A key metric in the data released by Wal Mart is not their upfront sales and profit. The recessionary KPI (key performance indicator) is a significant increase in same store sales of 6% (excluding fuel), yet the outcome of that increase in customers is a decrease in profit because the purchases are food.

[Keep an eye on this and we will likely see a similar increase in foot traffic at Aldis]

(VIA NBC) […] Walmart, which is the biggest grocer in the U.S. and often considered a bellwether for the overall economy, said more customers are turning to its stores, which are known for low prices, to fill their pantries and fridges. But they are skipping over general merchandise that they can live without.

Walmart said it now expects same-store sales in the U.S. to rise by about 6% in the second quarter, excluding fuel, as customers buy more food at its stores. That’s higher than the 4% to 5% increase that the company previously expected.  However, that merchandise mix will weigh on the company. Groceries have lower profit margins than discretionary items, such as TVs and clothing.

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Yesterday, Senator Chuck Grassley sent a letter [pdf HERE] to Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Chris Wray, notifying them of whistleblower allegations from within the FBI that senior leadership in both Main Justice and FBI are involved in a coordinated effort to cover-up criminal activity related to Hunter Biden.

The whistleblower allegations, in combination with the documented history of DOJ and FBI misconduct, culminate in Senator Grassley stating:

“If these allegations are true and accurate, the Justice Department and FBI are – and have been – institutionally corrupted to their very core to the point in which the United States Congress and the American people will have no confidence in the equal application of the law. Attorney General Garland and Director Wray, simply put, based on the allegations that I’ve received from numerous whistleblowers, you have systemic and existential problems within your agencies.” (LINK)

Unfortunately, what this amounts to, is Senator Grassley is telling Chris Wray and Merrick Garland, the leaders of the institutionally corrupt activity, that they are systemically corrupt. Which is akin to telling a criminal that he is engaged in unlawful conduct.

Our friend Techno Fog breaks down the outlined allegations succinctly HERE.  Absolutely none of the information contained in the allegations is surprising or new to anyone who has followed the details of Main Justice and FBI activity through the past several years.  What Grassley outlines is simply evidence, supportive evidence, of what has been transparently obvious to those who have reviewed the DOJ and FBI conduct.

The U.S. Dept of Justice and FBI are now political institutions that have abandoned their originating mission in order to become the domestic equivalent of the Soviet-era FSB. Their joint targeting mechanisms have been redesigned to support the interests of corrupt DC politicians, specifically the interests of democrats.  Grassley is admitting what has been visible for years.

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Steve Bannon appears for an interview with Tucker Carlson to discuss his contempt of congress conviction hours earlier.  After the guilty verdict Bannon reaffirms: “I support Trump and the Constitution and I’m not backing off one inch. If I go to jail so be it.”  {Direct Rumble Link}

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You might have heard about an online grocery distribution center called Picnic in the Netherlands burning to the ground {LINK}.  The backstory of how the Picnic operation connects to the Dutch government is fascinating, and with context it looks like Picnic was targeted as part of the Dutch farmer protest.

In the Netherlands the government official who organized the regulations to take farmland from farmers and reduce their livestock is a politician named Christianne van der Wal-Zeggelink {wiki link}.  Mrs van der Wal-Zeggelink is the current Minister for Nature and Nitrogen Policy in the Dutch cabinet of Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

Minister Christianne van der Wal-Zeggelink and Prime Minister Mark Rutte are climate activists, so it makes sense that the “Minister of Nitrogen Policy” would be the person who would attempt to reduce nitrogen by targeting the farmers.  It is Mrs. van der Wal-Zeggelink who created the regulations that the farmers are protesting.

Now, stay with me… Christianne van der Wall-Zeggelink is married to Piet van der Wal, an heir to the wealth of the family who owns a supermarket chain called Boni. {citation} So, when Dutch farmers sell product to Boni they are directly funding the wealth of the government minister who seeks to destroy their livelihoods.

