New DVDs By Michael Snyder
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 The next great economic crisis is rapidly approaching, and most people are going to be totally blindsided by it. Even though the warning signs are glaringly obvious, most Americans continue to believe that our “leaders” know what they are doing and that everything will be just fine. But what will happen when the next great financial crash happens and trillions of dollars of “paper wealth” disappear into thin air? What will happen when the coming credit crunch causes economic activity to dramatically slow down and millions upon millions of people lose their jobs? This shouldn’t sound far-fetched to you. Remember, this is exactly the kind of thing that we saw back in 2008, and the next great financial crisis is likely going to be significantly worse. Our economy is in far worse shape than it was back in 2008, and government dependence is now at an all-time high even though most Americans are still enjoying debt-fueled false prosperity. We are living in the largest debt bubble in the history of the planet, and when it bursts we are going to experience a crippling “adjustment” to our standard of loving. Some people understand this and are busy preparing for what is ahead. It has been estimated that there are approximately 3 million “preppers” in the United States, and that number is growing all the time. Unfortunately, most Americans are not preparing for the coming economic depression and they are going to bitterly regret it.
So what does preparing for the coming economic depression look like?
Well, it doesn’t have to be complicated. Most of the things that you should do are just common sense.
But there are some people that take things to extremes. For example, a new National Geographic series is featuring a family that is actually constructing a “Doomsday Castle“. The former U.S. Army officer that is building this unusual home is trying to prepare for virtually every type of disaster that he can imagine…
Meet Brent Sr., the leader of the six-person family. Brent is a former Army Infantry Training Officer who is heading up the project to build an “EMP (electromagnetic pulse)-proof medieval castle in the woods of the Carolinas.”
According to National Geographic, Brent is teaching five of his 10 children survival skills.
The unfinished, fortified castle that Brent Sr. is building — an idea he got during the Y2K prep craze — will be able to sustain an EMP-event that could wipe out a power grid, but will also survive natural disasters like hurricanes.
He even plans to train his family members to use crossbows and a catapult to defend against potential home invaders.
Not many people out there are going to take “prepping” to such extremes.
But even if you don’t plan to build a “Doomsday Castle”, that doesn’t mean that you should be doing nothing.
Sadly, most Americans are quite ill-prepared for a major economic downturn at this point. In fact, most Americans seem to be doing almost nothing to prepare.
Just consider the following statistics. Most of these numbers come from one of my previous articles…
-According to a survey that was recently released, 76 percent of all Americans are living paycheck to paycheck.
–46 percent of all Americans have less than $800 in savings.
–27 percent of all Americans do not have even a single penny saved up.
-Less than one out of every four Americans has enough money stored away to cover six months of expenses.
-Each year, 12 million Americans take out high interest payday loans.
-In 1989, the debt to income ratio of the average American family was about 58 percent. Today it is up to 154 percent.
-It is estimated that less than 10 percent of the U.S. population owns any gold or silver for investment purposes.
–44 percent of all Americans do not have first-aid kits in their homes.
–48 percent of all Americans do not have any emergency supplies stored up.
–53 percent of all Americans do not have a 3 day supply of nonperishable food and water in their homes.
–One survey asked Americans how long they thought they would survive if the electrical grid went down for an extended period of time. Incredibly, 21 percent said that they would survive for less than a week, an additional 28 percent said that they would survive for less than two weeks, and nearly 75 percent said that they would be dead before the two month mark.
Those numbers are absolutely appalling.
When the system fails, most people are going to be completely blindsided by it and millions upon millions of people are going to absolutely freak out.
Don’t let that happen to you.
So what are some basic things that you can do to get prepared for the great economic storm that is coming?
The following are a few of the things that Nicole Foss suggests…
1) Hold no debt (for most people this means renting)
2) Hold cash and cash equivalents (short term treasuries) under your own control
3) Don’t trust the banking system, deposit insurance or no deposit insurance
4) Sell equities, real estate, most bonds, commodities, collectibles (or short if you can afford to gamble)
5) Gain some control over the necessities of your own existence if you can afford it
6) Be prepared to work with others as that will give you far greater scope for resilience and security
7) If you have done all that and still have spare resources, consider precious metals as an insurance policy
8) Be worth more to your employer than he is paying you
9) Look after your health!
I think all of those are great pieces of advice.
In addition, below I have posted some of the things that I personally recommend. The following is an excerpt from one of my previous articles entitled “25 Things That You Should Do To Get Prepared For The Coming Economic Collapse“…
#1 An Emergency Fund
Do you remember what happened when the financial system almost collapsed back in 2008? Millions of Americans suddenly lost their jobs, and because many of them were living paycheck to paycheck, many of them also got behind on their mortgages and lost their homes. You don’t want to lose everything that you have worked for during this next major economic downturn. It is imperative that you have an emergency fund. It should be enough to cover all of your expenses for at least six months, but I would encourage you to have an emergency fund that is even larger than that.
#2 Don’t Put All Of Your Eggs Into One Basket
If the wealth confiscation in Cyprus has taught us anything, it is that we should not put all of our eggs in one basket. If all of your money is in one single bank account, it would be easy to wipe out. But if you have your money scattered around a number of different places it will give you a little bit more security.
#3 Keep Some Cash At Home
This goes along with the previous point. While it is not wise to keep all of your money at home, you do want to keep some cash on hand. If there is an extended bank holiday or if a giant burst from the sun causes the ATM machines to go down, you want to be able to have enough cash to buy the things that your family needs. Just ask the people of Cyprus how crippling a bank holiday can be. One way to keep your cash secure at home is by storing it in a concealed safe.
#4 Get Out Of Debt
A lot of people seem to assume that an economic collapse would wipe out all debts, but that will probably not be the case. In fact, if you are in a tremendous amount of debt you will be very vulnerable if the economy collapses and you are not able to find a job. Just ask the people who were overextended and lost their jobs during the last recession. So please get out of debt. Many debt collectors are becoming increasingly ruthless. In many areas of the country they are now routinely putting debtors into prison. You do not want to be a slave to debt when the next wave of the economic collapse strikes.
#5 Gold And Silver
In the long-term, the U.S. dollar is going to lose a tremendous amount of value and inflation is going to absolutely skyrocket. That is one reason why so many people are investing very heavily in gold, silver and other precious metals. All over the globe, the central banks of the world are recklessly printing money. Everyone knows that this is going to end very badly. In fact, there is already a push in more than a dozen U.S. states to allow gold and silver coins to be used as legal tender. Someday you will be glad that you invested in gold and silver now while their prices were still low.
#6 Reduce Your Expenses
A lot of people claim that they can’t put any money toward prepping, but the truth is that we all have room to reduce our expenses. We all spend money on things that we do not really need. Those that are “lean and mean” will tend to do much better during the times that are coming.
#7 Start A Side Business
If you do not have much money, a great way to increase your income is by starting a side business. And it does not take a lot of money – there are many side businesses that you can start for next to nothing. And starting a side business will allow you to become less dependent on your job. In this economic environment, a job could disappear at literally any time.
#8 Move Away From The Big Cities If Possible
For many people, this is simply not possible. Many Americans are still completely and totally dependent on their jobs. But if you are able, now is a good time to move away from the big cities. When the next major economic downturn strikes, there will be rioting and a dramatic rise in crime in the major cities. If you are able to move to a more rural area you will probably be in much better shape.
#9 Store Food
Global food reserves have reached their lowest level in nearly 40 years. As the economy gets even worse and global weather patterns become even more unstable, the price of food will go much higher and global food supplies will become much tighter. In the long run, you will be glad for the money that you put into long-term food storage now.
#10 Learn To Grow Your Own Food
This is a skill that most Americans possessed in the past, but that most Americans today have forgotten. Growing your own food is a way to become more independent of the system, and it is a way to get prepared for what is ahead.
#11 Nobody Can Survive Without Water
Without water, you would not even make it a few days in an emergency situation. It is imperative that you have a plan to provide clean drinking water for your family when disaster strikes.
#12 Have A Plan For When The Grid Goes Down
What would you do if the grid went down and you suddenly did not have power for an extended period of time? Anyone that has spent more than a few hours without power knows how frustrating this can be. You need to have a plan for how you are going to provide power to your home that is independent of the power company.
#13 Have Blankets And Warm Clothing On Hand
This is more for emergency situations or for a complete meltdown of society. During any major crisis, blankets and warm clothing are in great demand. They also could potentially make great barter items.
