The Third Annual Neoliberal Darwin Award…

 

The Third Annual Neoliberal Darwin Award… 

 

The “Glasgow climate pact” was adopted despite a last-minute intervention by India to water down language on “phasing out” coal to merely “phasing down”.

 

The pledges on emissions cuts made at the two-week long Cop26 summit in Glasgow fell well short of those required to limit temperatures to 1.5C, according to scientific advice. Instead, all countries have agreed to return to the negotiating table next year, at a conference in Egypt, and re-examine their national plans, with a view to increasing their ambition on cuts.

 

-      Cop26 ends in climate agreement despite India watering down coal resolution, Guardian

 

 

By Gregg Wall (11-13-21)

 

This year’s Neoliberal Darwin Award winners were easy enough to identify…  not only does this industry consistently lie about its products, contribute immensely to destroying the planet, receives billions and billions in government welfare annually, but the Oil & Gas industry plays a key role in demonstrating just how corrupt Western democracies have become.  So right up on the metaphorical podium, right beside the Oil Majors and OPEC, we would have to place highly corrupt politicians, who always find an excuse or a means to sabotage any moves to eliminate fossil fuels. 

 

Of course, I witnessed -- and breathed -- planetary destruction this summer here in Calgary, with climate fires burning up the Western United States and Canada.  At one-point British Columbia had no fewer that 300 fires burning, and entire towns were evaporated.  Farmers also took a hit, with Big Oil destroying crops and livestock, and the resulting higher food prices, due to scarcity, are showing up as workers are still dealing with an exceptionally nasty pandemic. 

 

The timing of all this matches up perfectly as COP26, finally, winds down.  And as many predicted, COP26 is a bust.  It seems that the endless finger pointing game, America’s failed political duopoly has turned into an art form, readily transfers to the global stage.  Nations that earn huge revenues from trading in oil & gas are reluctant to give up their gravy train, developing nations – dependent upon fossil fuels – do not want to make the sacrifice required for a green transition, and so-called developed nations don’t want to spend the money to save the planet.   Oil despots say they a perfectly willing to let the planet burn, as they move to extract every last barrel from the ground.  And so, the finger pointing begins, nothing is achieved, politicians can shrug – they tried, and the planet chokes and floods (burning under the weight of too much humanity and an utterly failed libertarian/neoliberal economic model). 

 

Almost everybody recognizes Big Oil & Gas as a malevolent force in the world.  America has fought endless Middle East wars, sacrificed thousands of troops… for what, so that Oil majors could lay claim to Iraqi oil fields?  So that we could continue to prop up the Royal House of Saud?  So that military industrial complex stocks could rise higher and make the day traders in Congress wealthier still?  But Big Oil & Gas – with their Wall St. buddies – took things to a new level this year, when fossil fuels supplies were deliberately cut by OPEC, the Texas Oil patch deliberately held back on production, and Wall St bid up oil commodities to make a killing and manufacture inflation.  Of course, the billionaire/corporately owned MSM did its part and promptly picked up the narrative that POTUS Biden’s progressive promises have created inflation, even though – surprise, surprise – very little of Biden’s promises have been enacted and passed into law.

 

So at a time that labor has been crushed for three to four decades, wages have stagnated, the wealthy have cleaned up from entirely rigged Western economies, governments, and stock markets… Western labor & essential workers must deal with a pandemic and soaring food & fuel prices (in large part manufactured by cartel, monopoly, monopsony, foreign supply chains, and highly corrupt Western government officials that profit from all this). 

