Societal Collapse

A ‘High-Level Exercise’ Conducted 3 Months Ago Showed That A Coronavirus Pandemic Could Kill 65 Million People

Just over three months ago, a “high-level pandemic exercise” entitled “Event 201” was held in New York City.  On October 18th the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, in conjunction with the World Economic Forum and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, brought together “15 leaders of business, government, and public health” to simulate a scenario in which a coronavirus pandemic was ravaging the planet.  The current coronavirus outbreak that originated in China did not begin until December, and so at that time it was supposedly just a hypothetical exercise.  The following comes from the official page for this event…

The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security in partnership with the World Economic Forum and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hosted Event 201, a high-level pandemic exercise on October 18, 2019, in New York, NY. The exercise illustrated areas where public/private partnerships will be necessary during the response to a severe pandemic in order to diminish large-scale economic and societal consequences.

I find it quite interesting that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was involved, because they are also financial backers of the institute that was granted a U.S. patent for “an attenuated coronavirus” in November 2018.

It appears that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has been quite interested in the threat posed by coronaviruses for quite some time.

Eric Toner, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, spearheaded putting “Event 201” together.  In his scenario, a coronavirus outbreak had begun on Brazil’s pig farms…

Toner’s simulation imagined a fictional virus called CAPS. The analysis, part of a collaboration with the World Economic Forum and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, looked at what would happen if a pandemic originated in Brazil’s pig farms.

Even though the outbreak was quite limited at first, Toner’s scenario ultimately showed that a coronavirus pandemic could kill 65 million people…

The pretend outbreak started small: Farmers began coming down with symptoms that resembled the flu or pneumonia. From there, the virus spread to crowded and impoverished urban neighborhoods in South America.

Flights were canceled, and travel bookings dipped by 45%. People disseminated false information on social media.

After six months, the virus had spread around the globe. A year later, it had killed 65 million people.

Let us certainly hope that this current outbreak does not evolve into that sort of a nightmare.

According to Reuters, there are now more than 800 confirmed cases, and the death toll has shot up to 25…

China confirmed 830 cases of patients infected with the new coronavirus as of Jan. 23, while the death toll from the virus has risen to 25, the National Health Commission said on Friday.

But many are skeptical that the official figures are accurate.  Because the images coming out of Wuhan are extremely alarming…

Disturbing images of Wuhan residents dropping unresponsive to the floor have emerged on Instagram following the diseased Chinese city’s coronavirus lockdown.

Wuhan has been branded a “zombieland” by frantic locals after Chinese authorities told residents they are not allowed to leave yesterday morning.

Pictures from inside the city paint an apocalyptic picture as medics patrol in hazmat suits and gas masks.

Over the past 48 hours, numerous videos have been posted on social media that supposedly show violently sick people that have literally collapsed in the streets of Wuhan.  Here is just one example.

And in another video, hundreds of mask-wearing Chinese citizens are crammed into the hallways of a hospital in Wuhan as they wait to see a doctor.

This is something that I wrote about yesterday, and even though I documented my claims, I don’t think that a lot of people believed me.

In fact, when I told my wife what was happening at the hospitals even she didn’t believe me at first.

But this is actually happening, and one video from a Wuhan hospital even shows a patient that collapsed on the ground as he waited to see a doctor…

If people are literally dropping where they stand, that would seem to indicate that we aren’t being told the full truth about this virus.

Chinese authorities are trying to keep everyone calm, but they are definitely treating this like it is no ordinary outbreak.  For example, one airline passenger that was suspected of having the virus was actually “wheeled out of an airport in a quarantine box”…

Footage has emerged showing an airline passenger with suspected SARS-like coronavirus being wheeled out of an airport in a quarantine box.

The man inside the box is wearing a protective suit, a mask and gloves after he reportedly showed possible symptoms, including a fever, during screening and was isolated from other travellers.

The box is surrounded by staff wearing blue masks as it is wheeled to a waiting ambulance outside a terminal at the airport in Fuzhou in south-eastern China.

The whole world was stunned when it was announced that the entire city of Wuhan would be facing a quarantine, but now seven other Chinese cities are also being locked down.

In addition, big cities all over China are canceling festivities for the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday…

Major Chinese cities, including Beijing and quarantine-blocked Wuhan, banned all large gatherings over the coming Lunar New Year festival, the most important holiday on the Chinese calendar, in an expanding effort to contain a rapidly spreading coronavirus outbreak.

The announcement Thursday came as authorities expanded travel restrictions imposed on Wuhan to surrounding municipalities, shutting down travel networks and attempting to quarantine about 25 million people – more than the population of Florida.

We have never seen anything like this before in the entire modern history of China.

Would Chinese officials really take such dramatic measures if the threat was not real?

Of course here in the United States the CDC is assuring us that we don’t have anything to be concerned about…

“We don’t want the American public to be worried about this because their risk is low,” says Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “On the other hand, we are taking this very seriously and are dealing very closely with Chinese authorities.”

Hopefully they are correct, and hopefully this outbreak will blow over sooner rather than later.

But a virologist that played a key role in identifying SARS in 2003 insists that what we have seen so far is just the beginning…

“A bigger outbreak is certain,” said Guan Yi, a virologist who helped identify severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003. He estimated – “conservatively,” he said – that this outbreak could be 10 times bigger than the SARS epidemic because that virus was transmitted by only a few “super spreaders” in a more defined part of the country.

