Paris - The Capital Of West & Central Africa

Via GEFIRA,

Once France was one of “the great powers”, dominating Europe and parts of the world in terms of culture and economy. The country’s demise started after the Second World War, though it still played a key role in the creation of the European Union and the euro, which was to prevent Germany from subjugating the rest of the continent.

However, this strategy has failed and Berlin has become Europe’s capital, with France’s importance ever dwindling.

France’s population is slowly being substituted for by people from Africa. Renaud Camus calls it the “grand replacement”. Paris, once a European, then a global is slowly turning into an African metropolis. If French elites, whose influence in Europe is fading, want to remain a world power, they can only opt for Africa. Qaddafi, the king of the kings, became a threat to France’s interests on the continent. It were not the Americans that pushed for Qaddafi’s replacement but the French elites.

Although the days of colonialism officially came to an end in the 1960s, Paris has not given up its position of a great power on the Dark Continent.

France controls most of the countries in West and sub-Saharan Africa politically, economically and through a strong military presence.

Gendarme without backbone

France’s current zone of influence in Africa is the result of the policies of President Charles de Gaulle, who was unable to come to terms with his defeats in Indochina (1954) and Algeria (1962) and therefore sought to achieve the dominance of France in his former colonies. After de Gaulle, however, other presidents did not refrain from using military force and violence in Africa to defend their interests, on the pretext of protecting human rights and democracy. The French often achieved the opposite, because they made the same mistakes in their military actions as Americans made elsewhere in the world: they supported people who later became their enemies or violated human rights.  For example, it was the regime of Juvenal Habyariman in Rwanda that was supported by Paris: the French supplied Hutu combat groups with weapons, thus contributing to the Tutsi massacre. Hollande, who in Paris and Europe was perceived as a weakling, showed the face of a warrior and sent heavy units and fighter planes to Mali in 2013. This would not have been necessary if French President Sarkozy and the USA had not overthrown Qaddafi. It was Sarkozy that initiated the NATO led airstrikes against Libya. The removal of Colonel Qaddafi gave rise to the creation of the Caliphate with the help of Tuaregs in the north of Niger and Mali. After a few years since the start of the mission in Mali one wonders: has it made Europe safer? Has the flow of migrants been stopped through Sahel countries? Are the Jihadists of African descent a lesser threat in Europe?

The cost of the military action in Mali in 2013 amounted to 650 million euros. Operation Barkhane (as it is called) continues to this day and costs the French budget €500 million per year. Of course, democracy in Mali is a top priority for most Europeans, right?

A total of 9,000 French soldiers are currently stationed in Chad, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Gabon, the Central African Republic and Djibouti. The growing military presence is intended to support the fight against terrorism and crime, in fact it is about the French elites extending their power to the south, reaching for cheap raw materials and outlet markets.

Common currency – Central African Republic sponsored by Mario Draghi

To preserve power, a sovereign needs not only to have an army but even more so issue a currency. Paris knows about this and uses a currency of its own to preserve its colonial power. It is beneficial for the government and large corporations that it represents: uranium from Niger and Gabon, cocoa from Ivory Coast, peanuts from Senegal, commercial orders for French companies in many different countries of West and Central Africa – some 1,000 French companies operating in francophone Africa generate annual profits of around €52 billion.Such profits would not be possible without the CFA franc. The CFA franc is the official currency in 14 African countries with a total population of 140 million.

Its history can be traced back to the Bretton Woods conference after the Second World War:as in all countries participating in the Bretton Woods system, there was considerable inflation in France. The introduction of a quasi-parallel currency should devalue the real franc and lower inflation in the African countries because the Africans cannot print money at will. Banque de France thus guaranteed the convertibility of the CFA franc into the real French franc for many decades and ensured its devaluation and a fixed exchange rate:

Since the introduction of the euro, the CFA franc has been linked to the common European zone. Still, it is the French treasury that is responsible for its stability and so it is the French tax payers who are held liable.

The monetary union thus transferred the cost of the CFA zone to the French taxpayer. Is it clear to an average French taxpayer that he is not only confronted with the cost of mass-migration and that, apart from the billions in development aid, which is usually wasted anyway, part of his tax goes to Africa? Part of it? Well, how much is that? Those responsible are happy to keep quiet about this. Try to get the information out, it’s like France’s state secret. The Maastricht Treaty provides proof of this: it says nothing about the CFA. Perhaps the French signed the treaty because the financial burden was too heavy for them?

Carrot for African elites, French conglomerates and… migrants

Let us take just one country as an example: Senegal, a popular destination for French presidents. Rolf Heimer wrote:”The devaluation (1994) of the CFA had two aspects: on the one hand, exports of its most important product, peanuts, actually rose in 1994/5, and thus the income of the plantation owners, who belonged to the elite; on the other hand, the majority of the population continued to impoverish, as the higher prices for the fertilizers and pesticides imported from abroad meant much lower income for most small farmers.^"

While devaluation against the franc or the euro makes imports from Europe more expensive, linking the CFA franc to the strong euro reduces the competitiveness of African CFA countries. It favours imports from countries with weaker currencies (e. g. China, Nigeria, India and Thailand). In addition, most of Africa’s exports are calculated in dollars, meaning that the loss is double, since any appreciation of the euro against the dollar worsens the total value of exports. It was particularly clear in the years 2000-2010: the appreciation of the euro put the CFA countries at a disadvantage. The African countries do not form an optimal currency area. It means that the group of countries can be hit by crises that are economically too much asymmetric: one of them can be worse off while others can be booming. There is no coordinated fiscal policy ensuring that capital is transferred from states that are doing well to those that are doing poorly. For example, rises in oil prices can cause immense damage to employment and production capacity in one country, as their central banks cannot cushion the negative effects of changes in nominal exchange rates, while another country may profit from the phenomenon. Even though the CFA guarantees its countries lower inflation and fiscal discipline imposed by the ECB, the question here is whether the cost of the single currency will not outweigh expected profits.

Who profits from it? It is certainly Africa’s upper classes and migrants. Thanks to CFA, the former can buy luxury goods at low prices in Europe and transfer French lifestyle to Africa, while the latter can rely on their homes in Ouagadougou or Dakar to retain their value.

Macron – a man who will change everything?

You must be joking. During his February visit to the former French colony of Algeria, he said:“Colonization is part of French history. It is a crime against humanity, a real barbarity. You have to face that part of the past and apologize for what has been done.” 

From a historical perspective it was a strange remark, because the French conquered Algeria while it was under the Ottoman rule to end Berber slave raids and piracy. Politically, his apologies make sense in that to rule the African continent, the Paris elites should win the hearts and minds of the black “French” peasants.

The Cardinal Sin Of International Finance

Authored by Nick Giambruno via InternationalMan.com,

As Doug Casey has correctly noted, the prime directive of any organism - whether it’s an amoeba or a person or a corporation or a government - is to survive.

