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election.  But now they are believing every single thing the same media tells them about Ukraine.

The media has shifted dramatically from COVID propaganda to anti Russia propaganda.  The war hawks are happy right now to have Trump out of office and to be looking to get back in the spotlight.  This includes the war hawks from both parties, but especially the Republicans.  Now we get to listen to the horrible people like Sean Hannity, Nikki Haley, Lindsey Graham, and Brian Kilmeade.

Someone like Kilmeade is tough because he was really great on COVID and opposing vaccine mandates.  But now he gets to foam at the mouth over the prospects of more war.

The one encouraging thing is that I have seen more conservatives and libertarian-leaning Republicans who are at least skeptical of going to war.  There are still many bad Republicans who are eager to go to war, but not nearly as many as 20 years ago.  Ron Paul, Donald Trump, and Tucker Carlson all contributed to the slightly less hawkish Republican Party.  Unfortunately, most of the Republicans in DC are still bad.

On May 1, 2021, I published a post about the prospects of Dave Smith running for president in 2024.  It has been a popular post.

I am a Dave Smith fan.  I often have my take on current events, and I find that Dave repeats many of the same things that I thought or spoke to others.  But he does a great job of articulating those thoughts.

It is difficult to find people who are consistent and accurate.  This is why it was so amazing to have Ron Paul as a spokesman for liberty in 2007/ 2008 and 2011/ 2012.

Dave has the right personality to appeal to many people.  He can speak a populist message while still managing to educate others and stick to libertarian principles.

I especially like Dave’s podcast where it is just he and Robbie “The Fire” Bernstein.  Robbie is the perfect co-host.  He leaves Dave alone to speak when Dave is on a classic rant.  At the same time, Robbie will add interesting points.  He also isn’t afraid to ask dumb questions and get Dave to answer things that other people might have been wondering.

There is one major problem with his show that happens to be named “Part of the Problem”.  They like to drop a lot of F bombs, and they tell crude jokes at times.

No, I’m not worried about what the media will say.  That has already been addressed.  Every time Dave gets asked about some horrible thing he supposedly said, he will respond that he isn’t bombing Syria or starving little children in Yemen. Is an off-color joke more offensive than those things?

My worry is appealing to others who might not find Dave to be their cup of tea.  There are a lot of Christian conservatives who will be turned off by Dave, even though many of these same people managed to justify supporting Donald Trump.

Dave is actually a good family man.  He is married with kids.  He just happens to be a New York comedian.  It is his job to tell sex jokes or jokes that are politically incorrect and offensive.

The problem I have is that I am going to have trouble selling him to my wife, my mother, and even my daughter (even though she won’t be old enough to vote at that time).  I can talk to my wife and relay all of the great things he stands for, but it will be difficult with others.

I am not going to refer my mother to a podcast where she will hear the F bomb dropped 50 times in an hour.

Appealing to Another Demographic

Here is my humble suggestion for Dave Smith.  I suggest that he have a “clean” podcast.

I don’t want to take away his mojo.  I don’t want him to stop with his regular podcast.

I know that Dave is capable of being clean because he has been on CNN and Fox News many times.  He has the ability to articulate his positions without dropping a bunch of F bombs.

I think he should release some short episodes that I can send to my mother.  They can be 10 minutes long.  He could put out one episode per week.  Most people don’t want to watch somebody new for longer than 10 minutes anyway.

Dave could also write a book.  I wouldn’t be against this, but I don’t think it plays to his strengths.  I think having Dave go on one of his rants for 10 minutes in front of a camera, minus the F bombs, would be effective.  It is easily shared with others through text and social media.

Dave was recently on Joe Rogan’s podcast, and it was right after all of the controversy surrounding Rogan.  I can’t imagine how many millions of people saw Dave’s appearance, or at least clips of it.  I think Dave can easily appeal to much of Rogan’s audience.

This should continue to be his focus.  At the same time, I want something I can send to my wife and mother that is relatively clean.  I want a good Dave rant that can be listened to around the kids.

