Month: August 2023

Tucker Carlson flew to Hungary last week where he gave two powerful speeches – apologizing for the United States’ lack of diplomacy and its “cultural imperialism.”

Carlson started by apologizing on behalf of the United States after US Ambassador David Pressman, a gay activist, lectured the Hungarian government over LGBTQ rights.

“The point of diplomacy is not to hector other nations for its own sake,” said Carlson. “To show up in someone else’s country and scream at them because they’re different from you.”

“I’m not in the habit of apologizing for the United States. In fact, I don’t think I ever have, but the behavior of the American ambassador to Hungary makes me want to apologize,” said Carlson. “It’s disgusting and inexcusable. It’s also so far from the norms of diplomacy in my country that it’s hard for me to believe that David Pressman is actually doing what he’s doing.

“And so for a creep like David Pressman, who is not a diplomat – who’s a political activist and Biden donor – to show up in your country and lecture you about your culture, and threaten you because you do things differently from the way they do things where he lives… hurts the United States and is a grave embarrassment to me as an American, and an outrage to me as someone who pays his salary. It’s disgusting.“

Hungary under Orbán has been tightening laws targeting LGBT propaganda. Currently same-sex couples in Hungary aren’t allowed to adopt children, and changing genders is also illegal. Pressman, meanwhile is a gay human rights lawyer and California-born former aide to former US Secretary of State Madeline Albright. Earlier this year, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto slammed Pressman, saying he was way out of line.

Carlson also criticized America’s ‘cultural imperialism,’ insisting that larger countries have a responsibility not to force their ideologies or lifestyles onto smaller ones, and that this behavior undermines the notion of self-determination.

“That is not the basis of a successful Empire,” he said.

“Everybody wants Freedom everyone understands the concept of self-determination,” said Carlson, adding “Hungary isn’t hassling anybody else; Hungarians have views, your government has views.”

Tucker Carlson went off in Budapest:

“The ruling party is the childless, the unmarried, working for low wages for large corporations and living in tiny apartments in overcrowded cities rife with crime, having food delivered by immigrants, and spending time glued to a screen.” pic.twitter.com/Im62rNPShO

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) August 26, 2023

Carlson then warned: “It’s the ones who tell you the 180 degree opposite of the truth who you need to be careful of and they’re the ones who will enslave you.”

He also warned NATO… “The world is reseting completely. The post-war order is collapsing. NATO is going to collapse. NATO cannot stand long term.”

Tucker in Hungary: “The world is reseting completely. The post-war order is collapsing. NATO is going to collapse. NATO cannot stand long term.” pic.twitter.com/QzEla49erc

— TheBlaze (@theblaze) August 28, 2023

In closing, he recommended reading books.

“The most important thing I ever did other than get married was read books not tweets, not electronic but paper books in traditional form and read them every day,” said Carlson, pondering whether the decline in reading is responsible for the clouding of the world’s collective wisdom.

He then conveyed a message to the West…

“What Hungary is saying to the West is we want to be part of the West… maybe don’t push your garbage on us so aggressively,” he said – in essence, that Hungary doesn’t want to be an island, it wants to participate in Western civilization but without the oppressive force of cultural changes that don’t align with its values.

Watch the entire speech below:

Carlson’s speech echoes some of what he told a crowd in Esztergom, Hungary two years ago, when he told the crowd that the US media landscape lacks objectivity, and discussed the importance of respecting culture, history, and beauty in society. Carlson views these elements as essential for human happiness and effective governance, something he thinks Hungary has managed better than the U.S.

“If you disobey the political orders from the ruling party they’ll shut you down,” Carlson said (prior to being shut down).

Carlson was particularly struck by Hungary’s stance on migration. “Hungary stood alone essentially in saying you know no thanks, and that struck me as a totally legitimate thing to do,” he said, referring to the Orban’s decision to block migrants from entering the country.

Flashback:

Authored by Egon von Greyerz via GoldSwitzerland.com,

This 25 minute video with Matthew Piepenburg and myself is probably one of the most important discussions that we have had.

For years we have both warned investors about the consequences of a system based on unlimited money printing, debt creation and money debasement.

The world economy and the financial system is now on the cusp of a precipice. 

No one can forecast when the coming violent turn will come. 

It can take years or it can happen tomorrow. 

Future historians will tell us when it happened.

In the meantime investors have one duty to themselves and their dependents which is to protect their wealth from total destruction. 

Money printing and debt creation have taken markets to dizzy and unsustainable levels. 

Since Nixon closed the gold window in 1971, both global and US debt is up over 80X!

And asset markets have been inflated by this fake money with the Nasdaq up 120X and the S&P up 44X since 1971. 

