Inflation: Political And Economic

This will be a sort of news roundup, touching a variety of bases, but the intersection of politics and economics will hopefully bind it all together. Tom Luongo has been predicting an eventful September, and the month is already shaping up that way.

First, I’ve been spending some time listening to The Duran today. The discussions touched on several topics that arose here yesterday. There is talk, apparently, that Putin will be seeking to revise the Special Military Operation (SMO). The goals as initially stated were relatively limited—assist the Donbass republics, demilitarize and denazify Ukraine—while being open to a negotiated solution. The relentless escalation of the war by the US and NATO has left that policy in tatters, and the Russian takedowns of much of the energy grid in Ukraine over the past two days—at least temporarily—is a strong indication that Putin knows he’ll have to step up the SMO in response to public pressure. That actually is a positive for the ever cautious and methodical Putin, who always seeks to have public opinion at his side, rather than being too far out in front. The speculation is that Russia will declare that the SMO will now become an “anti-terror” operation. We’ll just have to wait and see, but the implication of that is that if it comes to pass then the Ukrainian leadership will become targets, along with much else. It will further signal a much more direct involvement of the Russian armed forces. Playing into this possibility is the Ukrainian shelling of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, which offers strong support for a Russian contention that the Ukraine is now a terrorist regime.

There was also a fair amount of discussion of the economic situation in Europe. Whatever anyone may think about the military situation in Ukraine, there is no doubt that the Europe is a major loser—indeed, it’s clear that Europe is heading into winter facing an energy crisis that they have no plan for dealing with. The leaders have made clear that they know they will face civil unrest, but that they don’t care. They will double down on support for Ukraine and will use their highly capable riot police to crush domestic opposition. Germany’s FM Baerbock made that much clear in the last two days during her trip to Kiev, where she as much as stated that she stands with the US puppet regime in Ukraine, and not with the German people.

The shocked reaction in the US to today’s red hot inflation report suggests that reality may be starting to bite here, as well. Before citing those reports, however, consider these items:

'Largest Private-Sector Nurse Strike In US History' Unfolds Across Minnesota

On Monday, 15,000 private sector nurses from 16 hospitals in Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and the surrounding communities walked off the job as they sought increased pay and improved staffing conditions in a healthcare system that is severely under pressure.

Pay for nurses has fallen well behind inflation, and guess what? The nurses aren’t alone.

White House Readies 'Emergency Decree' As Nationwide Rail Strike Looms

Update (1144ET): President Biden and senior administration officials are working with others in the transportation industry, including truckers, shippers, and air freight, for "contingency plans" if a rail shutdown materializes at the end of the week, a White House official told Bloomberg.

The administration is trying to understand what supply chains could be disrupted the most -- and how to utilize other forms of transportation to ensure commodities and consumer goods continue to flow across the country.

More than 100,000 railroad workers could walk off the job on Friday if freight-rail companies and unions don't reach labor agreements.

We noted that 29% of all US freight moves on the rails. Half the cargo is bulk commodities, such as energy, food, chemicals, metals, and wood productions -- the other half is shipping containers of consumer goods.

Political as well as economic ramifications? You betcha! DoTSec Butthead will be handling this one, right? How confident does that make you feel, given the way the Zhou regime has dealt with supply chain problems in the past? One way or the other, transport costs will go up—probably sharply.

This story could play into all these labor/inflation problems:

Half Of U.S. Workers Are "Quiet Quitters"

New research estimates that about half of U.S. workers could be considered "quiet quitters" - the new buzzword that's being used for people who fulfill their job descriptions, but are psychologically detached from their work.

Productivity is already in the dumper, relatively speaking. What will it take to make it better—and how long will that take? Things won’t turn around quickly.

Will quiet quitters, striking nurses, transport workers, and many more be mollified or enraged with this next:

Biden Scrambles For Damage Control After Disastrous Inflation Report

After bragging just four weeks ago that the economy had "zero percent inflation" in the month of July (looking at cherry picked month-over-month figures which completely ignored the highest food price inflation since 1979), President Biden issued yet another insultingly stupid statement in response to Tuesday's extremely hot CPI print which sent markets into turmoil and rate hike expectations shooting higher.

And so just minutes after markets began puking in response to today's CPI, Biden claimed that "Today’s data show more progress in bringing global inflation down in the US economy," adding "Overall, prices have been essentially flat in our country these last two months."

We already know how the Fed will react, and we know what that will mean for the economy—jobs, inflation, hardships of all sorts, especially relating to indebtedness:

Fed Mouthpiece Speaks: "At LEAST 75bps Next Week" Sends Odds Of 100bps Rate Hike to 47%

Three stories provide details on the inflation report:

US Consumer Prices Blow Away Expectations, Rise For 27th Straight Month

'Hot' CPI Sparks Market Turmoil - 100bps Rate-Hike Odds Spike

"There Is No Good News Across This Report" - A Shocked Wall Street Reacts To Today's Scorching CPI Print

That’s the backdrop for the DC Establishment’s War On Trump. Well, it is bipartisan, although it’s heavily identified with Dems, along with economic woes. How will an inflation oppressed citizenry feel about Dem political shenanigans intended to keep the people whom most people blame for our problems? I’m guessing this will go down poorly—and with judges, too. They shop, more or less like the rest of us, and they read the news. The real question is, Will GOPers ever figure out that these are real issues?

