The CoronaVirus has taken the world by storm over the last month, but the way politicians and financial market participants are reacting is a bit amusing. Everyone was pretending it was nothing and just the normal flu...

Then the economy: just about everyone, especially Republicans, were pretending that the economy was healthy and if it wasn't for this pandemic raging in the world everything would be sound.

The narrative for the last decade has been: buy stocks, the central banks will do whatever it takes to keep the global economy running. And the laughable: "This is the Greatest Economy ever!"

The Federal Reserve has been bluffing all along — they knew the economy wasn't strong and their 'effort' at raising interest rates was always feeble, as was their effort at shrinking the Fed's balance sheet. They knew the precarious state of the global economy. When you are in charge of sentiment in the markets, you have to bluff. Basically they are saying "you can't handle the truth." As soon as the global equity markets sneezed in late 2018, the big U-turn happened suddenly — they went from saying they are going to tighten, to "we are pausing," which means lowering was likely to follow, and that is exactly what happened.

And now they have no choice but to admit the weak state of the global economy. I wrote about this exact topic in 2016 titled The Fed's Bluff Cycle — this aged very well!

People who have had massive amounts of debt have flourished over the last decade. Translation: people who have gambled with other people's money in shaky or weak fundamental-based assets have made a lot of money. Think: hedge funds, banks, stock buybacks, Tesla, and of course as Trump ominously brought to the world's attention recently — 401(k)s.

I know a lot of people who have made money in the stock market over the last decade. That's nice, I suppose. But when I inquire about what their thesis was to hold stocks or indexes, I get answers like: "Stocks always go up over the long run and my recent returns have been good so I'll just keep doing that." Or I do get this also: "Well, the central bank put is a real thing, and they will ride to the rescue if anything was to disrupt bullish sentiment in the markets."

This is more worrying in some ways. This line of thinking is more informed, sure, and they have some understanding that the Fed has killed the business cycle or is doing what it can to pretend that business cycles don't exist anymore. Well, they do...

When the cost of money has been manipulated for the last decade via suppressing interest rates, when the Fed finally does lose control at the helm, the business cycle will return with a vengeance. Think about a coiled spring or a balloon underwater.

But sure, chase 10% a year upside on the worst valuations and fundamentals we've ever seen. Stocks always go up after all, and don't worry about things like: tensions around trade and imperialism with China, war with Russia or Iran, 100% debt-to-GDP levels around the world, dementia in the White House or on the campaign trail. All is well — oh, by the way, OPEC just ended...

After all, it is the greatest economy ever... we just need record low interest rates, or even negative rates, and quantitative easing (debt monetization) to keep it moving.

This narrative is laughable, but it was bought into by the masses. The economy can be viewed as a heroin addict (addicted to debt, of course) and instead of letting the patient withdraw from the toxic substance, the central banks around the world have decided that the best way to solve the heroin addiction (debt) is to double the dose of heroin the patient is currently taking.

When you are addicted to heroin, you must wean yourself off with methadone — doubling the dosage of the heroin (culprit) will eventually kill the patient. And in this case, doubling the debt will eventually kill the economy.

So surprisingly, the patient's immune system (global economy's health) wasn't that strong when the coronavirus came along. The global economy and our patient didn't really have a solid foundation when 2020 started — he was extremely sick already. Remember, he had doubled his heroin addiction over the last 10 years and his immune system was extremely weak.

Making money in indexes and stocks over the last decade was 'right' until recently. Let's see where we go from here. But don't claim that it was or is prudent to be long the S&P 500 or whichever broad index you favor — it's basically just a big casino where fundamentals and Econ 101 have been chucked out the window.

We need to play a bit of catch-up here. Since the 2008 mortgage crisis, nothing really has been solved on a global macro scale. If you have a debt problem which stemmed from loose monetary policies a decade ago, naturally the solution to that is to make monetary policies looser and double the debt levels. That will solve the problem — well, it did solve problems for people who don't care about fundamentals and blindly or recklessly chased anything for a return.

To be fair, the central banks in some ways forced people to do just that. They created an environment where anyone who didn't buy that narrative was going to have a hard time making money. Yep, that was me — hands up.

As Elon said: "The CoronaVirus is dumb." Soon it will be "the financial markets are dumb." Translation: my stock is down close to 50% over the last month, and a month ago I felt better when I was gloating.

But it's not just Elon. The world is addicted to running on fumes (debt) and can you blame them? This is the incentive structure that has been placed in front of us and rewarded.

Eventually, inflation will materialize. Central banks will ensure that. Stay vigilant — there is no precedent to what is happening right now.

There have been a series of bubbles in the 21st century brought on by easy credit, that have infamously blown up — The 'Dotcom Bubble' of the early 2000's, and more recently the 'Housing Bubble' of 2008. Both of these booms and busts were brought on by imprudent easy money policies by the FED (Federal Reserve).

If you make debt easily accessible to an entitled populace who can file for bankruptcy as easily as signing their name on paper, they will bite every time, and bite they did.

As all bubbles do, they eventually deflate when the cost of financing ever larger amounts of debt at higher interest rates cause the inevitable: insolvency to those who bit off more than they could handle in the 'Go-Go years'. It is easy to justify buying things on credit for years of paying nothing but artificially low-interest rates on large amounts of debt. But when interest rates rise and your payments start to increase, negative compounding returns are a scary thing; reality sinks in very quickly to those who indulged during the #goodtimes.

However, I want to nail these points home so that people understand what it is that has happened over the last few decades, and to get a better idea of where we are likely heading. Even just thinking about Central Banks and how they operate causes me to shake my head in disbelief! Central Banks' panacea to these two most recent bubble bursts was to increase the amount of debt in the system. Furthermore, they may lower interest rates closer to 0%, or when accounting for inflation, even negative real interest rates.

"You mean I can live beyond my means today and borrow from the future — Sure! What is the maximum amount I can borrow? And where do I sign?"

Debt is stealing from posterity, but most are far too short-sighted or selfish to see this — or care for that matter. To be fair to Central banks who deservedly get the brunt of the blame from people paying attention to economic issues: if your only tools are a printing press, interest rate adjustments, and you are the only one in town with that ability to use these tools as you please, it is little wonder you resort to low-interest rates and debt in various forms more often than not.

To a man with a hammer (printing press), everything looks like a nail. — Mungerism

Capital in early 2019 is rapidly starting to realize that the normalization of interest rates is destructive for the stock market and a weak economy. The normalization (5%) of interest rates is fiscally impossible when you are running gradually ballooning annual deficits with no road to a surplus in sight, and your debt piles are growing ever bigger by the day.

The FED has no choice but to walk down their dot plot of further raising interest rates into 2019 and 2020, which will signal to the world that they aren't going to raise them anymore. FED chairman Powell recently stated rates are 'nearing normal'. A drastic change from his October statement when markets were near all-time highs when he stated 'We're a long way from normal'.

Regardless, whether Powell is at the helm of the FED or not I expect the FED to eventually fully recant on rate raises and reverse course to get back to what they do best: encourage debt accumulation, capital misallocation, and continue the boom and bust cycles we have come to know. As we have seen in the recent past, the FED won't stop at just lowering interest rates if they deem economic numbers weak enough; they will go all out and do 'whatever it takes'. This means they will likely engage in more QE (quantitative easing), which is just monetizing the debt (money printing), negative interest rates, and various forms of bail-outs and bail-ins.

"While the whole world was having a big old party, a few outsiders and weirdos saw the giant lie at the heart of the economy, and they saw it by doing something the rest of the suckers never thought to do: They looked." — Jared Vennett, The Big Short

While the markets are currently in freefall (Dec 20, 2018), eventually the inevitable will happen: the FED and government will ride to the rescue. Don't be too impatient for that to result as the Establishment wouldn't mind getting Trump out of the White House first.

Good things take time and I know that the FED will not relent in bringing about the inflation they desire and I predict over the coming years.

#skininthegame
Long: Precious Metals, Miners, Mongolian equities, Energy Companies (oil/gas and uranium), Russian banks, CryptoCurrencies (Bitcoin & Loom)
Short: Nada

This article, like many others I have delved into in the past, is based around what I'm reading and conversations I have been frequently having. Since I have been back in The Americas, especially recently in Alberta, Canada, certain political topics seem to resurface like a broken record. I'm never one to shy away from voicing my opinion.

The world may seem like a pretty chaotic and confusing place in late 2018. There are uprisings across the world, some of them still relatively peaceful and some not as much, but the majority have one thing in common. People aren't satisfied with the way things have been going and want a change! Can you blame them!?

There have been two major referendums in the last few years that epitomize the discontent felt in the developed world: BREXIT (Britain leaving the EU) which was mostly around the UK's immigration policy and its sovereignty related to all things trade, and Trump's rise to the White House which I'm pretty sure needs no backstory.

The LEFT/Liberals still can't seem to accept or understand either of these events and are doing their best to block or rob the citizens of an idea that has become more revolutionary than one would expect in 2018 — DEMOCRACY!

How we got here:

In the 21st century, the easy monetary policies of the central banks have caused the living standards of the majority of the populace to drop, while their cost of living has risen. The number one culprit is inflation, and to a larger degree in the European Union: immigration. The vast majority of the 99% own little assets, and the bottom 50% own close to none. They are mostly in debt, meaning they don't capture any appreciation of assets brought about by inflation, while the 1% do as they own the majority of all assets.

What motivates people to rise up and challenge authority more than anything? Economic Discontent.

If citizens aren't able to have their basic needs met, they are unlikely to care about issues such as global warming, social justice, political correctness, and issues in other countries such as refugees. This is just the way it is, I'm sorry to say. #notsorry

Change comes not from CHOICE but from NECESSITY.

The refugee crisis in Europe is largely a result of the West's occupation, or 'regime change', which is just a euphemism for imperialism. Large parts of Syria and other countries, namely Iraq, Libya, and Yemen have been utterly ruined over the last few decades from the West imposing their ideologies on unsuspecting victims.

Unless Liberals dig deeper into the economic discontent of their own citizens, upheavals, like we are seeing in Paris right now, will become the norm.

We must respect the voice of the people, or future generations will wake up in a country vastly different than the founding fathers fought so hard to establish, and that would be a travesty!

I prefer to use the word temperament when discussing this topic. If you aren't familiar with this word, it can be interchangeable with: disposition, nature, character, personality, make-up, constitution and to some degree the term 'emotional intelligence'.

Nothing could be more important to me in life than one's temperament — this directly correlates to making better life decisions. I do tend to vet people quite hard based on their temperament; it has served me well thus far, but I'm starting to become slightly more flexible in regards to how I judge others' temperament. I don't want to write anyone off based on a limited interaction. We all are going through different stages of our life and it is hard to know exactly where someone is in their life when we happen to encounter them.

But don't be fooled either, some people are toxic and 'energy vampires'. Try to avoid spending significant amounts of time with people who bring you down.

I have this really weird concept: I don't like to have stress in my life. #artoftheclown

Stress is one of the leading culprits for heart disease — which is the number #1 reason men die!

Persistently elevated stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol wear your body down a lot quicker. It can be thought of as having your body in 'fight or flight mode' too often, and putting unhealthy demands on your heart which can be life-threatening.

I think one's ability to control what happens between one's own left ear and right ear is the most important thing you can really gain any semi-mastery of in your life.

I have spent the better part of 10 years focusing on my 'temperament' and emotional intelligence — which can be broken down into various sub-topics ranging from: behavioral finance, psychology, stoicism, self-control, self-help, etc.

While raw IQ is governed to a very high degree, I think emotional intelligence isn't AS much; you may be limited in your ability to solve complex problems and thought experiments, but temperament is something that we have a lot more control over from my empirical research. Academic research on the subject would support this claim.

I will reluctantly admit that I do find it amusing when people, myself included, allow things to get the better of them and lose composure by external factors. Emotions are what make us human sure, but they can also get in the way of us achieving greatness in so many aspects of our life by guiding us to act irrationally.

In 2018 emotions seem to have the upper hand on facts. Think: Politically correct speech, Trump temperanderum syndrome, #metoo Kavanagh hearings, EU's immigration crisis, and a 10 year bull market in US equities based on 'faith' not sound fundamentals.

One of the reasons that I became fascinated by temperament was this simple inquiry: “If I'm not in control of my emotions, then who is?” And the simple answer is: anyone or anything can control your emotions if you can't.

I like to simplify the concept of temperament to children by telling them that if they allow anyone or anything to make them feel a certain way, it's as if they're handing over a remote control for their emotions. If they want to make you feel happy — press the green button. If they want you to feel angry — press the red button. If they want you to feel sad — push the blue button. If they want you to be quiet — push the mute button. Basically your temperament is at the whim of ANYTHING except for your own governance.

