Libertarian Leanings

Glenn Greenwald: About That Hunter Biden Laptop...

$1 Trillion Coins Instead of More Federal Debt?!

The following article was provided by Stefan Gleason, President of Money Metals Exchange.

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Credit risk out of China and debt ceiling drama in Washington are driving precious metals markets this week. Gold and silver attracted some significant safe-haven buying as equity markets succumbed to selling.

The storyline being trumpeted in the financial media is that a government shutdown and possible debt default loom in October unless the U.S. Senate comes to an agreement on raising the debt ceiling.

Mock $1-Trillion coin/IMAGE: DonkeyHotey (CC)

There is some truth to these headlines. And we would certainly include unsustainable government debt among the top reasons for investors to own physical precious metals.

But let’s get real. The odds of an actual default on U.S. government bonds in 2021 are slim to none.

Like so many times before, brinksmanship will almost certainly give way to compromise. The debt ceiling will be raised one way or another.

Right now, what we are witnessing is mostly political theater.

Republicans are posturing to show they are opposed to Democrats’ spending agenda. And Democrats are posturing to force Republicans to vote in favor of raising the debt ceiling.

The reality is that establishment Republicans approved most of the spending that is now being financed. And Democrat Leader Chuck Schumer could authorize the government to undertake additional borrowing through a procedural vote in the Senate at any time.

“Democrats have the votes to do it on their own,” left-leaning CNN acknowledged.

But by doing so, “they would be getting all the worst parts of raising or suspending the debt ceiling with none of the benefits.”

By “benefits,” they mean political cover for vulnerable Democrats in the mid-term election campaign.

Meanwhile, CBS News is reporting that a “U.S. debt default could wipe out 6 million jobs and $15 trillion in wealth” based on calculations by Moody's Analytics.

Janet Yellen is warning of an “economic catastrophe” in the event that Congress fails to raise the government’s credit card limit.

These alarmist warnings are misleading. Government bonds and the dollars in which they are denominated are claims on wealth – not wealth itself.

In a sovereign debt collapse, purchasing power is transferred away from bondholders to the benefit of taxpayers who are no longer on the hook for paying interest and principal.

Of course, a domino effect would hit financial markets and sectors of the economy sensitive to credit risk. The financial system would be forced to reorganize itself on sounder footing – a painful process which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing in the long run.

But a default won’t be allowed to happen.

Even if the Senate fails to act, the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve could invoke emergency measures on their own.

Some unconventional options being discussed involve precious metals – though not in the sense of returning to sound money.

One proposal would have the Treasury Department mint platinum coins with an arbitrary face value of $1 trillion. These coins could then be deposited at the Federal Reserve, which would credit the government with the trillions of dollars it needs to pay its bills.

Voila, no new debt!

As wacky as this idea sounds, it was first floated by hard leftists during the Obama administration as a way around political gridlock over the debt ceiling, and it is again being pushed as a possible last-ditch maneuver.

Of course, individuals who hold platinum American Eagle coins (face value $100) wouldn’t become instant trillionaires. But platinum and other hard assets could still move markedly higher in dollar terms based on inflationary fears if the Fed used its digital printing press to buy coins the U.S. government declares are worth a trillion dollars.

Regardless of what form it takes, the Fed stands ready to print all the currency the government needs to pay its bills.

Former Fed chair Alan Greenspan has said that a default is essentially impossible under our monetary system.

Instead of fearing a formal U.S. default, investors should fear the inflationary consequences of averting it. A lot of new currency creation will be coming down the pike in the years ahead to keep the $28.8 trillion (and growing) national debt propped up while enabling politicians to continue running multi-trillion-dollar annual budget deficits.

The greatest default risk of all is that of the Federal Reserve reneging on its obligation to maintain a stable currency.

With no meaningful grounding anymore in gold or other precious metals, there is nothing to stand in the way of a precipitous decline in the Federal Reserve Note's value – especially since a currency devaluation is more convenient for politicians than balancing the budget.

   

Stefan Gleason is President of Money Metals Exchange, the company recently named "Best Overall Online Precious Metals Dealer" by Investopedia. A graduate of the University of Florida, Gleason is a seasoned business leader, investor, political strategist, and grassroots activist. Gleason has frequently appeared on national television networks such as CNN, FoxNews, and CNBC and in hundreds of publications such as the Wall Street Journal, TheStreet, and Seeking Alpha.

Another Shoe to Drop?

TigerDroppings:

 

    Tech executive referenced in Durham indictment is now gone from his company         Posted on 9/22/21 at 1:52 pm

quote:

---

Kingmaker - Big IF! (True)
@KingMakerFT
Here’s some fairly strong evidence that Durham’s next shoe will drop soon. Tech Executive, Rodney Joffe. is out at Neustar. This follows Elias leaving Perkins Coie last month, Sussmann going on leave and then indicted, and now Joffe follows suit.

'Freedom Is An Illusion'

Lara Logan on Twitter Unwrapped.

