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Guest Post: Bernanke's Press Conference, August 1, 2012
Submitted by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds
Bernanke's Press Conference, August 1, 2012
In which a parrot replaces Ben Bernanke, who shows up late looking OD'ed on Ibogaine.
August 1, 2012: Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke once again defended the Fed's accommodative monetary policy at today's press conference. Mr. Bernanke was late to the conference, which was shielded from protesters by riot police.
In his absence, a pet parrot was brought out to amuse the waiting journalists, who had been carefully vetted by the Fed to "represent the nation's media." The parrot had apparently occupied a perch in the Fed's conference room, for it repeatedly squawked, "Stocks are up, stocks are up."
As the dollar continued its slide, unemployed German workers shouted "Death to America" in mass protests in Germany's industrial heartland. With the euro worth $2, German exports to the U.S. have shriveled, causing a sharp contraction in the once robust German economy.
In Japan, the 7th government in six months took power, vowing to continue fiscal stimulus, despite the failure of the policy. The dollar's decline has crushed Japanese exports to the U.S., as the dollar fetches only 55 yen, far below the breakeven point for Japanese exporters.
Japan's new prime minister voiced support for the quatloo, the new petroleum-backed currency being touted by Saudi Arabia, China and PIMCO as a global alternative to the U.S. dollar.
China's military deployed to 15 additional cities to quell the protests over rising food and energy prices. As the Chinese economy spiraled into that nation's first deep contraction, China's leadership continued to blame the Fed's policies for crushing the dollar and driving up commodity prices.
Since the Chinese currency is linked to the dollar, then skyrocketing commodity costs caused by the sinking dollar are also affecting the Chinese economy.
Just before the Fed press conference, President Obama announced that he was closing the commodity futures exchanges "to eliminate these speculators once and for all." He also announced that any farmer caught "hoarding grain" would face confiscation of the grain by Federal authorities.
"We have to stamp out these evil speculators, whatever it takes," the President said from the safety of the White House, which has been surrounded by angry mobs protesting $10 per gallon gasoline.
Gasoline suppliers responded to the closing of the futures exchange by raising the cost of fuel from $10 per gallon to $11 per gallon.
Sweating profusely, Mr. Bernanke repeated the same message he's been giving the nation for over a year: zero interest rates and Fed purchases of assets to keep interest rates low would eventually create more jobs in the U.S., and the dollar would strengthen as foreign investors flocked to the U.S.
Some observers have noted that this is at odds with the government's restrictions of foreign ownership of U.S. assets, following China's attempt to buy the bankrupt state of California earlier this summer.
The Fed chairman also pointed to the Dow Jones Industrial Average surpassing 20,000 as evidence that the Fed's policies were "working as planned." A recent Bloomberg analysis of the low-volume market meltup found that most of the volume on recent trading days resulted from the trading of a single block of SPX shares, which were traded 4,200 times by primary dealers and then purchased by the Fed at the top tick of the day.
Ignoring questions from financial media outlets, Mr. Bernanke took a question from the UFO Weekly representative on the Fed's views about Area 51 and alien spacecraft. Mr. Bernanke replied that alien spacecraft could handle the job of dropping money as well as helicopters, and then veered into a rambling discussion of the importance of managing perceptions, at one point shaking his fist and saying, "If only they knew the power of the Dark Side."
To the consternation of onlookers, the chairman then vowed to "crush the bears, all of them" and said "you will see Dow 36,000 sooner than you can possibly imagine."
When a heckler asked about rising grain prices, Mr. Bernanke shot back, "Let them eat stocks."
After the chairman was led away by aides, some who had witnessed his erratic behavior and tirade noted an uncanny resemblance to those suffering from overdoses of the illegal drug Ibogaine.
In other news, President Obama continues to poll well in Washington, D.C. just a few months before the 2012 presidential election, but is trailing comic character Alfred E. Neuman in the rest of the country. Republican candidate Donald Trump's campaign declared bankruptcy, which Mr. Trump characterized as "a necessary step to greatness. Bankruptcy is the basis of any great business."
Long-term Treasury yields shot up to 18% as the market absorbed the possibility that once in office, Mr, Trump would pursue bankruptcy as a national policy.
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And then one of the journalist had a plastic gun hidden on him and shot Bernanke. Bernanke was pronounced dead at the scene. The police escorted the shooter out and he was heard screaming SILVER BITCHEZ!
LOLotfpm (laugh out loud on the floor pissing myself)
Spot on. Exactly.
Increasing demand for removal of The Bernank and the Federal Reserve System is moving into serious backwardation.
Washington D.C. (including the burbs in Maryland & Virginia, chock full of government employees and contractors) and Manhatttan - two of the biggest welfare states/districts the world has ever known.
