Solid set of predictions; No point in further elaboration there.

Our local rag today is ramping up (even more) the Ukrainian relief efforts and how we should all be supporting them. There is a sizable population here; they converted a Quality Inn from a hotel to "short term stay" for refugees.

I have nothing against the refugees, but there's NFW they're ever going to want to go home after getting membership to the FSA here.

Global war is again coming. We have advance warning to preserve wealth, consider getting out of the blast areas, gathering supplies and skills.

The lifestyle you have now, consider it to be the best you will ever have it. Running water, electricity, food, transport, health care, relative safety, and the ability to defend one's self, even if frowned upon by authority, with relatively easy to obtain weapons.

Most of human history never had it anywhere near as good as you do right now, even if you're in the bottom 10% of American culture.

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Stay out of the blast radius.

Yep.

And carbon did every bit of it.

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Here's a couple of my takes.

Auto Market:
My daughter-in-law works at a large new car dealership. She says that November was their best in the previous 18 months. However, December sales fell off a cliff. It seems there's a small, independent used car dealership on every corner and most of them will disappear.

Biden:
It being obvious that Biden is pumped full of pharmaceuticals and still visibly declining, he will have a major health scare in 2023 and does not survive the end of his presidency.

Supply Chain:
My wife forced me to go on a anthropological field trip to WalMart yesterday. Still empty shelves all over in the grocery section while clothing is packed everywhere. Our local Dollar General still has excess stock stacked in boxes in the aisles. Over-supply and under-supply will not go away anytime soon.

Crime:
You will increasingly see businesses hire armed security much like the gas station/c-store in Philadelphia that was in the news recently. My friend went on a hunting trip to South Africa pre-Covid with a friend who lives there. Nearly all businesses have private armed security. This will be a growth industry in the USA - especially in the blue hives. There will also be "retail deserts" in high crime areas where shoplifting cannot be controlled. Look for this to be highlighted as further "racism" by the white establishment and business communities.

Rates:
The Fed will be forced to stick to their guns to defend their honor, legacy, and the currency. I agree that finger pointing and friction between the Democrats and the Fed will increase as rates go up and inflation lingers.

Fiscal Nightmare:
KD is right in that the FY2023 Omnibus spending bill is inherently inflationary and outside the Fed's monetary control thus the lingering inflation. However, despite the HUGE deficit, there will be a "need" for supplemental funding before the end of FY2023 setting up the divided CONgress budget fight for FY2024.

This is too depressing. I think I'll quit there.

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"Economists are no different than the prophets of ancient Pompeii who reassured that Mt Vesuvius would never blow. After all, it never had before." Baxter Black, DVM and Cowboy Poet

"You can avoi

Excellent prediction Ticker as we've all come to expect, and yes, good time to thank you Karl for what you do. Whether you realize it or not you've affected so many lives to the net positive and educated me so much more than the previous 20 years before finding you. I may very well print this years version and keep next to my PC where I monitor the news throughout the day.... I can quickly check off each item and add a "Karl told us so" sticker to each one. Thanks again!

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Embrace the suck.

Re: Heartlander's link to the Putin press conference. Holy Shit - anybody here remember when we had a president/leader who could speak so eloquently and intelligently without a teleprompter or notes? Yeah, me neither. Talk about "dumbing it down"..... anyone on the lower part of the bell curve is now qualified to be the leader of the free world.

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Embrace the suck.

Re: green energy. Just got in from in and out trip in 36 hours I may add to Waco Tx. Just east is a vast wi d farm. The wind was light but they were moving blades. You can get close to them and I think we're being played as I assume those darn things are heavily subsidized. I am not an engineer but I don't see how those blades catch air as big and heavy as they must be. They appear thin and the breeze was very light. I wouldn't be surprised if they were consuming energy to force them to turn so folk think they are working. Just strange looking.

Karl wrote..

* The Democrats are going to get obliterated in the midterms. Clean miss; I didn't even hear the whizz of that one going by. No, the narrow margin in the House isn't worth even a fraction of a point.