Freedom today in the US is an illusion. We live in fear not liberty. We self-censor/hide/give up our rights & stopped fighting because we think we won’t win. When we lose faith in our govt/elections/law enforcement/media/institutions - that’s what they want. It’s easier for them.

Easier to burn it all to the ground & implement whatever is planned. No Church? No police? No freedom of speech? No choice on vaccines or anything else? No diversity of thought? No critical thinking? No right to question anything deemed a “violation of community standards”?

They are counting on us to do the job for them. That’s why it’s good to be disillusioned - recognizing where we are is the first step to not being deceived. The truth is the only thing that counts. It cannot be altered. If we start there smarter people than me will figure it out.

But there’s no white knight, no magic pill. No one coming to save us. No one screaming about Americans in solitary confinement who’ve not been convicted of a crime. No one stopping the banks closing accounts, no one closing the border or even talking about national security.

If you think you can just keep your head down & follow their rules & somehow you’ll be ok, that’s an illusion too. What you’re clinging too is already long gone. And the hardest choices we now face will seem like good options when they too have been taken away.

From the Ever Popular Babylon Bee

"Yeah usually solving crimes is so easy, because we're the ones that do them," said Director Christopher Wray. "We stage the crime, then we commit the crime or entrap someone into committing it for us, and BOOM! Case closed. I love open and shut cases like that."

FBI Admits It’s Really Hard To Solve Crime They Didn’t Make Up Themselves https://t.co/thXHfHNb9W

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) September 22, 2021

International Bridge in Del Rio

NEW: This is what it looks like under the international bridge in Del Rio this morning. Latest numbers as of 6 AM.

6,722 migrants
4,742 family units
1,489 single adult men
418 single adult females
73 family “groups”

300+ pregnant women here as of yesterday.@FoxNews pic.twitter.com/xbR2tNj9XT

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) September 22, 2021

 

Good Questions:

Many of the Haitians now in Del Rio have been living in Mexico and S America for years. Why did they so many of them decide last week to take buses to Acuna and walk across the Rio Grande? Will even one member of the corporate press ask that Q? Does it even occur to them to ask?

— John Daniel Davidson (@johnddavidson) September 22, 2021

“If they’re not going to protect me, I want to know, who are they trying to protect?”

Julie Kelly:  The FBI’s Incurable Rot

FBI Director Christopher Wray, hired by President Trump in 2017, publicly apologized. The “fundamental errors” made in the Nassar case, Wray told the judiciary committee, would not happen again as long as he’s head of the agency. “I want to make sure the American people know that the reprehensible conduct . . . is not representative of the work that I see from our 37,000 folks every day.” The rank-and-file, Wray insisted, perform their jobs with “uncompromising integrity.”

But Wray is wrong to claim that the Nassar case is an outlier. From the top of the command chain down, the FBI has trashed its reputation through a series of scandals. It’s not just the alarming texts between spousal cheats Peter Strzok and Lisa Page; the ambush of Lt. General Michael Flynn in the White House; Comey’s use of the shady Steele dossier to set up Donald Trump; or Andrew McCabe’s lies to his own FBI investigators.

It’s not just the other set of “errors”—17 to be exact—found in the FBI’s four unlawful FISA applications on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. Or the official email doctored by a top FBI lawyer cited as evidence on one of the applications. Or the fact that no one in the agency has gone to jail for perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in history on the American people.

As seen in the alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, lowlifes populate the FBI’s rank-and-file. Richard Trask, the special agent in charge of the investigation, was arrested in July for physically assaulting and choking his wife after attending a swinger’s party. Trask was fired this month; he faces numerous criminal charges. Prosecutors decided not to use Trask as a witness after his social media account revealed numerous anti-Trump posts, including calling the president a “piece of shit.”

Defense attorneys in the Whitmer case asked the judge to delay trial for 90 days as they investigate the conduct of at least a dozen other FBI agents involved in the conspiracy. The FBI gave one informant $24,000 and a new car for his services.

Read the rest here.

On the Origins of SARS-CoV-2

Alina Chan, a postdoctoral researcher with a background in medical genetics, synthetic biology, and vector engineering:  A response to “The Origins of SARS-CoV-2: A Critical Review”.

Summary:

