While CNN remains an undisputed propaganda arm of the ruling class (see: Ted Cruz’s recent ‘will you accept the results’ purity test interview), the network committed two recent acts of journalism we felt warranted recognition in the hope they’ll change their ways (don’t hold your breath).
First,they debunked the absurd “unified Reich” hoax – in which the Trump campaign ‘reTruth’d’ a video which used a stock video template that anyone can buy online, called “Newspaper Vintage History Headlines Promo,” and which flashed the image of a headline from 1871 which reads “”German Industrial Strength After 1871 Driven By The Creation Of A Unified Reich.””
The leftist media complex, which unrepentantly helped the US intelligence community frame Trump as a Russian asset, flipped out – with networks including CNN going into literal shakes to whip up their goldfish-brained viewers.
What’s amazing here is that CNN then devoted resources to actual journalism to track down the origin of the video (no doubt in the hopes of finding a tiki-torch aficionado at the bottom of it) – only to discover, and report, that a 30-year-old Turkish graphic designer made it, and that “All signs point to it’s inclusion being an oversight, not a fascist dog whistle.“
He made the template to mimic a vintage newsreel and copy and pasted random phrases that he assumed people would replace. “United Reich” appeared in the Wikipedia entry on WW1. pic.twitter.com/UuozlxeWWB
Of course, this moment of journalistic integrity is likely an outlier, as the same CNN journalist, Jon Sarlin, was pushing ‘it’s not the economy, you’re just stupid‘ propaganda earlier this year.
Except…
While underlying costs have similarly risen – including forced wage hikes, ruining the ‘greedflation’ narrative. Even James Carville is willing to tell the truth.
James Carville: “We keep wondering why these young people are not coming home to the Democrats. Why are blacks not coming home to the Democrats? Because Democrat messaging is full of shit, that’s why.”
CNN’s second act of journalism in the course of two weeks was when Manu Raju ambushed Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) and badgered him over his bribery case.
New — Henry Cuellar, a Texas Democrat, walked into my live shot so I asked him about his three associates pleading guilty in his bribery case and whether he would resign from Congress amid his federal indictment. pic.twitter.com/TFtApNdpsr
The last few years have blown wide open a scandal that has long existed but is not that well known aside from specialists. The problem is the collaboration between pharmaceutical companies, government regulators, and the medical industry. The problem is so vast that it is hardly describable in a short article.
It turns out that the ineffective COVID shots were just the beginning. As far as we know and have discovered in the course of investigations, the shot was developed quickly as a countermeasure to distract from the problem of a lab leak. The world’s population was held hostage for a year and more while the inoculation was rolled out. But once deployed, it became obvious that it could not actually block infection or stop the spread. So everyone got the bug anyway, and we are left with tremendous damage caused by the shots themselves.
I described this short history to Dr. Drew Pinsky, the famed addiction doctor who now has a popular video podcast. He found no fault with my scenario as mapped above. He immediately added that this has many parallels with the opioid crisis that led him into public advocacy. The pharma companies advertised some miracle drugs to fix pain with no risk of addiction.
The frenzy to prescribe was so intense that some doctors even feared penalties for not prescribing. The result of course was a disastrous addiction crisis that continues to this day. Unlike vaccine companies, the producers were not indemnified against payouts for harms, and as much as $50 billion ended up going to victims just last year. The numbers are mind-boggling.
Just when you think you have reached the bottom of this problem, new information comes along. Last night I was privileged to attend a talk by Sheila Matthews-Gallo who founded AbleChild, an organization that advocates for child rights against forced medicalization. Why would such a thing be needed? As it turns out, many if not most kids in public schools today face this threat daily. They can be identified as having ADHD or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
It turns out that there is nothing proven chemically to constitute ADHD. It is entirely a diagnosis applied based on behavior as identified throughout a checklist questionnaire. The checklist is about fidgeting, forgetting, boredom, finishing tasks, various acting up, expressions of frustrations, and so on. In other words, what we have here is a list of all the signs you might expect when boys in particular are told to sit perfectly still at a desk for months and years and complete tasks assigned to them by some authority figure.
With this kind of diagnosis, you are likely to rope in a vast number of kids, particularly the exceptional ones and those once considered to be “gifted and talented.” As it turns out, there is a vast industry working today to pathologize perfectly normal behavioral traits. It hits boys in particular very hard because, in general, they mature more slowly than girls and tend toward behavioral resistance to environmental adaptivity relative to girls.
