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Change They Don’t Believe In

T he unfortunate consequence of not allowing the process of “creative destruction” to occur in banking and Big Business is that the historic forces behind it will seek expression elsewhere in the realm of politics and governance. The desperate antics of central banks to cover up financial failure can’t help but provoke political upheaval, including war.

It’s a worldwide phenomenon and one result will be the crackup of economic relations — thought by many to be permanent — that we call “globalism.” The USA has suffered mightily from globalism, by which a bonanza of cheap “consumer” products made by Asian factory slaves has masked the degeneration of local economic vitality, family life, behavioral norms, and social cohesion. That crackup is already underway in the currency wars aptly named by Jim Rickards, and you can bet that soon enough it will lead to the death of the 12,000-mile supply lines from China to WalMart — eventually to the death of WalMart itself (and everything like it). Another result will be the interruption of oil export supply lines.

The USA as currently engineered (no local economies, universal suburban sprawl, big box commerce, despotic agribiz) won’t survive these disruptions and one might also wonder whether our political institutions will survive. The crop of 2016 White House aspirants shows no comprehension for the play of these forces and the field is ripe for epic disruption. The prospect of another Clinton – Bush election contest is a perfect setup for the collapse of the two parties sponsoring them, ushering in a period of wild political turmoil. Just because you don’t see it this very moment, doesn’t mean it isn’t lurking on the margins.

This same moment (in history) the American thinking classes are lost in raptures of techno-wishfulness. They can imagine the glory of watching Fast and Furious 7 on a phone in a self-driving electric car, but they can’t imagine rebuilt local economies where citizens get to play both an economic and social role in their communities. They can trumpet the bionic engineering of artificial hamburger meat, but not careful, small-scale farming in which many hands can find work and meaning.

The true genius of Hillary is that she manages to epitomize every failure of our current political life: the obsessive micro-manipulation of image, the obscene moneygrubbing, the tired cronyism, the entitlement masquerading as sexual equality. Mostly, though, she has no idea where history is taking us, in case you’re wondering at the stupefying platitudes offered up as representative of her thinking. I’m not advocating for this gentleman, but it will at least be interesting to see Martin O’Malley jump into the race and call bullshit on her, which he will do, literally, because he has nothing to lose by doing it. The eunuchs on The New York Times Op Ed page certainly won’t do it.

What happens on the world financial scene will determine the flow of events up into the 2016 election. The built-up tensions and fragilities are begging for release. The defining instant might be Greece’s unwillingness to fork over another debt payment, or the death of the shale oil “miracle,” or some act by Saudi Arabia’s enemies, or some chain of exploding booby-traps in the shadow banking netherworld. The great surprise for America especially will be the recognition that our current living arrangements have no future. That’s the only thing that will prompt a new consensus to form around some alternate, more plausible future, and the emergence of a generation willing to fight for it, even if it requires some real creative destruction of the things that are killing us anyway.

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James Howard Kunstler is the author of many books including (non-fiction) The Geography of Nowhere, The City in Mind: Notes on the Urban Condition, Home from Nowhere, The Long Emergency and the four-book series of World Made By Hand novels, set in a post economic crash American future. His most recent book is Living in the Long Emergency; Global Crisis, the Failure of the Futurists, and the Early Adapters Who Are Showing Us the Way Forward. Jim lives on a homestead in Washington County, New. York, where he tends his garden and communes with his chickens.

397 Responses to “Change They Don’t Believe In”

  1. Htruth April 20, 2015 at 9:54 am #

    Corporate America will keep living off of the government as long as the tax paying sheeple allow it to happen. The tax system is especially fraught with corporate giveaways and sponsorship. Welcome to fascist America: https://youtu.be/RpXPOTstY5s

    • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 1:50 pm #

      No, rule by the rich is Plutocracy. Fascism would subordinate the Corporations for the national and public good. You are confusing the two because both involve a mixing of the public and private spheres. But in our current system, the private obviously dominates government. In Fascism, it would be the other way around.

      • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 3:44 pm #

        Corporations are firmly in control it just isn’t obvious. That is why we have Fascism Lite. Same great tyrannical opression but with fewer calories. On the surface it looks like a variant of representative democracy like a wasteband friendly pale ale. Behind the scenes it is a much darker brew.

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:54 pm #

          Agreed. The political scene is really amorphous at this point. The infamous “revolving door” between well-connected public and private officials is now spinning so fast that it can effectively no longer be discerned, even among the few well-intentioned. I’m not sure there is an effectively functioning US government anymore absent the private sector, so where does that leave us?

          • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 9:01 pm #

            It leaves us up the creek in a concrete canoe. Or as one writer who adapted a line from “Ninety-two in the Shade” by Thomas McGuane concerning being stuck in a concrete canoe:

            “We’re literally stuck up a cul-de-sac in a cement SUV without a fill-up.”

          • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 12:51 am #

            JHK—–

            hope you write about this

            88,000 People Apply for ‘Poor Door’ Building — NYMag
            nymag.com/…/88000-people-apply-for-poor-door-…
            New York Magazine
            2 days ago – 88,000 people applied for the 55 affordable rental units available at the Upper West Side “poor door” building. The condo features 219 luxury …

      • GutenbergGuy April 21, 2015 at 3:54 pm #

        This is a myth, one that works very well to the advantage of the plutocrats. Review the role of German corporations – and, yes, American and other ones, as well – especially I.G. Farben, in the rise of Nazi Germany.

        Only recently have people begun to ask, “Where did Hitler get the money to do what he and the Nazis did?”

        And as Mussolini said, it’s “corporate fascism.” All the rabid nationalism and the rest of it is just rhetoric.;

    • abbybwood April 21, 2015 at 1:54 am #

      Okay, this should give everyone a good laugh, especially JHK.

      In today’s article:

      “I’m not advocating for this gentleman, but it will at least be interesting to see Martin O’Malley jump into the race and call bullshit on her, which he will do, literally, because he has nothing to lose by doing it.”

      Well, lo and behold if Mr. O’Malley didn’t get bleeped on NPR when he said, “Bullshit!”:

      http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/politics/blog/bal-omalley-cursed-on-public-radio-now-hes-raising-money-off-it-20150420-story.html

    • ozone April 24, 2015 at 7:31 pm #

      **WARNING**
      Abandon hope [for enlightened discourse, reality-based stratagems for facing onrushing predicaments and support thereof] all ye who enter here (the Clusterfuck Nation comment section).

      Thank you for your brief attention (A Disinterested Party)…

  2. peakfuture April 20, 2015 at 9:55 am #

    O’Malley – the folks here give him 33:1 odds. http://www.politicalbettingodds.com/2016-us-presidential-election-odds.html

    It would be great to see someone confront *anyone* in the establishment, left or right.

    • Neon Vincent April 20, 2015 at 10:21 am #

      “It would be great to see someone confront *anyone* in the establishment, left or right.”

      Oh, that will happen, but it won’t necessarily be someone in the major parties. The closest we’ll likely get to one on the Republican side is Rand Paul, but he’s nowhere near as independent as his father. My opinion of Ron Paul was that he got the problems right but the solutions all wrong and when he had a good idea, it was another example of a stuck clock being right twice a day. On the Democratic side, Martin O’Malley might be it. Bernie Sanders would be a better bet, although he’s technically an independent and may decide not to run. Instead, look at the Greens, where Jill Stein is gearing up to run again and the Libertarians, that is, if they can get someone as charismatic as Gary Johnson, if not Johnson himself, to run. Just the same, because of Duverger’s Law, the two parties combined would be lucky to get 5% of the vote.

      As for our host’s comments about “living arrangements that have no future,” I was a guest on BlogTalkRadio for Earth Day last Thursday where I talked with the host about the California drought and the unsustainability of California’s water infrastructure to support the state’s population, agriculture, and industry. One of those industry’s was oil, especially fracking. After I described the process to him, he likened it to pouring water in an ice cream carton to float the last scraps of ice cream off the bottom. I think he got the idea.

      Also, today is the fifth anniversary of the Gulf oil spill. Let that stand as a cautionary tale about the high cost of maintaining our unsustainable lifestyles.

      • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 10:44 am #

        And a vote for any of those you mention will have the same impact as a vote for K-Dog; that being none. The election is already bought and paid for and focus groups are choosing catchy mind killing slogans right now to seal the perfidity.

        Gulf oil spill? What was that? Oh yeah, that was when Obama was supposed to step up and show that he had a B.. P….. .

        Which he did.

        • Exscotticus April 20, 2015 at 2:55 pm #

          I will never forget the order of events. First Obama campaigned against offshore drilling. Then he got elected and green-lighted it (one of an endless series of broken campaign promises). Then the BP oil spill happened. The Obama came out against offshore drilling again.

          • DA April 20, 2015 at 3:02 pm #

            Any which way the political wind blows…

        • K-Dog April 21, 2015 at 9:27 pm #

          To clarify, the B.. P…. disaster did not show that Mr. Obama had one. Rather it showed that he is one.

          • benr April 27, 2015 at 9:25 am #

            On a more serious note Obama actually BLOCKED offers of help from foreign governments specifically the Dutch who had the equipment and know how to lesson the damage of the leaked oil.
            In fact he allowed this disaster to widen in scop as a result.

      • orbit7er April 20, 2015 at 10:51 am #

        Jill Stein spoke at the Green Party New Jersey Congress last month where I was recruited to table for NJ PeaceAction. She had a very comprehensive view of the whole outline of our current problems and I have finally decided to abandon the Democrats for the Greens. What was most encouraging to me was to see young Millenials becoming politically active on a wide range of issues.
        Youth spearheaded an unbelievable drive to get the all Republican conservative Morris County Freeholders to unanimously oppose the Pilgrim Shale oil pipeline proposed across Morris County. Note that the Morris County freeholders was the first political office for Gov Chris Christie, of course long since sold out to Koch Brothers and the plutocrats. The Morris County freeholders supported this resolution so strongly after young people persuaded 29 towns to pass resolutions, letters and legal action to oppose the Pilgrim Shale Oil pipeline.
        The Greens actually have young local candidates running for the NJ State legislature all of whom expressly mentioned Green Transit – ie increased Rail and bus transit instead of Auto Addiction in their sprawl areas. Another group of young people were fervent supporters of the “15 Now” campaign for a $15 minimum wage and got 300 people to turn out in Newark, NJ for a rally during lunch hour.
        Young people today know they are getting screwed from every angle and as they largely changed the whole gay rights issue, they will be a huge political force very shortly.
        The Green Party is for all their issues of Climate Change, Green jobs, Green transit, environmental justice, public banking, against the endless Wars.
        People are sick of both sellout Corporatist parties in the US and are ready for a true alternative…

        • russ April 20, 2015 at 12:22 pm #

          If I recall correctly, Dr. Stein was in the field of internal medicine. Some years ago she came to the conclusion that so many of her patients’ illnesses were caused by various combinations of environmental toxicity factors, stress-related events, poor diet factors, etc. She decided that in good conscience she could not simply treat her patients’ symptoms, and turn them back out where they would simply be re-exposed to the same things – but to try to eliminate some of the factors that were causing the illnesses.

          Trying to address the problem at its source, as opposed to simply treating the symptoms over and over again, seems to be to be the right way to go. Which is why I voted for her for President in 2012.

          And I try to vote for Greens locally – although the Democratic Party goes out of its way to keep them off the ballot. Just as the Republicans strive to keep the Libertarians and Free Party candidates off the ballot.

          Our 2 Party system is one of the things that makes us Exceptional. It also makes us FUBAR.

          • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:46 pm #

            I think you’re supporting the Greens at the local level is a good idea and the best approach, as any meaningful change must bubble up from the bottom. And there’s a practical reason for saying that as well. Any radical top-down change that managed to actually get through the political process would simply be negated the old fashioned way: by brute force. It’s still easy to underestimate the forces within our own national political apparatus that would gladly do us all harm if it served them well. We shouldn’t take them lightly.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 1:53 pm #

          Very bad ideas. As the international system crumbles, we’re going to need all the domestic oil and coal we can get. Everyone of those protestors would gladly embrace them after even one night without heat

          • claireboothloose April 20, 2015 at 1:57 pm #

            A negro in Maryland inadvertently killed himself and his eight chillen when he had no heat and used his generator indoors. Guess he missed the chemistry class about carbon monoxide fumes and the fact that they can be quite bad for you.

          • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 5:17 pm #

            Not when the choice is water and food, or oil. Fracking requires a lot of water.

          • sprawlcapital April 20, 2015 at 7:34 pm #

            I am puzzled beyond all recognition by what you just said, Janos. You mean an environment free of toxins and safe for humans and other living things is a bad idea?

  3. George April 20, 2015 at 9:56 am #

    “The great surprise for America especially will be the recognition that our current living arrangements have no future.”

    Guess what? Most living arrangements worldwide have no future. As I type refugees are fleeing the malignant chaos that’s consumed the Middle East. Presently the majority hail from Libya but others flee from Somalia, Syria, Tunisia, Egypt, Algeria and even a few from Turkey. Though not surprising, it’s sad to learn that some in one of the neighboring countries feel safer when they’re surrounding by the chaos of disintegrating nations and countless millions of shattered lives. Some suspect that they may have even nudged it along and when they do, they’re given to call it: “Mowing the grass.” Is it possible for anyone to be more selfish?

    http://www.thesisa.org

  4. DanandMary April 20, 2015 at 9:57 am #

    We’re looking forward to your next book…hopefully later this year? As for now, prepping garden beds… and ducklings are to arrive in a few weeks. The chickens are sporadic layers, and I’m beginning to think of them as ‘useless consumers’.

    • Helen Highwater April 20, 2015 at 12:46 pm #

      I’m not a poultry expert but I know you should be getting an egg a day from each hen if they are fed the right stuff and you have the right breed. Maybe do a bit of research and find out what the problem is before you give up on chickens. If they are too old they won’t lay consistently. If they are, you can eat them and get new ones. They definitely should be earning their keep.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 1:56 pm #

        You eat them? Your feathered friends who worked to feed you all their lives? You are a speciesist.

        • Lindy1933 April 20, 2015 at 10:22 pm #

          True story: I was going to raise some chickens. My wife is a bird person. She asked, “What I would do when they got to old to lay?” … I said, “eat them”. She said. “You will provide a rest home for them and if they need a hip replacement, by God they will get it.” We don’t have chickens.

  5. DA April 20, 2015 at 10:04 am #

    Marco Ru-Ru-Rubio took to the morning talkies yesterday all balls out talking up the war option with Iran. [Yawn!] Looks like another replay in ’16 of America’s perennial “we’re exceptional and they’re not” theme which has led us to our current predicament. Still living in the past, we never have really gotten beyond the Cold War nightmare on which we baby boomers cut our teeth. Queen Hillary’s a tired old conservative nag (and notorious front runner who has a bad habit of fading in the stretch) who imagines herself to somehow be quasi “liberal,” whatever in the hell that even means anymore, as a means to cozy up to the uppity east coast hipsters who apparently throw money at her. Whatever else comes out the ’16 horse race, recognition of, never mind acting on, anything remotely resembling the truth won’t be one of them. Sigh… Same as it ever was.

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    • benr April 27, 2015 at 9:33 am #

      Calling Hillary a Conservative is like Calling Hitler a nice old guy that was simply misunderstood. Just how far to the left are you?

  6. shotho April 20, 2015 at 10:04 am #

    So much to comment on in today’s edition. Mr. K put his finger on it; unrest has been masked by the endless supply of cheap goods from overseas and, also, the endless variety of sports and entertainment. When cheap food and the above-mentioned are threatened, then social unrest will become more manifest. However, I continue to believe it will take more than that to effect the changes he foresees. My constant social prayer is for a deep and prolonged financial depression; only that will destroy the sclerotic institutions that infest our society. But who can know what political regime will arise from the ashes. We just know that the vacuum will be filled and not by Clinton-Bush types either.
    Mr. K, you are very wise to not give anymore precise timeline predictions. The process began a long time ago and will take a long time to work out.

  7. Ussi April 20, 2015 at 10:04 am #

    The sooner the current system is creatively destroyed the better.

    The Next System Project is trying to open the space for a civilized future.

    The only question is are We civilized enough to do it?

    http://thenextsystem.org

  8. FincaInTheMountains April 20, 2015 at 10:06 am #

    “…can bet that soon enough it will lead to the death of the 12,000-mile supply lines from China to WalMart — eventually to the death of WalMart itself ”

    Wal-Mart suddenly closed 5 stores and laid off thousands of workers and no one knows why

    Wal-Mart suddenly closed five stores in four states on Monday for alleged plumbing problems.

    The closures could last up to six months and affect roughly 2,200 workers in Texas, California, Oklahoma, and Florida, CNN Money reports.

    Wal-Mart employees say they were completely blindsided by the news, having been notified only a couple hours before the stores closed at 7 p.m. Monday.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/wal-mart-suddenly-closes-stores-2015-4

    • MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 1:05 pm #

      Well spotted… I commented on this very thing last week. This shenanigan seems to be a dry-run in the event that real cuts are necessary.