• The 2003 epidemic SARS-CoV was quickly traced to proximal animal sources (intermediate hosts) of the virus. Yet, despite greatly improved surveillance technologies and capabilities, an intermediate host for SARS-CoV-2 has still not been found more than 1.5 years since the virus was detected. Tens of thousands of animal samples including those from susceptible host species in Wuhan, Hubei, and across China have all tested negative for the virus.
• The geographic distribution of early Covid-19 cases appears to overlap with densely populated Wuhan districts with higher proportions of the elderly individuals, which is a plausible alternative explanation to the location of the Huanan seafood market. Furthermore, sampling of cases around the Huanan seafood market may suffer from ascertainment bias because one of the criteria used initially to determine cases was exposure to the Huanan seafood market and related markets.
• The fact that the home addresses of early cases are not concentrated close to WIV campuses is a weak argument. Previous natural spillovers and lab escapes illustrate the importance of tracking down early patients and identifying their exposures to various possible sources.
• Furin cleavage sites exist in other coronaviruses, but have not been found in sarbecoviruses. Despite the discovery of a growing number of close virus relatives of SARS-CoV-2, an S1/S2 FCS insertion remains unique to SARS-CoV-2.
• We have little insight into the viruses and virus sequences available to scientists and the experiments being conducted in labs prior to the Covid-19 outbreak. Varied cell types were used to culture viruses. It is premature to predict what sequences may have been engineered or that the cells used would have selected against furin cleavage sites.
• The existing genetic and epidemiological data point to a single introduction of SARS-CoV-2 into humans. An origin hypothesis involving multiple spillovers from animals to humans at multiple locations is not parsimonious, especially given that there is still no direct evidence for spillover at even a single market.
• Further mutation of SARS-CoV-2 during the pandemic does not contradict the hypothesis that the virus was pre-adapted to human infection when detected in December 2019. Both SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 are generalist viruses. If the 2003 SARS epidemic had been allowed to expand, recurrent mutations would likely have been observed.
• Plausible lab origin scenarios were not addressed by Holmes et al., who focused on furin cleavage site insertions and unlikely experiments with wild-type mice. The available data and information remain consistent with both natural and lab origin hypotheses.

In my own cynical view, the question is not whether the coronavirus originated in the lab or not, but whether its escape from the lab was accidental or deliberate.

Read the rest here.

Corruption at the Fed: Are America’s Money Masters Engaged in Self-Dealing?

The following article was provided by Jp Cortez, Policy Director of the Sound Money Defense League.

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America’s central bankers are tasked with impartial oversight over aspects of the American economy. But could these individuals be making decisions on interest rates and bailout operations based on what is best for their own personal investment portfolios?

After some embarrassing revelations regarding the trading activities of two senior officials, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell abruptly ordered a comprehensive examination last week into internal compliance with an ethics rule directing Fed employees to avoid “actual and apparent conflicts of interest.”

According to the Fed’s official code of conduct, Fed officials are “prohibited from participating personally and substantially in an official capacity in any particular matter in which, to the employee's knowledge, the employee has a financial interest if the particular matter will have a direct and predictable effect on that interest.”

Documents revealed that Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan and Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren made several trades of individual stocks, in some cases worth $1 million or more, in markets where Fed actions have impacted financial performance.

Additionally, several Fed officials personally held the same type of assets the Fed itself was buying.

According to CNBC, Chairman Powell held between $1.25 and $2.5 million of municipal bonds. The bonds were purchased in 2019 but they were in Chairman Powell’s control while the Fed bought more than $5 billion in municipal bonds to support that market.

Fed President Rosengren held between $151,000 and $800,000 worth of real-estate investment trusts that owned mortgage-backed securities – all while the Fed was active in that market.

More specifically, Rosengren made as many as 37 separate trades in four investment trusts contemporaneous to the Fed’s own purchase of almost $700 billion in mortgage-backed securities.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve announced last year that it would open a corporate bond-buying facility and purchased almost $47 billion of corporate bonds.

Rosengren wasn’t the only Fed official making money on corporate bonds. CNBC noted that Richmond Fed President Thomas Barkin held $1.35 million to $3 million in individual corporate bonds of Pepsi, Home Depot, and Eli Lilly purchased before 2020.

And according to Reuters, Fed President Kaplan’s financial disclosure included several sales or purchases of at least $1 million in individual company shares or investment funds, including Apple Inc. (a stock that’s almost doubled since COVID-relief efforts began in March 2020). In July 2020, the Federal Reserve bought $25.5 million in Apple's corporate bonds.

So far it’s undetermined whether the above trades violated Fed ethics rules. But to outside observers, it certainly stinks.

America’s central bank exists, ostensibly, to foster price stability and maximum sustainable employment.

In their often misguided and even harmful attempts to monkey with financial asset prices, Fed officials constantly pull different levers of monetary policy and wield an inordinate amount of power over markets and financial institutions.

The potential for conflicts of interest when concentrating such financial power in the hands of a few individuals has always been obvious. Indeed, central bank senior officials may have exercised their power, in part, to increase their personal wealth.

Following disclosures of their trading and the subsequent public backlash, Fed Presidents Kaplan and Rosengren both agreed to divest any holdings of individual stocks by Sept. 30.

However, this half measure hasn’t assuaged the critics, who point out the ongoing market interventions by the Federal Reserve have disproportionately benefited owners of assets while the Fed’s resulting price inflation in food, housing, and medicine have especially hurt savers, wage earners, and pensioners.

Far from achieving their supposed goal of creating price stability, Fed officials seem to have deliberately engineered widespread price increases and inflated potentially dangerous bubbles in asset markets.

Turning to sound money would ensure the purchasing power of Americans isn’t sapped away by bureaucrat bankers with ulterior motives.