But the bubbles are not just in stocks but also in bonds,  property, art, other collectibles etc, etc.

In our view, the time to pay the Piper is here and now. The consequences will be costly, even very costly for the investors who ignore this major risk. 

Just as bubble assets can go up exponentially they can implode even faster. 

RISK OF MARKETS FALLING 50-90%

Sustained corrections of 50% to 90% in stocks and bonds are very possible and when the bubble bursts it will go so fast that there won’t be time to get out or to buy insurance. 

Whether the Everything Bubble turns to the Everything Collapse today or tomorrow, the time to protect your assets is before it happens which means NOW. 

Forecasting the gold price is a Mug’s game . But understanding the significance of gold for protecting against unprecedented risk is not. We had the Ides of March in mid March this year when 4 US banks, led by Silicon Valley Bank and Credit Suisse, Switzerland’s second biggest bank all went under in a matter of days. 

That was a rehearsal. Bad debts and rising interest rates are a timebomb for the banking system. So is the $2-3 quadrillion derivatives risk. This gargantuan risks are before us  now and could materialise at any time starting this autumn. 

The risk of A Catastrophic Debt Implosion is just too big to ignore. 

In our video discussion below Matt and I discuss these risks and most importantly, the best way to protect or insure against this risk. 

Owning physical gold outside the banking system is by far the superior method to preserve wealth.  

But it is not just about buying physical gold but how you own it, where you store it, in what jurisdictions etc.

This is an area which MAM/GoldSwitzerland has focused on for a quarter of a century and has developed a superior system for HNWIs. 

Please watch this important discussion…

The head of the country which comprises NATO’s second largest military is planning a trip to Russia to meet with President Vladimir Putin.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made the announcement Monday, and teased potential progress for reestablishing the critical Black Sea grain deal, despite ongoing international tensions over Russia bombing Ukraine ports, which has been strongly condemned by the West.

“President Erdoğan has so far led an intense diplomacy in order to help prevent a global food crisis,” ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) spokesman Ömer Çelik said in announcing the upcoming trip, 

The meeting will be held as soon as next week, with Bloomberg reporting a date of Sept.8 – prior to Erdogan going on to India for the G20. The Turks as well as Russian media confirmed it will be hosted in Sochi. But it could happen early next week, with TASS mentioning September 4 as a possible date, citing diplomatic sources.

“Turkish news reports said Erdogan planned to bring up the issue of renewing the grain deal during the potential talks with his Russian counterpart,” TASS wrote. “Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov previously said that the meeting between the two leaders would take place shortly, but he did not name any specific dates.”

Since the Black Sea Grain Deal Initiative expired on July 17, and as Moscow pulled out (by not renewing it), global food prices have risen. Meanwhile Ukraine has with Western backing sought to establish an alternate export route by using the maritime territory of Romania and Bulgaria.

Within NATO, Erdogan has not been as vociferous in condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine compared to other leaders, instead playing more of an intermediary role, keeping diplomacy open. Prior to its collapse, Turkey touted the grain deal as its greatest achievement toward peace and dialogue related to the Ukraine war.

#Turkish President #Erdogan will reportedly meet #Russia‘s Putin next week.

▪️Erdogan could possibly go to Russia on Sept. 8, before traveling to India to attend the Group of 20 Summit in New Delhi, officials said. pic.twitter.com/ASgvefFol1

— EHA News (@eha_news) August 28, 2023

The West will be watching Erdogan’s actions closely, and likely some officials will condemn the Turkish leader’s trip to Russia outright, after China’s Xi was recently another major leader to visit Russia during the war.

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Rents are rising at a record pace in Germany. Politicians turn to a price control gambit guaranteed to fail…

Germany’s ruling party, the Social Democratic Party (SPD), is preparing to propose a three-year rent freeze nationwide to help tenants cope with rising housing costs. “We need to create a space where we can breathe – we need a rent freeze for the next three years,” says senior…

— Kuzey Piyasası (@kuzeypiyasasi) August 27, 2023

Rent Control Evidence

Please a September 2019 Stanford Business Study on The Effects of Rent Control Expansion on Tenants, Landlords, and Inequality: Evidence from San Francisco

Using a 1994 law change, we exploit quasi-experimental variation in the assignment of rent control in San Francisco to study its impacts on tenants and landlords. Leveraging new data tracking individuals’ migration, we find rent control limits renters’ mobility by 20 percent and lowers displacement from San Francisco. Landlords treated by rent control reduce rental housing supplies by 15 percent by selling to owner-occupants and redeveloping buildings. Thus, while rent control prevents displacement of incumbent renters in the short run, the lost rental housing supply likely drove up market rents in the long run, ultimately undermining the goals of the law.

