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After the rather tumultuous events of the past 48 hours, it is time to take a moderate to quite moderate break. Please use this space to hyperventilate, or else breathe normally, at your leisure.
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Use this: (two different servers)
http://188.126.66.66/
http://188.126.66.68/
Here's hoping the Eurozone breaks up in 2011 and we can have some financial sanity in Europe again.
In the UK we hope that it will result in our politico's winning back our Sovereignty.
(Ben Stein Voice) Farage, Farage, Farage (looks at MEP desk) Farage, Farage, Farage..
As was proposed on another thread (lost in the re-boot) is there a method (for those who wish) to keep in touch if Uncle Sugar pulls the plug? The chat spot has some chick sitting in a snow cave smoking. Is that a casualty of the recent hijinks? The "hammers" were using some sort of cryptic messaging system (morse?) on another thread which could be a viable option, but is easy to locate. Anyone have any insight with these:
http://shop.sprint.com/en/services/walkietalkie/international.shtml
I didn't really want to talk to any of you guys anyway...
May we all have a long weekend. Thanks too for being here, ZH.
Folks, help me out here. My wife, sister, brother in law and friends think I'm freaking nuts because I tell them the current monetary system is collapsing. Disclaimer, I own physic G&S and miners. (not much but enough). My portfolio has never been better and yes wifey agrees said portfolio looks great but they all still tell me to "get a life". How do I get through to them?
IMHO stop trying to convince them. You will not. My wife says that after I am dead that the kids will just have to throw away all the extra supplies and food I am stockpiling. I reply that I hope and pray she is right.
I hear ya... my thanksgiving went something like this...
"Um, see, u don't, I mean, can't you see... ah fuck it pass the potatoes."
I can relate. I note the lack of invitation to the family Christmas party this year.
LOL. I know! I realized one day I was playing the role of the guy on the corner with a "world is ending, save yourself" sign at work (at home they believe me thank God). I finally learned to shut up. What can you do? Every now and then another person joins the ranks, but most people would rather live for today, not worry, just be happy. Sometimes I wish I didn't know what I know. Ignorance really is bliss. At least until the day you can't buy food with your worthless dollars.....
Yup. But was heartened a coupla weeks ago when a colleague quietly came up to me when no one else was around and asked me to teach them how to buy silver and gold. I don't talk about it much anymore, don't care much what other people think about me anyway. Just trying to lay low, attract little attention and wait for the coming storm to pass.
I figure, if ya haven't figured it out yet, and yer not willing to learn, ya will be future dog food for my hounds anyway. : )
First they laugh at you
then they discredit you
then they fight you
then..... they LOSE
Truth cannot be stopped.
I'm sorry your family is going to be in deep shit because they are so willfully ignorant. I commend you for having the courage to try to get through to them. I can't stand trying to convince small minded people anymore.
Folks, help me out here. My wife, sister, brother in law and friends think I'm freaking nuts because I tell them the current monetary system is collapsing. Disclaimer, I own physic G&S and miners. (not much but enough). My portfolio has never been better and yes wifey agrees said portfolio looks great but they all still tell me to "get a life". How do I get through to them?
Ask them if they predicted ANY of the following --- or if, instead, they would have mocked predictions of the following:
The collapse of the Soviet Union
The reunification of the two Germanies, even one year before it happened
The Asian currency crisis of the late 1990s
The collapse of the Nasdaq bubble in 2000
The September 11, 2001 attacks
The real estate/housing bubble of the middle 2000s
The collapse of the real estate/housing bubble of the middle 2000s
The financial crisis of September/October 2008
The five-fold+ increase in the price of gold since 2001
Then ask them if anyone who was warning others of these events before they happened (and there were plenty of astute analysts making such warnings) should have "gotten a life" instead.
So true! Fuck it, I'm going to remind everyone of these events at dinner on X-Mas. I guarantee you my wife won't talk to me for a freaking month. So true and too funny
akak, you may have been the one to point him out earlier, but if not, check up on Anatoliy Golitsyn. He will be my holiday reading this year. 19 friggin' 68. Un-fucking-believable. Of course no one even bothered to read through his analysis, he was immediately and thoroughly discredited by all who were supposed to take a professional interest. Finally went public with it in 1984. Still taken for a fool then, I suppose. Until about five years later... I think we all need to know more about WHAT ELSE he proposed/forecast.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoliy_Golitsyn
I'd read about that before. There was a TV interview from back in the early 80's that talked about infiltration and crippling the government from within.
