The Irish Savant

Sometimes it seems you just can’t win. But for some people it seems you can’t lose. One instance is a variant of the problem/reaction/solution Hegelian Dialectic whereby you generate a major health panic by way of forecasts derived from complex scientific models, reinforced by impressive graphics in bright colours. To counter the risk you cite a series of draconian measures which are duly implemented by panic-stricken authorities. That the crisis never materialised is then attributed to the counter-measures that were implemented. It’s brilliant in that you can’t be wrong.

Take the case of COVID-19. Imperial College London’s Department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology (massively funded by the Gates Foundation – no conflict of interest there) and their solemn forecast of 500,000 deaths in Britain in the absence of a series of draconian measures. Unabashed, they’ve now reduced that to 20,000. In other words their model produced a result that was more than 95% inaccurate. Mystic Meg in her tent would have had a much better shot at it.  Yet they now bask in adulation. Why? Because their counter-measures saved the day! Heads I win, tails you lose.

Then take the new banking environment which, in large part thanks to the handiwork of Robert Rubin and Larry Summers, can now engage in activities involving gross conflicts of interests. Say Goldman Sachs issues a report claiming that the price of gold (or any commodity) is set to drop sharply. The fund managers to whom you entrust your pensions will offload their gold holdings. Which obviously leads to a drop in the prices. GS will be hailed as geniuses, especially as they had apparently put their money where their mouth is by offloading their own gold holdings just as they issued the report. After a discreet interval during which they had been quietly rebuilding up their gold holdings at the low prices GS will issue another report forecasting a sharp rise in prices. Fund managers and the public will of course pile into gold, driving the price up once again. GS will again be hailed as geniuses while profiting handsomely from selling at the new high. And so the circle goes. Heads I win, tails you lose.

And that’s not the only way that the banksters have contrived a no-lose wheeze. Just like it was before the 2008 crash insane loans have been handed out like snuff at a wake. Missing that hobo you used to see living under a bridge near your office? Well that’s because he’s headed off in a luxury Fleetwood Fortis RV thanks to a $500,000 ten-year loan from a friendly financial adviser.  Now a great bundle of such loans has been packaged back at head office into investment bonds which are rapidly assigned a premium-grade AAA rating by the “independent” rating agencies. Enormous multi-million dollar/Euro bonuses are trousered by the purveyors of these “products”. But, you ask, what happens when the hobo fails to make his monthly payments? Well let me tell you what doesn’t happen: The people who made the reckless loans and sold them on as AAA investments won’t lose their jobs or bonuses, still less go to jail. The losers are the small investors and pension funds – those who purchased the garbage based on fraudulent ratings. In other words, indirectly, you and me.

But as we now know the greed of banksters is literally insatiable. Which in due course brings the ponzi to the point of collapse. Which is where we are today. What happens to the banksters heavily invested in the wildly-inflated stock market? Those who bought insanely over-valued stock on the assumption that market values would continue to spiral irrespective of underlying corporate performance? Do they face ruin? Of course not. This is where Trump’s bailout comes in to, well, bail them out by buying their junk at a ‘fair’ price by way of magic money conjured up out of thin air. (Same will happen in other Western countries).

And who has Trump appointed to oversee the project, to protect the interest of the tax-paying public? Why it’s BlackRock, the biggest and arguably most unscrupulous investment management firm on the planet. I’ll bet any anxieties you might have will be dispelled by the knowledge that your interests are being looked after by these sharks, headed up by a shark by the name of Larry Fink.

Yes indeed, heads I win, tails you lose.