The gold miners’ stocks have had a wild ride this month, surging then plunging. After hitting new upleg highs, the leading gold-stock benchmark collapsed in a sharp drawdown. That gutted bullish sentiment, bringing back worried bearishness. But despite that big swing, the uptrend of gold stocks’ young upleg remains intact. This sector is still marching higher on balance with gold, a bullish omen for further gains.
Gold-ETF Selling Slows
One of gold’s primary drivers is American stock-market capital sloshing into and out of gold through major exchange-traded funds. Their sustained inflows and outflows partially fuel gold’s bull-market uplegs and corrections. Interestingly the differential gold-ETF-share selling that exacerbated gold’s recent correction is greatly slowing. Gold’s next upleg depends on those capital flows reversing to buying, accelerating its gains.
Gold’s largest and most-popular exchange-traded funds are increasingly coming to dominate gold price trends. Cheap and easy to trade, they act as direct conduits for the vast pools of stock-market capital to access gold. Stock traders use these gold-ETF shares to instantly gain or shed gold exposure in their portfolios. The collective capital flows through gold ETFs are responsible for ever-more of gold’s price action.
WUWT Retrospective Post
By Rud Istvan – Re-Blogged From WUWT
My first recent ‘ruminative’ post was about basic climate science misconceptions. My second was about their resulting failed basic climate predictions over now 4 decades (e.g. Viner 2000–children will soon not know snow!). This third ruminative post (celebrating roughly my 10th WUWT anniversary post here) introspects climate ‘science’ misconduct in the dubious service of posts 1&2.
Like my first here long ago, just more examples like that first, decade old provable NRC US crop canard.
Some Interesting Facts About Covid in Sweden.
By: Jan Kjetil Andersen – Re-Blogged From WUWT`
Sweden has some good stuff. One of them is SCB, Statistics Central Bureau, a jewel for statistic geeks.
Sweden has also made headlines because of their alternative non-lockdown policy during the pandemic, so let’s take a look on some numbers.
A table of special interest in these pandemic times is the weekly mortality rate, and even more interesting is it when we compare that with the Worldometer Covid statistics.
I base the statistics on reports from December 5th but make a cutoff on November 15th to avoid errors because of late reported deaths. According to the information from SCB, no significant changes occur on data more two to three weeks old. We can therefore trust the data up to November 15 as accurate.
Fed Misleading The Public About Inflation
Did the Federal Reserve just usher in the next phase of the U.S. dollar’s decline?
On Wednesday, the central bank recommitted to leaving its benchmark interest rate near zero for the foreseeable future.
Fed officials also vowed to keep pumping cash into financial markets.
Send the Paris Climate Treaty to the Senate
[Being sick still is not much fun. Sorry for the missed days. –Bob}]
The most far-reaching international agreement ever must get Senate advice, consent and vote
By Paul Driessen – Re-Blogged From WUWT
Article II, Section 2 of the US Constitution is simple and direct: “The President … shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present concur.” It served America well for 225 years.
Then, in 2015, the UN’s “international community” of climate activists gathered in Paris to hammer out language requiring that developed nations slash their fossil fuel use, tighten greenhouse gas emission targets every five years, and become “carbon neutral” within a few decades – to prevent a manmade climate chaos forecast by computer models but not supported by Earth history or real-world evidence.
Role of Weather on December 7th, 1941
By Paul Dorian – Re-Blogged From WUWT
Actual hourly weather observations shown here as recorded by the weather observer at Hickam Field in Honolulu, Hawaii on the morning of December 7, 1941. The highlighted text appears to say “obstructions to visibility at this (scribbled)” and then what appears to be the word “terrified”. The obstruction to visibility at this time could have been “smoke”. The weather observer on this day was PFC Sherman Levine of the US Air Corps and he died during the attack, likely a few minutes after completing the last observation on this small slip of paper. For more on the life of PFC Sherman Levine, click here.
