#1139 – The Expat Files: Controversial Remarks, Economic Turmoil, and Global Perspectives

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came up to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you ex-pat wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started You know on last week's show when I spoke about how third world countries will always remain third world countries No matter how much they insist that someday they will be first world Well, I knew I was gonna get a lot of heat and feedback for that Because we mentioned the fact that third world countries dominate in low IQs on an average and the woke snowflake

[00:52] Cancel culture white-bashing crowd do not like to broach the subject of IQs They don't like the science behind it because it conflicts with their version of the truth like there can be different versions of the truth, huh? Even though we went through the example of how the US government has been doing IQ testing on the military personnel for over a hundred years And in that time they've tested over a hundred million people. I Suggest you listen to last week's show if you're not up on what we're talking about here You know, I thought I'd get dumped on for that But guess what surprise surprise I had lots of military and ex-military people writing to me saying things like this Let me just take an excerpt here Miss see who's obviously military writes this. She says Johnny. I want to correct you on the

[01:38] ASVAB test. It's an acronym. So we say it as VAB Everything else you said was spot-on. In fact, the lowest ASVAB scores are for army cooks and drivers those two cohorts are by far the dumbest people I've ever met in the army and Johnny the army uses a subset of the ASVAB test called the GT score Which means general technical score for reading writing arithmetic, etc And that's how the candidate gets their particular job the average GT score needed for intense jobs is 110 then she says of course the ASVAB test isn't perfect Because some people are just good at taking tests. But overall it is great because you know by those numbers

[02:27] Exactly where they are in the competency scale Anyway, Johnny loved the show signed Missy Anyway, I got quite a few positive emails on that order from military and ex-military saying yeah, Johnny you're right if you got an IQ of less than 81 you get washed out and Quite a few listeners asked me for the link to that worldwide IQ report for 2022 that the whole discussion was based on It's quite sad really and sometimes I wish I hadn't run across it And if you want to be a little bit sad to send me an email the expert files at gmail.com And I'll send you a link to that report Seems as if the whole world except the Asian countries are being dumbed down Though one thing I know for sure an IQ of 81 or less does qualify you for Congress seems to be a prerequisite

[03:19] Along with the ability to spend like a drunken sailor. Of course. I want to remember Bush jr He had never even made it into Congress. I guess an IQ of 50 or less It's just straight to the presidency and then there's Biden a guy who has proved to the world that to be president Your brain doesn't need to be connected to your mouth only your ass, but I digress as usual Speaking of getting the hell out of Dodge Were we speaking of getting the hell out of Dodge? Well, we are now we got this email from Horace. He says dear Johnny Most people now are absolutely certain Inflation is here to stay soon to get completely out of control thing is we might not be able to beat inflation But there are some ways to ameliorate it You see in the world of finance. There are three Undisputable laws the US dollar has no bottom

[04:06] Bitcoin has no top and the more beer you drink the more money you save Don't laugh if you drink enough beer you'll pass out and naturally you'll stop spending stop eating, too He says Johnny and these precarious inflationary times drinking beer is the only responsible thing to do It's a tough goal But it needs to be done wives and girlfriends need to support their men in this endeavor and make sure they create extra room in The fridge next to those TV dinners for an additional six pack at all times Everyone needs to do their part if we're gonna beat this thing But seriously, he says my grandfather used to tell me stories about how it was in the depression days of the 1930s He lived right near the famous Route 66 that went cross-country from the East Coast all the way to California It was the only way to go cross-country before the interstate system started with Eisenhower in the 1950s

[04:56] Which by the way might have been the very last government program that actually served the taxpayers in the short and the long run But before that my grandfather most every day He would sit on the porch and watch people hitchhiking with signs that said California or bust even old jalapies he said and rotted out pickup trucks with people in the back would have signs that said California or bust and Sometimes he said there'd even be a carload full of pretty girls 20-somethings that had signs that said Hollywood or bust guess they were the Marilyn Monroe or Kardashian wannabes of their day Then Horace says my grandpa told me everyone wanted to go to California because there were jobs out there While the rest of the country was falling apart plus they had a dustbowl going in the Midwest

