In the 1960s, economist Arthur Okum began calculated America's Misery Index by adding the unemployment and inflation rates for a sense of public pain or lack of it in good times.

In May, it hit a record high exceeding 25, surpassing the earlier June 1980 21.98 top, based on how both measures were then calculated, not today's methodology, manipulated to hide painful truths.

At issue is:

-- over 22% unemployment, including discouraged workers and the so-called "birth-death model" estimate of net non-reported jobs from new businesses minus losses from ones no longer operating; during hard times, painful truths are hidden by creating non-existent jobs out of whole cloth instead of subtracting them to reflect fewer, not additional new businesses;

-- double digit inflation, including soaring food, energy, healthcare, college tuition, and other costs omitted or understated in core figures;

-- rising poverty, more than one in seven affected according to way understated Census Bureau figures, using threshold measures developed 40 years earlier;

-- record numbers on food stamps;

-- record measures of food insecurity - Feeding America.org reporting one in six American facing hunger;

-- predicted record 2011 numbers of home foreclosures, estimated at 1.2 million after one million lost last year;

-- record homelessness numbers up to 3.5 million on any given night, needing refuge wherever they can find it or face life on city streets; and

-- other measures of worsening conditions during a Main Street depression, affecting Europe, Japan and elsewhere like America.

Economic recovery? Explain how to millions unemployed or underemployed, foreclosed homeowners, bankrupt business owners, impoverished legions, and many others food insecure at a time US and European leaders enforce austerity when massive social stimulus is needed.

Across Europe, large deficits and public debt crises are spreading, an Economist April 29 article highlighting "a moment....when events spiral out of control. As panic sets in, bond yields lurch sickeningly upwards and fear spreads to shares and currencies."

It happened in September 2008, a decade earlier when Russia defaulted, and similar past events. "When the unthinkable becomes the inevitable," contagion and panic follow like a tsunami sweeping away everything in its path.

Numerous European countries are deeply troubled, notably Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain, entrapped in debt, locked in a Eurozone straightjacket. Perhaps heading for default, they've inflicted painful austerity on working households, rallying them en masse in protest.

On May 30, financial expert and investor safety advocate Martin Weiss said:

"Never before have I seen so many threats to your safety and wealth converging in one time and place," citing:

-- deteriorating bank safety, evident from increasing failures and other systemic risk measures;

-- a deepening housing market depression with no end in sight;

-- a worsening European sovereign debt crisis; and

-- most worrisome, the contagion spreading to America.

According to Weiss:

"If you thought the debt crisis of 2008-2009 was a harrowing experience, wait till you see what's coming next." Last time, corporations were affected. Sovereign states are getting hammered now, including America.

On May 16, the Global Europe Anticipation Bulletin (GEAB) headlined, "Global systemic crisis: Confirmation of a Major Alert for the second half of 2011 - Explosive fusion of world geopolitical dislocation and the global economic financial crisis," saying:

As it predicted in February 2008, GEAB again believes conditions now suggest a later in the year "explosive fusion....(a worldwide) geopolitical dislocation on the one hand and (a) global economic and financial crisis on the other."

Combined they show major economic trauma coming, extinguishing economic recovery hopes, notably in debt entrapped America, "represent(ing) the end of an era (in which the) dollar was the currency of the United States and the rest of the world's problem."

Ahead, it's becoming "the main threat weighing on the rest of the world" and America. Summer 2011 "will confirm that the Federal Reserve has lost its bet: the US economy has, in fact, never left the 'Very Great Depression which it entered in 2008 despite" massive money creation.

As a result, interest rates will rise. Government deficits will explode. Economic decline will intensify. Equity valuations will decline. The dollar will behave erratically "before suddenly losing 30% of its value" as earlier predicted. Continue Reading>>>>

http://www.theundergroundinvestor.com/2011/06/js-kim-on-max-keiser-discu...

2011 2-Coin Set 5 oz Silver ATB Coins - Gettysburg & Glacier for $3.49 per oz. over spot

2011 5 oz Silver ATB Olympic National Park, WA for $3.49 per oz. over spot

Free shipping when you purchase:

-          At least 5 of the 2-Coin Gettysburg and Glacier sets

OR

-          At least 10 of the Olympic National Park coins

Customers only have to meet 1 of the free shipping requirements to get free shipping on the order.

U.S. shipments only

Sale ends Friday, June 10^th, at 8:00am CDT.

http://www.gotgoldreport.com/2011/06/when-big-sellers-of-silver-futures-...

BEIJING -- China should guard against risks from "excessive" holdings of U.S. assets as Washington could pursue a policy to weaken the dollar, a senior currency regulator said in comments published on a website that briefly pushed the dollar lower.

However, the comments by Guan Tao of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange were quickly removed from the website at his request. He told Reuters the comments had been made in private academic discussions and represented his personal view only.

"We must be alert of economic and political risks in excessive holdings of U.S. dollar assets," Guan, head of the international payment department at SAFE said in the article on the website of China Finance 40 Forum, a Beijing-based think-tank of Chinese economists, bankers and officials (www.cf40.org.cn).

2011 Silver American Eagles for $3.99 per oz. over spot

Also, receive FREE SHIPPING with a minimum order of 20 (U.S. shipments only)

http://www.kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2011/6/4_Ji...

Also at King World News today is the weekly precious metals review with Bill Haynes of CMI Gold & Silver and futures market analyst Dan Norcini. Norcini thinks gold looks very strong. The weekly review can be heard here:

http://www.kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2011/6/4_KW...

"It is the Fed's problem, rather than Greece's impending financial collapse, that should be closely monitored by gold bugs. This is not to belittle European difficulties and those of the European Central Bank. But in a strict monetary sense, the ECB is not so far down the monetary inflation route as the Fed -- yet. It is the Fed that has already expanded its money quantity explosively and is struggling to find further monetary fuel to lift the economy. It is the Fed that is locked on a course of accelerating monetary inflation, as those monetary base statistics show."

Macleod's commentary is titled "Catch 22 for the Fed" and you can find it at GoldMoney here:

http://www.goldmoney.com/gold-research/catch-22-for-the-fed.html?gmrefco...