Prepare for Rip-Off

We are entering a new world — the post-hypocrisy, post-shame planet. Forget the pretenses. Now bribery, influence peddling, murder, larceny, vulgarity — it’s all right out in the open.

Tom Nichols:

The White House press secretary answers a question from a member of the free press—a serious question about who planned a meeting between the American and Russian presidents—by saying, “Your mom did.” The secretary of defense cancels DEI and other policies by saying, “We are done with that shit.” The vice president calls an interlocutor on social media a “dipshit.” The president of the United States, during mass protests against his policies, responds by posting an AI-generated video of himself flying a jet fighter over his fellow citizens and dumping feces on their heads.

What kind of country is this, Nichols wonders?

We don’t know…but our beat is money, so let’s stick to the coin. And the way to make money now is to invest in the Trump family and its pet projects. Here’s the latest from the Washington Post:

More than half of the companies that donated are facing or have recently faced federal enforcement actions tied to alleged wrongdoing, ranging from engaging in unfair labor practices to deceiving consumers and harming the environment, according to the report from Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy organization.

A conflict of interest? You bet. But that’s the post-hypocrisy world…where we ‘let it all hang out.’ The business of government, after all, is to redistribute wealth and power, from ‘The People’ to the rich and powerful. Canny investors want to be on the right side of that trade.

Yesterday, we explored the way public standards slip. Richard Nixon went on national TV to overcome the appearance of wrongdoing. Today, there’s so much wrong being done, it’s hard to keep up with it.

And it’s not just a few billion dollars and the reputation of the first family that are at stake. It’s the future for all of us.

Note that the Fed lowered interest rates last week. Adjusted for inflation, member banks now borrow for less than 1%. This is supposed to stimulate the economy by making credit more readily available. As we have seen, lower rates do not actually help the Main Street economy where most people live, work and shop. This century has seen more ‘stimulus’ than ever before…with Fed rates actually below zero, in real terms, for nearly ten years. And yet, GDP growth rates have gone down, not up.

What has gone up are asset prices. The big banks borrow from the Fed at super-low rates and feed the money into the Wall Street economy, not the Main Street economy. They use it to wheel and deal…to speculate…and to pay themselves huge fees.

Forty percent of the public may rely on SNAP or food banks, but the rich get richer than ever. NewsBytes:

Top 10 US billionaires gain $700B as wealth gap widens

The top 10 billionaires in the United States have seen their collective wealth increase by a staggering $698 billion over the past year, according to a report by Oxfam America. The study highlights how policies from both Republican and Democratic administrations have contributed to widening the wealth gap in the country. It also shows that between 1989 and 2022, the richest 1% of American households gained 101 times more wealth than median households.

Did these people suddenly become smarter or more productive? Nope. They were just on the right side of the trade. People generally are probably no more corrupt than they always were. They are neither always good, nor always bad…but always subject to influence. And what has influenced us all is a money system that is easily exploited by those who control it.

If the Trump boys take out a billion here…a billion there…who cares? But as the Fed reduces rates, it leaves the rip-off rate (inflation) at 3% officially…and nearer to 10% by our reckoning. Consumers pay higher prices. And savers lose money.

On outstanding US treasury debt alone, that means somewhere between $1 and $4 trillion will be scammed away.

And the tariffs!

The ground shifts daily…but it is fundamentally another transfer of wealth, from the middle classes to the ruling classes. Consumers pay the toll when they shop. It’s a trivial amount to the rich, but a major cost to those who live paycheck to paycheck. The overall rate is said to be around 17%. With total imports around $3.5 trillion, that’s another half a trillion-dollar transfer. The money goes from the public to the feds, their donors, and their favorite causes.

Where this leads, we don’t know…but we buckle our seat belts, close our laptops, and prepare for rip-off.