Quotable – “The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.” – Dante Alighieri

Commentary & Analysis

[Warning: I am feeling a bit dark this week. So if you want to join me in depression, feel free to read. Otherwise, skip this one. Thanks. Jack]

I finally figured it all out. Our global policymakers are nothing more than Wizard of Oz aficionados (the movie as the book is way over their collective heads). They just love happy endings. Let’s just get all the little people to follow down the yellow brick road and it will all turn out just fine, our pols want to believe.

Of course our politicos’ fairy tale is validated each day by those they love the most–the big people leading us down this path–financial types (defined as anyone who benefits from the financial world, not the real world). It is what it is. Big people are big for a reason. And the big people want that path paved with yet another layer of green paper. Simple!

What is this talk of recession, say the big people? And they say it with their Super Pacs and $40,000 –$50,000 a plate dinners to help elect the top Republicans and Democrats (read totally vetted shills who pledge behind closed doors to keep the status quo the status quo; nothing more than different colored horses from the same stable it seems to me). After all, the financial economy is doing just fine; great in fact, is the refrain from Mr. Financial Big Whig.

But even Mr. Financial Big Whig has a few laments: 1) The price of houses in Greenwich or London; 2) His driver’s parking problems in Davos last year; and 3) The damn 5-minute wait in line at the lift in St. Maritz. What is this recession crap?

I asked JR yesterday (as we watched the local news of Mitt Romney in Palm Beach for a reported $50k a plate stop-over); who is more sickening, the shills panhandling for $40-50k a pop or the crony-istic dregs who actually pony up that much? Decisions, decisions….

To say it is a bifurcated world culturally and materially is to understate the obvious. It is bifurcating down the path of the financial economy versus the real economy, to a large degree. [And if you read Charles Murray’s new book, you get a very bad feeling in the pit of your stomach as to where this is leading.]I realize it is what it is and always has been. But watching it all play out so transparently with such hubris flowing from the top makes it that much more revolting. For example, a bit off point, but if are disgusted with US politics, you have to be stunned to watch the US State Department chastise other countries about the need to “improve their election system”? What a farce! Sorry. These dark thoughts creep in whenever I consider hedge fund managers and pols in the same sentence.]

Back to point, assuming I have one here. Joseph Goebbles would be proud of our central banking wizards. Goebbles, the Nazi propaganda chief, understood the big lie told again and again will sooner or later be believed as truth. All Pols follow this theory. But even Goebbles would be stunned to see how often the Big Lie is used by central banks as the truth stares everyone in the face; the face of those who know how to find US Banking Reserves as listed by the St. Louis Feds research department:

1. If Fed liquidity worked the US would be in the midst of the biggest post-recession boom in history. Instead, we are in the slowest post-recession recovery since Stalin-loving Roosevelt stacked the Supreme Court. Let’s let the reserves speak once again for themselves:

If real growth is taking hold, we should have seen a fall in all these reserves sitting on bank balance sheets.

2. Déjà vu all over again from the ECB. Gee, it did nothing for the US real economy, so why don’t we try it here in Europe, say the Wizards running the European Central Bank (ECB).

The argument to my rant is obvious: So what would you do Jack, let the banking system go bankrupt? Well, yes I would, thank you for asking. One by one and every stinking banker who led his firm down the prim-rose path of derivatives would be history. Super-regional managers would step up to the plate and take their turn. After all it is the regionals and local banks that really know what banking should be anyway…credit and relationships. It isn’t rocket science. [Just look at how massively the powers-that-be, pols and their handlers in the banking system, have attacked Paul Volcker’s very good ideas of what banking should be. Nothing has changed!]

There’s an evenin’ haze settlin’ over town Starlight by the edge of the creek The buyin’ power of the proletariat’s gone down Money’s gettin’ shallow and weak Well, the place I love best is a sweet memory It’s a new path that we trod They say low wages are a reality If we want to compete abroad

My cruel weapons have been put on the shelf Come sit down on my knee You are dearer to me than myself As you yourself can see

While I’m listening to the steel rails hum Got both eyes tight shut Just sitting here trying to keep the hunger from Creeping it’s way into my gut

Meet me at the bottom, don’t lag behind Bring me my boots and shoes You can hang back or fight your best on the frontline Sing a little bit of these workingman’s blues

Well, I’m sailin’ on back, ready for the long haul Tossed by the winds and the seas I’ll drag ’em all down to hell and I’ll stand ’em at the wall I’ll sell ’em to their enemies I’m tryin’ to feed my soul with thought Gonna sleep off the rest of the day Sometimes no one wants what we got Sometimes you can’t give it away

Now the place is ringed with countless foes Some of them may be deaf and dumb No man, no woman knows The hour that sorrow will come

In the dark I hear the night birds call I can feel a lover’s breath I sleep in the kitchen with my feet in the hall Sleep is like a temporary death

Bob Dylan, Workingman’s Blues

At some point, this game must end. The financial world CANNOT continue to widen its gap with the real world ad infinitum. Sooner or later, I think we will learn the path to hell, not Oz, is indeed paved with green paper.

Jack Cooks Black Swan www.blackswantrading.com Currency Currents Blog

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