The Pope Says This Christmas Is A ‘Charade’ And That For Some People ‘It May Be Their Last’

Pope Francis sure does say a lot of strange things. I don’t think that any other Pope throughout history has ever called Christmas a “charade” or has suggested that for many people this Christmas “may be their last”. What in the world would cause Pope Francis to adopt such an ominous tone? Without a doubt, the leader of the largest religious organization in the entire world would be privy to information that would not be available to ordinary people like you and I. Could it be possible that he is aware of something that is coming that is going to dramatically change life on this planet? What we do know is that our world is becoming increasingly unstable. World War III threatens to erupt in the Middle East at any time, the number of terror attacks around the globe continues to increase, earthquake activity continues to rise, giant cracks are opening up in the ground all over the world, and we are rapidly plunging into a brand new global financial crisis. There is certainly a lot to be concerned about, but what would make the Pope so glum that he would actually call Christmas a “charade”?

One of the primary reasons why the Pope is so down is all of the war that is going on all over the planet right now. It was in the context of talking about war that he made this recent statement about Christmas being “a charade”…

Pope Francis has declared in a sermon that Christmas this year will be a “charade” because “the whole world is at war”.

The pontiff’s speech at the Vatican came after terrorist attacks in France claimed the lives of 129 people; a Russian plane was bombed and dozens of people were killed in a double suicide attack in Lebanon.

Speaking during Mass at the Casa Santa Maria, he said: “We are close to Christmas. There will be lights, there will be parties, bright trees, even Nativity scenes – all decked out – while the world continues to wage war.”

“It’s all a charade. The world has not understood the way of peace. The whole world is at war.”

And what he has said is actually true. War and civil conflict are breaking out all over the planet, and all of this violence threatens to spiral out of control as we head into 2016.

On another occasion, Pope Francis even went so far as to suggest that we have now entered a third world war…

“Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction.”

So has World War III begun?

I don’t know that I would go that far, but I believe that we are certainly on the road toward it.

The recent statements from Pope Francis that I have already shared with you are bizarre enough, but then just a few days ago he added this whopper to the list…

The Pontiff, who turned 79 on Thursday, elaborated on his views this weekend, telling a crowd, “While the world starves, burns, and descends further into chaos, we should realise that this year’s Christmas celebrations for those who choose to celebrate it may be their last”.

What in the world did he mean by that?

Precisely who was he talking about when he said that “it may be their last” Christmas?

That statement can be taken a lot of different ways, and it has raised a lot of eyebrows. And of course this is just the most recent example of this Pope doing and saying some very unusual things. Just consider what we have seen over the past couple of years…

–Pope Francis Declares That Christian Fundamentalism ‘Is A Sickness’

–In New York, Pope Francis Embraced Chrislam And Laid A Foundation For A One World Religion

–In Fiery Speeches, Pope Francis Excoriates Global Capitalism

–Pope Francis Calls For A New Global Political Authority To Save Humanity

–The Pope’s Embrace Of Evolution Brings Us One Step Closer To A One World Religion

–Pope Francis And Shimon Peres Discuss The Establishment Of A ‘United Nations Of Religions’

This Pope has been unlike any Pope that we have ever seen before. He has been consistently doing and saying things that would be regarded as “crazy” if any other religious leader did or said them, but because he is the Pope he gets away with it.

Meanwhile, other prominent voices around the planet are also issuing apocalyptic warnings these days.

For instance, tech guru Elon Musk believes that World War III “could erupt at any time”…

World War III could erupt at any time, and the effects could be devastating.

That’s the warning from top technology boss Elon Musk.

The billionaire businessman, who’s companies include Tesla Motors and SpaceX, believes a number of factors including the growth of religious extremism could trigger a third World War.

Musk believes that in the future the world could find itself locked in a nuclear World War “far worse than anything that’s happened before.”

And I believe that Musk is right about that.

Personally, I am completely convinced that we are eventually heading toward a third world war, and I believe that it will fundamentally change life on this planet.

So what is the solution?

Well, Musk believes that we need to consider traveling to Mars while there is still time…

Mankind may only have a brief window to set foot on Mars before a disaster such as a third World War makes it no longer possible, Elon Musk has warned.

The founder of SpaceX, which was the first private company to resupply the International Space Station, fears such a war could set back technological advancements.

His company is preparing to announce its ambitious plans for rocket and spacecraft technology to carry humans to the red planet.

To Musk, a “colony on Mars” would make perfect sense. He believes that it would give us the best chance to survive as a species if life on this planet was totally wiped out…

Speaking in an interview with GQ, he said such a mission may be important to help ensure the long term survival of mankind.

In particular, he believes a Martian colony could help to ensure humanity survives if there is ever a calamity on Earth that destroys life here.

‘You back up your hard drive…. Maybe we should back up life, too?’ he said.