 

Oh, the sweet irony of watching the UK’s PM Johnson chastise world leaders on the coming of pitch forks and torches, as humanity rises up, while the Tory party is mired - are you ready for it – in its very own ‘sleaze scandal.’  And speaking of corrupt politicians, Canada’s own, Mark Carney, former head of the BOC and BOE … and now with Brookfield Asset Management (bespoke purveyors of financial engineering and private equity chaos… not to mention fossil fuels and pipeline investments) … has been chairing a Net-Zero committee.  Per Bloomberg, seems that the Net-Zero committee is a complete disaster, w/ no scientists and no global government, formally, signing onto Mr. Carney’s project.  And yet, the fossil fuels industry loves it, Wall St and shadow banking loves Net-Zero, and politicians love the Net-Zero paradigm that merely enriches the 1% for trading in carbon credits.   That’s a whole lotta love for a failed, half-baked ‘markets will save us’ proposition.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have I left anything out?  This product, this year’s award winner has it all:  It’s killing the planet; destroys crops & livestock; manipulates the economy – by manufacturing inflation; is driving mass migrations of humanity; manipulates governments and politicians so as to thwart humanity and a progressive agenda; collects billions in corporate welfare & tax cuts (while seemingly, there’s no money for green initiatives); it continues to make Wall St. & politicians fabulously wealthy; while its known and social costs are passed onto the disenfranchised suckers who actually pay taxes (such as myself). 

 

It’s as if the devil himself developed a product and turned it loose on humanity, as a direct affront to Goddess, her creation, and so as to stack heaven & hell with fresh souls. 

 

This year’s award winner clearly demonstrates the nihilism that ensues, when too much economic power is transferred into the hands of a predatory few (as Big Oil & Gas shows its complete stranglehold over democracy and the aspiration of effective and sound government). 

 

In the last twenty-four months I’ve attempted to expand my horizons by reading up on Freud and Jung.  One of many theories Freud advanced was the theory of the pleasure principle and a death drive.  While Freud is widely read to this very day and many of his theories, or modifications of same, still hold sway… his death wish principle remains among his most controversial.   

 

In the heavens, Freud should rest easy… Big Oil & Gas and failed neoliberalism are just the latest manifestation of humanity’s outward obsession with death and planetary destruction.  Ironically, the higher up the food chain some members of society climb, the more megalomaniacal & psychotic they become… the more intransigent, tyrannical, and obsessed with control & power they become, all at the expense of humanity, productive change, and the planet.

 

No wonder this same criminal class of billionaires is constantly looking to Mars and space stations to escape the hell they’ve created here on Earth. 

 

Big Oil & Gas… its management, ownership, and owned politicians … are not only this year’s Neoliberal Darwin Award recipients, but they are the death drive defined.  As for a solution, it’s obvious by now that we need to take the path to a green future out of politicians’ hands, and demand that the process be placed on autopilot, with: concrete goals and objectives, the ramping up of renewable energy, third party audits, and draconian penalties for failure achieve goals, annually. 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2021

 

 

American Democracy: Gateway Government to Oligarchy

American Democracy: Gateway Government to Oligarchy

 

When it came to financial markets in 2020, the most frequently asked question was why. Why, in the midst of a global pandemic that has killed some 1.7 million people worldwide and plunged the economy into the worst crisis since the Great Depression, did equity markets stage a historic rebound to reach new highs and become completely disconnected from reality?

 

The answer is much simpler and comes down to one number: $14 trillion. That’s the amount by which the aggregate money supply has increased this year in the U.S., China, euro zone, Japan and eight other developed economies. To put the surge in perspective, the jump to $94.8 trillion exceeds all other years in data going back to 2003 and blows away the previous record increase of $8.38 trillion in 2017, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

 

It’s also important to understand the mechanics. The place to start is with the central banks, which were instrumental in printing the money they needed to inject directly into the financial markets by purchasing bonds and other assets on a scale never seen before. As of Nov. 30, the collective balance sheet assets of the Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of Japan and the Bank of England stood at 54.3% of their countries’ total gross domestic product, up from about 36% at the end of 2019 and about 10% in 2008, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

 

-      Only One Number Mattered to Global Markets in 2020, Bloomberg

 

By Gregg Wall (10-30-2021)

 

Thank Goddess for Vivaldi and wine.  Thank Goddess for cloudless days, knockout blue skies, and the Canadian Rockies in the distance.  These types of days can be quite deceptive.  They make you feel - for a few moments - that all is right in the world.  There is hope… that the powerful can’t possibly mean to destroy the humanity living in this Eden in the name of greed.  That good governance and reform are within reach. 

