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Most people have a preconceived notion that there will be a clear winner and loser from any war. In their view, the world economy will go on, much as before, after the war is “won” by one side or the other. In my view, we are basically dealing with a no-win situation. No matter what the outcome, the world economy will be worse off after the fighting stops.
The problem the world economy is up against is the depletion of many kinds of resources simultaneously. This depletion is made worse by rising population, meaning that the resources available need to provide an adequate living for an increasing number of world inhabitants. Because of depletion, the world economy is reaching a point where it can no longer grow in the way it has in the past. Inflation, food shortages and rolling blackouts are likely to become increasing problems in many parts of the world. Eventually, the population is likely to fall.
We are living in a world that is beginning to behave like the players scrambling for seats in a game of musical chairs. In each round of a musical chairs game, one chair is removed from the circle. The players in the game must walk around the outside of the circle. When the music stops, all the players scramble for the remaining chairs. Someone gets left out.
In this post, I will try to explain some of the issues.
[1] In a world with inadequate resources relative to population, conflicts are likely to become increasingly common.
The Russia-Ukraine conflict is one example of a resource-associated conflict. The allies underlying the NATO organization have chosen to escalate the Russia-Ukraine conflict, in part, because the existence of the conflict helps to hide resource shortages and accompanying high prices that are already taking place. No matter how the war is stopped, the underlying resource shortage issue will continue to exist. Therefore, the conflict cannot end well.
If sanctions lead to less trade with Russia (or even worse, less trade with Russia and China), the world economy will have an even greater problem with inadequate resources after the war is over. In fact, many parts of the current economic system are in danger of failing, primarily because depletion is leading to too little energy and other resources per capita. For example, the US dollar may lose its reserve currency status, the world debt bubble may pop, and globalization may take a major step backward.
[2] There is a huge resource depletion issue that authorities in many countries have known about for a very long time. The issue is so frightening that authorities have chosen not to explain it to the general population.
Mainstream media (MSM) practically never mentions that there is a major issue with resource depletion. Instead, MSM tells a narrative about “transitioning to a lower carbon economy,” without mentioning that this transition is out of necessity: The world is up against extraction limits for many kinds of resources. Besides oil, coal and natural gas, resources with limits include many other minerals, such as copper, lithium, and nickel. Other resources, including fresh water and minerals used for fertilizer are also only available in limited supply. MSM fails to tell us that there is no evidence that a transition to a low carbon economy can actually be made.
[3] The big depletion issue is affordability of end products made with high priced resources. The cost of extraction rises, but the ability of the world’s citizens to pay for end products made using these high-cost resources doesn’t rise. Commodity prices do not rise enough to cover the rising cost of extraction. When this affordability limit is hit, it is the resource extracting countries, such as Russia, that find themselves in a terrible situation with respect to the financial well-being of their populations.
The big issue that hits because of depletion is a price conflict. Businesses extracting resources need high prices so that they can reinvest in new mines, in ever more costly locations, but consumers cannot afford these high prices.
In a sense, the higher cost is because of “inefficiency.” As a result of depletion, it takes more hours of labor, more machine time, and a greater use of energy products to extract the same quantity of a given resource that was previously extracted elsewhere. Growing efficiency tends to help wages, but growing inefficiency tends to work the opposite way: Wages don’t rise, certainly not as rapidly as prices of end products.
As a result, commodity exporters, such as Russia, are caught in a bind: They cannot raise prices enough to make new investments profitable. The problem is that the world’s consumers cannot afford the resulting high prices of essentials such as food, electricity and transportation. Russia reports very high reserve amounts, especially for natural gas and coal. It is doubtful, however, that these reserves can actually be extracted. Over the long term, selling prices cannot be maintained at a sufficiently high level to cover the huge cost of extracting, transporting and refining these resources.
The success of a country’s economy can, in some sense, be measured by the country’s per capita GDP. Russia’s GDP per capita has tended to lag far behind that of the US (Figure 2).
Russia’s inflation-adjusted GDP per capita fell after the collapse of the central government of the Soviet Union in 1991. It was able to grow again, once oil prices began to rise in the early 2000s. Since 2013, Russia’s GDP per capita growth has again fallen behind that of the US, as increases in oil and other commodity prices again lagged the rising cost of production. Given these difficulties with depletion, Russia is becoming increasingly unwilling to ignore poor treatment it receives from Ukraine.
There may be another factor, as well, leading especially to the escalation of the conflict. The US seems to covet Russia’s resources. Some powers behind the throne seem to believe that Western forces supporting Ukraine can quickly win in this conflict. If such an early win occurs, the aim is for Western forces to step in and inexpensively ramp up Russian resource extraction, allowing the world a new source of cheap-to-produce fossil fuels and other minerals.
In this context, Russia launched an attack on Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Ukraine has presented Russia with problems for many years. One issue has been transit fees for natural gas passing through the country; is Ukraine taking too much gas out? Another problem area has been the rise of the far-right Azov regiment. Russia has also expressed concern that NATO has been training soldiers within Ukraine, even though Ukraine is not a member of NATO. Russia doesn’t want military, trained by NATO, at its doorstep.
[4] World economic growth very much depends on growing energy consumption.
There are two ways of measuring world GDP. The standard one is with the production of each country measured in inflation-adjusted US$, with the changing relative value to the US$ considered. The other approach uses “Purchasing Power Parity” GDP. The latter is supposedly not affected by the changing level of the dollar, relative to other currencies. Inflation-Adjusted Purchasing Power Parity GDP is only available for 1990 and subsequent years. Figure 3 shows the high correlation between energy consumption and PPP GDP during the period from 1990 through 2020.
The reason for a strong association between GDP growth with energy consumption growth is a physics-based reason. Producing goods and providing services requires the “dissipation” of energy products because the laws of physics tell us that energy is required to move any object from one place to another, or to heat any object. In the latter case, it is the individual molecules within a substance that move faster and faster as they get hotter. The economy is a “dissipative structure” in physics terms because of the need for energy dissipation to provide the work needed to make the system operate.
Human beings are also dissipative structures. The energy that humans get comes from the dissipation of the energy found in foods of every kind. Food energy is commonly measured in Calories (technically, kilocalories).
[5] World economic growth also seems to depend on factors besides energy consumption.
The fitted equation on Figure 3 (the equation beginning with “y”) implies that GDP is rising much more rapidly than energy consumption, almost twice as rapidly. Over the entire 30-year period, the actual growth rate in energy consumption averages about 1.8% a year. If energy consumption growth had really been 1.8% per year, the fitted equation implies that growth in GDP would have greatly sped up over the period. (In fact, the growth rate in energy consumption was falling over the 30-year period, but GDP grew at closer to a constant rate. In terms of the fitted equation, these two conditions are equivalent.)
How can GDP rise so much more rapidly than energy dissipation? There seem to be several ways such a higher rate of increase can occur, on a temporary basis:
[a] A worldwide trend toward an economy using more services. The production of services tends to require less energy consumption than the production of essential goods, such as food, water, housing and local transportation. As the world economy gets wealthier, it can afford to add more services, such as education, healthcare, and childcare.
[b] A worldwide trend toward more wage and wealth disparity. Such a trend tends to happen with more specialization and more globalization. Strangely enough, a trend to more wage disparity allows the world economy to continue to grow without adding a proportionately greater amount of energy consumption use because of the different spending patterns between low-paid workers and high-paid workers.
Analyzing the situation, the world is filled mostly with low-paid workers. To the extent that the pay of these low-paid workers can be squeezed down, it can prevent these workers from buying goods that tend to use relatively high amounts of energy products, such as automobiles, motorcycles and modern homes. At the same time, growing wage disparity allows the higher-paid workers to be paid more. These higher-paid workers tend to spend a disproportionate share of their income on services, such as education and healthcare, which tend to consume less energy.
Thus, greater wage disparity tends to shift spending away from goods and toward services. The main beneficiaries are the top 1% of workers (who buy mostly services, requiring little energy consumption), rather than the remaining 99% (who would really like goods such as a car and their own home, which require much more energy consumption).
[c] Improvements in technology. Improvements in technology are helpful in raising GDP because technological improvements tend to make finished goods and services more affordable. With greater affordability, more people can afford goods and services. This effect is favorable for allowing the economy, as measured by GDP, to grow more quickly than energy consumption.
There is a catch associated with using improved technology to make goods and services more affordable. Improved technology tends to increase wage disparity because it nearly always leads to owners and a few highly educated workers being paid more, while workers doing the more routine parts of processes are paid less. Thus, it tends to lead to the problem discussed above: [b] A trend toward wage and wealth disparity.
Also, with improved technology, available resources tend to be depleted more quickly than without improved technology. This happens because finished goods are less expensive, so more people can afford them. Once resources start getting exhausted, improved technology can’t fix the situation because resource extraction costs are likely to rise more rapidly than can be offset with the impact of new technology.
[d] A worldwide trend toward more debt at ever-lower interest rates.
We all know that the monthly payment required to purchase a car or home is lower if the interest rate on the debt used to finance the purchase is lower. Thus, falling interest rates can make paychecks go further. Both businesses and citizens can afford to purchase more goods and services using credit, so the overall level of debt tends to rise with falling interest rates.
If we are only considering the period from 1990 to the present, the trend is clearly toward lower interest rates. These lower interest rates are part of what is making the GDP growth higher than what would be expected if interest rates and debt levels remained constant.
[6] The world economy now seems to be reaching limits with respect to many of the variables allowing world economic growth to continue as it has in the past, as discussed in Sections [4] and [5], above.
Figure 6 shows that there have been two major step-downs in world inflation-adjusted per capita PPP GDP. The first one occurred in the 2008-2009 period; the second one occurred in 2020. Figure 7 shows the sharp dips in energy consumption occurring in the same time periods.
In 2021, energy prices started to rise rapidly when the world economy tried to reopen. This rapid rise in prices strongly suggests that energy extraction limits are being reached.
Another clue that energy production limits are being reached comes from the fact that the group of oil exporters, OPEC+, found that they couldn’t actually ramp up their oil production as quickly as they promised. Once oil production is cut back because of inadequate prices, it is hard to get production to rise again, even if prices temporarily rise because the many pieces of the chain supporting this extraction are broken. For example, trained workers leave and find jobs elsewhere, and contractors go out of business because of inadequate profits.
If we think about it, Items [5a], [5b], [5c] and [5d] are all reaching limits as well. Item [5d] is probably clearest: Interest rates can no longer be lowered. In fact, nearly everyone says that interest rates should now be raised because of the high inflation rates. If interest rates are raised, commodity prices, including prices for fossil fuels, will fall.
With lower fossil fuel prices, there will be pressure for oil, gas and coal producers to reduce their production, even from today’s lower levels. Because of the tight connection between energy and GDP, lower energy production will tend to push economies further toward contraction. Of course, this will make resource exporters, such as Russia, worse off.
As the world economy enters recession, we can expect that Item [5a], the shift from goods toward services, to turn around. People with barely enough money for necessities will reduce their use of services such as haircuts and music lessons. Item [5b], globalization and related wage disparity, is already under pressure. Countries are finding that with broken supply chains, more local production is needed. In the US, recent wage gains have tended to go to the lowest-paid workers. Item [5c], technology growth, cannot ramp up as resources needed from around the world are increasingly unavailable, due to broken supply chains and depletion.
[7] We are likely facing a collapsing world economy because of the limits being reached. Adding sanctions against Russia will further push the world economy in the direction of collapse.
