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The gold rush continues…

Just a few short days after Poland’s government touted its economic might after completing the repatriation of 100 tons of the barbarous relic; and with Hungary‘s anti-immigrant Prime Minister Viktor Orban also ramping up holdings of the safe-haven asset to boost the security of his reserves, more Eastern European nationalist leaders are demanding their country’s gold back on home soil.

As Bloomberg reports, former Slovak Premier Robert Fico, whose odds of returning to power are rising quickly, urged parliament to compel the central bank into repatriating the nation’s gold stocks, which are currently stored in the U.K..

His reason?

Perhaps most vocally reflecting what many other nations also believe – sometimes your international partners can betray you.

Citing a 1938 pact by France, Britain, Italy and Germany allowing Adolf Hitler to annex a chunk what was then Czechoslovakia, Fico told reporters:

“You can hardly trust even the closest allies after the Munich Agreement.

I guarantee that if something happens, we won’t see a single gram of this gold. Let’s do it as quickly as possible.”

Additionally, Serbia’s strongman leader Aleksandar Vucic took note, ordering the central bank to boost reserves and prompting the purchase of nine tons in October.

Vucic said last week that more should be bought because “we see in which direction the crisis in the world is moving.”

The various leaders have a recent example to prove their fears right as the Bank of England refused to return Venezuela’s gold stock over political differences.

“Gold is a symbol,” said Vuk Vukovic, a political economist in Zagreb.

“When states purchase it, people everywhere see it as a sign of economic sovereignty.”

The gold rush mirrors steps by Russia and China to diversify reserves exceeding $3 trillion away from the dollar amid flaring geopolitical tensions with the U.S.

Source: Bloomberg

Authored by Steve Brown via TheDuran.com,

The Secret War in Africa (part 1) covered the overall strategic predominance of US military/ NATO bases – some secret – in Africa, and the expansion by private military contractors (PMC) there in aid of corporate and national interests according to the major powers.

In Part 2 we examine the geopolitical associations in Africa which vary by nation, where major powers have a vested interest in a particular resource causing that major power to assume an aggressive posture to ‘protect’ its national interest by dominating or subverting the African state, in possession of that resource.

Typically those resources include natural gas, oil, gold, diamonds, silver, uranium, coal, rare earth elements and minerals, etc.  Thus the major powers have their ‘client states’ in pursuance of the extraction of those resources, where that extraction may result in corruption, confrontation, armed aggression, and even support for terrorist organizations in those states.

In this post-Colonial era the extraction of resources by the major powers in a region where the indigenous people are exhorted to have their own right to self-determination is a significant challenge to global corporations, and former colonial occupiers in Africa like Britain, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, etc.

When corporate interests either collide or collude with state interests the local insurrection may be severe as mining giant Rio Tinto discovered in Bougainville. Other examples include coal and natural gas in Mozambique; uranium and gold in Niger and Mali; oil in Sudan; diamonds in the Central African Republic, and so on.

France in Africa

Perhaps the most notable component for NATO – specifically for France – is the uranium needed to run its nuclear operations. Most of that uranium originates in Africa even though France has reduced its capacity for nuclear power. Even so, France still receives in excess of two-thirds of its electricity from nuclear power via the former Areva Corporation, now called Framatome.

The uranium mined for Framatome’s nuclear reactors is commonly found in the Sahel region of Africa where most of France’s uranium comes from, primarily northern Niger and Mali. Chad** and Mauritania also possess enormous reserves of the dangerous material. Mali is the fourth-largest supplier of gold too, and with falling registered gold reserves and the already accomplished confiscation of gold by the west from its failed states Mali makes an especially attractive target… particularly for the EU’s struggling banks.

After the indigenous people of the Sahel suffered serious illness from the effect of uranium mining – where drinking water is frequently contaminated – activist leader Almoustapha Alhacen and NGO Aghirin cooperated to oppose France’s corrupt mining giant Areva in Niger and Mali after 2001.