I think he can do this.  I know he is capable of it.

He could just clean up his regular podcasts with Robbie, but I don’t think that’s the way to go.  Some people like the guy talk and the humor, which is fine.

There are also a lot of libertarians out there who aren’t really familiar with Dave Smith.  Some of them are socially conservative people and would consider Dave’s material to be trash.  I perfectly understand that he isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.  But it would be a mistake for both sides for other radical libertarians to miss out on the things Dave is saying.

Again, I am just asking for maybe 10 minutes per week with a great rant against the state and in favor of liberty.  It can be marketed as the “clean” version of Dave Smith.

I am very excited about his prospects in the next couple of years.  It could be a game changer.

I don’t expect Dave to win the 2024 presidential election.  Dave understands the long game, and he understands that it is about educating others on the benefits of liberty.  We can gain some great momentum in the next couple of years.

There are many people who are tired of big government and all of the lies.  They saw what was done to them by the state in response to COVID.  They want someone who is willing to tell them the truth, even if the truth can hurt at times.

It’s hard to believe after the last 2 years that things could get any worse, but Canadians have found out that anything is possible when you have a pretty boy wanna-be dictator at the helm.

When the whole trucker convoy started in Canada and exposed that it was more than just a “fringe minority” who weren’t happy with the way things were going, who could have guessed that it would just lead to more tyranny?

Well, anyone who saw what happened in the U.S. on January 6, 2021 and then the aftermath of locking people up without a fair trial for trespassing in the “People’s House” probably could have seen what was coming in Canada.

Let’s remember that the trucker convoy started because it was a protest against tyranny.  While Canada endured a lot of lockdowns and restrictions, the specific issue being protested, at least at the start, was the vaccine mandates.  In 2021, governments worldwide decided that its subjects should be forced to take experimental government “treatments” or risk not being able to work and provide for themselves and their family.

It all started out well for the protesters.  It gathered momentum and support quickly, and many of them were having fun in the streets.

This irritated the pretty boy tyrant to no end, so it was rather obvious where the whole thing was going.  Trudeau has been one to praise Castro and the communism of China.  He doesn’t praise communist dictators for their ability to negotiate peacefully with their subjects.

Trudeau brought down the hammer good and hard.  Not only did he send in the police (or was it some kind of military?) to arrest and brutalize the protesters, but he did much better.  He gave the government (himself) the power to freeze bank accounts, not just for the protesting truckers, but for anyone who dared to support them.

So if, a month ago, you didn’t like the vaccine mandates and saw the trucker convoy as a movement that you supported and decided to throw 50 bucks in support of them, now you may not have access to “your” money any longer.  So because you supported something that was in opposition to the Trudeau regime, you are now no longer permitted to pay your rent or buy food for your family unless you can find a creative way to survive without a bank account.

In doing this, not only is Trudeau trying to punish all who opposed him, but he is also acting to prevent people from protesting or speaking out in any way that opposes the regime in the future.  If you don’t like one of Trudeau’s policies or something that he says, if you speak out, then you may go home to find your bank account has been closed.

How’s that for a first-world so-called liberal democracy?

Trudeau has since revoked the Emergency Powers Act that he initially invoked to take these actions.  Perhaps he didn’t like the label of dictator in a derogatory way and didn’t want to press his luck.

But the power is still there.  The damage is already done.  And we can expect that the truckers and other protesters will be handled in similar fashion to the people who entered the Capitol building on January 6, 2021.  Even though almost all of the truckers did nothing violent, their lives will be made a living hell.

No matter what kind of government rules, the rulers always rely on the consent of the people.  Unfortunately, in Canada, there are way too many people who accept the tyranny of the Trudeau government.  They believe what he says, and they are obedient to his words.

The good news is that what has happened has opened a lot of eyes.  There are many more Canadians today who understand that they are living under an authoritarian government.

I think Trudeau must have sensed that he had overstepped his bounds, even for him.  It is possible, even in a first-world country, to lose control.

