The New Manna: A Zimbabwe Dollar - In God We Trust

Evil and Amalek don't play the game of life with logic and of course not with Torah wisdom; it's a game of odds and basic math patterns, based on sub-par algorithms. The article presented says doomsdayers [i.e. blogs about moshiach, etc.] are fear mongers who exploit the facts as he presents in his case. The hand that he tips actually says that the nature of evil is a gambler and a risk taker as long as the odds are good enough; lets call it socio-blackjack, with a cheesy Vegas dealer name Bazza at your service.

Their view is that Zimbabwe was simply under-managed, and with American brass it can be steered, righted, and brought back to prosperity; throw in a few wars for the cause [not WWIII standard as a doomsdayer would suggest] and soon we'll be back to decadence, which is a right that every American has [as per their indoctrination] while the nations abroad are sold [or told?] to endorse, worship, and push the agenda of America enjoying its eternal birthright [Esau anyone?].

There are two possible key issues here: either they lose, and welcome Moshiach, or they try to win, and, well, yes, Geulah will be extended - but the fiasco and charade that they put on display for public will be quite pathetic, as probably every prophecy in Tanach will now have an easy platform to inform the people of God's intentions. What do we say to this - have fun? Buckle up? oy vey.

By the way, I'm going on record as agreeing with him, as I think God wants this elongated as possible to allow for teshuvah, save lives, etc. as outlined by the Vilna Gaon - who says its like being decreed a big rock to crush you; only God has mercy and agrees to throw the rock on you, but only as sand pebbles - many of them - like American dollars will be.

The Geulah process has already begun in certain sectors, and this will allow people to get on board and gain merit, again, thanks to an elongated process. And at the end of the day, I think Hashem just wants in his heart that one day he should pay an Avreich in Kollel a  Billion dollar monthly check, just in principle the World must see that day, for fate must contain a sense of irony.

Forbes.com:

From all the doom and gloom about U.S. and European economics you would have thought the end of the financial world was nigh. In fact a lot of people are saying that right now. Want some good news? It is not going to happen. That is not to say I haven’t written a lot of gloomy economic stuff myself. Yet, to be honest, I’m over that now. The economic accident happened in 2007/2008. The developed world’s economy didn’t die. It is now recovering. It is only a start but we have entered a new era nonetheless.

The idea is, U.S. and Europe are on a binge of deficit spending and this has created a titanic overhead of sovereign debt that can’t be supported or repaid.

This is correct. But do not panic.

The conclusion of the doomsters is that consequently the economic world will implode and the globe will spin off its axis into outer darkness. Well, the bit about spinning out of the orbit of the sun is an exaggeration, but not by much.

The doomsters see a collapse of so called fiat money, i.e. money as we know it and an economic and social breakdown will follow. Gold and bullets are to be the only currency.

According to this line of prediction, we should all be rearing chickens in anticipation and ready to grow bean shoots in our closets for food. While you are at it, get some plans to create a stealth smokehouse. Forget zombies; the marauders of the future financial collapse are going to be real people.

Woe on us, prepare!

This prepper-view is nonsense. The view that fiat money is going to disappear is mad and silly. Fiat money is going nowhere, except down in value.

Special Offer: After a big drop, Apple’s valuation and dividend yield look tempting. Time to buy? Click here for a free-trial and immediate access to Forbes Dividend Investor advisory service.

Whatever the political and economic rights and wrongs of the matter, what happens next is as close to the doomsters fall of the Roman Empire part 2, as a roller coaster ride is to a plane crash.

Why?

It is infuriatingly simple. Let us say the U.S. government got to a state that it owed 120% of GDP in debt. The U.S. is not there yet but it will likely get there soon enough.

What happens next? The U.S. simply engineers a 7% rate of inflation, all other things being equal and in two Presidential cycles U.S. debt to GDP is roughly halved to the old sweet spot of 60% to GDP. Of course modelling that with all the possible variables is way more complicated than that, but you get the idea.

Halving the value of money does the trick of sorting out this whole sorry mess. Now that might sound horrendous but it is not.

So okay you are a doomster and you think the end is nigh and that gold is money. Well, gold has gone up roughly 10% a year compounded since the end of Bretton Woods in 1971. This implies an average compound rate of inflation of 10%; if you believe that gold is real, inviolate, hard money, which as a doomster you most definitely do.

The world didn’t end over those 40 years as money was devalued forty fold. The fiat system didn’t implode, in fact everyone got a lot richer, even though in the meantime 2.5 cents of gold became worth a dollar or put in gold standard terms, 2.5 cents in 1971 has been inflated to $1 today.

If the dollar got devalued in real terms at 10% a year, as we have enjoyed in gold terms on average for 42 straight years, a 120% debt to GDP would hit 60% in around 6 years. This is why it is not a good idea to panic and get doomy.

The key is to be positioned for the denouement of current economic rescue attempts. The solution is the dilution of debt, through the devaluation of money. The governments of the west will not run out of money. That’s impossible. What will happen to rebalance the debts of the U.S. and Europe is what we need to focus on.

In a nutshell, bonds are going to get monetised. Sovereign debt will be turned into cash. Operation twist has put a large proportion of that mountain of debt at the short end of maturities. The economy of the U.S. is going to get very liquid indeed. That is the one thought to hold.

If you believe the developed world is going to get into a tail spin, it won’t be that fiat money will disappear. Instead there will be much more of it about.