      Walmart Inc. has 2M+ employees and is the largest private employer in the world (which says a ton about the state of post-industrial employment). Surreptitiously laying off 2K employees is financially and statistically insignificant to Walmart et al. so this is a safe way to test and measure effects – while at the same time sending a message to store managers to do as they were told last fall by the office of the CEO and CFO to get their numbers up – or be the next store ‘randomly selected’ for de-facto closure…

    • WannaBleave April 20, 2015 at 2:00 pm #

      In the case of Walmart’s California location, it is clearly an anti-union action. The Pico-Rivera store was the first to strike and has been very active in labor organizing. I expect we will hear denials from Walmart’s Bentonville HQ… but anyone with half-a-brain can figure out this was a retaliatory move by the country’s largest employer.

  9. swmnguy April 20, 2015 at 10:08 am #

    I just returned from a trip to China. Flying over China is very different from flying over the US. In rural China, people live in little villages a couple miles apart, surrounded by their farm fields. They walk to work and walk home again at night. It’s all right there. Labor is dirt cheap (literally), but energy and technology are comparatively expensive. By contrast, flying over America, one sees unproductive “communities” that sprawl for miles, requiring very costly upkeep and taking over land that could be used for food. One realizes that in America, labor is very expensive, energy is comparatively dirt cheap, and technology is cheaper than labor.

    What we’ve got in America is the logical outcome of a system of finance capitalism in which debt at interest is money. That requires infinite inputs of money, energy, resources, and markets. Of those 4, only money can be made infinite on a finite planet, and that only by making it abstract. As energy, resources and markets become more difficult or expensive to come by, the amount of money has to increase, to keep the same result, as in an equation A x B x C x D = X. If B, C and/or D decrease, A has to increase to keep us getting X.

    The effects of increasing A (money, which is actually debt) are all around us. America has had to export wage-earning jobs to get the cost of manufactured goods low enough that people can afford them while providing the desired level of profit. Rather than raising the prices to provide gains to employees, manufacturers chose the race to the bottom to keep the profits while reducing the cost of manufacturing. Eventually, of course, nobody can afford the goods at any price.

    But since debt is money, “wealth” can still be accumulated by negative terms, by imposing more and more debt on an increasingly insolvent citizenry, who used to have jobs making things, which allowed them a net-positive net worth. Now as finance capitalism reaches its logical conclusion, a positive net worth is actually a negative to the overall economy. Infinite debt is worth more to the Elites than a small or zero net worth.

    Hillary and the rest are very intelligent and educated people, but are products of and worshippers of hierarchical authority systems. They come up with the logic and answers that they think will please authority figures. They literally cannot conceive of a system that is not like the current system. To do so would be to nullify everything they have believed and worked so hard to achieve. What is Hillary Clinton, or Jeb Bush, or any of these freaks, outside a finance capital system based on debt at interest as money? What can any of these people do? Nothing.

    Anytime people get too far into esoterica, eventually somebody says, “This is all bullshit.” At that point the bull session is over. In the current situation, too many of us have gone along for far too long and are so completely invested that it’s really hard to call BS on it and lose everything. But the amount of debt that has been created is at the point of saturation. Too many of us will never pay our debts, public or private. The liquidation of our estates won’t cover it. The losses cannot be put off forever, though that seems to be the current plan.

    Since this is an abstract system, we can just change the rules to prolong the pretense. We can do that forever, or just until a critical mass of people opt out, or until one of the inputs becomes unavailable (money, energy, resources, markets). Right now we’re seeing disruption in energy due to finance, not availability. A crisis in availability is coming, but only due to financial reasons. When the lack of abstract money keeps a society from taking useful, concrete measures, the cart is in front of the horse and collapse is inevitable in one form or another.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 10:22 am #

      Great post that really sums up our situation. The abstractness (which Greer points out all the time too) is the key point. The divorce of the entire system from concrete reality it what allows the subterfuge to work as well as it does, although as you say, it can’t go on levitating forever. I think the only remaining question is will the legal system survive intact to enforce private property rights once the economic system fails? More likely I think that we return to local feudal warlords who enforce property rights the old fashioned way. Brute force. The money, since it’s all abstract anyway, can be reconstituted locally as required.

      • swmnguy April 20, 2015 at 10:53 am #

        Frankly, I don’t see how any legal system could sort out property rights after the shared hallucination of our current financial system falls apart. The pen may be mightier than the sword, but the sword cuts right through paper.

      • MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 1:12 pm #

        “More likely I think that we return to local feudal warlords who enforce property rights the old fashioned way. Brute force. The money, since it’s all abstract anyway, can be reconstituted locally as required.”-d a.

        Imagine some pampered Roman *latifundia* journeying to provincial Dacia in the death-throes of the empire, to enforce his ‘lawful and ancestral’ claims to some huge swathe of land and chattel… What do you think would become of him?

        😉

        That’s the downside of not respecting the limits of Capitalism, but in point of fact ‘capitalism’ can’t help it.

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:30 pm #

          As Marx was quite fond of pointing out, Capitalism sows the seeds of its own destruction. We are living through the the proof of that observation. Smart guy, Marx.

    • And So It Goes April 20, 2015 at 1:15 pm #

      Very excellent post… You must be a teacher….

      • swmnguy April 22, 2015 at 3:04 pm #

        Nah. My parents were teachers. I somehow managed to drop out of middle school, high school, and college.
        At some point in my rebellious phase I noticed that most concepts were pretty straightforward, when stripped of jargon; and that most people are pretty intelligent and sensible regarding matters that are familiar to them. However, let “experts” cloak things in jargon, and present them to people as if they were beyond people’s ken, and people will believe in the most absurd things. So I’ve made it a study to find things that interest me, and try to break them down to more basic terms and strip away the non-essential complexities. When you do that, it seems people and our constructions aren’t all that hard to grasp.
        I sure drive my investment adviser crazy. My wife just smiles and nods. My kids’ eyes glaze over, but the reactions they get from their high school teachers are pretty funny; some of it seems to be sinking in.
        Thanks for the kind words.

  10. Cold N. Holefield April 20, 2015 at 10:15 am #

    It all started with Sears, Roebuck & Co. in1886. Increasingly from there on out, people ordered out what they formerly procured/created within and Globalism is an extension of that trend.

    The notion of free market that is bandied about by the propagandists in the media is a joke, or worse. In a truly free market, an impossibility obviously, aside for a few basic, simple rules the chips should be allowed to fall where they may. Instead, what may have been a relatively free market at one time is quickly gamed and usurped and the chips are gathered in a very few rather prodigious piles. And I dare anyone to try and get those chips without blowing the whole damn place up.

    Jim, if you don’t I will, but we need some coverage of the colossal clusterfuck that is the Affordable Care Act. It’s hardly affordable and it’s hardly care. It is a scam of the highest sort perpetrated to continue the failed health “insurance” model another decade or two at most, by using the uninsured as dupes/vessels to line the pockets of insurance executives.

    Policies procured through The Marketplace rather than through an employer are increasingly rejected by healthcare providers and these policies, subsidies and all, are not cheap. Increasingly, people who are forced to carry health insurance and do it through The Marketplace because they can get a subsidy are finding their policies are worthless because no, or hardly any, providers will accept their insurance.

    It looks like America is fast becoming as kleptocratic as Russia but with the polished veneer of Mad Men Marketing. Perhaps we all need to become golfers like Jordan Spieth — a shining example that it’s as good as it’s ever been in this shining city on the hill. All those yachts in Hilton Head this past weekend. From their perspective, things couldn’t be better.

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    • lsjogren April 20, 2015 at 10:24 am #

      A couple comments:

      1). Some sectors of the economy DO operate largely on market economics.

      1a). Other sectors do not (health care being one). Whether they COULD operate on a free market system is hard to judge since in my lifetime we have never had anything resembling a free market health care system. I suspect it is problematical, because the role of health care in the economy is far different than the role of discretionary consumer products.

      2). You point out the policy flaws of ACA, but there are even worse problems with it. It is run by idiots. I am enrolled in ACA and it has been a Kafakesque nightmare. I was signed up aid paid up for it in 2015, and for OVER TWO MONTHS my state exchange did not communicate to my provider (Kaiser) that I was enrolled. So the state exchange showed me enrolled in Kaiser, and Kaiser showed my coverage having expired Dec 31 of last year. Finally that got cleared up, now they are showing me late on my payments even though I have paid for April and May and even overpaid $170 for last year which I never got reimbursed for. They have great staffers when you call for help, the guy I talked to immediately confirmed the above two facts, and yet when they set up a ticket to resolve such problems, they seem to go into a black hole and take weeks or months to resolve. In the meantime I am concerned I will be bounced from my coverage because of their accounting screwups.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 10:40 am #

      I’ve come to the conclusion that the ACA was just another ploy to expand the health insurance racket so that it could be used as a “market driven” rationing device to deny care to all but the richest among us. The secondary, and also quite considerable benefit being of course that it allowed the financial industry to bankrupt them in the process. The fact that the ACA was, and continues to be, presented as actual “socialized medicine,” with government “death panels” appointed to decide whether people lived or died was when I finally got it. Americans will still accept untold amounts of criminally insane bullshit when it’s gussied up as a “market based solution” that they’d never sit still for an instant for if it was sold as a “government entitlement.” Go figure. I think most imagine that it will never happen to them, but until it does, they just want to take pleasure in the misery of the mythical “others” who are leeching off the system.

      • swmnguy April 20, 2015 at 10:59 am #

        ACA is just a bailout for the healthcare/finance complex. They had priced themselves out of the range of a critical mass of employers and citizens, so the costs had to be socialized through premium subsidies, while the profits remain privatized. Any actual reform would have been something like opening Medicare to everyone. But instead the priority of ACA is to get everyone onto private insurance, regardless of ability to pay, with the shortfalls made up for by the government.

        And yes, it is just another debt-mining exercise. The policies available nowadays contain huge gaps in coverage that in the event of a serious health crisis, convert a patient into a debt reservoir to be extracted at will, just as the humans in “The Matrix” movies were actually hooked up to energy extraction devices.

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 1:11 pm #

          Credit where credit is due: we’ve hit the trifecta with ACA. The perfect wealth funneling machine, it denies care at every turn to its beneficiaries, strips them of whatever spare cash they may have had in the process, and is so mind-numbingly complex to decipher that even in the aftermath its marks remain largely clueless as to what happened to them.

          • DA April 20, 2015 at 2:57 pm #

            And all delivered by a nominally Democratic administration no less! Makes my head spin to think about it.

        • MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 1:21 pm #

          “ACA is just a bailout for the healthcare/finance complex.”-swmn.

          Precisely. The HMO business-model was in dead-man-walking territory in an era of shrinking payrolls and disappearing employer-assisted health benefits. ACA was the only thing that they could have done to keep the party going a little longer.

      • Ussi April 20, 2015 at 10:59 am #

        Ha, Western occupation of the Middle East is an immeasurable huge subsidy to fossil fuels.

        Another immeasurably huge subsidy to dirty energy is the environmental damage and climate change costs We pay.

        Federal and State subsidies to fossils fuels are 10s of billions of dollars per year:

        http://priceofoil.org/2014/07/09/cashing-in-on-all-of-the-above-u-s-fossil-fuel-production-subsidies-under-obama/

      • sharonsj April 20, 2015 at 5:44 pm #

        I disagree. Most people do not think the words “market-based solution” when they read or hear the news. Most people don’t think. They don’t want to know either. Having spent years specifically reading right-wing sites, I can tell you at least 25% of conservatives are simply looney tunes. And the percentage rises the further out the site is (Glen Beck’s is a prime example).

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:41 pm #

          You’re right. They don’t think those words in particular and they don’t really “think” either. But they do believe in the concept, whether they know it or not, having been conditioned to believe it their whole lives with every waking breath. American Capitalism, just like Soviet Communism before it was portrayed so effectively to us, is effectively the very air that you breathe. That’s the meaning of “paradigm” which few fully comprehend. A belief that’s so obviously self-evident that it’s never questioned in the least in the first place. A belief so true that it effectively IS you and you are it!

          Believe me I know. I experience it every time I talk to my aging mother or converse with my other relatives via email back in the midwest every other week or so.

  11. lsjogren April 20, 2015 at 10:16 am #

    “The prospect of another Clinton – Bush election contest is a perfect setup for the collapse of the two parties sponsoring them, ushering in a period of wild political turmoil. ”

    No doubt there would be turmoil, but the collapse of the two parties is one prerequisite to any hope for change in this country.

    • Smoky Joe April 20, 2015 at 10:23 am #

      Joseph Schumpter was onto a Big Idea when he wrote about disruption and creative destruction of industries.

      How hilarious it is that the very proponents of free-for-all capitalism protect their leash-holders: big banks, firearms makers, and fossil-fuel dinosaurs.

      They are all ripe for some creative destruction.

      • lsjogren April 20, 2015 at 10:34 am #

        Too glib. First of all, the main reason our banking system is not free market is that our whole monetary system is a quasi-governmental cartel, the Federal Reserve System.

        And it is the right wing free market types, the advocates of “Austrian” economics, who are about the only critics of that system.

        Secondly, the government does little to favor fossil fuels. They get some modest subsidies that are granted to manufacturers. People might ask, why don’t they just voluntarily give those up, if they don’t amount to a hill of beans? I believe the answer is that they are unwilling to validate the role that the left wishes for them- to be the boogieman and whipping boy of the business community.

        Firearms makers, what do they get? Perhaps you are referring to the fact that firearms are easy for an ordinary citizen to buy. And this is due to the fact that a large portion of the American public feels strongly that individual citizens should have the right to own firearms. Why did the Democratic Party abandon gun control in the 1990s? Because it was hurting the party’s prospects of winning elections. And why do so many Americans want to own guys? I would say that has its basis primarily in culture and history. I sincerely doubt that the reason Americans want guns is that they want the firearm industry to make more profits.

        • lsjogren April 20, 2015 at 10:35 am #

          whoops, “want to own guys” lol, obviously a typo

          • elysianfield April 20, 2015 at 4:32 pm #

            Christ, I hope it is a typo…we tried that already, and it is not working out so well….

        • Ussi April 20, 2015 at 12:43 pm #

          Ha, Western occupation of the Middle East is an immeasurable huge subsidy to fossil fuels.

          Another immeasurably huge subsidy to dirty energy is the environmental damage and climate change costs We pay.

          Federal and State subsidies to fossils fuels are 10s of billions of dollars per year:

          http://priceofoil.org/2014/07/09/cashing-in-on-all-of-the-above-u-s-fossil-fuel-production-subsidies-under-obama/

        • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 5:07 pm #

          By “quasi-government cartel” do you mean a system in which the government gets the liabilities and the quasi gets the assets?

  12. K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 10:25 am #

    “the American thinking classes are lost in raptures of techno-wishfulness…”

    Not really, for those who really think know better. Those who masquerade as having a big brain are lost in dreams of techno-narcissism and sugar plum fairies and while it is true that PHD s in mathematics are given out to those who can’t appreciate the simplest of exponential functions yet still there is intelligent life on planet earth. Sadly though, not very much of it. It is like the gene for red hair, only about 2% of the population have a thinking brain.

    Our current living arrangement has no future and those ensconced in American politics have no alternatives with which to threaten or cajole our recalcitrant masses towards a future with a future. This will not change in the weeks and months ahead and a savior will not arise. Fascism Lite only allows for positive thinking, and an unquestioned belief in growth and prosperity. Mediocrity is encouraged under the system; our system. Anything else is a thought crime an unsanctioned thoughts can and will bring on bad luck to dissidents.

    Dissidents, thats another word for the thinking classes.

    • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 1:16 pm #

      “PHD s in mathematics are given out to those who can’t appreciate the simplest of exponential functions”

      K, I often agree with your posts, so I hope that you meant that in jest. If not, you should know that mathematicians are about your only allies.

      Exponential functions should be taught in the first calculus course, certainly by the second. That is, first year. Mathematicians first learn a lot of mathematics, then they actively create more – creating new mathematics is a requirement for the Ph.D.

      It might interest you to learn that every year of graduate study in mathematics encompasses more than a 4 year degree program. It is very hard – 50-90 solid hours of solid concentration every week. Try solid concentration on calculus for the next 8 hours and see how you fare.

      Do not confuse mathematicians with those who can’t even make it to the wanna-be level, i.e. economists, or those who learn to cheat on some of the easier forms, i.e. typical physicists. Mathematicians are highly abstract thinkers, and they often do not turn to easier topics until they get old.

      If you want an expert opinion on damn near anything, turn to a second rate mathematician (or an old one) who takes an interest in that topic. That person will not be confused by the misuse or intentional abuse of mathematics which is so common in our world.

      Those who abuse mathematics are your legitimate target. Mathematicians are your allies, so you should not abuse them.

      • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 2:31 pm #

        Your praise of mathematicians is admirable but note that any comparison of mathematicians and economists is insulting. Insulting to the mathematicians. Calling economists wanna-be is too kind for them and having them devine the future using animal entrails would be more honest than their use of the mathematical tools they abuse.

        Hows about we assess the ratio of mirth to seriosness concerning my remark about PHD mathematicians at 49.005647 %.

        • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 3:20 pm #

          K, on re-reading my post I realize that it is ambiguous. I meant to say that economists were unable to rise to the level of wanna-be’s.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:08 pm #

      Only 2% can think, huh? Why that’s harsh even by my standards. Now let’s unpack that and see what it means. First of all it means Democracy is out completely, right? Right? Then go see who those 2% are and I’m sure you will see very few dark faces. Thus Republicanism and White Nationalism are vindicated. Put the two together and you have Fascism. Hail Victory, Comrade.

      • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 3:13 pm #

        I almost agree with you, Janos, but not quite.

        Certainly democracy has failed. An authoritarian government is the only hope as resources dry up, because the alternatives are worse.

        I further agree that most can’t think outside their professional sphere – it’s hard, it requires study, and that leaves out most people. How many have studied symbolic logic and rhetoric in these times? Damn few, and they’re all dead.

        Where we seem to differ is on the role of race. I think that racial differences are largely social, while you seem to think that they are matters of DNA. Am I correct in this?

        • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 6:01 pm #

          Yes. Where on Earth did you get the idea the races were intellectually equal? No other civilization believes it – certainly not the Arabs who have had long experience with Blacks. And in both testing and the American classroom, they have come out on the bottom for a hundred years.

          They have culture free tests – same thing. They have created tests using Black culture words and images, same thing. In short, nothing is more established than the inequality of IQ. The Boasian School of Anthropoloy were Communists of the same ethnic group who runs the Media – so of course they came out on top (this is where you got this crazy idea). But real Psychometricians (unlike Stephen Jay Gould) have fought back: a couple of decades ago they even took out an ad in th NY Times stating the Truth and signed it.

          • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 7:08 pm #

            Janos, no-one disputes that there are differences between nationalities and differences between races. The question is, first, whether these differences are innate (in the DNA) or cultural, and second, whether these differences are meaningful.

            I suspect that differences are not innate, that they are mainly cultural, and that this may be the result of different DNA expression based on environment. Further, based on the virtual identity of DNA among all humans, I suspect that remaining differences are not meaningful; for example, the highest Neanderthal DNA component I know of is in a highly talented artist who taught university science and mathematics.

          • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 2:28 pm #

            You are trying to have it both ways methinks. DNA means genetic. Sure the Environment played a factor in selecting for High IQ over the ages – we’ve never said otherwise. That’s why Northern People are far more intelligent than the ones who never left Africa or the ones who hugged the Indian coast as they went Eastwards (Australoids). And yes, the most intelligent peoples – Whites, Jews, Northeast Asians all have the most Neanderthal Blood – the preeminent Northern People, who survived the Ice Age in the North. Black Africans have no such blood and their accomplishments are nil.

            I hope you aren’t trying to suggest that if you take Blacks out of the tropics they suddenly become like us in a generation or two. Nature isn’t that quick. And they show no signs of changing. But try the reverse: put Icelanders in Haiti and they would turn it into a garden paradise. Put Haitians in Iceland and they would all be dead in a few decades. It’s not the Jungle per se that dooms men – look at what the Cambodians achieved. It’s just that the tropics didn’t challenge men to change. And no, the Blacks were no more “isolated” (as if men can’t achieve on their own) than anybody else. Many Blacks lived near the Egyptians and the Arabs – and those are the ones who got ahead because of that. Not on their own merits in other words – they simply took what was given them. Blacks can innovate in music of course – there they are their own men. And they are physically gifted. Funny how they don’t need affirmative action there and why it isn’t offered to Whites and Asians.

      • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 9:10 pm #

        You have standards?

        I’ll stick with 2% though a higher percentage can play follow the leader rather creatively. But original thought is as rare as a good hair day for John Kerry.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 2:32 pm #

          A cheap shot because you have no answer to my challenge. By Leftist standards you are now a monster. Equality means believing IQ doesn’t exist or matter.

  13. newworld April 20, 2015 at 10:33 am #

    Sorry folks it will get worse before your utopias come to fruition. This weekend Drudge had a link to an article by the Pew Charitable Trust about the fastest growing areas of America and that would be the exurbs, not the cities, not the suburbs but bucolic and safe country living in the exurbs.

    In the “far right” Liberty movement there is a strong plurality for Hillary Clinton for obvious reasons, she will destroy the trust in government that even another retarded Bush won’t be able to accomplish.

    I don’t think O’Malley will do much more than be Not Clinton to the D party voters, and that might be enough. But coming from the fringes of society to represent the fringes against the center I’m not sure America can tolerate much more of that. Maybe another 4 to 8 years of sideshow politics of distractions like gay marriage, racist politics (kind of like German anti-semetism) is possible but I don’t see much of a historical example to support this.

  14. newworld April 20, 2015 at 10:43 am #

    Americans are provincial, which means we cannot see that this country has become a Third World Country. The left makes too many short term compromises to power, the right too baffled by BS and the refusal to believe we ain’t number one.

    In my lifetime California was it, it was the state of the white workingman’s utopia the fusion of all the things that worked in every sector. First in about every meaningful positive category, take education 1st then amongst states now 49th and not last simply because in MS the black to white test gap is so huge in that state. But there it is California is Mexico Norte, wealthy oligarchs, small overly comfortable state sector and increasing poverty for the rest, Third World.

    • newworld April 20, 2015 at 10:52 am #

      I came to the above conclusion after a visit to South Africa in 2013. Sure I would rather live here for a number of reasons, but honestly after seeing another country that by all measures would be called “Developing” you can see that America is breaking down rapidly from its sugar buzz.

      In the RSA I found the major roads better, the semis on the road were light years better maintained and newer than the rolling wrecks we allow on our roads, the cell phone system is better where I was. Yes there was poverty and the usual crime associated with it, but for whatever reasons you could still find public accomodations next to such poverty such as a perfectly kept up gas station next to a shanty town.

      America is becoming a Ferguson, MO. with pockets of gated communities from which the grandees spit their venom.

      • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:23 pm #

        America is becoming a Ferguson, MO. with pockets of gated communities from which the grandees spit their venom.

        Yep. Probably the most pointed and unfortunate lesson from last summer’s “festivities.”

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 1:13 pm #

      I think the “left” has long since quit “making compromises with power” in favor of just climbing all the way into bed with them. Any “true” left has long since been completely marginalized and bankrupted.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:13 pm #

        And Bob Avakian is still looking off into space, infinitely noble and hunted. In reality, the Government lost interest in him years ago. He remains inaccessible to keep the myth about himself alive to his gullible followers. He could hardly live up to it at this point. Just a fat guy who likes eating at KFC and watching porn.

  15. saharasergei April 20, 2015 at 10:59 am #

    I want Martin O’Malley to run – I’M advocating for him. There are only two ways to defeat the Clinton machine. One way is with conventional means, which would take too long and probably hurt some people, and the other way is for an opponent to perpetrate a really, really stupid gesture.

    And O’Malley is just the guy to do it.

    TOGA PARTY! TOGA PARTY! 😀

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  16. Greg Knepp April 20, 2015 at 11:07 am #

    I don’t know about that; I’m older than Jim Kunstler – at least by a couple of years – and I don’t feel any such ‘approaching mortality’. No, I think the author’s viewpoint has been fairly consistent over time.

  17. peakfuture April 20, 2015 at 11:08 am #

    The word ‘disruption’ is a bit double (or even multi!)-edged; it can take a few forms – one is the high-tech sort of disruption (CHS wrote about this yesterday http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2015/04/disrupt-or-be-disrupted.html ), low-tech ones (running out of cheap fuels, ethnic strife, war), or non-technical ones (governments refusing to pay bondholders, changes in tax codes or legal rulings).

    K-dog – I’m always curious how and *why* the 2% (those who think) are who they are. My own trial balloon on this idea (posted this week) is that those who live on the edge of regular society are *forced* to pay attention, like animals at the edge of a herd.

    If things are going well for you, perhaps there isn’t much incentive to rock the boat, or to think differently. The mantra, “Don’t get to comfortable,” may be said in jest, but perhaps it is a good guidepost to survival.

    • K-Dog April 20, 2015 at 9:33 pm #

      Your theory makes sense but what comes first? Thinkers by nature are already on a razors edge. A dog chases its tail here.

      As most everyone tries to ‘fit in’ no matter what toll it takes on their mentation perhaps one has to feel they don’t fit into regular society for their minds to be free enough to escape the confining and censoring box of social correctness enough to think outside of it.
      One also has to have courage to be wrong and face up to their own limits and foibles. That all by itself puts thinkers in a small minority as looking at the man in the mirror can be hard to do.

      Most of what we think of as original is really a remix of other ideas adapted to particular circumstances. A fact of life I actually observed on my own some years ago!

  18. PeteAtomic April 20, 2015 at 11:23 am #

    I certainly wanna believe that there are, as Kunstler points out, a possible “force in the shadows” (paraphrasing) as counterpoint to the 2 party political machinery– but what is/would that force be? The only groups of people out there who seem motivated enough at the moment are the so-called “patriot” groups scattered here or there. I don’t see much of the American intelligentsia, media, or military calling for the types of reformation needed. So, this points to a populist, revolutionary movement that must arise. I’m not sure what these “patriot” groups stand for exactly, they seem to have various, sundry motivations– and not all of them democratic in mind. I’m all for populist revolutionaries, as long as they have the Bill of Rights & Constitution as the central philosophy, not Mein Kampf, or Mao’s Red Book.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 10:33 pm #

      There are no realistic “forces in the shadows” at this point (that wouldn’t themselves be benevolent anyway) out there to save us. We’ve long since passed the point of complexity at where such naive hopes could ever hope to save us. At this point, intellectual, philosophical, and organizational constructs and the like are the least of our problems. Our own human nature is what’s betraying us now; or, as the old saying goes, “we have met the enemy and he is us.” Wanna believe in someone or something? Get your mind right and believe in YOURSELF!

  19. Jeremy April 20, 2015 at 11:25 am #

    Ponzi Man gets it.
    Just brilliant!

    http://ponziworld.blogspot.co.uk

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 11:43 am #

      Nice link.

  20. peakfuture April 20, 2015 at 11:45 am #

    Jeremy – yes – great post there on ponziworld.

    The comment:

    “This cycle will only be broken when this species gets tattooed with a lesson that sticks. A sense of foreboding humility passed down from one generation to the next.

    That lesson is coming.”

    … is great. But will the tattoo not fade over time? It might take branding, or something so spectacular (like a scar on the surface of the moon) for humanity to be aware.

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  21. wayfarer April 20, 2015 at 12:15 pm #

    Thanks! Always have to read Kunstler for his outside the box thinking on the future which is a very difficult thing to get right.

  22. wpa_ccc April 20, 2015 at 12:45 pm #

    orbit7er: “People are sick of both sellout Corporatist parties in the US and are ready for a true alternative…”

    Nice post, orbit7er. If only 27% of voters in the two major parties decide to vote Green Party, then the Green Party will win.

    The only way I see the Green Party losing the 2016 election is if people vote for the Democrats or Republicans instead of Green Party.

    I thank you for your service. The Green Party is indeed a worthy alternative to the two major corporatist parties. They confront Obama and offer an alternative to Obama’s policies. It is easy to gripe about problems. Green Party is offering solutions with a great platform.

    I will give The Green Party serious consideration, especially if Jill Stein decides to run again. I like her. She walks her talk.

    • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 2:57 pm #

      A corollary to your comment is that a vote for R or D is a vote for the two party system, which is to be part of the problem.

      In 2012 we saw a candidate who was too far in front of what should have been a non-alternative alternative. The result was open discussion of third party voting. Well, that would never do!

      Does anyone recall the first debate? And the subsequent narrowing of the margin? And subsequent lack of interest in a third party? An accident?

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:22 pm #

      I know it sounds like pure negativism, but a third party candidate simply has NO CHANCE under the current system. It would be nice if they did, but let’s face facts: if they can’t even get invited to the televised debates what chance do they have? Most people won’t even know they exist. Things will have to get a good deal worse before third party candidates will be a realistic option, and at that point even more extreme options will likely be on the table as well.

  23. volodya April 20, 2015 at 12:54 pm #

    PeteAtomic,

    You’re right, revolutionary movements have a gestation period. They don’t just suddenly appear. People say, ooh, ISIS, what’s this? But ISIS didn’t come out of nowhere.

    Everything is obvious in retrospect. People don’t see things coming, people never have. Was anything obvious to people in 1860 or 1913? I doubt it. But, to get a clue, maybe the trick, as Orwell might put it, is for us to look right under our noses.

    A lot of people make a big deal about the dysfunction in Washington. But a large element of the “dysfunction” is, IMO, just theater. In fact there’s pretty good agreement on a number of important issues, mainly that there will be gigantic expenditures on defense and social security, but that there will be insufficient taxation to pay for it. Another is that there will be offshoring of productive capacity to low wage parts of the world with the consequent gutting of the American middle class.

    Washington politicians may go through the motions but the all play-acting, all the fakery with the homey accents and the outrage and the thundering denunciations, masks real division in the societies the politicians supposedly represent.

    Politicians play to the crowd. From south of the Mason-Dixon Line politicians adopt the mantle of pious, righteous, God-Fearing patriots. They salute the flag, they pray to the Lord for guidance. That’s what the electorate wants, that’s what the electorate gets. From the north they adopt the pose of progressive intellectuals, all well-meaning concern for the rights of women and gays and the historic plight of blacks.

    The thing is, the division isn’t make-believe. It has historic roots with the south and north of the country having different founding groups, with differing economic interests and values. And, lest we forget, a war was fought over this. It hasn’t gone away, there’s real loathing.

    If you want my opinion, the place to look is right there. For while a large element of dysfunction in Washington is glorified professional wrestling, a lot of dysfunction isn’t. Not for nothing are central banks selling logical pretzels, that is, trying to convince themselves and us that there really is such a thing as a free lunch. Well, sorry, but there isn’t. Never has been and all the pseudo-scientific mumbo jumbo emanating from the Eccles Building won’t change that fundamental fact of financial gravity.

    The fact is that the country is sitting on an 18 trillion dollar financial time bomb, and notwithstanding Krugman’s bleating that debt doesn’t matter, debt DOES matter. There’s a multitude of people from different countries that will tell you.

    We’ll learn this, the way we usually learn things, you know, the hard way. When the federal government loses the ability to exert its authority, when its reach doesn’t um, reach, to all parts of the country, that’s when you’ll see the crack up start.

    I doubt this will be an antiseptic process with reason and good sense prevailing. And I don’t think it won’t be as “simple” as just a north-south split. But, that geographic and cultural division being a most obvious fracture line, maybe that’s the place to start looking.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 1:23 pm #

      Debt does matter because the interest on it will eventually be defaulted on and/or used as an excuse to eliminate the social safety net entirely, thereby handing even more money to the Federal Reserve banking cartel. But it could be eliminated simply with the stroke of a pen by eliminating the Fed and having the US Treasury issue debt free currency in its place to pay off the “debt” to bondholders. No, that will never happen, for obvious reasons. But it’s important to at least realize that such a thing is indeed possible, and that the only thing preventing it is our own ignorance and lack of political backbone.

      • elysianfield April 20, 2015 at 4:43 pm #

        US Treasury Notes…Been done, back in the early 60’s by that Kennedy guy….wonder whatever happened to him?

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:13 pm #

          Good point.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:17 pm #

      Remember, the most radical plan for wealth distribution in American History was put forward by Huey Long, a genuine American National Socialist. He was assassinated by a Jewish dentist. It wouldn’t work today in the South, but people down there were once more open minded and much less dumbed down by the Military Industrial Jesus Complex.

      • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:15 pm #

        Thanks for the reminder. Huey Long was indeed “a man for his times.” Imagine a firebrand like that taking on Wall St and the eastern interests today! Even BillHillary and HillBillary had the good sense to shift their allegiances to NY once they became “big time.” Think that’s why HillBillary is the odds-on favorite in the 2016 Prez race? Hmm…

        • elysianfield April 20, 2015 at 9:19 pm #

          I remember stories of Huey Long…a real populist…wonder what happened to him?

    • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 2:47 pm #

      Agreed V.

      While conventional economics argues that debt does not matter, that is only true under assumptions of an exponentially increasing resource base. In that case, as pertained a century ago, increased debt can be paid by increased production (aka “economic growth”).

      Of course, far from exponentially increasing resources, we need to cook the books to appear to show no increase (or decrease) at all. So yes, debt does matter, and it will eventually hurt very badly.

      As for fiscal imbalance, that does not matter, as Keynes showed, but only if spending in the bad times is paid for by saving in the good times. The caveat is always ignored (which may be a precondition for a Bank of Sweden award).

      Again, fiscal imbalance matters, not intrinsically, but because of our broken institutions. These institutions are so far from touching reality that I prefer to regard them as religious in nature, but without the spiritual component that would be their only redeeming feature.

      • Ussi April 22, 2015 at 9:16 am #

        Debt does matter, but not in the way most people think.

        The petrodollar is the world’s reserve currency. As long as that persists it’s value can be artificially manipulated and maintained to a great degree.

        The US is also a monetary sovereign. It prints money out of thin air so doesn’t not have the constraints that households have. Yes, causing inflation is a constraint – BUT, that only happens when money supply outstrips productive capacity.