As far as the book by Golitsyn, it can be found here at Google docs:
http://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www.archive.org/download/Golits...
Thanks! Here is a fascinating (if a little sycophantic) documentary on the history of Wikileaks posted on Max Keiser's site (posted further down the thread by merehuman):
http://maxkeiser.com/2010/12/17/new-wikileaks-documentary/
And for some music, a Thievery Corp. playlist from another ZH reader:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1s1BkjLj84&feature=BF&list=MLGxdCwVVULXfoAsMyhw...
That's interesting, thanks!
I did some scrounging and found Golitsyn's follow up, The Perestroika Deception : Memoranda to the Central Intelligence Agency.
http://curezone.com/upload/Members/ChazTheMeatHe/Books/Golitsyn_The_Pere...
I've gotten pretty good at scrounging up PDFs of some works online. I like reading and well, I'm cheap. :-)
I wish I still had access to the archive my father once told me about/showed me -- ex-Soviet (and then increasingly pan-national) students, researchers, hackers, etc. back in the late 80's/early 90's already started the Google Books project on their own -- scanning by hand and storing (on public servers) the contents of tens of thousands of textbooks, scientific books, research tomes, political writings, etc. that were simply not available AT ALL in the Eastern Bloc -- either due to censorship or merely cost barriers. The index was kept on either Usenet, or a BBS. The point at the time was for those lucky enough to study/work in the West to help all those who were still in the respective Old Country.
...and the Saints winning the Superbowl
Blackest of Swans?
Browns Getting to a Super Bowl.
Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit drinking.
Now you really did make me laugh out loud!
Good humor!
I'm still chuckeling....
"Government is not eloquence, it is not reason --- it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant, and a fearful master."
-George Washington
http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html
This link has my full approval!
Powder Keg Question:
Is global warming real or not? What convinced you? and how old were you when you made up your mind?
No, snow, and 3.
I beat Algore?
Not real. I am old enough to remember that the first earth day was to stop global cooling.
"I am old enough to remember that the first earth day was to stop global cooling."
LOL...exactly.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944914,00.html
Brought to you by the same people who brought you The Population Bomb.
Right. Or this one from newsweek. Notice the scientific jargon (cover the poles with black ash to melt the ice) and the overall alarmism that nothing will be done by the government. Complete and total bullshit, same scam different day.
http://denisdutton.com/cooling_world.htm
Yep...thoroughly convinced they got it right this time.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/cif-green/2010/nov/10/geo-engineering-science-research-dilemma
They are quite insane...we and all animals breath out CO2...this (living & breathing) is a danger to the planet?...LOL.
Reminds me of George Carlins classic...they're just trying to make the world safe to drive their Volvo's.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw
Whenever ego, profit & ideology come together it's a dangerous mix.
Dude! The Carlin link is priceless! I knew he was the last word on voting and farts, but that link is bookmarked and ready to show at every party at my house where someone says "Where is the recycling bin" and I say "Just throw it in the garbage".
The larger insight I always take away is the herding effect for the plebes while the elites scoot by in their limos on the way to Cancun (more record low temps for that meeting as well...LOL)...I tried to corner the green ink market when all this crap started without success, it was dominated already by the CCX, Goldman & Gore...LOL.
Time for some grub.
SeeYa
The main difference between us and the 99% of other species which have lived and on this planet and since gone extinct?
Our demise will be self inflicted. Attempting to save ourselves from....ourselves....will be our undoing.
Thanks for the Carlin link - forgot about that one. Awesome.
Good point! Am I supposed to believe scientists were dumb back then and smart now?
Wasn't there an issue of Time magazine from the mid-70's declaring we were headed in to another ice-age?
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944914,00.html
the earth has been warming and cooling for eons. clearly it has been warming lately. A nuke war or meteor strike might reverse the trend over the shorter term. Long term we're all dead anyway.
climate change is real, canada tar sands operations release the same amount of CO2 every single day, as all of the cars in Canada, while at the same time destroying ancient growth borreal forests at a faster rate than combined farming and timber production in the amazon, in addition, taking 3 gallons of superheated fresh water and the equivalent of 2 gallons of gasoline to produce one gallon of bitumen petroleum. nice ain't it? what convinced me? no yale phd here, just common sense look at the numbers. made up my mind long before the IPCC fiasco and gore vidal's cousin's movie.
http://www.zcommunications.org/on-precaution-by-naomi-klein
That article is primarily about the gulf oil spill, and the deforestation is sinful, but the question is: Is the world really getting hotter?