I'm no master at temperament yet, but I have come a long way since reading a lot and practicing various kinds of stoicism in extreme situations over the last decade. Remind me over a glass of whisky or dry red of those times when I: collapsed running at a national championship half a meter before the finish, broke a collarbone, spent 24hrs in an Asian jail, or lost $100k. Suddenly stoicism and emotional intelligence start to pay dividends when you're confronted with extreme adversity.

The strong economy narrative just won't give way for now, fair enough! The death of market cycles has been greatly exaggerated!

Financial markets are largely voting machines in the short term and only become weighing machines in the long term — but what is the 'long term' when it comes to investing?

In the summer of 2018, we are living in a world which pays little regard to economic cycles or any kind of core fundamentals, as they appear not to exist anymore nor matter. We are currently experiencing the longest bull market in history — closing in on 10 years in March 2019.

Depending on your age and interest in finances 10 years ago, you may or may not remember the great recession of 2008; for me personally it was a visceral experience as I lost my life savings in less than 6 months. Looking back on it now leaves me with a sense that the world has gone collectively mad as nothing has been addressed from that financial shock, and to my great dismay the problems have only compounded.

The culprit of the last crisis was too much debt, specifically in the housing sector which caused the 2008 financial crisis that spread into the full blown global crisis. So naturally the panacea for the mortgage (debt) crisis of 2008 was to add even more debt on the books and hope that everything will be ok!

Debt is nothing more than stealing from posterity.

Debt is like peeing your pants in the winter — feels good at first until you realise the predicament you are now in.

A recovery that is fueled by rising debt isn't a recovery at all, it is more like another hit to a heroin addict going through withdrawal.

Something Einstein said comes to mind: They're doing the same thing and expecting different results — INSANITY? Si Señor!

Unless they (central banks) aren't expecting different results then it would appear that some level of duplicity was at work, which I believe is more inline with the actions that have been taken since 2008 by the powers that be.

It would appear in the summer of 2018 that we are living in a 'brave new world' when taking a look at a few points:

• SP500 just hit a new all time high — longest bull market in history!
• US National debt: $21.5 trillion — up 130% since 2008!
• US Annual deficits — $1 trillion(ish)...
• Federal Reserve (FED) balance sheet hit $4.5 trillion
• The FED has finally raised interest rates to 2% after nearly a decade of 0% 'real' interest rates.

“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”

But that is exactly what we have tried to do since 2008 with debt!

I'm not sure that even Donald Trump knows (anymore) what kind of danger the global economy is in. Ignorance is bliss, but in Trump's and America's case, it might be more apt to say arrogance is bliss! Until it isn't.

Candidate Trump understood the true state of the economy and interest rates back in Sept of 2016 when he said: Donald Trump accused Fed Chair Janet Yellen of keeping rates “artificially low” and creating a “false stock market” to make President Barack Obama look good.

But now President Trump is taking credit for the exact same stock market and loose interest rate policy which he previously demonized; those that live by the economy's health, die by it as well!

The Federal Reserve (FED) has their 'fall guy' (Trump) in the White House when the next financial recession does materialize. Trump already had a minor run-in with the FED since being President regarding interest rate policy. With the 'deep state' so adamant about toppling Trump, a continuation of rising rates now appears more likely heading into 2020.

Central banks will be more than pleased to use Trump and his trade wars as a scapegoat for the next recession which will be brought on by rising interest rates and the continuing collapse of a unipolar world and demand for the USD/Petrodollar.

The number of enemies Trump currently has is a true testament to the level of threat he really is to the 'status quo'. He may be a member of the 1% but I do earnestly believe he really is a patriot and is doing what he can and thinks is best for the working class folks.

Eventually with rising rates the powers that be will get the desired outcome they are seeking, which is Trump out of the WH. The only question you should be asking is 'can they keep this decades old bull going until 2020?'

Bearish catalysts for a US and global financial crisis:

• Rising interest rates on unprecedented amounts of debt
• Unforeseen contagion triggered by a trade war with China
• Rising hostilities with Russia, Iran, Turkey and China
• Russia and many other countries dumping USD debt en masse
• Iran could greatly disrupt the flow of global oil via blocking the Strait of Hormuz
• Cryptocurrencies continue to further displace traditional methods of transactions
• Emerging Market contagion: Turkey, Iran, Argentina, Venezuela

We are living in world awash in debt and namely $USD, at some point this all comes to a painful stop — after a decade of 'growth' I think we are a lot closer to the curtain call on this trend.

Skin in the GAME:
Long: Gold & Silver, Cryptocurrencies (BTC & ETH), Uranium, Mongolia, Russia
Short: $USD, $SP500 via LEAPS, $TSLA via LEAPS, $FB via LEAPS

The term 'blockchain' rose to prominence in 2009 when under the pseudonym 'Satoshi Nakamoto' (possibly a group or team, male or female — nobody really knows) the whitepaper for BTC (Bitcoin) was released and the original blockchain protocol was born.

In December 2016, BTC's price was around $1000. Dec '17 saw BTC hit its all time high of $20,000 (making 20x in 12 months is a real thing in the crypto space!).

In my opinion, there is nothing that can stop the cryptocurrency/blockchain space from reaching into the trillions of dollars over the coming decade.

ETH (Ethereum) was the real winner in 2017, outperforming even BTC's 20x return; ETH started off 2017 around $10 and hit a peak of over $1400 — that is more than 140x. Understanding the potential of ETH's smart contracts early on would have been key to capturing Ethereum's parabolic gains.

Smart contracts are self-executing contracts with the terms of the agreement between buyer and seller being directly written into lines of code. This is revolutionary in the blockchain space.

The blockchain's main key characteristic is a recording (ledger) of everything that has happened since its genesis. Every transaction, comment, vote, 'like', or 'Tweet' is immutable — this is transparency on a level that most people can't even begin to grasp!

The blockchain's core characteristics are libertarian in that the protocol runs on a decentralized network. Simply put, no single actor can easily control or dominate the price, direction or outcome.

Sanctions imposed mainly by the US and its vassal states are pushing countries like Russia, China, Venezuela and Iran to experiment with, and use the blockchain to circumvent the SWIFT system to settle transactions. I think it is only a matter of time until larger countries like China and Russia incorporate their financial systems with some form of the blockchain.

The world is just starting to come to terms with what the blockchain's potential really is. Yes the path will be bumpy and riddled with scandals and scams but the blockchain revolution is here to stay.

Capital markets allow everyone to get what they want: if you seek adrenaline, the markets will provide; if you seek pain, the markets will provide; and lastly, if you seek steady ROI, the markets will comply. The crypto space is a sector where everyone gets what they want like traditional capital markets, but the timelines are all on warp speed — a month in crypto is like a year in traditional markets.

Adjust your expectations accordingly and buy with conviction once your thesis on this sector is formed! You're Welcome!

If you Google the word 'Flâneur' you might get a myriad of different definitions, as the word isn't commonly used, especially in English. The first definition for flâneur that I can find is: 'a man who saunters around observing society', and this is a good place to commence this missive.

A flâneur is a stroller, a loiterer, someone who ambles without apparent purpose, but is secretly attuned to the history of the streets he walks — and is in covert search of adventure, aesthetic or erotic. The word carried a set of rich associations: the man of leisure, the idler, the urban explorer, the connoisseur of the street.

The word originated in France around the late 19th century, when there were many people observing, or loitering around the streets observing Paris transform and modernize. Depending on who you ask today, the word 'flâneur' can carry a positive connotation — “connoisseur of the streets” — or a negative connotation — 'lazy idler, without purpose or employment'.

Words are nothing more than what we understand them to be and more importantly, how we use them in conversation and prose.

The word came to my attention in 2012 via 'Antifragile' by Nassim Taleb:

The rational flâneur is someone who, unlike a tourist, makes a decision at every step to revise his schedule, so he can imbibe things based on new information. The flâneur is not a prisoner of a plan. Tourism, actual or figurative, is imbued with the teleological illusion; it assumes completeness of vision and gets one locked into a hard-to-revise program, while the flâneur continuously— and, what is crucial, rationally— modifies his targets as he acquires information.

I think one of the most undervalued life fulfilling characteristics in 2018 is optionality, being flexible with time, travel, purchases and of course all decisions. Most people don't value having time to think and reflect on life, or if they did, I think they would organize their life with a lot less commitments.

The life of the flâneur is all about having optionality and being able to make decisions on the fly when satisfactory information is attained.

I'm often asked two questions pertaining to my life: How can you travel incessantly? And: Don't you crave stability?

They are really the same question, just spun in a positive or negative light depending on who is asking.

Traveling incessantly is really quite affordable when you stick to a few basic guidelines — no cars, houses, dependencies: kids, wives, dogs, or mortgages. There are many countries that would be hard to live in with a modest salary, but those are all Western Democracies which aren't high on my priority list to begin with.

After spending a decade in Asia, and spending more time in Canada recently, I certainly don't crave stability at this stage of my life. I feel like I've gotten my 'get out of jail free card'. At the moment I crave new people, new places, adventure, and new opportunities.

Most people who are living a conventional lifestyle tell me that they would love to travel more, but either don't have the time or money. But when I question them on their 'excuses' or dig a bit deeper, that is where cognitive dissonance emerges — I'm not sure most people are really up for traveling more.

I think most people are too conventional in their approach to life, enjoyment and more importantly understanding who they really are. It took me a long time to really figure out what drives me, what really motivates me to improve or to take on new challenges.

I've seen many people make life altering decisions before they have reached the age of reason. If you don't know who you really are, what you are passionate about or what really motivates you in life, how can you buy a house, have a successful marriage or be a good father? Without question, people can adapt to situations, but why would anyone intentionally limit themselves when life is so vast?

The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that is changing rapidly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.

The thing I try to avoid the most and I might be most afraid of is boredom, and for me that means not challenging myself or trying new things on a regular basis.

While living on a secluded area of the Adriatic Sea in Croatia, I was left with an abundance of time to read and contemplate life and the world. New business ideas came to me, which I was able to dig really deeply into. I felt so privileged to have the time and optionality to be able to read and contemplate the world. A flâneur runs with his passions and interests when they arise.

Being a global flâneur forces you to quickly adapt to new environments and situations, which is very healthy for one's stoicism. When jumping into the unknown, our brains are initially thrown into a state of mini shock. This forces our brain to get out of 'auto pilot' mode and really be present and alive.

I have found that the more I move around and expand my spatial settings, the more memorable life becomes. When your brain is stimulated with new things, we have stronger anchors and can easily recall things in our minds.

When we are totally isolated and aren't distracted by people and technology, we can really hear the inner voice inside of us, which helps direct us in life. Our inner compass can navigate the world better once devoid of all the noise.

Another key component of being a flâneur is becoming a minimalist. Excess things in life don't add excess value, but rather just add stress. The more things we have, the more mental energy is allocated towards those things.

There is a very easily conceivable liberating feeling when you get rid of things that you know aren't offering a lot of utility in your life. When you only have 1 carryon and 1 piece of checked luggage, you are forced to really evaluate what is vital and what is excess.

Roger Lowenstein describes Warren Buffett: “Buffett's genius was largely a genius of character — of patience, discipline and rationality. His talent sprang from his unrivaled independence of mind and ability to focus on his work and shut out the world.”

“It's not that I'm so smart; it's just that I stay with problems longer.” — Albert Einstein

The best thinking, which equates in the best decisions being made, is often done when there is no stress, no time limits, no threats, or judgments; you might even go as far as to say the best decisions are made when you are living more like a flâneur.

BUT....... I feel.... my opinion is..... (insert emotions, personal story and white noise)

I always enjoy coming 'home', a term I use loosely, as I don't have a current home base. Over the last 2-3 years when I do find myself in Canada, I seem to have greater difficulty relating to people's outlook of the world; people are a product of their environment, so maybe it isn't a surprise that I relate less and less; possibly a term like 'global citizen' would better describe me as I have spent the majority of my formative years outside of North America. 'Sovereign Individual', a book (by James Dale Davidson) which I highly recommend, lays out the narrative that more and more people won't have the need to be tied to a single country in the near future; the nation-state is dying a slow death. The trend in 2017 is pointing us towards increased numbers of 'digital nomads' choosing their abode based on convenience rather than necessity. I concur with this line of thinking, and the ease of travel, rise of digital currencies and all things Amazon (the retailer, not the river) are proving this narrative correct.

Slight digression, back to Postmodernism.

If the term 'postmodernism' is new to you, let me try to explain: It is difficult to put a hard definition on it, as the term and movement around people who ascribe to postmodernist ways of living don't have definite beliefs and don't really agree on any universal truths. The only thing they seem to collectively agree on is that their opinion can stand up to all scrutiny, regardless of the fallacies present, which usually become obvious as soon as they open their mouth. I will use the term 'Millennial' and 'Post Modernist' almost interchangeably throughout this article as they deserve to be conflated in my opinion.

