The Metamorphosis of Life

This last week has been very exciting and sad at the same time. Since the release of the song Patria y Vida on YouTube and all other music streaming services by a group of Cuban musicians it has lit a fire in the hearts of men and women around the world. It seems that after 62 years of people fleeing the Mafia style communist regime for freedom, the world is beginning to acknowledge the desperation of the people on the island.

The European Parliament invited the diaspora of the Cuban community to speak. Yotuel, one of the authors of the song spoke eloquently about how the Cuban people are just like a kidnapped and abused women. They want to get out but fear for their life and without outside help will have no ability at escape. Yotuel since has been contacted by US President Biden, who has been typically quite friendly with communist regimes earning him the nickname China Joe. It has yet been made public what his administration’s position is on Cuba, but most of the Cuban exiles fear continued appeasement of the existing regime as did former president Obama by legitimizing the existing dictatorship which continued the suffering of the people of the island who are starving to death. They are starving due to a complete lack of understanding of basic economic principles by the Cuban dictatorship which is the same issue which plagued the USSR. While everyone in positions of power live like Hollywood elites and eat like kings.

When I was growing up in the 1970s, I heard very little about Cuba. I knew that my mother and father with my baby older brother fled the island with expectations of returning. I knew my father had to leave because he had been printing and distributing anti-Communist pamphlets, and he was warned that he was set on a short list for execution, mafia style. I also knew that my grandfather was initially involved with supporting Castro to overthrow Batista. That was about the extent of it. But I knew both my parents yearned for their homeland. They in their hearts waited for the day they could return.

Many years went by and even with the stories of atrocities committed by the communist regime no international pressure was made to make them change. In fact, after the USSR collapsed Europe went out of its way to support the communist government in Cuba. The dictatorship used the US Embargo as an excuse of the cause of the countries economic crisis. Europe moved forward knowing well that this is not true. Luxury Hotels were built while most Cubans lived in poverty and could not even conceive of attaining to a stay at one. Meanwhile, very little profit from these enterprises made it into the hands of the people. This support kept the oppression of the people going longer. The Castro regime also exported doctors to foreign countries to receive the foreign capital while these doctors lived on slave wages.

Later came their great savior and fellow communist, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela to save the day. Just like the communists in Cuba, Chavez robbed his country driving it into destitution while making himself grandiose in the eyes of foreigners and those that relied on their wealth. It is well-known that the communist dictatorship in Cuba maintains personal foreign accounts. Of course the simple fact that Cristina Chavez is said to be worth 4 billion dollars is proof positive. I wonder, how did she earn that money?

When I turned fifty, I wanted to go to Cuba with my Dad. But he refused to go while the Castro’s were still in power. That was nine years ago and my dad sadly passed away three years ago. Since then, my life has changed, and I have been spending a lot of time with my mother. She has been sharing things I never knew about Cuba and my family’s life there.

Since, the recent fervor and raising of hopes due to the great success of the song Patria y Vida, she has been reflecting on the past. She shared with me that her Uncle was tried by a kangaroo court after the Castro’s came to power, and he was sentenced to 30 years in prison for lending someone his car. They had false witnesses accuse him. My mom had spoken to the judge and was told that they would get him out. Unfortunately, he was being brutally tortured and beaten in prison to the point that he asked his son for cyanide so that they would not have the pleasure of killing him. He took the poison but when his jailers found him dead they propped the corpse on a chair and shot at it then declared that he had been executed at gunpoint. Lies and deception never stop at the hands of evil persecutors. The story is told in a book no longer in print called Diario Traición 1959 (Betrayal Diary 1959).

The Cubans abroad have inadvertently been part of the reason the uprising has not yet happened. US dollars coming from outside the country has enabled the regime to steal money to maintain their facade. It has been reported that over $3.5 billion annually are sent from the USA to Cuba. But money needed to be sent one way or another to keep clothes on their families’ backs and food on the table.