To shift topic a little (you started it), our energy policies are retarded. Know what technology built America? Hydroelectricity. And while we're trying to abandon it, other countries (including Venezuela) are expanding it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity#Major_projects_under_construction
We don't necessarily have to build dams and re-route rivers either. We could put floating undershot water wheels on existing rivers. Not the most efficient, but reliable and near-zero enviormental impact.
This clever guy built one, but the DEP says "No go"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_TsWkn9hac
Why?
I think in the article, she was making the subtler point of the precautionary principle using bp/gulf/tar sands as an argument that we just jump right into whatever technologies or discoveries we 'make' without deep due diligence as to the consequences.
If you read just what I wrote and ask if a closed system, i.e. the biosphere, is unaffected by what we do, the answer is no it is not, un-affected, you do not need to do sicence to carry out that logic. my concern is not the planet, she will be fine and reach another equillibrium all by herself, what that will do to us in the process is somewhat worrysome. That's all.
Not saying the sky is falling (eventhough we are beyond the looking glass at this point), but to say all is good and we're ok is also not tenable. incidently, look up the names of towns in alaska that have had to be moved back from the shore just to save the entire town from rising sea levels for further evidence, or look at the shrinking glaciers in alaska. that kind of glacial recession does NOT happen in under a century in some 50-60 years, the earth does not move that fast, if she did we wouldnt survive in the first place because we could never adapt fast enough, nor could any other life as it now exists because the rate of change all life on earth has adapted to is much slower, geological rather than, anthropocentric.
consider as well, that the amount of carbon we are extracting was stored for millions of years and would be released via geological processes in millions of years, not 50 yrs or 100 yrs, we've put the earth on a human time schedule, faster and faster, that's some balls, and she ain't gonna be very happy about that.
it is funny isnt it to think we could take a bunch of energy dense stuff that took millions of years to form burn half of it in a hundred and not expect some effect...
it's scary that the logic, so clear, gets junked...
it's scary that the logic, so clear, gets junked...
it's scary that the logic, so clear, gets junked...
it's scary that the logic, so clear, gets junked...
the site just went down again...im in la and its 9 pm here which means its morning in zurich...what are you all doing over there...marla... the amount of years it takes under certain conditions...the amount of pressure and heat and most importantly, time, it takes to compress and convert organic matter into inorganic fuel is immense.
- blah blah blah.
Cheers !!!
http://www.youtube.com/user/tetekofa?feature=mhum#p/f/439/qLAKE0X-k3M
Hydro? Try coal.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/
Well, scientists tell us, and geological evidence shows, that we were in the throes of an ice age 10 or 12 k years ago, with glaciers down to what is now Arkansas, so techically haven't we been warming for 10-12k yrs. I do know that Chicago hasn't been over freezing since Thanksgiving this year, which is unusual. I read also that the earth hasn't warmed in 10 years, has actually cooled slightly, so could it be that solar output, or some other phenomenon is responsible for what we are experiencing? There was a mini ice age around the first millenium followed by serious warming long before the industrial revolution, so it seems man is likely not as responsible for warming or cooling as our egos would like to believe. Or not.
that must mean you walk every where you go and don't use electricity. Good for you!
I was shocked to learn that apparently Max Keiser's a hard-core believer.
I don't want to ignore truth, but when you tell me how you gathered your data is "proprietary", let's just say I become skeptical. Shouldn't we all be able to observe these things in real time somehow?
If we can't fudge the data then the terrorists win. Crap and trade is every squid's right.
+1. Heh Heh Heh.
The even worse thing about the global warming, er, I mean climate change mantra is that it has subverted the whole environmentalist movement. Rather than reducing pollution because it is toxic to our environment, the argument now is reduce pollution to 'stop global warming'. WTF..?!? Like we are going to change the weather by driving a Prius instead of a Hummer? How in the hell are people so stupid to buy INTO this bunk?? We need to get the environmentalist movement back on track to clean up the earth--to make it clean and safe--not to stop global warming.
Big problems arise when you have an underlying absolute bullshit argument driving a movement. I am still amazed that all the liberals have bought into the global warming hypothesis hook-line-and-sinker. They don't think for themselves.
