As the editor of the Silver Bear Cafe, I spend most of my time researching current events. I explore the markets, the economic war that is being waged on the middle class, precious metals, the Federal Reserve and energy. In this weekly column I will attempt to condense the week's events and examine how the news might affect your pocketbook. JSB

Financial Markets

It has become very apparent that the Central Banksters of the world are bound and determined to continue to tear down the global financial system. This week, Shinzo Abe, the new Prime Minister of Japan has vowed to fight deflation with any and all means possible. Please keep in mind that deflation is the only solution to the bubbles that the Central Bankers have created.

From Michael Pento:

It is an unfortunate truth that Keynesian counterfeiters with their Kamikaze monetary and fiscal policies have taken over the developed world. Politicians and central banks in the United States and Europe have decided to cement firmly in place their addictions to debt, inflation and artificially produced low interest rates. But Japan has now leapfrogged into the lead of those nations that believe prosperity can be brought about by loading up on government debt and increasing the number of zeros being printed by their central bank.

Shinzo Abe and the Liberal Democratic Party swept into power in mid-December by promising to boost inflation and destroy the value of the Yen. The new Prime Minister is trying to usurp the independence of the Band of Japan (BOJ) by dictating that the central bank provide an inflation target of at least 2% and also force them to expand their government bond-buying program. The reason for this is clear; Japan's debt has ballooned to over $12 trillion and is now 237% of their GDP.

On the Economic War Front

I was a little taken aback this week when I read that a taxpayer funded think tank had determined that people exactly like me (and you) are terrorists...

From Dan Norcini:

Do You Support "Individual Freedoms"?... Then guess what - according to a study done by a West Point "Think Tank" funded by none else than your own taxpayer money, America needs to be warned against you and those like you! Think I am making this idiocy up? This is an excerpt from the article:

A West Point think tank has issued a paper warning America about "far right" groups such as the "anti-federalist" movement, which supports "civil activism, individual freedoms and self-government."

The report issued this week by the Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., is titled "Challengers from the Sidelines: Understanding America's Violent Far-Right."

The center — part of the institution where men and women are molded into Army officers — posted the report Tuesday. It lumps limited government activists with three movements it identifies as "a racist/white supremacy movement, an anti-federalist movement and a fundamentalist movement."

The West Point center typically focuses reports on al Qaeda and other Islamic extremists attempting to gain power in Asia, the Middle East and Africa through violence.

But its latest study turns inward and paints a broad brush of people it considers "far right."

It says anti-federalists "espouse strong convictions regarding the federal government, believing it to be corrupt and tyrannical, with a natural tendency to intrude on individuals' civil and constitutional rights. Finally, they support civil activism, individual freedoms, and self government. Extremists in the anti-federalist movement direct most their violence against the federal government and its proxies in law enforcement." www.washingtontimes.com

And a contribution from Ol' Remus

You know you live in a country run by idiots if you can get arrested for expired tags on your car but not for being in the country illegally, if you have to have your parents signature to go on a school field trip but not to get an abortion, if an 80 year old woman can be stripped searched by the TSA but a Muslim woman in a burka is only subject to having her neck and head searched, if your government believes that the best way to eradicate trillions of dollars of debt is to spend trillions more of our money, if a seven year old boy can be thrown out of school for calling his teacher "cute" but hosting a sexual exploration or diversity class in grade school is perfectly acceptable, if the Supreme Court of the United States can rule that lower courts cannot display the 10 Commandments in their courtroom, while sitting in front of a display of the 10 Commandments.

You know you live in a country run by idiots if children are forcibly removed from parents who appropriately discipline them while children of "underprivileged" drug addicts are left to rot in filth infested cesspools of a "home", if hard work and success are rewarded with higher taxes and government intrusion, while some slothful, lazy behavior is rewarded with EBT cards, WIC checks, Medicaid, subsidized housing, and free cell phones, if the government's plan for getting people back to work is to provide 99 weeks of unemployment checks to not work, if being self-sufficient is considered a threat to the government.

You know you live in a country run by idiots if politicians think that stripping away the amendments to the constitution is really protecting the rights of the people, if the rights of the Government come before the rights of the individual, if you pay your mortgage faithfully, denying yourself the newest big screen TV while your neighbor defaults on his mortgage while buying iPhones, TV's and new cars and the government forgives his debt and reduces his mortgage with your tax dollars, and if being stripped of the ability to defend yourself makes you "safe".