For more on this amazing reality, see “The ADHD Fraud,” an eye-opening book.
What could be the purpose of such a diagnosis? You guessed it: there are drugs for this supposed problem. They have various names: Ritalin (methylphenidate), Adderall (amphetamine), Dexmethylphenidate, Lisdexamfetamine, Clonidine, and Atomoxetine. Not even one of them has been proven to be a chemical fix for any biological abnormality. They are all behavioral-adjustment drugs; that is, psychotropic drugs; that is, narcotics for kids.
Millions of kids take them, as many as 13 percent of teens.The rate grows higher in the college population. Some one in three adults are taking psychiatric meds. It’s getting worse. It starts in school.
Listening to all of this, I found myself astounded. And yet, in some ways, it fits with everything else we know. We have an industry here that is in a tight working relationship with government institutions like public schools, plus regulators, plus medical authorities that are throwing drugs at people with the promise of miracles but with results that actually ruin lives.
Think of how different your school years would have been if you had developed a drug addiction and lived off psychotropic meds from the age of 7. I was fortunately spared such a fate. But millions of kids today cannot say the same. It’s utterly astonishing. It strikes me that this is a scandal just waiting to be blown wide open.
Among the related factors, as RFK, Jr. has been pointing out in public lately, is the odd relationship between school shootings and the wide distribution of these drugs. Many cases we know about already but the medical records of others are being withheld, even though the public is more and more understanding that the real problem is not guns but pharmacological products. And yet the activists themselves are entirely focused on taking away guns rather than looking more deeply.
I have had personal experience with young adults who are addicted to Adderall. In many ways, when you are a college student, it seems like a miracle drug. In college, discipline over the use of time recedes into a low priority. Instead the demand is to turn in long papers on deadline, memorize vast material you can spit out on a test and forget the next day, and otherwise stay intensely focused sporadically. For many students, this drug is exactly what the doctor ordered: it permits hyper-focused all-nighters followed by a day or two of feeling like a zombie but no one notices.
I’ve known many people who develop addictions, not only physical ones but psychological ones: life without the drug seems dull by comparison and who wants that? These students carry this over into professional life and attempt the same pattern. They can work all day and stay up all night and achieve something that seems mind-blowing but not quite what you asked for. You ask for fixes and they don’t happen. In fact, you don’t hear from them for days after until they reemerge with no memory of the work they did. This pattern repeats itself.
I gradually came to learn that the real problem was the drugs. I concluded that I would rather have a moderately productive employee who at least had a steady pattern of labor and a mild recall of skills that could be built up over time. The issue is that when hiring someone, it’s not quite kosher to ask such questions as: what drugs do you take? You end up guessing, and sometimes guessing wrong.
I’m telling you from long experience that these drugs are a catastrophe for professional life. No one should ever take them. That’s my considered opinion in any case, and I frequently warn college students against them. And what’s true for college kids is thousands of times more so for high school and grade school. It’s a complete scandal that these drugs are given out like candy to school kids. Parents have every right and obligation to resist.
It’s all the more astonishing to learn, as I did last night, that there never was any science to the diagnosis of ADHD, any more than there was any science behind social distancing. It’s all made up to service the state and its adjacent players in the private sector who benefit from various mandates that somehow always end in drugging the population. The whole thing astounds me.
Think about the bigger picture. We’ve created these public schools, force the kids to attend them, ban them from any remunerative work, shove boys and girls together, impose uniform curricula as if every student learns at the same pace, take away discretion from teachers, and saddle the institutions with massive bureaucracies. When the kids don’t take well to the environment, we call them mentally ill and drug them up in ways from which state-connected pharma companies can profit.
This level of cruelty is really baked into the system. It’s a wonder any civilized society could ever accept it. And once you discover the fullness of the scandal about what’s going on, you have to start asking other questions about weight-loss drugs, other vaccines and miracle cures, and the entire machinery of allopathic medicine itself. Yes, the rabbit hole is very deep.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Sinaloa’s Top Assassin Extradited To US For Flooding Nation With Fentanyl
The US Justice Department announced on Saturday the extradition of a top assassin for the Sinaloa drug cartel to the US who was recently arrested by Mexican authorities. The cartel has been responsible for flooding America with fentanyl via the Biden administration’s open southern borders, sparking the worst overdose drug crisis this nation has ever seen.
