Martin Armstrong Discussion

[iamnotback]

sloanf once again without access to a paid subscription talking nonsense.

r0ach once again totally misunderstanding MA's point.

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[r0ach]

Germany just printed up their debt because they considered their creditors malevolent.  If Trump is not a shill, or anyone who isn't that takes control of the US, they're going to deal with debt in a similar manner as Germany - taking as easy of a way out as possible whether it's defaulting or printing.  Trump might just try to ignore it and kick the can down the road but it will probably blow up on his term anyway, and he will deal with it in a manner irrespective of creditor interest.  For someone like Armstrong to consider govt debt sacrosanct he has to be arguing from the position of a creditor shill (banker) from the get go.

[iamnotback]

r0ach you do not even understand MA's thesis which derives from his extensive study of history.

Hyperinflation NEVER occurs in a country which is still able to sell its debt. It happens only in countries which are undergoing revolutions or dictatorships and where the public have lost confidence in the government. The USA has the strongest military and will not hyperinflate away the debt. At some point, they will do a monetary reset and rape you goldbugs. Watch and learn from the master.

I am not going to reply to the nonsense any more. Heading back to my profession as a computer programmer.

[tabnloz]

sea levels rapidly, not incrementally, increased around 400ft 10,000yrs ago (12,800 BP)
this sea level rise coincides with something called Meltwater Pulse 1b (unexplained by *conventional*, uniformitarian academia)
How about we figure out why temps went up 10 degrees in a year or two and sea levels rose 400ft almost overnight? That's a real frightening mystery (and interesting).

There's some guy named Graham Hancock who seems to of made a career talking about this; that the written record of human history only goes back 5000 years and around 13,000 years ago the mythical flood talked about in things like the bible and other mythology actually did take place.  I think his hypothesis is that some type of projectile like a comet hit one of the poles and released a bunch of water somehow, but it seems like any type of object large enough to do that would have also extincted all life in the process.

Perhaps someone else can chime in on the viability of a comet melting huge amounts of ice but not exterminating all life at the same time?  I would imagine some type of eruption/activity from the sun could have caused the ice to melt as well.

As this largely impacted US, Canada & Europe (where the Laurentide & Cordellian ice sheets reached), it didn't wipe out all of humanity. But you can be sure everyone on earth was impacted by it. Survivors would pass the tale on through mythology - it's suggested by Randall Carlson that a comet impact ties in with the mythology of Halloween, Day of the Dead, Festival of the Dead etc which occur on roughly the same day (a global remembrance of a catastrophe?). And what is Halloween / All Hallows Day represented by? A witch, flaming hair & a broomstick: all ancient ways to describe comets. Similar symbology is seen in Mexico & Sth America. Other common symbols are of serpents.

It is interesting to note that some words literally describe events like these:

catastrophe - iirc derived from ancient greek kata (meaning down but also at times cup, bowl, crater), astro (meaning from the stars), so literally falling stars that cause massive destruction.

So the comet theory is that multiple impacts (from the Taurid meteor stream) hit the Nth US / Canada ice sheet and melted the ice, wiping out megafauna & Clovis culture (US). The NW US geology supports a catastrophe - the amount of water flow needed to carve the ancient river channels that are way, way above present day Snake & Columbia rivers, to transport glacial erratics hundreds of miles, to ripple the earth in the channelled scablands, could only come from a massive heat source. It would also send shit into the atmosphere, start massive wildfires and the flow of water into the pacific coast would not only raise sea levels by hundreds of feet but disrupt the warm water currents with ice water. So, we would have plunged back into an ice age. And the evidence from black mat samples & Greenland ice cores samples make a compelling case for extra terrestrial impact.

Hancock is a good writer who makes some interesting connections and points out areas where mainstream science and academia have just papered over inconsistencies. Similar to mainstream economists who are set in their thinking and attached to their beliefs, egyptology, geology and archaeology are the same. The mythology is the most interesting to me and his interpretation of early religion. Having spent a lot of time in the middle east I find it fascinating.