#14 Store Personal Hygiene Supplies
A lot of preppers store up huge amounts of food, but they forget all about personal hygiene supplies. During a long crisis, these are items that you would greatly miss if you do not have them stored up. These types of supplies would also be great for barter.
#15 Store Medicine And Medical Supplies
You will also want to store up medical supplies and any medicine that you may need. In an emergency situation, you definitely would not want to be without bandages and a first-aid kit. Over the course of a long crisis, you do not want to run out of any medicines that are critical for your health.
#16 Stock Up On Vitamins
A lot of preppers do not think about this either, but it is very important. These days, it is becoming increasingly difficult to get adequate nutrition from the foods that we eat. That is why it is very important to have an adequate store of vitamins and other supplements.
#17 Make A List Of Other Supplies That You Will Need
During any crisis, there will be a lot of other things that you will need in addition to food and water. The following are just a few basic things that it would be wise to have on hand…
– an axe
– a can opener
– flashlights
– battery-powered radio
– extra batteries
– lighters or matches
– fire extinguisher
– sewing kit
– tools
This list could be much, much longer, but hopefully this will get you started.
#18 Don’t Forget The Special Needs Of Your Babies And Your Pets
Young children and pets have special needs. As you store supplies, don’t forget about the things that they will need as well.
#19 Entertainment
This may sound trivial, but the truth is that our entertainment-addicted society would become very bored and very frustrated if the grid suddenly went down for an extended period of time. Card games and other basic forms of entertainment can make enduring a crisis much easier.
#20 Self-Defense
In the years ahead, being able to defend your home and your family is going to become increasingly important. When the economy crashes, people are going to start to become very desperate. And desperate people do desperate things.
#21 Get Your Ammunition While You Still Can
Your firearms will not do you much good if you do not have ammunition for them. Already there are widespread reports of huge ammunition shortages. The following is from a recent CNS News article…
“The run on ammunition has manufacturers scrambling to accommodate demand and reassure customers, as many new and seasoned gun owners stock up over fears of new firearms regulations at both the state and federal levels.”
Don’t just assume that you will always be able to purchase large amounts of ammunition whenever you want. Get it now while you still can.
#22 If You Have To Go…
Have a plan for what you and your family will do if you are forced to leave your home. If you do have to go, the following are some items that you will want to have on hand…
– a map of the area
– a compass
– backpacks for every member of the family
– sleeping bags
– warm clothing
– comfortable shoes or hiking boots
#23 Community
One of the most important assets in any crisis situation is community. If you have friends or neighbors that you can depend upon, that is invaluable. The time spent building those bonds now will pay off greatly during a major crisis.
#24 Have A Back-Up Plan And Be Flexible
Mike Tyson once said the following…
“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”
No plan ever unfolds perfectly. When your plan is disrupted, what will you do?
It will be imperative for all of us to have a back-up plan and to be flexible during the years ahead.
#25 Keep Your Prepping To Yourself
Do not go around and tell everyone in the area where you live about your prepping. If you do, then you may find yourself overwhelmed with “visitors” when everything falls apart.
And please do not go on television and brag about your prepping to a national audience.
Prepping is something that you want to keep to yourself, unless you want hordes of desperate people banging on your door in the future.
*****
For much more on prepping, I would encourage you to check out the dozens of excellent websites out there that teach people advanced prepping techniques for free.
So what do you think about all of this?
Are you getting prepared for the coming economic depression?
Please feel free to share your perspective on prepping by posting a comment below…
 If you want to track how close we are to the next financial collapse, there is one number that you need to be watching above all others. The number that I am talking about is the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries, because it affects thousands of other interest rates in our financial system. When the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries goes up, that is bad for the U.S. economy because it pushes long-term interest rates up. When interest rates rise, it constricts the flow of credit, and a healthy flow of credit is absolutely essential to the debt-based system that we live in. Just imagine someone squeezing a tube that has water flowing through it. The higher interest rates go, the more economic activity will be squeezed. If interest rates continue to rise rapidly, it will be more expensive for the U.S. government to borrow money, it will be more expensive for state and local governments to borrow money, the housing market may crash again, consumer debt will become more expensive, junk bond investors will be in for a world of hurt, the stock market will experience a tremendous amount of pain and there is a good chance that we could see the 441 trillion dollar interest rate derivatives bubble implode. And that is just for starters.
So yes, we all need to be carefully watching the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries. On Friday, it opened at 2.76% and hit a high of 2.86% before closing at 2.83%. The yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries is up nearly 120 basis points since the beginning of May, and almost everyone on Wall Street seems convinced that it is going to go much higher.
We are truly moving into unprecedented territory, because we have been in a bull market for U.S. Treasuries for the last 30 years. Many investors don’t even know that it is possible to lose money on U.S. Treasuries. They have been described as “risk-free” investments, but that is far from the truth.
In fact, we could see bond investors of all types end up losing trillions of dollars before it is all said and done.
And those in the stock market will lose lots of money too. Low interest rates are good for economic activity which is good for the stock market. The chart posted below shows that stock prices have generally risen as the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries has steadily declined over the past 30 years…
When interest rates rise, that is bad for economic activity and bad for stocks. That is why so many stock analysts are alarmed that interest rates are going up so rapidly right now.
And as I wrote about the other day, we have just witnessed the largest cluster of Hindenburg Omens that we have seen since before the last financial crisis. The stock market already seems ripe for a huge “adjustment”, and rising interest rates could give it a huge extra push in a negative direction.
By the time it is all said and done, stock market investors could end up losing trillions of dollars in the next stock market crash.
In addition, rising interest rates could easily precipitate another housing crash. As the Wall Street Journal discussed on Friday, as the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries goes up it will also cause mortgage rates to rise…
Higher yields will push up long-term borrowing cost for U.S. consumers and businesses. Mortgage rates will rise, and investors are keeping a close eye on whether this may derail the recovery of the housing market, which has shown signs of turning a corner this year.
In one of my previous articles, I included an example that shows just how powerful rising mortgage rates can be…
A year ago, the 30 year rate was sitting at 3.66 percent. The monthly payment on a 30 year, $300,000 mortgage at that rate would be $1374.07.
If the 30 year rate rises to 8 percent, the monthly payment on a 30 year, $300,000 mortgage at that rate would be $2201.29.
Does 8 percent sound crazy to you?
It shouldn’t. 8 percent was considered to be normal back in the year 2000.
If you own a $300,000 house today, do you think it will be easier to sell it or harder to sell it if mortgage rates skyrocket?
Yes, of course it will be much harder. In fact, there is a good chance that you will have to reduce your selling price significantly so that prospective buyers can afford the payments.
Let us hope that the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries levels off for a while. If it says at this current level, the damage will probably not be too bad.
But if it crosses the 3 percent mark and keeps soaring, things could get messy pretty quickly. In fact, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch investor survey, the 3.5 percent mark is when the collapse of the bond market is likely to become “disorderly”…
Our latest Credit Investor Survey, conducted July 8-11, showed that 3.5% on the 10-year is most commonly thought of as the trigger of a disorderly rotation – i.e. higher interest rates leading to outflows and wider credit spreads – among high grade investors.
Put differently, 3.0% on the 10-year will not lead to overall wider credit spreads if there is enough buying interest from institutional investors (though note that the 10s/30s spread curve would flatten further, as mutual fund/ETF holdings are concentrated in the belly of the curve, whereas institutional demand is disproportional in the long end of the curve). However, if the probability of a further move higher in interest rates to 3.5% is high – which will be the perception if interest rate volatility is high – certain institutional investors will choose to remain on the sidelines.
Thus there may not be enough institutional buying interest to mitigate retail fund outflows and contain overall high grade spread levels.
So what is causing this?
Well, there are a number of factors of course, but one very disturbing sign is that foreigners are selling off U.S. Treasuries at a pace that we have not seen since 2007…
One of the biggest fears in the financial markets is that foreign investors will stop buying U.S. Treasury securities, causing borrowing rates to surge.
Not that this is the beginning of a frightening trend, but new data from the Treasury Department shows that foreigners were net sellers in June. In fact, this is the largest net sale of U.S. securities since August 2007.
Do you remember all of the warnings that we have received over the years about what would take place when foreign countries started dumping U.S. debt?
Well, it looks like it may be starting to happen.
Unfortunately, there is no way that the party that the U.S. government has been throwing can continue without foreigners buying our debt. We have added more than 11 trillion dollars to the national debt since the year 2000, and according to Boston University economist Laurence Kotlikoff we are facing unfunded liabilities in future years that are in excess of 200 trillion dollars.
