This ought to begin pushing the dollar down faster.

Russia's currency was being abandoned, literally.  The market was having an inflation tantrum over there and the Russian central bank had to react or risk hyperinflation and complete economic collapse.  And so today they raised interest rates to 17%.  That shows significant resolve on the part of the Russians to protect their fiat currency, fake money though it may be.

My recent chart on UUP modeled that the dollar had peaked but that options remained open.  Still, the primary count was that the move down on Dec 8th was wave 1 down.  We really do need a gap down tomorrow in order to send the message across the herd that the dollar is way too strong for now.  After all, if Russia is paying 17% and the US is paying bupkis that is a powerful incentive to move money east.  And once it starts going then it exposes existing underlying dollar weakness.  Besides, the dollar is only strong right now because the US government is lying about how good things are with the economy.  The federal reserve is essentially monetizing its good name.  Once people figure that out, the US won't get the automatic economic respect that it used to.

The speed at which the Ruble began its unwind should scare anyone who knows anything about currencies $hitless.  The reason it can move so fast is that it literally has no discernible value.  The dollar can and will begin moving quickly too both up and down.  It's called volatility and it is going to wreck havoc on derivatives, most of which have some kind of USDX or interest rate term built into the calculations.  This volatility is totally unhealthy and it leads to escalations of efforts on the part of the participants to save themselves from collapse.  At some point everyone declares everyone else an evil currency manipulator, nobody wants to back down and the war begins because "they left us no other choice".  We have to be very careful here because that bastard warmonger con man Bush 2 left us with the so called Bush Doctrine which is basically:

• You are either with us or against us.
• We reserve the right to carry out preemptive strikes, including nuclear ones if we think we need to.

Russia doesn't go around making these kinds of bold kinds of statements but if she is pushed too hard or too far into a situation where the leadership has nothing left to lose, they will push the launch button.  In other words, we are not the only ones who can do a first strike.

All of these things are upon us because we let some fucking old moneymen take control of the money supply and turn it into a complete sham.  May they all rot in Hell for the damage that it will likely result in, even if we are lucky enough to avoid nuclear war.