[05:43] Yep, the word was out all over the country. There were jobs in California agricultural jobs jobs in the airplane factories It was growing like wildfire and even if you couldn't get a decent job out there The weather was so nice. You could pinch a tent and sleep on the beach In fact, there were little tent towns popping up all over called Hoovervilles as in Herbert Hoover Homeless people tent towns. Yeah, that's right. Where have we heard that before? then he says Johnny just a few years ago before the kovat thing and before all the street people start taking over San Francisco and LA stories like my grandfather told would have sounded outrageous That was way back when in the Great Depression that could never happen again. The United States is all grown-up sophisticated and techno-savvy hard to believe 90 years ago a vast wave of people were taking to the highways with signs that said

[06:34] California or bust Isn't it funny though the more things change the more they stay the same today people are flowing in the opposite direction It's more like for astute people. Anyway, get out of California or basically the whole USA or bust in Short get out of Dodge or bust think of it in the US the wealthy people are rich but only on paper They're in debt like everyone else supported by historically low interest rates interest rates that are creeping up and will strangle them shortly Yeah, most all rich people except the mega wealthy are in trouble They're the ones along with the banks that actually own the property and issue the loans that are going to suffer Which is why it's so important not to put any faith in what the lame-stream media is saying about the financial news The Federal Reserve has no choice

[07:20] But to keep the massive printing going keep the leveraged equity markets and leverage real estate markets going up and up and up forever Of course, we know they can't do that But that's the plan and there is a massive crash coming take it from me Johnny I've been in the brokerage business for 30 years. You could say I'm in the business of helping people lose their money I've had that thought in the back of my mind for a long long time. I live with it every day I don't care what you sell every salesman has a little bit of larceny in them in the brokerage line We're in the business of selling hope. Have you ever once considered where us brokerage people really make our money on Commissions, of course, we don't make our money in the market. Even though it seems we're wired into it We don't have a crystal ball. You might think we do but we're just selling a product We don't care that much about the market Sure

[08:05] We like it when it goes up because all our clients are happy but we make money whether it's going up or down We churn our clients. It's a nasty word, but that's how we make our money Though we'd never come right out and tell you that we're in our own little state of denial We don't much like clients who just buy and hold then we don't make anything But let me tell you Johnny if all of us brokers had to go to confession tomorrow Churning our clients would be our original sin that said the fact is a massive crash is coming Of course, there's always been doomsayers and people crying wolf saying the collapses is right around the corner, but it never comes Well, it is coming. We're on a cusp of it. It's the perfect storm of government commercial and personal Financial mismanagement and most of us brokers know it the ones that don't see it are in denial What do you talk about in private around the office water cooler? You might want to ask yourself

[08:55] What do you think we talk about for the public? We put on a happy face. All right, but deep down we're scared So what's the average guy to do? Well, the average guy is screwed. Mr. Average. There's no helping him What about the above average guy depends if they're tuned into the alternative media or not? Unfortunately, most aren't the only Americans that will weather this thing are the ones that have got no debt and own their own homes Still inflation will ramp way up and they'll take a big hit too We'll all get hurt, but who will get hurt the least it's not complicated Here's the simple answer Even if you own just one home a beach cabana or whatever in a foreign country as long as you own it out Right, it's better than ten homes that you might own in the USA because you never really own your home in the USA

[09:40] You're just a perpetual renter and your state government's your landlord. He's a deadbeat landlord at that He never does any repair but man, you better not miss a rent payment Think of it a $5,000 a year property tax bill is pretty normal throughout the United States. That's about $420 a month if for example, you rent a house in Mexico for that amount 420 bucks a month You're considered upper middle class and most likely you'll be living in a nice gated guarded community with a great view and upscale Neighbors with nicer cars than yours or you'll be living in a residential tower I'm not talking about Cancun or Tulumo. You'll pay double that I'm talking about way off the tourist trail Anyway, Johnny, as you know, if you have no debt on your own home have solar electricity solar hot water Rainwater catchment and grow your own food if you still live in the States

[10:29] you could sit back on your porch like my grandfather did during the Depression and Watch the parade of fools go by with their signs saying not California or bust but taxes or bust That's the trend these days as if Texas was the promised land as you probably know. We're seeing a lot of that already Texas is still part of the USA part of the problem. It may be the last man standing But it'll fall as for me. I made my plans. I've got a house in Mexico. I know I know Johnny You're not big on Mexico. Well, I didn't catch your show till about two years ago And by then I'd already planted a flag there Yes If I had done a little more research that have gone south of south of the border But I still consider myself one of the lucky ones to have been able to get the hell out of dodge Before the walls came tumbling down and I'm fine with weathering the storm in Mexico

[11:18] At least we'll never have food or food supply chain problems or fossil fuel shortages for that matter Oh and when Americans up in the States asked me about my property taxes I just look at them laugh and say what you pay for your property taxes in one year covers mine for ten So glad I did it Johnny though I do worry about my friends and relatives in the US, but you can't live their lives for them They're zombies dead men walking and they don't even know it. That's my rant Johnny for what it's worth 6-2 and even over and out signed Horace All right Horace congrats on your move and thanks for that Let's take another email. This comes from longtime listener Cameron. He says Johnny What are the people in Latin America thinking and talking about regards to the Russia Ukraine war thing?