 

Then one remembers that it was on a very similar day, a perfect day … on a beach on the South Shore of Massachussets, w/ my perfect son… that I learned of the planes that had ripped into the World Trade Center (two flew out of Boston Logan).  And you remember, there is fanatically obsessed, incomprehensible, evil in this world; and so, these beautiful days are a mirage, a veil, perhaps, to a better world. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Writing of unspeakable evil, we pivot naturally to America’s national debt… ever growing, ever skyrocketing, the thirty trillion-dollar monster in the corner of the room.  Debt accumulated bailing out the wealthy & Wall St., not once but twice (2008 and 2020), financing tax cuts for the obscenely wealthy & corporate welfare, and debt used to fund endless credit card wars.  

 

National debt that is always used as an excuse, by America’s wealthy & powerful, not to fund basic needs and social programs taken for granted by nearly every other Western democracy.  And so it is, as POTUS Biden retreats from his agenda and his promises to the American people.  In a complete twist of fate, this same debt is never given a moments thought when the GOP are in power, when billionaires and multinational demand more corporate welfare and tax cuts. It’s never given thought, when the annual omnibus spending measure is crammed through congress, w/out hesitation (preserving a failed status quo and massive welfare for billionaires & multinationals). 

 

The crushing debt is also used by the Federal Reserve to hold in place a failed low interest rate regime, that ensures the stock market flies ever higher, so that we see stocks like Tesla with a 364 P/E ratio (as of the close on Friday).  In the ultimate twist, the preponderance of the wealth is in the hands of a predatory few billionaires.  And so naturally, when these men refuse to pay taxes on that wealth… the debt spirals ever higher, the money supply grows larger, and it finds its way into markets and elite assets that escape the surly bonds of Earth. 

 

Odd, the debt – and resulting money supply - fuels a rising stock market, increasing the wealth of a handful of individuals (mostly white men) by some seventy percent, during a time of pandemic crisis, w/out these same men lifting a finger.  It’s all courtesty of the U.S. government and its policies, essentially adding up to a billionaire welfare state. 

 

An American child born into this world is indentured upon exit from the womb to the tune of $80,000.   All because a handful of men refuse to pay taxes on the excessive sums they received from an entirely captured U.S. government, from egregious tax policies, from a complete failure of economic stewardship by the U.S. government (which has allowed monopoly and globalization to become the standard), and via Federal Reserve policies that have made these persons incomprehensibly wealthy. 

 

America’s failed system of governance has so many structural impediments in favor of the wealthy, it’s little more than a gateway government to kleptocracy and oligarchy.

 

When the current gerontocracy exits power, it will be up to the young to write off this great evil – the national debt – which has been used w/out question to enrich a predatory few and to the complete detriment of the American people & sound government. 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2021

Globalization takes a big hit…

Globalization takes a big hit… 

 

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde warned that the globalized nature of the euro area’s economy makes it highly vulnerable to systemic shocks from supply chain disruptions. 

 

“There are signs that the global economy could increasingly be a source of shocks for Europe rather than a stabilizer against volatility,”  Lagarde said. 

 

-       Just-in-Time Economy Becoming a Problem for Europe, Lagarde Says – Bloomberg

-        

By Gregg Wall (10-16-2021)

 

This was the week when many of neoliberalism’s problems, and its twin's, globalization, came home to roost. 

 

Neoliberalism is little more than laissez-faire, that is to say libertarianism in the extreme… where untrammeled markets rule, banks use free central bank money – not to lend – but create monopolies & cartels, and where billionaires are free to buy and purchase Western governments.  As for globalization, it’s the apex of neoliberalism applied to the global economy… where billionaires and monopolists use the global stage to conduct labor, regulatory, and tax arbitrage (essentially pitting nation state against nation state, in a race to the bottom).   Outsourcing, consolidations, crushing labor, the soulless commodification of all human endeavor, foreign supply chains, and just-in-time delivery are some of globalization’s hallmarks. 