Never misunderestimate how capable the Republican Party is when it comes to Snatching Defeat From The Jaws Of Victory.
Things like the midterm BS makes me think that the "Controlled Opposition" claim is true, whether or not that's considered "tinfoil" or part of the Kabuki-theater of our ruling caste, I'll let the reader decide.
(It happens far too often and with too much consistency to be "accident".)

Karl wrote..

* The consequences of corporate and government mandates will manifest in severe dislocations through industry. We're already seeing it. Southwest and their flight disruption is not just Southwest; it is not only a "oh we have a system engineered to remove all unnecessary cost" (which then has no redundancy in it so when something goes wrong it all goes to Hell immediately) it's everywhere in the airline industry and elsewhere. It has been known for a decade that there's a problem coming with qualified pilots and part of the entire nonsense with increasing automation and such in cockpits, along with pressure to reduce qualifications. Rather than make the investments in both training and pay to incentivize people to take that path the choice was made to lower standards and press existing employees. That never turns out poorly, right? Uhhhhh.... yeah, ok. Health care is another example; people are screaming about shortages of beds and similar but there are beds -- just no staff, so entire wings are shut down because you need the staff to run that wing, and you don't have said people. Management has gotten awfully arrogant, often with government backing (e.g. jab mandates) when it comes to employees and the bill for that will become increasingly critical this coming year. All-in this is probably a good thing for society as a whole as labor/management balance is just that, but it won't come without pain and adds further inflationary pressure.
[...]
* DEI and ESG will be increasingly recognized as resulting in DIE. This won't play out entirely in one year, but it will start in earnest this year. There are plenty of people who think they can double down on this and force it to not only continue but expand. They're wrong and they're about to get a very expensive and personal lesson starting with the loss of their job and recognition that their lavish lifestyle does not square with the income that can be generated in the fast-food industry. Refusal to recognize that the end of "free money" means you must actually produce and that means meritocracy wins and all else loses will lead you directly to the nearest Federal Bankruptcy Court.

@Tickerguy -- These two items alone could be their own book, but I think what we're going to see is a whole lot of management mis-steps from trying to cut DEI/ESG precisely because of the "remove all unnecessary cost" (i.e. redundancy) that management has done in the past two decades where they combine multiple positions -- as evidenced in the job-ads for "entry-level" technical jobs where it looks like they're listing an entire R&D skillset rather than a single person. The Affordable Care Act's incentivization of cutting hours both birthed the "gig economy" (where the lower-paying "real" [i.e. not high-schooler's summer-job] jobs became insufficient to support a family) and encouraged the employers to adopt a "you're lucky to have a job!" attitude where they acted like they were doing you a favor by treating you like shit... and this trend in attitudes culminated with the branding of workers as "essential" even as the employers disregarded employees' concerns & convictions to implement the clearly (if you took more than 5 minutes thought) unlawful "mandates".

Because of the DEI/ESG "diversity" push, there are a LOT of unqualified and underqualified people in key positions and, to make matters worse, the DEI/EGS rot typically infests HR so that they can push the entire company in that direction. -- So there's a LOT of distortion and "misappropriation" (to use the Army logistics term) among personnel, and correcting that is likely going to hurt. -- Like a cancer, HR is going to be the main-mass and try to keep metastasizing... and, due to the "cost savings" of combining the productive-positions, any mistake in the "surgery" is going to hurt all the more, precisely because there's little redundancy in the productive body.

Dingleberry wrote..

6. Trump isn't done. Vast majority of his endorsements got elected, and the abortion thingy (an unforced error) made hoe's mad and cost repubs. Now they can enjoy losing the rest of their freedoms. Besides, we still have two years until next election and that is a political eternity. DeSantis won't be able to withstand the withering onslaught that the media-DNC complex spews forth, not to mention the majority is now solidly left. The dems could nominate Fetterman and he would win. That is how they vote. You exercise discernment, they do not. Ever. If you have lived around them, you know this. Red areas will get redder, blue and purple areas will become bluer. Let them enjoy their local filth and corruption.