Many sources report that Russian exports of wheat, aluminum, nickel, and fertilizers will be “temporarily” disrupted. A few sources note that Russia plays an important role in the processing of uranium fuel used in nuclear power plants. According to the Conversation:
Most of the 32 countries that use nuclear power rely on Russia for some part of their nuclear fuel supply chain.
We have become used to efficient air travel, but sanctions against Russia make this less possible, especially for flights to Southeast Asia. A Bloomberg article called Siberian Detour Requires Airlines to Retrace Cold War Era Routes gives the example of direct flights from Finland to Southeast Asia being canceled because they have become too expensive and are too time-consuming with the required detours. It becomes necessary to fly indirect connecting routes if a person wants to travel. Many other routes have similar problems.
US President Joseph Biden is warning that food shortages are likely in many parts of the world as a result of the sanctions placed against Russia.
According to a video shown on Zerohedge,
“It’s going to be real. The price of the sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia. It’s imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well.”
If the world economy were doing well, and if Russia were a tiny part of the world economy, perhaps the sanctions could be tolerated by the world economy. As it is, the Russia-Ukraine conflict acts to hide the underlying resource shortage problem. This is possible because, with the conflict, the resource shortages can be described as “temporary” and “necessary” in the context of the terrible things the Russians are doing. The way the West frames the problem provides a scapegoat to deflect anger toward, but it doesn’t fix the problem.
Russia started out being very disadvantaged because commodity prices, in recent years, have not been rising high enough to ensure an adequate living for Russian citizens and high enough tax revenue for the Russian government. Adding sanctions against Russia will simply make Russia’s problems worse.
[8] There is little reason to believe that Russia will “give up” in response to sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries.
The attacks by Russia of Ukrainian sites seems to be occurring for many related reasons. Russia can no longer tolerate being inadequately compensated for the resources it is extracting and selling to Ukraine and the rest of the world. It is tired of being “pushed around” by the rich economies, especially the United States, as NATO adds more countries. It is also tired of NATO training Ukrainian soldiers. Russia seems to have no plan to gain the entire territory of Ukraine; it is more of a temporary police action.
Russia’s underlying problem is that it can no longer produce commodities that the world wants as inexpensively as the world demands. Building all the infrastructure needed to extract and ship more fossil fuel resources would take more capital spending than Russia can afford. The selling price will never rise high enough to justify these investments, including the cost of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Russia has nothing to lose at this point. The current situation is not working; going back to it is no incentive for stopping the current conflict.
Russia is in some ways like a heavily armed, suicidal old man, who can no longer earn an adequate living. The economic system of Russia is no longer working as it should. Russia is incredibly well-armed. The situation reminds a person of the story of Samson, in his old age, taking down the temple of the Philistines and losing his own life at the same time. Russia has no reason to back down in response to sanctions.
[9] Leaders of the world, including Joe Biden, appear to be oblivious to the situation we are facing.
Leaders of the world have created ridiculous narratives that overlook the critical role commodities play. They seem to believe that it is possible to cut off purchases from Russia with, at most, temporary harm to the rest of the world economy.
The history of the world shows that the populations of many civilizations have outgrown their resource bases and have collapsed. Physics points out that this outcome is almost inevitable because of the way the Universe is constructed. Everything is constantly evolving, even economies. The climate is constantly evolving, as are the species inhabiting the Earth.
Elected leaders need a story of everlasting growth that they can tell their citizens. They cannot even consider the physics-based way the world economy operates, and the resulting expected pattern of overshoot and collapse. Modelers of what are intended to be long-lasting structures cannot accept this outcome either.
Limits which are defined based on affordability of end products are incredibly difficult to model, so creative narratives have been developed suggesting that humans can move away from fossil fuels if they so desire. No one stops to think that economies cannot continue to exist using a much lower quantity of energy, any more than an adult human can get along on 500 calories a day. Both are dissipative structures; the ongoing energy requirement is built in. Factories close when electricity, diesel and other energy products are cut off.
[10] The sanctions and the Russia-Ukraine conflict cannot end well.
The world economy is already on the edge of collapse because of the resource limits it is hitting. Intentionally stopping Russia’s output of resources like fertilizer and processed uranium is certain to make the situation worse, not better. Once Russia’s output is stopped, it is likely to be impossible to restart Russia’s production at the same level. Trained workers who lose their jobs will likely find jobs elsewhere, for one thing. The shortfall in output will affect countries around the world.
The United States dollar is now the world’s reserve currency. The sanctions being applied indirectly encourage countries to use other currencies to work around the sanctions. There seems to be a substantial chance that the US economy will lose its role as the center of international trade. If such a change takes place, the US will no longer be able to import far more than it exports, year after year.
A major issue is the huge amount of debt most countries of the world have. With a rapidly slowing world economy, repaying debt with interest will become impossible. Debt defaults will further wreak havoc with the world economic system.
We don’t know the exact timing of how this will play out, but the situation does not look good.
TM and his theory of gravity.
https://surplusenergyeconomics.wordpress.com/
Have only read once, first guess is inflation is the only way to deal with asset prices. Inflate real goods faster than asset prices and effectively the value of the financial assets declines.
Fiat money is unfortunately first in line and volatility somewhat increases need for fiat money due to liquidity issues. One may have the “wealth” financial tomorrow and yet have a debt due today which causes a fire sale price.
Meanwhile, the band is playing “It don’t come easy.”
Dennis L.
An asset only has value to the extent that it can be used by its owner for some useful purpose.
Land is useful to the extent that it can be used to grow crops. Growing such crops depends on the availability of fertilizer, seed, and a lot of other things. If tractors cannot be used, that greatly reduces the value of the land. So does lack of adequate water supply.
A factory is useful to the extent that it can get the necessary raw materials. It also needs buyers to buy the end products. If something interrupts this process, the value of the factory is only scrap value.
A house is helpful, only to the extent that the homeowners can live in it and somehow pay for its use. If the homeowner’s job disappears, the value is whatever the homeowner can get, selling it to someone else.
Governments have been writing out checks to citizens, with nothing behind them. This creates “inflation.” But it doesn’t really add anything of value.
Leaping fast toward bare utility economy. The 4th horseman approves it.
I don’t believe in utility anything. But my unshakeable conviction that land cannot be a utility (anymore than jumping off a cliff could be a utility) is paramount. Land is the reason we exist, and therefore precedes us in importance. Regard the land as a utility and that is the INEVITABLE end of you. Land is the nearest tangible thing we have to God.
Well put. To live off the land is to be at the mercy of many forces outside of one’s control…humbling to say the least….all the harvest festivals around the world make perfect sense….giving thanks for what the land has provided….what God has provided….
That’s a fine, animist comment Artleads. Appreciate that!
With one caveat: animist love for the land is beyond the New Age fantasy concept of God. All animist cultures held that a Creator must exist — since something cannot come from nothing — about which nothing can be known nor posited beyond it’s existence.
The God concept arose in the elitist mind of man in order to fill the void of animism lost.
Talked to a friend recently…..he could sell his house right now for X9 times what he bought if for 22 years ago….a 100+ year old house is now 120+ years old….quality of life has deteriorated….crime, traffic gridlock, no parking, air and noise pollution….walk a few 100m to the local high street…..a waste land….betting shops…nail salons…turkish barbers….charity shops…..
When the self-organising system finally neutralises the central bank shenanigans….the bust is going to be spectacular……
Getting interesting, anyone know how to trade bitcoins for rubles?
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/putin-signs-decree-ordering-gas-exports-be-halted-if-buyers-dont-pay-rubles
It is a poker game, one side upped the pot and now the other matched that bet and raised. I don’t play cards, so my terminology may be a bit off.
The US is apparently also increasing the draw down of the SPR, spending our rainy day fund as I see it.
Reality seems to be getting in the way of the best formed policy reports.
Warren is buying US stocks, he reports not liking the return on his $100B cash horde.
Dennis L.
US Stocks are based on creative destruction
(Amazon, AirBnB, Uber)
EU Stocks are based on creative creation.
(VW, T-Systems(WHO), SAP)
The eternal dance…
Every conflict (no matter what its nature is) between at least two sides is based on escalation dominance. Who in the current conflict has room for escalation and the escalation initiative on their side? 5his is the only important question
uh, you could also say, who in a conflict has the cool mind to bring it down again.
My Ego, my, you know!
I had a car bump with another guy some months ago.
He was very upset.
I said:
“Look, I am also not well now because this situation also stresses me a lot but we need to settle it in a good way.”
and we setteled it ok.
Another strategy is to say you had your booster and you are experiencing stabbing heart pain …
You can use that line to try to get out of a car crash that you caused… you might try it on with a hottie in a club to see if you can get a pity shag (don’t say your heart is damaged though… just been feeling a bit unwell)… if your wife catches you in a compromising situation — blame it on the booster… etc etc
As far as I understand a Hotttie would not engage in a ram that has heart problems…
Ya you need to invent something less frightening… hotties are not keen on having a dead guy draped over them… I know! Had the booster and holy cow am I ‘boosted’.. boosted like a race horse…
Thanks for giving escalation dominance memorable context
So you had de-escalation dominance on your side. I am afraid state power systems are not comparable to humans though
The “Putin” obviously is not a human but as we Germans know since a long time a
“Untermensch”
I love it!
Again about Hunter Biden and biolabs in Ukraine:
”The Russian Defense Department has published correspondence between the son of U.S. President Hunter Biden and Pentagon employees and its biolaboratory contractors in Ukraine.
The content of the letters shows that Hunter Biden played an important role in creating a financial opportunity to work with pathogens on the territory of Ukraine , securing funds for Black and Veach and Metabiota,” said Igor Kirillov , head of troops RCBZ at a briefing .”
https://voxnews.info/2022/03/31/russia-pubblica-corrispondenza-del-figlio-di-biden-sui-laboratori-di-armi-biologiche-in-ucraina/
Somehow, this will be covered up/ignored by the mainstream media.
Rosaviatsiya has switched to pen and paper after losing 65TB of data. According to sources, it suffered a major cyberattack on Saturday.
Russian aviation authority switches to paper after losing 65TB of data
by
Jurgita Lapienytė Cybernews
30 March 2022
The Federal Air Transport Agency Rosaviatsiya is responsible for overseeing the civil aviation industry in Russia. Its website favt.ru went offline on Monday and has been unreachable since.
“Due to the temporary lack of access to the Internet and a malfunction in the electronic document management system of the Federal Air Transport Agency, the Federal Air Transport Agency is switching to a paper version,” reads the Rosaviatsiya statement signed by the agency’s head Alexander Neradko.
Russian Telegram channel Aviatorshina said that Rosaviatsiya was hit by a severe cyberattack on Saturday, leading to the collapse of its entire network. Documents, mail, files were allegedly erased – approximately 65 TB of data was been lost.
According to Aviatorshina’s source close to the matter, the agency lost a 1,5-year-worth of emails and has no backups to restore its system. The source also said that the prosecutor’s office and the FSB have been working with Rosaviatsiya since Saturday.
Russian media outlet Kommersant quotes two independent sources close to the agency. They confirm that outages were likely caused by a cyberattack. The agency has presumably regained its access to the email service and expects to fully restore access to its data storage soon.
Meanwhile, Rosaviatsiya keeps posting updates on its social media channels, including Telegram and VK, and linking to its website as if nothing happened. According to the “Is It Down Right Now” monitor, favt.ru is not down for everyone.