I find Hancock is good at collating and tying together the works of others, like Randall Carlson, Robert Shoch (who proposes a solar flare theory not a comet), West etc. He bases much of his updated theories on them and the publications of the Holocene Impact Working Group as they are mainstream scientists analysing black mat samples, tsunami marking (Madagascar & South Australia having most prominent features from around 5,000 yrs ago) and undersea impact craters.

[iamnotback]

Final warning to the goldbugs:

Re: Precious metals are not useful in a collapse scenario!

Keep in mind that the collapse of a financial system has historically unfolded to different degrees. If we are talking about a Dark Age, then you are into the Mad Max situation. Then the only thing that has value is food – not even gold. That was the fall of Rome. People effectively sold themselves as serfs to work the land, retain 20% of the crop in return for protection behind the castle walls. Medieval coinage really appears only in silver and are rarely found more than 20 to 30 miles from where the coins were struck. This illustrated the isolation  of city states. Money was not really necessary for there was really no major trade interacting within Europe – hence the Dark Age.
In order for tangible assets like stocks, gold, art, antiquities, etc. to survive, the fundamental infrastructure must survive. That means there must be ample food for gold to have any value whatsoever. So you must stop short of the Mad Max event for anything tangible to have a safe haven value.

Therefore, if we are only talking about a reset of the world financial system, then tangible assets retain value that becomes translated into the new currency. Hence, equities will survive, government debt and currency will not. Only going all the way to a Mad Max event would everything lose value except food. Not even gold survives for trade comes to an end.

The civil unrest we have beginning today post-Trump is intended to overthrow Trump and Obama has remained in Washington, which NO PRESIDENT has ever done. We have Soros licking his lips on the prospect to altering the USA with his vision of Marxism. We have the same trend emerging in France, Britain, and Netherlands and of course Italy, Spain and Greece.
So we have some actors intent upon creating change that would subjugate all of us because they think Marx was correct after all. Their desire is to live vicariously off of other people’s money and they do not accept that anyone should have things they do not. We have students protesting because they think everything should just be free. Hence, this is a battle shaping up for the future; the final conflict over Marxism, which began with the fall of Communism in 1989. This final battle began 26 years from 1989.95.

My response is that open source is destroying the need for the nation-state. Open source is a paradigm shift which creates an Inverse Commons which does not suffer the Tragedy of the Commons prisoner's dilemma...

...

So into Stage #5 we go, and cull all this useless dead weight left over from the Industrial Age.

The nation-state was necessary for aggregating capital for the Industrial Age, but it has lost is reason to exist. And btw, this is why when Armstrong mentioned the USA would break up, it immediately seemed plausible to me.

Because I have been explaining we are moving from the Industrial (fixed capital) Age to the Knowledge Age where individuals will own their productive capacity and can't be bought with financial capital.

Thus the nation-state concept has peaked. The globalists are consolidating power now to try to fend off the Knowledge Age, but they will fail (although they will succeed to enslave those who don't transition and remain dependent on the one world reserve currency and governments).

...

The individual is rising. Government is dying, and as it last hurrah it will descend into one world government which in fact already exists de facto as the DEEP STATE.

Eventually, they will create a new currency, default on the obligations, and we get a reset. This is where tangible assets come in. ALL ASSETS survive such a rest PROVIDED there is no war that results in the destruction of the infrastructure as we saw after World War II.

All tangible assets will be confiscated or end up illiquid. No exceptions. Stored capital is dying. We are leaving the Industrial Age wherein fixed capital was necessary. You are missing the entire trend. You are only looking at the highly VISIBLE symptoms and Bureaucrats and not looking deeper.

These comments make it painfully obvious that Armstrong does not
understand the global trend underway with the transition from the
Industrial (fixed capital) Age to individual ownership of one's productive
capital in the Knowledge Age. For details on that trend, refer to my prior
writings upthread. Specifically knowledge workers today can produce and
distribute their own work individually without relying on the Theory of
the Firm and finance. The 3D printer is yet another example of this trend
underway.

He is framing the issue with the wrong perspective, thus he entirely
misses the point and thus the correct conclusion.

Crypto-currency doesn't need the entire world's confidence and acceptance.
The sovereign Knowledge Age workers are adopting it...