I certainly hope he is.
That bullshit NFT digital collectable-/trading-card (i.e. it doesn't actually exist) that he attached his name to and pushed should, alone, tank him... but I suppose that's in a sane world, which this is observably not.

we have the wrong people running things now. They will be making poor decisions and will make conditions worse.

As in the 1929-34 period, you can get a market crash, a false recovery, then another crash.

The idiot criminals that brought us the Covid/Vaccine event are still running the show and controlling our money.

Here's my one "sure thing" prediction. On a regular basis, I'm going to take my canoe out onto Tampa Bay and do some yachting. F-em.

Is Credit Suisse the canary in the coal mine...perhaps. Everyone was worried back in the late summer about them in the $6 range...now about to break through $3.

@Edward.fish - Regarding the Republicans, keep in mind that people like us are the RINOs. The leadership of the Republican party hates us. Reality is that we register and vote Republican because we really have no alternative, certainly we do not agree with the leadership of the Republican party.

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'Power, like the reproductive muscle, longs to be exercised, often without judgement or right' - Gerry Spence

Quote:

Besides, we still have two years until next election and that is a political eternity.

I'm ready to throw down a longer term prediction: there won't be any elections in 2024.

And if I'm right, you won't be bothering to gloat on the Ticker about it, because you'll have REAL problems to deal with wherever you live.

Predictions are tough, especially concerning stuff that hasn't happened yet. But here are a few anyway.

The US continues to decline at a fundamental level. Fewer people decide they are willing to support the decaying carcass with their time, labor, or blood.

I expect to see further declines in military recruiting because fewer people are willing to fight for the country. Those that do join will do so for "free stuff" or because they have no other options.

The marriage rate declines even more, with an increasing number of young males going their own way for a number of reasons.

There are fewer childbirths, possibly made even worse by the failed vaccines.

VIP/RIP increases at large corporations, eventually forcing these companies to either pay their talented employees more money, OR keep paying the diversity folks.

The Biden regime, having successfully avoided a 2022 recession, will suffer a rough one in 2023. All according to plan, since they think the economy will recover in 2024 and thus won't hurt them in the presidential election. I suspect the recession will be worse than they anticipate and will carryover in 2024.

Without a Democrat Congress to bail them out, "blue" states will look for other revenue streams. I expect a couple of them to legalize prostitution and tax the hell out of it. They need young males who can do stuff to remain in their states, and the lure of pussy will trump fishing in Wyoming for many of them.

Red states will be moving in the opposite direction, with several making attempts to eliminate either the state income tax (article on ZH today) or state property tax. Those who do so first will see a large influx of population.

50% chance a Supreme Court justice has to resign or dies from illness. Supposedly they are all boosted, and many are very old. With a Democrat Senate, Brandon will pick another communist judge. And THIS (if not the clot shots first) might be thing that ends Trump's campaign since it is his fault for losing the Senate. But the Democrats won't get off scot-free either. As they would surely lose the WV, MT, and OH Senate seats in 2024, costing them control of the Senate.

Not sure this will happen in 2023, but I do expect a "confidence crisis" to happen in the US. This could be because of a failed response to a natural disaster like a large earthquake, or a military fiasco, like two ships with "diversity" captains colliding and sinking, or something totally unexpected like when Mathias Rust landed in Red Square after penetrating Soviet air defenses, thus showing the world the USSR was a paper tiger.

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What is wrong with philately? A bunch of folks have bought stamps recently-- the $200 kind.

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Quote:

I'm expecting reasonable deals mid year and in fact looking forward to them as replacing my half-ton truck with a 3/4 is something I am considering... But not at today's prices.

Why a 3/4 ton instead of a full ton? The latter is only a few thousand more, but gives you close to 1000 pounds more payload capacity. Of course, if you are looking to buy used, the 3/4 ton makes sense since there are probably at least ten of those for every 1 ton truck.