“We have passed through the ‘golden period’ for prevention and control,” he told Caixin magazine from self-imposed quarantine after visiting Wuhan. “What’s more, we’ve got the holiday traffic rush and a dereliction of duty from certain officials.”

And if that wasn’t enough to send a chill down your spine, just check out what else he had to say…

“I’ve seen it all: bird flu, SARS, influenza A, swine fever and the rest. But the Wuhan pneumonia makes me feel extremely powerless,” he told Caixin. “Most of the past epidemics were controllable, but this time, I’m petrified.”

The next week or two will be an absolutely critical time.

If authorities are able to stop the number of cases from rising at an exponential rate, and if there are able to keep it mostly confined to just a few areas of China, we may have a chance to prevent a global pandemic.

But if not, we may be facing a worst case scenario.

And according to “Event 201”, a worst case scenario could potentially mean tens of millions of dead people.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.

10 Things That Just Happened In America During The Holiday Season That Will Make You Cringe

Everything is great in America, isn’t it?  After all, the new Star Wars movie just came out, stock prices just hit another all-time record high, and Americans spent more money on Christmas gifts this year than ever before.  According to some people, this is the greatest time to be alive in all of American history, and the years that are ahead of us are going to be even better.  Of course if you are gullible enough to believe that there is a giant bridge in California that I would like to sell to you.  We live at a time when our society is literally falling apart all around us, and throwing even more money at our problems is not going to fix them.  As I noted the other day, “the suicide rate is at an all-time high, we are fighting the worst drug crisis in our history, according to the CDC more than 110 million Americans have an STD, and we have the highest percentage of children living with a single parent of any nation in the entire world.”  In other words, anyone that is attempting to argue that this is a golden era in America history is being more than just a little bit delusional.

Yes, the stock market has been soaring in recent days, and that is a good thing.

But investors are pouring their money into stocks because they believe that America has an exceedingly bright future.

When that optimism disappears, stock prices will collapse, and then what will we have to brag about?

Everywhere around us, the fabric of our society is deteriorating, and our decline seems to be accelerating with each passing month.

In this article, I am going to share yet more examples of our stunning societal decline with you.  The following are 10 things that just happened in America during the holiday season that will make you cringe…

#1 Two real life grinches were trying to ruin the holidays for as many people in Roseville, California as possible before the police caught up with them.  According to one media report, they were caught “with approximately 100 stolen packages” in their van: Two men are behind bars after they were found with approximately 100 stolen packages in Roseville, according to the Roseville Police Department.

#2 This is known as “the season of giving”, but one 65-year-old guy in Colorado decided it would be more fun to do it with other people’s money: Just after noon on Monday, a 65-year-old man walked into a downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado bank and stole thousands of dollars before running outside and tossing the cash up into the air while yelling “Merry Christmas!”

#3 Speaking of Colorado, one group of high school students was recently forced to recite poetry that contained worship of Moloch.  Apparently that whole “separation of church and state” thing does not apply to pagan deities: A school in Steamboat Springs is under scrutiny after a parent reported an assignment in which students were required to recite sexually explicit and/or distasteful poetry that includes worship of the pagan deity Moloch as well as conveying the topic of “sexting” in society – which was assigned to eleventh grade students without parental consent.

#4 Considering the fact that the streets of San Francisco are constantly littered with human waste, one homeless man decided that it must be okay to defecate in the middle of a grocery store too: The picture shows a disheveled gentleman in a man-bun with his pants around his knees, feces clearly visible on the floor near a chip display as he prepared to wipe.

#5 Don’t let your kids hear about this or you will be sorry.  This holiday season, “fart launchers” became one of the most popular toys in America: The Fart Launcher’s reek, “while incredibly accurate … is organic, plant-based, doesn’t get caught in fabric and dissipates in minutes,” WowWee brand manager Andrew Yanofsky tells The Post.

#6 It just wouldn’t be the holidays unless “Florida man” did something really crazy.  In this instance, a Florida man was trying to bust down a bathroom door with a hatchet: A Shalimar man is charged with trying to attack another man with a hatchet after using the weapon and his feet to bust down a bathroom door. The Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office arrested 39-year old Jason Godwin Christmas Day for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill and culpable negligence.

#7 You may have been safe, warm and well fed this holiday season, but more than half a million Americans didn’t have a home at all: While millions of Americans celebrate Christmas this year with loved ones, carving turkey and sharing gifts, others are not so fortunate. According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, over half a million of us will spend Christmas on the streets. The government agency estimates that on any given day, around 553,000 Americans are homeless. A third of those are families with young children. African Americans and those with disabilities are particularly likely to become homeless.

#8 One rapper in Los Angeles decided that the best way to address the problem of homelessness was to climb on top of a tall building and throw cash down on to the homeless people living on Skid Row so they could fight over it: The 22-year-old rapper known as Blueface climbed onboard a black Mercedes SUV in Skid Row before throwing money out of a bag while dozens of people below scramble to catch the flying cash and pick it up from the ground. The artist, whose real name is Jonathan Michael Porteris, is known for the Benjamin Franklin tattoo on his cheek and a handful of hit tracks that reached viral status in recent years.

#9 Providing daycare for working parents is apparently quite lucrative if you pack them in like sardines.  When police investigated a suspicious residence in Colorado Springs recently, they found 26 children and two adult workers hidden behind “a false wall”: Not finding any children, officers spoke with Faith, who, according to Sokolik, “refused to cooperate.” While still in the home, officers said they heard the sound of children, Sokolik said. Eventually, they found “a false wall” leading to a finished basement, where they discovered 26 children — 20 more than the license allowed — all under the age of 3, and two adults, police said.