Unlike the central bankers’ depreciating fiat currencies, physical gold and silver are incorruptible, free-market forms of money that retain their purchasing power over time.

 

Jp Cortez is a graduate of Auburn University and a resident of Charlotte, North Carolina. He is the Policy Director of the Sound Money Defense League, an organization working to bring back gold and silver as America's constitutional money. Follow him on Twitter @JpCortez27

Solutions Are at the State Level

Just the News:  New Hampshire House speaker files bill to block vaccine mandate

New Hampshire House Speaker Sherman Packard is working on legislation that would ban state or local enforcement of COVID-19 vaccine mandates.

Packard, a Londonderry Republican, said his office is working on a bill that is aimed at blunting the impact of President Joe Biden's new federal vaccine requirements to "prevent federal overreach, protect our citizens and prevent worker shortages should this mandate take place."

Read the rest here.

Angelo Codevilla Has Passed Away

PowerLine:  ANGELO CODEVILLA, RIP

Terrible news out this morning of the death of Angelo Codevilla, at age 78, reportedly the victim of a drunk driver.

It is hard to overstate the importance and brilliance of Angelo. If you only knew him by his many books and columns (including this 2015 piece he wrote for Power Line on Trump’s significance and prospects), it would be sufficient to establish his greatness. But he was also at the storm center of key aspects of American intelligence and foreign policy going back more than 40 years.

Read the rest of PowerLine's tribute here.

In 2010 Angelo Codevilla wrote an article in The American Spectator, America's Ruling Class — And the Perils of Revolution, describing the stark political divide in America.  I was impressed, to say the very least.

Important as they are, our political divisions are the iceberg’s tip. When pollsters ask the American people whether they are likely to vote Republican or Democrat in the next presidential election, Republicans win growing pluralities. But whenever pollsters add the preferences “undecided,” “none of the above,” or “tea party,” these win handily, the Democrats come in second, and the Republicans trail far behind. That is because while most of the voters who call themselves Democrats say that Democratic officials represent them well, only a fourth of the voters who identify themselves as Republicans tell pollsters that Republican officeholders represent them well. Hence officeholders, Democrats and Republicans, gladden the hearts of some one-third of the electorate — most Democratic voters, plus a few Republicans. This means that Democratic politicians are the ruling class’s prime legitimate representatives and that because Republican politicians are supported by only a fourth of their voters while the rest vote for them reluctantly, most are aspirants for a junior role in the ruling class. In short, the ruling class has a party, the Democrats. But some two-thirds of Americans — a few Democratic voters, most Republican voters, and all independents — lack a vehicle in electoral politics.

Codevilla observed that our ruling class wants power.  Everything — every policy, every crisis, everything — is contrived or manipulated to increase its power.  He was a man of rare insight.

 

John Durham Is Not Done

Shipwreckedcrew:  The Sussmann Indictment Reads Like Overts Acts In Furtherance of a Conspiracy - Because That's What It Is.

If you want an example of what a typical such indictment might look like, it’s right there in Sussmann indictment — read paragraph 46:

That is all one needs for a single count indictment charging a defendant with a violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1001. That paragraph tells the defendant the date and location of the offense and the specifics of the offense conduct.

Paragraphs 1 through 44 were not necessary to charge Sussmann. That makes what Durham returned a “speaking indictment.” It discloses information in a public document that would not otherwise be known if the indictment set forth only facts needed to meet the requirements of due process.

A “false statement” charge does not require a litany of factual allegations regarding the conduct and statements of the defendant and numerous third parties over the course of weeks or months leading up to the making of the false statement. In over 30 years of practice as both a federal prosecutor and a defense attorney specializing in federal cases, I’ve never before seen anything remotely resembling the Sussmann indictment in a single count “false statement” case.

John Durham is far too serious of a career prosecutor, with a very long and established record of meticulous investigation and preparation, to have rolled out an indictment in this fashion if he was intending to wrap up the remainder of his work with a report to the Attorney General.

Could John Durham be daring the DOJ?  Go ahead.  Just try and sweep Russiagate under the rug?

Read the rest here.  And do read all of it.

Adverse Effect Reporting ‘Under the Mat’

BREAKING PART 1: Federal Govt @HHSgov Whistleblower Goes Public with Secret Recordings

‘Government Doesn’t Want to Show the [COVID] Vaccine is Full of Sh*t’

They ‘Shove’ Adverse Effect Reporting ‘Under the Mat’#CovidVaxExposed pic.twitter.com/jXTtIS2RqB

— Larry (@tulsaoufan) September 21, 2021

Defunding The Police — The Objective

Their goal is to federalize all law enforcement. It started with demonizing local cops, defund them, crime skyrockets, stage an insurrection, and then they’ll transition to federal law enforcement. It’s the only way to assure the path to communism.

— Jenamcal (@jenamcal) September 21, 2021 

A Nixonian Bag of Tricks

Jonathan Turley:  Clinton lawyer’s Indictment Reveals “Bag of Tricks”

Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann stands accused of lying to the FBI when he delivered "evidence" of a Trump server connection to Russia's Alfa Bank tying the Trump campaign with the Kremlin.