        US deficit hawks do not have a basis in reality to stand on. Yes, QE to infinity will cause another crash but that the corrupt to the core system is throwing good money after bad which warps price discovery.

        This is not inflation, it is predatory capitalism self destruction.

        For anyone interest in macroeconomic reality, learning about Modern Monetary Theory is well worth while.

  24. MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 12:54 pm #

    It seems that Mr. Kunstler had his dander up when he wrote today’s tender missive – and that seems to enhance the quality of his work. Today’s offering – on the significant-for-various reasons date of “4-20” is nice and tight, right through to the end,

    “That’s the only thing that will prompt a new consensus to form around some alternate, more plausible future, and the emergence of a generation willing to fight for it, even if it requires some real creative destruction of the things that are killing us anyway.”-J H K.

    And therein lies the rub, the difference between the survivors/_Winners_ and the casualties/_Losers_ in this world is slim. It simply comes down to whether the affected party *recognizes* that they have nothing to lose and *does* something about it, before they have no way to…

    😉

    • ozone April 20, 2015 at 5:27 pm #

      MD,
      You sez:
      “… the difference between the survivors/_Winners_ and the casualties/_Losers_ in this world is slim. It simply comes down to whether the affected party *recognizes* that they have nothing to lose and *does* something about it, before they have no way to…”

      Yep, recognition of the extreme narrowness of “options”, a boatload of luck and an “unwanted” but well-watered locale.
      Stay nimble!

  25. MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 1:17 pm #

    “I can’t help but think that the ever-increasing bleakness of Mr. Kunstler’s prognosis for the future is somehow tied to his rapidly approaching mortality”-re.

    I have yet to meet the person truly *ready* to face the Last Act – but then again, no virgin is ready for the actual event either, so let’s not be too harsh.

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    • RocketDoc April 20, 2015 at 3:50 pm #

      This virgin thing is interesting. If every martyr gets 5,10,20,70 (I forget) then where do they come from? Few women are virgins although all were. Why do they have to be virgin–why not just–attentive or cute? I don’t think the numbers work. You would have to kill a lot of 9-year olds to get them into heaven and they would have to “grow up” there. Perhaps heaven has its own rules. The same 70 girls are reworked for every martyr. A lobotomy to forget the last experience and a new hymen. It is embarrassing to have virginity associated with heaven. Have I missed a memo that categorically denies this? Why does Christianity go for streets paved with gold and Islam for virgins? So Kunstler’s getting old–Age gelds a man. Perhaps we don’t want to go to heaven with our current level of “capability”. By definition, heaven is better than here but it is so “not here” one can hardly wish for it.

      • Greg Knepp April 20, 2015 at 5:23 pm #

        “Age gelds a man”?… My girlfriend would beg to differ.

        Where do you young fuckers get this shit?

      • HowardBeale April 20, 2015 at 7:33 pm #

        “You would have to kill a lot of 9-year olds to get them into heaven and they would have to “grow up” there.”

        We’re talking Islam. No aging needed–or tolerated. And that’s why “cute” isn’t sufficient…

      • swmnguy April 22, 2015 at 3:09 pm #

        This reminds me of the old explanation for why Christ wasn’t born in Wisconsin. Try as they might, they couldn’t find 3 Wise Men or a Virgin.

        I’m not sure Age gelds a man. As I get older, though, I find that younger girls perceive me as some sort of asexual being. That’s not the same thing, though. And, curiously, I find very young women less and less sexually attractive. Beautiful, sure. Sexy, you bet. But coltish and awkward and not intended for me, and therefore not interesting in that way. Let the young guys who are equally immature have them; that’s how it’s supposed to be anyway. Romeo was just fine for Juliet. And when I was 15, she would have been fine for me. But as a 48 year-old; well, I already have teenaged kids. Last damned thing in the world I need is another, and a sexual complication would be the absolute topper.

  26. passerby April 20, 2015 at 1:20 pm #

    You say the USA has suffered mightily from globalism. I’d say the average American has suffered from imperialism.

    In the ancient Roman empire, grain from the provinces was sent to Rome as tribute payments. The small Roman farmer was unable to compete with the imported grain, and had a hard time making ends meet.

    The US empire is wherever people accept dollars as payment. As long as other countries accept dollars, it is a simple matter of Washington printing dollars, and foreign countries sending goods to the US in return. The American worker is unable to compete with the imported goods, and has a hard time making ends meet.

    We all know how that ended for the Romans.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 1:29 pm #

      Globalism is effectively the highest form of imperialism we’ve yet devised. And it shelters itself under the guise of “free capital markets” and other such misleading terms. Free to be exploited by large multinational predators, yes. Even the US government is ultimately expendable, as we’re seeing gradually unfold every day now. She’s still got a bit of life in her yet, but when she no longer does, no worries, the globalists will move on and do just fine either way.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:19 pm #

        Yes, and mass immigration to replace free native labor is an integral part it, both now and back in Rome.

        A Free Society is one with armed borders.

    • MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 2:10 pm #

      “In the ancient Roman empire, grain from the provinces was sent to Rome as tribute payments. The small Roman farmer was unable to compete with the imported grain, and had a hard time making ends meet.”-passer.

      And that that’s how the latifundia-owners consolidate small-holdings, became the agri-business and moneylending wealth concentrators of their day, and ripened the empire for disintegration… Yes, there are parallels. We just don’t hear about them much because the outcome of that fiasco isn’t sufficiently uplifting to the wealth concentrators of our empire.

  27. capt spaulding April 20, 2015 at 1:27 pm #

    This not about this week’s topic, but it struck me as worth a comment. I heard on the news that there were 10,000 illegal immigrants going to Italy last week. It’s pretty weird, because I remember reading a book about this very activity. The immigrants were from India, and they were going to France aboard rusty old freighters and beaching them on the Riviera. Turns out that it’s a pretty prophetic book. It’s called The Camp Of The Saints, written in 1973 by Jean Raspail. People on all sides of this issue have fought over the book for years, but apparently Raspail could see the future. Some call the book racist, and others call it prophetic. Whichever way you feel, I think it’s worth a read in light of what’s happened in the last few weeks. It would be interesting to hear people’s opinion on the book. In regards to JHK’s latest article I agree with him completely. It puts me in mind of a quote. “The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicsm by those who do not have it.”

    • Jeremy April 20, 2015 at 2:05 pm #

      Correctly described here as “climate refugees”.
      And notwithstanding the fact they are flooding in from Yemen and Libya – countries we have destroyed.

      http://www.dailyimpact.net/2015/04/20/time-what-you-dont-need-to-know-about-refugees/

      • malthuss April 20, 2015 at 3:40 pm #

        ‘Climate Refugees’????bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

        When people pass thru several countries to get to their destination they are seeking economic benefits from host country.
        they are not ‘refugees’.
        sorry–it dont fly.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:25 pm #

      Yes, Raspail went down to the beach one day and they were “there” – he could see them in his mind. A spiritual experience. Let’s hope he was wrong about Europe laying down and dying because that’s what accepting these people means. 170,000 of them last year alone in Italy. Catastrophic.

      The boats must be turned back – or sunk if it comes to that. The refugees already there must be deported – with or without the approval of North Africa. They let them through so Italy has the right to dump them right back. Once people see the Party is over, they will stop coming. Until then, it is war.

      As Orianna Fallaci said, this is the biggest story our times yet no one would cover it. Same thing here in America with the Central Americans. No coincidence but a Globalist Plot.

      • BackRowHeckler April 20, 2015 at 7:37 pm #

        Dude, the Camp of the Saints is already well established, here and in Europe.

        The only thing left to do now is wait for the USAF fighters to come for you, piloted by Mustafa, Raoul, and Ramon.

        brh

        • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 10:58 pm #

          That’s the response I expect from Republicans. After decades of saying nothing was happening, or that the influx was small and manageable, didn’t matter, or even that it was good for business – you finally jump and say it’s terrible, inevitable, and nothing can be done about it.

          You people skipped the middle part, the part where you recognize a problem and solve it. THAT’S why America is doomed. Yes, a good trick indeed. But guess what? You still aren’t absolved of responsibility: just because America is doomed doesn’t mean White Americans are. The soul of America still lives in its people, its real people that is.

  28. Q. Shtik April 20, 2015 at 1:48 pm #

    Which is why I voted for her for President in 2012. – RUSS

    ================

    And you see how far that has gotten you and Dr. Stein.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:27 pm #

      Yes, you don’t want to waste your vote. Only vote for someone who has a real chance of winning – and that means voting for someone in the Party, either branch is fine.

      • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 3:26 pm #

        Well said, Janos.

    • russ April 20, 2015 at 4:12 pm #

      Yeah. Missed my chance to vote for a blood sucking venture capitalist, or a lying “hopey-changey” tool. Gosh darn.

      I am not going to vote for the lesser of two evils.

      I may vote for the lessor of two evils because that’s where the money is.

      And why vote for the lesser of two evils? If you’re going to vote for evil, don’t waste your vote on ninnies like Obama and “my dog rides on top” idiots like Romney.

      Vote for real evil. I’m holding out for a run by Cthulhu.

  29. claireboothloose April 20, 2015 at 1:48 pm #

    If you ask me, Greece would be better off telling them to shove it.

    • MisterDarling April 20, 2015 at 2:15 pm #

      They are in the process of doing precisely that;

      http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-18/greek-white-knight-emerges-putin-give-athens-%E2%82%AC5-billion-advance-gas-pipeline-fees

      • Janos Skorenzy April 20, 2015 at 2:31 pm #

        The Golden Dawn would tell the EU to shove it – and drive the Internationalists and Immigrants out. The whole package.

      • ozone April 20, 2015 at 5:36 pm #

        MD,
        I like the ending portion of that article:

        “Finally, for those confused about the flow of funds, here it is:

        Russia (Gazprom) gives Greece money, which Greece uses to repay the IMF, which uses the Greek money to fund a loan to Kiev, which uses the IMF loan to pay Russia (Gazprom).

        A perfect circle.”

        Yikes! Must be some of those dreaded “Thinkers” in ol’ Russkieland. 😉

  30. toktomi April 20, 2015 at 2:21 pm #

    Any discussion of the hypothetical merits of the 2016 U.S. presidential election only lends legitimacy to a completely illegitimate event.

    Please, ignore it. From this day forward refuse to discuss it anywhere or with anybody.

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    • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 3:32 pm #

      Are you sure that you aren’t confusing elections and the Two Party System? The two are not identical, nor even similar.

      When intelligent people fail to vote, democracy has indeed failed. As here we see.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 8:11 pm #

      Yep. I think that might be the best advice.

  31. RB April 20, 2015 at 4:05 pm #

    I am older than Mr. Kunstler and well remember the “good old days”. Bah! Screw mom and pop stores with their gouging prices and one choice to choose from. Screw the communities where a handful of families controlled the wealth, the politics and everything else. If you were black, fuhgettaboutit. The well off bitched about the government then while they took huge amounts of cash from the government for their farms. White collar welfare. Cops were assholes then too. Oh, and the upper classes bad mouthed government but were terribly happy when the government required power and phone lines to go out into the boonies. The lovely thing now is that many of these privileged families are dead broke, bankrupt and politically powerless. Yes, the train used to stop in ******ville and you could board it and off you went. At least that is what the poor folks did. The well heeled drove their packards and such where they wanted. The screw turns and it is turning now. It is fascinating to watch the cycle of change. The Mexicans are taking the southwest USA. The blacks are going to own the cities elsewhere. The Jews will continue to own the banks and the entertainment industry. The young folks will continue to believe that a college degree is the key to paradise. Old folks, like me, will continue to drain the treasury and not give a shit who else suffers because of it. Yep, this sucka is coming down but there will be no trains to run again and no seeds to plant even if you know how. Hopefully there will be enough bulldozers to prepare mass graves.

    Cheers to all.

    • sauerkraut April 20, 2015 at 4:19 pm #

      “Cheers to all.”

      Very nice.

    • ozone April 20, 2015 at 5:41 pm #

      One small quibble, RB…
      A large excavator would be handier (not to mention, much faster) for digging mass graves; bulldozer best for filling ’em in.

      Here’s to your health!

      • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 12:48 am #

        RB- are you new here?
        Thats quite a ‘stream of consciousness’ view of yday and tomorrow.

        Where didya grow up?

        The old days were better, before feminism and endless leftist propaganda. Before school had to be taught in 130 languages.
        Before legal infanticide.
        Before the Clintons and Bushes.

        get the pic?

  32. BeerBarrel April 20, 2015 at 4:12 pm #

    I’ve a nephew from my wife’s side who dropped out of high school, and after some, was given a job training opportunity by some program in the state where kids of majority age can learn to do something in a place about 150 miles distant. I was heartened to hear he’d signed up for their carpentry program – after all – that is first a sensible thing to learn, and a good use of my taxpayer resources. But it became too hard for the lazy bum, and he switched classes to roadside traffic “management” (i.e. sign holder). Turned out he was unable to hack that, coming home for a weekend but failing to return due to some inconvenience whatever it was. So they dropped him from the program, and the lazy bum moved onto selling drugs and is now free on bond waiting for trial for distribution of something – not sure, it’s cocaine, pills, heroin, I’ve heard all three. So, now he and is girlfriend (also scheduled for trial on same charges) whose mother is a stripper/dancer are holed up in a hotel screwing and doing drugs all paid for by her prostitution as they push the system (trial date) back farther, screwing with the graciousness of the judges who see potential salvation (whereas I do not) and stealing from department stores in various states to return items in order to pay for their drugs.

    That’s America for a lot of the youth today. Laziness, and corruption and there’s nothing anyone wants to do about it.

    • BackRowHeckler April 20, 2015 at 7:32 pm #

      Sounds like we’ll be seeing them on the Jerry Springer show sometime pretty soon.

      Do they have any recognizable Tatts?

      brh

      • BeerBarrel April 21, 2015 at 8:14 pm #

        I’ve thought the same. The entire story, involving the mother, sister, their sordid arrangements and doings, however, is much more amazing in its sheer heights of idiocy and unfathomable corruption.

      • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 12:51 am #

        Beer – its his not is.
        BRH- thats a dumb question.

        It should be ‘how much ink and where’?

        Remember that building, w the poor entrance and rich entrance?

        88000 and counting.
        whoa nelly.

        88,000 People Apply for ‘Poor Door’ Building — NYMag
        nymag.com/…/88000-people-apply-for-poor-door-…
        New York Magazine
        2 days ago – 88,000 people applied for the 55 affordable rental units available at the Upper West Side “poor door” building. The condo features 219 luxury …

  33. hineshammer April 20, 2015 at 5:27 pm #

    “…masked the degeneration of local economic vitality, family life, behavioral norms, and social cohesion.” JHK

    To that end, Walmart has suddenly closed five stores including one here in the Tampa Bay area. Five stores is nothing to Walmart, but if anything I expect them to be opening more, not closing any. The reason given for the one here is something to do with the plumbing, but suspicions abound. Could this be a harbinger of something bigger? I don’t know.

  34. BackRowHeckler April 20, 2015 at 5:37 pm #

    Meanwhile, across from my house, down along the river, a beautiful 5 acre meadow, formerly productive farmland, was plowed under, and 6 massive McMansions are being slapped up in no time flat. You should see the size of the earth equipment down there; you’d think another Hoover Dam was going in!

    As far as young citizens finding meaningful lives here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, in the small city I’m working in, in western CT, last week two 20 year old local girls, both white and from the former the middle class and old established families, engaged in a knife fight in the street at midnight: 1 stabbed to death, one in jail.

    Something is wrong, but people can’t recognize it with heir heads up their asses.

    brh

    • ozone April 20, 2015 at 6:11 pm #

      Personally, I can hardly wait for the next big flood to take away all this waste (and the wastoids that live within).
      An awful lot of crap was built up in these historically designated flood plains, and those who are under the illusion that the dams will never fail are going to get a deadly surprise. Gotta *maintain* all that expensive infrastructure that allows building their crap-tastic look-at-me boxes there. Do they even KNOW why that soil is so rich?? …Probably not.

      • Frankiti April 20, 2015 at 7:38 pm #

        You cannot possibly NOT be a misanthrope and exist in this world. Nothing will miss humanity. This planet will ABSOLUTELY be better without us. I take the doom thing one-step further and question the need for civilization to carry on. Humanity could use a good scythe.

        • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:03 pm #

          Whoa Frankiti! Are you playing with us now? You’ve taken a pretty hard turn left since last we’ve conversed.

          • Frankiti April 20, 2015 at 9:35 pm #

            I’m not playing with you. There is nothing worth saving. Humanity is a dead-end and a bad turn by evolution. When Earth shrugs us off, or our successors, the robots, relegate us to a menagerie… all of nature will rejoice.

  35. ozone April 20, 2015 at 6:00 pm #

    “The true genius of Hillary is that she manages to epitomize every failure of our current political life: the obsessive micro-manipulation of image, the obscene moneygrubbing, the tired cronyism, the entitlement masquerading as sexual equality. Mostly, though, she has no idea where history is taking us, in case you’re wondering at the stupefying platitudes offered up as representative of her thinking.”

