However, now the outer wall has been penetrated, defense against the epidemic is at the second stage – social distancing. The disease caused by the virus arrives 1-2 weeks after infection. Russia is a few weeks behind Western Europe in the epidemic, so social distancing now, can prevent the flood in cases that we see in Western Europe.

This was always a given. How on earth do you wall off the world’s biggest country? And one that borders China at that.

Russiagate is psychotherapy for Biden voting Baby Boomer generation. It slowly dawns on them how badly they screwed up the USA (current financial crisis that is ravaging their public pension funds and 401k’s is just one manifestation), and they need a deflection, an external enemy to blame, and a place to escape and relieve their younger days when they were still cool.

1970’s doesn’t work (the whole Vietnam and inflation thing), so last time Boomers were cool was in the 1980’s fighting Evil Red Russians. Thus they are LARPing Red Dawn on Twitter, it makes them feel better. Unfortunately, it’s like catnip to them, so I dont think US Russia relations will improve in the near to medium term due to this domestic political issue.

Does Russian dead woman actually count? Vzglyad did a follow up, her artery ruptured rather than lung fluid did her in.

https://m.vz.ru/news/2020/3/19/1029707.html

Looks like Russian officials decided against registering her as virus caused death.

https://m.vz.ru/news/2020/3/19/1029755.html

I might be naïve, but I think I know why there are so few Corona cases in Russia. I think that the reason is because the virus has extreme dislike for non-democracies. After all, we are talking about the 21st century virus, who has seen the world, not some backward 14 century stupid European plague virus.

This virus knows that it will receive better treatment by the “democracies” – that’s why it’s headed their way. I mean look at the treatment it got in China. Is that a way to treat a modern virus? It was totally disrespectful and brutal.

I don’t blame the virus for wanting to migrate to the west, if I was a virus – I would have similar urges. I think that the virus should definitely expect a better treatment in the west – they probably have already set up a multicultural milieu so the poor virus won’t feel isolated, but rather establish instant camaraderie with the other multicultural viruses in the west.

It boils down to pension funds vs pensioners. If stock markets are not up soon, whatever old people are not killed by the virus would need to be run over with tanks on the streets once their pension checks stop arriving.

That said, UBI and fund bailout would have been a smarter way to go – printing money for this is easy. As it stands, anybody going to work would need to resolve to not contact anybody over 60 years old. not sure this is an option for many people.

Also, there will not be a sharp recovery after this, at least not without massive money money printing for the consumer ($5 trillion or more allocated for UBI). Service economies are like buying haircuts. If you experience hardship and have to go without haircut for 6 months, once your fortune improves, you will not go out and buy six haircuts you missed out on – you will only buy one. This will be a problem for GDP recovery. While workers or capital are not very important in modern economy, consumption must be sustained at all costs. No consumer = no economy.

What will be American debt to GDP ratio by the end of this year? Does anyone in US care anymore? They’ll have significantly smaller economy and trillions of new debt.

No. Money is just a digital token that can be created (and destroyed) in any quantity required. Worrying about debt is like worrying about gold in your World of Warcraft account – you can if it makes you feel good, but it is not necessary. All this concern trolling about balanced budgets and the deficit is a show to make capital exporters feel good while they transfer their goods and services to the US. But really, capital exporters have no choice – US military is there to ensure that their debts are denominated in USD, and so is their trade.

Infinite amounts of debt can be financed at 0% or negative interest rates. People say American banks won’t allow negative rates because it will kill them. That is true. This is a battle we will need to win when we get there – Goldman Sachs and Friends vs Federal Government. It will be tricky since Goldman Sachs and Friends own Federal Government, but there won’t be a choice really. Big banks will need to be automated and nationalized. Given prevalence of algorithmic trading, we are mostly there already.

Dollars, society, economy are all mental constructs, they don’t really exist. In that way toilet paper is different, it is tangible, it exists.

We live in a mental world that we create and psychological rules apply: once we create something and get used to it, it cannot be discarded at will. In that way ‘dollars’ are safe, people see them as ‘money’ and we can’t comprehend a world without money. Thus we can’t comprehend a world without dollars unless something else steps up to replace it (not gold for god’s sake).

People hoard valuables in times of crisis – they will hoard dollars. Why not? What exactly would be an alternative?

This can go on for a lot longer than people think. First off, while reserve currency is not really needed today (we have this thing called Internet now where relative values of currency pairs can be tracked in real time without the need for 3rd party intermediate such as USD), foreign people can’t let go of the concept, and they want USD. This will continue for some time, and as such, they will need USD regardless of US domestic policy. US is an Empire, and as such, the rest of the world economies will burn before US economy is really threatened. Like Beckow said, it may not be a physical need, but a psychological need nevertheless.

More fundamentally though, hyperinflation generally requires three things:

1. External shock (Weimar – reparations to allies, Zimbabwe – IMF loan repayment, Venezuela – sanctions, post Soviet Russia – former Soviet republics dumping rubles and establishing their own currencies)

2. Supply chain collapse (Weimar – loss of German Empire and industrial districts, Zimbabwe – replacement of competent white farmers with incompetent blacks, Venezuela – foolish factory nationalizations and failure to invest in oil company maintenance, Russia – new borders cutting off goods flow and government failure to support markets).

3. Worker wages going up. If toilet paper costs a wheelbarrow of money, some consumer must have a wheelbarrow of money to set this price.

How does this play out in the US:

1. This is what US military is for. Good luck demanding any real payment (gold, net exports, etc) from the US. Not happening, and if you keep insisting, you will get a good doze of democracy bombed into you.

2. Barring Civil War, supply chain collapse is not realistic either. Ironically, US is a service economy, haircuts do not require complex supply chains, so even a Civil War will have minimal impact on haircut prices.

3. US wages have gone nowhere in the past 20 years, and will continue to stagnate due to automation. When Hair Salon lady demands $1,000,000/hr in wages, she will be replaced with $20 buzz cut clippers working for 2 cents worth of electricity. Robots don’t care about money, and their cost is approaching near zero. Commodities are also dirt cheap. This is why hyperinflation is impossible in a modern economy. Technology is massively deflationary.

TLDR: despite USD being printed by the $trillions, hyperinflation is impossible in modern service economy due to robots not caring about currencies. Robots are free because you can simply borrow as much money as needed to buy them. Zero or negative rates take care of repayment. Absent external shocks (nuclear war blowing up automated factories), the future is deflation, and to achieve GDP growth, wage increases can not be counted on. Therefore, direct payments to consumers are required or Depression results.