Overview
The weather on Oahu, Hawaii in the early morning hours of Sunday, December 7th, 1941 was not at all unusual for the time of year with mild temperatures and mainly clear skies. Unfortunately, the weather conditions on that particular day would play a role in the bombing of the U.S. naval base by Japanese fighter planes at Pearl Harbor near Honolulu, Hawaii. As Japanese fighters crossed the Pacific Ocean, they were given hope that their mission would succeed when the announcement was made of “clouds mostly over the mounts…visibility good”. It is believed that the decision to attack on that particular day had plenty to do with the projected favorable weather conditions.
Pearl Harbor is in the “rain-shadow” of the Koolau Range on the south side of Oahu
Discussion
In 1941, Hawaii was a territory of the US with statehood some eighteen years away. As early as the 1870’s, the US military had scoped out the islands for commercial and defensive potential and decided that Pearly harbor on the south side of Oahu about ten miles northwest of Honolulu fit the bill. With the persistent trade winds blowing from the northeast most of the year, this particular part of Oahu is in the rain shadow of the Koolau Range. While clouds and rain are common in the Koolau Range, the downsloping winds tend to dry out for southern side of the island. In fact, Honolulu averages only about 17 inches of rainfall in a given year due to the drying effects of the downsloping winds.
On the morning of December 7th, 1941, the weather observer at Hickam Field in Honolulu reported mainly clear skies each hour with mild temperatures and light east-to-northeast winds. There was nothing that would obstruct fighter pilots lines of sight, no heavy cloud cover and no heavy rains to make flight difficult on that fateful day. After crossing the rough waters of the North Pacific, the Japanese fighter pilots in more than 350 planes reported seeing a “long white line of coast” referring to Oahu’s Kakuku Point (according to National Geographic, AccuWeather). In summary, as far as the weather was concerned, all was favorable for the attack that had been planned “many days or even weeks in advance” according to President Roosevelt in his famous speech given on the following day.
Though the US suffered greatly on that particular morning due in large part to the generally clear sky conditions, the weather actually played an important indirect beneficial role for the nation. The USS Enterprise (CV-6) was coming back to Pearl Harbor from Wake Island and was actually scheduled to arrive on the morning of December 7th, but it was delayed due to high winds and rough seas. According to the former director for the US Naval Institute, Paul Stillwell, “the vessel was behind schedule returning to Pearl Harbor, and because of this was not present for the attack. The Enterprise played a substantial role throughout the remainder of the war, and had it been in port that day, things may have been very different.”
Aerial view of USS Enterprise at sea in 1945 (courtesy Wikipedia)
USS Enterprise (CV-6) was the seventh U.S. Navy vessel to bear the name. Colloquially called “The Big E”, she was the sixth aircraft carrier of the United States Navy. A Yorktown-class carrier, she was launched in 1936 and was one of only three American carriers commissioned before World War II to survive the war. Had the mighty vessel made it back to Pearl Harbor on schedule, she would have been engaged by Japanese fighters and likely damaged or destroyed. As it turned out, the USS Enterprise earned enough commendations (20 Battle Stars) to become the most decorated US ship in World War II.
Land Mines
When the market cap of equities reaches 183% of GDP and gov’t bonds yield near 0%, or even less overseas, the notion that one can just buy and hold a balanced portfolio is extremely dangerous. The minefield is not packed with IEDs, it is actually replete with tactical nukes.
One of those land mines would be the failure to keep government open and pass more stimulus. I have no special insight here except D.C. is famous for brinkmanship but always opts to spend more money in the end. Another problem would be the failure to have a peaceful transfer of power come Jan. 20th. Also, the failure of vaccines to prove to be safe, effective and long lasting would blow the whole recovery mantra sky high.
Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #434
The Week That Was: December 5, 2020
Brought to You by www.SEPP.org, The Science and Environmental Policy Project
By Ken Haapala, President,
Quote of the Week: Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thought-crime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten. . . . The process will still be continuing long after you and I are dead. Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller. Even now, of course, there’s no reason or excuse for committing thought-crime. It’s merely a question of self-discipline, reality-control. But in the end there won’t be any need even for that. . . . Has it ever occurred to you, Winston, that by the year 2050, at the very latest, not a single human being will be alive who could understand such a conversation as we are having now?” – George Orwell, 1984 https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/450328-don-t-you-see-that-the-whole-aim-of-newspeak-is
Hamburg, Germany Shuts Down a 5 Year Old Coal Plant
By Eric Worrall – Re-Blogged From WUWT
h/t Krishna Gans – According to the German climate website Kalte Sonne, the renewables obsessed German and city of Hamburg governments intend to shut down local coal and nuclear power plants, but have no serious plan to make up the resulting energy shortfall.
Ottawa’s Latest Climate Plan Bet
By Burgess Langshaw – Re-Blogged From WUWT
The Trudeau government has tabled a bill that, if passed, would legally bind Canada to achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick
Last week, the federal government released its long awaited plan to tackle greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. Bill C-12, if passed, commits Canada to “binding” targets every five years as of 2030 with the goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.
The bill is thin on details, due to its focus on establishing an independent 15-member advisory board. This is both a strength, in that it will hopefully include climate scientists, Indigenous people and other expert stakeholders, and a weakness, because it pushes the timeline for specific measures and action further into the future, with 2030 the first target date.
Slight, Beneficial Warming From More Carbon Dioxide!
By David Wojick, Ph.D. – Re-Blogged From WUWT
Exhaustive study finds more CO2 and water molecules will not cause dangerous warming
Precision research by physicists William Happer and Willem van Wijngaarden has determined that the current levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide and water vapor are “saturated.” In radiation physics that means adding more CO2 or water molecules will bring modest warming that will benefit plant growth, and thus all life on Earth. More CO2 and H2O will not cause dangerous warming.
From this point forward, emissions from burning fossil fuels will bring little additional global warming, and what does occur will improve forests, grasslands and agriculture. There is no climate emergency.
Sue & Settle to Impose Green New Deal
By CHRIS HORNER – Re-Blogged From WUWT
Activists who came up with plan now on Biden EPA transition team
As reported in the Wall Street Journal, a trail of emails between progressive state attorneys generals (AG) offices and former Obama-Biden and career Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials – obtained over nine months by Energy Policy Advocates’ dogged public record requests – reveal a plan to use the courts to impose the “climate” agenda early in the next administration, skipping Congress. The chosen approach is even more aggressive than the disastrous and politically unattainable “Green New Deal” (now rebranded as “Net Zero”) and was previously rejected by the Obama EPA and green activists as too extreme.
The plan is for an otherwise Obama-like move: an end-run around the democratic process, avoiding political sign-off or accountability for what would be a massive, painful and ideological restructuring of the U.S. economy.
Hannibal Trap
Is the global investment world about to be caught in the Hannibal trap?
Hannibal was considered as one of the greatest military tacticians and generals in history. He was a master of strategy and regularly led his enemies into excruciating defeats.
The trap that investors are now being led into has many similarities with Hannibal’s strategy in his victory over the Romans at Lake Trasimene in 217 BC.
Hannibal was a general and statesman from Carthage (now Tunisia) who successfully fought against the Romans in the Second Punic War.
Continue reading
853,000 Americans Filed New Unemployment Claims Last Week
Many more Americans filed new unemployment claims last week than during the previous week, as a resurgence in COVID-19 cases heading into the winter led to more business-constraining social distancing restrictions and pushed more people out of work.
The Department of Labor released its weekly report on new jobless claims Thursday morning at 8:30 a.m. ET. Here were the main results in the report, compared to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg:
- Initial jobless claims, week ended Dec. 5: 853,000 vs. 725,000 expected and a revised 716,000 during the prior week
- Continuing claims, week ended Nov. 28: 5.757 million vs. 5.210 million expected and a revised 5.527 million during the prior week
Gold Green-Lights Miners
The gold miners’ stocks are finally perking up again, after spending months slogging through a grinding correction. Contrarian traders are taking notice, starting to redeploy capital in this high-potential sector. Gold miners’ earnings and thus stock prices are overwhelmingly driven by gold’s fortunes. And the yellow metal’s recent technicals are signaling a mature correction, green-lighting gold stocks’ next major upleg.