Why am I writing about this today? It is because I am happy. I believe that there actually exists a chance now for this sequestered island nation to have freedom at last. I know that if freedom comes to these people, for some it will be difficult to adapt. For the many the ability to hope and work once again with their hands and minds freely and to earn their prosperity will bring great joy. There will be food in the grocery stores. There will be investment and growth. There will be good paying jobs and the diaspora which has been very successful will return to help.

Everyday now I say a Chaplet of Divine Mercy for the Cuban people, those on the island and those in exile. I pray for the good Lord to grant them liberty, peace and joy. I pray with all my heart that one day I can step foot on the land of my fathers and see the love that thrives in the hearts of all Cubans bursting with the joy of freedom.

Nuestra Señora de la Caridad del cobre ruega por nosotros.

I am 59 years old and never owned a weapon, other than a baseball bat, until the year 2020. For almost all of my life I have been happy and felt secure in the United States of America. I grew up here and could not ever imagine living anywhere else. This is the country of laws, respect for authority and peace. This is the country where you can safely travel from place to place and not even carry identification.

I recall, when I was younger and traveling the globe, people told me stories of violence and horrors that happened in their home countries. Places like Argentina, Colombia, and Cuba from the 1960s to the 1980s and I also met persons who survived the horrors of Stalinist Russia, Mao Zedong’s Chinese revolution and the holocaust of Nazi Germany. It saddened me to no end that men and women can be so cruel to each other. I thanked God that I lived in a country of peace and order.

Fast-forward to summer 2020. The media and certain States have their citizens sequestered in their homes. Half the people are in panic and others like me are not believing how our rights are being so easily stripped away from us. I was and continue to be shocked at how easily this became a norm.

The original story had been, the lockdowns were necessary to prevent the flooding of hospitals. This flood of patients never materialized. Both the makeshift hospital in Central Park and the floating Navy hospital were dismissed rather quickly. In less than three months, this threat was averted. But did we go back to living our lives free of fear? No, in fact, some states would not let family visit their family in Senior Citizens homes and many died alone and lonely. To top it off, things got worse. They would not allow religious services for the dead or any gatherings of more than ten people. These things were bad enough. This we as “free” people allowed happening.

I am not convinced until now of the numbers thrust upon us. This is because I know first hand from doctors and nurses that they were instructed to put death by Covid-19 when it was not often the case. How am I to trust the numbers? The Flu has been eradicated or were these occurrences just absorbed into the fearmongering Covid-19 pandemic? There is so much to distrust about the way this was handled and the propaganda that followed along with it. In the end, we will never know the truth. Massive money and political machinations are behind the vaccines that are following and that incidentally we are all being told is necessary. It has gotten to the point that those that do not wish to take the vaccine are ridiculed.

Then we have the twisting of one racial event into a major countrywide narrative. The death of George Floyd, at the hands of a cruel police officer, which was unnecessary and could have been prevented sparked riots. But then something more sinister began to occur, cities with Marxist strongholds such as Portland and Seattle had full-blown anarchy. Violence and destruction were heaped upon these cities under the guise of fighting so-called systemic racism. I have lived in this country my whole life. I am Latino and have had racist insults thrown at me from the ignorant few. I have had friends of color that also experienced racism. But neither they nor I believe in the claim that it is systemic. This is just a mere fabrication in reference to most of the country. But to actually believe that our police, which are all independent organizations, throughout the states is organized in being racist is a blatant lie manufactured to create division in this country.

It was then that I realized that our country is being attacked by nefarious forces from within. These nefarious forces hide themselves in the guise of political parties, but they do end up showing their true colors. They make outlandish claims about people and insult them to shut up so that they can claim power over the people. They use fear to control people, and then they push them to antagonize or insult their fellow citizens if they do not toe the line.

This is a Marxist communist tactic. They destroy by getting the masses to believe their lies and then having them toe the line. Doing this includes murdering millions of people for the good of their Marxist religion. This is the step to silence those that disagree. The next step is to take away your ability to defend yourself. Many people point to China, Russia and Nazi Germany to make the point that this is what comes next. But it happens with any governing power that wishes to become a dictatorship whether left or right.

