"We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put up a façade to prevent ourselves from seeing it.”
Blaise Pascal
“A true opium of the people is a belief in nothingness after death— the huge solace of thinking that for our betrayals, greed, cowardice, and even murders that we are not going to be held to account.”
Czesław Miłosz
"The cruelest lies are often told in silence."
Robert Louis Stevenson
I am taking care of the queen, mostly just keeping an eye on her and helping as needed.
She requires someone to be with her most of the time for now. I have a resident goddaughter taken over in the evening after work. I try to use the time to do charts when I can, but often I have to do the little chores around the house and outside.
I will provide chart updates when I do them in the evening.
Not one thing has changed in my outlook for the markets.
The Recovery™ is an artificial, almost farcical construct by and for the one percent, and no one else. Nothing could be more obvious based on the economic results of the last twenty years starting with the Asian currency crisis and the first tech bubble of 2000.
Chris Whalen of the Institutional Risk Analyst thinks that the Fed is going to do a 'one and done' in June and then won't be raising rates again anytime soon, perhaps 'for years.' I could not agree more.
The interest rate increase in June is going to be another gratuitous nod to the Fed's desire to get some space between the current interest rate and zero so they can cut when their latest narrow bubble bursts.
Why are we caught in this cycle of bubble and busts without sustainable recovery? Because our distorted monetary and fiscal policy continues to create paper wealth and deliver it to the top of the income pyramid by inflating financial assets, putting a hammerlock on wages, and allowing predatory monopolies to continue to expand and financialize their positions of power.
Top down stimulus is a canard like deregulating to create 'efficient markets.' There is no 'wealth effect' that lifts all boats.
So why is the establishment in such aggressive denial after all these years of failure? The very important people being paid not to see what they to see and manage that it is almost mind-boggling.
And the rest of our experts and politicos just follow cravenly along, too timid to take on the consensus of insiders and be exiled from access to the halls of privilege and power.
We are going to keep lurching from bubble to bust until the gears of this dirty, rotten system grind to a halt. I do not see any realistic movement for reform to come from within the established parties. The money and the momentum of hypocrisy and greed are just too good.
I did a 'cartoon' for Tony Sanders' latest column at Confounded Interest while I was cooling my heels in the Emergency Room on Saturday. Tony is a smart guy and a very kind human being. I get a lot of joy and fellowship from many people I have never met.
I finished a second cartoon later that evening when the queen was cleaned up and put to bed. One must always make time for work and prayer, and a laugh when you can manage it. Especially in times of elephantine vanity and greed.
'I am frightened, by the strength of evil, and the weakness of men.
Do you love the Lord, as He loves You? Then you must fear no more.'
Have a pleasant evening.