#10 This last item on the list should definitely break your heart.  For many Americans, this is one of the most difficult times of the year.  And when the pressure becomes too much, unfortunately some people completely snap.  On Christmas Day, a 40-year-old mother in Boston threw her two young children off of the roof of a nine-story parking garage before killing herself as well: A Boston woman who pushed her two young children from the top of a parking garage and then killed herself in a double murder suicide has been identified. Erin Pascal, 40, was named on Thursday as the woman whose body was found on the sidewalk next to those of her two young children; four-year-old daughter Allison and 16-month-old Andrew.

It is such a tragic thing when someone commits suicide, because that is never, ever the solution to anything.  There is so much to live for, but our society trains us to relentlessly chase things that don’t really matter.

Sadly, even though the suicide rate is already at a record high, it is likely to go even higher as our society continues to deteriorate in 2020 and beyond.

What we need is not more money.

What Americans really need is more faith, more hope and more love, and those three are in very short supply in our society today.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.

Goodbye Middle Class: The Percentage Of Wealth Owned By The Top 10% Just Got Even BIGGER

The middle class in America is being systematically eviscerated, and it is getting worse with each passing year.  As you will see below, one new study has found that 10 percent of Americans now own 70 percent of all the wealth.  Once upon a time, the United States had the largest and most vibrant middle class in the history of the world, but pretty soon we are just going to have the ultra-wealthy and everyone else.  Our system has been designed to funnel as much wealth as possible to the very top of the financial pyramid, and that means that most of the rest of us are deeply struggling.  And when you are just barely getting by from month to month, all it takes is one bad break to knock you completely out of the middle class and into poverty.

I have been chronicling the demise of the middle class for many years, but I didn’t know that the numbers had gotten this bad.  According to a study that was recently conducted by the Federal Reserve, the percentage of wealth controlled by the top 10 percent of U.S. households has shot up from 60 percent in 1989 to 70 percent today…

Deutsche Bank’s Torsten Sløk says that the distribution of household wealth in America has become even more disproportionate over the past decade, with the richest 10% of U.S. households representing 70% of all U.S. wealth in 2018, compared with 60% in 1989, according to a recent study by researchers at the Federal Reserve.

The study finds that the share of wealth among the richest 1% increased to 32% from 23% over the same period.

The ironic thing is that the Federal Reserve has actually done much to cause this high concentration of wealth among the elite.  In response to the last financial crisis, the Federal Reserve pumped unprecedented amounts of money into the financial system, and this has created the greatest stock market bubble in our history…

The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +2.06% has climbed nearly 300% since its closing low in March 2009, the S&P 500 index SPX, +2.14% has climbed 325%, while the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP, +2.65% has soared 535% over the same period.

Meanwhile, wages have stagnated for ordinary Americans.  According to the Social Security Administration, the median yearly wage in the United States is currently just $30,533.  In other words, 50 percent of all American workers make at least that much per year, and 50 percent of all American workers make that much or less per year.

$30,533 a year breaks down to approximately $2,500 per month, and you simply can’t support a middle class lifestyle for a typical American family on $2,500 a month.

Meanwhile, the cost of living for middle class families has exploded higher over the past few decades…

Everyday expenses continue to rise, and as the shadow inflation increases, it also threatens to wipe out the middle class – what’s left of it anyway. In fact, middle-class life is now 30% more expensive than it was 20 years ago, according to a separate report by CNBC. The cost of things such as college, housing, and child care has risen precipitously: Tuition at public universities doubled between 1996 and 2016 and housing prices in popular cities have quadrupled, Alissa Quart, author and executive director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, tells CNBC Make It.

As the cost of living has risen faster than our incomes have, more Americans have been squeezed out of the middle class with each passing month.

As a result, an increasing number of Americans have become financially dependent on the government, and our rapidly expanding welfare state is a big reason why the federal government is now 22 trillion dollars in debt.

Of course many Americans are no longer able to make it at all, and the ranks of the homeless are swelling all over the nation.  In fact, we just got some brand new numbers about the growth of homelessness in the Los Angeles area that are absolutely eye-popping…

The number of homeless people counted across Los Angeles County jumped 12% over the past year to nearly 59,000, with more young and old residents and families on the streets, officials said Tuesday.

The majority of the homeless were found within the city of Los Angeles, which saw a 16% increase to 36,300, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority said in presenting January’s annual count to the county Board of Supervisors.

Yes, it is true that we have a record number of millionaires on the west coast in 2019, but meanwhile our major west coast cities are being transformed into rotting, decaying nightmares right in front of our eyes.

During a recent interview with Laura Ingraham, Dr. Drew Pinsky admitted that there is “a complete breakdown of the basic needs of civilization in Los Angeles right now”…

“We have a complete breakdown of the basic needs of civilization in Los Angeles right now,” Pinsky told host Laura Ingraham. “We have the three prongs of airborne disease, tuberculosis is exploding, (and) rodent-borne. We are one of the only cities in the country that doesn’t have a rodent control program, and sanitation has broken down.”

Pinsky’s comments followed news that Los Angeles police officer had contracted typhoid fever, a rare and life-threatening illness that fewer than 350 Americans contract each year.

Los Angeles had a typhus outbreak last summer and will likely have another this summer, Pinsky said. Meanwhile, bubonic plague – a pandemic that killed tens of millions of people during the 14th century – is “likely” already present in Los Angeles, Pinsky added.

