time for the friday edition of kunstler who delivers clear insight as usual, and in this case, about all of your favorites;

The loyal opposition is the party out-of-power in a polity that stands divided into two factions — assuming the polity can still function as such, which, apparently, it no longer can. Historically in the USA, this used to allow for the tempered regulation of changing conditions during two hundred years of a rapidly evolving techno-industrial economy that pumps out more goodies year after year while the population grows and grows.
Much of America, political leaders especially, assume that this arc of growing goodies and more people will just keep trending up forever. They are just plain mistaken about that. Rather, the whole industrialized, wired-up world is rolling over into the greatest contraction ever witnessed. The only thing that’s postponed the recognition of this reality is the profligate borrowing of money, or shall we say “money” — data entries that pretend to represent secure wealth. This amounts to borrowing from the future to pay for how you live today. Of course, the act of borrowing is based on the supposition that there will enough future productive activity to allow you to pay back your borrowings with interest. This is obviously not the case now, in the face of epochal contraction, especially of affordable energy to keep things running hot.
Thus, the US has decided to get through the approaching winter by setting its house on fire. The two political parties alternately in charge of things are driving around the burning house, stopping at intervals to run Chinese Fire Drills. We call these “elections.” Both parties pretend that the burning house is not a problem. Mr. Trump, aka the Golden Golem of Greatness, has taken “ownership” of the rising temperature in the burning house. “Hey, at least you’re not freezing now.” He and his party have been piling all the furniture inside the house on the fire, to keep the heat up, rather heedless that flames are starting to shoot out of the attic.


http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/feeling-the-heat-yet/

the juxtaposition of captain queg and netanyahoo is quite well done. the following ten minute video presents an issue long forgotten no matter how much its brought up, about the israeli attack on the uss liberty, and then shows reality in israeli occupied palestine. it ends with some 'memes' you may wish to ponder should you have a curious streak;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K9n8iZy4TE

sent by a friend this video of just under ten minutes presents some ideas you may wish to consider, and i'll leave it at that for your thoughts;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRtEgdgj_XQ&feature=youtu.be

caitlin seems to find curious twists to things and here she explores the edges around the now famous disappearance/murder of the month;

Be Skeptical Whenever The Political/Media Class Converges On A Single Narrative

 

The Trump administration has ended its weeks-long silence on the disappearance of the Saudi Arabian Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Following a briefing from Secretary of State Pompeo who has just returned from a visit to Riyadh and Ankara, the president has said that contrary to some hopeful speculation that had emerged early on after his disappearance, Khashoggi does indeed appear to have been killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. If it is determined that the Saudis were responsible, Trump warned that there will be “very severe” consequences. Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin has announced that he will not be attending the Future Investment Initiative summit in Riyadh next week.
I’ve been following this story with some interest, but I haven’t been writing about it until now. This is one of those rare stories that has drawn the focus of both mainstream and alternative media, the latter because it’s seen as an opportunity to criticize the west’s extremely immoral involvement in the depraved activities of a murderous theocracy, and because it’s an opportunity to attack the hypocrisy of the establishment in decrying the murder of a single man while ignoring Saudi Arabia’s far more unconscionable behavior like its war crimes in Yemen and facilitation of bloodshed in Syria. Killing one man is very, very far from the top of the list of the most horrific things Saudi Arabia has done; criticizing them for that is like criticizing Henry Kissinger for not tipping well at restaurants.

https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2018/10/19/be-skeptical-whenever-the-politicalmedia-class-converges-on-a-single-narrative/

the title was ''every time a new trump tweet comes out". i'm sure some of you know i have no use for any president since jfk and find very few politicians of any stripe worthy of their station, but this picture sums up its title very clearly and well, to my thinking, so here it is and have fun;

if this article was just about the murdered saudi journalist i wouldn't bother posting it however it has some interesting side roads that make up the main part of the writers journey so should you choose you can find some curious items herein;

