Germany

Mexico’s Win Over Germany Shocked The World, And Mexican Fans Actually Created A “Minor Earthquake” The Moment The Goal Was Scored

Wouldn’t it be nice if sports fans in the United States were this passionate?

At the exact moment when Mexico scored against Germany, a minor earthquake was detected by authorities in Mexico…

Mexico’s goal celebration against Germany quite literally caused a minor earthquake as fans’ wild reaction sparked seismic activity in the nation’s capital.

Mexican authorities reported the reading was recorded at the exact time Mexico took the lead in their Group F World Cup opening match against Die Mannschaft.

The Germans have got to be extremely disappointed in this outcome.  You can see highlights of the match right here…

Trump Is The Number One Topic On The Agenda Of The Bilderberg Group This Year

The Bilderberg Group conference is being held less than 30 miles from the White House, and the number one subject on the official agenda this year is Donald Trump.  The three day summit began on Thursday, and the Westfields Marriot in Chantilly, Virginia has essentially been transformed into an armed fortress in order to protect the 131 dignitaries that are attending.  But unlike other gatherings of world leaders, the mainstream media won’t be telling us what is going on inside because reporters are banned.

These meetings are designed to be highly secretive, and for many years you were labeled a “conspiracy theorist” if you even suggested that the Bilderberg Group existed.  Thanks to the relentless work of investigative journalists, we know a lot more about Bilderberg these days, and they have taken a few steps toward becoming more public.  For example, they have published a list of the key topics that will be addressed at the summit this year.  The following comes from the official Bilderberg Group website…

  1. The Trump Administration: A progress report
  2. Trans-Atlantic relations: options and scenarios
  3. The Trans-Atlantic defence alliance: bullets, bytes and bucks
  4. The direction of the EU
  5. Can globalisation be slowed down?
  6. Jobs, income and unrealised expectations
  7. The war on information
  8. Why is populism growing?
  9. Russia in the international order
  10. The Near East
  11. Nuclear proliferation
  12. China
  13. Current events

As you can see, Donald Trump is at the top of the list.  The elite consider Trump to be the biggest threat to globalization that they have confronted in a very long time, and most of them would love to see Trump removed from office somehow.

The eighth topic on the agenda is closely related to Trump.  The elite talk about “populism” as if it is a bad thing, but aren’t our leaders supposed to be trying to do what is “popular” with the people?  Isn’t that what democracy is supposed to be all about?

And what is the alternative?  Are we just supposed to allow the elite to control both political parties and therefore control all political outcomes no matter what the people may want?

Point number nine is very interesting as well.  The elite like to uses phrases such as “the international order” and “global governance” rather than phrases such as “world order” or “new world order”, but the meaning is the same.  The ultimate goal is to merge the entire planet into a single global system, but right now nations such as Russia are a bit of a headache for the globalists.

Every year, some of the biggest names on the entire planet attend the Bilderberg Group meetings.  The list of those that have attended previous conferences includes Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Prince Charles, David Cameron, Tony Blair, Henry Kissinger, Bill Gates, Angela Merkel, Ben Bernanke, Rick Perry, David Rockefeller and Joe Biden.  But none of them ever talks publicly about what goes on at these meetings because they are instructed not to do so.

Needless to say, a number of the big names that will be attending this year will be absolutely furious that President Trump has just announced that the U.S. will be pulling out of the Paris climate agreement.  Many Americans don’t even know that the Paris climate agreement is, but for the elite this is about as big as it gets.  The Paris climate agreement was supposed to be a giant step forward toward globalization, and almost the entire planet was on board.

Now that Trump has decided to pull out of the agreement, criticism is coming in fast and furious from top leaders all over the globe…

Before he even sat down, his predecessor Barack Obama launched an all-out assault, saying Trump ‘joins a small handful of nations that reject the future’.

The leaders of France, Germany and Italy said the decision was ‘regrettable’ and that the deal was ‘non-negotiable’.

Elon Musk, the Tesla billionaire, said he was quitting advising the White House, tweeting: ‘Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world.’

Incredibly, many Democratic politicians are already promising to defy President Trump.  In fact, a number of mayor and governors have already pledged to continue to honor the agreement.

Out of everything that Trump has done so far, pulling out of the Paris climate agreement is going to be the thing that the elite hate the most.  So as much as they wanted him gone before, now their hatred for him is going to go to a whole new level.

And we are already seeing this in just the first few hours after Trump’s announcement.  For example, billionaire climate activist Tom Steyer says that what Trump has done is “a traitorous act of war against the American people”…

Billionaire climate activist Tom Steyer called President Trump a traitor if he makes good on his promise and exits the Paris climate change agreement.

“If Trump pulls the US out of the #ParisAgreement he will be committing a traitorous act of war against the American people,” Steyer tweeted.

Steyer was very active during the presidential campaign through his group, NextGen Climate, and has become a leading activist in an agenda that supports moving the nation toward 100 percent renewable energy over the next 25 years.

It is important to understand the mentality of these people.  They literally believe that climate change is the greatest threat that humanity is facing, and that anyone that opposes their agenda is literally putting the future of the human race in peril.

Of course that is absolute nonsense.  Carbon dioxide is a life-giving gas, and without it all life on our planet would cease to exist.  Scientists tell us that life absolutely thrived when levels of carbon dioxide were much, much higher in the ancient past than they are today.  In fact, some scientists point to evidence that levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere were once four times higher than they are right now.

Humanity is certainly facing a lot of threats, but carbon dioxide is not one of them.  But to the true believers, the facts don’t really matter.  Despite a mountain of contrary evidence, they are convinced that carbon dioxide is the primary cause of climate change, and that warming temperatures could ultimately wipe out the human race.

And since Donald Trump is standing in the way of their agenda, he is now enemy number one, and they are going to do all that they can to get rid of him.

Germany ‘freaked out’ as Greece ‘could ditch EU currency for US DOLLAR’

Professor Ted Malloch revealed that senior Greek economists have enquired about the possibility of adopting the greenback if the country crashes out of the single currency.

He asserted that Athens is so desperate it is prepared to tie itself to the dollar on the same terms as the likes of Puerto Rico if it means being able to quit the eurozone.

And Prof Malloch said German leaders including Angela Merkel were “freaked out” at the humiliating possibility of losing Greece to a rival currency, which would be a devastating blow to the EU project.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

German Press: “That Was No Presidential Speech; That Was A Declaration Of War”

Following yesterday’s openly confrontational, deliberately protectionist presidential address by president Trump, which in various circles has been dubbed the “American carnage” speech for obvious reasons, some of Obama’s closest foreign friends are scrambling to find a role in a world that has drastically changed in less than 24 hours. One of them is the foreign leader whom Obama spoke to last before vacating the White House, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who vowed on Saturday to seek compromises on issues like trade and military spending with Trump, adding she would work on preserving the important relationship between Europe and the United States.

“He made his convictions clear in his inauguration speech,” Merkel said in remarks broadcast live, a day after Trump vowed to put ‘America first’.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Dad saves daughter as Muslim rape frenzy plagues Germany

Germany Map - Public Domain

In one case, a German father is being called a hero for rescuing his daughter from a Syrian refugee who had stalked her as she was walking home early Sunday morning from a disco.

The woman, 23, called her 57-year-old father to say “there’s a man following me home dad…”

He raced to the scene in a push scooter, only to find the man had punched his daughter almost unconscious, was on top of her and tearing off her clothes, the U.K.’s Express reported. He had dragged her from the side of the road into some underbrush.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Germany Green Party pledges to pay for free sex with prostitutes for anyone who needs ‘sexual assistance’ and can’t afford it

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Sex with prostitutes will be paid for by the Government for anyone too poor for a hooker and deemed to need sexual assistance under German Green Party plans.

The party’s care spokeswoman Elisabeth Scharfenberg says doctors should have the right to issue the free prescriptions to their patients for ladies of the night.

Prostitution is legal in Germany and carries little of the taboos associated with it in many other countries.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Angela Merkel’s Brave New Germany — A Product of Muslim ‘Cultural Enrichment’

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(By Caleb Stephen) Monday’s terror attack in Berlin left 12 dead and another 48 injured after a truck with a Muslim terrorist behind the wheel ploughed into a crowd of people at a Christmas market. As at writing, the perpetrator remains at large after police captured the wrong person.

Initial reports said the suspect’s identity is either Pakistani or Afghan. I wouldn’t be surprised. Regardless, ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack and issued a statement through their official news agency Amaq praising the perpetrator as a “soldier of the Islamic State”.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said it would be “hard for us all to bear” if the Berlin attacker was indeed a Syrian refugee.  Not near as hard as it would be for the victims, I bet.

But you see, Merkel’s to blame for this attack anyway. The entire Muslim terrorist/rapefugee problem was caused by no one else but her.

She created the failed multicultural “Open Doors” policy bringing in some 1.5 million mostly male Muslims to Germany behind the guise of “tolerance” and “diversity.”

The UK Sun offers us a glimpse of some products of Germany’s “cultural enrichment” and “diversity”…

A series of violent attacks and sexual offences involving migrants has hardened the German public’s attitude.

On New Year’s Eve 2015 hundreds of sexual assaults, including at least 24 rapes, and numerous thefts were reported in Germany, mainly in Cologne city centre. Similar incidents were reported in Hamburg, Frankfurt, Dortmund, Düsseldorf, Stuttgart, and Bielefeld.

On July 18 a 17-year-old Afghan refugee wielding an axe and a knife attacks passengers on a train in southern Germany, severely wounding four, before being shot dead by police. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack.

Four days later an 18-year-old German-Iranian gunman apparently acting alone killed nine people in Munich. The teenager had no Islamist ties but was obsessed with mass killings.

The attack was carried out on the fifth anniversary of twin attacks by Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik that killed 77 people.

On July 24 a 21-year-old Syrian refugee was arrested after killing a pregnant woman and wounding two people with a machete in the southwestern German city of Reutlingen, near Stuttgart.

That same day a Syrian man wounded 15 people when he blew himself up outside a music festival in Ansbach in southern Germany. Islamic State claims responsibility for the attack.

And of course on top of all of that we could mention all of the foiled terror plots such as the one last week in which a 12-year-old German-Iraqi boy was arrested after trying to commit a terror attack at a Christmas market in Germany with a homemade nail bomb. He is also believed to be a member of Islamic State.

We’ve seen examples of Merkel’s failures over and over again in recent headlines and it’s more than nauseating. It’s repugnant and it’s deplorable.

Needless to say, Germans are starting to get very fed up with Merkel. The UK Sun has reported the chancellor is facing widespread backlash over the terrorist attack. This is certainly not the news Merkel  wants to hear especially given that fact that she’s been very busy campaigning in recent days for a 4th term as chancellor in the 2017 general election.

The country’s “far-right” leaders have blasted the chancellor’s “open-door” immigration policy for sparking the attack in Berlin – and even her own party is putting the boot in.

Let’s not forget that earlier this year she claimed refugees did not bring terrorism to Germany. Clearly she’s in a state of denial refusing to accept Islamic refugees as being the root cause of unprecedented terrorism and the alarming rape/assault epidemic.

What she’s done is identical to letting a fox into a chicken coop and then expecting that nothing adverse will happen.

How many trucks need to plough through crowds of people before Germany reverses the ridiculous open doors policy? How many more girls need to be raped before Germany’s leadership wakes up? Banning trucks and putting up barriers around every public space or building is certainly not a solution that is either realistic or feasible. Handing out rape whistles, “Don’t Touch Me” bracelets and posters showing how not to inappropriately touch females are not the solutions either.

What then is the solution? Stop importing terrorists! Not cutting the numbers from 1.5 million to 300,000. That’s 300,000 too many.

Germany has the largest Muslim population in Europe. I don’t think that’s a mere coincidence.