By 2006-2009 the protests and strikes in Agadez and Mali became effective versus Areva. And by 2011 – surprisingly coincident with Hillary Clinton’s “Arab Spring” – mysterious new terror cells appeared in the Sahel subsequent to the NATO destruction of Gaddafi’s government, including:

• Movement for Oneness Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO) funded by France/Morocco Intel

• Ansar Dine funded by France/Morocco Intelligence Services

• Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) funded by the United States of America CIA

Prior to 2011, a Tuareg rebellion led by the Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) had some success versus the Malian government and versus Areva. The MNLA is a legitimate secular rebel group and is not funded by any western intelligence service. MNLA’s success eventually led to air and ground assaults by France in Mali in Operation Serval (with bases in Bamako and N’Djamena) by 2014.

Under the guise of striking al Qaeda and ISIL in Africa – a continent where those groups did not  exist prior to 2010 – France invoked air strikes and ground assaults versus the indigenous  people  who have been most effective in their resistance to Areva.

France’s military uses Bamako airport in Mali (which hosts the MINUSMA mission) and N’Djamena in Chad where these facilities certainly do not provide ideal bases for striking the rebellious indigenous population of the region. * Unfortunately for Macron’s ultra-high-tech world order, Bomako and N’Djamena air strips are ill-equipped for modern military aircraft.

Now, with the commissioning of the US Niger Air Base 201 as of November 1st, 2019, the question arises as to whether Macron will be allowed to use this base to bomb Tuareg protestors. That’s because NATO and the US military will not reveal whether Niger Base 201 may be jointly used, where all such communications appear to be classified. However, Base 201 may be considered a defacto ‘secret’ NATO air base.

Note that the United States imports less than 3% of its uranium from Niger whereas France imports more than ten times that much (in percentage terms).  While the United States imports very little oil from Africa, France by contrast imports large amounts. France imports oil from Nigeria, from Angola, Libya and Algeria — comprising one-quarter of France’s oil imports overall.

These ‘divergent goals’ and the rift between the United States and France has recently come to light.  France’s position in Africa has been modified by the ascendance of Donald Trump because under the Obama regime the United States and France had been marching in goose-step… or, lockstep.. but not anymore — at least for now.

The United States has asked France and all other NATO nations to contribute more funding to the construction and operation of bases – including Air Base 201 and other NATO bases. But even if France does have the use of Niger Base 201 it is clear that Macron prefers to see such a base owned and controlled by the European Union. Overall, the foregoing may lend some insight about Macron’s drastic words ie that NATO is ‘brain dead’.

France is evidently wheeling for a predominant position in the EU as a major power which has escaped France so far and (perhaps) resulted in NATO keeping quiet about its bases in Africa. At present all such NATO bases in Africa are used secretly or covertly by NATO because NATO does not fund any US military base.

United States Bases in Africa

The United States has its own agenda of course for the thirty-four military bases it operates in Africa (with many more under construction). One can only surmise about the rapid growth of bases there since 2016. It appears that this rapid growth is not based on a particular goal to cull resources in Africa at present; instead the US intends to maintain its role as global hegemon, to manage its Empire by Terror in the region, and to resist any nascent exploitation of African resources or expansion by Russia or China.

The United States is of course forward-looking in its role as unilateral global hegemonic and understands that it will not always be self-sufficient in oil. At some point shale and fracking will be done where Oilprice touts that shale is already in trouble with fracking to follow by 2024.

In that event — and since the United States has already destroyed most of the Middle East — Africa will become important to the US as a source for oil going forward. Meanwhile US plans to expand its designs on natural gas from Mozambique and elsewhere in Africa continue apace.

In summary US bases in Africa serve these purposes:

1. Beheading anyone by drone as seen fit

2. A gateway to African resources if and when they are needed (generally corporate)

3. To prevent and discourage Russia and China from exploiting resources in Africa

4. Use of bases by NATO should that interest coincide with US interest

5. Reinforcement of the US global hegemonic

Russian Base in Eritrea

Russia has only one base in Africa. Russia’s Eritrea Logistics Centre is a recent development and the intended purpose for this site is presently unclear and it may not be a military base. However the Russian leadership has publicly expressed its interest in developing resources in Africa especially to provide safe nuclear power on the continent, and this site may bear some relation.