Experts have sounded mixed security warnings in the wake of the pullout from Russia by Microsoft and other tech giants, with some playing down the impact on ordinary citizens and others predicting a return to ‘pen and paper.’
“They will end up going back to pen and paper as computers stop operating due to lack of updates, expired licenses, and failures,” Alex Artamonov, infosecurity officer at Infinitely Virtual and a regular contributor to cyber industry trade publications, once told Cybernews.
Heard they are accepting gold as payment…tooth crowns accepted
Microsoft, ok.
Has there been any announcement from Linux distributions for not delivering images to IP adresses in Russia. And do they know if it is not just a VPN?
I never understood why a whole f789 lot of industry relies on microsoft or aws.
I argued, but no one wants to hear it.
This post by Radagast has a passage :
https://www.rintrah.nl/nature-is-sending-you-a-message/
“Governments should have listened to the fringe. To the conspiracy theorists, the NEETs, the paranoid schizophrenics, the flat-earthers, the antisemites, the religious fundamentalists, the far-right extremists, the incels, the autists, the angry white males, the Trump supporters, the QAnon crowd, andsoforth. Effectively, anyone who is in some form disenfranchised from this society, anyone who has a low social status in Western society, made the right call by not receiving these vaccines.”
Sigh.
When I visited India in 2012, I saw pen and paper records, both in the airport and in the place I stayed. Huge books for recording transactions were needed. We don’t have many of them today.
Another perspective on the rubles for gas situation. Clearly the western MSM is struggling, and fluctuating, about how to ‘spin’ this story. This is Bloomberg within the last hour.
> Putin Says Gas Exports to Be Halted If Payments Not Made in Rubles
Russia to demand rubles for gas sales from April 1, Putin said
Foreign buyers of Russia gas will need to open ruble accounts
Russia will halt gas supplies to buyers from ‘unfriendly’ states unless they switch to payments in rubles from April 1, President Vladimir Putin said, the latest strike in a struggle with Europe over energy sales.
“To buy Russian gas, they need to open ruble accounts in Russian banks,” Putin told officials in a televised speech Thursday. “It is from those accounts that gas will be paid for starting April 1. If such payments aren’t made, we will consider this a failure by the client to comply with its obligations.”
Buyers should open special accounts in state-controlled Gazprombank to allow foreign currency to be swapped to rubles for settlements, according to an order signed by Putin.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-31/putin-says-gas-exports-to-be-halted-if-ruble-payments-not-made
Tick, tock…
all wars are ultimately about energy
never been a war like this one
Norman,
I referred to “Hidden History” above, interesting read, seems ego is a very large factor.
Dennis L.
Dennis—I couldn’t see the link to hidden history–please repost, sounds interesting.
And–ego is a massive part of any ‘dictator’ thing, whether real or wannabe–look at Trump.
it was his ego that got him elected because his unlimited boasting got him unlimited headlines, he just went on saying dafter and dafter things, and his audience just lapped it up.
Trump was telling his adoring crowd exactly what they wanted to hear—leading them in chants of ‘lock her up’ might have sounded amusing. It was anything but. When Pu tin came to power he killed off anyone who opposed him. So did Hit., ler. It’s the same thought process.
It couldn’t happen here? It most certainly could. Remember the night of the pre-election debate when Trump stood breathing down Clintons neck?–that was pure threat.
i’ve warned and warned, time and again about the rise of theo fascism in the USA. There will be no problem at all in staffing ‘camps’ in the USA when the time comes. No shortage of gaul itiers to run the states, for as long as states exist.
watch Mussolini in particular–the striking of postures, particularly facial is comical in their comparison. Except that it isn’t funny any more.
Energy depletion will throw up a US dictator, because the USA will go to war with itself over energy supplies. In doing that, the American nation will devolve into warring regions, each certain of course, that god is on their side.
nothing scripted, just human nature set to self destruct.
I’ll take no resposibility for brain damage:
https://stolenhistory.net/
pretty bold but not hidden…
Good points on Trump that echoes what an older friend of mine predicted about the next election cycle. I hope you are both wrong.
Honestly, I consider Trump and the rest of them B-list actors which was confirmed after watching the video of the jovial post-debate press club interaction between Clinton and Trump (former best buds). I’ve spent a bit of time behind the scenes with Ds and Rs.. you’d be surprised how often they put on a pouty face or boxing gloves for the cameras then mingle, align and/or switch affiliations depending on the political wind or appointment.
“Hidden History” Docherty and MacGregor.
The process probably mirrors our time.
Dennis L.
You mean where the invading side didn’t bomb the infrastructure of the invadee to smithereens, cutting off their electricity, gas, water and telecoms, or bombing their passenger trains? Good point!
I don’t recall Celine Dion ever expressing any solidarity with the poor innocent people of Serbia. Nor Lyndsay Graham calling for anyone to be assassinated. Nor Joe Biden being overcome with moral outrage.
Norman is teflon granddaddy. He doesn’t even rwgister facts which run opposite to his thesis and believes. Fine Anglo-Saxon gentleman!
just reading the latest info on ivermectin, as much promoted via OFW, why i dont know.
The New England Journal of medicine:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2115869
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/ivermectin-covid-patients-study_n_624509fae4b0d8266aa77126
I don’t rely on my thesis and beliefs—I try to check where possible. And throw in a dash of common sense. The above on Ivermectiin confirms what ive said all along.
probably a mediplot though.
i don’t rant myself into a state of childlike hysteria if anyone says I’m wrong.
A fine anglo saxon trait I think? Don’t know your racial heritage geno but it obviously matters, though not to me.
a calm courtesy everywhere, in every respect, in every situation. The ‘English’ way. I do take pride in that.
with absolutely no exceptions whatsoever
“just reading the latest info on ivermectin, as much promoted via OFW, why i dont know.”
The media are propaganda pieces for the Gov’t. If you want the real lowdown and excellent results from Ivermectin or HCQ then listen to this guy who’s a pulmonary expert, Dr. Pierre Kory or Dr. Peter McCullough. Ivermectin has had incredible and positive results but the Media won’t let you know about that. Instead they make fun of taking horse paste.
I find it odd that people with commonsense don’t question having to take multiple injections of the same stuff that clearly at best isn’t working and are being convince to take more of it because “THIS TIME” it’ll work. Instead they question something that leading experts say does work like Ivermectin and HCQ along with vitamin supplements.
https://usawatchdog.com/800000-lives-could-have-been-saved-with-ivermectin-and-hcq-dr-pierre-kory/
@Norman Pagett:
Why would a government need to intercept a postage package at the border containing a drug where the usage is for horses?
It happened in Austria, please accept that I do not search for proof here.
1. A govt that intercepts parcels is not a govenment but a totalitarian shithole.
2. Blocking a med from delivery what is this? potential murder?
3. If I want to hang myself is it necessary that the government stops all imports of rope?
Anything else, have fun!
I am not a doctor. I am not offering medical advise.
Horse paste totally eliminated all symptoms of covid in a hour and a half for me. This after three days coughing up phlegm. My friends results have not been as dramatic but certainly significant. Kory estimates 800,000 dead from not allowing aggressive early treatment with IVM. But trust the government. The American indians “trusted the science”.
What’s your problem, Norman?
Ivermectin has saved the lives of millions and enhanced the quality of life of at least a billion human beings.
If you want to read about it, why not start from the horse’s mouth—the discoverers and inventors of the wonder drug.
Since its introduction more than 20 years ago, ivermectin has proved to be one of the most successful therapeutic drugs in veterinary medicine, as well as the basis of one of the most successful public- health programmes of the past century.
The drug arose from a unique international collaboration between the public and private sectors. The development process also incorporated the world’s first and largest drug-donation programme and involved a unique association between governments, non-governmental organizations and industry. The drug is now being used, free of charge, in two global disease-elimination programmes that are benefiting millions of the world’s poorest people.
In 1973, a research partnership was established between the Kitasato Institute in Japan and the Merck, Sharpe and Dohme (MSD) research laboratories in the United States. The outcome of this alliance led to an important advance in animal health products, through the development of an extremely safe drug with a broad spectrum of antiparasitic activity — a drug that has also provided significant benefits to human health for more than 20 years, improving the lives of hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest and worst afflicted in the process. . .
http://www.bio.umass.edu/micro/klingbeil/590s/Reading/Omura2004.pdf
Rodster: I find it odd that people with commonsense don’t question having to take multiple injections of the same stuff that clearly at best isn’t working and are being convince to take more of it because “THIS TIME” it’ll work.
According to Einstein, “common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.”
Norman is currently around eighty-five years old, so according to Einstein, Norman’s common sense is of a vintage that predates 1956—the year before Buddy Holly and recorded the original version of That’ll Be the Day.
To put it another way, Norman’s wisdom was conventional and his window on the world was set firmly in place by the time Norman Wisdom starred as a window cleaner in the comedy movie Up in the World.
Critical reception
The Radio Times wrote, “for his fourth starring vehicle, Norman Wisdom teamed up once more with director John Paddy Carstairs. However, this tacky comedy gave notice that the winning formula was already beginning to wear thin…The worst aspect of this maudlin mishmash is the fact that Wisdom gets to warble so often. No wonder he ends up in prison”.
TV Guide called the film a “routine British comedy”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_in_the_World
norm was on the Titanic… and pushed a child out of one of the boats and survived.
That’s how old norm is
I don’t think it so much fluctuating in how to ‘spin’ this particular story (which is not to say that spin and counter-spin from media on both sides is not endemic) but rather to keep up with it. Putin signing this decree runs contrary to what Draghi and Scholz had apparently believed to be the case yesterday.
“The announcement comes after Moscow appeared to soften its stance on Wednesday over demanding rouble payments, saying they would be introduced gradually.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60945248
Harry,
“Hidden History,” excellent thought process on early twentieth century England, well worth the read. Carol Quigley is mentioned, interesting fellow, wrote, “Tragedy and Hope.” He was prof at GW, Bill Clinton a student.
Spin is mentioned in book, well done over a hundred years ago.
Dennis L.
Yes, I think that something must have happened from this morning.
Either MSM didn’t report the truth saying in the morning that Russia changed mind about Rubles payment or Russia didn’t bear the way UE Countries reported as a success this change (while it was not a change but only an adjustment to help the change from supplier to client) and so Russia decided to take a strong position losing its patience.
https://www.repubblica.it/economia/2022/03/31/news/putin_gas_rubli-343578498/?ref=RHTP-BL-I341773210-P1-S2-T1
The EU is now threatening to ‘block’ Russian gas imports in response lol
‘We were not cut off, we refused supplies!’
So, the EU increased the bet, will the bet be increased? Interesting game.
Dennis L.
As I don’t think that EU will stay waiting its gas supply disappearing and have citizens protesting on the streets, I expect a dirty action soon, like something about chemical, bioweapon or any other false flag to blame the Russians.
From the position of Germany I would say that there exists a government position being “refusing supplies” and an industry position (BASF, Wintershal …) that might just open an account with Gazprombank and trot on.
It was the same with NS2: A. Merkel said, well, we do not really like it, well, the EU comission does not really like it but unfortunately we have a free market…
The EU is stuck in an ideologic trap between micromanageing everything happening in it’s economy for example the decision of “net” and “Data” and “customer service” with Telecom or “grid” and “producer” and “customer services as in “use you car as a battery for the grid” in electricity.
