Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, appears on Face the Nation to describe the current status of EU success in shrinking the economy to achieve parity with the shrinking of energy development. Ms. Lagarde is very happy with their ‘management of the transition’ so far, and sees slow economic growth combined with a citizenry happily accepting the lower standard of living, the new normal.

As Lagarde outlines, the lowered economic activity is helping the central banks support the objectives of the government officials and corporations who are giving the instructions. Overall, she is optimistic the common man and woman will continue accepting less ability to achieve personal economic and financial success, as the bankers and politicians continue managing the western transition. Things are going swimmingly. WATCH:

MARGARET BRENNAN: We’re joined now by Christine Lagarde, former head of the IMF, now the president of the European Central Bank. Good morning.

PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK CHRISTINE LAGARDE: Good morning, Margaret. Lovely to be back.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Good to have you here, and your recovery is going all right?

MADAME LAGARDE: Yes, in a couple of days, I think I’ll be fine.

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Always keep in mind that retails sales from the Dept of Commerce [DATA HERE pdf] are always calculated in dollars.  Inflation can artificially skewer retail sales if prices increase, and yet consumer purchases decline at a rate lower than the increase in price.  Fewer units sold at higher prices can give the false impression of increased sales.

During an inflationary environment, when prices increase yet retail sales drop, there are substantially fewer units being purchased.  Overall purchases at stores, restaurants and online declined a seasonally adjusted 1% in March from the prior month.

During the time measured gasoline was less expensive, so that led the drop in fuel sales; however, drops in dept stores (-2.5%), General Merchandise (-3.0%), electronics (-2.1%), and building supplies (-2.1%), shows another broad-based pullback of Main Street consumer spending. (pdf here)

These outcomes are in general alignment with what many people have shared via regional ground reports.  Grocery store sales are flat despite major increases in grocery store prices (+10 to +20%).  People are buying fewer grocery store units and making their food budget stretch as far as possible.

Durable goods are not considered essential, and sales of cars, electronics and department store products are much lower.

I am actually a little (pleasantly) surprised to see restaurant sales holding (+0.1%), despite the massive increase in fresh food costs.   I thought people would eat out less, but the total decline in restaurant foot traffic seems to be in the single digits.  I guess people can afford it more than I anticipated.

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Tucker Carlson played the full interview excerpt where President Donald Trump answered the question about who blew up the Nordstream pipeline. {Direct Rumble Link}.  Within the answer, President Trump doesn’t want to undermine the Biden administration, yet we know who was responsible.

What you notice again from the totality of President Trump’s responses and worldview is the unique nature of the honesty.   In the most consequential of ways, President Trump was the single most consequential foreign policy president in a generation.   We forget that during Trump’s term in office, the headlines about North and South Korea were not about conflict, but rather about the possibility of unification on the Korean peninsula.

Two large elements played out when Trump was in office.  First, economic security is national security.  Second, “peace is the prize.”  Through both elements the Trump Doctrine was born and the effectiveness, while downplayed and ignored, was unmistakable.  WATCH:

♦President Trump’s foreign policy approach brought North and South Korea together away from the table of conflict.  ♦President Trump’s foreign policy approach brought Serbia and Kosovo together away from the table of conflict.  ♦President Trump’s foreign policy rallied the Gulf Cooperation Council to stop Qatar’s support for Islamic extremists via the Muslim Brotherhood. ♦President Trump’s foreign policy brought Turkey and the Kurdish forces together away from war and conflict.  ♦President Trump’s foreign policy created a ceasefire to stop the bloodshed in Syria.  President Trump mediated a cessation of hostilities between India & Pakistan in the Kashmir region. ♦President Trump’s foreign policy brought Israel and the UAE together… and then Bahrain… and then Sudan in the Abraham Accords.

President Trump executed a clear foreign policy, a unique doctrine of sorts, where national security is achieved by leveraging U.S. economic power. It was a fundamental shift in approaching both allies and adversaries; summarized within the oft repeated phrase: “economic security is national security.”

The Trump Doctrine of using economics to achieve national security objectives was a fundamental paradigm shift.  Modern U.S. history provided no easy reference for the effective outcome.

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In the latest round of statistics from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) the March inflation data has been released [DATA HERE]. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) climbed 0.1% in March after advancing 0.4% in February.  This puts the 12-month CPI outlook at 5% inflation. [See Modified Table A on Left]

A 4.6% decline in March gasoline prices was offset by higher rental and housing costs.  That was the primary driver of the lowered inflationary data as gasoline is weighted heavier in the impact.

However, that said, gasoline prices are already rising again after Saudi Arabia and other OPEC+ oil producers early this month announced further oil output cuts.  This puts the April CPI data (starting to be assembled this week) on track to increase over March.

Overall, in the big picture the data shows the plateau of sorts as we described for this spring.  This plateau will be followed by another bump as a result of current input costs and prior energy costs traveling through the supply chain.

Energy services, electricity and natural gas, are stable but higher than last year.  The crop cycles carry those increased costs from field to fork.  Consumers cannot avoid those food prices increasing.  The more processing involved in the food sector, the higher the price increase.

Housing increases are another unavoidable cost and generally cycle with a lag within them.  As leases expire, the new lease rates increase accordingly.  The same is true for insurance rates.  Both unavoidable sectors have a rolling lag that hits the consumer upon renewal.

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A few days after the terror attack of 9-11-01, someone in media asked George W. Bush what Americans can do to help.  Dubya’s response drew instant criticism, because he asked people to go shopping… but in the big picture, President Bush knew what could happen if the economic freeze continued.

