[7 min read] Dear Reader, One of the advantages of getting older is that you can look back and see how things have changed. I mean, the capitalism that I knew when I was younger is very different to the ‘capitalism’ I know now. But for those experiencing it for the first time, probably just think this is ‘capitalism’. It’s far from it. And I’ll explain why in a moment. But to give you some context, I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. When I was in my 20s, I was a lefty. Like most youngsters, I thought things could, and should be improved. At the time I was too young to ask the question, improve for who? Who gets to decide for who? Anyway, I read lots about the capitalist system to try and find holes in it. I even read The Communist Manifesto. But as I got older, I realised that most leftists were mini tyrants trying to change the world for their benefit, dressing it up as compassion and altruism. But then I read the stoic philosophers and chilled out. Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius wrote the text on stoic philosophy, if inadvertently. His book, Meditations, is up there with the Bible in my view. If you want to find inner peace, read this book. Aurelius constantly refers to being in tune with nature. Not just the external world, but your true self. The path to happiness lies in being in tune with yourself and understanding that everything is connected. As Aurelius wrote in Meditations: ‘Keep reminding yourself of the way things are connected, of their relatedness. All things are implicated in one another and in sympathy with each other. This event is the consequence of some other one. Things push and pull on each other, and breathe together, and are one. ‘Everything is interwoven, and the web is holy; none of its parts are unconnected. They are composed harmoniously, and together they compose the world.’ Which brings me back to capitalism. Capitalism is a system that promotes connectedness. Free trade, free flow of capital and movement of people. It’s far from perfect and has always been subject to abuse. But now the abuse of the system is worse than ever. Interconnectedness is breaking down. Mini tyrants are stepping in at every point. If you wonder why it feels like there is more turmoil in the world, there is your answer. The media will spin it otherwise, of course. They will try to throw you off the scent and tell you the solution to government interference is more government interference. That’s crony capitalism. The foundation of real capitalism is money. Money represents trust between two (connected) parties. Trust that you’re getting like-for-like value in any transaction. When trust in the value of money erodes, you get corruption. Since 2008, when the financial system as we know it died, central banks around the world have eroded the value of our money. The result isn’t just small scale ‘mafia’-type corruption. It’s an insidious and hidden corruption on a global scale, hidden in plain sight. Take this Klaus Schwab lunatic. He’s the head of the World Economic Forum, best known for his ‘COVID-19, The Great Reset’ agenda. Like some adolescent lefty, Schwab views the trauma of 2020 as an opportunity to mould the world into an image of his own liking. On the surface the intentions are noble, as detailed on the World Economic Forum’s website: ‘The Great Reset agenda would have three main components. The first would steer the market toward fairer outcomes. To this end, governments should improve coordination (for example, in tax, regulatory, and fiscal policy), upgrade trade arrangements, and create the conditions for a “stakeholder economy.” ‘The second component of a Great Reset agenda would ensure that investments advance shared goals, such as equality and sustainability. Here, the large-scale spending programs that many governments are implementing represent a major opportunity for progress. ‘The third and final priority of a Great Reset agenda is to harness the innovations of the Fourth Industrial Revolution to support the public good, especially by addressing health and social challenges.’ This is 21st century socialism dressed up as concern, compassion and altruism. It’s a cover for the massive wave of coming government spending and centralised control over the global economy. The capitalist or classical liberal tradition of being free to do what you want, as long as you’re not infringing the rights of others, is dead. I mean, Qantas recently said that you’ll only be able to travel if you are vaccinated against COVID-19! Yet here are the survival rates from the US Center for Disease Control: Survival rates by age group: 0–19: 99.997%20–49: 99.98%50–69: 99.5%70-plus: 94.6%It’s a joke, dear reader, and the joke is on us. One of the great spending programs of this new agenda will be on ‘green energy’. In the next few years, trillions will flow into this sector. Whether any of this will generate a long-term decent return on capital remains to be seen, but in the short term that doesn’t matter. Which brings me to my point. One way to protect yourself from this new Communist Manifesto is to play the game. Look to where the money is going and position yourself to take advantage of it. Don’t stand back like a schmuck, tightly gripping the money these sociopaths are trying to devalue. Like the boiling frog, you will go poor slowly, and won’t realise until it’s too late. How do you do it then? One way is to check out the report just published by my mates over at Money Morning, Ryan and Lachie, designed to profit from this coming green revolution. They’re not talking about buying wind farms. Rather, they’re focused on a mixed bag of green tech and supply chain plays, as well as the commodities that will go into building this brave new (green) world. Check it out here, and profit from the new Communist Manifesto while it’s still early days. Regards, Greg Canavan, Editor, The Rum Rebellion ..............................Sponsored..............................Gold’s ‘Last Call’ Before AU$4,379? With gold hitting record highs, Nick Hubble argues this could be your last chance to buy the precious metal before it jumps out of your price range… If he’s right, gold investors could soon go into ‘panic buying’ mode, sending the price soaring…and forcing more supply shortages... CLICK HERE to read his latest research. | ..........................................................................