A Brookings Study says “Rent control appears to help affordability in the short run for current tenants, but in the long-run decreases affordability, fuels gentrification, and creates negative externalities on the surrounding neighborhood. These results highlight that forcing landlords to provide insurance to tenants against rent increases can ultimately be counterproductive. If society desires to provide social insurance against rent increases, it may be less distortionary to offer this subsidy in the form of a government subsidy or tax credit. This would remove landlords’ incentives to decrease the housing supply and could provide households with the insurance they desire.”

Common Sense

Common sense suggests the same thing.

Landlords of rent control units have no incentive to make improvements, and developers do not want to add units in rent control areas.

The common remedy to the latter point is to offer developers incentives. Developer incentives further distorts the markets.

Rent Control Doesn’t Work, But It’s Still a Good Idea

Leave it To Vox to conclude Rent control won’t fix the housing crisis. It’s still a good idea.

Role of the Fed

None of the articles addressed the Fed’s role in creating housing bubbles, housing speculation, and asset bubbles in general.

The AirBnB Bubble Popping Will Pop The Housing Bubble https://t.co/iLM783yvj9

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 27, 2023

Charles Hugh Smith Via ZeroHedge

The Problem Isn’t a Housing Shortage, It’s the Concentration of Ownership by the Wealthy, this bubble is fundamentally an artifact of central bank and government policies that enrich the already-rich, who were incentivized to outbid each other with low-cost credit to snap up “investment properties” with their “surplus capital” that generate more income and capital gains that cash, which until recently was “trash” due to near-zero savings yields.

Bingo.

Rent controls cannot possibly address that fundamental problem.

The Fed Commits to a 2 Percent Inflation Target, Carefully

Please note The Fed Commits to a 2 Percent Inflation Target, Carefully

Powell’s Warnings

Here is the key thing Powell said today: “As is often the case, we are navigating by the stars under cloudy skies.”

And to that I would add, using tools like inflation expectations proven to be totally worthless.

The Fed creates bubbles because it is has no idea what inflation is. Hell bent on raising routine consumer inflation, the Fed ignored massive bubbles in housing.

The Housing Bubble Is Expanding Again

Case Shiller National and 10-City home prices indexes plus OER, CPI, and Rent indexes from the BLS.

After a two-month decline in most markets, prices are again on the rise.

For discussion, please see The Housing Bubble, as Measured by Case-Shiller, Is Expanding Again

Maybe Smith is right and the AirBnB Bubble will pop the housing bubble.

But meanwhile, Biden is doing everything he can to stoke inflation with energy policy and tariff madness.

*  *  *

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Libyan Foreign Minister Najla al-Mangoush met with her Israeli counterpart FM Eli Cohen last week in Rome.

Upon reports of the “controversial” meeting, mass protests have erupted across the country, which since Muammar Gaddafi’s overthrow at the hands of NATO-backed rebels has been in a state of internecine conflict and chaos.

FM Mangoush represents Libya’s Government of National Unity (GNU) in Tripoli, which is the United Nations and US-backed authority in Libya, following years in-fighting among rival Libyan factions ruling western, eastern, and southern parts of the country. 

The North African country has never recognized nor had diplomatic relations with Israel. Any dealings with Israeli are punishable by imprisonment, according to the Libyan penal code. 

Al Jazeera is reporting Monday that Foreign Minister Mangoush has been fired, which is a deeply ironic situation given the Tripoli government was literally installed after the US-NATO military intervention in 2011.

In wake of the controversy, both governments are now trying to downplay the Rome meeting as more of a chance encounter, but regional sources have pointed out the following:

Reporting from West Jerusalem, Al Jazeera’s Harry Fawcett said: “[An Israeli] foreign ministry spokesman said that it was a coordinated meeting, it was not something accidental bumping into, it was a deliberate, direct session of talks with Italian foreign minister in attendance.”

Over a decade after Obama pledged to bring “democracy” to Gaddafi’s Libya, by bombing it in support of NATO-armed rebels, the new government dismisses ministers for merely meeting with close US-ally Israel.

The Associated Press has revealed that no less than CIA Director William Burns was earlier this year dispatched by the White House to urge Tripoli to enter diplomatic relations with the Jewish state:

A Libyan government official said normalization of relations between the countries was first discussed in a meeting between the Tripoli-based prime minister, Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, and CIA Director William Burns, who visited the Libyan capital in January.