Going forward, I have to wonder though how much longer they are going to keep making both as "having a lot of choice" is coming to an end. It seems like they will consolidate to one design going forward.

Also, I drove by the Ford dealership today. There was not a single new or used Super Duty on the lot.

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Each of those steps consumes more fuel. Buying more than you reasonably expect to use it a material and recurring waste of money.

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Quote:

Not sure this will happen in 2023, but I do expect a "confidence crisis" to happen in the US.

I can think of two possibilities, one which is quite likely in '23.

The likely one is that the Russians kick ass in Ukraine and the U.S. send troops in along with Polish and some Romanians. We then get our asses kicked as well, including the possibility of American POW's in Russia. I'm not sure how the inside the Beltway crowd will deal wit this.

The other, less likely, possibility is we get into it with China, most likely over Taiwan, with two carriers at the bottom of the ocean.

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Its all in the mitochondria

Any shooting war with actual uniformed American casualties involving Russia or China and you have a very high probability of needing SPF 5000 sunblock.

Everyone knows that too so I rate the probability low -- except via a chain of mistakes, which is always possible.

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Years ago before the union was busted at a local packing plant, people waited for a strike to buy up pickups, RVs, boats, etc on the cheap.

IMHO, the vehicle supply/demand dysfunction will be solved partially once the economy tanks in 2023. A lot of used vehicles (trucks) will be hitting the market when contractors and small businesses fail. I see a LOT of damned nice 3/4T and 1T trucks all decked out plus covered with advertising that are expensed to some obscure, niche business but used only as a personal business.

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"Economists are no different than the prophets of ancient Pompeii who reassured that Mt Vesuvius would never blow. After all, it never had before." Baxter Black, DVM and Cowboy Poet

"You can avoi

Chromehill wrote..

@Edward.fish - Regarding the Republicans, keep in mind that people like us are the RINOs. The leadership of the Republican party hates us. Reality is that we register and vote Republican because we really have no alternative, certainly we do not agree with the leadership of the Republican party.

@Chromehill -- Agreed; I have said before, elsewhere, that the True Republican is the McCain, the McConnell, Romney, and Cruz -- the political creatures who, as you observe, hate the average American and their base all the more so -- if you ascribe to any of the [traditional] stated party planks (government accountability, fiscal responsibility, Rule of Law, Ending Roe v. Wade*, etc) then it is YOU who is the RINO. -- You see, the Republican Party (as it functions) is but a Trumpesque "All Talk, No Action"/"All Hat, No Cattle" organization that, like the National Rifle Association, exists only to grift. (Whether the object of that grift is money, or votes, or both is actually immaterial -- they are the embodiment of fraud and deceit, having no desire to achieve their stated purpose and ofttimes working against that goal.)

Trump is actually an excellent example of, shall we say, voter retaliation: in 2016 there were something like 12 or 16 candidates, and of them Trump and Carson were the only two not obviously in-line with the Elite talking-points/policies, and they planned to have a JEB or Cruz in-place --and make no mistake here, Cruz would be fatal to the US and Rule of Law, for he does not qualify for President due to the NBC requirement-- and was saying sensible things that one could infer were plausible instances of an abstract ideal. (e.g. "Build the Wall!" -> border-security and immigration-control; "Lock her up!" -> an anti-corruption agenda, etc.) --- either he would at least attempt to enact policies, or else he would tear the party apart with his bombastic "personality. (Looks like "The Party"/elites, to include Trump himself, chose the latter; I hope their plans roll back on them and crush them.)

It's been noted that there is no real opposition, politically (or "partyily") speaking here: https://cosmonaut.substack.com/p/a-split.....

Interestingly enough, the mere act of speaking (which is all Trump ever really did) is enough to send TPTB into a tizzy, the mere talk of pushing back on (e.g.) immigration enough to be de-platformed, banned, and/or shadow-banned. That is how much they've grown unused to criticism or push-back in their arrogant echo-chambers and active disdain for the common man. -- Considering this, simply declaring the Truth, refusing to submit to lies, is enough to destabilize their power/control.

