Without much fanfare and no coverage in Western media, one of the most important agreements of the 20th century was allowed to expire last week. That agreement is the deal made between the United States and Saudi Arabia in 1974 that established what has been known ever since as the petro-dollar. Saudi Arabia would price its oil exports exclusively in U.S. dollars and invest its surplus oil revenues in U.S. Treasury bonds while the U.S. provided military protection to the kingdom.
The importance of this deal cannot be overstated. The demand for dollars has kept the currency strong and thus kept imports cheap. It also allowed the Federal Reserve to “export excess dollars” to developing countries with a need for dollars. The institutional demand for treasuries as a result of this agreement allowed for the low interest rate environment we have seen for decades. This has made it possible for the United States to build up massive debts both publicly and privately.
Another way to think about this deal is by pricing energy in dollars, the dollar became the default global currency because the dollar was a proxy for energy units. This made the Saudis the head of the mint and the Federal Reserve the global bank. The Saudis could control the flow of energy units around the world, a very profitable position, and the United States could skim from every transaction denominated in dollars, which was every transaction across national borders.
The reason for the lack of coverage of this historic event is two-fold. One is the mass media is now populated by zombies with no agency of their own, so until the regime hands them copy, they have nothing to say. The other is the financial world has no idea where this is going. Five years ago, no one imagined this deal would be allowed to expire, but years of mismanagement by the Biden administration has made a hash of things all over the world.
There is speculation that the Saudis are simply bargaining hard knowing that the Biden admin is desperate. Anthony Blinken is supposedly prepared to offer the Saudis a generous nuclear package, in addition to more military support, in order to continue the relationship, but of course it comes with a catch. The Saudis will have to normalize relations with Israel, something they are loath to do. There is no upside to them making a deal with a regime that routinely slaughters Arabs.
Now, the expiry of this deal does not mean much at the present. Half a century of pricing everything important in dollars will not be unraveled quickly. Tens of trillions in assets are priced in dollars, so the dollar remains the default currency, but it does open the door to alternatives. The Saudis will now accept other currencies for their energy products, which means OPEC will follow their lead. China can now buy oil in yuan, rather than swap yuan for dollars.
In the short-term this will not change much of anything, but over time it will result in a decrease in the demand for dollars. For example, if you trade with China for manufactured goods, it makes sense to trade in the yuan for energy products as it simplifies trade with China. The same is true for the Russian ruble, the Indian rupee, and the Brazilian real. Of course, it also means bypassing the American controlled banking system for settling these transactions.
The next shoe to drop in this process is a settlement system that operates outside the control of Washington. Project mBridge is a scheme for creating a digital currency to facilitate cross border transactions. The Saudis have recently joined this project, which is mainly supported by China. The Russians have recently shown interest in the project, despite years of resistance. The trade war launched by Washington has changed opinion in Moscow about dealing with the West.
That is another aspect to this. The Russian economy not only absorbed the sanctions blow, but it has also grown faster than the Western economies. Russia now has the fourth largest economy in the world. Sanctions forced the Russians to do thigs like replace the retail credit card system with their own system. They cleaned up their banking system to root out fraud and corruption. It was an inadvertent test case for creating financial systems outside of Western control.
Again, none of this signal the collapse of the dollar. The people screaming such things have no idea how the world actually works. What we are seeing is the slow decline of the American financial order. The countries that make things, fix things, dig things from the ground and invent things are starting to see that they do not need the countries that merely count things. This is especially true when the people doing the counting have a history of stealing from their customers.
What comes next is the slow decline in the demand for dollars and euros, which will make inflation a feature of Western economies. It will also mean the slow rise in borrowing rates in the West. If the rest of the world needs fewer dollars and euros it means they need fewer bonds denominated in dollars and euros. That leaves Western governments with the choice of cutting spending or printing money, which is the same thing but only less honest.
None of this was inevitable. After the Cold War, the United States could have remained the world’s banker and honest broker. Instead, the economic elites of America allowed the world’s most dishonest people to gain control of foreign policy. They used that power to launch a decades long crusade against their ancient enemies and in the process, they squandered the good name of the American people and destroyed global trust in the United States. Decline is now what must follow.
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This cautionary tale ignores the rot that is at the heart of the problem. The nominal President of the United States of America shits his pants in public. That is no trivial thing. And that image alone fundamentally undermines confidence in US strength and vitality going forward. Our election system is broken and rigged. All our major institutions are now being run by corrupt idiots whose sole talent is parasitism. Our military is a woke charade. No one likes a bully, which is what our government has become. Methinks our decline will be more like a bank run.
There have to be several countries planning a way to diminish the standing the United States without wrecking their own economies in the process. It is somewhat surprising to me that Taiwan hasn’t been trying to cut a deal with the Chi Coms. Maybe there is too much bad blood there, but they have to be terrified at the prospect of our insane government plunging them into a war. It would be incredibly destructive to Taiwan and almost certain they would lose.
I suspect Taiwan fears a CCP control of their industry and a lessoning of a generally free capitalistic system of profit under their current government. Certainly, they are now diverting their major industry, semi-conductors, out of their island.
“Certainly, they are now diverting their major industry, semi-conductors, out of their island.”
If you mean the $13bn fabrication plant the TSMC has built in Arizona, that’s because of arm-twisting by the Biden administration. It remains an open question to me whether this plant will be profitable.
They signed up for 3 plants, but stopped at one—so far. Instead switching that 2nd plant to *Japan*. That doesn’t sound like US arm twisting. Biden admin simply offered incentives to build, but failed to correct the most off-putting aspects of building new plants in the USA: environmental regulations, and an ignorant and lazy work force. You don’t run a chip fabrication plant with burger flippers. Son is in manufacturing, high up, in the Phx metro area. That’s basically his entire conversation when the topic comes up—work force and regulation. You can’t even fire the incompetent and move on. Moving… Read more »
Yeah, I agree. I heard TSMC sent some US “engineers” to Taiwan for training with — *ahem* — rather mixed results.
Son has been to Taiwan several times. Always leaves impressed. Why not? You can grab a rice farmer out of the field over there and have more success putting him on a production line than you can hiring most college grad’s here.
I guess the “incentives” offered by the corrupt US government overrode their necessary due diligence – hasn’t hurt the stock price though…
I’m guessing they were also *diverse* results.
