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crazy that him and kamala think i’ll vote for them again. my generation wont be tolerating this shit anymore
It just sucks that we'll likely have to deal with another 4 to 8 years of right-wing trash to MAYBE get something decent. That's a big MAYBE. Hell, DeSantis and his cronies are currently trying to pass a bill to protect white people from feeling guilty about racism. No, I'm not kidding. If that's who's president, it'll be Trump but with competency.
crazy that him and kamala think i’ll vote for them again. my generation wont be tolerating this shit anymore
It just sucks that we'll likely have to deal with another 4 to 8 years of right-wing trash to MAYBE get something decent. That's a big MAYBE. Hell, DeSantis and his cronies are currently trying to pass a bill to protect white people from feeling guilty about racism. No, I'm not kidding. If that's who's president, it'll be Trump but with competency.
It just sucks that we'll likely have to deal with another 4 to 8 years of right-wing trash to MAYBE get something decent. That's a big MAYBE. Hell, DeSantis and his cronies are currently trying to pass a bill to protect white people from feeling guilty about racism. No, I'm not kidding. If that's who's president, it'll be Trump but with competency.
Yep. Desantis scares me more than Trump.
At least Trump is largely incompetent and clueless. DeSantis is turning Florida into a little fascist state, ironically as he decries the left as fascists. Classic.
Either we need to destroy capitalism, or capitalism will destroy us all.
If you didn't notice yet, the stock market is tanking today and has been for the past few weeks. If my analysis is correct, we will be hearing a lot more about the market meltdown in the coming months. To help people steer the tumultuous waters, I will be providing more frequent analysis and commentary on here.
It's no secret that the prices of things have been increasing fast--real estate, stocks, bonds, luxury art, NFTs, bitcoin, shitcoin, etc etc. Basically, if you purchased *any asset* over the past 1,2,5, and 10 years, you are up big on your initial investment. You probably feel like a damn genius. Even if you're just parking your retirement money in stocks, you probably feel pretty good. This is asset price inflation, different than consumer inflation. For ten years, this has been a market where you simply can't lose. Buy some tech stock, win! Buy a flop house in Idaho, you're winning. Purchase an easily and infinitely reproducible unoriginal and hideous digital 'art' for $40 million--you're winning too! It's why everyone you talk to these days thinks they are a financial market genius. The gap between participants' perceived intelligence and the necessary set of skills to succeed in finance has never been greater. We basically have a global, highly speculative market of millions of greedy nubes being preyed on by the wealthiest people in the world--a Wolf of Wall Street level of fraud but with a $3 trillion market made of pixie dust. Speaking of, Jordan Belfort, the penny stock fraudster depicted in The Wolf of Wall Street whose activities which earned him a lifelong ban in professional finance, is a leader in the crypto space. With crypto, the scam is apparent, but irrational market participants have never let obvious red flags get in the way of a greedy frenzy.
Accompanying the asset price bubble has been the re-emergence of broad "inflation" in essential goods and services. Everything from food, gas, healthcare, childcare, housing (again), consumer goods are going up--and it's front page news across the world. Talk of "inflation" went from a phrase not uttered in a long term 30 year period--to front page news 24/7, it's happening in every single consumer item, and it seemingly happened overnight.