    Absolutely on the mark.
    Here’s another representative of that “thinking” amongst the untouchably remote and criminally well-heeled:

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-19/vapor-capital-asset-mismanagement-lp-jon-corzine-planning-hedge-fund-launch

    Now, we might wonder why Johnny thought it safe to pop his head up out of his hidey-hole at *this particular time*… but I’m sure we wouldn’t want to start any theories of conspiracies a-bubbling, would we?

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  36. Q. Shtik April 20, 2015 at 6:10 pm #

    “Age gelds a man”?… My girlfriend would beg to differ.

    Where do you young fuckers get this shit? – Greg K

    ====================

    There’s an old saying:

    “Memory is the second thing to go.”

    • Greg Knepp April 21, 2015 at 9:57 am #

      Actually, a good friend of mine (I don’t recall her name) who worked in the field of geriatrics once told me that the sex drive is often the last thing to go.

  37. dolph9 April 20, 2015 at 6:51 pm #

    Can we get over this idea of the 1950s or some time in the distant past as being the good ole days. For some this may have been the case, but for many it wasn’t.

    Broadly speaking, for most Americans, and I suspect for most people around the world, the late 90s to early 2000s was the true good ole days. Everything was less expensive, jobs were plentiful, the technology boom promised much. Banks were regulated, healthcare was reasonable, and we hadn’t yet engaged in so many useless wars.

    All of that is a distant memory. We gave it all up and head into collapse.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:00 pm #

      Thanks for that much needed reminder! We Baby Boomers do tend to get a bit presumptuous at times, don’t we?

      But just as a reminder, your future was being mortgaged even then, although neither of us knew it. Your “good old days” were, even then, being bought and paid for with the debt that’s crushing both of us now.

  38. EvelynV April 20, 2015 at 7:17 pm #

    Doom and Gloom is so last decade.

    Technology might, probably, will save us.

    People have been surviving horrors none of us can imagine for centuries. The survivors in the U.S. may not like the way things turn out but who knows, maybe it will help us find enlightenment. The path our culture is on sucks.

    Every person’s purpose is to overcome their own egos. No one reading this has done it I’m quite sure but many know the truth of it.

    • Frankiti April 20, 2015 at 7:34 pm #

      You need to overcome yours. Technology is today’s virulent religion. You are not allowed to doubt it, you must believe that it will save you, and you must believe that what ever it delivers will be better. Help yourself to the smelling salts… and wake up.

    • DA April 20, 2015 at 7:34 pm #

      LOL! Now it’s been reduced to a “fad” eh? You suffer from a western-centric lack of imagination. Cars and all their related hydrocarbon burning brethren have only been around for a century now and oil for a little longer than that, and we’re already suffering from supply issues on the front side, environmental degradation issues on the backside, and economic issues on all sides. Might note that all the meaningful technology that’s got us this far and will for the foreseeable future is also largely or entirely based on the same energy source, either directly or indirectly. It’s not technology you believe in, it’s JHK’s well documented “magic.” Read the book. One of the better “doomer” tomes out there.

    • MikeMoskos April 21, 2015 at 12:03 am #

      I strongly believe one type of technology will indeed save us: soil science. A small number of people in the regenerative agriculture movement have figured out how to regenerate soil much faster than nature can. It is even faster than the native Americans who–limited to intuition and observation–build the soils that were the envy of the world (much of which has washed away into the oceans).

  39. Frankiti April 20, 2015 at 7:31 pm #

    I think James needs to read the recent opinions of the otherwise ignorable Maureen Dowd. She has gone after Clinton Inc. full bore.

    I think the plan, in all sincerity, is through neglect, rabid partisanship, wealth divisions and mass migration is to make this country unrecognizable, and ultimately, a place not worth caring about. At least our forebears had places to go. We’re stuck on this last ride around the toilet bowl.

  40. wpa_ccc April 20, 2015 at 9:27 pm #

    JHK: The prospect of another Clinton – Bush election contest is a perfect setup for the collapse of the two parties sponsoring them, ushering in a period of wild political turmoil. Just because you don’t see it this very moment, doesn’t mean it isn’t lurking on the margins.

    John Ellis Bush will not be the Republican candidate. The Koch brothers are backing Scott Kevin Walker. Ipso facto (using JHK’s logic), there will be no collapse of the two parties.

    We need to stop focussing on the two parties and vote for a third party, for example, the Green Party. The presidential debates are rigged. The Green Party and Libertarian Party are suing the Commission on Presidential Debates: http://gp.org/index.php

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    • DA April 20, 2015 at 9:52 pm #

      That’s a start at least wpa! Keep it up and I might be with ya! As I tell my alternative minded cousin, keep up the positive thinking and I might just be with ya eventually! But until then, I’m hellbent on tearing down what is, just in case. The two are not mutually exclusive! Cheers!

  41. captswife April 20, 2015 at 9:40 pm #

    Great hen house! We’re dealing with a visiting fox right now, and our fence is too short – yours is perfect!

    And on another note, are you considering — or working on — a cookbook from the World Made by Hand series? I’m on my fourth time through, and during Witch of Hebron I just kept thinking, “I want the recipe for that.” I’ve already started drying and grinding rose hips for tea, and making cider and elderberry wine, but there are still so many great sounding dishes in the stories, I’d definitely buy a cookbook! Of course it must include the preserving part. 🙂

    • EvelynV April 21, 2015 at 1:39 am #

      Silly people, wishing for the end.

      All the terrible things you imagine are how a likely majority of the world already lives.

      Whether you are holed up with your beans and gold in your apocalyptic fantasy caves or still plugging for collapse at home on your computers, you are still you and you needs fixing.

      Are self absorbed or thought of by others with affection because you are kind?

      Doomers tend to be the former.

      • EvelynV April 21, 2015 at 1:45 am #

        …Are U self absorbed…

        • vengeur April 21, 2015 at 2:56 am #

          Yes , I suppose that the relatively few Jews who managed to get themselves out of Europe prior to WW2 were likewise just self absorbed fools.

      • elysianfield April 21, 2015 at 10:57 am #

        Probably some truth it what you write, but 60+ years of observation reveal hard truths. I can only say…”I wish I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then…”

  42. BackRowHeckler April 20, 2015 at 11:04 pm #

    Somebody above suggested Greece tell the EU to take their long and short term debt and shove it up their asses, we aint payin, the game was rigged, F- off!!

    Well, isn’t that what Iceland told the international Banking System back in 08 when their whole economy went down due to bad bets on the US real estate market? They survived. For awhile I was reading stories about Icelanders going back to earlier times, to a substitence economy, hunting and especially fishing. Iceland and Greece seem to be similar in that they’re relatively small countries with long histories and homogenous populations, altho I must add Greece has a lot more corruption, and is facing pressure from illegal Muslim immigration from NAfrica, Asia and the Middle East.

    From what I read last weekend Greece needs to make a decision pretty soon as their banks are running put of cash, and the Germans are getting impatient.

    brh

  43. BackRowHeckler April 20, 2015 at 11:23 pm #

    Also, you’ll be happy to know, amidst the half dozen or so existensial, potentially civilization ending world crises brewing right now, and the spectacle of Ethiopan Coptic Christians shot and beheaded on the NAfrican beachhead, our esteemed President has seen fit to install a transgender restroom inside the White House. What, you hadn’t seen it? Yeah, it was right above the article about a possible naval engagement with the Iranian fleet in the Indian Ocean, and below the story on Putin warning the US about keeping Airborne troops inside Ukraine. I’m reassured he is taking care of the important matters, the stuff that counts.

    How do you like it now, Gentlemen?

    brh

    • EvelynV April 21, 2015 at 1:44 am #

      The president himself install a restroom…!?

      Imagine that. As much as he has on his plate and still is able to do carpentry and plumbing.

      • vengeur April 21, 2015 at 2:51 am #

        So the King hath decreed… As if he would be capable of hammering a nail or anything else other than reading a teleprompter.

      • BackRowHeckler April 21, 2015 at 4:35 am #

        TR built himself a formidable ranch house in the Dakota Wilderness with an axe and a barrowed cross cut saw.

        Then again, what kind of skills can one develop standing on a milk crate in a South Side Chicago ghetto, imploring the natives to sign up for foodstamps, section 8 vouchers and free cell phones.

        brh

    • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 2:39 pm #

      Isn’t that bigoted though? Aren’t we supposed to accept the gender the trannie is claiming? Or are there just two many genders now to accommodate each with its own rest room?

      Bruce’s interview with Diane Sawyer airs Friday night.

      • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 6:46 am #

        Like I mentioned before I Knew Bruce back in the day, before he became a big Olympic hero, and Hollywood freak star.

        He was pretty normal. I’m wondering if his baby drowning in a swimming pool accident and his younger brother being killed in a car wreck in one of Bruce’s Porches has anything to do with the transformation going on now? Its hard to explain what happens to people

        brh

  44. wpa_ccc April 21, 2015 at 5:41 am #

    venguer: “As if he would be capable of hammering a nail or anything else other than reading a teleprompter”

    Thanks to President Obama’s leadership we have 12 million new jobs, the stock market has doubled, deficits have been cut by two-thirds, health care inflation is at its lowest rate in 50 years, manufacturing is coming back, the auto industry is coming back, and clean energy has doubled, thanks to Obama’s leadership.

    But conservatives cannot give President Obama any credit. All of a sudden the most important metric is the labor participation rate!

    LOL!

    • vengeur April 21, 2015 at 11:47 am #

      Yes , it’s all “coming back”. LOL. And as far as the Labor Participation Rate, why should anybody worry about average people actually participating in the “recovery” (as in having a good paying job) ? But the funniest part of your nonsense is the “deficits have been cut by two-thirds”! If you would stop j*cking of to Obama for a minute you would realize he is as full of sh*t as the republicans you hate.

  45. FincaInTheMountains April 21, 2015 at 6:54 am #

    Officially, the de-industrialization of US began in 1981, when President Reagan announced the beginning of a new economic policy – Reaganomics. Really it all started around 1977, when China began its industrial leap. Then began the process of transferring industrial capacity from the US to China. Europe after 1985 also began to transfer production to the east: China, Taiwan, ASEAN countries.

    The idea was to eliminate the ground for a social revolution.

    Simultaneously the grounds for extracting super-profits were formed. The environmental pressures and social conflicts were passed on to the elite of the Third World. Then the leaders of the world oligarchy thought that they have caught God by the beard, and it was “the death of history”, but as it turned out, just seemed…

    But the tragedy and horror lies in the fact that the US and the West do not have time to stretch the pleasure, as it happened in 1991. They dragged the process, slowly buying weak, killing persistent. Then they had the time. Between 1991 and 2008, there were 17 years of feasting on resources of the USSR and the Soviet bloc. Now everything is spent. No more time remains.

    In 2008 and the crisis broke out. It continues today and has not yet reached its climax. They managed to stretch it over time, but it cannot be bypassed. It is systematic and total. Everybody owes to everybody else more than they can pay. Oligarchs will become beggars. They are ready to unleash World War III, but the war leg hit the wrong wheel…

    For World War they need multimillion army. The United States has 2.3 million trained reserves and 2 million under the gun now. But…

    Weapons remains just for 500-600 thousand. In 1991 it was almost 15 thousand tanks, 5300 now. They are old; production began in 1980, completed in 1996. 19 years ago. You can certainly see the figures for other types of weapons, but believe me, depressing situation for all types of heavy weapons. In aviation, which the United States is so proud of the situation is even worse. The main plane USAF F-15 has a problem with the strength of center and wing. With vigorous maneuvering there are cases of destruction of aircraft. While combat aircraft of America and NATO exceeds Russia’s, but they have nothing to replenish the group.

    That’s the time for America to launch its factories! …

    But there are NO factories, they are all demolished!!!

    Re-industrialization takes a lot of time. USSR increased industrial capacity for 12 years before the last war. And that was not enough. While the generation of tech-savvy people was not prepared, victory did not come.

    US passed the process of industrialization for over 100 years. They do not have 100 years now. They do not have 10 years. Moment of collapse into the abyss can come in a year or two – maximum. In order to equip the army they’d have to build factories from scratch, to fill them with equipment (where? Because China and the emerging economies do not produce the entire line), it is necessary to train staff to prepare engineers, but the US does not even have teachers. Everything is destroyed and lost.

    Therefore, they will fight with what they have now. All NATO weapons are still relatively regularly or can be quickly repaired. We ammunition is not expired. But mass production of all that is needed for the war is no longer possible. History and idiocy of oligarchs have left them without most important resource of all: time.

    According to this US should start a war with Russia yesterday. Not yet working out. CIA repeatedly organizes quite decent “casus belli” – well here! It’s time !!! But the military helplessly shrug – can’t do it! Prepare military conditions for large-scale war – blitzkrieg does not work. And US still can’t pull together the military group of sufficiently decent size.

    Only this, and not philanthropy or some clever super-US plans explains the prolonged situation of “no peace – no war.” But US still pulls troops and equipment. After some time there will be enough. At least group will seem sufficient. Maybe there remaining months, maybe a week. Mere mortals do not know, but obviously there is no much peacetime remains. Too obvious are preparations for war, and to explode the political situation in Russia. America cannot wait long…

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  46. Q. Shtik April 21, 2015 at 1:19 pm #

    with an axe and a barrowed cross cut saw. – BRH

    =================

    I own a lot of tools but I do not possess a barrowed cross cut saw. What does it look like and where can I get one?

    • EvelynV April 22, 2015 at 3:42 am #

      It looks like any other saw you use to castrate a hog.

  47. volodya April 21, 2015 at 1:27 pm #

    BRH,

    The powers-that-be seem to think that a Grexit will be akin to jumping blind-folded without a parachute. Is the drop three feet or 3,000 feet?

    But, make no mistake, they only care about being collateral damage if Greece goes splat. Not that they give a shit if Greece does. At this point they wish it would.

    I think at this point they have to make the jump. The situation is un-tenable.

    The Greeks got into the Euro-zone on the implicit assumption that they could con the stupid Germans into financing Greek tax evasion and the easy going Greek lifestyle. I mean, after all, the Germans WERE bone-headed enough to give up the mighty D-Mark.

    Not only that, but to Greeks, given Greek incompetence at monetary matters, having an Italian managing their currency appears to be an improvement. Did I mention that Draghi is also a Goldman alumnus? The mind reels…

    The Greeks insist they want to stay in the Eurozone. Too bad really. If Greece won’t go then heave them out.

    Maybe I’m missing something, but to my knowledge, fiscal transfers only exist within nation-states like the US and Germany and not within multi-national agglomerations like the EU.

    And that’s fiscal transfers done on the up-and-up (more or less). No country is totally free of theft and waste. But people in one region in a country won’t take so much exception to sending some tax bucks to fellow country-men.

    It’s a much different thing if there’s an expectation for one country to subsidize another’s sloth and corruption. Ask a German whether he would take kindly to his taxes being funnelled to a crooked Greek government for the pleasure of Greece’s continued membership in the Euro-zone. What’s the German expression for “get fucked”?

    In any case, this is more of the same. The people in charge of pulling financial levers bloody know the status quo can’t be sustained.

    QE Euro-style and keeping Greece tied to a regime of de-facto fixed exchange rates are more of the decades long obstruction to a restructuring to a viable economic and monetary system.

    A restructuring will be a messed up thing. But the longer this goes on the more messed up it will be.

    This is change the oligarchs and ruling elites don’t believe in because it threatens their place at the top. Even if it only involved some diminution of their already colossal and un-spendable personal wealth, they wouldn’t have it.

    Why? Because, to them, a buck (or a Euro) is a buck. They want it. And they’ll have it. No matter if there’s not enough hours in a day to spend it all. Their greed is massive, ungovernable and world-devouring.

    Have you ever seen rich people shop? Do you subscribe to the notion that they don’t look at price tags? They ALWAYS look at price tags.

    To those guys enough is never enough. No 150 buck Seiko watch for them. Swiss made, a quarter million, maybe…

    • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 6:51 am #

      V,

      The Greeks might be able to guilt trip the Krauts with claims of Nazi war atrocities in the 40s, and leverage that to get better terms. It would save face for the Germans, too. I don’t see any other way for Germany to fund what you call Greece easy lifestyle in the sun, and its monumental corruption and tax evasion.

      brh

  48. malthuss April 21, 2015 at 1:49 pm #

    Consider the following — Rand Paul has done:

    – Doesn’t want to end the War on Drugs, just want to “soften” mandatory sentencing.
    – Supports the private property killing Civil Rights Act of 1964.
    – Endorsed Mitch McConnell and Mitt Romney
    – Wants to increase the military defense budget
    – Wants to imposed sanctions on Iran and Russia
    – Opposes drone surveillance but supports drone strikes
    – Wants to continue foreign-aid to Israel
    – Voted for the NDAA
    – Bailed out industries in Kentucky
    – Proposed “economic free-zones” (where the government chooses who gets to be free)
    – Endorsed by Sarah Palin, John McCain, and Sean Hannity

  49. Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 3:08 pm #

    The Rotus, receptionist of the Potus, is a deaf woman who needs a normal or abled person to help her do her work. More than a little absurd but her name, Leah Katz-Hernandez, explains much. Two of the most favored minority groups. Add in disabled and female and you Four-fer. Royalty in other words. If she’s a Lesbian, that would make her a Five-fer. Her “assistant” – who does the real work – is just an ordinary White Woman. This is the model of the future, the model of South Africa, where Blacks get the money and acclaim while Whites do all the actual work.

    http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/politics/2015/02/23/white-house-staffer-leah-katz-hernandez-is-pioneer-on-reception-desk/

    There are other Rotuses or Roti who are not disabled btw. One is grateful for small wonders. I expect old Leah receives at a small back office, not used on a daily basis. She lives and has always lived a life of privilege. Someone should interview her assistant and check her self image.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 3:13 pm #

      Leah doesn’t have to do anything. Her very existence in the main point and being a Rotus just helps broadcast her to the world. The medium is the message. Any young girl can be a Rotus – they just have to be born in the right race, gender, and politically correct and connected family. That’s not so hard, is it? You Whites had it all and now it’s our turn. Go back to Europe. What’s that? You’re losing Europe too? Sucks to be you then, eh?