Imagine if some of the Ottawa police officers went home for dinner that night and got a lecture from a wife or a mother saying that it was unacceptable to act as a thug on behalf of a dictator.  Imagine a wife telling her husband that he can sleep in his car in the garage until he finds his soul and realizes that he shouldn’t be brutalizing innocent people just because it’s for a paycheck.

If the people get restless enough and the dictator gets violent enough, eventually the violence can turn onto the dictator.  All it takes is for one person or a few people to turn on him and he might be strung up in the town square.  I have to imagine that Trudeau realized this.

If Trudeau pushed far enough, even his buddy Klaus Schwab might not be able to bail him out in time or get him onto the next flight to seek asylum in the Caribbean.

The story of Canada will be an interesting one to follow in the coming months.  Will the Canadians regain their liberty, at least to the degree that it existed in 2019?  For their sake, I certainly hope so.

The Biden administration, along with many of its war hawk allies in the media, is lecturing the Russians about aggressiveness.  Or maybe they are lecturing us so that we don’t stop and notice some of the finer details.

Analyzing the situation in Ukraine is a bit like trying to analyze different regions of the Middle East.  You are dealing with a lot of history, government changes, changes in land control, and different factions of people.  It is a complicated situation to say the least in Ukraine.

But here are some things that aren’t complicated.

First, the U.S. government backed a coup in 2014 that overthrew the democratically-elected government of Ukraine that just so happened to be somewhat friendly towards Russia.

In fact, if the U.S. government hadn’t helped with this coup, then it is likely that none of this would be happening right now.  Crimea wouldn’t have gone to Russia, and Russia wouldn’t have announced independent regions in eastern Ukraine as we are seeing now.

A second thing that isn’t complicated is that, despite assurances to the contrary, NATO has been getting closer and closer to Russia since not long after the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Russia simply doesn’t want NATO (i.e., the United States) right on its border with missiles ready to launch.

Imagine if Russia or any other country overthrew the government in Mexico and then wanted to bring Mexico into its alliance and put missiles near the Texas border.  Do you think that would go over well with most Americans, let alone the war hawks in Washington DC?

This is in no way a defense of everything Putin has done or will do in the future.  He is a politician, and there is little doubt he enjoys his power.  The difference is that he actually seems to care about the people he rules over, or at least his actions seem to indicate that.  And Putin doesn’t seem interested in having a massive war, which can’t always be said for Washington DC.

The Hypocrisy

Even if what is happening now should be considered an invasion by Russia or Russian aggressiveness, and even if the U.S. hadn’t helped overthrow the government in Ukraine in 2014, it is still the height of hypocrisy for American officials and media to be lecturing anyone about invasion and aggressiveness.

Just since the turn of the century, look at U.S. foreign policy.

• In late 2001, the U.S. invaded Afghanistan and occupied the country for nearly 20 years.
• In 2003, the U.S. again went to war in Iraq and occupied the country and is still involved there to this day.
• In 2011, the U.S. invaded Libya and assassinated its leader.
• After not gaining support from Congress or the American people, the U.S. government still went to war in Syria in 2014 and attempted to overthrow the leader there.
• The U.S. government helps to sanction Yemen and starve children in what is already one of the poorest countries on the planet.

And these are just some of the more obvious interventions that mostly involved sanctions, bombings, assassinations, and occupation.  There are many other smaller military and covert operations in other parts of the world.

But the war hawks in the media and U.S. government officials are going to lecture the world about Russian aggressiveness towards Ukraine?

In Canada, Justin Trudeau just announced his plans to use his version of the Enabling Act.  The truckers and their allies are protesting the COVID restrictions from the last two years and particularly the vaccine mandates that began in 2021.  But Trudeau won’t back down.  He is in fact going full totalitarian.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden is cheering on Trudeau and telling him to use any means necessary to quash the protests.

Over the last year, I have heard many people question why there are protests all over Europe and other places, yet there is very little in the United States.  The reason isn’t because Americans are more passive.  The reason is because the restrictions have not been as bad in the U.S., as hard as that is to believe.

