Pakistan is Bankrupt, Protests Everywhere. China's financial crisis (Video - 14')

  Now as predicted months ago, it is the turn of Pakistan to fall... 

 This will be relentless, country by country from the outside in.

 

"Completely Unprecedented" Martin Armstrong Warns Trump Raid Is "Deathblow To Democracy"

  While we are being distracted, our democracy is falling apart.

 The Greek democracy didn't survive the fall of Pericles. The Roman Republic was already in tater when Cesar crossed the Rubicon. The Venetian Republic lasted a little longer thanks to an ingenuous system to limit graft and tenure politicians.

 Clearly the American democratic system is approaching the end and with it the Western hemisphere will fall back into darker ages once again.

 Martin Armstrong is a brilliant investor and as such he offers a sharp and to my opinion accurate perspective over the risks in the coming months. But the core of the problem/rot is much deeper and as such can't be easily remedied. 

 In 1944, America became an empire at Bretton Woods.

 In 1971, the US dollar became a fiduciary money with no restrictions on issuance, what the French called the time, an exorbitant privilege and soon after the World currency when Saudi Arabia accepted that all purchases of oil should be paid in USD. 

 In 1981, Reaganomics launched the fire-wheel of permanent deficits followed in 1998 by the abolition of the Glass Steagall act, the fundamental distinction between deposit banking not taking risks on the market with client money and investment banking who could, unleashing the following 20 years of Casino gambling on Wall Street. 

 In 2001, the Patriot act eviscerated freedom and marked the start of permanent wars in the Middle East allowing the "deep State", mostly the CIA and other agencies to grow out of proportion thanks to pork and dark money. The praetorian guards were reborn!

 Finally in 2020, the global cabal of the WEF-linked elites asserted their power over the Western Hemisphere thanks to their total control over international institutions, pretending that a recurrent but engineered virus was a "new" deadly pandemic. 

 All this took 70 years to build. 70 years of peace and prosperity thanks to the aversion to war of traumatized populations in the West and the extraordinary reliance on oil, the most dense and concentrated energy ever used until now.  

 This era is over. From now on energy and resources will be sparse and expensive. As for economic growth, forget about it. Phony statistics are replacing the real stuff. There won't be any recession as long as governments do not declare one. Same for wars, pandemics and almost everything. 

 Truth will soon become a revolutionary act.    

 Carpe Diem! Enjoy the coming months, what comes after will be darker.

Via Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com,

Last month, legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong said the time to prepare is now for the chaos that is coming in 2023. 

The destabilization of America has been kicked into high gear early with the FBI raid on President Trump’s Florida home this week.  Armstrong explains,

“This really is unprecedented...

In the United States, we are supposed to have civilized transfer of power.  That’s all coming to an end.  I am not being dramatic here.  From a legal perspective, this is completely unprecedented.  The danger of this is once they have done this, if the Republicans are ever allowed to get back into power, they would only end up doing the same thing to the Democrats...

It’s striking a real deathblow to the very idea of a democracy.  We are not, at least we were not until today, someplace like Guatemala where you throw the opposition in jail, kill them or whatever you do.  This is what’s going on.  They are so afraid of Trump running in 2024 that this is just over the top.  Once they did this, there is no end.”

Armstrong says the Democrats are in “dire straits” at the polls–and they know it.  Armstrong thinks the Trump raid by the FBI is an act of desperation, and it will “backfire,” but that’s not the only play in the Democrat playbook for the midterms in November.  Armstrong says,

“I have been warned that the Democrats have been maneuvering, and the reason they are allowing all the illegal aliens to come in is they intend to allow them to vote.  You already had the Justice Department go after one state that said you had to prove you are an American to vote, and they filed a suit against them saying that they violated their civil rights.  At that stage of the game, hey, all of Europe, Australia, everybody should just send in a vote.”

Armstrong’s says forget what the mainstream polls are saying about voter support for Democrats and Joe Biden because the real numbers are much lower than the public is told.  Armstrong’s “Socrates” computer program shows Joe Biden has just 12% of support in America.  Maybe this is why Democrats are desperate and realize they have to cheat and break the law to stay in power.  It’s not going to get any better, and the entire world is in the same sinking boat.  Armstrong says,

“We basically are sitting here in the middle of the collapse of Western civilization.  It’s socialism that is collapsing because these people have done nothing but borrow money to bribe them to vote for them...

There is no way to pay it back, and they had no intention of paying it back...