The question therefore is how to play the outcome of cash flooding everything.

You can do worse than look back to the seventies to see what happened and use that period as a model of what to do. The answer isn’t to prepare for Armageddon. It is to invest in inflation linked assets producing index linked yield.

So perhaps buying bits of mountain desert to rent out to terrified ‘preppers’ is the way to go, because not only will the property value and rent rise with real inflation, you’ll also be paid in gold.

Forsight in Klippah?

Read more »

Moshiach and His Bat Made in China

Read the following presented article very carefully. It cleverly shows answers to big questions:

Why is the EU in debt? - They have no Central Bank [thanks to empirical paranoia] and thus can't handle the international pressure and need for stability.

Why is America in debt? - America is collapsing under the same decree on the EU, only is lasting longer. The EU was created to compete against America.

Who is on top? - China! They have a model of success that is sending them near the top. It is clear that America / Obama is leading America into a Chinese [communist] philosophy of re-growth. It is also clear that Romney [and his Chinese attack comments] had a similar plan of taking on China with the Amero concept, a united North America].

Who is winning? - Israel! When you have read the article, realize that Galus China will never happen, as they are in a compulsion repetition of "finally winning" syndrome. Israel is the only country on earth that is able to implement China's victory strategy, and they are, and they are winning. America is trying, but it will never be able to achieve what Israel can. God simply designed Israel to succeed in this day and age; perhaps the future will hold a different hand, but for the time being, Israel owns 2012 and beyond.

In other words: Welcome to Pax Judaica. The only challenge will be to turn it into a Kedusha enterprise.

Zionism is the blood that fuels the animal, our job is to turn blood into Light. Zionism has led the way, but one must not forget, the Torah of Eretz Yisrael, Torah Zionsim, digs back most recently tore the students of the Vilna Gaon [to name one example].

May the Jewish People merit a true Zionism, and merit to hear the Kol HaTor in our Land.

****I will highlight key points that relate to Israeli successful implementation.

People's Daily Online:

The report of the 18th CPC National Congress proposed to speed up the formation of a new mode of economic development by focusing on enhancing the new driving force of innovation and relying more on domestic demand, especially consumer demand for economic development and thus outlined a clear roadmap for our country to achieve economic transformation.

Experts said that we should stick to the roadmap, firmly grasp the strategic basis of "expanding domestic demand", substitute the new engine of innovation for the traditional elements, and gradually bid farewell to the traditional model of development to realize China's economic transformation.

Transformation is the key to China's economic rebirth

Since the Reform and Opening up, China has created an economic miracle with an average economic growth rate of above 9.8 percent over 34 consecutive years, ranking the world's second-largest economy in 2010.

However, with changes in the elements that support China's economic development, the traditional unbalanced, uncoordinated, and unsustainable extensive growth mode has come to an end.

Economic circles unanimously agree that China's economy has entered a period of major transition where transformation is the key to China's economic rebirth.

President of China Reform and Development Research Institute Chi Fulin said that China's economic growth is at a historical inflexion point to converse from high-speed to medium speed. The economic slowdown since 2011 reflects the short-term economic fluctuations as well as long-term trend of economic growth. Only by releasing the huge potential demand and accelerating the transformation of development mode can we cope with the changes in the pattern of domestic and international economy.

Economic commentator Ma Guangyuan believes that as international economic downturn led to deterioration of China’s foreign trade conditions, China must transform its economic development model as soon as possible.

Facing the test of “middle-income trap,” China needs to get rid of the development mode that extremely relies on investment and exports to fuel economic growth, lacks technological innovation, and has low consumption, backward service industry, vague boundary between markets and the government and slow pace of urbanization, and enter a stage of modern economic growth. Therefore, the 18th CPC National Congress has an epoch-making significance to arrangement of economic transition, Ma said.

“Economic restructuring is the key of striding over the middle-income trap,” said Zhang Monan, an associate research fellow with the Economic Forecasting Department of the State Information Center.

Zhang pointed out that it must comprehensively adjust the growth pattern and economic structure to achieve economic transformation, including using innovation to promote supply growth and tapping domestic market potential

Reliance on innovation and domestic demand to achieve economic transformation

“Innovation is the requirements of scientific outlook on development and transformation of economic development mode,” said Li Yiping, professor of Renmin University of China. He pointed out that the progress of world economy needs innovation, so does Chinese economy.

Deputy Dean of the Academy of Macroeconomic Research at the National Development and Reform Commission Wang Yiming also stressed that Chinese economy must rely on innovation to realize a transformation from emphasizing scale expansion to focusing on promotion of quality and efficiency.

The 18th CPC National Congress pointed out that as the strategic support of improving social productive forces and overall national strength, scientific and technological innovation must be placed in the core position of national development, concentrating the whole society’s wisdom and strength on innovative development.

Ma Guangyuan said that the concept is unprecedented, clearly showing the courage and determination of China to say goodbye to investment-driven development mode in the past.

About the role of expanding domestic demand in changing the mode of economic development, the 18th CPC National Congress said, “We must firmly grasp the strategic basis of expanding domestic demand to accelerate the establishment of a long-term and effective mechanism and unleash the consumption potential.”

Fueling consumption is the strategic focus in expanding domestic demand. Chi Fulin said that China is still in a rising stage over the next 10 years and owns huge consumption potential. As long as the consumer demand can be effectively released, it is possible to maintain a moderate growth rate of 7 percent to 8 percent in the next 10 years. 