People have lost their jobs over vaccine mandates, and that continues to happen to this day.  But overall, the same restrictions don’t apply in the U.S. as in some of these other supposedly first-world countries.  Americans also have a choice of moving to a freer state.  It isn’t an easy choice, but it is a choice.

The Super Bowl was held in Los Angeles where the stadium was packed with mostly maskless people.  This includes many hypocritical celebrities.

Even with vaccine mandates in some big cities, they are starting to be rolled back or not enforced.  Some mayors are starting to suggest that they weren’t meant to be permanent.  Meanwhile, you have many of the previous COVID hysterics who had been deemed “experts” starting to say that we have to learn to live with the risk of the virus and get on with life.

This is not a coincidence.  They see which way the parade is marching, and they are getting out in front of it.

The establishment relies on the consent of the people.  They understand if they keep issuing edicts and most everybody ignores them, then it won’t look good.  They would rather pretend that it was their expertise that called an end to the “pandemic” and led us back to normal.

Consent of the People

In the mid 1500s, a man named Etienne de la Boetie pointed out that all rulers rely on the consent of the governed.  It doesn’t have to be an explicit consent, but at least an implicit consent in accepting the ruling system.

If the rulers lose this consent to too many people, then their rule collapses.

Look at the United States.  There are about 330 million people.  There is only one president.  There are only 535 members of Congress.  There are only 9 Supreme Court justices.  There is only one Federal Reserve chairman,

All of these people rely on people being obedient to the system.  Some might complain about the president or members of Congress, and some might even despise the individuals in office.  But if they still consent to the system, then the rule continues.  The rulers themselves may change over time, but the power is still there as long as people obey.

In one of his writings, de la Boetie wrote:

“Obviously there is no need of fighting to overcome this single tyrant, for he is automatically defeated if the country refuses consent to its own enslavement: it is not necessary to deprive him of anything but simply to give him nothing; there is no need that the country make an effort to do anything for itself provided it does nothing against itself.  It is therefore the inhabitants themselves who permit, or, rather, bring about, their own subjection, since by ceasing to submit they would put an end to their servitude.”

He continues: “A people enslaves itself, cuts its own throat, when, having a choice between being vassals and being free men, it deserts its liberties and takes on the yoke, gives consent to its own misery, or, rather, apparently welcomes it.”

So while it is better to have a kind and benevolent ruler, if there is such a thing, it is impossible for a country to be ruled by one man or by a small group of people without a large portion of the population consenting.

It is nice to see that Joe Biden’s approval ratings are in the toilet.  Hopefully this means that people just aren’t consenting to his sometimes-dictatorial rule.  In the long run, it isn’t about any one man.  Getting rid of Joe Biden isn’t going to solve all of our problems.  It may solve a few in the short run, but ultimately what matters is how much people are willing to tolerate.

So while Biden and his handlers deserve much criticism, it is really the system that needs to be changed.  It is the concept that such a small group of people is able to inflict so much damage over a large population.  But it is only because a good portion of that population consents to the corrupt system.

Oh Canada

The reason there are mass protests in some places while the rulers double down on their power is because the population is largely split.

It is hard to say exactly, but probably half of the Canadian population wants the mandates and COVID restrictions to go away.  The other half are accepting of them to a large degree and listen to the state media and those deemed “experts”.

Much of my extended family lives in Canada, and I can tell you that most of them are not really on the side of the truckers.  Maybe they don’t disagree with everything the truckers have to say, and maybe they don’t agree with everything that Trudeau is doing, but they generally consent to their rulers.  They enable the people who make their lives miserable.  The rulers don’t care about their subjects at all except to the degree that they are obedient.

This is why there is a standoff.  It is why Trudeau is trying to make the whole thing violent.  Of course, Trudeau has been using the threat of violence all along, which is the problem.  If he were to simply withdraw the restrictions and mandates, then the protests would end.

Trudeau can invoke an emergency and, at least for now, get away with it because about half of the Canadian population consents to it.  They accept it.  They are obedient.  They enable the very people who are their enemies, but they don’t see it.