Illegals in Santa Teresa, New Mexico were just caught by Border Patrol agents trying to climb the fence using ladders.
BP was attacked by illegals using random simple weapons like rocks and dirt.
— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) May 23, 2024
Néstor Isidro Pérez Salas, also known as “El Nini,” one of America’s most-wanted criminals, was extradited to the US for his role in “illicit fentanyl trafficking.”
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland released this statement:
“This morning, Néstor Isidro Pérez Salas, also known as ‘El Nini,’ was extradited to the United States. We allege El Nini was one of the Sinaloa Cartel’s lead sicarios, or assassins, and was responsible for the murder, torture, and kidnapping of rivals and witnesses who threatened the cartel’s criminal drug trafficking enterprise.
“We also allege El Nini was a part of the Sinaloa Cartel’s production and sale of fentanyl, including in the United States. I am grateful to our Mexican government counterparts for their extraordinary efforts in apprehending and extraditing El Nini.
“With this enforcement action, El Nini joins the growing list of cartel leaders and associates indicted in, and extradited to, the United States. The Justice Department will continue to go after the cartels responsible for flooding our communities with fentanyl and other drugs.”
The majority of Americans will never forget the disastrous open southern borders, flooding the nation with ten million unvetted illegal aliens and fentanyl, that has caused chaos and death from coast to coast. The US drug death catastrophe has now exceeded the entire Vietnam War every six months. Most of this is linked to fentanyl-laced narcotics pushed by Mexican cartels.
News from Baltimore this week, just north of the White House, shows the imploding metro area run by radical Democrats (half-century of Democratic control) has been crowned the overdose capital of America.
Remember, Nancy Pelosi got her political start in Baltimore – yet she’s too focused on trading stocks than actually caring about issues plaguing the working poor and black community. The very fact that federal, state, and local progressive lawmakers care very little about enforcing common sense law and order, not just at the southern border but in metro areas, has sparked monumental failures and led to surges in the drug death catastrophe nationwide.
Americans must demand accountability at the polls this November for the chaos radical leftists who pushed failed open southern borders, embraced Soros-backed DAs and mayors, and failed criminal and social justice reforms that have only ignited crime and chaos nationwide.
Don’t worry. Americans will never get accountability from the radical left because as they try to install a socialist hellhole, they will flee to their second, third, and or fourth homes on liberal elite islands, such as Martha’s Vineyard.
You know, if Trump wins in November – it’s game over for the cartels. It’s time to get serious – also, potentially hitting Mexican banks with sanctions. Follow the money. Why can’t the Biden team do that?
A growing number of U.S. congressional Democrats pushed back Friday against pressure to endorse House Speaker Mike Johnson’s invitation for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress—even as his government stands accused of genocide in a World Court case and he faces the prospect of an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for alleged crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Opposition to Johnson’s (R-La.) invitation—which the speaker formally announced Thursday—has been mounting following news that ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan applied for warrants to arrest Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and three Hamas leaders for alleged crimes committed on and after October 7 and Friday’s International Court of Justice order for Israel to immediately halt its assault on Rafah.
While there is some question over whether Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) will endorse a Netanyahu congressional address—with Johnson tellingThe Independent on Wednesday that Schumer said he’d sign the invitation letter—mainstream Democrats are joining the chorus of calls from progressive lawmakers and campaigners opposing the prospective speech. Several of the lawmakers spoke to Axios on Friday.
“I think it’s a strange time to invite Netanyahu; it’s a really divisive kind of move,” Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.) said, pointing to Khan’s effort to arrest the Israeli leader.
Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.) said, “I don’t think it’s a good time… let’s not complicate an already complicated situation.”
House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Jim Himes (D-Conn.) asserted that Netanyahu “should be focused on freeing hostages, not on charming legislators.”
Regarding whether Schumer would sign the invitation, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) simply said, “No.” Pelosi, Himes, and Peters were among the 173 House Democrats who last month voted to approve $26 billion in new U.S. military aid to Israel, in addition to the nearly $4 billion it already gets from Washington each year. Kildee voted against the aid package.
Congressional progressives have voiced opposition to a Netanyhau speech for days, with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—who caucuses with Democrats—indicating Wednesday that he would boycott any address by the prime minister and calling the invitation “a terrible idea.”