It was only last October, for instance, that we learned that then-President Obama was briefed by his CIA director, John Brennan, on an intelligence report that Clinton planned to tie then-candidate Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.” That was on July 28, 2016 — three days before the Russia investigation was initiated.

The problem was that both the Steele dossier and the Alpha Bank allegations fell apart soon after being fed to the FBI. A key source for dossier compiler and former British spy Christopher Steele was viewed by American intelligence as a Russian agent, and it was believed that the Clinton campaign and the dossier were being used by Russian intelligence to spread disinformation.

According to Durham, the Alpha Bank allegation fell apart even before Sussmann delivered it to the FBI. The indictment details how an unnamed “tech executive” allegedly used his authority at multiple internet companies to help develop the ridiculous claim. (The executive reportedly later claimed that he was promised a top cyber security job in the Clinton administration). Notably, there were many who expressed misgivings not only within the companies working on the secret project but also among unnamed “university researchers” who repeatedly said the argument was bogus.

The researchers were told they should not be looking for proof but just enough to “give the base of a very useful narrative.” The researchers argued, according to the indictment, that anyone familiar with analyzing internet traffic “would poke several holes” in that narrative, noting that what they saw likely “was not a secret communications channel with Russian Bank-1, but ‘a red herring,’” according to the indictment. “Researcher-1” repeated these doubts, the indictment says, and asked, “How do we plan to defend against the criticism that this is not spoofed traffic we are observing? There is no answer to that. Let’s assume again that they are not smart enough to refute our ‘best case scenario.’ You do realize that we will have to expose every trick we have in our bag to even make a very weak association.”

Read the rest here.

Sussman Indictment Opens a Can of Worms for Russiagate Hoaxers

Aaron Maté: With Clinton lawyer charged, the Russiagate scam is now indicted. 

The Clinton campaign lawyer under indictment is Michael Sussman of Perkins Coie.  In addition to selling the FBI on bogus evidence of a connection between the Alfa Bank of Russia and a Trump server, Sussman was also the one who hired the IT firm Crowdstrike.  Crowdstrike originated the farfetched claim that Russia had stolen Democratic National Committee emails and passed them to Wikileaks to help Donald Trump get elected president in 2016.  The Alfa Bank and DNC email allegations led to the multi-year FBI investigation of Trump campaign ties to Russia.

Sussmann is charged for failing to disclose that he was acting on behalf of Clinton's team. But the indictment makes clear that Durham has uncovered a wider deception. For weeks prior to his meeting with the FBI, Sussmann worked with the unnamed technology executive ("Tech Executive-1"), who, like the Clinton campaign, was also Sussmann's client. The executive's "goal", Durham says, was to create a "narrative" about Trump's "ties to Russia" which would ultimately "please certain 'VIPs'" – i.e., Sussmann's clients in the Clinton campaign.

To advance this goal, the executive took advantage of his ownership position at several companies to access "public and non-public" internet data, and tasked several people to assist him. Their efforts yielded a cache of purported DNS traffic between a Trump-adjacent marketing server and Alfa Bank in Russia. According to Durham, the tech executive's researchers expressed misgivings about the project. One team member relayed "continued doubt" about the Trump-Alfa conspiracy theory that Sussman "would later convey to the FBI," and concerns that the project was driven not by data, but by "bias against Trump."

To suggest even "a very weak association," the researcher warned, "we will have to expose every trick we have in our bag." At one point, the executive himself even admitted that the Trump-Alfa Bank traffic was not a secret channel but in fact a "red herring." But that ultimately did not stop him from working with Sussmann to draft white papers and collect data that would be submitted to the FBI in the service of the "VIP"-catered "narrative."

The FBI would ultimately reach the same "red herring" conclusion that the executive had concealed. As Durham notes, "the email server at issue was not owned or operated by the Trump Organization but, rather, had been administered by a mass marketing email company that sent advertisements for Trump hotels and hundreds of other clients."

For its part, Alfa Bank has filed suit against the computer researchers involved, accusing them of doctoring computer data in a deliberate smear campaign to tie the bank to Trump. A lengthy report commissioned by Alfa Bank posits that "threat actors may have artificially created DNS activity" between Trump and Alfa Bank "to make it appear as though a connection existed, for 'discovery' later."

The question remains:  Will this be the end of the Durham investigation?  Is Sussman the fall guy whose indictment will put the entire Russiagate scandal to bed once and for all, or will Durham go after the ones who gave the orders?

Read the rest of Aaron Maté's article here, and do read all of it.

Data Study: 18 Months of Ammo Sales during a Pandemic, Protests, and the Biden Presidency

The following article was provided by Sam Jacobs, Lead Writer and Chief Historian for Ammo.com.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In our previous data study on the initial effects of the pandenmic on our business, we outlined increased sales due to the public’s growing leeriness of COVID-19, starting from February 23, 2020 when the news coverage became ominous.

