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Friday, October 14, 2022

An Interesting Winter



. . . but maybe a good spring? 


We shall see. I can make a pretty good argument for the interesting winter part. We already have an interesting fall. Just following the current issues will be enough to hold our attention. 


Inflation is in the news, and in the grocery stores. I’m not sure that the Fed’s job killing efforts are the way to go. However, I’m not an economist. Too bad, as it’s a great job. You can always be wrong and still work in your field. 


Real estate has some negative trends going on. High interest rates are making home loans more expensive. Since hurricane Ian you can expect insurance rates to go up too. Places that were hot markets during the pandemic are cooling rapidly. Turns out a lot of urban dwellers don’t like living in rural Lower East Podunk Nowhereville. 


This mid term elections are heating up. I’m betting there will be more than a few surprises on election day. Of course everyone will accept the results, shake hands, and plan for the next election. Right. That doesn’t happen so much anymore. Personally I can’t believe how many people are still stuck on the 2020 election. The world keeps on moving. Try to keep up.


The war in Ukraine is getting more intense. The Ukrainians are wisely hitting Russian logistics very hard. Russia’s response has been to hit static civilian targets. It’s a war crime and it doesn’t advance their cause. Expect more Ukrainian gains. Russian conscripts are going into a meat grinder. Some military experts expect winter to cause a major slow down in intensity. They might be in for a surprise. 


One thing to come out of all this is the weakness of Russia. They are struggling and are getting clobbered by the Ukrainian's use of western weapons. Here’s the thing. The west is only now starting to send a little of the top shelf stuff. The Russians have been getting beat with second and third tier weapons. 


Energy is an issue and will continue to be until at least spring. Europe is going to have a long cold winter. However, they are working very hard to fill the huge gap left by departing Russian fuels. By next winter they won’t even miss Russian energy supplies as they will have found alternatives. 


Gasoline prices really aren’t all that bad in the US right now. The big issue is diesel and heating oil. I know heating oil is too expensive for me this winter. The woodstove will be our primary heat source. My neighbor locked in a lower price with a prebuy program. Soon after I checked into the program only to find it was suspended in my area. 


By spring my guess is that a lot of the financial instability will be over. The trial and error school of economics will have sorted something out. The election will be behind us and new people settled into office. It’s just a feeling, but I think Russia will be seriously looking for a way out of Ukraine -if they haven’t been pushed out by then. A change of leadership is probably already in the works. As the weather warms up pressure on diesel and fuel stocks will drop. 


Spring could have a lot of things sorted out and some positive trends started. 


Of course, freaking Putin could decided to go nuclear and all bets are off.


-Sixbears



13 comments:

  1. I think a lot why the feelings from the 2020 election results are still high is because the 2016 election results were such a hit. Politics sure did become a relevant topic.

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    1. It would be nice for politics to become boring again.

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  2. The 2020 election is still relevant because the lefts blatant cheating and theft of the White House was the crime of the century. Not has allowed them to run amok destroying everything they don't napprove of. Because of that theft energy, inflation and costs are number one on everyone's mind. And regardlessly of what happens in the midterms...and the odds are the cheating will be even more rampant...the criminals in control of the administration will still be in power and stillworking tirelessly to destroy America and us peons whom they hate so much.

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    1. Well Dan, in spite of many claims of fraud nothing has stood up in court. Stop drinking the coolaid.

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    2. The first thing to go, it seems, is the mind.

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  3. So, I gather 6 bears your suggesting we "Get over the 2020 elections" and move on that you approved of the results?

    That's a little like telling a sobbing woman to "get over" the sexual assault don't you think?

    When General Washington became President Europe watched with amusement as THEY thought we just renamed a King as a President. The royalty of Europe was astonished when mere peoples voting changed the President of America without violence.

    Plenty of violence both verbal and physical was deployed to install a basement dwelling decrepit old man for the UNELECTED to use as their puppet to sign (autopen) EO's decreeing this and that like Kingmakers of old.

    And somehow you see those Kingmakers will simply ALLOW mere peoples votes to change the leadership THIS TIME?

    Curious thought 6 Bears. More than a coffee pot worth of chatting here.

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    1. I felt it was a fair and free election according to reliable sources. Biden was far from my first choice, but I actually believe he's an improvement. That might not make me real popular with a lot of the prepper community but so it goes.
      I worry about your consumption of "news."

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    2. 6 Bears, you and I are blessed to be living in a very peaceful section of the USA. NH is even now quite the polite place to be. When Plymouth had it's one and only Black Lives Matter event it was very peaceful and only one pair of African Americans tried to block main street and were removed by bystanders before the police showed up.

      Meanwhile I had family and a family business in Portland OR that was destroyed by BLM marches in Sept 20. My Uncle's home was above the shop. He put his phone outside the window so I could hear them chanting *uck Donald Trump, He must go" as they had one of those "Firey but mostly peaceful Protests" as described by CNN.

      They wanted to sell and move on as their shop was in once a nice safe area next to the Police Station, but nobody would even give them a bid while BLM and Antifa were playing there for several months. They did finally move and sellout at a loss.

      So yeah, I worry about the Media reporting myself.

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    3. There are reasons I live here and safety is one of them. I know journalism, having an actual degree in it. Not the weirdest thing I've studied. Everything is slanted to a certain extent. The danger is focusing on only what confirms your preconceived ideas. BLM issues are real. There's a lot of pent up anger. Of course, those who suffer from that anger rarely are the ones who caused it. The elites pit us little guys against each other.

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    4. Yes, I have to agree that most of the propaganda is designed to keep "little People" angry at each other instead of the folks that are doing the dirty deeds.

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  4. Getting all of our news from one location could be a mistake.

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    1. Also helps to know what's news and what's propaganda.

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    2. Read widely. Question everything, especially our own assumptions. Makes it easier to sort the fake from the real.

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