Europe is, just forget it.  You have emerging markets collapsing around the world because to sell their debt, they had to put it into dollars.  Sri Lanka, Lebanon, Pakistan, Argentina are falling apart on a global scale.”

Armstrong thinks the dollar will be strong for now and not to expect a collapse in the USA anytime soon because America will be the last man standing. 

That said, Armstrong does see the possibility of a “stock market collapse in September.” 

Armstrong is also “worried about civil war or extreme civil unrest in 2023 in America.” 

Armstrong is seeing a “world war coming in 2024 or after.”

Armstrong also said, “My computer warns that there may not even be an election in America in 2024.  It’s reaching that critical period.  So, this raid on Trump is like throwing down the gauntlet.  Everything is gone.”

There is much more in the nearly 53-minute interview.

Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, cycle expert and author of the upcoming new book “The Plot to Seize Russia, Manufacturing World War III” for 8.9.22.

The US is about to go full Louis XVI

  Often a good lesson is a lesson from history. Unfortunately few countries seems to learn which is why history tends to repeat again and again.

 From the Romans onward, our ancestors faced the same problems and used the same solutions sometimes successfully, often not so much. No prize for guessing how this one will end!

Source: sovereign man

On September 3, 1783, after nearly a year of excruciating back-and-forth negotiations, all sides had finally gathered together in Paris to sign a historic peace agreement.

It was a pretty important peace deal. Because the Treaty of Paris, as it is now known, is what formally ended the American Revolution, and when Great Britain legally recognized the United States as an independent nation.

The treaty was signed in Paris because France had been a major supporter of the US war effort. And just as soon as the ink was dry, French King Louis XVI ordered his finance minister to prepare an accounting of exactly how much money France had spent on US independence.

The result was nothing short of astonishing—more than 1 billion livres.

To put that number in context, the French Treasury’s entire annual revenue only amounted to around 200 million livres.

So they had basically sunk FIVE YEARS worth of their tax revenue fighting someone else’s war.

Granted, Britain was still one of France’s main rivals. And the French did not care for British King George III.

But the American War was simply too costly, and France had already been on very shaky financial footing well before this point.

Louis XIV had nearly bankrupted the country a century before. His successor, Louis XV, had to drastically slash expenses and could barely hang on financially.

Then, in 1774, just prior to the American Revolution, Louis XVI became king at a time that France was rapidly deteriorating.

You’d think that with so much economic turmoil at home that he would have focused on his own national interests… and, in lieu of money, weapons, and ships, he would have instead sent the royal thoughts and prayers to America.

But no. Lucky for the United States, Louis XVI courageously fought the American Revolution down to the very last French taxpayer.

Only after the war did Louis finally take stock of the situation and realize the truth: America was in a much better position. Britain was bruised but still powerful. Yet his own

France was nearly bankrupt and desperately in need of cash. Not exactly a win/win.

Louis XVI was King, but his powers were limited; he was beholden to the legislature, called the Estates-General, and he couldn’t simply decree new taxes without their consent.

The King did, however, control the tax collectors. And Louis made sure they had every authority to coerce, harass, and intimidate money out of French citizens.

French tax collectors had the authority to walk right into people’s homes unannounced, conduct surprise inspections to look for hidden wealth, and walk away with whatever money or property they felt would satisfy the peasant’s tax bill.

This is actually a pretty common theme throughout history: governments that are on the ropes routinely resort to plundering the savings of their citizens.

Several ancient Roman emperors, in fact, from Diocletian to Valentinian III, famously sent ruthless tax collectors to harass their citizens and steal their wealth. Several ancient Chinese dynasties did the same thing. So did the declining Ottoman Empire.

Significantly ramping up tax collection efforts is typically a hallmark of an economy and empire in decline.

So we can’t be too surprised that, in its latest legislative bonanza, the US government is setting aside $80 billion for IRS tax collection efforts.

They’re calling the bill, of course, the Inflation Reduction Act. This is pure comedy—the legislation will do no such thing. Why would inflation, which in part was caused by excessive government spending, magically dissipate because of more government spending? It’s ludicrous.

But inflation aside, front and center in the legislation is $80 billion in funding for the IRS, primarily to step up its tax collection and enforcement efforts.

To put that number in context, the annual budget for the IRS is about $12 billion. So, even though the $80 billion will be leaked out over a period of several years, it constitutes a major increase in the IRS budget.

The entire idea is based on a bizarre notion known as the ‘tax gap’. This is the difference between the amount of tax the government collects, versus the amount the government thinks they should collect.

In other words, the tax gap represents how much they believe people are cheating. And the estimates vary wildly, from $100 billion per year to a whopping $1 trillion per year.