I’ve been there, too. It’s a beautiful clean country with healthy, well-educated people. In the cafeteria of the semiconductor fab, I felt like a fat slob even though I’m in reasonable shape for an American. Need I say there’s a surfeit of hot women?
The USA will never be a major chip manufacturer ever again (because I believe it was one in the 1970s and 1980s before it went offshore like so much else). We have a workforce that not only struggles to get your burger and fries order correct, but is also protected by the state from any reprocussions for being incompetent and lazy. How is something like a modern chip ever going to be made? I read an op-ed about all the diversity stuff in the chip act too – the sad thing is, the peope in charge actually believe in all… Read more »
Yep. Actually, I read that the Chinese really just need to get their hands on the current generation of high tech chip manufacturing machinery that Taiwan has. The Taiwan factories and personnel would simply be a bonus.
Yes, China lacks the advanced process nodes of Taiwan, but they are catching up reallllllllly fast. So soon China will be able to design the chips, something Taiwan can’t do, and make them, something the US can’t do. The Brandon admin thought they were crippling China in 2022 when they started restricting what China can buy, but they forgot they are not dealing with a vassal state that depends on the US for everything, or a third world country full of low IQ people that can’t make cement without it getting shipped from somewhere. Of course, Brandon’s response to this… Read more »
The only chips our vibrants could handle making–MAYBE–are those sliced from a certain tuber much beloved in Ireland.
I’d say the US isn’t going to be a major manufacturer of anything of import for the foreseeable future. The dye was cast 50 odd years ago with all the offshoring, now being guaranteed by the on shoring of millions low iq third world turds. The undisputed hegemon run is over for good.
The US is the World’s Leading Manufacturer of blue check marks available round the globe in Twitter/X.
The blue haired tatted up dykes with a face full of fishing tackle who sell them are the shock troops of American Empire, always striving diligently to produce quality output.
thks Sev for the last line,
They also believe that sex is a choice, intelligence is less important than skin color, and a host of other delusions.
That seems to be a problem here across the board. Even well intentioned efforts from the top to improve things turn into a looting expedition once they get down to the level of the people who (are supposedly) implementing them. *Everything* just turns into another opportunity to reward well connected corporations and billionaires. If the project never gets done who cares? The grift was the real point. This may even be why the US picked such worthless countries as “arch-enemies”. It means huge new outlays for exotic weapons systems to fight basically primitive people. Building a giant space laser to… Read more »
Or ever open.
Also, are the new American fab plants future proof ? We are getting to extreme limits on current wafer size – 3nM. The next generation of chips will work with light. The Chinese have a massive lead in Optical chip technologies which will replace contemporary chip fabrications. There is a real risk that the US govt is sinking billions of $ into facilities which will be out of date by the time they are ready for mass production operations. The clumsy design and implementation of sanctions on Chinese tech industries is max clown world. Don’t they solicit advice from Silicon… Read more »
From what I understand, China is in a pretty tough position herself. They are trying to unwind major bubbles. The corruption pervades every aspect of life and business. Someone stole the fuel in some rockets and replaced the fuel with water. This was exposed a few months ago when they failed to launch. Some additional RE companies have or are collapsing. Vanke, I believe is one of them. I think there may be a big state owned RE company that is also teetering.
How is China not a mirror image of the US? Sure we have different history, but when you look at them and us i’d say we’re def converging or ending up in the same place.
Because China is run by Chinese. Can’t say the same for Murka…
Perhaps one of these days Murka will also be run by the Chinee…
China needs to bring back public executions for major economic crimes. This seems to have become passé as they’ve sought to soften their world image. Bad move.
Our Vietnamese friends know what to do with out of control bankers…
Anybody remember in the early 2000’s how you couldn’t trust China’s economic statistic and everybody said electricity production was a better gauge of economic growth? Does anybody trust the statistics we put out these days?
That’s been true for decades. At least with some of our economic “data” Like how our official unemployment numbers are just made up in the birth death model. Or like how our headline inflation numbers are inflation minus inflation. Google Hedonic Adjustment. It’s comical.
Indeed, i believe the Boskin commission was when they rejiggered the CPI to understate inflation. A Win Win, inflation is “psychological” so by understating it people will “believe” and we pay out less in social security or anything indexed to it, like wages.
Don’t forget about TIPS. TIPS is a great reason to lie about inflation. I don’t know how much of our debt is in TIPS bonds, but in 2022, they were probably paying like 12%
The only difference between now and then (they were lying thieves back then also) is that you stopped believing in them
The official employment/unemployment numbers are pretty bogus, hence the revising. AZ Congressional Rep Schweikert spoke on this recently. Seems the Fed gathers many stat’s from the position advertisements in the trades, which have been known to be advertisements for non-positions or rather positions that are not meant to be filled. He had an explanation for this, but I forget exactly what. He did say 17 out of the last 18 Red numbers were revised significantly therefore. He said they are working to stop this practice for gathering (bogus) info, but as of yet no progress.
I’ve been hearing that China was on the verge of collapse, that it’s economy would implode, and that it could never compete with the U.S. on the world manufacturing stage.
China’s been around for 5000 years or so. We’ve been in business for maybe 300. I keep that in mind when evaluating claims of China’s imminent demise, or our imminent triumph.
That ignorant bozo John McCain called Russia “a gas station masquerading as a country.” That “gas station” came into existence some nine centuries before the US and produced geniuses such as Mendeleev, Suvorov, Pushkin, Lermontov, Mandelshtam, Pasternak, Blok, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Turgenev, Chekhov, Gogol, Glinka, Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov, Mussorgsky, Glazunov, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Prokofiev, Shostakovich and Kandinsky.