The rest of humanity will descend into enslavement in a one world reserve
currency and a de facto DEEP STATE that runs the dying fixed capital age
and the concept of the nation-state which raison d'etre was the politics
of finance.

See the one world outcome is the death star of collectivism. Again I refer
him to my seminal article on the Rise of Knowledge:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=355212.0

Focus on the "Rise of Knowledge" essay and understand why savings must
decay otherwise knowledge doesn't advance.

I expounded on a later blog:

http://unheresy.com/Information%20Is%20Alive.html#Thought_Isn%27t_Fungible

...

Armstrong is stuck in an anarchic idea of government and finance. He is
blinded to the decentralized rise of the sovereign individual in the
Knowledge Age. Thus to his hammer everything looks like a nail. He can
only see everything in terms of government. He can't see the true
revolution going on which government can't do a damn thing to stop.

Let them try to turn off the electricity. Watch how fast the Knowledge Age
workers engineer a solution that bypasses their grid.

Checkmate for the Industrial Age, nation-states, and voting. Those are the
dinosaurs.

When will Armstrong have the epiphany and realize what time it really is?

His model is screaming that I am correct. Yet he is blinded by his old age
and ingrained thought patterns and experience as a hedge fund manager.

Rising taxes is the stage where the nation-states self-destruct, as
planned. To usher in the power vacuum (chaos and misery) that gives rise
to an international discipline and solution circa 2032.

[tabnloz]

Final warning to the goldbugs:


See the one world outcome is the death star of collectivism. Again I refer
him to my seminal article on the Rise of Knowledge:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=355212.0

Focus on the "Rise of Knowledge" essay and understand why savings must
decay otherwise knowledge doesn't advance.

Armstrong is stuck in an anarchic idea of government and finance. He is
blinded to the decentralized rise of the sovereign individual in the
Knowledge Age. Thus to his hammer everything looks like a nail. He can
only see everything in terms of government. He can't see the true
revolution going on which government can't do a damn thing to stop.

Let them try to turn off the electricity. Watch how fast the Knowledge Age
workers engineer a solution that bypasses their grid.

Your idea makes a lot of sense iamnotback.

I guess that Armstrong's view is colored by his dealings with government. While the systems function, they are very hard to defeat.

But yes watch the engineers generate solutions. Even at the most basic level this already occurs - we see 3rd world nations improvise and innovate when government has failed them, an example being the plastic bottle + bleach + water, set in the roof to generate light.

[iamnotback]

Surely if you're alone saying something and everyone is saying the contrary with proofs it must be because they're the idiots while you're right ^^

You'll never figure out why I am nearly always correct in my predictions (and you will even go misinterpret and misrepresent my predictions to convince yourself I wasn't correct):

This rally since 2009 has been the most BEARISH rally ever in history. Think of this like the mirror image of gold. Gold has declined for 5 years and you have people screaming here we go with ever $20 rally. In the stock market, it has been exactly the opposite. Every time the market decline, they say here we go it will crash by 70-90%.

This is what I mean that the MAJORITY must always be wrong for they are the fuel that moves markets. I have been stating persistently that the Dow cannot “C R A S H” when the majority are bearish and retail participation is at historic lows (see Gallup poll).

[sidhujag]

Surely if you're alone saying something and everyone is saying the contrary with proofs it must be because they're the idiots while you're right ^^

You'll never figure out why I am nearly always correct in my predictions (and you will even go misinterpret and misrepresent my predictions to convince yourself I wasn't correct):

This rally since 2009 has been the most BEARISH rally ever in history. Think of this like the mirror image of gold. Gold has declined for 5 years and you have people screaming here we go with ever $20 rally. In the stock market, it has been exactly the opposite. Every time the market decline, they say here we go it will crash by 70-90%.

This is what I mean that the MAJORITY must always be wrong for they are the fuel that moves markets. I have been stating persistently that the Dow cannot “C R A S H” when the majority are bearish and retail participation is at historic lows (see Gallup poll).