They create a shitload of regulations and say: This is a free market.
From what I see cognitive dissonance will break one day or the other only depending on complexity piled up.
Or as Gail would say: The most complex s*t goes to the compost heap of history first.
In case you are wondering, guys, shelves are stocked in Russia. Products of interest to me (meat, kefir, mineral water and eggs) have not increased in price in 6 months. Butter has increased in price though, maybe 15% over 3 months. Electronic goods have increased.
given the state of the road leading to my village I have bought the russian equivalent of a Hummer (less than 7km/liter), but there are other signs of inflation. My morning americano coffee in town went from 89 to 99 rubles. Possibly the local government will give me 3M rubles as I start my farm, enough to cover for seeder and combine (used). I will also get free help re: livestock and where to sell. I am waiting for the ground to melt and dry up to start operations. The website for those interested will be up (maybe in a month) but today is the first non-stressful day since mid-January.
Hey drb, good story, please keep us/me updated!!!!
Thanks for the inside Russia update.
Glad to hear you are doing well, Dmitry.
Mirror,
Have you read “Hidden History?” It seems to be a very good read on how things work behind the scenes, this is a book relating to early twentieth century England. Carol Quigley is mentioned, he was a mentor/teacher of a fellow named Bill Clinton.
It is small world at the top, I confess to not being part of it.
Dennis L.
(Reuters) ‘Cucumber crisis: surging energy prices leave British glasshouses empty’
Glasshouses empy is really a scary picture…
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/cucumber-crisis-surging-energy-prices-leave-british-glasshouses-empty-2022-03-31/
When we visited Iceland on our way to Sweden/Norway, we were amazed at the amount of produce being grown in greenhouses there. They have a lot of cheap electricity from hydro and from geothermal energy. I suppose their problem will eventually be broken supply lines. Otherwise, Iceland could (in theory) export vegetables to the UK (by ship). This might leave those in Iceland without.
and heat for greenhouses direct from geothermal heat.
What’s next? 🍅 tomatoes!!!
Beginning to look like the great Depression.
I disagree that those who are in the know are superior and know the truth and will prevail through the other side of the bottleneck…
Nope, doesn’t happen that way…More likely end up like Dr. Stockman in Herman Hesse play “An Enemy of the People” …by the way, Actor Steve McQueen produced a nice movie with himself of the play… available still
Thanks, Herbie. I didn’t know this play — my favorite — was made into a movie. Henrik Ibsen actually wrote the play.
Yep, just wanted to see if anyone noticed my post ..this for the comment correction
Both authors are worth studying
If this is real … then it looks to be a policy of forced starvation … Devil Covid + forced starvation + possible full on nuclear war… and finally spent fuel ponds = total annihilation of all humans
This makes sense that they are allowing the green houses to go empty – the end game is obvious
‘Germany Says Putin Backs Away From Rubles for Gas Demand’.
‘Ukraine Update: Putin Tells Draghi Payments Can Be Made in Euros’
If anyone is able to give some reliable information about what they negotiated it would be interesting.
Because any medium level intelligent person would never believe that Russia changed mind in 24h.
Thanks
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-31/ukraine-update-kyiv-says-talks-may-restart-friday-oil-tumbles?srnd=premium-europe
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2022-03-31/germany-says-putin-backs-away-from-rubles-for-gas-demand-video?srnd=premium-europe
I suspected the same. I read similar ones on Reuter.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/putin-signs-decree-ordering-gas-exports-be-halted-if-buyers-dont-pay-rubles
It is real then….
“Analysts speculate that Putin may have climbed down from his hard line due to the technical problems of making ruble payments associated with issues making transfers harder following the SWIFT sanctions on Russia…”
https://intellinews.com/germany-says-putin-has-agreed-to-keep-payments-for-gas-in-euros-239913/
Behind payment in Rubles there is not only Putin.
This would mean that they are a group of stupid people not considering these technical problems.
I can accept that Russians can be bad, but I cannot believe that they are stupid otherwise we would have already conquered them.
Let us wait and see. In this upside down world, you just cannot tell what is real or true anymore.
In addition, according to this news it seems that Gazprom bank will act as a sort of foreign money exchange office.
So the bank would probably take a commission on change for that.
That would be a good explanation, instead of thinking ‘they had miscalculated technical details’.
Good point!
The money will necessarily be in rubles by the time that it gets to Russia.
This looks like it may satisfy the aims of Russia, to shore up the ruble, and to avoid foreign currencies, Russia’s supplies of which might be frozen, like of late; Germany can continue to pay in Euros, contracts are maintained, and business is furthered. The ruble is back to its pre-sanctions level, and Russia’s wealth will be accumulated in rubles. Russia will be able to maintain its energy exports without fear of frozen funds.
Obviously western propaganda will spin this as a ‘climb down’ rather than as a successful and nuanced strategy to obtain objectives. They will have only harsh, obscuring words about Russia whatever happens, anyway. They are now given to repeatedly and outright lie about Russia on an hourly basis. No one in the West now believes a word that comes out of the western MSM.
> Germany says Putin agreed to keep payments for gas in euros
The Russian leader said money would be paid into Gazprom Bank, which is not a subject of sanctions, and then transferred in rubles to Russia, according to a German statement.
Scholz is committed to a G7 agreement that energy supplies from Russia would be paid for only in euros or US dollars
Germany’s government said on Wednesday it has received assurances from Russia that Europe would not have to pay for Russian gas supplies in rubles.
Olaf Scholz’s office said Russian President Vladimir Putin told the German Chancellor that European companies could continue paying in euros or dollars.
In a phone call with Scholz, Putin said the money would be paid into Gazprom Bank and then transferred in rubles to Russia, a German statement said. The bank is not currently subject to sanctions.
“Scholz did not agree to this procedure in the conversation, but asked for written information to better understand the procedure,” the statement added.
Putin said last week that Moscow would only accept rubles as payment for gas deliveries to “unfriendly” countries, including European Union nations.
According to a Kremlin statement, Putin told Scholz that “the decision taken should not lead to worsening of contractual terms for European importer companies.”
He also sought to justify Russia’s demands for ruble payments, saying that “in violation of the norms of international law, the foreign exchange reserves of the Bank of Russia were frozen by the member states of the European Union.”
The Kremlin said the two leaders agreed that experts from each country would hold further discussions on the matter.
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-says-putin-agreed-to-keep-payments-for-gas-in-euros/a-61310461
Yesterday’s report talked about a fuzzy starting date for the change. Natural gas only, and perhaps not applied immediately.
Yes, it is true. I remember the same.
“…analysts at political risk consultancy Eurasia Group say it is… likely, Gazprom will seek to renegotiate existing contracts — a time-consuming process at the best of times — in the context of periodic reviews which most long-term contracts allow for.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/31/europe-energy-russia-appears-to-soften-its-gas-for-rubles-demand.html
Go to the kremlin site. The presidential decree is there. Rub for gas effective from tomorrow
If you carefully read the news on 02/07/2022 you would not have bothered:
https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russia-china-agree-30-year-gas-deal-via-new-pipeline-to-settle-in-euros/
Actually Europe is the end of the Belt And Road initiative.
The endpoint from Shanghai is Germany.
Somebody could of course create huge troubles as in the old western movies, where a train is attacked by a cavalary horde…
“What will Russia’s post-invasion economy look like? … the Kremlin is now seeking to build an economy that won’t be “affected by external price levels for the goods”.
“To achieve this, especially with a dramatically weaker rouble, the Kremlin will need to not only build a command economy but also have complete political control over pricing. This means businesses will not be competing on price or quality but on the basis of their connections to the Kremlin and other economic policymakers.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/3/31/russias-post-invasion-political-economy
“The economies of Russia and Ukraine will shrink by 10 percent and 20 percent respectively in 2022, according to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
“In its first economic forecast since Russia’s invasion on February 24, the London-based lender warned on Thursday that the war had triggered “the greatest supply shock since at least the early 1970s” and would have a severe effect on economies far beyond the immediate area of the conflict.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/31/russias-economy-projected-to-shrink-by-10-ukraines-by-20
Dramatically weakened RUB is back to pre-war levels. Just saw it on the TV.
Here’s a random link from the bulgarian info-op called Zero Hedge:
https://cms.zerohedge.com/s3/files/inline-images/2022-03-30_16-32-44.jpg?itok=cHwooTbr
It is. The Russian Central Bank’s extreme interventions have been effective.
It is an open question longer term whether the Rouble will fall to reflect the health of an economy that may have shrunk by 10% this year.
Yet to be seen, Mr. McGibbs. You are right though that the stabilisation of the RUB is mostly through extreme policy. I am no oracle but i know that commodities for the economy are like plants for ecosystems. I am afraid what will be the shrinkage of other countries economies if Russian one shrink with 10%.
Right. I’m afraid when we look at currencies and indeed national economies now, it is a case of which are the best looking horses in the glue factory. 😆
It is fiat so the options are not even binary 🙂
This is related to what you quote:
I am not sure about “dramatically weaker rouble,” now that Russia is pricing natural gas in rubles, and eventually everything in rubles for NATO countries. If the Ruble is tied to the price of gold, it may hold value better than some other currencies.
The demonisation of Russia is so intense thatit is unbelievable.
I’m afraid every big issue that comes along these days tends to be powerfully polarising – Brexit, Trump, Covid, Ukraine etc. We can see it here in the comments section.
The moral outrage is certainly amplified and reinforced by social media but I do think the collective unconscious is roiled and humans generally are reactive and ill at ease, as we move into this era of enormous challenges.
Facts are facts and fiction’s fiction.
Some people think they can micromanage the population by dividing them into micro units.
This is possible but I recall a quote from a blogger:
“As I am quite right wing I look forward to talking to this marxist guy because I have the impression that we have quite some things in common.
common
is the word…
No doubt; I just inadvertently burned-a-bridge yesterday after sending an acquaintance links to an April 2021 Pittsburg Post-Gazette series on the “oligarch” behind Ukraine’s president that tracked the history of his crew having laundered almost a billion-dollars from Ukraine bank-fraud over many years into the US; funding the purchase of 13 steel mills, a tubular-pipe operation in Michigan, and a substantial amount of commercial real-estate in Cleveland. Looks like a number of those steel mill operations were “bust-outs”; including massive tax-breaks, zero maintenance, serious worker injuries, horrible pollution, money pass-throughs, and eventual bankruptcy, leaving towns like Warren Ohio in the lurch. He had a network in Miami that enabled massive transfers of money via numerous corporate shells and multiple banks; in one case $180 million in a day.
He’s not welcome in the US at this point, but it’s difficult to imagine the intransigence and negligence of EPA, OSHA, bank regulators, and politicians. Anybody who’d go fight for this criminal in Ukraine is seriously misinformed. Sound like they’re hot on his trail over there too, but they’re up against his wide-spread cohort unfortunately, not to mention he’s got a triple-passport so he’s likely untouchable. Anybody who can’t handle the implications of this kind of old-style investigative-reporting is no friend of mine at this stage of the game. These Post-Gazette reporters remind me of Pete Brewton, Gary Webb, Gordon Thomas, Seymour Hersh, Dan Morgan, Leah McGrath Goodman and Alfred McCoy. Hope they get a big book-deal out of their work.
These things happened a lot with the deindustrialisation of eastern Germany by “Treuhand” and in eastern Europe.
It is always the same:
We create and they loot.
Necessary to stop riots… Putin volunteered to play the villain ..
