Darrell Castle addresses the President's statement about immigration from certain countries, specifically those in Africa as well as Haiti.

Transcription / Notes

COMFORTING LIES AND DISTURBING TRUTHS

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, January 19, 2018, and on today’s Report I will be talking about the President’s remarks the other day, when he allegedly referred to certain countries as "poop hole" countries.  He is actually credited with having asked some lawmakers, during discussions on DACA (the delayed action on childhood arrivals) bill, that is a current matter of contention holding up passage of the budget for this year; why do we take so many immigrants from "poop hole" countries, we should be taking in more from Norway.

Whether he actually said it or not is a matter of contention because he said he used strong language but not the word "poop hole", and some of the lawmakers in attendance said that he did, in fact, use the word poop hole.  Whether he actually used that word or not, I am not sure, but for purposes of this Report, I am going to take the position that he did use the word "poop hole", in reference to some countries in Africa and Haiti, in particular.  Notice that I am using the word "poop hole" countries instead of the actual word the President used because I don’t want to offend anyone who might be offended by the commonly used word for defecation.

Even that is a matter of debate, however, because what did the President mean when he said poop hole?  Did he intend the word "poop hole" to refer to a toilet, i.e., those countries are like toilets, or did he intend it to refer to the actual human "Heine hole", i.e., those countries are like "Heine holes"? I’m going to take the position that he meant toilet, as has most of the media.  You can scan the media around the world, and even in countries where the language doesn’t translate very well, such as Japan; the press usually says that the President referred to certain other countries as "toilet countries".

This President is often crude, but he has a knack for raising questions that lead many of us to truths we have been wondering about but perhaps did not have the courage to ask.  I think his question; why do we admit so many from those countries is a legitimate question that the vast majority of Americans think should be asked and answered.  Why, indeed, what do people from those countries bring to the United States besides a little bit of those countries?  How could immigration from those countries benefit the United States in any way?  Aren’t Presidents, Congressmen, and Senators supposed to represent the people of the United States?  They take an oath to protect and defend the Constitution, but doesn’t that require them to represent us?

I know what immigration in general means to our lawmakers, and too many Presidents before this one.  For the Democrats it means building a permanent voting block of dependent people, who will always return the hand that feeds them to power.  For the Republicans it means satisfying their crony capitalists, who fund their campaigns in return for a steady supply of cheap labor.  The last two Republican Presidents before this one, accepted the seemingly inevitable march to the European-style socialist, multicultural administrative state, but this President does not accept it.

For us rubes who live out here in flyover country, it means that if we want to be considered nice people, if we want to be acceptable to many of our friends and relatives, if we want to be like those in Hollywood and the media, we must enthusiastically go along and accept it all as inevitable.  However, this President has given a little hope to many of us deplorables.  He is giving voice to those of us who have had no voice for so many years,

Darrell Castle talks about purchases of French landmarks by the Saudi Royal Family, attacks on French women, and especially French Jews by Muslim immigrants.

Transcription / Notes

EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION  IS CIRCLING THE DRAIN

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, January 12, 2018, and on today’s Report, I will be talking about some recent events in Europe and the Middle East, and what these events say about the future of Europe, especially France.  From the title of this Report, you may be thinking, “he’s given up on happiness and gone off the deep end again”, but before you jump to that conclusion, just hear me out.

First of all, I have made a commitment to talk about Europe in these Reports as often as possible because European Civilization is Western Civilization, and that is our civilization, at least it once was.  Our story this week began in the New York Times Sunday Edition of December 17, 2017, when that paper carried a front page story about the new Crown Prince in Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman. You should remember him from the recent Report I did concerning his appointment by King Salman as his successor, as well as his efforts to reform Saudi society.

It seems that the young Prince, age 32, has gone abroad looking for places to put his country’s wealth and France is one of the lucky recipients.  There are many landmarks in France that represent French history and, as the tour guides will tell you, the landmarks also remind us of the glory of the age of kings.  The most prominent and famous, and a symbol of France itself, is the Palace of Versailles.  Louis XIV built Versailles as his permanent home during his 72 year reign, and now it is perhaps the structure that, except for the Eiffel Tower, is most representative of France and the French people.

