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     Apr 29, 2008
Big, bad, and the bill is rising
By The Mogambo Guru

Martin Weiss of MoneyandMarkets.com writes that what is euphemistically called a "credit crunch" - which he defines as "essentially a slowdown in the pace of new credit growth" - is actually much, much more than that, and that The Mogambo was right the whole time when he was yelling at his stupid neighbors and stupid family that they should be buying gold, silver and oil, and how the Federal Reserve creating so much excess money and credit will end up destroying the dollar and destroying the economy and destroying the country and probably destroying the whole freaking world with inflation in consumer prices, even though all this new money actually spent most of its life creating inflation in stock prices and bond prices and the price of government, and now we are (as I never seem to tire of saying) freaking doomed!

Okay, on powerful cross-examination I now admit that Mr Weiss


 

did not say that, and what he actually said had nothing whatsoever to do with me, and in fact what he DID say is that this is not a temporary-but-pesky "credit crunch", but is "actually a credit crack-up - an outright contraction of credit the likes of which [has] never been witnessed in our lifetime", which reminds one of Ludwig von Mises's description of the "crack-up boom" at the end of a long money expansion!

In case you can't tell from the horrified look on my face and the way I am drooling down my chin in mindless terror, this is a bad, bad concept that is so bad that you should not even talk about it while eating, or for an hour after eating, because you will gag and vomit in fear.

In a surprising flash of crass commercialism, I interrupt this newsletter to introduce the latest "gotta have it" item from Mogambo Interstellar Enterprises (MIS), which is a new diet program based on the idea that if you are always too frightened to eat or keep food down, then your caloric intake is reduced, and you should lose weight. Easy and brilliant!

This caloric-attenuation regimen is scientifically paired with an aerobic, cardio program to insure that you get a terrific exercise workout from merely cleaning up your own puke all the time.

So, to capitalize on this phenomenon, the dieter merely tunes in to any of the seemingly-endless Angry Mogambo Tirades (AMT) found round-the-clock on Free Radio Mogambo (FRM), a broadcast on a radio frequency that unfortunately keeps shifting (which plays hell with trying to attract advertisers and sponsors, I can tell you!), but which is necessary to stay one step ahead of the government censors so that uniformed government goon squads don't smash down the door to silence the Brave And Heroic Mogambo (BAHM). If you have seen the movie, "The Matrix", you know what I am talking about. "Hello, Neo." Gaaahhhh!

Anyway, the FRM is available everywhere, so if you cannot find it on either the AM or FM dials, then this proves that the government is jamming the signal in your area so that you don't find out what in the hell these weenies are doing to our money, which is not only the same subject that FRM is always screeching about to make you so frightened that you cannot eat or will make you vomit up anything that you manage to eat, but which is also the title of an old Murray Rothbard book titled, What Has Government Done to Our Money?, which shows that all this dollar-debasement crap is certainly nothing new, and is a book which is available at Mises.org, which I bring up because Mises.org is the site of Austrian economics in America, which is the only true economics, and which is a fact that imbues me with the awesome power of Angry Mogambo Arrogance (AMA) to sling righteous abuse at all others who do not agree with me, as is their just desserts now that they have demonstrated that they are not very smart if they actually believe that silly econometric crap, like especially those losers at the Federal Reserve and at most of the universities in America, I am sorry to have to admit, and my loud denunciations of them all grows ever louder as things are turning out exactly - exactly! - as Austrian economic theory says they would, which means that we are, in case you ain't heard, freaking doomed.

This is the basis of the new Mogambo Diet Plan (MDP), and you can see how that kind of "kiss your own nasty butt goodbye because you are going to die" news, delivered in a constant, shrill, high-decibel voice would make you lose weight!

But we here at Mogambo Nutritional Laboratories (MNL) realize that some people will still manage to eat and will not lose weight, which is why we have a strict policy of "no refunds for any reason", which (in case you are a lawyer) means "including the fact that we didn't even send you anything, and all we did was cash your stupid check", which will probably work out really well for me in case somebody actually buys a copy of our new Mogambo Diet Plan (MDP), which probably won't happen because it is such a stupid and repellent idea.

For example, Mr Weiss is obviously not going to buy one, and instead he made me lose MY appetite when he went on, "Based on its Flow of Funds Report, in the third quarter of last year, 'open market paper' (mostly short-term commercial loans) was slashed at the annual rate of $682 billion."

Mr Weiss sees that blank look on my face, indicating that the significance is lost on me. So, with what I detect was a little angry frustration in his voice, he says, "I repeat: This is not a mere 'slowdown' in new lending, which would be relatively routine. This is an actual reduction in the short-term loans outstanding, which is anything but routine ... which implies a rupture in the nation's credit spigots."

And if you have ever had to call a plumber, at midnight, on a weekend, in an emergency of a "rupture in your spigots", whatever in the hell that is, then you realize that you are going to pay a big, big price.

You just don't know HOW big a price until the end, when you get a bill that is so outrageous that you have a brain spasm and you die. In short, there are no good endings to a spigot rupture or creation of excess money and credit.

Unless you buy gold, then at least you are rich while all others die, which is much nicer!

Richard Daughty is general partner and COO for Smith Consultant Group, serving the financial and medical communities, and the editor of The Mogambo Guru economic newsletter - an avocational exercise to heap disrespect on those who desperately deserve it.

(Republished with permission from
The Daily Reckoning
. Copyright 2008, The Daily Reckoning.)


THE COMPLETE MOGAMBO GURU


1. Taliban bitten by a snake in the grass

2. Hillary, the war chick

3. Western excess is the Earth killer

4. Petraeus' rise lets Cheney loose on Iran

5. Abdullah's second-chance reform drive

6. Rice, death and the dollar

7. Back to the hard line on N Korea

8. BOOK REVIEW: The Fed's king of bubbles

(Apr 25-27, 2008)

 
 


 

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