Emerging Biological Threat: New Super Bug

With the recent reports of the New Superbug it brings to light the necessity of having a plan, especially in the event of a collapse and expected refugee movement and degraded medical care making pandemics much more likely. This plan would be how you keep you and your survival team from being exposed to and infected by new and old communicable diseases. 

How you interact with strangers - which is bound to happen even in the lost remote locations.  Have you thought about quarantine protocols if and when these strangers/refugees or even members of your own group are thought to be contaminated?  What are your disinfectant and sterilization procedures, and when do they become necessary?  Do you have personal and group hygiene protocols?  Methods and resources for water purification? Do you have procedures and requirements for handling any livestock you may have such as chickens, goats, even cattle? 

The threat of rampant disease and pandemics, untreatable by any means we have now or the more minimal means we'll have in a total collapse scare the hell out of me as they should you.

CDC Article on the New Superbug

Emerging Superbug Requires Urgent Action, CDC Says.  An emerging superbug is infecting an increasing number of people in the United States, and health officials are calling for urgent action to stop its spread.

During the first six months of 2012, nearly 200 hospitals and long-term acute care facilities together treated at least one person who had been infected by the superbug, known as Carbapenem-Resistant Enterobacteriaceae, or CRE, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The bacteria is resistant to a class of antibiotics known as carbapenem, powerful drugs that are typically used as a last resort to treat resistant bacterial infections, thus the origin of the superbug's name.

CRE can cause pneumonia and blood and urinary tract infections. CRE infections are still rare, and so far, nearly all cases have been seen in people who've had long-term care in hospitals, nursing homes or other healthcare facilities. But once a person becomes ill, the disease can be lethal, killing up to half of people who develop serious infections, the CDC said.

"CRE are nightmare bacteria. Our strongest antibiotics don’t work and patients are left with potentially untreatable infections," said Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the CDC. Doctors, hospitals and public health officials must work together to implement strategies to stop CRE's spread, Frieden said.

Enterobacteriaceae are a family of bacteria that include E. coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae, and typically live in the digestive tract, but can cause infections if they spread outside the gut, the CDC said. Over time, some of these bacteria have developed resistance to carbapenems.

CRE were first identified in the U.S. in 2001, and have now spread to 42 states. The new report, which examined U.S. health care infections, found that the percentage of Enterobacteriaceae that are resistant to carbapenems has increased fourfold during the last decade.

In 2012, 4.6 percent of hospitals and 18 percent of long-term acute care facilities, reported having a patient with a CRE infection, the CDC report said.

Healthy people don't usually develop CRE infections. People most at risk for infection are those whose care requires devices such as a ventilator or catheter, and who require a long course of antibiotics, the CDC said.

Hospital workers who don't properly wash their hands can spread the bacteria between patients, and the bacteria themselves can spread resistance to other similar bacteria.

Unlike methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), CRE hasn't spread into the community, Frieden said.

"That's really a message of hope: we still have a window of opportunity to stop it" before it becomes as prevalent as other antibiotic-resistant organisms like MRSA, Frieden said.

In 2012, the CDC created guidelines for preventing CRE infections in hospitals and other care facilities. These include following proper hand hygiene recommendations (hand-washing); grouping patients together who have CRE; dedicating certain staff members and equipment to people who have CRE; knowing which patients in a hospital have CRE and alerting other health care facilities about the infection if the patient is transferred; and using antibiotics wisely.

Facilities that have implemented these measures have seen a drop in their CRE infection rates, Frieden said.

Patients can also play a role in prevention. For instance, if they have a catheter put in, they can ask how long it will be in place, and ask that it be removed as soon as possible, Frieden said.

Continued research into tests to detect CRE, and ways to treat it, is critical as well, Frieden said. The report will be published this week in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

Survival Bug Out Bag's Re-visited,...Again

A reader of UrbanSurvivalSkills.com wrote in with the following question: "I currently have a ROTHCO survival kit (tin), an excursion bag with a two person eblanket and a Remington rain poncho, and several feet of paracord. I also have the book "stay alive"by john mccann. What else could you suggest?"

The background on this question is that the individual has some medical issues and he said he may find himself homeless before the collapse.