Despite all of our great wealth and despite all of our advanced technology, this is what life is like in our second largest city right now.

And if things are degenerating this badly during stable times, what are things going to look like once our society plunges into chaos?

Ultimately, the American Dream is about being self-sufficient.  Most people want to be able to work hard and provide a nice life for their families, but that is becoming harder and harder to do.

No matter which political party has been in power in Washington, the middle class has continued to shrink and more wealth and power has become concentrated in the hands of the elite.

Now we stand on the precipice of the next major economic downturn, and many are deeply concerned about what that is going to mean for the future of our society.

Get Prepared NowAbout the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally-syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including Get Prepared Now, The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters. His articles are originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News. From there, his articles are republished on dozens of other prominent websites. If you would like to republish his articles, please feel free to do so. The more people that see this information the better, and we need to wake more people up while there is still time.

San Francisco, Los Angeles And Seattle: 3 Formerly Beautiful West Coast Cities Have Literally Been Transformed Into Hellholes

Once upon a time, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle were three of the most beautiful cities on the entire planet.  I know that this is hard to imagine today, but there was a time when millions of people eagerly moved out to the west coast for a better quality of life.  Sadly, the reverse is true today.  Millions of people are moving away from our major cities on the west coast because of the hellholes that they have become.  A former Seattle police officer that was recently interviewed by a reporter from KOMO News  was very honest about the fact that he would never want to raise a family in Seattle because of the hellhole that it has become.  Every night he saw the worst of Seattle firsthand, and he finally felt forced to quit because city officials would not allow him to effectively do his job.  An explosion of homelessness in our major west coast cities has fueled a wave of crime, drugs and human degradation unlike anything we have seen before, and in many cases our law enforcement officials have their hands tied and are literally being prevented from cleaning up the streets.

Right now, more than half a million people are homeless in the United States.  As the economy gets worse, that number will continue to rise.

Many homeless Americans are law-abiding citizens that have just had a tough break. Everyone gets knocked down in life at some point, and we need to do all that we can to help those law-abiding citizens get back on their feet.

But because of their ultra-liberal policies, some of the major cities on the west coast have become magnets for drug addicts, serial criminals, sex offenders, illegal immigrants and people that have simply heard about all of the “free benefits” that are being offered.  As a result, the streets of those cities have become a showcase for the social decay that is sweeping across our nation.

Let’s start with San Francisco.  According to one report, it is home to more than 28,000 homeless people, and that would make San Francisco the city with the third largest homeless population in the United States.

Others feel like that number is way too low, and the truth is that it is exceedingly difficult to count the homeless.

After all, how are you supposed to accurately count people that don’t want to be counted?

What we do know is that San Francisco is a huge magnet for drug addicts.  The city handed out 5.8 million free syringes in 2018, and that number would seem to suggest a homeless population far in excess of 28,000.

And as all those drug addicts aimlessly wander through the streets, many of them use those streets as their own personal toilets.  Over the past 8 years, more than 118,000 reports of human feces in the streets have been filed with city authorities…

Since 2011, there have been at least 118,352 reported instances of human fecal matter on city streets.

New mayor, London Breed, won election by promising to clean things up. However, conditions are the same or worse. Last year, the number of reports spiked to an all-time high at 28,084. In first quarter 2019, the pace continued with 6,676 instances of human waste in the public way.

In addition to endless piles of poop, the drug addicts are also endlessly committing property crimes in order to pay for their drug habits.

Each year, there are more than 6,000 property crimes per 100,000 residents in San Francisco.  That is about four times the rate of property crime that New York City has reported.

Mayor Breed would like to get a lot of these homeless people off of the streets, but finding a place to put them has been problematic.  Residents of one wealthy liberal neighborhood are currently fighting like mad to keep a proposed homeless shelter away from their gated mansions…

A wealthy liberal neighborhood in San Francisco whose residents cast the most votes for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election is fighting against a proposal to build a new homeless shelter near their gated mansions.

Mayor London Breed has sponsored legislation to fast track a homeless shelter that would house 200 people. However, wealthy liberals living in the affected area have set up a GoFundMe to stop the project which has already hit $80,000 of its $100,000 target.

Things are certainly not any better in Los Angeles.

According to the same report mentioned above, L.A. has nearly twice as many homeless people as San Francisco…

Los Angeles has the second largest population of people exploring homelessness, according to a new report.

The LA area contains 55,200 homeless people, according to data released by the Bay Area Council Economic Institute.

The homeless population in L.A. has surged 75 percent in six years, and this has happened during a time when the economy has been relatively stable.

So how bad are things going to become when the economy starts getting really bad?

When I was running for Congress, one of the people that came to help the campaign had spent a lot of time in some of the worst parts of Los Angeles.  He told me about the public drug use, the constant crime and the human degradation that is seemingly everywhere.  This greatly saddened me, because Los Angeles was once a magnificent city.  In fact, at one point in my life I wanted to live there.

But not anymore.  Today, millions of people are leaving California and never looking back because of the utter hellhole the entire state has become.

Further up the coast, the city of Seattle is experiencing similar issues.  Not too long ago, a veteran Seattle reporter named Eric Johnson produced an hour-long documentary entitled “Seattle Is Dying”, and if you have not seen it yet I would strongly recommend taking the time to watch it.