Frankly these numbers have always seemed to me like they were completely made up. No one has explained how they actually come up with such estimates. They just barf up some number and pretend that it’s true.

Obviously there are a whole lot of hardcore tax cheats out there, stealing and defrauding the system. But that’s not why the IRS is receiving an $80 billion boost.

This money will go to hire a small army of tax inspectors who will fan out across the nation on a giant fishing expedition that will ensnare countless middle class Americans and small businesses.

Certainly they’ll catch a few cheats along the way. And they may even find a few bucks to close that mythical ‘tax gap’.

But at what cost?

One of the biggest problems with the US economy right now is that it’s so much more difficult to produce goods and services.

Over the past few years, the people in charge have put up endless road blocks and obstacles for small business.

They vanquished the labor market and made it all but impossible to find workers. They destroyed the supply chain. They engineered historically high inflation. They came up with a myriad of costly new environmental and public health rules.

On top of that they constantly create new rules and regulations, many of which step far beyond the government’s authority.

(Last year, for example, the CDC Director decided in her sole discretion that she controlled the entire $10+ trillion US housing market.)

23% of full-time workers today require a government license to do what they do, according to the US Department of Labor. Even being a hairdresser is full of red tape and costly bureaucracy.

This new threat of widespread tax audits is going to be yet another obstruction to Americans’ productivity…. at a time when the economy desperately needs maximum focus.

Inflation is raging because there is a serious, global imbalance between the supply and demand of goods and services.

Specifically, demand is too strong because they doled out trillions of dollars in free money. And supply is weak because nearly every single government policy makes it harder for people to produce (which is yet another hallmark of empires in decline).

Now, on top of everything else, there is a very high likelihood of being harassed by the tax authorities.

Audits are incredibly unpleasant, costly, and time-consuming. Even if all of your accounts are in order and you’ve done nothing wrong, a tax audit monopolizes a tremendous amount of time and money.

It’s debilitating. Say goodbye to actually running your business, growing sales, or spending time with your family on nights and weekends… and say hello to preparing for your tax audit.

Your time will now be spent digging up receipts, finding old contracts, and trying to recall specific details of trivial decisions you made years ago.

Plus you’ll most likely have to pay outside experts to assist with the process, like CPAs and attorneys. And naturally the government does not reimburse you for such expenses. But at least you’ll get to deduct them… from your taxes.

In the end, after endless financial scrutiny, the government may conclude that you owe them a few bucks because of some undocumented deduction from several years ago. So you write them a check for some trivial sum… after having spent countless hours and effort taken away from your productivity.

The cost/benefit just doesn’t compute. And that’s why healthy, prosperous nations don’t engage in such absurd activities. They don’t need to.

Taxes ultimately represent the government’s ‘slice’ of an economic pie. So when a country is prosperous and an economy is strong, the government’s slice continues to grow because the overall economic pie is constantly getting bigger.

But nations in decline don’t see it this way. For them, the pie is shrinking. So they think the only way to increase their slice is to go after other people’s crumbs.

History shows this is absolutely the wrong move. Raising tax rates, inventing new taxes, and recruiting armies of tax collectors only makes the pie shrink even more.

Their efforts, instead, should be focused on making the pie bigger. But they don’t think that way.

Bear in mind this is all brought to you by the same people who are shoveling your tax dollars out the door to Ukraine $50 billion at a time. It’s very ‘Louis XVI’ of them.

All of these trends—the cannibalistic surge in tax authorities, the anti-productive regulations, the economic scarcity mentality—are all hallmarks of an empire in decline.

The situation is NOT terminal. It is NOT irreversible. But it is reason enough to have a Plan B.

China’s Economy Slumps Further, Raising Fears Of Layoffs

  China is quickly moving to the core of the current financial crisis raising further the odds of a confrontation in the Taiwan strait. 

 There is nothing strange to this phenomenon. In 1929, it is in New York, the rising market at the time, that the market crashed. And it is also the US which recovered first after the 2WW. 

 The circumstances are different so history may well take another path. But some of the similarities are striking. The Americans are squeezing the Chinese almost exactly as they squeezed the Japanese in the 1930s when Japan invaded Manchuria. Still, China is not Japan. Nor is Russia similar to Germany. There is no lack of natural resources on either side this time. It is uncanny to see the world slipping almost unconsciously into a setup where war is the only possible outcome.