According to the official, Burns proposed that Dbeibah’s government, which is recognized as Libya’s internationally backed government, join the group of four Arab countries that normalized relations with Israel under the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords in 2020. The Libyan premier gave an initial approval, but he was concerned about public backlash in a country known for its past support for the Palestinian cause, the official said. 

Hard to imagine a better illustration of how the Israel obsession warps U.S. Middle East policy than sending the CIA director to pressure one of Libya’s two rival governments to normalize ties. Does it even fit on a Top 20 list of U.S. interests in Libya? https://t.co/k9WRqwX57H

— Aron Lund (@aronlund) August 28, 2023

Back in 2011, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was considered the “architect” of the war, which many pundits have also called “Obama’s Iraq”. Like with US policy in Syria, it resulted in arming and empowering jihadists and other fanatical Islamists. 

Rather than stemming the expansion of terrorism in the Mideast/North Africa (MENA) region, Washington’s “Arab Spring” era interventions served to exacerbate and spread terrorism in the region.

Authored by Bryan Jung via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A German court has sentenced one of its own judges to prison for ruling against the government’s mask mandates.

In 2021, Judge Christian Dettmar struck down a local government ordinance that required schoolchildren to wear masks in the German state of Thuringia. The case made headlines across Germany.

Judge Dettmar is now set to lose his legal career and pension and receive a two-year suspended prison sentence for allegedly “perverting the law.”

During the pandemic-era lockdowns, the Thuringian state government ruled that all children were to wear masks while at school, stay a minimum distance from each other, and take virus tests.

The judge ruled that masks shouldn’t be mandatory for children at two schools in Weimar, Thuringia, after the mother of two children, aged 8 and 14, complained that the masks were giving them insomnia, nausea, and headaches.

‘I Saw Danger in Delay’

Judge Dettmar told the schools in Weimar that they could no longer enforce the order, as the mandates weren’t compatible with the welfare of the children involved.

His decision immediately sparked outrage in the state government, which called for his punishment and removal.

The judge’s ruling was overturned by the Higher Regional Court in Erfurt, following a complaint by the state’s education department, which forced students to once again wear masks in schools.

The district court in Erfurt stated that only an administrative court held the jurisdiction to make such a ruling and that Judge Dettmar’s decision didn’t fall under the scope of his court.

“The good cause of protecting children, which they may have had in the back of their minds, does not justify the way,” the district court judge said in his ruling.

Judge Dettmar defended his decision on the matter, arguing that he had merely consulted certified university experts.

“I still don’t know why I’m sitting here. I have three grown-up children myself. At that time, I was driven by the everyday life of the schoolchildren. I saw danger in delay. The reports I use come from experienced university professors,” he said.

The high court decision also led to Judge Dettmar’s suspension from the bench after a disciplinary hearing was conducted by the Judicial Service Court.

State prosecutors then took action against the judge, charging him with “perverting the law” and ruling on a matter he had no authority over.

According to German public broadcasting channel MDR, the court heard arguments from prosecutors that Judge Dettmar had made his ruling as a political statement against lockdowns, not out of genuine concern for the children involved.

He was also accused of deleting emails and files from his computers to cover up the reason for his ruling.

A police raid on his home and his office, conducted only weeks after his ruling was overturned, seized his electronic devices, including his mobile phone, which contained private correspondence that allegedly revealed his bias against lockdown measures.

Prosecutors further accused the judge of being biased toward experts who were critical of lockdown rules before giving his verdict, according to the German tabloid Bild.

They said he met with them before hearing from the official experts who were consulted in the case when making his original decision.

Judge Dettmar said he did consult with scientists who were skeptical of the measures enacted by the government at the time.

State Prosecutors Want Harsher Sentence

Judge Dettmar had been suspended on probation pending the investigation’s results.

His legal team is considering an appeal in the case as he faces possible dismissal from his duties as a judge in addition to his two-year suspended sentence.

According to German law, a civil servant who’s sentenced to a custodial sentence of more than 12 months is deprived of both position and pension.

The prosecutors, who had originally asked for a three-year sentence, are also appealing the sentence, according to MDR, which has been following the story since it broke in 2021.

The defense has argued that the trial was politically motivated and was intended to silence dissenters.

Before his sentence, Judge Dettmar said he had no regrets about his decision and that he would make the same ruling again “out of deep inner conviction.”

“I have considerable doubts about the usefulness of masks. If you want to wear them voluntarily to school, you can do so, but we don’t have to patronize parents,” he said.

COVID Lockdown Rules, Revisited

Germany instituted some of the harshest restrictions in Europe during the COVID-19 pandemic. The German government eased most mandates in March 2022, but many German politicians were eager to reinstitute them, and stricter mask rules were issued the following winter.