If you know much about history, the oceans have been encroaching on land throughout the history of mankind. The former lighthouses for the Romans and ancients are now completely submerged under water. News flash--the Romans and ancient Egyptians didn't drive Hummers or have huge coal burning power plants. This is a natural trend THAT WE CANNOT CONTROL.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++.....+
I always thought Spock was the coolest dude on the Enterprise.
Please stop making sense. Please
It is real.
Cuz imma scientist. A mad scientist but it takes all kinds.
Here, let me explain my 6 point plan for world domination...
ditto.
Ready to sign up for the 6-pointer!
You are asking the wrong question, as many people do re: this issue. The real question (and the elephant in the room issue) is: Can mankind can control the weather? The answer is no. It is pure hubris to think that we can impact the weather through small incremental changes in our use of energy.
Somehow Al Gore and all his minions have convinced 60% of the world that if we buy electric cars and solar panels that the world will cool down. The only action we can do which may impact the weather would be to detonate about 75,000 nuclear bombs all over the planet and then we could have a nice cool nuclear winter. Otherwise, all this bullshit about reducing our carbon footprint will have zero impact on the weather. It's pure hubris and a scam of monumental proportions to shift assets to people who tell you they can control the weather. Use some common sense people...
Please read Storms of my Grandchildren by James Hansen. Please. It's too important an issue to be wrong.
you just pointed out we effect our environment with pollution. weather is not an aspect of our environment?
Of course it's real. But some of the faithful are way too full of their religion. Which is how some of the science got polluted. Most of it is entirely accurate, but that's not the part they're paid to tell us about.
I remember when I was very young and the U.S.S. Nautilus cruised to the North Pole. The pole was completely covered with ice. Just like in the Santa stories. These days it's open water. So what happened?
But despite global climate change, we still have winter. Generally a little warmer every year, but the occasional La Nina throws a curve. But I've been on the planet long enough to notice the change. It really is getting warmer, two degrees up, one degree back.
But that kind of talk makes people nervous, so pretend I'm just a crazy coot. No big deal.
I really don't want a bunch of human action to stop the warming anyway. It means a lot fewer people alive on the planet in the long run, and that's a really good thing.
So let's hear it for Global Climate Change! Yay!!!!
Visit Venus...One Step Beyond...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZezP5V8o3g
"I remember when I was very young and the U.S.S. Nautilus cruised to the North Pole. The pole was completely covered with ice. Just like in the Santa stories. These days it's open water. So what happened?"
Ebb & flow.
A simple experiment for anyone to do regarding the North Pole's ice cap.
Place an ice cube in a glass (this represents the ice cap)...next fill the glass to the very brim with cold water (this represents the ocean under the North Pole). Now place it on the counter and watch...the ice cube will melt but it will not overflow the glass. It's the same amount (volume) of water inside the glass (one is frozen, the other liquid).
The condensation pool around the outside bottom of the glass is irrelevent as this is a reaction to warmer air on the outside of the cold glass.
Result?...the entire North Pole ice cap could melt and the effect on the shoreline would be zero. We're talking sea ice here.
Archaeologists have made some fascinating discoveries of late as well.
"The find and discovery site were kept secret from fear of "treasure graves" first. In the following two years, coworkers of the archaeological service looked for the area precisely off. They found approximately 300 further articles at the edge of the ice: Stone Age articles of clothing and arrows, garb needles from the Bronze Age and shoe nails from the Roman period. Suter wants to further-search in the next year "in any case." Particularly the Stone Age artifacts from organic material did it to the archaeologists. They are a truly lucky find. Because the wood -, to leather and textile remainders only kept, because they were covered before scarcely 5000 years rapidly by snow and ice and found very fast now after that to way ropes of the gletschereises. "depending upon size of the pieces", Suter says, " such old organic material only keeps itself for two weeks" if it lies exposed. With the professional search on the forgotten pass, two further larger pieces of the koecher were found, of one contained two flint heads of the arrow. Several arrow shanks from the wood of the snow clenching smoke completed the hunt equipment.
A larger piece phloem network could come from a umhang, as Oetzi put it around the shoulders. Like the wanderer from the Oetztal, Stone Age Swiss wore deer leather trousers sewn with lime tree phloem. The archaeologists constituted repair patch on it still another. From the many other leather bits they could reconstruct a Neolithic shoe including tying volume eyes. Altogether "we have fragments of more than two shoes", reports Suter. Whether these belonged to the footwear of a further traveller over the pass or carried as a pair of reserves, he cannot say.