That’s why the US government protects the petrodollar so zealously. It needs the system to survive.

Why Everyone Uses the US Dollar… for Now

In the 1970s, the US government struck a series of deals with Saudi Arabia, creating the petrodollar system. The US promised to coddle and protect the Saudi kingdom. And, in exchange, Saudi Arabia would use its dominant position in OPEC to ensure that all oil transactions happened in US dollars.

 

Until recently, virtually anyone who wanted to import oil from any country needed US dollars to pay for it.

 

The dollar is just a middleman here. But countries and businesses use it in countless transactions amounting to trillions of dollars that have nothing to do with US products or services.

 

Plus, if foreign countries are already using dollars for oil, it’s just easier to use the dollar for other international trade. That’s why, in addition to oil sales, the US dollar is used for about 80% of all international transactions.

World leaders who have challenged the petrodollar recently have ended up dead…

Take Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi, for example. Each led a large oil-producing country—Iraq and Libya, respectively. And both tried to sell their oil for something other than US dollars, before US military interventions led to their deaths.

In October 2000, Saddam had started to sell Iraqi oil for euros only. Iraq said it would no longer accept dollars for oil because it did not want to deal “in the currency of the enemy.”

A little over two years later, the US invaded. Immediately after Baghdad fell to US forces, all Iraqi oil sales were switched back to dollars.

Thanks to WikiLeaks’ release of Hillary Clinton’s emails, we know that protecting the petrodollar—not humanitarian concerns—was a primary reason for overthrowing Libya’s Gaddafi.

According to her leaked emails, the US (and France) feared that Gaddafi would use Libya’s vast gold reserves to back a pan-African currency. This gold-backed currency would have been used to buy and sell oil in global markets. Also, it would have likely displaced a version of the French franc that’s used in Central and Western Africa.

The US and France backed a rebellion, both militarily and financially, that overthrew Gaddafi in 2011.

After Gaddafi’s death, plans for the gold-backed currency—along with Libya’s 4.6 million ounces of gold—vanished.

Of course there were other reasons the US toppled Saddam and Gaddafi. But protecting the petrodollar was a serious consideration, at the very least.

Putin Is a Tougher Adversary

The dollar’s special status gives Uncle Sam tremendous leverage. So it’s no surprise that Russia wants to undermine the petrodollar system.

Russian President Vladimir Putin summed it up this way:

Russia shares the BRICS countries’ concerns over the unfairness of the global financial and economic architecture, which does not give due regard to the growing weight of the emerging economies. We are ready to work together with our partners to promote international financial regulation reforms and to overcome the excessive domination of the limited number of reserve currencies.

Essentially, Putin is saying they all want to ditch the dollar.

That’s largely because the US uses the dollar as a political weapon. For example, the US tried to sanction Russia for its actions in Crimea and Ukraine. These sanctions made it harder for Russia to access the US dollar–based financial system. So of course Russia is going to push for an alternative.

Shortly after the sanctions, Russia struck a massive deal to sell oil and gas to China for yuan. The deal totally bypassed the US financial system… and any sanctions.

China’s Permanent Bypass Around the US Dollar

Russia is the world’s largest energy producer. China is the world’s largest energy importer. Normally, they would trade with each other exclusively in US dollars.

But, as I’ve told you in recent weeks, China is now introducing a more permanent way around that.

I call it China’s “Golden Alternative” to the petrodollar. It’s a streamlined way for Russia and everyone else to sell oil to China for yuan—or effectively gold.

China’s “Golden Alternative” to the Petrodollar

China is launching a practical and attractive alternative to the petrodollar system. It will allow anyone in the world to trade oil for gold. It will also totally bypass the US dollar.

 

Here’s how it will work…

 

The Shanghai International Energy Exchange (INE) is introducing a crude oil futures contract denominated in Chinese yuan. It will allow oil producers to sell their oil for yuan.

 

Of course, China knows most oil producers don’t want a large reserve of yuan. So producers will be able to efficiently convert it into physical gold through gold exchanges in Shanghai and Hong Kong.

Bottom line, two of the biggest players in the global energy market are totally bypassing the petrodollar system.

Informed observers say Russia is already converting a large portion of its yuan earnings to gold.

Of course, other countries are interested in sidestepping the US financial system and US sanctions, too. China’s Golden Alternative will give anyone the option to do just that.

This will make the US dollar a much less effective political weapon.

Other countries on Washington’s naughty list are enthusiastically signing up. Iran, another major oil producer, is accepting yuan as payment. So is Venezuela, which has the world’s largest oil reserves.

I think others will soon follow. From the perspective of an oil producer, it’s a no-brainer.

With China’s Golden Alternative, an oil producer can participate in the world’s largest market and try to capture more market share. It can also easily convert and repatriate its proceeds into gold, an international form of money with no political risk.

But this doesn’t apply to one critical holdout… Saudi Arabia.

Twisting the Saudis’ Arm

Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest oil exporter. A lot of that oil goes to China, the world’s largest importer.

Beijing still reluctantly pays for Saudi crude in US dollars. The Saudis won’t have it any other way, at least for now.

This bothers China. It can only import Saudi crude by obtaining and then using US dollars. And that, of course, means it has to stay in Washington’s good graces.

Trump’s Treasury secretary really drove this point home recently. He threatened to kick China out of the US dollar system if it didn’t crack down on North Korea.

China would rather not depend on an adversary like this. This is one of the main reasons it’s launching the Golden Alternative.

Saudi Arabia, however, refuses to participate. It won’t sell its oil in anything but US dollars because that would break its longstanding petrodollar agreement with the US.

When China, Russia, and others trade oil for yuan, it’s a significant blow to the petrodollar. But if Saudi Arabia switched to yuan, it would take out the petrodollar… and cause an immediate financial panic in the US.

The truth is selling oil for yuan would cost Saudi Arabia a whole lot.

It would immediately lose American diplomatic and military protection. Then the media and think tanks would quickly start pounding the table for the US military to force democracy on Riyadh.

Last year Trump said, “If Saudi Arabia was without the cloak of American protection, I don’t think it would be around.”

He’s absolutely correct.

Of course, the Saudis know all of this. So they’ve been on a short leash… until recently.

In a surprise move, Saudi King Salman recently became the first sitting Saudi monarch to ever visit Russia.

Until recently, the visit would have been unthinkable. Saudi Arabia has been one of the US’ closest allies since the petrodollar system started in the 1970s.

Meanwhile, Russia and Saudi Arabia have been enemies for decades. Most recently, the Saudis and Russians have been on opposite sides of the Syrian Civil War.

That’s why King Salman’s historic visit to Moscow is so remarkable. The Saudis are clearly hedging their bets against the US and the petrodollar system.

Saudi Arabia is now drifting closer to Russia.

The Saudis have committed to invest up to $10 billion in various Russian sectors. But, even more significantly, they’ve agreed to buy the S-400 missile system, Russia’s top line air defense system, as part of a $3 billion weapons purchase.

