RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/03/inflation_good_news__democratstyle.html

Today’s inflation news will be something Joe Biden crows about, but only if you don’t need to eat.

As per its schedule, the U.S. government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its monthly report on the February 2023 Consumer Price Index (CPI) at 8:30 a.m. (EDT) this morning, confirming what most of us have noticed.  

CPI for all items rises 0.4% in February as shelter increases

In February, the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers increased 0.4 percent, seasonally adjusted, and rose 6.0 percent over the last 12 months, not seasonally adjusted. The index for all items less food and energy increased 0.5 percent in February (SA); up 5.5 percent over the year

“…less food and energy…” 

Oh.

Food, which all living things need, jumped on an annual basis to 9.5%.  For those who eat at home, food prices zoomed up 10.2 %.  If that is too much for some, be reassured that “food away from home” in the past 12 months gulped up “only” 8.4%.  

Yeah, yeah…I know.

But there was some better yearly news on energy; really.  Energy costs (only)  increased 5.2% as energy commodities (oil, gas) dropped 1.4%. 

Drill, drill, explore, and drill some more.

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/03/15/this-is-good-inflation-news-not-if-you-need-food-heat-or-a-place-to-live/

Inflation eased again.” “CPI inflation rate slows to 6%.” “Inflation fell for the eighth straight month in February.” Those are the headlines that greeted the latest Consumer Price Index Report. Why aren’t those ungrateful families celebrating?

Prices in February climbed 0.4% from the month before and 6% from the year before. Both are down slightly from January.

President Joe Biden cheered the news, saying that “today’s report shows annual inflation is down by a third from this summer” and is “the slowest annual increase since September 2021.”

Huzzah!

OK, sure, that 6% year-over-year bump is still three times the average inflation for the past three decades. And sure, it comes on top of the 7.9% jump in prices in February 2022. And, yes, it means that the Consumer Price Index has now risen 15% in the short time Biden has been in office.

But fear not! Because Biden is on top of the situation, and his “inflation reduction act” is clearly working. Right?

The problem with the focus on the overall CPI – which measures cost changes in a “basket of goods” – is that people aren’t buying this basket every month. Most are just trying to make ends meet. They’re trying to feed their families. Keep the lights on. Avoid eviction.

https://asiatimes.com/2023/03/feds-try-to-stop-bank-crisis-of-their-own-making/

NEW YORK – US bank regulators on Sunday announced a massive response to last week’s run on Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and the risk of copycat runs against other regional banks.

The Federal Reserve will provide one-year loans against banks’ security portfolios through a new Bank Term Funding Program, eliminating the risk that banks might be forced to sell their US$4.4 trillion in government securities at a loss.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), meanwhile, will make whole all SVB depositors, as well as those of the Signature Bank of New York, closed by New York state authorities on “systemic risk” grounds.

Federal regulators have slapped a rather large bandage on a gaping wound that they cut into the banking system. By tightening credit to control a wave of inflation that had nothing to do with credit in the first place, the Treasury and Federal Reserve have created a credit problem where none existed before. There are few comparable instances of self-sabotage in the annals of bank regulation.

Although depositors won’t lose money, holders of bank bonds may take substantial losses. That augurs poorly for a recovery in credit markets already stressed by Federal Reserve tightening.

Sunday’s announcement will ease market fears that the run on SVB, which saw $45 billion in deposits leave the bank in little more than a day, might spread to other regional banks. The value of regional banks’ stocks collapsed on March 10 in response to the fear of a general run.

https://openthebooks.substack.com/p/the-silicon-valley-bank-coverup-and

Last Friday, when the Silicon Valley Bank quickly imploded and rocked the U.S. financial sector, it was taken over by federal regulators. The bank was known for backing tech start-ups, and had come under fire for prioritizing investments into climate change and social ventures rather than those that could make a predictable return.

The executive roster of the bank had a questionable track record. For example, SVB’s Chief Administrative Officer, Joseph Gentile, was the CFO of Lehman Brothers investment bank when it collapsed. SVBs Chief Risk Officer position was left vacant for nine months through January 2023.

The CEO, Greg Becker, was a director at the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank from 2019 until termination on Friday. Becker’s also under investigation for selling $3.6 million in bank stock during a period when SVB was in the markets to raise $2 billion from investors— an effort to keep the bank solvent.

Silicon Valley Bank’s “Behested” $100,000 Gift To Newsom’s Nonprofit

Our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com found that California Governor Gavin Newsom, through a nonprofit organization his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom founded, the California Partners Project, has very close ties to the bank.

In 2021, SVB gave $100,000 in corporate gifts to the Newsom nonprofit. These gifts are so intertwined with the Newsom’s that they are listed as a matter of California ethics law on a state government website, California Fair Political Practices Commission.

https://unherd.com/2023/03/the-ghost-of-ancient-rome-haunts-america/

The death of Ancient Rome wasn’t so much a collapse as a slow, interminable decay: between the second and sixth centuries AD, its population declined from a million people to just 30,000. Since then, 15 centuries have passed and thousands of cities have been built. And yet, as Rome’s greatest chronicler Edward Gibbon warned in 1776, a similar fate awaits our modern metropolises. This time, however, their decline will radically alter our perception of what “urbanism” really means.

London, New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles — these urban centres epitomised what Jean Gottman described in 1983 as “transactional cities”. Based on finance, high-end business and IT services, they were defined not by production and trade in physical goods, but by intangible products concocted in soaring office towers. For years, academic researchers, both on the Left and Right, envisioned a high-tech economic future dominated by dense urban areas. As The New York Times‘s Neil Irwin observed in 2018: “We’re living in a world where a small number of superstar companies choose to locate in a handful of superstar cities where they have the best chance of recruiting superstar employees.”

Yet even before the current downturn, the data defied the bravado. For decades, the ultra-tall towers that once symbolised urban greatness have been as anachronistic as the cathedrals of the Middle Ages. Office occupancy has been declining since the turn of the century, along with the construction of new space. In 2019, before the pandemic, construction was one-third the rate of 1985 and half that of 2000.

More serious still has been the movement of people. Migration to dense cities started to decline in 2015, when large metropolitan areas began to see an exodus to smaller locales. By 2022, rural areas were also gaining population at the expense of cities. The pandemic clearly accelerated this process, with a devastating rise in crime and lawlessness: notably in London, Paris, Washington, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia and Chicago. In some parts of Chicago and Philadelphia, young men now have a greater chance of being killed by firearms than an American soldier serving during the Afghanistan or Iraq wars.