You had my attention until you mentioned American military. The notion that people could be intimidated by this paper tiger to buy US debt is preposterous, absurd. 😂

While our friendly leadership is utterly incompetent at policy level, US military still packs tremendous amount of firepower that hurts badly. Of course, you need policy to translate firepower into victory, hence US predicament, but do not confuse stupidity for inability to hurt people.

“Dollar is the true foundation of American power and prosperity, destroying the value of dollar will make US irrelevant overnight.”

Dollar, like all fiat currencies, has no value. Hence this value can’t be destroyed – can’t destroy something that doesn’t exist. I mean, what is the value of a kilogram? The concept doesn’t even make sense. Metric system has tremendous value (universal measurement system reduces transaction costs), but kilogram in abstract has no value – there’s an infinite amount of abstract kilograms out there. They are worth nothing. Same with dollar. Dollars are infinite, but as long as they fulfill the psychological need of foreign people for universal accounting system, dollar will reign supreme.

If you think I’m wrong about automation, you are welcome to try and invest in manned mall stores here in US – plenty of retail space available as they are going bust. My bet would be on Amazon and their automated warehouses though.

Automation already eliminated most jobs, if you define a job as activity that generates value. The world is $255 trillion in debt. Whatever it is we are doing when we “work”, we are clearly not generating value. Robots are a lot better at it than we are already.

Automation already eliminated most jobs, if you define a job as activity that generates value. The world is $255 trillion in debt. Whatever it is we are doing when we “work”, we are clearly not generating value. Robots are a lot better at it than we are already.

I wonder how you define “value”. I suppose it must ultimately be defined in terms of “who, whom”.

In which case, perhaps we should focus on who “who” and “whom” might be and how it is that they get to define what is valuable – or why they are excluded from such decisions.

And then perhaps we might drag some of that old rope out of the toolshed.

To financial institutions that produce loans with a few key strokes. They count those loans as assets but they aren’t really – they are just future claims on labor.

It is inherently unjust that some people can create money with few keystrokes, and use that to claim other people’s lives. To ameliorate, basic income comes closest to at least partially addressing the problem.

Possible but unlikely – there isn’t really a scarcity as such, except shortage of consumers. I mean, energy is dirt cheap (electricity is $0.1/kwh oil is $20-30, gas is under $2), commodities are dirt cheap, and even money is dirt cheap but only for the rich.

Western corporations can borrow at 0% or negative rates, but instead of creating consumers through wages and building factories, they use that money to pump up their bosses digital wallets.

If corporate sector doesn’t want to create new consumer, then government need to step up. Consumption must go up, or GDP will fail to grow, with tragic results.

Well, that’s a bit harsh.

First man made object to arrive on the Moon was a Soviet probe, so in that sense, USSR beat Americans to the Moon.

Soviet manned program was poorly thought out (they basically tried to to find employment for an obsolete nuclear bomb booster rocket, not so much send a man there), but the idea of sending people there was not really scientifically necessary (which is why Americans stopped as well).

Soviet robotic Moon exploration program was far cheaper and far more successful. Lunokhod drove around and conducted scientific observations, and sample return missions were done without the need for humans.

In terms of scientific value and cost/benefit analysis, Soviet moon program wasn’t too bad compared to American one.

I agree,

And ierestingly enough as of this year:

“Boeing is buying Russian-made power converters for its new Starliner manned capsule programme, the company’s space division has confirmed”

https://www.spacedaily.com/m/reports/Boeing_buying_Russian_components_for_Starliner_999.html

Seems the old Sovok tech’s not so bad after all.

🙂

If you want to see cool Russian/Soviet space tech, look up Psyche mission by NASA. It will take off in a year or two and will study Psyche – metallic asteroid, in order to better understand planet formation. It also happens to be of immense value to people contemplating asteroid mining.

Spacecraft is being built by University of Arizona, and propulsion on it is SPT140 – Hall Effect (magnetic plasma) thruster, made by Russian Fakel.

For where the future is , TEM (транспортно энергетический модуль) is very interesting – a nuclear electric space tug. I really wish Roscosmos would prioritize that technical development.

If Putler reads this blog, he needs to squeeze Rogozin so that he stops wasting time and money on the same old orbital booster variants, and funds awesome groundbreaking technology such as nuclear electric instead.

Russia has the best plasma drives on the planet, and extensive space nuclear power experience. Combining the two technologies is an obvious direction to take.

I remember being in a night train between Piter and Moskva in 1994 and having as company a couple of guys from some closed down NII that lamented the demise of Soviet science.

One of them told us that they developed plasma thrusters where he worked.

He said that they had working proof of concept prototypes.

He said that it was absolutely unique and revolutionary.

He was more than bitter that his lab closed down.

Nice to know that a similar technology is finally being used.

Maybe it’s based on the device my passenger companion was talking about.

Not sure the dude survived the blessed 90ies though…

US shale has never been competitive, and there have never been any effective cost containment measures. The industry has never made any money, not with oil at $100, or $20. They are hundreds of $billions in debt and blowing up US junk bond market as we speak.

After the price crash of 2014, they simply found more idiots to throw money at them. Those idiots are now going bankrupt. Oh sure, there may be a well in the Permian that may have a $20 break even if you squint at it just right and commit slightly less than usual amount of accounting fraud. And there are also people who win a lottery. Doesn’t represent average lottery player outcome though.

Buying lottery tickets is still better than buying shale plays though – much better chances of seeing your money back. Shale will not die fast – they drilled and capped a lot of unprofitable wells, and creditors will force the drillers to open those up to recover at least some cash flow, but those wells will shoot their wad in two years. After that, shale will need new wells, and you would have to be delusional to commission new projects on the patch even if oil goes to $100.

The most favorable Shale oil plays in TX/OK have been highly profitable with a break even at $15-20/bbl. Light sweet crude, near transport and storage. No squinting or accounting trickery needed. This was genuinely easy money before bottlenecks appeared.

Right, lottery winners. And even that is flawed, because it doesn’t account the need for reinvestment and capital burn required for it. Shale oil as a whole has never generated positive cash flow. Top lottery winners (like top 10% of the companies) have only been able to generate cash by culling capital investment. This works for about two years, after that time your best prized wells run out of oil and you need to drill again. And given depletion rates, you pretty much need to drill constantly to maintain output. There are accounting gimmicks you can do to to postpone the inevitable (long term debt vs short term etc), but in the end, unless shale production is nationally subsidized, it is not worth it.

Right. There are some shares of Whiting Petroleum for sale now, I hear. Sound business, if you believe that get them while they are hot.

FYI, my information is about shale oil, not gas. Gas is even worse.

I think Italy simply got overwhelmed. And Chinese were able to mobilize, and were successful.