Notice how all of the red highlights [China's hopes] are being successfully implemented by Israel - in uniform. Israel's demographics, reality, nationalism, philosophy, government, etc, make it the perfect chemistry for Pax Judaica. Equally notice how America will never again be able to recapture the chess pieces it lost off the board.

One must assume that there is a tremendous guiding light behind Israel. We are not here for naught; the Light of Moshiach is ready to shine through the darkness. Just as a light shines brightest before darkness, the galus shines brightest before its demise.

As the Ramchal says: One Kingdom must not trespass another. The Kingdom of Galus is nearing its end, seen by its magnificant glow.

With that you can be sure, Moshiach is next and close by.

****Israel’s economic growth should start picking up in the first half of next year thanks to a boost in external demand, the OECD concluded in its biannual economic outlook on member states Tuesday. Output growth is projected to drop from 3.1 percent in 2012 to 2.9% in 2013 (incorporating a 0.2 percentage-point boost from the new Tamar offshore gas field), but then rebound to 3.9% in 2014, the report said.


******...and in America: The Fed said today that seven of 12 districts reported “either slowing or outright contraction in manufacturing” as some contacts “expressed concern about the outlook for 2013, in part, due to the uncertainty regarding the outcome of the fiscal cliff.”

Follow @RabbiKSoulMazal

Read more »

In Rahmbo We Trust!

Paul Ryan: Buddying up with 'Ole Rahmbo? [Emmanuel] This brings the word "connections" to a whole new level.
Paging Erev Rav, Paging Erev Rav - Mr. Ryan is on the phone. (More money Mitt?)
[of all people - Rahm?!]


YahooNews:

Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan spoke out against the Chicago Teachers Union strike on Monday, saying he stands behind Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's opposition to the demonstration.

"Mayor Emanuel is right today in saying that this teacher's union strike is unnecessary and wrong," Ryan said in Portland, Ore., according to a pool report transcript. "We know that Rahm is not going to support our campaign, but on this issue and this day we stand with Mayor Rahm Emanuel."

More than 26,000 education professionals in the Chicago area did not attend work on Monday over a contract negotiation dispute with the Chicago Board of Education.

President Barack Obama's administration declined to comment on the strike. Emanuel, elected mayor in 2011, was Obama's chief of staff from 2009 to 2010.

Here are Ryan's full remarks:

If you turned on the TV this morning or sometime today, you probably saw something about the Chicago teacher's union strike. I'd like to make a couple of comments about that because it does matter. I've known Rahm Emanuel for years. He's a former colleague of mine. Rahm and I have not agreed on every issue or on a lot of issues, but Mayor Emanuel is right today in saying that this teacher's union strike is unnecessary and wrong. We know that Rahm is not going to support our campaign, but on this issue and this day we stand with Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

We stand with the children and we stand with the families and the parents of Chicago because education reform, that's a bipartisan issue. This does not have to divide the two parties. And so, we were going to ask, where does President Obama stand? Does he stand with his former Chief of Staff Mayor Rahm Emanuel, with the children and the parents, or does he stand with the union? On issues like this, we need to speak out and be really clear. In a Romney-Ryan administration we will not be ambiguous, we will stand with education reform, we will champion bipartisan education reforms. This is a critical linchpin to the future of our country, to our economy, to make sure that our children go to the best possible school, and that education reforms revolve around the parents and the child, not the special interest group. This is something that's critical for all of us.

 

 

Things really may get quite scary as the Keitz approaches.
Here is to '73 - May it be filled with Geulah vibes of Emes.

 

Read more »

USA Lottery Winner Gets $222 Trillion!

"...But I saved my receipt Sir! I'm Good For The Money!"


YahooNews:

America is headed for a fiscal cliff at the end of this year. If Congress does not act, $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts will take effect as will a number of tax hikes on Jan. 1. Many economists believe this so-called fiscal cliff could send the country back into recession. Boston University economics professor Larry Kotlikoff describes just how bad America's finances are as a result of trillions of dollars in unfunded entitlement liabilities in his new book The Clash of Generations: Saving Ourselves, Our Kids, and Our Economy. He joined The Daily Ticker's Aaron Task to discuss the nation's indebtedness and his solutions for how to fix America's ongoing fiscal crisis. He details the seriousness of the problem in the post below.

By Laurence Kotlikoff

The 78 million-strong baby boom generation is starting to retire in droves. On average, each retiring boomer can expect to receive roughly $35,000, adjusted for inflation, in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits. Multiply $35,000 by 78 million pairs of outstretched hands and you get close to $3 trillion per year in costs. This is not a partisan issue. The dirty little secret that neither President Obama nor Mitt Romney is telling you is that our kids, who are being stuck with the bill, can't afford it. They are at the end of the great postwar chain letter that has been benignly labeled 'Pay As You Go' but is properly called 'Take As You Go.' One administration after another has bought oldsters' votes by letting them take resources from the young while appeasing the young with the prospect of taking their turn at generational theft.