TBTF Frausters in Manattan & 10-4 Clock & Paper Pusher in D.C. and the corridor.
Two ends of the same cloaca, with Bawlmore and Philly in between. Blech.
Can't wait.
well Shiver me Timbers
"Long-term Treasury yields shot up to 18% as the market absorbed the possibility that once in office, Mr, Trump would pursue bankruptcy as a national policy. "
Help me out here. How would this be different from current national policy?
Trump's hair is funnier to look at..
Well, if we are going to declare bankruptcy, Trump would be by far the most qualified for the position given his broad portfolio of experience in the matter.
+ a trillion trump dollars!!! Spot on, this guy inherited everything and in, inflation-adjusted, dollars he has lost money. His father was the smart one, he is an idiot.
Yep, according to his auto-bio, Trump was given hundreds of thousands of pre-1971 dollars by his old man when he turned 21, "to get a start".
I think he should campaign on that "Look everyone knows America is bankrupt in every possible meaning in the world. Look at the field, no one has the level of experience in handling bankruptcy like me. I promise if elected to guide this great nation through it's bankruptcy proceeding and televise it in reality show format"
Wow, that may just work, who would he run with?
Alfred E Newman
I can see the bumper stickers now. What, me worry? I've got the Trump card!
Short with confidence
the West is long on banking and political parasites
...and short manufacturing
...i fancy chicken farming while this shit plays out to its predictible end
Check out the bearish wedge forming on MUB.
http://www.finviz.com/quote.ashx?t=mub
Not impressed! Quotes a price of gasoline, but no mention of the price of Gold or Silver.
Gold and Silver have gone to infinity and thus become priceless.
The people who have saved for decades and don't want to gamble in a manipulated stock market thank you VERY FUCKING MUCH for giving us .25% interest rates, you asshole.
The people who have saved for decades and don't want to gamble in a manipulated stock market thank you VERY FUCKING MUCH for giving us .25% interest rates .. that's it !! that's correct !!! & they are doing it on purpose. there is a concerted effort to implement policy that will "nudge" people to just die early & then, all that is left are the younger generation. The "oldsters" still have memory left of the way things should be...... money that has value, money that earns interest in a basic savings account.
Remember the words of my Grandma Jo (born 1915, god rest her soul) : Never trust the government & do not go into the stock market . she learned her lessons from the Great Depression
+1000.
8/1/2012 The Chairman announces a new program called Demand Strengthening (DS1) which will essentially dump FRN's on front lawns across the country. A second program called Price Controls (PC1) is scheduled to roll out on 1/2/2013. These programs should temporarily enable consumers to deal with the transitory inflation (caused by QE4.)
If it has to happen then let it start with your disabled vets who have not had a COLA increase in the third year now, because as we all know there has been no inflation since 2008. I would not object to my drastically reduced standard of living if the bankers and politicians were being hit equally hard, or they just stopped treating us like idiots who cannot figure out just how screwed we really are, but in this end game blow off kleptocratic disaster I simply refuse to go quietly into the darkness while the top 1% brazenly feather their estates with dynastic wealth.
By the way, I thought China already owned most of CA and was trying to get rid of it.
But the reality is that Germany is outpacing the US despite the weakening dollar.
Yes, Germany is doing the mercantilist approach just like China.
However, most of the countries Germany is exporting to can only pay with colored pieces of paper (often lent to them by German banks), as they have/produce not enough the Germans want to buy. And this money has mainly been used to prop up the German pension system (equivalent to US Social Security), not so much to keep infrastructure in shape, for the last 20 years at least.
China on the other hand got industries built up in their own country by foreigners in exchange for their goods. So for a long while that was a really good trade for them, now coming to an end though.
....luv Charles Hugh Smith articles, luv the photo of the macaw . macaws are extremely intelligent & great talkers !
Unlike Bernanke & Geithner who are extremely devious & constant liars...
Compulsive liars. Also repulsive.
Compulsive liars. Also repulsive.
Yes, but to have really done it right it should have been
SQUAWK (as in SQUAWKbox)
not
BRAWK
Parrot picked up a list from the chairsatan.
And Macaws don't need teleprompters, they can ad lib.
Don't understand all the hate towards Ben... He's only following orders from the wizard behind the curtain.
What about Ben grows a pair and tell his masters to suck it?
Ben? "I vos ohny following orders".
Judge: That plea didn't work well in Nüremberg either.
So, the Bernak has been hiding out with the Bwiti, learning about Ibo? Makes sense, 'cause he does in fact look like something of a Pygmy who it is said were the pioneers in the Ibogaine business.
And might be primarily for the Conspiracy Theorists, but how is it that his aides so readily identified the symptoms of Ibogaine overdose?
"Stocks are up! Bwakkkk! Stocks are up"
"Progress led by confusion boats, mutiny form stern to bow..."