There is a lot of anti Chinese propaganda in US right now, how their hospitals are falling apart, how their masks are defective etc. And I’m sure it is true but Western propagandists miss the point. It doesn’t matter if Chinese hospital falls apart after two weeks in operation. What matters is that they built it in a week to handle overflow of patients during the worst of the epidemic, and it did the job. After the worst is over, it doesn’t matter if it is still standing, it is no longer needed.

Same with supplies and such. I’m sure there was a million defective masks or whatever, but its out of 500 million or so that they made , so again, its not really critical. Mobilization does not need to be perfect, it just needs to be massive. And Chinese being totalitarian know how to do massive.

And why now? After all, those events took place more than three years ago.

Because Mueller indictments of St Petersburg troll farm went bust recently, and State Department can’t use “evil sneaky SPb trolls corrupting innocent foreigners” meme without embarrassing themselves. So the State Dept had to invent “evil sneaky SPb Imperial Terrorists corrupting innocent foreigners” meme.

There is this organization in UK called Integrity Initiative. The basic goal is to kill tourism to Russia as part of the plan to isolate the country and make it easier to demonize. State Department is part of the same game – it is much easier to brainwash the peons about how evil and sneaky Russia is if they have never actually been there. Gods forbid regular people go to Russia and see it as a normal country with normal people and have a great time (like during World Cup) – this can’t be allowed.

This is relatively successful too – when I went to St Petersburg three months ago to renew my Russian passport, everybody pretty much staged my funeral in the US – i was to be kidnapped by KGB agents and fed to bears. Even my grandmother in Kirov region was against me going. You know it’s bad when they get grandma in the provinces. The only person who was like “you mad? Hardly ever see a bear in St Pete these days” was my dad. And it ended up as a pretty awesome trip. Almost no bears.

Anyway, expect more hysterical stories about evil SPb terrorists in Western media. They booted Russia from Tokyo Olympics, but Corona Chan blessed that event so nobody cares. By the time Olympics happen, Russia may win arbitration, and that makes our Integrity Initiative friends sad. So they need another tourist horror story to hound Russia with.

Which faction will benefit?

The “money printer goes brrr!” faction of course. Whoever prints the most will print the best. US will hit $30 trillion in debt years ahead of schedule, and US debt to GDP ratio will be a thing of beauty.

At that point, it won’t be about virus anymore – finance charges on debt alone will cause difficulties for Federal Government budget. Repayment in real terms will become mathematically impossible. Inflation, even hyperinflation, will be seen as a desirable goal rather than a threat. US was able to inflate away WW2 era debts before, but this time demographics and technology will cause deflationary pressure to prevail. Inflation is impossible in sufficiently automated service economy with declining demographics.

When US enters deflationary spiral in the face of $100’s trillions of debts, we will finally do a monetary reform, and hopefully eliminate the parasitic finance sector and focus our efforts on something more productive. My favorite is space program, leftists want to focus on Green stuff, which is less critical i think, but still better than what we have now.

Future is looking bright for “money printer goes brr!” faction. 🙂

Because Mueller indictments of St Petersburg troll farm went bust recently

Few people seem to know, but what Mueller engaged in is called prosecutorial misconduct in American law. It is a crime. Do you think the criminal will be punished? That’s right, no way. You do not get punished for crimes committed in service of Deep State. You get punished for perfectly legal actions against Deep State (remember Assange?). This is called the rule of law, in case you are wondering.

M4A will have no effect on US defense spending or US military bases. US has no shortage of dollars just like US has no shortage of kilograms.

US defense spending will increase, and US military bases will be enlarged. Specific example – Trumps’ Space Force has began a rollout of Starlink military network being built by SpaceX. This system will be comprised of 1000’s and potentially 10,000’s of command and control satellites around the globe. Construction and deployment of automated assets managed by this network is expected to make a significant contribution to US GDP.

My apologies if i wasn’t clear.

I think you meant $34 trillion over 10 years. True, it looks like a lot of money, but it is actually a bit less than what US will spend under current system.

No, taxes will not go up. People will make a lot of noise and certain tax rates may go up, but taxes (as in actual revenues to the government) will not go up (Hauser’s Law). US Fed Gov revenue is always 18% GDP (14-20% range, extremes are self leveling as high tax take booms lead to recession busts), doesn’t matter what the rates are.

Yes, M4A will add to the deficit just like everything else in that $24 trillion pile. This will force interest rates down. If banks make their stand at 0% Rubicon, Federal Reserve will monetize this just like they have monetized $5-6 trillion in securities currently. My preference would be to nationalize the Fed and Primary Dealer banks, and drive rates negative, but even if this is not adopted, Federal Reserve monetization will make any large scale government program viable.

US defense spending is projected to fall as a %GDP to 2.5% from about 3.2%. I doubt this will happen – GDP will decline this year making defense larger as a percentage, and defense contractors need business (Boeing bailouts etc). Also, US will likely start another war somewhere, if history is any guide.

US military bases will be upgraded and expanded – they are not going anywhere, even if defense spending is lower in %GDP terms.

If annual government expenditure increases by $3 trillion+ to pay for m4a, how will it be possible to cover it without a large tax increase (government revenue as a percentage of GDP)?

Easy – just like US treasury funds current $trillion deficit. Treasury issues debt of various duration (bonds, bills, notes), and “investors” (major banks and financial institutions) buy it on the open market. Then they turn around and sell those bonds, bills, notes to Federal Reserve at markup for a nice profit. It is so easy, a trained dog could do it. There is a matter of finance charges (interest on debt is one of the largest Federal Government expenditures at the moment), but conveniently, by law Federal Reserve is required to remit all profits (such as Treasury interest) back to the Treasury. This is a problem that solves itself. For debt held outside Federal Reserve, 0% or negative interest rates are a solution.

Basically, you will see debt to GDP ratio going through the roof rather than tax increases.

We are speculating about the medium and long term so for this discussion let’s assume that m4a passes in the early 2020s. Defense spending as a percentage of GDP falls to 2.5% in 2025. Will this not affect the ability of the US military to project power globally?

Nope. Defense spending is always increasing (in raw numbers). What makes it shrink in %GDP term is idealistic assumptions about GDP growth – people thought US economy was going to do great. Well, we are entering Great Depression II, GDP is going to tank. So each dollar of defense spending will be greater in weight relative to GDP ($1 in defense from $100 GDP is 1%, if GDP tanks 50%, that same $1 will become 2% of GDP, but not because defense spending got more funds).