“German inflation hits 40-year high as ECB president warns of ‘supply shock’.
“German inflation rose to 7.6 per cent in March, its highest rate for 40 years, as European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde warned that Russia’s war in Ukraine was delivering a “supply shock” to the eurozone economy.”
https://www.ft.com/content/2f2fb7cc-3039-416b-ad22-f42315d0b1d0
“Europe’s energy crisis sends shockwaves through Germany’s industrial heart…
“Germany’s Mittelstand, the small and mid-sized companies that power Europe’s largest economy, was already battling its biggest crisis in a decade trying to absorb rocketing energy bills. Then the government warned it might have to turn off the gas…
“”If we don’t get gas we’ll have to switch off,” Craig Barker, the managing director of Kelheim Fibres, whose fibres are used in everything from tea bags to tampons, told Reuters.””
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/europes-energy-crisis-sends-shockwaves-through-germanys-industrial-heart-2022-03-31/
“Europe told to turn down the heating in Russia gas standoff.
“Fears of a Russian gas supply crunch prompted some European countries on Wednesday to ask people to consume less energy in a move that could potentially yield big results.”
https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/europe-told-turn-down-heating-russia-gas-standoff-2022-03-30/
“Euro Zone’s Consumers Face €230 Billion Energy Shock This Year.
“The energy crisis gripping the euro area will inflict an extra bill on consumers equivalent to 1.8% of its gross domestic product, according to analysis by Bloomberg Economics.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-31/euro-zone-s-consumers-face-255-billion-energy-shock-this-year
It is snowing in the UK right now. I hope they enjoy not heating their homes as the cost will be sky high….all for their utterly corrupt, mismanaged neoliberal government.
Not a surprise!
A friend of mine send me a video from German supermarket where bunch of well looking people were beating the crap out of each other for 10L container of sunflower seed oil.
Do modern germans dream about hyperinflation?
I have not seen anything like this recently, but it is not impossible.
Rapeseed oil and sunflower oil is sold out everywhere.
But…my God, there is olive oil, coconut oil, butter. So enough alternatives.
This video delves in the cooking oil fights – https://youtu.be/mfG5vvMZni8
See why we need the CEP…
“Soaring Cost of Diesel Ripples Through the Global Economy.
“Farmers are spending more to keep tractors and combines running. Shipping and trucking companies are passing higher costs to retailers, which are beginning to pass them on to shoppers. And local governments are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars extra to fill up school buses. Construction costs could soon rise, too.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/31/business/economy/diesel-economy-russia-ukraine.html
“Trucker on diesel prices: ‘We’re going to have a lot of bankruptcies’…
“Independent trucker Michael Whitaker says at the beginning of the year it cost $600 or $700 to fill up his truck tank. Now, he’s paying about $1,000. “You notice it into your pocket, oh yes,” says the Iowa-based trucker.”
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/diesel-prices-you-notice-it-in-your-pocket-says-independent-trucker-154417800.html
“China’s retail diesel, gasoline prices to hit record highs.
“China’s retail diesel and gasoline prices are set to soar to historically high levels, following a surge in global crude oil benchmarks amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chinas-retail-diesel-gasoline-prices-hit-record-highs-2022-03-31/
“Members of the Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria have expressed concern that certain hospitals in Rivers State have closed owing to a rise in the price of diesel.
“Others are struggling to provide services.”
https://www.informationng.com/2022/03/hospitals-shut-down-over-high-cost-of-diesel.html
“Diesel was no longer on sale across Sri Lanka on Thursday, crippling transport…
“Diesel — the main fuel for buses and commercial vehicles — was unavailable at stations across the island…”
https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/2288202/sri-lanka-runs-out-of-diesel-faces-longest-ever-blackout
What do we expect, when diesel prices were already high, and diesel exports from Russia were cut back?
talking to a friend at the gym today, who was at a lecture last night about valuable antique glass
at the end of the lecture, lecturer held up a glass from IKEA—from a pack of 6 for £3
he said, and I quote: ”In 100 years time, this will be worth a fortune, because we won’t be able to make it”
sums up our situation neatly i thought
Because of the energy intensity?
because of the non-availability of energy to produce it.
Is that the Geriatric Gym? Do you participate in the pool exercises? What do they call that – Aquarobics? Do they have a diaper dispenser in the change room?
I’m asking for mike – he is looking for something like that
Moderna Developing Dangerous Flu Vaccine https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/international-news/vaccine/moderna-developing-dangerous-flu-vaccine/
“Moderna, the company that produced its first vaccine amid Operation Warp Speed, has plans to release another risky injectable. The company is working on another mRNA vaccine to combat the common flu called mRNA-1010. Moderna is currently in phase two of the trial for the unnecessary vaccine, and there are already major red flags. Those who received the mRNA-1010 vaccine were twice as likely to experience side effects than those who received Afluria, the standard flu vaccine. The adverse side effects were experienced across every age group.
Why would the most vulnerable in our population take a vaccine that is proven to cause twice as much harm as the currently available one? Answer: coercion and fear for profits.
The company also plans to develop a vaccine that combines the unknown chemicals of the COVID vaccine with its flu vaccine. Novavax is already in phase one of a trial for a combination vaccine.
Thanks for the warning.
Would anyone be surprised if this is not just the same Covid garbage… relabelled…
“Locked-down residents in China are protesting as patience wears thin against the country’s strict zero-Covid rules, in place again as omicron spreads…
“For most Chinese, the zero-Covid response was a source of pride – a sign that the Chinese system was superior in such times of emergency, especially compared to the chaos in other nations, including the US and UK. But now people are growing tired of the disruptions…”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/03/30/protests-grow-against-chinas-zero-covid-lockdowns/
“Six Chinese developers face indefinite trading suspension after expressing inability to meet March 31 reporting deadline.
“While Evergrande has already been suspended, China Aoyuan, Kaisa, Fantasia Holdings, Modern Land and Sunac will see their shares suspended from Friday”
https://www.scmp.com/business/china-business/article/3172428/six-chinese-developers-face-indefinite-trading-suspension
“China’s economy hit by double whammy in March.
“Activity in Chinese manufacturing and services simultaneously contracted in March for the first time since the height of the country’s Covid-19 outbreak in 2020, adding to the urgency for more policy intervention to stabilize the economy.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/03/31/economy/china-economy-pmi-contraction-hnk-intl/index.html
China is not in good condition, and the shutdowns aren’t helping.
“A ban on muck-spreading this autumn has been lifted by the UK Government in a victory for farmers.
“Farmers have argued that they should be allowed to use manure as an organic alternative to artificial fertiliser, for which gas is a key ingredient, as it becomes more scarce.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/03/30/muck-spreading-ban-lifted-victory-farmers/
“Spain allows supermarket rationing to prevent shortages.
“The move came as empty shelves appeared in many supermarkets due to the combined effect of a truck drivers’ strike and the Ukraine war… Spain has been struggling with a wave of social unrest over runaway inflation and rising prices.”
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20220331-spain-allows-supermarket-rationing-to-prevent-shortages
“Cucumber crisis: surging energy prices leave British glasshouses empty…
“While last year it cost about 25 pence to produce a cucumber in Britain, that has now doubled and is set to hit 70 pence when higher energy prices kick in, trade body British Growers say.”
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/cucumber-crisis-surging-energy-prices-leave-british-glasshouses-empty-2022-03-31/
Definitely a good idea.
Who do you hope is NEXT?
I am hoping Neil Young goes down… ya… Neil Young… a happy day that would be
Lynyrd Skynyrd likes this comment.
I think Bruce Willis is the latest victim of the worldwide phase III clinical trial. Just saw he quited acting due to aphasia (which is due to a stroke).
Back in the day, I has a devoted admirer and listener off Young’s music creativity.
From what I heard he may have “sold out” to give support of the unneeded vaccination pogrom for profits and control.
If that is so, sad day in the annuals of the 60s counterculture movement.
Old man take a look at my life…..
Trust NAOMI, trust ULTRA!
check both (!) out on your favourite search engine.
From what I see in my previous residence country Austria, ALL cultural events are “COVID Pass” required.
F789 them ALL!
Some criticism is emerging in Germany.
(Frankfurter Allgemeine) All the mistakes of Ministry of Health Karl Lauterbach
https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/karl-lauterbach-die-vielen-fehler-des-gesundheitsministers-17918912.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_2
More information about Bruce Willis illness.
Times of Israel describes it as ‘cognitive illness’.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/action-hero-bruce-willis-to-retire-due-to-cognitive-illness/
Aphasia is one of the most frequent effects of stroke.
hahahahaha
COVID-19 in Indonesia – a familiar story…
Applying the Bradford Hill criteria to assess the possibility that COVID-19 mRNA injections increase COVID-19 itself.
https://metatron.substack.com/p/covid-19-in-indonesia-a-familiar
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe4aa48d0-97f4-4f36-ad40-f8a169b2f545_3251x2601.png
Dr. Tim Morgan hits a homerun with his latest over at Surplus Energy Economics, #225. Gravitational Pull.
Transition? Nope
I was more referring to his summary of the relationship between the economy and energy and where we are today. He is mildly optimistic but not high on hopium. Sort of the way Catton was hoping we would have a managed collapse.
Yes he defining paper on that was Perfect Storm … read that many years ago — it was huge.
He seems to not want to accept what looks to be a rather obvious outcome of running out of energy – and 8B people who eat oil.
I suppose he’d fall into despair if he admitted this
YES!!! My man GVB rocks
“I SERIOUSLY expect that a series of new highly virulent and highly infectious SARS-CoV-2 (SC-2) variants will now rapidly and independently emerge in highly vaccinated countries all over the world and that they will soon spread at high pace. I expect the current pattern of repetitive infections and relatively mild disease in vaccinees to soon aggravate and be replaced by severe disease and death.
Unfortunately, there is no way vaccinees can rely on assistance from their innate immune system to protect against coronaviruses as their relevant innate IgM antibodies are increasingly being outcompeted by infection-enhancing vaccinal Abs, which are continuously recalled due to the circulation of highly infectious Omicron variants. In contrast, Omicron’s high infectiousness would enable the non-vaccinated to train their innate immune defense against SC-2 while the infectious and pathogenic capacity of the new SC-2 variants would be debilitated in the non-vaccinated for lack of infection-enhancing Abs in their blood. Unless…”
https://voiceforscienceandsolidarity.substack.com/p/geert-vanden-bossche-predictions?s=r
Let me take the other side in this upside down world. Perhaps it is us, those who are aware and can think are the “disabled” people in this reality.
The “normal” people outside are the ones who cannot think or question critically. Since they are the majority and the people who have the characteristics below are the minority….
1. admit they are wrong and will change their view
2. critically questioning everything and not accepting anything at face value
3. wary of what is being told or informed.
4. Able to articulate to a third party without beating around the bush
Perhaps we are the re-tard-ded ones in this reality !! Oh my gosh !!
In a way it would be good to be norm….
But we’re not hahahahahahaahaha … and given the choice… I’d choose Greatness again
Mediocrity is for MOREONS
Ignorance is only bliss — if you are ignorant – right norm?
we are the chosen ones CTG we will survive this because we know the truth thats all that matters even if you die at least you know you died for a purpose continuation of our species thats what we know to protect the survivors froms the coming bottleneck of resource scarcity some of us will not be making it, it is a necessary sacrifice
Didn’t you get vaccinated just so you could drive a tram around Melbourne? That sounds like you are in the normie group mate.