This last statement brings me to a current ongoing horror which is the continued enslavement of the Cuban people since 1959. Fidel Castro did the same, disarming the people. What has that led to? Extreme poverty at the hands of a legitimized mafia supported by Marxists around the globe. A country frequently sighted for Human Rights offenses and yet, many countries still support this despotic system. The people cry out for change. They leave the island risking their lives for the liberty we have here and often die trying. But even with a majority of people against the dictatorship they cannot make change because those with control of the weapons have the power. If they rise they will be silenced. They live in fear.

Last night I watched Alex Otaola who fled persecution by the Castro regime in 2003. He is an entertainer turned educator. He is raising awareness of all the ignorant around the world of the cruel suffering of the Cuban people. In last night’s show, he broadcast a video of a family being attacked for standing up against the dictatorship. A crowd was at the family’s sad little home shouting all sorts of obscenities. Eggs were thrown at their home. Their windows were painted black while the children are in the home with their parents, terrified and crying. Where were the police? There is no protection for those that oppose the regime. Finally, as a finishing blow, the blood thirsty crowd killed their dog.

Why do you think a crowd can get away with that? It is elementary because they know that those people have no way to defend themselves. The government put the crowd of people up to that, no doubt by offering them a decent meal that week. This, the founding father’s knew, is the risk of a totalitarian government. They knew their present and foresaw our possible future.

A future with a people unable to protect themselves from evil against their family by persons or the government is one I do not want to live in. It is one I would not recognize. I will die for our constitutional right to bear arms if I have must. This is why at the age of 59 I bought my first firearm. If the right to bear arms is taken away from us our future will be bleak, and I don’t plan on being put away in a cage without a defense.

It has been a long time since I have written about the precious metals market on my personal blog. I don’t know that this will reach many involved in the recent silver market machinations but the few that still read my musing will at least receive an education.

Today, I was sent and article posted on ZeroHedge. These articles are typically anonymous and sometimes do have some good and valid points. But in this case, the author or authors have absolutely no understanding of the silver market and try to create a mountain out of a mole hill. This is an ongoing theme where the merchants of retail silver products armed with a minute understanding of the commodities markets and create a fictitious theme to promote more sales of their products.

The article today was quasi-fake news. What I mean is, they took legitimate news about changes to the legal documents of the SLV and the SIVR Exchange-traded Funds (ETF) and twisted what they said to have a totally opposed meaning to the actual purpose of those changes.

But before I proceed, for those who have not been following the news; the Reddit group Wallstreetbets famously known for putting the squeeze on the traders who shorted the GameStop stock and were quite successful, had decided that the silver market would be their next target. They believed that bankers and hedge funds were shorting the market and that this was holding down the silver price.

There is no doubt that there were some naked shorts in the market. Then when the Reddit crowd came into the market they shook them out on the rise to $30. However, they bought the metal mostly in the silver ETFs and also bought physical silver from the retailers wiping out physical silver stocks.

What does this mean? Silver stocks were wiped out? It means that physical silver in certain locations were no longer available and those that were available were demanding high premiums of as much as 50 cents an ounce. This is and was a short term a major aberration.

Silver is rather large and bulky. In large quantities it typically ships by boat and tractor trailers. Silver is produced all around the world, and it is principally a byproduct of Zinc, Gold and Copper mining. Then we have to mention that silver is also recovered from scrap recycling. One fact never mentioned by the silver promoters is that NONE of the producers of silver are in London or New York. These two are the primary markets for delivery to exchanges and vaults which are behind the ETFs and the COMEX.

Hence, lets do simple math. For example, a market may have a few million ounces of silver unsold in the hands of physical traders on any given day. Suddenly, there is a sharp increase in demand to ten million ounces in a short period of time. All gone! What does this mean? Is there no more silver? No, it means there is no more silver in New York or London for delivery to the investment market. This will mean that these funds and exchanges will need to get more metal into their vaults. Now they have to have it shipped from where they are produced which in this hemisphere is Canada, Mexico, Peru and Chile to name a few. They are also limited to only accepting silver branded and approved for delivery by the LBMA and the CME. Believe it or not there are brands that are not accepted by some exchanges. This is because the producers never felt the need to get the designation. Also, for the exchanges and funds there is only one size acceptable and those are a thousand ounce bars (this is approximate because these individual bars vary in weight). Hence, no other product on the shelf is acceptable.

