A Trend Alert From Trends Journal
Everything is not alright. And things are going to get worse . . . much worse. The economy is on the threshold of calamity. Wars are spreading like wildfires. The world is on a razor’s edge.
Not so, say world leaders and mainstream media experts. Yes, there are problems, but the financiers and politicians are aware of them. Policies are already in place and measures are being taken to correct them.
Whether it’s failing economies, intractable old wars or raging new wars, the word from the top always maintains that steady progress is being made and comforts the populace with assurances that the brightest minds and the sharpest generals are in charge and on the case. On all fronts, success is certain and victory is at hand. Only “patience” is required . . . along with more men, more time and more money.
As far as these “leaders” and their media are concerned, the only opinions that count come from a stable of thoroughbred experts, official sources and political favorites. Only they have the credentials to speak with authority and provide trustworthy forecasts. That they are consistently, if not invariably, wrong apparently does nothing to diminish their credibility.
How can any thinking adult possibly imagine that the same central bankers, financiers and politicians responsible for creating the economic crisis are capable of resolving it? Within days of its announcement, we predicted that Bush’s TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) was destined to fail, and subsequently predicted the same for Obama’s stimulus package (The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act). They were no more than cover-ups; there would be no recovery.
Meet the New Plan, Same as the Old Plan
Democrat or Republican, it makes no difference. Despite the heated rhetoric, solving economic problems had less to do with the party in power and more to do with professional competence. Both sides had their turn in office. Both used their power to initiate policies that created the problems. Both sides had their shot at fixing the messes they were responsible for. Both sides failed, as we predicted. Given who they are and what they’ve done, we confidently predict an unbroken sequence of bipartisan failures in the future.
The Beltway Incompetents are in the driver’s seat. What person with a healthy instinct for self-preservation would believe the promises of politicians or trust the judgment of central bankers or Wall Street financiers whose only real interest is self interest?
Not “Business as Usual”
In the 1920s, U.S. President Calvin Coolidge declared, “The business of America is business.” Four score and 10 years later, the business of America has become war: The forty-year War on Drugs; The ten-year War on Terror; the Afghan War (longest in American history); the eight-years-and-no-end-in-sight Iraq War; the covert wars in Pakistan and Yemen; and most recently, the “time-limited, scope-limited kinetic military action” in Libya.
While the justifications for engaging in these wars were all different, all were murderous, immoral, interminable, ruinously expensive and abject failures. Why would anyone believe the optimistic battle communiques issued by the “czars” in charge and the battlefield brass who keep reassuring the public that reapplying previously failed strategies would, this time, lead to success?
Yet even in the face of their proven failures and gross incompetence, anyone daring to challenge the party line or the conventional wisdom is dismissed as an “alarmist,” “fear monger,” or “gloom-and-doomer.” However unwelcome our forecasts may be – pessimism, optimism, like or dislike are all irrelevant – only their accuracy counts. We correctly forecast:
* Afghan and Iraq Wars would be debacles
* Bursting of the housing bubble
* The “Gold Bull Run”
* The “Panic of ’08”
* European Monetary Union crisis
* Failure of U.S. bailout/stimulus packages to revive housing and create jobs
* Falling governments, spreading civil wars and social upheaval on a global scale
We also said that the Federal Reserve’s sighting of economic “green shoots” in March 2009 was a “mirage” and predicted that their much vaunted “recovery” was no more than a temporary solution, a quick-fix to be followed by “The Greatest Depression.”
And now, in June 2011, with the Dow on a down trend and the economic data increasingly pointing in the direction of Depression, Washington and Wall Street remain in denial. The only debate among the “experts” is whether a “double dip” recession is likely.
However, for the man on the street – pummeled by falling wages, higher prices, intractable unemployment, rising taxes and punitive “austerity measures” – “Depression,” not “recession,” and certainly not “prosperity,” is just around the corner.
According to a June 8th CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, 48 percent of Americans believe that another Great Depression is likely to occur in the next year – the highest that figure has ever reached. The survey also indicates that just under half of the respondents live in a household where someone has lost a job or is worried that unemployment may hit them in the near future.
