The “North Atlantic Terror Organization” , alias NATO, isn’t officially at war yet, but you wouldn’t know it from the balance sheet. Drowning in debt, NATO’s members somehow found the cash to make Ukraine the priciest conflict in the alliance’s history. Spending will hit $1.59 trillion in 2025—up from $1.5 trillion last year—with the US footing the lion’s share at $980 billion. Canada and Europe together will cough up $608 billion, averaging 2.76% of GDP, while Poland proudly takes the crown at 4.48%. Lithuania and Latvia follow close behind, with the Nordics happy to burn through 3% or more of their GDP on this “defense.”

https://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pdf/2025/8/pdf/250827-def-exp-2025-en.pdf

Remember when NATO members were “struggling” to meet 2%? That was before Russia-Ukraine. Now they’ve shot up from 1.8% pre-war to 2.6% in 2024, and 2.76% today—already marching toward the 5% pledge made at the Hague Summit in June 2025. Apparently, when your economy is buckling under debt and inflation, the smartest thing to do is double military spending. Brilliant.

Of course, the sales pitch hasn’t changed in a century. Before World War I, it was “deterrence” as Europe poured money into armies and navies. In the 1930s, it was “job creation” as Germany, Italy, and Japan rearmed while their citizens starved under wage controls and shortages. Rome did the same in the third century: endless frontier wars devoured the treasury, coinage was debased, and the empire collapsed. Different actors, same playbook.

https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2020/february/war-highest-defense-spending-measured

What NATO is doing today is no different—gutting social programs, diverting capital from productive enterprise, and pretending that war spending is “security.” In reality, it’s inflation, destruction, and debt-financed suicide. The latest NATO report isn’t just a budget—it’s a roadmap of nations stumbling into the War Cycle. The West has chosen militarization, and history is laughing—because we already know how this story ends.

In true “Lettuce vs. Liz Truss” fashion, Keynesian hero ‘Keith Starmer’ is about to unveil a budget with a £35 billion black hole—without, of course, denting economic growth.

Bond vigilantes are back in the UK, as markets were slow to price inflation into gilts and that fiscal clarity is now essential. On Tuesday, 30-year gilt yields spiked eight basis points to 5.72%. Treasurer in Chief ‘Live Even-More’ of course downplayed the move, insisting yields are simply tracking global peers and remain “orderly.”

In a nutshell, ‘Keith’ ‘s magic-budget lettuce act comes with a £35B hole, soaring gilt yields, and a Treasurer insisting it’s all just “orderly gardening.”

Before handing the White House keys to Donald Copperfield, Sleepy Joe and his merry band of green zealots made sure to squeeze in one last magic trick—laundering cash faster than a washing machine on spin cycle, with one member even perfecting the art of “tossing gold bars off the Titanic.”

https://www.projectveritas.com/news/epa-advisor-admits-insurance-policy-against-trump-is-gold-bars-off-titanic

The so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” was nothing more than a reckless spending spree, a Trojan horse to bankroll the Malthusian climate crusade of the green zealots running amok in the Washington Swamp under #46.

https://x.com/TrumpWarRoom/status/1831786155559547172

The corruption was beyond parody—an agency with barely $100 in revenue got handed a $2 billion grant, all conveniently tied to failed politician. Just picture the media outrage if Donald Copperfield had funneled billions to a group with the financial heft of a lemonade stand and links to a conservative ally. Instead, under the last administration, looting the public purse for climate scams, migrant handouts, war profiteering, and personal gain was treated like business as usual.

https://www.rightwing.org/massive-scandal-2-billion-grant-given-and-hidden/

There’s a real chance this mess ends up before the U.S. Supreme Court. And frankly, the American people should be furious: billions were burned not to serve the public, but to score points against a political rival. Let’s be clear—the spending spree hurt taxpayers, who are always the collateral damage in these petty political wars.

While American workers were nursing barbecues and hangovers, China marked the 80th anniversary of its liberation. The self-styled “Peace Maker in Chief”—better known as the “Warmonger in Chief”—reminded Beijing to thank the U.S. for the blood it spilled to secure China’s freedom.

At Beijing’s grand military parade—the largest in China’s history—Xi Jinping rolled out the new axis of power with Putin and Kim Jong-Un at his side, a not-so-subtle warning to the West. Cloaked in the rhetoric of “peace or war, dialogue or confrontation,” Xi assured 50,000 spectators that China “stands on the right side of history.” Of course, every nation at war makes the same claim—yet history only remembers the victors.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/03/china-military-parade-xi-jinping-appears-with-vladimir-putin-kim-jong-un

China’s parade was more than a commemoration of Japan’s retreat 80 years ago—it was a thunderous declaration that neutrality is over. With Europe flirting with boots on the ground in Ukraine and World War III looming, Beijing lined up alongside Moscow and showcased an arsenal designed to rattle the West. Xi paraded not just tanks and troops, but a chilling array of weaponry: the Dong Feng 5C ICBM, capable of hurling a dozen nuclear warheads anywhere on Earth, and hypersonic “carrier killers” engineered to outpace America’s most advanced defenses.
The message was unmistakable—choose peace, or face China’s sharpened edge.

https://youtu.be/ifiGDrsO14I

Wall Street is still popping champagne over a maybe-rate-cut, while the real show is happening backstage: liquidity. The Fed’s overnight reverse repo has collapsed from a $2.3 trillion mountain to pocket change ($17.9 billion). That pile of “extra money nobody wanted” was parked at the Fed like a kid’s allowance in a piggy bank. As it drained, it quietly juiced markets like stealth QE.

Now the piggy bank is empty, the Fed’s QT party is about to hit the wall, and bank reserves—still fat at $3.2 trillion—are next on the chopping block.

On September 17th when the FOMC meets, the real story isn’t whether the Fed cuts rates—it’s that QT is ending. That’s the real market mover. Meanwhile, the USD liquidity aggregate index is tightening again year-over-year, and every time that happens, bonds and equities usually throw a proper tantrum. In short: forget the rate-cut hype, brace for volatility.

Instead of tuning in to financial “experts” who’ve never risked a single dollar, investors should strap in—September is shaping up to deliver more volatility than anything we’ve seen in this so-called Jubilee Year.

US Services activity perked up in August — thank you, data centres and the great sport of tariff front-running. The ISM Services PMI jumped to 52.0 from 50.1, with new orders at their fastest pace since October. Of course, backlogs shrank, prices stayed painfully high, and employment kept contracting. Translation: business looks “better,” but mostly because firms are rushing to beat tariffs while quietly admitting they can’t keep eating the costs. Call it growth with a side of inflation, served lukewarm or an inevitable stagflation ahead.

In a nutshell, August’s services rebound looks less like real growth and more like tariff panic—demand up, costs rising, jobs shrinking: stagflation dressed as recovery.

Under the iron-fisted wisdom of “Gavin Grewsom,” California hasn’t just been perfecting its transformation into a budget-friendly Socialist theme park—it also earned gold medals in ‘plandemic’ paranoia. So really, who’s shocked that on September 1, 2025, the California Department of Public Hysteria— meaning, Public Health—decided to warn everyone to wear masks again.

https://www.breitbart.com/health/2025/09/03/masks-coronavirus-wave-hits-newsoms-california/