The Masque of the Red Death - American Style

The “Red Death” had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal—the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men.

—Edgar Allen Poe, The Masque of the Red Death

We’re facing a different kind of death—economic death. Self-determination death. Self-ownership death. The world seems to be going up in flames. Ukraine vs. Russia. Syria’s brutal Assad vs. al Qaeda. China vs. Japan and Vietnam. The United States vs. Everyone.

But mostly, the political dichotomy here and around the world is the elites vs. the plebeians.

Martin Armstrong (via ZeroHedge.com):

The Guardian reported that some 50,000 people marched in London to protest against austerity. They cried: “Who is really responsible for the mess this country is in? Is it the Polish fruit pickers or the Nigerian nurses? Or is it the bankers who plunged it into economic disaster – or the tax avoiders? It is selective anger.”

In the United States, both the federal government and the states have lost control of our borders. I don’t mean this as hyperbole, as many have over the years. There are literally thousands of destitute children taking over the border states of the US, and no one can stop it. No one. These refugees bring with them disease, poverty, and ignorance. And the President has no clue what to do.

Meanwhile, the world’s economies are facades hiding an empty bank managed by champagne-bathing, corrupt bankers. Congress and the White House and the press and the Fed keep the mask in place.

Yet we all know, deep down, the mask is slipping. Gravity drags the mask down. The banksters sweat a bit more, lubricating the mask and assisting gravity.

And yet on Wall Street the band plays on. The worse the economic news, the higher the market goes. From ZeroHedge.com on Friday:

It was a busy week… Shittiest GDP print in 5 years, dismal consumption data, and European confidence and PMIs plunge (and Japanese macro data just collapsed)

** JPY’s biggest gain in 14 weeks ** 10Y Yield’s biggest drop in 6 weeks ** USD Index worst week in 14 weeks ** European stock’s worst week in 14 weeks

“Most Shorted” stocks continue to surge back to what looks like a great double top forming (7th week in a row)…

And the market responded with panic-buying to close Friday in the green.

Back to Poe:

But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious. When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.

—Edgar Allen Poe, The Masque of the Red Death

Did he call these people to warn them? To prepare? To train them in the medical arts?

Of course not. He told them buy stocks.

It was towards the close of the fifth or sixth month of his seclusion, and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad, that the Prince Prospero entertained his thousand friends at a masked ball of the most unusual magnificence.

—Edgar Allen Poe, The Masque of the Red Death

Maybe Edgar Allen Poe saw 2014 coming. And maybe Martin Armstrong sees what lies ahead.

The solutions from politics will always be the same – grab more power. We are in a downward spiral of liberty and how far we go down this path to the future will be determined by the people and if they at least wise up and see this is not class warfare, it is the people against government. This is why I say career politicians are dangerous for they can be bought way too easily as Clinton was to open the flood gates for the bankers.

This is why I now write about the new political dichotomy and what we can about it. And why I’ve lost faith in the GOP’s ability or willingness to stop the red death.

In Virginia, people did wise up–enough to jettison Eric Cantor, who will now work with massive corporations and TBTF banksters and their PACs to destroy David Brat. The GOP Establishment doesn’t want just any Republican economics professor to win—they want their candidates to win. As Mitch McConnell told us, the Republican Party’s only purpose now is to crush the tea party.

A couple of nights ago, I was in my garage putting tools away. A wicked looking black spider ran across the floor right in front of me. We have a Black Widow problem, so I didn’t bother to get the details of this bug. I stepped on it. Then I felt my body shiver as if the temperature had dropped to -5. The spider popped and hundreds of tiny, miniature versions of the spider scurried out from under my topsider. I killed the one and unleashed hundreds. (Others have experienced this freaky phenomenon.)

Maybe the GOP will succeed in crushing the tea party. But we’re like that black spider. Crush one and hundreds run from your shoe.

Let’s hope it’s tea partiers. Here’s Martin Armstrong’s depressing close:

**This is not going to end pretty. The question is when does society wake up? **Just how high will this price be that we have to pay? They will blame the rich and the idiots will cheer – get them. What will happen when there is no more wealth to hunt? We end up with a communist state by default – no wealth, just career politicians who blame everyone but themselves.

I’m sure my elephant-hat-wearing Republican friends are unhappy with my recent turn toward independence. But saving the Republican Party isn’t my mission. I’m trying to save self-governance. I’m trying to save self-determination. I’m trying to avoid totalitarianism and fascism. I’m trying to destroy the Red Death before it destroys us. And the GOP isn’t helping just now.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.

—Edgar Allen Poe, The Masque of the Red Death

Tomorrow I plan to profile some candidates you haven’t heard of. You haven’t heard of them because they don’t represent an establishment party. When you vote, I want you to know your choices, not just the choices your establishment overlords want you to know.