If life is so great and everything is under control, then why are world leaders like Elon Musk and Pope Francis so seemingly obsessed with apocalyptic scenarios?

Could it be possible that everything is not really “under control”?

The truth, of course, is that most of us have a gut feeling that big trouble is on the horizon. Many of us may not know exactly what that trouble will consist of, and we may not be able to put our feelings into words, but deep inside most of us understand that the future is not bright.

So what should we do?

Is there anything that can be done?

Is it inevitable that humanity is facing a future of chaos and war?

Credit to endoftheamericandream.com

Zimbabwe Becomes Beijing's First African Colony With Adoption Of Chinese Yuan

To say that Zimbabwe has not had much luck with its monetary system experiments, would be an understatement. 

After its disastrous adventures with hyperinflation denominated in its own currency...

... Zimbabwe decided to entirely abandon its reserve currency and shift to the dollar. 

As we reported over the summer, the Zimbabwe Central bank completely "demonetized" the old Zimbabwe Dollar which would be removed as legal tender after the currency’s use was abandoned in 2009 following a surge in inflation to 500 billion percent. To do this, the bank would exchange up to 175 quadrillion Zimbabwe dollars for $5 US dollars, the country’s central bank said. 

Which, as we admitted then, surprised us for three reasons. 

First, as noted in 2011, in a stunning example of irony, Zimbabwe cult central banker Gideon Gono made it clear he wishes to avoid another episode of transplant currency hyperinflation courtesy of his counterpart in the Marriner Eccles building and "warned that Zimbabwe’s nascent economic recovery is at the mercy of the United States dollar, which is facing new pressures from the Euro-zone debt crisis." Yes, Zimbabwe was bashing the US Dollar.

Gono said Zimbabwe should in be looking to the Chinese yuan as its main currency, while urgently seeking to restore its own currency which was abandoned in 2009 after a dramatic loss of its value. Amusingly, he said that "with the continuous firming of the Chinese yuan, the US dollar is fast ceasing to be the world's reserve currency and the Euro-Zone debt crisis has made things even worse." And the terminal slap in the face of all that is American: "As a country, we still have the opportunity to avoid being caught napping by adopting the Chinese yuan as part of consolidating the country's look East policy." 

Second, as further reported early in 2015, China decided to reciprocate Zimbabwe's diplomatic overtures, by taking a special interest in the south African nation bordering the gold and diamond rich Republic of South Africa. It did so by announcing it planned to set up a modern high-tech military base in Zimbabwe's diamond-rich Marange fields.

The news of the agreement to set up the first Chinese military airbase in Africa comes amid increasing bilateral cooperation between Zimbabwe and China – notably in mining, agriculture and preferential trade. China is the only country exempted from the indigenisation laws which force all foreign investors to cede 51% of their shareholding to carefully selected indigenous Zimbabweans.

China could be positioning itself for future “gunboat diplomacy” where its military presence would give it bargaining power against superpowers like the US. It would also be safeguarding its significant economic interests in Zimbabwe and the rest of Africa.

The third, and most important reason, is that according to leaked confidential Central Intelligence Organisation documents suggested that China had played a central role in retaining President Robert Mugabe in the country's most recent elections, indicating that high level military officers had worked closely with the local army in poll strategies while Beijing bankrolled the ruling party, Zanu (PF).

The new Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Lin Lin, recently said trade between the two countries last year exceeded the $1 billion mark. Yet Zimbabwe is only 26th on the list of China’s 58 biggest African trading partners.

The Asian country has supplied Zimbabwe with military hardware, including MIG jet fighters, tanks, armoured vehicles and rifles, since Independence. In other words, while nobody was looking, China just took over one more nation without spilling a drop of blood.

And then, on Monday, all of our confusion was laid to rest when Zimbabwe announced that this small, economically devastated country would officially make the Chinese Yuan its legal tender as it seeks to increase trade with Beijing. In exchange for becoming not only a military but also financial colony of China, $40 million of its debts to Beijing would be canceled. 

China was delighted it cost it only a $40 million debt write off to acquire its first official African colony.

Credit to Zero Hedge

The Trade Wars Begin: U.S. Imposes 256% Tarriff On Chinese Steel Imports

Two weeks ago, when looking at the latest import price index data, we showed something disturbing: China has become an all out exporter of deflation. As the chart below shows, In November, import prices from China decreased 1.5% over the past 12 months, the largest year-over-year drop since the index declined 1.7% for the year ended in January 2010.

Howdid this happen? As we explained, with all of its domestic markets fully saturated, China has had no choice but to export its soaring commodity production as we explained in "Behold The Deflationary Wave: How China Is Flooding The World With Its Unwanted Commodities."  

