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By VALDO VACCARO April 1, 2020  

CORONAVIRUS: THE EXPECTED MANNA – BY NICOLA ARGEO MASTROPIETRO – SUBTITLES BY VV 

01/03/2020  

THE SYSTEM WAS SHUDDERING TO TEAR DOWN A WORM-EATEN CASTLE 

Finally! It is like a liberation. Those who’ve been following us since long know that what is happening on the markets was expected and almost inevitable. Besides, an important crisis was expected; many analysts were aware of that. It was simply not known when it would happen.

This is because, despite the widening of the gap between reality and fictitious world, no one could afford to take responsibility for tearing down the castle. Politics could not afford it, much less the central banks and the financial system, and neither a part of the economic system.

THE GREATEST ECONOMIES WERE FALLING AND SLOWING DOWN

As it always happens, nobody wanted to take responsibility for such an event; but the situation was critical and unsustainable. The last quarter of 2019 gave us a general economic slowdown: zero GDP growth in Germany, -0.3% GDP in Italy, France stuttering with a minimal growth with deficits and a worsening debt, a reduction of the same growth in China and even the United States had a lower GDP than expected; this during the Christmas period when a certain positivity is always assumed.

CUTS IN PRODUCTION AND GLOBAL DEBT IN CONTINUOUS INCREASE 

But not only that. For example, Germany has been experiencing a decrease in production for a year and a half, the same in Italy. Furthermore, there is an ever increasing world debt; we are talking about 250,000 billion, 330% of global GDP… But despite all this, how did the stock exchanges behave?

The global indexes were at their highest, ever higher, as if everything was going well. There were markets far from the real economy that were suffering a continuous growth. And with each failure, with each small crack, here are the central banks coming and helping with monster supplies of liquidity: the system had to hold on and go on.

But the situation was unsustainable, to be able to exceed the maximums having already taken for granted all the positive things you could find (or invent) was really difficult. It was thought that things had been taken too far. January had been a calm month.

WELCOME CORONAVIRUS, SAVIOR OF THE WORLD 

But then, here comes help, the chance, the scapegoat, the perfect guilty. His Majesty Coronavirus: an opportunity not to be missed, an unrepeatable opportunity. Operation becomes frenetic: in one week, a dizzying collapse. To find a similar crash in Wall Street we have to go back (coincidentally) to 2008, to find the numbers recorded in the last five we have to go back to 2011. How to miss this (not really) sudden manna?

FORMIDABLE FLU TO MUDDY THE WATER AND MAKE A NEW START 

A fantastic non-lethal non-dangerous flu, certainly very contagious and easily expanding, was the trigger that permitted the staging of the great theatrical performance: aggregation blocking, no conferences. But it is possible to go to work in companies where there are hundreds or thousands people together.

ILLOGICAL BUT VERY FUNNY MEASURES 

It is not permitted to play tennis in two, but it is permitted to go to the supermarket with lots of panicked people. It is not permitted to go to the stadium, it is just for the Serie B; and if it’s basketball then you can go. There were many people at the bar below the office, but it wasn’t a problem until 6 p.m.. After 6 p.m., it was.

A farce demonstrating the non-gravity of this virus, but enough to create panic to curb the economy and limit daily life. But above all, a manna for the markets instead, that were able to act as reason imposed, but politically incorrect. But this is nothing new, indeed it is all very old.

IN THE BANKING SECTOR THINGS ARE WELL KNOWN BEFORE THEY HAPPEN 

Let’s remember the speculation of Dot.com. You were a fool if you dared to say that it made no sense and that you would have paid such an exaggeration. It took September 11 to crash markets. In 2008 it was Lehman Brothers who took the blame. It was known since 2006 that the situation was overly and hopelessly unsustainable.

But even in that case if you talked about it you were held up as the one who understood nothing; the world had changed and we had to adapt to it. Still nowadays there are settled down politicians and pseudo economists who dare to declare that it is not exactly known what happened in 2008 and why, when reasons and events are perfectly known instead; and they were well known before they broke out.

FACTOR X HAS COME, THE ONE THAT TAKETH AWAY THE SINS OF THE WORLD 

And today the trigger of the inevitable is our dear Coronavirus. For a long time, we have been asking to be cautious on the stock and not to go too long, but even in this case, as in the previous ones, we needed the X factor. And now everything is easier, the stage is sad, but behind the scenes they are gloating. On a political level, in Italy for example, GDP would have been negative even in the first quarter of 2020, officially proclaiming the technical recession even without the Coronavirus.

We already needed a new corrective action. Politically it would have been tough. Now everything is lawful. A Soviet-style law on interception has been passed and Gualtieri has been able to talk about the need for an action that will consist of new taxes, new limits on individual and business freedom. Like everything is normal. Simply, because it is due to the Coronavirus, to external, abstract  causes, accepted by people, by their ignorance.