[12:08] Is it on anyone's radar over there are the locals talking about it? If so, what are they saying? All right me Johnny here. There's more to that email and we'll get to that next but first let's answer that part Well Cameron seems like the only people that are interested or are talking about it are gringles and expats You'd think that since every Latino down here as well as people from the states are addicted to their cell phones They'd be reading the news feeds about Ukraine and Russia all the time and with great interest, but they're not paying attention They don't care. It might as well be taking place on the moon They just read the headline or barely read it and skip right over to Diktok You know who does give a damn though all the gringles and expats you talk to especially the ones that are bored and sedentary I have nothing to do but look at the idiot mainstream talking heads on CNN Fox News and the rest of them

[12:56] Which brings us back to the rest of Cameron's email. He says Johnny I read a recent report from a noted historian. Dr. Gideon Poya who's counted 70 different times the US has invaded other nations since 1776 That's about one invasion every three to four years for the US So why get upset with Russia when it invades Ukraine? That's the American way Sometimes we invade foreign nations in order to protect the existing regime Even if it's brutal or toxic as long as the tyrants in charge are playing ball with us Sometimes we invade to change the existing regime because it's not friendly to our business interests there It's that old tired 20th century building democracy rhetoric Taken all together He says the cost of meddling and other countries affairs is headed towards a trillion dollars a year or more than 10 grand per household per year

[13:46] It's simple arithmetic. You can do the math yourself. Hell Johnny cost money to run an empire The thing is though when you invade a country is supposed to be a paying proposition Look at the Romans the Spaniards the French the Brits. They all plundered and ended up richer That was the formula for a while anyway, but soon enough they all face the law of diminishing returns So the proposition that you invade you steal you enslave and you end up richer doesn't work So well in the 21st century these days when the US invades they turned a target into a bombed out money pit Dumping billions to support the local warlords propping up economies and donating billions to its own military surveillance industries The local hustlers and criminals get rich sometimes they get gifts of truckloads of money

[14:32] From none other than the US government. That's exactly what Obama did during his wars We often pay off for bribe insurgents to fight our wars for us while back at home Defense contractors like Raytheon general dynamics and the Boeing executives etc get filthy rich The lobbyists in Congress get rich to retire generals get to join defense contractor boards of directors and they get rich and congressional scum like Nancy Pelosi become filthy rich on defense contractor inside trading deals Sometimes I wonder Johnny if anyone really reads or understands history at all Take the history of empires. They all start and end up the same For example, the Roman Empire Little by little they made their gold coins smaller and smaller and started diluting them with base metals

[15:20] Then they switched to silver the silver Daenerys It was 95% silver when Augustus introduced it a century later It was only 85% silver and the silver kept disappearing a century later The coin was reduced to only 50% silver then by the year 268 AD There was hardly any silver at all in it only about 5% then a century later Rome was no more it fell Now you might say so what it took many centuries for Rome to fall But back then it took months to get a simple message to the farthest outposts they had in England You might remember that's why Hadrian built that famous wall in northern UK The barbarians at the gates and all that but now in the 21st century news travels around the world in less than a second

[16:09] Then Cameron says I wonder if one in a thousand Americans knows anything at all about that story Funny thing is of all the empires that ever existed that's exactly how they all debased their money They started with gold went to silver and eventually to the base metals copper nickel and brass And the US has exactly followed that same pattern They've gone from the gold to the silver to the base metals and now there's nowhere else to go Except to a central bank digital currency like China has Then it's game over not only for privacy but for personal liberty too All the best signed Cameron PS keep the great shows coming Just one request tell us a little bit more about that stem cell clinic in the DR I'd really like to go but I speak no Spanish Would Google translate work would that be enough?