Authored by Alex Wu via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

This aerial photo shows cargo containers stacked at a port in Lianyungang in China's eastern Jiangsu province on May 9, 2022. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)

Both official and independent data show that China’s economy has slumped further in the second quarter of the year, with manufacturing slowing down unexpectedly and a downturn in the real estate sector intensifying. This has raised fears of a wave of layoffs in the second half of the year adding to already severe unemployment issues in China.

China’s economy deteriorated further in July, said a China Beige Book International (CBBI) report in early August, which provides independent economic data. Factory outputs and new production orders in China reached their slowest since mid-2020, and retail employment was at its worst in more than two years, according to the latest CBBI survey. Deterioration in revenue growth for manufacturers and retailers curtailed profits, the report said.

On Aug. 1, official data revealed even worse numbers in manufacturing and real estate. Data released by the Chinese regime’s statistics bureau showed that the purchasing managers index (PMI) of China’s manufacturing industry for July was 49.0 compared with 50.2 in the previous month, a decrease of 1.2 percentage, which is below the critical level of 50.

In July, with more cases of COVID-19 emerging in parts of China, the communist regime continued its strict “zero-COVID” measures, putting many cities in lockdown, including industrial centers and economic hubs.

Manufacturing activity had rebounded in June after the lockdowns were lifted in parts of mainland China but have now slumped again.

The China Real Estate Index Research Institute publicized that in July, the average price of new residential buildings month-on-month in 100 cities in mainland China dropped instead of increasing, and the average price of homes further plummeted. Price drops for new houses were greater in cities, especially in the Yangtze River and Pearl River deltas, where housing prices had been increasing in previous years.

A general view shows Evergrande residential buildings under construction in Guangzhou, in southern China’s Guangdong Province on July 18, 2022. (JADE GAO/AFP via Getty Images)

Property sales in the 17 cities tracked by the Index Research Institute fell 33.4 percent month-on-month in July, compared with an 88.9 percent jump in June as lockdowns lifted.

High Unemployment Rate

According to a report by major Chinese finance website Caixin, employment in the domestic manufacturing sector has continued to shrink, with the employment index falling to its lowest point in 27 months. The report attributed the layoffs to cost-cutting measures of factories, weak sales, and a “cautious attitude toward hiring” across industries.

In addition, nearly 11 million college students in mainland China graduated in the summer—a record high. According to official data released by the Chinese regime, the unemployment rate for urban youth aged 16-24 climbed to 19.3 percent in June, also record high.

Thousands of job seekers flock to an employment fair in Hefei, east China’s Anhui Province on Feb. 25, 2015. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

Due to widespread uncertainty about employment, consumer confidence remains fragile. For those who still have jobs, many are more reluctant to spend money.

Official data shows that economic growth in mainland China slowed to 0.4 percent year-on-year in the second quarter. The outside world believes that China’s economy may even already be in recession, as the Chinese regime is known for its lack of transparency and often reports false numbers.

Dim Prospects

At China’s ruling Communist Party’s (CCP) Politburo meeting on July 28, the regime acknowledged that this year’s international environment is “complex and severe,” and that domestic tasks are “difficult and arduous.” The CCP leadership remained silent on the 5.5 percent economic growth target it set for this year. Analysts say this suggests that the CCP believes it will ultimately fail to achieve this goal.

Independent current affairs commentator Tang Jingyuan told The Epoch Times that the downturn in Chinese real estate, a pillar industry and the largest sector of local government investment and revenue, has intensified. “Manufacturing employment continues to shrink, and unemployment hits a new high, and manufacturing corresponds to the export of China’s economy. It shows that the mainland China’s consumption stimulus policy has no effect,” he said.

“These data reflect that the three pillars of China’s economy: investment, exports and consumption, are overall in deceleration or even stalling. On this basis, the CCP authorities still stick to ‘zero-COVID’ policy, which will only hurt the Chinese economy,” Tang said.

“To make matters worse, China’s economic crisis is not a question of whether it can achieve the targeted growth rate, but whether it can stabilize the economy in the next five or even 10 years.”

Semiconductors Emerge As Battleground In US-China Race

  As expected the battle for semiconductors is quickly heating up as one of the key front in the confrontation between China and the US. But unlike the Moon race of the 1960s between the USSR and the US, the weapons are not technology and science but sanctions, trade embargoes and restrictions dividing further the world into blocks. 

 The risk of such a strategy is that even if we escape a hot war in the short term, we will end up with a huge fracture zone with "sporadic eruptions" almost anywhere: Political plate tectonics on a grand scale! But unlike the cold war of the last century, this one will be fought with high-tech weapons and mercenaries guarantying a spillover in short order.

