It's Friday!

The GDP number came in at 2.2% and the lowest estimate I saw was 2.6%.  This follows what I've been saying about the recovery.  I think it's only a matter of time before The Bernank gooses the system with more liquidity.  Precious metals and their stocks are moving off their lows I think.

The first piece is from Krieger's new blog.

The Rebirth of Barter

Posted on April 26, 2012
Justice in the hands of the powerful is merely a governing system like any other. Why call it justice? Let us rather call it injustice, but of a sly effective order, based entirely on cruel knowledge of the resistance of the weak, their capacity for pain, humiliation and misery.
- Georges Bernanos
(1888-1948)

Outwardly we have a Constitutional government. We have operating within our government and political system, another body representing another form of government, a bureaucratic elite which believes our Constitution is outmoded.
- Senator William Jenner
(1908-1985) U.S. Senator (IN-R)

The Final Act of the Uruguay Round, marking the conclusion of the most ambitious trade negotiation of our century, will give birth – in Morocco – to the World Trade Organization, the third pillar of the New World Order, along with the United Nations and the International Monetary Fund.
- Government of Morocco
April, 1994   Source: New York Times, full page ad by the government of Morocco

Before I get into the email I want to remind everyone that I launched a blog a week ago and it can be found here: http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/  I have also recently added a twitter account if you want to get updates on posts that way and there is a button on the right sidebar for that.  Ok, now onto the fun stuff…

The Plates of Power are Shifting
What an amazing time to be alive.  Whereas in prior decades plans for global dominance by TPTB via a global fiat currency and supranational organizations set up under the guise of “the general welfare” were largely kept hidden from the public, there was always going to be a coming out party where these control-freaks needed to “sell” global bondage to the 99.9%.  Whether you believe 9/11 and the collapse of 2008 were planned or just randomly happened is largely irrelevant.  What is indisputable at this stage is that these events were both used as the “crises” to announce their plans.  9/11 was the catalyst to sell the sheeple on the police state here in America and in reality across the entire globe.  Despite the fact that you probably have a greater likelihood of being hit by lightning while riding a tricycle than being killed in a terrorist attack, heightened fear was encouraged and promoted by the media and our government in order to put in the infrastructure for a total police state.  Many people stood up at the time and pointed out that this event was being used to manipulate people into going along with a shredding of the Bill of Rights, but most of us remained completely compliant out of shock and fear.  Then, seven years later we had the global financial crisis.  While 9/11 played on people’s fear of physical harm, the GFC played on people’s fear of financial harm.  As soon as it happened the selling process was on.  The sale was that capitalism had failed.  We needed more government.  More importantly, the Central Planners (the FED and all other Central Banks) were made out to be the heroes.  We were told at the time and continue to be told to this very day that if it were not for the decisive action and infinite wisdom of these mandarins we would be back to the stone age.  Combined, the attacks of 9/11 and the GFC were used as the vehicles through which to more overtly announce and sell the implementation of the long planned New World Order.

As we know, for every action there is a reaction and I am pleased to say that the reaction from the public has generally speaking (albeit very gradually) been in contrast to what TPTB had hoped for.  While I think 9/11 was a great success for them the GFC was not.  In fact, I think it was the absurdness of the actions to save the system since 2008 and the clear theft and consolidation of power by the financial elite since that date that has served more than anything else to wake up tens if not hundreds of millions of people throughout the world.  This has clearly frustrated the plans of these clowns and their concern was quite evident on the face of The Bernank during yesterday’s press conference.  Things are now falling apart so fast for these guys behind the scenes that they are being forced into increasingly desperate action.  This increasingly desperate action is then being translated into more sheeple waking up, which in turn is resulting in the undesired response from the public and even sovereign nations themselves.

Nowhere is this becoming more clear than with the whole Iran fiasco, which may end up being one of the biggest geopolitical mistakes in United States history.  This should not come as a surprise since as I mentioned recently the people running this country are more cunning and manipulative than they are wise or knowledgeable.  They actually collectively remind me of the child King Joffrey Baratheon in HBO’s Game of Thrones.  Washington D.C., Wall Street and much of corporate America are being run by petulant, power-lusting, stunted-adults who are incapable of seeing beyond the next move in the game.  They are playing checkers while their opponents are playing chess.  This is what is so amusing about the whole imminent failure to implement the New World Order.  Their parents or those that came before them might have been able to pull it off.  They were far smarter.  These guys are ten year olds with a crown strutting around with no clothes on.