Precious Metals

It's astounding to me that there is a very large number of American out there that do get it and yet choose to remain silent. First, in response to the threat of gun confiscation, gun sales, along the the sale of ammunition, and large capacity magazines, have gone through the roof. How can this not send a message to the administration? Is their blatant failure to acknowledge our opposition to their constitution crushing rampage a result of their plans to confront us over this issue?

Now, this week, the US Mint has suspended minting 2013 Silver Eagles because they have run out of silver. Might this exhibit a mass distrust of the Federal Reserve and their rabid destruction of the US dollar?

From Zero Hedge:

As we noted earlier this month, the demand for both gold and silver 'physical' coins has been record-breaking as 2013 began. So much so, that now after selling over 6 million silver coins in 2013 so far, the US Mint has run out of silver eagles and has suspended sales. Furthermore, the Mint is saying that it will not restart sales until January 28th! With all asunder proclaiming victory and crisis averted based on the nominal price of stocks at five-year highs, Swiss interest rates no longer negative, and Spanish bond yields at 5%, it seems there are still a few that demand the wealth-preserving safe-haven of hard assets as the escalation of the currency wars shows no sign of abating.

Authorized Purchasers,

The United States Mint has temporarily sold out of 2013 American Eagle Silver Bullion coins. As a result, sales are suspended until we can build up an inventory of these coins. Sales will resume on or about the week of January 28, 2013, via the allocation process.

Please feel free to call us if you have any questions.

Regards,

Jack A. Szczerban
Branch Chief, Precious Metals Group
Department of the Treasury
United States Mint

Energy

There has, for some time (since the middle seventies) been an ongoing debate over Peak Oil. Since its discovery in Titusville, Pennsylvania in 1859 we have been burning this finite resource, at an ever increasing rate, and are now, inevitably, approaching its depletion. Big oil has successfully thwarted the development of alternative power generation systems. This, obviously is happening as a result of a enormous lack of foresight and vision and a blaring instance of unbridled greed. We have now reached the wall. Everything will be going downhill from here.

From Chris Martenson

Not Enough Net Energy for Economic Growth

There has been a very strong and concerted public-relations effort to spin the recent shale energy plays of the U.S. as complete game-changers for the world energy outlook. These efforts do not square up well with the data and are creating a vast misperception about the current risks and future opportunities among the general populace and energy organizations alike. The world remains quite hopelessly addicted to petroleum, and the future will be shaped by scarcity – not abundance, as some have claimed.

This series of reports will assemble the relevant data into a simple and easy-to-understand story that has the appropriate context to provide a meaningful place to begin a conversation and make decisions.

Since completing the Crash Course in October of 2008, much has gone as I anticipated in the way of money printing, official neglect of the main predicaments we face, and generally higher petroleum costs (2012 was the record so far on a yearly basis).

What has not changed is the general trajectory of liquid fuels becoming increasingly expensive and more difficult to produce. I know that this runs counter to virtually every news article that has come out recently. It is time to separate the data and facts from the hype. Much has recently been either muddied or presented so far out of context as to be more distortive than helpful.

There are two numbers to keep firmly in mind. The first is 22, and the other is 10. In the past 22 years, half of all of the oil ever burned has been burned. Such is the nature of exponentially increasing demand. And the oil burned in the last 22 years was the easy and cheap stuff discovered 30 to 40 years ago. Which brings us to the number 10.

In every calorie of food that comes to your table are hidden 10 calories of fossil fuels, making modern agriculture and food delivery the first type in history that consumes more energy than it delivers. Someday fossil fuels will be all gone. That day may be far off in the future, but preparing for that day could (and one could argue should) easily require every bit of time we have.

The Fed

While I realize that, for most of you, I am "singing to the choir", I feel compelled to say it over and over: "the Federal Reserve is the source of all the economic ills that plague America". The American citizenry has been constantly warned about the insidious parasite, which is the Federal Reserve Bank, since before the Federal Reserve Act was passed (illegally) in 1913. That is why there is a forum specifically dedicated to trying to inform you that the Federal Reserve is not part of the problem, it is the whole problem. Everything that is wrong with our economy (and that of the rest of the World for that matter) is a direct result of the operations of the Federal Reserve. Until it is abolished, and most of its members jailed, and its former members dug up and hung, we will be, and remain, debt slaves. If you come across anyone who is not aware of this one, simple fact, please let them know.