Next to Versailles once sat another château, also built by Louis XIV, on 57 manicured acres of gardens.  These Chateaus are more than just symbols or landmarks, they represent the history of a once great nation, and more importantly, they should be the property of the French people who built and paid for them with their labor and blood.  But nevertheless, in 2009, one Chateau was bulldozed and a new, high-tech Chateau Louis XIV was built in its place by Emad Khashoggi, nephew of the late billionaire arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi.  The new Chateau recently sold for $300 million to a mystery purchaser, but a little research by the New York Times revealed the purchaser to be the Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman.

Does this mean that France has sold its soul?  Perhaps it means that France has sold its history, culture, and the nation itself as well as its soul.  France is no longer even a nation-state, and it has been reduced to just a place where people live.  No borders, and as the new prime minister, Emmanuel Macron, said, no culture.  France sells its national treasures to the highest bidder without regard to whom or what that bidder is.  There is no regard whatsoever of history, culture, tradition or religion.  None of those things exist anymore since they have been exchanged for a new multicultural, open society where everything goes because nothing matters.

Ethics, the foundation of civilization, has been destroyed, or at least abandoned, almost everywhere but especially in France.  The new multicultural socialist state is fostered on the people, and they absorb it and embrace it because from early childhood they have been indoctrinated with the belief that all truth is just a matter of opinion and absolute truth does not exist.  Right and wrong then are just matters of opinion, and opinions can change from day-to-day.  Government is free and encouraged to do whatever appears necessary, without exception or limit.

Darrell Castle discusses how the problem of individual debt is causing a lot of the stress and anger-related problems affecting the average American.

Transcription / Notes

THE REAL PROBLEM WITH DEBT IN AMERICA

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, January 5, 2018, the first Friday of 2018.  Today I will be talking about debt, and I don’t mean the unpayable, unimaginable, debt of our various National, State and local governments.  I’m going to address the plight of the Average American with regard to debt, and discuss how lives are being affected in ways perhaps we haven’t thought of before.   I am, I submit, very qualified to discuss this subject, having been a bankruptcy lawyer for now close to 39 years.

During the second Obama administration, and now during the Trump administration, we have been told repeatedly that we are in an economic recovery and that things are really looking up.  That might be the case for some, but for the average American that is not the case.  Nearly half the men ages 18-34 now live with their parents, and about one third of all Americans of that age group live with their parents.   We are told that the generation now 18-34 is the first generation of Americans to have a life less well off economically than their parents.

In cities like Seattle and Los Angeles, hundreds of homeless camps line the downtown streets, bridges, and overpasses.  In Los Angeles more than 14,000 people live outdoors on the streets of that city. Young people, the generation I just mentioned, owe 1.5 trillion dollars for their educational loans, 10% percent of which are in default.   Americans in general, owe more than one trillion dollars on credit cards, much of which is in default.  About one trillion dollars is owed for car loans, which lose value the minute you drive them off the lot.  Last month the average price for a light vehicle was $31,720.  That’s up 75% from the average selling price 20 years ago, but during that 20 years median household income increased by only 52%.

How do people make up the difference?  By borrowing.  Financing of the average new vehicle amounted to $30,945 last year, or 97.6% of the purchase price.

In America today, we have a group of people commonly referred to as the working poor, and their debt load has nearly quadrupled in the last 20 years as a percentage of their income.  Most likely, that debt can never be paid off, and that is why they are often doomed to lives of poverty without any explanation of why.  Taking on such huge debt loads is a very stressful way to live, and yet for many, there doesn’t seem to be any way out.  I suspect that many of our society’s social problems are fueled by this incredibly stressful, anger-inducing situation.

This debt peonage has created a downward spiral on the everyday lives of Middle Class people. The mortality rate for working class white men, in particular, has risen sharply in recent years.  Most of these deaths are from what have come to be called "deaths of despair", primarily suicide, drug addiction, and addiction to legal opiates.  There have been over 66,000 drug overdose deaths in the last 12 months.  70% of Americans are on some prescription drug, often to treat anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts. However, side effects from such drugs are often anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts.

Let’s go back for a moment and take a look at what is the root cause of the problem.  It’s true that we have wealth disparity at levels unseen since the 1930’s depression years, with 10% of Americans owning 75% of the wealth.  That situation is a symptom of the problem and not the root cause, but the real issue is what caused it.

