Today, October 13th, 2022 brought dreadful news of inflation, worse than the expected at 8.2% in final pre-election report. Of the various headlines throughout the morning, this one caught my eye and may in fact be my favorite:
For all the talk of the world being on the verge of nuclear war courtesy of the dementia patient in the White House, a real life financial nuke just went off at 8:30am when the BLS reported a shocking CPI print so unexpectedly hot ( a 2.9-sigma upside surprise to consensus), that even the bears were shocked. The result was... well, an absolute disaster doesn't even begin to cut it."Horrible"... "Brutal"..."A Disaster For Democrats"
Meanwhile, mortgage rates have hit their highest level in 16 years at 6.81% for the week. Consumer prices have surged higher than expected. They are up 8.2%. This begs the question, what was expected? Moreover, with inflation, mortgage rates, food prices, and gasoline prices all at historic prices, all simultaneously mind you, why weren’t the “experts” expecting higher in the first place? Perhaps a bit of pessimism would have softened the blow.
For the rest of us hard working folk, wages have not kept up with inflation. As a result, real wages have fallen. Likewise the price of nearly everything has crept up quite rapidly. Locally, restaurants and coffee shops have raised their prices not incrementally, but in some places 30-40% overnight. Kinda wish I have stocked up on canned goods and coffee beans last year. Alas, who could even do so during our short-lived supply chain crisis. I think some folks were even forced to resort to buying toilet paper on the black market.
Albeit the Market reacts to many things, one of which is the key “players” of the world, one being our President. I find this quote from the New York Times yesterday quite fascinating: NYT: "Biden’s folksiness can veer into folklore, with dates that don’t quite add up and details that are exaggerated or wrong, the factual edges shaved off to make them more powerful for audiences." https://t.co/rdEfCnydYD
Shaving off the factual edges for the benefit of the listener or reader, now that’s an interesting way of putting things. Could that also be considered veering into the neighborhood of exaggerating? I would just assume have all the facts, clear, precise and unadulterated. After all, the facts will eventually rise to the surface anyway. They always do. The truth will set you free!
I hope you don’t mind my brand of unfiltered ramblings. I promised myself I wasn’t going to get political but I’m really not. I’m simply deeply concerned for my family, and for all of us actually. Our present leadership team is not making fiscally responsible decisions, that much should be clear. With elections on the horizon, I pray you will bear this in mind and make an informed voting decision. We simply cannot continue on our present course and expect to have anything left for our posterity, both fiscally and morally. We are approaching bankruptcy in respect to both.
The wise man saves for the future, but the foolish man spends whatever he gets. Proverbs 21:20
Jim
Me too. Handling the Word of God with a clear mind takes His mind in us to do so. Rest well tonight my dear friend. We need to preserve our Truth Sayers.
I enjoy the way you think! I always see Christ's mind seeping through your writings. Keep them coming, Jim.