From Harry V. Martin

Foreign Bankers own a Majority of the Federal Reserve

More that half the share holdings in the Federal Reserve Bank arc controlled by large New York City banks, including National City Bank, National Bank of Commerce, First National Bank, Chase National Bank, and Marine National Bank. When Rockefeller's National City Bank merged with J.P. Morgan's First National Bank in 1955, the Rockefeller group owned 22 percent of the shares of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which in turn holds the majority of shares in the Federal Reserve System - 53 percent. But who really owns what? Here arc the top controllers of the Federal Reserve Bank

1. Rothchild banks of London and Berlin.

2. Lazard Brothers Banks of Paris.

3. Israel Moses Seif Banks of Italy.

4. Warburg Bank of Hamburg and Amsterdam.

5. Lehman Brothers Bank of New York.

6. Kuhn, Loeb bank of New York.

7. Chase Manhattan Bank of New York, which controls all of the other 11 Federal Reserve Banks.

8. Goldman, Sachs Bank of New York.

This ownership combination has been challenged by the Federal Reserve Bank, but a study of Standards and Poors will verify the ownerships. This means that the controlling interest of our national monetary system is foreign. In 1797, John Adams wrote to Thomas Jefferson, "All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects of the Constitution or Confederation; not from any want of honor or virtue, as much as downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation." In simple terms, the United States Government borrows money from the Federal Reserve Bank with interest. Here is how it works: The Government wants $1 billion. The Federal Reserve prints $1 billion - based upon no hard asset - and lends it to the Government at a high interest rate. The bank did not have the original money, it created it and made a bookkeeping entry - like you writing yourself a check without funds and cashing it. The Federal Reserve controls the flow of money, making it tight and creating unemployment or printing more than actually exists and creates inflation. It is, in essence, a paper corporation, which controls the entire economic well-being of the nation.

Conclusion

No Congress, no President has been strong enough to stand up to the foreign-controlled Federal Reserve Bank. Yet there is a catch - one that President Kennedy recognized before he was slain - the original deal in 1913 creating the Federal Reserve Bank had a simple back out clause. The investors loaned the United States Government $1 billion. And the back out clause allows the United States to buy out the system for that $1 billion. If the Federal Reserve Bank were demolished and the Congress of the United States took control of the currency, as required in the Constitution, the National Debt would virtually end overnight, and the need for more taxes and even the income tax, itself. Thomas Jefferson was concise in his early warning to the American nation,

"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."

Financial Survival

We are being lied to. On a hourly basis we are being mislead. The Sandy Hook details have turned out to be suspect. But Sandy Hook is just the latest in a string of atrocities that have been used to strip us of our liberties. It brings to mind a piece from the archives in which one of my favorite pundits, the Honorable Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, explains the startling scope of the crime. He covers the Twin Towers, Waco, and Oklahoma City.

Now, after ten years, 36% of Americans believe 9/11 was an inside job. In the same poll, only 28% of the people even knew that a third building (building seven) fell. Building seven is the "canary in the coal mine". One cannot watch the collapse of building seven without realizing, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that its collapse was a result of "controlled demolition". The fact that the planning and preparation required to "pull" a skyscraper (or three) takes several months (more if its occupied) and the odds of building seven being brought down on 9/11 without prior knowledge of the planned destruction of the twin towers is preposterous, and it's a fact that has been conveniently overlooked by the bulk of the sheeple. It's one thing to be born stupid. It's an unfortunate result of being genetically challenged. It's another thing, entirely, to be "conveniently stupid" or stupid on purpose (SOP). Being stupid on purpose is a devolutionary act. It is the antithesis of "survival of the fittest". It is an act that merits a Darwin Award and it is the result of being effectively "dumbed down" for generations. It's an affliction that, as a result of the dumbing down, is running rampant in our country today. Until the sheeple wake up, and the perps of the 9/11 attack on America are routed out, and exposed to the light of day, the future of America will remain on extremely shaky ground. Neither you nor your kids will have a happy, secure future so long as you allow madmen to run the world.

From Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

Hon. Paul Craig Roberts is the John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy, Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. A former editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal and columnist for Business Week and the Scripps Howard News Service, he is a nationally syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate in Los Angeles and a columnist for Investor's Business Daily. In 1992 he received the Warren Brookes Award for Excellence in Journalism. In 1993 the Forbes Media Guide ranked him as one of the top seven journalists.