WE NEEDED A GLOBAL RECESSION TO DEPLETE THE WORLD AND TO REBALANCE THE FINANCIAL ACCESSES 

Coronavirus has been the manna dropped from heaven or from who knows, which allows a return to reality, to rebalance the financial accesses, probably an healthy world recession that the establishment could not justify and afford. But in addition, it allows people without responsibility to pay the bill, as always; on the contrary, it offers the chance to become saviors of the land. No need to say, “I told you”. Now we are almost ready for a nice V-bounce instead; which will be, however, just illusory. Then, probably, with less hysteria, we will drop down a little more. 

Nicola Argeo Mastropietro

COMMENT 

ONE THING IS THE ORDERLY DECREASE, ONE THING IS CHEATING PEOPLE 

This is one of the most interesting and clarifying articles on what is happening. I thank Luciano Spaggiari for sending it to me. In fact, since many years people talk about decrease also thanks to the French philosopher and economist Serge Latouche. Not only economic, but also existential decrease, which under some aspects could also be useful for a more sustainable, less challenging and consumerist development.

DELINQUENT GAME AGAINST MANKIND

Both in content and in form imposed to the unsuspecting population and to the assembly of the nations, nowadays events have a content of barbarism, fatal imperialism, fraud and delinquency, eveything packed in a macabre and theatrical form, with the result of devastating the body and the spirit of the whole world. This is a delinquent game aimed at redesigning the planet for the selfish purposes of power groups. A game planned against humans, against the community and the entire planet.

A MULTI-HEADED MONSTER LOOMS OVER OUR FATE 

There is not a single director, but it is a multi-headed monster, a multi-sprawling octopus. Always following the track of money and always following the track of political power, the track of the insatiable voracity to put it in the ass of the poor unaware and maneuvered mass at will. We have to follow this track, if we want to understand something.

Nicola Argeo Mastropietro is doing it on a macroeconomic and macropolitical level, where, after all, the Italian main characters are nothing but mediocre extras, poor people claiming for help and Eurobonds from a very expensive, inept and antagonistic Europe, with one thousand branches and white elephants, and poor chances of getting into further debt.

WHAT HAPPENS FALLS WITHIN THE UNIVERSAL LAW OF CAUSE AND EFFECT, WITH CARNIFICES AND VICTIMS 

The real main characters are in Beijing and in the White House. I don’t think Xi Jinping should go to church or pray God, being the leader of a materialist party. But in this case I can see him kneeling in an act of thanksgiving to the sacred image of Coronavirus. A Coronavirus that suddenly bailed him out.

MANY AIMS INSPERABLY ACHIEVED IN ONE SHOT 

He spared troops and tanks against the ungovernable revolt in Hong Kong. He gave a shoulder to the enemies inside the Politburo, and in particular to 93-year-old Jiang Zemin, leader of an internal branch aimed at blowing up his reputation and his unchallenged success so far.

It brought back in line the protests of the ethnic minorities subject to severe limitations and re-education camps. He made the most of his huge bundle of American debt securities, relying on his boundless bargaining power.

He has silenced the anti-Chinese accusations of printing too much counterfeit and inflationary money, used to subsidize macro-projects across Africa. He has given a muscular demonstration and a political lesson to the whole world.

THE CHINESE LEADER MADE AN IMPECCABLE IMPRESSION

Xi Jinping has even earned the most profound praise for his health-oriented foresight, for having practiced interventions worthy of Tamerlane and Genghis Khan put together against the unfortunate ​​Wuhan area, and for having received with great honors in Beijing, and with a surgical mask on the face, the macabre director of the WHO, the Ethiopian Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

As for Trump, I do not envy him, forced as he is to wander between  Pentagon, CIA, his internal Burionis, and China, that keeps him living on the edge. For now Vladimir Putin is safe. All the rest is cannon fodder. Not managers, not main characters, but mediocre and irrelevant extras. And that’s why I took the liberty to give the Pope a little pinch. Pray less and don’t get involved in the dirty games in progress. We really need the buffoonish spirit of Dario Fo, the one of “Mistero Buffo”, to ridicule the mental hospital under  construction.

AN UNARMED AND INANIMATE SPECK OF DUST TURNED INTO A RELENTLESS MONSTER 

With the alibi of this frightening mini-totem, and with this lure, it is not a matter of decrease, of social-economic slowdown for good, much less of health, but it is a green light to all sorts of illicit and arrogance.

Thanks to this massive theatrical operation we can finally talk, without any embarrassment, about restriction of personal freedom, limits to cash, mandatory vaccinations for everyone, new taxes, house-to-house telephone tapping, drones over our heads, an ultra-Soviet military regime dressed up with suit and tie, retrogradation to the time before the Magna Charta of human rights. Thank you, Coronavirus, thank you very much indeed for giving us all this! 

Valdo Vaccaro – Translation by Silvia Raggetti