Saturday, April 25 — The Week in Review
Your money, explained like I'm family.
The Debase Brief
Saturday, April 25 — The Week in Review
Written by Unc LASTE · Your money, explained like I'm family
The war machine needs feeding again. This week showed us exactly how that works. While everyone argued about peace talks, oil tankers got seized, mines got laid, and the Strait of Hormuz stayed closed. Your gas prices are about to hurt more, but that's just the start.
Here's what actually happened: The government needs money for war. Always has. But they can't just raise your taxes — you'd notice that. So they print it. They've been printing it. And this week, while the missiles flew and the tankers burned, they printed more.
The inflation numbers came out looking tame. Official story says prices barely moved. Your grocery receipt says different. Your rent says different. But the government needs you to believe their story because if you knew what was really happening, you'd be furious.
They're stealing from your savings account without touching it. Every dollar they print makes yours worth less. It's a tax you never voted for.
The money supply grew again this week. It grows every week. Nobody sends you a memo. Nobody asks permission. They just create more dollars, and each one makes yours weaker. Meanwhile, they point at the Middle East and say "look over there."
But some people figured it out. Bitcoin had another solid week while everything else wobbled. The network doesn't care about peace talks. It doesn't need government funding. It just keeps producing blocks every ten minutes, same as always. Only 21 million will ever exist. No emergency war printing. No inflation adjustments. Just math.
The national debt added another chunk this week. Another week, another pile of IOUs your generation will pay. The boomers who run this show will be gone when the bill comes due. You won't.
Here's what most people missed: This isn't about oil prices or shipping lanes. It's about a government that needs infinite money for infinite wars, and the only way to get it is to devalue what you already have. Every crisis becomes an excuse to print. Every war becomes a reason to spend. And every dollar they create is a dollar stolen from your future purchasing power.
The pattern is older than you are. Crisis hits. Government needs money. Printer goes brrr. Your savings get weaker. Rinse and repeat. They've been running this play since before you were born, and they're getting better at hiding it.
But you're not your parents. You have options they didn't. You can see the game now. You can opt out of their shrinking currency. You can save in something they can't print.
Next week they'll find another crisis. Another reason to print. Another excuse to steal from your future. But now you know the play. Now you can protect yourself. The question is: will you?
Watch the Middle East negotiations this week — if the Strait stays closed much longer, everything that moves by truck gets more expensive. The Fed meets Tuesday, and they're stuck between fighting inflation from energy prices and keeping the economy from stalling out.
They can argue all they want about who's right and who's wrong. The money printer doesn't care. While they debate, your purchasing power gets smaller, the war machine gets bigger, and the system keeps doing what it was designed to do — transfer wealth from people who work to people who don't.
But you're reading this, which means you see it too. And seeing it is the first step to beating it.
Choose Your Lens
Same data. Your reality.
Retiree / Fixed Income
If you're living on a fixed income, you already know the official inflation numbers are lying to you. Your Social Security adjustment doesn't cover what groceries actually cost, your Medicare premiums keep climbing, and now the war spending means they'll print even more money that makes yours worth less.
But you've survived worse markets than this, you know how to stretch a dollar, you know which stores still honor senior discounts, and you know that real wealth isn't just what's in the bank. Share that knowledge with your kids before they learn it the hard way.
Small Business Owner
If you run a small business, you're watching your costs climb while your customers have less to spend. The same money printing that funds wars makes your inventory more expensive, your fuel costs unpredictable, and your customers more careful with every dollar.
But you see what's happening before the big corporations do, you can adjust faster, find local suppliers, and build real relationships that matter when money gets tight.
Real Estate
If you're in real estate, you already know what happens when they print money, property values go up, but so does everything else. Your deals might look bigger on paper while your actual purchasing power shrinks, and now with energy costs about to spike from this mess overseas, your operating expenses are heading up too.
The good news? You hold hard assets. While everyone else watches their savings melt, you own something they can't print more of.
Equities / Investor
You manage money for other people, and this week just handed you a gift wrapped in chaos. While everyone else panics about oil spikes and supply chains, you see the pattern, defense contractors, energy infrastructure, commodity plays that print money when governments print money to pay for wars.
The smart money isn't running from this mess. It's positioning for what always happens next.
Student / Young Professional
If you're grinding through unpaid internships while your student loans pile up, you're watching the game change in real-time. The money they're printing for missiles means your starting salary buys less than it did when you started college, and nobody's going to explain why your "competitive offer" feels like a joke.
Start tracking what things actually cost, not what they tell you inflation is. When you see the gap, you'll understand why your parents' advice about saving doesn't work anymore, and why you need a different playbook.
Beginner / I'm New Here
If you're just starting to pay attention to your money, you're noticing something's off, your paycheck doesn't stretch like it used to, and everyone's talking about wars you can't keep track of. What you're feeling is real: when governments need money for conflicts, they print it, and that printing makes everything you buy more expensive.
Expat / Global
If you're living abroad, you're watching your home currency lose value against whatever you're earning in. The war spending back home doesn't just fund conflicts, it devalues every dollar your family sends you, every pension payment that crosses borders, every investment you left behind.
But you see what others can't: how different countries handle their money, how some currencies hold while others fold. That perspective is gold, use it to protect what you've built.