Being the pig means you dont know who the other pigs are.. whatever direction the pig takes you have a massivr edge being his counterpart in any market.. just the way the world works

[tabnloz]

Insightful Dennis Kucinich interview.

The deep state is at war with the USG, going all out against Trump (but also ruining the Obama initiative in Syria). The Cold Warriors want to determine foreign policy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7j_ZfKmcnSk

[r0ach]

So we have some actors intent upon creating change that would subjugate all of us because they think Marx was correct after all.

More Armstrong lies.  The only source of Marxism is the Jews, it does not originate from anywhere else.  This is always where it comes from.  They do not "believe" Marxism is some great form of ideology, they only use it as a political weapon to subjugate real civilizations (unlike their own).  You see, for all the Jews claims of being intelligent and superior thinkers, they have never once built a civilization superior or even equal to anyone else's.  The entire history of the Jew is infiltrating real human civilizations and trying to insert themselves as middlemen parasites to live off usury (i.e. scammers).

Since all homogeneous human civilizations always expel the parasites that try to subjugate them - which has happened to the Jews in at least 109 countries now - the Jew's only hope to practice his parasitical usury is to try and run a divide and conquer strategy of Marxism.  You flood a country with 3rd world cavemen to create a bunch of warring factions, then the homogeneous population is marginalized and no one can come together to overthrow the parasites (or so they think).

This is the basis of everything going on now.  It's all just parasitical Jewish banking and media trying to mold the world into some form that allows them to practice their scams without being expelled or holocausted in the process.  Armstrong is a known dirtbag shill for the Jews and can't be trusted as far as you can throw him as evidenced by his past posts:

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/uncategorized/anti-semitic-and-pro-nazi-activities-rising/

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/history/europes-economic-history/jewish-bankers-vs-all-bankers/

[tabnloz]

tabnloz, seems you are lagging far behind:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1703300.msg17809145#msg17809145

You really should spend some time in that thread and also this one:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=374873.0

I've read through the PM's & Collapse thread. Really interesting (however I find it strange that people cannot read & take in the opposite argument to their own.)

Initially I thought that PM's would be the fall back option at least until the baby boomer generation dies off. But it would be contextual - which direction a society takes under such strain is hard to know. This would depending on location, type of collapse:

- War, eg in China would see generational gold enter society as payment for safe passage etc not traditionally trusting government like pre WW2 where 'Yamashita's Gold' was looted from China, Philippines, Malay & "stored" for future use in Luzon, Mindanao, Bagiuo, Manilla.

 - Financial, like the great depression whre infrastructure remains

 - Or war as in Serbia where cigarettes, food & alcohol were used (terrific book McMafia by Misha Glenny shows how both leaders enriched themselves as their people died by trading behind the scenes)


But iamnotback makes some great points, namely:

during ww2 gold was used because it already the backbone of the system, unlike now.

as long as infrastructure survives (indicating a financial system collapse) the internet & the speed at which solutions can be engineered outside of governmental avenues. and crypto is blooming, could soon be as ubiquitous as mobile phones. if crypto overcomes onramping obstacles it could serve as the path of least resistance ie stored & sent via mobile phones.

that a total financial system collapse could shove us into a dark age of food shortages (4 meal theory) and need for weapons. in isolated or war torn areas, are PM's more viable than food or ammo.

[iamnotback]

I've read through the PM's & Collapse thread...

But iamnotback makes some great points, namely:

during ww2 gold was used because it already the backbone of the system, unlike now.

as long as infrastructure survives (indicating a financial system collapse) the internet & the speed at which solutions can be engineered outside of governmental avenues. and crypto is blooming, could soon be as ubiquitous as mobile phones. if crypto overcomes onramping obstacles it could serve as the path of least resistance ie stored & sent via mobile phones.

that a total financial system collapse could shove us into a dark age of food shortages (4 meal theory) and need for weapons. in isolated or war torn areas, are PM's more viable than food or ammo.

And incorporate the creative destruction aspect of Stage #5.

So clearly we see what is being created is the antithesis of the NWO, i.e. the decentralized society that is rising to become Stage #6.