All this the archaeologists owe to the retreat the glacier in the upper Bernese country, which continues for decades and was accelerated by the particularly hot summer of 2003. However it was still hotter in the third millennium BC. At that time the temperatures in the Swiss Alps were up to two degrees over the today’s. The timber line had climbed substantially, the glacier zone began only at 2700 meters. In the outgoing Stone Age and the early Bronze Age, the inhabitants of central Switzerland used the later completely forgotten Schnidepass, in order to come directly into the Rhonetal. Identical garb needles in graves at the Thuner lake and in the Rhonetal speak for such a direct connection."
http://climateaudit.org/2005/11/18/archaeological-finds-in-retreating-swiss-glacier/
I highly recommend Steve McIntyre's site regarding this issue.
The take away of course is it's been much hotter in the past.
And it certainly hurts one's cause for an Al Gore to come forth with an easily disproved "hockey stick graph" which ignores known climatic events of the past...likewise a sycophantic press who will not or dare not investigate his assertions...likewise his monetary connections to eventually profit from his own assertions (Goldman and the now defunct CCX)...likewise the statists in tow (UN) who saliviate at the prospect of greater taxation on a long suffering wage earner...likewise the fact that no legislation thus far proposed would actually cut carbon emmisions by even one ounce, only trade credits...likewise the exposure of fraud at East Anglia & elsewhere where science itself is bastardized to achieve a desired outcome (read grant money flow/careers) instead of finding a result in science..etc.
Longer post than I expected...but let me say...yes it's warming somewhat (if we can even believe the data)...but not alarmingly so.
I say ifwe can believe the data because when you place air temp. monitoring stations next to air conditioning units, asphalt parking lots with idling vehicles in the summer & winter etc. it tends to skew the data somewhat in only one direction...LOL. Then of course there was the collapse of the Soviet Union where manned stations in Siberia were shut down for lack of funds...look at that "global warming spike"...LOL...anyways...
Do I think other technologies have value?...surprisingly to some here...yes I do.
But they need to develop with someone else's money, not on my dime (as a taxpayer/consumer) for "others" (bureaucracies, industrialists, foreign nationals and yes pseudo-capitalistic-parasitic traders) to profit on.
lots of opinions out there out there.
http://deepclimate.org/2009/10/04/climate-auditor-steve-mcintyre-yamal/
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/12/climategate/
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/thinktanks-take-oil-money-and-use-it-to-fund-climate-deniers-1891747.html
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=still-hotter-than-ever
The UEA is not the only thinktank / databank. There is a dramatically larger number of scientists that think there is something to this than not and many still criticiize some of the UEA MOs. The fact that it's been "much hotter in the past" does not answer the question of modern & recent man caused. McIntyre is a child of the mining industry. Keeping an open, inquiring and skeptical mind. There are serious interests and money in both directions. Youre a smart man nmewn, I hope to God they're wrong. Time will tell
"The fact that it's been "much hotter in the past" does not answer the question of modern & recent man caused. That's a serious logic failure."
I would say that's a serious premise failure on someone else's part ;-)
The issue has morphed from "man made global warming" via CO2 to the more nebulous anthropogenic warming (thus dropping "man made" & CO2 from marketing consumption hype, even though it means the same thing) to just "global warming" which reinforces to me something is logically or scientifically untenable.
Real science does not rename a study/concept or experiment for no reason...this is for acceptence of result not proof of a result. That is marketing, not science.
Turning that around and looking at it the other way...destroying or misplacing test data that led to a certain conclusion and a proposed new policy doesn't do much for the marketing side either.
"Keeping an open, inquiring and skeptical mind. There are serious interests and money in both directions."
Absolutely agree with you there Davey...right now I'm just focusing on trying to keep the monied interests out of my pockets until they can come up with some tangible, irrefutable truth.
One of the bad things about this whole affair (that I always think about anyways) is they have so destroyed their credibility (on the pro side), that if there is anything to it...it will not be believed by many.
This is what happens when politicians & zealots conspire with some unethical scientists and are exposed...they can do enormous damage to both a cause and science.
I recently read an article written by an environmentalist who firmed this up in my mind...his position was we (environmentalists) need to get back to local issues and the larger picture will take care of itself.
I hunt, fish, do sports...everyone wants and needs clean water and fresh air for themselves and their children...and their children's children.
Again, the science has not caught up with whatever the reality is...data was forged, data was destroyed/misplaced, data was/is interpreted wrong (Soviet Union/Siberia/air temp.stations wrongly positioned/temp.averaging above certain latitudes) etc...it's hard to move the position forward with that backdrop.