The rich seem to get richer while everyone else loses ground,

Darrell Castle talks about happiness and whether it is possible to achieve a happy state of mind at the end of 2017 and the beginning of 2018.

Transcription / Notes

HAPPINESS

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, December 22, 2017, and on today’s report I will be talking about some reasons to be happy as we approach Christmas and the end of 2017.  The Castle Report is dedicated to bringing you my perspective on the news or the things happening in our world and admittedly those things are usually bad, but today we look at happiness as an object in and of itself, and some very good reasons to be happy as we begin 2018.

We might assume that people who reside in the United States, the world’s economic powerhouse, would be the happiest people on earth, but sadly that is not the case.  The World Happiness Report, yes there is such a thing, reports that on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being very happy and 1 being very unhappy, Americans are just not very happy.  In 1950, Americans rated 7.5, but today the rating is 5.5.  With all the advances in technology, medical science, economics, and civil rights, we are far less happy now than we were in 1950.

The US GDP per capita rose by a factor of 3 during that 67 year period but real wages relative to inflation have been stagnant or falling since we left the gold standard in August 1971; ahh but I digress.  I’m starting to do what comes naturally to me, and that Is to explain why people are so unhappy and then tell you why they should be unhappy, but not today.  No, today I’m going to give you only good news and tell you why we should be exceedingly happy, especially if you are of my daughter’s generation.

Why should we be happy and why do we want to be happy?  Happiness is the state that everyone wants above all things.  How many times have you used or heard someone use the expression,"I just want my children to be happy".  It seems to be a state of mind that we can achieve for only very brief moments in our lives, and yet we would literally give anything we possess to have it.  In fact, most of the things we possess we acquired in an effort to be happy.  Are you really happier in your current house, your current car than in your last?  I doubt it, but that promise of happiness in the things we acquire drives the modern consumer economy.

Perhaps we can agree that money does not bring happiness, or said another way; happiness is not something you buy.  I will argue, though, that lack of money can bring a lot of misery into your life.  Aristotle wrote that happiness is the final destination, or final cause, as he called it.  Without the desire to be happy, we would digress and never find our final destination.  He said that happiness is the most valuable asset that a person can acquire and it is something worth spending one’s life in the pursuit of.

Let’s take a few moments then, and look at some reasons to be very happy here in America, at the end of 2017 and the start of 2018.  These first few reasons are numbered and come from 99 Reasons 2017 was a Great Year, courtesy of John Mauldin’s newsletter “Thoughts from the Frontline.”

* Death is retreating around the world. The world health organization has announced a new vaccine effective enough to end cholera.

* Cancer deaths have dropped by 25% in the United States since 1991, saving more than 2 million lives. Breast cancer deaths have fallen by 39%, saving the lives of 322,600 women.

* For the first time in history half of all the people on earth with HIV are getting treatment and aids de...

