Somehow I Touched a Nerve

Somehow I Touched a Nerve

After your editor tiptoed back into a minefield yesterday — the intersection of economics and politics — the reader feedback was… shockingly reasonable.

The disagreement was respectful. One individual wished to quibble over the definition of “socialism.” Another missed the point completely but still had the civility not to label me a fascist. Honestly, the reaction as a whole was… so mellow it was almost boring.

Anyway, welcome to an extended mailbag edition of these 5 Bullets.

Yes, we’ll tackle Fed chair Jerome Powell’s stupid Jackson Hole speech and the market reaction shortly. But it’s otherwise a quiet late-summer Friday. And after a week in which we had either a limited mailbag or none at all, we have some correspondence to catch up on.

It seems my response to the only item of reader mail we ran earlier this week touched a nerve.

This all comes back to the policy I implemented a couple of weeks ago: “For the duration of this election campaign,” I wrote, “I’m making it a policy to refrain from addressing any topic which entails bashing a single presidential or vice presidential candidate.”

I implemented the policy after I tried to address serious economic issues playing off of J.D. Vance’s “childless cat ladies” remark — and the reaction went off the rails.

A brief digression, if I may: One reaction in particular — which I did not publish — stuck in my craw.

Someone wrote in to ask why I hadn’t said anything about Kamala Harris’ intent to ban fracking.

A couple of reasons: First, a lot of people have spilled a lot of digital ink about Harris and fracking. As I said only yesterday, our mission here is to pursue “the story no one else is telling.”

Second, we don’t even know if she intends to ban fracking — even if she advocated it in the past.

Politicians change their minds all the time — Harris more than many, it seems (not unlike J.D. Vance). The outcome in the Electoral College this November is riding on Pennsylvania — which happens to be home to a lot of fracking jobs.

For all the caterwauling about “communism,” much of Harris’ agenda remains a blank slate. There’s still no policy section on her campaign’s website. She’s done no media interviews where she can be pressed on her positions. She’s running entirely on “vibes.”

Even the one substantive economic proposal she’s articulated — the moronic ban on “price gouging” at the grocery store — is being walked back by her aides. The New York Times cites “people familiar with Ms. Harris’ thinking” as acknowledging the plan “might actually not do anything to bring grocery prices down right now.” Further, it would apply only during “emergencies” and “would not rely on numerical price targets.”

Digression over. Back to what I said that touched a nerve…

The “Civil War” Thing, Again

In any event, the new policy did little to alleviate the vitriol that’s increasingly infested our virtual mailbag in 2024 — something unprecedented in my 14 years of doing this.

Thus, my brief lament on Tuesday: “People of both the D and R persuasion can’t let go of their groupthink, their hivemind, their tribalism — and they’re spoiling for a fight.”

Again, something touched a nerve. A couple of people brought it up parenthetically reacting to the “where I get my news” edition on Wednesday. (You’ll hear from them later.)

And a few readers sought to address it directly…

“How about simply ignoring such complaints from either side altogether?” wrote one of our longtimers. “Keep up the good work you do.”

“Be careful about getting mad at or disappointed in everyone because of certain characteristics or assumed characteristics,” said a lengthier missive.

“No one thinks they are part of a tribe or participating in groupthink, especially those that accuse others of participating in groupthink. Either everyone does to some degree (unless they are literally the only one thinking the same thing) or no one does. So do you.

“You got your butt hurt a little. That's OK, but lashing out at everyone that has principles, whether good or evil, isn't the answer. If you believe something, state it. You won't please everyone ever. So, don't try. You have to stay true to your principles, whatever they are, at least until a reasoned argument is made and you are honest enough to change your principles.

“Anyway, the statement above was you letting people get to you emotionally. Have Emily reread your content and not let you betray your emotions in your pieces so readily.”

[Heh, Emily was away earlier this week…]

After a little introspection, I don’t think it’s a matter of “butthurt.” It’s the frustration of watching one’s fellow Americans shout at each other incessantly while frequently failing to understand the real issues.