 

While animal spirits and markets may have their place in individual sectors of the economy (especially in well-regulated businesses, with plenty of competition), as JMH has written on more than one occasion, the greed that defines neoliberalism and globalization is no way to run a democracy or a national economy. 

 

That became abundantly clear, again, this week, as supply-side inflation skyrocketed, and global supply chains continue to fall apart and are threatening economic recovery.   As Madame Legarde pointed out, I paraphrase, so much of human endeavor is now dependent upon monopolies and just-in-time delivery that if one or more points along the supply chain collapses, the entire system or economy has a very big problem.  Further aggravating inflation, tearing into consumer pockets, labor’s wages, and pushing the economy into recession? 

 

And the ECB’s head banker isn’t the only person who has noted the problem… President Biden also sounded off loudly this week on supply chains, bottlenecks to economic recovery, shortages, and inflation that, well, directly threatens his second term.  It appears that POTUS Biden and establishment Dems were counting on massive vaccine uptake and a reinvigorated U.S. economy to get them off the hook from fulfilling the president’s progressive campaign promises.  That’s speculation on my part (although it would explain endless delays in passing Biden's two-track infrastructure bills), but what isn’t in doubt is that globalization and neoliberalism – as means to rule an economy and government – are, again, an unmitigated disaster.  

Now, with the US recovery under threat, pictures of empty store shelves … just-in-time for the holidays…  and the economy struggling to create well-paying jobs, it’s all looking like a photo-op, and a massive Christmas gift, for the GOP. 

Here’s POTUS Biden:

 

Never again should our country and our economy be unable to make critical products we need because we don’t have access to materials to make that product.

Never again should we have to rely too heavily on one company or one country or one person in the world, particularly when countries don’t share our values when it comes to labor and environmental standards.

I’ve said before: We’re in comp- — we’re in the competition for the 21st century.  We are America.  We still have the most productive workers and the most innovative minds in the world.  But the rest of the world is closing in, and we risk losing our edge if we don’t step up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, Mr. Biden and his Senate colleagues would certainly know… many of the senate gerontocracy were around for much of the last forty years: letting Wall St blow up, not once but twice; allowed the US economy to metastasize into cartels and monopolies; authorized the export of the US economy and middle class offshore; and kowtowed to billionaires and corporate power with lickspittle adulation and blind devotion.  Ah, neoliberalism and globalization at its zenith. 

 

And after crushing U.S. labor all these many years, American workers are having a moment.  Walking off jobs, going on strike, and demanding better working conditions, benefits, and pay.  Long scorned and looked down upon with condescension -- by boardrooms, congress, and C-suites -- it turns out that the vast majority of American workers truly are essential.  But not so much billionaires, who now busy themselves with ego gratification and space races with Captain Kirk.  Thanks to the FED’s easy money policies – minting the exceptionally wealthy out of thin air, along with trillions in dollars – billionaires are a dime a dozen and entirely, nonessential.  Many no longer create anything, certainly not jobs or opportunity; but instead ride a speculative wave as the FED prints money, because the very same rich refuse to pay taxes (despite holding obscene amounts of wealth).  

 

My guess… the fun is just getting started.  Greed, globalization, neoliberalism – and the resulting corruption of the US government – will mean continued economic shocks.  Per the usual, the disenfranchised and the poor - nearly fifty percent of society - will pay the price.  Sadly, the Dems continue to burn up the legislative clock and do absolutely nothing to address fundamental structural defects, both economic & political…  let alone address and meet Biden’s commitments & obligations to the American people. 

 

All too common, America’s politicians make a great show of addressing the symptoms of the problem -- contrived, foreseeable, & manipulated shortages in supply -- instead of the disease itself: greed, globalization, & neoliberalism. 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2021