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What Pastor Dana Coverstone Was Just Shown About The Statue Of Liberty Shook Him To The Core – Everyone Needs To Hear This!

Pastor Dana Coverstone has had quite a few very troubling prophetic dreams about America’s future, but this latest dream shook him up emotionally more than any of the others.  In the dream, he saw the Statue of Liberty under attack, and he interpreted that to mean that our nation as a whole is under attack.  And of course that is definitely what we are seeing here in 2020.  Those that reject our history, our culture and our Constitution have launched a relentless assault against our most cherished traditions, and it is only going to get worse.  The goal is to reshape America into something that is fundamentally different from what our founders intended, and to a large degree they are succeeding.

For better or worse, if there is one national symbol that has come to represent the U.S. as a nation it is the Statue of Liberty.  Whenever that symbol is used, people instantly recognize that it is a metaphor for America.  Personally, I wish that our most recognizable national symbol was a Christian symbol, but that is not the case.

Over the decades, there have been numerous prophetic dreams and visions in which the Statue of Liberty has been used to represent our country, and at the end of this article I will share an example of this.  Many are comparing Pastor Coverstone’s latest dream to what A.A. Allen was shown all the way back in 1954, and I agree that there seems to be quite a few parallels.

One of the things that I really appreciate about Pastor Coverstone is that he shares exactly what he was shown without any filter.  That way we can come to our own conclusions about what his dreams may mean.

In his latest video, Pastor Coverstone becomes quite emotional as he describes this new dream.  He obviously has a great love for this country, and it was not easy for him to see what he saw.

My wife has put together a transcript of the video, and that transcript is reproduced below.

Following the transcript, I will share a recent video in which Jonathan Cahn shared some thoughts on the prophetic significance of the Statue of Liberty with Sid Roth.  And following that video I will share what A.A. Allen was shown in 1954.

To me, it seems obvious that this was a dream that contained quite a bit of symbolism, although much of that symbolism seems quite easy to understand.  Here is my wife’s transcript of Pastor Coverstone’s new video…

It is Pastor Dana Coverstone. It is Tuesday September 8. Last night on Monday the seventh of September, had a dream.

That’s probably troubled me more than the dreams that I’ve had.

I’m an American. I love this country. I have traveled to probably 43 countries.
We have a heritage, we have a country that stood as a beacon, of hope and light, even financial support for other nations.

This one got me last night.

I saw the Statue of Liberty, proudly standing in the harbor outside of New York, lighting the nation’s freedom.

I saw the sky suddenly darkened. Strong waves began to crash against the shore with a very very fierce intensity almost hurricane tsunami-like force; tropical storm force.

There were boats and they had men in them. They were out in the storm trying to breach the island on which she stood. They were fighting the waves as well but they were actually kind of working with the waves. They were trying to get the lady but the storm was so severe that could not. Even though the storm they seemed to be looking into, you know, working together, so to speak.

I saw the torch in her hand. It was flashing being struck by lightning pieces of rock and debris were being thrown into a brute force and she was even though she had her torture she was an immovable statue I saw her watching and looking around about her to kind of see where the, where the attacks are coming from so she knew they were there but she would not move. Her feet were stuck on that pedestal.

The rocks and the stuff that debris was being thrown at her caused some gashes and cuts on her neck, around about her heart. I could see there was blood coming out like she had been shot but something had had tried like the debris and the rock and either pierced her or left a jagged edge and cut something.

I saw the three of the spines on the crown on her head. I don’t think this is a crown but it has some spines are pointing out three of them. Three of those spines on a crown have been broken off and was leaving a very very jagged edge.

The right torch hand kept dropping to secure the tablet with the Declaration of Independence July 4 of that year, had been pinned on. She would drop her hand and kind of do this to keep the book in her place.

She was struggling to keep her footing, almost slipping off the pedestal. But she wouldn’t move, she will not move. There was a huge volley of trash and debris. Just junk. Hit her directly in the face and she stepped back off the pedestal and she fell, because the force of this hit her right in the face. She’s still held on to the torso. She still held on to the declarations, you know, dateline on the book.

With that light, that torches kept flickering like a light.

The declaration that was in her left hand or left arm; it was cracked. There were large chips and pieces falling off of it. That’s, I kept seeing Liberty tried to reach out with her hand while she holds them in grabbing the pieces, but they wouldn’t stick. She was crying. Liberty was crying. She was weeping, she was fighting to keep her dignity. She was trying to you know to get the pieces of what she had held on to but it was it was obvious she knew that she was in a battle that was fighting her and defeating her, and she was desperate trying to hold on, you can see the fierceness in her face that she was trying to fight and win.

Then the boats appeared with the men and they threw ropes around her arms and her legs and kept trying to bring her to the ground. They pulled and pulled and tandem and finally she fell to her knees. It was almost like Gulliver’s Travels when the giant gets knocked over.

She still got the light, the hoarser in her fist, or right hand is just trying to hold that book. They were hammering away like pry tools at the declaration, trying to get the days off. So July 4, they’re trying to pry those, those numbers and those letters off. They were using cutting tools to remove the torch. They kept trying to rip it, jerk it out of her hand and she just kept holding on, and holding on, and holding on. Because she fought them so hard they finally just began to cut off her hand.

They tied her other hand behind her back. The men began rolling her in ropes and she was yelling for help. She was crying out. It wasn’t a desperate cry, it was a cry for those who were listening to come to her defense. All those nations that that she had helped for so many years and nobody would come.

They took a large banner of fabric, it was black and smoky gray kind of all together. They covered her face with it. They just kept wrapping, and wrapping, almost like a mummy, they just kept wrapping, and wrapping and wrapping until you could barely see her eyes and the jagged spines of some of her crying, of her crown.

Then they took an anchor chain, and wrapped it around her neck. They asked her if she had any last words. Her eyes weren’t fearful they were feisty. They were fitful. There was this angry resolve in her face that she said nothing.

The chain was tied to a boat and the boat began to drag her off of to Liberty Island out into the harbor.

When they got her into the sea, the boat began to pull very quickly. Her arms were down, her legs to the side and she was just kind of rolling spinning.

As the boat pulled, going faster and faster was almost like a ski boat was pulling her. She kept twisting back and forth, but she was being pulled by the by the boat and eventually lost all the strength that she had. The banner had come off of her mouth but she wasn’t saying anything.

The boat slowed. Then the boat kind of looked back to see how, where she was and they reversed the boat. In reverse, the boat went backwards and ran over her, body bouncing and bleeding in the harbor.

She took a breath and she went under. She came back up. A minute later that she did the same thing again. She came up the next time the boat accelerated forward, hit her square on the face as she went down. The boat began to circle the area.

After it hit her, she never came back up. She never came back up. At least alive. She floated back up. Her back was to the top. (Torch hand was gone ?? ) , other arms tied behind her back.

Was this thunderous clap. Brilliant lightning strike. The storm just raged all around the harbor.

That’s all the men on that boat. It was a loose group of men.

I was throwing them pieces of silver not in a bag just loose pieces of silver being thrown.

I began to pick them up kind feverishly, gripped them with their fists in their pockets. Sat down and drove away.

Almost like, okay, our job here is done.

(Dream ends at 10:04 in the video)

When I started to put this article together, I instantly thought of an interview that Sid Roth recently conducted with Jonathan Cahn.

They discuss a wide range of topics in this video, but it is definitely worth watching the entire thing, and of particular note are the couple of times that Jonathan Cahn brings up the Statue of Liberty.

 

Lastly, I would like to share what A.A. Allen was shown in 1954, because many people are pointing out that it goes right along with what Pastor Coverstone was just shown about the Statue of Liberty.

I quote A.A. Allen’s account in my new book, and the full version of his prophecy is reproduced below…

A.A. Allen’s 1954 Vision

As I stood atop the Empire State Building, I could see the Statue of Liberty, illuminating the gateway to the new world.  Here, spread before me like an animated map, is an area sixty or eighty miles in diameter. I was amazed that the Spirit of the Lord should so move me, there atop the Empire State Building.  Why should I feel such a surge of His Spirit and power there?

Suddenly I heard the voice of the Lord.  It was as clear and as distinct as a voice could be. It seemed to come from the very midst of the giant telescope.  But when I looked at the telescope, I knew it hadn’t come from there, but directly from heaven.  The voice said, “The eyes of the lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him.  Herein you have done foolishly. Therefore, from henceforth, you shall have wars.”

Immediately when I heard the voice of God, I knew this was a quotation of Scripture.  But never before had a thing come to me so forcibly by the power of the Spirit. The ticking of the telescope stopped. The man before me had used up his dimes worth.  As he stepped away I knew that I was next.  As I stepped to the telescope and dropped in my dime, immediately the ticking started again.  This ticking was an automatic clock which would allow me to use the telescope for a definitely limited time only.

As I swung the telescope to the North, suddenly the Spirit of God came upon me in a way that I had never thought of before.  Seemingly in the spirit I was entirely caught away.  I knew that the telescope itself had nothing to do with the distance which I was suddenly enabled to see, for I seemed to see things far beyond the range of the telescope, even on a bright clear day.  It was simply that God had chosen this time to reveal these things to me, for as I looked through the telescope, it was not Manhattan Island that I saw, but a far larger view. That morning, much of the view was impaired by fog. But suddenly as the Spirit of the Lord came upon me the fog seemed to clear, until it seemed that I could see for thousands of miles.

But that which I was looking upon was not Manhattan island, it was all of the North American Continent spread out before me as a map is spread upon a table, it was not the East River and the Hudson River that I saw on either side, but the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans.And instead of the Statue of Liberty standing there in the bay on her small island I saw her standing far out in the Gulf of Mexico. She was between me and the United States.

I suddenly realized that the telescope had nothing to do with what I was seeing, but that it was a vision coming directly from God. And to prove this to myself I took my eyes away from the telescope, so that I was no longer looking through the lens, but the same scene remained before me.

There, clear and distinct, lay all the North American Continent, with all it’s great cities. To the North lay the Great Lakes. Far to the Northeast was New York City. I could see Seattle and Portland far to the Northwest. Down the West Coast, there were San Francisco and Los Angeles. Closer in the foreground, there lay New Orleans, at the center of the Gulf Coast area. I could see the great towering ranges of the Rocky Mountains, and trace with my eye the Continental Divide. All this and more, I could see spread out before me as a great map upon a table.

And as l looked, suddenly from the sky I saw a giant hand reach down. That gigantic hand was reaching out toward the Statue of Liberty. In a moment her gleaming torch was torn from her hand, and in it instead was placed a cup. And I saw protruding from that great cup, a giant sword, shining as if a great light had been turned upon its glistening edge. Never before had I seen such a sharp, glistening, dangerous sword. lt seemed to threaten all the world. As the great cup was placed in the hand of the Statue of Liberty, I heard these words, “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Drink ye and be drunken, spue and fall, and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send”  As I heard these words, I recognized them as a quotation from Jeremiah 25:7.

I was amazed to hear the Statue of Liberty speak out in reply, “I WILL NOT DRINK!” Then as the voice of the thunder, I heard again the voice of the Lord, saying, “Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, YE SHALL CERTAINLY DRINK.” (Jer.25:28)  Then suddenly the giant hand forced the cup to the lips of the Statue of Liberty, and she became powerless to defend herself.  The mighty hand of God forced her to drink every drop from the cup.  As she drank the bitter dregs, these were the words that I heard, “Should you be utterly unpunished?  You shall not be unpunished: for I will call for a sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the Lord of Hosts.” (Jer.25:29)  When the cup was withdrawn from the lips of the Statue of Liberty, I noticed the sword was missing from the cup, which could mean but one thing.  THE CONTENTS OF THE CUP HAD BEEN COMPLETELY CONSUMED! I knew that the sword merely typified war, death, and destruction, which is no doubt on the way.

Then as one drunken on too much wine, I saw the Statue of Liberty become unsteady on her feet and begin to stagger, and to lose her balance.  I saw her splashing in the Gulf, trying to regain her balance.  I saw her stagger again and again, and fall to her knees. As I saw  her desperate attempts to regain her balance, and rise to her feet again, my heart was moved as never before with compassion for her struggles. But as she staggered there in the gulf, once again I heard these words, “Ye shall drink and be drunken, and spue, and fall, and rise no more because of the sword that I shall send among you.”

As I watched, I wondered if the Statue of Liberty would ever be able to regain her feet – if she would ever stand again.  And as I watched, it seemed that with all her power she struggled to rise, and finally staggered to her feet again, and stood there swaying drunkenly.  I felt sure that at any moment she would fall again – possibly never to rise. I seemed overwhelmed with a desire to reach out my hand to keep her head above water, for I knew that if she ever fell again she would drown there in the Gulf.

“Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction that wastes at noonday.” Psalms 91:5,6.

Then as I watched, another amazing thing was taking place.  Far to the Northwest, just out over Alaska, a huge, black cloud was arising. As it rose, it was as black as night.  It seemed to be in the shape of a man’s head.  As it continued to arise, I observed two light spots in the black cloud.  It rose further, and a gaping hole appeared.  I could see that the black cloud was taking the shape of a skull, for now the huge, white, gaping mouth was plainly visible.  Finally the head was complete.  Then the shoulders began to appear and on either side long, black arms. It seemed that what I saw was the entire North American Continent, spread out like a map upon a table with this terrible skeleton-formed cloud arising from behind the table.  It rose steadily until the form was visible down to the waist.  At the waist, the skeleton seemed to bend towards the United States, stretching forth a hand toward the East and one toward the West – one toward New York and one toward Seattle. As the awful form stretched forward,  I could see that the entire attention seemed to be focused upon the U.S., overlooking Canada at least for the time being.  As I saw the horrible black cloud in the form of a skeleton bending towards America, bending from the waist over, reaching down toward Chicago and out towards both coasts, I knew it’s one interest was to destroy the multitudes.

As I watched in horror, the great black cloud stopped just above the great lakes region, and turned it’s face towards New York City. Then out of the horrible, great gaping mouth began to appear wisps of white vapor which looked like smoke, as a cigarette smoker would blow puffs of smoke from his mouth.  These whitish vapors were being blown toward New York City.  The smoke began to spread, until it had covered all the eastern part of the United States.

Then the skeleton turned to the West, and out of the horrible mouth and nostrils came another great puff of white smoke.   This time it was blown in the direction of the West Coast.  In a few moments time,the entire West Coast and L.A. area was covered with it’s vapors

Then towards the center came  a third great puff.  As I watched, St. Louis and Kansas City were enveloped in its white vapors.  Then on it came towards New Orleans.  Then on they swept until they reached the Statue of Liberty where she stood staggering drunkenly in The blue waters of The Gulf.  As the white vapors began to spread around The head of the statue, she took in but one gasping breath, and then began to cough as though to rid her lungs of the horrible vapors she had inhaled.  One could readily discern by the coughing that those white vapors had seared her lungs.

What were these white vapors?  Could they signify bacteriological warfare or nerve gas that could destroy multitudes of people in a few moments time? Then I heard the voice of God, as He spoke again: “Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof,.  And it shall be, as with the people. so with The priest; as with the servant, so with his master; as with the buyer, so with the seller, as with the taker of usury, so with the giver of usury to him.  The land shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled : for The Lord has spoken this word.  The earth mourneth and fadeth away,The world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish . The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.  Therefore has the curse devoured the earth and they that dwell therein are desolate; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned and few men are left.” (Isa.24:1-6)

As I watched, the coughing grew worse.  It sounded like a person was about to cough out his lungs.  The Statue was moaning and groaning. She was in mortal agony.  The pain must have been terrific, as again and again, she tried to clear her lungs of those horrible white vapors. I watched her there in the Gulf, as she staggered, clutching her lungs and her breast with her hands. Then she fell to her knees. In a moment, she gave one final cough, and made a last desperateeffort to rise from her knees, and then fell face forward into the waters of The Gulf and lay still as death.  Tears ran down my face as I realized that she was dead!  Only The lapping of The waves, splashing over her body, which was partly under the water, and partly out of water, broke the silence.

“A fire devoureth before them, and behind them a flame burneth; the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them, a desolate wilderness.” Joel 2:3

Suddenly the silence was shattered by the screaming of sirens. The sirens seemed to scream, “RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!” Never before had I heard such shrill, screaming sirens. They seemed to be everywhere – to the North, South, the East and the West.  There seemed to be multitudes of sirens.  And as I looked, I saw people everywhere running.  But it seemed none of them ran more than a few paces, and then they fell.  And even as I had seen the Statue struggling to regain her poise and balance, and finally falling to die on her face, I now saw millions of people falling in the streets, on the sidewalks, struggling.  I heard their screams for mercy and help. I heard their horrible coughing as though their lungs had been seared with fire.  I heard the moanings and groanings of the doomed and the dying.  As I watched, a few finally reached shelters, and above the moaning and groanings, I heard these words: “A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth for the Lord has a controversy with the nations.  He will plead with all flesh; He will give them that are wicked to the sword, saith the Lord. Behold evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of The earth. And The slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even onto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented neither gathered nor buried; they shall be dung upon the ground. (Jer. 25:31-33)

Then suddenly I saw from the Atlantic and from the Pacific, and out of the Gulf, rocket-like objects that seemed to come up like fish leaping out of the water .  High into the air they leaped, each headed in a different direction, but every one towards The U.S.  On the ground, the sirens screamed louder.  And up from the ground I saw similar rockets begin to ascend.  To me, these appeared to be interceptor rockets although they arose from different points all over the U.S. However, none of them seemed to be successful in intercepting the rockets that had risen from the ocean on every side.  These rockets finally reached their maximum height, slowly turned over, and fell back toward the earth in defeat.  Them suddenly, the rockets which had leaped out of the ocean like fish all exploded at once.  The explosion was ear- splitting.  The next thing which I saw was a huge ball of fire.   The only thing I have ever seen which resembled the thing I saw in my vision was the picture of the explosion of the H-bomb in the South Pacific.  In my vision, it was so real I seemed to fell a searing heat from it.

As the vision spread before my eyes, and I viewed the widespread desolation brought about by the terrific explosions, I could not help thinking, ” While the defenders of our nation have quibbled over what means of defense to use, and neglected the only true means of defense, faith and dependence upon the true and living God, the thing which she greatly feared has come unto her!  How true it has proven that “Except the Lord keep The city, The watchman watches but in vain.”

Then as the noise of the battle subsided, to my ears cam this quotation from Joel, the second chapter, “Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand; A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations.

A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run…” (Joel 2:4).

***Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.***

About the Author: My name is Michael Snyder and my brand new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available on Amazon.com.  By purchasing the book you help to support the work that my wife and I are doing, and by giving it to others you help to multiply the impact that we are having on people all over the globe.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  In addition to my new book, I have written four others that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned)  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with as many people as we possibly can.

Escape From New York: Wealthy Residents Flee In Droves As The City Degenerates Into A Hellhole

Hundreds of thousands of wealthy residents have already left New York City, and more are leaving every day as America’s biggest city rapidly degenerates into a hellhole.  This is incredibly sad to watch, because in many ways New York had been an incredible success story over the past several decades.  The 1970s and 1980s were nightmarish times for the city, but over the past several decades it was transformed into a virtual paradise for the wealthy and famous.  Crime rates absolutely plummeted, the city was given a dramatic facelift and a booming financial community brought an unprecedented amount of wealth into New York.  But now many of the old problems are starting to come back again, and a lot of wealthy New Yorkers have decided that it is time to look for greener pastures.

Of course the COVID-19 pandemic has been the primary motivation for a lot of the wealthy individuals that have been fleeing the city.  According to the New York Times, there was a mass exodus of 420,000 New Yorkers between March 1st and May 1st…

Roughly 5 percent of residents — or about 420,000 people — left the city between March 1 and May 1. In the city’s very wealthiest blocks, in neighborhoods like the Upper East Side, the West Village, SoHo and Brooklyn Heights, residential population decreased by 40 percent or more, while the rest of the city saw comparably modest changes.

Can you imagine 40 percent of your neighborhood leaving in just two months?

Wealthy people can often pick up and move a lot more easily than the rest of us, because many of them are not tied to traditional jobs and a lot of them already own second homes.  And it is definitely understandable that a lot of them would have wanted to leave during the peak of the pandemic in the New York area, but now that infection rates are a lot lower they still aren’t coming back and this has become a hot political issue for New York politicians.

Just a few days ago, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo lamented the fact that this mass exodus is hitting tax revenues really hard…

A single percent of New York’s population pays half of the state’s taxes, he said, “and they’re the most mobile people on the globe.”

“I literally talk to people all day long, who are now in their Hamptons house, who also lived here, or in their Hudson Valley house or in their Connecticut weekend house,” Cuomo continued. “They’re not coming back right now. And you know what else they’re thinking, if I stay there, they pay a lower income tax because they don’t pay the New York City surcharge. So, that would be a bad place if we had to go there.”

But New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is taking a completely different tone.  At this point, he doesn’t seem to care whether the wealthy come back or not…

Mayor de Blasio couldn’t care less if wealthy people leave the city for good because of the coronavirus pandemic, telling reporters on Friday that he won’t bend over backward for the one percent to return to NYC.