He was Distinguished Fellow at the Cato Institute from 1993 to 1996. From 1982 through 1993, he held the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. During 1981-82 he served as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy. President Reagan and Treasury Secretary Regan credited him with a major role in the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981, and he was awarded the Treasury Department's Meritorious Service Award for "his outstanding contributions to the formulation of United States economic policy." From 1975 to 1978, Dr. Roberts served on the congressional staff where he drafted the Kemp-Roth bill and played a leading role in developing bipartisan support for a supply-side economic policy.

In 1987 the French government recognized him as "the artisan of a renewal in economic science and policy after half a century of state interventionism" and inducted him into the Legion of Honor.

Dr. Roberts' latest books are The Tyranny of Good Intentions, co-authored with IPE Fellow Lawrence Stratton, and published by Prima Publishing in May 2000, and Chile: Two Visions - The Allende-Pinochet Era, co-authored with IPE Fellow Karen Araujo, and published in Spanish by Universidad Nacional Andres Bello in Santiago, Chile, in November 2000. The Capitalist Revolution in Latin America, co-authored with IPE Fellow Karen LaFollette Araujo, was published by Oxford University Press in 1997. A Spanish language edition was published by Oxford in 1999. The New Colorline: How Quotas and Privilege Destroy Democracy, co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, was published by Regnery in 1995. A paperback edition was published in 1997. Meltdown: Inside the Soviet Economy, co-authored with Karen LaFollette, was published by the Cato Institute in 1990. Harvard University Press published his book, The Supply-Side Revolution, in 1984. Widely reviewed and favorably received, the book was praised by Forbes as "a timely masterpiece that will have real impact on economic thinking in the years ahead." Dr. Roberts is the author of Alienation and the Soviet Economy, published in 1971 and republished in 1990. He is the author of Marx's Theory of Exchange, Alienation and Crisis, published in 1973 and republished in 1983. A Spanish language edition was published in 1974.

Dr. Roberts has held numerous academic appointments. He has contributed chapters to numerous books and has published many articles in journals of scholarship, including the Journal of Political Economy, Oxford Economic Papers, Journal of Law and Economics, Studies in Banking and Finance, Journal of Monetary Economics, Public Finance Quarterly, Public Choice, Classica et Mediaevalia, Ethics, Slavic Review, Soviet Studies, Rivista de Political Economica, and Zeitschrift fur Wirtschafspolitik. He has entries in the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Economics and the New Palgrave Dictionary of Money and Finance. He has contributed to Commentary, The Public Interest, The National Interest, Harper's, the New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Fortune, London Times, The Financial Times, TLS, The Spectator, Il Sole 24 Ore, Le Figaro, Liberation, and the Nihon Keizai Shimbun. He has testified before committees of Congress on 30 occasions.

Dr. Roberts was educated at the Georgia Institute of Technology (B.S.), the University of Virginia (Ph.D.), the University of California at Berkeley and Oxford University where he was a member of Merton College.

He is listed in Who's Who in America, Who's Who in the World, The Dictionary of International Biography, Outstanding People of the Twentieth Century, and 1000 Leaders of World Influence. His latest book, HOW THE ECONOMY WAS LOST, has just been published by CounterPunch/AK Press. He can be reached at: [email protected]

You must first realize that there are, present in our lives, enemies. You must then know who those enemies are and act accordingly.

Eliminate as much debt as possible, especially “variable rate” debt, such as credit cards and lines of credit. Interest rates will be rising, so the elimination of debt offers a “real return” of escaping rising rates by creditors.

Get some control over some fresh water.

If you are depending on Social Security, stop.

Follow the course opposite to custom and you will almost always do well...

Its not what you don't know that will screw you up, it's what you know that is wrong. The spin you hear from the mainstream media is intended to mislead you. Open your eyes and face the future. If you leave your head in the sand and ignore it, you are only leaving your butt exposed for the world to kick. This all may sound like gloom and doom, but when you get a handle on what is going to happen, you will have a future filled with opportunity. Fortune favors the Informed.

More next week...

May the Great Spirit be with you always,

Johnny Silver Bear
Chief cook and bottle washer, The Silver Bear Cafe

Disclaimer

All statements and expressions are the sole opinions of the editor and are subject to change without notice. A profile, description, or other mention of a company in the newsletter is neither an offer nor solicitation to buy or sell any securities mentioned. While we believe all sources of information to be factual and reliable, in no way do we represent or guarantee the accuracy thereof, nor the statements made herein. The staff of Silver Bear Cafe are not registered investment advisors and do not purport to offer personalized investment related advice. The publisher, editor, staff, or anyone associated with, or associated to the Silver Bear Cafe may own securities mentioned in this newsletter and may buy or sell securities without notice.