Since it was first released, it has been viewed almost 2 million times on YouTube…

In the past two weeks, Seattle Is Dying has garnered 38,000 shares on Facebook and nearly 2 million views on YouTube. The report has clearly resonated with anxious, fearful, and increasingly angry Seattle residents. Exhausted by a decade of rising disorder and property crime—now two-and-a-half times higher than Los Angeles’s and four times higher than New York City’s—Seattle voters may have reached the point of “compassion fatigue.” According to the Seattle Times, 53 percent of Seattle voters now support a “zero-tolerance policy” on homeless encampments; 62 percent believe that the problem is getting worse because the city “wastes money by being inefficient” and “is not accountable for how the money is spent,” and that “too many resources are spent on the wrong approaches to the problem.”

One of the moments in the documentary that really touched me was when a concerned resident described how drug addicts have been leaving needles and human waste in the graveyard near his home.  The homeless have erected tents all around the graveyard, and he can clearly smell urine whenever he walks down the streets.

He would like to fix things, and he is fed up enough that he has decided to run for city council.  But he is facing an uphill battle, because Seattle has been entirely taken over by socialists.  The following comes from Mac Slavo…

The entire video is about an hour long, but it is pretty easy to see where Seattle continues to go wrong. A heavy tax burden, regulations that push out businesses, and a power-hungry group of totalitarian sociopaths have been slowly eroding the city. The decay of Western civilization can be seen up and down the entirety of the West coast. Some say it’s by design, others disagree. But the commonality is that all of the cities are being pushed into poverty by illusions and lies of socialists. Calling Seattle anything other than a leftist’s paradise would be inaccurate. The city has all of the laws the socialists want, yet it’s killing itself because of it.

In life, the decisions that we make have consequences, and San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle are now experiencing the consequences of decades of incredibly foolish decisions.

But of course they are far from alone.  All across the country there are thousands of communities where social decay is exceedingly evident, and it is getting worse with each passing year.

If we want to change the trajectory of our future, we have got to start doing things differently.

Because if we keep doing the same things, we are going to keep getting the same results, and our country is going to continue falling apart right in front of our eyes.

Get Prepared NowAbout the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally-syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including Get Prepared Now, The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters. His articles are originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News. From there, his articles are republished on dozens of other prominent websites. If you would like to republish his articles, please feel free to do so. The more people that see this information the better, and we need to wake more people up while there is still time.

Raw Video Shows Dozens Of People Looting A Dollar Store As Flooding Cuts Wilmington Off From The Rest Of North Carolina

A major emergency brings out the best in some people, but in others it brings out the absolute worst.  Shocking images of “dozens of people” ransacking a Family Dollar store in Wilmington, North Carolina have stunned the nation.  This happened in broad daylight, and many of the looters didn’t even seem to care that a television news crew was filming them.  Sadly, this always seems to happen whenever a major disaster takes place.  Our established social order is so vulnerable, and so many people out there will gladly take advantage of others if they believe that there is an opportunity to get away with it.  If this is how people will behave during a storm, how will they act once things start getting really bad in this country?

At this hour, Florence continues to dump massive amounts of rain on the Mid-Atlantic region, and now the death toll is up to 18.  It is being reported that more than 640,000 people are without power, and the National Hurricane Center says that more “catastrophic flooding” is coming as Florence remains stationary over the Carolinas.

Major roads all over North Carolina and South Carolina have been flooded, and some parts of Interstate 95 have had to be shut down.

The flooding is already so bad that the city of Wilmington has been completely cut off from the rest of North Carolina, and that is where the Family Dollar store was looted.  One reporter was able to capture raw footage of the looting in progress, and you can see that video on YouTube right here.

This is one of the most disturbing things that I have seen in a long time.

How can people behave like that?

According to one news report, many of the looters were carrying things back to a public housing project right across the street…

Footage from local news station WECT shows dozens of people carrying any items they could get their hands on out of the store and back to a public housing community called Houston Moore.

While there were no members of law enforcement on the scene due to management’s request, police enacted a curfew for the area from 5pm Saturday to 6am Sunday.

They also said many of the alleged looters could be identified in WECT’s video. They encouraged locals to report anyone they recognized in the footage.

If it was just one or two people doing the looting, that would be one thing.

But for “dozens of people” to be looting a store in broad daylight is a very frightening indication as to where we are at as a society.

The storm just arrived a couple days ago, so none of these people were hurting for food or water.  They were just immensely greedy, and they decided to loot the store because they thought they could get away with it.

According to one reporter, “you could just see people everywhere”…

WECT reporter Chelsea Donovan, who went to the scene with another journalist to film the looting, said: ‘When we came over the hill on Greenfield Street, you could just see people everywhere.’

In her news coverage Donovan gestures into the store’s front entrance as she says: ‘You can see here inside just a complete mess, people taking duffel bags and trash bags, now noticing we’re here [and] running away from the camera.’

And of course this was not the only instance of criminal activity in the region.

Over in Brunswick County, at least 4 crooks were arrested…

Dashaun Smith, 25, and Brandon Bellamy, 30, are both charged with possession of burglary tools and break and or enter at Tommy’s Mini Mart in Leland. They are each being held under a $20,000 bond.

Devin Harris, 21, and Justice Harris, 18, are both charged with break or enter a motor vehicle. They are being held under a $5,000 bond each.

We have raised an entire generation that has no moral foundation, and when things take a turn for the worse in this country we are going to see chaos like this all over America.

It doesn’t matter how many laws you have if people don’t follow them.  To a very large degree, any free society is heavily dependent on the fact that most people will regulate themselves, and that is one of the reasons why the social decay that we see all around us is so deeply alarming.