* Roe v. Wade could have been fixed by enacting legislation declaring the issue to be State-level and excluding the appellate matter from the Supreme Court, which Congress has power over via Art III, S2, C2: "In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make."

** To prove Cruz's ineligibility, let us use proof by contradiction, now we know that the purpose of the NBC requirement was to prevent the Presidency from being held by someone with foreign allegiances, in particular they wanted to prevent someone who was heir to the Throne from becoming President and then "reunifying"/annexing the newly formed United States-- the circumstances of Cruz's birth are that he was born to a citizen mother and non-citizen father outside the US. Therefore, applying these circumstances to someone, say born in England, whose father was not a Citizen, say the king of England, thus produces someone whose allegiance is supremely doubtable: the Prince of England. Therefore, it is shown that the circumstances of birth exclude Ted Cruz. QED.

Abelarldlindsey,

The west is casualty-phobic. Fun fact that not too many realize:

There is no other military in the west EXCEPT for the US. The allies we have are glorified police-like forces with a few ships and planes. This is not an offense, but a statement of fact.

We in there US won't be going to war with a major power(s) that does not give a shit about casualties. This means everyone not in the west. At least intentionally.

First, you won't find enough young real men here who would volunteer. They are checking out of society, not defending it. Not even considering the extremely relative few that are even capable of joining.

Second, a draft is not even remotely politically viable. Not even in the slightest.

Third, the most rabidly anti-Putin (lefties) shoot their mouths off and attack with emojis, not guns. Cowards all.

Unless the Russians are truly that inept militarily, this will be a slow, steady grind. And lots of money to be made by the MIC, kickbacks to the big guy and friends from giving the crackhouse of Europe billions of our tax dollars per month, etc.

Quote:

Any shooting war with actual uniformed American casualties involving Russia or China and you have a very high probability of needing SPF 5000 sunblock.

That this hasn't already happened suggests that the whole Ukraine thing may just be more Kakabuni theater.

I know of people who have gone over there. They all have known legally they're mercenaries and if caught they better use their last round on their own head because Vlad has no obligation to be nice..... And won't be.

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Quote:

Any shooting war with actual uniformed American casualties involving Russia or China and you have a very high probability of needing SPF 5000 sunblock.

Everyone knows that too so I rate the probability low -- except via a chain of mistakes, which is always possible.

I see four scenarios in descending order of probability:

1) The Ukrainians get their butts kicked just like the way Scott Ritter and Douglas Macgregor talk about on Andrew Napolitano's "Judging Freedom". We accept the lost, pressure Ukraine into cutting a deal with Russia, and then walk away and never talk about it. Kind of like Afghanistan a year and a half ago.

2) We escalate and it turns into a Vietnam level event until, once again, the Russians kick ass and we withdraw, just like in scenario #1.

3) Through a series of mistakes, we end up in a WW1-like clusterfuck which may or may not go nuclear. Even if it does not, all of the major power's economies end up hosed for a very long time (10-20 years) just like all of the European powers after WW1.

4) A nuclear war. There's nothing to be said about this one.

Like I say, I think option 1 is the most likely scenario for this coming year.

About the nuclear thing, I don't think the Russians will start a nuclear war if they are able to get what they want without one. I'm more concerned about our arrogant, narcissistic political class going nuclear than I am of the Russians. I don't think this will happen. But I am skeptical and dubious enough of our political class that I have very little confidence in them acting rationally and prudently.

I think the Russians will win in any conventional scenario because they are there, have the troops and materials, and most importantly the troops knowing they are fighting for the Motherland. If we sent troops over there, what are they fighting for? George Soros's global social engineering schemes? Its an easy guess as to who will fight harder.

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Its all in the mitochondria

I'm not disagreeing with you guys at all. Its just that I'm at the point where I'm starting to wonder if a lot of our politicians are no longer playing with full decks.

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Its all in the mitochondria

They're not.

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