The Rebirth of Barter
One of the most important articles I have read this week comes from Forbes contributor Gordon Chang.  In it he states that China is preparing to avoid U.S. sanctions on Iran by paying for oil with gold.  Not only that but he also mentions that China has already been bartering with Iran to get a hold of petroleum.  He states:

Read more here:  http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/

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I thought this was a good comment from Stansberry about the WMT scandal.  Mostly, it's about the US loving to incarcerate people.

On Tuesday, I stirred the pot by asking who, if anyone, was hurt by Wal-Mart's alleged Mexican bribes… clearly implying the acts hurt "nobody." Many readers were able to let go of their fears about appearing disreputable and gave the matter serious consideration. Bravo to them. They made me proud and happy to do what I do for a living.

Other responses dismissed my question with the glib phrase… "The law is the law." That's what otherwise rational adults sound like when they refuse to take responsibility for determining right from wrong. It's the easy way out of one of life's most important and difficult tasks. To suggest U.S. law is an infallible representation of right and wrong is just silly.

The United States imprisons 700 people for every 100,000 people in the population… That's more than any other country on Earth… more than North Korea… more than Libya… more than Iraq or Mozambique… Pick whatever godforsaken hellhole you like… it doesn't have nearly the per-capita prison population that we do. More than 7 million people in the U.S. are in prison, jail, or on probation. If you say, "the law is the law," you're not even in the conversation.

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STOCKS AND POLITICS - In the last 50 years (1962-2011), the S&P 500 has been up +21.3% per year (total return) under a Democrat President and a Republican-led Congress, nearly 5 times the +4.5% annual return achieved under a Republican President and a Congress controlled by the Democrats. The stock index gained +11.5% per year when the White House and Congress were controlled by the same political party. The worst stock performance came under a split Congress (up +5.7% per year) regardless of which party controlled the White House (source: BTN Research).

VERY RARE - There are 31 Americans worth at least $10 billion. There are 313 million American citizens. Thus, 1 out of every 10 million Americans is worth at least $10 billion (source: Forbes).

ALMOST FIFTY - Jamie Moyer became the oldest person ever to win a major league baseball game last Tuesday (4/17/12), breaking a 79 ½ year old record when the Colorado Rockies beat the San Diego Padres 5-3 in Denver. At 49 years, 150 days in age, Moyer has thrown 58,753 pitches in his 25-year career (source: MLB).

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What Falling Milk Prices Say About an Economic Slowdown

The decline of milk prices this year has been a welcome development for consumers pressured by $4 a gallon gas, but could be a bad sign for the economy.

Falling milk prices—particularly over the past decade—have been a warning signal for a slowdown, while rising prices have accompanied upturns in the economy, according to research from Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at ConvergEx in New York.

"That's good news for this high-profile consumer good and its effect on inflationary expectations," Colas said. "At the same time, milk prices have been cyclical since the Great Depression. The pullback in 2012 could therefore be a useful early warning sign about a slowing U.S., and global, recovery."

Prices pulled back during the recessions   of 2002-03 and 2009, while they surged in 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2011.

More recently, milk has been on a slow but steady decline since reaching a historical peak in September, falling nearly 4 percent at the supermarket and nearly 25 percent in recent days at the distributor level.

The current price of $3.86 a gallon is still high by historical levels, but drifting lower as demand fades.

The milk futures contract has risen 6 percent over the past month a half, but the American Restaurant Association expects that to fade due to a larger than expected milk cow herd.

"A more sluggish domestic economy is always bad for milk prices, so we have to treat the recent pullback as a warning sign about the national economy," Colas said. "Moreover, exports of milk products were an estimated 13 percent of production, which means weaker prices may also be a sign of diminished demand in global markets."

Other indicators are confirming what milk is showing, though consumer prices broadly are up 2.7 percent over the past year.

The Chicago Federal Reserve's National Activity Index, though not one of the market's more widely followed barometers, nevertheless posted a minus-0.29 Thursday, indicating economic contraction.

"An index reading of less than zero depicts an economy growing at below trend and easing pressures on future inflation," said Andrew Wilkinson, chief economic strategist at Miller Tabak in New York. "That is a positive development set against the higher inflation projections at yesterday’s (Federal Reserve) meeting although no one wants to see growth tapering off."

One area of which investors should take note: Colas found that demand for organic milk actually has increased 22 percent, translating to higher prices and perhaps indicative of a two-speed recovery where higher-end goods are trending stronger than their lower-cost alternatives.