    • Q. Shtik April 21, 2015 at 4:06 pm #

      Roti

      ===============

      Roti is an Indian Subcontinent flat bread. How dare you denigrate the disabled with this label?! wink

      • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 11:46 pm #

        How dare you say wink – as if I wouldn’t know you were kidding.

        • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 7:03 am #

          Blacks in SA are turning on each other, natives against immigrants from the north.

          Meanwhile, at least 600,000 whites reside in refugee and squatters camps, subject to raids and brutality from black gangs from the cities. Many of occupants in these camps are children whose parents were murdered on their farms in the countryside.

          Is Bono still making frequent trips there, on stage with the corrupt President, leading heart warming sing-a-longs with songs like “Kill the Boer”, and “Bring Me My Rifle”?

          brh

  50. fodase April 21, 2015 at 7:46 pm #

    For awhile I was reading stories about Icelanders going back to earlier times, to a subsistence economy, hunting and especially fishing.

    not true at all, nothing to hunt in iceland, relatively speaking, fishing you could do but you’d need a boat and its bloody dangerous, ocean will kill you in a jiffy.

    They can trumpet the bionic engineering of artificial hamburger meat, but not careful, small-scale farming in which many hands can find work and meaning.

    the problem is that US american culture is designed to turn out graduates who have nothing to offer skillswise to meet the massive demand for bionic engineering. society is going forward and needs skilled technologists but instead the US american educational system turns out people who believe they can fly like r. kelly but are dodo birds in the job market.

    the vast majority of US american students could be rudimentally trained to participate in the technology society, but you would need a cultural change to effect this.

    Cars and all their related hydrocarbon burning brethren have only been around for a century now and oil for a little longer than that, and we’re already suffering from supply issues on the front side, environmental degradation issues on the backside, and economic issues on all sides. Might note that all the meaningful technology that’s got us this far and will for the foreseeable future is also largely or entirely based on the same energy source, either directly or indirectly.

    same development was seen with all previous energy resources. solutions were always found. coal is not suffering from supply issues, by the way.

    and lots of the meaningful technology based on fossil fuels is freeing us from dependence on the same, viz wind turbines, which produce 20-25 times more energy than the fossil fuel inputs used to make them.

    we are not in a sysiphean struggle with fossil fuel depletion, we are breaking the shackles of fossil fuel dependence at a rapid pace, viz all the solar successes i continually point out.

    what say ye to a country of 50 million getting almost HALF its electrical power from the sun and wind?

    The US Energy Information Agency says of Spain (pop. ca. 50 million):

    Spain is the fifth largest energy consumer in Europe and has virtually no domestic production of liquid fuels or natural gas. Renewable energy, including hydroelectric generation, accounted for 30% of Spain’s power generation in 2012.

    That figure is close to HALF as of 2015.

    Now, tell me how this is not demonstrable proof that fossil fuel dependence is being mitigated on a national level, and by extension on a global level?

    The proof is in the pudding. It’s right in front of your eyes. The fifth largest energy consumer in Europe is fast freeing itself from fossil fuel dependence.

    Spain producing 35% of all electrical power in the country by harnessing the WIND as we speak. How’s that for not needing millions of barrels of oil to do the same?

    It’s incontrovertible people.

    fodase

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    • Janos Skorenzy April 21, 2015 at 11:59 pm #

      Yeah but what percent of the Spanish are now minority? From what I’ve heard they’re doomed just like the rest of Europe. Europe will become Eurabia, poor and wretched, depending on muscle power, be it man or donkey. Perhaps the use of gears and mill stones to augment that.

      • wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 1:27 am #

        “Yeah but what percent of the Spanish are now minority?”

        This is a nonsensical question because wind and solar energy do not change depending on the race of the engineers managing the renewable energy systems.

        Spain could become 100% “minority” and the wind and solar systems will continue working with “minority” engineers.

        A majority of the world’s population is white and guess what? The wind and solar systems do not care if the engineers are white or non-white.

        Your attempt to turn everything into a divisive racial question is nonsense in a discussion of harvesting energy from the wind or the sun.

  51. Pucker April 21, 2015 at 11:00 pm #

    K-Dog may be interested in this course?

    “This course is designed to help lawyers assess and develop dog bite cases in order to better represent the injured victim. It will cover strategies in handling a dog bite case from the initial client interview up to jury selection with aim of winning the case before you ever get to trial.

    Key topics to be discussed:
    The Problem of Dog Bites In America
    Overview of Dog Bite Law
    Finding the Law
    Defenses
    Vetting the Case
    The Pretrial Demand
    The Lawsuit
    Issues in Insurance Coverage
    Settlement Strategies
    Minor Settlements
    Tips for Trial”

    • K-Dog April 22, 2015 at 9:57 pm #

      Had I decided to be a lawyer I think I’d have made a very good one but as it is I’m not. Therefore I have no need for the course. I’ll generally growl before I clip a bloody steak out of somebody’s butt cheeks. When I bite someone they deserve it.

  52. Pucker April 21, 2015 at 11:18 pm #

    Aunt Bee, Barney, Sheriff Taylor, Otis, Helen, Thelma Lou, Ernest T, Opie

  53. Pucker April 22, 2015 at 12:13 am #

    I wonder if Secretary of State Kerry and Vladimir Putin have any common experiences that they talk about? For example, did they both as children watch reruns of “Mayberry RFD”?

  54. progress4what April 22, 2015 at 12:14 am #

    Just after midnight, 4/22. Nice week’s work, JHK. Short, succinct, and straight to the point. Thanks!

    • Q. Shtik April 22, 2015 at 1:05 am #

      I accepted your challenge. See last comment in last week’s thread.

      • wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 1:31 am #

        Q., S4B has become a drive-by poster. He will tune in again Sunday evening because he is upset with JHK’s comment software.

        Don’t feed the trolls.

        • progress4what April 23, 2015 at 11:02 pm #

          Yeah, I saw that. Will you see this, Q? RSVP

          • progress4what April 23, 2015 at 11:05 pm #

            See, there you go. I responded to Q, and this f*cking software makes it look like I responded to wap/cia/krugsoaker, who is a vile human being, btw.

  55. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:17 am #

    Hello Swmnguy,

    re | “Since this is an abstract system, we can just change the rules to prolong the pretense. We can do that forever, or just until a critical mass of people opt out, or until one of the inputs becomes unavailable (money, energy, resources, markets). Right now we’re seeing disruption in energy due to finance, not availability. A crisis in availability is coming, but only due to financial reasons. When the lack of abstract money keeps a society from taking useful, concrete measures, the cart is in front of the horse and collapse is inevitable in one form or another.”-swmn.

    I loved your post. However, this system actually is not *that* abstract. I think that there may be a issue with the way that you’re formulating this – a critical structural component is missing. There are inputs, outputs and ALSO the resources required to maintain the means/infrastructure to run the system. This is where the cracks show first and what defines the rate of collapse [*] [**]. If that were not true then debt truly would be “self-canceling” … *U n f o r t u n a t e l y* Death and Depreciation DO matter.

    So, what we’re seeing on a global scale is what typically happens late in life-cycle of any organization, enterprise or empire: resources are misallocated, concentrated and hoarded non-productively, and said organization loses the ability to heal (let alone maintain) itself.

    Technophiles (of the “Too Much Magic” variety) are assuming that ‘Technology’ as they understand it will radically expand the limits of what is possible, and to mutate civilization itself into something that overcomes the last set of deadly externalities… achieving escape velocity from itself, in effect. But, as you more than probably realize…

    LOL

    😉

    [*] Orlov covered this in a couple of pages in Five Stages of Collapse…

    [**] for instance; You can have all the food/water/air/comfy temps you like, but without a functioning _body_ to convert those basic inputs into something we cheerfully refer to as an ‘existence’ you’re S-O-o-L — I don’t actually believe that you need that analogy, but it might be helpful for others dropping by.

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    • ozone April 22, 2015 at 8:14 am #

      MD,
      Glad to see you’re discussing realities and “externalities”. Our direction is absolutely determined by these, despite howlings that we youmans are thoughtful and rational and will do a 180 before all goes to wrack and ruin. …If I should come across signs of that, I’ll let you know.

      (I noticed that someone tried to change the subject immediately after your post. Interesting, that.)

      • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:02 pm #

        Ozone,

        We have a particularly pathetic sock-festation on CFN. They demand specifics so you give them specifics, then they change the subject, ignore it or pick a fight with one of the attention-seeking regulars. It completely removes any interest in engaging ‘them’ directly (that would be so counterproductive).

        Best thing to do is talk over and around ‘them’.

        • ozone April 22, 2015 at 5:30 pm #

          Righty-o! 🙂

  56. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 1:32 am #

    Janos: “Yeah but what percent of the Spanish are now minority?”

    This is a nonsensical question because wind and solar energy do not change depending on the race of the engineers managing the renewable energy systems.

    Spain could become 100% “minority” and the wind and solar systems will continue working with “minority” engineers.

    A majority of the world’s population is white and guess what? The wind and solar systems do not care if the engineers are white or non-white.

    Your attempt to turn everything into a divisive racial question is nonsense in a discussion of harvesting energy from the wind or the sun.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 22, 2015 at 4:14 am #

      Black Africans in an “elite” Black Engineering school were tested and had IQ’s that averaged around 100 – two standard deviations below that of White Engineering students. 100 is simply not smart enough to do first class work.

      Wrong again.

      • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 12:38 am #

        So a White one would have 120? 130? Whats one deviation, 10 points?

      • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 12:54 am #

        JHK—–

        hope you write about this

        88,000 People Apply for ‘Poor Door’ Building — NYMag
        nymag.com/…/88000-people-apply-for-poor-door-…
        New York Magazine
        2 days ago – 88,000 people applied for the 55 affordable rental units available at the Upper West Side “poor door” building. The condo features 219 luxury …

  57. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:34 am #

    Speaking of ‘Too Much Magical Thinking’, the issue in Fukushima has not gone away, it only gets worse – it ‘killed’ a specifically ‘hardened’ robot trying to explore the nuclear pile that melted through bottom of the containment vessel…

    It gets better…

    The Technology to even begin to deal with it does not exist, even as a theory:

    http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2012-10-04/fixing-fukushima-beyond-current-technology

    Once again, The process of technological advance is a system with it’s own set of critical constraints. There are far too many ways to crash the process of technological process – let the fiasco in Fukushima stand as ‘Exhibit A’…

    • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:43 am #

      EDIT: “process of technological progress”…

  58. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:45 am #

    On a lighter note…

    Putin maintains ManStandard:

    http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/images/user3303/imageroot/2015/04/20150417_putinghi.jpg

    😉

    Cheers!

  59. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 1:53 am #

    Mister Darling: “…is what typically happens late in life-cycle of any organization, enterprise or empire: resources are misallocated, concentrated and hoarded non-productively, and said organization loses the ability to heal (let alone maintain) itself.”

    Then we are not late in the life cycle. Our economy is humming along and is on track for best year since 2005. We still have the ability to heal ourselves, as post-1929 demonstrated, as post-2007 demonstrated. Sorry, doomsters.

    The U.S. is powering its way to recovery, with a generally favorable influence on the rest of the world. The fall in oil prices is almost universally good news for the world economy. News from emerging market economies — despite slower growth — is positive. The firm dollar has been a boon for most countries. Modest growth is resuming in Europe, still home to many of the world’s most technologically adept companies and much R&D brainpower.

    The signs are positive. The cornucopians are in ascendance, and the best is yet to come.

    http://money.cnn.com/2015/04/14/news/economy/economy-growth-imf/

    • ozone April 22, 2015 at 8:26 am #

      I suspect that’s change you don’t really believe in.

      Here’s a subtle critique of your choice of “news”/troll sources:

      http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article41621.htm

      CNN Money, FFS.

    • elysianfield April 22, 2015 at 10:38 am #

      I wish to God that I could believe in your perspective…however, possessing a modicum of education, and 60 years of life experience, I just cannot see it. I would happily drink from the chalice whatever cool-aid you are quaffing if I could again experience the outlook of my youth.

  60. Janos Skorenzy April 22, 2015 at 4:24 am #

    http://www.infowars.com/u-s-army-forces-cadets-to-wear-high-heels-to-promote-feminist-campaign/

    Forced cross-dressing is a classic humiliation technique used by cult leaders such as Da Free John or Jim Jones. It was foisted on the cadets are part of the fraudulent rape culture on campus campaign wherein Feminists continue to peddle the discredited one in five statistic.

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    • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 7:12 am #

      Like I said before, the whole f=kkin world must be laughing at us, ‘specially Putin, who might come to the conclusion this isn’t the same US Army that met up with Zhukov’s Guard’s Divisions at the Elbe River in April 1944.

      But when the CIC goes by the name ‘Bathhouse Barry’, and his Butt Buddy is named Reggie Love, what can you expect?

      brh

      • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 7:19 am #

        The Kuds force and ISIS must be highly impressed, too.

  61. FincaInTheMountains April 22, 2015 at 10:27 am #

    If a Clinton were to marry a Bush, the US could cancel elections

    With apologies to their respective spouses, if Jeb Bush’s son, George P. Bush, had married Chelsea Clinton, Americans could have spared themselves the spectacle of Election 2016 and saved billions of dollars.

    All that the USA needs now is for a young Clinton to pair up with a junior Bush. Should the union produce an heir, a single line of monarchy would be established. This is the reality of the USA’s broken politics in 2015. A country pretty much established in opposition to hereditary elites now has the most closed political system in the Western world.

    In the past, America’s strange obsession with the British Royal Family was usually explained by fact that the US has no monarchy of its own. The bad news for Queen Elizabeth’s bunch is that this is increasingly the case in name only.

    http://rt.com/op-edge/251985-clinton-bush-us-presidential-election/

  62. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 11:09 am #

    From the link comrade Ozone provided:

    “The roll of dishonour includes “stellar” corporate names, from CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, Financial Times, Guardian, France 24, Deutsche Welle, and many more. It is a veritable troll army marching in lockstep with their governments’ agenda of disinformation.
    In unison, they are functioning as a global ministry of propaganda.
    Reputable Russian news media have not indulged in the unquestioning Western narrative asserting that Russian aggression is the cause of the entire Ukrainian conflict. In other words, the Russian news industry is providing proper journalistic services.”

    Congratulations, Ozone, for outing yourself as a Russian agent trolling CFN. Governments lie, except Russia? C’mon, Ozone, where is your critical thinking? Why are you defending Putin, the KGB/dictator?

  63. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 11:56 am #

    Brh, you speak so admiringly of the Zhukov Guard Divisions, Kuds force, ISIS. Those entities are not accepting of non-heterosexual individuals (male or female) in their fighting forces.

    Are you implying you want the US armed forces/special forces to be just as vicious and violent and sexist? Are you saying you do not want the USA elite fighting forces, like the SEALS, to include women, homosexual or transgenered individuals?

    Do you want us to adopt the values of the Zhukov Guard Divisions, Kuds force, and ISIS? Have you lost faith in the USA, in American values of inclusion and unity? Do you want to exclude minorities, like Muslims, from the military? Have you lost faith in US military personnel just because they do not share your religion or your sexual orientation? If so, you are the traitor undermining America.

    • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 1:31 pm #

      We need more Muslims in the Armed Forces like Major Hassan, is that what you mean?

      Or the loyal son of Islam who fragged his CO in the opening days of the Iraq War.

      brh

  64. fodase April 22, 2015 at 12:24 pm #

    So, what we’re seeing on a global scale is what typically happens late in life-cycle of any organization, enterprise or empire: resources are misallocated, concentrated and hoarded non-productively, and said organization loses the ability to heal (let alone maintain) itself.

    just a throwaway generality. resources have and always will be misallocated etc. nothing new here.

    Europe and the US are maintaining themselves pretty well. Would you call 1914/1930s/1945 Europe better maintained than the Europe of 2015?

    I mean, come on. You might try to say something specific, you doomsdayers just trot out one meaningless phrase after another like it’s some grand wisdom.