As covered in part 1 , private military contractors from Russia have been active providing security in the following African states:

• Central African Republic, Resources: gold, timber, diamonds

• Libya: Oil, natural gas, iron ore

• Mozambique: Russian giant Gazprom was in competition with US Exxon for a large natural gas contract in a lawless region of Mozambique which was awarded to Exxon

• Angola: iron ore, diamonds, petroleum, bauxite, uranium, feldspar and petroleum

• Uganda: copper, cobalt, gold, platinum

• Cameroon: oil, timber, hydroelectric power, rubber, palm oil, natural gas, cobalt, nickel

The relevant resources are listed because PMC contractors are generally hired to protect these resources on behalf of their private clients — no Russian Federation bases in Africa or Russian governmental ambitions are involved. PMC contractors support either Russian corporate interests or the local interests of their hosts and clients in Africa.

Regardless, the presence of private military contractors in Africa with connections to any Russian private business bears no relation – not even a remote comparison — to the massive and bloated US military presence in Africa.

China’s PLA Military Support Base in Djibouti

China’s military base in Djibouti was established in 2017 perhaps to counter the growing threat of US unilateralism. Since the base opened, a number of alarming reports have appeared in the US major media including the idea that the US could ‘lose its only base in Africa’ due to China’s presence when in fact Washington supports a vast number of bases in Africa.

China states that its purpose in Djibouti is to maintain peace in the region and to support humanitarian operations in Africa. That China appreciates African resources and their potential for development is just as relevant as saying that all other major powers appreciate the same.

China has a specific vested interest in patrolling the Gulf of Aden to ensure that piracy versus its shipping is kept in check.

Summary

There is a trite saying that the last frontier is space, but for those of us on earth it’s clear that Africa is the last frontier. Africa is a continent of resources and promise that could be responsibly developed and thrive if there were only any will in the world to do so.

Climate change and a declining world order make the prospect for Africa look bleak, as well as the resurgence in western colonial thought which sees Africa not as a treasure chest for promise, but for greed.

There are tiny rays of hope for Africa in the form of Algeria, Tunisia, and even Eritrea… but the colliding world disorder of west versus east and ever-deepening corruption in the ever-decaying west may not spare Africa.  The ‘secret war’ in Africa is just that – secret, and shall remain so, so long as the new world disorder — primarily engendered by the west – continues in its apparent death spiral.

Authored by Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

On November 11th, the very disturbing but clearly true “Lessons To Learn From The Coup In Bolivia” was posted to the Web. That anonymous author (a German intelligence analyst) documented the evilness of the overthrow of Evo Morales in Bolivia, and the threat now clearly posed to the world by the US regime — a spreading cancer of expansionist fascism, led from Washington. But, even more than this, he indicated that unless the individuals who are responsible for the advancing fascism are executed, there won’t be any real hope for democracy anywhere in the world.

Either this impunity will stop, or else the spread of the US international dictatorship — not only by CIA coups such as this, but by illegal international invasions such as of Iraq 2003, Libya 2011, Syria 2012-, and Yemen 2015-, —  will continue and will engulf in misery ultimately the entire world. He makes clear the complicity of US ‘news’-media in the lies that ‘justify’ this coup (and ‘justified’ those invasions). It’s, by now, clearly the way the US regime functions. Of course, none of those media will publish any such truth; they all cover-up constantly for the regime, because they actually are an essential part of it. (All of these invasions and coups are based on nothing but lies, and the media are a necessary part of that.) Censorship in America is thus actually extreme, and constant.

For example: how many US-and-allied media have even reported that fascists took over in Bolivia?

Instead, we’ve got newspaper editorials such as the New York Times blaming the extraordinarily successful and popular democratically elected President of Bolivia for the coup which overthrew him and replaced him by fascists (and never using the word “coup,” except once derisively, by saying that “British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, cried ‘coup’” — as if it weren’t a coup — and making no mention whatsoever that it had been done by committed fascists). This ‘news’-paper’s ‘news’-report the prior day had been headlined with the ridiculously anodyne “Bolivian Leader Evo Morales Steps Down”, and it asserted that “Mr. Morales was once widely popular,” as if he weren’t still so, and as if all of the polling as well as the last Presidential election showed him still to be “widely popular”, but the CIA-and-oligarchs’ organized fascist mob hated him, and brought him down.