"Not only are milk prices a useful economic indicator...and a proxy for inflationary expectations... but also a great barometer between a commodity and a differentiated good," Colas said. "Different, in this case, is very good."

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Could The New York Times Sell Its Scoops to Hedge Funds?

Felix Salmon has raised an interesting question: could The New York Times sell early access to market-moving scoops to hedge funds?

After The New York Times published the results of its investigation of the Wal-Mart bribery case, something like $12 billion came off its market cap.

Clearly, early access to the story would have been very valuable to traders. So, in this age of cash-strapped news organizations, shouldn’t The New York Times be able to monetize the value of scoops by selling early access to hedge funds?


Felix explains:

In a sense, there’s something very economically inefficient about scoops like this one. The NYT story came out in the middle of the weekend, when markets were closed; when they opened on Monday morning, both Walmart and Walmex had billions of dollars shaved off their market capitalizations, but no one was given the opportunity to short those stocks at their prior level. After many months of diligent and valuable work on this story, one would think that a genuinely capitalist economy wouldn’t just leave money on the table like that.

It’s very clear that The New York Times isn’t in the front-running business. In fact, I suspect that the potential market-moving effect of the story played a role in the timing of the publication. By publishing it over the weekend, the editors assured that information would be fully disseminated into the market before anyone could trade Wal-Mart’s stock [WMT  59.12     0.17  (+0.29%)       ]. No one received even a momentary edge from asymmetric information.

But let’s say a particularly enterprising publisher took over at the paper and decided to launch a NYT: Frontrunner subscription service.

Would it work? Would it be legal?

Commenters on Felix’s post, particularly Daniel Davies, have argued that the Times and its subscribers would be engaging in illegal insider trading. I don’t think that’s correct.

Let’s take that New York Times story. It’s very clear that reporters at the Times had access to material non-public information about Wal-Mart. Some of this appears to have been acquired from Wal-Mart insiders in breach of their duties of confidentiality owed to their employer.

On the surface, this sounds like the makings of an insider-trading case. You have many of the key elements: (a) non-public information, (b) materiality, and (c) an intentional breach of a duty confidentiality.

There is, however, one element missing: the personal benefit for the insiders providing the information.

In a 1983 case known as Dirks v. SEC, the Supreme Court held that a corporate insider who discloses material nonpublic information to someone who trades on the stock of the insider’s company cannot be held liable unless the tipper benefited or expected to benefit from making the tip. What’s more, the trader also couldn’t be held liable unless the tipper benefited—even if the trader made a profit by trading on the insider information.

The facts of the Dirks case make its applicability to the Wal-Mart case even clearer. Raymond Dirks was a Wall Street stock analyst specializing in the insurance sector. On a spring day in 1973, Dirks got a tip that an insurance and mutual fund company called Equity Funding of America was fraudulently overstating its assets. The tip came from Ronald Secrist, a former officer of Equity Funding, who urged Dirks to investigate.

Dirks flew out to Equity Funding’s Los Angeles headquarters and met with several officers and employees. Senior management denied any wrong-doing—as senior management tends to do. But certain employees corroborated Secrist’s charges.

Throughout the investigation, Dirks discussed the information he was obtaining with a number of clients and investors. Some sold Equity Funding stocks, including five investment advisers who liquidated holdings of more than $16 million. During Dirk’s two-week investigation, the price of Equity Funding stock fell from $26 per share to less than $15 per share.

Dirk’s also contacted the L.A. bureau chief of the Wall Street Journal and shared his information with the paper. The bureau chief thought the allegations were too far-fetched. He was also worried about being sued if the allegations turned out to be false.

The rapid decline in price, with no publicly announced news, led the New York Stock Exchange to halt trading on March 27. Shortly thereafter, California insurance authorities impounded Equity Funding's records and uncovered evidence of fraud. The Wall Street Journal then ran a front page story about the fraud, based mostly on information Dirks had given the paper.

The Securities and Exchange Commission rewarded Dirks’ work uncovering this massive fraud by charging him with insider trading. Although he didn’t trade the stock himself, he passed along the insider “tip” about the fraud. The idea was that train of tipper-tippee liability stretched from Secrist and other tipper employees, to Dirks who was both a tippee and a tipper, to his clients who traded on the information.

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I'm sorry in advance to any females that are offended by these 2 videos.  I just couldn't help myself on a Friday.

This is the best burger commercial ever.  I know you have all seen it but this is the director's cut.


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Since youtube kept throwing Kate Upton videos at me, I bet you can't win the staring contest...