    Technophiles (of the “Too Much Magic” variety) are assuming that ‘Technology’ as they understand it will radically expand the limits of what is possible, and to mutate civilization itself into something that overcomes the last set of deadly externalities… achieving escape velocity from itself, in effect. But, as you more than probably realize…
    LOL

    How is your quoted ‘Technology’ different from technology? And how do ‘they’ understand it, other than see advances in telecommunications, healthcare, longevity, energy etc and conclude that these will continue?

    We didnt have cellphones, now we do. Ergo we’ll probably have better cellphones, or maybe cellphones on our wristwatch or in an earring, in a few years. This is called progress.

    Vaccinations were invented and have now eradicated polio, TB and a host of other ills. This is called progress.

    Nuclear power radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    Telecommunications radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    The internet radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    Solar + wind power radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    The global economy radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    Higher education radically expands the limits of what is possible.
    Medicine is radically expanding the limits of what is possible.
    Smart metering radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    Recycling radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    Agroforestry radically expanded the limits of what is possible.
    The green revolution (food) radically expanded the limits of what is possible.

    How can you not see these things?

    ‘…the last set of deadly externalities…’ LOL

    this doesn’t MEAN anything lol, just like all the rest of your side’s pointless doomsday phrases.

    can you cite some specific ‘last externality’?

    other than empty plebian verbal diarrhea, your side has nothing to offer in the way of argumentation.

    Joke’s on you, LOL.

    Spain was getting ca. 34% of all its electricity FREE from the WIND a few hours ago:

    https://demanda.ree.es/eolicaEng.html

    Denmark getting 15% of all its electricity FREE from the WIND + the SUN as we speak – and Denmark doesn’t even HAVE bloody sunlight compared to the bulk of the world’s countries.

    http://energinet.dk/Flash/Forside/UK/index.html

    HAHA, too easy showing you girlies up for the purveyors of nonsense you are. No offense to girls.

    fodase

  65. volodya April 22, 2015 at 1:11 pm #

    BRH, the only problem with the reparations idea is that if Greece gets money from Germany there won’t be any end to the line-up. For example, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus all suffered miserably under the Germans. If Greece is owed then those other countries are owed more. Would generations of Germans born post WW2 will let themselves get picked clean for what their grandparents and great-grandparents did a lifetime ago? Mind you they WERE dumb enough to give up the D-Mark.

    I think you’re right though, how else does Germany fund Greece’s dissolute ways? There’s risk there too because there’s other countries that would like nothing better than to live easy at German expense ie the Italians and Spanish

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    • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 1:28 pm #

      Its funny you mention Spain, V.

      We sold our compound in NE Spain about 12 years ago. Put it on the market on a Monday, by that thursday a German from Dusseldorf bought the place with cash.

      And that’s when the Euro was flying high and thought to have a bright future.

      brh

    • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:30 pm #

      Volodya,

      I find it odd that you seem to be ignoring the fact that Greece is about to get paid Euros-5B in advance from Russia – for the pipeline their going to thrust from Turkey into Europe’s luscious, sunny bottom. This whole sh*t-show with the troika looks very much like a diversionary tactic while the Greeks prepare to perma-f@ck-it to the ECB, NATO and all exposed counterparties…

      • BackRowHeckler April 22, 2015 at 1:43 pm #

        I missed that.

        So MD you’re saying Russia is simply bailing Greece out, or this pipeline is a legit business deal.

        Both countries are Orthodox Christians too, which must count for something, ‘specially in Putin’s book.

        brh

        • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 6:31 pm #

          So, here’s the funny thing;

          The Greeks might even be *conflicted* about leaving the Eurozone, but now that they’ve gone to the table with the Russians, they will find that backing out of the deal will be, hmmm… shall we say ‘difficult’?

          For Putin it’s not about the ‘money’ (b/c it’s only a ‘lot of money’ if you happen to be Greece). For Putin this deal is a massive strategic advantage – and he seems to be the only major actor on the world stage that plays for keeps that way.

          All other G-20 governments are oligarchic puppet-shows…

  66. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:11 pm #

    Regarding China…

    There’s this idea still floating around Occidental circles that China will ‘save’ ‘us’ from financial Armageddon by throwing a huge raft of willing victims into the wall-street-lamprey infested waters. There’s this *other* idea that China is still securely fastened to a lower-tech agrarian economy (compared to the USA, definitely… but that’s not saying much).

    Hate to pop those bubbles:

    1. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-09/we-travelled-across-china-and-returned-terrified-for-the-economy

    It all looks so simple from 35000 feet, but when you actually walk/drive the ground things look a little (lot) different…

    [to be continued]

  67. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:15 pm #

    Regarding China, continued…

    2. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-21/copper-plunge-continues-despite-chinese-stimulus

    Isn’t China supposed to be “the shop-floor of the world”? If that’s true then why has their electricity usage plummeted, along with their “insatiable” demand for Copper, Iron and Nickel ore?

    The only insatiable demand for metal anyone’s seen from China lately is their demand for Gold bullion…

    Just let that set in…

    😉

    [to be continued]

  68. MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 1:25 pm #

    Regarding China (lastly)…

    Lastly, if global trade is “humming along” so smoothly, where _the fuck_ are the shipping stats to prove it? As I’ve mentioned more than once (duly ignored by those on CFN with no interest in acknowledging reality) the Baltic Dry Index has plummeted to 1986 (and still falling) levels. When the CEO of Maersk goes on record saying that shipping is fucked, IT IS. Dutch business-people have no interest in pulling any punches. They might even be incapable of it.

    So where does that leave China?

    ITEM 3: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-16/chinas-cosco-dis-assembles-8-ships-amid-glut-baltic-dry-hits-another-record-low

    ANSWER: Stopping production on ships and sending them directly to the wreckers, half-built. Why? Because there’s no business in the ‘pipeline’ and no prospect of any. That’s why.

    By the way, I take absolutely no joy in spelling this out to the people of good will on CFN. I’m exposed to the fallout. But “forewarned is fore-armed”, as they say.

    Chip-cheerio!

    🙂

  69. nsa April 22, 2015 at 1:27 pm #

    WPA,
    Your new diversified military would have to be renamed. The Air Force could become the Flying Fairies. The Airborne could be renamed the Fighting Fags. Armor could be renamed the Tank Trannies. The Stykers could become the Sucking Sissies. The possibilities are endless. You came up with a winning concept this time…..

    • vengeur April 22, 2015 at 1:51 pm #

      And we could have a special commando force: “The Flirty Dozen”.

    • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 6:22 pm #

      And PsyOps + Fort Huachuca et al. would be what? “Nattering Nancies”?

      Yes, I think that you might be onto something here nsa – and not just a Stryker Brigade Sissy-boy, either.

      [have fun w/that]

      Cheers!

  70. volodya April 22, 2015 at 2:03 pm #

    Mister Darling,

    I hadn’t heard the number you mention, the 5 billion Euro advance, but I knew that the Russkis and the Greeks were dancing. While we’re at it, what about a ménage with Turkey?

    We’ve been here before. This is where the titans of foreign policy start to think firmly inside the box. If it were up to me, given that the Greeks are a royal pain in the ass, always will be a royal pain in the ass and utterly not worth the bother, I’d hand over the whole mess to Putin wrapped in a bow.

    Same with Pakistan and China. I remember not too long ago the State Dept and the academic commentariat were in a flap over the diplomatic and commercial overtures China was making towards Pakistan.

    Again, thinking inside the box: we CAN’T let Pakistan get cuddly with China!

    Well, why the fuck not? What does Pakistan have going for it? Nothing, that’s what. Pakistan is your proverbial nuclear armed, terrorist infested piss-hole. Why do we need such an “ally”? This is one I would off-load to China right fucking NOW. If the Chinese are dumb enough to have them then give Pakistan a good shove out the door.

    Same idea with Greece. Does Putin want Greece for naval installations? For airfields? I’d offer to kick in a bit of money to help. Just to get things rolling. I mean, if we deem Russia to be an adversary don’t we WANT Russian imperial over-stretch? Do the Russkis want to carve Greece out of the western orbit? Hurray, let’s get on with it!

    And, while we’re at it, let’s see what we can do to get Turkey the fuck out of NATO and into Russia’s Co-prosperity Sphere. That’s another shit-hole that’s been stinking up the joint for far too long.

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    • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 6:47 pm #

      Volodya,

      You already know that I second your recommendations *s t r o n g l y*. I remember discussing this with an relevant & influential person five years ago about this, and his take on the situation (b/c it was obviously game-over back then) that the Greeks “are a Balkan nation and have NO BUSINESS in the EU at all”. He pointed out the fact that the Greek government had to cook the books to qualify for entry into the zone to begin with…

      But that’s all just so much toilet-water under the bridge now.

      re | “Same idea with Greece. Does Putin want Greece for naval installations? For airfields? I’d offer to kick in a bit of money to help. Just to get things rolling. I mean, if we deem Russia to be an adversary don’t we WANT Russian imperial over-stretch? Do the Russkis want to carve Greece out of the western orbit? Hurray, let’s get on with it!”-v.

      The Russians just got a helluva deal from Cyprus for exactly that – which is all they need (in addition to their Syrian coastal access and all that friendly Turkish coastline).

      But That’s Not All! They will very likely wind up getting all-up-inside the Port of Piraeus via their SCO/BRICS-bloc buddy China – which managed to snag a piece of that action early in the Troika’s forced-privatization spree… So, don’t expect the Russians to pack it in and go home after just one drink, not after they’ve been given so much good sugar.

      Regarding Russian strategic “over-stretch”; at this juncture it looks like the only ‘stretching’ being done will be European port capacity – to deal with all that inbound Russian military muscle.

      😉

  71. volodya April 22, 2015 at 2:26 pm #

    Mr. Darling, the generation-long quest of the oligarch class for the lowest possible wage bill got us to where we’re at. Having said that, an obstreperous union movement didn’t help matters any. And having said THAT, businesses generally get the unions they deserve.

    Well, in any case, the oligarchs did what they did. There’s no chance in hell that China would have industrialized as fast as they did without the money, technical know-how and financial expertise of the guys doing the off-shoring.

    What the oligarchs couldn’t say and what their mouth-pieces in academia couldn’t explain, is how to support this unsupportable arrangement. The only way was to talk a lot about newly laid off workers in the US and other western countries re-training and going into higher value added lines of work.

    And, as it turned out, these higher value added lines of work were a blatant fairy tale. A distraction. Smoke and mirrors.

    And so China is choking from mal-investment. An all-in bet by oligarchs that should have known better, that will cut their own throats in the end and by a Chinese elite that wasn’t thinking things through on their own, that didn’t apply elementary common sense, that took the word of people that allegedly had deep expertise in these matters.

    Too bad. For the Chinese, lessons learned: don’t believe the bull-shitters on Wall Street. They will screw you every chance they get.

    • MisterDarling April 22, 2015 at 6:56 pm #

      Hello V,

      re | “Too bad. For the Chinese, lessons learned: don’t believe the bull-shitters on Wall Street. They will screw you every chance they get.”-v.

      The current course was set back in the 1980’s by a bunch of Long-March veterans. The extent of their direct experience with America’s business class was vintage-1940’s; when they were getting American weapons and ammo at fire-sale prices through KMT warlords. How were they to know that American business-folk “are fundamentally amoral – at *best*”… [*] You don’t comprehend the crookedness of that crap until you’re in it.

      [*] I’m quoting a German businessman, off the record.

  72. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 2:43 pm #

    nsa: “You came up with a winning concept this time…..”

    Thanks, the military is a giant big government welfare scheme, so why shouldn’t goldbrickers of all religions and races get some of the swag?

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:24 pm #

      They probably should, but only if they have enough money to gain access.

  73. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 4:16 pm #

    Sales of previously owned homes jumped in March by the most in four years. Purchases increased 6.1 percent to a 5.19 million annualized rate, the highest level since September 2013, figures from the National Association of Realtors showed Wednesday.

    Thanks to Obama, there is more job growth, so people who now have good-paying jobs are buying houses.

    Note: This is not government data of increased existing home sales. This is more proof from the private sector of Obama’s economic recovery. The economic recovery y’all deny every week.

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:18 pm #

      Economic recovery for the few, stagflation for the many.

      • capt spaulding April 23, 2015 at 11:14 am #

        Too true, too true. The stock market is setting record high numbers, while most of the younger people that I know are working one or two part-time jobs with no insurance, no retirement, and no future.

  74. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 4:34 pm #

    vengeur: “And as far as the Labor Participation Rate, why should anybody worry about average people actually participating in the “recovery” (as in having a good paying job)?”

    Vengeur, your minority opinion is your opinion, but you do not speak for the majority of the American people.

    Average people are getting good jobs. For the first time since President Obama took office, a significant majority of Americans give the economy two thumbs up. Americans are the most optimistic since before the Great Recession. On top of that, Americans think the sunny economy will keep going.

    The rising confidence of the American people, thanks to President Obama’s leadership, will be self-reinforcing, driving stronger growth in the future as people and businesses spend more.

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:20 pm #

      You sound more and more like a paid shill.

  75. nsa April 22, 2015 at 5:17 pm #

    WPA,
    And the bloodthirsty southern belle from South Carolina, La Lindsey Graham, could be a five star general under a new secretary of defense, Dame Barney Frank. Barry Sataro could just come out of the closet and still be President…..transitioning to Hillary the rug muncher and first lesbo in the oval office. It would be F A B U L O U S………

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    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:14 pm #

      LOLOL! Not PC, but love it nonetheless! I’ve always suspected Miss Lindsey, in particular, to be a Proper Southern Bitch. Hillary, a political whore of the highest order (look who she learned from!!!) no doubt goes whichever way the wind blows, while Frank no doubt pitches, albeit on the “B” team. I’d imagine you’d have to be pretty far down the party list to imagine that Barney slapping you on the ass at 2:00 AM is in any way a good thing.

  76. fodase April 22, 2015 at 5:31 pm #

    Why do we need such an “ally”? This is one I would off-load to China right fucking NOW. If the Chinese are dumb enough to have them then give Pakistan a good shove out the door.

    yeah, let’s offload them to china so we don’t know any longer what they’re doing with their nuclear weapons.

    not sure why you didn’t get that foreign service job commandeering indian sub-continent policy.

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:23 pm #

      Since the US invented nuclear weapons they should be the deciders of who has them forever more. Right. Even Oppenheimer wasn’t that stupid.

  77. fodase April 22, 2015 at 6:06 pm #

    if you LEARN a SKILL the ECONOMY is GOOD.

    yes it’s that simple.

    there are 1 million unfilled positions for workers who have some SKILLS.

    These aren’t menial or “dead end” jobs. They typically pay between $50,000 and $90,000 a year and with benefits the compensation can climb to $100,000. That’s rich in most nations.

    http://www.heritage.org/research/commentary/2014/8/americas-worker-shortage-one-million-and-counting

    these aren’t rokkit scyents skills we’re talking, either.

    cfners, get a grip.

    do you have the discipline it takes to train yourself?

    fodase

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 8:48 pm #

      Typical half-assed, short-sighted, tossed-off bullshit. I’m a “techie” myself (I might be the most accomplished MS Excel developer and programmer that no one’s heard of out there). Retired from the USAF with a very modest pension (~$25K), used the GI Bill (which I had to chip in and partially pay for, but no complaints) to get a BBA (Bachelors Business Administration, boy was THAT a mistake!) from a small state university, followed by an employer “sponsored” MBA program (little more than a ruse) where I work now. Now I’m WAY overqualified to perform essentially the same EXACT job I was doing for the USAF, albeit in a higher tax bracket and with a WHOLE LOT less respect and prospects for advancement in the corporate world due to my age. Seems that 50 somethings only “slot into” senior level management positions, and failing that, we’re virtually useless, regardless of skill level. All my fellow 50 somethings could care less about my skills, since they’ve long since cashed in and are preparing to retire, and the twenty somethings I could possibly teach/mentor are “all like, DUDE, how’d you DO that?” Actually, they’re not even that interested. They’re following my peers’ leads and plotting their way to their own do nothing $100K+/yr jobs.

      The discipline you speak of is nowhere to be found in the corporate world, and is in fact, openly ridiculed among all but the most naive. All the so-called “smart” money out there is looking for the next great corporate scam to cash in on. And the skills are likewise bullshit. The “information age” has long since crested and begun to recede, at least as far as actual human contributions and enrichment are concerned. Truth is, it was all a mirage in the first place. It’s economic “advantages” have all been exploited for the enrichment of the few at the expense of the many (just as they always are), albeit at an exponentially quicker rate, and have thus simply accelerated human overshoot in the process. Say thank you young’ns for your good fortune to be among the last generations to survive. It was a damn good ride while it lasted and you all have a front row seat to the epic finale of all finales!

      • woe April 23, 2015 at 12:50 pm #

        Very well put, most people don’t get it. They don’t want to pay for brains and experience anymore. They show some person on a glossy brochure, and most people take it for the truth. If you are making the money, you live at work. Work you till you burn out. So what, the heritage foundation says there are thousands of jobs out there that are well paying, TPTB says the unemployment rate is 5.5%. The Heritage foundation says there are hundreds of jobs paying good money, so we’re SAVED!!!!!!