Ultimately, we will probably see even more looting before this storm is over, because it is being reported that “the worst flooding is yet to come”…

Florence’s merciless deluge has already killed 18, trapped hundreds and made parts of North and South Carolina impassable — and authorities say the worst flooding is yet to come.

The tropical depression will keep dumping rain over parts of North Carolina for the next few days, with numerous rivers expected to crest at major flood stage.

Flooding already is so bad in North Carolina that the state transportation department is telling people not to travel in the state. Numerous highways, including sections of I-95 and I-40, are closed, and road flooding has virtually cut off the coastal city of Wilmington.

Previously, I have discussed the fact that it is being projected that this storm could potentially dump 10 trillion gallons of water on North Carolina.  The flooding is already “catastrophic”, and you can view some really good before and after photos right here.

The National Hurricane Center says that up to 40 inches of rain will likely fall on southeastern North Carolina and the northeastern tip of South Carolina.  Even though Florence turned out to be not quite as powerful as the experts were anticipating, this is still an extremely, extremely damaging storm.

At times like this, it is so important for communities to come together and support one another.

Unfortunately, some have decided that this is the perfect time for a crime spree, and as an American I am deeply ashamed by what I am seeing.

About the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News and the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

Bankers And Tech Executives Know The Collapse Of Society Is Coming And Are Feverishly Prepping For It

While most of the general population has been lulled into a false sense of security, bankers and tech executives are spending millions upon millions of dollars to prepare for the collapse of society.  Do they know something that the rest of us do not?  Apparently talk of doomsday scenarios has become very popular at Silicon Valley dinner parties, and as you will see below, having a plan to escape to New Zealand appears to be a very popular “Plan B” among the tech elite.  Of course this is not just a west coast phenomenon.  Many bankers on the east coast have similar concerns and have also been developing contingency plans.  Ladies and gentlemen, they know what is coming and they are feverishly getting prepared for it.  In fact, J.P. Morgan Chase’s head quant just publicly declared that the next financial crisis is going to result in “social unrest not seen in the U.S. in half a century”.  The following comes from CNBC…

Sudden, severe stock sell-offs sparked by lightning-fast machines. Unprecedented actions by central banks to shore up asset prices. Social unrest not seen in the U.S. in half a century.

That’s how J.P. Morgan Chase‘s head quant, Marko Kolanovic, envisions the next financial crisis. The forces that have transformed markets in the last decade, namely the rise of computerized trading and passive investing, are setting up conditions for potentially violent moves once the current bull market ends, according to a report from Kolanovic sent to the bank’s clients on Tuesday. His note is part of a 168-page mega-report, written for the 10th anniversary of the 2008 financial crisis, with perspectives from 48 of the bank’s analysts and economists.

If you visit my website on a regular basis, you already know that I have been warning that rising levels of anger and frustration are rapidly eroding the thin veneer of civilization that we all take for granted on a daily basis.

Back in 1968, the Vietnam war was in full swing, a presidential election was approaching and two of the most prominent leaders in America had just been assassinated.  Chaos erupted in the streets as a result, and Kolanovic is absolutely convinced that we will see a similar eruption soon…

Kolanovic closes his report on an ominous note: “The next crisis is also likely to result in social tensions similar to those witnessed 50 years ago in 1968.”

That year saw the peak of both the Vietnam War and anti-war movement and the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy. Today, the internet and social media are helping to polarize groups, and events including the U.S. election and Brexit show tensions that will probably worsen in the next crisis, he said.

When society begins to come apart at the seams, many among the elite do not plan to stick around for the day of reckoning.

A Bloomberg article that was just published entitled “The Super Rich of Silicon Valley Have a Doomsday Escape Plan” has some amazing revelations.  According to the article, over the past two years seven “Silicon Valley entrepreneurs” have purchased survival bunkers from a company in Texas and shipped them to locations in New Zealand…

In recent months, two 150-ton survival bunkers journeyed by land and sea from a Texas warehouse to the shores of New Zealand, where they’re buried 11 feet underground.

Seven Silicon Valley entrepreneurs have purchased bunkers from Rising S Co. and planted them in New Zealand in the past two years, said Gary Lynch, the manufacturer’s general manager. At the first sign of an apocalypse — nuclear war, a killer germ, a French Revolution-style uprising targeting the 1 percent — the Californians plan to hop on a private jet and hunker down, he said.

It would be weird enough if one wealthy individual did this, but the count is now up to seven.

So why have they chosen New Zealand?

Well, it is because New Zealand doesn’t have any enemies, English is spoken there, it is very stable, and it is very far away from everything else.

Plus, the country allows wealthy individuals “to essentially buy residency”…

The nation allows emigres to essentially buy residency through investor visas, and rich Americans have poured a fortune into the country, often by acquiring palatial estates.

Billionaire hedge-fund honcho Julian Robertson owns a lodge overlooking Lake Wakatipu in Queenstown, the South Island’s luxury resort destination. Fidelity National Financial Inc. Chairman Bill Foley has a homestead in the Wairarapa region, north of Wellington, and Titanic director James Cameron bought a mansion nearby at Lake Pounui.

There has been a significant exodus of wealthy Americans to New Zealand in recent years, and once things start getting really bad there will be a steady stream of private jets taking off from locations in the U.S. and landing in that beautiful nation.

Of course not everyone plans to leave.  Luxury survival bunkers are also being constructed all over the heartland of America, but they aren’t cheap.

For example, it was being reported that a “penthouse” inside the Survival Condo in Kansas was selling for more than four million dollars…

Another shelter for the ultra-wealthy is the Survival Condo in Kansas.