Darrell Castle talks about the destruction of our nation’s moral consensus and the necessity of secured borders. Transcription / Notes OUR CRUMBLING CIVILIZATION AND IMMIGRANT RIGHTS Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, December 15, 2017, and on today’s report, I will be talking about how our civilization is starting to crumble at the foundation.  It seems that when advancements are made by humanity, sometimes taking thousands of years to achieve, these advancements are often given back or destroyed in a few decades. Western Civilization, for example, is based on a shared moral consensus as its foundation.  When that consensus is destroyed, or even weakened, the foundation of our civilization crumbles.  The moral consensus underpinning Western Civilization has now been replaced by a set of amoral rules, which make up our new amoral code.  The new set of rules is absolutely binding on most of us, but for a few they are not so binding.  The rules we are now expected to live by make up the system of politically correct multiculturalism that totally dominates our society.  You violate one of the rules at the peril of losing your job and often having your life ruined. Since there’s no morality anymore, only rules, we have lost our ability to separate right from wrong and not just the ruling elite either.  Even the man and woman on the street who raise their children, go to work each day, vote, and serve on juries, seem to have lost discernment.  For example, they allow their civic leaders to declare their cities sanctuary cities, meaning those who have entered this country illegally, whether they are honest, hard working people, or seven-time felons, can flee to that sanctuary city for protection.  Sanctuary cities don’t want illegal immigrants to be subject to deportation, even if they have seven prior felony convictions, as did Jose Garcia Zarate when he killed Kate Steinle. Mr. Zarate had been deported five times and illegally returned to the United States each time.  He was nearing release from prison for his seventh felony when the Federal Immigration Authorities, or I.C.E., requested that he be released to them so that he could be deported for the sixth time.  The people of San Francisco, through their elected representatives, said no he can stay here in our sanctuary city.  That decision cost a young woman named Kate Steinle her life. Mr. Zarate fired a previously stolen .40 caliber Sig Sauer handgun into a crowd of people, walking on a pier in San Francisco.  The bullet apparently ricocheted off a piece of concrete and struck Ms. Steinle in the back, fatally wounding her.  He then threw the stolen gun into San Francisco Bay and ran, but it was all captured on video tape.  First he said he fired on purpose but was aiming at a seal, then he changed his story to say that he found the gun on the pier and when he picked it up it accidentally fired. It seems pretty clear that Mr. Zarate did not intend to kill Kate Steinle, but firing a handgun into a crowd of people has to at least constitute negligent homicide, or extremely reckless homicide, or grossly negligent second degree murder with implied malice doesn’t it?  Under the law, in most areas shooting into a crowd would carry implied malice for murder, but no, the jury said not guilty, of anything, except being a felon in possession of a hand gun.  I guess their reasoning was that possession of a gun is a crime but using it to kill is not.  The felon in possession charge carries a sentence of three years, for which Mr. Zarate was given credit for time served and has probably been released by now. If so, Mr. Zarate walks the streets of his sanctuary city a free man while Kate Steinle is in her grave.  Apparently our culture has become so perverted that we can’t even begin to tell the difference between right and wrong?  Perhaps the many years most of us spend under government control, in government schools,

Darrell Castle talks about the budget debate in Congress and what is causing the impasse. Transcription / Notes HOW CAN THE REPUBLIC SURVIVE ITS ELECTED LEADERS Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, December 8, 2017, and on today’s report, I will be discussing the National budget, due today but now postponed until December 22.  Congress is supposed to pass a budget for the New Year by the end of each fiscal year, but they have been unable to do so for quite some time operating instead on a series of continuing resolutions. This is very important to each of our lives for reasons we will see.  The people we elect to oversee the nation’s finances control even tiny aspects of our lives, for example, they tell me who I can hire and who I can fire, how much water I can have in my toilets, what lights I can use in my home, and how I can heat and cool my home.  The point is that there so many glaring problems on the backs of the American people but our elected leaders will not deal with them except perhaps to make them worse. According to Federal Reserve statistics, the United States Government owes 20.4 trillion dollars and climbing every minute.  The 75-year shortfall of promises, over actual ability to deliver, is 210 trillion dollars currently.  That means that over the next 75 years, not including what’s being added every year, the Federal Government has issued promises for 210 trillion dollars more than it is capable of delivering.  Our children, grandchildren, and future generations will owe more and more of their wages to tax, if they are fortunate enough to have wages. In addition to the Federal Government, virtually every state and local government is head over heels in debt they cannot pay.  Private individuals have followed the government’s example into debt slavery as well.  One in 10 individuals has debt in the hands of a collection agency.  I mention these things just to set the stage for what the government is doing to resolve its budget problems. Congress is divided just like the rest of the nation is divided, but the difference is, that on most items in Congress, decisions are made by the majority.  The Republicans hold majorities in both houses so they don’t really need Democrat cooperation, but it seems that the minority party always has leverage if it has the courage to use it.  A couple of months ago Congress was unable to pass a budget so they passed a “continuing resolution” instead.  That resolution provided funds to run the government until today.  Now the Republicans have prepared a new continuing resolution to last until December 22, so the whole thing will have to be debated again in two weeks. If Congress doesn’t pass a 2018 budget by midnight December 22, the Federal Government will have to theoretically shut down.  That is non-essential services will have to shut down.  Most services and agencies will be fine and some will be partially affected.  The longer the impasse lasts the more the services will be affected.  National Parks, payments to Federal Contractors, certain regulatory enforcement, visa processing and other such things would be shut down. The military, federal prisons, the war on drugs, etc. will all be just fine.  The last shutdown in October 2013 lasted just 17 days.  Most of us survived the apocalypse just fine and laid off federal employees received their back pay for not working.  Social Security checks went out on time and TSA remained on the job but still, one wonders why these intelligent people can’t agree on how much more than they actually have should be borrowed and spent. Everybody on both sides of the isle seems to want more guns, bullets, airplanes, ships, and the people to operate them.  Once they have them our representatives busy themselves creating world situations that require the federal government to use them.  They are willing to sacrifice a lot of things in order to purchase the items of war.