But no Germany doesn’t seem to take the problem very seriously. Instead they’ve been busy brainwashing their people to accept multiculturalism (also know as the promotion of the Islamic ideology) through video clips broadcasted on national TV such as these…

The mainstream media has also been complicit in the cover up of the colossal migrant problem. To criticise refugees and Islam as an ideology is both “islamaphobic,” “intolerant” and “racist” in their eyes. Notice that we’re not criticising their race and skin colour, yet somehow we seem to be called “racists” every single time.

Never mind the fact that Islam has been responsible for nearly 30,000 terror incidents since 9/11. Never mind the fact that Islam just stamped their seal on the latest terror attack. Never mind the fact that Islam’s prophet Muhammad taught that throwing gays off buildings, raping little girls, mutilating female genitals and beheading anyone who does not agree with their violent ideology is 100% acceptable.

Never mind the fact that even the so-called moderates have expressed overwhelming support for “radical” Islam.

Never mind the fact that the “tiny radical Muslim minority” is just a mere myth.

Never mind the fact that Islamists just last week gathered in London to call for a global caliphate under Sharia law.

When will we ever learn that this is not about radical Islam or extreme Islam, it’s just Islam, period!?

This is the truth the prostrating mainstream media doesn’t want you to see. Don’t believe me? Read the Koran and you’ll find such gems as this…

Sura 2:190-194

Fight in the way of Allah those who fight you but do not transgress. Indeed. Allah does not like transgressors.

And kill them wherever you overtake them and expel them from wherever they have expelled you, and fitnah is worse than killing. And do not fight them at al-Masjid al- Haram until they fight you there. But if they fight you, then kill them. Such is the recompense of the disbelievers.

And if they cease, then indeed, Allah is Forgiving and Merciful.

Fight them until there is no [more] fitnah and [until] worship is [acknowledged to be] for Allah . But if they cease, then there is to be no aggression except against the oppressors.

Not long after Monday’s attack happened, major corporate controlled media agencies such as CNN, BBC and New York Times were blaming – get this – the TRUCK for killing 12 people and wounding 48. They also seemed very reticent to acknowledge that this was a terrorist attack, instead preferring to call it a ‘truck crash’ misleading countless people around the globe.

I also suppose the simple fact that ISIS and Al Qaeda have been plotting attacks exactly like Monday’s for a very long time completely escaped their minds. Let’s not forget that just last month, the UK Mirror warned of terrorists “planning a wave of Christmas attacks throughout Europe, targeting shopping areas and crowded market-places to maximise casualties”.

A security source informed the Mirror:

“Whilst UK agencies have been extremely good at preventative intelligence operations against jihadist groups, other European equivalents have been less successful, sadly.

“This means the entire continent is vulnerable to attack as we have seen in France, Germany and Belgium but particularly in the run-up to Christmas.

“It is a Christian period of festivities, bring together large crowds of soft target civilians and will attract attention from those who wish to inflict harm.”

Another co-incidence? I think not.

Let’s also not forget that ISIS has exploited the refugee crisis to infiltrate Europe. The UK Express reported in April this year: “ISLAMIC State (ISIS) terrorists ARE taking advantage of shambolic border checks by posing as migrants to infiltrate Europe, the EU’s own border agency has sensationally admitted tonight.”

ISIS also called such exploitation “stealth jihad”. In November, a Syrian operative claimed more than 4,000 covert ISIS gunmen had been smuggled into western nations – hidden amongst innocent refugees.

The ISIS smuggler, who is in his thirties and is described as having a trimmed jet-black beard, revealed the ongoing clandestine operation is a complete success.

“Just wait,” he smiled.

I can tell you those are chilling words – especially in light of Monday’s terror attack.

Author Robert Spencer recognised this stealthy tactic when he wrote in Front Page Magazine in September this year, “This is no longer just a ‘refugee crisis.’ This is a hijrah.”

Hijrah is the Islamic doctrine of migration, which is a form of stealth jihad.

“To emigrate in the cause of Allah – that is, to move to a new land in order to bring Islam there, is considered in Islam to be a highly meritorious act,” Spencer wrote. He cited the following Quranic text:

Sura 4:100

And whoever emigrates for the cause of Allah will find on the earth many locations and abundance,” says the Quran. “And whoever leaves his home as an emigrant to Allah and His Messenger and then death overtakes him, his reward has already become incumbent upon Allah. And Allah is ever Forgiving and Merciful

CNN also took the opportunity to blame conservatives for the attack as they were more concerned about “right-wingers” being proven right than Islamic bloodshed.

And now… the Daily Mail is reporting that Cologne is getting prepped up for New Year’s Eve in anticipation of yet another Cologne raping spree. Police have been busy emptying prison cells ready “for a possible new outbreak of migrant sex attacks during the upcoming New Year’s celebrations.”

Austria is following suit with police to distribute 6,000 rape whistles on New Year’s Eve to “help prevent incidents like the mass sex assaults in neighbouring Germany”

The bottom line is that Germany and other European countries will continue to face the threat of heightened terror, rape and violence perpetrated by the refugees until they stop denying the problem and actually start doing something about it instead of continuously virtue signalling. Until the platitudes and candle light vigils end, bloodshed and war on European streets will continue.

It’s time to admit that Islam is a violent hateful religion which has no place in any Western democracy. It’s time to admit that we “right wingers” turned out to be totally correct after all.

CNN Responds to Islamic Terror Attack in Berlin by Blaming Conservatives

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CNN responded to the Islamic terror attack in Berlin carried out by a Pakistani refugee by worrying about how conservatives who have criticized Angela Merkel’s open border migrant policy might be proven right.

An article appeared on the news network’s front page underneath the words “The fallout of fear,” and was subtitled “Attacks fuel far right’s assault on democracy”.

Quite how rightly pointing out that importing over 1.5 million Muslim migrants, a significant portion of whom ascribe to a jihadist ideology, is a terrible policy, represents an “assault on democracy” is not explained.

According to writer David A. Andelman, the right-wing’s ability to capitalize on the attack is “potentially more pernicious” than the attack itself, which killed at least 12 people and injured dozens more.

In other words, the seemingly endless sight of mangled, bleeding bodies on the streets of major European cities isn’t the main problem, but right-wingers being proven correct is.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Blood on Angela’s hands? Far-right blames German leader’s immigration policy for Christmas attack as ‘shocked and shaken’ Merkel lays flowers where 12 died

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Germany’s far-right has blamed Angela Merkel’s immigration policy for the Berlin Christmas attacks as the chancellor insisted terrorists will not destroy ‘freedom’ in the country.

Mrs Merkel has laid white roses at the scene where 12 died after she said she was ‘shocked and shaken’ by the deadly attack in Berlin last night and admitted it would be ‘particularly sickening’ if the terrorist was an asylum-seeker.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Truck slams into Christmas market in Berlin, killing at least nine

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A truck slammed into a Christmas market in central Berlin on Monday night, killing at least nine people and injuring many others in what police said was a deliberate attack.

The incident took place at an outdoor market near Berlin’s Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. A suspect, believed to be the driver, was arrested at the scene and a passenger was found dead in the passenger seat, according to the Associated Press and German media.

The scene was laced with chaos. Dozens of ambulances lined up in front of the church and police are letting just a few media through to the scene at a time.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

The German Government Is Seeking To Fine, Jail Creators Of “Fake News” Content On Facebook

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(By Whitney Webb of Trueactivist.com) As the controversy surrounding “fake news” continues unabated in the US, Germany’s government has now gotten involved battling. On Sunday, Germany’s Justice Minister Heiko Maas – a member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition – demanded that Facebook respect Germany’s strict anti-defamation laws, adding that free speech does not apply to “slander.” “Defamation and malicious gossip are not covered under freedom of speech. Justice authorities must prosecute that, even on the internet,” Maas said in an interview cited by Reuters. Maas also noted that offenders could face up to five years in jail under German law. “Anyone who tries to manipulate the political discussion with lies needs to be aware [of the consequences].”

The policy is remarkably similar to one already in place in Israel, where Israeli authorities have arrested, imprisoned, and fined over 400 Palestinians and other Arabs for “inciting violence” on social media. Before “fake news” became a topic of national discourse, Israel had partnered with Facebook to censor such posts and accounts for “incitement.” However, the actual consequence has been the banning of accounts belonging to Palestinian journalists, news agencies, and peaceful activists.

Authors “fake news” and “malicious gossip” on social media are not the only ones in the cross-hairs of German officials as Facebook itself is set to suffer legal and financial consequences if it fails to meet new German standards. Last Friday, Chairman of Germany’s Social Democratic Party Thomas Oppermann told Der Spiegel in an interview that “if, after appropriate examination, Facebook does not delete the offending message within 24 hours, it should expect individual fines of up to 500,000 euros ($523,320).”

Maas and Opperman’s announcements followed last week’s launching of several initiatives to flag and eliminate “fake news” from the newsfeeds of Facebook users. As True Activist previously reported, Facebook will rely on the “fact-checking” of the George Soros and Bill Gates-funded Poynter Institute as well as 5 media organizations (Snopes, Politifact, FactCheck.org, ABC News, and the Associated Press) to vet “disputed” content.

Of course, the supposed epidemic of “fake news” is clearly an attempt to scapegoat Hillary Clinton’s electoral defeat on something other than herself as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the following about “fake news” on the social media network:

“Of all the content on Facebook, more than 99 percent of what people see is authentic. Only a very small amount is fake news and hoaxes. The hoaxes that do exist are not limited to one partisan view, or even to politics. Overall, this makes it extremely unlikely hoaxes changed the outcome of this election in one direction or the other.”

Clearly, the frenzy to censor and eliminate “fake news” is not about eliminating the “very small amount” of actual fake news, it is about censoring anti-establishment viewpoints from both left and right wing sources. Many stories that do not follow the narrative of the neo-liberal establishment are often treated as “conspiracy theory,” “fake news,” or “Russian propaganda” while those that follow the narrative are free from such attacks, even when such stories themselves are proven to falsified or dishonest. If Germany manages to enact these measures officially and punish publishers of independent news for spreading “fake news and malicious gossip,” it will only be a matter of time before the US and others follow suit.

In Germany, some Muslim refugees convert to Christianity

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Clad in white at a Berlin church, asylum seekers Saeed, Veronica, Farida and Matin were just about to become Christians on a recent Sunday.

“Do you believe from the bottom of your heart that Jesus Christ is your Lord and saviour, and will you follow him every day of your life?” Pastor Matthias Linke asked them. “If so, say yes.”

All four replied with a frank “Ja”, to the enthusiastic applause of the faithful at the Free Evangelical Church, and were plunged head-to-toe into a baptism basin.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Matteo Renzi’s Italian referendum defeat ‘threatens survival of the euro,’ warn German business leaders

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The euro’s survival is under increased threat following the political instability caused by the Italian referendum result, German business bosses warned yesterday, raising further questions about the long-term viability of Italy’s membership of the currency union.

Ulrich Grillo, the head of the Federation of German Industries, or BDI, said the crushing defeat handed to the Italy’s centrist prime minister, Matteo Renzi, had worsened the outlook for the survival of the single currency.

“The risks of a new political instability for economic development, the financial markets and the currency union are increasing further,” he said.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Axe-Wielding Terrorist Attacks Train Passengers In Germany And A Police Car Is Firebombed In Florida

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Crazy people committing random acts of senseless violence is rapidly becoming the “new normal” in the western world. On Monday, a police vehicle was firebombed in Daytona, Florida by someone that was enraged by the recent shooting deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. And over in Europe, an axe-wielding Islamic terrorist shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he started wildly attacking passengers on a train in southern Germany. Authorities say that the young man was originally from Afghanistan, and according to the Mirror he was shot dead before he could flee the scene of the attack…

The horror began at around 9mpm local time when the teenager stormed a train that was traveling close to Wurzburg in southern Germany.

He then shouted “Allahu Akbar” – which means God is greatest – before launching into the terrifying attack on innocent passengers and then attempted to flee.

News outlets in Germany have claimed the crazed attacker was shot dead by armed police as he tried to escape.

Even though this 17-year-old Afghan terrorist was armed with an axe and a knife, none of the passengers were killed, although a few of them were seriously injured.