Sanders told CNN‘s Kaitlan Collins: “Look, you have a prime minister who has created the worst humanitarian disaster in modern history. Israel, of course, had the right to defend itself against the Hamas terrorist attack, but what Netanyahu has done is go to war against—all-out war—against the entire Palestinian people, women and children.”
“Five percent of the population is now dead or wounded. Sixty percent of them are women and children. Some 200,000 housing units have been completely destroyed,” he continued. “Every university in Gaza has been bombed. There is now imminent starvation taking place.”
“So why you would invite somebody who has done such horrific things to the Palestinian people?” Sanders added. “I think it’s a very bad idea.”
Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) said earlier this week that “if Netanyahu comes to address Congress, I would be more than glad to show the ICC the way to the House floor to issue that warrant.”
Netanyahu—who faces multiple criminal corruption charges in Israel unrelated to Palestine—has addressed Congress three times. If he does so again he will have spoken before Congress more than any other foreign leader.
Controversy over a potential Netanyahu speech goes beyond Gaza and corruption charges. The prime minister raised eyebrows in 2008 after he said that Israel “benefited” from the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States—which he earlier called a country that “can easily be moved.”
Venturing beyond his typical audience of uniformly-adoring supporters, Donald Trump was showered with boos, heckling but also applause as he addressed the Libertarian National Convention in Washington DC on Saturday night.
The very idea of his speech was unusual. As the Washington Post’s Aaron Blake noted when it was announced weeks ago, “Even for the Libertarian Party, inviting another party’s 2024 nominee to speak even as it nominates a candidate to oppose them is something.”
“I’d like to propose that we go tell Donald Trump to go fuck himself” Someone at the Libertarian convention voiced opposition to Donald Trump speaking. pic.twitter.com/a1yWyRv1fF
In addition to party delegates, Saturday’s crowd also included Trump supporters who bought tickets to the event. When they periodically broke out in chants of “WE WANT TRUMP,” libertarians drowned them out with “END THE FED.”
There was tension between the camps before Trump even took the stage. Having been dismissed from the convention proceedings, party delegates entered the hall where Trump would be speaking to find that Trump supporters who’d purchased spectator tickets were already in the front rows — despite previous assurances from party chairwoman Angela McArdle that delegates would get the best seats. Verbal battles escalated into fisticuffs.
Trump received wide applause when he spoke in support of various libertarian positions, buteach time he told the audience that they must join with him to defeat Biden and the Democrats, boos erupted. The crowd dialed its booing up to 11 when Trump went so far as to say the Libertarian Party should make him their nominee.
Trump responded to the jeers by making fun of the party’s lackluster quadrennial showing. “Only if you want to win,” he said. “Maybe you don’t wanna win. If you wanna lose, don’t do [nominate me]. Keep getting your 3% every four years.”
Trump claps back at the Libertarian Convention.
“The Libertarian party should nominate Trump for President of the United States…only if you wanna win…maybe you don’t wanna win. Only do that if you want to win. If you wanna lose don’t do that. Keep getting your 3% every 4 yrs”. pic.twitter.com/G0YDJY7aUo
By far, the most sustained applause came when Trump announced that, if elected, he will commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht, who created and ran the Silk Road website from 2011 to 2013. Users flocked to that dark web platform to engage in all manner of secret transactions such as the purchase and sale of illegal drugs. In what many view as a grossly disproportionate sentence, Ulbricht was condemned to a life sentence.
Many in the crowd held FREE ROSS signs, and chanted the slogan earlier in Trump’s speech…and again after he announced his promise:
BREAKING: Trump just won over the Libertarians that have been booing him by saying “If you vote for me, I will commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht”
This man is a political genius, he could’ve said that at the start but he allowed them to boo him and then cheer for him, now… pic.twitter.com/hrI9y4s4pi
He also vowed to ensure a secure future for crypto, to include self-custody, saying “I will keep Elizabeth Warren and her goons away from your Bitcoin.” He also vowed to block the creation of a central bank digital currency (CBDC).
JUST IN: 🇺🇸 Donald Trump says “I will ensure that the future of crypto and #Bitcoin will be made in the USA…I will support the right to self custody to the nations 50 million crypto holders.” pic.twitter.com/GFxSGbSckY
Trump promised libertarians a presence in his administration. “I’m committing to you tonight, that I will put a libertarian in my cabinet, and also libertarians in senior posts,” said Trump. Reuters reports that some skeptical members of the audience responded by yelling “BULLSHIT!”