Postmodernists, which are most prevalent in the Millennial demographic around the world, seem to dismiss a lot of what we now refer to as the Enlightenment (17-18th century European intellectual movement — emphasizing reason rather than tradition). I'm not sure why anyone would choose voluntarily to dismiss reason, free speech, and capitalism, but to my great shock and horror, visions of a socialist 'utopia' seem to be back on the rise in Western democracies. Bernie Sanders epitomized this movement in the 2016 election, coming close to securing the Democratic nomination; he might have secured the nomination if it wasn't for the DNC deciding from the outset that Hillary was going to be the nominee. Domestic terrorist group 'Antifa' perfectly captured the zeitgeist of 2017 American Millennials — the name which means 'Anti-Fascist' is an oxymoron, as they have been acting more fascist than any conservative leaning political group.

Having productive dialogue with anyone who doesn't accept any universal truths is like debating semantics with someone who is stoned.

There is nothing that can be advanced if we don't accept the same universal truths and past; we are left going around in circles with empty words spewing out full of emotions and white noise. 2017, stuck in a world where 'virtue-signaling' has no limits, the concept of caring and empathy matter more than the real thing.

For the most part, Canadians are liberal leaning and indifferent to what is going on outside of their own lives. I can't really blame them — they have no real problems besides the ones that all humans face: relationship problems, stress, death and taxes. They say 'real change comes not from choice, but rather from necessity'; that seems to flow in 2017 within Canada.

I love the word 'solipsism' — the view or theory that the self is all that can be known to exist. Solipsism aptly summarizes the majority of the Western populace. A flip through a few channels on the TV — "Yemen and Venezuela are in the midst of a famine? Wow, that's too bad, but can you change the channel back to 'Game of Thrones', thanks." ;)

I provoke, but that narrative isn't too far off the mark for most North Americans. Priorities, if you will!

It would appear that almost everyone has an opinion on what is happening in the world, usually starting with something like "Trump is an idiot, Putin is Hitler and undermining democracies around the world, Assad is evil, China & Iran are constantly causing trouble around the world" — and that list is far from being exhausted. I don't have a problem with everyone having their own opinion on different issues; I think that is great, healthy and leads to evocative discourse. I do worry about the way in which these opinions are formed and how sacrosanct they are.

Readily present, especially with the younger demographic, is 'single issue politics' where voters get so engrossed in one issue, usually social causes, and don't care to understand anything remotely concrete like monetary and foreign policy. Anything beyond their own interests doesn't phase them — both the Left and the Right are guilty of this. The ironic part of being indifferent to fundamental issues is that they do affect your livelihood in more ways than you care to understand — ignorance is bliss, until it's not.

• Don't care to be informed on monetary issues? Great! — Then happily vote for Bernie Sanders and his vision of a Marxist Utopia while the debt to GDP ratio crosses over 100%, and we continue to saddle your generation (Y) — Millennials and future generations with a plethora of debt which will only worsen as the share of people aged 65+ skyrockets over the coming decades when the 'baby boomers' (babies born 1945-1965) start to retire en masse. Debt is really just stealing from future consumption, and in this case, stealing from future generation's entitlements and standard of living.
• Can't be bothered to understand the refugee crisis in Europe, which is based around imperialism? — Then happily accept refugees en masse, increased terrorism in the West, and bills/laws being passed which limit our free speech but hide under the guise of 'Islamophobia and Xenophobia'. Don't pay any attention to the fact that NATO (which Canada is a member of) airplanes/bombs are largely responsible for the displacement of civilian cities and homes in the greater Middle East which is causing refugees to seek asylum from that region. African refugees, which are the majority, is a slightly different can of worms, which I will leave untouched for the sake of terseness.
• No interest to understand what really transpired in the 2016 US Presidential election, that caused Trump to be elected? — Then continue to blame Russia and continue to move us closer to a NATO conflict in Eastern Europe. Also please ignore all the Wikileaks revelations which clearly show it was the DNC and Hillary Clinton that conspired to steal the election, but still lost. Russia's 'rigging' boiled down to $50,000-100,000 spent on social media ads. It was Hillary and the Clinton Foundation who had closer ties with Russia than Trump has ever had. But, believe the mainstream narrative if you will, and with that, bring us closer to a global conflict with a military superpower.
• Russia invaded Ukraine is obviously simple and doesn't need any background or thought to understand it. — Ignore the fact that it was the CIA who violently overthrew the government of Ukraine in 2014, plunging the country into chaos. Russia also might have a slight interest in stabilizing Ukraine; after all, it is directly on its border, they have their largest abroad military base in Sevastopol, Crimea, and not to mention that the vast majority of Crimean citizens are Russian. Please look me in the face with a straight face and tell me that the US would look on indifferently if Russia or China overthrew the US-friendly government in Mexico or Canada and was arming fascist-leaning mercenaries in those countries.
• N. Korea news isn't your cup of tea? — Then look on indifferently as the US bullies its allies in East Asia to continue engaging in 'war games' on N. Korea's border, raising all kinds of potential for an altercation with a nuclear armed state and key ally of China. Also forget that the US is the only country to ever use nuclear weapons in combat, on the Korea's doorstep in neighboring Japan. Before you start your diatribe, please be able to locate North Korea.
• Not sure what calling Iran a terrorist state really means? — It sounds about right as that is what CNN is saying — then be my guest to look the other way while the US cuddles up to Saudi Arabia, the true terrorist state in the region, largely responsible for 9/11/2001, the rise of ISIS, and the current famine in Yemen right now. Can't remember the last time Iran invaded a country? Me neither! With the rest of the UN Security Council in agreement that Iran is in compliance with the nuclear deal, why does President Trump continue to insist Iran is violating the "spirit" of the agreement? Are they looking for a war?
• China is taking advantage of the US by manipulating their currency and copying our products — that narrative has often been repeated, and recently louder thanks to Trump's ascent to the White House. Makes sense, right? Sure, don't bother to understand that China holds the largest amount of US debt, and it is the US who is taking advantage of other countries by being able to print their currency at par value, a position that only the world's reserve currency country can pull off. Not to mention that without trade with China, which most of the largest US multinationals rely upon, global trade would grind to a halt.

If all or most of these issues seem complex, well they are, and don't expect to grasp much about them by skimming the mainstream news a few times a week. I do agree that any amount of information is better than none, but don't fall into regurgitating what you have seen on TV the previous night and digging in your heels when someone brings a different opinion to the table. Also please don't pretend you really care about these issues when you don't have a rudimentary understanding of events that have transpired and led to the current situations.

I have been accused of being callous in the way that I approach the news and political discourse; that may sound partly true to uninformed, virgin ears. I'm not out to win points with the 'social justice warriors' and no amount of virtue signaling on my part is going to help people across the world. But, don't let me stop you from changing your Facebook picture to a nation's flag that signals that you are a good citizen and your morals are in the right place.

Real and meaningful change will come when the populace understands the core of the issues and starts to ask the right questions, which starts by educating yourself and not allowing yourself to fall victim to the prevalent narrative at first glance.

I have been known to enjoy riling people up at times, but I find that politics has become something else since Trump's election victory just over a year ago. The level of polarization in opinion is ghastly; especially triggered are the younger generations who we will call postmodernists or Millennials — they seem to carry the most resentment to their opinions being challenged.

This post is for everyone who was sleeping or indifferent to 'real' events in 2016. This post is also to save me from having the same conversation over and over online and off.

I don't think this is what CNBC/NYTimes 'journalist' John Harwood had in mind when he tweeted out his predictions for the year.

The Russian hacking story never ended! The only supposed evidence continues to be 'too classified' to release. Sounds a lot like: 'if you can't see the clothes you are a fool, or not worthy of your current position' — reminiscent of a children's story regarding an emperor and his clothes. In our current lexicon in 2016-2017, the more apt term is 'unpatriotic' for those who don't blame Russia for everything or just side with WikiLeaks over other sources.

If the US had no one to demonize, they wouldn't be able to justify spending over half a trillion dollars a year on the military budget, which is 3-4 times bigger than what China spends and almost 10 times as much as Russia spends on their military every year.

Is it that Putin/Russia threatens world peace, or rather threatens America's hegemony? If we didn't caricature Putin as Hitler, it starts to get difficult to incessantly demonize Russia. Trying to end the war in Syria, selling weapons to its allies (China & Iran) or buffing up its borders from hostile countries (NATO) that are conducting war-games on its borders definitely sounds EVIL to me!

I'm sure the US would sit back patiently and try and understand China and Russia's foreign policy if they were deploying troops and conducting war-games in Mexico and Canada. We were on the brink of WW3 when the Cuban Missile Crisis took place; one must also remember that Cuba has something called an ocean in the middle. Russia isn't as fortunate to have an ocean in between it and NATO expansion on its borders.

By the looks of the map, it is obviously Russia who is aggressively expanding the 'Warsaw Pact' (which ceased to exist post 1991) on the West's borders. NATO has nothing to do with it.

So many people around the world wondered how, in a country with 320 million people, the best candidates that Americans came up with were Trump and Clinton? I would say 2016 was a wake-up call to more than just the elites who are currently discussing in Davos how to handle the events in 2016, which they were greatly caught off guard by.

2016 should also be a wake-up call to all the people, mainly the ones who call themselves 'liberals,' who were so surprised by Brexit and Donald Trump getting elected — wake up and try to understand a bit more of the world that you are living in, not just your small enclave.

Aleppo was 'liberated' in 2016, and didn't 'fall' to the bad side. Check how the Aleppo citizens really feel today — talk to them, travel there, check foreign language news sites. The consensus is that the vast majority of Syrians would rather live under Bashar Al Assad's regime than the 'moderate rebels' aka IS, al-Nusra, etc.

Who should we believe: the Syrian people or CNN?

President Obama, in his recent farewell speech, would like to have us all believe that everything is fine and well. His two terms in office were a huge success, but here are a few things that stand out to the contrary. Obama was so successful with the economy that people elected a 'casino owner' to see if he can do any better with jobs and the income inequality gap.

The stock market is at all-time highs — true — with the caveat that since Obama has been in office, the US debt has doubled from 10 to 20 trillion dollars.

Even with the Fed's bluff cycle which I wrote about, almost a full decade of zero percent 'real' interest rates — sounds like a healthy economy to me! Such a vibrant economy indeed, that the cost of money must be artificially held down for 10 years in a row.

The number one culprit for income/wealth inequality are the central banks around the world. They are addicted to easy monetary policies which will eventually result in inflation. I wouldn't bet against central banks' ability to devalue currencies; they have a pretty good track record. The central banks have openly stated that rising prices, aka inflation, is one of their mandates. The richest 1% own the vast majority of assets, while the rest of us are just stuck with higher living costs when inflation does appear. Sounds fair to me!

Ron Paul has it right when he calls for auditing and ending the Fed; it's anyone's guess whether Trump will stay interested in this, or if it was just campaign rhetoric when he opined on 'auditing the Fed.'

'Obamacare,' as Obama likes to call the 'Affordable Care Act,' is affordable depending on who you ask. Even ardent Obama supporters are starting to accept that health care costs are rising. Yes, more people may be covered, but at what cost? The Affordable Care Act by definition isn't working well! It's unsustainable for a squeezed middle class and a government already running perpetual deficits.

As much as you may love Obama's rhetorical gifts and his pleasant demeanor, he hasn't had a very fruitful tenure if his job is to help all Americans fulfill their dreams. And he failed on an even grander scale, if you happened to live in a host of countries America has destabilized over his 8 years in office.

I will leave his Nobel Peace Prize out of this article, but will just state that: Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, Libya, Ukraine and now Syria will never be the same as a result of Obama's 'peaceful' foreign policy.

I digress, back to why I started this missive:

I think it's great to be passionate about issues and have an opinion, but also we must be wary not to grab the first 'fact' or opinion we read on Facebook or Twitter, or maybe even worse — the mainstream news. Research. Read. Think first!

"You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts." — Daniel Patrick Moynihan

I'm all about healthy discourse, but please use facts rather than emotions, or what you want to be real.

Polls and the financial markets reacted when it was all but certain that Brexit and Trump would carry the vote. It looks like a few people were caught asleep at the wheel. It might have been a good idea for some British folks to have picked up a few gold/silver investments before the Pound dropped off a cliff — still sliding...

If everyone was well informed — "I think most sane people are actually libertarians, but they just don't know it." — Gary Johnson. I think overall in the 2016 campaign he was an embarrassment to the Libertarian Party and even more to Ron Paul, who has spent his lifetime building up libertarian awareness.

In 2017 information is virtually free. If you are reading this, then you have access to the internet which has all the information you need. Do some exploring and seek out answers or even scarier facts! Or turn back on Netflix and finish another season of...

This is the world we are living in. Hope you enjoyed my 2016 summary.

