should I panic now?

SHOULD I PANIC NOW?


We’ve covered this a few times before. Perhaps not as many times as Rawles telling his legions ( who, granted outnumber mine 35 to 1 but who are pasty marshmallow Yuppies so we could probably take them easy ) to buy nickels. That wonderful investment you have to have the energy to melt down to utilize and is more likely than not to NOT be accepted universally as a trade unit ( pre-1982 pennies are copper. The copper in a nickel won’t be recognized or desired by most folks you will trade with- or so I’m assuming. I could be wrong ). But I’m telling you again that you should panic. And when I only see one percent of you A YEAR buying grain grinders I’ll just keep assuming you need to hear it again sooner than you would like ( and, no, I don’t think you all already have grinders- I might have just fallen off the turnip truck and hit my head, but I wasn’t born yesterday ).

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Retail prices of gasoline just went up about 8% in the last two weeks. This isn’t like the Memorial Day merchants profiting off an increase in demand as in the past. This is pricing in the slight possibility that the middle east will continue to see turmoil ( and if it was a price difference reflecting a larger possibility chances are you couldn’t afford the stuff ). Now Libya has joined the list of those nations seeing mass civil unrest. When places like Greece see civil unrest it is just a bunch of fat whores protesting their government welfare check isn’t big enough. The protests are token, as serious violence has been bred out of them. When a third world crap hole sees unrest, it usually means that the legions of permanently unemployed youth have massed enough numbers that the secret police can’t contain things any longer. Forget democracy and all the rest of that horse crap. Serious issues like food are behind this and it will shake up entrenched powers and upset the US Empire applecart. Which is why a mere 10% price increase in crude is a drop in the potential bucket.

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As I told you before, we peaked in 1999 in coal. We might have 80% ( or whatever, I’m pulling this out of my butt ) of our coal left, never having seriously depleted our stocks since we for all practical purposes went from wood, barely stopped at coal and then went to oil. But we’ve also used a lot of coal to generate our electricity. We’ll continue to use even more. When you go from producing 90% of your own oil down to 30%, even after adding Alaska and Gulf oil to the potential pool, of course you are going to start using more coal and natural gas. But the catch is that on an energy return basis, we’ve already used half our coal ten years ago. The coal left, even if it is a lot, contains so little energy compared to what we are used to getting that it takes much more to generate the same energy. Hence, coal BTU peaked ten years ago. Coal can’t save us, and the fabled North Dakota oil coming on line won’t even stay even with our import declines ( and all our importing countries are unstable and/or already terrorist targets- except Canada but wouldn’t it be a hoot if China helped destabilize Quebec to harm us? ).

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Again, to repeat, we now import 60% of our silver. It used to be 6% not too long ago. Add in the derivative market shenanigans and I don’t think we’ll see a repeat of the Hunt brothers smack down getting the price back under control. It is now a question of true supply disruption. Since silver is the only thing poor people can afford to insulate themselves from inflation ( I’m talking about non-doomers. Yes, wheat is much better, but doomers aren’t even 1/100th of one percent of the affluent countries populations ) and since the world has a lot more population then it did in 1980, especially in countries that traditionally see mass ownership of silver amongst the poor, silver will in all probability keep going up. As I said before about gold, the price is more than likely being manipulated. It keeps dropping one hundred bucks an ounce quickly, then ever so slowly inching back up to make up for all the loses, and then that is the new floor on the price. Too fishy to be natural. But if gold is being manipulated by the big players, I still think silver is truer to supply and demand. Far less regular folks ever own gold.

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I’ve told you for, what? Six months? More? The global food supply is getting seriously whacked by weather. Before, it was one major grain region at a time and all the unaffected ones made up the difference. Global grain trade really did help keep famine problems localized mostly to Africa ( I don’t know why we collectively crap on that continent so much ). But now almost all grain regions are being hurt by weather. I don’t care if it is from Gore Warming or a weird event like the 1930’s Dust Bowl. The weather has already gotten bad enough that food security is in jeopardy. Despite years of record breaking production, population is increasing more. Add in weird weather and fundamentally ZERO reserves and what does that spell? For the US, baring transportation fuel issues, just much higher prices. Not famine. But when your fifty pound sack of wheat kernels goes from $12 to $32, how many of you can afford to stockpile that grain for your own food stockpile? Get your Gott Damn wheat stockpiled now, while you can afford it. Jesus Crapping Christ On A Friggin Pogo Stick!! If weather events don’t screw you, increased inflation will. Now what about increased costs associated with oil? I might be much too Pollyannaish with my guess of $32 a sack. Get the stuff now, it won’t get any cheaper.

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If you have a family of four, and you buy everyone a years supply of wheat, two Russian bolt guns, a water filter and a grinder, you won’t spend much more than a thousand bucks ( $24 a hundred pounds, times 16 is $400. Add buckets for about $150. Two rifles $200, 800 rounds of ammo $200. A filter $50, a grinder $25 ). Seriously? You can’t find this in savings? Charge it on a card for $100 a month for a year? Sell enough crap? This is Mission Impossible for you? You do realize that increased unemployment, increased inflation, rising food prices, credit contraction and a never recovering economy mean this is just going to continue to get harder the longer you wait.

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