This deal signals a geopolitical earthquake. The Saudis have never bought Russian military equipment before.

Ever since the birth of the petrodollar, the Saudis have depended on American military protection. After all, it’s what they get in return for pricing their oil in dollars.

The S-400 system deal suggests the Saudis are hedging their bets. First, they’re not buying an American system. Second, they’re buying a Russian system that’s capable of deterring an American attack.

Saudi Arabia is making significant moves to give itself alternatives to American protection.

At the same time, China is cutting back on Saudi crude.

A few years ago, Saudi oil made up over 25% of Chinese oil imports. They were Beijing’s No. 1 supplier. Today, the Saudis’ market share has dropped below 15%.

In other words, the Saudis are losing massive market share and getting pushed out of the biggest oil market in the world. This is mainly because they refuse to sell oil to China in yuan.

China has made itself clear. It’s willing to expand business with anyone who will accept yuan as payment.

Today, Russia has overtaken Saudi Arabia as China’s top supplier. Its share of the lucrative Chinese market has grown from 5% to over 15%.

Russia’s enthusiastic acceptance of yuan as payment is the main reason for this shift.

In the meantime, Angola, an African oil producer, has also come on board. The country now accepts yuan as payment for its oil exports to China. It even made the Chinese yuan its second legal currency in 2015.

Chinese imports from Angola have shot up since. It’s now China’s No. 2 supplier, after Russia.

None of this bodes well for the petrodollar system.

The Saudis have two choices… rip up the petrodollar or get shut out of the world’s most lucrative oil market.

One way or another—and probably soon—the Chinese will find a way to compel the Saudis to accept yuan. The sheer size of the Chinese market makes it impossible for Saudi Arabia to ignore China’s demands indefinitely.

What to Watch For…

China might not convince the Saudis to ditch the petrodollar system tomorrow. But it’s making significant progress.

A few months ago, Saudi Arabia announced it was willing to issue Panda bonds to finance its government spending deficit. (Panda bonds are yuan-denominated bonds from non-Chinese issuers that are sold in China.)

This is remarkable. The Saudis’ currency is pegged to the US dollar. Up until this point, they’ve exclusively used US dollars for all of their major financial initiatives.

Issuing debt in yuan—instead of US dollars—is a significant move. It means Saudi Arabia is drifting closer to China.

Also, the Saudis recently inaugurated the massive Yasref refinery in the Saudi city of Yanbu. The refinery is an $8.5 billion joint venture between Saudi Aramco and China’s Sinopec.

These are noticeable steps. But the Saudis still haven’t given China what it really wants—oil for yuan.

However, it could happen soon…

The Largest IPO in History

In the coming months, the Saudis plan to float a 5% stake in Saudi Aramco, the state oil company.

Saudi Aramco is the most valuable company in the world. It will likely be the biggest equity offering ever. It could triple, or even quadruple, Alibaba’s current record initial public offering (IPO) of $25 billion.

The IPO’s success will depend on Saudi Arabia recruiting big cornerstone investors. But so far, Western investors haven’t shown a lot of enthusiasm.

For China, however, it could be the perfect opportunity to buy political influence in Saudi Arabia.

If China bought a large stake in the Aramco IPO, it would help cement its relationship with Saudi Arabia. It would also put more distance between the Saudis and the Americans.

And critically, it would give the Chinese more leverage to compel the Saudis to accept yuan for oil.

China is in the process of negotiating not just a 5% stake, but potentially a larger one.

Bottom line…the Saudis haven’t made a clean break with the US yet. However, they are drifting toward China financially and Russia militarily.

The Saudis are clearly setting up the option to dump the petrodollar.

If the Saudis sell oil to China in yuan, it would kill the petrodollar overnight. However, short of that, things still look very dire for the petrodollar.

The petrodollar system is facing serious erosion, thanks in large part to China’s Golden Alternative. That’s already baked into the cake.

And with that, severe inflation in the US is a certainty.

This will likely be the tipping point…

After the collapse of the petrodollar, the US government will be desperate enough to implement capital controls, people controls, nationalization of retirement savings, and other forms of wealth confiscation.

I urge you to prepare for the economic and sociopolitical fallout while you still can. Expect bigger government, less freedom, shrinking prosperity… and possibly worse.

It’s probably not going to happen tomorrow. But we know where this trend is headed.

It’s possible that one day soon, Americans will wake up to a new reality. Once the petrodollar kicks the bucket and the dollar loses its status as the world’s premier reserve currency, you will have few, if any, options.

The sad truth is, most people have no idea how bad things could get, let alone how to prepare…

Yet there are straightforward steps you can start taking today to protect your savings and yourself from the financial and sociopolitical effects of the collapse of the petrodollar.

We recently released a special Guide to Surviving and Thriving During an Economic Collapse. Click here to download the PDF now.

Mission Creep In Darkest Africa

Authored by Eric Margolis via Orinetal Review,

The British Empire, which at the end of the 19^th century ruled one quarter of the earth’s land surface, is long gone. But its robust successor and heir, the United States, has set about enlarging it.

As I sought to explain in my last book ‘American Raj – How the US Rules the Muslim World,’ the US imperium exerts its power by controlling tame, compliant regimes around the world and their economies. They are called ‘allies’ but, in fact, should be more accurately termed satrapies or vassal states. Many states are happy to be prosperous US vassals, others less so.

The US power system has successfully dominated much of the world, except of course for great powers China, Russia and India. Germany and much of Western Europe remains in thrall to post WWII US power. The same applies to Canada, Latin America, Australia, and parts of SE Asia.

There is one part of the globe that has remained free from heavy US influence since 1945, sub-Saharan Africa. But this fact is clearly changing as the US military expands its operations the width and breadth of the Dark Continent.

We are seeing a rerun of the fine old 1930’s film, ‘Beau Geste’ which was taken from a cracking good 1924 Victorian novel by C. Percival Wren. Set in French North Africa, Wren’s dashing French Legionnaires end up defending a remote fort against masses of hostile Arab and Berber tribesman.

The novel and film negatively shaped western attitudes to the Arab world and its peoples but glorified the French Foreign Legion. Wren claimed to have been a member of the Legion which was the primary enforcement arm of France’s African colonial empire.

The famed Legion, which fought from Mexico to Indochina, has now shrunken to a pitiful 8,000 men. France’s thread-bare finances proved a deadlier enemy than Saharan horsemen.

Even so, the Legion is still used by Paris for sudden shock interventions across West Africa to support client French regimes and punish those who challenge the status quo. I’ve lifted  a glass with many Legionnaires. They are an amazingly tough bunch: you never know whether they are going to kill you or buy you drinks.

US troops have now stepped into the boots of ‘La Legion.’ Almost unnoticed, US Special Forces – our version of the Legion – have been slipping into Africa, the newest and most exciting market for the Pentagon.

