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EXTEND & PRETEND: A Matter of National Security, Submitted by Gordon T. Long of Tipping Points
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No, Lucky Guesst, the mental midgets are not in control of the system, they are simply following orders from the top of the pyramid. The USA was deliberately taken down so that creating a world government would be easier. Google the New World Order and keep reading...
is no difference in the mental midgets of the past and the present. As a proportion of population I'd bet is a constant. 80% midgets - 20% tall midgets.
What has changed is that now the midgets can get help from their government in taking from the taller midgets and they expect it today because the government has helped train them in the government education centers that everyone should expect to have everything they need and to envy then hate those who accumulate, save and work hard rather than to strive to be that person.
The difference is that the government now uses that envy and takes and accumulates power in an ever increasing flow by taking more, regulating more, chipping away at personal liberty more every day to satisfy the mob of short midgets - no offense meant to real small people.
When this country was founded it was the tall midgets that fought, that wrote the constitution that went to war without the small midgets who sat back and either sided with the English or did nothing at all. We will need to do the same but the enemy is now us and the small midgets now have something to fight for - their share of my pie.
Fuck them.
Yep. "Fuck them" is the sign I really want to make and carry in a Tea Party rally, but MSM would just use it against the TP to discredit them, so I can't.
lol the teaparty discredits themselves. Not even your corporate lacky puppetmasters have any respect for you idiots. Equivalent to the anti-abortion easy votes.
Aw go ahead! I haven't heard a good news story from the Ozarks in a long time!
You'd just get marked as subversive/fake by those folk.
Actually most of them would laugh, some would take offense to the language (they r elderly) but all would tell me I wasn't helping our cause and they would be right.
What has changed is that now the mental midgets are the ones admired and emulated. That's how you know that it's the end of the road.
What you people are missing is how entertaining Dancing with the Stars is! Who cares what is going on with the Fed or .gov! Ipads are sweet, I need to get two so when one breaks, I can seemlessly move my apps to the next. No Job, theres and app for that.
They should make an app for phones that connects the looters to welfare and food stamps so they can use their phone to pay for booze and drugs. They could seemlessly transfer it to the RFID chip implanted in their arm thats needed for transfer payments when they come out!
P.S. I have never seen dancing with the stars.
That's nothing. Now they have a dancing show just for fatties.
It's called "Dance Your Morbidly Obese, Diabetic Ass Off" I think.
I shit you not.
Good god... he wasn't kidding. It's called "Dance You Ass Off" - http://dyao.oxygen.com/
Another prime example of the collective madness that CogDis so articulately identifies. The members of the hive can sit and laugh at those who are outside the "norm." Hey honey, come and see these fat assholes! My god! My job sucks and my life sucks, but at least it doesn't suck as much as these fat fools...
Hollow masses? Don't you, for an instant, feel just a touch of elitism?
The rise of micro, the collapse of macro.
We wait, impatiently for the black swan that will devastate the twisted macro mindset.
More prepare or begin to prepare every day.
Each individual can. "We can" is BS.
. . . Break Glass
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), along with one Republican and Democratic senator, introduced a bill late last week that would allow the President to effectively disconnect the internet by emergency decree.
The Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act would allow the President to disconnect Internet networks and force private websites to comply with broad cybersecurity measures.
Future US presidents would have their Internet "kill switch" powers renewed indefinitely.
That this outrage is even being proposed shows that the government has no respect, at all, for the constitution. They lied when they swore to uphold it.
Not likely to happen. It would kill the economy. The internet is too important to business now.
If they want to live like North Koreans, then fine.
Just they should know - suppressing dissent leads to terrorism. When people can't express their frustration through the media, the psychos get loose. So, paradoxically, in the name of "security," they'll encourage chaos and violence from the most unstable sectors of the population.
Lieberman has always wanted to run his own counter-insurgency. Fuck him.
Agreed. But do not doubt these bumbling idiots could kill the econmy (look what they have done up untill now! NAFTA???); their idiocracy is fascinating.
more evidence that the next false flag is cyber. The very fact that it is vital to the economy only makes the motive more...security regulations, taxes, top down control... but it's still "capitalism"
+1, this is of a great likelihood.
Probably as close to 100% certainty as you can get these days.
I've been watching this one for over a year, beginning with this:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10320096-38.html
Rockefeller, Snowe, and Senator K. Hutchinson - their names come up frequently on bills related to globalist agenda, such as "weather modification" etc.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=2423
Excellant thread, Thanks Tyler..
Amongst all the other great, informative,
non-msm-reported threads, this is the sort of diamond that puts ZH at the top of the list..(And draws such a quality of diverse posters..)
The Global Chess Game goes on..
The USA was/is a great experiment..
Sure hope it survives human nature..
Mother Earth needs honest, responsible, thoughtful people everywhere to predominate..
Be safe all...
1. People have changed. They have been less interested in the things that really matter to them and have become more interested in American Idol and America's Next Top Model. Only recently has that tide begun to turn as people have begun to wake up and tune into the internet to get the truth (Thank you ZH) and the cracks in the façade are coming into focus.
2. From a cause/effect standpoint, doesn't the FRN play the biggest role in all of this? Having an unsound monetary unit that has been abused by the banks and politicians being the cause while the effect being the same cast of characters destructing everything in their wake trying to keep the FRN afloat?
Unfortunately most people would gladly give up all of their freedoms for security, housing and food.
America use to be the land of the "can do attitude" and we attracted people from all over the world with the same mentality.
If not here, where?