I have been involved in working with agencies who help the homeless. What I found in doing this was that some or even many of these homeless people preferred 'living on the streets" as opposed to the responsibility of maintaining a job and a residence, and, conforming to dress and behavior standards. Some were influenced by mental-cognitive issues and others from alcohol-drug problems.  Having said that, I'm sure there are many homeless who desire a much better, more mainstream, lifestyle but can't for a number of reasons, among them the bureaucratic process involved in getting help is sometimes just over whelming,....unless you are a baby factory, cranking out babies for welfare dollars.

I will say this before I move on to the question at hand,.....if you are a veteran then please go to the nearest VA hospital or clinic and see what benefits are due you. Many times there will be a Veterans Advocacy desk there that can help you. Even sitting with other veterans can help point out what programs or benefits you are due.

In any event, if you choose to survive as a homeless person, being in that environment either as you choose to, or due to a situation outside your control, then preparation and planning are foremost in your arsenal. In short, Preparation in your equipment and your knowledge - without both you are essentially disarmed, and Planning where you are going to go,...how you are going to get there and your general scheme for survival are all vital.

I have a State Trooper friend who was called to investigate a homeless man begging at a Interstate off ramp at the out skirts of a fairly big city. When he rolled up he did not see anyone, but a flutter of tan color caught his eye. He was out on approach and discovered the homeless man in a makeshift tent (the tan color) about 200 yards from the interstate exit.

The way the Trooper explained it to me was that the homeless guy, in his late 40's or early 50's, was fully with his wits and cognitive function. He had a fire place with a makeshift grate using empty tin cans to heat water and cook out of. He had actually snared a rabbit, and while there is not much meat on a rabbit, he was sun drying the meat. There was a pile of stuff that the homeless survivor told the trooper that he fished out of dumpters including a pair of boots, clothing of all types, a bath towel, a bucket or two, newspapers and magazines that the homeless guy used to start fires and pad his sleeping area, and probably many others things that most would over look.

The homeless guy would get enough spare change from motorists that he never went hungry, buying canned and other goods from a nearby Dollar Store.

While sounding too much like the depressing movie "The Road" to me, you have to hand it to the homeless guy who is much better prepared than many of us to handle the stress and subsequent survival in a total collapse.

Anyway, to my fiend who wrote in, I would suggest several more things in your Bug Out Bag if you intend on, or plan on having to be homeless and surviving:

Folding knife and a fixed blade knife - be careful as a law enforcement encounter could get you arrested for a certain length.

Extra clothes. Heavy dury pants (jeans work well). Think about dressing in layers and for the temperature extremes you will be in.

Fishing items like mono-filament line and fish hooks. You can improvise poles and sinkers and even lures.

A roll of snare wire.

Another poncho, tarp or ground cloth.  Depending upon the climate, you may need a pretty good sleeping bag.

Make sure you have good boots and have several extra pair of socks.

At least a couple butane lighters and a striker fire starter.

Bullion cubes,....40 or 50 of them don't take up much room and come in handy for flavoring up soup stock. A can of salt would be a good idea too, from everything from flavoring food, providing this electrolyte, to curing meat.

Water carrying capacity,...many canteens, hydration badders, etc.

Saws. Maybe a hacksaw blade or two, but a wire saw or small cross cut saw.

Combo fencing pliers/hammer. One version is called a Plammer....useful for cutting and mending fence lines you have to cross, bending wire for your needs, driving stakes for a tent or lean to.

Multi-tool. Leatherman or Gerber type - always good to have.

Personally, I would have a firearm, but as a homeless man, again, you are a law enforcement magnet and it could end up being bad for you.

A bottle of Aspirin, some sterile bandage material, anti-septic cleaner and anti-biotic ointment. You'll need it and will be glad that you have it.

A hard bar of soap in a plastic container.

A bucket and lid to carry other items, also serves as a camp stool and can be used to carry water, like from a store spigot, for cooking, cleaning, washing and treating to drink.

Good luck and safe travels.   I hope providence finds you in the near future.   

Obama's Secret Army?

I received this e-mail from a reader:  "What do you know about the secret FEMA Youth Corps? I understand that they have just started building up and doing training but already have several hundred. It looks to me like Obama is creating the security force like he talked about 4 yesars ago. This is very disconcerting to me as this FEMA Corps is made of young, and therefore brainwashable youth. They also bought tons of ammunition. What is to keep Obama or the next dictator from using this FEMA Youth Corps as an army for martial law? Do these people have weapons?"