TRUMP: “I’m committing to you tonight that I will put a Libertarian in my cabinet, and also, Libertarians in senior posts.”
In a reaction that probably confused Trump and his team, the crowd booed when he touted his nomination from the National Rifle Association, as many libertarians view the NRA as a weak and inconsistent defender of gun rights, with a tendency to pander to police:
Trump: We just got the full NRA, the strongest endorsement they’ve ever given. The NRA [Crowd booing] pic.twitter.com/eYEQuiAsPv
Trump’s unusual appearance at the convention is indicative of the perceived tightness of the 2024 race. One of the wildcards contributing to the uncertainty is independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, who himself spoke to the convention on Friday. Kennedy reiterated his promise to pardon Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. He’s previously said he would take a look at Ulbricht’s case.
In the RealClearPolitics polling average, Trump is ahead of Biden by 2.4% in a five-way race:
Donald Trump: 41.7%
Joe Biden: 39.3%
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr: 10.5%
Cornel West: 1.7%
Jill Stein: 1.5%
Of course, the national numbers only mean so much — the election will be decided in seven battleground states. According to new numbers from the Cook Political Report survey, Trump is winning in six and tied in one:
Arizona: Trump + 4%
Georgia: Trump +4%
Michigan: Trump +3%
Nevada: Trump +8%
North Carolina: Trump +8%
Pennsylvania: Trump +3%
Wisconsin: Tied
One thing’s certain: Trump is the most entertaining of the bunch:
“Why isn’t Joe Biden here speaking to you tonight?…You know why?…because he can’t put 2 sentences together, that’s why he’s not here!”
– President @realDonaldTrump
Have you ever felt like you can never seem to get ahead no matter how hard you try? If so, you are definitely not alone. The gap between the ultra-wealthy and the rest of us has never been greater, and more wealth is being transferred to the top of the pyramid with each passing day. Unfortunately, our economy has evolved into a highly centralized system that is designed to drain wealth from those that do not own wealth-producing assets and transfer it to those that do own wealth-producing assets. Sadly, even most of our homes and most of our vehicles have been turned into wealth-producing assets by the elite. Every month when you make your mortgage payment and your vehicle payment, you are making the wealthy even wealthier. The entire system is designed to get you deep into debt and keep you paying on that debt until you die.
As we have seen in recent years, those that manage the system will do whatever it takes to protect the wealth of the elite.
The Federal Reserve pumped trillions of dollars into the system to prop up the value of financial assets, and it worked.
Right now, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is hovering around 40,000 and those that own stocks are living the high life.
But who owns most of the stocks?
According to Federal Reserve data, the wealthiest 10 percent of all Americans own a record high 93 percent of all the stocks…
The wealthiest Americans have never owned so much of the stock market, with the top 10% now holding a record 93% of US equities, according to Federal Reserve data.
Still, stock ownership is skewed toward the top: by comparison, the bottom 50% of Americans owned just 1% of all stocks and mutual fund shares in the third quarter, central bank data shows.
Of course stocks are just one form of wealth.
But when you add in all other forms of wealth, the bottom 50 percent of the U.S. population still only owns just 2.6 percent of all the wealth.
Tens of millions of Americans have lost faith in the system and are becoming increasingly restless, and our politicians have been trying to keep them pacified with handouts.
At this point, a whopping 42 million Americans receive food stamp benefits each month, and much of that money is spent on junk food…
An alarming study has spotlighted how 42 million food stamp recipients spend their welfare handouts on ultra-processed junk food.
Coca-Cola, Sprite and other soft drinks are the most commonly-bought items via the $135 billion-a-year Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), a new study says.
Candy, potato chips, frozen pizza, ice cream, cookies, and other ultra-processed food dominates the top 20 items, says a report from the Economic Policy Innovation Center (EPIC).
A lot of those that are receiving government assistance are actually employed.
But the cost of living has become so oppressive that even people working for some of the biggest companies in America can’t afford the basics…
Five years after Amazon.com Inc. raised wages to $15 an hour, half of warehouse workers surveyed by researchers say they struggle to afford enough food or a place to live.
The national study, published Wednesday by the University of Illinois Chicago’s Center for Urban Economic Development, asked US employees about their economic wellbeing, including whether they’d skipped meals, went hungry, or were worried about being able to make rent or mortgage payments.