Will Great Depression II affect the ability of US military to project power globally? Unlikely, far more likely it will strengthen it. We are looking at up to 30% unemployment. This means weapons factories will be running full capacity just so people have jobs. Likewise military recruiters – the Army loves unemployment and poverty. Everybody knows US got out of Great Depression by taking part in World War II. Temptation will be strong to take a chance on World War III. Expect more wars.

If in 2025, defense spending falls as a percentage of GDP from 2018, do you think US military bases will probably expand?

If we are still stuck at 10-20% unemployment by 2025, and World War III is chosen as a means to boost GDP similar to WWII scenario, you bet US military bases will probably expand.

A chair in Victoria Nuland’s and Robert Kagans’ living room. (I do not think they have children? If so, such cross breeding project had failed like so many of their policies).

Unemployment spike will, in the short-term, produce large pools of native labor that can be hired to upgrade infrastructure and public works. Forward-thinking states should take advantage of this

Theoretically plausible but it will take time. First off, unlike 1930’s where you just gave shovels to people, modern construction and infrastructure works are done by specialists with heavy machinery. That requires a lot less people per project. More importantly though, people getting unemployed the most are bartenders and Starbucks baristas and such. I wouldn’t trust them with with cement mixers and power lines or whatever without training. That will take time.

This is why I support Basic Income over lefts’ Green New Deal vision – there is nothing wrong with what they want – everybody likes cleaner air and water and soil. But I am skeptical of their ability to rally office plankton to rush out and change broken wind turbine blade off shore on Lake Michigan in the middle of January.

Not saying office plankton is dumb or incapable, but it would require a bit of a mindset change. And you can’t really force it.

The idea is to cancel all other welfare payments and to liquidate the bureaucracy handling welfare, since the U in UBI makes it trivial to administer: every Liegekey receives an automatic payment.

I don’t believe most governments are that benevolent that they would pay a “Living Wage” to everyone in the country by default as some sort of compensation for automation putting millions of people out of work.

Then those governments will collapse or commit national suicide and fade into irrelevance (see Japan, the biggest worthless losers on the planet, with South Korea being a close competitor).

People can rant about welfare leeches and masturbate about “muh productivity” all they want, but the reality is, we live in a consumption based economy driven by credit growth, aka digits in a spreadsheet. We must have credit growth or bad things happen (unemployment skyrockets and pensions go bust). Even if you view yourself as productive worker, the only reason you are alive is because you are collecting spreadsheet digits from unproductive ones. If spreadsheet digits stop moving, economy dies, and productive workers get fired just like everybody else. It is irrelevant where those digits come from, private banks or government, as long as they keep coming.

We are currently bailing out corporate sector again, but if corporates don’t find customers soon, it will do nothing – they will fire the workers again which will crush demand, and depression will result. Corporate sector is too dumb, greedy, and irresponsible to manage fake digits on a computer. So government must step in.

You don’t want to be Japan. They are famed for crazy work hours, but at 300%+ debt to GDP ratio their national balance sheet is worse than a homeless bum in California who never held a job in his life. Their stock and bond markets are on the way to full nationalization. They haven’t even been an exporting powerhouse since Fukushima. If that’s your plan – amass countless $trillions of debt, you can do this on a beach sipping a margarita rather than hiding in office cubicle 20 hours a day. Much healthier this way.

Based on their fertility rates, Japanese use work to hide from their wives. Which is understandable, but it literally kills their consumer base. With 300,000 net population loss, that is like a Hiroshima bomb going off in Japanese shopping malls every year, and people wonder why Japanese economy fails to grow. You can’t grow economy if you are dead. Dead don’t care to buy stuff.

This is the future that awaits us all. It needs to be avoided. If doorknobs could buy cheeseburgers and haircuts, i would advocate Basic Income for doorknobs. It doesn’t matter as long as it grows credit and consumption.

Height and build difference.

If you want to know more relationship between men and women, go to a farm and watch a herd of cows. Bulls fight, cows throw themselves at the biggest one, with the juiciest patch of grass. Losers don’t fare too well with the ladies, even though they are available and willing. That is literally all you need to know.

Africa itself will do great. They are very tribal, so if “youths” start acting up over there like they do in Sweden (throwing grenades etc), then the tribe of the victim will get together and take the “youths” down. If “youths” don’t get the message, their own tribe will get massacred in retribution.

Russia also does well with tribal management. In Chechya, Kadyrov represents the sensible tribes. The less sensible tribes have to deal with Kadyrov at their own peril and expense.

I would recommend Europe to brush up on their tribal management skills, and place less sensible tribes in cheaper housing so it is easier to rebuild when it burns down.

ATM? Yes, I see a green juicy patch of grass already 🙂

I’ve heard that there’s hard data that indicates that women’s standards have dropped.

This is more likely due to #MeToo than economic insecurity. Men have become much less aggressive in their advances, not sure of what is currently acceptable behavior and afraid to cross the line. Hence, lowered standards by their targets.

Does the master have children? From the evolutionary perspective, in the medium term, the winner is whoever is still around a few centuries from now in the form of genetic lineage. In the long term, both the master and the bull will evolve into something unrecognizable, and the question is moot. Such is the game of life.

It is a debate I had with my vegan relatives. They want to end animal suffering, and call for people to stop eating meat. Fair enough. However, if demand for meat collapses, farmers will slaughter their herds, it will be a complete genocide, baby cows, everything. Yeah, that will end their suffering, but I’m not sure cows will be happy about it. Is genocide to end suffering a moral angle here?

I don’t do the whole jew thing, but yeah, they are overrepresented in the finance sector. That said, it is a financial sector organization that is the problem, if somebody else replaced the jews in finance, that would still be a problem.

Well, look at a very bright side of this – non stop demonization of Russia and China will make it easier to sell World War 3 to the American public. Purely coincidentally I’m sure.

Trump will lose the election (Republican Presidents historically don’t do well when unemployment is 10-40%), and we will get President Joe Biden.

Getting Biden to launch the nukes is a simple matter of convincing him that the red button orders pizza with extra mushrooms. At the rate he is declining, by 2022 there will be a YouTube Challenge “Get Joe Biden to nuke something”. It will be definitely interesting to see how it all plays out.

Well, if you take Western propaganda at face value, Putin personally exterminated dinosaurs, poisoned Socrates, crucified Christ, burnt Giordano Bruno, shot Kennedy (both, I guess), elected Trump, caused Brexit, and launched current epidemic. That’s not counting his minor sins, like solar and lunar eclipses. God almighty can only envy this man.

Our friendly overlords will need a scapegoat, and Trump is a perfect one. When people start asking questions such as why they are living in a tent while oligarchs got $trillions in free money, the answer will be Trump/Putin. People who believed past Russiagate nonsense will happily swallow this too.