In a briefing from City Hall, de Blasio for a second day in a row sneered at Gov. Cuomo’s suggestion that the Big Apple’s ballooning deficit can only be bridged if rich people who fled at the outset of the pandemic come back and start paying taxes again.

Mayor de Blasio can continue to deny reality if he wishes, but without a doubt the lack of revenue is starting to have a major impact.

The sanitation budget was cut by more than 100 million dollars, and at this point giant mountains of trash are starting to pile up around the city…

Photos show bags filled with leftover food scraps, cans and bottles piled high on sidewalks or overflowing out of corner litter baskets.

Dead rats have been found among the waste and raccoons have been spotted climbing out of garbage cans.

At one time such scenes would have been unthinkable in New York City, but now they have become a daily reality.

Meanwhile, crime rates are absolutely skyrocketing.  In fact, the number of shootings in the city during the month of July was up 177 percent compared to the same month a year ago…

The NYPD recorded 244 shootings in July 2020 versus 88 in July 2019, which is a 177% increase. Shootings rose in July in every borough, police said. Through July 31, the city has experienced a 72% spike in shootings compared to the same time last year—772 versus 450 in 2019.

Murders in July rose 59% compared to last year with 54 in 2020 versus 34 a year ago. Burglaries were up 31% percent year-over-year. Police said 309 more auto thefts were reported for the month compared to a year earlier.

This explosion of criminal activity is being called a “crime wave”, and even the wealthiest neighborhoods are being hit hard…

New York City’s wealthiest neighborhood is grappling with a spike in armed robberies, new data reveals.

Manhattan’s Upper East Side has seen 27 robberies over the past four weeks – a 286 percent increase when compared to the same period last year, according to the NYPD.

Some of the wealthiest people on the entire planet call the Upper East Side home, and they paid a lot of money for their homes so that they would be insulated from this sort of thing.

But now even their neighborhoods aren’t safe.

Over on the Upper West Side, a different sort of problem is making headlines…

Hundreds of homeless people who have been put up in luxury hotels on Manhattan’s Upper West Side by the city as part of its efforts to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks in shelters are terrifying residents by urinating, sleeping and taking drugs in the streets.

In July, it emerged that 139 of the city’s iconic hotels – which had been forced closed for months – had agreed to take in homeless people for $175 per person, per night as part of a scheme by the city to try to avoid a breakout of COVID-19 in homeless shelters.

Can you imagine paying millions of dollars for your home and seeing homeless people urinate and take drugs right on the sidewalk in front of your building on a regular basis?

Even worse, it has been revealed that quite a few of the individuals that are being housed in these luxury hotels are registered sex offenders…

Of greatest concern for parents are the sex offenders — 10 are living at the Belleclaire as of Thursday, the state sex offender registry said. That’s just one block from PS 87’s playground.

And of those ten, there are four that actually victimized children…

There are also four offenders whose victims were children: Ronald Butler, 62, convicted in June 2013 of raping a 16-year-old girl; Eddie Daniel, 59, convicted of abusing a 10-year-old in 2011; Jonathan Evans, 29, convicted of abusing a 6-year-old; and Michael Hughes, 55, convicted of possessing child pornography in 2007.

This is what life is like for the wealthy in New York City in 2020.

No wonder so many of them have left and have no plans to come back.

Sadly, similar things are happening in major cities all over the nation, and what we have witnessed so far is just the beginning.

I certainly don’t blame anyone for wanting to leave New York.  If I was living there, I would want to leave too.

All over America, major cities that are being run by Democrats are being transformed into hellholes, but most of those Democrats just keep winning elections over and over again.

When will we ever learn?

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.***

About the Author: My name is Michael Snyder and my brand new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available on Amazon.com.  By purchasing the book you help to support the work that my wife and I are doing, and by giving it to others you help to multiply the impact that we are having on people all over the globe.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  In addition to my new book, I have written four others that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned)  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with as many people as we possibly can.

In California, New York And Other Big States, The Multi-Stage “Reopenings” Will Take Many Months To Fully Play Out

The fact that a number of states are preparing to “reopen” their economies has created a wave of optimism in recent days, and most Americans are assuming that things could start “getting back to normal” in just a matter of weeks.  But that is not true at all.  As you will see below, some of our biggest states are planning multi-stage “reopenings” that will unfold over many months.  And if a new wave of infections starts to erupt, they will just lock everything down again.  So even in a best case scenario, life is not going to return to “normal” for the foreseeable future, and it is entirely possible that some restrictions could remain in place well into 2021.

Let’s break this down one step at a time.  In California, Governor Newsom just announced that there will be a four stage “reopening” process in his state, and he is openly admitting that stage 3 is months away…

The next phase, Stage 3, is “months, not weeks, away,” Newsom said.

That stage will encompass personal care businesses like gyms, spas and salons, sports without live audiences, in-person religious services and other businesses where workers come in close contact with customers.

And the final phase, Stage 4, will see the end of the stay-at-home order with the reopening of the “highest risk parts of our economy” being reopened, Newsom said on Twitter. That includes concerts, convention centers and sports with live crowds.

If stage 3 is not going to arrive until “months” from now, when will we finally see stage 4?

And considering the fact that California is home to so many professional sports teams, what is all of this going to mean for the NFL, the NBA and Major League Baseball?

If the NFL season ends up getting delayed or canceled, I will be very upset about that.

Unfortunately, Newsom seems quite determined to stay the course, and he is promising that life will never fully return to normal for residents of his state “until we get to immunity or a vaccine”…

“We are not going back to the way things were until we get to immunity or a vaccine,” Newsom said. “We will base reopening plans on facts and data, not on ideology. Not what we want. Not what we hope.”

As I have discussed previously, it is extremely unlikely that “herd immunity” will be achieved in this country until 2021 at the earliest.

And there has never been a successful vaccine for any coronavirus in all of human history.

So if Newsom is serious, it appears that economic activity will be greatly depressed in the state of California for a long time to come.

Meanwhile, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is also telling residents of his state to expect a multi-stage “reopening”…

“We’re going to reopen in phases,” Cuomo said. “Look at the regional analysis, make a determination, and then monitor whatever you do. Phase one of reopening will involve construction and manufacturing activities, and within construction and manufacturing, those businesses that have a low risk.”

Phase two would involved a business-by-business analysis, asking how essential — and how risky — that business is to reopen.

And if cases in his state start spiking again, Cuomo has made it abundantly clear that he is more than ready to shut everything back down again…

As New York prepares to let businesses reopen with the easing of the coronavirus pandemic, the state will have measures in place that will signal another outbreak of the disease and the need to curb activity once again, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday.

In particular, Mr. Cuomo said that if either the hospital system in an area of the state hits 70% of capacity or if the rate of transmission reaches 1.1—meaning for every person who has the virus, another 1.1 are infected—that would constitute what he called a “circuit breaker.”

Needless to say, all of this is completely nuts, and it certainly feels like the inmates are running the asylum at this point.

No matter what we do, this virus is going to keep spreading, and most Americans are eventually going to get it.  These lockdowns can delay the inevitable, but they can’t stop it.

Unfortunately, decision makers all over America are completely paralyzed by fear of this virus, and that is resulting in some very strange outcomes.  For example, Harvard is already warning that the upcoming fall semester may be conducted “without students on campus”…

Harvard University announced Monday that, given the uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic, it is leaving the door open for a fall semester without students on campus.

“We cannot be certain that it will be safe to resume all usual activities” by autumn, university provost Alan Garber wrote in a note to the school Monday. “Consequently, we will need to prepare for a scenario in which much or all learning will be conducted remotely.”

We truly have become a nation of “snowflakes”, and fear of this virus is going to paralyze some portions of the nation for a long time to come.

But the truth is that we can’t keep Americans confined to their homes indefinitely.  As I pointed out yesterday, people are already starting to venture out of their homes more frequently, and one new survey indicates that a lot of Americans are going to reach their “breaking points” if restrictions are not lifted soon…

In all, 1,895 U.S. citizens over the age of 18 were surveyed earlier this month, and 72% said they expect to reach a “breaking point” by mid-June if stay-at-home orders aren’t lifted. In fact, 100% of respondents said they would snap if this all lasts for longer than six months. The survey was conducted between April 3rd and 6th, and at that time, 16% said they had already hit their breaking point, with that number rising to 25% within the next two weeks. That would indicate that one in four Americans have likely reached wits’ end by now.

Broken down by gender, 20% of surveyed women had already reached their breaking point at the time of the survey, and 12% of surveyed men said the same. Half of women felt they’ll hit rock bottom within four weeks of the survey, and 76% in two months.

If you are elderly, have a compromised immune system or are in some other high risk group, it is going to be important for you to continue to quarantine yourself.

But the rest of the country needs to get back to work.  More than 26 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits during this crisis so far, and a new Gallup survey discovered that about a third of all Americans have lost income due to the coronavirus…

Nearly one in three Americans have experienced a temporary layoff, permanent job loss, reduction in hours, or reduction of income as a result of the coronavirus situation. Eighteen percent have experienced more than one of these disruptions.

We are seeing so much suffering out there right now, and people deserve a chance to make a living.  According to a report that was just released, 31 percent of all Americans have already “cut spending on food” during this crisis, and that is a very alarming number.

Yes, a lot more Americans are going to get sick, and a lot more Americans are going to die.  Sadly, this is going to happen no matter if we have lockdowns or not.

In fact, we won’t ever get to the point of “herd immunity” until most of the population catches this virus, and that is going to take some time to happen.

But meanwhile, these lockdowns are causing our economy to come apart at the seams and the stage is being set for great civil unrest.

I understand that it would not be easy, but we need to try to move forward as a nation.

Unfortunately, the “multi-stage reopenings” that some of these governors have dreamed up will hold us back for many months to come and will greatly extend our economic suffering.

Elections have consequences, and the truth is that a lot of these governors should not even be trusted with mopping the floors at a local Dairy Queen.  But now they are the ones running the show, and the decisions that they are making are going to be very painful for all of us.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

Why Are So Many People That Have “Recovered” From The Coronavirus Testing Positive Again?

The mysteries surrounding this COVID-19 pandemic just keep getting deeper and deeper.  When you catch a virus, you are not supposed to test positive, fully recover and test negative, and then some time later start testing positive again.  But this is actually happening in an alarming number of cases, and scientists are absolutely baffled by this.  The information that I am about to share with you is quite disturbing, and hopefully scientists will eventually be able to explain to us precisely why this is taking place.

On Monday, headlines all over the globe breathlessly declared that 51 coronavirus patients in the South Korean city of Daegu had “tested positive again” after supposedly fully recovering…

FEARS have been raised that the coronavirus may be able to remain in the body and “reactivate” later after 51 recovered patients tested positive again.

The patients, from the city of Daegu, South Korea, had all spent time in quarantine while recovering from the virus, but were diagnosed again within days of being released.

At this point, nobody knows how to explain this.

Could it be possible that the tests were faulty?

Could it be possible that these patients became infected a second time?

The researchers that studied these patients are rejecting both of those explanations and instead are floating the theory that the virus “reactivated” in these particular victims…

The 51 cases were identified as part of a study conducted in Daegu, the epicentre of the outbreak in South Korea, by a team of epidemiologists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The center said it did not believe the patients had been reinfected, but that the virus had remained at undetectable levels in their cells and later “reactivated”.

But of course the truth is that they don’t really know why this is happening.

And similar cases have been popping up all over China for quite some time.  In fact, “second-time infections” have been documented “in many regions”…

As China releases more patients who have recovered from the coronavirus, there are an increasing number who are testing positive for the second time. The State Council ’s Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism said last Saturday that second-time infections have been reported in many regions, including Guangdong, Sichuan, Hunan, and Hubei province, where Wuhan is the capital city.

Needless to say, it is likely to have a tremendous impact on public policy if scientists are able to confirm that “second-time infections” can happen very rapidly following a full recovery, and so it is absolutely imperative that scientists get to the bottom of this mystery as rapidly at possible.

So far, researchers in China are reporting that “between 3 and 10% of cured patients became reinfected” shortly after fully recovering from the virus.  The following comes from Fox News…

As many as 10% of recovered coronavirus patients in China tested positive again after being discharged from the hospital, according to a report.

Doctors on the front lines of the outbreak in Wuhan, China — where the virus emerged — reported that between 3 and 10% of cured patients became reinfected with the illness, though it’s unclear whether they were contagious the second time, the South China Morning Post reported.

In the western world, there has been a lot of talk about how it will be “safe” for those that have had the virus to go back to work once they recover because of the immunity that they will have supposedly acquired.

But that may not be a safe assumption to make.

This virus appears to behave very unusually, and making a wrong choice can be the difference between life and death.

In one very alarming case in Wuhan, China, a 36-year-old man that became a confirmed coronavirus case was admitted to the hospital on February 12th.  Two weeks later he was released after he was deemed to have “fully recovered”, but that was not the end of the story…

A 36-year-old man has died of respiratory failure in Wuhan, five days after being discharged from one of the makeshift hospitals built to contain the outbreak, according to a report by Shanghai-based news portal The Paper.
The report, which was later removed, said Li Liang had been admitted to the hospital – built to treat patients with mild and moderate symptoms – on February 12, according to his wife, surnamed Mei. He was discharged two weeks later with instructions to stay in a quarantine hotel for 14 days.

On March 2nd, Li Liang died, and the death certificate clearly stated that COVID-19 was the cause.

But that wasn’t supposed to happen.  He was supposed to have made a complete recovery.

Something isn’t adding up.

Hopefully our scientists will be able to unravel this mystery very soon, because the death toll is rapidly rising.

The very first coronavirus death in the United States happened on February 29th, and now here we are just over a month later and more than 10,000 Americans have perished…

There were 10,335 deaths as of Monday afternoon, according to the Johns Hopkins dashboard, which tracks the numbers.

That total surpasses the number of battle deaths from six U.S. wars combined, according to data from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

VA data says a total of 9,961 soldiers died on the battlefield during these six wars: The American Revolution, War of 1812, Mexican War, Indian Wars, Spanish-American War and Desert Shield/Desert Storm.

This pandemic has escalated so dramatically in the U.S. that nearly the entire nation is currently shut down and creepy drones that are barking orders to “maintain social distancing” are hovering over parks in New York City…

Our society has been fundamentally transformed in just a matter of weeks by this pandemic, and many believe that our problems have just begun.

But at this moment there is a lot of optimism in America because the numbers are not growing quite as rapidly as they were last month.

That is definitely a promising sign, but it is only happening because most people are confined to their homes right now.

Once people start resuming their normal activities, that will give the virus a lot more opportunities to spread, and we shall see what happens at that point.

Hopefully these mysteries surrounding COVID-19 can quickly be resolved, because it looks like we will be fighting this virus for a long time to come, and we need the best information that we can possibly get.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

For A Glimpse Into Your Dystopian Police State Future, Just Visit Your Local Walmart

Things are really starting to get crazy out there.  All over the country, “non-essential” businesses have been forced to shut down, but because Walmart sells food and other basic supplies it gets to be one of the “essential” businesses that stays open.  However, a trip to your local Walmart now will be far different from what you remember previously.  When you arrive, you will find that a very narrow entry corridor has been taped off with yellow security tape, and only a very limited number of shoppers are being allowed in at any one time.  And once you get inside, you will discover that there are very strict limits on what you are permitted to purchase.

I know that all of this sounds incredibly bizarre, but it is really happening.  The following is what one of my contacts reported when she visited her local Walmart…

Wow, so we just got back from walmart in Pine Bluff, AR….they herded us in, like cattle…I kid you not….we had to go through a taped-off line and they had only one door open instead of the two they normally have. They have a 5 person limit in Magnolia, AR…..and security guards at the door as well…armed security guards. You can only buy one loaf of bread and the store closed at 7PM…normally open 24 hours. It is CRAZY….someone opened a side door by accident and alarms started going off. I joked to the lady next to me “Oh crap, someone must have taken more than a dozen eggs!”

You can see some video of what these taped off entry corridors looks like right here.  Obviously a lot of the customers are quite concerned about potentially catching the virus because they are wearing masks or other coverings over their mouths.

And it is also being reported that very creepy social distancing instructions are being repeatedly broadcast over the speakers as shoppers circulate through the stores.

Just days ago, Walmart stores all over the nation were operating normally.  But then on Friday, draconian new restrictions were suddenly announced…

Starting Saturday, we will limit the number of customers who can be in a store at once. Stores will now allow no more than five customers for each 1,000 square feet at a given time, roughly 20 percent of a store’s capacity.

To manage this restriction, the associates at a store will mark a queue at a single-entry door (in most cases the Grocery entrance) and direct arriving customers there, where they will be admitted one-by-one and counted. Associates and signage will remind customers of the importance of social distancing while they’re waiting to enter a store – especially before it opens in the morning.

Once a store reaches its capacity, customers will be admitted inside on a “1-out-1-in” basis.

Once shoppers do get inside, they will find that their choices have been significantly narrowed.

In fact, in some Walmart stores entire aisles have been completely sealed off…

Walmart stores in New England are sealing off entire aisles with products deemed “unnecessary” in attempts to combat the scourge of shoppers wandering around to relieve coronavirus quarantine fatigue.

According to CBS Boston, Walmart in addition to Home Depot and BJ’s Wholesale stores in the town of Chicopee, Massachusetts, worked with the city health department to “reduce unnecessary roaming around aisles and putting others at risk.”

Unfortunately, in some stores garden seeds have actually been deemed “non-essential”, and so many that were hoping to grow their own food during this time will be out of luck.

Hopefully once this pandemic is behind us we will see these ridiculous restrictions at Walmart locations go away.

But as we have seen during other moments of crisis in the past, once “emergency measures” get implemented they have a way of sticking around.

And right now many Americans seem to be in the mood to sacrifice their liberties and freedoms for an illusion of safety.  If you can believe it, one recent survey actually found that 67 percent of us actually want restrictions put on interstate travel…

Although America has a reputation for being rather libertarian with regards to personal rights and one’s freedom of movement, a new opinion poll by Rasmussen Reports shows that Americans are turning hardline in the face of the new and deadly Chinese coronavirus. Two out of three want to ban interstate travel and fine those who violate social distancing guidelines.

To be precise, 67% of likely U.S. voters say they want to ban all out-of-state travelers from entering their state — except for emergencies. A mere 21% are opposed, 12% are undecided. As for fining those who break social distancing guidelines: 68% support such a measure, while 20% oppose it and, again, 12% are not sure.

Yes, we should all work together to defeat this virus, but once we lose our most cherished liberties and freedoms they will be exceedingly difficult to get back.

So we should definitely take common sense precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but we must also diligently guard our rights wherever they are threatened.

As this pandemic stretches on, people all over the world are going to be clamoring for a “solution”, and without a doubt the elite will gladly give us one once it is ready.

We are being told that life will not get back to “normal” until a vaccine arrives, and we are also being told that the elite are feverishly working toward that goal.

In fact, it is being reported that Bill Gates is spending billions of dollars building seven different vaccine factories…

Bill Gates is plugging money into building factories for seven promising coronavirus vaccine candidates, even though it will mean wasting billions of dollars.

On Thursday’s episode of “The Daily Show,” the Microsoft billionaire told the host Trevor Noah that his philanthropic organization, the Gates Foundation, could mobilize faster than governments to fight the coronavirus outbreak.

Our society is being transformed at a pace that is absolutely breathtaking, and life as you have known it will never be the same again.

These are perilous times, and things are only going to get stranger from this point forward.

So work hard, pray hard and hold on tight, because the road ahead is going to be really bumpy.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

The Prime Minister Of Australia Warns That Life Will Not Return To “Normal” Until A Coronavirus Vaccine Arrives

It is starting to look like there will not be a return to normalcy for a very long time.  Even though about half of the world is currently under some sort of a “shelter-in-place” order, COVID-19 continues to spread at an alarming rate.  Of course the U.S. is seeing far more newly confirmed cases than anyone else at this point, and that is a huge concern.  The United States now has more confirmed cases than Italy and China combined, and the daily death toll in our nation just hit another new high.  Sadly, one of the big reasons why the U.S. is having such a problem is because a whole lot of people are completely disregarding the “shelter-in-place” orders.  As a result, a lot of them are getting sick and spreading the virus.

But even if everyone all over the planet was strictly following the “shelter-in-place” orders, the virus would still continue to spread, it would just be at a slower pace.

Needless to say, many of those that have been confined to their homes are very much looking forward to resuming their normal lives, but that may not happen for quite a while.

This week, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison warned the people of his country that it will be “at least six months” before this pandemic is behind us…

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has reiterated that life as we know it will not return for months as global leaders race to find a coronavirus vaccine.

He said he had been “very upfront” with all Australians “to say you’re looking at least six months for this, and that’s why we have to adapt”.

Does that mean that the entire nation of Australia will continue to be locked down until then?

Morrison went on to say that once a coronavirus vaccine arrives it will finally allow “everybody to go back to life as it was”…

Morrison told The Latest that while many states have managed to “push the curve down”, ultimately, “there needs to be a vaccine”.

“And there are some promising signs in a number of these, and we’ll continue to work with other countries along those lines.”

“A vaccine ultimately enables everybody to go back to life as it was,” he said.

Wow.

As I read that, a couple of thoughts immediately came to mind.