Fifty-three percent of respondents reported that they’d experienced one or more forms of food insecurity in the prior three months, and 48% experienced one or more forms of housing insecurity. Workers who said they took unpaid time off after getting hurt on the job were more likely to report trouble paying their bills, the researchers found.
Today, approximately 40 percent of the entire U.S. population is either living in poverty or is considered to be among the ranks of “the working poor”.
In order to maintain the same standard of living as it did in January 2021, it now costs the average American family $12,000 more per year.
If your income has not increased by $12,000 a year since January 2021, you are falling behind.
After a spurt of optimism, Americans are feeling a little more glum about the economy — again.
Consumer sentiment, a gauge of Americans’ economic perceptions, is at a six-month low, according to a closely watched index by the University of Michigan. The measure notched its biggest drop since 2021, reflecting the persistent tug of inflation on household budgets and fueling fears that rising prices, unemployment and interest rates could all worsen in the coming months.
That pessimism is altering consumers’ spending habits. McDonald’s, Home Depot, Under Armour and Starbucks all recently reported disappointing earnings, as people cut back on fast food, kitchen renovations, sneakers and afternoon lattes.
Frustration with the economy is going to be a major theme during the next few years here in the United States.
Of course the entire world is grappling with a system that is leaving way too many people behind.
According to Oxfam, most of the global population has gotten poorer since the turn of the decade…
Oxfam’s new report, Inequality Inc., explores the disparity between the uber-wealthy and the rest of society. Since 2020, five billion people have become poorer, while the world’s five richest men have more than doubled their fortunes—at a rate of $14 million per hour.
Just like in the United States, the gap between the wealthy and the poor globally has reached a level we have never seen before.
Hundreds of millions of people are struggling to keep up with the cost of living; meanwhile, billionaires are $3.3 trillion richer than they were in 2020. This is not a coincidence. When we analyzed the world’s largest corporations, we found that a billionaire is running or the principal shareholder of 7 out of 10 of them.
Such a system is not sustainable.
If most of the global population is steadily getting poorer and a tiny sliver of the global population is becoming fabulously wealthy, it is only a matter of time before the entire system comes crashing down.
Today, the world is dominated by ultra-powerful governments, ultra-powerful banks and ultra-powerful corporations.
The little guy is being absolutely crushed, but it won’t be too long before the deeply corrupt system that the ultra-wealthy have created suddenly implodes right in front of their eyes.
We all know the problem with fiat currency: the temptation to print more currency is irresistible, but ultimately destructive.
Money in all its forms attracts quasi-religious beliefs and convictions. This makes it difficult to discuss with anything resembling objectivity. But given the centrality of money (and its sibling, greed) in human affairs, let’s press on and ask: would returning to the Gold Standard (i.e. gold as money / gold-backed currency) resolve our most pressing monetary problems?
The conviction that the answer is “yes” is widespread. In this view, President Nixon “closing the gold window,” in 1971, i.e. ending the convertibility of the US dollar to gold in international foreign exchange (FX) markets, is the Original Sin that doomed us to the inflationary Hell of fiat currency, i.e. currency unbacked by anything tangible such as gold or silver.
In this view, the only way to avoid the consequences of this Original Sin–the eventual reduction of fiat currency to zero value via hyper-inflation as the currency is “printed” without restraint–is to return to the gold standard.
So far, so good, but from here on in it gets tricky. We have a long history of precious metals being the only form of money in various economies, and an almost as long history of paper money augmenting precious-metal “real money” (in China, for example) and the issuance of copper coinage to grease small transactions.
Gold-backed currency rolls off the tongue rather easily, but what exactly does this mean? In theory, it means every unit of paper / digital currency in circulation can be converted on demand to a physical quantity of gold or silver at an exchange rate either set by the nation-state’s government or by the market.
This conversion acts as a governor on the issuance of new currency: if the nation has $100 billion in gold/silver, it cannot issue $1 trillion in currency, as the whole idea of conversion is that each unit of currency can be fully converted to gold/silver. So in a truly gold-backed currency, the money supply in circulation must be limited to $100 billion.
There are various tricks that can be played here, of course. The government can assign a conversion rate that doesn’t align with the actual market value of gold/silver, for example. Or it can limit conversion to the settlement of foreign trade with other nations.