This is why the goldbugs are entirely wrong. The NWO is going to take Universal Surveillance control over the tangible economy and destroy it. All tangible stores of wealth will die, and only the new decentralized forms of capital in the Knowledge Age will survive.

And unlike the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, this NWO will be geographically global. The frontier this time will not be geographical (i.e. no Byzantine Eastern Empire), but rather the decentrzalized online economy will be the release value and frontier that provides the way out of the creative destruction.

This is absolutely crucial to understand. And I as @AnonyMint have been explaining this since 2012 with my seminal essay in the Economic Devastation thread and then the various quotes since such as in 2014.

The only source of Marxism is the Jews, it does not originate from anywhere else.

The actual source is the power vacuum created by the natural requirement to concentrate fixed capital in the Industrial Age. The banksters just stepped into that natural power vacuum.

[iamnotback]

...no electricity and [no Internet]...

Such a total order is impossible because it would require snuffing out every decentralized instance of human ingenuity hiding under every blade of grass on the planet:

(for the same reason NWO can't physically confiscate all the precious metals but NWO can sure as hell make them illiquid as I explained upthread^[1] because of their requirement to be physically traded with centralized market makers who have large economies-of-scale; whereas, the NWO can't make crypto-currency illiquid because just like prohibition of alcohol in the prior century and decentralized file sharing, the more they try to stop it, the more decentralized users of it will increase)

[1]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16980080#msg16980080 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16980315#msg16980315 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg17868111#msg17868111 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16739692#msg16739692 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16770121#msg16770121 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16737988#msg16737988 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16755123#msg16755123 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16742292#msg16742292 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16753527#msg16753527 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16730530#msg16730530 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16732850#msg16732850 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16769418#msg16769418 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16729361#msg16729361 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16733941#msg16733941 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16737879#msg16737879 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16910820#msg16910820 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg16916220#msg16916220 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg17080482#msg17080482 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg17084075#msg17084075 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg17173412#msg17173412 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1665943.msg17174452#msg17174452

Recent comments on the electricity and Internet grid issue:

Final warning to the goldbugs:


See the one world outcome is the death star of collectivism. Again I refer
him to my seminal article on the Rise of Knowledge:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=355212.0

Focus on the "Rise of Knowledge" essay and understand why savings must
decay otherwise knowledge doesn't advance.

Armstrong is stuck in an anarchic idea of government and finance. He is
blinded to the decentralized rise of the sovereign individual in the
Knowledge Age. Thus to his hammer everything looks like a nail. He can
only see everything in terms of government. He can't see the true
revolution going on which government can't do a damn thing to stop.

Let them try to turn off the electricity. Watch how fast the Knowledge Age
workers engineer a solution that bypasses their grid.

Your idea makes a lot of sense iamnotback.

I guess that Armstrong's view is colored by his dealings with government. While the systems function, they are very hard to defeat.

But yes watch the engineers generate solutions. Even at the most basic level this already occurs - we see 3rd world nations improvise and innovate when government has failed them, an example being the plastic bottle + bleach + water, set in the roof to generate light.

For the peak energy Malthusians:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/02/170209133509.htm

r0ach you do not even understand MA's thesis which derives from his extensive study of history.

Hyperinflation NEVER occurs in a country which is still able to sell its debt. It happens only in countries which are undergoing revolutions or dictatorships and where the public have lost confidence in the government. The USA has the strongest military and will not hyperinflate away the debt. At some point, they will do a monetary reset and rape you goldbugs. Watch and learn from the master.

I am not going to reply to the nonsense any more. Heading back to my profession as a computer programmer.

[iamnotback]

It is very crucial that readers you understand what Stage #5 entails and the timing.