Yes, but we were all so much older then, we're younger than that now.....
Nice +10
Very Funny(and sadly coming true). Enjoyed it.
8/1/2012 - CNBC - Steve Liesman reports that Timothy Geithner has accepted the Intuit CEO job as he feels particularly qualified for the role having been a Turbo Tax user for all these years - In a surprise nomination President Obama, sporting Donald Trump's hairstyle, put forth the name of Mark Zandi for Treasury Secretary indicating that Bo the family dog really likes Mark & is aligned with his economic policies -Please note that the COMEX has modified the Gold quotation system to support exponential notation...
like hillary (nee rodsky) said we cant make all drugs legal,
too much money at stake. any drug that can end addiction
is the most illegal of all.
http://www.relfe.com/ibogaine.html
What will Skull and Bones steal after the US Treasury and Social Security?
Your kids!
Ever hear of the "Department of Education"? Becoming less funny, it seems.
I prefer it when CHS writes thougtful analysis instead of this garbage. It's easy to pretend to predict future outcomes, but he does this at the risk of undermining his own credibility. Stick to the high road, CHS.
Funny-ass piece.
The man just won't quit, he just won't... Until the top 0.1% own 99% of U.S. assets.
Which are debt-laden...
August 12, 2012:
In other news, MethMan was appointed by President Obama as the nation's new Silver Czar, responsible for the newly-created legions of shovel-wielders assembled under the Total Resource Optimization Labor Law (TROLL), who have been tasked with digging into the nation's regolith in search of silver to replenish the COMEX wearhouses after their June default and the subsequent rise in the price of silver to $184 per ounce. Czar MethMan, in an official press release, reaffirms his confidence in the great success of his diggers' mission, stating "the shit is fucking everywhere!".
For reasons not fully understood, however, the TROLL legions of Silver Czar MethMan have become popularly known as "The $5 Brigade".
+1
LMAO.
Brawk, tell Barack extra wax on my new Maybach, Brawk!
Flash: Fed Chairman Bernanke announces that he's found a way to cut inflation. Starting in one week the Dollar bill will be reduced in size 50%, and printed on one side only and in one color, green. Inexpensive to print, the new Dollar will not be able to be countfeited as counterfeiters would find it cost prohibitive.
The thing about these people at the Fed and most in Universities makes little difference where in the world they are. They have spent a great deal of their life mostly in education on a single grand ruling hypothesis upon which their minds, reports and foundations are built. It is very difficult if not almost impossible for them to realize that perhaps everything they thought, wrote, or done was wrong. I have known several who actually had no choice but to come to their errors, and one who committed suicide.
These people are human beings, despite their intellect, knowledge, experience, wisdom or not and just like us to admit they know nothing is very hard. I think a big part of this is because they have come to depend on peers for their own reasons, avoiding at all cost entering a black cave for the fear of blindness. But until they discover that blindness actually makes them see for the first time things they would never see when in the light of peers, they remain unaware with eyes wide open.
How can I be the only one sick of CHS' half-assed rants on ZH?
Dump this idiot's posting privileges, stat!
Very nice. Awesome parrot.
Charlie don't surf. Macaw's don't talk.
Pretty remarkable pulldown in the price of both gold and silver at exactly noon, no? If Blythe had a silver colored african grey, I wonder what it would say.
Mine would say, "Silver, bitchez".
CHS is a hegemon-in-disguise; Euro @$2 !
Hah, very funny/not.
EU is generations ahead of US in terms of:
technology implementation
infrastructure
social fabric and civic-mindedness
US citizens are committing suicide -
consumer-bots & celeb worshippers -
as the elite sucks their last drops of blood.
Prediction: US collapses next 12 months.
I saw the CNBC staff of idiots commenting on the Bernanks performance. Anybody else think that Ron Insania has a frog face, but even worse, gave B. all A's for his performance? That network along with parent GE is a disgrace.
You all realise this is a positive (rosy) scenario?
Once a threshold has been reached it's going to take more energy to bring it back into balance than it took to balance it in the first place. Just look to nature for an example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATg-OXrdfQw
I fully expect Bernanke to show up with a W.I.N. button next time. Clearly, he's certain printing all that money has nothing to do with higher prices.
Funny if it weren't but a realistic outcome.
Ding, Ding, Ding...
"China's military deployed to 15 additional cities to quell the protests over rising food and energy prices. As the Chinese economy spiraled into that nation's first deep contraction, China's leadership continued to blame the Fed's policies for crushing the dollar and driving up commodity prices."
Nice to hear the blogsphere is catching on...
11 months after the attack in chicago performed by the CIA Alqaida/Muslim brotherhood
Thanks, Benny. Now all that is left is to choose my route to quick death: hara kiri or karoushi.