US just had 22+ million job losses, and once those people stop buying stuff due to loss of incomes and credit, it will cull the rest of the economy too.

Even if the virus disappears tomorrow, we will be lucky to get half of those jobs back. Millions living in tents by election is not out of the realm of possibility.

The thing is shouldn’t Putin really push for the destruction of America? It is very clear that America wants Russia destroyed, that being the case Putin should do everything in his power to destroy his enemy first.

While endsieg cannot be declared without at least the break-up of America into its constituent nations, Russia isn’t really being forced into war at the moment (while existing sanctions will probably continue indefinitely, barring some geopolitical explosion, no more significant sanctions are likely to be put on) and America is becoming increasingly partisan and disunited.

The consequences of this are not only for the home audience however. The talk and the growing hostility with Russia (and China, Iran, North Korea, Syria, etc) is going to end up causing a real conflict.

From a Russian perspective, why should they make themselves the main adversary when there are so many other quicksands for America to get stuck in?

A “DJ Soros” might actually be an amusing feature at, say, a Halloween dance party. After all they do say he bathes in children’s blood, or something to that effect.

Modify a vampire costume, add a bottle of “baby oil” filled with red alcoholic beverage of your choice. Have your significant other dress as Bank of England (sexy secretary plus top hat and a monocle ought to do the trick), and you are good for triggering SJWs on college campuses.

Both of those people are losers. The only two passports worth having are American and Russian. If you have the ability, always count nuclear warheads when picking travel documents.

American passport will open many doors, and if you anger American government and need to do a Snowden, Russia is the place to go (don’t be Assange).

Unlimited printing press benefits of the US are worth it though. US will always have a more dynamic economy relative to vassals such as Europe and Japan. As long as they use USD they will pay a tax in real capital costs. Same for China and Russia and others.

Russia is the only large developed economy that doesn’t rely on infinite money printing for development. It diminishes GDP growth numbers, but if money printing is misused in US, I have Russian passport because Russia will be more stable in the long run.

Ксюнечка Кузнецова will be featured in front page New York Times article about evil Putler poisoning Russian children.

Nothing is worse than a nagging Sovok soccer mom with control issues. This is why Russian men drink so much.

The future of warfare is orbital class booster dropping rocks of various shape and mass upon the targets of choice. This method allows for custom payload delivery anywhere on the planet, and energies attainable exceed what is available from mere thermonuclear weapons (also, unlike nukes, rocks don’t have non-proliferation legal issues). If necessary, asteroid redirect may not be a fast mission, but it can resurface a continent of choice. Once in space refueling and refit operations are established, fuel and ammunition become free, and intercepts of payloads and boosters difficult.

As far as Turks go, they got their behinds beaten by SAA and Hezbollah in Saraqib. Their drones caused casualties of 70 year old tanks but were not decisive in the end, and SAA ended up opening strategic roads they needed, which was impressive because SAA is usually not very competent. Casualties are sad, but achieving objectives is what ultimately wins wars.

Thinking about Norway, too, but at least they did their homework for many decades to prepare for such a moment as this via their massive (proportionally) SWF, in a way that Russia simply failed to do.

Norwegians lost $124 billion last month because they are silly vassals whose only purpose in life is to prop up American and European stock markets.

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-health-coronavirus-norway-swf/hedge-fund-manager-to-lead-norway-sovereign-fund-after-124-billion-loss-idUSKBN21D0S8

In contrast, Russia invests their $560 billion in forex reserves in gold and highly liquid securities which are ideal for current environment, and therefore limited the losses to $5-10 billion.

Norwegians are the incompetent ones here, not the Russians. I think the even the Saudis didn’t do so bad compared to Norway.

It will last longer than Monday, there is no place to put the oil and it takes months to curb the pumping volumes of oil wells.

I have a suggestion that would benefit everyone: pile up the stuff in front of Greta’s house and start a huge bonfire. No storage costs, great visuals, corona fizzles out in the heat, and she gets really angry. What’s not to like?

That’s simply the stonk market, which goes up and down. The long-term track record of stonks is second to none.

True, unless you have to sell into the downturn. The 1930’s were rough on stock owners, at least in the US. I wish Norwegian people all the best with their new “London based hedge fund manager”.

Norway as something like -200% negative net debt. That is an insane claim on the rest of the world in terms of assets. Private wealth is sky-high, too. Unlike Germany, which is reasonably low government debt but has low private wealth.

It is good that Norway has lower 36% Debt to GDP ratio. Not as good as Russia’s 15% though. I would caution when counting assets though, because paper asset is a claim and not a real object. In US for example, total debt is $75 trillion or so, and total assets (wealth) are counted as ~$130 trillion. It looks great until you realize what the composition is. Setting aside real estate ($33 trillion worth of McMansions and shopping malls), US only has $7 trillion worth of real assets (factories, pipelines, roads, equipment, etc), and $91 trillion of “financial” assets which is simply the debt of other people that they can (and will) refuse to pay for one reason or another. This is why “the richest country in the world” has trouble with making masks or whatever. Those financial assets are not real. This is also why leftists are wrong about taxing the rich – taking worthless papers and imaginary digits from the “rich” will not improve the welfare of ordinary people. And this is why we must print imaginary digits to support the price of other imaginary digits at all costs – it is the only thing keeping the US economy going.

Russia has certainly been prudent over the past half-decade. I cannot find much fault there. The problem is that you need to be prudent over decades to do well in the biggest economic shock since the 1930s. A half-decade isn’t enough. You also have to take into account that there are 5.5 million people in Norway and 145 million in Russia. So Norway’s SWF simply covers a lot more than Russia’s on a per-person basis.

That is true. Before Putin, the last competent leader Russia had was Tzar Alexander II.

“Russia has sufficent ammunition to cover their immediate needs for the next few years, if we assume $25 per barrel. But if oil gets stuck at $15 then suddenly that safety margin gets incredibly squeezed. More omniously, what will Russia do if very cheap oil is the new normal? Shifting an economic model is easier said than done. Given their frozen relations with the West and China’s de facto mercantilism, who will buy their subpar industrial goods? They failed to get rich for the last 200 years. Why would This Time Be Different?”

Russia has been shifting their economic model for the past 20 years, and successfully so. Oil exports are only ~7% of GDP and 35% of budget revenue. First off, Russia can abolish 13% flat tax and go to progressive tax system like the rest of developed world, and running budget deficit is not the end of the world. If oil went to $0 forever, losing 7% GDP would hurt, but nothing Russia isn’t used to. More realistically, if oil is stuck at $10, Russia will revalue ruble to 100, this will boot agricultural, industrial, and services exports. Russian goods are not subpar, they simply lack dealer networks for post sales service. Those are not impossible to develop. As for being rich, lol! West and China print debt to play “rich”like there is no tomorrow. No debt, no “rich”. Russians have different, more conservative philosophy.