The French election in April/May will set fire to the EU and Euro, that will accelerate the short dollar vortex. When the short dollar vortex peaks after roughly 2018, then the USA goes over the cliff and all hell breaks loose in the world. Also a pandemic could start as soon as 2019 (e.g. imagine what war such as when they catapulted the diseased corpses over the walls to spread the Bubonic Plague into Europe that killed 50% of Europe's population in the Black Death and global cooling can unleash with 70 - 80% of those in the Third World being infected currently with LTBI, i.e. latent Tuberculosis infection). Also the Maunder Minimum Ice Age has begun and will accelerate from 2020 going into 2030, causing cold and/or wet places to become frozen and/or flash floods and dry and/or warm places to become drought-sticken and hotter. The tropics (such as Venezuela) can suffer droughts. Mass starvation and/or enforced malnutritionary enslavement+eugenics is coming. So after 2032.95 (i.e. starting in 2033), the West will utterly collapse into chaos (with the USA headed into civil war and breakup):

By 2032, the other side of that turning point looks to be a serious risk of total chaos in the West, and the financial capital of the world will move to Asia. Keep in mind that Asia is NOT PART OF the bail-ins that governments in the West have signed into law. Asia is void of the real structural flaws that are going to cause the collapse of the United States and Europe. These people stirring up the protests do not realize that they cannot simply overthrow Trump and everything will be OK. This will lead to unimaginable confrontation and history provides a guide to how the military will itself split.



During the Nika Revolt, the angry mob began shouting insults at the emperor and began to assault the palace. The palace fell under virtual siege for 5 days and people were fed up with the high taxes and the government like we see today. The mob set fires that began to spread and much of the city now was engulfed in the flames as they have done recently setting fires to various things.

The local police and military troops would not suppress the mob and then some of the Senators called for the overthrow of the emperor. The troops would not defend the emperor. Fortunately, one legion was stationed outside the capital. They were not composed of local Greeks so they had no problem killing Greeks. They came to the aid of the Emperor, entered the city, and killed all the protesters.

What is going on is very similar to the Nika Revolt. Asking the military to overthrow Trump is just totally insane. These people have absolutely no concept of what they would unleash. The military will split and we will have troops fighting troops on American soil as we saw in the decline of the Roman Empire. Anyone who thinks they can overthrow Trump and that will end everything, they are out of the mind. This will be just the beginning of the end. History does repeat.

Edit: to expound a little on the risk of a pandemic. I think the multi-drug resistant strains of superbugs is likely going be the cause of the next pandemic. For example, there are so many Tuberculosis patients in the Philippines who don't finish their 6 month drug therapy and thus the MDR strains are 14.3% (resistant to the two main line drugs) if the new active TB cases. The rate of resistance to all 4 of the TB mainline drugs is roughly 0.5% already in the Philippines for reported active cases at hospitals, but these MDR strains are spreading now as LTBI and we will see the actual incidence of MDR on a lag of several years. For example tonight my gf told me her cousin didn't finish his 6 month prescription and starting drinking Tanduay rum instead as a "treatment" and "he is fine". I got so angry. I said, "he is not fine, he is a public health menace likely being a carrier and manufacturer of MDR TB strains now, with 1000s or millions to be infected downstream from his gross negligence. And since the turn of the 21st century, filipinos have been leaving the country in droves to go work abroad throughout the world as laborers and domestic helpers, thus spreading this LTBI thoughout the world. Note some countries such as the USA require a chest xray for immigrants, but this is not conclusive for LTBI! The Quantiferon test is conclusive, but it costs around $200 and so filipinos can't afford it (the test isn't even generally available in the Philippines). Also you have the rapefugees migration of the Third World into the heart of Europe, likely being carriers of a very high incidence of LTBI.

Worldwide, in 2008, there were an estimated 440,000 new cases of MDR-TB and 150,000 deaths from MDR-TB. Estimates show that 3.3 percent of new TB cases are really MDR-TB.

As the Maunder Minimum kicks in and an Ice Age causes massive malnutrition, then we can see the MDR strains of LTBI triggered to active at massively accelerated rates (currently as reported by the WHO only 0.3% of the population per year in the Philippines, at least for cases reported to hospitals).

This is not a joke. And note TB can't be eradicated like smallpox because there is no effective TB vaccine, and if we even tried to give therapy to those 2+ billion people infected with LTBI, we would end up with massive MDR strain proliferation.

Rome's example is instructive.

[tabnloz]

Much to consider.