Creation of the new US Africa Command in 2007, with headquarters in Germany, was discreet but it signaled active US military and geopolitical interest in resource-rich Africa, a key target of Chinese interest. No one in Washington seems to know how many US troops operate in Africa, but it’s at least 12,000 not counting mercenary contractors and CIA units. There was consternation in Congress when these facts emerged last week.

The key US base in Africa is at Djibouti, a poxy, fly-blown French colony on the Red Sea that is also shared by the Legion and, curiously, a Chinese naval station. US forces in Djibouti operate into Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia and Central Africa. US forces in West Africa operate in Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Liberia, Uganda, and anywhere that pro-US regimes are under pressure. Mali and Chad, where nomadic tribes battle the central government, are key operating regions. Both are under nasty dictatorial regimes backed by Washington.

As in the British Empire, the ‘natives’ are kept under control by small numbers of skilled Western troops. There’s no need for big battalions of regulars. The key is western air power and intelligence. Particularly so in often barren sub-Saharan West Africa where French and US warplanes patrol the skies. `We have the Maxim gun (machine gun) and they have not’ wrote a Victorian poet. Nothing much has changed.

France’s previous president, Francois Hollande, charged into a local tribal squabble in Mali, a key uranium supplier, between black town dwellers and nomadic Tuareg and assorted Islamists. Unable to afford the spreading war, France asked for US help and got it. The bitterly anti-Muslim Trump administration could not miss a chance to attack Muslims in West Africa under the banner of ‘anti-terrorism.’

A ‘terrorist’ in this case is anyone who challenges the western-dominated political order, from Malian nomads to Central African Republic rebels. In the brutal dictatorial regimes of former French West Africa the only effective opposition comes from groups calling themselves Islamic. This pulls the chain of the Trump administration and its Christian fundamentalist allies at home who seek to uproot fast-spreading Islam from Africa.

So off the US military charges into Africa, with little understanding of the region and even less strategic planning. It’s Vietnam-style ‘mission creep’ all over again.

Washington is still trying to figure out what happened to Herzegovina in the Balkans while it plunges into darkest West Africa. That’s why Trump and French president Emmanuel Macron are so chummy these days.

Who"s "Winning" In Africa?

Authored by Brian Cloughley via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

On October 4 in Niger in central Africa four American special forces soldiers were killed in an ambush by “fifty fighters, thought to be associated with ISIS [Islamic State], a US official said.” In the course of the attack, one US soldier was left behind when the others withdrew, and was subsequently found dead. Nigerien soldiers were also killed, and it is interesting to examine how US media outlets recorded this aspect of what was obviously a disaster for US Africa Command, AFRICOM, the organisation headquartered, bizarrely, in Germany, that has 46 military bases (that we know of) in that continent. (Niger, incidentally, is twice the size of Texas.)

ABC News reported that “a soldier from Niger also died from the attack” while CBS thought that “four Nigerien soldiers died,” and Stars and Stripes went with “several.” CNN’s tally was five but the New York Times didn"t mention Nigerien soldiers at all. Fox News, surprisingly, said that four were killed, as did the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times, which even expanded to record that there had been eight Nigerien soldiers wounded.

It isn’t to be expected that the US media would ever concern themselves with deep research into how many foreign soldiers are killed in any of the countries in which the US is involved in armed conflict, but the sloppy reporting is a good indicator of the shrug factor.

And the western media continues to shrug about the deep involvement of the US military and the CIA in countries throughout Africa.

President Donald Trump claims he would win an IQ contest against his Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson (how bizarre and nationally demeaning that a President of the United States of America can stoop to such childish yah boo behaviour), but it’s a fair bet he would not be able to identify on a blank map of Africa the countries in which his armed forces are at present engaged in various degrees of conflict. As recorded by Alexis Okeowo in the New Yorker, “Publicly, Africa may not be on the radar of the Trump Administration, but it is a priority for the US military. At the moment, seventeen hundred members of the Special Forces and other military personnel are undertaking ninety-six missions in twenty-one countries, and the details of most are unknown to Americans.”

It is intriguing that the US military - the Pentagon - so rarely informs the public of their global operations, yet much of the world knows about them down to the last detail. For example, it’s obvious that the Taliban in Afghanistan are well aware of all the crash-and-bash US special forces assaults in villages, because they have become more expert in avoiding them and then concentrating on defeating the weak, corrupt, and increasingly ineffectual Afghan armed forces. Not only that, but they reap massive propaganda benefit from publicising the fact that the wham-bam kick-the-doors-down infidels have once again struck a blow for Islamic State recruiting efforts. In Africa, it’s much the same game, with no publicity until that becomes unavoidable because there has been a major disaster involving the deaths of US soldiers. (Mere injuries are never mentioned, but some reporters keep an eye on casevac [casualty evacuation] flights arriving for attention of the caring saints at the US military hospital in Landstuhl in Germany. The numbers are interesting.)

The United States military and the CIA have a large presence in Africa and, as recorded by Nick Turse in April, “A set of previously secret documents, obtained by TomDispatch via the Freedom of Information Act, offers clear evidence of a remarkable, far-ranging, and expanding network of outposts strung across the continent . . . AFRICOM lists 36 US outposts scattered across 24 African countries.”

According to the Pentagon “US forces are in Niger to provide training and security assistance to the Nigerien Armed Forces, including support for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance efforts, in their efforts to target violent extremist organizations in the region.” In fact, as CNN reports, “There are about 800 US troops in Niger and the US military has maintained a presence in the northwest African country for five years, with small groups of US Special Operations Forces advising local troops as they battle terrorist groups, including, Islamic State in Greater Sahara, the ISIS-affiliated Boko Haram and al Qaeda"s North African branch, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.” The place is a war zone, and citizens of the US and Europe have little idea about what’s going on in their names — and at their expense in cash, international credibility and growing distrust and hatred of the West.

Mind you, it’s unlikely that very many Chinese citizens are aware of the deep involvement of their country in the African continent, either. But the difference between ephemeral US policy and long-term Chinese strategy is that Washington seeks domination, while China seeks trade and gradual influence and trust.

While attending the UN General Assembly in September President Trump addressed the leaders of several African nations at lunch. He didn’t mention drones or Special Forces or CIA interrogation cells but made clear his enthusiasm for their countries by declaring that “Africa has tremendous business potential, I have so many friends going to your countries trying to get rich. I congratulate you, they’re spending a lot of money. It has tremendous business potential, representing huge amounts of different markets. It’s really become a place they have to go, that they want to go.”

It’s a pity he hadn’t read the Financial Times in June, when it sagely pointed out that in Africa “In the past 15 years the level of engagement by Chinese state-owned enterprises, political leaders, diplomats and entrepreneurs has put centuries of previous contact in the shade... While Europeans and Americans view Africa as a troubling source of instability, migration and terrorism — and, of course, precious minerals — China sees opportunity. Africa has oil, copper, cobalt and iron ore. It has markets for Chinese manufacturers and construction companies. And, perhaps least understood, it is a promising vehicle for Chinese geopolitical influence.”