That's only part of the story, however, because over the last 18 months, we've experienced a particularly charged election year, BLM protests amid calls to "defund the police," a contentious transfer of power, and most recently a surprise ban on popular Russian ammo.

These events in particular, set against the backdrop of the ongoing response to the pandemic, resulted in demand spikes. Looking at the data below, you'll get a sense of a high level trend during the pandemic and then see how that trend changed during certain specific time periods, like the BLM protests, when already-elevated demand went up even more.

To give a pre-pandemic baseline of sorts, over the past 18 months our overall sales have increased as follows:

• 590% increase in revenue
• 604% increase in transactions
• 271% increase in site traffic
• 77% increase in conversion rate

This data is from February 23, 2020 - August 23, 2021, when compared to the previous 18 months (August 24, 2018 - February 22, 2020).

Below are tables which list the top 10 states, ordered by our total sales volume, and how they fared during these recent demand spikes when compared to the previous time period, respectively. We also listed which calibers were most popular in those top states. Here is how to interpret our data:

• State Ranking by Sales Volume displays the total sales volume (how much was ordered in United States dollars) on a state-by-state basis in column one. Column two shows how much sales have increased percentage-wise in that particular state during the designated time period. Only states to which we sell are shown.
• Most Popular Caliber by Sales Volume displays the most popular caliber based on sales volume in that state in column three, as well as the increase for that caliber by state during the designated time period. Columns five and seven display the second and third most popular calibers based on sales volume in that state; columns six and eight display how much the sale of those particular calibers has increased on a percentage basis.

And now without further adieu, here's our data on the prolonged increase in demand for ammunition - and how recent events have further spiked that demand.

18 Months of Ammunition Sales During the Pandemic: State Ranking by Sales Volume

State Ranking by Sales Volume		Most Popular Caliber by Sales Volume		2nd		3rd
State	% Increase		% Increase		% Increase		% Increase
1. Texas	+736%	9mm Ammo	+1,866%	223 Ammo	+922%	5.56x45 Ammo	+224%
2. Florida	+586%	9mm Ammo	+536%	5.56x45 Ammo	+2,182%	223 Ammo	+256%
3. Georgia	+613%	9mm ammo	+507%	5.56x45 Ammo	+1,014%	223 Ammo	+1,040%
4. Pennsylvania	+644%	9mm Ammo	+668%	5.56x45 Ammo	+3,378%	223 Ammo	+210%
5. Washington	+775%	9mm Ammo	+721%	223 ammo	+642%	5.56x45 Ammo	+992%
6. Arizona	+765%	9mm Ammo	+727%	223 Ammo	+∞%	5.56x45 Ammo	+2,750%
7. North Carolina	+739%	9mm Ammo	+1,107%	223 Ammo	+∞%	45 ACP Ammo	+5,034%
8. Illinois	+469%	9mm Ammo	+1,045%	223 Ammo	+217%	12 Gauge Shotgun Shells	+∞%
9. Colorado	+659%	9mm Ammo	+1,471%	5.56x45 Ammo	+834%	380 ACP (Auto) Ammo	+7,346%
10. Virginia	+484%	40 S&W Ammo	+53,769%	9mm Ammo	+802%	5.56x45 Ammo	+354%

Note: These figures compare February 23, 2020 - August 23, 2021 to the previous 18 months, August 24, 2018 - February 22, 2020. Due to city and state laws, Ammo.com does not ship ammunition to Alaska, Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, Washington, D.C., New York City, or Chicago. These jurisdictions, along with a handful of other states, have been excluded from the table above.

Demand Spike: Ammunition Sales Following the Surprise Ban on Russian Ammo in August 2021

Following the Biden Administration's announcement banning the importation of Russian ammunition, we saw an immediate spike in sales of calibers produced in Russia. The most popular calibers of imported Russian ammunition are 7.62x39, known as “The Hammer of Lenin," and 5.56x45, largely due to the Soviet Union’s huge legacy capacity to mass produce select rifle rounds, predominantly in steel casings.

Sales Figures for 7.62x39 Ammo

Below are the figures from August 17, 2021 - August 23, 2021, compared to the previous period, August 10, 2021 - August 16, 2021.

Nationwide:

• 124% increase in revenue
• 52% increase in transactions
• 91% increase in site traffic

State Ranking by Sales Volume of 7.62x39 Ammo
State	% Increase
1. Arizona	+ 442%
2. Texas	+ 35%
3. Pennsylvania	+ 275%
4. Michigan	+ 185%
5. New Jersey	+ 507%
6. North Carolina	+ 260%
7. Florida	- 49%
8. Washington	+ ∞%
9. Tennessee	+ ∞%
10. Illinois	+ 4%

Sales Figures for 5.56x45 Ammo

Below are the figures from August 17, 2021 - August 23, 2021, compared to the previous period, August 10, 2021 - August 16, 2021.