What's going on has nothing to do with money, or the banks..........
It's a Takeover of America, by fiat.New laws are passed weekly.
The leaks in the Gulf are being allowed to continue, for MASS effect.
Clean up, removal efforts are stopped, hampered...........
Why?...............well, it's should be obvious, it's called Cap & Tax.
Obama is ONCE more using a crisis, to pass Anti American legislation..........because you KNOW it's a MUST!!!
We have to do it NOW!!!.
A third of his address the other night was nothing but political posturing for taking over yet ONE more part of our freedoms, and a means to tax us to death.
The man does not have America's interest at heart period.............it's a bloodless Coup, without a shot fired................yet.
+1000
Dos, be careful, many here support "change (chains) we can believe in"
I don't think this is true. I don't see a great deal of support for Obama.
GW uses Huff Post and msnbc as sources for many of his articles, both of which are progressive mouthpieces (and yes I know that FOX is a republican mouthpiece).
over,
I have company..........in my beliefs.
http://www.europac.net/videoblog.asp?a=watch
Truth is like a sword.............and screw their chains.
If many here support these "Changes", they are not Americans......
Many brilliant remarks, guys.
Personally I thought that the "National Security" card was invoked back in March 2009. That's when it became brutally clear that if drastic command and control of world capital markets was not undertaken by the new Administration (and the international brotherhood of central bankers) then the world as we knew it would vaporize. The global financial construct created by disciples of the Chicago School of Economics starting in the 1970s was toast. So what we now call "extend and pretend" was actually a very dramatic and decisive action in response to imminent change.
The fact that "Market Forces" did not right the ship on their own was fully acknowledged by the Draconian reaction. And it serves as a full repudiation of the very dogma which created the construct in the first place.
I agree with those who have cynically noted that the current state of affairs is a denial response by America, a desire to evade confronting critical questions. That's the usual reaction of people who prefer "the devil you know". It's also a form of nostalgia and grieving for a world that people know has changed irrevocably. However reality sooner or later creeps in and exceeds the forces of denial, no matter how strong.
The forces pro and con "extend and pretend" are roughly in balance right now. As always, conservative forces are the default modality and are backed by those with the most power and the most to lose. But we here at ZH know that we've already crossed the threshold of inevitability. The economic model is just a corpse, propped up by the druids of the old system. When we no longer chose to believe in druids is when change will be ushered in.
Hear, hear!
Hopefully belief in the efficiency and rationality of the markets will finally die. Maybe the fat tail will finally be 'priced in'.
the Constitution is in cold storage..the supreme court has given up on private ownership of property..surfs never own the land only dukes and royalty do..learn to live in a Orwellian communist state-we are all criminals now.
The markets wer never allowed to 'right the ship on its own'. Banks should've failed. It would've been brutal to get through, but it would've been better than continuing this bizzaro-world where nothing is real...
The markets wer never allowed to 'right the ship on its own'. Banks should've failed. It would've been brutal to get through, but it would've been better than continuing this bizzaro-world where nothing is real...
It kills me how the very words "economic stimulus" belie the fact that economists and politicians are intentionally injecting the patient with a potent mix of financial chrystal meth and cocaine... I have nothing but scorn for the economists and other highly placed policy wonks who don't seem to get it through their PhD-thickened skull that economies, no matter at what scale you measure them, family, municipal, regional, state or global, are living things...it pisses me off that "big" people hesitate accepting this is not just a metaphor but a FACT. Maybe because it diminshes the role of humans in the whole affair and highlights how pretty much EVERYTHING that matters about our Universe is beyond our puny-minded control...
Anyways, give a living thing "stimulus" long enough and it won't be long that to maintain a given state of kinetic activity you'll have to up the dosage in ever-increasing proportions. It is not rocket science. The only way to mitigage the severity of the crash is to lay off the stimulus and allow the organism to run it's normal, healthy and much less volatile, bio-rhythms... but this can only be done before the scourge of addiction completely takes over.
Societies of all stripes abhor addiction and what it does to people, their families, and in some circumstances, entire communities.. and yet we just sit back and watch as our elected leaders inject trillions of dollars of high grade cocaine into the global economy's veins... mind you that was until the crash of 2007/08.. It might very well be the case that QE and the soon to be injected QE2 act more like (h)opiates in that they depress the organism into a zombie-like state that is nonetheless euphoric and desirable for it confuses the organism's pain receptors into signalling that all is not only well, but FANTASTIC when in reality the body is accelerating in its mental and physical decay. Most dangerous of all...it is opiates that lead to death when withdrawn cold turkey.
Houston.. We have a problem.
The incidence of fatal opiate withdrawal is very tiny.
Yes but many people in this country are going to feel like they have been "tied to the whipping post, Lord sometimes I feel like I'm dying"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHhKnc0XZrs
As I tell my Republican pals, when the science comes home to roost, ain't nothin' Rush Limbaugh can say to fix it. Here we are.
The chain of command from BP (BRITISH Petroleum) is from BP to the Rothschilds family, not to Obama. If there's an extinction event, good riddance to the Rothschilds. The good news is that BP elsewhere in the world will come under increased scrutiny, as will all other oil companies.
Gord is doing Gods work.
Jesus fucking christ!
The proportion of US citizens who are either socially enlightened or educated is roughly the same as it ever was.
Today is the goddamned "Golden Age".
Those of you who whine "Government has changed" just what fucking History have you been reading? Government has always been about RICH WHITE MALES! We need resources we seize land. Labor fights back call out the troops.