This is not to knock government involvement in retirement saving and healthcare. Uncle Sam has a legitimate role in making sure people save and get health insurance. But that's different from robbing Peter's generation to pay Paul's. All Ponzi schemes end and Uncle Sam's will end particularly badly by blowing up in the baby boom's face. Their kids can't remotely cover what's needed, so the baby boomers -- who, as a group, are incredibly poorly prepared for retirement -- won't get the benefits they've been promised. In June, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its Alternative Fiscal Scenario (AFS) — the CBO's projection of the government's finances into the future. The projections are truly scary, but they received zero press coverage — not a word from the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, or any other major media outlet.

The latest projection shows massive fiscal deficits as far as the eye can see. In less than a dozen years, the CBO projects federal debt will exceed 100 percent of GDP. By the time today's 20 year-olds have reached middle age, the debt to GDP ratio will be 200 percent, a figure that would make Greece blush. But the truth is far worse than these figures convey. The truth is that our politicians have been very careful in their labeling of government receipts and payments so as to keep most of the coming bills associated with 'Take As You Go' off the books. Consider, for example, Uncle Sam's promises to pay me my Social Security and Medicare benefits starting in roughly 10 years. The present value (the value in the present) of these promises is $400,000. How does this differ from my holding a Treasury bond valued at $400,000? Fundamentally, it differs not at all, which means that the government has a lot more debt than it's reporting. How much more?

I'm not sure you want to know. I recently calculated the fiscal gap using the CBO's AFS forecast. The fiscal gap measures the present value difference between all projected future federal expenditures (including servicing official debt) and all projected future taxes. The fiscal gap is thus the true measure of our government's total indebtedness and the true measure of fiscal sustainability. How big is the fiscal gap? Brace yourself. It's $222 trillion large! In comparison, official debt in the public's hands is only $11 trillion.

Here's one way to wrap your head around our $222 trillion fiscal hole: closing it via tax hikes would require an immediate and permanent 64 percent increase in all federal taxes. Alternatively, the government could cut all transfer payments, e.g., Social Security benefits, and discretionary federal expenditures, e.g., defense expenditures, by 40 percent. Waiting to raise taxes or cut spending makes these figures worse. In short, our government is totally broke. And it's not broke in 30 years or in 20 years or in 10 years. It's broke today. There are radical polices to save the day at least cost to all generations. I've laid out these policies at www.thepurpleplans.org. Take a look, endorse the plans if you like them, and forward them to our two "leaders." There's always the chance that one of them will take a stand against fiscal child abuse.

To The Tune Of 222 Trillion Dollars!
2012 Means Something; At Least Something!

Read more »

Erev Rav and Their Money La La La, La La!

This Global Caste System is sickening. It is now a crime if you choose to be Human.

Haaretz.com:

Carl Philipp Gottfried von Clausewitz was an officer and strategist in the Prussian army. Among other things he coined the phrase, “War is just a continuation of policy by other means.” It seems his adage has been adopted by none other than U.S. president Barack Obama.

The president, who naturally wants to be re-elected to another term on November 6, embarked on a campaign which until recently would have been unthinkable in most democratic societies: a call for “class warfare.”

The class warfare that Obama describes is between Americans who are wealthy and those who are not, or the 1 percent against everyone else.

In the 2012 presidential campaign’s best video clip to date, we hear Republican candidate Mitt Romney singing “America the Beautiful” off-key against a photo backdrop of closed factories and tax shelters in Switzerland and the Caribbean.

That campaign, which has been very successful, attacks Romney point-blank as a wealthy businessman who closes companies for personal gain while stashing his millions in off-shore bank accounts.

Now Romney is on the defensive. He hasn't managed to present a credible story to voters, and Obama now leads in polls taken over the past few weeks in several key U.S. states.

If the president can do it, then yes, we can too. The U.S. media and influential pundits are no longer avoiding the class issue.

When the wealthiest one percent of the population pays the lowest marginal tax rate in 80 years, that is class warfare. When an investment fund manager (Mitt Romney, for example), pays an effective tax rate of 14 percent on annual profits totaling millions of dollars while a firefighters pays an effective tax rate of 28 percent on the merely tens of thousands of dollars he earns – well, then there is a class war going on in the U.S. Champions of inequality

The same applies here in Israel. Based on figures published by The Marker last week, it appears that Israel’s wealthiest 10 percent controls two-thirds of the capital in the Israeli economy.

Among corporate executives and the self-employed, the gap is even wider: the top 1 percent in this group earns 65 percent of total group income.

This is nothing new. A graph plotting the Gini coefficients of OECD countries (which represent national levels of income inequality) would show Israel in the worst part of the graph. Only Mexico and the U.S. have worse levels of inequality. And in recent years, the inequality gap has only widened from annually.

The winner? The rich, of course. The proposals to institute an inheritance tax have been shelved. The tax on exceptionally high income earners proposed by the Trajtenberg Committee was torpedoed.

Yet despite all this, the capital gains tax exemption for those who own multiple apartments and sell an apartment no more than once every four years has been reinstated. This is a tax benefit that only property owners enjoy. Yet in Israel, the class war is not only between the poor and the rich. In practice, a whole slew of wars is taking place simultaneously, and here they are. Young vs. old

When a country decides to increase its debts, it automatically lowers the standard of living of its young in order to preserve the standard of living of its older population. Why? Because the debts will be repaid in future decades by those who go out to work and pay income taxes, while those who reap the immediate benefits will be receiving their pensions in several years’ time. The issue is particularly trenchant in Europe, where national debts are sky-high, but Israel’s situation is no better. An analysis by the National Insurance Institute published last week in The Marker shows that over the past decade, Israel’s young people have been pushed to the bottom two deciles of Israeli income-earners.