Cannot see this trend stopping; something that has built up for years doesn't just disappear. Like dam. ursting, there is a lot of backpressure and debris to collect along the way. The masses will not be placated now the veil has been lifted - it is an undercurrent quickly turning into an overflow that is carving out new channels in the landscape. The status quo of trickle down economics, neokeynesianism,lobbying, ongoing war and manipulation of the public via media IS OVER.

The same way that groupthink & continual bombarding of the masses with targeted narratives worked for the status quo previously is the same way its working to bring them down now. The cat is out of the bag and the recent 'impossible' victories emboldens others to adopt the same ideals. This era of government is OVER and the next year or two will just continue the decline. No doubt though, as referenced above, that tptb will go on the attack to preserve their interests.

I say this as someone who dislikes many parts of the Trump, Brexit narrative. ut completely agress with destroying the scourge of the msm.

[tabnloz]

Rickards' theory condensed (from Road to Ruin)

"Elites realize money printing may produce not price inflation, but asset inflation, and form new bubbles that could burst and destroy confidence for two generations. The ice-nine solution is standing by if that happens. For now elites push on with reflation like a forlorn platoon neck deep in the Big Muddy"

[OROBTC]

...

tabnloz & iamnotback

Thank you both for making this recent discussion reach a higher level than I had even hoped for.  Armstrong is a fount of ideas I see nowhere else, even if sometimes wrong.

Nor had I ever considered that TB might come back, bigger and badder than ever.

I believe it was the Chinese who said that problems are never resolved.  Only put away for a time, just to come back later.*


* Or maybe that was Armstrong...   


* * *

tabnloz just referred to Jim Rickards' new book.  I read it a couple of months ago (as I have read his earlier books).  Highly recommended.

[r0ach]

Rickards has always been an oddity to me.  He seems to be an insider who was a part of the whole scam system, then he brags about how he's going to tell you "secret" information from the fed/treasury/what have you.  Any of this so called secret information would either be classified or get you killed by spreading it.  Due to this, I'm kinda leaning towards Rickards being some type of disinfo agent.  Harry Dent probably also is.  They give you 60-70% correct info then 30% wrong of the important parts.  Some of these guys exist only to deflect attention away from the Jewish media and banks to try and prevent them from being holocausted again as well.

But...the Goyim know:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFIuATI0558

[OROBTC]

...

Comments on SHTF and TEOTWAWKI

This should perhaps be a more extended essay, but I pass along these thoughts as they seem to be not much discussed especially in the whole precious metals vs. cryptos conversation.

Which "investment" is the "best" all depends on what happens.  That is such a simple-minded statement, but a neglected thought (and more complex than the statement appears at first glance) in most of these discussions of a SHTF.

It has always been my working thesis that none (let's say very few) of us can know the future.  It is too complex, and whatever variables that Armstrong can crunch (and his work appears to be of great value) cannot foresee events caused by the Beijing Butterfly's flapping wings...  Imagination and information (which Armstrong has) cannot cover all the bases.

Nonetheless, there are trends that do appear to be unstoppable, or nearly so.  iamnotback & Armstrong, IMO, both appear to be correct in their general analyses of trends that look to be very powerful, and even explanatory, in shaping events to come.

* * *

SHTF and TEOTWAWKI are really two separate sets of events (the way I look at them) that overlap.  First comments on my take of the theme of SHTF.

A "SHTF" can be as mild as a 2008 stock market crash, which of course was pretty shitty to those who were exposed...  But the term SHTF seems to be used more (here) as a bigger event, let's say the most commonly cited SHTF would be a large-scale financial collapse that shuts down many parts and conveniences of modern society, but leaves the infrastructure intact.  This set of possibilities would be similar in scale & scope to the Great Depression of the 1930s, in that the electricity stayed on, the factories were left intact (if idle for awhile).  A version of this kind of SHTF would likely leave many impoverished (perhaps no credit cards functioning, no access to their bank accounts), but the bulk of our fixed investments (includes bridges, etc.) that provide great societal value would stay intact.