It is likely that this was a copycat attack. This young Afghan probably saw the attention that the horrible attack in Nice received, and he probably thought that he could become famous too by jumping on a train and hacking innocent people to death with his axe. Unfortunately for him, he is now dead and facing the afterlife, and most of the rest of the planet will probably forget about him by tomorrow.

Meanwhile, the wave of violence against police in the United States continues to intensify. On Monday, a police vehicle in Daytona, Florida was firebombed by an unknown individual. The following comes from the Daily Mail…

A squad car in Florida was set on fire with a Molotov cocktail in what appears to be more anti-cop backlash following the shootings of two black men that have sparked protests throughout the nation.

The police cruiser was parked in front of the Islamic Center of Daytona about 2:30am Sunday when it was set on fire.

The car was fully engulfed in flames when police firefighters arrived.

By itself, it may have been difficult to connect this incident with the recent attacks on police in Dallas and in Baton Rouge, but the perpetrator removed all doubt about his or her motivation by leaving a note at the scene of the crime…

Police said a note was found at the scene.

‘BLACK LIVES MATTER. A. Sterling. P. Castile,’ the note said, referencing the shootings of Alton Sterling, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Philando Castile in St. Paul, Minnesota.

There was a bit more to the note, but it contained an expletive directed toward police that would not be appropriate for young readers to see.

On Sunday, the deaths of three police officers in Baton Rouge overshadowed another very disturbing incident that took place in Wisconsin. A suspect shot and seriously wounded a police officer while he was just sitting by himself in his vehicle…

A domestic violence suspect opened fire on a Milwaukee police officer who was sitting in his squad car early Sunday, seriously wounding him before fleeing and apparently killing himself shortly afterward, authorities said.

The shooting, coming the same day that three police officers were killed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, prompted the Milwaukee Police Department to send all officers out in two-person squad teams, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

I think that what the Milwaukee Police Department has done is very wise. No police officer should be alone in any major city at this point.

Sadly, I think that what we have seen so far is just the beginning of the violence. Once the conventions are over, things will swing into full general election mode, and emotions on both sides will be running extremely high.

In particular, the radical left is being absolutely inundated with messages telling them that Donald Trump is basically the American equivalent of Adolf Hitler. Of course that is complete and utter nonsense, but after hearing it enough times a lot of them are starting to believe it, and some of them are actually discussing the possibility of real violence against the government if Trump wins in November. Just consider the following…

The failed coup in Turkey that killed more than 200 people and wounded thousands more could be coming to America — if Donald Trump is elected and #BlackLivesMatter activist and Daily News columnist Shaun King has his way.

King tweeted this weekend that the U.S. would suffer the same fate as Turkey if the soon-to-be Republican nominee won the presidency.

“If Donald Trump becomes President, you are fooling yourself if you think we’re far from having a coup our own selves,” King tweeted. “I’m dead serious.”

And of course I think that most people are anticipating that riots, protests and violence will follow the Trump campaign around the country between now and election day in November. The radical left hates Donald Trump with a passion, and they have already shown what they are willing to do to disrupt Trump rallies. If Donald Trump looks like he has a realistic shot at winning as we approach election day, that will just send activists on the radical left into overdrive.

We have entered a period of time when America is the most divided that it has been in decades. The mainstream media loves to pit us against one another, and they love to focus on hatred and dissension. This country is starting to come apart at the seams, and what we have witnessed so far is just the beginning.

As a nation, we have made certain choices, and at first those choices didn’t seem to have any serious consequences. But now decades later we stand poised to reap what we have sown, and it is going to be a very, very bitter harvest.

*About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog and End Of The American Dream. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

The United States Of Europe: Germany And France Hatch A Plan To Create An EU Superstate

Europe Connections - Public Domain

If you believe that the Brexit vote is going to kill the idea of a “United States of Europe”, you might want to think again. In fact, it appears that the decision by the British people to leave the European Union is only going to accelerate the process of creating an EU superstate. As you will see below, one of the largest newspapers in the UK is reporting that the foreign ministers of France and Germany have drafted “a blueprint to effectively do away with individual member states”. So even though men like George Soros are warning that the eventual dissolution of the European Union is “practically irreversible” after the Brexit vote, the truth is that the globalists are not about to give up so easily.

For a very long time, advocates of increased European integration have dreamed of going all the way and creating a true “United States of Europe”, but Britain was always one of the stumbling blocks that stood in the way.

But now that Britain is out and there is great fear that the entire European project may be in jeopardy, there seems to be a rush to go for broke and try to complete the job of European integration. The Express is one of the biggest news organizations in the UK, and they are reporting that the foreign ministers of France and Germany already have a blueprint “to effectively do away with individual member states”…

The foreign ministers of France and Germany are due to reveal a blueprint to effectively do away with individual member states in what is being described as an “ultimatum”.

Under the radical proposals EU countries will lose the right to have their own army, criminal law, taxation system or central bank, with all those powers being transferred to Brussels.

Controversially member states would also lose what few controls they have left over their own borders, including the procedure for admitting and relocating refugees.

When I read that earlier today I was absolutely stunned.

Did they come up with this blueprint before the Brexit vote or after?

And do they plan to allow the citizens of individual nations to vote on any of this?

It is being reported that the following paragraph comes from the preamble to the document…

“Our countries share a common destiny and a common set of values that give rise to an even closer union between our citizens. We will therefore strive for a political union in Europe and invite the next Europeans to participate in this venture.”

Of course it would have been totally unrealistic to expect backers of European integration to go down without a fight. After all, what did we expect them to do – throw up their hands and admit that the British people are right and that the European Union is a failure?

No, that was never going to happen.

As I mentioned in the other article that I published today, the elite are going to make the British people pay for what they have done. The British pound has already been smashed, British stocks are getting pounded, and the UK economy is going to suffer greatly. In addition, the British people are being inundated by mainstream news stories telling them what a horrible mistake they made.

And as the crisis in Europe gets progressively worse, the “solution” that will be heralded by mainstream news organizations will be increased European integration. In fact, this is something that CNN is already promoting…

The elite are desperate to rescue a European project that is considered to be “dying” in the eyes of many. For example, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman just compared what is happening in Europe right now to the collapse of the Soviet Union…

The upheaval in the U.K. after its Brexit referendum in favor of leaving the European Union has similarities to the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman.

While it’s “unreasonable to draw direct parallels,” it’s obvious that the U.K. is going through a “turbulent, confusing and unpredictable period,” Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call Monday. Russia “has gone through the collapse of the Soviet Union and many generations clearly remember the period of the Soviet collapse, that period of uncertainty.”

So those that are in favor of European integration are in full damage control mode at this point. Just today, there was a report in the Daily Mail about how German Chancellor Angela Merkel is telling people that it is vital to keep any other members of the European Union from leaving…

Mrs Merkel said the EU needs to stop other countries following Britain out of the door amid market fears that the bloc is ‘no longer governable’ after Brexit.

The German Chancellor told her conservative party board in a conference call that it was necessary to prevent other European Union members going down the same path as Britain.

Merkel is also said to have revealed that international financial markets are concerned the EU is ‘no longer governable’ in the wake of Britain’s exit vote.

The elitists that run the EU don’t really care about the will of the people, and they will work very hard to prevent more referendums from being held. In an age of “democracy”, the EU is one of the most undemocratic political institutions in the entire western world. I know, because I studied EU law when I was in law school.

If you have any doubt about this, just check out this recent quote from European Parliament President Martin Schultz…

“The British have violated the rules. It is not the EU philosophy that the crowd can decide its fate“.

Say what?

In the short-term, it is entirely possible that we could see more nations leave the EU. I would watch Greece in particular.

But in the long-term, we will see a major push for more European integration. Germany and France will be at the core of this movement, and other European nations will join them.

The British people may not participate any time soon, but the dream of a United States of Europe is far from dead.

And if the advocates of increased European integration have their way, we will be seeing their dream become a reality sooner rather than later.

(Originally published on End of the American Dream)

The Stock Market Crash Of 2016: Stocks Have Already Crashed In 6 Of The World’s 8 Largest Economies

Network Earth Continents - Public Domain

Over the past 12 months, stock market investors around the planet have lost trillions of dollars. Since this time last June, stocks have crashed in 6 of the world’s 8 largest economies, and stocks in the other two are down as well. The charts that you are about to see are absolutely stunning, and they are clear evidence that a new global financial crisis has already begun. Of course it is true that we are still in the early chapters of this new crisis and that there is much, much more damage to be done, but let us not minimize the carnage that we have already witnessed.

In general, there have been three major waves of financial panic over the past 12 months. Late last August we saw the biggest financial shaking since the financial crisis of 2008, then in January and February there was an even bigger shaking, and now a third “wave” has begun in June. Not all areas around the globe have been affected equally by each wave, but without a doubt this new financial crisis is a global phenomenon.

The charts that I am about to show you come from Trading Economics. It is an absolutely indispensable website that is packed full of useful data, and I encourage everyone to check it out.

Let’s talk about China first. The Chinese economy is the second largest on the entire planet, and since this time last year Chinese stocks are down an astounding 40 percent…

Chinese Stocks

As things have started to unravel in China, the Chinese have been selling off U.S. debt and U.S. stocks like crazy. The following comes from Bloomberg…

For the past year, Chinese selling of Treasuries has vexed investors and served as a gauge of the health of the world’s second-largest economy.

The People’s Bank of China, owner of the world’s biggest foreign-exchange reserves, burnt through 20 percent of its war chest since 2014, dumping about $250 billion of U.S. government debt and using the funds to support the yuan and stem capital outflows.

While China’s sales of Treasuries have slowed, its holdings of U.S. equities are now showing steep declines.

Unfortunately for China, their economy just continues to slow down, and George Soros is so alarmed by this and a potential “Brexit” that he has been selling off stocks and buying enormous amounts of gold in anticipation of an even bigger global downturn.

Japan has the third largest economy in the world, and over the past year Japanese stocks are down a total of 26 percent from the peak…

Japan Stocks

Personally, I have been extremely alarmed by what has been happening in Japan lately. Japanese stocks were down almost 500 points last night, and overall the Nikkei is down a whopping 1,800 points so far in June.

Of course the Japanese economy as a whole is essentially a basket case at this point. For a detailed analysis of this, please see my previous article entitled “Watch Japan – For All Is Not Well In The Land Of The Rising Sun“.

Germany has the fourth largest economy in the world, and over the past year their stocks have fallen 19 percent from the peak of the market…

German Stocks

The key thing to watch for in Germany are serious troubles at their biggest bank. I wrote a long article about the slow-motion implosion of Deutsche Bank last month, and just this week Deutsche Bank stock hit an all-time low.

The fifth largest economy on the planet belongs to the United Kingdom, and since last June their stocks have fallen about 13 percent…

British Stocks

One week from today, the “Brexit” vote will be held in the UK, and if they vote to leave the EU that could have very serious economic and financial implications for them and for the rest of Europe as well. For an in-depth look at this, please see my previous article entitled “June 23, 2016: The Brexit Vote Could Change EVERYTHING And Plunge Europe Into Financial Chaos“.

France has the sixth largest economy in the world, and over the past year French stocks are down 20 percent from the peak of the market…

French Stocks

The French economy is really struggling these days, and we have not heard much about it in the U.S. media, but there have been tremendous riots in major cities in France in recent weeks.

The seventh largest economy on our planet belongs to India. Even though India is facing some very serious economic problems, their stocks are doing okay for the moment. Even though stocks in India are down over the past 12 months, we have not seen a major financial crisis over there just yet.

But there is definitely a major crisis in the eighth largest economy in the world. Italian stocks are down a staggering 32 percent from the peak of the market. That means approximately a third of all stock market wealth in Italy is already gone…

Italian Stocks

Earlier this year, I wrote about the horrifying collapse of the Italian banking system that has greatly accelerated since the start of 2016. It looks like virtually all of their big banks will ultimately need to be bailed out, and this threatens to become a far bigger crisis than the crisis in Greece ever was.