Bull markets are an alternating series of uplegs followed by corrections, for every few steps forward there is always one step back. These periodic selloffs are essential for bulls’ health and longevity, rebalancing sentiment and technicals before they get too overheated. Popular greed growing too extreme early in bulls will prematurely slay them. All available near-term buying is sucked in, exhausting capital inflows and upside.
Joe Biden Wants a Huge New Tax on Gun Owners
Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article.
Joe Biden’s gun policy platform offers support for almost all conceivable forms of government restrictions on the Second Amendment. This includes bans and restrictions on sales, expansion of registration and background checks, expansion of buyback programs and gun-grabbing statutes, and the closing of all sorts of “loopholes.”1
While we are only at the policy platform stage, where proposals are grandiose and imprecise, Biden’s legislative agenda will clearly be anti–Second Amendment and not a program to reduce crime and violence. First, he wants to stop the “gun violence epidemic” with restriction on rifles when it is handgun shootings, not rifles, that are a problem and one that is mostly confined to big cities controlled by leftists. Second, he wants to go after “assault weapons” and “weapons of war” when he should know that rifles like the AK and AR “sporters” are not military-grade fully automatic weapons. Third, he would like to hold gun manufacturers civilly liable for criminal acts committed with guns, a move which would shut down the industry, the true goal.
How the Left Sees the World: Power, Race, and Class
How do those on the Left determine right from wrong? Since Marx, they’ve relied on a formula based on status, skin color, and wealth. But is that the way to reach a moral conclusion? Dennis Prager uses Israel and the United States to provide an illuminating perspective on this question.
Please watch the VIDEO
Millions of Hungry Americans Turn to Food Banks for 1st Time
By Associated Press – Re-Blogged From Headline Wealth
Volunteers distribute food to people who waited in line in their cars overnight, at a food distribution point in Metairie, La.. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
looking for work, his wife needed surgery, then the virus began eating away at her work hours and her paycheck.
The Crawfords had no savings, mounting bills and a growing dread: What if they ran out of food? The couple had two boys, 5 and 10, and boxes of macaroni and cheese from the dollar store could go only so far.
A 37-year-old Navy vet, Crawford saw himself as self-reliant. Asking for food made him uncomfortable. “I felt like I was a failure,” he says. “It’s this whole stigma … this mindset that you’re this guy who can’t provide for his family, that you’re a deadbeat.”
Hunger is a harsh reality in the richest country in the world. Even during times of prosperity, schools hand out millions of hot meals a day to children, and desperate elderly Americans are sometimes forced to choose between medicine and food.
Biden’s coming China headache: Climate change and “Developing Countries”
By Roland Gross – Re-Blogtged From Climate Science Press
Regime survival, China’s red line, is predicated on meeting the material aspirations of ordinary citizens, the only source of legitimacy afforded to unelected governments throughout history.
A Biden presidency, which now seems most likely, will have plenty on its foreign policy plate, ranging from relations with Russia, China and Europe to the Iran question in the Middle East. But it is likely that global climate change policy, especially in relation to China’s position in it, will be among the most contentious challenges it will face in international diplomacy.
Inflation Is Back, Big-Time
The conventional view of inflation is that it’s not only low, but dangerously low and in need of aggressive encouragement.
But that view is becoming increasingly hard to defend, given all the things that are soaring in price. Consider:
Gold In the Season Of Santa, Milk And Cookies
STORY AT A GLANCE – week ending November 27:
- Gold prices made a significant low during November or December in 8 of the last ten years. Gold prices are low and over-sold as of Nov. 27.
- The gold to S&P 500 ratio shows gold is inexpensive compared to the S&P over four decades of history.