First of all, U.S. officials are telling us that a vaccine will probably not be available for the general public until 2021.

Will all of our lives continue to be radically disrupted until we get to that point?

Secondly, a whole lot of us are not going to get that vaccine under any circumstances.

Will those of us who don’t want the vaccine be allowed back to work, back to school and back into public gathering places?

If not, how will that be enforced?

Already, fear of the coronavirus is causing decision makers to institute restrictions that would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago.

For example, check out what Wal-Mart just announced…

Starting Saturday, we will limit the number of customers who can be in a store at once. Stores will now allow no more than five customers for each 1,000 square feet at a given time, roughly 20 percent of a store’s capacity.

To manage this restriction, the associates at a store will mark a queue at a single-entry door (in most cases the Grocery entrance) and direct arriving customers there, where they will be admitted one-by-one and counted. Associates and signage will remind customers of the importance of social distancing while they’re waiting to enter a store – especially before it opens in the morning.

Once a store reaches its capacity, customers will be admitted inside on a “1-out-1-in” basis.

Can you believe that?

Of course most retailers across the nation have been completely shut down indefinitely, and many of them are boarding up their storefronts…

A growing scene for those who venture out into the streets of Manhattan these days is boarded up storefronts. From luxury retailers to small bars, establishments that have no idea when they are going to be allowed to reopen are putting up protection over their glass doors and windows.

The businesses have taken the unsightly measure in an effort to defend against the potential for civil unrest caused by the coronavirus and a lack of officers on the streets.

Sadly, many of those stores will never open up again.

Meanwhile, the vast majority of churches in America have been shut down as well.  In fact, one new survey found that only 7 percent of America’s churches are still gathering as usual…

The study by LifeWay research found that on March 1, some 99% of churches were still gathering as usual. The following weekend, roughly 95% held services. By March 15, the number had dropped down to 64%, and by March 22, 11% of pastors say their churches gathered in person.

By March 29, just 7% of church leaders report meeting with their congregations in a face-to-face setting.

Did you ever think that you would see the day when such a thing would happen?

The reason why such extreme measures are being taken is because this virus is exceedingly dangerous.

It spreads from person to person with exceptional ease, the death rate has been higher than anticipated, it can absolutely destroy your lungs if you catch it, and now scientists have discovered that it can even cause brain damage…

Coronavirus could cause brain damage in some patients by triggering inflammation that can lead to bleeds and the killing of cells, doctors have warned.

The virus appears to have resulted in neurological complications in some of those infected – including one Florida man in his 70s who temporarily lost the ability to speak.

In addition, a new study that was just conducted in China found that even cats can spread the virus…

The rapidly-spreading coronavirus can be transmitted between your feline pets, according to a new Chinese study.

Researchers at Harbin Veterinary Research Institute found that cats are not only susceptible to contracting COVID-19 but can pass it on to their furry friends as well.

If cats can spread COVID-19, it is possible that many other types of animals can spread it as well?

If that turns out to be true, it is going to be nearly impossible to ever completely defeat this virus.

Already, coronavirus has become the third leading cause of death in the United States on a daily basis, and Mike Adams of Natural News is reporting that COVID-19 now has a daily mortality rate that is “ten times higher than daily regular flu deaths”…

Remember just two weeks ago when a long list of conservative publishers (and even some doctors) rolled out “bad math” articles that claimed the seasonal flu had a ten times higher fatality rate than coronavirus? They all now look strangely disconnected from reality as the real coronavirus death numbers continue to climb, debunking their bizarre theories rooted in mathematical illiteracy.

With the coronavirus pandemic now killing over 1,000 Americans per day, it has achieved a daily mortality total that’s ten times higher than daily regular flu deaths, on average.

Things are particularly bad in New York City.

According to the Daily Mail, an average of 23 people are dying from the coronavirus every single hour in NYC right now…

Overnight, the death toll rose from 2,373 to 2,935 – the single highest increase in a day yet and the equivalent of 23 people dying every hour. The number of cases went up by 10,482 to 102,863.

More people have now died across the state of New York as a result of the coronavirus than were killed in New York City in the Twin Towers attacks on 9/11. That day, 2,753 died in New York and an additional 224 died in the attacks on the Pentagon and on United Flight 93.

We have never seen anything like this before, and many believe that the numbers will soon get a lot worse.

For a long time I have been warning that a “perfect storm” is coming to America, and now that it is here a lot of people are getting mad at me.  It is almost as if they think that I am helping to cause all of the bad stuff that is happening because I am reporting on it.

Of course the truth is that we were warned in advance about these things, watchmen such as myself have been strongly urging people to get prepared for a very long time, and now all of the things that we have been warning about are starting to unfold.

Now is not a time to wallow in denial.  A deadly virus really is sweeping across the globe, and the dead bodies are really beginning to pile up.

We need to get our emotions under control and act wisely during this time, because the decisions that we are making now could literally be the difference between life and death for ourselves and our families.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

New York City Is Running Out Of Places To Put All The Dead Bodies

It wasn’t supposed to happen this rapidly.  It seems like the coronavirus pandemic has been raging in New York for a really long time, but it was only just over a month ago when the first case in the state was confirmed.  Of course now the entire state has been put under a “shelter-in-place” order and New York City is quieter than it has ever been in modern American history.  And just like we saw in China and in northern Italy, dead bodies are piling up so quickly that authorities don’t know what to do with them all.  In both China and Italy it got to the point where cremation centers were running around the clock, and now that is happening in New York City too…

New York City crematories are extending their hours, burning bodies into the night. The state has started a running tally of all cremations and burials. City officials are surveying upstate cemeteries for temporary interment sites.

The destructive spread of the coronavirus through New York has not yet reached its peak, but those who put the dead to rest have never been busier.

It is hard to believe that this is actually taking place in the United States.

We are supposed to have the greatest healthcare system on the entire planet, and yet we are unable to keep people from dropping dead left and right.

In fact, so many New Yorkers are dying in Brooklyn that their hospitals are being compared to “a conveyor belt”…

Bodies of coronavirus victims are flowing through Brooklyn hospitals ‘like a conveyor belt’ and as many as 130 more mobile morgues are on their way to New York City to store them as experts warn that the death toll in the US pandemic epicenter could reach 16,000.

Hospitals and healthcare professionals are struggling to bring the crisis under control and the city is becoming overwhelmed with dead bodies as the pandemic is poised to kill more New Yorkers than 9/11.

Hopefully all of those mobile morgues will arrive in NYC very quickly, because at this point authorities are running out of places to put all the dead bodies.

If you can believe it, the media is actually reporting that some dead bodies have been “left lying in refrigerated trucks for days”…

A domino effect has meant victims’ bodies are left lying in refrigerated trucks for days as there is not enough space in hospital morgues, funeral homes can’t keep up with demand and cemeteries are operating less than usual due to the city’s lockdown and social distancing rules.

Mobile morgues have been drafted in to plug the gap and the city’s medical examiner’s office has taken control of the disposal of bodies and started taking in bodies to its five facilities.

If things are this badly already, what is going to happen if the daily death toll doubles or triples?

Images of medical workers transferring dead bodies into refrigerated trucks outside of New York hospitals have captivated the entire nation, and let us pray that this pandemic doesn’t get this bad in the rest of the country.

Over the past 24 hours, about 29,000 more confirmed cases have been added to the rapidly growing U.S. total.

That is the largest daily increase so far.

As the number of infected people rises, the strain on our healthcare system is only going to get worse.

In New York City, first responders are already stretched so thin that they have been ordered to no longer take heart attack victims that cannot be revived on the scene to the hospital…

Cardiac arrest victims whose hearts cannot be restarted at the scene are now being left there — rather than being brought to coronavirus-strained hospitals for further revival attempts, according to a new guidance for medical responders.

The Regional Emergency Medical Services Council of New York, which oversees the city’s ambulance service, issued the guidance on Tuesday in a letter obtained by The Post.

Can you believe that?

Unfortunately, more very difficult policy decisions will have to be made if this virus keeps spreading like wildfire.

It is stunning how much things have changed in New York City in just over a month.  Over a thousand members of the NYPD have tested positive, and even New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s brother has caught the virus…

“This virus came at me, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Cuomo said, telling viewers that he was racked with a fever of around 103 degrees “that wouldn’t quit.”

“It was like somebody was beating me like a piñata,” he continued. “I was shivering so much . . . I chipped my tooth.”

Thankfully, not everyone that is infected has that sort of an experience, but there have been enough severe cases in New York that the state is on the verge of a ventilator shortage…

“Right now, we have a burn rate of about six days in the stockpile,” Cuomo said. “We have extraordinary measures in place that can make a difference if we run into a real ventilator shortage.”

The governor said just 2,200 ventilators remain in the state’s stockpile. An additional 350 a day are needed to save coronavirus-stricken patients.

Once there aren’t enough ventilators to go around, doctors will be faced with making grim choices about who lives and who dies.

This is yet another reason why you want to avoid getting this virus at all costs.  You don’t ever want to find yourself in a position where a doctor that you don’t even know decides if you get to live or not.

Of course some people never make it to the hospital at all.  On Thursday morning, authorities found a 62-year-old man dead on the floor of a subway train…

It was a grim discovery on a subway train in the Astoria section of Queens early on Thursday morning. Passengers reported an unconscious person on an ‘N’ train at the Ditmars Boulevard Subway Station on 35th St.

Police got the call just before 4:30 a.m. and when they got there they found that the 62-year-old victim was dead on the floor of the train.

At this point we don’t know if that man had coronavirus or not.

But considering the fact that we have seen videos of people dropping dead from the virus all over the world, it certainly wouldn’t be a surprise if he did.

Scientists kept warning us that someday a major pandemic like this would happen, but most Americans didn’t take those warnings seriously.

Now COVID-19 has become the third leading cause of death in the United States, and some experts believe that it will actually take the top spot in a few weeks.

Hopefully the measures that have been taken all over the nation will start to “flatten the curve”, but even if that happens it appears that we are in for a very, very long battle with this virus.  Just consider what Dr. Anthony Fauci told the media earlier this week…

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci says that the United States will not come out of lockdown until there are no “new cases” of coronavirus, prompting some to question precisely how long that will be.

During yesterday’s White House briefing, Fauci, who has become the face of America’s response to the coronavirus, was asked by a reporter whether social distancing measures will be imposed until there is a drug or vaccine to treat COVID-19.

“I think if we get to the part of the curve that Dr. Birx showed yesterday when it goes down to essentially no new cases, no new deaths at a period of time. I think it makes sense that you will have to relax social distancing,” Fauci said.

So how long will it take to get to “essentially no new cases”?

And will our economy be allowed to continue to collapse until that happens?

Of course this coronavirus pandemic is not the only major crisis the world is dealing with right now, and the truth is that “the perfect storm” is just heating up.

Unfortunately, most Americans are still completely clueless about what is transpiring, and most of them are still desperately hoping that things will eventually return to “normal” somehow.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

Coronavirus Is Now The Third Leading Cause Of Death In The United States

More than 1,000 Americans died from the coronavirus on Wednesday.  As you will see below, that now makes COVID-19 the third leading cause of death in the United States on a daily basis.  Unfortunately, the number of Americans dying from the coronavirus is expected to rise even more in the weeks ahead.  As the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases globally gets ready to cross the one million mark, many of those that initially attempted to downplay this pandemic are now changing their tune.  I think that it really startled a lot of people when President Trump warned that 240,000 U.S. citizens could potentially die during this pandemic.  Trump is taking COVID-19 very seriously, and everyone else should be as well.  This is truly a major national crisis, and it is just getting started.

But even though I have been writing about this pandemic day after day, I didn’t realize that coronavirus had already become the third leading cause of death in the entire country…

A physician in San Diego, California, and data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are reporting that the coronavirus is now the third leading cause of death, killing 748 people a day in the United States.

This is only outranked by deaths from heart disease (1,774 a day) and cancer (1,641 a day).

And as I noted above, more than 1,000 people died from the coronavirus on Wednesday, and so this pandemic is catching up to heart disease and cancer very rapidly.

In fact, there are some that believe that coronavirus will actually become the leading cause of death in the U.S. “by mid-April”…

Some researchers say the daily death toll could more than double – to 2,200 or more – by mid-April. That figure would eclipse heart disease, the nation’s No. 1 killer with about 1,772 deaths per day, according to the CDC.

To say that we were unprepared for a pandemic of this nature is a major understatement.

There are shortages of essential supplies all over the nation, and the federal government has almost entirely depleted the inventory of personal protective equipment in the Strategic National Stockpile…

The Strategic National Stockpile is deploying the last round of shipments in its inventory, depleting the bulk of its protective gear, according to a source familiar with the matter.

The official added that the stockpile was never meant to serve as the only source of protective gear for the entire coronavirus response and said the states would need to get more supply from the private market.

We are supposed to have the greatest healthcare system in the whole world, but some of the things that we have been witnessing as this crisis has unfolded have been nothing short of horrifying.

There have been stories of doctors using the same mask over and over again, and in some hospitals nurses are being instructed to only use masks under very limited circumstances…

There’s a perception among hospital nurses that our employers are not doing enough to protect us during this pandemic and that this puts our patients and the public at risk. Multiple hospitals across the country have insisted that nurses not use protective equipment except for those patients who have been placed on isolation precautions, even for patients who show symptoms consistent with COVID-19 but have not been diagnosed with it.

And if you can believe it, in some cases nurses have even been disciplined for wearing masks when they are not personally interacting with patients…

As a result, some health care workers are facing the threat of disciplinary action for wearing masks in the hallways, elevators and shared clinical and nonclinical areas of hospitals—in some instances even if they come from the worker’s own supply.

And a number of doctors and nurses are distraught over this, says Megan Ranney, associate professor of emergency medicine, Brown University. “I have heard multiple anecdotes from colleagues in other states who report they were personally disciplined or lectured when seen wearing procedural masks in the halls of their hospitals,” she remarks.

Is this really happening?

In one particularly disturbing incident, a nurse was actually asked to deal with very sick patients without wearing a mask at all, and that made national headlines when she quit her job and ranted about it on social media.

I don’t know why every doctor and nurse in America is not wearing a mask at all times at this point, and those that are knowingly putting them in danger should be completely and utterly ashamed of themselves.

Meanwhile, the U.S. is still having a major problem getting coronavirus tests processed in a timely fashion.  The following comes from CNN…

As the US health care system has scrambled to track the spread of coronavirus, one of the nation’s largest commercial labs has faced a backlog of tests that ballooned in the last two weeks, and has delayed results in some cases up to 10 days.

New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics had about 160,000 coronavirus test orders waiting to be processed on March 25, which amounted to about half of the 320,000 total orders for the tests the company had received up to that date, according to Quest internal materials obtained by CNN.

Officially, the U.S. has more than 215,000 confirmed cases as I write this article, but if results were being processed in a timely manner that number would likely be far, far higher by now.

Of course there are still many people out there that are insisting that this pandemic is being overblown, but if that is the case then why did FEMA just put in a request for 100,000 body bags?…

The Pentagon is seeking to provide as many as 100,000 military-style body bags for potential civilian use as the U.S. warns that deaths could soar in the coming weeks from the coronavirus pandemic.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has requested 100,000 body bags, known as Human Remains Pouches, through an interagency group that directed it to the Defense Department. The Pentagon is looking into buying more bags and will draw some initially from a stockpile of 50,000 it maintains, according to two people familiar with the request.

And if this pandemic is not really that much of a threat, then why is New York City having prisoners dig mass graves?…

NEW YORK CITY is offering prisoners at Rikers Island jail $6 per hour — a fortune by prison labor standards — and personal protective equipment if they agree to help dig mass graves on Hart Island, according to sources with knowledge of the offer. Avery Cohen, a spokesperson for the office of Mayor Bill de Blasio confirmed the general arrangement, but said that it was not “Covid-specific,” noting that prisoners have been digging graves on Hart Island for years.

For those that are still doubting, it is time to wake up.

People are dying all around us, the economy is collapsing, millions of Americans are losing their jobs, and “the perfect storm” has finally arrived.

Approximately 75 percent of the country is shut down right now, and the “shelter-in-place” orders are not likely to be lifted for quite some time.

In anticipation of being cooped up in their homes for an extended period, many Americans stocked up on toilet paper, and now we have learned that sales of alcoholic beverages have also gone through the roof…

U.S. sales of alcoholic beverages rose 55% in the week ending March 21, according to market research firm Nielsen. Spirits like tequila, gin and pre-mixed cocktails led the way, with sales jumping 75% compared to the same period last year. Wine sales were up 66% while beer sales rose 42%. And online sales far outpaced in-store sales.

Nielsen said online alcohol sales were up 243%. Danelle Kosmal, a Nielsen vice president, suspects growth rates peaked that week as people loaded up their pantries before state stay-at-home orders went into effect.

It is during times of great crisis that we find out who we really are, and the weeks ahead are going to greatly test all of us.

Pray for those that are sick, pray for those that are dying, and let us all hope that this pandemic will pass as quickly as possible.

But at this moment it appears that we still have a long battle ahead of us, and that battle is going to change America permanently.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

Some States Are Now Intercepting Travelers From Other States And Forcing Them Into Quarantine

All of a sudden, people all over the country are very afraid of travelers from New York, Louisiana and other COVID-19 “hotspots” across the nation.  In fact, as you will see below, some states are now trying to intercept travelers from other states and force them into quarantine.  Measures that would have been unthinkable just a few short weeks ago have now become a reality, and things are likely to get even crazier in the days ahead.  If this pandemic is causing this much fear already even though less than 3,000 Americans have died so far, what will the level of fear be if 30,000 or 300,000 Americans die?

Unfortunately, many experts are now warning that the death toll will eventually get very high in this country.  For example, on Sunday Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNN that he expects to see more than 100,000 deaths in the U.S. alone…

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top expert on infectious diseases, predicted Sunday that the United States will end up with “millions” of cases of coronavirus and up to 200,000 deaths by the time the pandemic ends, though he cautioned that any projection of mortality statistics could “easily” end up being wrong.

“Looking at what we’re seeing now, I would say between 100,000-200,000 [deaths],” Fauci said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

This virus spreads so easily from person to person, and once it gets loose in a city it can spread like wildfire.

Right now, New York City is being hit harder than anywhere else in the country.  At this point close to 700 members of the NYPD have tested positive for the virus, and the public transportation system is being flooded with calls from sick employees…

The MTA’s 24-hour hot line for workers with coronavirus symptoms is constantly crashing because it’s being flooded with calls — and higher-ups are bracing for a mass sickout, transit insiders told The Post.

Bus and subway employees already called out sick at three times the normal rate last week, prompting the MTA to dramatically reduce service.

Overall, the death toll in New York has reached nearly 1,000, and many believe that what we have seen so far is just the beginning.

Needless to say, hospitals are rapidly being overwhelmed, and basic medical supplies are being used up fast.

Fortunately, a lot of outside help is coming in.  On Sunday, I was greatly encouraged to learn that Samaritan’s Purse is actually putting up a field hospital in Central Park…

Dozens of people worked in a drizzle to erect the facility for an expected influx of COVID-19 patients at the epicenter of the US coronavirus pandemic.

Samaritan’s Purse, a US-based Christian global relief agency, is setting up the hospital on the park’s East Meadow lawn, where workers in face masks unloaded a white tarp and other equipment on the grass. The site is right across from one of the facilities in the Mount Sinai hospital group.

But as other states have watched the nightmare that is currently unfolding in New York, they have become greatly alarmed, and some have even taken measures to try to prevent New Yorkers from spreading the virus to their communities.

Beginning on Friday, authorities in Rhode Island started stopping vehicles “with New York plates”, and any New Yorkers that were discovered were forced into “14 days of self-quarantine”…

Rhode Island police began stopping cars with New York plates Friday. On Saturday, the National Guard will help them conduct house-to-house searches to find people who traveled from New York and demand 14 days of self-quarantine.

“Right now we have a pinpointed risk,” Governor Gina Raimondo said. “That risk is called New York City.”

When New York Governor Andrew Cuomo found out about this, he went ballistic, because it specifically discriminated against citizens of his state.

So Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo later expanded the directive to include anybody coming into Rhode Island from any other state…

Gov. Gina Raimondo instead has expanded the order to include ‘any person’ coming to Rhode Island from another state to ‘immediately self-quarantine for 14 days’.

The directive, signed late Saturday, does not apply to health workers or those working in public safety. It reads: ‘Any person coming to Rhode Island from another state for a non-work-related purpose must immediately self-quarantine for 14 days.’

Of course Rhode Island is basically the size of a postage stamp, and so not that many people are too worried about what they are doing.

But Florida is a much bigger deal.

Florida has already been forcing anyone flying in from New York to self-quarantine for 14 days, and on Friday Governor Ron DeSantis expanded that directive to include anyone traveling into the state from Louisiana…

New Orleans is experiencing a coronavirus surge of more than 1,000 infections linked to the Mardi Gras celebration in February, sending Louisiana’s total number of cases past 3,300 as of Saturday. DeSantis wants to intercept any Louisiana travelers from “seeding” the virus in Florida.

It’s about a three-hour drive from New Orleans to Pensacola, Florida, and panhandle officials had expressed concerns to him about travelers fleeing the Bayou State and carrying the virus into Florida.