Xi Jingping announced residential real estate is for homes, not for speculation. The fall of prices of Chinese real estate is orchestrated so their young people and village dwellers can afford to own a home. Chinese banking is a public utility, hence they can write down defaulted debts without consequence except to speculators. American hedge fund operators bought the bonds of bankrupt Evergrande Real Estate hoping the USA would force the Chinese government to make good on the bonds. The Chinese People’s Republic allowed the NYC speculators to lose 99% of their money. China does not allow billionaires and parasites… Read more »
It gets better than that… Even ‘honest’ billionaires get ‘invited’ to join the CPC when they start getting noticed. This isn’t so much co-opting them as putting them under internal party discipline. So you get situation where a guy who is a ‘Master of the Universe’ gets to join a strongly hierarchical oversight and governance organization *at the bottom*. Now imagine being able to do that to Jeff Bezos. OK, you can ‘own’ everyone’s data and run the government cloud for us, but *we* (who live only to govern and live pretty well if we don’t eff it up or… Read more »
They have their problems. But then again they seem to have managed to plonk a lunar lander on the far side of the moon the week before last to collect samples for earth return. They have hypersonic missiles (along with the Russians). You do not. Sorry to say but the Skunkworks in Current Year probably looks like the DMV. I think some of these reports you’re reading are low-grade Epoch Times (run by CIA / Falun Dafa — Syncretic Chinky cult in a feud with CPC, long story) and/or YouTube loser grifters such as ‘serpentza’. Don’t believe everything you read.… Read more »
Did you actually read the post I wrote? I said I heard she was having some economic trouble and a lot of corruption. They have a really big RE bubble. The corruption is something we Americans deal with all the time. All the pirated goods. All the junk not fit for sale. The drugs coming across our border from China. Having economic troubles is not to say they (the state or the party) are on the verge of failing, just that these appear to be trying times. I am also well aware that I don’t speak Chinese and can’t read… Read more »
Hell, they can probably build that fleet before we can decide which fag we are going to name our imaginary carrier after.
The China tonnage build capacity for shipping is 200 times ( not percent) the tonnage of the US.
https://www.businessinsider.nl/china-has-the-capacity-to-build-pla-combat-ships-at-200-times-the-rate-that-the-us-can-per-leaked-us-navy-intelligence/
“The corruption is something we Americans deal with all the time”
Yes but we don’t do the bullet in the back of the neck thing, yet.
We should probably start tbh
You think Seth Rich was talked to death in a “robbery” gone bad?
Yes, but when the fuel thieves get caught, they WON’T get a slap on the wrist.
Biden is such a bad look, I’m surprised that even Boomer lefties take him seriously. But they do. Of course what follows is that other countries start asking, why is (at least) half the populace voting for these sad jokes? Maybe Americans and their government is stupid, or ignorant, or both, and is not worth other countries’ time. Countries like Saudi Arabia, Russia, and to an extent Brazil, India, and China, respect power and the Man in charge. It’s the historical norm and what focuses geopolitical relations. When you want to cut a deal with the Americans, whom do you… Read more »
I’ve said it before, there needs to be a strong man in charge simply for the ability to make back door “deals” that other strong man leaders will believe. We don’t see much reporting on these in current media, but historically we read often enough of such “agreements” between leaders.
Trump, and for that matter, Perot, tried to tell everyone there need not be a strongman. That deals need not be made between governments…
I can’t do any better than to quote Patrick Deneen on this one: “People keep suggesting that it’s outrageous to keep Biden as the Democratic nominee. I disagree. Biden is actually perfect to lead the progressive liberal party. Its functionaries run the entire government — all of the agencies, the cabinet, and the inner circle of executive branch operatives. They have a giant publicity arm in the mainstream media, and by extension, the entertainment industry. Their court intellectuals run the universities. Their people are in charge of the military. A Democratic president is about as essential to running the US… Read more »
The vaunted Soviet Union collapse occurred over 17 weeks. The collapse in America may be just as quick, and start out of the middle nowhere. Nothing would surprise me at this point.
We’re on year 16, so won’t have to wait much longer.
Stealing Russia’s foreign reserves for the Piano Player should go over well with world financial institutions. Legalized theft ain’t a good way to stabilize markets.
“The consolidation of the states into one vast empire, sure to be aggressive abroad and despotic at home, will be the certain precursor of ruin which has overwhelmed all that preceded it.”
Robert E. Lee
Took a while longer than Lee likely imagined, but it’s sure here now.
I believe a lot of this unwinding has already been planned based on the coming “Great Reset.” Biden is just there to take the heat so that Trump wouldn’t have to. In a sense, Biden was compromised and MAGA blackmailed him (Jeffrey Epstein style) to be the fall guy. Trump will come in and clean up whatever else needs to be cleaned up to get us on the right path.
If Trump had to take all this heat, we never would be able to get to all the mop-up work because of his lack of popularity.
“They cleaned up their banking system to root out fraud and corruption…”
in other words, they kicked the jews out of their finances and banking… which is what has the tribe in a royal snit and trying to focus American rage and firepower on Russia.
We need to do the same. Russia goes from pissant status to the 4th strongest economy in a couple years? And that, in the midst of a costly war with NATO. The mind boggles at how much that tribe is stealing from us.
I’ve heard it mentioned fairly often that Putin put paid to Russian Finkels. I hope that is indeed the case, but where is the evidence he actually did this? And the success of Russia’s economy is not dispositive in that regard.
Russia does not permit dual nationals to serve in the government of The Russian Federation. One million Russian born Jews moved to Israel after the collapse of the USSR. This indicates these parasites lost their government jobs and their easy life predating the Russian people. The Russians learned hard lessons under the boot of the Jews during the reign of the USSR.
Or, like so many other Russian emigres after the fall of USSR, maybe they were prevented from leaving…?
That used to be a thing. Like the Berlin Wall.
Putin’s PHD thesis was on the development of resource rich economies. It used to be available on The Atlantic Website.
Dunno if it’s still there, indolence prevents me from finding out.
Jews are quite useful in the building stages of a system rigged with fiat money. After the jig is up you need Goodfellas.
Airports are very depressing places. You want to see White dispossession in action go to any airport. The number of joggers and birthing persons in cockpits has increased noticeably. The travelers have turned the terminal strip mall into a double take wondering if you are on the liquor store street corner. The speed at which this has occurred is breathtaking.
I take it you’ve been through the Atlanta airport recently.
Atlanta is a giant overflowing toilet bowl of diversity. The airport is an aerial sphincter, unclenching to release a new stream of sewage to keep the expansion going. From the mountains to the sea, the parasitic diversity will spread out in glee until there is no place left for whitey. The International Jew cackles, and counts his money.
Ha. How poetic. In a rather dark–so to speak–way.
The other thing I noticed the last time I went through Atlanta was the private booths in the corridors where chestfeeders who were recently birthing persons rushing to catch the next flight to a business meeting can stop and pump.
Peak America.
I see Atlanta and raise you Minny-St. Paul, aka Mogadishu Part Deux.
At Miami International, the only language you won’t hear is English.