What is truly sickening about the majority of these posts are mostly of you just want to protect your vapid little lifestyles! You don't really give a shit about the next guy. Why the fuck do you think Gold is promoted to you? So you don't lose ANYTHING! So you don't SACRIFICE!
Wake the fuck up!
Y'all beat off to Ayn Rand the same way Liberals were once described as mastrubating to the Times picture of a Molatov cocktail.
You want real change do some fucking thing. Start a movement where you ABSOLUTELY refuse to vote or donate money to any major party until REAL investigations with REAL penalties start. You don't call those assholes, you hit them where it HURTS.
Get yourself elected on local levels as an independent. Go all Jesse Ventura. Spend your own money so you are not beholden to anyone.
Don't want to do that? Move to a cave and scrounge like the guy out west. Too radical, buy some land and homestead.
Cut as many ties as possible.
You want real change, change your fucking lifestyles. Give shit up.
You want real change STOP PLAYING THEIR GAME!
There is no middle ground where " We the people" can win. There never has been. People get co-opted and seduced by TPTB. They do that it is their game and they play it better than you.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure"
That does not say by the rust on your Beamer. It doesn't say by the e-mails to self serving politicos. It say clearly "WITH THE BLOOD"!
If you are unwilling to give up your ac, how the fuck you gonna sacrifice your life?
I admit there are a few who "get it". Who understand the sacrifice necessary and are committed. They ain't the majority.
Phil Ochs got it. He understood there were those who acted and those who paid lip service. These lyrics apply everyone not just Liberals. It should be Love me I'm a hypocrite.
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
Tears ran down my spine
I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
As though I'd lost a father of mine
But Malcolm X got what was coming
He got what he asked for this time
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I go to civil rights rallies
And I put down the old D.A.R.
I love Harry and Sidney and Sammy
I hope every colored boy becomes a star
But don't talk about revolution
That's going a little bit too far
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I cheered when Humphrey was chosen
My faith in the system restored
I'm glad the commies were thrown out
of the A.F.L. C.I.O. board
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
as long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
The people of old Mississippi
Should all hang their heads in shame
I can't understand how their minds work
What's the matter don't they watch Les Crain?
But if you ask me to bus my children
I hope the cops take down your name
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I read New republic and Nation
I've learned to take every view
You know, I've memorized Lerner and Golden
I feel like I'm almost a Jew
But when it comes to times like Korea
There's no one more red, white and blue
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I vote for the democratic party
They want the U.N. to be strong
I go to all the Pete Seeger concerts
He sure gets me singing those songs
I'll send all the money you ask for
But don't ask me to come on along
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to the socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
But I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Talk is fucking cheap, bitches, now put up or shut up!
Gettin' junked again Gully.
How about a great deal on a bank of servers and some domain names? I have a bunch of Indonesians that will set you up with your own turnkey site. then you can blog to infinity.
Baloney, "meet the new boss, same as the old boss". You are just proposing a different boss. It's all about morality. At the end of the day, society is made up of all of us, and in a representative democracy, government is a reflection of the society (we get the government the majority deserves).
Too many people are too focused on the "big" problems of society, but ignore the "little" problems in their life. There is much wisdom in the scripture verse. "Take the log out of your own eye, then you can see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbors eye."
It's not that the big poblems are not big problems, but we will never solve them as long as we ignore our problems as individuals
1. Lying/dishonesty
2. selfishness/narcissism
3. lack of compassion for our "neighbor"
and many more.
Sometimes the focus on the real issues of others/society is really all about ignoring our faults that we don't want to admit we have, or deal with the pain and embarrassment of dealing with.
Did you actually write this, or did you steal it from somebody?
Awesome post GF!! The amount of junks is a compliment, you hit a nerve. Bravo!
There are 100's of sites to look up song lyrics.
+.308
There is no doubt that common sense has been lost in this country.
As long as we accept 15% of our economy being producers all fundimental indicators will point downward.
We have been tricked into believing that we are intitled to high standards of living because we are special and we do not have to make things to be a strong nation. This is a false idea.
The things that made this nation strong are gone (mostly) save our defense industry and real production has been replaced with financial voodoo.
We have become a wild horse that needs broken in order to be useful. I look forward to the breaking of said "wild horse" and our sense of entitlement is replaced with values and ethics that made this country and its people the "beacon on the hill" once again.
Defense industry - ha. Just look at their last attempts to build major weapons systems - US 101 Presidential Helo, F-35, F-22, etc, etc. Over budget, under performing. They are a government cash cow. Yes there are smart people wthin them, but that system is broken, too.
Yes, the insights compiled,formulated and illustrated so neatly are talked about often. I would add one component that is foundational to all said above, and that is moral integrity. Since time began the human condition plays the biggest role on the stage of life. As we focus on finance in this forum, the principle of "just weights and measures" is paramount to investment, currency value, and commerce at every level- local, national, global. Notice defining words in the article and comments following-cheat, liar, steal, exploit, greed etc. these are moral terms but, oh how significant they become in transacting business.
While I agree with many of the points in this memo, particularly his discussion of political spectrum (I have seen the libertarian/republican/democrat/statist diamond before), I have one major problem with him and other gold bugs.