Will the CIA and generals, and Bolivia’s oligarchs, be executed for that? Of course, they should be. If they aren’t, then how can democracy ever be restored there? It’s one, or the other — it’s continuation of the dictatorship, or else it will be restoration of the democracy — at this stage. There can be no ‘reconciliation’, now. This is an irreconcilable state of war that exists between the coupsters and the Bolivian people. There will be bloodshed — and the more so as the coupsters remain in power and Morales not be quickly restored fully to the powers to which he had repeatedly been popularly elected. However, he won’t be able safely to return to his home and his homeland, unless and until the coupsters are executed, because, otherwise, they certainly would execute him first, and he would never be able to feel safe there.

Because of what the coupsters did, this will inevitably be a war to the death — and not only for the principal persons on each side, but for hundreds, or probably thousands, of their followers. What the coupsters did has thus precipitated, inevitably, massive future bloodshed in Bolivia. And yet the US regime’s lying press supports what was done. The truths that they know they hide from the public. This constant lying will be necessary in order for the US regime’s extensions such as the OAS and the IMF to provide the coupsters the public support that will enable the Bolivian coup-regime to be granted international ‘legitimacy’, which will be necessary in order for that regime’s actions to be treated as legally valid and binding in international business.

Another recent example of this spreading cancer of the US regime’s fascism was the US coup that installed a rabidly fascist regime in Ukraine during February 2014. Even today, the US-and-allied ‘news’-media cover that  coup up, too, as having been a ‘democratic revolution.’ (How much of what is shown on that linked video was reported honestly in media such as the New York Times and Fox News?) Furthermore, when the EU learned, after the coup was over, that it had been a coup (instead of the democratic revolution they had thought it to have been), they were shocked, but plodded on to take Ukraine into the EU because they mistakenly thought that this would be of benefit to the EU nations, and not recognizing that it would turn out to be instead an albatross, which, even today, is nowhere closer to meeting EU standards than it had been on the day of the coup, and is actually far less so than it was even back before the coup occurred.

How can the public, in any country, possibly control the Government if they are being so viciously and routinely lied-to by the Government and by its ‘news’-media? Democracy is impossible in such a country as this. It is a sham. Multiple political parties don’t mean that they’re not all controlled by the 607 US billionaires — some who are Democrats, and others who are Republicans, but all of whom are actually lying fascists. Clearly, dishonesty rules, and it’s bought by the few individuals who control most of the nation’s wealth (and ‘news’-media). Here is an example within the US itself: the 2016 US Presidential ‘election’, which was actually a Presidential selection, by the billionaires.

Even decades after the entirely illegal tortures that the CIA perpetrated after 9/11 and which produced no usable information, the CIA officials and George W. Bush are not prosecuted for having broken both American and international laws, and the mere fact of that illegality has made impossible any court-trial anywhere of the alleged terrorists who remain at Guantanamo. The US regime is rampant and unrestrained illegality, lying, and it’s even blatant violence, and injustice, all with no accountability whatsoever.

Unfortunately, the only global solution would be a second American Revolution, but, this time, the news-media are far less honest, and so almost no support exists amongst the US population for doing that.

Consequently, the outlook for the future, worldwide, is grim.

If the warning (hidden by the media as it is), this time from Bolivia, is not heeded, how can this cancer ever be stopped from engulfing the entire world?

Reuters is reporting that Russian state-owned TASS is making big claims this weekend that a Russian military jet has air-launched a hypersonic missile in the Arctic. 

TASS cites several Russian military sources, who said a Mikoyan MiG-31 interceptor jet air-launched a Kinjal (Dagger) hypersonic missile over Russia’s part of the Arctic earlier this month.

As we’ve recently noted, Russia has been aggressively expanding its military presence in the Arctic. It has also been increasing exploration activities in the region, such as oil and gas and mineral extraction.

TASS quoted one of the sources in saying, “the tests took place in mid-November.” 

The MiG-31K took off from the Olenegorsk airfield in the northern Murmansk region. It fired the hypersonic missile at a ground target located at the Pemboi training ground in Russia’s Arctic Komi region. 

Last month, we mentioned that Russia has been installing early warning radar systems across the Komi Republic and the Murmansk region in northern Russia. The radar systems are expected to become operational by 2022, will monitor Arctic airspace for ballistic missile attacks, and monitor aircraft in the region.