Darrell Castle explains why it is so difficult to compete at a high level in politics or even in the marketplace of ideas in our world today. Transcription / Notes COMPETING AGAINST SOROS Hello this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, December 1, 2017, and today’s report will deal with why it is so difficult to compete at a high level in politics, or even in the marketplace of ideas in our world today. A few days ago I got an email from a gentleman, followed by a requested phone call to him in which I was asked to answer a question.  The question was: since it is so hard to compete with Democrats and Republicans, why can’t we in the 3rd party movement come together as one to compete with them.  I explained to the gentleman my many attempts over the years to explore that possibility but have come to understand that 3rd parties have fundamental differences from each other, just as they do with the other two parties, as well principles that we are unwilling to abandon. About that same time, a person in media called to ask me my opinion on why ballot access is so hard to achieve and what it would cost to obtain ballot access in all fifty states.  I explained the ballot access process and how it is controlled by those who already have it, but then I gave some thought to the rest of her question.  Ten million dollars would do it I said; yes it would take ten million, starting from scratch, to get ballot access in all fifty states. The enemies of our civilization, of our nation, of our families, and of all humanity have no such head scratching moments to ponder.  In October of this year one of those enemies, Mr. George Soros, donated 18 billion of his 26 billion dollar fortune to his Open Society Foundation.  I’ve talked a lot about Mr. Soros but let me take just a moment to refresh your memory. He was born in Hungary to Jewish parents.  His father was a successful Jewish lawyer so when the Nazis were coming to power in Germany, he could see what was eventually going to happen in his own country.  He managed to get his son George an internship with a government official friendly with the Nazis.  When the Nazis marched into Hungary, George traveled with his mentor in that man’s official capacity, which was to hunt down Jews and confiscate their property. George was 14 years old at the time, but he had the opportunity to watch his friends and neighbors stripped of their property and sent to the labor camps and gas chambers of Nazi Germany.  That was not the only thing he learned from the Nazis because he had a chance to learn the propaganda techniques of Dr. Joseph Goebbels, the Nazis minister of propaganda.  He does not feel guilty about any of it, and in fact, he now says enjoyed it, and that it was fun.  His rational was that if not me then someone else would be doing it, so why not me since it will happen anyway. This is not speculation or exaggeration on my part, and I’m not just making up a fairy tale.  You can watch a video interview with him on YouTube where he describes what I’ve just said in his own words on camera.  He doesn’t seem to have any remorse or guilt feelings about his past or about what he is doing now, and that always made me wonder.  He says in the interview that he is not religious and does not believe in God.  Man created God he says, not the other way around. So there’s your answer to why he does what he does.  Mentored by Nazis, while they killed his friends and neighbors, he believes in nothing outside of himself, so why shouldn’t he be completely self absorbed and selfish.  He lives by no moral code and if he tried to, where would it come from.  Who or what would tell him the difference between right and wrong?  When there is no morality, all you have is a set of rules, which Mr. Soros is very clever at avoiding.  Because of his great wealth he is completely insulated from any consequences.  He fears no one and nothing as he goes about the world doing what he enjoys. Mr.