Taking a step back, I wouldn’t be surprised if the world has permanently peaked in oil usage. Electric car sales are only going to beat new records, because even with cheap oil, there are increasing carbon taxes coupled with hard ceilings introduced to phase out fossil fuel cars. EU and China are the leaders here, but India is fast playing catch-up. Individual US states like California are also moving in this direction.

This is true. Age of oil is coming to an end. Cheap natural gas and nuclear power will be in high demand to make all those green solar panels and electric cars and windmills. Russian Power Siberia into China will see heavy use. Rosatom will be happy as well. It is all good.

I agree about Saudi Arabia and the rest of your post.

NOBODY is talking about how KJU just got btfo after a heart surgery and perhaps will die?

It appears that CNN is continuing their track record of being 100% wrong. (1)

“There is nothing unusual going on in North Korea. It’s not true,” a Seoul government official told Yonhap on Tuesday. Yonhap also got a spokesman for President Moon Jae-in, Kang Min-seok, on the record to deny the report.

“No unusual signs have been identified inside North Korea,” Kang reportedly said. “There is nothing we can confirm with regard to Chairman Kim’s alleged health problem.”

PEACE 😷
_______

(1) https://www.breitbart.com/asia/2020/04/21/its-not-true-south-korea-trashes-sensationalist-cnn-report-on-kim-jong-un/
.

In the longer term, oil prices will likely fall due to electrification of transport, but this likely not be in a serious way until the 2030s, at least in my conservative intuition. (Moreover, at least our bodies will be compensated with the benefit from cleaner air of the 2030s).

The $10 price is more of a long term outlook, but i’m not sure oil demand will bounce back quickly – too much supply accumulating, and more people discovering that working from home is not bad at all. Corporate bosses are realizing how much money they can save on skipping office rentals. People may simply drive less when it is over.

In the longer run, like Thulean Friend said, regulations and taxes will mandate electrification of transport. Age of oil is over. We will need natural gas to power industry to build green tech, but that’s a different matter. Besides Novatek and Gazprom, Russia needs to promote Rosatom as excellent source of reliable industrial electricity, and the likes of Norilsk Nickel as metals suppliers for batteries. Russia can make good money in green tech.

There are definitely benefits of devaluation in some export industries – and perhaps in whole economies like South Korea.

However, the devaluation of 2014, has had not much positive effects, and resulted in considerable reduction of purchasing power for average households.

Devaluation boosted Russian agriculture exports and more importantly gave domestic producers a chance in local markets. People buying Ladas and going to Crimea for vacation instead of Turkey. Over time, this will give domestic producers the capital they need to develop quality service networks, and that is what makes industrial exports competitive. Aside from a brief inflation spike in 2014-2015, purchasing power of households wasn’t too badly affected by devaluation if they bought domestic (tax reforms and VAT hike are a different matter).

A basic Kawai K500 (upright piano) costs $10000, or your complete annual income.

Lol, most people in US don’t have even a $1,000 for a car repair, nevermind a $10,000 piano. Well, doctors can afford it, but they are the main reason why everybody else can’t.

$12,000/year is not a scary salary in Russia. My father is a librarian in St Petersburg and makes about that much. Between him and his wife they clear $2,000 per month. They have no mortgage or rent to worry about, no insane medical bills, income taxes are lower, no need for car (excellent public transport) no stress about 401k contributions, their internet is something like $5/month, major expenses are utilities, maybe a $100/mo and food. Considering that everything is on average 3 times cheaper in Russia vs US, their disposable income is higher than mine in US lol, despite me making nominally higher wage. Before devaluation they went to Italy and Spain for vacations, post devaluation they keep it local. Even my grandmother in Kirov who is single income pensioner managed to sneak out to Turkey on occasion.

The only negative to costs of living in Russia is cost of credit (i don’t think you can take a 0% loan to pay for home improvements or a car), so big projects can get done faster in US if you don’t mind going into debt slavery. If you want to look good fast, US is the place to be. But this philosophy of life has risks, and is not cheap due to inflated prices in select sectors.

I only approve women for leadership so long as they’re vehemently authoritarian and highly attractive.

Therefore, I will contribute my psi-energy to Coronachan in her quest to install Kim’s sister.

This lady seems to be concerned with radiation. This is fair, and must be investigated further. To do so, we must turn to another intermittent radiation source – Japan – and compare. What do Japan and Belarus have in common, that might have a radiation as a cause?

What are they good at?
Japan – electronics.
Belarus – video games (Wargaming).

So far so good.

What are they famous for?
Japan – Godzilla, sex pillows, and tentacles.
Belarus – potatoes and vodka.

At first glance, not related but wait! If you drink enough vodka, a potato will start looking like Godzilla. And favorite porn in Belarus is hentai, that covers the sex pillows and tentacles part.

When Japan got nuked in 1945, quality tanks appeared on the streets of Tokyo, belonging to American occupation army. When Fukushima happened in 2011, Wargaming had worldwide rollout of World of Tanks. And Japan responded with release of Girls und Panzer anime.

The relationship is clear – radiation causes both Belarus and Japan to do geeky stuff. It also causes quantity of both the tanks and cartoon girls to increase in both countries.

So what can we expect going forward with the 5G rollout and accompanying radiation?

In Japan, if combined with increase in potato diet, it will lead to increased profits for arms manufacturers as tank production is ramped up, as well as skill improvement for Japanese tank drivers. As a side effect, Prime Minister will be renamed “Батька Abe”.

In Belarus, it will lead to potato size growth and therefore sharp increase in Godzilla related incidents. Sex pillow sales with also go up. If those predictions pan out, i think this lady is a genius, and truly deserves her Nobel prize.

My kids can get Russian citizenship, nice.

It’s not, after all, like Zucc is Durov, a true Chad who fasts every weekend, takes ice baths, and walks around with sunglasses 24/7 who sent both FSB and CIA rats alike scurrying with their tails between their legs.

Sure, but is Durov a ravenous irradiated cancer resistant immortal polyp? Zucc probably is at this point.

With funds from Chan Zuckerberg’s Biohub, the goal is to latest technology to figure out how to pinpoint the “cellular mechanisms that keep their genes in better shape,” explains Palumbi.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/04/chan-zuckerberg-biohub-14-million-coral-reef-human-biome.html

Humans are not bacteria in a petri dish.