In Septemeber, Russia deployed S-400 Triumph systems on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in the Arctic.

The Danish Defence Intelligence Service published a report last week that said, “a great power play is shaping up” between Russia, the US, and China, which has undoubtedly increased tensions in the Arctic region. The reason for the elevated tension is that $35 trillion worth of natural resources could be hiding underneath the Arctic Ocean floor. 

Russia’s militarization of the Arctic is to also defend its “Polar Silk Road” as warming temperatures give way to new shipping lanes and economic opportunities.

Washington has widely criticized Moscow for its increased presence in the Arctic.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently responded to US criticism, indicating that Moscow isn’t intimidating anyone in the Arctic, noting that increased defense capabilities in the region are to protect its assets.

The Arctic’s vast amount of resources will be a significant topic of the 2020s, and beyond, the first country to secure the region with military force could be the next superpower of the world. 

Authored by Robert Bridge via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Following decades of increased life expectancy rates, Americans have been dying earlier for three consecutive years since 2014, turning the elusive quest for the ‘American Dream’ into a real-life nightmare for many. Corporate America must accept some portion of the blame for the looming disaster.

Something is killing Americans and researchers have yet to find the culprit. But we can risk some intuitive guesses.

According to researchers from the Center on Society and Health, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, American life expectancy has not kept pace with that of other wealthy countries and is now in fact decreasing.

The National Center for Health Statistics reported that life expectancy in the United States peaked (78.9 years) in 2014 and subsequently dropped for 3 consecutive years, hitting 78.6 years in 2017. The decrease was most significant among men (0.4 years) than women (0.2 years) and happened across racial-ethnic lines: between 2014 and 2016, life expectancy decreased among non-Hispanic white populations (from 78.8 to 78.5 years), non-Hispanic black populations (from 75.3 years to 74.8 years), and Hispanic populations (82.1 to 81.8 years).

“By 2014, midlife mortality was increasing across all racial groups, caused by drug overdoses, alcohol abuse, suicides, and a diverse list of organ system diseases,” wrote researchers Steven H. Woolf and Heidi Schoomaker in a study that appears in the latest issue of the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association.

At the very beginning of the report, Woolf and Schoomaker reveal that the geographical area with the largest relative increases occurred “in the Ohio Valley and New England.”

“The implications for public health and the economy are substantial,” they added, “making it vital to understand the underlying causes.”

Incidentally, it would be difficult for any observer of the U.S. political scene to read that passage without immediately connecting it to the 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

Taking advantage of the deep industrial decline that has long plagued the Ohio Valley, made up of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky, Trump successfully tapped into a very real social illness, at least partially connected to economic stagnation, which helped propel him into the White House.

Significantly, thirty-seven states witnessed significant jumps in midlife mortality in the years leading up to 2017. As the researchers pointed out, however, the trend was concentrated in certain states, many of which, for example in New England, did not support Trump in 2016.

“Between 2010 and 2017, the largest relative increases in mortality occurred in New England (New Hampshire, 23.3%; Maine, 20.7%; Vermont, 19.9%, Massachusetts 12.1%) and the Ohio Valley (West Virginia, 23.0%; Ohio, 21.6%; Indiana, 14.8%; Kentucky, 14.7%), as well as in New Mexico (17.5%), South Dakota (15.5%), Pennsylvania (14.4%), North Dakota (12.7%), Alaska (12.0%), and Maryland (11.0%). In contrast, the nation’s most populous states (California, Texas, and New York) experienced relatively small increases in midlife mortality.

Eight of the 10 states with the highest number of excess deaths were in the industrial Midwest or Appalachia, whereas rural US counties experienced greater increases in midlife mortality than did urban counties.

A tragic irony of the study suggests that greater access to healthcare, notably among the more affluent white population, actually correlates to an increase in higher mortality rates. The reason is connected to the out-of-control prescription of opioid drugs to combat pain and depression.

“The sharp increase in overdose deaths that began in the 1990s primarily affected white populations and came in 3 waves,” the report explained: (1) the introduction of OxyContin in 1996 and overuse of prescription opioids, followed by (2) increased heroin use, often by patients who had become addicted to prescription opioids, and (3) the subsequent emergence of potent synthetic opioids (eg, fentanyl analogues)—the latter triggering a large post-2013 increase in overdose deaths.