Couldn’t agree more. Land at Miami International and you think you’re still in Latin America.
And you might as well be.
For that matter, I was shopping at the Sawgrass Mills Shopping Mall once about 20 years ago on a trip to Miami. Same. Might as well have been in Mexico City.
We have an ironclad law in my area: all cab drivers must wear a turban. At least I assume it’s a law…
Don’t forget about the Turks. Their economy is in a mess right now, but they have the most powerful military in NATO (apart from the US, of course). The Turks see what is going on and they have taken preliminary steps toward joining the BRICS group. If membership in the EU remains closed to them, they won’t have any problem partnering up with Russia and Iran economically. It just makes sense. At that point, they will probably look around and decide that being a member of NATO is dumb and dumber.
I’d argue the Turks have a stronger industrial base than the US because they installed the machinery in the shiny new 155mm ammo plant in Mesquite, TX. The NYT even reported on it.
Try buying a cheap shotgun these days. “Winchesters” are all made in Turkey…
Sorry, I guess that’s supposed to be “Turkiye” or some such shit now, just as “Kiev” suddenly became “Keeeev.”
The fat that we are still calling the place “Turkey” betrays us as members of the great mass of unwashed hoi polloi, I guess…
A rule of thumb is that the less important news is the more it is promoted. A jogger kills himself by cop, nonstop for 72 hours. The pin holding the empire afloat, hardly a word.
One of the strange features of the Cold War was that Republicans were much better at empire, which requires a light touch when dealing with vassels. Democrats couldn’t help but meddle in the name of democracy and justice, which led to the collapse of those vessel states (See Iran in 79). This changed with Bush the Lesser and his messianic invasion of Iraq.
Biden’s controllers did the same to the Saudis over some journalist. Trump, for all his inexperience in foreign affairs, had great instincts.
I believe that the main reason for this is that the left is overwhelmingly feminine, especially their “men”. With apologies to the womenfolk here, females tend to be meddlesome and most simply cannot abide just letting things be.
Read The Assemblywomen Play by Aristophanes.
2400 years later, same shit.
The controllers were high on their own supply about the Kashoggi incident.
No one in the real world gave a rip.
I don’t remember a single person in any medium recognizing the guy’s last name and understanding what he was. His uncle was Saudi Soros.
Noticed your comment about Iran in 79. The architect of that debacle, Jimmy Carter, is reported to be on his last legs and will soon depart to his reward. I live in South Georgia, near Plains, and have friends who are knowledge about his condition and have told me his time is near. No secrets in a small southern town.
Now that’s something of a funny coincidence. A couple of days ago I made a post here mentioning Carter is 99 and would have to leg it out to October 1 to reach 100.
> Sanctions forced the Russians to do thigs like replace the retail credit card system with their own system. They cleaned up their banking system to root out fraud and corruption. It was an inadvertent test case for creating financial systems outside of Western control.
Note they did this is very little time too. Mind you, there were plans in the works for a while, but it’s clear a lot of American financial power was simply smoke and mirrors (and aircraft carriers).
Yeah, we all know the early history of those who squandered the good will of their new homeland. Though how many still hold a second passport and hate their so called fellow countrymen?
Is that second passport any use now, Israel isn’t a great place to be right now, what will it be like in ten years ?
They all hold New Zealand passports as well.
True. The ones with means have all procured a third passport for the entire clan
Yep. Anybody with *money* that doesn’t have three or more passports is a “nobody”.
Most empires collapse after overreaching themselves, usually caused by drinking too much of their own Koolade…The Roman and British Empires come immediately to mind…Varus and his lost legions, and Britain’s foolhardy entry into WW1 are examples…The US with its 800 bases worldwide has been “cruisin’ for a bruisin’ ” for some time….
And the military is absurdly risk-averse due to being unable to replaced destroyed equipment, despite an 800+ billion budget.
Britain’s decline started with the Boer War. And the Empire – with all its ideals of liberty, democracy, and equality – carried within it the seeds of its own destruction. The world wars only slowed down independence for the Dominions, Ireland, India, etc.
I heard once that “Britain sleep walked into global empire,” which totally fits. Most of it was gained by the private efforts of companies or singular individuals in government. There was no overarching strategy or vision, so it fell apart quickly.
unfortunately, I think we’re in a different boat. The powers that be have a unifying ideology and destination in mind. It’s an unintuitive form of organization, but they are organized.
Mitchell Lange, I believe this to be the correct view. The British East India Company, so dominant in it’s dealings and untouchable in it’s position it simply was known as ‘The Company’, started off as effectively a private endeavour. By 1788, it had achieved primacy in all parts of the Indian subcontinent that mattered, and enjoyed huge profits generated from trade and taxation. Of course, The Mutiny happened and a begrudging UK government had to step in (the UK government had been steadily getting involved since the 1830s, I believe). There was no big plan there. Same story with Africa.… Read more »
Actually, what I’ve read is that the East Indian Company became much less profitable after Britain defeated the French in the mid-1700s and the Company acquired more and more territory (+ subjects + taxation and other duties and responsibilities, etc.) as more British military adventurers (e.g. Wellington) went there to seek personal glory. By the time of the Sepoy Mutiny it was basically an ill-concealed shell for Imperial interests.
The earlier Company was very profitable when it stuck to trade and had coastal outposts.
“Varus and his lost legions,”
Facepalm.
Had absolutely nothing to do with the Decline of Rome. It would be like suggesting Custer’s defeat was the beginning of the end for the U.S.
Don’t get me started on the constant misuse of the battle of Waterloo.
Heh. Perhaps the effect was simply delayed by about four centuries.
Don’t get me started on the constant misuse of the battle of Waterloo.
Couldn’t escape if you wanted to?
(Damned Swedes and their earworms!)
Yeah. Varus defeat comes at least 100 years *before* most historians would pin as the height of the Roman Empire.
Heck, even after the crisis of the Third Century the Western Roman Empire carried on for almost two centuries and the Eastern Empire lasted over another millennium.
One reason the Western Roman Empire lasted as long as it did after its ruling class was de-Romanized was that the provincials who took over all had a vested interest in the continuation of the empire. They might disagree on who should get the lion’s share of the graft, but they didn’t want to burn it all down.
Here in AINO can we say the same?
