Mohamed El-Erian, the chief economic adviser for Allianz, got the inflation problem correct; states a forecast in line with CTH Main Street review, but then falls short on his political outlook for the solution.

Within the interview, El-Erian predicts inflation at the current CPI measure will increase from current 7.9% to over 10% this year.  That aspect is in alignment with CTH review at ground level.

Current real inflation is more than 15% across the board, if you use the CPI methodology we were using in the 70’s and 80’s.  Both the scale and the speed of the current price increases are historic.  That is why you are seeing prices on retail items jumping so high, so fast.  The price increases on highly consumable goods are in the 15 to 20% range.  WATCH:

An increase to over 10%, using current CPI measures, equals an increase of 25 to 30% in actual price (using historic measures).  Keep in mind, we have already passed through a wave of backward-looking inflation in the 25 to 30% range.  El-Erian is predicting a duplication of that scale into the remainder of 2022, I agree.  The 2020 $3 item became the 2021 $4 item, which will now become the 2022 $5.50 item.  That is our reality. It will not get better.

Where we differ from El-Erian is on the wage side and the political analysis.  Any political intervention to create govt subsidy with the goal to generate a higher workforce will backfire – bigly.  Recent historic employment statistics have not yet reflected the demand side decline in goods.  The employment data is skewed and useless because of the COVID mitigation impact on jobs.

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This post is an assembly of previous research, in preparation for what is likely to surface soon.

Anyone who has followed politics for any amount of time knows the Nancy Pelosi “January 6th Committee” is an opposition research effort under the guise of a House investigation.  The goal is to frame an extremist narrative favorable for the Democrats in the 2022 mid-term election.  That is the entire goal.

What the Mueller probe was to President Trump, the J6 Committee is to the MAGA movement.

Everyone, and I do mean e.v.e.r.y.o.n.e in Washington DC knew Robert Mueller was appointed as special counsel for one reason, to target President Trump, weaken his administration and ultimately remove him from office.  Not a single entity in DC did not know that was the goal.  The same is true here.

Everyone in DC knows Nancy Pelosi’s J6 Committee is intended to target Democrat political opposition. That is the goal. That is ONLY the goal.  Not a single entity in DC does not know that is the goal.

The Republican House members who voted to authorize the J6 Committee know the goal is to target Republicans.  Please repeat that as many times as you need in order to dispatch your battered conservative status.  The Republican House members who voted to authorize the J6 Committee are OUR ENEMY every bit as much as the Democrats.

All of that said, we are now entering the 2022 mid-term election cycle.  The downstream networks, identified by the J6 Committee, are likely to become targets – viewed as influence risks by the Democrats in power.  However, as the objectives of the J6 net grow wider, the DC jurisdiction of the J6 runs into an increasingly more challenging enforcement issue.

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Tucker Carlson used his monologue tonight to give a big picture review of how the White House is using the Ukraine-Russia conflict to hide the economic outcomes created by their policy.

Massive inflation on basic necessities, combined with rising gas, fuel and energy costs are crippling the working class.  The White House is now using the Russia-Ukraine conflict as an excuse to hide their responsibility.   It’s an accurate outline. WATCH:

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If you remember this very important quote from two weeks ago, what follows will make a lot more sense:

…”Strategic success in the 21st century is not about a physical land grab of territory; that’s what Putin has done.  In this century, strategic power is increasingly measured and exercised by economic strength, by technological sophistication and your story – who you are, what your values are; can you attract ideas and talent and goodwill? And on each of those measures, this will be a failure for Russia.”

~ Deputy National Security Advisor Daleep Singh

White House Deputy National Security Advisor Daleep Singh boiled down geopolitical power to a cultural issue of social likeability.  This is genuinely what the people running the Biden administration believe.

Everyone in the Biden administration is, after all, spawned in the petri-dish of community activism. When they successfully installed Barack Obama, the premise of their strategy proved accurate.   Within this political and cultural strategy, pop icons are used as influencers and policy ambassadors.