Right now I have to go take care of some carbon units myself...leaves all over my backyard ;-)
SeeYa
Edit;
I hope to God they're wrong (the pro warmers) as well Davey. I really do. I don't have any interest in them being wrong...don't work in finance, government or the oil industry or associated industry...seems like we all have to give these damned disclaimers these days...LOL.
You are one of the brainwashed Al Gore minions that believes everything you see on a Prius or Greenpeace TV commercial. DO SOME RESEARCH! Don't believe the main stream media propaganda! You've been hoodwinked.
You buy into the corporate hubris all the way. And yes, I said "corporate" hubris. The big power companies are behind the whole global warming movement 100% because one of the major tenets of the movement is to charge more for energy. That will remove more money from the pockets of poor people and put it into the pockets of big energy. You don't realize it, but the Global Warming movement is being driven by big energy because cap-and-trade legislation mandates higher prices for energy to discourage use of it. It sounds so noble--yes, I'm willing to raise my cost of living in order to cool down the world from the awful impacts of global warming. Yet you have been 100% hoodwinked. The true bottomline is that mankind cannot control the weather by reductions in CO2 output.
You said, "I remember when I was very young and the U.S.S. Nautilus cruised to the North Pole. The pole was completely covered with ice. Just like in the Santa stories. These days it's open water." YOU ARE WRONG! The North pole still gets covered in ice every winter. In fact the changes in ice coverage over the past 20 years is essentially the same. See for yourself in this time lapse of the Arctic Sea from 1978 - 2009:
http://vodpod.com/watch/2342179-arctic-sea-ice-timelapse-from-1978-to-2009
The UN is behind the global warming hysteria because it justifies the transfer of large sums of money from rich countries to poor ones. It's all about money and power. If the UN really wanted to do something concrete to help the world, they would have a big drive to clean up the huge polluted collection of trash that has accumulated in the Pacific ocean just south of Hawaii. Global warming is a fabricated boogeyman. Sure, the world may be heating up. The bottomline issue is that we cannot control it. And further, the negative impacts of a hotter world are greatly over exaggerated. Going back into an ice age would be far worse for mankind.
Read the writings of Richard Lindzen, the former Director of the Center for Earth and Planetary Physics at Harvard University and the current Professor of Meteorology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He argues that increases in CO2 levels in the atmosphere are (1) a minor impact if at all to weather and (2) likely the result of global warming rather than the cause of it.
http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/L_R-Exchange.pdf
What if Harry came by, and found we moved? Be a loss to the board.
/end sarc
Meanwhile, FL, 3 GA, AR, and MN banks are gone.
Bank Failure Friday used to be shocking. desensitization
157 down for the year...at this pace they've got a long way to go.
"The big corporations own you --- and there's nothing you can do about it. Get with the program."
-Leo Kolivakis
What if Leo came by, and found nobody home?
If Leo's solar stocks fall to zero in a forest, and nobody is around to hear his anguished screams, does he really make a noise? And does anyone give a damn either way?
Overall, Leo makes a hell of a lot more sense that most of the brightly clad characters in this clown car.
LMAO!! Did he really type that? haha All the pain of his blown up solars must have went to his skull.
Sadly and pathetically, yes he did.
To his eternal dishonor, and to my eternal contempt.
"The big corporations own you --- and there's nothing you can do about it. Get with the program."
So his thesis was to submit, as taxpayers, to subsidize corporations, who own you.
Interesting...LOL.
Isn't that message obvious in virtually every one of his posts?
He may know a thing or two about pension systems, but when it comes to ANYTHING else, he is diametrically opposed to everything ZeroHedge stands for. Leo is not even remotely worthy of spouting his statist, neo-Keynesian, pro-kleptocorporatist bullshit on this site.
I used to just love when his vile comments would be routinely junked into total oblivion here. It does seem, though, that he has backed off somewhat from his formerly, even more wildly inflammatory and ridiculously pro-establishment comments in the forum, as they would often result in a Swiss-cheese thread full of holes where his former execrable comments HAD been. I still wonder if he is not just acting a part as a purposeful instigator here, sowing controversy just to increase hits to this site.
"Isn't that message obvious in virtually every one of his posts?"
Yes, it is.
I've long tried to figure out if he's just one of the boiler room guys or if he is just so blinded with greed/ideaology he loses sight of the moral component of what he is advocating as outlined above.
