By Chris at www.CapitalistExploits.at
Well done!
To the Donald...
Too true Donald. These guys are filthy rich. In fact, if Justin Bieber lived out there, they'd put him on income support.
Fighting words those. Bow wow, woof, woof. Grrrr!
Disgraceful... this bowing thing. Elect me, and I'll show 'em.
Aaaand.... tamed!
POTUS caught curtseying.
Is that Trump or Hillary bowing? They use the same hair dye, and increasingly there seems little to distinguish them apart. The man is as steely, resolute, and determined as a bowl of yoghurt.
In his Saudi speech the Donald refused to utter the words “radical Islamic terrorism”. You'll recall that this was a term he had endlessly berated President Obama for failing to use. He went as far as to call Islam “one of the world’s great faiths”. Trump supporters' heads must have exploded.
For everyone else... the brilliance coming from Washington never ceases to disappoint.
Ramifications?
For the stock market... here's the iShares US Aerospace & Defence ETF:
A $110 billion weapons deal worth over $350 billion over 10 years which Hillary Trump just signed will have that effect. The establishment rice bowls will be filled after all. Whew! Rumsfeld and Cheney must be relieved.
As for the electorates faith in the political system...
Well, let's see... $350 billion in advanced weaponry to the barbaric, medieval regime that chops of more heads than ISIS.
You tell me.
Intricately Tied to It
Over in Manchester, a Libyan refugee Salman Abedi, after having read a poorly written medieval science fiction book and thus under the delusion of paradise and 40 virgins, blew himself to smithereens, taking with him 22 innocent people who were out enjoying a night's music.
How is this intricately tied?
Last year, I explained the actions and consequences to this question:
"According to a group of human rights organisations, the body count from the wars in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq – all part of the ridiculously named “war on terror” – stands at over 2 million.
Let’s think about this for a minute. Consider how many close friends and family you have. Let’s put the number at an even 50. Remember also that culturally Muslims have an average of 4 children rather than the European 1.5 average and factor in that a good portion of this group practice polygamy – taking 4 wives and having 16 rather than 4 children – and this number is likely pretty conservative.
For every person killed (and this can be directly or simply as a result of Western intervention) we have therefore a further 50 friends and family. So now we have 2 million multiplied by 50 which is 100 million people. What percentage of those 100 million people blame the West for the death of a loved one? It’s higher than zero, that much I know.
Now some portion of those 100 million people have been invited with open arms into Europe, and we’re not even mentioning soldiers who’ve fought against any of the Western-led military campaigns. Many of them too have made their way into the homelands of the “infidels”.
Imagine for a minute being invited to a party at the home of someone who you believe had a hand in the slaughter of your family. That is unfortunately how many feel. We don’t need to imagine this, we know it because they have told us this.
I’m not making a judgement call here just pointing out the obvious.
European politicians seem to have a shockingly dim understanding of this dynamic, which on it’s own shows a naivety befitting a 5 year old schoolgirl.
You cannot directly, or indirectly, kill two million people, invite their relatives home and expect no blowback. That’s beyond stupid. It’s suicidal."
And then only a month ago, I wrote about what the silent majority is really saying:
"While afraid to say so publicly how many in private think: is it not time to bring in the military, round them all up, put them on a ship with a jammed rudder and aim it at North Africa?"
This number grows each day, and today - just days after this Manchester attack - the number of people thinking these thoughts is exponentially higher than it was at the beginning of the week. This is how trends and consensus form. Ignore it at your peril!
And while I've been explaining behavioural economics and this social dynamic in my little corner of the web, I've been arguing that it will increasingly become mainstream with profound ramifications.
And here we have one such case. It doesn't get much more mainstream than Morrissey himself. Read it carefully.
On a more positive note, I sure hope you're following this.
The Belt and Road
A week before Chairman Trump and Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud sat down to lobster bisque, roast swan stuffed with oysters, and sautéed slave to discuss how many Yemenis could be wiped out with the brand spanking new US bombs, President Xi hosted leaders from around the world pushing ahead with China's ambitious OBOR project.
One can conquer by force or by trade - a point worth remembering.
With trade comes influence - political, economic, and social.
Consider what's happened in just 40 years.
Forty years ago, China was a backwater - nothing of a place inhabited by little brown people in straw hats rummaging around in garbage cans wearing clothing that looked like they'd been nicked from the film set of Schindler's List.
If you were lucky, you'd spot a moped but it had probably run out of fuel because nobody could afford anything more than soup. And since nobody had invented a moped that ran on soup, it wasn't going anywhere.
Today, not only does China produce an avalanche of goods but they are rapidly becoming a formidable consumer themselves. In terms of influence consider that they are now:
- Asia's largest trading partner
- US largest trading partner
- Germany's largest trading partner
- Australia's largest trading partner
- Russia's second largest trading partner (after Germany)
- Africas largest trading partner
- South America's largest trading partner
China has, over this 40 odd years, built up some impressive things. Among them a credit bubble, which will need to be dealt with but also substantial foreign exchange reserves, most of them held in US government debt securities. Trading those securities for influence, and dare I say it inflation protection, will translate into revenues to the Middle Kingdom. This is the plan... and it isn't a bad one.
They sure could do worse. They could sell bombs to the most hated family in the Middle East, and when the inevitable backlash takes place, then turn around and say with a straight face.
Question
Cast your vote here and also see what others think is going on
- Chris
"The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting." — Sun Tzu, Chinese
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