Gold and Silver Blog

Investors in gold have reason to cheer as gold prices rise but there is a definite downside to increased prices. Impoverished populations that lack the basics of human comfort have no choice except to mine gold regardless of the environmental consequences.

Although large gold miners do not use mercury, small mines frequently use mercury in the separation and recovery of gold from ore extracts. Besides the danger of handling mercury and breathing the vapors, vast environmental damage is being done in the process of gold recovery, as documented by Bloomberg.

Lax supervision and outright support of informal mining by Brazilian authorities were behind a 46% jump in Yanomami land degradation last year in the form of deforestation and contamination of water and soil, according to a report released Monday.

Artisanal miners known as garimpo have wrecked 3,272 hectares (8,085 acres), with the size of the area doubling since 2018, according to the latest edition of “Yanomami Under Attack,” which is prepared by community groups with support by Brazilian conservation group Instituto Socioambiental. Their presence is also introducing more disease, weapons and alcohol.

The Yanomami are facing a second big gold rush since the 1980s, with an estimated 20,000 illegal miners inside an area of forest that straddles Brazil and Venezuela. The growing threat to remote Amazon communities comes as the administration of President Jair Bolsonaro plans to allow mining on indigenous lands in a bill that’s even opposed by large mining companies. As lawmakers prepare to vote, about 7,000 indigenous people are camped out in the nation’s capital in protest.

This situation seems to be beyond the control of local governments and like many other world problems are insurmountable.

Here we go again. President Biden’s penchant for making erroneous, creepy, and discombobulated off the cuff remarks seems to have eliminated any chance of a negotiated cease fire in Ukraine.  Biden, speaking publicly in Poland, stated that President Putin must be ousted from office.  This position slams the door on a diplomatic approach with a country that has been historically paranoid about Western bad intentions towards Russia.

Although the White Houe press staff quickly tried to walk back the bumbling Biden’s remarks, it remains highly doubtful that President Putin will dismiss the remark as a slip of an addled brain.  As noted in Business Insider, the ill-considered remark only seems to reinforce the view of many that top Washington officials want the war to continue to for political purposes.

Richard Haass, a veteran diplomat and president of the Council on Foreign Relations, told the Post that Biden’s remarks don’t achieve the priorities of “ending the war on terms Ukraine can accept, and discouraging any escalation by Putin.”

“It discourages Putin from any compromise essentially — if you’ve got everything to lose, it frees him up. Why should he show any restraint?” Haass added. “And it confirms his worst fears, which is that this is what the United States seeks his ouster and systemic change.”

Haass said that while the White House immediately walked back those comments, the fact that Biden’s comments were off the cuff “could be read as Biden’s genuine belief as opposed to his scripted words.”

Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told the Post the remarks make him concerned that top officials in Biden’s administration may not be thinking about ways to end the war.

“If they were, Biden’s head wouldn’t be in a place where he’s saying, ‘Putin must go.’

The situation in Ukraine becomes even more dangerous when considering previous unhinged remarks by Biden calling President Putin a “war criminal” and a “butcher”.  Name calling – seriously? We need diplomacy and negotiation – not remarks that only further inflame what is now only a local conflict.  Considering the increasingly aggressive rhetoric it is not now unreasonable to fear that Biden will sleepwalk us into a nuclear Armageddon that puts mankind back into the stone age.

Biden’s mental status has been questioned many times by many people.  The problem has become so alarming that the Wall Street Journal actually said The President Should Avoid Public Speaking on important matters.

Some issues are just too important to be left to an unscripted Joe Biden…But these are dangerous times and we would all be much safer if Mr. Biden would make greater use of prepared statements on subjects such as, for example, weapons of mass destruction.

Yes, it’s important for all of us to be able to hear from our elected officials and to assess the content of their remarks as well as the skill and conviction with which they advocate for their policies. But this particular elected official does not appear to be up to the task. While we consider the implications, Mr. Biden should try to say as little as possible in public during an international crisis.

The bubbling crisis in Eastern Europe is just one more reason to increase gold and silver holdings. If you don’t own precious metals, buy them now.  If you own them, buy more.