Darrell Castle talks about being thankful even while difficult circumstances surround us. Transcription / Notes GIVE THANKS – BUT SOMETIMES IT’S HARD Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, November 24, 2017, but more importantly today is the day after Thanksgiving, or what is commonly known as “Black Friday”.  The day after Thanksgiving has developed into a kind of holiday all its own as the retailers of America start the deep discount sales that begins the Christmas shopping season. Now some stores have extended Black Friday to Thursday so Black Thanksgiving, I suppose.  These retailers are counting on the lust for discount shopping but I suspect they are also counting on the distant and fading American family.  We want to buy presents for each other at a discount, but we can’t stand each other’s presence for one day. Don’t get caught in that trap. Black Friday if you must, but not Black Thanksgiving, please don’t go shopping on Thanksgiving even if they are giving stuff away. Let them keep their trinkets for one more day, perhaps just long enough for you to give thanks for your family. The American family is in trouble right now, and showing signs of crumbling.  The destruction of the American family coincides with the rest of America’s crumbling values, such as the high divorce rate and the extremely high rate of illegitimacy, which also coincides with the high rates of incarceration.  Addiction is another difficult anti-family problem, which I will talk about in a minute.  What does all that have to do with shopping; perhaps nothing, but it is an indication of lack of respect for the family unit. I said in the title of this report that sometimes it’s hard to be thankful, and that’s very true in our country and our world today.  To be thankful sometimes we have to remind ourselves of who we really are and what’s eventually in store for us. On this short Thanksgiving Report, I want to mention one thing that is sweeping across America today, that makes it hard for some to be thankful.  Around the turn of the last century, or the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, America did not have the concept of illegal drugs.  Everything was legal, even heroin, and that drug was widely included in other formulas such as cough syrup, and elixirs designed to treat a myriad of ailments.  It was even included in baby tonics, to keep baby quiet and pain free.  It worked, but it created quite a few addicts, although quietly. World War l came along with its trench warfare and exploding shells.  The wounded were often given heroin in its various forms, as a battlefield treatment for wounds and for pain.  The result was many addicted veterans of the war, often mutilated and physically disabled and in chronic pain.  The years between World War l and World War ll gave the country an opportunity to look at what had happened and heroin was banned. During World War ll, wounded men were given a battlefield shot of morphine for the pain.  These men were supposed to be noted somehow so the doctor at the aid station did not give them more, but it was rarely done.  While recovering they got more morphine, and before long, thousands of new addicts.  This has continued on through the wars our country has fought and has gotten worse, not better.   I argue that the worsening addiction rate among veterans has been caused by two things. Number one is increased effectiveness of battlefield treatment and early evacuation of causalities.  Wounds that would have been fatal in Vietnam were treatable in the desert wars. The second thing was that, after 80 years on the banned list, heroin made a very legal come back by American corporations in the form of Oxycodone, Oxycontin, and especially fentanyl  patches.  These corporations were able to fund studies and spread enough money around to convince doctors that the new drugs were safe.  The drugs are basically a new form of heroin, more addictive and more expensive than the original.

Darrell Castle talks about a new world of artificial intelligence being developed in Saudi Arabia. Transcription / Notes THE NEW SAUDI ARABIA Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, November 17, 2017, and on today’s Report I will continue the discussion of Saudi Arabia that we began a few weeks ago.  This is an important topic today as Saudi Arabia moves rapidly to consolidate a trans-generational change of power for the first time in 50 years.  The founding King has no more of his 36 sons left after the current one, King Salman, and therefore, power must pass to a grandson. King Salman, 88 years old, has selected his favorite son and close advisor, Mohammed bin Salman, age 32, as Crown Prince. It was assumed that King Salman would name Mohammed bin Nayef, head of the Interior Ministry, as his successor but instead, he selected Mohammed bin Salman.  Bin Salman is apparently the favorite son and top advisor to the King and, at age 32, is young enough to rule for many years.  He represents the King’s effort to restructure the House of Saud, and along with it, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and he represents the global world that is being built for us. The Crown Prince says that he is not into radical Islam at all, especially the Wahabi sect of radical Islam.  Instead, he wants to modernize and bring the Kingdom and bring it into the 21st century.  The King started the process with a decree that women would be allowed to drive cars. The Crown Prince decided to kick off the new Saudi Arabia with an international conference, which we will discuss at length in a minute, but for now the conference was held last week at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Riyadh.  Billionaires from around the world came, as did several of the Crown Prince’s rivals including high profile billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.  He, along with 11 or 12 other Princes, were arrested on corruption charges.  They are still confined to the Ritz-Carlton, which is a pretty nice place if you have to be confined. I predicted dire things for the Kingdom in my last podcast called The Rape of Yemen, including the monarchy falling to radical forces.  The Crown Prince apparently intends to prevent that from happening by using force and changes designed to modernize the country.  His changes, he hopes, will bring ordinary Saudis into the camp of the new country and out of the camp of the radicals. That there is more to the changes than just consolidation of power is obvious from the economic crises threatening the country.   Oil was discovered in Saudi Arabia in 1938, and since that year the seemingly inexhaustible thirst of the world’s internal combustion engines for oil has made the Kingdom extremely wealthy.  But what goes around comes around as they say and now the price of oil has fallen and shows no sign of relenting anytime soon.  The low oil prices, competition from American fracking technology, and expected long term reduced demand for oil, have sent shock waves through the world’s oil producers. Ninety-five per cent of Saudi GDP comes from oil, which will eventually put the country into a death spiral if something isn’t done.  Very soon, the Saud family, will not be in an economic position to pay the forces of radical Islam to avoid revolution.  King Salman is forward thinking enough to understand this, so he has spent his last years as King grooming the new Crown Prince to take the country in a different direction. Transitioning from complete dependence on oil revenue will not be easy, but the effort to wean the Saudi people off subsidies has already started.  The future plans, however, are to take the Kingdom into the new global world as a full partner with those seeking globalization at whatever price.  Vision 2030 is the name of the new initiative that seeks to leverage the massive financial reserves held in the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund toward global investment.  Still, it’s not at all clear how the young Prince will pull it ...

