If nothing makes sense in the world anymore, that’s not a bug. It’s a feature…
(by Half Dollar) I generally start my day off with a scan of the “news”.
Over the weekend, and this very Monday, as I have been scanning, the news is kind of all over the place, with no one thing dominating the other, but there was one piece of news that, while minor, is unfortunate yet also interesting, and the news really speaks to the state of America right now.
THE “PANDEMIC”, THOSE DARN “MASKS”, AND TWO AMERICAS
My son and I went fishing over the weekend, and while we didn’t catch any fish, we did catch a glimpse of the striking disconnect between Main Street, USA (small businesses) and Corporate America (huge multinationals).
First things first: The “license” to fish.
While I was already at Walmart buying some groceries, I thought I’d grab the fishing license there too, because if Walmart is one thing, in theory at least, it’s “one stop shopping”, even though in practice Walmart never has what you need and only a little of what you want, and not to bore you with the details, but I’ll just say that after twenty minutes of waiting at the sporting goods counter and after begging and pleading with two different employees, both armed with walkie-talkies, to send over the employee capable of selling me a fishing license, I gave up.
Despite the assurances that somebody was coming.
But I digress.
It’s not that I’m a quitter, it’s just that the ice-cream perched at the top of my cart was dripping down onto the other food below because apparently there was enough ice cream stuck under the lid but outside of the tub that when it melted it was causing quite a drippy mess, plus after standing there at the sporting goods counter looking like an idiot for 20 minutes, I had decided that I’d had about enough of competing with the Walmart Zombies for one day, so I left.
And I left the ice cream on the sporting goods counter.
Since I still needed the license to fish, the next morning, my son and I went to the local “bait & tackle” store, and that was a much better experience, and it was also enlightening.
You see, I’m new to this state when it comes to what one is and isn’t allowed to do, so I had questions, and not only did I get them answered, but I got the fishing license too, and it was even laminated for one dollar extra because fishing involves water, and well, water ruins paper, and fortunately, the fine folks at the local bait & tackle store understand this, and so they offer additional protection for a higher price.
Woot!
It is still possible to find customer service, you just have to get away from Corporate America.
But wait, there’s more!
That’s right folks, and because we have a Nazi Governor in this state, as do most states, if not all, and because there is still a stupid “mask mandate”, believe me when I say that any corporation that basically has absolutely zero heart or concern for America, much less any common sense, and yes, for those doing the math, that would be a negative rate of intelligence, enforces Unconstitutional limitations on Liberty like the good little Gestapo that they are, but when it comes to the small, local businesses, in addition to finding good customer service, small businesses realize that the mask thing is for, well, I’m still not sure what it’s for, but it sure was nice to not have to wear a mask inside the local bait & tackle shop while conversing with various employees about fishing what not.
Which brings me to the main point about the unfortunate, interesting piece of news: I read that the founder of Texas Roadhouse died, and when I first saw the headline over the weekend, my first thought was that he found a nice restaurant, but this morning I saw a sub-headline during my scan of the news, and I read that he committed suicide.
Now, obviously I’m committing every error in the book by making this point, but I think the point is valid: Texas Roadhouse had a fun atmosphere, and that’s from grabbing a handful of peanuts out of a huge wooden barrel and dropping the empty, broken shells all over the floor wherever one happened to be sitting or standing, to the waitresses line-dancing at times, to the generally loud, joyful, and delicious environment, although all of that has changed now, and like the good little Nazis Enforcers of Corporate America that they are, including the people at the Texas Roadhouse, because of this pandemic insanity, customers must now “wait in the car” until receiving a text message indicating the table is ready, customers must walk in with masks on and keep them on until seated, because everybody knows the virus is stupid like that insofar as there’s zero chance for infection while one is seated at the table as opposed to standing up or being anywhere else in the restaurant without a mask, and I must say, all of the coronavirus craziness is kind of a put off.
And whatever happened to the dang peanuts?
Here’s the overall point: With two active teens living in my house, teens who go to all sorts of places with all sorts of friends, engaging in “high risk” activities and “exposing” themselves to the oh so scary-scary coronavirus, suffice it to say there is absolutely no risk for anything anymore as far as I can tell, and yet, we’re living as if some hybrid form of Ebola mixed with the Black Plague is killing off seven out of every ten people in society, and this little disease is so infectious that transmission is achieved simply by looking in the general direction of an infected person.
Seriously.
Life is getting back to normal, and we’re in the changing of the seasons, yet at the same time, it’s the end of the freakin’ world!
Or is that not what American society is like in late March of 2021?
Small businesses generally understand the idiocy of it all, and in my opinion, it is Corporate America that is ruining things, and unfortunately, Corporate America has been dominating over small businesses during this pandemic, thanks to Big Government and the Fed, so it seems like Corporate America can only embrace the pseudo-science being pumped out by the “authorities” and believe the lies being told by the politicians, all the while forcing the use of masks, enforcing social distancing, limiting the number of people in any given establishment, and so on and so forth.
In other words, we live in two Americas right now, and one America is a nation that is ready to move on and simply live life again, because more importantly, this America sees no risk in the pandemic, because in my opinion, there is none any longer, and still, there is this strange, other America, which consists of a bunch of the Brainwashed Masses, Karens, Gestapo and other people with petty “power”, from the greeters at Walmart, to the Governors, to the public “servants” and everybody in between, and these people in this other America want to continue with all of the Freedom and Liberty crushing absurdities they’ve dished out for over a year, to put it lightly.
That said, and not saying this is the reason the Texas Roadhouse founder took his own life, it’s easy to see how somebody could lose his or her mind in all of this, especially if said person sides with an America that is ready to move on and live life once again, yet who is confined to the new America because of one’s job, status in society, or something else, and therefore said person is constantly apologizing for, enabling, or directly enforcing the whims of tyranny.
I hope this dual America thing ends very, very soon, because if not, as a society, and in a 1984ish kind of way, we will each soon have to choose whether we are part of The Party or part of the Proles.
The latter for me, thank you very much.
The Proles have way more fun.
In other news, well, this:
Strange times, indeed.
Silver is under $26 to start the week:
I silver now going to catch down to gold?
Gold has, after all, fallen considerably:
I mean, yeah, because why would anybody want some stupid pet rock when a transgender Islamist student in Pakistan can bid on a tokenized piece of art that was created by a humanoid robot?
I mean, come on, people, get with the times!
We may finally be at the time when we see gold & silver recoupling:
Why exactly would the Cartel not want to make silver catch-down to gold, again?
Let’s watch palladium this week:
Palladium can help us understand the extent to which supply chain disruptions continue to be disruptive.
Of course, platinum will be important to watch this week too:
The question is, how low will this pullback in the commodities and the precious metals go?
If the “inflation” narrative dominates, then not much lower:
Fed Chair Jerome Powell will be giving speeches today, tomorrow and Wednesday, however, so we should be able to get a feel for the narrative by the end of the week.
Copper hasn’t even pulled back to its 50-day moving average:
In my opinion, it should not be surprising if the commodities and the precious metals do continue to pullback and/or correct.
It will be “all eyes” on the stock market this week, too:
Just another buy the dip, or the start of something else?
If fear is any guide, it’s just another buy the dip:
So far, “market participants” have been rewarded with buying the dip.
It will also be all eyes on the 10-Year Note:
More importantly, market participants want to know how high the Fed is willing to let rates rise before intervening.
There was a lot of US dollar flip-flopping during the Trump “Administration”:
It seems like the dollar is merely an afterthought to the Biden “Administration”.
Stack accordingly,
Paul “Half Dollar” Eberhart