In fact, a highway checkpoint has already been set up on Interstate 10 so that police can monitor who is coming into the state…

“Look, we’re either trying to fight this virus or we are not,” DeSantis said of his plan that includes a checkpoint on Interstate 10 at the Alabama line and National Guard members greeting travelers from the New York City area at airports.

In the days ahead, more states may start implementing such measures.

So if you are still not where you want to be to ride out this pandemic, you need to get there as quickly as possible.

We still don’t know how bad this crisis is going to become.  It may fizzle out with just a few hundred thousand deaths globally, or we may end up with a nightmare scenario in which millions die.

We just don’t know yet.

But those that are running things are starting to act like we are facing a worst case scenario, and that should deeply alarm us all.

For instance, I was quite surprised to learn that officials from U.S. Northern Command have isolated themselves inside the giant Cheyenne Mountain facility in Colorado…

‘To ensure that we can defend the homeland despite this pandemic, our command and control watch teams here in the headquarters split into multiple shifts and portions of our watch team began working from Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station, creating a third team at an alternate location as well,’ Air Force General Terrence O’Shaughnessy, head of U.S. Northern Command and NORAD, said during a Facebook Live town hall with those under his command.

Perhaps such a move is warranted during a time of great crisis, but what really got my attention was the following statement that O’Shaughnessy made…

‘My primary concern was … are we going to have the space inside the mountain for everybody who wants to move in there, and I’m not at liberty to discuss who’s moving in there,’ O’Shaughnessy added.

Ummm, what?

Apparently so many people were clamoring to get inside Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station that he was concerned that there wouldn’t be room for them all?

I don’t like the sound of that at all.

We live in very strange times, and they are about to get even stranger.

I hope that you are somewhere safe, and I hope that you are well stocked up for the long, dark months that are ahead of us.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all many people as we possibly can.

For Millions Of Americans In The Middle Of The Country, It Feels Like An Economic Depression Right Now

What do you do when you have lost all hope that things will ever turn around? It may still feel like “the economy is booming” for those at the top end of the economic food chain in big coastal cities such as New York and San Francisco, but for millions of hard working Americans in the middle of the country, talk of a “coming recession” is absolutely ludicrous because it already feels like a severe economic depression is happening right now. In America’s heartland, bankruptcies are surging, debt burdens are becoming overwhelming, and suicide rates are spiking to unprecedented levels. We have not seen economic despair this extreme since the last recession, and I am about to share a story with you that will absolutely break your heart.

At one time, South Dakota farmers Chris and Amber Dykshorn looked toward the future with great optimism. But mounting debts and several years of disastrous weather changed all that, and in June their community was shocked when Chris took his own life…

Amber Dykshorn stood at her kitchen window and watched the storm come in.

It was a very dark Saturday night in the middle of the summer in the middle of a year that is on track to be the wettest in more than a century. The wind blew over the farm, the rain came down and she heard the ominous pings on her roof – pea-sized hail, striking the still-fragile stalks of the only corn her husband, Chris Dykshorn, was able to plant before he took his own life in June.

Chris had lost all hope.

The couple was absolutely drowning in debt, and they desperately needed a good year just to keep the farm going.

But then the rain just kept on coming, and now Amber has to deal with three young kids and $300,000 in farm debt all by herself…

Did their crop insurance cover hail damage? She had no idea. That was something Chris would have taken care of, if he were here. Instead she was alone, with nearly $300,000 in farm debt, three kids ages 5 to 13 and a host of grief-fueled questions. Why hadn’t she been able to save him? What would happen to them now?

Sadly, the Dykshorns are not an isolated case.

All across the Midwest, farms are going under at a staggering rate. According to the vice president of the National Farmers Union, the state of Wisconsin is “losing two farms a day” at this point…

“You look at the weather, you look at the crops you can’t get off the field, you look at the bills you can’t pay,” Patty Edelburg, vice president of the National Farmers Union, told Yahoo Finance. “Bankruptcies are up. Wisconsin is attributed as the No. 1 bankruptcy in the nation right now, when it comes to dairy farmers. That number is up, I think, 24% from last year already. We’re losing two farms a day.”

If you can believe it, the state of Wisconsin “lost almost 1,200 dairy farms” between 2016 and 2018.

Overall, the number of dairy farms in the state has fallen by 49 percent during the last 15 years.

Just think about that.

Half of all the dairy farms in our most important dairy producing state are completely gone.

And instead of tapering off, this “farm apocalypse” just continues to pick up speed. Sadly, the bankers are contributing to this crisis in a major way by denying loans to many of these troubled farmers…

“Farming is such a stressful occupation by itself,” Edelburg said. “When you start adding financial stress on top of it, it’s just going to add more stress. Farmers can’t pay their bills, they have no extra money, they have people honing down their neck looking to pay bills. They’re going to banks and they can’t get loans. They’re literally being denied loans.”

When you are already drowning in debt and your crops are failing and the banks won’t give you any more money, it can seem like there is no way out.

This is the position that Chris Dykshorn found himself in, and we can get an idea of what his emotional state was like just before he committed suicide from the final texts that he sent to his wife…

“I’m struggling so bad today. I don’t know what to do anymore,” he texted on May 31. “I seriously don’t know how we r gonna make it.”

On June 1: “I just want to sit in the house and cry.”

And then: “What am I supposed to do. I am failing and feel like I’m gonna lose everything I’ve worked for the past how many years.”

As I have stressed over and over, suicide is never the answer. But when someone loses all hope that there will ever be an opportunity to turn things around, it can be very difficult to keep going.

Meanwhile, money is flowing like wine on Wall Street thanks to the Federal Reserve. The unelected Fed has been pumping billions upon billions of dollars into the financial markets, and this has resulted in a higher concentration of wealth among the top one percent than ever before. The following comes from Bloomberg…

The top 1% of American households have enjoyed huge returns in the stock market in the past decade, to the point that they now control more than half of the equity in U.S. public and private companies, according to data from the Federal Reserve. Those fat portfolios have America’s elite gobbling up an ever-bigger piece of the pie.

The very richest had assets of about $35.4 trillion in the second quarter, or just shy of the $36.9 trillion held by the tens of millions of people who make up the 50th percentile to the 90th percentile of Americans — much of the middle and upper-middle classes.

In essence, Wall Street is being showered by “welfare money” from the Federal Reserve, and nobody is holding the Fed accountable.

At the same time, tens of millions of American families are working low paying jobs and are just barely getting by from month to month. The following comes from Zero Hedge…

For instance, a new report sheds light on 53 million Americans, or about 44% of all US workers, aged 18 to 64, are considered low-wage and low-skilled.

Many of these folks are stuck in the gig economy, making approximately $10.22 per hour, and they bring home less than $20,000 per year, according to a Brookings Institution report.

Today, half of all American workers make less than $33,000 a year. As the cost of living continues to rise much faster than wages do, hard working Americans are increasingly turning to debt in order to make ends meet, and during the next recession many families will not be able to service those debts.

All over the nation, we are watching a tragedy play out in slow motion.

America’s heartland is being gutted, and the “next recession” hasn’t even officially started yet. But soon enough it will, and the deep depression that we are already witnessing in many parts of the middle of the country will get a lot worse.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.

Halloween Warning: Here Are 15 Reasons Why You Should Not Celebrate “The Devil’s Holiday”

Halloween has become one of the most important holidays in the United States, and thanks to relentless marketing it is now celebrated in virtually every nation on the entire planet. According to the National Retail Federation, Americans will spend a whopping 8.8 billion dollars on Halloween this year, and most of that money will be spent on costumes, candy and decorations. The vast majority of the U.S. population will participate in some form of Halloween festivities, and most of them probably don’t want to hear anything “negative” about a holiday that they really look forward to enjoying. But should we actually be celebrating this holiday? After reading what I have to share with you below, you may be forced to reconsider what you believe about Halloween.

Before I get to my list, there is one key point that I would like to make. A lot of people out there seem to believe that engaging in Halloween customs is okay as long as they change the name of the holiday to something else. For example, many organizations will hold a “fall festival”, a “harvest festival” or a “trunk or treat” event this time of the year. But the word “Halloween” is not the problem. In fact, according to Wikipedia the word “Halloween” is just a shorthand way of saying “All Hallows’ Eve”…

The word Halloween or Hallowe’en dates to about 1745[32] and is of Christian origin.[33] The word “Hallowe’en” means “Saints’ evening”.[34] It comes from a Scottish term for All Hallows’ Eve (the evening before All Hallows’ Day).[35] In Scots, the word “eve” is even, and this is contracted to e’en or een. Over time, (All) Hallow(s) E(v)en evolved into Hallowe’en. Although the phrase “All Hallows'” is found in Old English “All Hallows’ Eve” is itself not seen until 1556.[35][36]

Changing the name of your celebration is not going to change anything. Ultimately, it is the traditions that are rooted in ancient pagan religious rituals that you should really be concerned about.

Look, if I attended a Satanic black mass and called it “Fun Fest 2019”, would that make it okay?

Of course not.

The ancient pagan festival that eventually became known as “Halloween” is still practiced today by occultists all over the world. They consider it to be a time when the veil between the living and the dead is the thinnest, and therefore it is an optimal time for communicating with the spirit world. And the original purpose for many of the ancient traditions associated with this holiday (such as dressing up in costumes) was to facilitate that sort of communication.

If communicating with evil spirits is something that you want, then go ahead and celebrate Halloween.

But as for me and my house, we don’t be doing it.

The following are 15 reasons why you should not celebrate “the Devil’s holiday”…

#1 Halloween is simply “a modernized version of the Druidic festival of the dead” known as Samhain.

#2 Samhain is one of the most important holidays on the Wiccan “wheel of the year”. In other words, it is considered to be a high holy day for witches all over the globe.

#3 Wiccan high priestess Doreen Valiente once made the following statement about this holiday: “Halloween is one of the four Great Sabbats of the witches that everyone has heard about. To witches, Halloween is a serious occasion, however merrily celebrated. It is the old Celtic Eve of Samhain.”

#4 Former Satanist John Ramirez says that he “sacrificed animals as part of satanic rituals” on Halloween, and now that he is a Christian pastor he warns people about how they can curse themselves by participating in Halloween traditions.

#5 In fact, Ramirez said that he would sleep all day long so that he “could unleash hell” all Halloween night long…

I remember the days leading up to Halloween, we devil worshippers had our instructions from the demon world about what had to be done, and we knew it was going to be a long night. I would sleep all day to be rested up and ready for midnight so I could unleash hell on the world into the wee hours of the morning.

#6 The founder of the Church of Satan, Anton LaVey, was absolutely thrilled that so many Christian parents embrace Halloween: “I am glad that Christian parents let their children worship the devil at least one night out of the year. Welcome to Halloween.”

#7 LaVey also once said that “after one’s own birthday, the two major Satanic holidays are Walpurgisnacht and Halloween.”

#8 According to an article in a British news source, animals and humans were both “thrown in to huge firepits as offerings” on the night of Samhain…

But the reality of Halloween through the eyes of the Celts and Druids is scarier than any horror film.

According to old documents, in its most primitive guise, Samhain would have featured many sacrifices to the Celtic gods of death, with both animals and humans thrown in to huge firepits as offerings.

People claimed the ancient Druids ate their first born children on Samhain, or collected the blood of their sacrificial humans in cauldrons and drank it.

#9 Even the History Channel admits that this was a night when animals would be sacrificed to the gods by the ancient Celts…

In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.

To commemorate the event, Druids built huge sacred bonfires, where the people gathered to burn crops and animals as sacrifices to the Celtic deities. During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, typically consisting of animal heads and skins, and attempted to tell each other’s fortunes.

#10 According to Smithsonian.com, many pet shelters across America will not adopt out black cats during this time of the year because this “is a time when blood rituals take place”…

It’s unclear exactly where the superstitions around black cats and bad luck came from, but people tend to eye ancient folkloric traditions like the Druids or associations with witchcraft that arose during the Middle Ages. But being the bearers of bad luck isn’t the only rumor that follows dark-furred kitties into the present. For decades, many animal shelters have refused to adopt out black cats on or right before Halloween out of fear they will be tortured or sacrificed, Kate Knibbs writes for Gizmodo.

“This is a time when blood rituals take place,” Hedy Litke, director of animal placement at the ASPCA, told K.C. Baker for the New York Daily News in 1999. “Black cats are often sacrificed.”

#11 Today most people consider “Halloween costumes” to be innocent fun, but their original purpose was “to allow for communication with the spirit world”…

Halloween masks and costumes were used to hide one’s attendance at pagan festivals or—as in traditional shamanism (mediated by a witch doctor or pagan priest) and other forms of animism—to change the personality of the wearer to allow for communication with the spirit world. Here, costumes could be worn to ward off evil spirits. On the other hand, the costume wearer might use a mask to try to attract and absorb the power of the animal represented by the mask and costume worn. According to this scenario, Halloween costumes may have originated with the Celtic Druid ceremonial participants, who wore animal heads and skins to acquire the strength of a particular animal.

#12 Even today, Wiccans consider dressing up on Halloween night to be “a form of ‘sympathetic magick’ allowing us to experience what it could be like to be on the other side of the veil”…

On Samhain night the Faerie folk are believed to be very active and delight in playing tricks on humans. If you’re near a faerie mound, be very careful not to be drawn inside, else you may disappear for a few hundred years. The Fey enjoy gifts of food and drink and pretty baubles, so be sure to leave treats for the Faeries so you won’t be tricked! In order to fool the Nature Spirits, our pagan ancestors would dress up in costumes if they had to travel about on Samhain night. They would dress all in white, like ghosts, make disguises of straw, or dress as the opposite gender. I suppose that the Faeries were so busy laughing at the costumes they forgot to play any tricks!

Another school of thought regarding dressing up at Samhain has a much more spiritual basis. Dressing as a ghost or skeleton could be seen as a form of “sympathetic magick” allowing us to experience what it could be like to be on the other side of the veil.

#13 Almost every year, dressing up as a witch is the number one costume for adults in the United States. Of course demons, goblins and vampires are very popular too. Do we really want to be engaging in a practice that actually embraces and celebrates darkness?

#14 Considering how much is done each year to normalize witches and witchcraft, should it be a surprise that Wicca has now become the fastest growing religion in America?

#15 The tradition of “trick-or-treating” is also an ancient pagan religious practice that was eventually “Christianized”…

The idea of trick-or-treating is further related to the ghosts of the dead in pagan, and even Catholic, history. For example, among the ancient Druids, “The ghosts that were thought to throng about the houses of the living were greeted with a banquet-laden table. At the end of the feast, masked and costumed villagers representing the souls of the dead paraded to the outskirts of town leading the ghosts away.”

As already noted, Halloween was thought to be a night when mischievous and evil spirits roamed freely. As in modern poltergeist lore, mischievous spirits could play tricks on the living—so it was advantageous to “hide” from them by wearing costumes. Masks and costumes were worn to either scare away the ghosts or to keep from being recognized by them

There is so much more that could be written, but hopefully you get the point.

This “day of the dead” is a holiday that fully embraces evil, and that is not something that you should want to participate in.

As I explained in my most recent book (#ad), life is all about choices, and the choices that we make consistently define who we are.

You can say that you want to be good all you want, but if your actions consistently embrace evil that is what you will become.

And let there be no doubt – Halloween is a holiday that is absolutely saturated with evil, and nothing good can come from celebrating it.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep.  I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters.  (#CommissionsEarned)  By purchasing those books you help to support my work.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles in written form on their own websites as long as this “About the Author” section is included.  In order to comply with government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished.  This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate.  You can follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of this website.

 

Chaos In New York: A Helicopter Just Crashed Into A Skyscraper In Midtown Manhattan!

 

A helicopter has crashed into a skyscraper in midtown Manhattan, and this has made headlines all over the planet. According to authorities, the pilot was the only one in the helicopter, and he was killed upon impact. Other than that, we do not know much at this point. Authorities have not released the name of the pilot, and we do not know if this was an intentional act or not.  The following comes from NBC New York…

A helicopter crash-landed on the roof of a 54-story office building in midtown Manhattan Monday, sparking a fire and killing at least one person, authorities say.

A call about the incident at the AXA Equitable Center on Seventh Avenue and West 51st Street came in shortly before 2 p.m. The NYPD confirmed the hard landing on the roof of 787 Seventh Avenue; it wasn’t clear why the chopper would have tried to land there, nor was it clear who owned the chopper.

War On The 2nd Amendment: New York Wants To Force All Gun Owners To Buy A Million Dollar Liability Policy

(The Organic Prepper) New York state is still busily chipping away at gun rights and now they’ve introduced Obamacare for guns. Legislators are hard at work trying to force every gun owner in the state (who isn’t a cop or active military) to purchase and maintain a minimum $1 million liability insurance policy.

§ 2353. FIREARM OWNERS INSURANCE POLICIES. 1. ANY PERSON IN THIS STATE WHO SHALL OWN A FIREARM SHALL, PRIOR TO SUCH OWNERSHIP, OBTAIN AND CONTINUOUSLY MAINTAIN A POLICY OF LIABILITY INSURANCE IN AN AMOUNT NOT LESS THAN ONE MILLION DOLLARS SPECIFICALLY COVERING ANY DAMAGES RESULTING FROM ANY NEGLIGENT OR WILLFUL ACTS INVOLVING THE USE OF SUCH FIREARM WHILE IT IS OWNED BY SUCH PERSON. FAILURE TO MAINTAIN SUCH INSURANCE  SHALL RESULT IN THE IMMEDIATE REVOCATION OF SUCH OWNER’S REGISTRATION, LICENSE AND ANY OTHER PRIVILEGE TO OWN SUCH FIREARM. (source)

Hmmm…privilege? I had no idea it was called constitutional privileges. I’m going to have to go back and fix some articles really quickly where I called them “rights.”

New York wants to make it impossible to own a gun. Although the bill clearly states it’s been read twice, it’s rife with grammatical errors, almost to the point of illiteracy. (I italicized them for ya.) But I digress. Under the heading “Justification” the bill states:

Injury and death by gun has increasingly become a problem in U.S. and in New York State. In the wake of recent mass shooting incidents in Aurora, Colorado and Newtown, Connecticut; there has been a nationwide attention on gun control and public safety.

According to FBI Crime Report, there were 445 firearm murderin New York in 2011 and 517 firearm murder in 2010. However, there is little attention on the economic impact these shootings have on the victims and their families.

This legislation establishes and requires gun-owners to obtain and maintain liability insurance policy prior to such ownership. By having this insurance, policy in place, innocent victims of gun-related accidents and violence will be compensated for the medical care for their injuries.

In such cases where the gun was stolen, the original owner is typically not liable unless the weapon was stolen through negligence on the part of the owner.

This insurance policy will also serve as an incentive for firearm owners to implement safety measures in order to conduct the activity as safely as possible and only when necessary.

This isn’t the first time recently that New York has proposed something outrageous.

In December of last year, they proposed a bill that would require anyone in NY who wanted to buy a gun to turn over their internet search history and their social media passwords. Seriously. According to Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, “A three-year review of a social media profile would give an easy profile of a person who is not suitable to hold and possess a firearm.”

Previously, I wrote:

Applicants to purchase a gun would be required by law to turn over their social media passwords to accounts like Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram, and they’d have to allow police to see a year’s worth of their searches on a year’s worth of searches on Google, Yahoo, and Bing.  As well, anyone renewing their permit for a pistol would be subject to this invasive investigation.

Now, for those of you sitting there saying, “That’s fine, I don’t use social media and I use Duck Duck Go or StartPage” this is great – for now.

How long do you think it would be before other outlets like blogs where you comment or these different search engines are added to the list of things that are searched? Trust me, if it gets passed, this is a greasy slide straight to the bad place. (source)

If you wondering what they’d be looking for, wonder no more.

Police would be required to look for evidence the applicant searched for or used racist or discriminatory language, threatened the safety of another person, inquired about or alluded to an act of terrorism, and, finally, “any other issue deemed necessary by the investigating officer.” (source)

How arbitrary is that? It’s basically down to whether the officer likes you and your beliefs our not.

Think for a moment about how much the investigating officer’s bias would come into play here. In some ways of thinking, people who say “all lives matter” are considered the epitome of racism even when taken out of context.

And what about a couple of women talking about a breakup using heated language in a conversation about the ex who has become the enemy? Are they really going to act on it or are they just blowing off some steam?

Then I think about my search history regarding terrorism – I’m a blogger, for goodness sakes. My search history is a dark place.  What if you’re researching what kind of gun you want to buy and you’re looking up things like “stopping power” or some other thing the anti-gun folks consider “scary” that is a completely legitimate question in reality?

And “any other issue deemed necessary” is just far, far too broad to provide any comfort whatsoever that the investigations would be fair and impartial. All of this is completely subjective. Anyone with a dark sense of humor, regardless of their sanity or upstanding citizen-ness, is going to be in for a hard time. (source)

It’s all just another paver on the highway to total gun control.

If you think this is crazy, stay tuned. It’s just going to get worse.