After repeated assaults on our liberties and our prosperity during the 21st century — the Patriot Act, the bank bailouts, the COVID lockdowns and mandates — the power elite’s divide-and-conquer strategy has brought us to the brink of civil war.

And as I wrote last December, it’s not a “civil war” as Americans conjure up the conflict of 1861–65. It’s shaping up to be neighbor-on-neighbor violence, grudges acted out with guns or cheap explosives or perhaps cheap armed drones.

No, we’re not there yet — but that’s the trajectory. And after 14 years of engaging with readers via the mailbag, it pains me to see this acrimony arise in a forum that heretofore has been a place for intelligent and engaging dialogue.

I’ll probably have occasion to write at more length about this after Labor Day… but we’ll leave it there for now and move on to Powell’s speech and reader responses to my media consumption.

Powell Prods an “Everything Rally”

Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell said all the right things today to juice nearly every asset class.

It being the fourth Friday of the month, Powell delivered his much-ballyhooed annual address at a confab of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. (For a good retrospective on how Jackson Hole became “a thing” every year I went into considerable depth in 2019.)

“The time has come for policy to adjust,” he said — telegraphing as strongly as possible the Fed’s intentions to start a cycle of interest rate cuts in September.

As a reminder, the Fed has held the benchmark fed funds rate steady at 5.5% for over a year now — after the steepest rate-raising cycle since the early 1980s.

More than one observer noticed the absence of the word “gradual” in Powell’s speech. Thus, the dollar is plunging relative to other major currencies — the U.S. dollar index now below 101 for the first time this year.

The dollar’s fall translates to the rise of nearly everything else as midday approaches in the Eastern time zone…

• All the major U.S. stock averages are up 1% or better. At 5,627, the S&P 500 is only 40 points away from the all-time high of 5,667 notched on July 16

• Gold is on track to end another week over $2,500, the bid at last check $2,513. And silver is less than 30 cents away from $30

• Crude’s rebound continues — a barrel of West Texas Intermediate up over 2% to $74.56. That other economically sensitive commodity, copper, is up over 1% to $4.14 a pound

• In anticipation of lower interest rates, bond prices are rallying — pushing yields down. The yield on a 10-year Treasury note is testing its August lows at 3.8%. (It was 4.7% only four months ago.)

The only thing it seems is not rallying is Bitcoin. But it already had a solid rally in the last 48 hours and it’s still holding the line on $61,000.

On the internal Paradigm Press e-chat, Jim Rickards’ senior analyst Dan Amoss points out the plunge in the dollar index accompanying every tease of lower rates will have two enduring effects: The prices of imported goods will rise… and so will the price of oil.

For the record: The lockout of unionized Canadian rail workers is over almost as quickly as it began.

Canadian National and Canadian Pacific locked out the workers yesterday amid a contract dispute. The impact threatened to spill over the U.S. border — agriculture and auto parts, among other things. Oh, and chlorine for city water supplies.

But the Canadian government ordered the two sides to binding arbitration. So there.

Readers React: “So Where Does Dave Get His News?”

“Thank you Dave, for providing this updated list of your sources,” a reader writes after Wednesday’s edition.

“You make a truly invaluable contribution with your deep engagement with the news, and with your forthrightness. I pay attention to some of the same people as you, such as Tracey, Taibbi and Greenwald, and none is nearly as broad in their coverage. There are any number of investigative journalists — Lee Fang is another one — but they don't do what you do. You really are one of a kind right now.

“I did not know about antiwar.com, and clearly it is the real deal. Along those lines, I used to check Consortium News when Robert Parry was still alive. In addition to the financial people you consult, I check what Lyn Alden has to say. Much of it is over my head, but she seems to know her stuff. She and Luke Gromen re-tweet each other.

“On X, I am quite taken with Arnaud Bertrand, a Sinophile with a lefty bias, who nonetheless consistently comes up with intelligent articles and interviews that do not align with Western narratives. Many of these are about Israel-Palestine, the EU, etc., and I imagine you already are well informed about those topics. On China, some of the data and reports are stunning. Not that I buy all of it, but it is always useful to hear what the other side has to say.