Darrell Castle talks about the new Federal Reserve Chairman recently appointed by President Trump. Transcript / Notes MEET THE FED’S NEW BOSS Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, November 10, 2017, and as you may know November 10 is the Marine Corps birthday.  I couldn’t let that day go by without at least saying “Happy Birthday” to my fellow Marines.  I should also mention the tragic shooting at a church in Texas as the important story for the week but, despite the tragedy,  today we discuss something more mundane but something of great importance, and that is President Trump’s appointment of the new Federal Reserve Chairman. Assuming confirmation by the Senate, and that seems like a mere formality, the new Fed Chairman will be Jerome “Jay” Powell.  Mr. Powell is a graduate of Princeton University and Georgetown University Law School so he is a lawyer not an economist.  He is a former investment banker with a little Treasury Department time under George H. W. Bush.  He was also a partner in the Carlyle Group, which is basically a Bush Family hangout for financial wheelers and dealers, but he was appointed to the Federal Reserve Board in 2012 by Barack Obama.  Since Mr. Powell’s appointment he has never cast a single vote against Janet Yellen or the Federal Reserve Board’s decisions; not one no vote in six years. His series of votes supporting board decisions is very relevant because it makes him safe.  Mr. Powell will not rock the boat, or so it appears.  President Trump interviewed several people before he settled on Jay Powell but reportedly Steve Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury, pushed hard for Powell.  One must assume that things will remain the same because if Mr. Powell has his own opinions about monetary policy, how would anyone know what they are since he has never dissented from standard policy? Those who have known me for a while, and have listened to my pod cast on why the Fed should be abolished, know how I feel about it, but until someone like me is elected we are apparently stuck with it so we should try to understand it. The Federal Reserve (Fed) is basically a cartel of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks and the Chairman or director of each of those banks makes up the Federal Reserve Board.  The Fed board is appointed by the President, as is the chairman of the board.  The opportunity to appoint directors is not as intensely examined as the opportunity to appoint Supreme Court Justices, but the board is vitally important since it determines monetary policy, i.e., interest rates, etc., for the United States. The Federal Reserve has existed since 1914, having been formed in late December 1913, but over the last four decades it has gained tremendously in power and independence in policy making.  It’s during that forty-year period, thanks in part to four strong chairmen, that the Fed has been able to operate with little or no oversight from Congress or the President.  The only control seems to be the President’s appointment of the Board, although from a list he is given, and appointment of the chairman, also from a list he is given. Those four Chairs were: Paul Volcker, who was brought in to raise interest rates and slow inflation during the Carter Presidency; Alan Greenspan, who served for almost 20 years and whose role was to keep the system running smoothly and it worked until the crises of 2007-8;  Ben Bernanke, who came in to clean up the housing mess and instituted a policy of money printing known as “quantitative easing“, which still exists to some extent; and Janet Yellen.  Under Bernanke and Yellen ,the Fed expanded its mandate to ensure full employment and protect the dollar to a role of financial stability. During the campaign, Trump seemed to be on a collision course with the Fed since he criticized Fed policy relentlessly.  He even accused the Fed of keeping interest rates low in the campaign to help Clinton.  Many people, myself included,