Let’s return to Nixon’s Original Sin and stipulate that there is no such thing as “free trade”, as all trade has geopolitical and domestic-economic elements. Those nations whose domestic growth depends on increasing exports, i.e. mercantilist economies, will naturally trumpet “free trade” as a cover for their exploitation of trade for domestic growth while they restrict imports.
Many observers seem to forget the US was engaged in an existential geopolitical struggle with the USSR in the 1950s, 1960s and beyond. Gaining and maintaining allies and “spheres of influence” were core dynamics in this global contest, and the US had over-riding reasons to support the war-devastated economies of its allies in Europe and Asia by enabling them to export goods to the US.
The US also had over-riding reasons to maintain the US dollar (USD) as a reserve currency, a currency that is available in sufficient quantity globally to grease commerce and credit and also act as a stable foreign exchange reserve for both private enterprises and nations.
Issuing a reserve currency offers an exorbitant privilege–what we might call monetary hegemony–but it comes with a price, a price explained by economist Robert Triffin as Triffin’s Paradox, which has two key paradoxical dynamics:
1. The issuing nation must run a sustained trade deficit in order to “export” sufficient quantities of its currency into the global marketplace to meet the expansive needs of global trade and other nations. (This helps explain why the USD is roughly half of all reserves (48%) while China’s RMB is only 2% of reserves: exporting nations running surpluses don’t “export” their currencies for use by others.)
2. This need to serve international trade / geopolitical goals is fundamentally in conflict with the goals of the domestic economy: the currency cannot serve two masters equally well.
Why did Nixon end USD conversion to gold? He had no choice, as the geopolitically necessary trade deficits were rising to the point that America’s gold holdings would have diminished to zero were the rising trade deficits settled in gold.
Existential challenges take precedence. To say that the US should have given up its reserve currency and insisted our struggling allies maintain balanced trade with the US is to ignore the geopolitical realities.
We must also recognize that markets discover the price/value of competing currencies, and so nations whose currency is priced higher than others will have difficulty exporting their goods, as these goods are priced in their own strong currency and are therefore more expensive in nations with weaker currencies. Nations with weaker currencies will have an easier time selling their goods to nations with stronger currencies, as their goods are cheaper as a result of their weaker / lower value currencies.
Those nations blessed with surplus essential commodities (energy, food, minerals, etc.) will naturally tend to run surpluses with nations less endowed with tradable goods, and as a result, the nations running trade surpluses will end up with the lion’s share of the gold and silver. This generates global “haves and have-nots,” with all the attending sources of conflict: “our lead will take your gold.”
We might also note that fiat currencies issued by the sale of sovereign bonds are not actually “backed by nothing”: they’re backed by the interest payments made on the bonds and the entirety of the nation’s economic-political-social stability and productivity which guarantee repayment of the bond at maturity.
We all know the problem with fiat currency: the temptation to print more currency is irresistible, but ultimately destructive: once currency is issued in excess of the actual expansion of goods and services, the result is devaluation / loss of purchasing power, a.k.a. inflation. Here’s a snapshot of global money supply:
In response, central banks are adding gold reserves: gold reserves are now larger than the reserves of the second-largest reserve currency, the euro:
Where does this leave us? Not with an easy answer, but with more complexities, starting with credit. As David Graeber explained in his book Debt: The First 5,000 Years, credit has been an essential element of commerce from the earliest days of commerce, for very compelling reasons. How do we graft credit onto “money” when credit is itself a form of “money”?
We’ll also have to consider the other crisis we face, soaring wealth-income inequality, which arose without restraint in ancient economies that used precious metals for money.
Looking at the history of Rome, we note that the wealth of Rome’s elite in the Republic era has been estimated as 30 times the wealth of the average free male citizen, where by the Imperial era the elites had amassed fortunes 10,000 times the wealth of the average free male citizen. There was no fiat currency, so we must accept that politics is part and parcel of “money,” social stability and economic vitality or stagnation.
Twister Chaos Tears Through Texas, Five Dead, Dozens Injured
A tornado struck a community north of Dallas, Texas, on Saturday night, resulting in at least five fatalities and dozens of injuries. Footage of the aftermath, shared on X, is shocking.
Cooke County Sheriff Ray Sappington told AP News that five were dead and dozens were injured.
“We do have five confirmed (dead), but sadly, we think that that number is probably going to go up,” Sappington said, adding, “There’s nothing left of this house. It’s just a trail of debris left. The devastation is pretty severe.”
He said the tornado tore through a roadside travel center near Valley View before demolishing an entire community of manufactured homes.