About The Author: Daisy Luther is a coffee-swigging, gun-toting blogger who writes about current events, preparedness, frugality, voluntaryism, and the pursuit of liberty on her website, The Organic Prepper. She is widely republished across alternative media and she curates all the most important news links on her aggregate site, PreppersDailyNews.com. Daisy is the best-selling author of 4 books and lives in the mountains of Virginia with her two daughters and an ever-growing menagerie. You can find her on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter.

Homelessness In New York City Is The Worst That It Has Ever Been

The mainstream media continues to try to convince all of us that the U.S. economy is “booming”, but meanwhile the number of homeless people is setting all-time record highs in major cities all over the nation. The recent article that I published about how wealthy elitists on the west coast are freaking out as hordes of homeless people take over their neighborhoods received a tremendous amount of attention, but nobody has a worse problem with homelessness than New York City does. According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, approximately 14 percent of all the homeless people in the entire country currently live in New York City…

According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s most recent assessment report, the number of people experiencing homelessness has been rising. The HUD’s annual survey found that on a single night in January 2018, there were a total of 552,830 homeless people across the country. New York City had 78,676 — or about 14 percent of the nation’s homeless population.

That number, 78,676, was a brand new all-time record high.

And more records are being broken during the early part of this year.

On Tuesday, the Coalition for the Homeless issued a brand new State of the Homeless report for 2019. According to that report, the number of people living in homeless shelters in New York City has been breaking record after record…

If found that in February 2019, an average of 63,615 men, women, and children slept in New York City shelters each night, just shy of the all-time record set in January.

While the number of families decreased slightly, the number of homeless single adults continues to increase.

An all-time record 18,212 single adults slept in shelters each night in February 2019, up 150 percent from 2009. Between September 2018 and April 2019, the number of single adults in DHS shelters reached a new nightly record high 32 times, according to the report.

If this is what an “economic recovery” looks like, then I shudder to think what will happen when the next recession hits.

Overall, “an all-time record 133,284 unique individuals spent at least one night in a New York City DHS shelter” during fiscal year 2018.

That represents a 61 percent increase since fiscal year 2002.

Obviously very little of the money being made on Wall Street is trickling down to those on the bottom rungs of the economic ladder. The stock market may be soaring, but more people than ever in New York do not have a place to sleep at night.

In the State of the Homeless report, Mayor de Blasio and Governor Cuomo both received an “F” for their handling of the homelessness crisis. Obviously this did not please either of them, and both of them are trying to defend their records.

For example, Mayor de Blasio can point to the fact that he just got judicial approval to open a homeless shelter on Billionaire’s Row in midtown Manhattan…

New York City officials received the go-ahead to open a homeless shelter in an old hotel in midtown Manhattan – one which happens to be back-to-back with one of the most luxurious and expensive condo buildings in the world.

A coalition of homeowners on West 58th Street sought an order to block a move by the city and its agencies to open a shelter in the former Park Savoy hotel at 158 West 58th. Among other things, they argued that the building was not up to fire safety codes and that it would create a public nuisance.

Apparently this new homeless shelter literally “stands back-to-back against the iconic One57 apartment building” where Michael Dell purchased a $100 million condo a few years ago.

And just like on the west coast, the wealthy residents of this neighborhood are quite upset about their potential new neighbors…

The West 58th Street Coalition, on its Facebook page, says its neighborhood is “under threat” by the shelter plan.

“While we understand the need to shelter the city’s homeless, we believe the residents on our block deserve to be consulted before one of our buildings is filled with recently released parolees,” the coalition wrote in an April 2018 position statement.

It is easy to laugh at the plight of these condo owners, but there is nothing funny about America’s rapidly exploding homelessness crisis.

In the old days, strong family units provided a national safety net that the federal government could never match. If someone was having a really hard time, another member of the extended family would take them in. But today the traditional family unit is under attack from a thousand different directions, and many homeless people literally don’t have anyone that they can turn to.

In addition, more Americans are hooked on legal and illegal drugs today than ever before in American history, and that is greatly contributing to the homelessness crisis. A very large percentage of the homeless are addicts, and this is particularly true on the west coast.

Of course many that are living on the streets have simply had a run of bad luck. Unless your family is independently wealthy, it is likely that you have had some tough times in your own life. We should never look down on those that are hurting, because with a few bad breaks many of us could end up on the streets ourselves.

We live at a time when literally everything in our society seems to be coming apart. And unless a miracle happens, things are going to get much, much worse in the months and years ahead.

Get Prepared NowAbout the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally-syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including Get Prepared Now, The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters. His articles are originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News. From there, his articles are republished on dozens of other prominent websites. If you would like to republish his articles, please feel free to do so. The more people that see this information the better, and we need to wake more people up while there is still time.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Own Mother Moved Out Of New York Because The Taxes Were Too High

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez continues to come up with new ways to bankrupt America, but meanwhile we have now learned that her mother actually moved out of New York because the taxes were too high. When AOC’s father Sergio died, things got very tough financially for the family, and at one point Blanca Ocasio-Cortez was unable to pay the mortgage on the family home for an entire year. But ultimately she was able to come to an agreement with the bank, and she ended up moving to Florida where taxes and the cost of living are much lower…

‘I was cleaning houses in the morning and working as a secretary at a hospital in the afternoon. I was working from 6am until 11pm. And I prayed and prayed, and things worked out. After the children graduated from college, I figured it was time for me to move to Florida.’

Blanca said it was a no-brainer, adding: ‘I was paying $10,000 a year in real estate taxes up north. I’m paying $600 a year in Florida. It’s stress-free down here.’

And of course it greatly helps that there is no state income tax in Florida, while New York has the highest tax burden in the entire country by a wide margin.

Things are particularly oppressive in New York City. On top of federal taxes, state taxes, exceedingly high property taxes and a whole bunch of other taxes, the city itself also imposes an income tax on those residing there.

By the time it is all said and done, some New Yorkers end up handing over close to 50 percent of their incomes to various government entities once all forms of taxation are taken into consideration.

This is the socialist environment that has given us Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

And it isn’t as if the money is being used well. In fact, it has just been revealed that Mayor Bill de Blasio’s wife was handed $900,000,000 for a mental health program, and nobody seems to know what happened to the money…

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, was given $900 million to start a mental health initiative focusing on helping the homeless in the city. Four years later, no one seems to know what that money was actually used for, according to the New York Post.

The City Council discovered this shocking amount of potential waste during a meeting Wednesday. And while it sounds good to spend heavily on a mental health initiative, it appears that nobody has noticed any real benefits from that investment.

Perhaps NYC would have been better off spending that money bolstering their police.

So far in 2019, the murder rate in the city is up 37 percent compared to last year.

New York City is a total mess, and now AOC wants to make the entire nation just like it.

But AOC is far more ambitious than your typical tax and spend liberal. She wants to take government spending to crazy new levels that nobody has ever seen before.

For example, one new study has determined that AOC’s “Green New Deal” would cost U.S. taxpayers approximately 93 trillion dollars. The following comes from Fox News…

The sweeping “Green New Deal” proposed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., could cost as much as $93 trillion, or approximately $600,000 per household, according to a new study co-authored by the former director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The sobering and staggering cost estimate came as Democratic presidential hopeful Kamala Harris pointedly declined in an interview broadcast Sunday to put a price tag on the Green New Deal and “Medicare-for-all,” saying “it’s not about a cost,” but rather return on investment. The Green New Deal’s botched rollout included the release of an official document by Ocasio-Cortez’s office that promised economic security even for those “unwilling to work,” and called for the elimination of “farting cows” and air travel.

To put that number in perspective, U.S. GDP is about 19 trillion dollars a year, and the U.S. national debt is sitting at just over 22 trillion dollars right now.

It is easy to attack AOC, because she is the perfect member of Congress for the “idiocracy” that America has become.

She literally doesn’t know what she is talking about on just about any issue that you could possibly name, but the people of her district decided to send her to Washington anyway. And the frightening thing is that there are quite a few other new members of Congress that are even worse than her.

But as bad as AOC is, I have to give her credit for one thing.

At least she is willing to stand up and fight for what she believes.

If you regularly follow my work, you already know that I can’t stand the “seat fillers” in Washington that are interested in little more than protecting their political careers at all costs. They never make any waves, they never fight for anything important, and they spend most of their time raising money for the next campaign.

Because if you do stick your neck out in Washington, very powerful people will likely bring the hammer down on you, and that is something that AOC is finding out right now…

Two political action committees founded by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s top aide funneled over $1 million in political donations into two of his own private companies, according to a complaint filed with the Federal Election Commission on Monday.

The cash transfers from the PACs — overseen by Saikat Chakrabarti, the freshman socialist Democrat’s chief of staff — run counter to her pledges to increase transparency and reduce the influence of “dark money” in politics.

Chakrabarti’s companies appear to have been set up for the sole purpose of obscuring how the political donations were used.

Of course the truth is that just about every member of Congress is deeply corrupt and should be kicked out of office.

But until the American people wake up and decide to take their government back, this is what we are stuck with, and that is a very depressing reality.

Get Prepared NowAbout the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally-syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including Get Prepared Now, The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters. His articles are originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News. From there, his articles are republished on dozens of other prominent websites. If you would like to republish his articles, please feel free to do so. The more people that see this information the better, and we need to wake more people up while there is still time.

“Muslim Community Patrol” Is Cruising Around New York City In Vehicles That Look Just Like Police Cars

According to former NYPD officer John Cardillo, the “Muslim Community Patrol” in Brooklyn is now driving around in vehicles that “look identical” to cars owned by the New York Police Department.  And as they “patrol” neighborhoods in Brooklyn, what is their goal?  On Twitter, Cardillo said that this certainly “looks a lot like Sharia Police”…

Not at all comfortable with this. ‘Muslim Community Patrol’ in NYC, driving cars that look identical to NYPD RMPs. This looks a lot like Sharia Police. In Brooklyn.

I don’t know about you, but to me this is deeply, deeply disturbing.

3 Pictures That Show How Much America Has Changed Since The Old Days


What would our founders think if they could see us today? Every great civilization throughout human history eventually entered a period of decline, and we continue to get more evidence every single day that America’s decline is accelerating. But even though I am constantly writing about this stuff, I was absolutely stunned when I first saw the photo above. If Kyrsten Sinema had shown up on the floor of the U.S. Senate looking like that in the old days, she would have been immediately hauled away. But today, apparently it is perfectly acceptable for America’s first bisexual senator to parade around the Senate floor looking like a prostitute. Quite a few conservatives have remarked that she looked like the character that Julia Roberts played in Pretty Woman, but in my opinion that is being way too kind.

Look, I have never been in favor of extremely strict dress codes either, but if you are going to represent an entire state in the U.S. Senate you should at least try to show a little bit of class.

Of course the truth is that Sinema is simply the product of a culture that is becoming less classy with each passing year.

For example, just consider what is happening in Tennessee. State Representative Antonio Parkinson has proposed implementing a dress code for parents when they visit public schools in the state. He did this because of all the horror stories that he has been hearing…

“People wearing next to nothing. People wearing shirts or tattoos with expletives. People coming onto a school campus and cursing the principal or the teacher out. These things happen regularly,” Parkinson said.

“A principal I talked to told me a lady came into the office with her sleepwear on with some of her body parts hanging out. You got children coming down the hall in a line and they can possibly see this,” he added.

Another indication of how much America has changed since the old days comes to us from New York state.

They just passed a law that will ensure that abortion stays legal in the state even if Roe v. Wade is overturned, and it makes abortions “legal all the way up to birth”…

To the sound of supporters chanting “free abortion on demand, we can do it, yes we can,” the New York legislature just passed the terribly named “Reproductive Health Act.” It’s the most radically pro-abortion state-level initiative in recent memory.

The new law has nothing to do with health, and everything to do with death. It removes abortion from the criminal code and makes it legal all the way up to birth, allowing all doctors and midwives to kill unborn babies, no questions asked.

To celebrate passage of this new law, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo ordered One World Trade Center to be lit up pink that night…

One World Trade Center in New York City, NY — the centerpiece of the World Trade Center complex — was illuminated with pink lighting to celebrate the Empire State’s passage of legislation designating abortion a “fundamental right.”

In response, this is what country music legend Charlie Daniels had to say about this new law on Twitter…

Watch the wrinkles on Cuomo’s face lengthen as the ramifications of the thousands of murders he has sanctioned come to bear on him. The NY legislature has created a new Auschiwitz dedicated to the execution of a whole segment of defenseless citizens. Satan is smiling

This third photo is one we’ll never forget. Nick Sandmann has been through hell and back because of this image, but he never deserved any of the abuse that he has received.

As the video evidence has clearly demonstrated, crazed leftist Nathan Phillips boldly approached Nick Sandmann and started beating a drum just inches from his face in an attempt to intimidate him.

But Sandmann refused to be intimidated, and instead he chose to courageously smile as a grown man wildly pounded a drum directly in front of him.

Nathan Phillips should be the one that the mainstream media is ripping to shreds, but instead it is Nick Sandmann that is getting all the abuse because he was the one wearing the MAGA hat.

The mobs of crazed leftists in Washington D.C. that I envisioned in “The Beginning Of The End” are beginning to materialize. There will be a lot more controversial confrontations between liberals and conservatives in cities all over the nation, and things are likely to get a lot uglier as we approach the next presidential election in 2020.

As much as we may wish that it could be true, America is never again going to be the same place that it was 50 or 60 years ago.

All nations change, and our country is currently evolving at a pace that is absolutely breathtaking. If we stay on the path that we are currently on, we will continue to rapidly decline and our fate will be inevitable.

But as long as there is still time on the clock, there is always an opportunity to turn things around. My hope is that there will be a great awakening among the American people, because time is quickly running out.

Get Prepared NowAbout the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally-syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including Get Prepared Now, The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters. His articles are originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News. From there, his articles are republished on dozens of other prominent websites. If you would like to republish his articles, please feel free to do so. The more people that see this information the better, and we need to wake more people up while there is still time.

More Than Half A Million People: America’s Homelessness Crisis Is Rapidly Exploding On Both Coasts

The homelessness crisis in the United States is getting a lot worse, and it is happening at a pace that is absolutely frightening. Did you realize that more than half a million Americans are homeless right now? One out of every four homeless Americans actually has a job, but thanks to rapidly rising housing prices they are not able to afford a place to live. So every night in this country, hundreds of thousands of people are sleeping in shelters, in their vehicles or on the streets. It is a national crisis that isn’t going away, and during the next economic downturn it is only going to intensify.

I have written about our exploding homelessness crisis on numerous occasions, but I had no idea that the numbers had gotten so large until I came across this article…

Recent estimates indicate that more than 550,000 people experience homelessness in the US on any given night, with about two-thirds ending up in emergency shelters or transitional housing programs, and one-third finding their way to unsheltered locations like parks, vehicles, and metro stations. According to the Urban Institute, about 25% of homeless people have jobs.

I find that it is difficult for me to wrap my head around pain and suffering on such an immense scale. Americans often think of the homeless as drug-addicted men that don’t want to work, but the truth is that about a quarter of the homeless population is made up of children.

And things are getting particularly bad on both the east and west coasts.

Recently, Jake Tapper of CNN confronted Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti about the fact that homelessness in his city has risen by 50 percent…

You were screamed at for four hours this week at a town hall on homelessness. Homelessness is nearly up 50 percent in your city since you became mayor, according to the Los Angeles Times. Now there’s a typhus outbreak likely due to the booming number of rats attracted by all the food and human waste on Skid Row and other places. Some critics may be saying why are you campaigning for Democrats in the midterms and traveling when you have this huge crisis in your backyard?

If the U.S. economy really was “booming”, the truth is that homelessness in Los Angeles would not be up by 50 percent. This is how Garcetti responded to Tapper’s question…

I think they’re linked together and I welcome a national conversation in Washington, D.C. where you see more homeless per capita, than you see in Seattle, in San Francisco, you see in red and blue cities. We have a a mental health crisis. Mayors can’t avoid that. A lot of people told me never touch the issue of homelessness. I am so passionate about it. People are dying on our streets from opioid addiction. I’m so proud of our voters in Los Angeles who passed two largest matters to combat homelessness. This is what people say is an unsolvable problem and I’m committed to solving it.

He is committed to “solving” this crisis, and yet it has gotten 50 percent worse while he has been mayor?

And this guy dreams of someday becoming president?

It can be argued that things are even worse in San Francisco. Thanks in large part to mountains of dirty needless and human feces, the city now spends 65 million dollars a year cleaning up the streets…

San Francisco’s housing crisis is also (of course) a homelessness crisis, and homelessness crises beget public defecation crises — and San Francisco has a serious public defecation crisis.

The city spends $65 million/year cleaning up the streets, a figure that is so high because of the quantities of feces, urine, and dirty needles that find their way onto San Francisco’s streets. And despite the $65 million, San Francisco’s streets are very, very dirty.

I know that San Francisco has become known as the human feces capital of the country, but somebody is still getting fleeced on that deal.

If San Francisco wants to give me 65 million dollars a year, I will make sure that their streets are clean enough to eat dinner on, and I will install fresh smelling flowers on every street corner.

Whoever is getting the 65 million dollars right now is doing an absolutely terrible job, because there are literally piles of poop all over the place. In fact, one recent investigation found 300 piles of human feces in downtown San Francisco alone.

Meanwhile, things have gotten so bad in Seattle that one official is proposing to spend 3 million dollars on a “mass shelter tent”…

At the urging of local public health officials, Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda is proposing that the city of Seattle spend $3 million to open a “mass shelter tent” with 75 to 100 temporary beds for people living on the street.

Announced as part of the Seattle City Council’s ongoing budget deliberations, the request only includes the capital cost of setting up the tent, not the operating costs. City officials estimate it would cost an additional $2 million to run, likely bringing the total up to around $5 million for the year.

Once again, this seems like an enormous waste of money.

If you spend 3 million dollars to house 100 people, that means that you would have to spend 30 million dollars to house 1000 people.

And so what is going to happen when these cities have tens of thousands of people sleeping in the streets during the next economic downturn?

The homelessness crisis continues to escalate on the east coast as well. In New York, the percentage of New York City students that are homeless has doubled over the last decade…

Data from the New York State Techincal and Education Assistance Center for Homeless Students (NYS-TEACHS), a project of Advocates for Children of New York (AFC), revealed a record 114,659 students were in temporary housing for the 2017-18 school year, up almost 3% from 111,562 in the 2016-17 year.

That equates to roughly 10% of all students enrolled in NYC schools are homeless. The figure is so shocking that it is more than double the rate from the GFC 2007-08 era.

Government studies have shown that students without homes “are less likely to meet grade-level standards for reading and math, and graduate from high school on time,” said New York Daily News.

And in New Jersey, homelessness is up 9 percent compared to last year…

A new report finds homelessness rose sharply in the Garden State last year.

According to just-released data compiled by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, there are 9,303 men, women and children who are homeless in New Jersey this year, which is a 9 percent increase from 2017.

The mainstream media keeps touting how well the U.S. economy is doing, but if that was really accurate we wouldn’t be seeing numbers like these.

Yes, a small sliver of the population has been thriving in recent years, but most of the population has been struggling and the middle class continues to shrink. Sadly, we have gotten to a point where even the most basic housing is out of reach for many Americans…

Of 3,007 counties in the US, a worker earning the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour can afford a one-bedroom rental in only 12. In San Francisco, where the median house price is over $1.5 million, a single mother earning the minimum wage would have to work 120 hours per week to meet her basic needs. And even outside of high-cost regions, nearly two-thirds of US households lack the savings to cover a $500 shock such as a car repair or health-care expense. For these families, one bad turn can result in homelessness.

The cost of living has been surging year after year, and our wages have not even come close to keeping up. For much more on this, please see my previous article entitled “Middle Class Destroyed: 50 Percent Of All American Workers Make Less Than $30,533 A Year”.

If the things that you have read in this article have made you angry, that is good, because people should be getting very angry about our exploding homelessness crisis.

Hundreds of thousands of people are deeply suffering in this country every single night, and that should not be happening in the greatest nation on the planet.

Unfortunately, most of our politicians are all talk and no action, and the homelessness crisis is likely to get a whole lot worse as the U.S. economy continues to deteriorate.

About the author: Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News and the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

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Move Over New York, Chicago Is Now The Rat Capital Of America – 55 Percent Increase In Rat Complaints Since 2014

(Fox News) New York is apparently no longer the big cheese.

The Second City has been dubbed the “rat capital” of America according to apartment search service RentHop, which said Chicago had the highest amount of rat-related complaints of four major U.S. cities.

The data compiled by the website showed that there were more than 50,000 rat-related complaints in 2017, which is a 55 percent increase since 2014.

New York City Is Sending Busloads Of “Peacekeepers” To Gang-Infested Neighborhoods

In its latest push to contain a recent surge in violent crime in the Bronx and other outerboroughs, New York City is spending nearly $2 million to deploy “mobile trauma units” featuring counselors and peacekeepers – or what the city calls “violence interrupters” – to try and calm worried locals and work with local gangs to try and reduce incidences of violence, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The buses will begin making their rounds in January 2019 as they seek to provide “trauma relief” in neighborhoods that are begging for relief of a different kind (namely, from crime). Though we imagine the ex-gang members the buses will deploy as counselors trying to convince street criminals to “do the right thing” and turn straight will be equally as effective as a few more cops on the beat.