 Silicon (article below), lithium, all rare elements, most metals (copper, titanium), food, energy... the list is endless and all without exception will sooner than later be under some kind of embargo. The post-war free trade world we have enjoyed over the last 70 years is truly over.

Authored by Jessica Mao via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

300-millimeter wafers are pictured in a machine for coating with gold in a clean room during the mass production of semiconductor chips at the Bosch's semiconductor plant in Dresden, eastern Germany, on July 12, 2022. (Photo by Jens Schlueter/AFP via Getty Images)

As every aspect of modern life becomes more and more digitized, not just the economies of nations but their sovereign influence will rely more and more on the command of technology.

Although the United States and China are not engaged in traditional warfare, they are engaged in a war of ideas, trade, and technology, especially in semiconductor hegemony, where both sides are battling for supply and advancement.

In recent years, the United States has made a series of moves to hinder and outpace Chinese development in semiconductors, including persuading Asian semiconductor powerhouses to join its alliance, passing a massive spending bill to aid domestic chip production, and banning exports of high-end chipmaking equipment to China.

In late July, the United States expanded its bans on exports to China of equipment that can make semiconductors up to 14 nanometers in size, according to major U.S. chipmaking equipment suppliers, such as Lam Research Corp. and KLA, who were notified by the government about the expanded restrictions.

Previously, the United States had banned the sale of equipment that can produce chips of 10 nm or smaller to Chinese chip manufacturers.

Generally in semiconductor fabrication, the smaller the process technology, the more advanced the chip. The smaller the technology node, the higher the transistor density and the lower the chip power consumption, resulting in higher performance. However, the smaller manufacturing process requires more advanced material and equipment, and will incur a greater cost in R&D and production.

Semiconductors are seen on a circuit board that powers a Samsung video camera at the Samsung MOBILE-ization media and analyst event in San Jose, Calif., on March 23, 2011. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

The development follows a historic $52 billion bill passed by U.S. congress on July 27 to aid domestic chip makers in research, development, and production volume. One of the conditions is that the companies receiving the funds will not increase advanced chip production in mainland China.

The U.S. Department of Commerce said the tightening policies impair “PRC efforts to manufacture advanced semiconductors to address significant national security risks to the United States.”

Meanwhile, the United States is also reportedly planning to ban the exports of U.S. chipmaking equipment that produces advanced NAND chips to major Chinese chipmakers, such as Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp (YMTC).

YMTC is a state-owned company and China’s only storage NAND flash memory manufacturer competing with major U.S. manufacturers. Its global market share is about 5 percent. In a report released by the White House in June 2021, YMTC was identified as the “national champion” enterprise of the Chinese regime, having received $24 billion in subsidies from the Chinese government.

NAND chips are used to store data in a wide range of electronic devices such as smartphones and personal computers, as well as in the data centers of companies such as Amazon, Facebook, and Google.

If the NAND chip initiatives are officially issued, they will be the first time that the United States uses trade restrictions to contain China’s ability to produce non-military use memory chips, broadening the scope of protecting the U.S.’s national security and dealing a massive blow to Chins’s memory chip industry.

On Aug. 1, U.S. senators, including Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), requested that the Department of Commerce add YMTC to the U.S. trade blacklist.

The move could further hamper the growth of China’s semiconductor industry and protect American companies; the only two U.S. memory chip makers, Western Digital and Micron Technology. The two account for about a quarter of the NAND chip market share.

According to a Bloomberg report, the United States is also pushing the Netherlands and Japan to stop the chipmaking equipment suppliers, ASML and Nikon, from selling lithography machines to China. The move could potentially deal a severe blow to major Chinese chipmakers such as Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) and Hua Hong Semiconductor Ltd.

US CHIPS Act

On July 26, the U.S. Senate voted to advance its Chips and Science Bill aimed at boosting domestic semiconductor production and improving technological competitiveness with China.

The bill was later passed in the U.S. House of Representatives on July 28 and signed into law by President Joe Biden on Aug. 2.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) speaks alongside a bipartisan group of U.S. Senators, including (L-R) Roger Wicker (R-Miss.); Mark Warner (D-Va.); Todd Young (R-Ind.), and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), following the passage of the CHIPS Act, providing domestic semiconductor manufacturers with $52 billion in subsidies to cut reliance on foreign sourcing, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on July 27, 2022. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)

The legislation will provide $280 billion in funding to prop up and kickstart domestic semiconductor manufacturing and research; the price tag is far above previous legislation that aimed to provide just $52 billion to manufacturers.