Trump doesn’t read the FT or any other source of balanced information, but gets his news and forms his opinions from US television channels, which suits the military-industrial complex very well, as it can count on being unhindered by the White House as it expands its counter-productive military operations across the continent.

Not that China has avoided Africa militarily. Not at all. The United Nations records that China has some 2,600 troops in Africa — all of them firmly under command of UN peacekeeping missions in Congo, Liberia, Mali, Sudan and South Sudan. (The US contributes a total of 48 military personnel and 19 police to worldwide peacekeeping.) The duties of Trump’s soldiers in Africa are, in the words of their chief, General Thomas Waldhauser, to conduct “joint operations, protection of US personnel and facilities, crisis response, and security cooperation.”

General Waldhauser considers that “Just as the US pursues strategic interests in Africa, international competitors, including China and Russia, are doing the same. Whether with trade, natural resource exploitation, or weapons sales, we continue to see international competitors engage with African partners in a manner contrary to the international norms of transparency and good governance. These competitors weaken our African partners’ ability to govern and will ultimately hinder Africa’s long-term stability and economic growth, and they will also undermine and diminish US influence — a message we must continue to share with our partners.”

But the US doesn’t have any genuine partners in Africa. On the other hand, China has created many. As noted by Forbes, “In December 2015, President Xi Jinping ushered in a new era of ‘real win-win cooperation’ between China and Africa. This strategy aims to create mutual prosperity, allowing investors to ‘do good while doing right.’ China has backed this proposal up with a commitment of $60 billion of new investment in major capital projects, which are tied to developing local economic capacity. This level of commitment contrasts starkly with the action, or lack thereof from the West.”

The message is clear. The US military-industrial complex has overtaken and indeed supplanted State Department diplomacy in Africa, as elsewhere in the world, and is intent on escalating its military presence while China is quietly winning friends and influencing people by engaging in massive, well-planned economic projects. No prizes for deducing who is winning in Africa.

A Complete History Of John McCain Calling For War Around The World

Authored by Jim Carey via GeopoliticsAlert.com,

Earlier this week notorious war hawk US Senator John McCain (R-Az) was diagnosed with brain cancer. While the liberal and conservative establishments are sending their regards, Geopolitics Alert instead compiled a list of reasons why we don’t care about McCain.

The list is of course a history of all the instances McCain has called for US-led intervention around the world. There’s obviously a long history here, so Geopolitics Alert has compiled the largest examples from Europe to Asia. We’ll start with the obvious wars first.

Afghanistan and Iraq

Obviously every US senator (besides California’s Barbara Lee) voted to give president George W. Bush the power to invade Afghanistan following the events of September 11th. However, McCain wasn’t happy with just moving to invade Afghanistan. No, he had other targets on his mind as early as the day after the towers fell.

Despite McCain’s claim in 2014 that “the Iraq war probably wouldn’t have happened” if he had won the 2000 Republican primary and then general election, this assertion seems ridiculous. On September 12th 2001, McCain appeared on MSNBC presenting a long list of countries he felt were providing a “safe harbor” to groups like al Qaeda. This list of course included Iraq and several other countries that appear later on this list.

Syria

Another country on that 2001 list (of course) was Syria. Now, the Bush regime may have never gotten a chance to continue toppling Mideast countries (thanks to the failure in Iraq and the exposure of that war being sold on lies). But McCain seemingly never lost sight of his hatred for Bashar Al-Assad.

Shortly after the Arab Spring “broke out” in Syria, McCain – and his constant partner in war crimes Sen. Lindsey Graham – quickly found communication channels with the “Syrian opposition.” Just a few short months after the US endorsed protests in Syria (even having their ambassador attend), McCain and Graham began calling for arms to start flowing to the Free Syrian Army and other “rebel” groups.

Libya

McCain’s plans for Syria never quite worked the way he wanted but he probably should’ve know they would never yield a positive result. If McCain didn’t want to look at Iraq to prove that point, he had another more recent example he could’ve used: the NATO intervention in Libya.

It was less than a year before McCain wanted to arm Syrian takfiris that he had supported with the bombing and no fly zones in Libya. McCain even wanted tougher actions against the country. Which has now become an anarchic Wild West that’s home to all sorts of horrors from the Islamic State to a new slave trade.

West and Central Africa

McCain is also a champion of the “war on terror” in other parts of Africa. While McCain hasn’t directly supported terrorists in some countries in Africa, he still has called for more US intervention across the continent.

This list includes countries dealing with Islamic insurgencies, such as Mali. McCain has also called for plans like “deploying Special Forces” to rescue girls kidnapped by Boko Haram in Nigeria and intervention in Sudan, where McCain and his wife have invested money for some time. 

Iran

Another country on the list of hated nations originally put forth by Bush undersecretary of defense Paul Wolfowitz, and also another long time target of McCain, is of course Iran.

Although McCain has always said “he prays” there will never be at war with Iran, the man constantly calls for it and even jokes about bombing the country when he feels the mood is right. The truth of the matter is, McCain’s positions towards Iran are so hostile that even flagship neoconservative institutions like the Cato Institute think he is too hawkish.

Bosnia and Kosovo

But McCain isn’t satisfied with just backing salafi jihadists in the traditional Middle East and North African theaters. He’s also backed violent radicals across the fringes of Europe. This trend really started in the mid 1990’s when McCain was a vocal supporter of then president Bill Clinton’s war in Bosnia.

Many of the Muslims traveling to Bosnia joining the mujahideen there have joined groups like IS in recent years. And IS flags can occasionally be seen in the Sunni areas of Bosnia now. McCain was still backing potential takfiri movements, recently accusing Russia of interfering in local affairs, and calling for more US intervention in the country.

McCain made similar decisions when he advocated US intervention in Kosovo in the late 90’s. In the Kosovo conflict, McCain backed the Kosovo Liberation Army: a genocidal jihadist organization with ties to Al Qaeda under Osama Bin Laden.

Ukraine

Don’t be fooled into thinking that McCain only supports jihadists in Eastern Europe though! He also backs the overt Nazis acting as death squads for Kiev in the ongoing Ukrainian conflict.

This of course started in 2014, but McCain has continued to pledge support for Kiev’s crimes in the Donbass region to this day. This is all par for the course in McCain’s larger theme of challenging Russia– the country he believes controls the separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Russia

The story of McCain’s hatred of Russia spans back to the Cold War. We won’t get into McCain’s fear of communism that’s evolved into just general Russophobia. But we will say he didn’t have many excuses to focus on making threats towards Moscow for a good 15-20 year stretch.