The rise of Milo Yiannopoulos, Paul Joseph Watson, and Donald Trump in 2016 all share one important characteristic — they are all okay with offending people.

"Freedom of speech means freedom to hate." — Christopher Hitchens

A subtler way of stating this would be, 'freedom to offend.' While I don't endorse spreading malignancy or hostility around the world, I do agree that we should always have the right, and dare I say privilege in 2017, to disagree with each other on important issues. To expect everyone to view the world in the same way or to assume that all people will feel the same way is absurd. If everyone is thinking the same thing, then nobody is really thinking at all.

Lemmings may have a rotten image, but no individual lemming has ever received bad press. We are safe in a group in that we can't be ostracized; this can be comforting, sure, but it also potentially causes individuals to turn off the rational part of their brain and to assume the opinion of the crowd.

I have spent the better part of the last decade in Asia, mostly Seoul, and have returned to America recently, North for now. The best way to understand people is of course to literally walk in their shoes by living with them. Since being back in America — 'home' — I have come to understand on a deeper level, you could even say viscerally, the rise of Donald Trump, Milo Yiannopoulos and Paul Joseph Watson. People are suffocating on political correctness!

The recently proposed Islamophobia law in Canada is the epitome of the problem right now. In 2017 we are facing a slippery slope to all-out censorship of discourse and free speech. One might also be reminded of this maxim: 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions.' The noose of free speech that the giants of the Enlightenment fought so hard for is starting to choke us, and we are the ones doing the tightening under the guise of 'culture enrichment.' I think we have entered a whole new era of what is pertinently called the 'oppression olympics.'

I will preface the rest of this missive with: I'm the least bigoted person towards people from the Middle East — namely Syria, Iran (one of my best friends is Persian), Yemen, Iraq, Turkey, Russia, China and any other countries that the mainstream media would have you believe are our enemies or a threat to our Western way of life.

I always like to point out to people who hold xenophobic positions on immigration that the least we (North Americans) can do is provide refugees from these countries with shelter. After all, Canada and the US are NATO members and we should be held accountable for what our foreign policy has brought to Syria and the Middle East as a whole. As long as we are involved in 'Western Nation Building,' or as I like to refer to it as 'Petrodollar imperialism,' then I have no other choice but to support immigration from these countries on a large scale.

That said, the Islamophobia law is not what Canada, or any country for that matter, should try to impose on its citizens. I strongly support the ability to talk openly about terrorism or foreign policy by including Islam in the discussion. Islam, like all religions, shouldn't be free of scrutiny. Just because some people disagree or feel offended about the manner in which you are discussing their sacred beliefs doesn't mean you shouldn't be allowed to engage in such discourse.

Having an honest discussion on what is the best way to assimilate people of all faiths in one country must be allowed to be discussed in the most open form possible. I don't fall into the camp which thinks Islam is the main motivator in terrorism against the West. I think Islam plays a part, but a small part at best.

In 2014 I wrote about what I think best explains the motivations behind terrorism towards the West:

Saying Islam alone is evil or a religion of hate is ridiculous, as all monotheistic religions contain doctrine that can be used to justify death to the infidel, not to mention that they all originate with the darkest chapters of the Old Testament. Islam may be having a rough century and be in need of a reformation like Catholicism/Christianity had in the past, but to blame Islam as the sole culprit for terrorist attacks is like blaming Christianity for Hitler's hatred of the Jews and WW2. Religion does play a part in radicalizing young men, in that it helps to justify their martyrdom, but doesn't that just sound like nationalism? Instead of debating issues like religious tolerance, immigration, and increased airport security, why not question what would motivate these people to terrorism and the need to retaliate against us in the first place? The elephant in the room emerges: we are occupying their land and killing their civilians.

Islam, like all religions, is a set of ideas and beliefs, and despite that they are sacred to some, all ideas and beliefs have consequences and should be open for discourse. For example, the majority of liberals would overwhelmingly say they support equality for women, but then when it comes to questioning the treatment of women in countries such as Saudi Arabia, where women are second-class citizens to say the least and chattel at worst, they might say something like "we shouldn't judge other cultures."

I always found this line of thinking amusing in that these same people who oppose Donald Trump for his misogyny look the other way when it comes to where the majority of Hillary's campaign funding came from in the 2016 election, or who the biggest donor to the Clinton Foundation was — Saudi Arabia in both cases!

Then there are feminists who opposed the recent campaign of Marine Le Pen in France, who if elected would have been the first female leader of France. This is both amusing and worrying if you really think about it.

Another noteworthy person who should be a hero to all women is Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She was a victim of religion and proclaimed infidel from her family and place of birth. A Somalian refugee in Europe, she later became a Dutch politician, prominent author, and women's rights advocate. Hearing all that about her, you would think she would be a hero to all women. However, this would not be the case, as many liberals find her opinions on Islam offensive. Offensive! Think about that!

"Those who are determined to be 'offended' will discover a provocation somewhere. We cannot possibly adjust enough to please the fanatics, and it is degrading to make the attempt." — Christopher Hitchens

We should be free to have open discourse on the merits of all ideas and beliefs — full stop. I think Western civilization over the last few decades has become hypersensitive. We call 'hate speech' anything we don't agree with. If we aren't allowed to speak freely and disagree with each other, do we really have free speech at all?

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." — Voltaire

Voltaire was a product of the Enlightenment. He knew better than anyone that without free speech and the ability to disagree openly with conventional wisdom, certain entities — namely the monarchy and the clergy — would be left unchallenged to assert their beliefs and policies on the unassuming populace.

Christopher Hitchens aptly opined: Who is going to be the arbiter of this law? To whom do you award the right to decide which speech is harmful or who is the harmful speaker? Or determine in advance what are the harmful consequences going to be, that we know enough about in advance to prevent? To whom would you give this job? To whom are you going to award the job of being the censor?

I would agree with Gary Johnson: "Most Americans are libertarians, they just don't know it." I might add onto that: most people are libertarians, but they don't understand how the Federal Reserve, Petrodollar, and the IRS really work, and vote with emotions rather than rationality. If you trust yourself over the government to decide what is best for you, by definition you are a libertarian. Who knows better than you how to spend your money, what you should be allowed to consume, or who you should be allowed to marry? I don't want bureaucrats or clergy telling me how to live my life, and neither should you!

All humans are products of their environments, so religious affiliation should be understood as nothing more than how your parents reared you and what you've been exposed to, especially in your formative years. Before we make outlandish statements and judge other civilizations, we should really try to learn and understand them. If we don't, we fall victim to prejudice and bigotry.

Someone who caught my attention during the 2016 presidential campaign was Milo Yiannopoulos. He was very outspoken on various issues and backed 'Daddy' for the White House. The reason Milo caught my attention was his indifference to cultural sensitivities — or as I like to call them 'insecurities' — and his enjoyment of 'riling' people up. He calls himself a 'virtuous troll' in that he thinks he is bringing light to issues that need a larger audience.

His rise to notoriety ties in with Trump's rise to the White House, so I found the correlation interesting and worth elaborating on. Paul Joseph Watson, probably best described as a YouTube star who works for InfoWars, is best known for his video rants on issues that many people are afraid to talk about. Whether you agree with him 100% or not, he is entertaining and has a rapidly growing audience.

I think we need more people who will challenge people's beliefs down to the core. I don't think the world in 2017, and especially millennials, need more coddling. In a lot of conversations that I have engaged in with people since being back in North America, I find myself tiptoeing around so as to not 'rile up' or offend people. So many people are starting to tune out anything they disagree with, including facts!

As the late Christopher Hitchens eloquently put it:

"If someone tells me that I've hurt their feelings, I say, 'I'm still waiting to hear what your point is.' In this country, I've been told, 'That's offensive' as if those two words constitute an argument or a comment. Not to me they don't. And I'm not running for anything, so I don't have to pretend to like people when I don't."

I'm going to explain where I think the markets currently reside, and then I'm going to give some pragmatic investment ideas that I think will benefit from the current environment or at worst will be more resilient than other investments you might currently find yourself holding.

On a side note, I just finished reading Nassim Taleb's book 'Antifragile' so I might let a few of his neologisms slip in this article. 'Antifragile', while being slightly verbose and unintelligible for the layman, had me captivated over the last week, and ties directly into this article.

The unprecedented complacency in the stock market right now has a lot of people scratching their heads, including myself, and wondering who is buying stocks at these levels, and more importantly what kind of returns are people expecting to get when entering this volume-less, volatility-less, stale bull market! The current bull market started in early 2009 — so we are 8+ years into this bull market. Historically speaking this is the second longest bull market since WWII, with only the 1990-2000 bull market being longer and we all know how that ended.

To preface: I'm a 'deep value-contrarian' when it comes to investments so I usually recommend investments that are currently out of favor or have yet to appear on people's radar. In saying that, I find it amusing when people tout the recent returns they have made in their 'index funds' or their stock of choice; it hasn't been that hard to make decent returns over the last 8 years — all you had to do is blindly buy anything. The S&P 500 is up over 250% during that time.

My returns over the last 5 years have been less than stellar minus a few bright spots, namely mining companies 2014–present and cryptocurrencies 2014–present day. The reason that my returns have been suboptimal is that I never really bought into the idea that the economy had recovered from the 'great recession' 2007-2009, which was a result of loose mortgage lending that resulted in the housing market crash in the US and then the full global slowdown. What this means is I didn't go blindly long the S&P 500 in 2009, but have bought out of favor sectors that haven't moved much.

People who have made great returns in indexes over the last 8 years might feel like they made a prudent choice investing a lot of money in indexes during this timeline, but I would beg to differ. Though volatility and risk have been suppressed leading stock buyers to believe the world has become 'antifragile' — this is exactly the wrong conclusion! Volatility will return with a vengeance in the near future — the markets have never been more fragile than they are right now!

I will give you a few things to ruminate on:

1) The US and global economy still hasn't recovered from the great recession, or why is the Federal Funds rate still less than 1%? Historically this is crisis level, but over the last decade it has become the norm.

2) Central banks around the world continue to monetize government debt in 2017, accumulating trillions of dollars in assets — central banks' AUM have swollen unprecedentedly. Yes stocks are higher, but are the markets really rising on strong fundamentals or rather artificial liquidity provided by central banks? I'm not sure why people refer to central banks as the 'lender of last resort' — they have become the 'lender of first resort'.

3) We have built a fragile system that has lost its ability to self-correct and moderate risk. In Nassim Taleb's lexicon, we have had 'fragilistas' at the helm of central banks around the world; this has created a fragile system that has been micromanaged to a perilous state. Volatility isn't allowed anymore; every time there has been a slight selloff in the markets, Janet Yellen and her cohorts come out with dovish statements to reassure all investors that the FED will do 'whatever it takes' to keep the bull market party going, and this isn't an isolated incident — this is happening globally.

I wrote about the FED's bluff cycle previously, and I want to expand on that a bit more. The whole narrative that the economy is strong and that the FED can normalize interest rates is still a non-starter, as it fails to take into account the precarious state of the economy and the high levels of debt which have been accumulated. It is easy to finance debt when interest rates are less than 1% or in some cases even negative. The cost of money has been so distorted for such an extended period; the misallocation of resources is on the precipice of a rude awakening.

So one of two things can happen here: either the FED can normalize interest rates (historically 3-5%) or they can't. My bet is that they can't, but let's run with the narrative that they can while you read the following points.

Case 1 — Normalization of Interest Rates

I can be quite confident that there will be massive ripple effects that will cause a 'great, great recession'. When in 2008 we had a debt crisis, the cure for that crisis is of course to DOUBLE the national debt (which has been done since 2008) — that should solve things!

1) US shale oil will see large-scale bankruptcies — the only reason shale oil was ever feasible below $80/barrel was that shale companies were able to take on vast amounts of debt at extremely low interest rates. This allowed balance sheets to look a lot healthier than they really were. The idea of the US being energy independent is still something I don't expect to see in my lifetime.

2) The interest payments on the national debt have remained roughly the same over the last decade even though we have doubled the national debt — how is this possible?! The reason this was possible is because interest rates dropped by more than half, allowing the government's interest payments to remain roughly the same. If interest rates were to normalize, the math would start to get ugly pretty quickly — negative compound interest, anyone?!

3a) Global equities, especially the S&P 500, will have a rude wake-up call when profits plunge as consumer credit tightens and the average person has a lot less money to spend.

3b) Another reason stocks have gone straight up over the last 8 years is 'share buybacks' — to explain simply, this is just a company using its cash to buy back its own shares. This sounds like a good idea at times if you have excess profits and your shares are undervalued, but that is where it gets confusing as neither of these were the case! Companies were taking on debt at 1-3%, and with nothing better to do with their newly acquired funds, they were buying back their own shares in the open market. Reducing the number of shares means earnings per share, revenue and cash flow grow more quickly on a per-share basis. Taking on debt to make earnings per share more attractive — LET THAT SINK IN!

