Hello everybody and thank you for tuning in to the Weekly Report.

Is Putin the new coronavirus?

President Biden's maskless state of the union signifies the near end of the COVID

tyranny we have lived under for the past two years.

Fortunately for Congress, the president and the Federal Reserve, the Ukraine Russian conflict

is replacing COVID as a ready-made excuse for their failures and a justification for

expanding their power.

Even before politicians began declaring the end of the pandemic, polls showed that rising

prices were the people's top concern.

Particularly the increase in gas prices.

This Russia is one of the world's leading energy producers, sanctions imposed on Russia,

as well as Germany's decision made under pressure from the U.S. to shut down the Nord Stream

2 pipeline provide a convenient excuse for rising gas prices.

This is the case even though the U.S. citing the instability in the world energy markets

created by the Russian Ukraine conflict has yet to officially ban import of Russian oil.

The Federal Reserve has been planning several interest rate increases this year, even though

some fear that rate increases could decrease growth and increase unemployment.

The Russian crisis allows the Fed to either postpone rates increases or blame Russia for any

unemployment that accompanies the rate increases.

Either way, the Fed can use the crisis to deflect attention away from its responsibility

for our economic problem.

As for now, it appears the Fed will go through with at least modest rate increases this month,

...