UrbanMan replies: I admit this caught me by surprise and I initially thought this was some internet legend until I started researching the FEMA Youth Corps which is easy to find information on. It is a legitmate government sponsored program to create a force of paid or volunteer young people capable of responding to national emergencies under the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

I did see some comments on websites which called this group "Hitler Youth", "Homeland Youth" and "Obama Youth". There are concerns from legitimate segments of society that FEMA would be the agency coordinating or managing any declared martial law under their national emergency authorities. And there is some discussions about hidden or secret Obama executive orders concerning a wide range of topics such as weapons, confiscation, food confiscation, martial law and planned martial law areas, travel restrictions, shutting down the internet, etc.

In regards to the FEMA Youth Corps, while I understand how some people see the advantage of hiring impressionable young people,..... the perception that they serve as Obama's army as well as the totality of suspicion about the current administration, .....I still do not see any nefarious activity going on here. Other people and I will be checking on this from time to time, but unless this FEMA Corps is being trained in quelling civil disturbances, security operations, firearms and martial/military type subjects, I do not see too much to get worried about.

The below is from the Department of Homeland Security site detailing this first class of 231 volunteers who graduated last fall. I could not find any reference to continung classes.........maybe the government couldn't find any more volunteers.

Welcome to the FEMA Corps Inaugural Class FEMA Deputy Administrator Rich Serino gives the keynote address at the Induction Ceremony for the inaugural class of FEMA Corps members. FEMA Corps members assist with disaster preparedness, response, and recovery activities, providing support in areas ranging from working directly with disaster survivors to supporting disaster recovering centers to sharing valuable disaster preparedness and mitigation information with the public.

Yesterday, we welcomed 231 energetic members into the first ever FEMA Corps class. The members just finished off their first month of training with our partners at the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) and are one step closer to working in the field on disaster response and recovery. They will now head to FEMA’s Center for Domestic Preparedness to spend the next two weeks training in their FEMA position-specific roles. Once they complete both the CNCS and FEMA training, these 231 dedicated FEMA Corps members will be qualified to work in one of a variety of disaster related roles, ranging from Community Relations to Disaster Recovery Center support.

FEMA Corps builds on the great work of AmeriCorps to establish a service cadre dedicated to disaster response and recover. To be sure, responding to disasters is nothing new for Americorps. In fact, the great work that AmeriCorps already does during disasters was the inspiration for FEMA Corps. When I visited communities all over the country that were devastated by disasters, from Joplin, MO to Bastrop, Texas, I always encountered the incredible members of AmeriCorps lending a helping hand to survivors. I was continually struck by the level of compassion, dedication, and skill these members brought to the table.

The inductees are pioneers, combining the exceptional record of citizen service at AmeriCorps’ National Civilian Community Corps with FEMA’s specialized mission of supporting survivors with their recovery after a disaster. The new members, who range in age from 18-24 years old, will contribute to a dedicated, trained, and reliable disaster workforce by working full-time for ten months on federal disaster response and recovery efforts. As we announced in March, FEMA Corps sets the foundation for a new generation of emergency managers; it promotes civic engagement and offers an educational and financial opportunity for young people; and is designed to strengthen the nation’s disaster response by supplementing FEMA’s existing Reservist workforce.

How the Collapse of the Dollar Could Occur

US Dollar Collapse? Here Are 9 Ways It Could Happen, by Chris Ferreira on Economic Reason.com, which defines nine ways the dollar collapse could occur. He is spot on concerning the slow, gradual decline until a major event triggers the collapse. Until then most people will be fooling themselves, thinking market correction, chances to buy cheap and sell high, until it becomes apparent that there are other things more important than their financial holdings,....and those things of course are the ability to feed yourself and your family,.....and the ability to protect the same.

We all know that the US dollar is losing value through inflation every year; in fact, the dollar has lost over 97% of its purchasing power over the last century. When “real money” (i.e. backed up with intrinsic value) was used, a cup of coffee in the 1920s costed about a few cents. In a fiat world, where money’s value is ambiguous, a cup of coffee can cost upward to a 100 trillion dollars, as was the case in Zimbabwe in recent times. Just how much more can the remaining 3% be debased from the US dollar, and how fast can it happen?