- Gold and silver price lows are due now—which means between mid-November and late December. Now, or soon.
- The GDX to gold price ratio bottomed in 2016. Expect gold to rally and gold stocks to rise faster in the coming years.
- Stocks are making new highs. Craziness in politics and monetary policy are “off the charts.” Beware the consequences of both.
Middle East Oil and Gas At The Cross-Roads under a Biden Presidency
By Dr. Tilak K. Doshi – Re-Blogged From WUWT
The Middle East is at the cross-roads, and policy choices made by a future Biden presidency will play a critical role in the outlook for the region’s oil and gas producers. As was apparent through the election campaigning, the contrast in Republican and Democratic world-views over fossil fuels and global energy geopolitics could not be starker. Joe Biden’s pledge to “transition away from the oil industry” in his last debate with Trump put climate change concerns as the top policy priority. He is more committed than any previous presidential nominee to take radical policy actions against the so-called “climate crisis”.
Republican State Legislatures are Positively Correlated with Obesity, Democrat Legislatures with Death from #Coronavirus
By David Stienmier – Re-Blogged From WUWT
I’ve had this data for a month or so now and I’ve been trying to decide what to say about it. I assumed someone else would show this somewhere first and I could resume my quiet observation. But I haven’t seen it anywhere and with everyone talking about locking down again I decided I should at least put it out there with minimum comment. So here it is.
Lockdowns are intended to reduce the spread of cases and therefore the number of deaths. A known side effect of the lockdowns is an increase in unemployment. So we should be able to use the increase in unemployment as a proxy for how hard a state locked down. Figure 1 shows how cases relate to lockdown intensity as measured by unemployment. There appears to be very little relationship, but maybe it reduces the number of cases slightly.
Gold-Stock Correction Matures
The gold miners’ stocks have suffered a correction since early August, gutting traders’ enthusiasm for this contrarian sector. This necessary and healthy selloff is maturing, after largely accomplishing its essential mission of rebalancing sentiment and technicals. The universal greed and extreme overboughtness plaguing gold stocks as their last upleg peaked has been reversed, paving the way for their next bull upleg.
Since corrections are challenging to weather psychologically, most traders hate them. But they are an integral part of secular bulls, which are ultimately an alternating series of uplegs followed by corrections. By preventing sentiment and technicals from terminally overheating, these corrections greatly extend bull markets’ longevity. Without rebalancing selloffs, bulls would rocket parabolic soon exhausting potential buying.
Proof That Trickle-Down Never Even Dribbled Down
Want to see a crystal-clear picture of who has been helped the most by decades of trickle-down economics, who has gone nowhere and who has actually gone slightly downhill? Well, here you go:
Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #432
The Week That Was: 2020-11-21 (EPP (www.SEPP.org,
By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real. If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet.” — Niels Bohr (1885-1962)
Number of the Week: 75% and 145%
Greenhouse Continued: For the past several weeks TWTW has described work by W. A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer (W & H), on the thermal radiation of the five most abundant greenhouse gases. The most abundant greenhouse gas, water vapor, and the second most abundant, carbon dioxide, are extremely saturated. This means it would take major increases in the concentrations of these gases in the atmosphere to have a significant impact on global temperatures. For carbon dioxide to have a significant impact on temperatures, it would require burning of more coal and oil than are known to exist. [There is enough CH4 in methane clathrates on the continental shelf to provide 3,000 years of all 2020 energy.]
Preventing Future Forest Infernos
Getting past the climate scapegoat, and taking steps that could actually make a difference
By Paul Driessen – Re-Blogged From WUWT
The 2020 fire season is nearing its end. But monstrous wildfires continue to rage across America’s western states, devastating towns and habitats, and killing hundreds of people and millions of animals. Politicians and environmentalists continue to rage that climate change is the primary factor, allowing few responsible, commonsense forest management actions that could actually reduce the risks.