The First Shall Be Last By Bill Bonner The new Biden bunch will be full of meaningless ‘firsts’. Kamala Harris will be the first female vice president. She will also be the first ‘woman of colour’ in that post. And the first person of South Asian descent. Janet Yellen will be the first woman to head the Treasury Department. Another first will likely be a woman as Secretary of Defense. Since the origin of the species, men have done almost all the fighting. They might be better at it; they are bigger, stronger, faster… And those who were bad at fighting may have been killed, or perhaps denied the right to mate. In some primitive societies, a man had to prove himself in combat before he was allowed to take a wife. So it almost seems natural to have a man at the head of a group of fighters. New era But this is a new era. If you’ve been following our Diary for very long, you know that nature has her cycles…her patterns…her birth announcements and obituaries. Great empires come and go, just like the rest of us. The newspapers report these comings and goings as the work of men. But men cannot defy nature…or the gods. And it appears to us that at the end of the 20th century, the gods decided to take the US empire down a peg. Bush, Obama, Trump — all have played their parts, each with his cockamamie projects and foolish ideas. Biden must continue the work. How better than to appoint the last people as the firsts? Limiting diversity Janet Yellen is one of the last people we’d have in charge of our money. So has Biden selected one of the last people who should be in charge of the armed forces. Today, there is no reason to think that a woman can’t do the top Pentagon job just as well as — or better than — a man. After all, it mostly consists of bullying small countries and lobbying for more money for the arms suppliers of Northern Virginia. God forbid that any real ‘defence’ comes into play. If it does, the US — with its gold-plated, lard-butt military — will probably be in big trouble. Besides, diversity is the most important thing now, not national defence. And diversity seems to be becoming more popular everywhere. Like ‘stimulus’ and fake money, diversity is another delusional desideratum for the 21st century. Here’s CEO News: ‘The growing drumbeat on ESG [Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance] in corporate America sounded louder than ever Tuesday, as Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman announced a new effort to require the boards of all Nasdaq-listed companies to have at least one female director and one director who is an underrepresented minority or LGBTQ — or explain publicly why they have not.’ But the call for ‘diversity’ is not aimed at increasing variety, but limiting it to a few ‘acceptable’ categories. No, ‘diversity’ is not really about diversity…it’s about sameness — having the same opinions…the same ideas…and the same people, worshipping the same ersatz gods. You put them on your corporate board — or in your cabinet — not to promote a variety of points of view, but to limit them to a few, faddish ones. Same, same, but different Speaking of underrepresented minorities…how many polygamists are there in the nation? For obvious reasons, it’s hard to say for sure…but you will score no ‘diversity’ points by putting a man with six wives on your board. And what could be rarer than a man who had murdered every one of them? Though ‘off the charts’ on diversity, no one would want him on their board of directors…or in the presidential cabinet. But at the Defense Department, how about a woman with the blood of thousands of men on her hands? Biden might have chosen Hillary Clinton for the job. But in Michèle Flournoy, he gets his Deep State martinet…his warmonger…without the political baggage. Is this a breath of fresh air? A new direction? Shall we say goodbye to the Bush/Obama/Trump forever wars? Will the gods be thwarted? Oh, dear reader, don’t be so naïve. You know as well as we do that Joe Biden is not going to shake things up. He won’t even stand up to the teachers’ unions, let alone the armed wing of the Deep State. He’s been one of its major supporters for the last four decades. And both Flournoy and his choice for Secretary of State, Tony Blinken, are democratic hacks…swamp critters, who swim back and forth between the government and the arms industry. When their party is in power, they promote war. When it is out of power, they advise defence suppliers on how to cash in. This from The Grayzone: ‘Since the 1990s, Flournoy and Blinken have steadily risen through the ranks of the military-industrial complex, shuffling back and forth between the Pentagon and hawkish think-tanks funded by the U.S. government, weapons companies, and oil giants. ‘Under Bill Clinton, Flournoy was the principal author of the 1996 Quadrennial Defense Review, the document that outlined the U.S. military’s doctrine of permanent war — what it called “full spectrum dominance.” ‘Flournoy called for “unilateral use of military power” to ensure “uninhibited access to key markets, energy supplies, and strategic resources.” ‘As Bush administration officials lied to the world about Saddam Hussein’s supposed WMD’s, Flournoy remarked that “In some cases, preemptive strikes against an adversary’s [weapons of mass destruction] capabilities may be the best or only option we have to avert a catastrophic attack against the United States.”’ Was Iraq about to launch a ‘catastrophic attack’ against the US? Of course not. Instead, the US launched a catastrophic attack against Iraq! The Grayzone continues: ‘As Iraq was plunged into chaos and bloodshed, Flournoy was among the authors of a paper titled “Progressive Internationalism” that called for a “smarter and better” style of permanent war. The paper chastised the anti-war left and stated that “Democrats will maintain the world’s most capable and technologically advanced military, and we will not flinch from using it to defend our interests anywhere in the world.”’ Full spectrum dominance What do you do if you want to keep the US on track towards its own destruction? You just need to make sure the trillion-dollar forever wars continue…along with the money printing to support them. Biden has both of those imperatives covered. With Janet Yellen as Treasury secretary, he is assured that the fake cash will continue to come hot off the presses. And with Michèle Flournoy as Secretary of Defense and Tony Blinken as Secretary of State, he’s found his ‘full spectrum dominance’ jackasses. Now, he can be sure that the country will continue its costly, clumsy misadventures overseas. The gods smile. Regards, Bill Bonner, For The Rum Rebellion ..............................Advertisement..............................An $11 trillion tsunami is about to pour into clean energy Pick the second-order effects of this — and the stocks poised to exploit them — and the potential profits could be huge. Click here to read on. | .......................................................................... |