This is really the problem everywhere.  It is often split down the middle.  Half of the population just wants to be left alone while half of the population wants to impose their will on others, or at least grant the power to their rulers to do so.

It is not quite this clean, but you can see the dividing lines with COVID.  I’m not saying that half the population is libertarian.  But on COVID restrictions and mandates, it probably is fair to say that half of Americans do hold a mostly libertarian position on the subject now.

The good news out of the last 2 years is that more people are seeing the problems of the entire corrupt system.  They are seeing that you shouldn’t trust the “experts”.  In fact, when the establishment media is telling you to trust the “experts”, it typically makes more sense to the do the opposite.

It is hard to say what the next decade will bring, but there is less consent for the rulers today than there was 2 years ago.  This is positive for the long-term prospects for liberty.

The Federal Reserve held a secret meeting on February 14, 2022.  We can guess that it wasn’t a happy Valentine’s Day for Jerome Powell and company.

The Fed is stuck between a rock and a hard place.  This is after getting away with massive monetary inflation and ultra low interest rates since the fall of 2008.

There have been major consequences from the Fed’s loose monetary policy, as it misallocated resources and allowed the government to continue to run up its debts at a significant pace.  But there never seemed to be an increase in consumer price inflation, at least by how the government measures it.

Now the CPI is coming in at an annual rate of 7.5%.  So it is widely expected that the Fed will start to tighten quickly. First, it actually has to stop its expansion of the balance sheet.  Most financial commentators tend to focus on interest rates instead of the money supply.

The Fed controls the federal funds rate, which is the overnight borrowing rate for banks.  They used to control this rate by increasing or decreasing the money supply, but now it is done more through other measures, including changing the rate paid on excess reserves.

Still, there is a correlation between the low interest rates and the easy money.  They go hand in hand.  As the Fed slows down or stops its balance sheet expansion, it will raise its target federal funds rate.

This will drive up short-term interest rates, which has already begun.  While there has been a lot of focus on the 10-year yield rising to 2%, the shorter-term rates have been more dramatic.  The 2-year yield has gone up to around 1.6%.

The 3-month yield has risen in less than two weeks from 0.19% to 0.43%.

The 1-month yield is still near zero.

When the 2-year yield goes above the 10-year yield, this will be significant.  It will be more significant when the 3-month yield goes above the 10-year yield, which could still take a while.

There is a lot of uncertainty in the financial markets, but an inverted yield curve is one thing that has been a near certainty through modern history.  When short-term rates exceed long-term rates, a recession is on the horizon.

I have somewhat discussed recession and a stock market crash in tandem, as if they will happen around the same time.  Perhaps this is a mistake.  It is quite possible that a crash in stocks could happen before a recession is evident.  Or we might see a decline in stocks for several months that isn’t too sharp, and then see a major crash when the whole economy goes down.

We may also see parts of the Everything Bubble go first before stocks.  It would not surprise me if cryptos, NFTs, and other major speculations fall hard before we see stocks fall hard.

Keep an eye on the yield curve.  If it inverts, you should prepare for a recession and a major downturn in stocks.  You should probably prepare for a major downturn in stocks no matter what.

The Fed is stuck.  If they keep the easy money flowing with low interest rates, then price inflation will just get worse.  If they slam on the monetary brakes too hard, it will lead to a quick and nasty recession.  Of course, the next recession will be nasty no matter what, but it is just a question of when.

The good thing about the Fed raising rates is that it will help expose the malinvestment, and it will hopefully force the federal government to restrain its spending at least a little bit.

I am happy I refinanced my mortgage last year.  I don’t know if we’ll ever see mortgage rates that low again.

Still, if the Fed can get the inflation under control and we see a major recession, long-term rates could fall again.  Bonds are the one piece of the Everything Bubble that may hold up longer than the rest, but that isn’t clear at this point.

Even though price inflation is roaring, it is still important to hold some cash/ cash equivalents, as things can change very quickly.  You won’t go wrong having some liquidity, even if it is currently depreciating at 7.5% annually.