As I indicated in the foregoing paragraphs, inflation in assets and inflation in household/consumer prices are two totally separate categories. With one very notable exception: housing. Housing in the capitalist market is both the largest household budget item--and at the same time, the largest speculative financial instrument in the world--measured in tens of trillions. The richest people in the world are basically gambling with each other to drive the prices up of the largest single budget item on global households. The more the wealthy speculate in real estate, the more money it costs for the global population to put a roof over their heads. In the last decade especially, housing is not simply a household cost, but a tradable highly speculative asset. You don't need to be a financial wizard to see how this could end in absolute disaster. Now, I want you to imagine a world where the opposite of the price of everything is increasing-- where the prices of all assets is in quick decline, everywhere. Chinese stocks, European bonds, US stocks, commercial and residential real estate prices in North America--all declining in unison. What I predict will happen in 2022-2024 will be the the world's first globally synchronized real estate bubble crisis. The prices of these long term assets which people use to measure their household wealth will fall faster than anyone predicted. What won't fall is the outstanding debts---mortgages, but also other corporate, commercial, consumer, student, and financial debt. Even Non-financial corporations are in trouble--these are the most well known, 100-year old household brand name companies that employ millions of people--are currently holding more than $10 trillion in debt ---much of it is barely investment grade--basically subprime and at risk of default if the economy sours. Before Tesla made headlines with record high stock price and global sales, the company nearly missed their debt payment and is still highly leveraged. Without massive and quarterly federal subsidies, Tesla would have gone bankrupt. Companies and households will need to pay back these debts as the value of assets upon which they borrowed the money will be falling. Imagine the companies that recently bought back their own shares with borrowed cash, or the households which took on a massive mortgage in the past 18 months simply to put a roof over their heads. And again, all these households are paying more for much less in return: there are no new schools, no new school funding, no new roads, nearly all communities are in the grips of a permanent pandemic. In short, there is quite literally nothing happen in Burgsiberg, Ohio, southern, NH or bumbleturd, Idaho that warrants a 30% increase in housing prices.
Now, it's natural to be skeptical about how much this means for the average worker. As some workers who don't own stocks (50% of the entire US population) have commented, "Well, I don't own any shares, so why should i care?" while some others have remarked on the inherent unfairness of a system that doesn't reward 80% of the workers when there's a bubble--in fact it just made everything required to live more expensive--but when the stock market tanks, it means the vast majority of people will suffer even more when the value of the only asset they have declines and the employment and income gains with it.
And there's reason to believe when this present bubble bursts--I believe it is happening right now now---the impact on the broader economy will be more far reaching than previous cycles. Allow me to explain. When the stock market bursts this time the 'wealth effect' will be much greater. Basically, the 'wealth effect' is a concept that wealth destruction in the stock market will have a knock-on impact on consumer spending. For every $1 trillion lost in the stock market valuation, some x% of damage will be done to consumer spending. When only a small portion of wealthy households hold stock--the wealth effect is actually small. For example, 12 years ago, the stock market could fall 40% and the knock to consumer spending was minimal because so few people owned stock. The problem is that now US households have more stock and equity as a percentage of their portfolio than ever. Millions of amateur investors along with the largest trading houses have been borrowing money to inflate these assets. What will happen when the value of everyone's stock portfolio drops 30%---and possibly followed by a fall in the value of their home(s). A significant percentage of homes purchased in Canada and the US are being purchased by people who already own more than 4 homes. But even these people, more well off than most, are not immune to a swift and sudden change in prices.
Mainstream commentators have been reassuring the public that there is no housing bubble whatsoever and the good times will last forever. This fictionalized reporting and commentary is part of the culture of a bubble--for me, it's the most easily recognized sign of a market asymptote. Trying to predict the exact timing of a market peak is next to impossible--yet one can glean from the headlines about Burger King giving out free crypto, or when Matt Damon is bullying you to get into crypto--to the talentless CEO of Twitter and amateurs trading on the basis of Elon Musk's tweets--the culture and language of a market bubble are clear. I recall in 2006, billboards over the entire US which featured an image of a stack of $100 bills burning in flames---the billboard warned, "this is what you're doing to your money if you rent". At the time, everyone said, "the prices of housing has never fallen" and that was all that was needed to keep any doubts at bay.
Four days ago, the NYTimes Upshot published a piece about housing prices. It is a fact free fictional nonsense throwing heaps of bullshit on anyone who thinks housing is in a bubble. You've heard this kind of talk about housing before, it was in 2006---but this time the masters of the universe didn't even bother inventing a new bubble, they just re-inflated the housing bubble which ended so well last time. Check Google News for the past year or two, and you literally can't find a single article that is predicting housing prices will crash. I search for it, everyday.