When it comes to politics and economic outlooks, trust your instincts.  The economics of the ‘thing’ is always the reason the ‘thing’ exists or does not exist.

When you are looking at economic news, always remind yourself… the people producing the news have a vested interest in maintaining a very specific outlook.  The motive behind what Dubya said in September of 2001, pertains every bit as much today.  Economic outcomes can topple entire governments.

Remember, this current ‘supply-side energy policy driven inflation‘, a purposeful effort to shrink the economy and yet tenuously maintain control, has never happened before.  The people behind the Build Back Better agenda are, in reality, experimenting with a theory. DATA…

(ISM) – The Institute for Supply Management’s PMI contracted for the fifth straight month in March registering 46.3, the lowest level since May 2020. Any reading below 50.0 indicates contraction.  The employment index declined by 2.2 percent to a level of 46.9.

Most of the impediments to manufacturing growth — such as shortages and lockdowns — have subsided, said Tim Fiore, chair of the ISM’s manufacturing survey committee, with the exception of pricing. ISM’s pricing index fell below 50 in March but at 49.2 remains higher than pre-pandemic levels.

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French President Emmanuel Macron was in the Netherlands today speaking to an audience in the Hague about his vision for the future of Europe.  A remarkably disassociated speech was the outcome.

Speaking of the importance of innovation to maintain economic competitiveness, on his right-hand Macron cheers for capitalism as an outcome of competition from the only venue it exists, the nation state.  Yet on his left hand, Macron proclaims the importance of ‘globalism’ and economic socialism, which is the anthesis of creating innovation.

Economic nationalism is the only way competition between nation states succeeds. Innovation is born from competition, and without the nation state there is no baseline to maintain capitalism.  Globalism creates socialism, equity as the baseline for distribution of innovative outcomes.  Capitalism and socialism cannot coexist if innovation and competition is the goal.  The pillars which form the baseline for Macron’s view of a new Europe, collapse in his contradictory worldview.  Prompted to 10:55, WATCH:

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Macron’s solution to the problem of innovation lacking in ‘globalist‘ economic models, is to force citizens to produce and innovate.  This is what he means by “reforms” in the competitive agenda.  Forced innovation, is the worldview of totalitarians.   Capitalism relies on freedom, not coercion.

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The United States Treasury Dept is planning to send officials to key parts of the globe to act as enforcers for western sanctions against Russia. Essentially, it’s a blackmail and extortion tour, where Liz Rosenberg and Brian Nelson will visit non-compliant nations and central Western banking hubs to threaten foreign nations against continued noncompliance.

Whether any nation complies with the pressure campaign threats is still unknown. However, against the backdrop of various geopolitical alliances now cleaving the global economy, and with a larger network of non-western nations now forming their own trade partnerships without regard for Washington DC opinion, the effort to draw “with us” or “against us” lines could backfire.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Top sanctions officials from the U.S. Treasury Department plan special international trips this month to pressure firms and countries still doing business with Russia to cut off financial ties because of the war on Ukraine.

The message is that those working with Russia’s government must decide:

1. Continue to provide Moscow with material support or

2. Keep doing business with countries that represent 50 percent of the global economy.

Those are the choices to be laid out, senior Treasury officials told reporters on a call Friday. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the travel plans.

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Attorney Thomas Renz was working on a legislative bill in Missouri for informed consent around vaccines, when suddenly he encountered pushback from Big Pharma and agriculture lobbyists.  When he looked into the nature of their opposition, he discovered the intent to use mRNA technology in the U.S. food supply.  Ever since he discovered this intention Renz has been trying to alert and warn everyone {Direct Rumble Link}.

Thomas Renz appears on the Bannon War Room for a discussion with Natalie Winters.   The first segment begins at 04:58 of the video below:

The second part of the interview {Direct Rumble Link} is below.  Start at 02:39:

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The labor unions are trying to maintain the momentum against French President Emmanuel Macron’s unilateral decision to raise the retirement age.  However, despite nationwide majority support, on the 11th day of a national strike there are fewer protests disrupting commerce.

On the positive side, the offices of Blackrock were targeted and torched.  So, we know the focus is generally on the right multinational target.  Meanwhile, President Macron is in Beijing, China, getting slapped around by the panda paw.

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PARIS (Reuters) -Clashes erupted in Paris next to a Left Bank brasserie favoured by French President Emmanuel Macron during a day of nationwide protests against a pension bill that he has pushed through despite widespread opposition.

La Rotonde, whose awning was briefly on fire as protesters threw bottles and paint at police, is well known in France for hosting a much-criticised celebratory dinner for Macron when he led the first round of the 2017 presidential election.

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For his opening monologue and first interview tonight, Fox News host Tucker Carlson outlined the ramification of non-western nations now trading in alternative currencies to the U.S. dollar.   {Direct Rumble Link Here]  As the dollar diminishes in value, and as an outcome of Biden using U.S. treasury bonds as part of the sanction regime against Russia, various non-western nations now perceive holding dollars as exposing themselves to risk.

Carlson is joined by Luke Gromen who accurately notes the dollar as a global trade currency may continue, but foreign nations holding U.S. treasury bonds as an asset will likely start contracting.  The result of U.S. treasury bonds returning after maturity with no repurchase, would be an inability of the U.S. to borrow against their sale. This could, perhaps likely will, severely diminish the amount of money the U.S. congress can spend.  WATCH:

None of this should come as a surprise to those who have paid attention. Factually, in March of last year, one month after the Russian sanctions were announced, the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Deputy Managing Director said the sanctions against Russia are likely to undermine the US dollar’s global dominance as a trade currency.  Everyone could see this coming.

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