A slow, gradual decline can occur without any one person ever even noticing the effects– until, that is, a “black swan”event comes along and triggers the psychology of investors to quickly reverse their thinking, and here a collapse can literally happen overnight. A “black swan,” a term coined by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his bestselling book The Black Swan, is “an event, positive or negative, that is deemed improbable yet causes massive consequences.” In his book he describes the psychology biases that makes people individually and collectively blind to a rare event. He also notes that the more complex a system is, the more prone it is to failure as there is more room for glitches and errors. This analogy can be used to describe the complexity of the US global empire, complete with its massive debt and 900 military bases around the world. This article is taking a “black swan” approach to the US dollar.

Here are nine events that could trigger a black swan event that would result in a US dollar collapse. The reasons below are not in order of importance, and all them can prove to be negative for the US dollar.

1. The Fed Chooses to engage in currency wars by being the spender of last resort and printing money to oblivion. When people think of a collapse, they often think of a deflationary setting. But a collapse can also occur when the face value of the currency goes up–or skyrockets upwards, as did the currency in Zimbabwe, when everyone was suddenly eligible to be a “trillionaire.” (Webster needs to update their dictionary with this word). When the face value of a currency skyrockets, the purchasing power decreases, and these are usually the ingredients for hyperinflation and collapse.

It took the US 200 years to issue $3 trillion dollar in M3 money supply. Greenspan increased this to $10 trillion dollars in his eighteenth year as Fed chairman. How much has it increased under Ben Bernanke, in his seven years as chairman of the Fed? Your guess is as good as mine, actually, because the exact number is unknown: the Fed no longer reports this statistic as of 2006, exactly when Bernanke entered office. What a coincidence!

With QE 3 and QE 4, the Fed now prints a total of $85 billion a month, most of which is reportedly being held in reserves. Even with these rock bottom low interest rates, credit demand is weak. There is plainly too much uncertainty.

If the stock market were to crash again as it did in 2008, and the Fed were to consequently launch QE5, then QE6 and so on… This would hardly be, in reality, a “black swan” event since it is probable, but nevertheless, it could eventually lead to hyper-inflation and a total collapse of the dollar, where people would lose purchasing power of the dollar as in the case of Zimbabwe. This is more likely to occur if the US dollar also loses its reserve currency status.

2. The Fed’s printing press “jams” and ceases to stops printing money. As I’ve stated before, the Fed will most likely not stop printing money. During the December 2012. FOMC meeting, this belief was supported. The most important reason why the Fed needs to continue printing money is so that it can hold interest rates artificially low to stimulate the economy. Normally, higher interest rates would increase the value of the dollar, as this would cause people to deleverage from investments and increase the demand for dollars. However, the structural imbalances the economy has undertaken from a decade of artificial low interest rates would implode the economy from high interest rates now. Undoubtedly, if the Fed stops printing money, this will mostly cause higher interest rates. This will lead to increased bankruptcies, higher unemployment, more foreclosures, lower tax revenue for the US government, and increased interest on the national debt. In this situation it could lead to the bankruptcy of the US as they could default on their own debt.

Interest rates in the 80′s were increased signficantly to kill inflation, however the US debt was nowhere near what it is today (even in terms of % of GDP). At the present moment, the US is paying over $1 billion a day just in interest payments to service its debt. A slight increase in interest rates would significantly increase these payments and leave the US with even more debt than it already has, increasing their trillion dollar per year deficits. This is a scenario whereby the US could default just as Argentina did in the early 2000′s.

If they were to stop printing money, the Fed could trigger a dollar collapse, especially if foreigners decide to no longer lend the US any more money, and start dumping US debt from their foreign reserves.

3. Rise of “Gotham City” and the Vigilantes. We know that the US is currently the largest debtor nation in the history of the world, operating on yearly trillion dollar deficits. What if the US citizens were to “wake up” and collectively stop paying their taxes? What if they were to collectively choose to no longer support political decisions that serve to perpetually increase the debt? An increase in debt ruins the prospects for future generations, after all. Taxes are essentially the life-line of any government. A cut on this life-line is like cutting the main artery to the heart. Without a tax base, government can no longer pay its bills.

A significant internal revolution by citizens would entail a collective refusal against the paying of taxes and the continual raising of the debt ceiling. Perhaps these citizens might even become bond vigilantes and sell US bonds, especially if other countries became US bond vigilantes and sell their US bonds, as well. This would likely collapse the dollar, and send the US dollar into hyper-inflation.