Tucker Carlson warns that Biden is actively criminalizing political opposition

I haven’t pasted in a Tucker transcript recently, so this one will do. I saw this last night and had to read it twice. Dems are really trying to suppress the First Amendment. I don’t think I ever expected we’d get here in my lifetime:

"This Is A Full-Blown Political Purge": Tucker Carlson Obtains DOJ Subpoenas Targeting Trump Allies

…

Partial transcript via Fox News:

This show has obtained a subpoena from Merrick Garland's DOJ issued in the past week and what it demands is both unlawful and without precedent in American history. The subpoena claims to be investigating, "any claim that the vice president and/or president of the Senate had the authority to reject or choose not to count presidential electors."

Now keep in mind that any claim you make as an American citizen about electors, any claim you make about American politics, period, is protected explicitly under the First Amendment. That's our core freedom. It's why we live here. It's why we're proud to be Americans. It's why so many American servicemen died protecting our country. Those are the freedoms that they fought to preserve. That's why nobody prosecuted leading Democrats in 2016 when they sought to reject electors for Donald Trump. Right. It's why none of those people, including Kamala Harris, is now in jail.

But right now, according to the subpoena that we have obtained, Merrick Garland's DOJ is demanding all communication from the following people on this topic and let's be clear before we read their names, that it is not clear what the investigation is actually about and that's the most terrifying part.

What is this? On what grounds are you demanding my private communications with people? They never say but included in this precedent-breaking sweep of political opponents of the Biden White House would be former White House adviser Bernie Kerik, who was the former police commissioner of New York City; Boris Epshteyn, who is the current attorney for Donald Trump (At no time in American history has it been okay to grab the personal communications of someone's lawyer because those are privileged. Not anymore.) Matt Morgan; Justin Clark; Kenneth Chesebro and Mike Roman; RNC official Joshua Findlay; Trump Attorneys John Eastman, Jenna Ellis, Joe DiGenova, James Troupis, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Victoria Toensing, Cleta Mitchell, and Bruce Marks. We could go on and on and on and on.

The DOJ is now going after former White House official Stephen Miller, a frequent guest on this show, with a subpoena. Why? Well, it could be because Stephen Miller went on this network and said, "If we win these cases in the courts, then we can direct the alternate state of electors are certified."

In other words, he didn't call for the insurrection, much less violence or a coup. He called for alternate electors to be seated if the court ordered them to be seated. In other words, he was following the constitutionally prescribed process post-election. He's doing what is supposed to do. He was following the rules, but under Joe Biden, that apparently is now a crime. By the way, every one of these people has to hire lawyers to defend him or herself and a lot of them at this point, after two years of harassment by Joe Biden, can't afford it.

In addition, we should say, we've obtained the subpoena, this subpoena goes on to demand the communications from dozens of other Republicans and people who have spoken to them, including State Representative Jake Hoffman in Arizona, Republican National Committee member Kathleen Berden in Michigan, former U.S. Representative Lou Barletta in the state of Pennsylvania and Republican State Party Secretary James DeGraffenreid in Nevada, among dozens and dozens of others.

So, what is this about? It can't possibly be about January 6, the fake insurrection, the only insurrection in history with no guns, the insurrection in which the only person shot to death was a Trump supporter. No, the point of this is to suppress political dissent, to hobble an entire political party and to keep any of these people from ever participating in American politics again and by the way, the cost to each one of these individuals or to any person at whose house the FBI shows up is enormous. Ask anybody you saw the FBI showed up with guns at their home what that's like. By accusing these people of insurrection for asking questions about electors by comparing them to Confederate soldiers, Merrick Garland's DOJ plans to disenfranchise them if not jail them. Really?

So, prohibit people from participating in American politics in the name of democracy? Too ironic to be real? Oh, it's real. It just happened in New Mexico. A state judge in New Mexico just removed an elected county commissioner from office, overturning the will of the voters. Why? Because he had dared to exercise his constitutional rights by participating in the election justice protest on January 6. So, this is a full-blown political purge. That's not a talking point. It is not in any sense a conspiracy theory. It's completely real and it began shortly after January 6 when Republicans, as usual, just as they were after the death of George Floyd, were so blown back, so intimidated by the aggression of the rhetoric from the other side that they let it happen.

And because they let it happen, as with the BLM riots, its effects are accelerating now. So, if you're accused of supporting Joe Biden's political opponents, you could be visited by armed agents from Joe Biden's FBI.

And here’s the icing on the cake:

FDA Refuses To Provide Key COVID-19 Vaccine Safety Analyses

Authored by Zachary Steiber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

U.S. drug regulators are refusing to provide key analyses of a COVID-19 vaccine safety database, claiming that the factual findings cannot be separated by internal discussions protected by law.

We’re not quite halfway through what’s shaping up to be an eventful September. Plenty more to come.