“That white populations first experienced a larger increase in overdose deaths than nonwhite populations may reflect their greater access to health care (and thus prescription drugs).”

In September, Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin, reached a tentative settlement with 23 states and more than 2,000 cities and counties that sued the company, owned by the Sackler family, over its role in the opioid crisis

Other factors also helped to drive up the U.S. mortality rate, including alcoholic liver disease and suicides, 85% of which occurred with a firearm or other method.

The United States spends more on health care than any other country, yet its overall health report card fares worse than those of other wealthy countries. Americans experience higher rates of illness and injury and die earlier than people in other high-income nations.

Researchers were perplexed but not surprised by the data as there existed clear signs back in the 1980s that the United States was heading for a cliff as far as longevity rates go.

So what is it that’s claiming the life of Americans, many at the prime of their life, at a faster pace than in the past? The reality is that it is likely to be an accumulation of negative factors that are finally beginning to take a toll. For example, apart from the opioid crisis, there has also been an almost total collapse of union representation across Corporate America, which has essentially crushed any form of workplace democracy. This author, a former member of three worker unions, witnessed this egregious abuse of corporate power firsthand, which is apparent by the total stagnation of wages for many decades.

Today’s real average wage – that is, after accounting for inflation – has about the same purchasing power it did about half a century ago. Meanwhile, in the majority of cases, increases in salary have a marked tendency to go to the highest-paid tier of executives.

In a report by Pew Research, “real terms average hourly earnings peaked more than 45 years ago: The $4.03-an-hour rate recorded in January 1973 had the same purchasing power that $23.68 would today.”

One needs only consider the growing mountain of tuition debt now consuming the paychecks of many university graduates, many of whom have yet to land their dream 6-figure job from their relatively worthless liberal education, to better understand the quiet desperation that exists across the country.

At the same time, the exponential rise in the use of social media, which has been proven to trigger depression and loneliness in users, also deserves serious consideration. What society is experiencing with its massive online presence is a total overhaul as to the way human beings relate to each other. Presently, it would be very difficult to argue that the changes have been positive; in fact, they seem to be contributing to the early demise of millions of Americans in the prime of life.

Taken together, abusive labor practices that ignores workplace democracy, the epidemic of opioid usage, compounded by the anti-social features of ‘social media’ suggests a perfect storm of factors precipitating the rise of early deaths in the United States. Since all of these areas fall in one way or another under the control of corporate power, this powerful agency must find ways to help address the problem. The future success of America depends upon it.

When the Chinese economy is booming, Mainlanders head to Macau to wager some of their disposable income at casinos. When the economy decelerates, sort of like what’s happening at the moment, gamblers stay home because of economic pessimism. 

New data from the Gaming Inspection & Coordination Bureau, first reported by Bloomberg, shows gross gaming revenue for Nov. was $2.8 billion, down 8.5% YoY. 

Year to date, gross gaming revenue sagged 2.4%, comes at a time when the Chinese government has told its citizens to embrace lower-economic growth. 

Macau’s gross gaming revenue is expected to record its first yearly decline since 2016, as several headwinds have developed. 

Several months ago, JP Morgan analyst DS Kim told Reuters that the casino slump in Macau is due to “social unrest in Hong Kong, tough year-on-year comparison, negative headlines around junkets, and macro headwinds.”

Credit Suisse Group analyst Kenneth Fong said Visa policies to Macau had been tightened ahead of President Xi Jinping’s visit this month. These restrictions, Fong said, are hurting visitation numbers into the late year. 

The Bloomberg Intelligence index of Macau casino operators slipped 3.4% in November. Though the index is still up for the year, it has dropped 20% from a peak in Apr. 

Wynn Macau Ltd.HK is down more than 42% since 2Q18 highs. 

With no turn up in the China Momentum Indicator, there’s a high probability that Macau’s gaming industry will continue decelerating into 2020. 

World stocks are ignoring the slowdown in China and in the Macau gaming industry.

Gaming industries in Macau and the US appear to exhibit signs of weakness. 

The global gaming industry appears weak, as well. Maybe highlights how consumers across the world are pulling back on casino spending as the global trade recession is imminent. 