[16:56] All right Cameron thanks for that I'll fill you in a little bit more in the DR thing in just a few minutes But I do want to add just a little bit to your Roman currency devaluation story Turns out as the Romans conquered more territory and they reached all the way up to England Like you said the coin of the realm was the silver Daenerys In fact it was the coin of the realm throughout the western world And of course all the Roman soldiers and legions had to be paid So the Roman treasury would send wagon loads of Daenerys coins up north to pay the troops And you might imagine horse drawn carts filled with that stuff on bad roads took months To get up through their final destinations and along the way astute paymasters found they could Snip little bits of silver off the edges of those coins That's why when you see pictures of old Roman coins, and even if you handle one personally

[17:44] They're slightly oblong and not exactly symmetrical when they were stamped They were by the time they got to the furthest outposts. They were clipped So Roman started putting edges or reads REEDS On the edges of their coins to discourage clipping clipped coins would be accepted but not at their full value Just check any of the US coins in your pocket the higher denomination ones have REEDS on them But only because of tradition They mean absolutely nothing because no one clips coins anymore because they're not worth their own weight in base metal if you melted them down In fact You should have been on higher alert that there's something really wrong with the US funny money system in 1982 when they took the copper out of pennies and they switched to copper plated zinc Didn't that seem a bit odd to you? I mean if you were alive back then Because starting then if you collected real copper pennies and took them to the scrap yard

[18:33] You get more than a penny for each one in its copper value But as usual no one paid attention Nor did anyone pay attention in 1964 when the shit really hit the fan when they took all the silver out of the coinage Because in 1964 if you took a dime quarter or half dollar to the scrap yard They'd give you more than its face value because the silver was worth more than the value of the coin stamped on it But that raised the alarm with almost no one except coin collectors Though that date 1964 really was the beginning of the end of the us funny money system though Most people who were in the know on such things would say it was 1971 when nixon took us off the gold standard And he closed the international gold window. By the way, did you know that nine dollars today purchases what one dollar did in 1964?

[19:22] In other words a person making ten thousand dollars a year in 1964 makes the equivalent of ninety thousand dollars a year today Now if you don't think there's something really fucked up about that Then you deserve to stay on the good ship usa. Otherwise known as the titanic Now here's something you'll never hear about in the news You might remember in a past show I mentioned that the russians including the ocranians Have never been able to travel visa free to any western country That is if they wanted to visit let's say the states or mexico or canada anywhere in europe They'd have to go down and apply To get a 30 or 90 day tourist visa to their destination country's particular consulate or embassy in their capital city

[20:08] For example, if you're from moscow and you want to visit england You'd have to go down to the uk consulate in moscow and apply for a visa And that means a lot of hoops to jump through plus interviews and bank statements personal and professional references and all that Just a ton of hoops to jump through That's why when you're traveling you almost never see russian or ukraine tourists. Have you ever run a tenny? Well, I never did until I visited the dominican republic Turns out it's the only western country that allows russians and ukrainians to fly in visa free for 30 days It's the same standard 30-day tourist visa us citizens automatically get when they arrive That's why when you go to the all-inclusive resource down there, you run into ukrainians and russians all the time

[20:53] In fact, the menus are in english spanish and russian. I've never seen that anywhere in the world Not to mention there's lots of dolph lungren clones running around. I know I know he's not russian But you know, he plays one on tv Now I have to remember the resort area in dominican republic is huge. They've got over 200 all-inclusive resorts and so from are like cities and themselves That means lots of direct flights from moscow st. Petersburg, etc In fact many times i've had discussions with russian and ukrainian couples at those resorts And they seem to get along with each other just fine But imagine this scenario There's all kinds of russians and ukrainians stuck in those resorts in the dominican republic right now That means there are hundreds if not thousands of russians and ukrainians hanging side by side

[21:38] Maybe even partying together while their countries are at war And since they are at war all those chartered flights to return home to russia or the ukraine have been halted. That means Lots of those russians and ukrainians are on extended vacations. I don't know who's paying for it But I know that the government of the d-area has lots more sympathy for the ukrainian stuck there than the russians How do I know that well because arrangements have been made to fly back three thousand ukrainians who've overstayed their 30-day tourist visas And no one mentioning any of that for those stranded russians Now this is strange since the war has been going over 30 days now Every single russian and ukrainian in the dr is overstayed his visa. He's there illegally not their fault, of course But you can imagine the problems even the chaos going on at those resorts right now