It was designed to withstand a nuclear blast or nature’s worst, but is far cry from what you might expect an underground shelter to look like.

There is a cinema, a swimming pool with a water slide, a spa, a lounge, a gym and an indoor shooting range to keep occupants entertained.

But survival comes at a price.

Last year, it was reported that plush 3,600sq ft penthouses within the shelter – a former missile silo – were selling for $4.5m (£3.6m).

Needless to say, anyone outside of the top 1 percent is not going to make it into the Survival Condo.

And in order to keep the rest of us out, it has an armory that is “stocked with guns and ammo”…

Additionally, an armory stocked with guns and ammo is in place in case of an attack by non-members, and is also available for owners to practice.

The bunker is able to sustain its owners for up to five years, by raising tilapia in fish tanks and growing hydroponic vegetables under lamps.

The elite can see what so many of the rest of us can also see.

Our future looks very troubling, and it appears to be wise to get prepared for what is coming in advance.

Unfortunately, the rest of us don’t have the money to buy a luxury survival bunker or to fly to New Zealand on a private jet.  Money may not be able to buy happiness, but it can buy a pretty good escape plan.

This article originally appeared on The Economic Collapse Blog.  About the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News and the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

MIT Computer Model Predicts Dramatic Drop In Quality Of Life Around 2020 And The “End Of Civilization” Around 2040

Is humanity approaching a major turning point?  A computer model that was originally developed in 1973 by a group of scientists at MIT is warning that things are about to dramatically change.  If the computer predictions are accurate, our standard of living will start to decline dramatically around the year 2020, and we will witness the “end of civilization” around the year 2040.  Of course this is not the first time ominous predictions such as this have been made about our future.  For years, experts have been warning that we are heading for severe shortages of water, food and oil as our limited natural resources begin to run out.  For years, experts have been warning that our economic model is not sustainable and that we are heading for a historic collapse.  For years, experts have been warning about the alarming increase in seismic activity all over the planet and about the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.  Society is crumbling all around us, and the elements for a “perfect storm” are definitely coming together.

So maybe this computer model is on to something.

The name of the computer program is “World One”, and it was originally created by Jay Forrester…

The prediction came from a programme nicknamed World One, which was developed by a team of MIT researchers and processed by Australia’s largest computer.

It was originally devised by computer pioneer Jay Forrester, after he was tasked by the Club of Rome to develop a model of global sustainability.

However, the shocking result of the computer calculations showed that the level of pollution and population would cause a global collapse by 2040.

The fact that the Club of Rome was behind Jay Forrester’s work is a major red flag, because David Rockefeller and other globalists founded the Club of Rome and it has always been used to further the globalist agenda.

Could it be possible that this computer model is a glimpse into the kind of future that the globalists believe is coming?

According to the model, life as we know it is about to change in a massive way…

At this time the broadcasters addreses the audience: “At around 2020, the condition of the planet becomes highly critical.

“If we do nothing about it, the quality of life goes down to zero. Pollution becomes so seriously it will start to kill people, which in turn will cause the population to diminish, lower than it was in the 1900.

“At this stage, around 2040 to 2050, civilised life as we know it on this planet will cease to exist.”

The computer model appears to be primarily concerned with natural resources, pollution and population levels, but other factors should be considered as well.

In order to have “civilization”, people need to behave in a civilized manner, and we see more evidence that we are in an advanced state of social decay on a daily basis.

For example, one would think that priests would be some of the most well-behaved and “civilized” members of our society, but a new report about clergy child abuse in Pennsylvania is pulling back the curtain on incredible acts of darkness…

Horrific details have emerged about predatory behavior by priests, including those who made young boys rinse their mouths with holy water to ‘purify’ them after they were forced to give oral sex and one young boy made to pose naked as Jesus while other priests took pornographic pictures and shared them with other clergymen.

A bombshell report by a grand jury in Pennsylvania has extensively detailed for the first time how 300 priests sexually abused more than 1,000 children and how church leaders, some of whom are still alive, covered it up.

Remember, these 300 priests are just from one state.  There are countless other incidents of abuse all over the country, and it is a crisis that appears to be escalating.

Earlier today, I came across a story about a 22-year-old man in Michigan that approached a group of young girls in a forceful manner, but fortunately they were able to fight him off…

Four Michigan girls successfully fought off a man who allegedly intended to kidnap and have sex with one of them by punching him and flinging hot coffee in his face.

Bruce Hipkins, 22, of Tuscola County, Michigan, was charged with kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment, assault and battery and criminal sexual conduct charges following the incident which occurred Friday night.

The thin veneer of civilization that we all take for granted on a daily basis is wearing very thin, and it is all that really separates us from societal collapse, chaos and anarchy.

Ultimately, a computer model from 1973 is probably not going to be the best guide, but I do agree that enormous societal changes are heading our way very rapidly.  In fact, I wrote an entire novel about what America will start to look like as those societal changes begin to accelerate.  I am more convinced than ever that America is heading for a “perfect storm” that will bring us to our knees, but most Americans appear to have bought into the fiction that everything is going to be okay somehow even though it is exceedingly clear that virtually nothing about our society is sustainable over an extended period of time.  A day of reckoning is inevitably coming, and even a computer model from 1973 can see that.

For those of you that have stopped, it is time to start prepping again.  A major international debt crisis has started, war almost erupted in the Middle East last week, and civil unrest is starting to erupt in major cities all across America.