Officially dubbed the CHIPS [Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors for America] Act of 2022, the measure would provide tens of billions of dollars in subsidies and tax breaks to technology corporations in an effort to spur new market growth, as well as funding for government-backed tech research.

Proponents of the legislation have long said that it’s necessary in order to maintain a competitive edge with China, which is pouring money into its own domestic chip production.

The legislation also clarifies that entities receiving U.S. government funding are prohibited from engaging in transactions involving substantial expansion of semiconductor manufacturing in China or any other foreign country of concern for at least ten years after the Act takes effect.

These restrictions are designed to prevent chipmakers from significantly expanding the production of chips more advanced than 28nm in China within the next decade.

Even though the 28-nanometer chips are a few generations behind today’s advanced semiconductors, they are still widely used in cars, lower-end smartphones, appliances, and more.

Chip 4 Alliance

The United States has also been working to persuade Asian semiconductor powerhouses to participate in its “Chip 4 alliance.”

The U.S.-led alliance aims to strengthen cooperation in the semiconductors industry among the United States and the East Asian powerhouses of Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan to build a secure supply chain that excludes China.

Taiwan and Japan have already agreed to participate in the Chip 4 alliance proposed by the United States this March, pending South Korea’s decision to join.

The United States has reportedly given South Korea a deadline to decide whether it will join the “Chip 4 alliance” by Aug. 31, according to local South Korean reports citing unnamed sources in Washington.

The "Unthinkable" In US-China Crisis

 The US-China relation is locked in a Thucydides trap and quickly approaching the danger zone where economic measures take a strategic aspect and become indistinguishable from war!

Authored by Maria Ryan via Consortium News,

One aspect of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan that has been largely overlooked is her meeting with Mark Lui, chairman of the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC). Pelosi’s trip coincided with U.S. efforts to convince TSMC – the world’s largest chip manufacturer, on which the U.S. is heavily dependent – to establish a manufacturing base in the US and to stop making advanced chips for Chinese companies.

U.S. support for Taiwan has historically been based on Washington’s opposition to communist rule in Beijing, and Taiwan’s resistance to absorption by China. But in recent years, Taiwan’s autonomy has become a vital geopolitical interest for the U.S, because of the island’s dominance of the semiconductor manufacturing market.

An employee at Intel Corporation’s wafer fabrication facility in Chandler, Arizona. Image: Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

Semiconductors – also known as computer chips or just chips – are integral to all the networked devices that have become embedded into our lives. They also have advanced military applications. Transformational, super-fast 5G internet is enabling a world of connected devices of every kind (the “Internet of Things”) and a new generation of networked weapons. With this in mind, U.S .officials began to realise during the Trump administration that U.S. semiconductor design companies, such as Intel, were heavily dependent on Asian-based supply chains to manufacture their products.

In particular, Taiwan’s position in the world of semiconductor manufacturing is a bit like Saudi Arabia’s status in OPEC. TSMC has a 53 percent market share of the global foundry market (factories contracted to make chips designed in other countries). Other Taiwan-based manufacturers claim a further 10 percent of the market.

As a result, the Biden administration’s 100-Day Supply Chain Review Report says, “The United States is heavily dependent on a single company – TSMC – for producing its leading-edge chips.” The fact that only TSMC and Samsung (South Korea) can make the most advanced semiconductors (five nanometres in size) “puts at risk the ability to supply current and future [US] national security and critical infrastructure needs.”

This means that China’s long-term goal of reunifying with Taiwan is now more threatening to U.S. interests. In the 1971 Shanghai Communique and the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, the U.S. recognised that people in both mainland China and Taiwan believed that there was “One China” and that they both belonged to it. But for the U.S. it is unthinkable that TSMC could one day be in territory controlled by Beijing.

'Tech War'

For this reason, the U.S. has been trying to attract TSMC to the U.S. to increase domestic chip production capacity. In 2021, with the support of the Biden administration, the company bought a site in Arizona on which to build a U.S. foundry. This is scheduled to be completed in 2024.

The U.S. Congress has just passed the Chips and Science Act, which provides $52 billion in subsidies to support semiconductor manufacturing in the U.S. But companies will only receive Chips Act funding if they agree not to manufacture advanced semiconductors for Chinese companies.

Image: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited , TSMC, Hsinchu Science Park, Taiwan. Wiki Commons

This means that TSMC and others may well have to choose between doing business in China and in the U.S. because the cost of manufacturing in the U.S. is deemed to be too high without government subsidies. This is all part of a broader “tech war” between the U.S. and China, in which the U.S. is aiming to constrain China’s technological development and prevent it from exercising a global tech leadership role.