This report today from the Washington Post is directly aligned:

(Washington Post) – On Thursday afternoon, 30 top TikTok stars gathered on a Zoom call to receive key information about the war unfolding in Ukraine. National Security Council staffers and White House press secretary Jen Psaki briefed the influencers about the United States’ strategic goals in the region and answered questions on distributing aid to Ukrainians, working with NATO and how the United States would react to a Russian use of nuclear weapons.  (read more)

It is very easy to snark or ridicule this approach from the position of being an intelligent adult in a world of childishness.  However, we dismiss it at our own peril.

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Mark Twain was reported to have said, “History may not always repeat, but it rhymes.”  With the Obama foreign policy team back together again in the White House, we are watching Twain’s truism play out in real time.

Yesterday, the Biden administration specifically designated Qatar as a major non-NATO ally {LINK}.

The purpose of this designation is brutally obvious. The United States is putting Qatar back into the business of brokering arms sales from the U.S. government into Ukraine.  Following the geopolitical intervention models previously used in Egypt, Libya and Syria by President Obama and Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Antony Blinken are now repeating the process toward Ukraine.

In many ways this should not be a surprise.  Qatar is the financial hub and support network for the Muslim Brotherhood.  Qatar is also the arms broker for covert military operations when the U.S. does not want visible fingerprints.

By making this designation now, the Biden administration is setting up the groundwork for a long-term proxy war between the U.S/NATO and Russia in Ukraine.

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The nationwide average for regular gas is now $4.32 a gallon, according to AAA. Just yesterday it was $4.25. In just a few days gasoline has eclipsed the highest price ever recorded by 20¢.  The previous record was $4.11 in July 2008.  Unfortunately, there is no end in sight.  Anecdotally, my neighborhood gas station went up 75¢/gal in just three days and is now $4.95.

Nationally, Diesel prices are also at record highs, with the average cost at $5.06 a gallon, up almost twenty cents overnight from Wednesday to Thursday.  This will increase transportation costs for all goods being delivered.   The speed of the current rate of increase is very troublesome.

(Current gas price in West Hollywood, Los Angeles, CA)

USA today has an estimate of gasoline prices by state – SEE HERE

What is the current price near you?

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Polish President Andrzej Duda used the opportunity of a joint press availability with Kamala Harris to correct the record and diplomatically push back against Secretary of State Anthony Blinken for making up the “green light” story {Background Here}.

During the Q&A, Harris was asked about what alternatives there were for the Polish fighter jets that have now been taken off the table in the material support discussions for Ukraine.  When it came time for his reply, President Duda stated:

Duda: “Let me say something more.  We accept that [Ukraine] have the right to demand this assistance from the international community.  They can demand this support from NATO.  We are providing them humanitarian assistance and material assistance the best we can.  We are trying to do our best. 
 
Some expectations were addressed in a very strong and unequivocal way, also towards us — towards Poland.  However, we are members of the North Atlantic Alliance.  And as far as security-related issues are concerned, we have to look at these not only through our own lens — through the prism of the security of Poland — but we also have to adopt the perspective of the security of NATO as a whole. 
 
So, in a nutshell, we have to be a responsible member of the North Atlantic Alliance.  That is why there were requests addressed to us.  Those requests were addressed to us by the Ukrainian side and also, to a certain extent, by the media. 

Notice those last three words, “by the media.”  The calls from media were an outcome of U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken saying Poland has a “green light” to send fighter jets to Ukraine – without ever discussing the issue with Ukraine in advance.  Poland was blindsided.

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The Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) has released the February capture of the current inflation situation {DATA HERE} – the results are alarming and unfortunately will get worse.