Of course a SHTF would likely, surely even, manifest itself in unpredictable ways.  Thus, I try to cover many bases, as I certainly cannot predict how this wrinkle vs, another would turn up...

iamnotback refers to various historical scenarios, for example (ex-Yugoslavia, FerFal's experiences in Argentina) where silver and gold were not used as "money" (perhaps "currency" would be the better term).

This apparently is true.  In my own studies of societies in crisis, I have not yet read of one using silver coins as their Medium of Exchange.  It always has been the nearest strong currency (US$, the DM) that such societies adopt.  We can learn from the experiences of the past...

[I hold a little, not much but some, silver]

You never know, so a small holding of silver makes some sense.

Gold is best used as a Store of Value, but it is unclear if gold's role as the premier store of value will always continue so.  In a severe SHTF, gold might only be able to be used:

1)  For large transactions (eg, buy a small farm for 20 oz)

2)  To preserve wealth through a difficult time (similar to the idea of gold being "insurance")

I also acknowledge iamnotback's comment on use of gold to pay for items in a country like the Philippines, or possible almost anywhere, might lead to missing fingers due to robberies...  Use of gold to pay for groceries (etc.) might become rather problematic than is foreseen.

Nonetheless, we can observe the behavior through history of the very wealthy to gain clues as to "what works".  The Rothschilds have been exposed to peril on-and-off for centuries.  They have invested their very large wealth in castles, vineyards, fine art.  They also own a large amount (how much is unknown) of gold.  The castles, art and vineyards can all be confiscated in a SHTF, perhaps later to be returned to the descendants of those whose wealth was so taken.

Gold, however, can be hidden...

Crypto(s) have a place in many of these kinds of events.

Note that all larger-scale events mentioned here are "SHTF Scale" events.

* * *

A "TEOTWAWKI" is not just a larger-scale SHTF, in my opinion.  While my concept of a TEOTWAWKI is perhaps slightly different than the "consensus opinion", it has guided my thinking in how to think about and prepare for it.

While a SHTF would be comparable to the Great Depression, the scarier TEOTWAWKI is more like McCarthy's The Road, or perhaps Orwell's 1984 would be apt as well.

No electricity.  Famine & thirst almost everywhere.  Anarchy and chaos (the bad kinds).  No modern comforts.  Pandemics and violence.

In such, I believe that I would just give up beyond a certain point.  Gold would be useless, or nearly so in the worst scenarios...

My characterization of TEOTWAWKI also eliminates cryptos as a valid asset.  Sorry, but paper wallets mean nothing in a world of wandering refugees.  In these kinds of scenarios, only a water well and guns & ammo count for much.  But what happens when the ammunition runs out...?

* * *

In thinking about Doom Porn, I also looks at the probabilities.  Various kinds of SHTF, IMO, are more likely than the more horrific TEOTWAWKIs.  The impact of the latter is much greater, but the probability is lower.

So, in sum, as we cannot accurately predict the future (we can identify issues and make guesses as to probabilities), I have chosen to diversify my assets (assets in all meanings of the word).

That is why I hold some gold.  More than the average HODLER, but gold is not, as iamnotback mentioned in various comments, a panacea.  As he also wrote:

"There are no panaceas."

[r0ach]

the scarier TEOTWAWKI is more like McCarthy's The Road, or perhaps Orwell's 1984 would be apt as well.

No electricity.  Famine & thirst almost everywhere.  Anarchy and chaos (the bad kinds).  No modern comforts.  Pandemics and violence.

In such, I believe that I would just give up beyond a certain point.

You guys are not very good economic collapse planners.  For one thing, there is A REASON the majority of large human settlements through history have been bordering the ocean.  If the crops go bad or if there's some type of scarcity issue, people just ratchet up the fishing.  There will be no global "TEOTWAWKI".  There will be many places of low population density that border the ocean where people will fish their way straight through it no matter how bad the economy became.

If the JIT delivery economy collapses, fishing will be the #1 workaround to that.  There is no possible better location than a low population density area bordering the ocean.  As for Anonymint, there's a lot of people stacked like pancakes in the Philippines, so you'd probably need the ability to go far out in the ocean to make due with all that competition.  I mean, if the competition is that high, you would basically be living out at sea.