All of them point to inflation and monetary crises as the reason to buy gold/silver. The problem, of course, is that we may go through a massive DE-flation, which is destructive for all asset classes, except cash. Unless the dollar is completely eliminated as a currency, which would mean the dissolution of the country in my opinion, cash would be the ONLY place you would want your money in a deflationary environment. In a deflationary environment, gold gets killed, stocks get killed, bonds get killed. Everything gets crushed, except cash. Hell, if the Dow went to 1,000, like I've seen suggested recently, your cash investment would be looking pretty good. If you have 3 months of income in cash, and we faced a 90% deflation like we saw during the 30s and 40s, you would all of a sudden have a 2.5 year cushion, pretty amazing "return" on your money, frankly.
Then why did gold go from 20$ -> 35$ during the great depression?
Gold IS Money. Hence why it does so well in Deflation.
Hyper-Inflation (not inflation) -> Currency Collapse -> depression ~ deflation.
Actually, Ludic Fallacy,
Gold does very well in a deflationary environment. You may recall that the US Government in 1933 revalued gold upward by 44%, if memory serves me correctly. Cash may do well but the problem is what do you do when your bank holding the cash closes its doors. Also cash may be confiscated at any time via government decree. At the risk of sounding like a gold bug, gold is one of the very few portable, fungible, universally accepted assets that cannot be printed by a central bank.
I was proud that the USA was able to rise above its racial biased past to elect a non white person (who I did not vote for because I couldn't understand how his background qualified him for President--let alone a member of the Senate). However, it is clear that neither he, nor his band of advisors, have the executive experience to know how to 'manage' the executive branch of this country or even a single state in this country. They are not qualified to run the country.
Is it too early to think of impeachment for malfeasance in office?
Not sure. Perhaps we should set up a comission of Nobel Prize winners to get together and get back with us later.
Nostalgia sucks. In the old days a President would ride in an open car. That's just not smart...
Despite several decades of airline hijacking and a failed attempt to bomb WTC, nobody was watching on 9/11. Too much security is not the problem here. Too much regulation is not the problem on Wall Street either. Regulation doesn't even touch the shadowy derivative market. Our kids will trade those things like we trade stocks probably.
but the economic system is changing, and the death of corporate America is at the top of the list of big sea changes. Corporations are simply too big, too over extended, and they rely on selling universal products to a world which wants local solutions. The power grid loses half of everything you pour into it, including the drip drip of solar power. Local solutions, new varieties of fruits and vegetables grown in your neighborhood rather than flown in from half way around the world, which is a waste of energy.
the corporation is dying, and with it so is big government, which relies on the corporate supply chain. Walmart is the worlds premier retailer, is the catalyst for this deflationary collapse, as they keep cutting prices, and wages, until one day they will be giving away their products free. But eventually the flow of cheap products is over, as the people in China refuse to make them (see Foxcon). There is no cheap labor, the last great resource to plunder. Human population will probably peak this century, and then economies built on population growth and expansion will begin to implode, along with the corporate supply lines.
the tipping point is technology, that two edged sword, which creates problem, and then creates the solutions. when the solutions to the old problems are no longer forthcoming, people lose faith in technology. that is the end. when technology becomes deeply embedded in your psyche you no longer need to understand how it functions. God gave me this GPS. You begin to fall back into archaic and imaginative old ways of thinking. Genesis seems as likely as Darwin, because science is the invisible hand.
now a few people still understand technology, but they are like the blind men and the elephant, they only understand the little piece they have a hold of.
our world gets smaller, and perhaps it is a happier place, although we have less, less stress and anxiety, which is the handmaiden of nostalgia. does living in the global village mean i have to live in a grass hut? perhaps, but you will also have the GPS device to tell you where the lion is.
see you there.
Another thing that gets mentioned now and again but deserves more attention are the Institutions of Corporate Behavioural Indoctrination formerly known as Universtities... especially the Ivy League schools and the big coveted British schools. Economics as a displine has to be reconsidered... If they are so confident that they can model economic activity why don't they have cute girls standing in front of green screens projecting tomorrow's indices forecast complete with high and low money velocity graphics and predictive flow charts showing where cash is rushing into next and the economic storms that result when all the squiggly lines and charts collide with each other.. Thought so..it's way more complicated than the weather and we can barely predicat that beyond a few hours... The world needs more philosophical and historical deep thought than ever if we are to reorganize into something that is worth our children living for.
"NObama - Keep the change!"
So anyways, did anybody here pre-order the iPhone?
Here at Starbucks, Mr. TippingPoint just strolled past. Obese, maybe 35 going on 18, absolute bling from tilted-cap clad head to $250 designer sneakers toe, working his electronics in one hand, enormous 27g fat/720 cal. iced sumthin mocha in the other. Not a worry in the world.
Who is John Gault? You need to know the answer to this question.
I strongly encourage everyone to read Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged". Despite the fact that she allowed Alen Greenspan into her inner circle of thinkers (nobody's perfect) - this book is an excellent story that is effective in describing the basis for the problems in America today. I read this book every 5 years or so to remind me that I that am the problem - but it is the pretenders and freeloaders that have infiltrated the highest levels of our government and business community.-28
I'll second that bigtime. Doesn't mean you have to buy everything she ever said, but the book reads like a prophetic vision of our current conflagration. One of the few books that truly changed my life in a real and positive way.
The chapter on The Twentieth Century Motor Company is 100% pure gold. There are some readings of it on youtube if you can't grab a copy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCmJUobwKQk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEJrgsooLc0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFhlqQ1dUUM
Any debate about who's fault it is government vs the people and the dumbing down of the masses has to take into account who runs the school systems (government)?, Who is teaching the students (Union members who owe their living to government)? and what is being taught and more specifically what is not?
It is the failure to accept and acknowledge the Law of Identity, that A=A, that lies at the heart of 99.99% of our problems.