Nationwide:

• 48% increase in revenue
• 41% increase in transactions
• 38% increase in site traffic

State Ranking by Sales Volume of 5.56x45 Ammo
State	% Increase
1. Arizona	+ 359%
2. Texas	- 43%
3. Pennsylvania	+ 62%
4. Florida	- 44%
5. Illinois	+ 465%
6. Michigan	+ 410%
7. Washington	+ 125%
8. Oregon	- 1%
9. Colorado	+ 1,016%
10. Maryland	+ 87%

Note: Due to city and state laws, Ammo.com does not ship ammunition to Alaska, Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, Washington, D.C., New York City, or Chicago. These jurisdictions, along with a handful of other states, have been excluded from the table above.

Demand Spike: Ammunition Sales During the Contested Transfer of Power in January 2021

Below are the figures from January 4, 2021 - January 22, 2021, compared to the previous period, December 16, 2020 - January 3, 2021, at a nationwide level and at a state level:

Nationwide:

• 78% increase in revenue
• 33% increase in transactions
• 73% increase in site traffic

State Ranking by Sales Volume		Most Popular Caliber by Sales Volume		2nd		3rd
State	% Increase		% Increase		% Increase		% Increase
1. Texas	+79.37%	9mm Ammo	+80%	5.56x45 Ammo	+461%	223 Ammo	+159%
2. Florida	+86.47%	5.56x45 Ammo	+330%	9mm Ammo	+17%	223 Ammo	+339%
3. Georgia	+85.34%	5.56x45 Ammo	+476%	9mm Ammo	+33%	223 Ammo	+482%
4. North Carolina	+63.31%	9mm Ammo	-23%	5.56x45 Ammo	+118%	223 Ammo	+378%
5. Arizona	+107.65%	223 Ammo	+1,941%	9mm Ammo	+69%	308 Ammo	+1,884%
6. Pennsylvania	+68.77%	223 Ammo	+212%	9mm Ammo	+39%	5.56x45 Ammo	+135%
7. Ohio	+68.77%	5.56x45 Ammo	+268%	9mm Ammo	+174%	223 Ammo	+346%
8. Michigan	+75.60%	5.56x45 Ammo	+355%	223 ammo	+562%	45 ACP Ammo	+176%
9. Tennessee	+82.73%	5.56x45 Ammo	+427%	9mm Ammo	+11%	223 Ammo	+695%
10. Washington	+23.21%	5.56x45 Ammo	+518%	223 Ammo	+580%	9mm Ammo	-34%

Note: Due to city and state laws, Ammo.com does not ship ammunition to Alaska, Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, Washington, D.C., New York City, or Chicago. These jurisdictions, along with a handful of other states, have been excluded from the table above.

Demand Spike: Ammunition Sales During the BLM Protests Amid Calls to "Defund the Police"

Below are the figures from May 28, 2020 - June 5, 2020, compared to the previous period, May 19, 2020 - May 27, 2020, at a nationwide level and at a state level:

Nationwide:

• 200% increase in revenue
• 192% increase in transactions
• 99% increase in site traffic

State Ranking by Sales Volume		Most Popular Caliber by Sales Volume		2nd		3rd
State	% Increase		% Increase		% Increase		% Increase
1. Texas	+138.80%	9mm Ammo	+178%	223 Ammo	+148%	40 S&W Ammo	+149%
2. Florida	+321.33%	9mm Ammo	+351%	223 Ammo	+670%	5.56x45 Ammo	+110%
3. Pennsylvania	+166.62%	9mm Ammo	+351%	223 Ammo	+160%	40 S&W Ammo	+190%
4. Georgia	+213.71%	9mm Ammo	+319%	223 Ammo	+130%	5.56x45 Ammo	+106%
5. Illinois	+290.28%	9mm Ammo	+625%	223 Ammo	+345%	7.62x39 Ammo	+951%
6. Washington	+121.66%	9mm Ammo	+186%	223 Ammo	+26%	45 ACP Ammo	+129%
7. Virginia	+334.86%	9mm Ammo	+344%	223 Ammo	+524%	5.56x45 Ammo	+143%
8. Arizona	+222.15%	9mm Ammo	+212%	223 Ammo	+410%	45 ACP Ammo	+321%
9. North Carolina	+218.24%	9mm Ammo	+275%	223 Ammo	+188%	5.56x45 Ammo	+172%
10. Colorado	+195.93%	9mm Ammo	+199%	223 Ammo	+428%	5.56x45 Ammo	+143%

Note: Due to city and state laws, Ammo.com does not ship ammunition to Alaska, Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, Washington, D.C., New York City, or Chicago. These jurisdictions, along with a handful of other states, have been excluded from the table above.

Conclusion

The pandemic lead to a sharp increase in demand for ammunition. This increase has continued for the past 18 months. It's been further exacerbated by a particularly charged election year, BLM protests amid calls to "defund the police", a contentious transfer of power, and most recently a surprise ban on popular Russian ammo. If you'd like to read our analysis as to what drove the initial increase in demand for ammunition, you can find that here.