Major share buybacks will be halted as it won't seem like such a great use of money to buy back your own shares when the cost of money rises with the normalization of interest rates. In most cases companies who took part in share buybacks were buying historically expensive shares on a price-to-earnings basis anyway, so the reduction of share buybacks is probably not the worst thing to happen.

Case 2 — The More Likely Scenario

The more likely scenario in my opinion is that the FED will recant on its stated goal of normalizing interest rates. Here is how I think this will unravel:

1) The dollar will continue to decline; it is already down around 10% since the peak of the Trump irrational exuberance rally. Trump has been rather quiet about the strength of the dollar recently, something he also naively took credit for after winning the election.

2) Monetary metals will continue their moves higher as people realize that interest rates aren't going anywhere, except most likely lower or even negative. Monetary metals usually trade inversely to the yield on the 10-year treasury.

3) Markets will initially sell off as the narrative of a strong economy is finally debunked, but I suspect that the 'central planners' will come to the rescue of the market and equities will eventually find a bottom and rally as the cost of money becomes looser and looser, and the chase for yield is back on.

4) Share buybacks will commence and the S&P 500 will start to drip higher again.

5) Inflation will creep up as the cost of all goods priced in USD will rise. Inflation will be seen in all things — rising house prices, natural resources, and of course gold and silver. Millennial gold and silver, aka Bitcoin and Ethereum, I suspect will also benefit from this.

So you may be propelled to think: if stocks will be rescued in the case of a market collapse, why should I sell funds out of my index and diversify? Certain markets will outperform over the coming decade, and I suspect that it won't be the major indexes. If you are someone who supports the narrative "over the long run stocks always do well," I would like to remind you that the Japanese index the Nikkei is still below its peak of 1990, and there have been many cases of 'lost decades' where the markets find themselves at the same place that they were a decade earlier; the S&P 500 traded around 1500 in 2000, 2007 and again in 2013, with a few 50% sell-offs in the middle. So timing is also very important when investing.

Whether the FED decides to pursue 'dovish' monetary policies is irrelevant when I point out that Donald Trump's decision to own the market's recent gains is imprudent. When Obama came into office he was buying the markets at the absolute lows of the great recession, while on the other hand Trump is buying the markets at extremely overbought levels after an 8+ year uptrend. I agree with Peter Schiff when he states that "the FED has their fall guy in the White House now," meaning that if they do continue to raise rates and prick the bubble, Trump — having taken so much credit for the recent stock market gains — will by default also be responsible for the aftermath of a historic debt-inflated market collapse.

In closing, I recommend people to think about what their expectations are over the next decade; do you think the next 8 years will be like the preceding 8 years? If so, index away and hope for the best, but I will remind you that 'hope' isn't an investment strategy! If you have good reasons why the index will outperform over the next decade, I would be interested to hear them. If you think that markets are unpredictable and that indexes don't assume to choose winners and losers as they capture the breadth of the markets and that makes them safe — again, index away!

I will leave you with this: The great Charlie Munger introduced me to the concept of inversion. He always recommends for people to invert their thinking, especially when investing. What this means is always think about how you can lose before you consider how you can win or profit. What could go wrong with this investment? What am I missing? What is my safety or margin of error? So forecasting a rosy next decade might make you feel good, and you will be tempted to think about how much money you will make in the case of markets repeating their past performance; that is sloppy thinking and should be avoided! What could possibly go wrong with artificially suppressed volatility and markets at record highs?! I hope I have awakened you to some of the potential outcomes.

The only investments that resonate with my style of investing are equities that I think have limited downside and unlimited upside. My style of investing would be well illustrated by limited downside (especially in 2017) and unlimited upside — the opposite would better represent the S&P 500 index at current levels: a small potential gain, but a vastly larger potential drop.

After I find investments that offer these kind of risk-to-reward profiles, I then take it a step further and think: what are the fundamentals of the company, the jurisdiction of the company, the character of the management, and my knowledge and confidence of the investment? I ideally like to buy investments that I think will return hundreds of percent over a 5-10 year basis.

As an example: the S&P 500 index may go up another 1-2 years returning 10-15% (highly unlikely on a historical basis), but the downside is magnitudes of that! I wouldn't be surprised to see a 40-50% drop within the next 2-3 years. That doesn't seem like a great risk-to-reward to me. I'm investing in things that I think have the exact opposite potential payoffs, in that they could drop 10-15% but more likely will be up triple digits over the next decade.

As I mentioned at the start, many of my investments have underperformed over the last 5 years, but the fundamentals are very strong at current levels. Many of the investments are trading below book value and have large catalysts which could propel them up hundreds of percent. These are investments that I can't afford to miss out on.

Without going into details, my portfolio is long investments related to Mongolia, Silver, Uranium and a few other contrarian investments that will benefit from antifragility (increased volatility).

The US election is slimming down quickly to give us really only a choice between two flawed candidates, so we have to take a stoic approach to it and make do with what we have left. Sanders has made the election interesting. However, barring a scandal or heart attack, Hillary Clinton looks untouchable with a huge lead in pledged delegates for the Democratic nomination. Donald Trump looks to have secured the Republican nomination with his recent win in Indiana.

Donald Trump may be a bigot, a racist, an Islamophobe, a narcissist, and a sexist, but he still seems more pragmatic about most of the issues Americans should really care about. I've heard many people tell me, "Yes, Trump would be interesting in office, but you don't have to live here, so you are detached from the situation enough that it is just entertainment." My friend has hinted that it may be the anarchist in us who wants to see the system burn down and see Trump in the White House. Nothing could be further from the truth. If I lived in North America or was a US citizen, I might have even more motivation to support Trump.

I'll outline the reasons why I think a Clinton presidency would be far worse for global stability in the long run than a Trump presidency.

To begin with, I don't even think Trump believes most of the things he says. He changes his opinion in the midst of a conversation/debate if he feels that is what needs to be done to advance his agenda. I think his proposal of building a wall on the Mexican border would phase out quickly if he got elected. Also, deporting all illegal immigrants while ambitious is near impossible. These bombastic statements have excited a lot of the GOP electorate, but most people will have lost interest or outright forgotten of these promises when 2017 rolls in.

Let's not forget Obama campaigned on a peaceful foreign policy platform and even won the Nobel Peace Prize, but during his presidency, he has sent troops to Libya, Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Mali, and Afghanistan. He doesn't seem as worthy of that Peace Prize anymore, but few voters care and or even remember what he said on the campaign trail back in 2008. All successful politicians say what they need to say to get into office even if they don't believe it or know their policies aren't feasible.

"That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach." — Aldous Huxley

While having an opinion or attacking Trump is easy, I challenge the reader to see which issues will impact their life the most and explore the two candidates' policies on these issues. Don't let your emotions get in the way of making an informed decision. I think income inequality and the refugee crisis are the two biggest issues in the world right now.

Income Inequality

This has become one of the defining issues of this election. There is deep dissatisfaction amongst the majority of Americans who feel left behind in this so-called economic "recovery" since the Great Recession of 2008. Sanders and Trump are both anti-establishment candidates. They are both popular for very similar reasons. People feel that they better represent the low-to-middle-income citizen more so than the establishment candidates like Bush, Clinton, and Rubio do.

Sanders has taken a kick-the-can-down-the-road approach to the real fiscal problem by offering government largesse with no feasible way of paying for it. America has been running deficits since Hillary's husband was in office and there looks to be no way to run a surplus anytime soon. Sanders' vision of a socialist utopia, which will result in an even larger government, is not exactly going to help the fiscal situation for the masses.

I would argue that the real culprit for income inequality is the Federal Reserve's loose monetary policies since 2008. Zero percent interest rates and QE (Quantitative Easing), which is just a euphemism for counterfeiting or monetizing the debt, have done little for the average person over the last eight years.

Sanders is somewhat right to attack the big banks. However, the big banks are just doing what they do best, which is taking advantage of policies that have been put in front of them by Washington and the Federal Reserve who decide the monetary policy for the country and most of the developed world. Blaming the big banks will get you nowhere quickly!

I respect Sanders' energy and integrity, but I also think he needs to come around to an audit-the-Fed stance like Ron Paul spent much of his career campaigning on, and his son Rand has picked up on as well. Trump has recently spoken in support of auditing the Fed. To have a mainstream politician talking about that is a big step in the right direction. The world deserves to know the intricacies of how the Fed operates. Trump has also spoken about replacing dovish Fed Chief Yellen with hopefully someone less prone to easy monetary policies.

The reason that monetary policy is so important in combating income inequality is that 1% of Americans own the vast quantity of all assets while the 99% of Americans own a very small percentage. The vast majority of the bottom 25% of the population own none at all. So yes, as the argument in favor of easy monetary policies goes, the US economy was temporarily saved from another great depression by the Fed and government largesse, but the majority of Americans never experienced a real recovery. Kicking the can down the road with more debt just steals future growth and makes the day of reckoning that much worse.

The unemployment rate looks favorable at around 5%, and the stock markets are at all-time highs, so everyone should be happy, shouldn't they? I would like to point out that real unemployment including discouraged workers who have dropped out of the labor force are not included in that 5% number. Also, the 5% rate counts equally part-time minimum wage jobs as full-time jobs.

So the Federal Reserve has been effective in stopping a great deflation thus far. However, inflation we have seen in the stock market and in real estate has benefited the 1% while only making it even harder for the majority of Americans who don't own those assets to keep up on a monthly basis. With inflationary forces showing their ugly head in rental prices and especially food prices, it is really starting to pinch the lower-income households who spend a disproportionate amount of their salary on basic living necessities. In contrast, the 1% spends such a small fraction of their income on housing and food that it is more than offset by the increases in their asset prices. This is why the income inequality gap continues to widen.

Sanders has forced Hillary to talk tough towards Wall Street, which is quite comical as she is Wall Street's horse in the race. She won't release transcripts of her highly paid speeches she made at Wall Street banks. In addition, we all know that the majority of her campaign is financed by Wall Street just like Obama's campaign. She is the last person who will move to audit the Fed, make any meaningful changes on Wall Street, or to the loose monetary policy. If you care about income inequality, Clinton isn't your candidate.

Foreign Policy — Syria

The Syrian civil war that started in 2011 hasn't finished yet. It has displaced around nine million people in the region. The refugee crisis has put a huge strain on Europe's security and politics as well. While Hillary has said she would put a no-fly zone in Syria, Rand Paul made clear in a debate what that really meant when he said: "Russia has been invited by the Syrian regime to fly in that area; if we were to impose a no-fly zone which Russia would surely not agree to, we would be threatening to shoot down Russian fighter planes."

I'm not sure how that could possibly be a good idea to attack one of the heaviest nuclear-armed states in the world. I would like to remind people that the Islamic State (IS) and the other terrorist groups operating in Iraq and Syria have no air force. Therefore, all a no-fly zone would do is stop Russia and the Syrian regime from bombing the terrorist groups and cutting off their oil sales, which is where they get the majority of their funding from. So far from defeating IS, imposing a no-fly zone would strengthen the world's number one so-called 'enemy.'

Trump, on the other hand, has said he would look to improve America's fractious relationship with Russia and has said that he sees no reason why he wouldn't be able to work with Putin. As the Donald likes to say, "I get along with everybody."

The western media loves to demonize Putin's actions in Syria and Ukraine as hostile. I love reminding people that if Russia and China were expanding a 'Warsaw Pact' with Canada or Mexico, do you think the US would sit patiently on the sidelines and watch? Or how about if Russia or China were sending spy planes or warships near US borders on a regular basis? I think China and Russia have actually been very patient and pragmatic in the face of NATO's expansion in eastern Europe and in the face of frequent shows of strength in the South China Sea by America and its allies.

Trump would act a lot more pragmatic towards these two military giants than Hillary would. We need a president who will 'get along with everybody', not someone who is campaigning on standing up to China and destabilizing that region, not to mention Clinton's plan of setting up a no-fly zone in Syria and bent on standing up to Putin's so-called "aggression."

Whether Trump understands the intricacies of how America's foreign policy has worked for the last four decades is debatable, as he seems ignorant of why we have troops stationed around the world. On the other hand, I'm sure Hillary understands the Petrodollar and how America's foreign policy works. After all, she has spent her lifetime in politics and was already Secretary of State. She knows that Putin threatens American hegemony more than any leader on the planet right now. Clinton knows that standing up to Putin is essential to maintain American hegemony. It could be argued that she leans more towards a neo-conservative agenda than Trump does.

On the face of it, Hillary appears to represent the nation better as a whole, and Trump appears to be representing only an extreme fringe of a broken part of the Republican Party. However, I would argue exactly to the contrary. Hillary represents the status quo, Wall Street, and the deep state — and especially the one percent. Trump represents everyone who is fed up with the status quo; Trump isn't my first choice by far, but the 99% see him as the most viable way to express their dissatisfaction, and they are relishing in his success.