And let us not leave off the ninth largest economy in the world. Not too long ago, CNN ran an article entitled “Brazil: Economic collapse worse than feared“. So not only are they admitting that the ninth largest economy on the globe is collapsing, they are also admitting that it is even worse than what the experts had anticipated.

So did I leave anyone off the list?

Ah yes, I haven’t even addressed what has been going on in the United States yet.

U.S. stocks did crash last August, but then they recovered.

Then they crashed again in January, but then they recovered again.

Now U.S. stocks have been taking another tumble here in June, but we are being assured that there is nothing to worry about.

Meanwhile, the underlying numbers for the U.S. economy just continue to get worse and worse and worse. If you have any doubt about this, please see the article that I posted yesterday entitled “15 Facts About The Imploding U.S. Economy That The Mainstream Media Doesn’t Want You To See“.

Hopefully this article will clear a lot of things up. In this piece, I have presented undeniable evidence that a new global financial crisis has begun over the past 12 months. We have not seen global stock declines of this nature since the great financial crisis of 2008, but much worse is still to come.

I would love to be wrong about that last part.

It would be wonderful if the worst was now behind us and good times for the global financial system were ahead.

Unfortunately, every single indicator that I am watching is telling me just the opposite.

*About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

Bilderberg 2016: What Are The Global Elite Plotting This Time Around?

Bilderberg Is Meeting At The Taschenbergpalais Hotel In Dresden

Later this week, dozens of the most important men in the world are going to gather at an ultra-luxury hotel in Dresden, Germany to discuss the future of the planet. What will happen at this meeting will not be televised, and the mainstream media in the United States will almost entirely ignore it, but decisions will be made at this conference that will affect the lives of every man, woman and child on the entire globe. Of course I am talking about the Bilderberg Group, and for decades you were labeled a “conspiracy theorist” if you even acknowledged that it existed.

Every year since 1954 the elite of the world have gathered at this time of the year to “discuss global events”, and since the Bilderberg Group operates under Chatham House Rules, everyone that participates is banned from revealing what goes on during the conference.

But what takes place at these conferences really matters. For example, it has been documented that the Bilderberg Group played a key role in the development of the European Union and in the decision to create the euro.

The elitists that attend these meetings are not the kind of people that would waste their time having tea and exchanging small talk. The list of previous attendees includes Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Prince Charles, David Cameron, Tony Blair, Henry Kissinger, Bill Gates, Angela Merkel, Ben Bernanke, Timothy Geithner, Rick Perry, David Rockefeller and Joe Biden. I have included a list of those attending Bilderberg this year at the end of this article.

The Taschenbergpalais Hotel In Dresden has been transformed into a heavily armed camp for this year’s conference, which only adds to the aura of mystery surrounding Bilderberg. The following comes from the Guardian…

You know Bilderberg’s about to begin when you start seeing the guns. The Taschenbergpalais hotel in Dresden is filling up with pistol-packing plainclothes security as the last guests are ushered out. The frowning gunslingers head up and down the corridors with their hotel maps, trying door handles and checking the lay of the land while, down in the hotel lobby, corporate goons gather in muttering huddles.

I don’t know why everyone’s so antsy. According to the local newspaper DNN, at least 400 police officers will be surrounding the venue for the three days of the talks. There’s already a ring of concrete blocks around the entrance. Is that not enough? What are they expecting? The charge of the light brigade?

So what precisely is going on that is so incredibly important that it needs such protection?

Well, the following list of “key topics” for discussion at this year’s conference comes directly from the official Bilderberg website…

  1. Current events
  2. China
  3. Europe: migration, growth, reform, vision, unity
  4. Middle East
  5. Russia
  6. US political landscape, economy: growth, debt, reform
  7. Cyber security
  8. Geo-politics of energy and commodity prices
  9. Precariat and middle class
  10. Technological innovation

The term “precariat” definitely caught my attention.

I didn’t know what that term meant, so I had to look it up. Here is how one source defines it…

The precariat is similar to the blue-collar workers of yesteryear in that they earn less than what Standing calls the salariat, but they are unique in that workers in manufacturing jobs, for instance, tended to have job security, benefits, and often union protection (which played a large part in the presence of the first two). Today’s precariat usually has none of that, and spans income and education levels, from sub-minimum-wage illegal migrant work and low-wage retail or service work to highly educated but contract- and freelance-dependent industries (like, ahem, journalism). Members of the precariat also, unlike their working-class forebears, have to put in an alarming amount of work that no one considers “work” or compensates them for.

But of course there will certainly be other things not on the official agenda that will be discussed by the elitists that gather in Dresden. Two topics that will definitely be on the minds of most attendees will be the upcoming Brexit vote and the Donald Trump phenomenon…

The attendance of anti-Trump Senator Lindsey Graham is an obvious sign that Bilderberg will be scheming on how to prevent Trump from defeating Bilderberg’s chosen candidate – Hillary Clinton.

As we reported during last year’s conference, Bilderberg was confident that Clinton could shake off her GOP challengers, but Trump’s self-funded campaign and his public opposition to globalism and internationalist trade deals like NAFTA has shocked the Bilderberg elitists.

Bilderberg will obviously be discussing Brexit – Britain referendum vote to leave the EU – because it threatens the future of the European Union federal superstate that was the brainchild of Bilderberg in the first place.

Ultimately, key decisions regarding the future of the European Union, U.S. politics and the global financial system will be made at this conference, but we are not supposed to know what takes place at Bilderberg and the mainstream media in the United States has always had a policy of virtually ignoring these meetings.

But some things have changed. In the past, it always took a good bit of detective work to figure out who was attending these meetings, but in recent years an official list of participants has been published on the Bilderberg website. Below is the official list for this year. Do you recognize any familiar names on this list?…

CHAIRMAN
Castries, Henri de (FRA), Chairman and CEO, AXA Group

Aboutaleb, Ahmed (NLD), Mayor, City of Rotterdam
Achleitner, Paul M. (DEU), Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Deutsche Bank AG
Agius, Marcus (GBR), Chairman, PA Consulting Group
Ahrenkiel, Thomas (DNK), Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Defence
Albuquerque, Maria Luís (PRT), Former Minister of Finance; MP, Social Democratic Party
Alierta, César (ESP), Executive Chairman and CEO, Telefónica
Altman, Roger C. (USA), Executive Chairman, Evercore
Altman, Sam (USA), President, Y Combinator
Andersson, Magdalena (SWE), Minister of Finance
Applebaum, Anne (USA), Columnist Washington Post; Director of the Transitions Forum, Legatum Institute
Apunen, Matti (FIN), Director, Finnish Business and Policy Forum EVA
Aydin-Düzgit, Senem (TUR), Associate Professor and Jean Monnet Chair, Istanbul Bilgi University
Barbizet, Patricia (FRA), CEO, Artemis
Barroso, José M. Durão (PRT), Former President of the European Commission
Baverez, Nicolas (FRA), Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher
Bengio, Yoshua (CAN), Professor in Computer Science and Operations Research, University of Montreal
Benko, René (AUT), Founder and Chairman of the Advisory Board, SIGNA Holding GmbH
Bernabè, Franco (ITA), Chairman, CartaSi S.p.A.
Beurden, Ben van (NLD), CEO, Royal Dutch Shell plc
Blanchard, Olivier (FRA), Fred Bergsten Senior Fellow, Peterson Institute
Botín, Ana P. (ESP), Executive Chairman, Banco Santander
Brandtzæg, Svein Richard (NOR), President and CEO, Norsk Hydro ASA
Breedlove, Philip M. (INT), Former Supreme Allied Commander Europe
Brende, Børge (NOR), Minister of Foreign Affairs
Burns, William J. (USA), President, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Cebrián, Juan Luis (ESP), Executive Chairman, PRISA and El País
Charpentier, Emmanuelle (FRA), Director, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology
Coeuré, Benoît (INT), Member of the Executive Board, European Central Bank
Costamagna, Claudio (ITA), Chairman, Cassa Depositi e Prestiti S.p.A.
Cote, David M. (USA), Chairman and CEO, Honeywell
Cryan, John (DEU), CEO, Deutsche Bank AG
Dassù, Marta (ITA), Senior Director, European Affairs, Aspen Institute
Dijksma, Sharon A.M. (NLD), Minister for the Environment
Döpfner, Mathias (DEU), CEO, Axel Springer SE
Dyvig, Christian (DNK), Chairman, Kompan
Ebeling, Thomas (DEU), CEO, ProSiebenSat.1
Elkann, John (ITA), Chairman and CEO, EXOR; Chairman, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles
Enders, Thomas (DEU), CEO, Airbus Group
Engel, Richard (USA), Chief Foreign Correspondent, NBC News
Fabius, Laurent (FRA), President, Constitutional Council
Federspiel, Ulrik (DNK), Group Executive, Haldor Topsøe A/S
Ferguson, Jr., Roger W. (USA), President and CEO, TIAA
Ferguson, Niall (USA), Professor of History, Harvard University
Flint, Douglas J. (GBR), Group Chairman, HSBC Holdings plc
Garicano, Luis (ESP), Professor of Economics, LSE; Senior Advisor to Ciudadanos
Georgieva, Kristalina (INT), Vice President, European Commission
Gernelle, Etienne (FRA), Editorial Director, Le Point
Gomes da Silva, Carlos (PRT), Vice Chairman and CEO, Galp Energia
Goodman, Helen (GBR), MP, Labour Party
Goulard, Sylvie (INT), Member of the European Parliament
Graham, Lindsey (USA), Senator
Grillo, Ulrich (DEU), Chairman, Grillo-Werke AG; President, Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie
Gruber, Lilli (ITA), Editor-in-Chief and Anchor “Otto e mezzo”, La7 TV
Hadfield, Chris (CAN), Colonel, Astronaut
Halberstadt, Victor (NLD), Professor of Economics, Leiden University
Harding, Dido (GBR), CEO, TalkTalk Telecom Group plc
Hassabis, Demis (GBR), Co-Founder and CEO, DeepMind
Hobson, Mellody (USA), President, Ariel Investment, LLC
Hoffman, Reid (USA), Co-Founder and Executive Chairman, LinkedIn
Höttges, Timotheus (DEU), CEO, Deutsche Telekom AG
Jacobs, Kenneth M. (USA), Chairman and CEO, Lazard
Jäkel, Julia (DEU), CEO, Gruner + Jahr
Johnson, James A. (USA), Chairman, Johnson Capital Partners
Jonsson, Conni (SWE), Founder and Chairman, EQT
Jordan, Jr., Vernon E. (USA), Senior Managing Director, Lazard Frères & Co. LLC
Kaeser, Joe (DEU), President and CEO, Siemens AG
Karp, Alex (USA), CEO, Palantir Technologies
Kengeter, Carsten (DEU), CEO, Deutsche Börse AG
Kerr, John (GBR), Deputy Chairman, Scottish Power
Kherbache, Yasmine (BEL), MP, Flemish Parliament
Kissinger, Henry A. (USA), Chairman, Kissinger Associates, Inc.
Kleinfeld, Klaus (USA), Chairman and CEO, Alcoa
Kravis, Henry R. (USA), Co-Chairman and Co-CEO, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Kravis, Marie-Josée (USA), Senior Fellow, Hudson Institute
Kudelski, André (CHE), Chairman and CEO, Kudelski Group
Lagarde, Christine (INT), Managing Director, International Monetary Fund
Levin, Richard (USA), CEO, Coursera
Leyen, Ursula von der (DEU), Minister of Defence
Leysen, Thomas (BEL), Chairman, KBC Group
Logothetis, George (GRC), Chairman and CEO, Libra Group
Maizière, Thomas de (DEU), Minister of the Interior, Federal Ministry of the Interior
Makan, Divesh (USA), CEO, ICONIQ Capital
Malcomson, Scott (USA), Author; President, Monere Ltd.
Markwalder, Christa (CHE), President of the National Council and the Federal Assembly
McArdle, Megan (USA), Columnist, Bloomberg View
Michel, Charles (BEL), Prime Minister
Micklethwait, John (USA), Editor-in-Chief, Bloomberg LP
Minton Beddoes, Zanny (GBR), Editor-in-Chief, The Economist
Mitsotakis, Kyriakos (GRC), President, New Democracy Party
Morneau, Bill (CAN), Minister of Finance
Mundie, Craig J. (USA), Principal, Mundie & Associates
Murray, Charles A. (USA), W.H. Brady Scholar, American Enterprise Institute
Netherlands, H.M. the King of the (NLD)
Noonan, Michael (IRL), Minister for Finance
Noonan, Peggy (USA), Author, Columnist, The Wall Street Journal
O’Leary, Michael (IRL), CEO, Ryanair Plc
Ollongren, Kajsa (NLD), Deputy Mayor of Amsterdam
Özel, Soli (TUR), Professor, Kadir Has University
Papalexopoulos, Dimitri (GRC), CEO, Titan Cement Co.
Petraeus, David H. (USA), Chairman, KKR Global Institute
Philippe, Edouard (FRA), Mayor of Le Havre
Pind, Søren (DNK), Minister of Justice
Ratti, Carlo (ITA), Director, MIT Senseable City Lab
Reisman, Heather M. (CAN), Chair and CEO, Indigo Books & Music Inc.
Rutte, Mark (NLD), Prime Minister
Sawers, John (GBR), Chairman and Partner, Macro Advisory Partners
Schäuble, Wolfgang (DEU), Minister of Finance
Schieder, Andreas (AUT), Chairman, Social Democratic Group
Schmidt, Eric E. (USA), Executive Chairman, Alphabet Inc.
Scholten, Rudolf (AUT), CEO, Oesterreichische Kontrollbank AG
Schwab, Klaus (INT), Executive Chairman, World Economic Forum
Sikorski, Radoslaw (POL), Senior Fellow, Harvard University; Former Minister of Foreign Affairs
Simsek, Mehmet (TUR), Deputy Prime Minister
Sinn, Hans-Werner (DEU), Professor for Economics and Public Finance, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
Skogen Lund, Kristin (NOR), Director General, The Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise
Standing, Guy (GBR), Co-President, BIEN; Research Professor, University of London
Svanberg, Carl-Henric (SWE), Chairman, BP plc and AB Volvo
Thiel, Peter A. (USA), President, Thiel Capital
Tillich, Stanislaw (DEU), Minister-President of Saxony
Vetterli, Martin (CHE), President, NSF
Wahlroos, Björn (FIN), Chairman, Sampo Group, Nordea Bank, UPM-Kymmene Corporation
Wallenberg, Jacob (SWE), Chairman, Investor AB
Weder di Mauro, Beatrice (CHE), Professor of Economics, University of Mainz
Wolf, Martin H. (GBR), Chief Economics Commentator, Financial Times