Nevermind 100 billion people.

Based on Calhoun’s Universe 25 experiment I have the gut feeling that we will probably never get more than a 10 billion population on this planet.

Our biggest and most advanced urban centers have already become behavioral sinks and fertility black holes.

Think Tokyo.

And this was already the case well before the current viral epidemic situation.

We need Space.

We need to swarm the Solar System ASAP.

Beam me up anytime Scotty!

it will become even easier because the best way to replicate function is seldom to replicate form.

I would generally agree but i’m not sure our current direction of tech is the way to go – having your personality live inside a calculator seems very fragile and limiting. Calculators require complex supply chains and one hunger strike in a Taiwanese microchip factory can ruin your upgrade and operating plans.

In your examples, a car is a more specialized tech but a cheetah is a more advanced tech by far. A car equivalent of a cheetah would be an all terrain truck that multiplies exponentially by feeding on Priuses and Teslas, and is self repairing, self driving, and self fueling. As awesome as that sounds, human tech is nowhere near that at the moment.

In the more relevant field of computation, one of the more critical technological questions is – do pigeons build and operate quantum computers? Recent research appears to be in the affirmative, but unfortunately humans with current level of scientific understanding lack the ability to comprehend pigeon navigation technology beyond hypothetical quantum chemistry models.

I dedicate this paper to poster ‘songbird’ as it concerns his/her brethren.
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2020/fd/c9fd00049f#!divAbstract
US Air Force is interested in pigeon based computing for obvious reasons.

The most important part here isn’t that birds deploy and operate rather advanced machinery to calculate and visualize Earth’s magnetic field lines. I’m sure humans will be able to understand and replicate the function and build similar computers in the upcoming decades. But pigeons are able to replicate and build those computers and grow exponentially from simple feed grains and a bit of water, no supply chains, no cumbersome utility supporting equipment, etc. That is a true technological marvel, far more so than racks of GPUs in a calculator.

Future of technology, including computation, will look more like biotech and cheetahs and pigeons vs cars and calculators i think. Genetic alterations will be far more robust and powerful than trying to live in a calculator. And this is why we must go to space – not only for more permissive legal environment, but also because accelerating evolution is a survival requirement, not a luxury, up there. Also, if we discover novel self replicating molecular structures different from current DNA/RNA paradigm, this may potentially push our technology far beyond pigeon computers.

Agreed. People vastly underestimate the sophistication and complexity of biological systems. Biology is engineering, except at a level of complexity that is currently completely outside the grasp of our ability to understand, let alone replicate or surpass. It still boggles my mind that the programming encoded in the DNA of the singe cell that is a fertilized human ovum carries within it not only the code for every possible protein that may need to be produced by every single type of adult tissue, but also the blueprint to guide the division and specialization of daughter cells thousands (or millions?) of cellular divisions into the future despite the fact each daughter cell possesses the same exact DNA as every other. It’s absolutely stunning, and it’s just one of innumerable complexities that make biological systems possible.

That’s a bit harsh. We will colonize Mars at some point because it has diversity of materials on it and lift costs are lower compared to Earth. So it will have a mining colony. I don’t see the need for large settlement on it however.

One of the main advantages of being in space is being able to pick and choose your preferred gravity and environmental conditions – a rotating factory ring 50 miles across will have far more options than any Martian or Earth settlements. Such factory will also be far cheaper to operate compared to any Earth or Martian settlement due to economies of scale, better environmental legislation prospects, simplified logistics, and being a good place to locate R&D centers. Such ring structures will be able to house far more people and deploy them more productively compared to cities on Earth or Mars.

It will be pricey to build, but that’s not really a show stopper. I mean Spanish galleons are cheap, but we use far more expensive jumbo jet airliners for transport instead. Space development will follow the same path.

There is nothing out there that we really need.

Who’s ‘we’? There is an infinite amount of energy, materials and space in space. Those things are useful. You want to make advanced electronics? On Earth it costs $billions to build and operate fab clean rooms. In space? Put up an umbrella and you are done. Temperature management? On Earth you need complex heating systems, in space – sunny side = hot, shade = cold. Precision engineering where you don’t want to worry about stupid gravity or other forces? Space is the place. You can even go pick up free anti-matter particles for research over the Atlantic anomaly if that’s your thing.

Even more important is the legal environment. Nobody is going to give you an environmental permit to mine cobalt in Congo or whatever by 2050. Asteroids don’t have endangered turtles so getting environmental clearance is going to be cheaper.

And if you have research that powers that be frown upon (I see this mainly applicable to genetic engineering), you can launch automated research stations for relatively cheap and have them broadcast results to you. If you choose orbital trajectories with 30 year period between launch windows, police will be collecting retirement checks long before they will be able to launch an interdiction mission.

For science, while i don’t expect to find fully grown T-Rex roaming on Ganymede, life on Earth is at least 4 billion years and we got whacked by some pretty big rocks in the mean time. Finding old Earth frozen biomolecules will be important for museums and research of Earth history. Holy grail of biotechnology would of course be finding biomolecules from 4+ billion years ago, the time when Earth was not Earthlike at all and could have pursued a different evolutionary basis. Plenty of fun to be had out there.

Well, normal people also like cheap iPhones and electric cars and turtles and polar bears and don’t like toxic mines in their backyard. Space offers solutions for that.

People underestimate Musk at their own peril. He currently builds and operates the most powerful heavy lift rocket available and got rocket landings more or less right, which is no small feat.

While his Starship is not going to Mars any time soon, it is a great engineering project for Pentagon. Starship is a steel can with lots of mass produced engines which means it will be extremely cheap even without reusability. US Space Force will order dozens of those and combine them with thousands of Starlink command and control satellites.

Thousands of tons of cheap guided ordinance in orbit means it’s game over for Russian and Chinese ICBM and hypersonic weapons programs.
Musk is a Pentagon man first and foremost.

Well, sure, next level would probably involve some sort of anti satellite weaponry, but cheap mass produced heavy orbital bomber would be very difficult to counter. Those things will be faster and more numerous in terms of payload than ICBMs and hypersonic weapons.

He currently builds and operates the most powerful heavy lift rocket available and got rocket landings more or less right, which is no small feat.

He does not. He’s not a rocker engineer, he’s a celebrity whose claim to fame is being famous. Like all the other talking heads on the American (((media))).

I’m talking about orbital weapons deployment. There is no need for pilot (its a satellite based weapon, with tons of fuel available (Starship payload capacity is 100 tons), it can maintain orbit pretty much indefinitely. Stealth and orbital predictions don’t matter because it can reach anywhere on the planet within minutes, even if you see it you can’t do anything about it.