This bubble bursting will be one of the most dramatic economic catastrophes in world history, and together with the lasting impacts of the ongoing pandemic--will likely reshape our world. As the economy tanks over the next months and years in a massive debt deflation unseen in the West since the Great Depression, the Fed might not be able to save the day this time, massive fiscal relief from US/Europe is likely not going to pass, and thus we entering something uniquely dangerous: a hardcore right-wing former slave empire--fueled by white grievance and terror--is watching as it's bullshit imaginary economy goes up like a puff of smoke. Already the US is in deep shit politically, economically, and culturally, and yet the Biden administration is itching for a new European war. This is unthinkable outside the context of a severe domestic crisis. The US has never tried to solve or address internal crisis, the solution has always been war.
Despite what the late, great David Graeber posits, whose work and activism I applaud, the only thing not imaginary are the debts, and those will have to be paid or written down. And because neither one of those solutions is likely going to happen for all sorts of reasons--we would easily enter a period of longterm protracted global debt deflation putting a hamper on consumer spending--which drives 2/3rds of the economy. Once people stop spending, companies stop hiring and economies stop growing. Some days I will provide analysis more cultural than economic, and sometimes I will focus on the political economy of the global collapse. Instead of going super esoteric and arcane on one particular topic, I will attempt to provide a birds eye flyover of the wreckage. In any case, I hope to post a lot more commentary because I know in times like this people appreciate any reflection they can get--even if they disagree with my politics, predictions, or analysis.
The main takeaway for today is the likelihood of broad asset prices in fast decline--it will be the first globally synchronized real estate bubble crash in history. Corporate media's self serving, limited, and relentless discussion of 'inflation' will soon turn to a panicky discussion of broad based deflation--housing, stocks, crypto, wages. And whereas China's massive stimulus saved our ass during the Great Recession as the West's housing and financial economy cratered, and Canada was seen as a safe pillar of prudent finance--this time China is facing a massive housing bubble collapsing, while Canada's real estate prices are the most irrational in the world. What I won't tell you is what to do with your money. I lost my own money, friends money, and loved ones money to ever dispense with that sort of advice again, something which I am not trained, qualified, or licensed to provide. Please don't message me asking for 'advice'. If people want investment advice, I'm not the person and this isn't the venue. The only thing I will say is like Noah, I am preparing for a biblical deluge. Hold onto your seats, this is going to get squirrelly.
Real talk - Is it possible for the Republicans to block his replacement? Can the Dems somehow fuck up this seemingly simple task of replacing him before the midterms?
Real talk - Is it possible for the Republicans to block his replacement? Can the Dems somehow fuck up this seemingly simple task of replacing him before the midterms?
It's only possible for the republicans to block a replacement if any democrats join them in blocking the nominee which isn't very likely in my opinion.
Post by potentpotables on Jan 26, 2022 12:57:31 GMT -5
If Biden follows through on his campaign promise to appoint a black woman, it seems like it's going to be Judge Kentaji Brown Jackson and I would think it would be difficult for Manchenima to oppose her. I think there'd be a chance of getting Murkowski/Collins to vote favorably even. Of course I wouldn't count on Murkowski/Collins.
Post by potentpotables on Jan 28, 2022 8:55:19 GMT -5
The pictures that have been shared on Twitter are terrifying. Also, Biden is on his way to Pittsburgh to talk infrastructure, and this bridge had been rated "poor" I think by PennDOT.
The pictures that have been shared on Twitter are terrifying. Also, Biden is on his way to Pittsburgh to talk infrastructure, and this bridge had been rated "poor" I think by PennDOT.
I can't imagine being on that bus. The entire neighborhood smells like Natural gas. Grateful nobody died.
Post by potentpotables on Jan 28, 2022 9:26:05 GMT -5
Oof, and now this. Friday morning coming fast and furious in PA. This decision by the Commonwealth Court is a disaster for democracy, because there are absolutely going to be right wing idiots thinking this invalidates Trump's loss in PA in 2020. SCoPA will likely overrule, but that won't matter for optics.