But as one councilwoman who pushed for the “mobile trauma units” reminds us, tending to the “emotional well-being” of crime victims and their families is a task for which police are ill-suited. The issue has received far more attention in the wake of the death of Lesandro “Junior” Guzman-Feliz, a 15 year old who was dragged out of a bodega by gang members and fatally stabbed with knives and a machete last month after he was mistaken for somebody else. (Zero Hedge)

Thousands Flood The Streets For New York City’s Annual Pride March

Thousands upon thousands of marchers filled the streets of New York City on Sunday to celebrate the city’s annual pride march…

Elected officials, including New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, and Senator Chuck Schumer, all Democrats, were among those attending the march.

Before it started, Cuomo officially unveiled a New York state memorial to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people that honors victims of intolerance.

Placed in Hudson River Park, it has nine boulders with pieces of glass installed in them that can as prisms and reflect rainbows when the sunlight hits them just right.

Cuomo formed the commission to come up with an LGBTQ+ memorial after the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando that left 49 people dead in June of 2016.

The theme of this year’s march was, ‘Defiantly Different.’ Eighty floats and tens of thousands of marchers were expected.

Similar events throughout the country have been extremely well attended during June.

What do you think this says about the future of our nation?

What Would Happen If A Nuclear Bomb Went Off In Times Square?

What a morbid question, eh?

Fortunately we have never seen anything like this happen, but it is only a matter of time before a nutjob gets a hold of a nuke and uses it to destroy a major city.

According to New York Magazine, this is what would happen immediately after a nuclear device went off in Time Square…

Consider one example: A ten-kiloton nuclear bomb detonated on the ground in Times Square would explode with a white flash brighter than the sun. It would be seen for hundreds of miles, briefly blinding people as far away as Queens and Newark. In the same moment, a wave of searing heat would radiate outward from the explosion, followed by a massive fireball, the core of which would reach tens of millions of degrees, as hot as the center of the sun.

When such a bomb explodes, everyone within 100 feet of ground zero is instantaneously reduced to a spray of atoms. There are photos from Hiroshima and Nagasaki showing eerie silhouettes of people cast against a flat surface, such as a wall or floor. These are not, as is sometimes claimed, the remains of vaporized individuals, but rather a kind of morbid nuclear photograph. The heat of the nuclear explosion bleaches or darkens the background surface, except for the spot blocked by the person, leaving a corresponding outline. In some cases the heat released by the explosion will also burn the patterns of clothing onto people’s skin.

I don’t think that any of us can even imagine devastation such as this.

And as bad as the initial fireball would be, more would probably end up being killed by the massive shockwave that would be unleashed…

As the fireball travels outward from the blast, people, buildings, and trees within a one-mile radius would be severely burned or charred. Metal, fabric, plastic, and clay would ignite, melt, or blister. The intense heat would set gas lines, fuel tanks, and power lines on fire, and an electromagnetic pulse created by the explosion would knock out most computers, cell phones, and communication towers within several miles.

Traveling much farther than the fireball, a colossal pressure wave would hurtle forth faster than the speed of sound, generating winds up to 500 miles per hour. The shock wave would demolish the flimsiest buildings and strip the walls and roofs off stronger structures, leaving only their naked and warped scaffolding. It would snap utility poles like toothpicks and rip through trees, fling people through the air, and turn brick, glass, wood, and metal into deadly projectiles. A blast in Times Square, combined with the fireball, would carve a crater 50 feet deep at the center of the explosion. The shock wave would reach a diameter of nearly 3.2 miles, shattering windows as far as Gramercy Park and the American Museum of Natural History.

And of course radiation would ultimately kill far more people than were killed by the initial explosion.

Today, we have literally created weapons that have the potential to completely wipe out humanity.

Do we also have the wisdom to keep these weapons from ever being used?

We shall see…

The Best Places To Live In All 50 U.S. States

We live at a time when Americans are packing up and moving with increasing frequency.  Some are moving for new opportunities, some are moving in anticipation of what is coming, and others are moving just because they are bored.  As the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog and The Most Important News, I am frequently asked to give my opinion about a potential move.  Of course I often don’t know what to say, because often factors that I don’t fully understand are involved in the decision.  For example, someone may be moving somewhere truly horrible for a wonderful new job, or complex family relationships are precipitating a move.  But there are some general principles that I share with people, and I will be sharing some of them with you in this article.

If you do a Google search, you will find that most lists of “best places to live” focus on major cities, but often the best place to live within a certain geographic area is far away from a major population center.  And obviously my choices have a lot more to do with quality of life and sustainability during the coming crisis years than with things like “employment opportunities” or “entertainment options”.

With all that being said, here are my choices for the best places to live in all 50 U.S. states…

Alabama – The coast is always tempting if you like the water, but we have all seen what hurricanes have done to the area around Mobile.  If I had to choose some place to live in the state, I think that I would focus up north near the Tennessee border.  There are more fresh water resources up north, and the Huntsville economy has been doing relatively well in recent years.

Alaska – I have always had a fondness for Juneau, but would probably rule it out for practical reasons.  It is quite isolated and it is way too close to the water.  In the years to come it will pay to be away from the ocean and from the major volcanoes, and so somewhere around Anchorage would probably be my choice.

Arizona – Even though my good friend John Shorey may disagree, I actually don’t like Arizona much at all.  Phoenix is way too overcrowded, Tucson is way too hot, and Sedona is way too crazy.  If I had to live in Arizona, I would definitely find somewhere with water, because water resources are going to be at a premium during the years ahead.

Arkansas – Even though Wal-Mart is headquartered there, northwest Arkansas is a lovely area.  Once you get away from Fayetteville there are lots of open areas, and fresh water is fairly abundant.  Crime is relatively low, but there is some around.  The key is to find a good community.

California – Unless you must do so for work or you feel directly called by God to go there, it is probably not a good idea to move to California.  If I had to choose anywhere in the state, it would probably be the far northern area away from the coast.  For much more on why you shouldn’t move to California, please see my recent article entitled “Why Are So Many People Moving Out Of California?”

Colorado – Many years ago I considered a move to Colorado, and I am so glad that I was talked out of it.  The quality of life in the Denver area is continually deteriorating, and more people just keep on moving in from other states.  I am told that Colorado Springs and Fort Collins are still fairly nice, but I wouldn’t be eager to move to either location.  If you must go to Colorado, try to find somewhere rural that has easy access to fresh water.

Connecticut – I actually applied to go to law school at Yale, but I was turned down.  I really would have loved to live up there, although I hear that New Haven is riddled with crime.  Considering the times that we are moving into, I would try to get inland as far as possible, and so I would probably look at any of the small towns north of Hartford.

Delaware – It is right along the ocean, it is riddled with crime, and it is best known for producing Joe Biden.  You probably do not want to move to Delaware if you can avoid it.

Florida – After being rejected by Yale, I was accepted by the University of Florida law school and I had four wonderful years there.  So I have to admit that I am partial to Gainesville, although there are some wonderful places in the panhandle as well.  Unfortunately for Florida, most of the state is either below, at or just above sea level, and that means that it is extremely vulnerable to potential tsunamis.  And crime has become a growing problem in the urban areas, and so that is a major factor to look at when considering a move into the Sunshine State.

Georgia – In Georgia you will want to stay far away from the madhouse that Atlanta has become, and you will want to stay far away from the Atlantic Ocean.  It would be tempting to look at Augusta, but I would probably choose one of the small towns near the northern border.

Hawaii – I think that nearly all of us have dreamed of living in Hawaii at one point or another.  Unfortunately, these are volcanic islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and one of them is erupting right now.  So while it might be tempting to consider a move to Hawaii, for practical reasons you should probably cross it off the list.

Idaho – People up here tend to get upset when I encourage my readers to consider coming to Idaho.  But of course there are good areas of Idaho and there are bad areas of Idaho, and more crazy people from liberal states such as California move in with each passing day.  If you want relatively moderate weather, stunning scenery, low crime and a low population density, I would commend north Idaho.  Unfortunately there are not many employment opportunities up here, and so don’t count on finding a good job after you move.  You will want to have your source of income squared away before you arrive.

Illinois – You can probably guess what I am going to say.  Chicago has become one of the most violent cities in North America, and that is really saying something considering what is going on in Mexico right now.  Today, approximately 125,000 gang members live in the city of Chicago, and they outnumber the police by more than 10 to 1.  If you must live in Illinois, you probably want to stay as far away from Chicago as you can.

Indiana – In general, the further south you go in the state the better.  Fort Wayne and Gary are hellholes, Indianapolis is better, and the small towns that stretch across southern Indiana are probably the best choices of all in the state.  I would avoid Evansville and focus more on the eastern part of the state, but the truth is that the whole region is in potential earthquake territory.

Iowa – Iowa is actually very nice.  It is flat, it is cold, and there are way too many crazy liberals there, but other than that it is quite nice.  I would probably avoid Des Moines and focus on finding a rural community with easy access to fresh water.

Kansas – Kansas is nice too, but the big problem in Kansas is not enough rain.  The current drought is getting really bad, and it looks like Dust Bowl conditions are rapidly returning to the state.  So for that reason alone, I would probably avoid Kansas.

Kentucky – Beautiful scenery, but it is hard to ignore the crushing poverty and the out of control opioid crisis.  If I was moving to Kentucky, I would focus on the far eastern portion of the state so that I could get as far away from the New Madrid fault zone as possible.

Louisiana – They have good food, but they are also a potential epicenter for natural disasters in the years ahead.  We all saw what Hurricane Katrina did to New Orleans, the Mississippi River is prone to major flooding, and one day the state is going to be on the receiving end of the aftermath of a massive New Madrid earthquake.  So it is probably not a state that would be high on my list of places to live.

Maine – Thanks to very liberal immigration policies, the character of towns all along the Maine coast has greatly changed in recent years.  There are still some towns up north that are very nice, but be prepared if you move to one of them, because it gets bitterly, bitterly cold in the winter.

Maryland – Much of western Maryland is actually very, very lovely, but not much else good can be said for the rest of the state.  If you must live in Maryland, you will want to stay far away from the shore, far away from Washington D.C. and you certainly won’t want to be anywhere near the drug-infested hellhole that is called Baltimore.  So that doesn’t leave much else except for western Maryland, but like I said, western Maryland is actually very, very lovely.

Massachusetts – If John Adams could see us now he would be absolutely horrified by what we have done to his state.  If I had to choose somewhere to live, I would focus on the small towns west of Interstate 91.  They tend to be a bit less liberal than the rest of the state, but I wouldn’t count on meeting too many true conservatives there either.

Michigan – If I had to live in Michigan, the choice would be easy.  I would definitely focus my search on the upper peninsula, because I would want to be as far away from Detroit, Flint and the other major population centers as possible.  In reality, the upper peninsula of Michigan is much more like Wisconsin than Michigan, and that is a good thing.  But if you move there you will need to prepare for some of the most bitter winters that you have ever encountered.

Minnesota – Speaking of bitter winters, Minnesota can be a very tough place to live.  Both of my parents were born in Minnesota, and I have been there many times.  Coming from Scandinavian roots, the bitter winters didn’t bother my parents too much, but they never passed that trait on to me.  If you can survive the winters, the giant mosquitos and the machete-wielding terrorists, you will probably do okay.  There are plenty of small, rural communities scattered throughout the state, and plenty of fresh water.

Mississippi – If you can find somewhere in the state away from the coast, away from the Mississippi and that isn’t being crushed by rising poverty and rising crime, you will probably do okay for a while.  But once again, I am deeply concerned about how this state will do when the New Madrid fault finally rips wide open.

Missouri – One of the worst cities in the entire country (St. Louis) dominates the eastern part of the state, the western part of the state is going to be deeply affected by the ongoing drought out west, but I actually love the southern part of the state.  I really love Branson and the surrounding areas, and I just wish that it wasn’t so close to the New Madrid fault zone.

Montana – There are a lot of people moving to Montana, and many of them don’t seem to be able to handle the bitter cold during the winter that well.  Western Montana is definitely superior to eastern Montana, but the entire state features a low population density and plenty of fresh water resources.

Nebraska – For the Democrats, this is “flyover country”, but the truth is that it is part of the heartland of America.  Like neighboring Kansas, Dust Bowl conditions are going to be an increasing concern, and so it will probably be best to avoid Nebraska unless necessary.

Nevada – Las Vegas dominates the region, and much of the rest of the state is a giant desert.  It is not a bad place overall, but the lack of water in the state is a major concern.  Someday the population of Las Vegas will need to be greatly reduced due to a lack of water, and the same thing will probably be true for other cities as well.

New Hampshire – Once you get away from the major population centers, New Hampshire is actually quite lovely.  And the population tends to be less liberal than New England as a whole.  But without a doubt it gets bitterly cold in the winter, and there aren’t many employment opportunities in the rural areas.

New Jersey – It wants to be known as “the garden state”, but most of us know it as “the armpit of America”.  It is overcrowded, the government is a giant mess, and crime is out of control.  Camden is a microcosm for what is happening to America as a whole, and it is not a pretty picture.  You will want to avoid New Jersey if at all possible.

New Mexico – The state can be summed up in three “D’s” – drought, drugs and decay.  The liberals are rapidly taking over here, and the consequences are quite predictable.  And as Dust Bowl conditions intensify, it will not be a place that anyone wants to be.

New York – The state isn’t all bad.  Yes, New York City is the epicenter for so much that is wrong with our society, but many areas of upstate New York are quite nice.  I would definitely stay north of Interstate 90, and I would focus on rural communities that have easy access to fresh water.

North Carolina – There are some very good reasons why so many people are moving to North Carolina.  The weather is moderate, the economy has been doing relatively well, there are plenty of open spaces, and the scenery is absolutely gorgeous.  Just stay away from the coastline and the major population centers and you will probably be just fine.

North Dakota – Nestled between Minnesota and Montana, this is a state that is for extremely hearty individuals.  But if you can stand the cold and the snow, you will find that this is actually one of the most freedom-loving states in the entire nation, and it has an abundance of natural resources.

Ohio – Cleveland is a nightmare, Cincinnati is not much better, but Columbus is actually fairly nice.  It is technically considered to be part of the New Madrid fault zone, so that is a huge negative, but it does get plenty of rain and it has easy access to lots of fresh water resources.

Oklahoma – This is a state that can never seem to get a break.  It was doing a lot better in recent years, but now Dust Bowl conditions are starting to return once again.  It is also in the very heart of “tornado alley”, and that is a huge factor working against it as well.  I wish that I could commend some area of the state but I really can’t.

Oregon – Much of western Oregon is very similar to California (or worse), but once you get east of Interstate 5 you will start running into a lot of good people.  Some areas of eastern Oregon are actually quite magnificent, and there are lots of high quality small towns if you need a place to hide.

Pennsylvania – Pittsburgh is to be avoided and Philly is a nightmare, but much of the rest of the state is actually very nice.  I would just try to stay away from the major population centers and focus my search on rural communities with each access to fresh water.

Rhode Island – I was actually born in Rhode Island, but that doesn’t mean that I am going to commend it to anyone.  It is our smallest state, and so there isn’t a lot of room to get away from the major population centers.  Unless you must be there, it is probably best to find somewhere else to live.

South Carolina – Many of the positives that can be said for North Carolina can also be said for South Carolina.  Just make sure that you are far, far away from the coast and from the major population centers and you will probably be just fine.

South Dakota – I actually like South Dakota more than North Dakota.  The weather is not quite as bitterly cold, the economy is a little more vibrant thanks to the tourists, and Rapid City and Sioux Falls are both decent.  It is far enough north that the drought is not affecting it too much so far, although that could change at any time.

Tennessee – You will want to stay away from Memphis and the west end of the state entirely.  If you are considering moving there, you will want to look at Knoxville and the Smoky Mountains to the east.  That whole region is teeming with natural resources and has a very low population density.

Texas – There are a lot of wonderful conservative people in Texas, but incoming transplants from California are trying to change things as rapidly as possible.  The major cities are way too overcrowded, crime is increasing due to illegal immigration and the drought is becoming a major problem.  But millions of good people love Texas, and it is easy to understand why.  It has got a great culture, and there are so many good communities down there.

Utah – The south is being heavily affected by the drought, and so that is a major concern.  Up north, Salt Lake City is doing quite well, but if you aren’t a Mormon you may find it difficult to fit in.  As with all of these states, I would strongly recommend visiting before making a permanent decision to move there.

Vermont – So many of the exact same things that were said about New Hampshire could also be said about Vermont.  I would be half-tempted to move there myself for the great natural beauty, but unfortunately the liberals are making a complete mess of the state.

Virginia – I received my undergraduate degree from the University of Virginia, and I must admit that Charlottesville is one of my all-time favorite places in the entire country.  Unfortunately, Charlottesville’s good name has been dragged through the mud, and that is a terrible shame.  For the years ahead, I would want to be as far away from D.C. and Richmond as possible, and so I would focus on Roanoke and points west of there.

Washington – The western half of the state is dominated by the liberal bastion of Seattle, and the eastern half of the state is dominated by “Spo-caine”.  Trust me, you don’t want to cheap out on a hotel when you are staying in “Spo-caine” because you could end up in a drug-infested hellhole that doesn’t look like it has had any maintenance for 20 years.  Yes, there are some areas of northeastern Washington that are very good, but you will want to choose your community carefully.

West Virginia – If West Virginia did not have such crippling poverty and was not one of the national epicenters for our exploding opioid crisis, I am sure that we would be able to say some really good things about the state.  Unfortunately, the state just seems to spiral further and further downhill with each passing year.

Wisconsin – Most of the liberals are either in Madison or in Milwaukee, and so finding a spot up north would definitely be preferable.  Once again, it is bitterly cold in this state for much of the year, but if you can handle that a rural community in Wisconsin with easy access to fresh water is not a horrible choice.

Wyoming – There is so much good that can be said for Wyoming.  It is very conservative, the population density is extremely low, there is no state income tax, and there is so much great natural beauty. But it is very, very windy there.  The wind never seems to stop and it cuts through you like a knife, and this is particularly agonizing during the winter.

Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

15 Signs That The Middle Class In The United States Is Being Systematically Destroyed

If your family is really struggling right now, you are far from alone. I have been publishing The Economic Collapse Blog for more than eight years, and all throughout that time I have seen the middle class in America get smaller and smaller and smaller. It is almost as if we are all playing a really bizarre game of musical chairs and every month someone pulls a few more chairs from the game. Yes, there are some people that have gotten exceedingly wealthy over the past eight years, and most of that wealth is concentrated in places such as New York, Washington D.C. and San Francisco. But meanwhile, most of the rest of the country has been steadily getting poorer. Just take a look at Detroit – at one time it had the highest per capita income in the entire nation and now it is a rotting, decaying war zone. Of course dozens of other formerly great manufacturing cities all over the nation have suffered a similar fate. Since 2001, we have lost more than 70,000 manufacturing facilities and millions of good paying manufacturing jobs. Those good paying jobs have been replaced by lower paying “service jobs”, and you can’t support a middle class lifestyle on those types of jobs.

In order to have a thriving middle class, you need middle class jobs, and our country is in desperate need of more of those jobs. At this point most American families are living on the edge, and more are falling into poverty with each passing month. The following are 15 signs that the middle class in the United States is being systematically destroyed…

#1 78 million Americans are participating in the “gig economy” because full-time jobs just don’t pay enough to make ends meet these days.

#2 In 2011, the average home price was 3.56 times the average yearly salary in the United States. But by the time 2017 was finished, the average home price was 4.73 times the average yearly salary in the United States.

#3 In 1980, the average American worker’s debt was 1.96 times larger than his or her monthly salary. Today, that number has ballooned to 5.00.

#4 In the United States today, 66 percent of all jobs pay less than 20 dollars an hour.

#5 102 million working age Americans do not have a job right now. That number is higher than it was at any point during the last recession.

#6 Earnings for low-skill jobs have stayed very flat for the last 40 years.

#7 Americans have been spending more money than they make for 28 months in a row.

#8 In the United States today, the average young adult with student loan debt has a negative net worth.

#9 At this point, the average American household is nearly $140,000 in debt.

#10 Poverty rates in U.S. suburbs “have increased by 50 percent since 1990”.

#11 Almost 51 million U.S. households “can’t afford basics like rent and food”.

#12 The bottom 40 percent of all U.S. households bring home just 11.4 percent of all income.

#13 According to the Federal Reserve, 4 out of 10 Americans do not have enough money to cover an unexpected $400 expense without borrowing the money or selling something they own.

#14 22 percent of all Americans cannot pay all of their bills in a typical month.

#15 Today, U.S. households are collectively 13.15 trillion dollars in debt. That is a new all-time record.

When you think of “poverty in America”, you probably think of our blighted inner cities, but that is not where poverty is growing the fastest.

According to author Scott Allard, it is actually our suburbs where poverty is growing more rapidly than anywhere else…

According to a May report from the Pew Research Center, since 2000, suburban counties have experienced sharper increases in poverty than urban or rural counties.

This is consistent with research across the U.S. over the past decade – as well as my own book, “Places in Need.”

This is why tens of millions of square feet of retail space is being closed down and why formerly great shopping malls all over America now resemble ghost towns.