*About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of End Of The American Dream. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

Will Deutsche Bank Survive This Wave Of Trouble Or Will It Become The Next Lehman Brothers?

Euro Question - Public Domain

If you have been waiting for “the next Lehman Brothers moment” which will cause the global financial system to descend into a state of mass panic, you might want to keep a close eye on German banking giant Deutsche Bank. It is approximately three times larger than Lehman Brothers was, and if the most important bank in the strongest economy in Europe were to implode, it would instantly send shockwaves rippling across the entire planet. Those that follow my work regularly know that I started sounding the alarm about Deutsche Bank beginning last September. Since that time, the bad news from Deutsche Bank has not stopped pouring in. They announced a loss of 6.8 billion euros for 2015, and they have been plagued by scandal after scandal. In recent months they have gotten into trouble for trying to rig precious metal prices, for committing “equity trading fraud” and for their dealings in mortgage-backed securities. The following comes from Zero Hedge…

A month after admitting to rigging precious metals markets, Deutsche Bank has been hit with a double-whammy of more alleged fraudulent behavior today and the stock is sliding. First, Reuters reports that the bank took a charge of 450 million euros for “equity trading fraud,” and then Bloomberg reports that The SEC is looking into Deutsche’s post-crisis mortgage positions.

This is a bank that is steadily bleeding money, and so the last thing that it needs is for government agencies to be putting immense pressure on it. Unfortunately for Deutsche Bank, the SEC seems determined to kick it while it is down…

Troubled Wall Street giant Deutsche Bank is under another investigation, this time by the Securities and Exchange Commission regarding the pricing and reporting of certain mortgage-backed securities.

The SEC wants to know whether the Frankfurt, Germany-based bank artificially raised the value of mortgage-backed securities in 2013 and later hid those losses for an extended period of time, Bloomberg first reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

But even if there were no scandals and no government investigations, the truth is that Deutsche Bank would be a deeply troubled bank anyway.

At one point, it was estimated that Deutsche Bank had 64 trillion dollars worth of exposure to derivatives contracts. That is an amount of money that is approximately 16 times the size of the GDP of the entire nation of Germany.

So nobody wants to see Deutsche Bank fail. It would be a financial disaster unlike anything the world has ever experienced before.

But right now things are not looking good. As you can see from this chart, the steady decline of Deutsche Bank’s stock price is eerily similar to what happened to Lehman Brothers during the months leading up to the time when it finally completely collapsed…

Deutsche Bank Lehman Brothers - Zero Hedge

Earlier this year, Deutsche Bank’s stock price set a new record low, and since that time it has been hovering just above that record low.

Clearly it is no secret that Deutsche Bank is having big problems, and the outlook for the immediate future is not good. I included the following quote from Berenberg analyst James Chappell in a previous article, but I think that it bears repeating…

Too many problems still: The biggest problem is that DBK has too much leverage. On our measures, we believe DBK is still over 40x levered. DBK can either reduce assets or increase capital to rectify this. On the first path, the markets do not exist in the size nor pricing to enable it to follow this route. Going down the second path also seems impossible at the moment, as the profitability of the core business is under pressure. Seeking outside capital is also likely to be difficult as management would likely find it hard to offer any type of return on new capital invested.

In the end, I believe that Deutsche Bank will ultimately implode, but it won’t be the only one.

Meanwhile, we just got some more very disturbing news out of Asia. According to Bloomberg, Japanese exports have now fallen for seven months in a row…

Japan’s exports fell for a seventh consecutive month in April as the yen strengthened, underscoring the growing challenges to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s efforts to revive economic growth.

Overseas shipments declined 10.1 percent in April from a year earlier, the Ministry of Finance said on Monday. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg was for a 9.9 percent drop. Imports fell 23.3 percent, leaving a trade surplus of 823.5 billion yen ($7.5 billion), the highest since March 2010.

When your imports are 23 percent lower than they were a year earlier, that is a clear sign that consumer demand is way, way down and that your economy is in the process of imploding.

So I will repeat what I have said a number of times before…

Watch Germany and watch Japan.

I believe that they are going to be two of the biggest stories as this new global financial crisis begins to play out.

*About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

10 Shocking Parallels Between The United States And Nazi Germany

Prison Camp Flag - Public Domain

Most Americans may not like to hear this, but the truth is that modern day America very closely resembles Nazi Germany. If you initially recoiled when you read the headline to this article, that is understandable. After all, most of us were raised to deeply love this country. But I would ask you to consider the evidence that I have compiled before you pass judgment on the matter. Most citizens of this nation know that something has gone deeply wrong, and I would suggest that just like the Nazis, all of the pageantry and beauty in our society masks an evil which has grown to a level that is almost unspeakable. And just like the Germans, we don’t do ourselves any favors by turning a blind eye to what is going on. The following are 10 stunning parallels between the United States and Nazi Germany…

#1 Human Experimentation

The fact that the Nazis conducted scientific experiments on their prisoners has been heavily documented, but many Americans may not realize that we have been conducting similar experiments for decades. The following comes from author John Whitehead…

In Alabama, for example, 600 black men with syphilis were allowed to suffer without proper medical treatment in order to study the natural progression of untreated syphilis. In California, older prisoners had testicles from livestock and from recently executed convicts implanted in them to test their virility. In Connecticut, mental patients were injected with hepatitis.

In Maryland, sleeping prisoners had a pandemic flu virus sprayed up their noses. In Georgia, two dozen “volunteering” prison inmates had gonorrhea bacteria pumped directly into their urinary tracts through the penis. In Michigan, male patients at an insane asylum were exposed to the flu after first being injected with an experimental flu vaccine. In Minnesota, 11 public service employee “volunteers” were injected with malaria, then starved for five days.

In New York, dying patients had cancer cells introduced into their systems. In Ohio, over 100 inmates were injected with live cancer cells. Also in New York, prisoners at a reformatory prison were also split into two groups to determine how a deadly stomach virus was spread: the first group was made to swallow an unfiltered stool suspension, while the second group merely breathed in germs sprayed into the air. And in Staten Island, children with mental retardation were given hepatitis orally and by injection to see if they could then be cured.

And while times may have changed, the truth is that we are still being experimented on against our will. Just check out what the New York Daily News says is happening in New York City this month…

Don’t hold your breath, it’s only a test.

The Department of Homeland Security will release “harmless particle materials” in the city’s subway system next week.

The “non-toxic, safe gas material” will be released at subway stations in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens in order to understand where hazardous material would travel in the event of a biological terrorist attack.

In addition, let us not forget that we systematically create and perform experiments on unborn baby children…

A shocking new report indicates scientists have found a way for human embryos to live outside the womb for 14 days, which is a record, so they can be experimented on for a longer period of time.

Leading pro-life advocates are outraged that scientists would specifically create unique human beings to purposefully experiment on and later destroy just for research. They are worried scientists will continue creating more unborn human people who will be subjected to research for a longer duration of their embryonic life.

What we are doing is so evil that it is hard to put into words, and yet most Americans have come to accept this kind of sick behavior as perfectly normal.

#2 Socialism

The Nazis were hardcore socialists, and they were very proud of this fact. For example, National Socialist theologian Gregor Strasser once made the following statement…

We National Socialists are enemies, deadly enemies, of the present capitalist system with its exploitation of the economically weak … and we are resolved under all circumstances to destroy this system.

Unfortunately, the United States is rapidly moving in a similar direction. An avowed socialist, Bernie Sanders, is wildly popular with Democrats, and more than half of all U.S. adults under the age of 30 now say that they reject capitalism.

#3 Free Stuff

Just like Bernie Sanders wants to do, the Nazis gave out lots and lots of free stuff. Kitty Werthmann was a child living a peaceful life in Austria when Hitler took over her nation, and I will be quoting her extensively for the rest of this article. She says that once the Nazis took control in Austria, they started handing out lots of freebies…

Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household. We had big programs for families. All day care and education were free. High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized. Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing.

#4 Taxes

Free stuff may sound like a good idea, but someone has to pay for it. According to Kitty Werthmann, once the Nazis took control of Austria “our tax rates went up to 80% of our income“, and that absolutely choked the life out of the free market system.

Sadly, things are moving in the exact same direction in the United States. When the federal income tax was first implemented a little over a century ago, most Americans were taxed at a rate of just one percent. But today, we are being taxed into oblivion. I recently wrote an article in which I listed 97 different taxes that Americans pay each year, and when you add all of those taxes together some Americans end up paying out more than 50 percent of their incomes in taxes.

#5 Obamacare

Would it surprise you to learn that the Nazis had their own version of Obamacare? The following is some more eyewitness testimony from Kitty Werthmann…

Before Hitler, we had very good medical care. Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna. After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone. Doctors were salaried by the government. The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything. When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a.m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full. If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn. There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine. Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and emigrated to other countries.

#6 Government Regulation

Just like the Obama administration, the Nazis wanted to tightly regulate virtually everything in the economy. Here is more from Kitty Werthmann…

My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables. Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners. Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities. It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar. He couldn’t meet all the demands. Soon, he went out of business.

If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control.

We had consumer protection. We were told how to shop and what to buy. Free enterprise was essentially abolished. We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers. The agents would go to the farms, count the live-stock, then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it.