Even with foreigners continuing to loan us gigantic mountains of super cheap money, it would still take a doubling of our taxes to put us on a fiscally sustainable course…
Writing in the September issue of Finance and Development, a journal of the International Monetary Fund, Prof. Kotlikoff says the IMF itself has quietly confirmed that the U.S. is in terrible fiscal trouble – far worse than the Washington-based lender of last resort has previously acknowledged. “The U.S. fiscal gap is huge,” the IMF asserted in a June report. “Closing the fiscal gap requires a permanent annual fiscal adjustment equal to about 14 per cent of U.S. GDP.”
This sum is equal to all current U.S. federal taxes combined. The consequences of the IMF’s fiscal fix, a doubling of federal taxes in perpetuity, would be appalling – and possibly worse than appalling.
Prof. Kotlikoff says: “The IMF is saying that, to close this fiscal gap [by taxation] would require an immediate and permanent doubling of our personal income taxes, our corporate taxes and all other federal taxes.
“America’s fiscal gap is enormous – so massive that closing it appears impossible without immediate and radical reforms to its health care, tax and Social Security systems – as well as military and other discretionary spending cuts.”
Can you afford to pay twice as much in taxes to the federal government?
Very few Americans could.
But that is how serious the financial problems of the federal government are.
And all of the above assumes that interest payments on U.S. government debt will remain at current levels. If the average rate of interest on U.S. government debt rises to just 6 percent, the U.S. government will be paying out a trillion dollars a year just in interest on the national debt.
Also, all of the above assumes that we will have a healthy financial system that does not need to be bailed out again.
But if rapidly rising interest rates cause the 441 trillion dollar interest rate derivatives bubble to implode, the bailout that the “too big to fail” banks will need will likely be far, far larger than last time.
In fact, once that bubble bursts there probably will not be enough money in the entire world to fix it.
If the picture that I have painted above sounds bleak, that is because it is bleak.
Sometimes I get frustrated with myself because I don’t feel I am communicating the tremendous danger that we are facing accurately enough.
We are heading for the worst financial crisis in modern human history, and the debt-fueled prosperity that we are enjoying today is going to go away and it is never going to come back.
You can dismiss that as “doom and gloom” and stick your head in the sand if you want, but that isn’t going to help anything. Instead of ignoring reality you should be working hard to prepare your family for what is coming and warning others that they should be getting prepared too.
When a hurricane is approaching landfall, you don’t take your family out for a picnic at the beach. That would be foolish. Unfortunately, way too many Americans are acting as if nothing like the financial crisis of 2008 could ever possibly happen again.
If you deceive yourself into thinking that all of this is going to have a happy ending somehow, you are going to get blindsided by the coming storm.
But if you make preparations now, you might just be okay.
There is hope in understanding what is happening and there is hope in getting prepared.
So watch the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries. The higher it goes, the later in the game we are.
 The largest Islamic nation in the Middle East is on the verge of descending into civil war, the Syrian civil war is starting to spill over into Lebanon, and the worst violence in five years has just hit Iraq, but Barack Obama is way too busy to be bothered with any of that. Right now, Obama is enjoying one of the true loves of his life – golf. According to the Washington Post, Obama has “played 18 holes of golf every day but one this week”, and without a doubt he appears to really be enjoying his time up in Martha’s Vineyard. I hear that it is absolutely beautiful up there this time of the year. And apparently he needs the rest. After all, prior to this vacation he has only had time to play 133 rounds of golf since becoming president. Between snubbing world leaders and getting the U.S. economy going again, it must be really tough for Obama to find enough time to sharpen his game.
Of course I am being facetious. It is absolutely ridiculous how much time Obama takes off, and Congress is even worse. Congress is taking a five week vacation right now. Most Americans don’t get that much vacation in an entire year.
Meanwhile, as our leaders enjoy their rest, the Middle East is coming apart at the seams.
In Egypt, authorities say that 638 people are now confirmed dead and another 3,994 people were wounded in the nightmarish violence that erupted in Cairo this week. Hundreds of bodies remain uncounted by the authorities, and it appears very likely that Egypt is rapidly heading down the path to full-blown civil war…
Angry supporters of ousted president Mohammed Morsi staged protests and burned buildings Thursday as President Obama condemned the violence on both sides and canceled next month’s joint military operations.
The unrest came a day after at least 638 people were killed in violence nationwide, including 43 police officers, the Health Ministry said. Most of the deaths occurred when security forces smashed two pro-Morsi sit-in camps in the capital. In the Nasr City district, 288 people were killed.
The Health Ministry said 3,994 people were injured.
After the police moved on the camps, street battles broke out across Egypt. Government buildings and police stations were attacked, roads were blocked, and Christian churches were torched, Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim said.
Sadly, some of the supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood have chosen to express their fury with the government by setting Christian homes, businesses and churches on fire. According to one report, 18 churches have been torched so far…
Now, with the crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood members by the Egyptian army, Islamist fanatics are taking out their frustrations on Coptic Christians. In the past few days, there has been a spate of attacks on Christian businesses, homes, and churches. As of Wednesday morning, according to local witnesses, at least 18 churches had been destroyed, and fires and riots were continuing to spread in Christian areas, the witnesses said.
This is absolutely despicable, and it is turning out to be one of the worst disasters for Coptic Christians ever recorded. Over the past few days, Twitter has been absolutely flooded with reports about what has been happening to Christians in Egypt…
Using the hashtag #EgyChurch, Egyptian users of Twitter and other social networks broadcast messages like “Can’t keep up with the number of churches, Christian businesses, and affiliates being attacked by ‘peaceful’ Muslim Brotherhood,” “It’s clear the Copts are having their churches burnt,” and “This is quickly becoming the worst sectarian catastrophe we’ve seen in our lifetimes.”
Meanwhile, the violence in Iraq continues to escalate. The following is how Reuters described what happened in Baghdad on Thursday…
Car bomb attacks killed at least 34 people in Baghdad on Thursday but the Interior Ministry said it would not allow al Qaeda, which it blames for a surge in sectarian violence, to turn Iraq into another Syria.
More than 100 people were wounded in at least eight blasts, one of which was near the “Green Zone” diplomatic complex, part of a wave of bloodshed that has taken the monthly death toll in Iraq to the highest levels in five years.
“Iraq’s streets have become a battleground for sectarian people who are motivated by hatred and religious edicts and daring to kill innocent people,” the Interior Ministry said in an unusually frank statement.
“It is our destiny to win this battle which is aimed at destroying the country and turning it into another Syria,” the ministry said.
And the absolutely brutal civil war in Syria is now spilling over into Lebanon. On Thursday, a Shiite stronghold in Beirut was hit by the worst car bomb attack that Lebanon has witnessed in decades…
A powerful car bomb tore through a bustling south Beirut neighborhood that is a stronghold of Hezbollah on Thursday, killing at least 18 and trapping dozens of others in an inferno of burning cars and buildings in the bloodiest attack yet on Lebanese civilians linked to Syria’s civil war.
The blast is the second in just over a month to hit one of the Shiite militant group’s bastions of support, and the deadliest in decades. It raises the specter of a sharply divided Lebanon being pulled further into the conflict next door, which is being fought on increasingly sectarian lines pitting Sunnis against Shiites.
And of course we shouldn’t forget about the war in Yemen either. Sadly, as Ron Paul recently noted, most Americans don’t even realize what is going on in Yemen…
Most Americans are probably unaware that over the past two weeks the US has launched at least eight drone attacks in Yemen, in which dozens have been killed. It is the largest US escalation of attacks on Yemen in more than a decade. The US claims that everyone killed was a “suspected militant,” but Yemeni citizens have for a long time been outraged over the number of civilians killed in such strikes. The media has reported that of all those killed in these recent US strikes, only one of the dead was on the terrorist “most wanted” list.
This significant escalation of US attacks on Yemen coincides with Yemeni President Hadi’s meeting with President Obama in Washington earlier this month. Hadi was installed into power with the help of the US government after a 2011 coup against its long-time ruler, President Saleh. It is in his interest to have the US behind him, as his popularity is very low in Yemen and he faces the constant threat of another coup.
Unfortunately, this is probably only just the beginning.
The violence in the Middle East is probably going to get much worse, and at some point I expect a major regional war to erupt in the years ahead.
But instead of going back to the White House and at least giving the appearance of being on top of things, Obama plans to continue his golf vacation.
This is so negligent that even the Washington Post is ripping him to shreds…
In a sense, then, Obama might as well play golf. He’s dropped the ball on Egypt and the entire region, leaving the United States with few options and the Egyptian people to a bloody future in the short run and a repressive authoritarian junta in the longer run. This is a policy failure of the highest order.