This changed in 2008, with the war in South Ossetia between Georgia and Russia. During this conflict McCain was the loudest voice saying the US “should immediately call a meeting of the North Atlantic Council to assess Georgia’s security and review measures NATO can take to contribute to stabilizing this very dangerous situation.”

This same situation repeated in Ukraine in 2014 but McCain’s worst comments came this year. As soon as the US Intelligence Community’s accused Russia of interference in the 2016 US elections– and without any evidence– McCain was first to say the event was an “act of war.”

North Korea

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DRPK/North Korea) was also an early target of McCain’s making his September 12th wish list. More recently though, the restyled “Trump opponent” McCain was all-in on the new regime’s saber rattling. Calling on Trump to strike the nuclear armed country.

Bonus: China

China is kind of in its own class with McCain, who’s made strange vague threats towards the country in the past. Such as “the Arab spring is coming to China,” whatever that means. China may be a target on the periphery for McCain but he does still encourage antagonizing the country to this day. Calling for things like more “freedom of navigation drills” and other naval exercises in the South China Sea.

*  *  *

So, in summation, next time someone asks why you don’t care about John McCain’s clock running out, show them this article. McCain has encouraged the spread of death worldwide. The day he leaves congress will be a victory for the human race.

Paul Craig Roberts Asks "Are Americans Racists?"

Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

“Racist” is the favorite epithet of the left. Every white person (except leftists) is a racist by definition. As we are defined as racists based on our skin color, I am puzzled why we are called racists a second, third, and fourth time due to specific acts, such as favoring the enforcement of immigration laws. For example, President Donald Trump says he is going to enforce the immigration laws. For the left this is proof that Trump has put on the White Sheet and joined the KKK.

The left doesn’t say what a president is who does not enforce the laws on the books. But let’s look at this from the standpoint of the immigration laws themselves. In 1965 a bill passed by the “racist” Congress and signed by the “racist” President Lyndon Johnson completely changed the racial composition of US legal immigration.

In 1960 75% of US legal immigration was European, 5% was Asian, and 19% was from Americas (Mexico, Central and South America and Caribbean Islands).

In 2013 10% of legal immigrants were European, 30% were Asian, 55% were from Americas, and 5% from Africa.

The 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act is a very strange law for racists to have enacted. Would racists pass a law, which has been on the books for 52 years, that fundamentally transformed the racial profile of the US by limiting white immigration, thereby ultimately consigning whites to minority status?

We could say the racists did not know what they were doing, or thought they were doing something else. However, the results have been obvious at least since 1980, and the law is still on the books.

We live during a time when there is an abundance of information, but facts seldom seem to inform opinions. The left delights in branding the Founding Fathers racists. The left was ecstatic when a 1998 DNA study concluded that Thomas Jefferson was one of eight possible ancestors of Eston Hemings, a descent of Jefferson’s slave Sally Hemings. The left seized on the implied sexual relationship as proof of Thomas Jefferson’s racism.

Let’s assume Jefferson had a sexual relationship with Sally Hemings. Does this prove he was a racist, or does it prove the opposite? Why is it a sign of racism for a white to have sex with a black? Does this prove that James Bond was a racist in the film “Die Another Day”? Do we really want to define racially mixed marriages as racist, as a white conquest over a black, Asian, or Hispanic?

The left has declared the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to be racist documents and, therefore, proof that the US was founded on racism. The left is particularly incensed that the Constitution counts enslaved blacks as three-fifths of a white person. Is the three-fifths clause a sign or racism, or was it a compromise to get an agreement on representation in the House of Representatives?

It was the latter. Indeed southerners, such as James Madison and Edmund Randolph, wanted blacks to be counted one to one with whites. It was northerners, such as Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, who wanted blacks to count as fractions of a person. Why was this?

The issue was whether the North or the South would have majority representation in the House. The country already had different economic interests which came to conflict in the War of Southern Secession, which is mischaracterized as a civil war. (A civil war is when two sides fight for control of the government. The Confederacy was not fighting for control of the government in Washington. The South was fighting to secede from the union in order to avoid economic exploitation.)

The southern states were agricultural, and from early colonial times long before there was a United States or a Confederate States of America the absence of a work force meant that the agricultural labor force was imported as slaves. For the South slavery was an inherited institution, and from the South’s standpoint, if blacks were not included in the population on which US representation in Congress would be based, the South would have a minority voice in Congress and would not agree to the Constitution. The three-fifths clause was a compromise in order to move the Constitution toward agreement. It had nothing to do with racism. It was about achieving balance in regional representation in Congress. 

The Southern Secession resulted from divergent economic interests and was not fought over slavery. In former times when the left had real intellects, such as Charles A. Beard, a historian who stressed class conflict and a founder of the New School for Social Research and president of both the American Political Science Association and the American Historical Association, the left understood the divergence of interests between northern industry and southern agriculture. Those who think Lincoln invaded the South in order to free slaves need to read Thomas DiLorenzo’s books on Lincoln. DiLorenzo establishes beyond all doubt that Lincoln invaded the Confederacy in order to preserve the Union, that is, the American Empire, which has continued its growth into the 21st century.

The preponderance of war correspondence on both sides shows that few were fighting for or against slavery. According to the 1860 US census, slave owners were a small fraction of the Southern population.  The Confederate Army consisted almost entirely of non-slave owners who fought because they were invaded by Union armies.

The large agricultural interests (slave owners) had the money necessary for raising armies and were represented in the governing bodies. So naturally, their interests would be represented in the articles of secession.

As the war began with Lincoln’s invasion of the South, we should look to see Lincoln’s explanation for the war. The reason he gave repeatedly was to preserve the Union. Most historians understood this until “racism” became the explanation of all white history and institutions.

As for Thomas Jefferson, he was opposed to slavery, but he understood that the agricultural South was trapped in slavery. The “discovery” of the New World provided lands for exploitation but no labor force. The first slaves were white prisoners, but whites could not survive the malaria. Native Indians were tried, but they were not only as susceptible to malaria as whites but also used their native knowledge of the terrain to resist those who would enslave them. Blacks became the work force of choice because of genetic superiority in resistance to malaria. As Charles C. Mann reports in his book, 1493, “About 97 percent of the people in West and Central Africa are Duffy negative, and hence immune to vivax malaria.”

Thus, the real “racist” reason that blacks became the labor force was their survivability rate due to genetic superiority from their immunity to malaria, not white racists determined to oppress blacks for racial reasons.

The myth has taken hold that black slavery originated in white attitudes of racial superiority. In fact, as a large numbers of historians have documented, including Charles C. Mann and the socialist economic historian Karl Polanyi, brother of my Oxford University professor, the physical chemist and philosopher Michael Polanyi, black slavery originated and flourished in Africa where tribes fought one another for slaves. The victorious would market their captives to Arabs and eventually as time passed to Europeans for transport to the new world to fill the vacuum of a missing labor force. (See for example, Karl Polanyi, Dahomey and the Slave Trade.)