#7 Gun Control

The Nazis believed in having a very strong military, but they were also obsessed with taking the guns away from the general population. According to Kitty Werthmann, the first step was gun registration, and once the government knew where all the guns were it was very easy to round all of them up…

Next came gun registration. People were getting injured by guns. Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns. Most citizens were law abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms. Not long after-wards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns. The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily.

#8 Spying

The Nazi secret police, also known as the Gestapo, became world famous for their brutal tactics. The Nazis wanted to know everything about everybody, and anyone that was deemed to be “anti-government” was dealt with mercilessly.

Unfortunately, we are moving in the exact same direction in the United States today. We spy on our enemies, but we also spy on our friends. Control freaks working for the government are systematically watching us, tracking us, recording our phone calls and monitoring our emails. At this point, government snooping has become so pervasive that 64 percent of all reporters believe that the government is spying on them.

#9 Abortion

The Nazis brought legalized abortion to Germany, and they were especially interested in having “undesirable” elements of the population engage in this practice. It turns out that Adolf Hitler was actually a huge fan of the founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, and he adopted many of her philosophies. As I have written about previously, Sanger once made the following statement…

“The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”

Now compare that line from Sanger to this statement from Hitler in Mein Kampf…

“The demand that defective people be prevented from propagating equally defective offspring. . . represents the most humane act of mankind.”

Just like the Nazis, our disregard for human life is absolutely appalling. Even after the American people were shown clear undercover video evidence that revealed that Planned Parenthood is chopping up aborted babies and selling their body parts to the highest bidder, one survey found that only 29 percent of Americans wanted to cut off the hundreds of millions of dollars that Planned Parenthood is getting from the federal government every year.

To say that we have become an “evil nation” is a gigantic understatement.

#10 Pushing The Christian Faith Out Of Public Life

In this day and age, it has become “American” to remove every trace of the Christian faith from public life. We don’t want God in our government, in our schools, in our parks or in our businesses. Many people may not realize this, but the Nazis were the exact same way. The following information originally comes from Bruce Walker, the author of “The Swastika Against the Cross: The Nazi War on Christianity“…

The Nazi tract Gott und Volk was distributed in 1941, and it describes the life cycle of German youth in the future, who would: “With parties and gifts the youth will be led painlessly from one faith to the other and will grow up without ever having heard of the Sermon on the Mount or the Golden Rule, to say nothing of the Ten Commandments… The education of the youth is to be confined primarily by the teacher, the officer, and the leaders of the party. The priests will die out. They have estranged the youth from the Volk. Into their places will step the leaders. Not deputies of God. But anyway the best Germans. And how shall we train our children? Thus, as though they had never heard of Christianity!”

And just like Nazi Germany, our end will be exceedingly terrible.

You see, the truth is that all evil regimes eventually fall, and America is headed for a day of reckoning.

Even now, our enemies are preparing weapons which could potentially destroy us in a single day. For example, just check out what Russia is building…

The “Satan 2” missile is rumoured to be the most powerful ever designed and is equipped with stealth technology to help it dodge enemy radar systems .

This terrifying doomsday weapon is likely to strike fear into the hearts of Western military chiefs, as current missile defence technology is totally incapable of stopping it.

It is being reported that the warheads from a single Satan 2 missile could destroy a state the size of Texas or a country the size of France.

Whether it is nuclear oblivion or something else, if we continue to behave like the Nazis it is just a matter of time before America is destroyed.

Let us hope and pray that this country wakes up while there is still time to do so.

*About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of End Of The American Dream. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.*

More Islamic Terror Coming: ISIS Has Sent 400 Trained Fighters Into Europe To Conduct Terror Attacks

Skull Smiling - Public Domain

The recent attacks in Paris and in Brussels were just the tip of the iceberg of a massive wave of Islamic terror that is soon coming to Europe. As you will see below, the Associated Press is reporting that ISIS has specially trained “at least 400 attackers” and has already sent them into Europe with specific instructions to conduct terror operations. So Barack Obama may not think that we have anything to be concerned about, but the facts on the ground tell us a completely different story. Thanks to Europe’s openness to “war refugees” from Syria, it is very easy for radical jihadists to get into countries such as France, Belgium and Germany. And once they are on European soil, there are plenty of other disgruntled Islamic refugees that they can recruit to their cause. Europe stands on the precipice of the greatest terror crisis that it has ever known, and the attacks that are coming next are likely to be far more deadly than anything we have seen so far.

As I mentioned above, the Associated Press is reporting that ISIS has already sent “at least 400” trained fighters into Europe for the purpose of conducting terror attacks…

Security officials have told The Associated Press that the Islamic State group has trained at least 400 attackers and sent them into Europe for terror attacks.

The network of interlocking, agile and semiautonomous cells shows the reach of the extremist group in Europe even as it loses ground in Syria. The officials, including European and Iraqi intelligence officials and a French lawmaker who follows the jihadi networks, describe camps designed specifically to train for attacks against the West.

And just in case you were tempted to think that this threat was not real, you may want to consider what happened in France on Thursday.

According to NBC News, police in Paris were able to foil a terror attack that was in “the advanced stages” of planning…

Raids in northwest Paris have foiled a terrorist attack, French officials said late Thursday.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve gave a press conference in Paris announcing there was an operation underway in Argenteuil, a commune in the northwest suburbs of Paris.

One man was arrested Thursday morning Cazeneuve said, adding that the operation thwarted a potential attack. Police were raiding his home again later Thursday evening.

The suspect was a French national who was in “the advanced stages” of a terror plot, the minister said, calling it a “major arrest.”

Of course much of the rest of the world is already solidly in the grip of Islamic terror. The number of people killed by Islamic terror attacks has been increasing year after year, but the western media only seems to get excited when an attack happens in North America or Europe.

I came across the following tweet earlier today, and it makes this point perfectly…

For instance, did you even hear about the horrific Islamic terror attack that happened in the Ivory Coast earlier this month? Gunmen opened fire on a very crowded beach in a key resort area on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb claimed responsibility for the bloodshed. The following comes from the New York Times…

Gunmen opened fire on picnickers and swimmers enjoying a perfect day at three beach resort hotels near the Ivory Coast’s capital on Sunday, killing 16 people and leaving bodies strewn across the bloodstained sand. It was the third major attack in West Africa since November, and verified fears that the spread of terrorism across the region was far from over.

The attack, on the first sunny Sunday in weeks, took place in Grand-Bassam, a popular palm tree-lined getaway for Ivorians and foreigners. Fourteen civilians and two members of the country’s special forces were killed, as well as six gunmen, according to a spokeswoman for the president.

So why do we get so bent out of shape when there is an attack in France or Belgium, but not when there is an attack in the Ivory Coast?

And what does that say about us?

As ISIS and other Islamic terror groups conduct more attacks in North America and Europe, the pressure to conduct military action in the Middle East is going to become very intense. For a long time I have been warning about the potential for World War III to erupt in Syria, and U.S. troops are already taking on a more prominent role in Iraq.

In fact, the International Business Times is reporting that U.S. marines are now “on the front line” in the fight against the Islamic State…

The Islamic State group is trying to retake control of the oil fields it lost two years ago in the semi-autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan by launching rockets at Kurdish and Iraqi soldiers. In an attempt to earn back the massive amount of cash it used to fund its international terrorism in 2014, the group has focused its resources on attacking Makhmur, a city just 75 miles miles from the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. So far, the group, also known as ISIS, has succeeded in outgunning the Iraqi forces in the city, but a new contingent of American Marines might change the outcome on the ground.

“Several weeks ago, thousands of Iraqi troops began occupying a tactical assembly area in Makhmur. This is part of the force generation associated with the liberation of Mosul,” Col. Steve Warren, spokesman for the fight against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, said in a press briefing this week. Mosul is the de facto ISIS headquarters in Iraq. “These Iraqi forces, along with their coalition advisers, require force protection,” Warren said. “So we constructed a small fire base to do just that.”

The U.S. Marines in Iraq are on the front line and have been tasked with protecting Iraqi units in Makhmur — a scenario President Barack Obama wanted to avoid as long as possible during his time in office.

And what happens when ISIS or another terror group is able to set off a chemical, biological or nuclear weapon in a major western city?

That would change the world literally overnight.

As I have been warning, most people have no idea how incredibly fragile our society truly is. Humanity has created weapons that are frighteningly powerful, and it is only a matter of time before terrorists acquire these weapons and begin using them.

The free and open society that we are all enjoying today is on borrowed time.

All it is going to take is the detonation of a single weapon of mass destruction in a major western city and everything will change.

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

Day Of Reckoning: The Collapse Of The Too Big To Fail Banks In Europe Is Here

Europe Lightning - Public Domain

There is so much chaos going on that I don’t even know where to start. For a very long time I have been warning my readers that a major banking collapse was coming to Europe, and now it is finally unfolding. Let’s start with Deutsche Bank. The stock of the most important bank in the “strongest economy in Europe” plunged another 8 percent on Monday, and it is now hovering just above the all-time record low that was set during the last financial crisis. Overall, the stock price is now down a staggering 36 percent since 2016 began, and Deutsche Bank credit default swaps are going parabolic. Of course my readers were alerted to major problems at Deutsche Bank all the way back in September, and now the endgame is playing out. In addition to Deutsche Bank, the list of other “too big to fail” banks in Europe that appear to be in very serious trouble includes Commerzbank, Credit Suisse, HSBC and BNP Paribas. Just about every major bank in Italy could fall on that list as well, and Greek bank stocks lost close to a quarter of their value on Monday alone. Financial Armageddon has come to Europe, and the entire planet is going to feel the pain.

The collapse of the banks in Europe is dragging down stock prices all over the continent. At this point, more than one-fifth of all stock market wealth in Europe has already been wiped out since the middle of last year. That means that we only have four-fifths left. The following comes from USA Today…

The MSCI Europe index is now down 20.5% from its highest point over the past 12 months, says S&P Global Market Intelligence, placing it in the 20% decline that unofficially defines a bear market.

Europe’s stock implosion makes the U.S.’ sell-off look like child’s play. The U.S.-centric Standard & Poor’s 500 Monday fell another 1.4% – but it’s only down 13% from its high. Some individual European markets are getting hit even harder. The Milan MIB 30, Madrid Ibex 35 and MSCI United Kingdom indexes are off 29%, 23% and 20% from their 52-week highs, respectively as investors fear the worse could be headed for the Old World.

These declines are being primarily driven by the banks. According to MarketWatch, European banking stocks have fallen for six weeks in a row, and this is the longest streak that we have seen since the heart of the last financial crisis…

The region’s banking gauge, the Stoxx Europe 600 Banks Index FX7, -5.59% has logged six straight weeks of declines, its longest weekly losing stretch since 2008, when banks booked 10 weeks of losses, beginning in May, according to FactSet data.

“The current environment for European banks is very, very bad. Over a full business cycle, I think it’s very questionable whether banks on average are able to cover their cost of equity. And as a result that makes it an unattractive investment for long-term investors,” warned Peter Garnry, head of equity strategy at Saxo Bank.

Overall, Europe’s banking stocks are down 23 percent year to date and 39 percent since the peak of the market in the middle of last year.

The financial crisis that began during the second half of 2015 is picking up speed over in Europe, and it isn’t just Deutsche Bank that could implode at any moment. Credit Suisse is the most important bank in Switzerland, and they announced a fourth quarter loss of 5.8 billion dollars. The stock price has fallen 34 percent year to date, and many are now raising questions about the continued viability of the bank.

Similar scenes are being repeated all over the continent. On Monday we learned that Russia had just shut down two more major banks, and the collapse of Greek banks has pushed Greek stock prices to a 25 year low…

Greek stocks tumbled on Monday to close nearly eight percent lower, with bank shares losing almost a quarter of their market value amid concerns over the future of government reforms.

The general index on the Athens stock exchange closed down 7.9 percent at 464.23 points — a 25-year-low — while banks suffered a 24.3-percent average drop.

This is what a financial crisis looks like.

Fortunately things are not this bad here in the U.S. quite yet, but we are on the exact same path that they are.