But this is just par for the course for Obama.
As we learned this week, this is the guy that was actually playing cards during the bin Laden raid…
Despite the picture the White House released showing President Obama intently watching the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, his former “body man” says the president spent most of the raid playing a card game.
“Most people were like down in the Situation Room and [the president] was like, ‘I’m not going to be down there, I can’t watch this entire thing.’ So he, myself, Pete Souza, the White House photographer, Marvin [Nicholson], we must have played 15 games of spades,” former Obama aide Reggie Love said at an event in Los Angeles sponsored by The Artists & Athletes Alliance in July.
Love, who played college basketball and football at Duke University, left the White House in 2011 to attend business school.
You can see video of Obama’s former “body man”, Reggie Love, making these remarks right here.
When it comes to foreign policy, Obama seems to be totally clueless.
So what would happen someday if a major foreign policy crisis erupted that actually seriously threatened our national security?
Would Obama be up to the task?
Let’s hope that we don’t have to find out.
 Should taxpayer dollars be used to buy sushi and lobster for a young man whose future plans consist entirely of surfing and partying as much as he possibly can? When I first saw the video that I am about to share with you, I was absolutely floored. Recently, Fox News interviewed a self-described beach bum named Jason Greenslate who was very open about the fact that he has no problem sponging off of all the rest of us. When he was asked if he ever had any interest in actually getting a job, his response was “not whatsoever”. Instead, he says that his job is to “make sure the sun’s up and the girls are out” and he would rather spend his days partying. Of course every American should be free to live their own lives as they see fit, but the problem is that Jason Greenslate is using food stamps to help support his lifestyle. In fact, he took Fox News into the gourmet section of a local supermarket where he purchased sushi and lobster with his EBT card. Sadly, he is just like millions of other young men in America today that seemingly have had the drive to succeed and to be independent totally sucked out of them. But what is the future of America going to look like if we continue to produce millions upon millions of young men that have absolutely no desire to make a living, get married and start a family?
Posted below is video from the Fox News interview with Jason Greenslate. If you are a taxpayer, this video should upset you greatly…
Of course the vast majority of those enrolled in the food stamp program are NOT like this. As I wrote about the other day, the economic independence of middle class Americans is being systematically destroyed. The percentage of self-employed Americans is at a record low and the percentage of Americans with a full-time job has dropped to a shockingly low level.
And the quality of our jobs continues to decline. If you can believe it, 40 percent of all workers in the United States today actually make less than what a full-time minimum wage worker made back in 1968.
As a result of our ongoing economic problems, we have seen wave after wave of Americans forced to go on food stamps. Between the year 2000 and the first inauguration of Barack Obama, the number of Americans on food stamps increased by 15 million. Since Barack Obama has been in the White House, the number of Americans on food stamps has increased by 15 million more.
At this point we have a total of 47 million Americans on food stamps, and most of them definitely need the help.
But there are also those such as Jason Greenslate that are openly abusing the system and making it more difficult for those that actually need the help to get it.
Sadly, he is a product of the system that he was raised in. There is a reason why so many young men are “checking out” and rejecting the traditional path of making a living, getting married and having a family.
In America today, the average American watches an average of 153 hours of television a month. All of that “programming” has an extremely powerful impact on all of us.
The next time you watch a television show or a movie, take note of how young men are portrayed and watch what values are being promoted to them. The truth is that they are not being taught to work hard, to be responsible or to want to be good fathers and good husbands.
It is easy to jump on Jason Greenslate, but the cold, hard reality of the matter is that there are millions of others out there just like him. Consider the following numbers…
-In America today, 36 percent of all young adults in the 18 to 31 age bracket are currently living with their parents.
-Young men are nearly twice as likely to live with their parents as young women the same age are.
-In 2011, SAT scores for young men were the worst that they had been in 40 years.
-According to the New York Times, approximately 57 percent of all young people enrolled at U.S. colleges are women. That means that only 43 percent are men.
-It is being projected that women will earn 60 percent of all Bachelor’s degrees from U.S. universities by the year 2016.
-Back in 1950, more than 80 percent of all men in the United States had jobs. Today, less than 65 percent of all men in the United States have jobs.
-Between 1969 and 2009 the median wages earned by American men between the ages of 30 and 50 dropped by 27 percent after you account for inflation.
-As I mentioned in a previous article, the marriage rate in the United States has fallen to an all-time low…
The marriage rate has fluctuated in the past, with dips in the 1930s and 1960s, but it has been in steady decline since the 1970s. Now, researchers report that the marriage rate has dropped to a new low of 31.1, meaning there are about 31 marriages in the U.S. for every 1,000 unmarried women, researchers found. In 1950, that number was 90.2. In 1920, it was 92.3.
-Back in 1950, 78 percent of all households in the United States contained a married couple. Today, that number has declined to 48 percent.
–Today, an all-time low 44.2 percent of all Americans between the ages of 25 and 34 are married.
–The U.S. family is rapidly breaking down. 100 years ago, 4.52 were living in the average U.S. household, but now the average U.S. household only consists of 2.59 people.
–At this point, approximately one out of every three children in America lives in a home without a father.
Instead of endeavoring to become a husband, a father and a productive member of society, Jason Greenslate wants to party on the “safety net” forever.
But if we continue to have millions upon millions more Americans jump on to the “safety net” eventually it will break.
Just this week, Fox News reported on another stunning abuse of the safety net. Large numbers of illegal immigrants have learned that they can get across the border and get a free hotel room by claiming that they have a “credible fear” of the Mexican drug cartels…
A sudden influx of illegal immigrants from Mexico requesting asylum is overwhelming immigration agents in San Diego, forcing agencies to rent hotel rooms for some undocumented families and release others to cities around the U.S.
Documents obtained exclusively by Fox News show Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been paying for hotel rooms for dozens of recently arrived families to relieve overcrowding inside the San Ysidro and Otay Mesa, Calif., processing centers. Some ICE employees are working overtime and others have been asked to volunteer to work weekend shifts. “Duties include intake, placements, transports and release of family groups and unaccompanied minors,” according to a memo obtained by Fox News.
The surge has raised suspicions about what is driving the influx, amid claims that illegal immigrants have learned they can attempt to get asylum by using a few key words — namely, by claiming they have a “credible fear” of drug cartels.
Yes, we definitely want to help the poor and those that truly need our assistance. But at this point about half of all Americans get money from the government every month, and that number is climbing with each passing day.
Meanwhile, our economic system continues to get even closer to a meltdown. On Tuesday I wrote about the stunning cluster of Hindenburg Omens that we have seen lately, and now another one has appeared. On Wednesday we witnessed the 6th Hindenburg Omen that we have seen in the last 8 trading days. The only similar clusters in recent history occurred just before the last financial crash and just before the end of the “dotcom boom”.
In addition, the level of margin debt continues to signal that big trouble is ahead. We recently learned that margin debt hit a brand new all-time high of 384 billion dollars in April, and this is repeating a pattern that we saw just before the financial crash of 2008 and the busting of the dotcom bubble in 2000.
So what is going to happen when the next great financial crash arrives and millions upon millions more Americans are forced to turn to the government for assistance?
And what will happen when the government is forced to start cutting back on benefits because there isn’t enough money?
Sadly, our leaders do not understand that a crash is coming. They keep insisting that everything is going to be just fine.
But remember, the last financial crash caught them entirely by surprise as well. For example, one of the top contenders to be the next head of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen, once made the following shocking admission about the last financial crisis…
“For my own part,” Ms. Yellen said, “I did not see and did not appreciate what the risks were with securitization, the credit ratings agencies, the shadow banking system, the S.I.V.’s — I didn’t see any of that coming until it happened.” Her startled interviewers noted that almost none of the officials who testified had offered a similar acknowledgment of an almost universal failure.
The blind are leading the blind, and none of them are going to see it coming.
But without a doubt the next great financial crash is rapidly approaching.
The system is failing, and people like Jason Greenslate are going to be in for a very rude awakening in the years ahead.
Now is the time to take responsibility, work hard and get prepared for the hard years that are coming. Nobody else is going to do it for you, and when everything starts collapsing the government is NOT going to come riding to your rescue.