The establishment is panicking as they should be. They know Trump is unpredictable and listens to no one but himself. Most would agree that Trump isn't their favorite candidate, but like me would like to believe in democracy. They feel like him doing well in the primaries shows there's still a semblance of democracy left in our system, rather than just another Clinton or Bush on each side representing special interests and a small faction of the country.

It has been over a year now since I wrote my article on $16 silver being the best investment over the coming decade 2015-2025. The price is back hovering around $16, after having dipped below $14 briefly in late 2015 and early 2016. The bottom is most likely in now as both gold and silver have had a strong run in 2016, both entering bull markets at times. A bull market can be defined as advancing 20% in price from its low. Silver touched $13.62 in December 2015 and traded as high as $17 recently. For most of the first quarter of 2016, silver had been lagging behind gold's rise, but over the last few weeks, silver seems to have caught up and exceeded the yellow metal.

A price advancing or declining by a certain percentage doesn't really hold a lot of meaning on its own, but when we start to use the terms "bull" market and "bear" market, the moves start to take on a life of their own and the price moves become a self-fulfilling prophecy in that many investors flock to buy or sell when certain trends develop.

Having been greatly attracted to silver at the start of 2015 around $16, I knew the downside was always going to be limited at such a low entry. The silver spot price had dropped from $50 in 2011. At $16, the majority of mining companies were producing silver at a loss. The silver spot price didn't drop that much over the last year, but the silver equities were smashed lower as they are highly leveraged to the price of silver.

There are so many catalysts that can drive the silver price much higher from here, including:

• Physical shortages in coins and bullion. We have seen shortages at times around the world already. The mints limit their sales during times of high demand so that they never really 'sell out', but anyone watching knows they are facing shortages.
• Monetary metals should continue following gold's rise on weak economic data that will cause central banks to be accommodative in monetary policy — i.e., negative interest rates and even further rounds of quantitative easing. The whole narrative that the world and especially the US economy is strong holds no weight in an environment where the Fed still can't normalize interest rates after eight years of close to zero.
• China and Russia's incessant demands for larger and larger stocks of precious metals to offset the decline in their foreign reserves. Their purchases can be looked at in various ways: a hedge against their depreciating US paper reserves or as a gambit to speed up the timeline of the dethroning of the world's reserve currency: the USD.
• Supply destruction from the miners below $20 per ounce of silver, where the spot price has been for the last year and a half, is not profitable for the majority of silver miners. There will be no new mine expansions, and some miners have already cut back production or closed up shop until the price rises further.
• Silver as a byproduct: Silver is mainly produced as a byproduct of other metals such as copper, zinc and iron. Base metals' prices have dropped precipitously over the last few years as well. We should expect lower production of silver going forward if prices of base metals remain depressed.
• Increased uses of silver. With ever-expanding demand and new uses for silver — namely in smart devices and solar panels — don't expect industrial supply to slow down anytime soon. Silver is such a small percentage of the total input in many products that the spot price is almost irrelevant to producers.
• Paper market manipulation: There have been recent revelations that the precious metals paper markets have been manipulated by Deutsche Bank. This news comes as no surprise to people who have been following the precious metals markets closely. It also adds further weight to having a physical exchange going forward where the price is set by supply and demand of physical silver and gold. Imagine that! Real price discovery the old-fashioned way!
• Negative interest rates: The majority of the developed world has already implemented negative interest rates or is thinking out loud about them. This is good news for silver investors as there is no lost yield to hold physical metal if banks are charging you to keep your money at the bank.
• The gold-to-silver ratio: We pull ten times as much silver out of the ground as gold, but the current ratio of the spot price is closer to 75:1 which historically speaking is very, very high. Silver is underpriced versus gold and should revert back closer to 30:1 or in a blowout bull market even 15 or 10:1.

With the silver price little changed over the last year, mining companies have been left in a tight spot of producing silver at a loss. But for silver equity investors, something exciting has developed over the last four months. Mining shares for silver producers are up sharply, and some of my main holdings are up over 100% from my entry into silver in early 2015.

Many silver investors have described the silver equities as equivalent to a beach ball held under water. When the silver price starts to move, the ball will be released, and the marginal silver producers who are heavily leveraged will explode higher. I think the recent outperformance in mining shares bodes well. Investors seem confident that the bottom in silver is in, and higher prices for both gold and silver will continue going forward.

Uranium, which is a key ingredient in making nuclear power, is currently undervalued in July 2016. Investing in uranium has been called the ultimate contrarian investment in that it is misunderstood and even despised by most people. Many countries have talked about abandoning nuclear energy as an energy source altogether.

The reason I find uranium appealing is that it accounts for a significant percentage of global electricity needs and that isn't about to change anytime soon. In a world where many people don't have stable electricity and are willing to burn coal or other cheap and dirty sources of fuel, uranium stands out as a great, affordable alternative which doesn't contribute to greenhouse gases.

Nuclear energy is the most condensed energy source currently available, which makes it a strategic form of energy for people in many countries who don't have sufficient amounts of fossil fuels. Nuclear energy also accounts for the majority of clean, non CO2 emitting energy produced globally every year.

The best part of producing and selling uranium is the cost of uranium is such a small factor in the end users total cost of producing electricity. The owner of the generator that produces nuclear energy isn't going to stop producing electricity when the price of uranium rises from let's say $26 per lb. to $260 per lb. which is a 1000% increase in the input price of uranium. It's such an insignificant part of their cost to generate a reliable power source.

Like all good investments, they must be bought at the right time. Uranium has been in a bear market since 2011 or depending on how you look at it, since 2007, when the price hit $130 per lb.

The current uranium spot price on July 27th is $25.25 per lb. in the spot market. According to Cameco, the world's biggest publicly listed uranium producer, the average global cost of production is around $60 per lb., so companies that are producing it now aren't making their cost of capital and they are depleting their reserves.

I'm going to make the case that over the coming five years, the price of uranium will rise and that money invested in equities with exposure to uranium will make outsized gains.

Many new reactors are being built around the world, most notably in China, India, and Russia. There are currently 440 nuclear reactors operating in 31 countries providing about 11% of the world's electricity needs.

According to data, it is estimated that 5.5 million people worldwide die prematurely every year from air pollution. The majority of these deaths occur in Asia, namely China and India as they are developing rapidly and rely on coal as their primary source of energy.

I predict a shortage of uranium will develop before 2020. Nuclear energy will continue being an essential part of the clean energy mix for the foreseeable future.

When we do finally get through the excess above ground supplies of uranium and we run into a supply deficit, we will already be in a big supply crunch as the amount of time to develop new sources of uranium is quite lengthy. It can take up to 10 years after discovery of a uranium deposit to permit and get into production. I expect during this stage that the price will skyrocket to the upside as it has in the past.

I'm buying a handful of companies which have uranium supplies and are already producing it. No matter what your opinion is on nuclear energy, it isn't going anywhere in the near future, so consider adding some uranium exposure to your portfolio for the inevitable price rise.

Ever since the FED (Federal Reserve) started to taper back in 2013, there has been a widely accepted belief that a long-term tightening cycle had begun.

In December 2015, we had our first 25 bps rate hike after 7 years of near zero percent interest rates. Real (adjusted for inflation) rates were and are still negative. The widely held assumption was that this rate hiking cycle would lead to the normalization of interest rates somewhere closer to a historical norm of 3-5%.

I have always found it hard to believe that we would get anywhere near historical rates as the world and especially the US economy has taken on so much more debt since the recent financial crisis. A normalization of interest rates would cause the US economy to implode and another recession/depression scenario would become inevitable.

Since January, we have been living in what could be called 'The FED's bluff cycle'. When we get a set of strong economic numbers, the FED starts talking about additional rate hikes and when the data is weak, they sound dovish and push any additional rate hikes further into the future. As Peter Schiff has been saying all along, the FED wants everyone to believe that they will raise rates again soon, but in reality, they have no plans to ever normalize rates.

If the FED were to raise one or two more times over the next few years, it is beside the point, as we'll see further easing from the FED in the form of additional QE or negative interest rates before we see rates anywhere near historical norms.

I think gold, and even to a bigger extent, silver, have captured the FED's rate rise bluff. Gold is up 27% on the year while silver is up over 45%. I'm heavily long all things silver related so I'm quite pleased with how the first half of the year has turned out.

We don't have free markets anymore, we have a series of interventions. The FED has manipulated interest rates, and this distorts price discovery for everything including the price of money itself. If the price of money isn't allocated effectively, then how can we expect to have a real economic recovery?

I think things will get a lot worse for the public before they get better. I think we will see negative interest rates in the US in the not too distant future. Negative interest rates are already in effect in Europe and Japan, accounting for over $13 trillion worth of bonds.

Eventually, volatility and mispriced risk will return with a vengeance. You can't keep market forces at bay forever. We will look back on this latest attempt at central planning and wonder why we ever thought this time is different.

This is my attempt at summarizing investing guru Rick Rule's thoughts on the subject from his many interviews, as well as my thoughts on the subject and, of course, a bit about my two favorite investments: silver and Mongolia.

Buying low and selling high is easier said than done. I have struggled to do this consistently in my investing career. Why is buying an equity when the price is low and selling it when it has appreciated in value so difficult? I think it lies in our need as humans to have confirmation, in that we crave support from our peers, and when we don't have it, we feel inadequate and have nowhere to hide.

"If you aren't a contrarian in the resource sector, you will be a victim." — Rick Rule

I believe it stems from humans evolving from small bands of hunter-gatherers tens of thousands of years ago. At that time, to be ostracized from the group meant death. In our current times, thinking independently is no longer a life-and-death outcome, but the emotions that we experience when we are on our own are much the same.

Mr. Rule likes to famously state that the cure for low prices is low prices and the cure for high prices is high prices. Resource markets are extremely cyclical because they are capital intensive, as well as time sensitive. When supply and demand aren't balanced, it can take a lot longer than other markets for the price to correct itself. This lag leads to huge boom and bust cycles.

"Our future perceptions are formed from our immediate past, and the past hasn't been pretty for the resource sector since 2011. This sector has come off its highs by more than 80%, which means that if all things are held constant, this sector is 80% less risky than it was previously." — Rick Rule

Warren Buffett famously said you shouldn't buy a share of stock unless you know it well enough that you would be delighted to see it fall 25% in price, so you could buy more at a 25% discount.

If we assume that, in the worst case, the downside is somewhere between 15-30% from here and the potential upside is somewhere between 300-1000%, that is a trade that I will take every time it is offered.

Rick likes to point out that the greatest risk any investor faces is to the left of his right ear and to the right of his left ear. So the first thing that one must do is learn to master himself before attempting to master cyclicality.

The resource sector, namely silver and Mongolia, trade at an extreme discount, and it has never been a greater time to be a contrarian with a firm grasp of patience and cycles.

I don't like speculating on which brands of phones or cars people will buy, as there are far too many variables that affect the decision-making process. People's preferences are constantly in flux, and they can change on a whim. I used to be a loyal iPhone fan until Apple's iOS and battery failed to ever make meaningful updates, and now I enjoy an Android phone with a battery twice the size of my old iPhone. Cars are no different. I know a lot of consumers and investors who have lost faith in VW, the automotive giant, over their recent emissions scandal. It goes to show that consumers aren't loyal at all; they are fickle, and will jump ship at a moment's notice. Consequently, trying to predict which brands will succeed in the long term is a risky game.

I do like investing based on demographics, which means investing in people's basic necessities. Consumer consumption can be predicted so far in that people enjoy eating food during the day, that they like heat when they shower and — especially in the winter — that they prefer driving over walking to work. If we take these consumption patterns as a given for the foreseeable future, we have the framework for a great investment.

Natural Resources

The energy and food we consume changes little over time; our lifestyle simply isn't that different from our parents', except for the fact that we spend 2-3 hours a day staring at screens. We still enjoy relatively cheap food and energy like the generations that came before us.

Prior to 1800, less than 1 billion people were alive on Earth; most lived as Thomas Hobbes wrote: "The life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." At this time, we weren't able to use all the locked solar energy in the form of coal, oil and natural gas that was stored in the earth, waiting for us to come and extract it. Once we managed to extract and utilize this locked energy, our lives increased by all measurable variables — longevity, income and diet; but most importantly, our population started to expand at a more rapid pace than ever before.

It took us less than 130 years to add another billion people to the planet, and then less than 30 years to reach 3 billion. The global population is growing at a rate of about 1% per year, which is equivalent to adding 75 million new people annually to our current total of 7.4 billion human beings. That is roughly the addition of an entire new France/Germany every single year, or two new Canadas.

The growth rate has slowed down over the last few decades, and will continue to do so, as large countries like Russia and Japan have already begun to shrink. The majority of the developed world is barely above the replacement rate, or the rate at which the population neither expands nor contracts, and many countries will join Russia and Japan with simultaneously aging and shrinking populations.