On top of all that there is exploding interest from the retail market and manufactures of the small one ounce rounds, ten ounce bars and a hundred ounce bars are also competing for immediate delivery of metal and are willing to pay higher premiums. They need metal to make their products for resale. Hence it is a short-term battle to secure immediate deliverable metal in any form.

This occurrence was not something that the creators of the exchange-traded funds ever envisioned at their inception. They pictured an orderly market, which is the norm. Hence, after this occurrence they became aware that the language in the documentation did not work with the current market scenario. It became obvious they had to correct this language to buy them time to secure the metal in adverse market conditions.

This is what all the hubbub is about in the article Twilight Zone As ETF Provider Warns Buying Silver Will Harm Hedge Funds And Large Banks on ZeroHedge. They add, an additional twist, that the managers of these investments are more concerned with the banks and hedge funds than that of the investor’s interest. Again, what they conveniently fail to mention is that the ETFs are managed by banks and hedge funds, and it is in their vested interest to make sure that their investors are protected by managing the market conditions so that the business can progress in an orderly fashion.

They quote the following from the SIVR prospectus:

“As of the date of this prospectus, the Fund and other Silver ETPs are experiencing a sudden increase in demand of shares following an online campaign to harm hedge funds and large banks with substantial short exposures to silver.

The campaign encourages retail investors to purchase shares of Silver ETPs as well as physical silver in order to intentionally create a short squeeze. This activity could result in temporarily inflated prices of Shares and the difference between trading price and NAV per share may widen.“

The problem here is not the quote but the spin they give it. The authors intentionally picked these snips to infer collusion between the fund managers and the banks against the investors. They also imply that the managers do not want to see the price go up. This is the furthest from the truth, a higher price means more management fees. Explain to me why would they work against their own interests?

The quotes only state the truth of the cause of the market conditions and their just moves to correct and protect the interest of the owners of their product.

Finally, I am not taking a position on whether the price of silver will go up or down. The purpose of this post is to neutralize the false narrative being presented elsewhere. There are plenty of reasons to own silver but the false conspiracy theories being spread about are not one of them

It has been a blatant scandal going back many years when now President Joseph Biden turned his back on being obedient to the Catholic Faith. He has outwardly and openly rejected support for the Pro-life cause, and today he has gone full-blown evil and is rescinding all the achievements of the cause to defend innocent human life in the womb.

Worse than promoting abortion, he is also funding it with our tax dollars. He and his party insist that it is a right to kill babies even after they are born. What is behind all this? First, Joe Biden is not a practicing Catholic as all the media proclaim. He is a poser that uses this to garner votes. Just because he goes to mass does not make him a practicing Catholic. What you can say about him is that he is a hypocrite. It has worked for him and continues to work. The blood that is on his hands will cry out from the very earth. I pray that he will repent for the great evil he is participating in before he dies. If not, there is only one place where he and the likes of Nancy Pelosi will go, and it will not be a place of bliss.

But who is really to blame for the situation where our most visible “Catholic” citizen is an apostate? The blame lies at the feet of the Bishops. As bishops, their job is to lead the faithful and discipline them when they do not follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and cause scandal. They as a group have not done this and worse have come out and supported Joseph Biden who remains in open opposition to Catholic teaching.

The first time Joe Biden ran for Vice-President he met with the Bishop Cardinal McCarrick, who then gave him his seal of approval. Of course, those of us not paying close attention would not realize until later that these two men appear to be cut from the same cloth. This is not a compliment. Both these men have blood on their hands for supporting the Marxist communist regime and ignoring its blaring Human rights violations. The regime under McCarrick’s direction would sign an accord with the Vatican which undermine the Catholic Church in China while increasing religious persecution. All the while Vice President Biden is increasingly undermining the USA favoring China in his dealings under the Obama administration.