Suddenly, after years of obvious economic hardship experienced by tens of millions of Americans – only when the suffering and pain can no longer be cloaked in abstractions and cooked statistics – does an emboldened media dare utter the forbidden “D” word.
For Trends Journal readers, alerted to this emerging trend some three years ago, the prospect of Depression should come as no surprise. Neither should the idea that, when it hits and can no longer be denied, a long suffering public will take to the streets.
When I made this forecast back then it was written off by most of the major broadcast and print media. Now, however, when one of their own, belatedly and hesitantly, raises that possibility he is elevated to sage status and it becomes big news.
In early June, Democratic strategist James “It’s the Economy, Stupid” Carville, having finally mastered the higher math of adding two plus two, warned that decaying economic conditions heightened the risk of civil unrest.
As I described it all those years ago: “When people lose everything, and have nothing left to lose, they lose it.”
Trend Forecast: The wars will proliferate and civil unrest will intensify. As we forecast, the youth-inspired revolts that first erupted in North Africa and the Middle East are now breaking out in Europe (See “Off With Their Heads,” Trends Journal, Autumn 2010).
Given the trends in play and the people in power, economic collapse at some level is inevitable. Governments and central banks will be unrelenting in their determination to wring every last dollar, pound or euro from the people through taxes while confiscating public assets (a.k.a. privatization) in order to cover bad bets made by banks and financiers.
When the people have been bled dry financially and have nothing left to give, blood will flow on the streets.
Trend Lesson: Learn from history. Do you remember when it first became apparent that the U.S. economy was in deep trouble and heading toward the “Panic of 08”? Not many will. Most people were in a summer state of mind and in holiday mode. It was late July 2007 when the stock market suddenly plunged from its euphoric 14,000 high.
Though we had warned in our Summer 2007 Trends Journal (released that June) that “trends indicators point to a major crisis hitting the financial markets between July and November,” the diving Dow was downplayed as a mere “hiccup” . . . a time to pause between more mouthfuls of expansion.
Biggest mistake in a falling stock market
The huge swings in the Dow are giving investors pause. But taking your money out of the market now could be the gravest mistake of all.
NEW YORK – This past Thursday was the second worst day of the year for the Dow Jones Industrial Average. But remember, it was just a week ago today that the Dow closed above 14,000 for the first (and only) time.
Fluctuations in the market shouldn’t get to the 401(k) investor. Keep in mind your time horizon – most of us are going to be invested in the market until we retire, often decades from now. – CNN, July 27, 2007
Four years and trillions of dollars in stock and 401(k) losses later, that typical “take a deep breath, stay the course” advice looks tragically misguided. The Dow would eventually lose more than half its value and now, in June 2011, it’s fallen below 12,000.
The moral of this story is to not let your mind take a summer vacation. Conditions are rapidly deteriorating and it is imperative to remain on high alert. Another violent financial episode is looming. It may be triggered by economics (e.g., debt defaults and debt crisis contagion in Europe, a crashing US dollar, or commodity price spikes); it could be terror (false flag or real), a man-made disaster (another Fukushima) or one made by Mother Nature . . . or any combination of the above.
Publisher’s Note: To excel in any field – from gourmet chef to concert pianist to close-combat warrior – you have to practice . . . endlessly, over and over, until finally the training sinks in and becomes a part of you.
In that spirit, I again repeat: preparing for financial survival is a “practice.” And it has to be treated as if you are preparing for battle; expect the unexpected and prepare for the worst, which in these perilous times could be a declaration of economic martial law. Banks may close, currencies may be devalued and deposit withdrawals may be imposed. Remember Gerald Celente’s basic survival strategy, “GC’s Three G’s: Guns, Gold and a Getaway plan.”
In the Summer 2011 Trends Journal (mid-July release) we will provide practical strategies to cope with the coming collapse and offer approaches that, if implemented, could reverse the prevailing negative trends.
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Comments welcome.
Posted on June 14, 2011