"He may know a thing or two about pension systems..."
He's definitely got a dog (or had a dog) in that fight. His last post on public sector pensions was revealing ;-)
is that really a quote from Leo? It would explain a lot about the man.
Yes it is, and that's why I laugh at all of you who think you're going to change this corrupt system. It's not a matter of submitting, it's a matter of surviving. I'm not worried about my solar positions as I took some profits and getting back in. Only thing revealing here is how a few of you are totally obsessed with me. Carlin said it best, which is why this is on my blog:
Quisling has spoken.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quisling
Well maybe I partially misjudged you Leo...all one has to do is trace back the origins of public education to find what Carlin is saying has truth in it.
I assume you have read John Taylor Gatto...it's the same in Greece.
But I still dislike subsidizing the solar industry...it's morally repugnant to me.
God, all I had to post on was yahoo finance for a awhile...
:) You guys are rare form tonight, and I haven't even had
a drink yet.
There's a Drunk Front comin through...get prepared...LOL.
OK, I'm joining in.
Cheers!
Hiccup!
I see that I am fashionably late to the ZH virtual xmas party. Y'all got a head start.
Right on time man. We've gotten about thsi goofy, still plenty of room for improvement
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvQwXOCKNLY
I'd like to see the Bernank perform his version.
This weekend I drink to forget.
What a wasted week. Extend and pretend rolls on into 2011.
As long as you don't forget to drink...
Hope it was methanol, motherfucker.
Me too!!!
wood alchohol.
3 fuckin jews.
i shouldn't be laughing. fuck you.
I am a fairly new member who reads this site religiously. I am a union tradesman with a question: Could the year end surplus in social security trust fund contributions be used as capital for qualifying mortgage loan customers, instead of our government borrowing it to balance their overspending? I can't seem to find an answer from my elected representatives. Please, anyone?
nice.
puhhhlease. give that 'elected representative' game up already. short answer is no. show me one place where they are 'representing' you? your union? riiight. they represent nothing but a target, pure and simple.
Listen jerkoff, I thought I was posing a reasonable question among intelligent people. I am very good at what I do, I just don't have the knowledge in finance or business or whatever you people call what you do. I am a debt free American who was always afraid of losing everything because of you crooks in the financial sector. I asked an honest question. If you don't have an answer, why don't you just shut the fuck up, asshole.
There is no surplus. If there was, fedgov would tell you they cannot afford to give you your money that they took already, anyway. Now play nice.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/30/AR2009033003291.html
Oh there's a surplus all right...a surplus of IOU's.
which is kept in a separate, distinctly different lockbox.
and i gave you my honest opinion, relax dude, I was talking about the illogical concept you hold as functional in your mind, that of 'elected representation'; not you or your job and I ain't in the fire sector. don't be so scared ok? you'll miss the point.
Social Security is pay-as-you-go. Due to the economic downturn, there's no surplus to be redirected for any purpose.
Ah easy pal... we're in here right now on sabbatical... boozin, ..not arguin'... that's for the other threads when we get back to calling each other know nothin' douchebags.
the reason the answer is no is because social security is untouchable by design, or it was until Clinton solved all our problems by using it. there is no surplus. the illusion of a surplus is because we have kicked the can down the road so many times that the money appears to be free from emcumbrences when in reality it was spent a long long time ago.
someone in here said "it sure ain't a fund 'cause it's bankrupt and you can't trust it 'cause they keep dipping into it", ergo trust fund = just another oxymoron; with corporate personhood and aunt jemima light among my favorites on a rather long list.
Wow. Short temper. Not everyone here is in the financial sector. Your question, while honest, was tremendously naive. You should watch C-Span for a little bit and see if you still think the 'elected representatives' are governing for your benefit.
The government likes to use "real dollars" that no interest is paid for to finance their largess. In this day and age, largess has become the norm, and printing dollars seems to be the fashionable way in which to cover their spending. But to answer your question, in my mind...no. I don't think using SSC to reinflate a bubble that has already burst would be politically correct. But, technically, if the gov could use these funds in a relatively low risk manner to draw interest and put it back into the fund...that could make sense under the present system. But, using the principal to loan out at low interest would likely not keep up with the present outgoing payouts. But, it would be better than blowing it. The problem is, the account inbalance would still have to be paid...likely from printing money.