As we noted then, shipments of steel, oil products and aluminum are reaching for new highs, according to trade data from the General Administration of Customs.  That’s because mills, smelters and refiners are producing more than they need amid slowing domestic demand, and shipping the excess overseas.

Logically, the less domestic demand for steel, and the greater China's steel exports, the lower the price continues to tumble, now at a 10 year low.

That’s
because mills, smelters and refiners are producing more than they need
amid slowing domestic demand, and shipping the excess overseas.  

The flood of Chinese supplies is roiling manufacturers around the world and exacerbating trade frictions. The steel market is being overwhelmed with metal from China’s government-owned and state-supported producers, a collection of industry associations have said. The nine groups, including Eurofer and the American Iron and Steel Institute, said there is almost 700 million tons of excess capacity around the world, with the Asian nation contributing as much as 425 million tons. 

According to Macquarie's Colin Hamilton, head of commodities research, it is about to get even worse: the price of hot-rolled coil, used in everything from fridges to freight containers, may decline about 13 percent next year. The nation’s steel exports, which have ballooned to more than 100 million metric tons this year, may stay at those levels for the rest of the decade as infrastructure and construction demand continues to falter.

A worker walks on stacks of steel pipes at a storage yard in Shanghai.

China's metals industry is facing the same problem that OPEC has had to deal with over the past year: a huge supply glut faced with declining global demand, only unlike OPEC there is no "efficient, rational" producer cartel that can (or in the case of OPEC could) implement production limits. 

While falling steel prices are partly driven by the collapse in raw materials and lower output costs, “it’s just more to do with the fact the industry was built for demand growth that hasn’t come through,” Hamilton said last week. “We’re past peak steel demand. I think provided there is overcapacity in the Chinese system and given where demand is, it’s going to be like this for some time.”

Well, maybe not: there is one thing that could dramatically slow down China's metal exports - tariffs, anti-dumping duties and other forms of protectionism. 

“What may slow down the exports is anti-dumping and protectionist measures that several countries have taken against cheap imports,” said Ernst & Young’s Agrawal. “We’re going to see an impact. More and more countries are raising their objections.”

In other words, a trade war.

To be sure India has already done just that:

India plans to step up its protection for debt-laden domestic steelmakers by imposing a minimum price on steel imports among other measures, Steel Secretary Aruna Sundararajan said in an interview this week. The import curbs are necessary to ensure a “level-playing field” for Indian companies after restrictions imposed in September failed to stop a decline in prices, she said.

And now it's America's turn.

According to a report released Tuesday by the US Department Of Commerce, corrosion-resistant steel imports from China were sold at unfairly low prices and will be taxed at 256 percent.

The measure is clearly aimed exclusively at China's dumping of steel on the US market, and its relentess exports of deflation. 

According to Bloomberg, imports from India, South Korea and Italy will be taxed at lower rates. Imports from Taiwan and Italy’s Marcegaglia SpA will not face anti-dumping tariffs. The government found dumping margins of 3.25 percent for most South Korean steel imports, with Hyundai Steel Co.’s shipments subject to duties of 3.5 percent. Imports from Italian companies excluding Marcegaglia will be taxed at 3.1 percent. Indian imports are subject to duties from 6.6 percent to 6.9 percent.

Which means that the biggest "beneficiary" of this dramatic import price surge will be none other than Beijing.

“We’re concerned that the dumping that’s occurring is at higher levels than these determinations reflect,” Tim Brightbill, a partner at Wiley Rein LLP, a law firm representing U.S. steelmaker Nucor Corp., said Tuesday in an interview. “We have serious concerns that these preliminary duties are not enough at a time when unfairly priced imports continue to surge into the U.S. market at unprecedented rates.”

According to some the US foray into trade wars was long overdue: 

U.S. producers including Nucor, U.S. Steel Corp. and Steel Dynamics Inc. filed cases in June alleging that some products from China, India, Italy, South Korea and Taiwan had been dumped in the U.S., harming domestic companies. In November, the government found that all those countries, except Taiwan, subsidized their domestic production by as much as 236 percent of its price.

The tarfiff hike comes on the heels of a previous announcement from November 3, which saw countervailing duties as high as 236%. Together these create a barrier to imports of these steel products from China, said Caitlin Webber, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence in Washington. 

“A 500 percent duty is obviously prohibitive,” Webber said in an interview. “The lower ones are much less prohibitive and would probably have a lower impact on imports.”

This means that suddenly China's steel exporters will have to scramble to find a comparably large market  in which to sell their wares as now exporting to the US is prohibitively expensive and would result in massive losses to domestic producers. 

According to Bloomberg calls to the spokesman’s office at China’s Ministry of Commerce in Beijing weren’t answered. An official who answered a call to the China Iron & Steel Association couldn’t immediately comment. Not like they would have much to say.

Credit to Zero Hedge