4. China, the largest financier of the US debt, drops the debt bomb. The Chinese can drop the debt bomb on the US just by selling a fraction of their US treasury holdings. As of June 2012, the Chinese owned $1.16 trillion in US debt (US government treasury bonds). Japan owns $1.11 trillion and the OPEC nations, $261 billion. In the last few years, China has been lowering their purchases of US debt and replacing it with other assets. To circumvent this problem, the Fed of late has been stepping in to purchase treasury bonds to make up for the lost demand of the foreigners.

China’s power is the direct result of the symbiotic trade relationship with the US. The US buys goods from China in US dollars, and China ships them the products and uses the US dollar surpluses to buy US debt, among other assets.

It may not be in the interest of China to drop the debt bomb, but it definitely has the power to do it. If this is the case, there would be so much US debt on the market that other US debt holding countries could also throw their debt on the market as well as a result of panic and fear. Triggering an international run on US debt. The US Dollar will surely collapse in this scenario.

5. China, Japan, Russia, Iran, Germany, Brazil, Australia, Chile, UAE, India, and South Africa are bypassing the dollar and creating bi-lateral trade warfare.

What if now the Chinese, instead of dropping the debt bomb, create enough bi-lateral trade agreements to avoid the US dollar altogether with foreigners? In fact China, among other countries, has already done this by trading with the Chinese Yuan instead of the US dollar. If China, Japan, Russian, Iran, Germany, Brazil, Australia, Chile, USE, India, and South Africa would continue to do so, other larger countries may follow suit and before you know it, the majority of trade would be transacted in non-US dollars. At this point, the US dollar would no longer be needed, and its world reserve currency status would collapse along with its purchasing power.

What could also trigger a large decline in the US dollar would be if a relatively large oil-producing country (like Saudi Arabia) refuses to use the US dollar to sell its oil, choosing instead something more tangible (like gold). William R. Clark’s excellent book, Petrodollar Warfare, treats this issue precisely, going in depth into the Petrodollar collapse and how the US maintains its dollar supremacy with its current imperialistic foreign policy. If a major OPEC nation refuses to sell its oil in US dollars, this could result in a total loss of confidence in the US dollar, precipitating its collapse.

6. “Good-bye Dollar, Hello SDR!” The U.N. and IMF implement a New World Reserve Currency George Soros states in a recent video interview (see here) that the US needs a “New Financial World Order,” on the pretext that the current system is “broke” and creating huge trade imbalances. The Guardian stated the following:

“The International Monetary Fund warned that the colossal United States trade deficit was a noose around the neck of the economy, emphasizing that the once mighty dollar could collapse at any moment.”

Soros, a member of the Bretton Woods Committee–the same institution that created the IMF–is now promoting the Special Drawings Right (SDR) as a potential new world currency.

The progress for the SDR has been very slow and has not received much acceptance among other nations. However, note that the US currently controls the IMF by its voting powers (17% nominal interest, and a required of 85% majority for decisions). As more and more people lose confidence in the US dollar in general due to reckless monetary and fiscal policies, the IMF can instead back the SDR with gold to promote stability and confidence. That is certainly one realistic possibility considering that they reportedly own over 2,800 tons of gold. A shift in reserve currency from the US dollar to the SDR or other another currency would undoubtedly collapse the US dollar. It’s trade imbalance is sustained by it’s reserve status.

7. A “too-big-to-fail” corporation fails: A derivative shock-wave. The Financial Stability Board (FSB) released a list of 29 “too big to fail” corporations operating around the world. According to the FSB, these banks are considered to be “systemically important financial institutions” and a failure of any one of these corporations could result in “financial systemic failure.” Of the 29 corporations on the list, 17 are based in Europe, eight in the U.S., and four in Asia.

Bank of America

Bank of China

Bank of New York Mellon

Banque Populaire CdE

Barclays

BNP Paribas

Citigroup

Commerzbank

Credit Suisse

Deutsche Bank

Goldman Sachs

Group Crédit Agricole

HSBC

ING Bank

JPMorgan Chase

Lloyds Banking Group

Mitsubishi UFJ FG

Mizuho FG

Morgan Stanley

Nordea

Royal Bank of Scotland

Santander

Société Générale

State Street

Sumitomo Mitsui FG

UBS

Unicredit Group

Wells Fargo

A failure of any one of these banks, but especially one in the US, could create a bank run, further destroying the ability to provide credit and increasing the likelihood of a dollar collapse.