Manmade climate change is a convenient scapegoat, but it cannot be separated from natural climate fluctuations and effects. Moreover, even assuming fossil fuel emissions play a dominant role in the human portion of this equation – and even if the Pacific Northwest or entire USA eliminated coal, oil and natural gas – China, India and scores of other nations will not do so anytime soon.
The Great Reset
[Sick of Being Sick: I’ve been out of commission again, and I’d beter not speculate on how long this round of feeling well will last. Let’s just say that, I’ll post as I can. You know my usual resources, so if you need additional articles, feel free to go to the source(s). Thanks for understanding. –Bob]
There are now two entirely different notions of a coming “reset”. One has been popular among those who speculate on the gold price. They expect a revaluation of the dollar. However, the government does not set the value of the dollar. So there is no way to reset the value. Indeed, the government has been trying to push down the value of the dollar for over a decade, and mostly failing (because increasing quantity is not the same thing as decreasing value).
Gold Mid-Tiers’ Q3’20 Fundamentals
The mid-tier gold miners’ stocks are in this sector’s sweet spot for upside potential. After a spectacular run since March’s stock panic, they have been correcting since early August. That is doing its necessary work of rebalancing sentiment, paving the way for the next bull upleg. Higher prevailing gold prices have proven a huge fundamental windfall for mid-tiers, as their latest quarterly operating and financial results reveal.
Mid-tier gold miners produce between 300k to 1m ounces of gold annually, more than smaller juniors but less than larger majors. Mid-tiers are far less risky than juniors, and amplify gold’s uplegs much more than majors. Their unique mix of sizable diversified gold production, material output-growth potential, and smaller market capitalizations is ideal for outsized gains. They are the best gold stocks for traders to own.
The Global Reset Scam
[This is a darker post than I usually send your way. It deals not only with inflation & hyperinflation but also currency collapse and what it might look like on the other side (actually quite optimistic). –Bob]
This article takes a tilt at increasing speculation about statist global resets, and why plans such as those promoted by the World Economic Forum will fail. Central bank digital currencies will simply run out of time.
Instead, the collapse of unbacked fiat currencies will end all supra-national government solutions to their policy failures. Already, there is mounting evidence of money beginning to flee bank accounts into stocks, commodities and even bitcoin. This is an early warning of a rapidly developing monetary collapse.
PMs: Money For the Long Haul
All in all, with risks of higher taxes, healthcare spending, technology regulation, climate change and a festering Trumpian Republican party, America’s reputation is taking a battering. Adding to this concern is that while inflation would be welcomed because it helps solve the government’s finances, the US dollar remains at risk. Although a weaker dollar would help US exports, already the combination of a Democrat government together with expectations of mounting twin deficits has weakened the dollar of late and the greenback has actually fallen 10% from its peak. And as the pandemic accelerates around the world, there is a move away from dollars while America’s dollar obligations keep mounting. We believe that the growing risk of more dollar deterioration could trigger an avalanche of foreign outflows which to date have financed America’s current account deficit. Borrowings more from the future is a recipe for disaster.
Fantasy from Future & Present
News From Future October 2024:
The Federal Reserve sold another $200 billion in perpetual bonds this week. These “Perps,” as the media refers to them, have no expiration date and pay interest forever, or until recalled.
Proceeds from the “Perps” sale will fund Fed-coins that are downloaded to digital wallets on government issued UBI-phones. Over 96% of adults have received UBI-phones that are loaded monthly with Fed-coin currency. The phones also track locations, movements, and spending. A second benefit is they enable contact-tracing for the COVID-19, 21, and 23 pandemics.
Abundant, Clean, and Safe
If you truly want to save the planet from global warming, there’s one energy source that can do it. It’s not wind or solar. It’s not coal, oil, or natural gas, either. So what is it? Michael Shellenberger, founder of Environmental Progress, has the answer in this important video.
Please watch the VIDEO
Biden Has a Plan for a New National ‘Supply Commander’
No, we don’t need someone to “take command of the national supply chain for essential equipment, medications, and protective gear.”