A thing cannot both be itself and "not itself" at the same time.
Every lie, euphemism, and corruption of language that runs rampant in our own country and the rest of the world is nothing more than an attempt to deny this basic law. It will not work.
It will be our undoing.
In additon "A is not non-A"
It's amazing how many arguments are about these two point's when you drill down to the bottom.
modern Philosophy is a dead-end, and leads to where we are going.
You obviously haven't heard of Kurt Godel, or solipsism.
I am VERY aware of Kurt Godel, and much of his work. I assume you are referring to "Godel's Theorem" that states roughly any finite system of logic can not be both complete and consistent.
But that doesn't mean that an intentionally inconsistent "logic" is a "good" thing, or useful, or even complete.
By the way you should also read J.S. Bell "Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics" published just before he died - fascinating book. It is clear most physicists and philosopher physicist wanabe's do not even begin to understand the difference between a locally causal system and a deterministic system. They therefore erroneously draw "conclusions about what "Quantum Mechanics Proves" about logic and determinism.
I apologize, I have a hair trigger around Randian cultists. Will read Bell, thanks for the tip. If you haven't already, I would suggest N.N.Taleb, 'Fooled by Randomness'.
No cultist here. ("Objectivists" annoy the hell out of me too.)
Just someone who believes a man can't both "lie" and "tell the truth" at the same time.
All the euphemisms in the world do not change reality.
You are living in a dream world teabaggers.
There is no BondZilla, it has never been about fiscal responsibility, it's about containing civil unrest.
Billz are taxes
Tyler, your site is being over run with retarded teabaggers, you need to do something about that.
You sir are an idiot. You wouldn't understand the difference between a retard and a re-tread.
Fortunately, this site is open to all, including the self-proclaimed idiots.
No really, self-flagellating teabaggers begging for austerity are retards. It's a policy that WILL FAIL.
Debt-to-the-moon "stimulus" will be successful though?
Just because austerity will result in much pain, doesn't mean the opposite isn't worse.
See like I said ths site is open to all self-proclaimed idiots
Alcoholic,
It's Tea Party, not Teabaggers.( I know you know the difference).
IF more Americans believed in, and stood up for what they believe, and practice....we likely would not be in the shithole we're headed for,(and no, I am not a member).
They at least have not given up the battle.
+$1263.50....I wonder how much of the tea party members FRN's are going into (physical) Au/Ag?
Disclaimer...I'm not a member of the Tea Party.
Thats right. Some people just like to complain about things, and even put down people who try and actually do something. Apathy and giving up is one of the reasons that why we are in this mess. The easy way out is to complain about even small differences in ideology as an excuse to do nothing.
Tyler, yes...Please do something about a person you classifies a whole group of like mined people as "retards"!
ANA, they came from GodLikeProductions.
Spoken like a real trader who sold out to the white man for a bottle of moonshine. Dress up in their clothes; live where they tell you; get on the government nipple; sucking away on the bottle, so drunk on the kool-aid you can't even sit up straight, let alone think for yourself. Is it that your shame talking or your ignorance?
Just ideology, ideology, ideology and so much blah blah blah...
The cheap ideologies consumed by American audiences make me sleep.
Even more amazing is the fact they don't realize that such ideologies are completely ignored by the rest of the world. Nobody takes seriously the American ideologies. In Europe, South America, Asia, everyone laughs of the American ideological swamp.
Yet they (Europe, SA, Asia) all followed the american example for 50+ years, all aspiring to emulate the american experience. They deride americans, yet love us. They mock our culture, yet buy every tee-shirt, baseball cap, and movie ticket.
Europe, SA, Asia are hypocrites and so are you.
The Great Depression was simplistically a two part problem. The economic part, and the brutal weather pattern that destroyed mid-Continent agriculture. Agriculture, which was the largest employee of the Nation, also was beat up with a fall off in prices to the extent that some crops were refused for shipment. Germany had other problems following WW1.
It may be that some differences between then and now is that then the Feds did not break the bank with two wars, huge bailouts, and trillions wasted. That was a period of unrest. The Communist Party gained in membership and popularity. Eisenhower and MacArthur led the US Army against WW1 veterans who were camped out in D.C. England banned guns because they were afraid of revolt. However, it was a time of Hurst/Clones controlling the news to the American people. A high school education was not held by 50% of the population. There was a population that was uneducated, under informed/misinformed and accustomed to hardship (overall excluding the roaring 20s etc).
Now the education level is improved and the news/communication system is the best humans have had. Unfortunately, power/wealth corrupts and absolute power/wealth corrupts absolutely.
So WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT? What is the start of change.
Does this mean that things are about to get much better in the long-run?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/18/opinion/18krugman.html?ref=opinion
If Paul Krugman is upset about economic policy, that must mean neo-Keynesianism is dying. Of course, A does not equal non-A, as one so astutely mentioned previously, but hey, it's a minor victory. I want to see Krugman and Friedman PISSED about economic policy. That means we will be on the right long-term track.
Sounds like the same old Krugman to me. To him, the problem is always that we're not spending enough.
HIS problem is that he doesn't understand debt. He believes that a recession is caused because consumers CHOOSE to save and not spend.
In the modern credit based economy, this isn't the case at all. People stop spending because their credit card bills get out of control. They have no choice but to stop spending.
Of course, in Krugman's world, these people could solve their problems by applying for more credit cards.
Hey, isn't Krugman a Nobel Laureate? I see a trend her. Krugman, Obama, Chu,...