I believe that we are going to witness bigger changes over the next two years than we have over the last ten years combined.  The clock is ticking, and America’s date with destiny is fast approaching.

As always, let us hope for the best, but let us also get prepared for the worst.

Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News and the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

Police Union President Laments That Portland Has Become A “Cesspool” As West Coast Cities Struggle With An Unprecedented Surge In Homelessness

Even though it has always been kind of crazy, at one time Portland, Oregon was quite an attractive place to live, but now those days are long gone.  Today, the city streets are strewn with garbage, drug paraphernalia and human feces.  Mentally ill homeless people and drug addicts wander about like zombies, and there are certain areas of the city that you absolutely do not want to visit at night.  In essence, the city is slowly becoming a post-apocalyptic version of its former self, and those that love the city are seething with frustration.  Of course Portland is simply experiencing the same surge in homelessness that so many other west coast cities are struggling to deal with.  As housing prices have risen dramatically, many on the lower end of the income scale have been priced out of the market entirely, and an increasing number of people are being forced to sleep in vehicles, in shelters or on the streets.

The president of the police union in Portland has had enough.  His officers are overwhelmed by the needs of the homeless on a nightly basis, and he is calling on the mayor to finally do something to resolve this crisis.  The following is the first paragraph from a statement that PPA President Daryl Turner just released…

Our City has become a cesspool. Livability that once made Portland a unique and vibrant city is now replaced with human feces in businesses doorways, in our parks, and on our streets. Aggressive panhandlers block the sidewalks, storefronts, and landmarks like Pioneer Square, discouraging people from enjoying our City. Garbage-filled RVs and vehicles are strewn throughout our neighborhoods. Used needles, drug paraphernalia, and trash are common sights lining the streets and sidewalks of the downtown core area, under our bridges, and freeway overpasses. That’s not what our families, business owners, and tourists deserve.

If that sounds familiar, that is because many other west coast cities are dealing with the exact same issues right now.

For example, new San Francisco Mayor London Breed recently admitted that there “is more feces on the sidewalks than I’ve ever seen”…

“There is more feces on the sidewalks than I’ve ever seen growing up here,” Breed told KNTV. “That is a huge problem and we are not just talking about from dogs — we’re talking about from humans.”

The streets of San Francisco are littered with a “dangerous mix of drug needles, garbage, and feces”, KNTV’s investigative team reported in February after surveying the city’s streets.

And a lot of other San Francisco residents have noticed the exact same thing.  In fact, during one recent seven day period 16,000 complaints were submitted to the city about human feces.

Sounds like a great place to live, right?

It is important to keep in mind that San Francisco supposedly has a “booming economy” and some of the highest real estate prices in the entire nation.

If this is happening in a “prosperous area”, what are things like in major cities where things are not so prosperous?

Down in L.A., there was a nearly 26 percent increase in homelessness in 2017, and overall homelessness in L.A. has risen 75 percent over the past 6 years.

Let that sink in for a moment.

During this supposed “economy recovery”, our second largest city has seen homelessness go up 75 percent.

Sadly, it is estimated that 25 percent of the nation’s entire homeless population now lives in California…

While it’s tough to say precisely how many Californians are experiencing homelessness, the federal Housing and Urban Development Department estimates the number statewide at 130,000 on a given night. That’s 25 percent of the entire nation’s homeless population. Since 2016, California experienced a larger increase in homelessness than any other state.

At one time, L.A.’s “skid row” was limited to a single street, but now it goes on mile after mile.  I just have to share with you the following excerpt from an excellent article about what life is like for those living on this famous stretch of real estate…

Most of its 2,000 residents sleep in tents or under tarps. Those with more status occupy the sides of streets shaded by trees. Location, location, location. The lowest caste sleep on cardboard or nothing. Some people rent tents for a few bucks a night.

There are no liquor stores so businessmen buy alcohol from shops a few miles away and sell it at a steep mark-up. Loan sharks collect debts by taking control of the debit cards issued to homeless people by government agencies.

A guy sits at a table on the sidewalk selling cigarettes and joints. The city has installed sidewalk restrooms. Ruffin pointed to one and figured people inside were shooting up or smoking. Meth, heroin and crack are the scourges of choice. Needles litter the gutter, as does a dead rat. On another block, homeless entrepreneurs chop and assemble bicycles for sale.

And let us not forget about Seattle.  Homeless encampments have become so pervasive in “the Emerald City” that authorities started building “tiny house villages” for the homeless out of desperation.  But these “tiny house villages” are a lot more depressing than they sound…

In the nearby neighborhood of Wallingford, a newly erected outpost of small wooden shacks offer shelter for 22 of Seattle’s homeless residents. This is a “tiny house village,” sanctioned by the city as a kind of middle ground between living at a street address and on the street. The buildings sit in the corner of a parking lot across from a seafood restaurant, shielded from view by a metal fence. Each shack, painted with one of the bold colors of a Crayola starter pack, offers electricity and a roof sturdier than the tents in Seattle’s increasingly common homeless encampments. Every resident is issued a window fan for the occasional hot day, and the people here hope to receive heaters before winter. But the small collections of potted petunias and pothos that sit in front of their temporary homes are unlikely to survive the city’s harshest months.

Unfortunately, this is probably only just the beginning of this crisis.  Homelessness always explodes during a recession, and many believe that we are rapidly approaching another one.  West coast cities are really struggling to deal with this crisis right now, and it is hard to imagine how they will deal with the tsunami of human suffering that is coming their way once economic conditions begin to sour.

Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News and the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

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