It is a mystery how the myth of Thomas Jefferson’s alleged racism and love for slavery survives his drafts of the Declaration of Independence. One of Jefferson’s drafts that was abandoned in compromise over the document includes this in Jefferson’s list of King George’s offenses:

“he has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it’s most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. this piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce: and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, & murdering the people upon whom he also obtruded them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another.”

Jefferson’s attack on King George sounds like the left’s racist attack on Jefferson.

It is amazing how proud some Americans are of their ignorance and how quick they are to hate based on their ignorance. In America the level of public discourse is so far below the gutter level that a person who ventures forth to tell the truth can expect to be met with violent hatred and every epithet in the book. Criticize ever so slightly the Israeli government’s theft of Palestine, and the Israel Lobby will immediately brand you an “anti-semite,” that is, a hater of Jews who wants to send them to the gas chamber. If you don’t denounce whites, especially Southern whites, as racists, you are not only a racist but also a member of the KKK who wants to lynch blacks.

Yes, I know. It works also in the other direction. If you don’t hate the left, you are one of them. Because I criticized the George W. Bush regime for its war crimes, conservatives branded me a “pinko-liberal-commie” and ceased to publish my columns.

Hardly anyone, even southerners, understands that racism in the South originated in the horrors that were inflicted on the South during the Reconstruction era that followed the military defeat of the Confederacy. The North inflicted blacks on southerners in ways that harmed prospects for relations between the races and gave rise to the KKK as a resistance movement. As Reconstruction faded, so did the KKK. It was later revived as a shadow of its former self by poor whites who were ambitious for personal power.

The question remains: How can President Trump or anyone unite a country in which historical understanding is buried in myths, lies, and the teaching of hate?

Try to imagine the expressions of hatred and the denunciations that this factual article will bring to me.

If we care about humanity and the creatures on Earth, our task is to find and to speak the truth. That is what I endeavor to do.

When the left abandoned Marxism and the working class, the left died. It has no doctrine to sustain itself, just hatreds based on historical ignorance and misunderstanding of the limits within which life is lived. Humans are not superheros or magicians who can reconstruct humanity by waving a wand or smashing evil. Everyone lives within limitations, and the many submit more than do the few.

It is the few who fight against the limits to whom we owe the defense of our humanity.

It is the haters who are the barriers to moral and social progress.

Policy Makers - Like Generals - Are Busy Fighting The Last War

Submitted by Chris Hamilton via Econimica blog,

The Maginot Line formed France"s main line of defense on its German facing border from Belgium in the North to Switzerland in the South.  It was constructed during the 1930s, with the trench-based warfare of World War One still firmly in the minds of the French generals.  The Maginot Line was an absolute success...as the Germans never seriously attempted to attack it"s interconnected series of underground fortresses.  But the days of static warfare were over – in 1940, the Germans simply drove around the line through Holland and then Belgium.  Had the Germans replayed WWI and made a direct attack, the Maginot Line likely would have done its job.  But Hitler wasn"t interested in a WWI re-do, so the fortifications were quickly rendered moot.  France, Europe, and the world would pay the price for generals fighting the last war rather than adjusting to the contemporary risks they faced.

In 2008, the economic generals at the various central banks likewise pulled out the playbook to refight the great depression... not realizing, this time was an entirely different opponent.  Federal governments and central bankers presumed doing what they had always done would again win the day.  Cut interest rates (this time to zero) to incent both public and private entities to refinance existing debt loads and undertake new, greater leverage.  This nearly free money would reduce debt service levels and the new loans would ignite a new wave of economic activity in the form of capital expenditures and small business creation.  Economic multipliers and velocity would ensure general prosperity with job and wage growth.  Instead, it"s the "Maginot Line" all over again for our economic generals as economic activity grinds to a stall absent the illusory asset bubbles.

BTW - if you are not a fan of charts or visual representations...this is not the article for you and likely best to stop here.

What changed?

1- The Global Population of Young (Future Consumer Base) Ceased Growing...30 Years Ago.

For hundreds if not thousands of years, global population growth rose at an annual rate of about 0.2% to 0.4%.  Somewhere in the 19th century, the pace of population growth began rising significantly faster and headed to a global rate never seen before and likely never to be seen again.  The rate of population growth peaked around 1970 and has precipitously fallen off since.  However, despite the collapse in the rate of population growth, the total population has continued to rise due to the existing population living decades longer than the previous generation (chart below).

The worlds population ceased growing in about 1988...since that time the world is only growing older.  Below, global births per five year periods plus UN medium and low estimates.  The double peak from "85-->"90 and again "10-->"15 is clear and as for the future, the reality will be somewhere between the medium and low estimates, but flat to declining births will be the order of the day.

So it only figures, if you tracked the population of young (0-4yr/old total annual population...chart below) that they would essentially cease growing.  The population growth party was over...and it ended almost 30 years ago.

2- The Worlds Population is Still Growing Due to a Surge in the Elderly Living Longer and High African Birthrates Offsetting Global Depopulation of Young

If there was no increase in the global number of births or the population of young...how did the world grow so much?  The old living so much longer.  The chart below shows the two ends of the life spectrum...the global populations of 0-4yr/olds vs. the 75+yr/olds.  Both populations grew rapidly until "90...but since "90, the 75+ population has nearly doubled while the population of young isn"t budging.  And by 2050, the population of elderly will surpass the population of young...undoing what was a 10:1 ratio in 1950.

Why is this a bad thing (economically)?  65+yr/olds consume at about 70% of the rate they did during their peak working years.  By the time they are 75+yrs/old their consumption drops to about 50% to 60% of what it was during peak working years.  They are credit averse, preparing for (or on) fixed incomes, and napping is one of their favorite activities and it doesn"t cost a thing.

3- Global Depopulation of young (excluding Africa)

The chart below highlights global births per five year periods ex-Africa plus UN estimates for medium and low future births.  Again, the reality will likely split the UN estimates but a clear peak in the late "80"s and huge deceleration of births since is undeniable.

The surging births in Africa plus medium and low UN future estimates.  But sadly, absent income, without savings, without access to credit, and the world awash in overcapacity as it is...this population growth in Africa has no avenue to export themselves to prosperity or greater consumption.  They are simply economically going to remain poor beyond belief and will not be capable of driving any significant economic activity.

Excluding Africa, births from the remainder of the world are collapsing since the late 1980"s peak.  And according to the UN"s best guestimates, births will only continue trending down world over (excluding Africa).  Fewer births means fewer consumers, declining need for housing, commodities, and nearly everything else as this smaller population works it way through from the bottom up (also known as deflation or depopulation).

What people struggle to understand is that our present system is all about growth and it is the population growth of .05% or 1% which drives economic activity magnitudes larger. This relatively small population growth % drives huge spending on infrastructure, home building, factories, supply chains, etc.  The differing impact of 1% or 0.1% population growth is felt far beyond a 1% or .1% economic growth...more like 10x"s that impact.