What is the antithesis of a Nobel Laureate?
Has anyone heard anymore on the 401(k)/IRA annuitization front? The comment period on the Treasury's plan should have been up in May.
This article has a good intro, then sort of loses the plot (with plenty of incorrect assumptions), I think. Tyler, you should post Doug Casey's interview:
http://www.thedailybell.com/1128/Doug-Casey-Revisits-the-Greater-Depress...
I will sum up the entire problem with the world in 1 word IMO.......
BOUNDARIES
Very few understand where their own boundary ends and the other guys begins.
Sin..is the problem. Jesus has dealt with the sin problem for those who believe he is the Son of God.
Ultimately yes, because the sins do impose on others. I don't believe that a person has to believe in Jesus (although I do) or they are a burden on society. You could be polite, law abiding and a positive addition to the population and not be saved. Free will = personal choice.
Sin..is the problem. Jesus has dealt with the sin problem for those who believe he is the Son of God.
Get your psychadelics, listen, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHFK1yKfiGo while reading. Not sure what it means but it seems profound ..... like it did in the 60s. We'll recover but it may take 20 years.
"Reykjavik, Iceland; 4:00 UTC, June 16th 2010. The WikiLeaks advised proposal to build an international "new media haven" in Iceland, with the world's strongest press and whistleblower protection laws, and a "Nobel" prize for for Freedom of Expression, has unaminously passed the Icelandic Parliament" - http://cryptome.org/0001/wikileaks-haven.htmWe are living in very interesting times.
+1000
Plus, if you are interested in alternative media and have an S video cable hooked up to your T.V. check out
http://www.livestation.com/
They have a media player app that makes it just like you had a cable hook up with channel up and down and all that.
I usually watch Al-Jazeera and Russia today (max keiser is actually on there right now talking about central banks), 2 stations that are hard to find a live stream of but livestation has them. Opens your eyes to how little actual news gets reported in the U.S.
Psst! Hate to break it to you but if it's a "foreign" news outlet communicating in English, odds are HIGH it's a psychological operation run out of DoD. Sorry. "Your tax dollars at work."
+++ thanks for posting that update Horatio!
Thanks a lot, Alcoholic Native American. I will check it out.
I agree, RT is also one of my favourite info sources. The Keiser Report is essential viewing.
I have been using this site for years - www.cryptome.org - it is an information gold (bitches)-mine. If you are in the US, have a look at this - http://cryptome.org/isp-spy/online-spying.htm
It is not completely fair to blame the public for their "sound bite oriented attention span". The average person is no match for the propaganda machine that we call the mainstream media (I call them the corporate media). It starts with a pathetic education - and I do not blame the teachers who also received a pathetic education.
But we can try and educate people - encourage more people to read "Manufacturing Consent", learn how to recognize and discredit propaganda, cancel your cable/satellite subscription (after the initial withdrawal period is over you will not want to go back), and so on. People need to realize they are being severely f'd over and start doing something about it.
What a fantastic blog this is. Thank you--all of you--for keeping things interesting AND truthful.
Speaking of truth, as most of us here know, we are living in a corrupt plutocracy and have been for decades. It is not a democracy. It is not a republic. This fact slaps us across the face day in and day out until we either get sick with anger or become numb to the endless lies and propaganda and give up.
There are only three things feared by our ruling elites:
loss of their wealth
loss of their power
loss of their personal security
They will not be influenced by anything else at this point.
Since it is illegal to do anything to their personal security, we will have to focus on their wealth and power. It is imperative that people understand. Unless you can make them fear you, nothing is going to change for the better. It will only get worse.
Most of us have contributed to various blogs, complained to politicians, and wondered what we can do instead of just typing and trying to wake up the rest of society. Maybe it is time to see just how much we are willing to do. And it can all start at the keyboard.
I would like to welcome all of you. It's time to make them fear you.
MakeThemFearYou.com
I would never click on that website without fear that I was being put on the "homegrown terrorist" list. Sorry, I truly mean no disrespect.
I'm sorry for you.
You are very naive.
.
Lucky Guesst,
by posting here, you already are on a list. Anyone who disagrees with the mind control relentlessly hammered into us by the main stream media is a threat. The only real question is how will you deal with it?
do you think any thinking person is exempt? seriously?
think creative destruction as it intersects with deflation
and tell me who is the hero and who is the anti-hero and
who is to determine, in denial, which party is considered
a terrorist? i think we may have entered the realm of
counter terrorist vs. terrorist vs. double counter terrorrrrist,
as all life revolves, in some circles, around the notion, feeling,
emotion and anti intellectual reaction of the field and universe
termed terror. think donald rumsfeld and pnac, cheney, bush become
obama hussein...blah blah etc.....
more defense spending, no rationality, confusion and narrative fear
chaos forever as you become a slave ongoing.....
powerless, always powerless and insignificant. always.
no choice, no liberty, under god etc..... amen.
more weapons, less thought and perception, no time. go!
faster.
Gotta extend and pretend to live to pump the junk stocks another day! Until one day real soon when the markets wont matter a hill of beans, only thing on anyones mind will be surviving and avoiding the hordes of Zombie rioters. Prepare yourself.
Folks - there is never a good time for an addict to stop. Take a look at the Prez' statement in his latest direction to G20 (below)..."sustainable public finances are important" but not now, always some later day when we'll be glad to take the pain that we can't bear today and some more effective politician will be able to get the people behind some cold turkey program. Krugman, Keynesian's, all hypothetically correct but in practical world, fucking idiots. Keynes said save along the way for smoothing out the ups and downs. Good idea. We never saved along the way...we did the inverse and spent big in the good times and now want to double spending in the bad times. Keynes is likely laughing or crying in his grave at the absurdity of this being done in his name.
