The Comic Opera

Banana republics, institutional capture, deep state operatives and trumped up charges...

(Source: Getty Images)

Bill Bonner, reckoning today from Poitou, France...

It rechristened its territories
As the "Banana Republics",
And over the sleeping dead,
Over the restless heroes
Who brought about the greatness,
The liberty and the flags,
It established a comic opera ...

~ Pablo Neruda

Angels gasped. And the dead generations rolled their dry eyes in disbelief.

Americans thought they could turn Nicaragua, Honduras, Haiti and Venezuela into dynamic democracies just like their own country.  They sent in troops…Peace Corps volunteers…do-gooders…consultants…entrepreneurs…investors…money.  They scarcely noticed as their own homeland went bananas.  

Two important things happened last week…each signaling another milestone passed. While we were at an opera in Austria, an ex-president was indicted…and Fitch downgraded the most important asset in the entire world – US govt. debt.

“No one is above the law,” said the mainstream press, with the mock piety of those who fashion the laws to suit themselves.

Respectfully Broke

This is the first time an ex-president has been charged with a criminal offense.  Our guess is, it won’t be the last. Because…that’s what they do in ‘Banana Republics.’ And over in the GOP, lawyers are already at work building a cage in which to lock up Joe Biden for “conspiring” with his son to peddle influence in the Ukraine.

As to the downgrade of US Treasury bonds… “it doesn’t matter” was the near-universal refrain. “The economy is strong. You can’t look at it as though it were a private business or a household.”

You can’t? Oh yes you can.

The US is going broke, just like a private business. But in the real economy, companies can’t ‘print money’ to cover their excess expenses and hide their shame.  Nor do they have the biggest spade in the world – the world’s reserve currency –  to dig a hole for themselves. When a private business or household takes on too much debt, lenders pull back. On Main Street, businesses and households still go broke in a common, respectable way.

Not so the US government. Its bankruptcy will be one for the record books. It will pay its debts with cheap, ‘printing press’ money. 

And there, front and center, is El Jefe, Jose Biden…with his ‘Bidenomics.’ Does anyone know what it is? Does Joe have any idea what he is talking about? The poor man can’t carry a tune…let alone a coherent economic policy. The signature element of Bidenomics, as near as we are able to determine, is simply Chiquita Finance. You enjoy the warm weather as long as possible – spend, spend, spend…borrow, borrow…borrow. And then, on a cold day, you pour gasoline over your head and set yourself on fire. And here’s the latest from MarketWise:

The U.S. debt will rise by more than $5 billion — every single day for the next decade

As the investment world still comes to grips with the Fitch Ratings decision to downgrade the U.S. debt rating, here’s an eye-popping stat: the U.S. government’s debt will rise by $5.2 billion — every single day for the next decade the latest missive from Bank of America strategist Michael Hartnett, in which he references Congressional Budget Office projections to come up with the number.

Trumped Up

Wall Street gets stimulated with monetary inflation. Main Street gets fiscal inflation. Nobody even suggests that the US should balance its budget or that the Fed should leave interest rates alone.  

Instead, ai chihuahua!, like all mismanaged nations, the US spends, borrows, and prints its way to the poor house.

As for Mr. Trump…

… the Democrats think they have the next election in the bag. By fiddling the justice system, they draw on the time-honored practice of banana republics everywhere. When you lose power…you flee the country. Otherwise, your opponents will try to lock you up. Juan Peron fled to Paraguay. Augusto Pinochet fled to London. Alberto Fujimori fled to Japan.

And now, the USA Democrats, along with the toady propaganda press, have convinced themselves that Donald Trump has committed neither an imbecility, nor an indiscretion, nor an act of supreme bad taste – any of which he would be convicted of summarily – but a crime! 

The poor man may be rightly charged with a lot of things – ignorance, sloth, vanity, stupidity, mendacity, recklessness et al. But the surprise of the United States vs. Donald J. Trump is the extent of the corruption of the former, not the well-known failures of the latter. What we see, in other words, is another of America’s institutions – the judiciary – suborned by politics…and now swaying with the palms.  

In a properly-functioning democracy, public institutions show modesty and restraint. Congress is not supposed to interfere with the courts. And the courts should be wary of politics.

“Open and Shut”

But here’s Jack Smith, special counsel to the Justice Department, with what he thinks is an ‘open and shut’ case against the leading Republican challenger to his boss, Joe Biden. Reading between the lines of the New York Times report, we find no real crime at all…but a ‘conspiracy theory,’ an elastic charge used by the feds to put away people they want to disappear.  

And once again, step by step, milestone by milestone, power is taken away from ‘The People’ and grabbed by the elites. The indictment stinks. Trump was a disgrace to the White House. And if the voters weren’t such morons they would have turned him out, and Joe Biden, too…years ago. Instead, the hacks in the Department of Justice have seized the initiative.  

Yes…read it and weep. The military…the CIA and 16 other Deep State agencies…the FBI…Congress…the bureaucracy…the universities…the medical/pharma complex...the press…

…and now the courts, too, have become a part of the comic opera.

Regards,

Bill Bonner