One interesting fact, the Chinese abort females over males with their two child policy. Where are the women protesting the rights of women to live? It is another blatant lie that the so-called defenders of abortion care about women. All they care about is making money.

The body of Christ here on earth is the Church which has been infected. Some would say that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is the principle part that is riddled with gangrene. This gangrene has spread throughout the faithful and is causing many to be led down the wrong path. A doctor would say it would have to be removed, or we will surely die. But can the gangrene be removed, and we survive as a church?

Then we must recall the teaching of Jesus Christ in the parable of the weeds among the wheat. The earth is the farm and there is a lot of good healthy wheat growing but sadly, there are many weeds. In the parable Jesus is telling us it is not our place to judge and discard the sinner. Let them be for when he comes he will separate the sinners from the righteous. Woe to those that are the weeds in this world for their punishment is certain. We can only correct them, move on and pray for their souls.

Of course, I write these things about the punishment for the sinner, but it means nothing to them because they are certainly not believers. If they were, they would have changed their course long ago.

The work of Satan is to make us lose hope and fill our minds with lies and darkness. You know the work of his demons by the (rotten) fruit of their labor. They know they belong to him. So do not fret, for we live for the future and a happy present in the presence of the Lord. Yes, the Church is sick, but our good God is watching, and he will make sure that His Church will return to Him in the proper course.

We must love, for this is an action word and the command of our Lord. By doing so, you will be filled with peace and joy among all the difficulties you face every day.

This podcast is now available on iTunes.

I hope you enjoy it.

Guillermo Perez

It has been several months since the announcement of the spread of the deadly virus Covid-19 became news. As it creeped over the borders and began making its presence know in the European continents it seemed the measures being taken in some countries had become Draconian and extremely exaggerated. I admit I thought the Italians dramatic; I thought this distancing us from people a cruel way of dealing with this issue.

Now the virus has made it to the shore of the United States of America. Living in the metropolitan area of New York City, I have become particularly effected. As an asthmatic and a person with borderline high blood pressure I am considered a high-risk candidate if I would contract the virus. I was asked to stay home until such time the risk is minimized. However, my understanding is that it will not be minimized and the measures we are putting ourselves through is only to slow the virus down so that hospitals can cope with what will be a tidal wave of illnesses. As of this moment, as the media and government paint of picture of death and gloom the numbers of death and illnesses globally, statistically speaking are not as severe.

I am now on my fourth day of quarantine from the office. The first two days were interesting getting situated. The third, I was totally overwhelmed as the markets continued their insane downward spiral and the fourth day, I am feeling isolated and trapped. But I am blessed at least for the time being.

I am blessed because our business is fairing well. I am blessed because I will still have a job coming out of the other side of this and because I will likely survive the virus.

I though, am very concerned about the collateral damage which I believe will be much greater than the actual virus. The global economy is being crushed. People are losing their small savings overnight and worse those with no savings are losing their jobs.

If I feel trapped and angry while having security, I cannot imagine the anxiety of those who are losing jobs and money. How will they feed their families if they cannot work? We have shut down restaurants, bars, movie theaters, concert halls and gyms. These are all industries that employ lower earning part of our economy. This quarantine cannot be sustained for a long period. Because we will be passing one form of suffering up for another which may in the end analysis be worse.

The world has become so averse to suffering that we go to any extreme for individualism. The concern for death of individuals over the concern of death of our society. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean to say that we should do nothing. I mean to say that this has got to be done with a balance. There must be controls in place to protect the system we have all worked so hard to build.

For instance, allowing the stock market to free fall since these state actions have come about is a serious misstep. Just as the government has shut down many businesses, the stock exchanges should have also been shut down. In the current scenario being played out by state governments, only the wealthy will come out the other end unscathed while the public working in the entertainment and service industries sectors will suffer greatly. This is not at all equitable.

It has not been a week and I want to go back to the office.  I want to walk the streets and I want to buy a lamb gyro from the street vendor. Now I know what it would be like to live under a totalitarian socialist government. Maybe a taste of this medicine, though harsh and perhaps necessary will also serve to remind people of the importance of liberty.