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The Group of 20 nations should work together to strengthen the economic recovery, but that recovery must be built on "balanced global demand," President Barack Obama wrote to leaders this week.
In a letter dated June 16 but released by the White House on Friday, Obama urged fellow G-20 leaders to restore what he called "sustainable public finances" in the medium term, as well as complete work on reforming the financial system.
But he also said that now is not the time for fiscal restraint in G-20 countries.
"We must be flexible in adjusting the pace of consolidation and learn from the consequential mistakes of the past when stimulus was too quickly withdrawn and resulted in renewed economic hardships and recession," Obama wrote.
AmeriCON'd! 20 USD a loaf bread; 100 USD gallon gas; and now china's monster dam goona make the world wobble as a drunkin man! Time to dust off the ancient book of fairy tales collecting dust in AmeriCON'd households gone stupid and goon gov debt willd!! Some things of biblical proportions taking place? Oil spill polluting 1/3 the oceans of the world just here-say??
Your an idiot, head on down to your local salvation Army, They still are giving bread and hot meals away for free. Food is not a problem in the US of A.
Are you confident that will remain the case, if, indeed, they can't get the oil spill under control?
It is magical thinking to dismiss this as a possible outcome.
"sustainable public finances are important" but not now, always some later day when we'll be glad to take the pain that we can't bear today and some more effective politician will be able to get the people behind some cold turkey program. Krugman, Keynesian's, all hypothetically correct but in practical world, fucking idiots. "
________
With economics being the dismal science, you can never prove a guy like Krugman wrong. He'll just say things would've been worse had you not done it his way.
This is some 1984 scary ass shhit. I can't imagine living in the United States of America where I am mandated by law:
1. To invest in federal or municipal bonds in a 401k or just generally. ( I really would love to see the representatives who sponsor that legislation).
2. Surrender any precious metals I may have in my possession, or create one-way money conversions from precious metals to worthless greenbacks.
But then again, once the oil runs out, none of this matter, period. It will be a Mad Max world, where a glass of water and a tank of gasoline is enough to get someone killed.
You remember that scene in Stone's JFK, - or Nixon - I don't remember which- the scene where some very powerful men, sit with Johnson on his Texas Ranch - and they basically tell him what he is going to do. It is obvious to anyone paying attention since 1960 - at least - that we do not have a Democracy here - there are very powerful players that dictate what the Government does. This is very obvious with Obama - something besides his own lack of experience has gotten to him.
ZH is filled with commenters that understand this- but we all seem to just suspend further inquiry. What is the next level? There are people that are controlling our government- who are they- and how many are there? Is it the ones we see - like Rubin and Cheney? How many are truly calling the shots? How hard would it be for someone to set up a website like Wikileaks- where people who know some of the pieces - actually Map out the structure - how hard would it be? Eric Prince at Xe - who does he answer to? Is it Americans in charge - is a consortium? We need to stop pretending that these Dark Players are never to be flushed out. It is a finite number of people - real people- not Jason Bournes - once we know who they are- can see them as actual people - we can take care of the problems they are causing. First, we need to see who they are.
+Everything!
It's way bigger than our political parties. Republican vs Democrats and Tea Party vs Unions is just a way to divide and conquor. There are players in every group. I think we are being petty and you just pinpointed the bigger picture.
How hard would it be for the "players" to set up a website like that to track the people who are trying to track them?
It is interesting to me. Some people look for individuals, others look to the structure of the existing system, not as it is written, but as it is practiced. Still others look to the culture or the mass psychology as the problem. It is all of these things and more because you cannot separate out individuals from their society, nor can you accomplish what we label as society without individuals. The fabric must be considered as an interwoven whole. An attack on certain individuals would help, but the structures and ways of thinking that enabled their choices, will produce more of them. And so it goes...
I believe many, over the years, have actually mapped it out, although the academics who have done so (exception: that Global Dominance Group fellow) have been somewhat circumspect about it.
Primarily it is the Financial-Intelligence Complex at the uppermost level, those who created the American intelligence establishment around World War II.
They use to simply bounce back and forth between Wall Street and the intelligence agency directorates, but with the privatization of the American intelligence community, that is no longer the case.
Booz Allen Hamilton, Raytheon, Mantech International, and most expressly SAIC (along with others) connect with the power base.
The top banks and private equity/hedge funds interlock with them.
You've got David Rockefeller and his disciple, Peter G. Peterson, who believe all "entitlements" (such as a pre-paid tax known as Social Security) should be privatized -- along with everything else.
Meanwhile, Peterson and his group pay little or no taxes, yet believe the rest of us should pay ALL the taxes, then they practise usury on us with our very own taxes.
Just look at the riff-raff at the Peterson Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the American Enterprise Institute, NABE, the American Securitization Forum, and so forth.
But the master list can be found on the membership list of the Bretton Woods Committee (brettonwoods.org).
It's all rather simple; all rather obvious.
great comment sgt_doom.
if your mind is open enough to read (and discard) the endless information the internet provides, and if you can connect-the-dots in ever widening circles, you'll soon move beyond sports-mentality cheerleading "left 'n' right" sides of "governance," and you'll begin to realise that elected leaders are merely bought and paid for actors, managed like "reality shows" to scripted pseudo-realities. . .
the REAL power, the REAL agenda, only unfolds incrementally as you acclimate your "reality" to a more inclusive truth. . .
those who direct the show are not bound by such out-dated notions as nationstate boundaries, nor laws, nor ethics. . .
si senior.
mack, I like the way you think
you're quoting an Oliver Stoned movie? oi vey.
what was that Didion said, "It was a land (California) where the literal translation of Genesis, slipped imperceptibly into the literal interpretation of Double Indemnity.."
