http://www.urbansurvival.com/week.htm

Forget about them 'three blind mice' - it's not the mice who are being blinded - it's the sheep.  Some major footwork is going on which should roust even the most somnambulistic of sheep to at least semi-consciousness.  Like kids playing, who are trying to put the square pieces of the puzzle in round holes, or the star-shapes into the pentagon shapes, most working people just don't have the time to try fitting pieces this way and that.  They're too busy working - trying to either hold on to their jobs, or worse, trying to hold on to their homes.  And most of the press in LameStreamMedia doesn't have the brains or balls to ask follow-up questions when the answers get slippery...

I'd reckon one of the worrisome pieces I'm test-fitting at the moment is that Air Force Air Combat Bases will be standing down on Friday.  What's worrisome about this is that it comes at a time when we have a fresh warning from al Qaeda that the US will be hit again.  Somehow, the remarkable timing: standing down of the Air Force and the heightened increase of terrorism, just hasn't registered with most people as a non sequitur.  To me, it sounds just plain/plane dumb.

"OK, George, what would you suggest, then?" you're thinking. Gee, that is simple:  Units going through the intensive training over three days, or a week, so that there would continue to be 'overlapping coverage' of key areas would be the first thing that comes to my mind.  But a stand down of all US Air Force combat units globally?  WTF? Is there a warhead missing, or what?  The 'net speculation runs rampant about a coming fαℓѕє fℓαg...

The second part of the test-fitting has to do with the change of government in Russia.  As you know, Vlad Putin dismissed his old government yesterday, but it is the remark of outgoing Mikhail Fradkov (ex-prime minister now) that can be taken several ways.  He said the "resignation of the government was necessary because of 'approaching significant political events."  So what 'significant political events' is Fradkov referring to - events in Russia or events in the USA? How soon is 'approaching'?

The fact that Viktor Zubkov, the head of Russia's Federal Financial Monitoring Service is even more interesting, because as I pointed out in yesterday's report, a collapse of the US dollar (stick around a few weeks)  would put Russia and its currency in line of succession to become the world's reserve currency.

But the third, and most worrisome item, is that the in the commodity world, it seems that gold has been heating up in advance of pending events - not necessarily a 'good' things, but definitely a 'tradable' thing - so the NYMEX has just increased margin requirements by 25% for clearing and non-clearing members and from $2,700 to $3,375 for customers.  So if you see gold drop a bit today, I'd expect it to consist of margin heavy players lightening up a bit.

Why would margins be tightened when, as one headline this morning puts it, "Gold bull run set to continue" and the 'yellow dog' is up 11% in about a month?  Unless, of course, there's something else percolating in background...and worries that gold will climb fast and hard.