Additionally, when Dutch shoppers spend their money at the Boni supermarket they are funding the family of the government minister who is seeking to destroy the farmers who provide the food to the supermarkets.  Do the Dutch farmer blockades of the supermarkets and distribution centers make more sense now?

Here is where it gets interesting….  The supermarket chain Boni is one of a small group of four big investors in the online supermarket chain Picnic. {citation}  The van der Wal family was part of a group of investors in 2015 and 2019 who generated €450 million for the Picnic grocery operation.

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One of the most frustrating aspects to our current state of national affairs is that no politician will articulate the basic commonsense problem, and how the people handling Joe Biden are directly to blame for it.  Instead, DC and national politicians talk around it, all of them pretending not to know.

However, at least there is one voice in Tucker Carlson who articulates the economic and political reality in a framework that most can understand.

In his opening monologue tonight, Carlson succinctly points out how the current state of economic anxiety is directly the result of Joe Biden chasing the Green New Deal initiatives that progressive, communist democrats have advocated for years.  WATCH:

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The energy crisis is intentional.  The food crisis is intentional.  Everything that is happening domestically in our economic crisis is happening intentionally.  All of the problems are the result of intentional policy decisions.

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This week Neil Oliver talks about the new Utopia we are being instructed to accept.  A world in which there are no rights, only permissions.

Everything including the modification of diets and the eating of bugs and fake meat; to the type of carbon footprint home we are permitted, to the energy we may use or the acceptable car we must drive; permissions, assuming of course, our social media profile and accompanying score is in line with regulatory inspection.

Nope.  Not happening.  There are more of us than them.  We will not eat the bugs.  WATCH: 

[Transcript] – What’s being done to us, or tried on us at least, isn’t working … and it isn’t working and won’t work because what we’re being pushed to accept as the new world makes no sense. The supposed utopia we’re being promised – or, rather, having rammed down our throats – is one in which there is no universal truth, no absolute and trusted truth, but only personal truth that trumps all else.

There are to be no facts like those observed by biologists, just as a for instance, and only feelings based on personal preferences that change from day to day. It will be a world in which we might have no inalienable rights, rights we are born with – just permissions granted one by one by the state … and then only if we do as we are told and do without cars and warm homes and eat our bugs and fake meat and take our medicine on demand. It is a world in which 2+2 might equal 5 if some faceless, unelected bureaucrat says it does – and if any of us says no, 2+2 always and only equals 4, then our bank accounts won’t give us any money until we accept our arithmetical and moral error.

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Keep in mind as you review this article from the Wall Street Journal that every corporate (think Wall St) media outlet, has claimed for well over a year, that inflation was predominantly a demand side issue.  In essence, consumer demand was so strong that prices were rising because of it.

The demand side argument/justification for inflation was always false.  However, it was/is still the claim made by members of the Biden administration and almost every board member of the federal reserve.

All of them, almost universally, dismissed the supply side inflation argument which is the reality at the epicenter of inflation causation.

Inflation was/is an exclusive outcome of three supply side aspects which merged simultaneously: (1) the Joe Biden energy policy, (2) the Joe Biden promoted covid response via legislative spending, and (3) the promoted Biden administration monetary policy.

While the legislative spending did create artificial economic activity, all of these inflationary sources are supply side impacts.

The demand side claim for the origin of inflation was always a ruse, a con, a complete farce intended to backstop the claim that inflation would be “transitory” once consumer spending moderated.   From that perspective every approach from government toward controlling inflation was wrong.  Not wrong by accident, wrong as a matter of deceit and purposeful media manipulation in order to maintain the “Build Back Better” or “Green New Deal” agenda….. which, I might add, benefitted from the advanced Wall Street investment in both constructs, globally and domestically.