The major increase in the world population comes from the developing world; Africa is leading the way with the world's highest fertility rate of around 5-7 offspring per family. Furthermore, the population of Africa, which now stands at about 1.1 billion people, is predicted to more than double by 2050, exceeding 2.4 billion people. In addition, India's current population of 1.2 billion people will far exceed China's in terms of boasting the world's most populous country, at close to 1.6 billion people.

Think tanks predict that the global population will likely exceed 9 billion people around 2040. That is 2.5 billion more people than there are today in the world, and that is only 25 years away, which means my generation will witness this. The vast majority of these new people will be coming from Asia and Africa, both of which have access to just a fraction of the calories and energy that western nations do. These people all want to enjoy the comforts of full bellies, warm or cool houses (depending on the weather), a roof over their heads and speedy transportation. They will all try to provide the best they can for their kin.

How Do We Capitalize on This?

With so many new global citizens due to appear on Earth in the foreseeable future, it only makes sense that there will be more people chasing fewer goods. That is to say, we will be in direct competition with more and more people, all of whom are after a slice of the pie, or as we say in the west, "the good life" or "the American dream."

Investing in easily predictable consumption patterns fits this well, as we will always need more resources. Price, however, determines how we share and consume those resources. I prefer investments that rely on the "when" factor, not just "if." Commodities such as oil, coal, natural gas, steel, copper and water will be in significantly higher demand in the coming years. We are making fewer large resource discoveries and always at increasingly higher costs. We have plucked the easy fruit and now we are after the harder-to-extract stuff; this will not change.

Mainstream news outlets will have you believing that peak oil and high energy prices are dead, as the world continues to enjoy affordable energy in abundance. This, however, is not the case. Conventional or easily extractable oil peaked in America in the 1970s, as Hubbert famously predicted, and global peak oil occurred around 2005. The current low prices we enjoy are a temporary flash in the pan from overproduction in a few key oil-producing states, not to mention "fracking," or unconventional oil, that is well below its current cost of production.

Unconventional oil only began impacting global production when prices exceeded $80 a barrel, and stayed there for an extended period; that is to say that these new forms of oil extraction are very costly. The petrol states — namely Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Russia — are burning through their rainy day sovereign funds, and will soon decide that "market share," as they are calling it, isn't worth the pain of low prices anymore. Consequently, they will be forced to shelf geopolitical ambitions, too.

Unconventional oil producers like "tight shale" in America and "tar sands" in Alberta will realize that $45 isn't earning its cost of production; they will be forced to cut back, and in the worst cases, they will be forced into bankruptcy. This "glut" will quickly correct itself over the coming years, and oil will resume its long-term price uptrend.

We will never completely run out of global oil, but we have already run out of surplus cheap and easily extractable oil. I have this to say to those who tell me that innovation and renewable energy will come to the rescue when prices rise significantly: In oil's brief history it has risen from under $0.50 cents to over $140 a barrel — isn't that a price rise? Since its discovery over 150 years ago, it still accounts for the majority of our energy consumption. Oil, coal and natural gas still account for over 80% of energy consumed! Coal is the dirtiest and most widely used source of energy in the developing world, leaving no shortage of incentives to innovate. Why hasn't this happened yet? The answer is price. Innovation and renewables will cause an energy revolution, but this will have to wait until we see much, much higher fossil fuel prices. Change comes not by choice, but rather by necessity.

The investment thesis consists of larger populations chasing after finite resources and higher prices as a result. In our current commodity cycle, we are in a "bear market," which means that prices have fallen from their peak on "weak demand," if that is the correct term to use for a slight slowdown in our consumption rate over the last few years. This makes the investment case even more compelling when we single out key resources such as oil, silver and many others that are currently below the cost of production and replacement capacity. This means that over the longer term (3-5 years), one of two things will happen: either there will be no resources left to consume, or the prices must rise to incentivize production.

Confusing Inevitable with the Imminent

I have stressed in a previous article that timing is crucial, and that we must exercise patience. Further, we ought to maintain a solid level of conviction, as prices can fall to well below what we thought possible in the short term, which only increases supply destruction, and speeds up the inevitable rebound.

I'm long energy, agriculture, and metals in various forms, which will all benefit from this thesis. Don't let the timeline and current prices distract from the inevitable.

What do Donald Trump and Netflix have in common? People want to be entertained!

I was posed a series of questions a few weeks ago, and I had an a-ha moment while answering the questions the best that I could.

"Who is the smartest Republican candidate on stage?" I tried to explain in layman's terms that I thought Rand Paul was the smartest guy on the stage after a recent GOP debate. (He has now dropped out of the race for the White House.)

"Why isn't Rand Paul leading in the polls?" came as a follow-up question. I started out by saying that the majority of the electorate doesn't have any grasp of Rand Paul's policies, which include such topics as limited intervention in Syria, balanced budgets, and auditing the Federal Reserve. I'm a bigger fan of Ron Paul, Rand's father, but will take a libertarian-leaning candidate any day of the week over the rest of the field.

If you ask most people questions like, "Where is Syria on a map?" they won't be able to point it out. If you ask how IS was really formed, or about the civil war within Islam and how that affects Syria, you might get some confused looks. And my favorite: "What is the petro-dollar and how does it affect America's relationship within the Middle East?" At this point, most people are lost and looking to change the subject away from politics.

Why would anybody care about these issues? This is the exact reason why Rand Paul has such low numbers in the polls. The general public would rather get a few catchy attack lines from Trump or a Twitter war with the Pope than dig into some facts and understanding of the biggest issues in the world. Anybody with an Internet connection is minutes away from the facts — if they decide to seek them out, that is.

Syria and Iraq's ongoing wars are directly responsible for the refugee crisis in Europe and the Middle East. Some estimates have the number of Syrians displaced at 9 million people; that is more than a third of the country's population. If this isn't the biggest story in the world presently, then I'm not sure what is.

Thirty percent of Republican primary voters would support bombing the fictional kingdom of Agrabah, from the Disney movie Aladdin, according to a report released by Public Policy Polling in December. I'm not sure what Aladdin ever did to America. It's the epitome of ignorance!

It's OK to say, "I don't know," or, "I'm not informed enough on this issue" sometimes! I don't claim to know every city in the Middle East, but I at least like to inform myself on the facts before I support dropping bombs and overthrowing regimes in far-off lands.

People get all emotional about micro issues locally, but then when it comes to macro issues, the masses decide to turn off and numb themselves. Most people know more about 'Game of Thrones' and 'Vampire Diaries' than current world issues. I enjoy movies just as much as anybody else, but if we don't understand current issues, how can we expect to make an informed decision when we vote?

I'll leave it to my favorite founding father, Thomas Jefferson, to summarize it:

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."

This election is shaping up to be entertaining at the very least; Sanders and Trump are giving the establishment a heart attack, but is that enough? It shows people are tired of the status quo, but are these the proper candidates for the change we need? Trump excites the masses with xenophobic rhetoric, while Sanders excites the young with his ever-generous socialist economic policies.

On a more positive note, Trump would work with Putin to defeat IS in Syria, and Sanders has a lot more transparency and integrity than Clinton does. Would I vote for either Sanders or Trump? Probably not.

But before you do any fact checking, why not check to see if there are any new zombie, hobbit or vampire shows out on Netflix? ;)

Silver has been used since the dawn of time as money and has always retained its purchasing power. The relatively tiny silver market is ripe for a huge move higher. Silver's fundamentals couldn't be any stronger in 2015.

In 2011, the price for silver neared $50/oz and was ready to break to new highs; however, it was quickly brought down by a series of brash market interventions through selling pressure in the paper markets and many margin increases on the CME. It had the intended impact and the price dropped rapidly and kept falling since, settling to where it is today at $16.

Nearing $50/oz silver was trading over a billion ounces a day in paper contracts, when the total global mine production that year was only 800 million ounces. That's well over a years' worth of supply, traded in a single trading day!

Marc Faber recently said: "The only way to short central banks is to own gold." I couldn't agree more, but I might add silver or any other physical asset to the list.

Demand for silver breaks down into three important categories: silver in industry, investment, and silver jewelry & décor. More than half of the annual supply goes to industry, which leaves a small amount for jewelry and investment. The huge upside will come from silver as an investment more than anything else.

Silver Ratio Facts: The in-ground ratio of silver to gold is estimated to be around 17:1. In Roman times, the price ratio was set at 12:1. In 1792, the ratio was fixed by law in the United States at 15:1. The average price ratio during the 20th century was 47:1. Current silver prices around $16 and gold at $1200/oz give a ratio of 75:1.

I expect the ratio to revert back to 30:1; but, if inflation picks up, it could narrow as much as 15:1, as silver usually outperforms. With a conservative estimate of gold over the next decade at $3,000/oz, we could see silver at well over $100/oz.

According to The Silver Institute, in 2013, there was a global supply deficit of 100 million ounces of silver. How the price dropped throughout this period is counterintuitive to anyone following supply and demand.

Author's note (2026): Silver is now trading above $80/oz. The thesis played out. The perfect storm arrived.

The western media would have us believe; that slowing oil demand, globally and especially in China; combined with the recent shale revolution in North America; and the Saudis concern over market share; are the main reasons for the large recent price drop in oil. Crude oil was trading over $100/barrel as recently as July; prices have more than halved (-55%) in the last few quarters, while global supply has slightly exceeded demand by less than 1% — something doesn't add up!

This is financial war with Iran, Venezuela and primarily Russia. The US is using its monopoly on the paper markets, where the price is set in USD, to manipulate prices lower causing instability in these heavily oil dependent countries and put extreme pressure on their leaders. Their contrived efforts to artificially push the prices down is exactly what they do in other commodity markets (Gold/Silver), which I have previously outlined in another article.

Blowback from low oil prices will see the US shale sector in a very vulnerable position, as well as Canada's tar sands. These marginal producers will see drastic layoffs, cutbacks in project expansions and large debt defaults, if the price remains low for an extended period. Oil's recent plunge can only be understood from a geopolitical standpoint and has little to do with supply and demand fundamentals.

The 'Colder War' as Marin Katusa is calling it, is the great energy war playing out in real-time; 'Currency Wars' as Jim Rickards also is a large factor, both have large overlaps, and both fall into the category of financial war. There are many key players, including; the USA, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and China, as well as minor players such as Iran, Venezuela, and individual OPEC nations. Each country holds various strengths and weaknesses in this financial war.

The US has already played a few of its big cards, including; the attack on oil prices, and the crashing of the Russian Ruble; with additional sanctions placed on Russia for its supposed meddling in Ukraine. China as a net importer of energy has been opportunistic in the recent attack on energy prices by loading up its storage facilities and signing long term agreements with the Russians to secure its future supplies of energy. Russia has largely been patient, in spite of recent events. Propaganda would have us believe Russia is weak and near collapse, while I believe Russia is holding all the right cards and can call out the West's bluff when it deems appropriate.

The recent plunge of the Ruble can be little explained by fundamentals. Russia runs a budget surplus, has debt to GDP of under 20% and has sufficient reserves to withstand 1-2 years of low oil prices; the US on the other hand has debt to GDP of over 100%, is running budget deficits annually and will be for the foreseeable future, its reserves are almost nonexistent (having the worlds reserve currency allows this luxury — for now). Russia has steadily added to its gold supply, while the US' has slowly drained its supply. Gold reserves are a huge asset in times of instability.

Having a strong USD which we currently have and a weak Ruble is very counterintuitive if one looks only at the fundamentals. If push came to shove and the attack on the Ruble escalated, Russia could signal its ability to make the Ruble convertible into gold. Russia could also corner the futures market in Gold/Silver by demanding delivery on a large physical order of these metals, which the west would have no choice but to default on the paper contract or settle in cash. Like most futures markets, which can trade a years worth of global production in a single trading day, the physical market doesn't have anywhere near the liquidity to supply a large order. Take away the west's ability to distort commodity prices and the run on the petrodollar would be in full effect. I don't expect either of these situations to happen quite yet, but they are cards Putin could play in an extreme situation.

Germany knows quite well that threatening Russia with sanctions will quickly backfire. If Russia were to decide that all countries supporting NATO's sanctions against it will be cut off from energy, Germany and most of Europe would freeze in the middle of winter, as they are heavily dependent on Russia for gas and oil.

The petrodollar is once again at the heart of this financial war and Putin knows this well. The BRICS nations have been moving towards transacting in commodities in alternate currencies, away from the dollar. I believe the BRICS nations are biding their time before they officially abandon the Petrodollar System, which is the US' main card it has been playing. As explained previously, giving the US the sole ability to price all commodities in USD allows it to export worthless dollars to the rest of the world, while taking in real resources in exchange. This system has survived longer than most would have imagined or liked, but its days are numbered — the BRICS and OPEC nations know this, and can sense the desperation of the west trying to hang on to the petrodollar standard, which ensures its hegemonic ability. We have now moved to all out financial war.