The Roman Empire is not illustrative of the present-day United States. The U.S. has not made an OVERT play for empire in, say, Europe, by spreading from Ramstein Base to other territories within reach. Additionally, America relies on “soft power” — such as cultural properties — to maintain its psychological edge. The Romans were more hard power folks.
— Xloveli (www.dark.sport.blog)
Instead of militarily conquering diversity then incorporating their former lands into our own as the Romans did, we have imported the diversity into our homeland area. The effect is the same: sharing a polity with diversity. My point is that our diversity overwhelmingly has no interest in maintaining the empire, whereas Rome’s diversity did.
Good lord. Nitpicking. Always with the nitpicking!
Varus defeat was at the official beginning of the empire during Octavian’s reign. There are many, many things that caused Rome’s fall – an accumulation of entropy. If you want two of the biggest they were unrecoverable decisions made by Marcus Aurelius. Aurelius after a big plague that killed an estimated 1.2 million Romans and in trying to fortify the Dacian frontier allowed over a million tribesman to cross the Danube and enter the peninsula with their arms. It was a Great Replacement of its own. Secondly, he addressed a massive debt problem by taking the bad advice of the… Read more »
Why do you think France became such a toilet?
Why is continental Europe so devoid of achievement since 2000?
Empire does not explain Italy’s or ,especially, Greece’s collapse.
Greece is literally a third World country.
They are pushing towards Agenda 2030 as hard as they can…
They will fail, just like they fail in everything. The problem is that their failure will impact us all.
The irony of countries moving away from trading the dollar (at least in the short term) is that the dollar will strengthen. All those people yelling that the dollar will lose its value have it backward – again, at least, in the short to, even, medium term. There’s more dollar-denominated debt outside the US than in the US. That debt needs to be serviced with dollars. If fewer dollars are floating around the system (supply goes down), the value of the dollar goes up (as demand remains constant). The demise of the Eurodollar system could be caused by dollar strength,… Read more »
The US doesn’t produce much anymore, right? Can’t they send the debt back as stuff? Is that, possibly, what’s happening?
“Can’t they send the debt back as stuff? Is that, possibly, what’s happening?”
Absolutely. That’s been a key part of the structural logic of the GAE: get countries in the Third World into massive dollar debt. Then, in order, to service that debt they have to export commodities to the USA. If memory serves, there’s more on this in Anthony Perkins’ book, “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.” But you’ll probably also find more on this in various writings of Michael Hudson.
Our manufacturing output (around $2 trillion) is roughly half of China’s (around $4 trillion). But we also produce food, energy, precious metals…the right people in charge and USA is peerless. (But we don’t have “the right people” in charge…)
No country in the world comes close to the US. We are protected by two oceans and friendly neighbors. We had a huge portion of the best farmland in the world. We have an embarrassment of natural resources. We have a giant economy. We have by a million miles the world’s deepest and most sophisticated financial markets. Despite everything, we still have a fairly robust manufacturing sector that could get ramped up quickly. We are the world’s tech center. I could go on, but you get the idea. The fact that the US is having any problems shows how unbelievably… Read more »
Democracy in a mixed, culturally diverse Republic is at odds with having the “right” people in charge as you don’t have the “right” people to be in charge of in the first place!
Yes, Mexico and Brazil also have a lot of resources, industry, advantages, etc. & look at them (our future?).
Jannie: I think Brazilification and Mexicanization are totally evident on the ground already in major U.S. cities all the way down to a Minneapolis or Denver level. The elites not only aren’t affected by it directly on a daily basis, but when they read about it or see news, or their nephew gets murdered by a young scholar, they have a predigested orthodoxy filter already to interpret it. They are insulated not only by financialization and credentialing, but socially-psychologically. This is where the accelerationism/MAGA-Marxism comes in, the assertion that unreformable systems must be collapsed. Which is a fun idea but… Read more »
California is already a third world country. Mexico is not a bad parallel. Huge swathes of Mexico are actually really nice, the place has natural resources galore, great farming, and there is a class of prosperous and wealthy people who live very luxurious lives at the top of the pyramid. But, of course, Mexico has an egregious weath gap between the rich and the poor. The government is barely functional, corrupt, has no accountability due to the one-party rule. The authorities mainly justify their existence by protecting the prosperous and rich people from the peasant rabble. This describes California. Actually,… Read more »
Not to mention that to migrate to Mexico, you must prove to either have decent assets or a skill actually in demand that they have no way to supply internally.
The dross don’t move to Mexico. It’s hard enough for a solid middle class American to move there.
One caveat–Mexico is now governed by a yenta named Scheinbaum. Its future just took a wicked turn for the worse.
Well, before our leaders screwed it up, we did provide the world with an extremely valuable service – a service that required both talented, trained people and very high-level industrial production. We provided the structure of the entire global trade and financial system. Our navy kept the sea lanes open. Our military kept a lid on any big wars. Our dollar was stable and could be used by anyone, anywhere. (The dollar was, in essence, the global language for banking and commerce, much like English is the global language which makes communicating so much easier.) Our massive financial markets kept… Read more »
It could have lasted. The Triffin dilemma is only a problem for low or stagnant growth. While one option for the reserve currency country is to reduce domestic production to encourage imports, the long-term stable option is to grow domestic production faster than population + standard of living expectations. Countries still have to export to build their currency reserves, but at a lower per-unit price.
Which path our morons chose is obvious.
It’d still be tough. The Petrodollar is the issue. It means that we have to run a trade deficit with countries that import a lot of oil and that’s manufacturing countries.
I suppose that we could have supplied the world with dollars by buying their assets and giving them dollars. Imagine a world where we didn’t flood the US with 3rd worlders, our workers’ standard of living grew and we owned the world via the dollar. Ah, what could have been.
The petrodollar was a last ditch effort to keep centralized control in DC, rather than allow America to manufacture its way out of closing the gold window.
That’s the problem. They sold out America to keep power. Didn’t take very long before offshoring became the only practical workaround to deal with a government at war with its country.
There’s something about the issue I’m not getting, but it’ll click at some point. I mean, the value of the reserve currency is basically liquidity, right? It facilitates trade. That creates demand for the currency, which means more, in this case, dollars in circulation. Which will reduce the purchasing power of the dollar, even as everybody is purchasing things in dollars, right? It’s kind of paradoxical. I also notice, domestically in practice, price inflation incentivizes spending, because the money is losing purchasing power. I figure that means price deflation would incentivize saving, which is also paradoxical. But then reserve currency… Read more »
Sort of. The reserve currency serves not to facilitate transfers, but to hold value. The dollar is just the best managed large currency in the world, hard as that is to believe.