How? It happened because of the erosion of government benefits, the rise in housing prices and the reduction in income tax rates, which largely benefits high income earners.

Daniel Gottlieb, the head of the NII’s research department, concluded that the economic distress of Israel’s young people has a real basis in the economic data. The price that today’s youth need to pay for their necessities has hit the stratosphere – and this is before taking into account all the taxes they will need to pay in order to cover the country’s obligations to its elder citizens. No wonder the social justice protests have not died down.

The winner? The elderly. The situation of Israeli youth will only improve if the government decides to cut its expenses, reduce its debts, balance the budget and reduce public-sector pensions. This is the exact opposite of what most young Israelis are shouting for as they demand bigger government and a bigger budget. Junior vs. senior public-sector employees

At first glance, the social contract that the public sector offers seems clear: a mediocre salary in return for job security, stability and maybe even some personal satisfaction from working for “the public good.” Big mistake.

While that is the deal that close to 80 percent of junior public-sector employees get, the deal for senior employees, the ones who are well connected and well established, is completely different. These high-ranking employees get high salaries (higher than those earned by professionals in the private sector), job security, a solid network of contacts, easy work that takes up only part of the day (after all, they still need some free time to engage in politics) and countless perks.

The winner? The well-established ones win, since they are the employees who control the committees and, through them, the country’s politicians. This 20 percent of senior public-sector employees possess a great deal of influence, and they concentrate their political firepower on one thing only: perpetuating the status quo.

Class warfare is also going on between the draftees and the career soldiers in the army, the police and the entire defense establishment. The arrangement here is almost identical to the one in the public sector, but more extreme. Career soldiers and high-ranking officers receive a generous budgetary pension and then retire to embark on a second career at a young age. Meanwhile, the actuarial pension liabilities for army retirees continue to climb rapidly. These actuarial liabilities have grown from NIS 80 billion some 12 years ago to NIS 256 billion today, a positively Brobdignagian burden for a country of Israel's size. Who will pay the bill? The people, that's who. The entire citizenry, including the people who serve in the army – whose service conditions will consequently deteriorate as time goes on.

Who wins? Whoever still has a non-contributory pension, which means they don't set aside a cent for their own retirement. The taxpayer pays the whole thing. Heirs of homes vs. everyone else

Every day, we see a new calculation demonstrating how difficult it is – impossible, actually – for young couples to buy a home in Israel without help from their parents. For example, the Migdal insurance group calculates that a young couple earning the average wage in Israel, about NIS 9,000 each, and managing to save about ten percent of their net income, would require about 295 monthly paychecks, or 25 years, to save the equity required to buy a home for NIS 1.5 million (assuming NIS 375,000 down, which is 30 percent of the price of the apartment).

A mortgage is no help: not only does the money have to be returned, but the interest must also be paid, and in the case of a 25-year mortgage, this means the amount to be repaid is double the price of the dwelling.

Thus two classes are being created: people whose parents gave them a home, and people whose parents didn't give them a home.

Who wins? Homeowners. The value of their property has begun to rise once more, and they receive special tax benefits when they realize their profits. The tycoons vs. business-sector entrepreneurs

When the tycoons and owners of holding companies claim that the economic concentration law and the “atmosphere in the country” are “harmful to businesses,” they are trying to do a media spin that is the complete opposite of reality. The separation between real and financial businesses, the dismantling of the corporate pyramids, the increase in the number of entrepreneurs who will do business with the state and reforms in non-competitive sectors – all of these will give a boost to new projects, the business sector and to medium and small businesses.

After all, the monopolies and oligopolies have succeeded in curbing potential competitors, while at the same getting their hands on the public’s long-term savings rather than investing in new businesses. In Israel, a fairly small club comprising several thousand tycoons, managers, directors, lawyers, accountants and consultants is being formed – and it is this club that will be holding the reins in the business sector.

We may well be seeing the members of this club in the gossip columns of the financial section every single day, as they keep on living it up.

And the winner? While the tycoons still have the advantage, if the economic concentration committee’s recommendations go through, competition among the banks and in the food and automobile industries will increase. If the general director of the Israel Antitrust Authority should carry out reforms and increase competition in other sectors, it is possible that entrepreneurs who own medium and small business will win out in the end.

The World is itching for Glabal Slavery.

...At least the Torah says Truth wins.

משיח בקרב ב''ה

Read more »

Yovel: The Great Shabbos Inching Near

Yovel:

In the Yovel, all is returned after 50 years (a time of Great Shabbos)

Look at the World: Everything has gone too far: Politics, Economy, Science, Technology, Entertainment,etc, etc...all are outdated and need a cosmic clock reset!

Since the World is now responding to Yovel like a baby who refuses to go to sleep, the World is literally inching along.

Bailouts -inching; needs reset
Elections -inching; needs overhaul
Policy -inching; needs reform (Constitution anyone?)
Science -inching; return to basic Physics?
Sports - inching ; needs to return to a purist's form
Technology - inching; needs overhaul and reset to align!

The old saying is: 20th Century infrastructure with 21st Century issues. The answer: reset the Clock! (Mayan Calendar anyone? And not as a dream, but rather a practical solution!)