(CNP/AdMedia/SIPA/Newscom)
The End of Women’s Sports
Selina Soule was one of the top five female high school sprinters in Connecticut… until competing against biological boys changed the game. Now, women aren’t just losing their races — they’re losing their chances to compete at all. Why is this happening? And what should we do about it?
Please watch the VIDEO
Burning Stuff
By Kip Hansen – Re-Blogged From WUWT
The image used here is of the charcoal-burning kilns in the Adirondacks, much of which were clear-cut in the late-1700s and early 1800s to provide timber and charcoal for the big cities of the Northeastern U.S. – particularly for New York City.
Quoting from Joel T. Headley’s “The Adirondack: or Life in the Woods” written in 1849:
“The first harvesting of the Adirondack forests began shortly after the English replaced the Dutch as the landlords of New Netherlands and changed its name to New York [September 8th, 1664] . Logging operations generated wealth, opened up land for farming, and removed the cover that provided a haven for Indians.”
Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #429
The Week That Was: October 31, 2020
Brought to You by www.SEPP.org
By Ken Haapala, President, The Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “Quantum theory yields much, but it hardly brings us close to the Old One’s secrets. I, in any case, am convinced He does not play dice with the universe.” Albert Einstein, to Max Born (1926)
Number of the Week: 2%
Knew What? The above quote illustrates the frustration Einstein had with Quantum Physics because one cannot precisely predict what will happens in nature on the atomic and sub-atomic level. For example, one cannot precisely predict what will happen to a photon when an energized molecule emits it. The photon may go in any direction.
We have built vast industries in electronics and other fields using principles developed in Quantum Physics. These industries include transistors (including computer chips); mobile phones, laptops, tablets etc.; nuclear power; health, magnetic-resonance imaging, or MRI; lasers for DVDs, scanners at store checkouts, industrial cutting of metal, eye surgery, etc.
Yes, Virginia, There Is An Alternative
On Monday the dollar had a ferocious rally, moving up from 15.87mg gold to 16.77mg and from 1.21g silver to 1.32g. In mainstream terms, the price of gold dropped about a hundred bucks, and the price of silver crashed $2.20.
One notion we’re hearing a lot now is, “there is no alternative to stocks.” Certainly, stocks have been rallying. They were up in Sunday evening (as we reckon it here in Arizona) trading. Then Pfizer announced good news for its COVID vaccine, and that seemed to be the signal to bid up stocks even more.
Data Integrity vs Data Manipulation
By Eric Worrall – Re-Blogged From WUWT
The Consequences Of Budget Deficits For International Trade
[Personal Note: For most of the last two weeks, I’ve been in the hospital with a kidney infection / kidney stone (3 inch diameter). I’m on the mend and the stone itself should be removed next week. Meanwhile, I’ll start to get back to posting as usual. –Bob]
By Alasdair Macleod – Re-Blogged From Gold Eagle
Introduction
Following the presidential election this week, the new President of the United States will face an economic slump. Long before the covid-19 lockdowns, economic and financial developments threatened to undermine both the US economy and the dollar.
The similarities between the situation today and the end of the roaring twenties, and the depression that followed, are enormously concerning. Both periods have seen a stock market bubble, fuelled by bank credit and an artificial monetary stimulus by the Fed. Both periods have experienced an increase in trade protectionism: In October 1929, the month of the crash, after debating it for months Congress finally passed the Smoot Hawley Tariff Act, raising tariffs on all imported goods by an average of about 20%. In 2019, US trade protectionism against China put a stop to the expansion of international trade. These facts, which should continue to concern us, have been buried by the immediacy of the coronavirus crisis, which is an additional burden for the global economy today compared with the situation ninety years ago.
The Myth of Glorious Renewables
By Vijay Jayaraj – Re-Blogged From WUWT
We all love energy solutions that make life better. It is an undeniable fact that coal propelled the Industrial Revolution and led to the alleviation of poverty in the West. More recently, the oil reserves in the Middle East have made it one of the most economically developed regions in the world.