Authored by Matthew Ehret via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

In Chrystia Freeland’s 2012 book Plutocrats, Canada’s leading Rhodes Scholar laid out a surprisingly clear analysis of the two camps of elites who she explained would, by their very nature, battle for control of the newly emerging system as the old paradigm collapsed.

In her book and article series, she described the “practical populist politician” which has tended to be adherent to business interests and personal gain during past decades vs the new breed of “technocrat” which has an enlightened non-practical (ie: Malthusian) worldview, willing to make monetary sacrifices for the “greater good”.

She further defined the “good Plutocrats” vs “bad Plutocrats”.

Good Plutocrats included the likes of George Soros, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos who made their billions under the free-for-all epoch of globalization, but who were willing to adapt to the new rules of the post-globalization game. This was a game which she defined in an absurd 2013 TED Talk as a “green New Deal” of global regulation under a de-carbonized (and depopulated) green economy.

For those “bad plutocrats” unwilling to play by the new rules (ie: the Trumps, Putins or any industrialist who refused to commit seppuku on the altar of Gaia), they would simply go extinct. This threat was re-packaged by Canada’s “other” globalist puppet Mark Carney, who recently said “If some companies and industries fail to adjust to this new world, they will fail to exist.”

Of course, when Freeland formulated these threats in 2011, China’s Belt and Road had not yet existed, nor had the Russia-China alliance which together are now challenging the regime-change driven world order in remarkably successful strides. The thought that nationalism could possibly make a comeback in the west was as unthinkable as the failure of free trade deals like NAFTA or the TPP.

As of November 18, 2019, Freeland has found herself cut down a notch by the “plutocrats” that she has worked so assiduously to destroy since becoming Canada’s Foreign Minister in 2017 when she ousted a Foreign Minister (Stephane Dion) who had called for a renewed cooperation with Russia on space, counter-terrorism and arctic development with Sergei Lavrov. Freeland’s unrepentant support for Ukrainian Nazis and NATO encirclement of Russia resulted in a total alienation of Russia. Her alienation of China was so successful that the Chinese government removed their ambassador in the summer of 2019. Freeland’s work in organizing the failed coup in Venezuela and supporting the MI6-Soros White Helmets in Syria became so well known that she became known as the Canadian queen of regime change.

Other pro-Chinese “bad plutocratic” companies which have been targeted for destruction under Freeland’s watch have included the beleaguered construction giant Aecon Inc. who’s board voted in favor of being sold to China in March 2018 in order to play a role in Belt and Road Projects (a decision vetoed by the Federal Government in May 2018), as well as Quebec-based SNC Lavalin which has had major deals with both Russia and China on nuclear power and major infrastructure projects and which now faces being shut down in Canada for having bribed politicians in Libya when it built Qadaffi’s Great Manmade River (destroyed by NATO in 2011).

Former Liberal Minister of Infrastructure from Shawinigan Quebec, Francois-Philippe Champagne has taken over Freeland’s portfolio and with him it appears a new pro-Eurasian policy may be emerging in Canada much more conducive to the long term survival (and strategic relevance) of Canada. This shift has already been noted by China which has responded by sending a new Ambassador to Ottawa, while a new Canadian Ambassador with a long history of working towards positive Chinese relations in the private sector (Dominic Barton) has just begun working in Beijing. Barton was the first Ambassador to China since “old guard” politician John McCallum was fired in January 2019 for defending Huawei’s Meng Wanzhou to a group of Chinese journalists.

In opposition to the cacophonic voice of Freeland, Champagne had spoken positively of China in 2017 saying:

“In a world of uncertainty, of unpredictability, of questioning about the rules that have been established to govern our trading relationship, Canada, and I would say China, stand out as [a] beacon of stability, predictability, a rule-based system, a very inclusive society.”