I don’t think you understand. Why nukes? Who cares about one satellite? There will be thousands of Starlink satellites, far more than any ASAT system will be able to take out, and dozens of Starship orbital bombers carrying 1,000’s of tons of simple tungsten spears. They will be able to drop those payloads anywhere on the planet (including Moscow or Beijing) in less than 10 minutes, far faster than any other weapons system available, and they will be able to do so relentlessly and continuously – it is easy to make metal sticks once you get a hang of it, and with cheap throwaway bombers they will be unstoppable.

This is what i mean it’s game over for Russian and Chinese missile programs. Hardened silos can be taken out faster than launch orders can be transmitted, and mobile launches can be destroyed at altitude. People who don’t see where SpaceX is going with this are making a big mistake.

We are not talking about manned program here. Also, SpaceX will be bridging that gap soon as well.

We are talking about heavy lift capability where SpaceX is currently an undisputed leader.

Russia, ironically, has the most advanced space tech as far as future technologies go. Future is spaceflight is nuclear electric and Russia has always been and continues to be the world leader in both space nuclear power and electric propultion. This will continue because putting nuclear power in space will run into regulatory problems in US and Japan.

Russia does not have technological competence and innovation problems.

For national security purposes though, Russia does have a management problem. All the most advanced spacecraft in the world won’t do you any good if you can’t put tonnage into orbit. It doesn’t matter how it gets done – dust off Energia blueprints if need be, but the future will belong to those who can control orbit, and only the people who can put up tonnage will be able to control the orbit. This is not the race Russia (or China) will want to lose, and it doesn’t require much technology breakthrough – just management and construction competence.

I seriously begin to suspect that you have no clue how orbital mechanics work – ICBM emit too much signature and are too slow and predictable. They need to reach high altitude and turn, while orbital lauches will not only be faster than ICBM, they will need to fight a lot less air for intercept.

Imagine yourself squashing an ant. This is exactly how an orbital weapons platform will eliminate an ICBM launch.

You are still thinking too complicated. 🙂 Look up “Rods of God” or “Global Prompt Strike” weapon, and eliminate all objections to cost or mass of launch, and you will see where I’m coming from.

War is not slaughtering the Davos elite. It’s slaughtering the most patriotic elements.

The cost of chemical propellants used in orbital launch vehicles is trivial, it is the price of the vehicles themselves that drives the high $/kg to orbit. I looked this up once and if I remember correctly the price of fuel for your average commercial satellite launch is on the order of a few hundred thousand dollars whereas the expendable vehicle costs tens of millions. If Musk can deliver the high degree of reusability he claims his Starship vehicle will be capable of then the economics of the launch industry will be transformed dramatically. It’s a big if, but if Starship pans out it will be single largest advancement in transportation technology since Sputnik. At that point, orbital kinetic weapons would be dramatically cheaper than any air breathing vehicles requiring engines, guidance system, etc. We’re talking six figures per projectile.

Customers in high income areas want to buy the $7 jam, and therefore supermarkets with this type of jam became more prevalent there, and therefore average food prices are far higher in those areas (because people are choosing to buy more luxury branded food).

Nobody wants to buy $7 jam, that’s insane. Not rich, not poor. What this means is for $1 in Russia you can get an edible product, and US that $1 jam is inedible, so you have to get screwed to get passable quality. But vast majority of the people would much rather pay less if they could.

In the real world, this plays out in critical areas such as healthcare (18% of US GDP). Nobody “chooses” to pay $3,000 for MRI when in Russia this service is what, $30? Or $10,000 ER visits. Cartels simply rape the American people and tell them to like it. Medical services being the greatest cause of bankruptcy in US, tells you exactly how much Americans can “afford to choose” it.

American and European markets are simply more cartel like and abusive of their citizens, hence higher prices. This is why Western economies are in so much debt – it is a simple population abuse. It has nothing to do with quality.

Don’t southern states have higher obesity rates?

I hope you realize that knowing how to manufacture and fuel an automobile will count for far more in post-apocalyptic combat than knowing how to program Candy Crush app or whatever other garbage widget our “cognitive juice” is currently producing.

That said, the other poster had it right – obesity will be a problem.

The Southern Army will consist of mechanized turbo diesel wheel chairs equipped with rocket launchers and carrying obese diabetics. In Mad Max fashion, they will invade the world seeking not fuel, but insulin.

To be fair, Zimbabwe and Syria have 3 cases per million people, as good as Vietnam, and some of the best performance in the world as far as containment statistics go.

The most successful countries in containment are Papua New Guinea and Angola. 🙂 (lowest number of cases per million). It helps if you are too poor to afford traveling to Europe and US.

Testing in those countries is also likely to be low, which just goes to show how much exaggerated this virus’ deadlines as is, as those countries do not seem to be on the verge of collapsing.

Here is the total number of deaths for April. For this month the hypothesis of mass hidden mortality from coronavirus is clearly unreliable

From this FT graph we can infer that there was a hidden corona epidemic taking place in Moscow in March-April 2018…Or that this mortality falls within normal range and does not require conspiratorial explanation to it.

I don’t like that you continue to dance around the real issue: that chart you copied from Facebook was clearly fake. And that Facebook group from what I can tell is a bunch of conspiracy nutters.

He was right about it crashing the economy though.

Karlin was optimistic (or let’s say – “well balanced”) about coronavirus, compared to most type of conspiracy theory, doomers and survivalist kind of people, especially in YouTube, as well as the anti-China people. They were saying like it was going to be the zombie apocalypse and it was time for us to escape down into the bunker.

The ironic that in January, it was “fashionable” for people to hype about the epidemic (or imply it is a Chinese bioweapon made from combining HIV and Ebola), and say like half the world would die from coronavirus. Whereas after a few months that mainstream media began to view the pandemic more seriously, then it is fashionable to say “it was hyped too much”.

Thats fair. I believe the title of his post was “Corona chan will crash economy and kill millions”.

I think lockdowns more or less worked and medical systems weren’t too overwhelmed, so deaths will be under a million, but if second wave forces more lockdowns economy is done for.

I don’t know about Europe, but US economy is entirely based on credit funded consumption. After a few months of bill non payments even if people get jobs somehow their credit scores will be ruined, so they won’t be able to get loans and spend anymore. This economic second wave will ruin a lot of businesses, and send people straight back to unemployment.

Russia doesn’t rely on credit spending as much so I expect it to do better.

Anyway, if Karlin named his post “Corona chan will crater the world economy OR kill millions” he would be spot on. 🙂

If medical system got overwhelmed we would see a lot more corpses i think.