The February rate of inflation was 0.8% (adjusted), an increase from the prior month (Jan 0.6%), and the calculated year-over-year inflation rate is now 7.9 percent and climbing fast.   There are some important indicators and aspects that need to be emphasized.  [Modified table-1 graphic]

First, the capture of the current February data was BEFORE the Russia-Ukraine crisis came into play.  Despite the White House attempting to justify the release data today by blaming it on Russia-Ukraine influence on oil and gas prices, the data itself was assembled before the recent spikes in oil and gasoline.  This is an important distinction, because that means what is coming next is even higher.

Second, what is surfacing now in the data is what we previously outlined in October and November as the inflation hurricane heading our way.  All of this was predictable, given the nature of the inflation, at all three stages of the supply chain (raw material, intermediate and wholesale).

The price of goods is still rising inside the supply chain, and the rate of petroleum price increases (energy and transportation) is making the final products even more expensive.

Third, the forward-looking rate of annualized inflation is higher in almost every category than the year-over-year backward looking data. This means future price increases will be even higher than previous price increases.  The rate of inflation monthly (in almost every category) is exceeding the previous rate of inflation.

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Pentagon Spokesperson John Kirby held a press briefing today (full video below) to underscore the U.S. military does not support the sending of any NATO planes into Ukraine.  “The intelligence community has assessed that the transfer of MiG-29s to Ukraine may be mistaken as escalatory and could result in significant Russian reaction that might increase the prospects of a military escalation with NATO,” Kirby said. “Therefore, we also assess that the transfer of MiG-29s to Ukraine to be high risk,” he continued.

Now ask yourself this question:

How could the transfer of MiG-29’s evolve from a “green light” position by the U.S. State Department Sunday, into a “high risk” assessment by the Pentagon today? 

This is the question that no U.S. media will touch, because the answer is almost too jaw-dropping to contemplate.  However, this answer must be outlined in order to fully grasp what took place.

The events of the past 96 hours, on this issue, are perhaps the most critical moments in modern U.S. history, that must be fully understood to fathom what has just happened and what dangers exist from within the current White House administration.

When we were discussing the Afghanistan withdrawal fiasco, we noted two competing factions within the U.S. national security apparatus.  One group is the Pentagon, the other is a completely rogue operation coming from the State Department.  In the Afghanistan example, the issues surfaced within the blame casting for the crisis upon exit.  In this current example, things are far more serious.

Last weekend, the US Department of State, Secretary Anthony Blinken, made the unilateral claim that Poland -a NATO ally- was approved by the State Department to send fighter jets into Ukraine.   Blinken was located in Moldova when he made the statement to three U.S. media outlets. Poland was caught completely off guard by Blinken’s statements, and only learned about them from the media reporting.

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First things first, there is no need for panic, and it is important to remember the United States is a net food exporter.  The U.S. is blessed with a food production and capacity industry that leads the world.  We have fertile land, abundant harvests and the strong advantage of food independence.

That said, the influence of multinational corporations in our agriculture industry over the past three decades has ramifications, and we have outlined exhaustively, on these pages, what the real-world consequences are. As we head into a chapter of global food crisis, the food production capacity of the United States can be viewed as an asset, but only insofar as we are willing to secure a national food supply for our own America-First interests.

What we have talked about prudently on these pages is now coming into greater focus, as global leaders are beginning to prepare their own citizens for the long-term consequences of their disruption to the food supply chain.

The meteor of government intervention hit the ocean back in the spring of 2020, when government intervened in the food supply process, the tsunami -the ripple effect from that intervention- is now within sight of shore.

I’m not going to repeat the history here. CTH readers already know the details {Go Deep} – for everyone else, use the site search function.  As a result of intervention, global COVID intervention, food stocks were depleted.  Combined with increased energy costs, driven by the ideological chase for climate change under the guise of ‘Build Back Better,’ we end up with higher fertilizer costs for this year.

The ripple effect becomes a tsunami, and the next round of global food harvests becomes more critically important and simultaneously more expensive. For the past three months, the sound of the alarms have grown louder.  Now, people are really starting to pay attention.

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