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Watch how this plays out in the global cleaving.  Watch closely…

The stresses of retaining climate ideology are beginning to surface in the EU and ‘western nations.’  The developing world needs fertilizer quickly, or their twice annual harvests will not produce enough to feed their population.  However, the EU does not want the developing world to create their own fertilizer because it would mean using an energy source the EU no longer supports.

The result within the G7, G20, World Economic Forum, multinational corporations and EU government, is a debate over whether it is better for people to starve, or to allow developing countries to manufacture fertilizer to feed themselves.   Some in the EU and western alliance say let the people die, climate is more important.  Others, seem to be saying if they allow mass starvation just to retain their climate ideology, they may lose influence in the world.  The debate rages on.

(Reuters) – The European Union is divided on how to help poorer nations fight a growing food crisis and address shortages of fertilizers caused by the war in Ukraine, with some fearing a plan to invest in plants in Africa would clash with EU green goals.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has prompted a global food crisis and fears of worse to come because of a drop in grain exports from Ukraine and a spike in prices of chemical fertilizers, of which Russia and Belarus are major producers.  [SD NOTE: This is false.  Russia’s invasion of Ukraine did not create a global food crisis, the Western Alliance & NATO sanctions did – Important distinction] 

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In 2006 we originally faced 20 DeceptiCons in the Senate.  They represent the right wing of the DC Congressional UniParty.  Having removed a few, and some of them died (McCain, Cochran) there are still 16 of them in office.  They are led by Mitch McConnell.

This is the same crew who vehemently opposed the nomination of Donald Trump for office.  These are the same republican senators who aligned against the Tea Party and later against the MAGA movement represented by our efforts to put Donald Trump into office.  These are the DeceptiCons we have been discussing for 16 years.  However, these are also a very sneaky bunch – notice how McConnell’s #2, John Thune, was permitted to avoid the DeceptiCon sunlight.

Today the DeceptiCons [Blunt (MO), Burr (NC), Capito (WV), Cassidy (LA), Collins (ME), Cornyn (TX), Ernst (IA), Graham (SC), McConnell (KY), Murkowski (AK), Portman (OH), Romney (UT), Tillis (NC), Toomey (PA) and Young (IN)] voted to shut down debate on the democrat senate firearm restriction and confiscation bill.  The vote to invoke cloture shuts down debate and ends the opportunity for a filibuster.  Invoking cloture, ie voting to support cloture, is a vote in support of the bill.

WASHINGTON DC – […] Ahead of the vote, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the Senate could pass the final bill as soon as Thursday with GOP cooperation. However, if any one of the 100 senators objects, final passage could occur as late as Friday night, briefly delaying the chamber’s planned two-week recess.

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U.S. inflation was/is driven by supply side impacts as a result of policy (Build Back Better).  The U.S. recession was/is now driven by demand side impacts that are the result of increased supply side costs.  This is the natural economic truth being denied by all levels of political leadership.

Joe Biden policy makers, specifically the U.S. treasury secretary and the federal reserve chairman, have claimed -falsely- that current inflation was/is being driven by demand. In essence, and ironically, their position means consumers are to blame for high prices.  This has been their story and they have stuck to it.  However, remember monetary policy can only impact the demand side of the economy.  Monetary policy cannot impact the supply side, that aspect is led by Joe Biden policy.

The Federal reserve, having denied (pretended) the supply side causation, has effectively raised interest rates (0.75%) into an economic environment where consumer demand was already contracting.  CTH has been asserting this fundamental position all year.   Here is the evidence:

US Manufacturing PMI fell dramatically to 52.4 in June 2022 from 57 in May.  This drop is well below the market and economic expectations of 56, and now points to the slowest growth and steepest drop in factory activity in almost two years.  Contractions in output and new orders are pushing the index down.

Production and new sales declined for the first time since the depths of the pandemic in mid-2020 driven by weak consumer demand.  Inflation and a drop in wholesale and retail purchases have lowered purchase orders.  The gears inside the economy are slowing to a halt.

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