Facilitating exchange is a bonus, at which the dollar also is superlative, bad as it it.
And third, network effects. Since everyone else is using dollars for reserve and exchange, its easy to do currency exchanges with other central banks.
Fly in the ointment is USD has now dropped to under 60% of reserves…
Maybe that’s what I’m not getting. It’s hard to say the dollar holds value, for instance, when its value is being borrowed away. I’m reminded of Quigley talking about the FDR admin not understanding the nature of money. If I understand it, the idea is that the value is in trading, rather than in the things being traded. This seems a very middle man perspective to me, since the middle man gets his cut of each trade. Iow, his value is in facilitation, rather than production. It’s kind of like the banks using supercomputers to do tons of trades, skimming… Read more »
Exactly. Folks just don’t understand the Eurodollar system. I would urge everyone here to listen to Brent Johnson (Dollar Milkshake Theory) and his podcasts on this topic. The irony is that the entire US might collapse and the Eurodollar system might be the last vestige left functioning.
Yeah, I was already beginning to notice that the dollar bears had some holes in their argument when I came across Johnson. His theory definitely helped me understand the dynamics better. It’ funny because I want him and his theory to be wrong, i.e. no confirmation bias here. But it’s hard to poke holes in it. I think that Z and others (including myself) are correct that the world will try to move away from the dollar. The problem is that 1) they might fail or 2) if they’re successful, it creates a huge problem that will explode before the… Read more »
Japan and Europe will collapse first, during that period the dollar will do gangbusters. Then we collapse.
Quite possibly. They’ll probably need to do a new Plaza Accord long before the world moves beyond the dollar.
Won’t matter. This ain’t the US Economy of 1946 or even 1986. They thought they’d won, that is why they sent all our production to China and SE Asia. Man when you’re holding that tiger by the ears, ya can’t let go.
He sometimes conflates debt and debt service. If enough Euro-held dollar-denominated instruments were to go into default, that might cause a “bank run” and strengthen the dollar. But that would not be caused by a central bank reducing it’s dollar reserve; the opposite. Reducing the dollar reserves would increase dollars circulating (by some measure, anyway, depending on whether it’s treasuries, dollar-denominated, etc.) making debt service easier, and reduce risk of default.
It’s like your mortgage. You don’t default because you have more liabilities than assets. You only need enough income to make the payment. Debt vs. debt service.
Depends on why they’re selling their treasuries. But let’s say that it was done, not because of a crisis, but because of a slow transition away from treasuries by CBs. Well, that just makes the dollar somewhat weaker, making it easier for businesses to pay back their dollar loans, which, in turn, keeps the whole Eurodollar system going on longer. I mean, what business is going to move away from the dollar when it’s still the GRC, easy to access and makes your borrowing costs less. I think that Johson is right. A weaker (but not freefall) dollar perpetuates the… Read more »
I doubt it will strengthen much, if at all, though a collapse should be almost impossible. Why? Arbitrage. Those dollar-denominated instruments have value, and currency fluctuations make Vanguard and Blackrock and Soros and that ilk very happy. Any spread will be arbitraged to the max.
If the BoJ can’t stop the yen from falling against the dollar, I’m pretty sure that Blackrock and Soros can’t stop a rising dollar either. There’s at least $75 trillion in dollar debt outside the US. The demand for dollars will stay steady for quite some time. If the number of dollars floating around the system falls, it has to put upward pressure on the dollar. We’d need the entire global financial system to move away from dollars, not just some central banks or some businesses. Businesses would need to start borrowing in other currencies, but, right now, that doesn’t… Read more »
With central banking, the question is always, “Compared to what?”
Japan was not (and still is not) in a happy place if the Fed were to pull another Volker. So long as we have people like Helicopter Ben pushing QE (whatever number we are up to) the bar is extremely low. Japan only has to perform slightly better than Zimbabwe to stay in the game.
Kind of like the guys being chased by a bear.
“Why are you putting on running shoes? That bear can outrun you!”
“Yeah, but I only have to outrun you.”
Well, the whole system is shaky because there’s too much debt all around. That always makes countries, businesses and households more vulnerable to what would normally be small shocks. There’s no doubt that the Fed/Treasury have taken their foot off the gas at times, in part because various countries have told them that their markets can’t take it. Regardless, the Japanese are a special case in many ways. They hold a ridiculous amount of assets abroad and treasuries so they can sell those to defend the Yen for a long time. Their households and businesses also save like crazy to… Read more »
And Johnson may well be right. If what happens is default, he’s just telling you an accounting tautology. And that could well happen, particularly with the, what, 12th renewal of sanctions?
But if it’s just central banks de-dollarizing, the same accounting tautology tells you to expect a weaker dollar.
BRICS suggests it’s prospective members default on USD denominated debt without penalty for BRICS membership. Get ready to see the USD’s steady decline over the next decade or sooner if WWIII is upon us.
“Instead, the economic elites of America allowed the world’s most dishonest people to gain control of foreign policy.”
You mean Jews?
Neocons, obviously. Been making some version of that point for decades.
This is a point the robot historians will puzzle over.
The JQers can win without the Naxalters.
Can the Naxalters even fill the old Shreveport Elks club? Are there any Naxalters under the age of 50?
The Naxalters stand athwart racial survival typing “Well, actually…”
Oh, come now, JQers are, what, some fraction of a percent of the population? Jews are around 2%. You are outnumbered at least 2:1. Not great odds. Then the nogs are 13%. What kind of hopium are you on?
JQers need to get their act together. Just typing, “Every. Single. Time.” or “Early Life” isn’t much of an outreach. One would think that would have occurred to you by now.
Neocohens.
That’s the point I was trying to get across with mention of the Black Nobility.
Those family lines are primarily white race, but they run the criminal networks at the bottom as well as the top.
Callous and cruel to those outside their circles, just as Big J is to Little J.
Tribalism is a spectrum, and some have far fatter tails, but the inability to reign in the narrow loyalties of elites is still the problem.
Parallel tribalism is where one’s own become one’s own worst enemies.
Hasn’t anyone read English history?
