I think investment banks got scared to report on the rollercoaster in rates last week because they knew that some new Fed speaker would have already caused a new ruckus by the time anything cleared their compliance departments.
Last week, the president of the St. Louis Fed said he supports raising interest rates by a full percentage point by the start of July, including the first half-point hike since 2000. "I was already more hawkish but I have pulled up dramatically what I think the committee should do," James Bullard said.
According to Moody’s Analytics Inc, the typical U.S. household is spending an additional $276 a month year over year on goods and services because of rising inflation. The last time inflation was at the current level, Olivia Newton-John's Physical topped music charts (which was just one indicator of how weird things got in the 1980’s). You can thank higher food, electric and housing costs for the throwback.
Notably, even The White House commented that it would be appropriate for The Fed to recalibrate its support for the economy. This sounds to me a lot like Trump-ish "meddling" with the independence of The Fed; it’s being interpreted by many as a clear message to Jerome Powell that it's ok to crash the economy in order to slow inflation.
In last week’s utterly fantastic statement from The White House, the president blamed the pandemic and then told some giant lies about wages: “While today’s report is elevated, forecasters continue to project inflation easing substantially by the end of 2022. And fortunately we saw positive real wage growth last month (lie), and moderation in auto prices (lie), which have made up about a quarter of headline inflation over the last year.”
The President went on to say that he has lots of tools and that he empathizes with “real stress at the kitchen table.”
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That is soooo rich. Look, let’s discuss one person who’s not having any stress at the kitchen table: Hunter Biden.
At some point or another, I’d like to see someone from the mainstream media point out that going to war in Ukraine would not be in our nation’s best interests. Joe Biden has proven to be as bad a liar as Donald Trump, and I just don’t understand why more questions about the Biden family’s history in Ukraine aren’t being asked.
Let’s look at a timeline of Hunter Biden’s time working for Kiev-based Burisma. Hunter served on the Burisma board from April 2014 until April 2019, and this is what was happening in his life at that time:
February 2014 — discharged from Navy for cocaine use
June 2015 — Beau Biden’s funeral
July 2015 — checks in to Caron Treatment Centers
August 2015 — his name is among those leaked in Ashley Madison data breach
October 2015 — Kathleen Biden files for divorce
February 2016 — checks in to Kolmac Outpatient Recovery Center
August 2016 — begins dating his dead brother’s widow
October 2016 — checks in to Grace Grove
January 2018 — gets stripper pregnant
It’s pretty clear from this timeline that Hunter Biden was a total fiending addict for the entire time he worked at Burisma. Remember, this is the guy who once wrecked a rental car, got a new one, then returned it with drugs, a crack pipe and his dead brother’s Attorney General badge on the dash before he ran off to another hotel with his brother’s widow. There is absolutely no way he had any time to do any work-- apparently, the only thing he had time for was tracking down his dope man— and he definitely wouldn’t have had the capacity to earn even a portion of his $1 million a year salary from Burisma.
I don’t really care about Hunter Biden, though. I think the daddy hook-ups provided to him over the years indicate that the President is corrupt as all get out, but that not’s the point. It just seems like we should try to figure out what’s going on with Ukraine before people start dying and oil hits $150 a barrel.
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