When I was growing up, the shopping mall was the place to be for average middle class kids. My family was middle class and virtually everyone that I knew was middle class. In fact, I don’t remember any really wealthy or really poor kids in my school at all.

But today most families have little to no financial cushion and are deep in debt. As a result, discretionary income has really dried up and that means less shopping.

So we are on pace for the worst year for store closings in American history, and yet the mainstream media keeps telling us that the economy is in “good shape”.

That is a load of nonsense. The numbers don’t lie, and the U.S. economy is never going to be in “good shape” until the middle class starts growing again.

Is there a solution?

Well, the mayor of Stockton, California seems convinced that the solution is just to give people free money. The following comes from Reuters…

Michael Tubbs, the 27-year-old mayor of Stockton, California, has a radical plan to combat poverty in his cash-strapped city: a “no strings” guaranteed basic income of $500 a month for its residents.

Starting in early 2019, Tubbs plans to provide the monthly stipend to a select group of residents as part of a privately funded 18-month experiment to assess how people use the money.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all just started getting big, fat checks from the government every month?

Why didn’t somebody think about this before?

Of course the truth is that we simply cannot afford to do that. State and local government debt levels have surged to record highs, and the federal government is now 21 trillion dollars in debt. We are on a path that leads to national suicide, and we desperately need to start living within our means.

We have been consuming far more wealth than we have been producing for a very long time, but we have been doing it for so long that many of us now think that this is “normal”. Meanwhile, our long-term debt problems continue to escalate and our once thriving middle class continues to shrink.

If we continue to do the same things, we will continue to get the same results, and right now we are in the process of absolutely destroying the greatest economic machine that the world has ever seen.

Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is the author of four books including The Beginning Of The End and Living A Life That Really Matters.

41 Million Americans Are Living In Poverty This Christmas

Even though the stock market continues to set new record high after new record high, poverty is exploding all over America. It is being reported that 41 million people are living in poverty at this moment, and 9 million of them do not receive a single penny of income from anyone. Once you have been unemployed for long enough, you don’t qualify for unemployment payments any longer, and once you are on the street there is nowhere for other governments programs to send a check to. I have previously discussed the rising epidemic of homelessness in our nation, but most people don’t want to think about that sort of a thing these days. Even though New York City has the most homeless since the Great Depression, and even though homelessness in Los Angeles is at an all-time record high, most people want to pretend that everything is just fine.

Well, the truth is that everything is not just fine.

A reporter from the Guardian recently traveled with a special UN envoy to some of the most impoverished areas of the United States. His report is extremely eye-opening, and I wanted to share a short excerpt from his story. This portion of his article is about a 41-year-old woman named Ressy Finley who is desperately trying to stay alive on the mean streets of Skid Row in Los Angeles…

Ressy Finley, 41, was busy sterilizing the white bucket she uses to slop out in her tent in which she has lived on and off for more than a decade. She keeps her living area, a mass of worn mattresses and blankets and a few motley possessions, as clean as she can in a losing battle against rats and cockroaches. She also endures waves of bed bugs, and has large welts on her shoulder to prove it.

She receives no formal income, and what she makes on recycling bottles and cans is no way enough to afford the average rents of $1,400 a month for a tiny one-bedroom. A friend brings her food every couple of days, the rest of the time she relies on nearby missions.

She cried twice in the course of our short conversation, once when she recalled how her infant son was taken from her arms by social workers because of her drug habit (he is now 14; she has never seen him again). The second time was when she alluded to the sexual abuse that set her as a child on the path towards drugs and homelessness.

Los Angeles has declared a state of emergency because the number of homeless is rising so rapidly, and so have nine other cities along the west coast. For much more on this, please see my previous article entitled “As America Gives Thanks, Homelessness Continues To Set New Records In Major Cities All Over The Nation”.

The sad thing is that there are more than a million homes sitting empty in America right now. As economic opportunities have dried up, many communities in the middle part of the nation are becoming “ghost towns”, and it is getting worse with each passing day…

There are nearly 1.4 million vacant residential properties across the country — abandoned, not for sale, mostly unoccupied homes. With vacant properties comprising as much as 30% of residential properties, some neighborhoods are starting to feel like ghost towns.

Many believe that the answer to the decline of the middle class and the growth of poverty is even more socialism.

But if you want to see where that road leads, just look at what is happening in Venezuela. People are eating cats and dogs, and just today there were a whole bunch of mainstream news articles about how children are literally starving to death.

No, the real answer is to do what made our economy so great in the first place. Between 1872 and 1913, we didn’t have an income tax or a central bank, and it was the greatest period of economic growth in U.S. history.

What we have today is not free market capitalism. We have gone very far down the road toward government-controlled socialism, and it has created a giant mess.

If we want to have a healthy middle class again, we need to have a society that promotes entrepreneurs and the creation of small businesses. Today we are literally choking the financial life out of entrepreneurs and small businesses, and when I am elected to Congress I am going to fight as hard as I can to change that.

Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.

As America Gives Thanks, Homelessness Continues To Set New Records In Major Cities All Over The Nation

If the economy is doing just fine, then why is homelessness at levels not seen “since the Great Depression” in major cities all over the country? If the U.S. economy was actually in good shape, we would expect that the number of people that are homeless would be going down or at least stabilizing. Instead, we have a growing national crisis on our hands. In fact, within the past two years “at least 10 cities or municipal regions in California, Oregon and Washington” have declared a state of emergency because the number of homeless is growing so rapidly.

Things are particularly bad in southern California, and this year the Midnight Mission will literally be feeding a small army of people that have nowhere to sleep at night…

Thanksgiving meals will be served to thousands of homeless and near-homeless individuals today on Skid Row and in Pasadena and Canoga Park amid calls for donations and volunteers for the rest of the year.

The Midnight Mission will serve Thanksgiving brunch to nearly 2,500 homeless and near-homeless men, women and children, according to Georgia Berkovich, its director of public affairs.

Overall, the Midnight Mission serves more than a million meals a year, and Berkovich says that homelessness hasn’t been this bad in southern California “since the Great Depression”…

Berkovich said the group has been serving nearly 1 million meals a year each year since 2013.

“We haven’t seen numbers like this since the Great Depression,” she said.

And of course the official numbers confirm what Berkovich is claiming. According to an article published earlier this year, the number of homeless people living in Los Angeles County has never been higher…

The number of homeless people in Los Angeles has jumped to a new record, as city officials grapple with a humanitarian crisis of proportions remarkable for a modern American metropolis.

Municipal leaders said that a recent count over several nights found 55,188 homeless people living in a survey region comprising most of Los Angeles County, up more than 25% from last year.

If the California economy is truly doing well, then why is this happening?

We see the same thing happening when we look at the east coast. Just check out these numbers from New York City…

In recent years the number of homeless people has grown. Whereas rents increased by 18% between 2005 and 2015, incomes rose by 5%. When Rudy Giuliani entered City Hall in 1994, 24,000 people lived in shelters. About 31,000 lived in them when Mike Bloomberg became mayor in 2002. When Bill de Blasio entered City Hall in 2014, 51,500 did. The number of homeless people now in shelters is around 63,000.

For New York, this is the highest that the homeless population has been since the Great Depression, and city leaders are trying to come up with a solution.

Meanwhile, things are so bad in Seattle that “400 unauthorized tent camps” have popped up…

Housing prices are soaring here thanks to the tech industry, but the boom comes with a consequence: A surge in homelessness marked by 400 unauthorized tent camps in parks, under bridges, on freeway medians and along busy sidewalks. The liberal city is trying to figure out what to do.

Are you noticing a theme?

Homelessness is at epidemic levels all over the U.S., and this crisis is getting worse with each passing day. Some communities are trying to care for their growing homeless populations, but others are simply trying to force them to go somewhere else. They are doing this by essentially making it illegal to be homeless. In some cities it is now a crime to engage in “public camping”, to “block a walkway” or to create any sort of “temporary structure for human habitation”. These laws specifically target the homeless, and they are very cruel.

Many of us tend to picture the homeless as mostly lazy older men that don’t want to work and that instead want to drink or do drugs all day.

But the truth is that women and children make up a significant percentage of the homeless. In fact, the number of homeless children in our country has increased by about 60 percent since the end of the last recession.

And there are thousands upon thousands of military veterans that are homeless. For example, a 34-year-old man named Johnny that served in the Marine Corps recently used his last 20 dollars to buy fuel for a woman that had run out of gas and was stranded along I-95 in Miami…

Pulled over on the side of I-95, McClure, 27, was approached by a homeless man named Johnny. She was apprehensive at first, but Johnny told her to get back into her car and to lock the doors while he walked to get her help. He went to a nearby gas station, used his last $20 fill a can and brought it back to fill up her car.

Grateful, but without a dollar to repay him, McClure promised she would come back with something.

In the weeks since, she’s returned to the spot along I-95 where Johnny stays with cash, snacks and Wawa gift cards. Each time she’s stopped by with her boyfriend, Mark D’Amico, they’ve learned a bit more about Johnny’s story, and become humbled by his gratitude.

Deciding that they wanted to do even more for Johnny, they started a GoFundMe page for him and have since raised approximately $250,000.

So it looks like there is going to be a happy ending to Johnny’s story, but the truth is that more people are falling into homelessness with each passing day.

If things are this bad now, how much worse will they become as the economy really starts slowing down? Already, we have shattered the all-time yearly record for retail store closings, and we still have more than a month to go. The following is from a CNN article entitled “Is This The Last Black Friday?”…

A record number of store closures — 6,735 — have already been announced this year. That’s more than triple the tally for 2016, according to Fung Global Retail and Technology, a retail think tank.

And there have been 620 bankruptcies in the sector so far this year, according to BankruptcyData.com, up 31% from the same period last year. Prominent names such as Toys R Us, Gymboree, Payless Shoes and RadioShack have all filed this year, and Sears Holdings (SHLD), which owns both the iconic Sears and Kmart chains, has warned there is “substantial doubt” it can remain in business.

Sadly, analysts are projecting that the number of store closings could be as high as 9,000 next year.

Yes, there are some areas of the country that are doing well right now, but there are many others that are not.

Let us always remember to have compassion on those that are struggling, because someday we may be the ones that end up needing some help.

Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.

The Tens Of Millions Of Forgotten Americans That The U.S. Economy Has Left Behind

The evidence that the middle class in America is dying continues to mount. As you will see below, nearly half the country would be unable “to cover an unexpected $400 expense”, and about two-thirds of the population lives paycheck to paycheck at least part of the time. Of course the economy has not been doing that well overall in recent years. Barack Obama was the only president in all of U.S. history not to have a single year when the economy grew by at least 3 percent, and U.S. GDP growth during the first quarter of 2017 was an anemic 0.7 percent. During the Obama era, it is true that wealthy enclaves in New York, northern California and Washington D.C. did thrive, but meanwhile most of the rest of the country has been left behind.

Today, there are approximately 205 million working age Americans, and close to half of them have no financial cushion whatsoever. In fact, a new survey conducted by the Federal Reserve has found that 44 percent of Americans do not even have enough money “to cover an unexpected $400 expense”…

Nearly eight years into an economic recovery, nearly half of Americans didn’t have enough cash available to cover a $400 emergency. Specifically, the survey found that, in line with what the Fed had disclosed in previous years, 44% of respondents said they wouldn’t be able to cover an unexpected $400 expense like a car repair or medical bill, or would have to borrow money or sell something to meet it.

Not only that, the same survey discovered that 23 percent of U.S. adults will not be able to pay their bills this month…

Just as concerning were other findings from the study: just under one-fourth of adults, or 23%, are not able to pay all of their current month’s bills in full while 25% reported skipping medical treatments due to cost in the prior year. Additionally, 28% of adults who haven’t retired yet reported to being grossly unprepared, indicating they had no retirement savings or pension whatsoever.

But just because you can pay your bills does not mean that you are doing well. Tens of millions of Americans barely scrape by from paycheck to paycheck each and every month.

In fact, a survey by CareerBuilder discovered that 75 percent of all Americans live paycheck to paycheck at least some of the time…

Three-quarters of Americans (75 percent) are living paycheck-to-paycheck to make ends meet, according to a survey from CareerBuilder. Thirty-eight percent of employees said they sometimes live paycheck-to-paycheck, 15 percent said they usually do and 23 percent said they always do. While making ends meet is a struggle for many post-recession, those with minimum wage jobs continue to be hit the hardest. Of workers who currently have a minimum wage job or have held one in the past, 66 percent said they couldn’t make ends meet and 50 percent said they had to work more than one job to make it work.

So please don’t be fooled into thinking that the U.S. economy is doing well because the stock market has been hitting new record highs.

The stock market was soaring just before the financial crisis of 2008 too, and we remember how that turned out.

The truth is that the long-term trends that have been eating away at the foundations of the U.S. economy continue to accelerate, and the real economy is in substantially worse shape this year than it was last year.

Just about everywhere you look, businesses are struggling and stores are shutting down. Yes, there are a few wealthy enclaves where everything seems wonderful for the moment, but for most of the country it seems like the last recession never ended.

In a desperate attempt to stay afloat, a lot of families have been turning to debt to make ends meet. U.S. household debt has just hit a brand new all-time record high of 12.7 trillion dollars, but we are starting to see an alarming rise in auto loan defaults and consumer bankruptcies. This is precisely what we would expect to see if the U.S. economy was moving into another major recession.

In fact, we are seeing all sorts of signs that point to a major economic slowdown right now. Just check out the following from Wolf Richter’s latest article…

Over the past five decades, each time commercial and industrial loan balances at US banks shrank or stalled as companies cut back or as banks tightened their lending standards in reaction to the economy they found themselves in, a recession was either already in progress or would start soon. There has been no exception since the 1960s. Last time this happened was during the Financial Crisis.

Now it’s happening again – with a 1990/91 recession twist.

Commercial and industrial loans outstanding fell to $2.095 trillion on May 10, according to the Fed’s Board of Governors weekly report on Friday. That’s down 4.5% from the peak on November 16, 2016. It’s below the level of outstanding C&I loans on October 19. And it marks the 30th week in a row of no growth in C&I loans.

Perhaps we will be very fortunate and break this pattern that has held up all the way back to the 1960s.

But I wouldn’t count on it. Here is what Zero Hedge has to say about this alarming contraction in commercial and industrial loans…

Here’s the bottom line: unless there is a sharp rebound in loan growth in the next 3-6 months – whether due to greater demand or easier supply – this most accurate of leading economic indicators guarantees that a recession is now inevitable.

We are way overdue for a recession, the hard economic numbers are screaming that one is coming, and the financial markets are absolutely primed for a major crash.

As Americans, we tend to have such short memories. Every time a new financial bubble starts forming, a lot of people out there start behaving as if it can last indefinitely.

But of course no financial bubble is going to last forever. They all burst eventually, and now the biggest one in U.S. history is about to end in spectacular fashion.

Trump will get a lot of the blame since he is the current occupant of the White House, but the truth is that the conditions for the next crisis have been building up for many years, and the horrors that the U.S. economy is heading for were entirely predictable.

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

It Is Becoming Illegal To Be Homeless In America As Houston, Dallas And Dozens Of Other Cities Pass Draconian Laws

Should we make homelessness against the law and simply throw all homeless people into prison so that we don’t have to deal with them? Incredibly, this is actually starting to happen in dozens of major cities all across the United States. It may be difficult to believe, but in many large urban areas today, if you are found guilty of “public camping” you can be taken directly to jail. In some cities, activities such as “blocking a walkway” or creating any sort of “temporary structure for human habitation” are also considered to be serious crimes. And there are some communities that have even made it illegal to feed the homeless without an official permit. Unfortunately, as the U.S. economy continues to slow down the number of homeless people will continue to grow, and so this is a crisis that is only going to grow in size and scope.

Of course the goal of many of these laws is to get the homeless to go somewhere else. But as these laws start to multiply all across the nation, pretty soon there won’t be too many places left where it is actually legal to be homeless.

One city that is being highly criticized for passing extremely draconian laws is Houston. In that city it is actually illegal for the homeless to use any sort of material to shield themselves from the wind, the rain and the cold…

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner is taking a similar approach—his anti-encampment ordinance makes it illegal to use “fabric, metal, cardboard, or other materials as a tent or temporary structure for human habitation.” This ensures that the Houstonian homeless are vulnerable not just to the elements, but also to the constant threat of the police. Officials cite one of the most common justifications for crackdowns on the homeless: neighborhood safety (a more socially acceptable way of talking about the not-in-my-backyard mentality).

With all of the other problems that we are facing as a nation, it stuns me that there are politicians that would spend their time dreaming up such sick and twisted laws.

According to one news report, the homeless in Houston are now officially banned from doing all of the following things…

1. They can’t block a sidewalk, stand in a roadway median or block a building doorway. (AKA they can’t panhandle).

2. They also can’t do any of these things — blocking walkways — under state law that already existed.

3. They can’t sleep in tents, boxes or any other makeshift shelter on public property.

4. They also can’t have heating devices.

5. They can’t carry around belongings that take up space more than three feet long, three feet wide, three feet tall.

6. People can’t spontaneously feed more than five homeless people without a permit.

If I was a homeless person in Houston, I would definitely be looking to get out of there.

But where are they going to go?

Things are almost as bad in Dallas. In fact, it is being reported that the police in Dallas “issued over 11,000 citations for sleeping in public from January 2012 to November 2015.”

When you break that number down, it comes to 323 citations per month.

Of course some people have tried to challenge these types of laws in court, but most of the challenges have been unsuccessful. For example, just check out what recently happened in Denver…

Three people who were contesting Denver’s urban-camping ban were found guilty on Wednesday, April 5, at the Lindsey-Flanigan courthouse. The defendants — Jerry Burton, Randy Russell and Terese Howard — were determined to have unlawfully camped on November 28, 2016, and to have interfered with police operations at one location. All three were sentenced with court-ordered probation for one year and between twenty and forty hours of community service.

The case challenged Denver’s unauthorized-camping ordinance, which has been divisive ever since Denver City Council approved it in 2012.

Since the courts are generally upholding these laws, this has just emboldened more communities to adopt anti-homelessness ordinances. According to one report, dozens of major cities have now passed such laws…

City-wide bans on public camping (PDF) have increased by 69 percent throughout the United States. What used to be seen as an annoyance is now prohibited, forcing fines or jail time on those who certainly can’t afford it. The only nationwide nonprofit devoted to studying this, the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, has been tracking these changes since 2006. Their findings? There are a scary number of laws passed that ironically make it costly to be homeless.

For example, in 33 of the 100 U.S. cities they studied, it’s illegal to publicly camp. In 18, it’s illegal to sleep in public. Panhandling is illegal in 27 cities.

In 39 cities, it’s illegal to live in vehicles.

As I have warned repeatedly, we are seeing hearts grow cold all around us. Instead of doing everything that they can to try to help those in need, communities are trying to make them go some place else, and those that try to feed and help the homeless are being harshly penalized.

Sadly, all of this comes at a time when homelessness is on the rise all over America. In a previous article I pointed out that in New York City the number of homeless people recently hit a brand new all-time high, and things have gotten so bad in Los Angeles that the L.A. City Council has formally requested that Governor Jerry Brown declare a state of emergency.

We tend to think of the homeless as bearded old men with drinking problems, but the truth is that many of the homeless are children.

In fact, the number of homeless children in the United States has risen by about 60 percent since the end of the last recession.

If this is how we are going to treat some of the most vulnerable members of our society while things are still relatively stable, how are we going to be treating one another when the economy completely collapses?

(Originally published on The Economic Collapse Blog)

War On The Homeless: Cities All Over America Are Passing Laws Making It Illegal To Feed And Shelter Those In Need

homeless-man-public-domain

If you want to be a “Good Samaritan” to the homeless in your community, you might want to check and see if it is legal first. All over the country, cities are passing laws that make it illegal to feed and shelter the homeless. For example, in this article you will read about a church in Maryland that was just fined $12,000 for simply allowing homeless people to sleep outside the church at night. This backlash against homeless people comes at a time when homelessness in America is absolutely exploding. In a previous article, I shared with my readers the fact that the number of homeless people in New York City has just set a brand new all-time high, and the homelessness crisis in California has become so severe that the L.A. City Council has formally asked Governor Jerry Brown to declare a state of emergency. Sadly, instead of opening up our hearts to the rapidly growing number of Americans without a home, way too many communities are trying to use the law to force them to go somewhere else.

For nearly two thousand years, churches have been at the forefront of helping the poor and disadvantaged, but now many communities are trying to stop this from happening. Earlier today, I was absolutely stunned when I came across an article that talked about how a church in Dundalk, Maryland has been fined $12,000 for allowing the homeless to sleep outside the church at night…

“I showed up Wednesday morning to find a citation on the door that said we’re going to be fined $12,000 and have a court date because we have unhoused homeless people sleeping outside the church at night,” said Reverend Katie Grover with the Patapsco United Methodist Church.

Grover added that the men and women who sleep outside their doors do so because they have nowhere else to go and because they feel safe there.

“We feel we here as a church that it’s scriptural mandate that’s it an imperative to care for the least, the last, the lost, the poor, the hungry,” she said.