While most of the world dropped mask travel requirements in 2022, the German government, under left-wing Social Democratic Party (SPD) Chancellor Olaf Scholz, waited until February to finally end the mandates on long-distance trains and buses.

SPD Health Minister Karl Lauterbach, who was known for his enthusiastic lockdown policies, claimed in February 2022 that the world would be dealing with COVID-19 for another 10 years, Der Spiegel reported, implying that Germany would also be dealing with pandemic measures to some degree for several years.

But Mr. Lauterbach told the German publication in January that “the population has built up high immunity, and the experts who advise us no longer believe there will be another big, serious winter wave.”

“At this point, we also don’t foresee particularly dangerous variants reaching us in the coming weeks and months,” he said.

Nonetheless, he appealed to the public to continue wearing masks voluntarily indoors and on trains.

In the United States, some schools and businesses are reintroducing mask requirements because of concerns about new variants of the virus.

France is defying the orders of Niger’s junta leaders, who have ordered France’s ambassador to immediately leave the country.

On Friday, French Ambassador Sylvain Itte was issued a letter telling him to exit the country within 48 hours, but Paris has said it will not recognize the “the putschists” but instead supports “a president who has not resigned,” according to fresh statements of French President Emmanuel Macron.

“Our policy is the right one. It depends on the courage of President Mohamed Bazoum, the commitment of our diplomats, of our ambassador on the ground who is remaining despite pressure,” Macron affirmed in a speech to a gathering of French ambassadors in Paris on Monday.

He also dismissed assertions that there’s reason to be afraid of Niger’s military rulers, given Amb. Itte could face arrest or even violence, also after earlier this summer the French embassy was attacked and set on fire by pro-coup demonstrators.

“One shouldn’t give in to the narrative used by the coup leaders that consists of saying France has become our enemy,” Macron said in the speech.

He also blamed Niger’s military coup leaders for country’s current economic woes and political instability. “The problem of Nigeriens today is the coup leaders who put them in danger because they are abandoning the fight against terrorism, because they are abandoning a policy that was economically good for (the population) and they are in the process of losing international funding that was helping them emerge from poverty,” he said.

But importantly, Russian media has picked up on an important part of speech where Macron said he’s willing to support military intervention if it is decided by a regional bloc of African states:

France is set to support any efforts, including military intervention, made by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to restore constitutional order in Niger, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday.

“We support the diplomatic and, if it is decided, the military activity of ECOWAS,” he said, adding that Paris will not drop its support for legitimately elected President Mohamed Bazoum.

UPDATE – French President Macron regarding Niger:

“Our policy is simple: we do not recognize the putschists, we support a president who has not resigned”.

“We support the diplomatic action, and when it decides, the military [decision] of ECOWAS”.

Subscribe to @WW3INFO pic.twitter.com/hNrTu5TRLJ

— TifaniesweTs (@TifaniesweTs) August 28, 2023

ECOWAS has made the threat several times, but has lately waffled in the face of Niger’s warning that it is ready to fight if invaded.

Niger also has a couple of regional supporters in the countries of Mali and Burkina Faso, both also run by juntas. These two outside powers would like jump by Niger’s side against the ECOWAS coalition.

Authored by Grzegorz Adamczyk via Remix News,

A company backed by the Soros Economic Development Fund has taken control of two major Polish newspapers, raising concerns over far-left media bias due to the billionaire oligarch’s progressive politics.

The Polish owner of the daily Rzeczpospolita and the financial daily Parkiet, Grzegorz Hajdarowicz, has sold a large proportion of his shares in Gremi Media, which owns the two papers, to the Dutch company Pluralis. This completes a deal struck in 2021 that saw Pluralis buy a minority stake with the option to buy extra shares later. 

As a result, Hajdarowicz has ceased to be the majority shareholder in Gremi Media, with the Dutch company Pluralis now owning 57 percent of the shares, which has allowed it to take control of the company, according to Business Insider.

One of the shareholders in Pluralis is the “Soros Economic Development Fund.”

The fact that billionaire George Soros, along with his surrogates, has become indirectly involved in the deal runs counter to his recent announcement that he is pulling out of being active within the European Union.

Soros has been highly active in former communist countries.

He is hostile to Poland’s ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party and the idea that it could win power for a third term in the parliamentary elections in October.

Soros supports liberal migration policies and deeper integration within the European Union. 

Poland’s state-backed oil and gas giant, Orlen, which has purchased a large number of regional papers, was in 2021 reported to be interested in purchasing the company then fully owned by Hajdarowicz.

However, Hajdarowicz preferred to sell the shares of Gremi Media to a foreign investor.