CTG, I have profoundly thought about this subject lately, because what is happening oblige us to think about this subject. Thank you for your comment.
As many philosophers have found about, I really think that humans are social creatures, set to live together and set to believe and follow some leaders.
The presence in ‘the herd’ of people thinking our of the box must be probably and necessarily limited, otherwise social cohesion declines.
In that sense if ‘the herd’ is ruled by deceivers, it must be very difficult for the herd to recognized it and it is probably a suffering process to get out from that, from phsicological and social point of view.
instead of ‘our of the box’ please read ‘out of the box’. Sorry for typing mistake
The herd is so trusting … that’s why they are so easily controlled by those who understand how easily they are controlled (and have the means to control them).
They’re not trusting they’re captured. They’re not wedded, they’re welded – as in bonded, as in bondage.
It’s Capture Bondage.
The ‘trust’ isn’t true trust, it’s a facsimile (a false fractal) of trust.
Just about everyone I know has taken the jabs…..the only jab pushers I know have been n.h.s. workers….early 2021 they were telling me that the jabs are safe, adequately tested and that I should take it…..15 months later….the message remains the same….jabs are safe and have saved lives….end of. I end up with cognitive dissonance…these folks are trustworthy….intelligent….have a lot going for them….but…wrt to the jabs, they will bat away any criticism….the word “institutionalized” springs to mind…
This is a very good interview with Dennis Meadows.
https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/12-dennis-meadows
PS “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities”-Voltaire
the elders have been working behind the scenes for a long time ‘ In the mid-sixties the UN member countries slowly began to agree on a greater
involvement of the United Nations in population matters. In 1967 the Secretary-General created a
Trust Fund to finance work in the population field. In 1969 the Fund was renamed the United
Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) and placed under the overall supervision of the
United Nations Development Program’
just speculating here but obviously 2020 was the cut off date for the elders the point of no return had been reached and it was time to bring in ‘the grim reaper’ so everything had been prepared for the poor addicted lambs who needed to believe that a great evil had been unleashed on them and only the jab could save them little did they know that they would be sacrificed for the greater good the survival of the human species.
hahaha https://t.me/VigilantFox/3682
Bruce https://t.me/robinmg/17984
Wow – he must be pretty pissed off about now
I imagine words fail him.
Remember this?
Bruce could do the voice overs!
Poor ol Bruce – seems he didn’t want to get the shots so we can cut him some slack.
norm – if it happens to you no slack.
https://youtu.be/ss2hULhXf04
Do we give sympathy to all of those that injected themselves into the machine so that the machine could grow stronger?
His acting is going nowhere lately. The shot did him a favour.
Anyone who injects is a MOREON – even if they were coerced by threats to lose their jobs…
You take the hit rather than inject an experiment.
He’s a fool – he has plenty of cash – he could have walked away — he will walk away anyway – with half a brain now hahahaaha
I have written here before last year if I am not mistaken on Prion and CJD (Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease). It is actually a very serious matter as I have stated in the post, if not mistaken, I was responding to Yoshua.
Prions are mis-folded protein. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prion It can cause normal proteins located side by side with this mis-folden protein to mis-fold and thus propagate. Mis-folded protein “cannot die” or destroyed in a normal way. It will be retained in the body or brain until it causes symptoms of CJD.
In a normal manner, CJD takes decades to manifest unless there is a catalyst like eating contaminated meat.
However, with this engineered virus (spike protein) and the mRNA with quadrillions of engineered mRNA spike protein “factories” in the body, the chances of artificially creating a mis-folded protein is probably orders of a orders of orders of magnitude higher than normal.
That was why in Yoshua’s post (IIRC), he/she was stating that we will have a zombie apocalypse soon.
Consider that they know that the injections do not stop the spread of Covid … that they do not stop serious illness or death (they have some short lived impact initially — they would need to in order to force the virus to mutate so you get this short term protection as the virus finds a work-around)…
Ask yourself — why would they continue to push for more injections? Billions are being spend on PR and ad campaigns to push more boosters… and the infants are next up….
If you are honest with yourself you have to admit — this has to be a conscious effort to cause deadly highly contagious mutations to emerge… it has to be.
Scientists other than GVB have stated that deploying leaky vaccines against any virus during a pandemic is an absolute no-no… they indicate that this is why they vaccine for flu BEFORE flu season .. and also why they tend to focus on vaccinating the at-risk… that reduces the chances of mutations emerging…
Here we are — having put the juice into upwards of 6B … shot after shot after shot … with infections now at record highs as we force mutation after mutation … with no end in sight… there can never be an end in sight because leaky vaccines do not sterilize so we never get herd immunity…
They’ll keep jamming this shit into people till they get the desired outcome.
And meanwhile they will continue to do whatever it takes to hold BAU together till they scream Bingo!
Ukraine surely is a key pillar of this strategy — every day the energy pool is drained a little more … they will be monitoring that while they wait for Devil Covid… and they will have contingencies in place such as rationing … to ensure BAU does not collapse while we wait…
Ukraine is obviously perfect cover for the rationing of everything from energy to food — there is no way in hell they could get away with any of this without riots resulting — unless they had Putin as the scapegoat…
The concern without a doubt is that DC does not present before the energy situation goes beyond critical and rationing becomes to extreme causing the system to break apart resulting in Ripping of Faces (or as in Utopia ‘tearing each other to pieces’)
It’s ok to be honest with yourself and accept our fate. If it takes a few jugs of Xanax to get through the stages of grief so be it. Doctors are happy to write you a script — that’s a Pfizer product so if the doc combines that with his covid injection sales.. that’s potentially a first class flight to Hawaii and a week in a Four Seasons suite.
https://t.me/robinmg/17982
Searching chris kamara slurring
There is nothing … only him explaining why….
Can anyone find this video?
norm?
https://t.me/chiefnerd/3062
Getting people ready for the CEP and starvation https://t.me/chiefnerd/3061
Bruce….
https://t.me/chiefnerd/3055
https://t.me/chiefnerd/3056
What are the odds… his condition just happened.. or it happened cuz of the injections ….
If you had to bet your life on this norm…. and it could be proved one way or the other…
the good news is that depopulation is now baked into the cake so with a bit of luck the human civilization will continue so the elders have done splendidly in perpetrating such a great con on the human race if some of our own members on OFW have been fooled it just goes to show how smart the elders have been in pulling this off I honestly did not expect some of our own OFW commenters to believe in the false reality being served to them but there it is we cannot change who we are.
Elders = Creators in Simulation.
The real question is how much depopulation. 10% per generation? 20%? I think the upcoming famine will be much more effective than these pitiful lockdowns and vaccines, which no one with 1/10 of a brain can consider much more than a bad flu.
I think everyone here realised that we are at the stage of “everything happening at the same time like that bankruptcy quote.
norm has only 1/10 of a brain hahahahahahahahaha
Bigger than a pea though
no matter eddy
OFW now has a resident, documented flat earther
he will be good company for you
Towards the emergence of a new form of the neurodegenerative Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease: Sixteen cases of CJD declared a few days after a COVID-19 “vaccine” Jab
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/358661859_Towards_the_emergence_of_a_new_form_of_the_neurodegenerative_Creutzfeldt-Jakob_disease_Sixteen_cases_of_CJD_declared_a_few_days_after_a_COVID-19_vaccine_Jab
Interesting. Thank you
This does sound worrying!
clever https://t.me/TommyRobinsonNews/34176
Intentional suppression of early therapy in order to promote fear, isolation, suffering, hospitalization, and death as a means of preparing population to accept mandated genetic products–most disturbing thing they have heard.
https://twitter.com/P_McCulloughMD/status/1509254767486414850
Thank you
famous screen actor Boost Willis.
I have said before COVID is done, over & OMICRON was our off-ramp; but I have also said that it will not end & WILL continue if we continue using a non-sterilizing vaccine (does not stop transmission)
This pandemic will continue for 100 years with a new variant each 2 months or so if we continue using these failed harmful vaccines that are driving the variants (via natural selection)
https://palexander.substack.com/p/i-have-said-before-covid-is-done
Funny I asked the chemist yesterday how many more shots… no idea… I says if the vax doesn’t stop the spread of covid – and it doesn’t does that mean we have to take shots forever? I dunno she says…
Hahahahaha… circus monkey…
When we lived in Bali a few km from us some f789er had chained a monkey to a post out front of their home… the poor thing was out of its mind … I was tempted to sneak in there at night and cut the chain … but with all the street dogs no way to do it without getting bit – or alerting the owners…
I would like to chain a human circus monkey in my front yard… cuz.
“Yet Pfizer’s CEO Bourla says we need a 4th shot (2nd booster like Biden):”
Bidet just got his 4th saline jab.
or perhaps if the moreon aging brainfart Elites want him out, they gave him the real toxic spike protein shot this time.
we’ll see.
hey look, everybody, I got a flat tyre.
Hopefully 👆. His year in office feels like 10
Perhaps you drove over a syringe?
I hear that is very NORMal these days.
hahahaha.. norm?
Not enough vaccinated people dying. Sad.
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/03/29/vaccine-boosters-needed-every-six-months-for-the-foreseeable-future-says-u-k-government-health-agency/
I feel your disappointment that it’s not every 2 months norm… but keep in mind — they say 6 months because they don’t want to freak people out … but you can bet your blow up doll on this — it won’t be 6 months
Here’s where we are in terms of a civilization …
Was communicating with a mate who is 15+ years younger than me … mentioned I was able to find a gravel trail bike in stock (they had a 2021 model that was discounted so that worked perfectly – otherwise its a few months wait if not longer and prices are not locked in).
He asked for a pic – ah you are dead set on those push bikes.. once you go E bike you won’t go back… (he’s a big ebike fan).
Which got me thinking … why would I ride an ebike — unless I was unable to peddle a bike up a hill like one of those fat old burned out geezers that I pass on the trails … I can see how that makes sense cuz for them it’s ebike or sofa teevee getting even fatter and more pathetic…
Isn’t an ebike basically a motor scooter that allows you to gently peddle to pretend you are actually exercising?
Maybe I’m f789ed in the head… but isn’t the point here to push yourself… to improve your fitness… isn’t an ebike taking the e-asy way out… isn’t it a waste of time… ain’t it like Ukraine – War Lite?
You either go all in — or why bother?
Is this not a symptom of where we are — snowflake .. weak… mediocre… stoooopid… MOREONS… etc…
Yeah that’s rich coming from you, Eddy. How about you apply that sentiment to our conversation about spent fuel rods disposal instead of e-biking your way through it lol. See you downthread! 🙂
Ya why not just dump the rods in the ocean direct now? Or better still – in anticipation of collapse just find a nearby stream and run a pipe into the spend fuel swimming pool and it’s all good for the next 10,000 years.
Because that would signal too early to the 8billion useless eaters that the ship is sinking. Timing is everything.
How would they know?
They think there is a full scale war happening in Ukraine and that they west is supporting freedom there.
They think that the vaccines are purposed to save them – and that they are safe and effective
They think that we have walked on the moon – they think that the US govt did not orchestrate 911…
Heaving some toxic shit into the ocean … in the middle of nowhere — during ‘military exercises’… how easy would that be?
Earlier today, Wednesday 30 March 2022, prior to hearing the Bruce Willis news, I was initiating a new phone on which the suggested google search terms (prior to entering any text) had “aphasia” as the first listing. As a friendly reminder; building 7 did not kill itself.