But population growth isn"t slowing across the board.  It is the huge population declines of the young among the combined wealthy 35 OECD nations (list of members HERE), China, Russia, & Brazil vs. the still growing but decelerating RoW (rest of the world...but really Africa).  So, the 0-4yr/old combined OECD, China, Russia, and Brazil population peaked in 1991 and has steadily declined since, now down over <-22%>.  The combined 0-4yr/old population growth among the relatively poor RoW was barely able to offset the declines of the relatively wealthy developed since "91 (chart below).

High fertility rates and population growth in Africa are solely offsetting the contracting populations of young across the remainder of the world.  The chart below highlights global fertility rates for 2016....where the global population growth is coming from.  In two words, Central Africa.

Those highlighted in yellow, orange, red, and magenta (indicating nations that, on average, have 3 to 6+ children per female) are almost entirely located in Africa.   Uganda, Somalia, Burundi all have birthrates near 6 children per female and the most populous African nation, Nigeria (approaching 200 million citizens), has a birthrate of 5.1.  Officially, 2.1 children per female is zero growth and the global fertility rate has fallen over 50% from it"s 1964 peak of 5.1 to 2.4 as of 2016...and all indications point to further declines.

Declining populations of young across the world has been made up for by growing populations of young in Africa.  Something tells me, economically, this is not a good trade.

Below, GDP per capita or purchasing power parity (PPP).  Countries with low PPP in red (Central Africa), moderate in green, high in blue, and very high in magenta.  Most global commodities and exports cost the same worldwide...so those with high PPP"s (and particularly those with relatively easy access to credit) can consume far more than those with low PPP"s.  The bulk of nations highlighted in red (particularly in Africa) have PPP"s below $2000 a year...(and as low as $400/yr).  Nations with annual PPP"s of $2000 are generally in-line with the GDP per capita of Haiti...their consumptive capability is equivalent to about 5% of US GDP per capita.

How the worlds population is distributed, by global regions (chart below).  Africa represents about 15% of the worlds population but at least 100%+ of population growth.

Below, net 2016 fertility rates as per those regions.  Shortly, all regions will likely be negative...except Africa.

Below, world population excluding Africa...further broken down by the under 45 and over 45yr/old populations.

Global 0-44yr/old population, excluding Africa (chart below).  This is the child bearing population...as their total number shrinks compounded by collapsing birth rates, a far larger population decline could be in store than anticipated.

Global 45+yr/old population, excluding Africa.  This is how the world is growing...by growing older (chart below).

Global 0-44 vs 45+yr/old population change, per 5yr periods (chart below).  No, the world is coming to the rescue...if the world is seen through a lens excluding Africa, the 0-45yr/old population growth is essentially over.  The population capable of bearing children has chosen not to...and is now itself declining in size.  The global economy will never be the same.

2017 is the last sliver of light for the nations that collectively consume 70% of global oil and represent about 80% of all global import markets.  The combined 0-64yr/old population of the 35 OECD nations plus China, Russia, and Brazil grows just one million persons in 2017 or 0.1% (chart below).  After that, the declines begin, slowly at first but picking up speed to the downside every year.  What was an influx of up to 30 million new consumers annually with the income, savings, and access to credit will now be a declining consumer base for the rest of our lives.

The reason Japan and Germany were able to maintain their economies once their own internal 0-64yr/old consumer bases were declining was an emphasis on exports to a still growing export market.  Looking at the annual population growth of the 0-64yr/old importer nations (OECD, China, Russia, Brazil), the chart below highlights when, in turn, major nations / trading blocks 0-64yr/old populations turned negative.  We see that the final support for global consumption, China, turns negative this year.  As you see below, that pool of seemingly endless demand for import growth goes dry this year.

So, what about the US?  The data that represents the US economy, charted out with a minimum of opinion.  You decide what it means.

US Population growth & Makeup of that Growth -

The change, per five year periods, of the 0-44yr/old population vs. the 45+yr/old population (chart below).  The UN medium population growth estimate is included through 2050 (the 45+ estimate is a lock but the 0-44 is highly optimistic and slowing birthrates almost surely means there will be significantly less 0-44yr/old growth than indicated).

Total US Debt & US Full Time Jobs - The change, per period, of net full time job growth vs. total debt growth (private and public...chart below).

US Energy Consumption - Total consumption and fossil fuel consumption since 1950 in the chart below.

Consumption change, per period in the below chart.  Fairly self explanatory that growth of energy consumption ended and we are now contracting.  Whether a shift from industrial to service economy, whether through higher efficiency, or a hundred other possible explanations for why...the declines are not debatable.

Energy consumption, by type of energy (chart below).

Change in energy consumption, by type per period.

Mortgage rates vs. Mortgage debt - Interestingly, lower FFR"s and mortgage rates did not incent more debt since 2007 (chart below).

Mortgage rates and mortgage debt, change per period (chart below).

From 1970 to 1981, as mortgage rates increased by 300%, mortgage debt increased by $1.2 trillion dollars (even unadjusted for inflation, this was a hug sum of money).  This was a 350% increase in outstanding mortgage debt while the cost of funding these loans rocketed higher.  However, since 2008, mortgage debt has fallen by a half trillion dollars despite a 50% decrease in rates.

Breakdown of America"s Core

Finally, the cleanest and clearest point of breakdown was the end of population and employment growth among the 25-54yr/old population.  This is the bedrock and foundation upon which the nations economy resides.  As this group goes, eventually so goes America.

The change in each, by period.

Let"s not be naïve and pretend the bill isn"t coming...employed 25-54yr/olds, this ones on you.  America played credit card roulette and you lost.  America"s federal debt split evenly among you is now $202,000...up from $100,000 in "07, $57,000 in "00, and $20,000 in 1980.  I hope you have been saving up because your real median household income is $57,000, slightly less than the $58,000 it was in 2000 and not much more than the $45,000 it was in 1980.

Unfortunately, we won"t find more growth in our future...population growth continues to be meager (and this assumes current rates of immigration plus an upturn in birth rates (premised on economic recovery)...if current patterns persist or worsen, perhaps all growth is gone).

Conclusion: 

Helicopter money, inflation, reflation, etc. are all premised on the idea that the economic slowdown is a temporary feature and that if the business cycle can just be restarted, things will be like they "always were".  However, what I"m showing is things will never again be like they were...at least not in our lifetimes.  In fact, aggregate economic growth should no longer be the goal and attempts to maintain the current unsustainable status quo are only further harming us.

It"s long overdue to acknowledge we face a future absent net growth and likely a future with fewer consumers, fewer homebuyers, fewer taxpayers, fewer employees.  We face a battle where higher productivity leads to ever more being done by ever fewer people...and it only follows that the declining population with even faster declines in employment will consume less.  If we aren"t thoughtful, honest, and creative in how we adapt to this new reality...terrible consequences could await us.