One of the big things that is fueling the banking crisis in Europe is the fact that the too big to fail banks over there have more than 100 billion dollars of exposure to energy sector loans. This makes European banks even more sensitive to the price of oil than U.S. banks. The following comes from CNBC…

The four U.S. banks with the highest dollar amount of exposure to energy loans have a capital position 60 percent greater than European banks Deutsche Bank, UBS, Credit Suisse and HSBC, according to CLSA research using a measure called tangible common equity to tangible assets ratio. Or, as Mayo put it, “U.S. banks have more quality capital.”

Analysts at JPMorgan saw the energy loan crisis coming for Europe, and highlighted in early January where investors might get hit.

“[Standard Chartered] and [Deutsche Bank] would be the most sensitive banks to higher default rates in oil and gas,” the analysts wrote in their January report.

There is Deutsche Bank again.

It is funny how they keep coming up.

In the U.S., the collapse of the price of oil is pushing energy company after energy company into bankruptcy. This has happened 42 times in North America since the beginning of last year so far, and rumors that Chesapeake Energy is heading that direction caused their stock price to plummet a staggering 33 percent on Monday…

Energy stocks continue to tank, with Transocean (RIG) dropping 7% and Baker Hughes (BHI) down nearly 5%. But those losses pale in comparison with Chesapeake Energy (CHK), the energy giant that plummeted as much as 51% amid bankruptcy fears. Chesapeake denied it’s currently planning to file for bankruptcy, but its stock still closed down 33% on the day.

And let’s not forget about the ongoing bursting of the tech bubble that I wrote about yesterday.

On Monday the carnage continued, and this pushed the Nasdaq down to its lowest level in almost 18 months…

Technology shares with lofty valuations, including those of midcap data analytics company Tableau Software Inc and Internet giant Facebook Inc, extended their losses on Monday following a gutting selloff in the previous session.

Shares of cloud services companies such as Splunk Inc and Salesforce.com Inc had also declined sharply on Friday. They fell again on Monday, dragging down the Nasdaq Composite index 2.4 percent to its lowest in nearly 1-1/2 years.

Those that read my articles regularly know that I have been warning this would happen.

All over the world we are witnessing a financial implosion. As I write this article, the Japanese market has only been open less than an hour and it is already down 747 points.

The next great financial crisis is already here, and right now we are only in the early chapters.

Ultimately what we are facing is going to be far worse than the financial crisis of 2008/2009, and as a result of this great shaking the entire world is going to fundamentally change.

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

German plan to impose limit on cash transactions met with fierce resistance

Germany - Public Domain

A plan to introduce a limit on cash transactions in Germany has been met with fierce resistance across the country.

Proposals to ban cash payments of more than €5,000 (£3,860) to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism were revealed by the German finance ministry last week. They face opposition from a broad alliance of political parties as well as the country’s bestselling newspaper.

The Bild published an open letter on Monday entitled “hands off our cash”, which, in keeping with the analogue theme, it encourages readers to sign, cut out and post to the finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Rape Epidemic In Europe: Why Won’t European Politicians Do Anything To Stop It?

Rape Epidemic In Europe - Public Domain

An epidemic of rape is sweeping all across Europe, and yet European politicians seem almost completely unwilling to stand up and do something about it.  In some major European cities, women are absolutely petrified to go out by themselves – especially at night.  Things have gotten so bad that some people are now making up entirely new words to describe what is going on.  Steve Quayle has labeled this crisis “rapeageddon“, and I think that fits.  Things are particularly bad in Germany, which has welcomed more refugees than any other European country in recent years.  If you can believe it, Germany opened the doors for 1.1 million “asylum seekers” last year.  That is an astounding number, and it is starting to have dramatic consequences for German society.

Just consider what happened in the city of Cologne on New Year’s Eve.  According to police, there were nearly 400 reports of groping, sexual assault, theft and rape.  The following comes from a column written by Cal Thomas…

In the city of Cologne, what is being described as an “Arab sex mob” of as many as 1,000 men surrounded groups of women on New Year’s Eve. The men, who were identified as being of Arab or North African appearance, fondled and sexually harassed the women. One city councilor, Judith Wolter, said Cologne’s town center has recently become a “no-go” area for women because of a rise in crime in the area. The city accepted more than 10,000 predominantly Muslim refugees last year. More than 30 women lodged complaints of similar New Year’s assaults in Hamburg and Stuttgart.

The German media have been accused of covering-up this and other incidents and Chancellor Angela Merkel has been revealed as the ultimate wishful thinker for refusing to do anything until recently to stem the flow of migrants from Islamic countries.

Actually things were even worse than Thomas reported in his article.  According to the authorities, there were 133 crimes against women in the city of Hamburg on New Year’s Eve…

Police in the northern German city of Hamburg said Sunday they have recorded 133 cases of offences including sexual assaults allegedly committed against women during New Year’s celebrations.

Investigators have not identified any suspects for the assaults that allegedly took place at the port city’s party avenue Reeperbahn.

But victims have described the perpetrators as having “African, Arab, or south European appearance”, a police spokesman told AFP.

Needless to say, a lot of Germans are completely and totally fed up at this point.  Many Germans are now referring to these immigrants as “rapeugees”, and some Germans are even calling for Angela Merkel to resign.

The frightening thing is that some of these “refugees” actually do have allegiance to the Islamic State.  Here is just one example that was recently in the news…

Over the weekend, some 1,700 people showed up for a PEGIDA rally where demonstrators held up signs carrying slogans such as “Rapeugees not welcome.” Some speakers at the event called for Merkel’s ouster.

Now, we learn that the man who last Thursday ran into a police station in northern Paris shouting “Allahu Akbar” and waving a meat cleaver spent time in a house for asylum seekers in Germany. That residence was raided on Saturday when German police, acting on a tip from French intelligence, stormed the building and found SIM cards, “documents” in Arabic, kitchen knives, and a banner reading “Islamic State forever” hanging in the kitchen.

And it isn’t just Germany that is experiencing an epidemic of immigrant violence.

In Sweden, violence against women has spiraled totally out of control.  But the Swedish media has been caught covering it up because they didn’t want to make Muslim immigrants look bad.  In recent days, the cover up of this violence against women has erupted into a huge scandal over there…

Nyheter Idag is now able to disclose in detail how major Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter deliberately covered up stories about widespread sexual abuse in central Stockholm in connection with a concert in the Kungsträdgården public square this August.

On Saturday August 15th, the nationally acclaimed and outspoken feminist artist Zara Larsson headlined the youth festival ‘We Are Sthlm” with a crowded concert in Kungsträdgården in central Stockholm. Thousands of young people were in attendance to take part in the event during the last summer nights of the year.

But for an unknown number of young girls the festival soon became a nightmare. Hordes of young men pressed against young girls, fondled and tried to cop a feel over and under skirts, pants and shirts. There were severe sexual assaults happening right in front of the stage, where artists such as Larsson and rapper OIAM performed.

In Sweden, this is something that has been building for years.  Once upon a time, it was one of the most crime-free nations in the world, but now that has totally changed.  According to Infowars, the number of rapes in that nation has risen by an astounding 1,472 percent since the mid-1970s…

Rapes in Sweden have skyrocketed by a shocking 1,472% since the mid-70’s, with 6,620 sexual assaults being reported to police in 2014 compared to just 421 in 1975.

“77.6 percent of the country’s rapists are identified as “foreigners” (and that’s significant because in Sweden, “foreigner” is generally synonymous with “immigrant from Muslim country”), writes Selwyn Duke. “And even this likely understates the issue, since the Swedish government — in an effort to obscure the problem — records second-generation Muslim perpetrators simply as “Swedes.”

Other European nations are dealing with similar problems.  Just check out these numbers…

In Norway, recent statistics revealed that 100 percent of violent street-rapes committed in the capital city of Oslo were committed by “non-western” immigrants. It’s a similar story in Denmark, where the majority of rapes are committed by immigrants, usually Muslim.

In England, it’s been rape after rape – tens of thousands of young British girls are brutalized, tortured, beaten and raped by organized gangs comprised almost exclusively of Muslims.

As the United States and Canada import thousands of these “refugees”, it is only a matter of time before similar things start happening here.

In fact, there was quite a chilling incident that happened in Calgary just the other day.  31-year-old Mohamed Elmi and 29-year-old Mohamed Salad have been charged with attempted murder for firing shots into a very busy Calgary nightclub…

Two bouncers who tackled a gunman holding a cocked pistol after shots were fired into a busy Calgary nightclub early Sunday morning are being credited by police and witnesses with risking their own lives to prevent further trauma.

While a 38-year-old man in the club was struck by a bullet and taken to hospital in stable condition with serious soft-tissue injury to his upper torso, officials believe many more patrons could have been hurt if it weren’t for the quick-thinking doormen.

So why didn’t we hear about this attack by two Islamic gunmen on the news?

Could it be possible that just like the European media, the mainstream media in Canada does not want to make Islamic immigrants look bad?

It has gotten to the point where the extreme political correctness that exists in our society is actually endangering our safety.

We need to see the world the way that it really is, and not the way that we wish that it would be.

There is a price to be paid for importing vast numbers of violent Islamic immigrants that do not have any respect for us or for our way of life.

This is something that Germany and Sweden have already discovered, and if we are not very careful our women will soon be paying the price as well.

There Are Signs That A Major Financial Event In Germany Is Imminent

Germany Euro Map - Public Domain

Is something about to happen in Germany that will shake the entire world? According to disturbing new intel that I have received, a major financial event in Germany could be imminent. Now when I say imminent, I do not mean to suggest that it will happen tomorrow. But I do believe that we have entered a season of time when another “Lehman Brothers moment” may occur. Most observers tend to regard Germany as the strong hub that is holding the rest of Europe together economically, but the truth is that serious trouble is brewing under the surface. As I write this, the German DAX stock index is down close to 20 percent from the all-time high that was set back in April, and there are lots of signs of turmoil at Germany’s largest bank. There are very few banks in the world that are more prestigious or more influential than Deutsche Bank, and it has been making headlines for all of the wrong reasons recently.

Just like we saw with Lehman Brothers, banks that are “too big to fail” don’t suddenly collapse overnight. The truth is that there are always warning signs in advance if you look closely enough.

In early 2014, shares of Deutsche Bank were trading above 50 dollars a share. Since that time, they have fallen by more than 40 percent, and they are now trading below 29 dollars a share.

It is common knowledge that the corporate culture at Deutsche Bank is deeply corrupt, and the bank has been exceedingly reckless in recent years.

If you are exceedingly reckless and you win all the time, that is okay. Unfortunately for Deutsche Bank, they have increasingly been on the losing end of things.

Prior to the “sudden collapse” of Lehman Brothers on September 15th, 2008, there had been media reports of mass layoffs at the firm. To give you just a couple of examples, CNBC reported on this on March 10th, 2008 and the New York Times reported on this on August 28th, 2008.

When big banks start getting into serious trouble, this is what they do. They start getting rid of staff. That is why the massive job cuts that Deutsche Bank just announced are so troubling…

Deutsche Bank aims to cut roughly 23,000 jobs, or about one quarter of total staff, through layoffs mainly in technology activities and by spinning off its PostBank division, financial sources said on Monday.

That would bring the group’s workforce down to around 75,000 full-time positions under a reorganization being finalised by new Chief Executive John Cryan, who took control of Germany’s biggest bank in July with the promise to cut costs.

Cryan presented preliminary details of the plan to members of the supervisory board at the weekend. A spokesman for the bank declined comment.

Deutsche Bank has also been facing mounting legal troubles. The following is a brief excerpt from a recent Zero Hedge article…

The bank, which has paid out more than $9 billion over the past three years alone to settle legacy litigation, has become something of a poster child for corrupt corporate culture.

In April, Deutsche settled rate rigging charges with the DoJ for $2.5 billion (or about $25,474 per employee) and subsequently paid $55 million to the SEC (an agency that’s been run by former Deutsche Bank employees and their close associates for years) in connection with allegations it deliberately mismarked its crisis-era LSS book to the tune of at least $5 billion.