“I hope you won't become too unhappy about how things are going. You do what you can, and that is plenty!”

Dave responds: I’ve encountered all of those folks along the way during my own online ramblings — good stuff.

Consortium News is now under the management of former Wall Street Journal reporter Joe Lauria. It’s still stepping on all the right toes — seeing how PayPal gave it the boot in 2022, presumably because it doesn’t hew to the mainstream line about Ukraine.

“Holy Criminy, Dave. You are a news junkie, and thank you for some ideas for me to tune into some of your feeds,” writes one of our regulars.

“I'm an avid reader, so if you could, pass on to the team my wish for more transcripts, rather than watching a feed on YouTube. I do tune in, but use the CC option.

“My only question for you is how does a Packers fan like you find time to manage a Fantasy Football team or two? ;)”

Dave: I’ll pass along your request; we’re getting better at the transcript thing, slowly.

But whatever gave you the idea I’m into fantasy football? That’s one thing I definitely don’t have time for — especially not this fall if the Brewers continue to surprise everyone and make a deep playoff run!

Podcasts… and That Tube TV on My Desk

“Are there any podcasts you find informative?” inquires a reader from Kentucky. “Enjoyed your breakdown of sources for Wednesday’s edition.”

Dave: Ooh, good question. I inadvertently left that out of my 2022 roundup and did so again this year. Here goes…

On the recommendation of colleague Dan Amoss, I started listening to the granddaddy of financial podcasts — the Financial Sense Newshour — in 2007. Financial Sense Wealth CEO Jim Puplava has presided over this podcast since 2001 — a time before the word “podcast” had come into being and many folks were still listening to audio content tethered to a computer with a dial-up connection!

For whatever reason, many of my most-listened-to podcasts are by people with whom I’ve crossed paths at one time or another.

I mentioned Scott Horton Wednesday — director of the Libertarian Institute, and editorial director at antiwar.com. But The Scott Horton Show also goes back to a time before the word “podcast” came along. He’s recorded over 6,000 interviews going back to 2003 — mostly though not exclusively foreign policy. Check out his recent talk with ace video producer and journalist Matt Orfalea about the censorship industrial complex.

I have something of a love-hate relationship with the podcast of another acquaintance, Demetri Kofinas of Hidden Forces. I’m in his debt for his concept of “financial nihilism.” It’s a widespread zeitgeist among (mostly) millennials — that macroeconomic forces and traditional valuation metrics like sales and earnings are meaningless. All that matters is the creation of a narrative and the ability of enough people to move an asset by sheer force of their numbers. (GameStop, anyone?)

Until recently, his takes and his guest lineup on foreign policy have been downright conventional and depressing. But he might be coming around — having conducted more than one interview recently with Columbia economist Jeffrey Sachs, a passionate critic of the national security state.

Another acquaintance, former hedge fund manager Erik Townsend, has carved out a niche with his Macro Voices podcast. The interviews are solid and the technical/chart discussions with his co-hosts are a worthwhile supplement to the insights of Paradigm’s own Alan Knuckman and Greg Guenthner.

I try to make time for The Shortwave Report — a weekly 30-minute compilation of news by international broadcasters running the gamut from Japan’s NHK to Radio Havana Cuba. It’s been faithfully curated since 1997 by a photographer and painter from Mendocino County, California.

Honorable mention goes to the conversations that syndicated radio host John Batchelor has each Sunday with Johns Hopkins historian Michael Vlahos.

“Dang, you should replace that antique CRT TV,” writes our final correspondent, agog at the setup in my home office. “Kind of looks like the one I had with built-in VHS and DVD, LOL.

“Thanks again for your work and insights. To h**l with those who can’t listen to facts and supportable opinion.”

Dave: Meh, it still works. I’ve got a little Roku box on top of it. It’s not as if I need to monitor France 24 in glorious 4K resolution.

Actually, I’m not sure I’ve ever thrown away a CRT TV that’s still functional — there’s another one equipped with a Roku that’s within eyeshot of the home treadmill. Thrift!