Building seven…now where’s the imagination in that?
The ‘House of Cards’, or something else!!
Didn’t it have incriminating files re Buildings/Savings and Loans collapse? Appropriate much.
Memory fades, which I am grateful for.
People seem to think a spent fuel pond is a big swimming pool.
It’s not.
Familiarize yourself:
https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-storage/pools.html
How do you do this when you just heave them into the ocean? You can’t – or they would. There is a massive amount of spent fuel in the 4000 ponds around the world – you dump all that in the ocean and you sterilise the oceans. And that won’t stay in the ocean due to convection.
And in any event what does it matter? When BAU goes the only people that have the slightest chance of being alive are remote primitive tribes. Who cares if they survive… we all die.
Lol. You’re still straw-manning, Eddy, and now you’re being intellectually dishonest in another way, too, by linking to an article that the casual reader might interpret means that neutron absorbers are required. They are not. They are only required, as the link says, when making room for more fuel rods beyond what the pools were designed to hold without the absorbers.
If you cared to think about the logistics, a triage system might occur to you whereby rods that have been in pools for a certain number of years can go first. Perhaps they all are transported and dumped in dry casks. When the dry casks fail in 100 years at the bottom of an ocean trench with good circulation, the water keeps the rods in check. As my previous link said, 7cm of water depth insulates against 50pc of fission products.
You’re last paragraph says a lot about you in general, and it also says a lot about your approach to this conversation. You clearly lack emotional maturity.
> South Ossetia to ‘take legal steps’ towards annexation by Russia
South Ossetian President Anatoly Bibilov has said he will take legal steps in the near future towards annexation into the Russian Federation, vowing to unite South Ossetia with Russia ‘in one country’.
His statement came as Bibilov is fighting an election campaign in South Ossetia, and on the background of the involvement of the local soldiers in Russia’s military [operation] on Ukraine.
The South Ossetian President went on to insist that Ossetian people, who are mainly divided between South Ossetia and the Russian Republic of North Ossetia, should not ‘miss the opportunity’ to unite under Russia, as he said had happened during the 2014 Russian annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea.
According to Russian legislation, foreign states or parts of other states must formally hold a referendum and support the idea to be admitted as subjects of the Russian Federation, a procedure that Russian authorities claimed to have respected in March 2014 in Crimea.
‘I believe that uniting with Russia is our strategic goal, our path, the aspiration of the people, and therefore, we are going to be moving. We will take the respective legal steps at the nearest point in time. The Republic of South Ossetia will be part of its historical homeland, Russia,’ Bibilov said.
https://oc-media.org/south-ossetia-to-take-legal-steps-towards-annexation-by-russia/
good.
it’s very revealing that Mariupol seems to be the only city that the Russian army is severely destroying.
MSM lovers might ask why?
the Azov Natzees are there, or more precisely were there, as it looks like they have been mostly exterminated, like cockroaches.
Russia looks intent on taking the eastern parts, and all of the south bordering the Black Sea (and the Sea of Azov haha).
there is optimism that they can wrap up this special military operation in April.
it’s looking good.
too bad the West has thrust much suffering on the 99% of Ukrainians who are innocent victims of the delusional non-negotiations and “sanctions”.
Define “severely destroying”.
“Grain for rubles. Fertilisers for rubles. Rare metals per ruble. Oil and gas for rubles. Now the EU will know exactly what rubles look like and forget what the dollar looks like.”
> Grain exporters asking to allow foreign purchasers to pay for grain in rubles
MOSCOW, March 30. /TASS/. The Russian Union of Grain Exporters has asked the Bank of Russia to investigate the possibility of enabling foreign purchasers of Russian grain to make payments on export contracts in rubles, according to a letter written by the Union (its copy has been obtained by TASS).
“We are asking to find the possibility of ensuring liquidity in rubles for foreign banks serving purchasers of grain. Among the largest purchasers are Turkey, Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabi, other African and Middle Eastern countries, as well as a number of Asian countries – Vietnam, Pakistan, Bangladesh,” the document said.
https://tass.com/economy/1430013
I might just buy myself some rubles!
https://www.amazon.com/USSR-Full-Set-BANKNOTES-Collection/dp/B07QD7RTY9/ref=sr_1_20?crid=1PRCQETL5K0AU&keywords=russian+rubles+currency+real&qid=1648697126&sprefix=russian+rubles%2Caps%2C144&sr=8-20
A few hours ago several reports came out that Russia has agreed for the EU to pay Gazprombank in Euros and then Gazprombank will immediately exchange those for rubles. If true, I guess the EU wins this round and Putin bluffed / doesn’t know how to implement this on a technical level.
I reckon a moderate smack with a shovel would end her
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/03/29/the-queen-is-owed-an-apology-infections-are-36-times-higher-than-at-time-of-funeral-when-monarch-sat-alone/
> China, Russia ‘more determined’ to boost ties, Beijing says
Flags of China and Russia are displayed in this illustration picture taken March 24, 2022. REUTERS/Florence Lo/Illustration
BEIJING, March 30 (Reuters) – Moscow and Beijing are “more determined” to develop bilateral ties and boost cooperation, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Wednesday following a meeting in eastern China with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, amid the Ukraine crisis.
The two also condemned what they called illegal and counter- productive Western sanctions imposed on Moscow over its actions in Ukraine, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
Wang and Lavrov spoke in the eastern Chinese province of Anhui, where China is hosting two days of multilateral meetings on Afghanistan. read more
“Both sides are more determined to develop bilateral ties, and are more confident in promoting cooperation in various fields,” Wang said.
“China is willing to work with Russia to take China-Russian ties to a higher level in a new era under the guidance of the consensus reached by the heads of state,” he said.
Russia’s foreign ministry said Lavrov had informed Wang about the progress of military operations in Ukraine and the state of Moscow’s negotiations with Kyiv.
“The sides noted the counterproductive nature of the illegal unilateral sanctions imposed on Russia by the United States and its satellites,” the ministry said in a statement.
The two ministers agreed that Russia and China would continue to strengthen their strategic partnership and to speak on global affairs “with a united voice”, it added.
China’s foreign ministry quoted Wang as saying that bilateral relations had “withstood the test of international turbulence”.
Lavrov said on Monday that Russia’s relations with China were at their strongest level ever.
On the eve of last month’s Winter Olympics in Beijing, China and Russia declared a “no-limits” strategic partnership.
https://www.reuters.com/world/moscow-beijing-agreed-widen-cooperation-ifax-cites-russian-foreign-ministry-2022-03-30/
For pro-lockdown campaigners, all roads lead to the Kochs
During the Covid-19 pandemic, tribal politics have pushed scientific discourse into the back seat. Scientists who provide their honest assessment of medical and public health data have often been subject to ad hominem attacks and slander.
When Left-leaning journalists defend the government’s pandemic strategies by falsely classifying opponents as Right-wing, it hurts the Left while boosting the Right. The latest example is an article in the New Republic with one of the most far-fetched personal attacks we have seen since March 2020 — a true accomplishment during a pandemic filled with logical somersaults.
The target is Urgency of Normal, a group of physicians and medical scientists arguing against the masking of toddlers and children. The group includes Dr Vinay Prasad, a physician, epidemiologist, and associate professor at the University of California in San Francisco. With colleagues at Harvard and the University of Colorado, he wrote the most thorough scientific review of the efficacy of masks against Covid. They concluded that “data to support masking kids was absolutely absent.”
https://unherd.com/thepost/its-not-right-wing-to-critique-lockdowns-and-masks/
Thanks as always Gail. Did you mean trained workers will likely not find jobs elsewhere in the final paragraph?
I am not quite certain what you are referring to.
Near the end, I say:
What I meant is that Russia’s workers in the oil, coal, gas and transport sectors will lose their jobs, if Russia needs to cut back its production for one reason or another (low prices, sanctions, or inability to source replacement spare parts, for example). These workers will move to other sectors of the economy to find jobs, as best that they can. For instance, they may find work in public transit or in the food industry.
There is a different problem I didn’t mention. In general, Russia, as well as the rest of the world, is not far away from losing jobs for workers because supply lines are broken, or because customers can no longer afford their products. In that sense, there will be an issue everywhere of more and more people without jobs because it takes energy supplies and supplies of many other raw materials to keep economies operating.
As energy supplies per capita decline, the situation will look more and more like the “Free bread and circuses” situation at the time of the Fall of Rome. A relatively small portion of the population will labor at close to slave wages, overseen by a few aristocrats or oligarchs. The rest of the population will try to exist on “dole,” such as it is. This cannot last long. The economy will quickly fall apart.
Re supply-lines, “Russian supply chains next in line for sanctions – U.S. Treasury’s Adeyemo….
“”In addition to sanctioning companies in sectors that enable the Kremlin’s malign activities, we also plan to take actions to disrupt their critical supply chains,” Adeyemo told an event at the think tank Chatham House.”
https://www.reuters.com/business/us-allies-aim-sanctions-more-russian-sectors-supply-chains-treasurys-adeyemo-2022-03-29/
This is a link to a very interesting 23 minute video about Russia. It emphasizes how poorly the country is doing and its demographic challenges. Nearly all of its trained workers are over 50 and its health and education systems are very poor. Its army ranks are thin. It would very quickly need to move move to nuclear weapons to defend itself, if it can’t solve its Ukraine problems quickly.
Russia would have lots of challenges shipping raw materials to China. Mostly, they would need to go around the horn of Africa, because Russia’s ports are mostly at the Western end of Russia.
The narrator speaks rapidly. I would need to listen to the video again to get all the points.
You don’t need an army when you have lots and lots of nukes and at the slightest provocation you are willing to launch hahahahaha More money for vodka
Russian women are the hottest.
But they can empty your bank accounts in a nanosecond.
Yes extremely fit and hot… they could all win the Ms Universe bikini contest… even the ugly ones…
In my view either Russia or US+UE are dying Countries in the way expressed by the video.
US+UE are accepting to be modified internally by strong immigration in order to resurrect (with politicians not considering resource depletion) and that is expecially true for UE, but Russia is not following this path.
In that sense I think that they probably have more social and cultural cohesion than us, although we are saying here that Russians want to remove Putin..
I don’t think so.
Maybe later, when this oppression against Russia will be finished they will change something, but my impression is that now people are tighten around him.
So I think that if we want to conquer them and collect their resources we will probalby get hurt first.
So maybe it is a meeting of two suicide persons, Russia from one side and US+UE from the other side.
As my grandmother always said, ‘il più intelligente si ferma prima’, which can be translated like: ‘the smarter stops first’.
“Vaccine-induced myocarditis in kids is not “mild”“ by Chris Martenson
https://peakprosperity.com/is-vaccine-heart-damage-child-permament/
A new study shows that these hopeful-sounding statements are neither true nor scientifically accurate.
“More than 2/3rds of all children who presented to the hospital with vaccine-induced cardiomyopathy were shown to have detectable imaging results consistent with scarring of the heart pericardium, up to eight months later.“
Rest easy. Just been to talk with my mechanic who does a lot of work for the local boatyard.
People are lining up with cash to buy the latest 52′ ‘Regal’ boats.
No change out of a million NZ peso’s.
This to go boating on our local puddle/lake.
So just know the ‘previous home’ of the America’s cup (going to Spain I see) is still trucking along nicely despite the news out some parts of sad NZ.