But it was out of the frying pan and into the fire so to speak, because early last month, the DoJ announced it would seek to extract a fresh round of MBS-related settlements from banks that knowingly packaged and sold shoddy CDOs in the lead up to the crisis. JP Morgan, Bank of America, and Citi settled MBS probes when the DoJ was operating under the incomparable (and we mean that in a derisive way) Eric Holder but now, emboldened by her pyrrhic victory over Wall Street’s FX manipulators, new Attorney General Loretta Lynch is set to go after Barclays PLC, Credit Suisse Group AG, Deutsche Bank AG, HSBC Holdings PLC, Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC,UBS AG and Wells Fargo & Co.

Of course the legal troubles are just the tip of the iceberg of what has been going on over at Deutsche Bank over the past couple of years. The following is a pretty good timeline of some of the major events that have hit Deutsche Bank since the beginning of last year. It comes from a NotQuant article that was published back in June entitled “Is Deutsche Bank the next Lehman?“…

  • In April of 2014, Deutsche Bank was forced to raise an additional 1.5 Billion of Tier 1 capital to support its capital structure. Why?
  • 1 month later in May of 2014, the scramble for liquidity continued as DB announced the selling of 8 billion euros worth of stock – at up to a 30% discount. Why again? It was a move which raised eyebrows across the financial media. The calm outward image of Deutsche Bank did not seem to reflect their rushed efforts to raise liquidity. Something was decidedly rotten behind the curtain.
  • Fast forwarding to March of this year: Deutsche Bank fails the banking industry’s “stress tests” and is given a stern warning to shore up it’s capital structure.
  • In April, Deutsche Bank confirms its agreement to a joint settlement with the US and UK regarding the manipulation of LIBOR. The bank is saddled with a massive $2.1 billion payment to the DOJ. (Still, a small fraction of their winnings from the crime).
  • In May, one of Deutsche Bank’s CEOs, Anshu Jain is given an enormous amount of new authority by the board of directors. We guess that this is a “crisis move”. In times of crisis the power of the executive is often increased.
  • June 5: Greece misses its payment to the IMF. The risk of default across all of its debt is now considered acute. This has massive implications for Deutsche Bank.
  • June 6/7: (A Saturday/Sunday, and immediately following Greece’s missed payment to the IMF) Deutsche Bank’s two CEO’s announce their surprise departure from the company. (Just one month after Jain is given his new expanded powers). Anshu Jain will step down first at the end of June. Jürgen Fitschen will step down next May.
  • June 9: S&P lowers the rating of Deutsche Bank to BBB+ Just three notches above “junk”. (Incidentally, BBB+ is even lower than Lehman’s downgrade – which preceded its collapse by just 3 months)

Are you starting to get the picture? These are not signs of a healthy bank.

What makes things even worse is how recklessly Deutsche Bank has been behaving. At one point, it was estimated that Deutsche Bank had a staggering 75 trillion dollars worth of exposure to derivatives. Keep in mind that German GDP for an entire year is only about 4 trillion dollars. So when Deutsche Bank finally collapses, there won’t be enough money in Europe (or anywhere else for that matter) to clean up the mess. This is a perfect example of why I am constantly hammering on the danger of these “weapons of financial mass destruction”.

If Deutsche Bank were to totally collapse, it would be a financial disaster far worse than Lehman Brothers. It would literally take down the entire European financial system and cause global financial panic on a scale that none of us have ever seen before.

On a personal note, I apologize for not posting anything last week. I traveled to two very important conferences and was living out of a suitcase for about eight days.

There has been a bit of a lull in the action over the past couple of weeks, but I expect that to end very shortly. I believe that the rest of 2015 is going to be incredibly chaotic, and we are going to see some things happen that most people could not even conceive of right now.

In the days that are directly ahead, I encourage people to keep a close eye on both Germany and Japan.

Big things are about to happen, and millions are about to be totally shaken out of their complacency.

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

Germany Never Intended For Greece To Stay In The Euro

No Deal - Public Domain

There never was going to be any deal. All along, Germany has been seeking to establish conditions that would never be met so that they could force Greece out of the eurozone. But the Germans had to do this subtly so that they would end up looking “reasonable” and would not turn the rest of the eurozone against them. So why does Germany want to get rid of Greece? Well, to be honest, it is because the Germans are sick and tired of paying for Greek mistakes. In Germany, there is an obsession with having a balanced budget. They even have a term for it – “the black zero“. So it absolutely infuriates the Germans that the Greeks can never seem to get their act together and that German citizens have to keep paying for it. At this point, the amount of money that Germany has already poured into Greece breaks down to more than 700 euros per citizen, and now Greece is going to need a new bailout of somewhere between 82 billion and 86 billion euros over the next three years. Needless to say, the Germans are fed up with pouring money down a financial black hole, and they know that if they keep bailing Greece out that it is only a matter of time before they will have to bail out Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, etc.

So, no, it hasn’t been the Greeks holding up a deal all this time.

It has been the Germans.

And now that we have reached the endgame, the Germans are pushing for what they have always wanted from the very beginning…

The German government has begun preparations for Greece to be ejected from the eurozone, as the European Union faces 24 hours to rescue the single currency project from the brink of collapse.

Finance ministers failed to break the deadlock with Greece over a new bail-out package, after nine hours of acrimonious talks as creditors accused Athens of destroying their trust…

Should no deal be forthcoming, the German government has made preparations to negotiate a temporary five-year euro exit, providing Greece with humanitarian aid while it makes the transition….

The Germans are sick and tired of having the Greeks be so financially dependent on them. So the Germans would really like to cut them off and have them go fend for themselves.

So that is why the EU laid out such draconian conditions for the Greeks over the weekend. The following is how Zero Hedge summarized where things currently stand…

For those who missed today’s festivities in Brussels, here is the 30,000 foot summary: Europe has given Greece a “choice”: hand over sovereignty to Europe or undergo a 5 year Grexit “time out”, which is a polite euphemism for get the hell out.

As noted earlier, here are the 12 conditions laid out as a result of the latest Eurogroup meeting, which are far more draconian than anything presented to Greece yet and which effectively require that Greece cede sovereignty to Europe, this time even without the implementation of a technocratic government.

  1. Streamlining VAT
  2. Broadening the tax base
  3. Sustainability of pension system
  4. Adopt a code of civil procedure
  5. Safeguarding of legal independence for Greece ELSTAT – the statistics office
  6. Full implementation of autmatic spending cuts
  7. Meet bank recovery and resolution directive
  8. Privatize electricity transmission grid
  9. Take decisive action on non-performing loans
  10. Ensure independence of privatization body TAIPED
  11. De-Politicize the Greek administration
  12. Return of the Troika to Athens (the paper calls them the institutions… for now)

Greece has been given until Wednesday to pass all of the legislation necessary to implement all of those conditions.

And if Greece does somehow get all that done, it still won’t get them a deal. All it will do is allow them to come back and restart negotiations.

Needless to say, the Greeks are steaming mad at this point. This new “deal” is being called “very bad” and “insulting” by Greek politicians.

But what they may not understand is that Germany does not actually want any deal to happen. Instead, they are working very, very hard to get the Greeks booted out of the euro. The following comes from the Washington Post…

The simple story is that Germany and the other hardline countries don’t trust Greece’s anti-austerity Syriza party to actually implement, well, austerity. And so rather than coughing up another 60 or 70 or 80 billion euros, they seem to want to push to kick Greece out of the common currency instead. That, at least, was the plan that leaked on Saturday. And now it’s part of the actual plan on Sunday. Indeed, it’s tentatively been included in the European finance ministers’ latest joint statement. This isn’t just what Germany is considering. It’s what Germany is trying to get the rest of Europe to go along with.

If anyone still doubts what the Germans are trying to do, here it is in black and white…

And this is not an idea that is new. In fact, some hardliners in Germany have been pushing for a “temporary Greek exit” since at least 2012…

This weekend’s events in Europe have clarified who is really running the show across the ‘union’. Hans-Werner Sinn, Chairman of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research, vehemnt euroskeptic, and head of the so-called ‘five wise men’ advising the German government and specifically Angela Merkel, confirmed his call from 2012 for a “temporary grexit from the euro.” The right wing economist previously explained “Greece and Portugal have to become 30-40% less expensive to be competitive again. This is being attempted through excessive austerity measures within the euro zone, but it won’t work. It will drive these countries to the brink of civil war before it succeeds. Temporary exits would very quickly stabilize these countries, create new jobs and free the population from the yoke of the euro.”

The Germans absolutely hate having to open up their wallets for someone else’s mess. And they know that if they endlessly bail out Greece that it won’t end there. Eventually, much of the rest of the continent will come to them for bailouts too. I think that Nigel Farage nailed it when he summed up what Germany is thinking this way…

“The German thinking is: ‘Let’s get rid of this mess,'” Farage said. Expressing what he thought Germany was thinking about other troubled peripheral euro zone economies, he added: “‘let’s send a message to Italy, France, Spain and Portugal that actually, if you’re members of this club, you got to abide by our rules.'”

But I believe that Germany is greatly, greatly underestimating the damage that a “Grexit” is going to do to Greece and to the rest of the members of the EU.

In Greece, the banking system is already on the verge of total collapse. We are being told that capital controls will remain in place “for at least six months”, and now Greek politicians are even talking about “a possible forced ‘bail-in’ of depositors”…

Capital controls will stay in place at Greek banks for at least six months, senior officials in Athens warned yesterday, as the government fights to keep lenders afloat.

Leaders of the four main banks and finance ministry officials will meet tomorrow to discuss how to save the banking system from collapse after a run on deposits.

Options under consideration include a consolidation of four main banks down to two, creation of a “bad bank” to house toxic loans, and a possible forced “bail-in” of depositors.

Hmmm – I seem to recall someone warning about this exact scenario nearly two months ago: “Are They About To Confiscate Money From Bank Accounts In Greece Just Like They Did In Cyprus?”

The economic depression in Greece is about to accelerate. But things are also going to get hairy for the rest of the continent as well. As I have warned about so many times, the euro is going to plunge like a rock, European stocks are going to crater, European bond yields are going to soar, and eventually we are actually going to see “too big to fail” banks all over Europe start to fail.

This is the big flaw in the German plan. They truly believe that they can remove the “cancer” of Greece without causing any lasting damage to the rest of the eurozone.

Sadly, they are dead wrong.

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

Senior German lawmaker sees no majority for further Greek bailout

Bundestag - Public Domain

A senior lawmaker from Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Bavarian allies said he saw no majority in the conservative parliamentary group for another bailout package for Greece, suggesting German opinion against Athens’s future in the euro is hardening.

The comments by Peter Ramsauer, deputy leader of the CSU conservatives, were the latest sign that Germany’s ruling coalition was losing patience with Greece after the landslide rejection of European bailout terms in a Greek referendum.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Greece debt crisis puts Germany’s Merkel under pressure

Angela Merkel - Public Domain

A “No” from Germany could railroad any third bailout for Greece.

And German politicians are not happy. They have already agreed to two bailout deals – the second time round many voted “Yes” reluctantly to a deal that, as one German newspaper put it, gave them “political tummy ache”.

Take Wolfgang Bosbach. He is a senior member of Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrat party.

“I will not vote in favour of a third bailout package for Greece,” he says. “I voted for the first expecting the plan would work, expecting Greece to reform.

“Instead the situation got worse and worse and the liabilities for the German taxpayer keep rising.”

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Rift Emerges as Europe Gears Up for New Talks on Greece Bailout

Greece Euro - Public Domain

Germany continued to maintain a hard line with Athens on Monday, just a day after Greek voters decisively rejected a bailout deal from its creditors. But some European countries showed a willingness to soften the push for austerity that has proved so contentious.

The growing rift among European leaders threatens to complicate any new negotiations, as the Greek government moves to restart talks for an international bailout. It also adds to the pressure on Greece, which is close to financial collapse with both the banking system and the government quickly running out of money.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

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