What is most likely to create a bank failure is a derivative failure. Actually, a current derivatives scandal is threatening to take down the world’s oldest bank:

“Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, the world’s oldest bank, was making loans when Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci were young men and before Columbus sailed to the New World. The bank survived the Italian War, which saw Siena’s surrender to Spain in 1555, the Napoleonic campaign, the Second World War and assorted bouts of plague and poverty.

But MPS may not survive the twin threats of a gruesomely expensive takeover gone bad and a derivatives scandal that may result in legal action against the bank’s former executives. After five centuries of independence, MPS may have to be nationalized as its losses soar and its value sinks.”

The precise, total amount of global derivatives in the market is not exactly known, but estimates range from 650 trillion to 1.5 quadrillion dollars. This amount dwarfs the world’s GDP at approximately $70 trillion. (Refer to this article to see what $16 trillion looks like.) It is no wonder why Warren Buffet calls derivatives the “financial weapons of mass destruction.”

According to the Controller of Currency and National Banks, here are the stats for the following banks as of September 2012:

JPMorgan Chase
Total Assets: $1.85 trillion dollars
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $71.07 trillion dollars

Citibank
Total Assets: $1.365 trillion dollars
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $55.51 trillion dollars

Bank Of America
Total Assets: $1.448 trillion dollars
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $43.79 trillion dollars

Goldman Sachs
Total Assets: $120.43 billion (not trillion)
Total Exposure To Derivatives: $41,23 trillion
Note that JP Morgan alone has more derivative exposure than the world’s GDP. A derivative collapse is definitely an event that could take down the whole financial system and collapse the US dollar. 8. A run on the gold and silver bullion exchanges. Andrew McGuire, a former Goldman Sachs trader, disclosed that the London bullion Market Association (LBMA) trades on a net basis each year of $5.4 trillion dollars, a little less than half the size of the US economy. The LBMA is the biggest gold commodity market in the world.

But how can the LBMA do this be when the gold market is such a tiny market? The world production of gold is about 2,500 metric tons of gold (88,184,905 oz) which at today’s price of $1,667 is approximately $147 billion in yearly production value.

The LBMA is the equivalent of a fractional reserve system in that it is leveraged 100 to 1. For every ounce of real gold that is sold, 100 ounces of paper gold is sold, meaning there are 100 claims on each and every ounce of gold. These numbers were verified by Jeffrey Christian, a gold expert and founder of CMP Group (a commodities research, consulting, investment banking, and asset management company). The leverage is absurd.

The LBMA can be compared with other exchanges. The world’s gold market is backed up by approximately 2.3% of real gold. If a mere 2.5% of people would start demanding their gold, the physical gold market would explode, subsequently crushing the dollar, as the value of the dollar is inversely proportional to the price of gold.

Hedge fund manager Kyle Bass pointed out that the New York Comex has only approximately 3% of the bullion on hand to cover future contracts positions. and this game will continue if people do not demand delivery of their gold. The emperor has no clothes!

9. A central bank gold rush and foreign gold repatriation from the Fed – Gold Audit Venezuela has actually just recently received their last shipment of gold bars from the US.

“This was the largest type of operation to transport this type of metal in the last fifteen years,” said Merentes. “The repatriation of our gold was an act of financial prudence and sovereignty.” (Bloomberg)

The Germans and the Dutch have also recently requested their gold to be repatriated from the US. However, unlike Venezuela, Germany was told to wait seven years to get their gold back. That sounds odd, right?

Now the Swiss, under their recently launched Swiss Initiative to Secure the Swiss National Bank’s Gold Reserves, are hinting that they might want to get their gold back on Swiss soil. The Swiss government has a long standing tradition of backing their currency with gold.

This gold repatriation is turning out to be much bigger than a political statement. It is a total non-compliant/non-confidence vote for the US and the US dollar.

Which country is next? Mexico? They have 96% of their gold stored in the US and London.

A central bank gold rush to repatriate a country’s gold from the US can cause a huge upward demand for gold, pushing the price of gold upward and crushing the US dollar. (Especially if the Fed doesn’t have their gold and has been leased out into the market).

We have just gone through nine black swan events–events, remember, that are highly improbable but yet, when they do happen, have massive consequences.

Chris Ferrerra promises a Part 2 of this article, which he will go through five other “black swan” events that could cause the US dollar to collapse.