Written by

Sam Jacobs

Eric Trump Responds to Breaking News that Hillary Funded the Alpha Bank Hoax

The Coming Future of Bliss

We run a company installing ev chargers, solar etc... We think the electric car thing is a massive mistake, the grid can barely cope at the moment, can you imagine how the grid will cope when the nation is charging there cars every night? Also batteries can not be recycled!

— EmWo12345 (@EWo12345) September 15, 2021

33 districts in Uttar Pradesh are now Covid-free: State govt

From the Hindustan Times:

There are no active cases of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in 33 districts of Uttar Pradesh, the state government informed on Friday. About 67 districts have not reported a single new case of the viral infection in the last 24 hours, the government said, noting the steady improvement of the Covid-19 situation in the state.

The 33 Covid free districts include Aligarh, Amroha, Ayodhya, Baghpat, Ballia, Balrampur, Banda, Basti, Bahraich, Bijnor, Bhadohi, Chitrakoot, Chandauli, Etah, Deoria, Fatehpur, Ghazipur, Gonda, Hamirpur, Hapur, Hardoi, Hathras, Kasganj, Lalitpur and Mahoba. The list also includes Moradabad, Muzaffarnagar, Pilibhit, Rampur, Saharanpur, Shamli, Siddharth Nagar, and Sonbhadra, according to the state government data.

Overall, the state has a total of 199 active cases, while the positivity rate came down to less than 0.01 per cent. The recovery rate, meanwhile, has improved to 98.7 per cent.

To what do they owe their success in the treatment of the coronavirus?  Ivermectin.

“Uttar Pradesh was the first state in the country to introduce large-scale prophylactic and therapeutic use of Ivermectin. In May-June 2020, a team at Agra, led by Dr Anshul Pareek, administered Ivermectin to all RRT team members in the district on an experimental basis. It was observed that none of them developed Covid-19 despite being in daily contact with patients who had tested positive for the virus,” Uttar Pradesh State Surveillance Officer Vikssendu Agrawal said.

He added that based on the findings from Agra, the state government sanctioned the use of Ivermectin as a prophylactic for all the contacts of Covid patients and later cleared the administration of therapeutic doses for the treatment of such patients.

Claiming that timely introduction of Ivermectin since the first wave has helped the state maintain a relatively low positivity rate despite its high population density, he said, “Despite being the state with the largest population base and a high population density, we have maintained a relatively low positivity rate and cases per million of population”.

Fortunately for multinational drug company profits, treatment with ivermectin has been actively discouraged throughout most of the world, particularly in the United States, paving the way for massive vaccination programs.  Consider this from the Harvard Law Bill of Health Blog:

According to the FDA, an Emergency Use Authorization is a tool that allows an unapproved medical product to be released to the public in a health crisis given that the medical product meets statutory criteria outlined in Section 564 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.

The statutory criteria are as follows: 1) an emergency must be declared, 2) the agent specified for the declaration of the emergency can cause a serious or life-threatening disease/condition, 3) it is reasonable to believe the medical product is effective in treating, diagnosing, or preventing that disease/condition based on scientific evidence, 4) the known potential benefits outweigh the known potential risks, and 5) there is no adequate, approved, alternate treatment available.  (My emphasis.)

Ivermectin has proven to be a very effective alternate treatment.  But acknowledging its effectiveness would have meant there could legally be no Emergency Use Authorizations for the new vaccines.  Drug companies, their investors, and others would have missed an opportunity for massive profits. 

Read the rest here, here, and here.

Democrats Propose to Merge Local Newspapers Into Their Propaganda Network

As broadcast and news media increasingly tilt to the left, taxpayer-supported media have led the way.  Among the perennial conservative pipe dreams is a hope that congressional Republicans would remove taxpayer support for Corporation for Public Broadcasting and National Public Radio.  Not only is the hope futile, but the future of local media independence is also precarious:  House Dems Propose $1 Billion in Subsidies For Local Newspapers.

House Democrats are offering more than $1 billion in subsidies to local newspapers as part of a massive spending proposal released this week, even as polls show record levels of distrust in the media.

The $3.5 trillion spending plan includes up to $25,000 in payroll tax credits for each journalist on a local newspaper's payroll. The carve-out will cost $1.3 billion over the next decade, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation. To offset this and other tax credits included in the bill, Democrats are proposing $2.9 trillion in tax hikes through higher corporate, capital gains, and personal income tax rates.

[...]

The proposal is nearly identical to the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, a bill introduced earlier this year by Sens. Maria Cantwell (D., Wash.), Ron Wyden (D., Ore.), and Mark Kelly (D., Ariz.). In addition to payroll tax credits, the senators proposed a $250 tax deduction for subscriptions to local newspapers.

The AFL-CIO, the country's largest labor union, endorsed the newsroom subsidies in a letter to Democratic leaders earlier this month. The union said that stipends were needed to grapple with a so-called information crisis.

The union's "information crisis" is that conservative viewpoints have not been thoroughly obliterated from local news.  

Read the rest here.