 Are we heading for a major stock market decline? Warnings about a crash of the financial markets are quite common these days, and usually they don’t materialize. But this time may be different. A number of top analysts are pointing out the fact that the biggest cluster of “Hindenburg Omens” has appeared since the last stock market crash. And those that have studied this insist that the more “Hindenburg Omens” there are in a cluster, the stronger the signal is. Meanwhile, another very disturbing sign is the fact that the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries is starting to soar again. On Tuesday it shot up from 2.62% to 2.727%. As I have written about previously, the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries is the most important number in the U.S. economy right now. If that number continues to rise, it is going to be very, very bad news for the financial system.
But before I discuss rising interest rates any further, I want to talk about this unusual cluster of Hindenburg Omens that we have just witnessed. In a previous article, I shared a list of the criteria that are commonly used to determine whether a Hindenburg Omen has appeared or not…
1. The daily number of NYSE new 52 Week Highs and the daily number of new 52 Week Lows must both be greater than 2.2 percent of total NYSE issues traded that day.
2. The smaller of these numbers is greater than or equal to 69 (68.772 is 2.2% of 3126). This is not a rule but more like a checksum. This condition is a function of the 2.2% of the total issues.
3. That the NYSE 10 Week moving average is rising.
4. That the McClellan Oscillator ( a market breadth indicator used to evaluate the rate of money entering or leaving the market and interpretively indicate overbought or oversold conditions of the market)is negative on that same day.
5. That new 52 Week Highs cannot be more than twice the new 52 Week Lows (however it is fine for new 52 Week Lows to be more than double new 52 Week Highs).
When the Hindenburg Omen makes an appearance, it is supposedly a signal that the U.S. stock market will likely experience a significant decline within the next 40 days.
But of course this has not always happened when a Hindenburg Omen has appeared. However, what we are seeing right now is a highly concentrated cluster of Hindenburg Omens. According to SentimenTrader’s Jason Goepfert, the last time such a cluster appeared was before the last stock market crash…
Sometimes a topic in the market takes hold and it’s hard to shake it off. One of those is the technical “market crash” signal called the Hindenburg Omen.
It has its boosters and its detractors, and we’re not going to get caught up in debating its merits. We’ve discussed it for 12 years, always with the same arguments.
On June 10th, we outlined the market’s historical performance after suffering at least 5 signals from the Hindenburg Omen within a two-week period. Stocks were consistently weak afterward, and proved to be so again, at least for a while.
With the latest market rally, the Omens are flaring up again.There have been 5 Omens triggered out of the past 8 trading sessions (your data may vary—we’re using the same sources we’ve always used for historical data). That’s actually the closest-grouped cluster since early November 2007.
It’s extremely rare to see as many Omens occurring together as we’ve seen over the past 50 days. The last time was prior to the bear market in 2007.
The time before that was prior to the bear market in 2000.
Will the pattern hold up this time?
We’ll see.
But without a doubt we have been witnessing some very unusual activity in the markets over the past couple of weeks. In fact, according to Tyler Durden of Zero Hedge, we have now seen a Hindenburg Omen occur five times in the last seven trading days…
For the 5th time in the last 7 days, equity market internals have triggered an anxiety-implying Hindenburg Omen. Based on our data, this is the most concentrated cluster of new highs, new lows, advancing/declining based confusion on record. The last few occurrences have not ended well (though obviously not disastrously) but as the creator of the ‘Omen’ notes, the more occurrences that cluster, the stronger the signal.
But the Hindenburg Omen is not the only sign that a stock market crash may be coming. Marc Faber, the publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report, says that the markets are repeating the exact same pattern that we saw just before the stock market crash of 1987…
“In 1987, we had a very powerful rally, but also earnings were no longer rising substantially, and the market became very overbought,” Faber said on Thursday’s “Futures Now.” “The final rally into Aug. 25 occurred with a diminishing number of stocks hitting 52-week highs. In other words, the new-high list was contracting, and we have several breaks in different stocks.”
Faber says that’s exactly where we find ourselves this August.
Faber is projecting a stock market decline of “20 percent, maybe more” in the month ahead.
Meanwhile, as I mentioned at the top of the article, the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries shot up to 2.727% today. The Federal Reserve is starting to lose control of long-term interest rates, and the only way that Fed officials are going to be able to get control back is to substantially raise the level of quantitative easing that they are doing, but of course that would create a whole bunch of other problems.
For now, the Fed keeps dropping hints that “tapering” is coming. But if the Fed does “taper”, there might not be any support for bond prices from the private sector. BAML credit strategist Hans Mikkelsen recently detailed why this is the case…
Since the financial crisis, Treasuries have been supported by numerous types of investors, including mutual funds/ETFs, banks, [emerging market] central banks and the foreign official sector (in addition to the Fed of course). However, these four sources of Treasury demand are unlikely to support the market in the short term going forward.
First, with continued outflows from non-short term high grade bond funds, money managers are unlikely to provide support for Treasuries any time soon.
Second, with increasing loan demand reducing the need for banks to support profitability by buying Treasuries, as well as significant mark-to-market losses in [available-for-sale] portfolios that in the future will count against capital, banks are unlikely to add long-duration assets in a rising interest rate environment.
Third, in light of continued depreciation of [emerging market] currencies, it appears unlikely that [emerging market] countries are experiencing inflows that need to be reinvested in Treasuries.
Finally, custody holdings of Treasuries continue to decline, suggesting foreign official sales of Treasuries.
If the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries continues to rise sharply over the coming months, that could potentially cause the 441 trillion dollar interest rate derivatives bubble to implode. As John Embry recently told King World News, that would be “disastrous” for the global financial system…
Interest rates have already risen dramatically, so any tapering will simply throw gasoline on that fire and torch the banking system which is up to its eyeballs in interest rate derivatives. This would be disastrous for the entire financial system.
Someone recently suggested that there was already a $4 trillion hole in the European banking system. If we look at the Japanese situation, that is totally unstable as well. So the destruction of paper money will only accelerate, and this is what you are seeing reflected today in the prices of gold and silver.
We also have this shortage of physical gold, which is reflected by the fact that the gold lease rates have been negative for 25 consecutive days. We then had the revelation that the Bank of England had dumped a staggering 1,300 tons of physical gold into the market that they were supposed to be safely storing for other countries. The Bank of England wouldn’t even comment, they just pleaded the 5th.
Hopefully these Hindenburg Omens will pass and nothing will happen.
Hopefully the yield on 10 year U.S. Treasuries will not continue to rise.
But you know what they say – hope for the best but prepare for the worst.
I hope that you are getting prepared for the worst while you still can.
 The percentage of Americans that are economically independent has dropped to a stunningly low level. In order to be economically independent, you have got to be able to take care of yourself without any assistance from anyone else. Unless you are independently wealthy, that means that you either have your own business or you have a full-time job. Unfortunately, as you will see below, the percentage of Americans that are self-employed is at an all-time record low and the percentage of Americans with a full-time job has declined to a level not seen in about 30 years. As a result, more Americans than ever find themselves forced to turn to the government for assistance. When you add it all up, about half of all Americans get money from the government each month these days. And yes, there will always be poor people that cannot take care of themselves that need help, but when you have more than half of the population dependent on the government that is a major problem. You see, the truth is that our independence is systematically being taken away from us and we are steadily being made serfs of the state. And once you become a serf of the state, it is very hard to resist anything the government is doing in a meaningful way. After all, the money that you are getting from the government is enabling you to survive. In essence, your allegiance has been at least partially purchased and you may not even realize it.
Of course this is not how the United States was supposed to operate. We were never intended to be a collectivist nation. Rather, we were intended to be a country where liberty and freedom thrived and where most people would be able to independently take care of themselves.
Unfortunately, it is becoming increasingly difficult to be economically independent in America today. One reason for this is that the environment for small businesses in this country is the most toxic that it has ever been before. The federal government, our state governments and even our local governments are constantly coming up with new ways to oppress small business.
And just this week we learned that the IRS is specifically targeting small business owners and sending them threatening letters.
Yes, you read that correctly. Despite all of the trouble that the IRS is currently in, they are still choosing to specifically go after small businesses with both barrels. As a recent Forbes article explained, the IRS plans to send threatening letters to 20,000 small businesses all over the country…
The tax agency is doing some targeting of its own, fingering at least 20,000 small businesses. And that number will grow. The scrutiny on this group and in this way is a little frightening. Small business people across America are receiving IRS notices. More will be coming. The IRS gathers data from many third parties—including credit card companies—to see if you picked up every nickel of income.
This is absolutely disgusting, but it is just another example of how small business is being eradicated in the United States. As I mentioned in a previous article, the percentage of Americans that are self-employed has dropped to a record low…
Well, at least we can achieve economic independence by getting a full-time job, right?