[22:26] Oh, and there's something related to that that's even crazier going on in the dr right now. And man, does this get interesting? Remember russians and ukrainians are allowed to come into the dr for 30 days of visa free They don't have to apply for a visa. They just can come and are granted one automatically Well, guess what right smack in the santo domingo dominican republic harbor. There's a 300 million dollar Spectacular yacht belonging to one of russia's richest oligarchs Now, of course, you've heard about how all the natal countries and all ukrainian friendly nations Have banned russian boats and yachts from entering or docking in their waters That means there are very few places for them to get refueled and resupply Add that to the fact that their bank accounts and credit lines have been blocked or frozen

[23:14] That means they can't pay for supplies or even pay off their crew members and that big 300 million dollar yacht sitting in Santo dominico harbor they've got at least a hundred permanent crew members By the way, i've got pictures of that thing. If you want to see it send me an email the expat files at gmail.com They're photos I took because right this minute i'm in the process of guiding two expat insider seminar attendees Through the paces of going to that stem cell clinic i've been talking about on the show lately And if you've been paying attention You'll know that my brother was the stem cell poster child case for going to this clinic And i'm happy to report that two months after getting his complete treatment He's telling me his two shoulders are greatly improved So much so that he used to have to take heavy painkillers every night before he went to bed because he just couldn't find a comfortable position

[24:04] The shoulders hurt so much He's reported in that they don't hurt and he no longer needs the painkillers to go to sleep That in itself is a huge improvement and he says his arthritis greatly improved too And as for that very bad knee to his that had been operated on many times He says it bothers him but not as much Before he got the stem cell treatments. I took a walk with him He had to sit down and give it a rest every two blocks Now he says he can walk continuously without resting though. It does still give him some problem though Not like it did before we'll see we'll keep on monitoring him It's only been two months and they say you generally start seeing results about three to six months after the treatment So then how much of that is the placebo effect? Who knows? Like I said, we'll keep monitoring him But so far it looks good and he's a happy camper. Oh and how I stumbled on this 300 million dollar russian yacht

[24:54] Well, that's because two seminar attendees are down here going through the stem cell treatment right now I'm happy to say all the bugs have been worked out for non-spanish speaking gringos and expats who want to come down to the clinic They've translated their intake forms to english There's an english speaking lady with a car that'll take you back and forth to your appointments every day from your hotel or resort And hold your hand through the whole process Just like I did for my brother and now others are coming down too like these two expat insider seminar attendees Of course, i'm not involved in this and i'm not gonna hold anyone else's hand through it either It's just that i'm the one who did the sleuthing and I discovered this place So I like the place a lot But I couldn't recommend it until they changed a few things to make it user friendly and smooth sailing For interested gringos and expats who don't speak spanish

[25:40] Oh and for those gringos who think they speak spanish, but in reality it sucks So anyway while I was down there visiting the clinic driving around I spot this gigantic yacht sticking out like a ufo Mothership in santo domingo harbor you could practically walk right up to it, too And you know, it may stick out like a sore thumb, but it is no sore thumb It's so elegant beautiful and it's got such great curves and lines almost like a cruise ship from the future That's been transported back in time If you want to see what this thing looks like send me an email the expat files at gmail.com You won't believe it. Oh, and of course the russian oligarch that owns that thing came in to all that money legally Yeah, right And now from the fake news service, you just love to hate ms nbc

[26:25] It says physical fitness is now called white supremacy according to msnbc A recent article warns that americans were trying to lose weight become more fit are being radicalized Because physical fitness has always been central to the far right It says number one the author claims that hitler was fixated on boxing and jujitsu therefore Modernist combat sports like mixed martial arts must be full of white supremacist extremists Therefore all forms of fitness including new pandemic induced online fitness trends are based in white supremacy There are it says online networks of fascist fitness chat groups recruiting people to white supremacist extremist ideologies lured by fitness health tips and strategies for positive physical changes

[27:15] Saying that new recruits are then later invited to close chat groups where far right content is shared So while you pass just aryan body wannabe fitness freaks out there How's your plan b coming? You've been listening to the expat files living in latin america If you need some help with your own plan b we can schedule a one-on-one phone or skype consult Just send me an email the expat files at gmail.com And if you want to get on the waiting list for my next week long expat insider seminar in central america Where you're guaranteed to get a two to five year head start on your plan b send me an email the expat files at gmail.com nos vemos