@ClassicalLib17
Welcome to Fight Club. I see you've been indoctrinated. As to your question:
Contrary to anything you may or may not have heard before, there is no social security lockbox. It's an accounting fiction. Any SS surplus is more than offset by the federal government's gaping annual deficit. So, your question is a non-starter.
And just in case:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WELvpeYo5m0
Hmm, not sure. But it'd be interesting to find out. Whom did you ask, i.e. did you ask your congressman, and how did you try? Perhaps a different tack will get you a better answer. Sorry I can't be of more use!
As some of the other folks pointed out, there is no surplus, SS became Washington's slush fund (and they are not the kind of people who you can trust with a slush fund).
Conceptually, I think it would have been a great. We could have killed off Fannie & Freddie, gotten decent returns on the surplus and let one generation help the next.
Now if we just had a time machine....
strangest "trust fund" I've ever seen.
LOL...+++++++
Surplus? HAHAHAHAHAHA - good one.
Surplus social security trust fund contributions?
I answer the question with another question:
If you piss into a black hole, where does the urine go?
Uranus?
That urine goes into a 11 dimensional foamy universe...
What was your elected representative's reply when you asked him if he had leads on a surplus?
"Leads? Ha ha ha ha. Leads, ya we got four detectives on it. We're working shifts man. Leads, ha ha ha ha."
Bah Humbug
With all due respect, in the most unparliamentary language:
FUCK...you, everybody...FUCK you.
I apologize now for my use of unparliamentary language.
Anyone know about the 'Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports'? Read something years ago .... Burnian sp?- originator. Double set of books kept by cities and states, lots of conspiracy stuff on it now kicking around on the net. Where's the truth in this one.
Anyone out there with direct eyes on this?
They are called CAFTA's (I think) (Comprehensive Annual ...)
do a search on "Walter Burien" and "CAFTA" and start digging.
On it now, thanks!
Here's to the failure of Spain ... next week... and to the failure of Belgium... before New Years.
Spain failed after that whole armada thing...and Belgium ... well The Pythons said it best:
Well now, the result of last week's competition when we asked you to find a derogatory term for the Belgians. Well, the response was enormous and we took quite a long time sorting out the winners. There were some very clever entries. Mrs Hatred of Leicester Said 'let's not call them anything, let's just ignore them' ... (applause starts vigorously, but he holds his hands up for silence) ... and a Mr St John of Huntingdon said he couldn't think of anything more derogatory than Belgians. (cheers and applause; a girl in showgirl costume comes on and holds up placards through next bit) But in the end we settled on three choices: number three ... the Sprouts (placard 'The Sprouts'), sent in by Mrs Vicious of Hastings... very nice ; number two..... the Phlegms (placard) ... from Mrs Childmolester of Worthing; but the winner was undoubtedly from Mrs No-Supper-For-You from Norwood in Lancashire... Miserable Fat Belgian Bastards. (placard; roar of applause)
Open thread is open!
That means ... FICTION!
http://madscienceunlimited.com/fiction/
Come back this time tmrw or Sunday and I might have the last installment in the series. It's Christmas, stand under the mistletoe and kill someone close to you. Real caroling, sustained cannon fire, an actual angel and the unmaker off her leash and liking it. It's going to be epic I can't wait. Ho Ho Hell you infernal bitchez.
Read them a while back, great material, thanks for sharing. Looking forward to reading the novel; hope you're still working on it.
good stuff enjoyed it thanks.
Go for it, have another one on me and Fuck JP Morgan.
But not Captain Morgan.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/halliburton-reportedly-agrees-pay-nigeria-250-million-drop-bribery-charges-cheney-firm/
Hey, good thing this guy was our VP for 8 years, obviously the right guy for the job...and we wonder why our country has delved into this state...
all that barking for 250 mill? pathetic Nigeria!
OMG, a corporation paying bribes to do business in another country? What is the the world coming to.............This must be a first!
Don't Ask Don't START
Its been a wild week inside the beltway as well. I wonder if there's a connection?
Son of TARP passed in the blink of an eye? What's another Trillion amongst friends...
An omnibus spending bill over a thousand pages in length DOA in the Senate? Mitch McConnell and Obama almost smiling? (Obama actually called him "Mitch" and didn't mean "bitch.") And unless I missed something, the rest of the world seems resigned to $14Trillion in US debt.
What happens when there are so many black swans they don't matter any longer?
They cease to be black swans.
Obama is a closet Republican.
Sounds reasonable, Clinton became one after '94......
And this changes things, how, exactly?