The countries that make things, fix things, dig things from the ground and invent things are starting to see that they do not need the countries that merely count things. That’s a nice way to put it, Z Man. I guess it’s an affirmation of one of the very few iron laws of economics: if you have proper wealth at your disposal, then eventually you’ll get to decide the units that count it. I guess the Saudis realize this, and can just play the long game… i.e., waiting. Same with the Chinese, I suppose. Same with Russia, a country with… Read more »
One of our stalwarts put a link to a video of Miss Lindsey yesterday: why are we in the Ukraine?
Miss Lindsey’s reason was: because of 11 trillion dollars worth of minerals, and we can’t just let Russia grab it!
The US perhaps has a limited supply of oil—hard to tell with restrictions on extraction and exploration, but gas supplies via fracking are immense and coal was estimated a couple of decades or so ago to last for 800 years. The Germans did make gasoline out of coal as did SA during the sanction period. Climate Change fraud aside, fossil fuel is probably going the way of the dinosaurs anyway. (Pun intended).
I would take the under on that one. What else explains the desperation with the entire switch to electric agenda? The BRICS will control the price of oil in the near future.
Much agree. Good catch. Everybody here today is just acing it.
Aww, c’mon peeps, Compsci just had to get that fossil joke in there. Spoilsports. Now to be all, like, serious, Ol’ John D. Rockefeller Hisself attended a natural science conference in Europe in which they were clarifying a system of classification. There it was noted all things organic were composed of C, H, O and JDR had the bright idea to claim “rotting organic matter”, so as to increase the scarcity value in the same way his fellow cryptos marketed diamonds. (I had thought the term ‘fossil’ came in with a bad paper in the 70s as part of PetroCanada… Read more »
Agreed with most, including the dinosaur quip, but this caught my attention.
Neither demand nor supply are stock terms. They are functions of price. At a trillion tons of gold per atomic mass unit of oil, abiotic refill would almost certainly supply more oil than you could sell.
I get that your point was no one would be wasting something that valuable on transportation. My point is don’t bury that assumption in the text, because my experience is that most people will not understand that it was assumed.
“The demand for dollars has kept the currency strong and thus kept imports cheap” If the winner in this has been the USA, the loser has been Saudi Arabia, forced into accepting IOUs (dollars and Treasuries of very dubious worth) and more generally everyone holding dollars worldwide because of its de facto reserve status. ” … but years of mismanagement by the Biden administration has made a hash of things all over the world.” Loath though I am to say it, it’s not been merely the Biden administration (though these monkeys have vastly accelerated the process). “De-dollarisation” was already moving… Read more »
I don’t remember the world being all that impressed with Shrub or President Zero. I bet the de-dollarization trend began under them.
It began with the end of the .com bubble. Why do you think we had to start the war on terror?
You guys don’t remember the “Jobless recovery” after the .com burst? Or Shrub adding corn to our gasoline to water it down? We’ve been in an economic depression since 1999 and its been papered over. Heck i’m at the point where i even think the Y2K bullshit was created as an excuse for the FED to juice that bubble one last time to extend it.
Y2K was the alpha version of covid, 9/11 was the released product, covid was 2.0
That sounds about right. I recall looking at USA’s current account deficits in the late ’90s (when Slick Willy was at the helm), which were then running at around $500bn a year (give or take) and thinking, “This can’t go on forever. There has to be a day of reckoning.”
DHS was a twofer, jobs for an economy that couldn’t organically produce them anymore for most people and spying! Another gift from the .com bust.
When did the extractive economy take off (Healthcare, higher education, banking)? Enron was a prototype. I’m sure you’ve all heard of the great taking at this point right? Remember all those videos on the news of people who lost everything in Enron? I imagine the great taking would be the same.
No later than Nixon ’73. Every country in the world was trying to trade increasingly inflated dollars for gold, so he closed the window. The ’74 Petrodollar was in response to give countries a reason not to feel they were cheated out of their gold.
Exactly, it was a default. That was why inflation was insane in 70’s and early 80’s. It only abated because we sent high paying jobs to China and substituted them with credit. Though we spun it as evil speculators and opec, not us defaulting on a contract we signed with the rest of the world after WW2.
I doubt it was the default, if that’s what it was.
The simple definition of inflation is too much money chasing too few goods. The central banks who were forced to hold dollars were obviously not putting it into circulation, as would have been the case had they converted it to gold.
The inflation of the 70s is mostly a combination of spending for Vietnam and Medicare/Medicaid, combined with the life expectancy making Social Security and government pensions vastly more expensive than forecast.
“The inflation of the 70s is mostly a combination of spending for Vietnam and Medicare/Medicaid”
And how do you think they paid for that? By letting people exchange the dollars they printed into existance into gold, or telling them to take it or leave it? If you and i agree to a system where i can exchange the money you control for a defined portion of something and then you renege on that, what would you call it?
And once the rules change, if you keep buying up more treasuries, what would you call it?
Regardless, a cause must precede an effect. US inflation was making gold exchange lucrative. Trade your dollars for gold, sell it on the European and Asian market for dollars, go back and redeem it for gold, repeat, every time at an increasing profit.
Shutting the gold window might have screwed other countries, but it was the only way to keep everything, everything in the country from having to be sold for gold to keep that exchange going. And it wouldn’t have been enough.
All inflation is a default on the promise that your money you worked for today will buy you just as much later.
Who promises that? For pete’s sake the Fed promises they will try to make it worth just 2% less next year than it is today.
you must be a lawyer 😉
Unfortunately the transition from a unipolar to a multi-polar world is and will not be nearly as much of a fundamental change as those hyping this narrative would have you believe, although the quality of life in America will drop significantly from such a transition. This is because the world is unfortunately organized at a level above that of the nation state. The structure for global control is shown on this image and discussed in some detail here…
I’m pretty sure for a decade or so trade between Saudi and China has been using RMB. China is Saudis biggest customer. I heard Saudi has a emergency oil reserve kept in China to protect it from attack.
Although I’m sure the Government Party will be desperate to make a deal, I’m not sure this becomes a problem for Main Street and Manufacturing America. Higher import costs means repatriation of manufacturing. Less global interconnectedness means greater US reliance on…itself. The USA is a completely self-sustaining economy. We have all the energy and natural resources we need. Human capital is becoming a problem, but mainly because the worship of GDP requires an increase in population. Illegals are a way to goose GDP on the cheap. Disconnect the US economy from the globe, and suddenly those tricks don’t matter…and the… Read more »
Russia seems to be having some success disengaging from the globalist economy. We might learn from them.