In 2020, the Trump administration imposed crushing sanctions on the Chinese tech giant Huawei that were designed to cut the company off from TSMC, on which it was reliant for the production of high-end semiconductors needed for its 5G infrastructure business. Huawei was the world’s leading supplier of 5G network equipment but the U.S. feared its Chinese origins posed a security risk (though this claim has been questioned). The sanctions are still in place because both Republicans and Democrats want to stop other countries from using Huawei’s 5G equipment.

The British government had initially decided to use Huawei equipment in certain parts of the U.K.’s 5G network. The Trump administration’s sanctions forced London to reverse that decision. A key U.S. goal appears to be ending its dependency on supply chains in China or Taiwan for “emerging and foundational technologies,” which includes advanced semiconductors needed for 5G systems, but may include other advanced tech in future.

Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan was about more than just Taiwan’s critical place in the “tech war.” But the dominance of its most important company has given the island a new and critical geopolitical importance that is likely to heighten existing tensions between the U.S. and China over the status of the island. It has also intensified U.S. efforts to “reshore” its semiconductor supply chain.

What Putin and China just did to the WEF is a game changer | Redacted with Clayton Morris (Video - 12')

  While the US is agitating with empty gestures (Biden "bumping" MBS in Saudi Arabia, Pelosi supporting Taiwan), Russia and China are moving on building a new world independent from the WEF (World Economic Forum) cabal, now in full control of most Western nations.    

 Neither Putin nor Xi are great friends of democracy but they are the last hope of the world of escaping the WEF dystopia of permanent wars, "green" economic destruction and recurrent virus lockdowns which are now the new normal in Europe and the US.    

 Thanks to captive medias, very few people yet see it that way in Western countries but in the rest of the world, the picture is getting clearer. This is the reason for the pivot of Asia, India, Africa and South America, close to 80% of the world population towards this non-Western centric economic arrangement. 

 The risks are extreme. Because none of the blocks are ready for war, they pile up economic and financial damages on each others endangering the stability of their social systems and in doing so, eventually increasing the chances of a nuclear confrontation. 

 We are as expected in this forth turning on the edge of the precipice.

 

 

The 4 things it takes to be an expert (Video - 18')

 What is exactly an expert and why do experts are so often wrong?

 A very interesting video to understand the subject of expertise.

 

Despite Climate-Doomsaying, Great Barrier Reef's Coral Growth Soars To Record

  Do not fall for the Global Warming Scam! 

 Yes the planet is warming, but nobody knows if it is a short or long term cycle and even less if we have anything to do with it. The models are not clear. According to some models, it looks like temperatures go up first then CO2, not the other way round, and mostly, it is likely to be more related to the sun than human activity. There are so many "unknowns" and question marks that contrary to what you hear in the Medias, the science is not settled. These are not "climate skeptics" or whatever the ostracizing word of the day may be, just science: We don't know!   

 Here's a very good subject that I happen to know particularly well and which has been used and abused over the last few years: Coral bleaching.

 When you dive somewhere and see large areas all white, it can be quite impressive and certainly looks like a good example of climate damage... Except that this is not the case. Here too, you are being bamboozled. 

 First, it is never ALL the corals which are bleached, just a few species which of course can be impressive if these particular species represent a large proportion of the living organism in an area. Second, the cause is almost never, just high temperatures, (You will find the most beautiful corals in the warmest seas of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea) but a mixture of temperature AND pollution, human or natural. Finally, if you come back to the same area a few years later, if the pollution is less, then systematically the corals are back. Always! 

 Conclusion: Humans are killing corals with pollution, not high temperatures. It makes a lot of sense. Temperatures have gone up and down over the ages, sometimes much higher than today when even polar seas were warm with healthy corals everywhere. These animals have an incredible ability to recover. They have done so for hundreds of millions of years. They recolonize an area within a few years, not partially, completely!      

 So whenever you hear about coral bleaching as a proof of global warming, take that warning with a pinch of salt. (The Picture is of me in Okinawa last year.)

Authored by Chris Morrison via DailySceptic.org,

The near vertiginous rise in the annual growth of coral at the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is continuing, with further major increases recorded across large areas.

According to the 2021-22 annual summary from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), levels of coral cover in the northern and central areas of the reef were at their highest levels over the past 36 years of monitoring.