As the need for reset weighs down, EVERYTHING is inching along...Assad, Iran, Obama, LHC, every sector of Wisdom.

The main point of this story is the bailout in the EU. Read the new2s, and yes Spain got a bailout. And yes this will work for even another few years with any luck. But when we take the Sof Zman for Geulah, yes, 5775 looks to be the last possible time, not because of a Zohar prediction, but can the World endure to 5776? -Good Luck!

In the meantime...life is inching by, Emunah is tested, but in the End, Torah wins...not some shady bailout scheme or promising the God Particle next year.
Eventually Moshiach will be everyone's solution, but by then we will all have succumbed to inching along, to which it is said: Moshiach will come by surprise...and this is getting more and more true each day, no matter how much Kavanah people seem to have (or seem to not have).

YahooNews:

Spain's grinding economic misery will get worse this year, despite the country's request for a European financial lifeline of up to €100 billion ($125 billion) to save its banks, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said Sunday.

A day after the country conceded it needed outside help following months of denying it would seek assistance, Rajoy said more Spaniards will lose their jobs in a country where one out of every four are already unemployed.

"This year is going to be a bad one," Rajoy said Sunday in his first comments about the rescue since it was announced the previous evening by his economy minister.

The conservative prime minister added that the economy, stuck in its second recession in three years, will still contract the previously predicted 1.7 percent in 2012 even with the help.

Spain on Saturday became the fourth — and largest — of the 17 countries that use Europe's common currency to request a bailout. This is a big blow to a nation that a few years ago took pride as the continent's economic superstar only to see it become the hot spot in the eurozone debt crisis. Its economy is the eurozone's fourth largest after Germany, France and Italy.

Although Spain has not yet said how much money it would seek, the Eurogroup — finance ministers of the 17-country eurozone, of which Spain is a member — said in a statement Saturday that it was prepared to lend up to €100 billion. The funds, which will come from one of three pools of emergency financing eurozone countries can access, will be sent to the Spanish government's Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB), which would then use the money to strengthen the country's teetering banks.

Across the country, Spaniards reacted with a mixture of anger and relief to the news. The full amount of the eurogroup's lifeline amounts to €21,000 of new debt for each person — almost equal to the average salary in a country of 47 million where the unemployment rate for those under age 25 is 52 percent.

The country is already reeling from deep austerity cuts Rajoy has imposed over the last six months that have raised taxes, made it easier to hire and fire workers, and cut deep into cherished government programs, including education and national health care.

"It's obviously a shame," said civil servant Luisa Saraguren, 44, as she strolled on a sunny Sunday morning with her young daughter. "But this bailout was fully predictable, and the consequences of this help are going to be a lot bigger compared to the cuts we've been living with already."

Rajoy took pains to avoid the word bailout Sunday, saying Spain's rescue package is a line of credit that its most troubled banks will be able to tap. The assistance will not come with the outside control over government macroeconomic policy like that imposed Greece, Ireland and Portugal when their public finances were bailed out.

He said interest rates on the loans will be considerably lower than the rate near 7 percent that Spain has been forced to pay recently on the international debt markets, a level that forced the other countries to seek bailouts. The government will be responsible for collecting repayments from the banks, with interest, and returning the money to the Eurogroup, although interest rates and loan duration details have not yet been revealed.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Spain's debt to GDP ratio was more favorable that even Germany's, with Spain at 78 percent of GDP and Germany's at 82 percent.

"Spain is making the necessary reforms to improve its competitiveness and to limit its fiscal policy to a sustainable deficit. By the way, Spain's overall debt (ratio) is lower than Germany's," Schaeuble said.

The bailout also spurred Irish opposition finance spokesman Michael McGrath to criticize his government for not having negotiated better terms, saying it needed "to start fighting Ireland's corner in a more vigorous and forceful way."

Spain hopes to regain the economic credibility it has lost by shoring up its banks. This should result in credit being restored so businesses and individuals shut off from loans can start borrowing and the economy will grow again, Rajoy insisted, again without saying when.

Europe's widening recession and financial crisis have hurt companies and investors around the world. Providing a financial lifeline to Spanish banks is likely to relieve anxiety on the Spanish economy — which is five times larger than Greece's — and on markets concerned about the country's ability to pay its way.

Spain's government will make a formal approach for aid once independent audits of the country's banking industry have been carried out.

It is not yet clear whether the money will come from the EU's €440 billion European Financial Stability Facility, the new €500 billion European Stability Mechanism, or a combination of the two.

The deal is to be underwritten by the Spanish state, which will use the FROB as its mechanism to funnel the loan to banks in need. Opposition leader Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said he had discussed the loan with Rajoy and added that for it not to increase the national deficit the entire amount borrowed will have to be paid back to the treasury by the banks, "including the corresponding interests."

Economy minister Luis de Guindos said 30 percent of the banking system needed recapitalization. The IMF in its financial stability assessment report said, without listing names, that Spain's two large internationally active banks "are well diversified." It is understood that these are Banco Santander and BBVA.

It said seven former savings banks that have received state support "rely significantly on FROB for capital and liquidity support" and that other medium and small private sector banks which account for approximately 11 percent of domestic banking were also exposed to the real estate and construction sector.

Spain's financial problems are not due to Greek-style government over-spending. The country's banks, particularly its savings banks or "cajas," got caught up in the collapse of a real estate bubble in 2008 that got worse over the past four years. However, as Spain's leaders have struggled for a solution to their banking crisis, the country's borrowing costs have soared close to the level that forced the governments of Greece, Portugal and Ireland to seek rescues.