Champagne is a long-standing protégé of former Prime Minister Jean Chretien and world travelled businessman who has worked in the European nuclear sector and has promoted industrial development with China for years. Jean Chretien, who campaigned for Champagne’s recent re-election, represents everything Freeland hates: A “practical” old school politician who recognizes that World War III and alienating Eurasian nations who are shaping the future is bad for business. In 2014, Chretien was given the “Friend of Russia” award and has played a major role in the private sector working with Quebec-based Power Corporation which runs the Canada-China Business Council (CCBC) and has brokered major contracts throughout China since ending his term as PM in 2003. Chretien is also the father in-law of current CCBC chair Paul Desmarais Jr. who is the heir to the PowerCorp dynasty. While these are not groups that in any way exemplify morality, they are practical industrialists who know depopulation and world war are bad for business and would prefer to adapt to a China-led BRI system over a “green technocratic dictatorship”.

Since December 2018, Chretien has attacked Freeland’s decision to support Meng Wanzhou’s extradiction to the USA, and has volunteered to lead a delegation to China in order to smooth tensions.

So while the “bad plutocrats” appear to have taken an important step forward though the debris of the recent near failure of the Liberal Party which narrowly kept a minority government after the October 21 Federal Elections, the ideologically driven technocrats led by Queen Freeland shouldn’t be discounted, as her new position as Deputy Prime Minister puts her in a position to possibly take control of Canada as 2nd in command of a highly fragmented nation which is now hearing renewed calls for separation in Alberta, and Quebec.

It was only about 10 days ago that Elon Musk revealed Tesla’s new Cybertruck to legions of adoring sycophants and – well, the rest of the world who laughed at him and ridiculed the truck’s design. Even Denny’s took shots at Musk.

And why wouldn’t they? The unveiling of the truck was a full scale disaster, complete with two broken windows and a passenger side back wheel that looked like it was about to fall off from underneath the truck. So, naturally, Musk claims that the cult of Tesla has already pre-ordered 250,000 of them. We documented the full unveiling circus in a writeup here. 

Now, we’re starting to get a glance into why the truck and its unveiling looked like such a poorly planned concept: because they were. 

Musk said in early November, just several weeks before the unveiling, that the company does “zero market research whatsoever” when designing a new product, according to a new article from the Wall Street Journal. 

In other words, Musk wants to enter the best segment of the auto industry: the highly profitable, billion dollar pickup truck segment, and he has done no research as to how best to meet the needs of potential customers.

Is it any wonder the company is losing close to $1 billion per year?

And how does Musk defend the strategy of doing no research? The idea seems “seems especially reckless in the age of Big Data,” the WSJ says. Especially while companies like Google, Apple and Facebook have based their success by doing nothing but harvesting and analyzing data. In other words, they don’t make blind bets, like Musk is doing. 

In a forthcoming book, “The Power of Experiments: Decision-Making in a Data-Driven World,” Harvard professors Michael Luca and Max Bazerman show how such experiments have helped organizations from eBay to the U.K. tax authority make better decisions. By testing different strategies on a limited pool of unwitting customers before implementing them, they say, companies can eliminate guesswork and intuition and build products and processes “that better account for the many quirks of human behavior.”

But Musk isn’t interested in that; rather, he seems interested only in what Elon Musk wants.

The Tesla CEO said at a November 5th event, about 16 days before the Cybertruck unveiling: “A lot of times people try to make products that they think others would love but they don’t love them themselves. Tesla’s approach is to start by imagining the platonic ideal of a car. I find that if you do that, people will want to buy it. If it’s compelling to you it will be compelling to others.”

Musk called the truck an “an armored personnel carrier from the future” on November 5th before stating at the unveiling:  “Trucks have been the same for a very long time, like 100 years. We wanted to try something different.” 

One thing is for sure: if the truck’s specs as listed survive to production at the same price point that Musk pitched ($39,900), the styling of the truck may not be an issue with customers. However, based on Musk’s inability to deliver at the price ranges he has pitched in the past Model 3 , we find it highly unlikely the Cybertruck, as shown, will be sold at the $39,900 price point. 

But it’s Musk’s method of “shooting first and asking questions later” that the WSJ takes exception with. “Put simply, today’s geniuses study problems. Only suckers make bets,” the piece concludes. 

Perhaps Musk doesn’t understand that as a public company you can’t be all visionary (if you even want to call him that). Unicorns and rainbows will only hold the stock up for so long, until such time as investors demand the company turns a profit. Musk has been, and continues to skate on thin ice by wholly ignoring this reality and its an inevitability that could come at anytime. Burning billions of dollars is not a business plan – it only works until it doesn’t.