The growth is of course excellent news for environmentalists, but curiously, at the time of writing, the news is being downplayed in the mainstream media. The demise of the world’s coral reefs has long been a go-to poster scare story for Net Zero promoters. As late as October 2020, the BBC  was telling stories about the Reef losing half of its coral. The Guardian was one of the first to set the coral doomsday ball rolling when George Monbiot told its readers in 1999 that the “imminent total destruction of the world’s coral reefs is not a scare story”. Noting the recent record growth, the newspaper added that “global heating could jeopardise recovery”.

This notion that global warming will cause corals to die is frankly a big whopping fib. Tropical coral, which is closely related to its cnidarian cousin the jellyfish, thrives in waters between 24°C and 32°C. It is highly adaptable but seems to dislike sudden changes in temperature, often caused by natural weather oscillations such as El Niño events. As the latest results from the AIMS show, coral quickly recovers when normal localised conditions return. In fact, coral often grows faster in warmer waters nearer the equator than the GBR. The big agitprop lie suggests minor long-term sea temperatures changes will wipe out the coral, but the scientific evidence suggests otherwise.

The sensational growth is clearly seen in the above graph for the northern reef. Recovery is said to have continued following a “period of cumulative disturbances” from 2014 to 2020. Only three of the 24 reefs surveyed in the last two years had decreased hard coral cover. The biggest disturbance, of course, arose around 2016 and was caused by a powerful, and natural, El Niño Pacific oscillation that quickly raised surrounding ocean temperatures by up to 3°C. Sudden warming spooks the coral and they expel symbiotic algae in a process commonly known as bleaching. As we can see, this is quickly reversed when sea temperatures stabilise. Corals have been around, in one form or another, for 500 million years. It is likely this natural process extends back that far to the birth of life as we know it on Earth.

In the central reef, the declines seen in 2012 and 2016 were due to natural events, namely Cyclone Yasi in 2012 and El Niño in 2016. The latter led to bleaching to around 2019, and matters were not helped by outbreaks of crown-of-thorns starfish attacks. Since then, the growth has been spectacular. Last year saw hard coral cover increase to 33%, said to be the highest for this region. Over the last two years, hard coral cover declined on only four individual reefs, and increased on most of the rest surveyed.

The southern part of the GBR has generally displayed the highest coral cover, but according to the AIMS it has been the most “dynamic” over the 36-year survey history. In recent years there has been good growth after the 2016 El Niño depredations, but there have been major attacks by starfish. AIMS notes that many southern reefs have high coral cover, but starfish continue to decimate some areas.

Overall, the GBR seems to be in excellent shape.

The AIMS notes that in the northern and central regions, hard coral cover reached 36% and 33% respectively. Reefs consist of much more than hard coral and contain a diversity of other species along with sponges and algae. The AIMS defines 30-50% as a “high value”, based on historical surveys.

Nevertheless coral is still too valuable a weapon in the green agenda to be discarded lightly. Despite highlighting some stunning reverses of the recent natural coral declines, the AIMS seems to be sticking to the trendy apocalyptic story.

“The predicted consequences of climate change, which include more frequent and intense mass coral bleaching events, are now a contemporary reality. Simultaneously, chronic stressors such as high turbidity, increasing ocean temperatures and changing ocean chemistry can all negatively affect recovery rates, while more frequent acute disturbances mean that the intervals for recovery are becoming shorter,” it concludes.

For what it’s worth, my own hunch is that the little critters will still be around in another 500 million years, maybe longer.

GDP is Crashing, Protests Everywhere. China's financial crisis is Here... (Video - 17')

 As we discussed several times over the last few months, China is going from bad to worse! This was unavoidable. This is by far the largest bubble ever and the chance of a soft landing was always going to be slim. Historically, bubbles more or less always end the same way. (One of the best and most comprehensive book written on the subject is probably: "Manias, Panics, and Crashes" by Robert Aliber)

 Many economists expected China to be able to manage such a crisis better than Western countries but in retrospect it is difficult to understand why. The political system is corrupt, blind and deaf as proven by the Covid crisis. How on earth was it going to be able to fix such an intractable problem? 

 But now what? China is like the proverbial cornered rat. It is still weaker militarily than the US, but sanctions plus external and internal pressure may be enough to tip the coin if the Politbureau sees no other options. 

The West has proved with Russia that it will chose a fight to the finish, although by proxy. China may not have heard the plight of its own people but it certainly hasn't missed the menaces from the US. Folding at this stage with the looming real estate bubble ready to burst would be tantamount to accepting defeat. This is very unlikely to happen. Prepare for the worst!