This was a great guest commentary . . .
... and should be required reading for every High School student in their last year. Students don't have to agree with the author, of course; but they should, at the very least, understand the concepts conveyed.
Then the school should give an exam related to the concepts within this commentary; if the student doesn't comprehend the basics of the concepts, they shouldn't be allowed to graduate.
Yeah, I know . . . wishful thinking.
If my food stamps/welfare check are 90 days over due may I throw the gov goons in debtors prison??
Put this in a historic context.
Soviets were able to keep the game of extend & pretend going for about 30 out of 40 years of what is historically referred to as "communism". It was a one party system of cronyism. An oligarchy that was protected by massive doses of "patriot" propaganda without much of any opposition to the system itself. Less and less outside influence was allowed.
The Soviets fell when the challenger exposed the naked truth.
There is no challenger on the horizon that could expose the naked truth of the true state of the US financial system and the economy in general. Extend and pretend can go on for as long as the money supply doesn't run out and / or the Fed doesn't get independently audited.
Until then.. expect more of the same. Misinformation, propaganda, hegemony and imperialism.
The people in the Soviet Union started to figure this out eventually. I have every reason to believe that more and more Americans will be able to see the light as well. Give it 10, maybe 20 more years.
A Malthusian misconception turned into one more deliberate Malthusian lie_
The notion that there is not enough to go around
http://notsylvia.wordpress.com/about-malthusian-ideology-today/about-pea...
Then check out what Bucky Fuller said in his book Critical Path
Bucky called it "Law Cap" in Critical Path_ short for Lawyer Capitalism. Its an astounding book really.For example, He talks about how the picture of George Washington in Cambridge, in front of what appears to be the original Colonial flag of Stars and Stripes, is in fact the East India Company's company Flag! The US Revolution was financed by the East India Company as a Corporate venture!Here is the astounding snip from the book_the point is_corporatism has been around North America since the Native Americans were given the boot!
http://jcrows.blogspot.com/2010/06/its-almost-unfathomable-what-is-going...
what if there is no conspiracy? just interested in peoples' thoughts here
http://www.amazon.com/JFK-Unspeakable-Why-Died-Matters/dp/1570757550/ref...
Fix It Again - thanks - I read that book several months ago. Excellent book filled with many historic details. About trying to separate what is fact from crazy conspiracy nonsense: Generally, when you read a book that is filled with extremely detailed facts, that hang together as a consistent voice - and the sheer amount of DETAIL - makes it apparent that the author has a very good grasp on the subject; when you contrast that with a simple, improbable fact- pushed aggressively by a group of people - for example, building Seven collapsed into its own footprint due to a fire - well, then, you get a sense of what is true and what is a lie. The book you cited - JFK and the Unspeakable - was one such book. David Griffin's The New Pearl Harbor, was another. Gary Webb's Dark Alliance was another. It is unclear to me why people- after so many past documented examples of Government malfeasance - why they resist believing that this shit is still happening. Are they just too lazy to think about it? When it doesn't actually effect them - they can afford to not question the outcome - or dismiss the people that do. But, if you are Pat Tillmann, it really, really mattered what you were questioning.
And two other excellent books- chock full of details - amazing quality of details. 1 Ellsberg's Secrets http://www.amazon.com/Secrets-Memoir-Vietnam-Pentagon-Papers/dp/0670030309
and Naomi Klein's "The Shock Doctrine" She goes a bit overboard trying to make the connection to actual Shock Therapy - but, all in all, her thesis is correct, and the details are exquisite.
generally speaking, the purpose of the written word is
preservation and distribution of message. the msm has
a primary function in the "system". i believe that function
is to delineate the boundaries of acceptable opinion, subject
matter, context, prioritization, values etc. obviously they
have a target audience which is specific to the publication and
this has all been well understood for decades. i think the
important idea here is that the publications of "record", the esteemed
journals and dailies function as standard bearers for the integrated
symbolically based cognitive "map" (neuro world view). they are dream
makers and market makers and judge and jury of your contemporary
self and world view, failing.
their target audience is your boss. your employer. your supervisor or
your client base. your government official. they have power through
symbols and are losing it for reasons discussed in the blogs. many and one.
money is a symbol.
words are symbols.
a cymbal is a cymbal.
the real world awaits men and women. there is abundance and deficit.
balance is the future of the activity of man. understanding imbalance
and achieving balance through proper control of levers and valves,
impulses and inputs. retention and release.
national security is misnamed. it is systemic security that is
referred to. the problem, the system is a failure and is predicated
on total insecurity, as in debt can solve a debt problem. a fruitful lie
to enable the transfer of "value", "money", "wealth", "credit" to a segment
of the people to the detriment of the other, (non target audience of the msm)
people or, if you prefere, class war in broad daylight yet refered to as
national security. remember, morphed. love that word. morphed.
private debt "morphed" into public debt for national security reasons.
and that private debt was located all over the world! but is now public
and centrally located within national borders.
msm, target audience, morphed. national security morphed into fascism
and terror at home. hmm....
"they made us an offer we couldn't accept." r.
http://www.democracynow.org/