The authorities in Dundalk say that the church is running a “non-permitted rooming and boarding house”, and the severity of this fine is likely to put the church in significant financial difficulty if it is forced to pay it. You can watch a local news report discussing this story on YouTube right here…

Of course Dundalk is far from alone. All across the U.S. laws have been passed that specifically target the homeless. According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, the following are some of the most typical ways that the homeless are targeted…

  • Carrying out sweeps (confiscating personal property including tents, bedding, papers, clothing, medications, etc.) in city areas where homeless people live.
  • Making panhandling illegal.
  • Making it illegal for groups to share food with homeless persons in public spaces.
  • Enforcing a “quality of life” ordinance relating to public activity and hygiene.

There are some people that have been feeding the hungry for decades that now find that their work has been suddenly made illegal. For instance, down in Houston a Good Samaritan named Jay Hamberger is outraged that the help that he has been providing to the homeless for 27 years has now made him an outlaw…

Jay Hamberger has been bringing food to Houston’s homeless for 27 years. He feels the city is infringing on his right to help others by requiring him to have prior permission to distribute food on public and private property.

“I’ve done it with impunity for 27 years now, and I’m the most law-abiding outlaw, because what I’m doing is illegal,” Hamberger said. “My understanding is that there’s no legal way to make this right with the city.”

This is just another example of how our society is being strangled to death by control freaks.

If I see someone that is desperately hungry and I want to give that person food, then I am going to do it no matter what the law says.

Unfortunately, as the homelessness crisis continues to escalate these types of laws are only going to increase. Even in supposedly “tolerant” areas of the country we are seeing draconian measures being implemented. For example, just check out the new ordinance that was just passed in Los Angeles…

LA legislators passed an ordinance that would ban people from sleeping in cars and recreational vehicles (RVs) near homes, parks and schools. Advocates see the ordinance as the latest move to criminalize homeless people.

The Los Angeles City Council voted in favor of the ordinance on Wednesday. Banning people from sleeping near homes, schools and parks in their vehicles, would, if signed into law, only make it legal to sleep overnight in cars and RV’s in industrial or commercial districts from 9:00pm to 6:00am.

As millions of Americans have fallen out of the middle class in recent years, we have seen an explosion in the number of people living in cars, trucks and recreational vehicles. This is something that I addressed in my recent article entitled “Living In A Van Down By The River – Time To Face The True State Of The Middle Class In America“. During this time of the year many that live in their vehicles head for warmer climates, and cities like Los Angeles are responding to the influx of homeless people by trying to force them to go somewhere else.

And this “war on the homeless” has actually been ramping up for quite a while. Just check out these numbers from the Washington Post…

Cities have enacted a wave of crackdowns and new laws against panhandling, camping and other activities associated with homelessness. They say such efforts help preserve the renewed vitality, curbing crime, health problems and behaviors that bother residents and disrupt business.

Between 2011 and 2014, the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty found that bans on sleeping in cars shot up 119 percent, citywide camping prohibitions jumped 60 percent, anti-loitering laws increased 35 percent and anti-begging laws increased 25 percent in a survey of 187 cities.

Homeless people do not have a permanent address, and there is always a temptation to try to force them to go somewhere else so that they become someone else’s problem.

But the truth is that we have a massive national crisis on our hands. The number of homeless children in this country has increased by 60 percent since the end of the last recession, and the number of homeless people sleeping in shelters has risen to record levels in major cities on both the east and west coast.

And considering the fact that about two-thirds of the country is currently living paycheck to paycheck, how bad will things get once the next major recession strikes?

Poverty is growing all over the nation, and at the same time hearts all over America are growing very cold.

I truly fear for what this country is going to look like just a few years from now.

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

The Good Side Of Thanksgiving And The Bad Side Of Thanksgiving

thanksgiving-dinner-photo-by-marcus-quiqmire

I have to admit – of all the holidays on our calendar, Thanksgiving is one of my favorites.  It is a time to gather with family and friends, and it is a time to give thanks for all the good things that have happened to us this year.  And the remarkable acts of generosity that happen during this time of the year remind all of us that there are still people out there that are trying to do the right thing and to be lights in their communities.  But of course all is not well in America this Thanksgiving.  As I write about so often on The Economic Collapse Blog, poverty is growing, close to 50 million Americans are struggling with hunger, and the number of people sleeping in homeless shelters in New York City just hit an all-time record high.  Sadly, even with such great need all around us, Americans continue to be some of the most wasteful people on the entire planet.  In fact, one newly released report says that Americans will throw away 200 million pounds of turkey this Thanksgiving alone…

Americans throw away roughly $165 billion in uneaten food every year, according to government data. And about $293 million of that waste will happen during Thanksgiving — and that’s just for turkey alone.

Although sales of whole turkeys for Thanksgiving have dipped a bit in recent years, consumers are still expected to throw away about 200 million pounds of turkey during the Thanksgiving holiday, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), a nonprofit organization based in New York.

“At a time when one in eight Americans go hungry, taking steps to reduce food waste is even more critical,” said a spokeswoman for the NRDC in a news release.

How could we be so wasteful?

When you break it down, 200 million pounds of turkey comes to about two-thirds of a pound of turkey for every man, woman and child in America.

And Thanksgiving is also a time when millions of Americans are eager to hit the bottle.  On the night before Thanksgiving, demand for alcoholic beverages was so great in Pennsylvania that it actually crashed liquor store credit card systems…

Credit card systems are back up and running at Pennsylvania liquor stores after they were down statewide for a time the night before Thanksgiving.

The credit card system at Wine and Spirit stores statewide went down Wednesday afternoon, CBS 3’s Greg Argos reports.

At the state-run Fine Wine and Good Spirits store near 20th and Market in Center City, the line wrapped around the store.

Perhaps even worse is what happens following Thanksgiving.  Our “Black Friday” orgy of greed and materialism has become a massive joke to the rest of the world, but we don’t seem to care.  As long as we can fill up our shopping carts with lots of cheaply-made foreign products at super-discounted prices we are happy.  For much more on the disgrace that the Black Friday phenomenon has become, please see my recent article entitled “Instead Of Black Friday Materialism, Thanksgiving Weekend Should Be A Time To Live, Laugh And Love“.

With all that being said, there is also so much good happening around the country on this holiday as well.

All over America people are devoting time, money and energy to make sure that struggling families have something to eat on Thanksgiving.  If you can believe it, even someone like Snoop Dogg is helping to give away thousands of Thanksgiving meals to families in need…

With Thanksgiving just days away, rapper and actor Snoop Dogg joined Inglewood city officials and Rams players on Monday to make the holiday a little brighter for families in need.

For the third year in a row, Snoop Dogg, who is from Long Beach, partnered with Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts and other city officials to give away thousands of Thanksgiving meals.

Many that are reading this article may be wondering why I am praising someone like Snoop Dogg, and without a doubt his music contains an incredible amount of offensive material, but in this case he is doing the right thing.

No matter who it is, when someone chooses to do great acts of love and compassion that individual deserves to be praised.

And you never know – when we praise someone for doing right, that person may ultimately decide that the path of righteousness is better than the path that they have chosen up to this point.

We should be in the “restoration business”, and there is nobody that is so far gone that they are completely out of reach.

Throughout our history, there has always been something about this time of the year that has brought out the best in people.  The following is a short excerpt from an absolutely outstanding article that was written for Charisma News by Dr. Eddie Hyatt…

The Pilgrims who landed on Cape Cod in November 1620 were devout followers of Christ who had left the comforts of home, family and friends to pursue their vision of a renewed and reformed Christianity. Although facing insurmountable challenges and much suffering, they maintained an attitude of gratitude through every trial.

They were a thankful people. They never wavered in their faith even during their first winter in the New World (1620-21) when sickness ravaged their community and half of them, about 50 in number, were taken away in death.

The first Thanksgiving was celebrated by the Pilgrims the following fall of 1621 after they had gathered in their fall harvest. Although their hearts were still heavy from the losses suffered the previous winter, there were at least three areas for which they felt particularly grateful to God.

And the spirit of that first Thanksgiving continues to live on today.  Earlier this month, a farmer named Steve Wollyung had 112 acres remaining to be harvested when the unthinkable happened.  But when tragedy struck, his entire community rallied around him and his family in a way that could definitely be regarded as miraculous…

His 4-year-old granddaughter Ayla was playing in a grain wagon when she became trapped in the wagon. First responders removed Ayla from the grain wagon, and she was airlifted to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital where she later died from her injuries.

Tara Henry, a longtime friend of the Wollyung family, heard about the farming accident the next day. She called up Steve’s wife Carmen and asked if they were done harvesting, and Carmen told her they still had over 100 acres to finish and they weren’t sure how they were going to get it all done.

Henry called a few farmers who were done harvesting and asked if they would be willing to help. Word spread quickly and pretty soon more than 60 people from several counties contacted Henry about donating their time and equipment to help the Wollyung family.

In the end, the remaining 112 acres were harvested on a single day.  In fact, all 18,463 bushels were brought in by about 5 PM.

That is the kind of good news that I get excited about, and it shows that love is not totally dead in America.

Yes, things are often very bleak in our country today, but let us never forget that light overcomes the darkness.

Just when you think that there is no hope, a little bit of love can change everything.

I would encourage you to think about how you can use the power of love to make a difference to those around you during this very special time of the year.

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

New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio Calls For More Anti-Trump Street Protests

anti-trump-protesters-in-chicago-photo-by-nathanmac87

New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio called for more anti-Donald Trump protests that have tied up traffic and sucked up law enforcement resources in the city.

De Blasio, who recently launched his 2017 reelection bid, told New York’s Hot 97 radio Monday, following days of anti-Trump protests across the country, that demonstrations should continue specifically because the final popular vote count will be in Hillary Clinton’s favor so Trump does not have a mandate.

“We have to recognize that all over this country, the more disruption that’s caused peacefully … the more it will change the trajectory of things,” De Blasio said.

(Read the rest of the story here…)

Democrats Are Now Calling For A ‘Revolution In The Streets’, And I Believe That They Are Quite Serious

anti-trump-protest-photo-by-fibonacci-blue

The surprise victory by Donald Trump on November 8th has spawned a series of violent protests and riots all over the nation as stunned leftists continue to throw the largest post-election temper tantrum in U.S. history. Protesters in large cities all across America have been disrupting public transportation, looting stores, hurling objects at the police and burning Trump in effigy. There have even been shootings at anti-Trump rallies in Seattle and in Portland. Hundreds of protesters have been arrested so far, and organizers are promising that this is only just the beginning. Meanwhile, large numbers of enraged leftists are physically threatening Trump on Twitter, and some are even calling for a violent revolution. Sadly, I believe that they are quite serious about this.

Even some big celebrity names are starting to use the word “revolution” in messages to their followers. On Twitter, Katy Perry has ominously warned that “the revolution is coming“, and comedian Sarah Silverman has boldly declared that “Trump gets a chance to hear us (or else we R them) If he fails REVOLUTION IN THE STREETS“.

Of course other leftists are seeking less violent ways to oppose Trump. There is a major push to use the electoral college to block a Trump presidency, if that fails there are many hoping to immediately impeach Trump once he takes office, and other activists such as former Labor Secretary Robert Reich are calling for a new third party if their planned post-election takeover of the Democratic Party is not successful.

But for many on the radical left the time for patience is over. The “Not My President” movement is taking off like a rocket, and one survey found that only 58 percent of all Clinton supporters consider Trump’s victory to be legitimate. A protest near Trump Tower in New York City on Saturday drew approximately 25,000 people, and USA Today reported that the anti-Trump protest in Portland, Oregon on Saturday night rapidly “devolved into a riot“.

It is becoming clear that these protests are not going away any time soon, and some are even beginning to refer to this movement as “the Purple Revolution”…

No sooner had Trump been declared the 45th president of the United States, Soros-funded political operations launched their activities to disrupt Trump during Obama’s lame-duck period and thereafter. The swiftness of the Purple Revolution is reminiscent of the speed at which protesters hit the streets of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, in two Orange Revolutions sponsored by Soros, one in 2004 and the other, ten years later, in 2014.

As the Clintons were embracing purple in New York, street demonstrations, some violent, all coordinated by the Soros-funded Moveon.org and Black Lives Matter, broke out in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Oakland, Nashville, Cleveland, Washington, Austin, Seattle, Philadelphia, Richmond, St. Paul, Kansas City, Omaha, San Francisco, and some 200 other cities across the United States.

So could we actually see a violent revolution on the streets of America?

Is the radical left really so horrified by the prospect of a Trump presidency that they would actually be willing to engage in a prolonged campaign of chaos, violence and physical intimidation?

Well, the Oath Keepers are so concerned about what this movement could become that they have initiated an intelligence gathering operation that they are calling “Operation HYPO”…

Clearly as Oath Keepers, we cannot simply sit around and watch while the enemies of liberty work to use violence to initiate a communist revolution in our country. As a result of the intelligence being provided by our Operation Sabot operatives, we have initiated Operation HYPO. We have allowed our personnel to burrow deep inside these protest organizations to collect information regarding tactics, motivations, schedules and logistics.

We had operatives at the planning meetings for the protests that occurred last evening in Baltimore, MD and Philadelphia, PA. Our operatives have also penetrated numerous other planning organizations in cities across the country. For OPSEC reasons, the precise list of cities we are operating in will not be publicly disclosed.

And one thing that we already know is that the radical left is hoping to organize the largest political protest in United States history in Washington D.C. on Inauguration Day. I will be writing about this later today on The Most Important News.

The election of Donald Trump has been the single most galvanizing event for the radical left that we have seen in decades. One of the early leaders of the “Not My President” movement is filmmaker Michael Moore, and the following are three of his key action points which he feels must be implemented immediately…

1. Must quickly and decisively form an opposition movement, the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the 1960s. I will do my part to help lead this as I’m sure many others (Bernie, Elizabeth Warren, MoveOn, the hip-hop community, DFA, etc.) will, too. The core of this opposition force will be fueled by young people who, as with Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter, don’t tolerate b.s. and are relentless in their resistance to authority. They have no interest in compromising with racists and misogynists.
2. Prepare to impeach Trump. Just as the Republicans were already planning to do with President Hillary from Day One, we must organize the apparatus that will bring charges against him when he violates his oath and breaks the law — and then we must remove him from office.
3. Must commit right now to a vigorous fight (including civil disobedience, if necessary)which will block any and all Donald Trump Supreme Court nominees who do not meet our approval. We demand the Democrats in the Senate aggressively filibuster any nominees who support Citizens United or who oppose the rights of women, immigrants and the poor. This is non-negotiable.

But of course other liberals are still in the “shock and disbelief” stage. As I have stated before, Americans were more emotionally invested in this election than they had been in any election in decades, and the aftermath has not been pretty.

This has been particularly true on college campuses all over the nation. According to the New York Post, college administrators have been going to extraordinary lengths to soothe the deep emotional pain that many of their students are experiencing…

  •  The University of Michigan offered its traumatized students coloring books and Play-Doh to calm them. (Are its students in college or kindergarten?)
  •  The University of Kansas reminded its stressed-out kids that therapy dogs, a regular campus feature, were available.
  •  Cornell University, an Ivy League school, held a campus-wide “cry-in,” with officials handing out tissues and hot chocolate.
  •  Tufts University offered its devastated students arts and crafts sessions. (OK, not kindergarten — more like summer camp.)
  •  At campuses from elite Yale to Connecticut to Iowa and beyond, professors canceled classes and/or exams — either because students asked or because instructors were too distraught to teach.

And it is also being reported that suicide hotlines are ringing off the hook all over the nation.

We have never seen anything like this ever before, and I have a feeling that this “Not My President” movement is going to absolutely dwarf the “Occupy Wall Street” and “Black Lives Matter” movements. And considering the very high levels of anger, frustration and pain that these radical leftists are feeling, it is easy to see how this movement could become very violent.

Many patriots, conservatives and Christians were hoping that Donald Trump could bring America together and lead us into a new era of peace and prosperity, but the radical left already hates Trump more than any president that has ever come before him.

It isn’t going to take much to push the radical left over the edge, and if that happens we could see endless chaos, violence and civil unrest for the next four years.

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

A Spirit Of Violence Rises In America Following The Unveiling Of The ‘Harbinger Of Baal’ In New York

baal-arch-photo-by-jeanie-laboy

Is it just a coincidence that we have seen violence erupt all over America since the unveiling of the arch that served as a gateway to the Temple of Baal in New York City on September 19th?  First there were the terror attacks in New York, New Jersey and Minnesota, then there were the unprecedented riots in Charlotte, and over the weekend there was a horrific mass shooting near Seattle.  All of these events took place within a week after the Arch of Triumph was put up in New York.  Baal was an ancient deity that was often associated with violence and bloodshed, and those that erected this arch have no idea what they are messing with.

Rabbi Jonathan Cahn was standing in the crowd when “the harbinger of Baal” was unveiled last Monday afternoon, and he posted video of the unveiling on YouTube…

In his best-selling book The Harbinger, Rabbi Cahn documented a number of very specific parallels between ancient Israel before it fell and America today, and now he is adding “the harbinger of Baal” to the list.  The following is an excerpt from a WND article that Rabbi Cahn just authored about the unveiling of this arch…

But Israel’s defiance of God was linked to a specific entity – the god Baal. Baal was the god to whom they sacrificed their children, before whom they practiced sexual immorality and called good “evil” and evil “good.” Baal was the god in whose name Israel persecuted the prophets and the righteous of their day.

Baal was their anti-god, their substitute for the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the god of their apostasy and the god of their destruction. Baal was their devil god. In fact the name for satan, Beelzebul and Beelzebub, is derived from Baal – meaning “Baal of the flies” and “Baal of dung.”

So in the template of “The Harbinger,” when the judgment finally fell, when the ancient kingdom of Israel was wiped off the earth, the people were worshiping Baal. In the last days of Israel, when the harbingers appeared, they appeared in a land covered with the images of Baal. It was the worship of Baal that ultimately brought about the harbingers of judgment. Thus Baal was the god of the harbingers.

In his article, Rabbi Cahn also included a stunning photograph from the unveiling of a stone slate that the organizers had placed close to the arch that contained an image of the Temple of Bel (Baal).  This was obviously put there to remind people of the connection that this arch has to that ancient pagan temple.

temple-of-bel-jonathan-cahn

Perhaps it is just a coincidence, but I find it very, very strange that there has been a dramatic outbreak of violence in this country in the week since this arch was put up.

The most recent incident happened over the weekend.  A 20-year-old Turkish immigrant named Arcan Cetin walked into a Macy’s department store in the Seattle area and started firing.  Five innocent people were killed, and this incident immediately made headlines all over America…

Surveillance footage from the mall shows the suspect entering the building late Friday without a weapon but walking into Macy’s 10 minutes later with what appeared to be a hunting rifle. He fired in the makeup area, then fled on foot out of range of cameras.

One of the victims was a 16-year-old girl who beat cancer, the Seattle Times and KOMO-TV reported.

Police say that Cetin was in a “zombie-like state” when he was later caught and arrested, and authorities say that his motivation for the attack is “unclear” at this moment.

But we do know that the Somali immigrant that stabbed nine people at a Macy’s in central Minnesota just a few days earlier was a radical Islamist, and it has been revealed that the man that planted improvised explosive devices in New York had actually attended a Pakistani seminary…

The alleged New Jersey terrorist charged with trying to blow up Chelsea last weekend with homemade bombs spent weeks getting an “Islamic education” at a Pakistani seminary, according to a report.

Ahman Khan Rahami spent three weeks in Kuchlak, an area described as a longtime “hub” for the Taliban, in 2011, a security official inside the country told the Guardian.

Rahami, 28, attended lectures at the Kaan Kuwa Naqshbandi madrasa.

For a very long time I have been warning that we would see a sharp increase in the number of Islamic terror attacks inside the United States, and it is now happening.

I have also been warning that rioting and civil unrest would get a lot worse in our major cities, and what we witnessed in Charlotte over the past week was absolutely chilling.  Stores were looted, objects were being hurled at passing vehicles from overpasses, one news photographer was almost thrown into a roaring fire, and at least 16 police officers were injured.

And of course this is just the latest in a string of riots which has hit our country in recent years.  The following is from a list of these riots that the Daily Caller has compiled…

Charlotte – 2016

Milwaukee – 2016

St. Paul – 2016

Baltimore – 2015

Berkeley – 2014

Ferguson – 2014

Brooklyn – 2013

Anaheim – 2012

Los Angeles – 2012

Los Angeles – 2010

Could it be possible that the violence that we have seen during the past week in Charlotte, New York, New Jersey, Minnesota and the Seattle area has some sort of connection to “the harbinger of Baal” that was just unveiled in New York City?

I am sure that this will be hotly debated by both sides.

But what should be exceedingly clear to all of us is that a spirit of violence is rising in America.  The tensions that are causing riots like we just witnessed in Charlotte continue to intensify, and the growth of radical Islam around the world will continue to motivate jihadists in this country and elsewhere to conduct more terror attacks.

For decades, most of us could just take for granted that we could go about our daily lives in peace without having to worry about some senseless act of violence.  But now that is starting to change in a major way, and “normal life” in America is never going to be the same again.

*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.*

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