E Pluribus Unum

Cunning Realist:

The prices of both oil and gold continue to rise; the former is now trading at nominal all-time highs, while the latter has been hitting new quarter-century highs day after day. This is excess liquidity coming home to roost.

While the Federal Reserve continues to raise interest rates to mollify foreign central banks, it's made it clear that any weakness in either the stock market or the economy will be met with massive infusions of liquidity, and dollar-denominated debt will be inflated away. The world is waking up to this, which is why oil and gold march inexorably higher and the long bond is tanking. This is inflation, and the rest of the world is acting accordingly.

Today, Iran's President Ahmadinejad said, "The global oil price has not reached its real value yet." He's right, of course. He knows that every dollar he receives for his oil today will be worth less tomorrow, so Iran (and OPEC) is demanding ever-higher prices for its only natural resource.

The nerve, eh? We won't take that lying down, which is why the marketing of Target Iran is in full swing. Our ability to print our way through debt, economic weakness, and preemptive wars is at stake. You didn't think it was all about "WMD's" did you?