Some of Spain's banks are struggling with toxic real estate loans and assets amid fears the problem will get worse as more jobless people can't pay their mortgages. The Bank of Spain says the toxic loans and assets total around €180 billion. Nationalized lender Bankia SA, which has requested €19 billion in aid, has €32 billion in toxic assets. Around four other banks serving the domestic market were assessed by the IMF report to have large exposure to corporate and retail real estate lending.

"I could never get my mind round the scale of consumption in Spain over the past 20 years, having known it in the 1960s when it was still extremely poor," said Paul Preston, a history professor and expert on Spain with the London School of Economics. "Lots of people enjoyed the consumer boom, but not everybody. Now everybody's having to pay for it."

Rajoy blamed Spain's woes on the previous Socialist administration of Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero without mentioning him or his government by name. Zapatero was ousted by Rajoy in a landslide in November by voters outraged over the Socialist handling of the economy.

"Last year Spain's public administration spent €90 billion more than it took in. This can't be maintained. We can't live like that," Rajoy said.

But Socialist Party leader Rubalcaba said Rajoy should acknowledge that Spain is now in bailout territory.

"The government is trying to make us believe that we've won the lottery, that the Three Kings of Orient have arrived, and that isn't so," Rubalcaba said.

After his news conference, Rajoy defended his decision to jet off an hour later to Poland to see Spain's famed national football team take on Italy in the Euro 2012 competition. He said he would be on the ground in Gdansk only for the game before flying back to Madrid on Sunday night.

"I'll be there 2 ½ hours and then I'll leave," Rajoy said. "I think the national team deserves it."

Rajoy was seen cheering as Cesc Fabregas equalized to give Spain a 1-1 draw against Italy.

The Problems are mounting....and solutions are decaying...and Moshiach is delaying.

From here onwards, perhaps Emunah is rising?

Read more »

The Golden Empire of Doom: Esav and Yishmael

..."And the Gold of the Land was Good."
...[of the 8th Edomite King] ( representing Geulah) "Bat Mei Zahav" -  (end letters=Bayit/House) : What is Gold? (Rashi) :The wealthy who have so much no longer recognize Gold. (interestingly enough it is hinting towards "Houses" i.e. housing crisis.

The Torah is adamant about Gold in many places..why is it so "good?"



GwinnettDailyOnline:

According to a select group of global analysts, the price of gold will more than likely double by the end of Q3 and could quite possibly approach the $5k per ounce level near year's end. This bold forecast has very little to do with dismal economic performance in US markets, although re-election of current US leadership in November is expected to help it along significantly. The actual cause of this predicted trend lies primarily with European leadership's unwillingness to take the bold steps necessary to repair the colossal problems with their debt. Most analysts agree that the floundering has gone on far too long and decision makers are far too comfortable with allowing correction opportunities to expire time and time again. Those who are in a position to make the tough decisions to salvage what little opportunity remains continue to do what they've been doing - which is nothing. They have their riches stashed away to live out their lives in the comforts of wealth. They refuse to be saddled with the legacy of the financial mess that's been festering for so long. The responsibility of the future will fall upon new shoulders after the current heads of state step down and retire. By then, the new individuals will be begging Germany to come to their aid at just about any cost. Only then, things will have gotten so bad that Germany will be demanding all of each country’s gold reserves and that’s just the beginning. It will seem like Germany is getting the old band back together – only without the violence and destruction. It will be at this point that the multitudes are expected to abandon near worthless paper currency for a gold-based economy and demand is expected to drive the price in excess of $5,000 per ounce within the year. This is the forecast that the aforementioned analysts are predicting and by the looks of the lack of any meaningful progress with Euro Debt - it's difficult to argue differently.

YahooNews:

Spain became the fourth and largest country to ask Europe to rescue its failing banks, a bailout of up to €100 billion ($125 billion) that leaders hoped would stabilize a financial crisis that threatens to break apart the 17-country eurozone.

The rescue offer follows growing pressure from international investors and the Obama administration and comes a week before elections in Greece, whose voters could decide whether the country leaves the euro.

Europe's widening recession and financial crisis has hurt companies and investors around the world. Providing a financial lifeline to Spanish banks is likely to relieve anxiety on the Spanish economy — which is five times larger than Greece's — and on markets concerned about the country's ability to pay its way.

"What the markets are looking for is essentially the Spanish government's acceptance that its banks are broke," said Jacob Kirkegaard, a research fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, Saturday.

Economy Minister Luis de Guindos announced the deal after an emergency conference call with eurozone financial leaders. He said the aid will go to the banking sector only and would not come with new austerity conditions attached for the economy in general — conditions that have been an integral part of previous bailouts to Portugal, Ireland and Greece.

The exact figure of the bailout has not yet been decided. De Guindos said the country is waiting until independent audits of the country's banking sector have been carried out before asking for a specific amount. The audits are expected June 21 at the latest.

De Guindos did say, however, that Spain would request enough money for recapitalization, plus a safety margin that will be "significant."

With markets in turmoil, de Guindos said the government's efforts to shore up the financial sector "must be completed with the necessary resources to finance the needs of recapitalization."