‘And I will set the Egyptians against the Egyptians: and they shall fight every one against his brother and every one against his neighbor; city against city and kingdom against kingdom. And the spirit of Egypt shall fall in the midst thereof; and I will destroy the counsel thereof.’  –– Isaiah 19:2-3

The story of the Jamal Khashoggi murder closing in on Saudi Crown Prince’s inner circle looks like a psy-op. It’s designed to pressure Saudi Arabia into delaying its petro-dollar break and to cooperate on pumping extra oil when the Nov. 4 sanctions begin on Iran. The timing couldn’t be worse for the U.S., as China and Russia have wrapped up their plans to ditch the dollar in bilateral trade. There is little doubt China has told the Saudis that it will not be buying their oil in U.S. dollars.
According to World Bank data, Saudi Arabia has one of the highest rates of spending on its military in the world, at 10.3% of GDP in 2017. Regardless, Trump has called on that country to increase military spending and pay their bills.
For Saudi Arabia’s part, it told the prior Obama administration and members of Congress that it will sell off the $750 billion worth of American bond assets it holds, if Congress passed a bill that would allow the Saudi government to be held responsible in American courts for any role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Congress passed the bill, Obama vetoed it, and then Congress voted to override his veto. This is notable because it suggests that the blackmailing of the Saudis’ for their role as patsies is breaking down.

https://www.winterwatch.net/2018/10/muhammad-bin-salman-extreme-bad-actor-now-in-charge-of-saudi-arabia/

 this author will show how hurricane trump is accelerating the demise of the empire using the dollar is the tool;

As it’s been pointed out by a multitude of experts from both the US and other regions of the world, a barrage of attacks with the goal of eroding Washington’s hegemony at the energy trading market will be one of the main battlefields where the future of America’s economic dominance will be decided.

Against this backdrop it’s only logical that countries are seeking ways to turn their backs the dollar or in the very least diminish their dependence on the ever-looming US currency, notes the Neu Zürcher Zeitung. It argues that this trend was triggered by the outright protectionist practices by the Trump administration that were introduced at a time when Washington would start trade wars left and right.

According to the data presented by the CNBC, the United States is currently waging economic warfare against one tenth of the world’s countries with cumulative population of nearly 2 billion people and combined gross domestic product (GDP) of more than 15 trillion dollars.

Additionally, the media source would point out that in recent months it seems that America’s unwavering commitment to fight all of the world’s scourges has brought all those governments and the wealthy individuals who support them to a critical mass, joining forces to create a parallel financial system which would be out of America’s reach. Should they succeed, the impact on America’s global posture would be devastating.

It would only be logical if American policymakers were mindful of the fact that at least 25% of the world’s population are now committed to putting an end to the global dominance of the US dollar.

As the infamous green bills are gradually losing their status of the world’s reserve currency, regular Americans will inevitably feel additional financial strain being put on their households. To make the matters worse, the global depolarization effort is being led by Russia and China that have emerged as full-fledged international players in recent decades, and they seem to have little tolerance for being pushed around. Further still, even the fact that Euro was established as a currency by Brussels can be regarded as a part of the same effort. For sure, de-dollarization is a slow process, but at this point it seems to be irreversible as there’s no chance that an emerging multi-polar world is going put up with the US dollar primacy.

However, there’s no arguing that this process, no matter how natural it is, was accelerated considerably by the sitting American president. By pursuing policies loosely described as “America first”, Donald Trump has got the US drawn in a number of trade wars, along with re-introducing protectionist practices to the US foreign policy. However, the more the Trump administration tries to negotiate favorable terms for American elites under the gun, the more countries are getting alienated by Washington.
https://journal-neo.org/2018/10/19/washington-s-protectionism-is-only-leading-to-the-us-dollar-demise/

https://journal-neo.org/2018/10/19/washington-s-protectionism-is-only-leading-to-the-us-dollar-demise/