Sadly, that is becoming increasingly difficult to do as well.
The chart below was created by Chartist Friend from Pittsburgh, and it shows that the percentage of working age Americans with a full-time job dropped sharply to 47 percent during the last recession and it has stayed about that level ever since. The yellow line is the line in the chart which demonstrates this…
As you can see, we briefly touched that level in the 1970s and again briefly in the 1980s, but it is important to remember that the percentage of women that chose to seek employment was much lower back then. When you take that into account, the current level of full-time employment in this country looks even worse.
The quality of jobs in this country has been steadily falling for quite some time, and we are rapidly transitioning to an economy where part-time employment will be much more prominent.
But you can’t support a family or be economically independent on a part-time income. In fact, most of those that try to make it on a part-time income find that they must turn to the government for help.
And right now, a higher percentage of Americans are economically dependent on the government than ever before. The following is from a recent article by Charles Hugh-Smith…
Why? Because half of us are getting a direct check, benefit or payment from the state. Over 61 million people get a check from Social Security, over 50 million draw Medicare benefits, another 50 million get Medicaid benefits, 47 million receive SNAP food stamp benefits, 22 million people work directly for the state on all levels, millions more work for government contractors that are effectively proxies of the state, millions more receive Federally funded extended unemployment, retirement checks, Section 8 housing benefits, and so on.
Orwell underestimated the power of complicity. Once a citizen receives a direct payment from the state, the state has purchased their complicity, for no matter how much that citizen may complain privately about the state, he or she will never risk the payment/benefit by resisting the state in a politically meaningful way.
Once you get a check from the state, you begin loving your servitude. The collusion of the state and its central bank is truly a thing of authoritarian beauty: the central bank (the Federal Reserve) creates money out of thin air and buys government bonds with the new money. The state can thus borrow unlimited sums at low rates of interest, and continue to send tens of millions of individual payments out to buy the passivity and complicity of its citizens.
So what is the solution?
Of course the solution would be for our economy to produce more small businesses and more full-time jobs so that more people could achieve economic independence.
Sadly, right now our system is steadily killing full-time jobs and small businesses, and there does not appear to be any hope for a major turnaround any time soon.
At this point, the number of Americans that are financially dependent on the government is absolutely staggering, and it gets worse with each passing year. Just consider the following statistics which come from one of my previous articles entitled “21 Facts About Rising Government Dependence In America That Will Blow Your Mind“…
1. Back in 1960, the ratio of social welfare benefits to salaries and wages was approximately 10 percent. In the year 2000, the ratio of social welfare benefits to salaries and wages was approximately 21 percent. Today, the ratio of social welfare benefits to salaries and wages is approximately 35 percent.
2. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 49 percent of all Americans live in a home that gets direct monetary benefits from the federal government. Back in 1983, less than a third of all Americans lived in a home that received direct monetary benefits from the federal government.
3. Overall, more than 70 percent of all federal spending goes to “dependence-creating programs”.
4. According to the Survey of Income and Program Participation conducted by the U.S. Census, well over 100 million Americans are enrolled in at least one welfare program run by the federal government. Sadly, that figure does not even include Social Security or Medicare.
5. Today, the federal government runs about 80 different “means-tested welfare programs”, and almost all of those programs have experienced substantial growth in recent years.
6. The number of Americans on Social Security disability now exceeds the entire population of the state of Virginia.
7. If the number of Americans on Social Security disability were gathered into a separate state, it would be the 8th largest state in the country.
8. In 1968, there were 51 full-time workers for every American on disability. Today, there are just 13 full-time workers for every American on disability.
9. Right now, there are approximately 56 million Americans collecting Social Security benefits. By 2035, that number is projected to soar to an astounding 91 million.
10. Overall, the Social Security system is facing a 134 trillion dollar shortfall over the next 75 years.
11. The number of Americans on food stamps has grown from 17 million in the year 2000 to more than 47 million today.
12. Back in the 1970s, about one out of every 50 Americans was on food stamps. Today, about one out of every 6.5 Americans is on food stamps.
13. Today, the number of Americans on food stamps exceeds the entire population of the nation of Spain.
14. According to one calculation, the number of Americans on food stamps now exceeds the combined populations of “Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.”
15. According to a report from the Center for Immigration Studies, 43 percent of all immigrants that have been in the United States for at least 20 years are still on welfare.
16. Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid. Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid, and things are about to get a whole lot worse. It is being projected that Obamacare will add 16 million more Americans to the Medicaid rolls.
17. As I wrote about recently, it is being projected that the number of Americans on Medicare will grow from 50.7 million in 2012 to 73.2 million in 2025.
18. At this point, Medicare is facing unfunded liabilities of more than 38 trillion dollars over the next 75 years. That comes to approximately $328,404 for every single household in the United States.
19. Back in 1990, the federal government accounted for just 32 percent of all health care spending in America. It is being projected that the federal government will account for more than 50 percent of all health care spending in the United States very soon.
20. The amount of money that the federal government gives directly to the American people has increased by 32 percent since Barack Obama entered the White House.
21. When you total it all up, American households are now receiving more money directly from the federal government than they are paying to the government in taxes.
Once again, there is certainly nothing wrong with helping the poor, and there will always be people that need a helping hand.
But what we have in America today is far beyond that. What we have in America today is a situation where economic independence is being systematically eradicated and the government is increasingly being expected to provide our daily bread and to take care of all of us from the cradle to the grave.
And once you are dependent on the system, at least part of you is going to become resistant to anyone or anything that threatens to bring meaningful change to the system because your survival depends on the system.
Or could I be wrong about this?
What do you think?
Please feel free to share your opinion by posting a comment below…
 Have things gotten so bad that it is time to leave the United States for good? That is a question that a lot of Americans are dealing with these days, and an increasing number of them are choosing to leave the country of their birth permanently. Some are doing it for tax reasons, some are doing it because they believe the future is brighter elsewhere, and others are doing it because they are very distressed about the direction that America is heading and they don’t see any hope for a turnaround any time soon. Personally, I have several friends and contacts that regard themselves as “preppers” that have decided that the United States is too far gone to recover. They have moved their families out of the country and they never plan to return. As this nation continues to head down the very troubled road that it is currently on, this trend is probably only going to accelerate even more.
In fact, some Americans are even going so far as to renounce their citizenship when they leave. This represents only a small percentage of those that are leaving the country, but as Bloomberg recently reported, the number of Americans that renounced their citizenship in the second quarter of 2013 was six times larger than the number that renounced their citizenship in the second quarter of last year…
Americans renouncing U.S. citizenship surged sixfold in the second quarter from a year earlier as the government prepares to introduce tougher asset-disclosure rules.
Expatriates giving up their nationality at U.S. embassies climbed to 1,131 in the three months through June from 189 in the year-earlier period, according to Federal Register figures published today.
Renouncing the country of your birth is not an easy thing to do. From the moment that we come into this world, those of us born in this country are trained to think of ourselves as “Americans”. The following is an excerpt from a recent article by Simon Black of the Sovereign Man blog…
It doesn’t matter where you’re from– the United States, Sweden, New Zealand, or Venezuela… many people all over the world are inculcated from birth with a sense that their country is ‘better’ than all the others.
We grow up with the songs, the flag waving, and the parades until the concept of motherland becomes deeply rooted in our emotional cores.
Not to mention, when so many of our friends and neighbors unquestionably fall in line, it’s a powerful social reinforcement that only strengthens the bond.
We come to view our nationalities rather ironically as a big piece of our core individuality. I am an American. I am a Canadian. I am an Austrian. Instead of– I am a human being.
It has taken decades… centuries even… to reach this point. So the fact that more and more people are making the gut-wrenching decision to ditch their US passports is truly a powerful trend.
Traditionally, the American people have been some of the most patriotic people on the face of the planet.
So why are we now seeing such an increase in the number of people choosing to leave the United States permanently?
Well, the truth is that there are a whole host of reasons why people are losing faith in this country and are deciding to leave…
-The U.S. economy has been steadily declining for many years and that decline now seems to be accelerating.
-We are being taxed into oblivion.
-The quality of the jobs in our economy is rapidly declining.
-The middle class is continually shrinking.
-Poverty is exploding.
-Escalating social decay in our major cities.
-Our culture is rapidly going down the toilet.
-Our health care system has become a complete mess and a giant money making scam. Obamacare is only going to make things even worse.
-Our politicians are tremendously corrupt, but the same clowns just keep getting sent back to D.C. over and over again.
-Our nation seems to be on a relentless march toward collectivism.