Finance ministers of the 17 countries that use the euro said the money would be fed directly into a fund Spain set up to recapitalize its banks, but underscored that the Spanish government is ultimately responsible for the loan.

Still, that plan allows Spain to avoid making the onerous commitments that Greece, Ireland and Portugal were forced to when they sought their rescues. Instead, the eurogroup statement said that it expected Spain's banking sector to implement reforms and that Spain would be held to its previous commitments to reform its labor market and manage its deficit.

The eurogroup statement said that meant the cost could reach €100 billion.

The Spanish acceptance of aid for its banks is a big embarrassment for Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who insisted just 10 days ago that the banking sector would not need a bailout. He was elected in November and walked right into a hurricane.

International pressure on Spain to solve its financial problems has grown more urgent in recent weeks. On Thursday ratings agency Fitch hit Spain with a three-notch downgrade of its credit rating. That left it two levels above junk status. Then on Friday, Moody's Investor Services warned it could downgrade Spain and other countries in the eurozone.

The International Monetary Fund early Saturday released a report estimating that Spanish banks need a recapitalization injection of at least €40 billion ($50 billion) following a stress test it performed on the country's financial sector. That report came out three days ahead of schedule, underscoring the urgency of the situation.

And U.S. President Barack Obama, facing re-election, enduring a weak economy and in need of strong trading partners, expressed strong concern late Friday over the European economic crisis.

U.S Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner welcomed Spain's decision and the offer of European support, describing them as "important for the health of Spain's economy and as concrete steps on the path to financial union, which is vital to the resilience of the euro area."

French Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici said the deal would "contribute to restoring confidence in the eurozone."

"The accord announced tonight speaks to a reinforced solidary among the countries of the eurozone and to their resolute desire to ensure its stability," he said in a statement.

Spain's financial problems are not due to Greek-style government over-spending. The country's banks got caught up in the collapse of a real estate bubble. However, as Spain's leaders have struggled for a solution to their banking crisis, the country's borrowing costs have soared close to the level that forced the governments of Greece, Portugal and Ireland to seek rescues.

Some of Spain's banks are struggling with by toxic real estate loans and assets. The Bank of Spain says they total around €180 billion. Nationalized lender Bankia, SA, which has requested €19 billion in aid, has €32 billion in toxic assets. Around four other banks are considered prime candidates for bailouts. De Guindos said Saturday the sector is largely solid and the euro zone package will be funnel toward only about 30 percent of it.

Analyst Rafael Pampillon if IE Business School in Madrid said the bailout addressed the uncertainty the markets had felt about how Spain's debt-laden banking sector would recapitalize.

"This uncertainty, and hence the panic, will slowly dissipate from the markets," he said. Pampillon added that with polls forecasting a pro-Euro victory in Greek elections, markets would be further relieved because the austerity conditions imposed on Greece would most likely be fulfilled.

Eswar Prasad, a Cornell University trade policy professor and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said the decision "buys some temporary breathing room for the eurozone."

Moody's said Spain's banking problem is largely confined to that country and not likely to spill over to other eurozone nations, with the exception of Italy — where the European Central Bank has already stepped in to buy government bonds as a way to help lower the country's borrowing costs.

Spain has been criticized for being too slow to set out a roadmap to resolve its problem. European business leaders and analysts have stressed that Spain must find a solution quickly so that it is not caught up in any market turmoil sparked by the June 17 Greek elections. There are concerns that anti-bailout left-wing party Syriza could become the largest party in the Greek parliament, putting the country's membership in the eurozone at risk.

Working in Spain's favor is the fact that its public debt is actually quite low, at 68.5 percent of its gross domestic product at the end of 2011.

Its debt is predicted to hit 78 percent by the end of the year, but even that figure would be below the debt-to-GDP ratios of Europe's strongest economy, Germany, which is at 82 percent.

But Spain's in its second recession in three years, with unemployment at nearly 25 percent and little hope for improvement this year. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's government has imposed a wave of austerity measures since he took office in December that have raised taxes, made it cheaper to hire and fire workers and cut government funding for education and health care.

There is an Economic Black Hole gorging on Earth.  The fears that people had with the LHC was that it could spawn a Black Hole. With Comet Elenin, it was thought that its effect on Earth was through "Mazal." {Am Yisrael is ABOVE Mazal} -

Is Mankind acting out "The End of Days" and "Doom" through Mazal - based- actions? If the World is susceptible to such behavior, and if the Age of Aquarius is upon Mankind, i.e. the Messianic Age, then  Man, who is the vessel of Creation, could be the instrument to identify doom, trends, and most importantly -NOVELTY.

We are seeing Yishmael fall, Edom collapse, Zion rising, all NOVEL...while the doom seems to be getting less and less?! There will be Doom, but perhaps Men of Mazal will depict the Divine Broadway that ultimately will begin telling the story of Redemption.

To be amongst Bnei-Torah in these times, with Wisdom of Torah {and being Above Mazal} provides an objective lens of which to observe what the World is doing. When we open our eyes, and gaze at the ruins of Olam HaZeh, the things we were told and that we fear of (or expect) are/is happening right before us! 

...as the Chofetz Chaim said: "if you ponder the Bias Moshiach you will feel it. If you do not ponder it, you will feel nothing at all."

There is plenty of Novelty to Ponder. Our job is to find it, connect to it, and remove the veil of Geulah, so the Shechinah can shine forth, and lay witness for all of Mankind!

Read more »