Now that the geopolitical factors are out in the open, let's dissect what $45 dollar oil really means.

Global oil consumption has been rising at an annual rate of about 1%; I anticipate this to remain intact, despite alternate forms of energy becoming more prevalent. The recent so called glut of supply is really a non-factor and will be quickly replaced by a shortage. If we assume the stated numbers are correct from the International Energy Agency (IEA) in 2014, global production was 91.96 million barrels of oil per day and consumption was 91.44 m/b/d, supply has barely overtaken demand. Glut!?

The US produces around 13% of global oil and domestic shale oil accounts for close to 5% percent of that. The average breakeven price for shale oil is around $60 per barrel, and that is being generous, as I've heard numbers as high as $80-90. The current price of $45 is far below the cost of production and it is only a matter of time till marginal producers (high cost producers) decide to pack it in and close up shop. This doesn't even take into account other unconventional producers such as the majority of Canada's tar sand oil, which has an average cost of production in excess of $70 per barrel. Canada is producing only 4% of global oil and the majority of that oil comes from tar sands.

We have only covered North America at this point, and have found 9% of global production unprofitable at $45 oil. While there was plenty of excitement around the world with deep sea and arctic production coming online, which have a far higher breakeven point. Our so called glut of oil quickly vanishes at $45 per barrel.

There are many other catalysts for higher oil prices; increased instability in other countries, namely Nigeria, Libya or Iraq could cause production slowdown or cause their production to grind to a halt. We have seen this in the recent past during Libya and Iraq's civil wars and terrorist attacks in Nigeria. These low prices are unsustainable and a great entry point for investors looking at energy companies. Energy companies share prices have been hammered over the last few quarters, especially the marginal producers, and those with unhealthy levels of debt. I expect many over-leveraged companies to fall into bankruptcy.

The best buying opportunities are born out of maximum pessimism.

How can we believe the common mantra: 'support the troops', without questioning what it really means? Is unquestionably supporting the troops our patriotic duty? I'm always surprised by the lack of interest in world events from most people, especially on matters of foreign policy. Then, the sudden surge of nationalistic fervor on social media when terrorist events happen close to our border. Are we that solipsistic that we can't see it for what it really is? BLOWBACK.

A few deadly attacks recently happened on Canadian soil and the country is in shock. 100,000 Iraqis/Syrians die and we barely blink and explain it as 'humanitarian' work, distorted vision of the world!? When is the last time the US, Russia or Mexico tried to invade Canada? 1812 can't even be considered as Canada's history because 'The Canadas' was still under Britain's suzerainty. Are we really protecting our borders or supporting Western Imperialism and the Petro-dollar? Kobane, Kabul and Kirkuk don't sound like Canadian cities do they? So why are we supporting bombing these cities?

Libertarians who don't support the foreign wars are called pacifists or worse still, unpatriotic. Globalization has brought us all closer together, what happens in another country will be felt around the world. Invading sovereign nations under the deception of humanitarianism and expecting no response is naive. We have supported bombing the Middle-East for the last few decades, with 100's of thousands of casualties, many of them civilians. Why are we then shocked to find that these people seek vengeance against us? BLOWBACK.

The impoverished Middle East nations can't compete militarily with the West, so they use guerilla war tactics such as suicide bombing and targeting of civilians. Canada has recently followed the US/NATO blindly into another unjustified war in the Middle-East in response to ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) establishing a Caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria. ISIS which emerged from Syria's three year old civil war is a radicalized Sunni-Muslim terrorist group. The current Sunni/Shia conflict dates back to 632 CE, it was sparked by opposing Caliphs claiming to be the legitimate ruler of the Caliphate after Muhammad's death. Do we really think we can solve this millennial conflict with more violence and war?

Islamophobia and Illiberalism

I do believe objectively questioning or talking about religion/faith shouldn't be such a taboo topic. If we don't question the status quo and our beliefs, did Socrates die for nothing? If we don't question authority are we any better than North Korea or the guards of Nazi concentration camps? Codified beliefs are dangerous and look where they led us in history: Crusades, Inquisition, Auschwitz, 9/11, Jonestown.

Saying Islam is evil or a religion of hate is ridiculous as all monotheistic religions contain doctrine that can be used to justify death to the infidel, not to mention that they all originate with the dark chapters of the Old Testament. Islam may be having a rough century, and be in need of a reformation like Catholic/Christianity had in the past. But to blame Islam as the sole culprit for terrorist attacks is like blaming Christianity for Hitler's hatred of the Jews and WW2. Religion does play a part in radicalising young men, in that it helps to justify their martyrdom, but doesn't that just sound like nationalism?

Regarding current events in Mesopotamia, religion completely evades the point of why we are really at war. Instead of debating issues like religious tolerance, immigration and increased airport security, why not question what would motivate these people to terrorism and the need to retaliate against us in the first place? The Elephant in the room emerges: we are occupying their land and killing their civilians. Or the fact that we reneged on our promise of giving them sovereign rule over their land post Ottoman rule, if they allied with the West to defeat the Ottoman Empire in WW1.

George Bush speaking after 9/11 wasn't so far off the mark when he stated that “They hate our freedoms.” Yes, they hate our freedom of a sovereign state ruled without foreign meddling.

I'm not suggesting people shouldn't be patriotic or respect people's sacrifices for their country. I think this is a very important issue and more open discussion is needed, but lets make sure we are discussing the real issues and not the fabricated ones by our media. Most of the propaganda coming out of Ottawa and Washington is nothing more than fear-mongering and deception.

(An adaptation of the late Christopher Hitchens' book title.)

Spending great passages of time immersed in finance, history, philosophy as well as keeping up with current events, has helped my understanding of the intricacies involved in the global economy. I've had an epiphany recently, relating to my outlook of the world and my investment philosophy. The knowledge I have attained thus far seems to be further deepening my insatiable desire to understand and connect the dots of the world we live in. There are an abundance of topics left untouched, a kind of scratching the surface feeling. I've come to understand that the world isn't quite what I've been led to believe my whole life. I've really been objectively questioning the news and media content that I've been consuming and how it has shaped me.

“The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free.” —Spinoza

“The most educated person in the world now has to admit—I shall not say confess—that he or she knows less and less but at least knows less and less about more and more.” —Christopher Hitchens

There is always an agenda in major news publications and I'm starting to better decipher through fact, propaganda and merely white noise. The greatest challenge in the information age which we find ourselves is to be able to tune out all the noise and think clearly and independently. Smartphones have become ubiquitous, bringing the ultimate distraction to our fingertips 24hrs a day; the ability to focus on just one thing seems like a fleeting skill. It's very easy to fall into an instant gratification loop, where we constantly stumble from one pleasure to the next in a mindless state.

I have been actively discussing with friends about Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World, inspired from a comic strip that recently went viral. In some ways we are living in Huxley's reality, in that for the most part information is widely available if we can get past the 'Soma' (TV, smartphones, social media, celebrities, professional sports) which is instant gratification. The truth is out there and waiting for the curious mind to discover it. People are angered that our civil liberties are being encroached on, but aren't proactive enough to do anything about it. The comforts that can be easily attained with little effort keep us mindlessly on a path to an Orwellian totalitarian state. The image of a 'Big Brother' constantly monitoring us, and the military state in the 'land of the free' is closer than most are aware of. The liberal image of democracy that the Founding Fathers proposed for us back in the 18th century is being constantly eroded away right before our own eyes, done in the name of ensuring our 'safety'. Limitations on who we can marry, what substances we can consume, double taxation on our income, mandatory conscription, and now 'Obama Care' and the NSA; these unconstitutional policies would have Jefferson and the Founding Fathers rolling in their graves.

“Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.” —Ronald Reagan

Technology does play a part in this, but I'm by no means a Luddite and I think we must open our eyes and interpret the world with a curious and optimistic mind. We must seek our own answers and explanations to things rather than being spoon fed from the talking heads on major news networks, social media being for the most part just a regurgitation of the following is no better. In the foreseeable future inequality will grow and dissatisfaction will continue to rise, any revolution or march on Wall Street that results from the wealth gap is futile, until we understand how we got here and where we are going. In this essay, I'm going to outline and try to put some clarity in how we got here and where I think we are most likely heading.

“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”

“If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.” —Thomas Jefferson

“The masses have never thirsted after truth. They turn aside from evidence that is not to their taste, preferring to deify error, if error seduce them. Whoever can supply them with illusions is easily their master; whoever attempts to destroy their illusions is always their victim.” —Gustave Le Bon

One of my major interests has become the United States Dollar (USD). The Federal Reserve which is the US' central bank is a privately owned and not a government institution; if more people realized this simple fact, they might be better able to construe their agenda. The current boom/bust cycle of our economy leading to bubble after bubble and further inequality can't realistically be viewed as for the people. Quantitative easing known as QE (another euphemism, meaning: they are monetizing the debt) has become widely accepted with the masses failing to understand its repercussions. If they did understand QE, 'Occupy Wall Street' a movement against the '1%' would have turned a lot more violent and been directed towards the 'Fed' rather than the large banks. The '1%' own the majority of all assets and have benefited disproportionately from central bank QE stimulation. As the stock markets have rebounded since the recent financial crisis, the '99%' own relatively few assets have struggled to find jobs and pay for necessities like housing and food. Automation and globalization contributed to higher unemployment, but can't be blamed, as these are natural consequences of higher minimum wages which the people for lack of an understanding have demanded for themselves. The real culprit is manipulation of the economy through Fed policy which muddies the economy's ability to efficiently allocate and price labor and resources.

Foreign policy, especially in the Middle-East is dictated by the 'petrodollar', rather than the widely held assumption of the war on terror since 9/11. ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), the rag-tag militia, which originally numbered around 10,000, suddenly emerged from different rebel groups fighting in Syria's civil war, and now threatens the whole world, really!? Is it possible that this isn't quite the full story? And larger countries with an agenda in Iraq/Syria and the wider region are funding the extremists? The US already overtly supplied ISIS with their weapons in Syria and supplied Iraq's army with weapons which ISIS then seized from their so called army earlier this year. Then, a few journalists who voluntarily left their homes to pursue work in this region were captured and beheaded, their videos and stories have been played on loop in the media to put fear into the public. I don't intend to sound overly callous about the journalist's plight, but Syria's war has been raging on for 3 years with excess of 100,000 lives lost, mostly civilian; there is no oil to be found in Syria, hence the limited International response thus far.

The West made a brief attempt at intervention last year blaming Assad, the leader of Syria whom the rebels are trying to overthrow for using chemical weapons on his own people. Obama made it quite clear last year that he had drawn chemical weapons usage as a redline for intervention in Syria. Then one has to ask himself: would the leader of Syria really jeopardize his rule and the outcome of his two year civil war with the usage of chemical weapons while the world is watching, especially when his soldiers had started to gain momentum on the battlefield? The little evidence that was found on the issue of chemical weapons points towards the most probable culprit being the rebels using it as a 'false flag' event to welcome Western intervention in the civil war on their behalf. The world was largely able to see through the plot, and realized the evidence against the Syrian regime was inconclusive and stood against intervention. Once the threat spread to Iraq, which boasts the world's fifth largest oil reserves, it became a 'humanitarian' issue overnight and the West had no choice left but to intervene immediately. No time for democracy, our Nobel Peace Prize winning commander in chief Obama, who campaigned on bringing the troops home, began warmongering and leading mission creep in the Middle-East. NATO and a host of countries including Canada diligently follow along as usual; the Orwellian never ending War on Terror 2.0 has arrived.

If humanitarian casualties was the real reason for intervention as stated by the media and president, what about Saudi Arabia? The Saudis' violations of human rights are well documented, they regularly behead people for breaking 'Sharia Law' and women are openly treated as second class citizens there. The US turns a blind eye to this, as the relationship the US has with Saudis who control the worlds largest oil reserves in the world, is the backbone to the petrodollar which is the US economy.

Liberalizing sovereign nations or propping up the 'petrodollar'?

Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 which was shot down over Ukraine this spring and was instantly blamed on the Ukrainian rebels, and therefore Russia and Putin; no evidence points towards this and none was found, but the verdict, entirely conjured through the media has the public ready to retaliate with financial sanctions and potentially war with Russia. Is it possible that the US sees Russia as a threat, in that they sell their oil outside of the petrodollar system, have close ties with China, and threaten the US' monopoly of military power in the region? The US is trying to provoke Russia to respond, using NATO membership in Ukraine, which is right on their doorstep. How would the US feel if Russia or China was setting up a hostile military alliance in Canada or Mexico?

Free thinking and ideas that question the status quo have been written off as bogus or far fetched conspiracy theories.