Sappington warned, “I can also tell you that number is going to go up … and I don’t want to speculate and give you a number.”
Footage on X of the destruction in Valley View is shocking:
🚨🇺🇸 5 FATALITIES AND DOZENS OF INJURIES REPORTED IN TEXAS TORNADO
The Tornado that decimated a Shell gas station and several adjacent restaurants in Valley View, Texas, has left up to 80 Texans injured and at least 5 dead, including children, in the area.
New US $275M Munitions Package Only Prolongs Ukraine’s Agony, Russia Says
On Friday the Biden administration revealed a new $275 million aid package for Ukraine, to address its “urgent battlefield needs” – and which is said to include a large infusion of desperately needed artillery shells.
US sources have estimated that Russian artillery outpaces Ukraine’s at ten to one. The new package comes as Ukraine forces are being driven back in Kharkiv oblast, leading to new desperation on the part of the West. However, Russia has said that the continued flow of new weapons and munitions to Kiev will only prolong the suffering of Ukrainians and the Zelensky government.
Russia’s ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov in fresh remarks has said “It is emblematic” as “the US announces this supply of deadly products from the local defense industry on the very same day when the Russian leadership clearly and unequivocally confirmed its readiness for negotiations.”
We detailed earlier that President Putin is newly signaling that he’s ready for negotiations if it means ‘freezing’ current lines, which “must reflect realities on the ground” – according to his Friday words.
Reuters whas written that “Three of the sources, familiar with discussions in Putin’s entourage, said the veteran Russian leader had expressed frustration to a small group of advisers about what he views as Western-backed attempts to stymie negotiations and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s decision to rule out talks.”
Any scenario which sees current lines frozen would mean Ukraine would have to cede substantial chunks of four Ukrainian regions. And in Kharkiv, for example, where a new Russian offensive is taking place, the border has been moved deeper into Ukrainian territory over the last weeks.
Putin also commented on the fact that the presidential election which was scheduled to be held in Ukraine this month was canceled under martial law. Zelensky will continue as president for as long as the war persists. Putin has as a result decried him as illegitimate.
“But with whom to negotiate? That’s a peculiar question, I agree,” Putin told a press briefing, emphasizing that “the legitimacy of the incumbent head of the [Ukrainian] state has expired.”
Meanwhile, the US government has not been secret about stating its ultimate long term goal…
When we hold the @NATO Washington Summit in July, we’ll take tangible steps to increase NATO’s role in building a capable Ukrainian force, supporting its ongoing reforms, better integrating Ukraine into the Alliance. pic.twitter.com/dxYxnAbWlP
While the assessment remains ongoing, OpenAI appears to have made little in the way of progress since 2023…
The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) published the first progress report from its “GPT taskforce” and the news isn’t good for ChatGPT.
OpenAI’s efforts to bring its flagship AI model, ChatGPT, into line with European Union rules, including the comprehensive General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), were noted by the EDPB but ultimately deemed insufficient.
Per the EDPB document:
“Although the measures taken in order to comply with the transparency principle are beneficial to avoid misinterpretation of the output of ChatGPT, they are not sufficient to comply.”
The findings come as OpenAI has spent much of 2024 dealing with temporary stop orders from several European member states.
As Cointelegraph reported back in January, Italy’s data protection agency found that ChatGPT and OpenAI were still afoul of Italian and EU data privacy laws despite having been warned and subsequently banned back in March 2023.
According to the EDPB’s report, OpenAI hasn’t done enough in the time since to bring ChatGPT in line with the EU’s laws.
The chief complaint appears to be that ChatGPT is prone to outputting inaccurate information.
“As a matter of fact,” writes the EDPB, “due to the probabilistic nature of the system, the current training approach leads to a model which may also produce biased or made up outputs.”
The report also expresses EDPB worries that “the outputs provided by ChatGPT are likely to be taken as factually accurate by end users,” whether they’re accurate or not.
It’s unclear at this time exactly how OpenAI could bring ChatGPT into compliance. The GPT-4 model, for example, contains billions of data points and around a trillion parameters.
It would be infeasible for humans to comb through the dataset to verify its accuracy to a degree that would allow it to be said to be reasonably accurate by GDPR standards.
Unfortunately for OpenAI, the EDPB explicitly wrote that “in particular, technical impossibility cannot be invoked to justify non-compliance with these requirements.”