Gail,
I watched your interview on geopolitics and empire. I thought it went well and it was well done. I imagine it can be hard to articulate the items but you did a good job.
Thank you.
You are welcome. The interviewer had clearly done a lot of homework beforehand.
Ethical Questions Arise After Scientists Brew Super Powerful ‘SARS 2.0’ Virus
https://www.vice.com/en/article/wnxqnm/ethical-questions-arise-after-scientists-brew-super-powerful-sars-20-virus
did I mention bruce willis has f789ed himself hahhahahahahahahahaha
Yep – he’d permanently f789ed himself up — and there ain’t no unf789ing this .. that’s why it’s permanent hahahaha..
I wonder how bruce feels now that he is a vegetable? Does he know that he’s a vegetable?
Does a carrot look in the mirror and say — wow I’m a carrot?
https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/aphasia-can-be-caused-by-the-covid
eddy
note the definition of Aphasia:
>>>>>Aphasia is an inability to comprehend or formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions<<<<
the corrections i have to make to your linguistic aberrations would lead me to suspect that you may have a similar problem.
Out of common courtesy I would not have mentioned it, but you seem to have brought it into the public arena.
Incidentally, the course of Anticussin medication I recommended doesn't seem to be working. Ask your doctor to double the prescription strength.
The ethical problem has been known for a long time. I see the first link is from 2015.
Just an FYI – Bruce Willis’ aphasia predates both Covid and the Covid vaccine – https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2022-03-30/bruce-willis-aphasia-memory-loss-cognitive-disorder
And here’s anna!!! Crawling out of her hole to spew MSM rubbish.
Anna want a banana??
https://adversereactionreport.com/vaccine-injured/779-athlete-cardiac-arrests-serious-issues-500-dead-after-jab/
I don’t see why Bruce needs to give up acting. Surely he could continue to play strong silent types? This is rotten news.
I was looking forward to him starring as a man who overdoses on Viagra in Die Hard with a Permanent Erection.
i wonder what is going on in Bruce’s mind now…
Just on with my mate who has heart wreckage… he’s in Europe having been permitted by the Entity he works for to spend 3 months anywhere by in Hong Kong ….
His good mate was asking for details of his heart problems:
I told him about the pain day – the crazy feeling of almost death dose 2 which lasted intensely for 8 hours including blindness temp crazy thoughts etc then disappeared in 5 minutes – doc’s diagnosis of myocarditis – irregular heart beat etc…
His mate’s conclusion – it’s probably anxiety…
We are trying to work out if he was just trying to make him feel better by saying this … or if he was so freaked out by the situation (he is boosted and probably getting ready for 4 – like norm) that he had to dismiss this life threatening condition his friend is experiencing…
Fifth COVID-19 Vaccine Shot May Be Needed In Fall: FDA Official
Hours after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized a fourth shot of the Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines for all Americans 50 and older, an FDA official said a fifth shot may be needed in the fall.
“I don’t want to shock anyone but there may be a need for people to get an additional booster in the fall, along with a more general booster campaign if that takes place, because we may need to shift over to a different variant coverage,” Dr. Peter Marks, head of the FDA center that regulates vaccines, told reporters on a call on March 29.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/fifth-covid-19-vaccine-shot-may-be-needed-in-fall-fda-official_4370086.html?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=ZeroHedge
Excellent. More Boosters for everyone … and the good thing is … they are Free!
How often do you get Free Shit — without a hitch (hahaha… never right)
He could star in remakes of Charlie Chaplin’s best movies… or he could play a deaf mute character … dress him up as a women and he could do The Helen Keller Story….
Or better still — since his life is basically wrecked… give him a jug of Fentanyl and shout GO!
Aphasia can be caused by the COVID vaccine
How do we know Bruce Willis’ aphasia wasn’t caused by the vaccine? Nobody is talking about it.
https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/aphasia-can-be-caused-by-the-covid
but did Willis get a flat tyre on the way back from the clinic like i did
that’s the question we should be asking
yes we should never question the science of vaccine damage to healthy human bodies.
we should always try to misdirect the questions towards strawman types.
you are quite the expert on that.
i was merely trying to point out, that literally any ailment no matter how far removed —gets the ”aha—this must be the result of vaxxing” treatment
no matter what the medical history or circumstances.
but feel free to ignore that
no.
you totally failed to engage with anything that Steve Kirsch wrote.
and you clearly seek to dodge any and all reports of possible or probable health damages caused by these vaccines.
fortunately you are among the majority of the Jabbed who have not yet suffered from the jabs.
Willis was once in your same majority.
thousands dead and millions injured and your response is:
hey look, everybody, I got a flat tyre.
that’s pretty sikck humour. I like it.
Norman has a very deep puddle in which he stands. His world view is very sepia cos he been dribbling into it for so long.
He dare not look into the abyss/mirror (Covid truth) cos he might fall away from supporting the lamestream narrative.
‘“Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you.”
Also, we can’t be sure that Norman isn’t vax damaged in subtle ways that would account for his inability to communicate sensibly about this subject.
In some ways, being in his eighties may be protective, since this means Norman’s immune system has less potential to go on an autoimmune rampage as a result of being over-stimulated by those naughty mRNA-induced spike proteins.
https://adversereactionreport.com/vaccine-injured/779-athlete-cardiac-arrests-serious-issues-500-dead-after-jab/
the ‘flat tyre’ joke came about because eddy was screaming warnings about not getting jabbed–i did and got a flat tyre on the way back from the clinic.
straightforward cause and effect
i have offered no comment either way on getting vaxxed or not—because i have no knowledge of the subject
my humour, (such as it is) over the past 2 years has been directed mainly at those trying to warn me that students of Dr Mengele are ‘coming after’ my g’ grandkids and ‘forcing’ them to be vaxxed, or metal objects sticking to skin because of the ‘iron’ in the vax itself— Bill Gates was doctoring vaccines so he could track us all through 5g masts–and originally (assured on OFW) that covid didnt exist—was a chinese hoax–was made in a chinese lab with Faucis help—–was a version of the flu—then it did exist but vaxxing didnt work—then ‘millions dead and maimed’–vaxxing causes infertility in women—and on and on. Decimating world population was a cracker. Total BS.
There’s much more. None of which is true. But all part of somebody’s belief system.
Now we have Bruce Willis with Aphasia—ha—he got vaxxed–stands to reason then. Much like my flat tyre.
So i ignore most of it. At no point have i said people should or should not get vaxxed
But of course different people take different parts of the above list as ‘fact’–and reject other parts.
whereas i reject all of it—and thus alienate everybody.
Disagree with me by all means.
But read through the above list, and decide if it makes any sense.
Norman
You once wrote, when prompted by me, that you agree with covid vaccine mandates. It’s impossible to be more pro-vaccine than that.
being pro vaccine myself, does not make me seek to influence or ridicule others who are not.
i reply to ridicule in kind, if i bother to reply at all. i try not to do more than that, not always easy to keep it measured. But i try. In many respects, response requires the same intellectual effort as picking up squeaky toys thrown out of a pram.
i also offered a pre published list of a few anti-vax beliefs, all of which have been offered, presumably with absolute sincerity on OFW and elsewhere.
you may believe all of that, or selectively some of it. Up to you. It doesn’t prompt me into a state of sexual innuendo laden hysteria.
My way is to examine sources–if the source is questionable in one respect–you can be certain it will be questionable in others.
i’ve said all along that there’s vax stuff i don’t know—i don’t plug gaps in my knowledge with BS—thought no doubt some would question that.
i question conventional media–but question more the media that can be created in seconds by someone interested only in clickbait and gaining his 15 minutes of online fame–or infamy.
you should too
norm drives his grandchildren to get the experimental injections that are killing and maiming millions
hahahaha
Therefore nor is a __________
Perhaps, Norman, your views on vax mandates have evolved over time?
norm loves Booster Shots
Complete COVID-19 Vaccine-Related Athlete Injury/Death List To-Date: 779 Cardiac Arrests, Serious Issues, 500 Dead
Published in Vaccine Injured – Last Updated March 19, 2022
https://adversereactionreport.com/vaccine-injured/779-athlete-cardiac-arrests-serious-issues-500-dead-after-jab/
https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/aphasia-can-be-caused-by-the-covid?s=r
Here’s what the numbers are just for the COVID vaccine alone:
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F17c6d093-b39d-4e0b-abcd-1da389b063eb_1392x1144.png
Pharmacovigilanve 101: if patient experiences listed adverse event (listed in the PI of the product) the event is conaidered related to the product.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/bruce-willis-stepping-away-from-career-due-to-aphasia-diagnosis-family-says/ar-AAVGaj2?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=ceca1746f2d340908777c36186800204
“Johns Hopkins said there are multiple causes for aphasia, including a stroke, head injury, brain tumor, infection or dementia. It is not clear which, if any, of those factors caused Willis to develop the disorder.”
very probably caused by vaccines.
but:
is it a clot related brain injury?
or is it a sign of prion disease?
IF it is a sign of prion disease, this might be UNSPEAKABLY bad for his short future.
it is HARD TO SAY.
I am somewhat at a LOSS FOR WORDS.
what question should Willis be ASKING? (though maybe not out loud.)
we should continue to TALK about this.
IF it is prion disease, then that is hugely significant for the billions of Jabbed.
we should be watching for updates on him.
what do you all SAY?
I hear you Dave.
your words come through loud and clear. 😉
I say…..I told you so…..if you were dumb enough to believe in this then you deserve everything you get.
The modern world is run by complete lies.
Based on the coding assigned to COVID vaccine problems reported to the VAERS system, aphasia is a very common symptom reported with respect to COVID vaccine injuries. That is what Steve Kirsch’s Substack article shows. I have a hard time understanding Norman’s concern. If doctors found it appropriate to report injuries as “aphasia,” who are we to dispute them?
A commenter at another site pointed out that listing “aphasia” (which is generally a product of stroke), or other various *symptoms* (rather than the actual diagnosis or underlying injury itself) allows them to reduce the absolute reporting numbers for (in this case) strokes.
!!
Ha! I am sure they could also have a stab (or jab) at defining-away vaxx deaths by listing the symptoms separately: total immobility, loss of speech; blindness; liver, brain, heart damage, memory loss, ………
And, voila! Completely accurate reports, but the deaths just massaged away!
There are so many creative possibilities in this new Age of Lies.
We need an upbeat TEDtalk on this…..
norm is provax (hahahahahaha who would admit such a thing!) – let’s see if he can do the talk…
He can start with nikoB’s joke about driving over used covid syringes and getting a flat har har har har …
norm – you can do it … you are The Man.. the ProvaxMan hahaha…
May as well stamp on your head – I’m a MOREON – I inject experimental shit (haha)
eddy
i have been known to make forecasts—some right, some wrong, some absolute crackers.
throughout 2021 i forecast that your comment rate would reach parity, 1 : 1 by Feb 2022
Gail’s March post, First day, first hour or so
12 comments
6 from eddy (saying nothing)
6 from everybody else
No13 comment, from me, pointing out the above
need i say more?
He’ll be joining Celine Dion in the Vegetable Garden
From her sickbed, Celine is currently signaling her virtue by tweeting her support for the people of Ukraine.
It begs the question, where has she been for the past eight years?
https://www.hellomagazine.com/celebrities/20220328136623/celine-dion-returns-social-media-devastating-statement-call-for-support-ukraine/
You took the words right out of my mouth. Need I say more.