-America is rapidly turning into a “Big Brother” police state that is run by control freaks that seem obsessed with watching, tracking, monitoring and controlling virtually everything that we do.
Of course the list above could go on indefinitely, but hopefully I have made my point. A whole lot of people out there are absolutely horrified as they watch what is happening to America, and leaving the country for good is increasingly being viewed as a potential option by many.
But as tempting as “going Galt” may seem, please come up with a good plan first.
As one family recently discovered, hopping into a small boat and sailing off into the Pacific Ocean in search of a better life is probably not going to work out too well…
A northern Arizona family that was lost at sea for weeks in an ill-fated attempt to leave the U.S. over what they consider government interference in religion will fly back home Sunday.
Hannah Gastonguay, 26, said Saturday that she and her husband “decided to take a leap of faith and see where God led us” when they took their two small children and her father-in-law and set sail from San Diego for the tiny island nation of Kiribati in May.
But just weeks into their journey, the Gastonguays hit a series of storms that damaged their small boat, leaving them adrift for weeks, unable to make progress. They were eventually picked up by a Venezuelan fishing vessel, transferred to a Japanese cargo ship and taken to Chile where they are resting in a hotel in the port city of San Antonio.
Yes, life in America is definitely going to be extremely challenging in the years ahead, but the grass is not always greener on the other side of the planet either.
There are a whole host of things to consider before you make a permanent move to another country. The following is an extended excerpt from one of my previous articles…
*****
The following are 10 questions to ask yourself before you decide to move to another country…
Do You Speak The Language? If Not, How Will You Function?
If you do not speak the language of the country that you are moving to, that can create a huge problem. Just going to the store and buying some food will become a challenge. Every interaction that you have with anyone in that society will be strained, and your ability to integrate into the culture around you will be greatly limited.
How Will You Make A Living?
Unless you are independently wealthy, you will need to make money. In a foreign nation, it may be very difficult for you to find a job – especially one that pays as much as you are accustomed to making in the United States.
Will You Be Okay Without Your Family And Friends?
Being thousands of miles away from all of your family and friends can be extremely difficult. Will you be okay without them? And it can be difficult to survive in a foreign culture without any kind of a support system. Sometimes the people that most successfully move out of the country are those that do it as part of a larger group.
Have You Factored In Weather Patterns And Geological Instability?
As the globe becomes increasingly unstable, weather patterns and natural disasters are going to become a bigger factor in deciding where to live. For example, right now India is suffering through the worst drought that it has experienced in nearly 50 years. It would be very difficult to thrive in the middle of such an environment.
Many of those that are encouraging people to “escape from America” are pointing to Chile as an ideal place to relocate to. But there are thousands of significant earthquakes in Chile each year, and the entire nation lies directly along the “Ring of Fire” which is becoming increasingly unstable. That is something to keep in mind.
What Will You Do For Medical Care?
If you or someone in your family had a serious medical problem in the United States, you would know what to do. Yes, our health care system is incredibly messed up, but at least you would know that you could get the care that you needed if an emergency arose. Would the same be true in a foreign nation?
Are You Moving Into A High Crime Area?
Yes, crime is definitely on the rise in the United States. But in other areas where many preppers are moving to, crime is even worse. Mexico and certain areas of Central America are two examples of this. And in many foreign nations, the police are far more corrupt than they generally are in the United States.
In addition, many other nations have far stricter gun laws than the United States does, so your ability to defend your family may be greatly restricted.
So will your family truly be safe in the nation that you plan to take them to?
Are You Prepared For “Culture Shock”?
Moving to another country can be like moving to a different planet. After all, they don’t call it “culture shock” for nothing.
If you do move to another country, you may quickly find that thousands of little things that you once took for granted in the U.S. are now very different.
And there is a very good chance that many of the “amenities” that you are accustomed to in the U.S. will not be available in a foreign nation and that your standard of living will go down.
So if you are thinking of moving somewhere else, you may want to visit first just to get an idea of what life would be like if you made the move.
What Freedoms and Liberties Will You Lose By Moving?
Yes, our liberties and our freedoms are being rapidly eroded in the United States. But in many other nations around the world things are much worse. You may find that there is no such thing as “freedom of speech” or “freedom of religion” in the country that you have decided to move to.
Is There A Possibility That The Country You Plan To Escape To Could Be Involved In A War At Some Point?
We are moving into a time of great geopolitical instability. If you move right into the middle of a future war zone, you might really regret it. If you do plan to move, try to find a country that is likely to avoid war for the foreseeable future.
When The Global Economy Collapses, Will You And Your Family Be Okay For Food?
What good will it be to leave the United States if you and your family run out of food?
Today, we are on the verge of a major global food crisis. Global food reserves are at their lowest level in nearly 40 years, and shifting global weather patterns are certainly not helping things.
And the global elite are rapidly getting more control over the global food supply. Today, between 75 and 90 percent of all international trade in grain is controlled by just four gigantic multinational food corporations.
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Leaving the United States permanently and setting up a new life in another country can be done, but it isn’t for the faint of heart. It takes planning, preparation and lots of hard work.
However, there are lots of people that have done it successfully, including quite a number of people that I know personally.
In the end, you have got to make the decision that is right for you and your family. Don’t let anyone else tell you what to do.
For many, staying in the United States and preparing for the tough years that are coming is the best choice. For others, getting out of the United States and heading for greener pastures is the right choice.
What about you?
What is your choice?
Please feel free to share your perspective by posting a comment below…
 Are the current personnel cuts the beginning of the end for the U.S. Marines? Could these actually be the last days of the U.S. Marine Corps? A decade ago, such a notion would have been absolutely unthinkable, but times have changed. The Marine Corps was already in the process of drawing down from a peak of 202,100 Marines to 182,100, and now Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel is warning that the sequester cuts may force the Army to be cut down to a size of 380,000 and the Marine Corps to be cut down to a size of 150,000. Unfortunately for the Marines, even larger cuts may eventually be coming. Many in the Obama administration and in the Pentagon are now openly questioning whether there will be an important role for the Marines to play in the future. After all, the U.S. military has not conducted a major amphibious landing since the Korean War. As our politicians look for even more ways to cut military expenses in the years ahead, the Marines may end up being very tempting “low hanging fruit” that the bureaucrats can’t resist. And unless another major conflict erupts, it seems clear that more cuts are probably coming. In fact, even the New York Times admits that “deep reductions” to the U.S. military have long been an important goal for Barack Obama.
So does Barack Obama plan to go after the Marines? Well, for now Barack Obama is publicly praising the Marines. In fact, Obama made the following promise to the Marines during a recent speech at Camp Pendleton…
“After all you’ve given to our nation, you have to know your nation will always be faithful to you.”
Will Obama keep that promise?
Well, considering his track record perhaps you should not hold your breath.
In any event, the Marine Corps brass is certainly bracing for very deep budget cuts right now. Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Jim Amos says that the Marine Corps is going to do “the very best we possibly can” with what they are given…
Amos said he assumes the Corps’ planned shift to more operations in the Pacific will continue, but the size of the force and the number of missions it will be able to undertake will be reduced if the budget cuts stay in place.“We’re going to do less with less,” Amos told the House committee. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to do it poorly or we’re going to do it inadequately. We’ll do it the very best we possibly can.”
Unfortunately for the Marines, they are being given less and less these days.
You see, the cuts to the Marines did not start with the sequester. The truth is that plans to reduce the size of the Marines started very early in the Obama administration. For example, the following are recommendations for cuts that came from the 2010 Force Structure Review Group report…
• A 13 percent drop in ground combat forces, including an 11 percent reduction in infantry, 20 percent reduction in cannon artillery and a 20 percent reduction in armor
•A 16 percent drop in fixed-wing tactical aviation squadrons
• A 9 percent drop in logistics
• A 7 percent drop in Marines assigned to non-operational billets
• And a 12 percent drop in the civilian work force.
And back in 2010, Defense Secretary Robert Gates stated that the Marines had “gotten too big” and he also publicly questioned the future of the Marines…
“All of the military services have been challenged to find the right balance between preserving what is unique and valuable in their traditions, while at the same time making the changes necessary to win the wars we are in and prepare for the likely future threats in the years and decades to come,” he said. “Looking ahead, I do think it is proper to ask whether large-scale amphibious landings along the lines of Inchon [the Marine’s invasion of the Korea peninsula in 1950] are feasible.”
Of course part of the problem for the Marines is that they are still considered to be a part of the U.S. Navy. The following is from a recent Fiscal Times article…
The Marines, while considered a separate branch of the military, are actually part of the Navy. They’re often referred to as the “infantry of the Navy.”
