Tuesday, January 29, 2019

The Goldilocks War

Dropping Hints,

Head Fake, or the war to unite America?
During a Monday White House press briefing national security adviser John Bolton was photographed carrying a notepad — presumably as he was fresh out of a national security meeting — and one of the things which appears to be handwritten on the pad is "5,000 troops to Colombia".
The contents of the notepad were spotted almost immediately by multiple journalists online after an NBC news release featuring the AP photo was published. More precisely the full contents appear to read:
"Afghanistan -> Welcome the Talks. 5,000 troops to Colombia."

Trump's national security advisor John Bolton recently admitted to Fox Business that the US has a "lot at stake" amidst the ongoing Venezuela crisis given the fact that it has the world’s largest proven oil reserves. Bolton told host Trish Regan:
It will make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela.

This last paragraph may be the most important and revealing bit of news we see today:
[..] Torino Capital Chief Economist Francisco Rodriguez, who advised defeated opposition presidential candidate Henri Falcon last year, wrote on Twitter that the recognition from the Trump administration makes it possible for Guaido, or a presumed transition government, to take charge of Venezuelan assets on US soil, such as state oil company PDVSA’s largest subsidiary, CITGO. It could also prevent the Venezuelan government from invoicing payments for oil shipments.

Just hours after The Bank of England refused to hand over $1.2 billion of Venezuela's gold from its custody vaults (stored there after the completion of a gold-swap transcation with Deutsche Bank) to President Maduro (after heavy lobbying from US officials), The Guardian reports that a UK foreign office minister is now urging the same Bank of England to transfer the bullion to the self-proclaimed interim leader Juan Guaidó.  

​I'm not sure how influential this is in Venezuela...
"As the Venezuelan defense attaché in the United States, I do not recognize Mr. Nicolás Maduro as president of Venezuela," Silva told el Nuevo Herald in a telephone interview from Washington.
"My message to all armed forces members, to everyone who carries a gun, is to please let’s not attack the people. We are also part of the people, and we’ve had enough of supporting a government that has betrayed the most basic principles and sold itself to other countries," added Silva. 

Russia has made no secret of its support for the regime of embattled Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro (after all, the Kremlin has invested billions of dollars in backstopping the Maduro regime by buying the debt if Citgo, the US subsidiary of Venezuela's state-owned oil company, among other measures). But in a statement to the press on Sunday, a spokesman for the Kremlin denied reports that 400 Kremlin-linked security contractors had been dispatched to Caracas to provide security for Maduro as he faces the most credible challenge to his rule since 2013.
 Asked by a local reporter if the Russian government had dispatched the men to shore up support for its struggling ally, Peskov replied "no, of course not."

America needs a lot of little nuclear warheads it can actually use for everyday household chores without triggering Armageddon...
The new weapon - the W76-2, is a modification of an existing Trident nuclear warhead. According to the NNSA, the first batch have come off the production line, and an unspecified number of them referred to as "initial operational capability" will be ready for delivery before the end of September.
According to Stephen Young, a senior Washington representative of the Union of Concerned Scientists, the yield on the W76 was likely reduced to created the W76-2 by removing one stage from the original two-stage device.
"As best we can tell, the only requirement is to replace the existing secondary, or second stage, with a dummy version, which is what they do every time they test fly a missile," said Young, who noted that the amount of the hydrogen isotope tritium may also be adjusted.
The result is that the yield has been reduced by 95% - from 100 kilotons of TNT to around five kilotons; around 1/3 of the force of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. 

​You-Tube is tweaking it's algorithms to further protect you from fake-news content which might mislead you, like "Flat Earth" and "9/11 Truth" crackpots.​
You won't have to be bothered by ever seeing those crazy videos about architects and engineers and pilots and physicists saying the government is lying to you. 
Whew! Let's look at some more Trannie Porn!

Gail Tverberg says "You Are Here", but I really think we are a little to the right of that dotted line, which explains the panic amongst our political and financial elites, and their difficulty agreeing upon a solution.
What seems to be happening is that the world economy is reaching Limits to Growth, as predicted in the computer simulations modeled in the 1972 book, The Limits to Growth. In fact, the base model of that set of simulations indicated that peak industrial output per capita might be reached right about now. Peak food per capitamight be reached about the same time.  

Chris Martinsen agrees with me on that point. We're farther out on the curve, but denying it.
Many people are expecting some degree of approaching collapse -- be it economic, environmental and/or societal -- thinking that they’ll recognize the danger signs in time. 
As if it will be completely obvious, like a Hollywood blockbuster. Complete with clear warnings from scientists, politicians and the media.  And everyone can then get busy either panicking or becoming the plucky heroes. 
That's not how collapse works.
Collapse is a process, not an event.
And it's already underway, all around us. 
Collapse is already here.
However, unlike Hollywood's vision, the early stages of collapse cause people to cling even tighter to the status quo. Instead of panic in the streets, we simply see more of the same -- as those in power do all they can to remain so, while the majority of the public attempts to ignore the growing problems for as long as it possibly can.
For both the elite and the majority, their entire world view and their personal sense of self depends on things not crumbling all around them, so they remain willfully blind to any evidence to the contrary.
https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/114741/collapse-already-here

In what's expected to be one of the most complicated bankruptcies in recent memory thanks to the involvement of indignant state and federal regulators, activist shareholders, worried bond holders and angry fire victims, PG&E has officially filed for bankruptcy.
The Wall Street Journal reported that as we previewed last night, the troubled utility which serves 16 million California customers, filed for bankruptcy early Tuesday, claiming more than $50 billion in debt. Facing what some analysts estimate could be some $27 billion in fines relating to the role of malfunctioning equipment in causing wildfires, the bankruptcy process is expected to be a protracted mess as state and federal regulators try to figure out the best plan for holding the country's largest utility accountable...
In the filing, the utility revealed that it's facing some 750 complaints on behalf of 5,600 fire victims, with fire-related liabilities amount to some $30 billion.

​Wile-E-Coyote​

No comments:

Post a Comment