Agree with all this, strongly, but I just noticed the reason we were taught to worship sterile measures like GDP.
Because not only does it benefit the rich, it’s also not racist!
(All human value is lost.)
This is true if and only if the natives can afford the higher prices. That seems to be in doubt.
Truth. Cet. par., higher populations consume more food, housing, energy, etc., so even if production expands to meet the increased demand and hold prices stable, GDP increases. And if they are doing productive work, GDP increases. Government spending also increases GDP, moreso if it is deficit spending, and even more when it causes inflation.
Why do you think government wants things measured that way?
King Dollar is a burden on us like the Empire itself. With some pain this will force change. Not to mention we must rid ourselves of the Saudis and the entire neighborhood, really we should have no alliances outside the Western Hemisphere.
Don’t know about other Western governments, but we sure know which choice will be made in the land of the Ozark grifters.
I know I’m going to get downvoted, but I believe we have been under some form of military government since after the 2012 election. Like having our own Paul Bremer in Iraq running things. Four key data points lead me to believe this: The video of the woman who snuck Zero’s birth certificate into the Hawaiian archives. Plane goes down, everybody survives except her and someone conveniently videos a diver probably stabbing her with something. Death sentence for treason? Zero being forced to exit the back of the plane in China. Countries just don’t do that to foreign leaders. Unless,… Read more »
Alphabet – typo
Downvote? Solid: “Like having our own Paul Bremer”
Completely concur. Best conclusion.
Why did we allow (((the chosen))) to hijack foreign policy so that the majority of what they do is sympathetic to their motherland? Why was nobody able to stop this monster?
You know, I also have an ancestral motherland I am sympathetic to. But if I were in a position of power, there would be no way I would do what the neocons have done in service to their motherland. As an agent of the American government, you’re supposed to look out for America’s interests first.
I know it’s a slow process, but if you speed it up it makes the foundation of a good set of stories.
I hope you’re right, Z-man. I need to get myself secured in my own mountain retreat before the SHTF. The good side is the the impending death of the dollar will kill this vile, evil system. Our Zionist pets, among others, won’t last 30 days without the US taxpayers’ help.
And most likely, neither will anyone who is not a part of some community. You need your neighbors, if for no other reason than that cheap drone the diversity will steal from Wally World can easily pick up the smoke from your stovepipe, or the quick flash off your solar panel or the sound of your generator or chainsaw.
You do not want to be alone at the end of some dirt road if the diversity decides it wants your preps.
The movement has managed to avoid another optics war over Taylor’s mustache, RamzP’s hair-coloring and the Z-blog update.
I’m sure we’ll come through the collapse of the petro-dollar system swimmingly.
RamzP’s hairdo and glasses have got to go.
His eyeglass frames are too small for his face. Someone should tell him. They barely reach his ears and they only go 1/3 of way down his nose. And it looks like he cuts his own hair.
Presentation matters.
Nah – RAMZ is the grumpy old uncle at the bar in 1985. He doesn’t need “optics”.
So, basically, a recreation of the current arrangement, but not run out of America. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. This sounds familiar, kind of like the ‘British’ Empire moving to DC. Not a revolutionary change, not even as much as transitioning from the gold standard to the petrodollar. Smooth means speedy, the last several years’ inflation is, I’d guess, evidence the process has been going on for a while. The current geopolitical tensions could be, rather than a epoch-ending moment, a show and a distraction while the looting and transfer of wealth goes on. Could be.… Read more »
This is the Great Reset. However, Trump and the people running this movie have made sure that it turns out in our favor. That’s what I believe anyway.
The petro/dollar was needed to get everyone to use the dollar or as some people call it the Euro/dollar. However, all the systems have been created and the dollar is now, 50 years later, ubiquitus. It can’t be replaced because nothing else can do what it does. George Gammon just tried to travel from Columbia to the U.S. border using bitcoin, gold and silver. None of it really worked because they are stores of value but poor mediums of exchange. The dollar is a near effortless medium of exchange, even if a poor store of value. The dollar will be… Read more »
Thanks for the laugh, I like well done satire.
The petro-dollar was a finite deal, anyway. No one expected the American reach to last forever, and the unraveling of the American sleeve only had to take place a little for the inevitable to happen. When forecasting the future, remember this: The stronger the party, the better his endurance has to be. That’s where the rubber hits the road.
— Xloveli (www.dark.sport.blog)
Totally, completely untrue. The rise of the American Empire began with global financial instruments created in the 1950s, not the alt-right talking point about the petro-dollar. This talking point, like the BRICS narrative, has an obvious agenda as propaganda for the right. It’s a favorite talking point among grifters but you might want to look up what major financial institutions base their financial backbone on. Hint… you’ve never heard about it in the news for a reason.
While it is true that the postwar rubble and Bretton Woods gave the USA the ability to finance an empire, the petrodollar system allowed the US to wrack up unsustainable and impossible financial debts and export inflation to the rest of the world while keeping the prosperity at home. The fact that the GAE wasted that system on wars of choice and a MIC that can’t win a real war is a separate set of problems. The GAE we live under today is largely a result of the petrodollar, not Bretton Woods or the Marshall Plan or whatever. BRICS is… Read more »
Sterling, just sterling. I mean, up above there’s talk about the Clinton 90s, when we managed to screw up the promise of the Internet. The revolutionary frickin’ Internet. Just like we’re screwing up the promise of cell phones today.
(Oil replacing steam, medicine, electricity, television, NASA…just how many revolutions do we gotta screw up, anyways?)
Revolutions++. That’s how many.
(*snickers in COBOL*)
Last time I touched COBOL was, um, 43 years ago, I think. Don’t even remember all that much about it, except that it was verbose enough to be self-documenting code.
In the last 15years or so the US has gone from 40% of global GDP to 26%. In that same period, BRICS has gone from 18% to 36%.
But accuse people of propaganda all you want. Reality has a way of biting those like you in the ass.
I don’t care about anything other than money and the fact that they have been stealing from us through inflation since at least the last 15 years, but I would even go back to the tech stock bubble bursting under Clinton. It used to be you could earn money in the bank and the interest you received was to keep up with inflation with maybe a tiny bit extra. Nowadays, except for promotional rates, you get squat and they eat away at it through inflation. In other words, they’re forcing you to either live like South Americans in the old… Read more »