“The Marines don’t have a separate fiscal existence. They are a wholly owned subsidiary of the Navy,” Adams said.
When it comes time to cut the Navy budget, it is often the Marines that feel the most pain…
But the Navy has authority over the Marine’s personnel budget–expected to be $12.9 billion in 2014. This means that Navy brass can decide how it pays to train, house, feed and maintain readiness of the troops.
Because of this, according to Adams, the Marines often find themselves the victims of Navy spending fights.
And right now the U.S. military is experiencing a spending squeeze that they have not felt in many, many years. In addition to personnel cuts, a whole host of other Marine programs could be cut back significantly because of the sequester…
Fewer F-35B Joint Strike Fighters, MV-22 Ospreys, AH-1 Cobras, and UH-1 Hueys. No Marine Personnel Carrier. Maybe no Joint Light Tactical Vehicle to replace the Humvee. 8,000 fewer Marines on active duty. The Marine Commandant has put all that on the table as part of his proposal to the Defense Secretary’s Strategic Choices and Management Review. If sequester goes into effect in its full 10-year, $500 billion glory – and all signs so far are it will – then Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos stands ready to sacrifice almost everything except the Amphibious Combat Vehicle and combat readiness.
As the size of the U.S. Marine Corps gets whittled away, we need to be very careful that we do not lose a very important part of our culture. The Marines have a very special place in U.S. history, and we should never forget the blood that so many of them shed to defend our liberties and our freedoms.
Unfortunately, our liberties and our freedoms are being eroded at an astounding pace today, and even the Marines themselves are quickly becoming an endangered species.
After surviving the Japanese and the North Koreans, it is a shame that many old vets may have to watch the Marine Corps that they love fall victim to Barack Obama and the bureaucrats.
The few and the proud are rapidly becoming fewer, and it just doesn’t seem right.
 How much is 1,000,000,000,000,000 yen worth? Well, a quadrillion yen is worth approximately 10.5 trillion dollars. It is an amount of money that is larger than the “the economies of Germany, France and the U.K. combined“. It is such an astounding amount of debt that it is hard to even get your mind around it. The government debt to GDP ratio in Japan will reach 247 percent this year, and the Japanese currently spend about 50 percent of all central government tax revenue on debt service. Realistically, there are only two ways out of this overwhelming debt trap for the Japanese. Either they default or they try to inflate the debt away. At this point, the Japanese have chosen to try to inflate the debt away. They have initiated the greatest quantitative easing experiment that a major industrialized nation has attempted since the days of the Weimar Republic. Over the next two years, the Bank of Japan plans to zap 60 trillion yen into existence out of thin air and use it to buy government bonds. By the time this program is over, the monetary base in Japan will have approximately doubled. But authorities in Japan are desperate. They know that the Japanese debt bomb could set off global panic at any time, and they are trying to find a way out that will not cause too much pain.
Unfortunately, the only way that this bizarre quantitative easing program will work is if investors in Japanese bonds act very, very irrationally. You see, the only way that Japan has been able to pile up this much debt in the first place is because they have been able to borrow gigantic piles of money at super low interest rates.
Right now, the yield on 10 year Japanese bonds is sitting at an absurdly low 0.76%. But even with such ridiculously low interest rates, the central government of Japan is still spending about half of all tax revenue on debt service.
If interest rates go up, the game is over.
But now that the Japanese government has announced that it plans to double the monetary base, it would be extremely irrational for investors not to demand higher rates on Japanese government debt. After all, why would you want to loan money to the Japanese government for less than one percent a year when the purchasing power of your money could potentially be halved over the next two years?
Amazingly, this is exactly what the Japanese government is counting on. They are counting on being able to wildly print up money and monetize debt, but also keep yields on Japanese bonds at insanely low levels at the same time.
For the moment, it is actually working. Investors in Japanese bonds are behaving very, very irrationally.
But if that changes at some point, we could potentially be looking at the greatest Asian economic crisis of all time.
And there are some very sharp minds out there that believe that is exactly what is going to happen.
For example, the founder of Hayman Capital Management, Kyle Bass, has been sounding the alarm about Japan for a long time. He correctly predicted the subprime mortgage meltdown, and in the process he made hundreds of millions of dollars for his clients. Now he believes that the next major crash is going to be in Japan.
According to Bass, the bond bubble in Japan is so large that once it begins to implode fear is going to start spreading like wildfire…
Remember, Japanese banks in general have 900% of their tangible assets invested in JGBs that are the most negatively convex instrument you can put into a portfolio. Assume for instance that a bank holds a 10 year bond yielding 80 basis points. A 100 basis point move will cost the JGB investor about 10 years of expected interest payments.
Think about the psychology of all the players and financial implications if rates do move 100 basis points. Think about the solvency of a nation which currently spends 50% of its central government tax revenues on debt service, half of which earns the lowest yields of any country in the world.
You can’t look at this as a simple question. You need to think about this as a multivariate equation. You have to think about the incentives and the fears of all the participants. And you need to think about the fiscal sustainability of the government.
If rates even rise by a full percentage point, it could start a stampede toward the exits that nobody in the entire world would be able to control…
I ran a survey of 1,009 Japanese investors where we asked: “If rates were to move up 100 basis points, would that engender more confidence and make you want to buy more JGBs?” or, “Would you take your money elsewhere, even if it were hamstringing your government’s ability to operate?” 8 – 9% of respondents that said that they would buy more bonds and almost 80% said they would run, not walk the other way.
For much more on this, you can watch a video of Kyle Bass discussing why Japan is doomed right here.
And of course Japan is not the only “debt bomb” that could potentially go off over in Asia. As I mentioned in another article, the major problem over in China is the level of private debt…
In China, the big problem is the absolutely stunning growth of private domestic debt. According to a recent World Bank report, the total amount of credit in China has risen from 9 trillion dollars in 2008 to 23 trillion dollars today.
That increase is roughly equivalent to the entire U.S. commercial banking system.
There is simply way, way too much debt in our world today. Never before has there been so much red ink all over the planet at the same time.
Many in the mainstream media insist that this party can go on indefinitely.
But that is what they said about the housing bubble too.
Sadly, the truth is that every financial bubble eventually bursts, and this global debt bubble will be no exception.
I hope that you are getting prepared while you still can.
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Egypt Is Descending Into Civil War, But Don’t Expect Obama To Cancel His Golf Vacation
Of course I am being facetious. It is absolutely ridiculous how much time Obama takes off, and Congress is even worse. Congress is taking a five week vacation right now. Most Americans don’t get that much vacation in an entire year.
Meanwhile, as our leaders enjoy their rest, the Middle East is coming apart at the seams.
In Egypt, authorities say that 638 people are now confirmed dead and another 3,994 people were wounded in the nightmarish violence that erupted in Cairo this week. Hundreds of bodies remain uncounted by the authorities, and it appears very likely that Egypt is rapidly heading down the path to full-blown civil war…
Sadly, some of the supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood have chosen to express their fury with the government by setting Christian homes, businesses and churches on fire. According to one report, 18 churches have been torched so far…
This is absolutely despicable, and it is turning out to be one of the worst disasters for Coptic Christians ever recorded. Over the past few days, Twitter has been absolutely flooded with reports about what has been happening to Christians in Egypt…
Meanwhile, the violence in Iraq continues to escalate. The following is how Reuters described what happened in Baghdad on Thursday…
And the absolutely brutal civil war in Syria is now spilling over into Lebanon. On Thursday, a Shiite stronghold in Beirut was hit by the worst car bomb attack that Lebanon has witnessed in decades…
And of course we shouldn’t forget about the war in Yemen either. Sadly, as Ron Paul recently noted, most Americans don’t even realize what is going on in Yemen…
Unfortunately, this is probably only just the beginning.
The violence in the Middle East is probably going to get much worse, and at some point I expect a major regional war to erupt in the years ahead.
But instead of going back to the White House and at least giving the appearance of being on top of things, Obama plans to continue his golf vacation.
This is so negligent that even the Washington Post is ripping him to shreds…
But this is just par for the course for Obama.
As we learned this week, this is the guy that was actually playing cards during the bin Laden raid…
You can see video of Obama’s former “body man”, Reggie Love, making these remarks right here.
When it comes to foreign policy, Obama seems to be totally clueless.
So what would happen someday if a major foreign policy crisis erupted that actually seriously threatened our national security?
Would Obama be up to the task?
Let’s hope that we don’t have to find out.