- RHINEBECK, NY -- The Panic
is "On." Each day brings more bad news and it just got much worse.
-
- On Friday, oil super-spiked nearly $11 to close above
$138 a barrel and the Dow dumped nearly 400 points. The dollar is back
on its losing streak and gold is back above $900 an ounce. Job losses increased
for the fifth month in a row and the unemployment rate had its biggest
jump since 1986.
-
- Chain stores are closing, credit keeps tightening and
economic conditions are worsening. The government is going broke, the people are broke,
the nation's fighting two costly wars and losing both and the President
warns there may be more.
-
- Avoiding intelligent discussion of the dire implications
of the oil shock, the next credit crisis and President Bush's warnings
that Iran is a potential military target, the nation's news has been focused
on the elimination rounds of The Presidential Reality Show.
-
- And while rumors of an attack on Iran by the US are generally
ignored or denied, the undercurrent of Middle East war is another speculative
factor driving oil prices higher. Among them, Israel announced new construction
of 900 homes in the occupied West Bank and threatened a major military
offensive to put down the worsening Gaza uprisings.
-
- Iran, who Israel accuses of supplying weapons to the
Palestinians, has also become a military target. On Friday, Israeli deputy
Prime Minister, Shaul Mofaz, said, "Attacking Iran, in order to stop
its nuclear plans, will be unavoidable." And, according to reports,
the US also has plans to launch a military strike against Iran. ("Limited
US attack on Iranian Revolutionary Guards bases in sight" (DEBKAfile,
3 June 2008); ("Bush intends to attack Iran before the end of his
term," The Jerusalem Post, 20 May 2008.) Note: Yielding
to pressure from Washington, The Jerusalem Post pulled the May
20th headline story from its website.
-
- Trend Analysis: With commodity speculators currently
being blamed for the oil spike, the threat of war and how it relates to
high oil prices, until just recently, was absent from national debate
as are the devastating global implications that would result from a Persian/US/Israel
war.
-
- Unless oil prices swiftly and dramatically decline, the
American people will suffer the worst socioeconomic conditions in living
history. Utility bills won't be paid, foreclosures will escalate, crime
will dramatically increase tax revolts, gas riots, strikes and protests
will ensue. Millions of elderly, those on fixed incomes and paycheck-to-paycheck
people won't be able to heat their homes, fuel their autos or cover their
expenses.
-
- It's pure and simple. For the working majority, wages
are falling, home equity is evaporating, investments are failing, pensions
are lost, benefits are scarce and each day it costs more to live.
-
- Forced to choose between filling the gas tank or feeding
the family, trying to make ends meet is a losing game. In the real world,
despite the government's adjusted-for-manipulation core inflation index,
which omits food and fuel from its calculations, the working class is going
under as prices of life's essentials keep going higher.
-
- Without money to make up for rising costs, credit cards
will be increasingly used as the finger in the bursting financial damn
that will eventually drown debt burdened Americans who won't be able to
meet their monthly card payments.
-
- But over the past weeks, the word from those who didn't
see the financial storm coming were now claiming that the worst of it was
over. The US Treasury Secretary, the Federal Reserve Chairman and the presidents
of the biggest banks and brokerages have declared that the credit crisis
is closer to the end than the beginning.
-
- Publisher's Note: Throughout the millennia and regardless
of country, economic hardship, not moral justification, has often been
used as a political pretext to wage war and as the public rationale to
support one.
-
- For example, when asked why the US launched the First
Gulf War against Iraq over their oil dispute with Kuwait in 1991, US Secretary
of State James Baker said, "It's about jobs, jobs, jobs" and
the American people agreed.
-
- Similarly, with high oil prices inflicting wide socioeconomic
damage, an attack upon an oil rich country, such as Iran, under the guise
of maintaining global stability, could be sold as an excuse for war by
politicians and supported by an economically depressed public as a rationale
to wage one.
-
- Gerald Celente
- Founder/Director
- The Trends Research Institute ®
- E-mail: <mailto:gcelente@trendsresearch.com>gcelente@trendsresearch.com
- Website: <http://www.trendsresearch.com/>www.trendsresearch.com
- Media Relations: 845.876.6700 Ext. 311
- <mailto:cheri@trendsresearch.com>cheri@trendsresearch.com
-
- ©MMVIII The Trends Research Institute ®
|