The Fate Of The Pound Sterling
This is the third in a series of articles focused on the outlook for major currencies. The first concluded that the US dollar is already on the path of monetary hyperinflation. The second concluded that the euro system is close to collapse as a consequence of a combination of the failure of commercial banks and the TARGET2 settlement system, likely to collapse the currency itself.
With its systemic exposure to the Eurozone, sterling is likely to be a casualty of the failure of the euro system and shares the monetary hyperinflation characteristics of the dollar. The Bank of England is copying US monetary policies and will find it increasingly difficult to prevent the pound from escaping the same fate as the dollar.
Continue reading
Remdesivir for COVID-19” Study Accidentally Proved Effectiveness of Hydroxychloroquine
By Leo Goldstein – Re-Blogged From WUWT
- The use of Remdesivir for COVID-19 was authorized by the FDA based on a single RCT, conducted by NIAID with the participation of Gilead Sciences, the exclusive manufacturer of Remdesivir. A final report from this study was published on October 8, five months after the drug’s authorization.
- The final report shows that at least 35% of the patients were treated with Hydroxychloroquine, probably with Azithromycin. The data in the final report suggests that Hydroxychloroquine, not Remdesivir, was the main factor benefitting the patients in this study.
- Nothing in the study supports the hypothesis that Remdesivir is an effective antiviral for SARS-COV-19
Are People Hoarding Toilet Paper Again?
KFMB-TV – Re-Blogged From Headline Wealth
It feels like déjà vu . Some shoppers are reporting seeing a shortage of toilet paper again.
There are concerns people may be hoarding supplies because of another coronavirus resurgence and the uncertainty of the upcoming election.
“I think we’re going to have the same problem we had when the pandemic started,” said shopper Bill Birch.
On the Costco 92127 Facebook page, toilet paper is the topic. People discuss when it’s there and when it’s not, when it’s restocked and when it’s gone again. Someone even posted Tuesday that people were lined up this morning to buy more.
A New World Monetary Order Is Coming
The global coronavirus pandemic has accelerated several troubling trends already in force. Among them are exponential debt growth, rising dependency on government, and scaled-up central bank interventions into markets and the economy.
Central bankers now appear poised to embark on their biggest power play ever.
Americanos: Emma Jimenez
Should Latinos see America as a land of systemic racism, xenophobia, and immigrant children in cages? Emma Jimenez, an independent journalist who immigrated from Peru, debunks some common myths. She also shares why becoming an American citizen was the most rewarding experience of her life.
Please watch the VIDEO
Weekly Energy and Climate News Roundup #428
The Week That Was: October 24, 2020)
Brought to You by www.SEPP.org
By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “Holmes: I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.” – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s 1891 A Scandal in Bohemia, [H/t James Randi]
Number of the Week: 251.9 million years ago
Atmospheric Measurements? The generally accepted standard for atmospheric carbon dioxide measurements are the ones from Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii run by NOAA. Writing in No Tricks Zone, Kenneth Richard asks: “Is this the best location to measure global CO2 levels?”
It may be a reasonable location, provided the MPAA carefully maintains the records. Alas, NOAA has not carefully maintained the US surface temperatures, once the gold standard.
We Will Have Vaccines Soon—Because of Science, Not Politics
By Gregory J. Rummo. – Re-Blogged From WUWT
It was one week after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 when envelopes containing a white powder began showing up at random locations in four states; among them, a newspaper office in Florida, the Washington D.C. office of then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, NBC News and the New York Post. The white powder turned out to be anthrax spores, engineered to be readily dispersed and inhaled – a potentially deadly bioterrorism weapon.
This Is How A State Goes Bankrupt, Illinois Edition
Somewhere back in the depths of the 20th century, a bunch of governors, mayors, and public sector union leaders got together and cooked up one of history’s greatest financial scams. They would offer teachers, cops, and firefighters extremely generous pensions but would avoid raising taxes to fund the resulting future obligations. Grateful workers would vote to re-elect their benefactors, while taxpayers would appreciate the combination of excellent public services and low taxes.