  78. fodase April 22, 2015 at 9:34 pm #

    Seems that 50 somethings only “slot into” senior level management positions, and failing that, we’re virtually useless, regardless of skill level.

    speak for yourself lol…

    so youre 50 something, no one respects you, my comment’s half assed, no one in the corporate world has discipline, you’re overqualified…yet you’re in a higher tax bracket.

    boo hoo hoo…….

    do you EVER bother to respond to what posts you’re responding to actually say? my post cites a Heritage Foundation study (click the link I provided) that shows that with not-so-difficult tech training one million US Americans could get jobs earning between $50-90K per year — because employers want to fill these positions but US Americans aren’t qualified, because they study shit.

    then they complain, like you.

    read the bloody study summary, it’s very simple.

    All the so-called “smart” money out there is looking for the next great corporate scam to cash in on. And the skills are likewise bullshit. The “information age” has long since crested and begun to recede, at least as far as actual human contributions and enrichment are concerned. Truth is, it was all a mirage in the first place.

    Ok, we’ll take your word that:

    – Tech skills are bullshit
    – The information age has ‘long since crested’
    – The information age was all a mirage
    – The information age is short on human contributions

    what utter stupidity, no wonder your career is a dead end. IT has improved the lives of millions of workers. It didn’t even exist 40 years ago, for all intents and purposes.

    PS I know of plenty of 50 somethings making tons of money in tech, age isn’t an issue if you have the talent they want.

    I just gave one a recommendation the other day, he’s been hired at $150K. He’s 52.

    I don’t know why I bother pointing out what’s obvious. Can’t make a horse drink water.

    Learn another programming language, since you’re a hotshot MS excel programmer. Learn Cobol, php, whatever, Excel can do some really snazzy stuff (as you know) and if you come to the table with more than one talent you have tons more options.

    fodase

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:49 pm #

      I don’t read “study summaries,” I LIVE them and even occasionally WRITE them. And you’re a drive-by dipshit poster who hangs out on sites like this to post “alternative commentary” (sometimes known as a “troll”) for whatever reasons, paid for or not.

      Yeah, I “speak for myself.” And you, you needle-nosed prick?

  79. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 9:41 pm #

    fodase: if you LEARN a SKILL the ECONOMY is GOOD.
    yes it’s that simple.

    Indeed. But you are placing the responsibility on the worker (good ‘ol conservative yankee initiative). There is no drama in that, no one to place the blame on except oneself, no world-wide conspiracy with everyone marching in lockstep to force us all into poverty and the FEMA camps, no secret clubs of Iluminati, Bildebergers, da jooz, etc. …. LOL!

    Thanks, fodase, for stating the matter simply and succinctly.

    These CFN conspiracy theorists want to pretend to be quarterback generals on foreign policy and they pretend to be macro-theorists on economics, but they can’t look in the mirror and place blame where it belongs. As you say, fodase, it ain’t rocket science.

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:55 pm #

      These CFN conspiracy theorists want to pretend to be quarterback generals on foreign policy and they pretend to be macro-theorists on economics, but they can’t look in the mirror and place blame where it belongs. As you say, fodase, it ain’t rocket science.

      Thanks for so succinctly “apologizing to” (formerly known as “licking the boots of”) your betters WPA. Let me guess. You’re a “legacy pledge” too? You fucking poser!

      • DA April 22, 2015 at 9:57 pm #

        Sorry for the italics, you little pussy.

    • DA April 22, 2015 at 10:08 pm #

      And yet, the Fodase’s and wpa-ccc’s have nothing better to do than hang out here and present shitty, disproven arguments to remind us “losers” about how we’re all wrong. Et tu, you fucking loser bitches, et tu?

  80. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 10:21 pm #

    DA: “The discipline you speak of is nowhere to be found in the corporate world…”

    Jeez, DA, stop playing dumb. Computer skills are not the only skills. You are crying because you are in your 50s! A 70 year old appliance repair technician can get $50 to $70 an hour to work on a broken refrigerator or dish washer. Likewise, plumbers and electricians.

    There are all kinds of skills which do not require you to go anywhere near a computer. But you won’t be on any corporate payroll… you’ll be self-employed… if you have the discipline to learn a new skill.

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    • DA April 22, 2015 at 10:38 pm #

      Ah yes. Life is good and we all recreate ourselves effortlessly in our 50s… for minimum wage in a maximum wage economy. Once again, let me guess, you’re a legacy pledge? But of course you’ll never admit to that, because you’re on here trolling for the virtues of the leisure class. Good work if you can find it. God knows I’m surrounded by your type.

      Let me say this in the nicest way possible. FUCK YOU and EVERYONE LIKE YOU! I hope one day I get the chance to push a knife through your still fucking beating heart!

      • woe April 23, 2015 at 1:15 pm #

        I’m with you DA I’m 56 and I don’t listen to the I got mine crowd anymore. They haven’t been laid off yet. Somehow, they think they’re special and with record corporate bankruptcies going on in this country that their “special asses” will continue to live the good life. They don’t realize, that one day, they will be laid off too, and can’t afford that house they overpaid for, and let me guess, they probably live in a high cost of living area. I bet that area is beautiful. It beautiful because they don’t have any unemployed/underemployed people living there. Man I would love to be there when they send out those 200 resumes and get no reply after 6 mos and have burnt through all their savings. They can’t sell that house they paid too much for, and their networked “friends” don’t return their calls.

        • BackRowHeckler April 23, 2015 at 1:59 pm #

          You need to get a government job, local, state or fed, it doesn’t matter, no layoffs, you can’t even get fired if you try. Great bennies, early retirement, regular and generous raises, and best of all, on many of the jobs you get to push people around, frighten them, tell them what and what not to do. You might be able to take their property, kick down their door, remove their children, close down their bank accounts — skys the limit!

          And yes, they have their own language, a form a newspeak … if you are fluent it marks you as an insider … listen to Federal Radio, the old WTOP out of DC … they speak it there.

          brh

          • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 2:44 pm #

            Until the dollar dies. Then what?

      • Janos Skorenzy April 23, 2015 at 4:42 pm #

        Careful there. Whites don’t get to talk like that – people like you act as enforcers and informants on this. Only very connected Whites can say shit like that now – people like Rahmbo. Of course he’s not White so it’s not a good example.

        I do agree with your indignation on the jobs issue of course. But you also favor mass immigration which dooms any chance at reform. So your rage is full of sound and fury but signifies nothing I’m afraid.

  81. wpa_ccc April 22, 2015 at 10:58 pm #

    DA: “Let me say this in the nicest way possible. FUCK YOU and EVERYONE LIKE YOU! I hope one day I get the chance to push a knife through your still fucking beating heart!

    Appropriate authorities have been notified.

  82. BackRowHeckler April 23, 2015 at 7:02 am #

    Watching BBC America this morning, a real ‘Camp of Saints’ scenario is unfolding on Europe’s Med Coast. Migrants are arriving by the thousands into Greece and Italy, in leaky boats, many drowning enroute. And they’re coming from many different places, Eriteria, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya, Iraq … the EU is convening a Commission to look into the problem. It seems like the whole 3rd world is in a state of collapse and the only remedy for people caught up in it is to get the hell out and head for Europe or the US.

    DA, my hats off to you for staying long enough in the USAF to get a pension out of them. I’m sure it wasn’t easy dealing with all the BS. Actually 25K per year isn’t too bad, there are places in the world you could live pretty good on that, some warm tropical place, kick back and take life easy, fish, drink, and whatever else you feel like doing.

    brh

  83. Cold N. Holefield April 23, 2015 at 9:41 am #

    Jesus, things are getting really heated up around here. I won’t touch it with a ten foot pole or any pole or object, thank you very much. One thing that still seems to be going strong and trucking along until it doesn’t is sports — of any kind, but especially pro basketball, football, baseball and golf and college basketball and football. And you must admit, it’s been shaped by American culture and it shapes American culture so any critical sociological analysis would be remiss to overlook its prodigious impact on the State of the Nation. Pursuant to that, I’ve created a companion blog and Twitter account to cover this dimension. Take a gander when you get a chance. It’s slow-going right now but I surmise traffic will pick up when Google starts showing it in search terms which takes a month or two at least.

    The Lewd Longhorn blog

    The Lewd Longhorn on Twitter

    • capt spaulding April 24, 2015 at 2:27 pm #

      They really ARE heating up. I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot Pole, or a ten foot Armenian either, for that matter.

    • Q. Shtik April 24, 2015 at 4:31 pm #

      Cold N,

      I read your new blog and wanted to comment but I am so utterly tech challenged I can’t even figure how to register. You have my email address. How about sending me some step by step instructions.

      You are the last person I would ever think once attended Texas A&M but your dropping after the first year and a half fits.

      I had an aggie roommate in the Air Force for one year. Lets see, I’m 74 so he would now be 72-73. Time flies. His name is/was Rick Smith. A real character.

      Given your dissertation about lying on the internet and your other blog titled Catcher in the LIE, I’m not sure whether to believe some of the personal info on family member’s sexual orientations that you reveal in your new blog.

      • Cold N. Holefield April 24, 2015 at 5:15 pm #

        I’ll look into why you can’t comment. It may be something I have to activate in my admin. screen.

        Yes, take everything I write with a grain of salt. Some of it may be true and some of it may be total fabrication. Only the most discerning reader can figure it out, and maybe even that’s not a guarantee.

      • Cold N. Holefield April 24, 2015 at 10:01 pm #

        You should be able to comment now without registering. The comment button is at the bottom of each respective post. All you need is your name and email.

        • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:36 pm #

          WHERE IS YAW BLOG?

  84. fodase April 23, 2015 at 9:55 am #

    DA: “Let me say this in the nicest way possible. FUCK YOU and EVERYONE LIKE YOU! I hope one day I get the chance to push a knife through your still fucking beating heart!

    thanks DA! we knew you could provide a fact-based retort as to why we’re wrong about our arguments.

    guess JHK isn’t reading, or his webmaster either, when death threats are made on his blog.

    goes to show what CFN doomsdayers are made of.

    aren’t the rest of you ashamed?

    I guess I’ll have to make that call to the FBI or whomever handles threats to kill made via internet.

    fodase

    • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:36 pm #

      I guess I’ll have to make that call to the FBI or whomever handles threats to kill made via internet.

      Does the FBI even bother?

  85. fodase April 23, 2015 at 10:03 am #

    I don’t read “study summaries,” I LIVE them and even occasionally WRITE them.

    how about some links to the studies you live and write?

    And yet, the Fodase’s and wpa-ccc’s have nothing better to do than hang out here and present shitty, disproven arguments to remind us “losers” about how we’re all wrong.

    you don’t see the obviousness of your illogicity in making this statement?

    LOL, too funny

    Let us know if you’d like it explained.

    In real world news, Spain currently only getting 5-10% of its electricity from the wind as we speak, must be a quiet day in Iberia.

    WOOPS! Denmark currently getting 62.5% of all its electrical power from WIND + SUN!!!!!

    http://energinet.dk/Flash/Forside/UK/index.html

    Woohoo, energy ascent baby!!!!

    fodase

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  86. BackRowHeckler April 23, 2015 at 10:50 am #

    “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen …”

  87. FincaInTheMountains April 23, 2015 at 11:23 am #

    Italy happily joined in the destruction of the Jamahiriya (Libya). Three years have passed.

    Now Libya – is not just a continuous war of all against all. It is also a wide-open portal through which to Italy from Africa there goes an unstoppable flow of hundreds of thousands of poor people. From which no economic benefit will come and which, unfortunately for the Europeans, not all are drowned in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea.

    Italy howls.

    But to make the right conclusions there, perhaps at the political level no one left to do – because all the authoritative place crammed with trained idiots. And they score high positions exactly because they are trained idiots helping to bury the very same system that trained them.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 23, 2015 at 8:01 pm #

      Never will it be forgotten. Never will it be forgiven.

      http://www.dailystormer.com/rape-hate-part-1/

      The only good Russians are the Aryan ones. They were mostly alright. The Mongols, Kazakhs, Khazars, and Kalmucks coming in the wave behind them were a far different story. No sane White Russian wants anything to do with such people.

      Thank you for admitting the obvious, that the Black Africans need to be sent to Davy Jones Locker.

  88. volodya April 23, 2015 at 12:20 pm #

    About trolls, you know who the trolls are, you know they aren’t bona fide commenters, you know their purpose isn’t honest discussion, in sum, you know there’s no point engaging with them.

    So don’t engage with them. That would be my advice. But, of course, you can do as you please.

    Mr. Darling, about Greece, Turkey, Russia etc. This is where the USA has a chance to turn a leaf, that being to adopt a new approach.

    Of course this would mean that the dominant group-think thinkers would have to modify their points of view. And, having been around, you would know there’s no force in this universe as powerful as the inertia of human minds accustomed to thinking in certain ways.

    This approach would be simple, that is, to take each and every US soldier, every piece of military equipment, every weapon, every ship and get it the hell away from the European continent. The idea being, of course, that the Europeans are more than capable of taking care of themselves, and that if they want, they could take care of threats, real and perceived, from Russia. Or anywhere else.

    Does Europe have nuclear weapons? Of course, both France and the UK are nuclear armed. Do they have a population of able-bodied young men capable of bearing arms? Of course, they have more than enough. Do they have economies capable of producing arms and munitions? Sure they do, there’s no problem. The only problem here is one of WILL.

    Do Europeans have the WILL? I doubt it, but this is their problem. There is no reason on god’s green earth that Americans should have to bear a burden that Europeans are unwilling to bear themselves.

    Will the Russkis get some nice ports and other facilities on the Mediterranean coast? Yes, sure. That’s not for the US to worry about. This is for the Europeans to deal with.

    You could extend the same approach to the Far East. South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia and all the rest have more than enough capability. There’s NO need to American fleets to be out there, there’s NO need for Americans to piss away their own resources doing things that Asians are unwilling to do.

    If the Chinese want to make the same mistakes that the US made with military over-stretch, if they’re too dumb to learn from others’ mistakes, well, that’s entirely their problem. If the Russians are too dumb to learn from their own history and mistakes, again, this isn’t the business of the US. Let the Russians make the same mistakes. Again.

    • MisterDarling April 23, 2015 at 7:45 pm #

      Hello V & co.,

      re | “Of course this would mean that the dominant group-think thinkers would have to modify their points of view. And, having been around, you would know there’s no force in this universe as powerful as the inertia of human minds accustomed to thinking in certain ways.”-v.

      It’s easier to move a mountain than change a mind in most cases – most people just aren’t wired for that… Or as Upton Sinclair put it;

      “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” -U S.

      von;

      https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/23510.Upton_Sinclair

      Regarding the ‘need’ for the US military to be deployed in the Asian and European Theaters, you must be kidding Volodya. You know perfectly well that there are BILLION$ of reasons why the number 1 & 2 most powerful oligarchic cliques __make sure__ the US government understands how “vital” it is that the US stays balls-deep in other peoples business. It’s the nature of the imperial warfare business. . . And consequently why working for the empire is a job with an “insept date”.

      We don’t have someone like Otto von Bismarck available to reign-in the chief executive, choke-chain the oligarchs and keep the realm out of counterproductive wars… So this is what we deal with.

  89. fodase April 23, 2015 at 12:45 pm #

    About trolls, you know who the trolls are, you know they aren’t bona fide commenters, you know their purpose isn’t honest discussion, in sum, you know there’s no point engaging with them.

    LAFFable as usual. Trolls are anyone you don’t agree with, lol, what a joke.

    People you don’t agree with aren’t “bonafide commenters” !! HAHAHAHAH

    guess folks like DA who make death threats online are bonafide commenters engaging in honest discussion?

    fodase

    • Janos Skorenzy April 23, 2015 at 2:26 pm #

      I think you two should handle this in a mature, manly fashion. In other words, a duel. It is said that Good shall conquer Evil. Surely God will favor the righteous one and grant him victory. How else can we know whom to believe? The books are cooked and the scribes and clerks in the pockets of the rich and powerful. Offhand I favor Da on this one, but who am I to judge? I would prefer having more to stand on. This duel should clear matters up considerably.

  90. Janos Skorenzy April 23, 2015 at 1:59 pm #

    The Clinton Foundation has made the Clintons rich. How? Because a whopping 15 cents of every dollar goes to the actual charity. Sixty percent goes to amorphous “other expenses”. One is remind of Chelsea saying she doesn’t care about money, doesn’t think of life in those terms, wouldn’t know what to do with it. Yet she still found her way into marrying into a Billionaire family. Life is funny like that.

    Alas poor Buck. It’s almost like Mr Kunstler and the whole Zeitgeist is responding to his post of last week. Imagine anyone thinking of Hillary as a viable candidate. Yet people do. Are they even human, these “people”?

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    • BackRowHeckler April 23, 2015 at 2:06 pm #

      Chelsea and her husband just bought themselves a new place in NYC, price: $10.5 million!

      Hillary is going to take on the 1%, her own daughter.

      brh

      • malthuss April 23, 2015 at 2:47 pm #

        I forget the actual figure BUT did Bil spend 50,000,000 dollars of the ‘Foundations’ money on travel?

        And Chelsea married an orthodox Jewish Hedge guy.
        Merger of empires.

        • BackRowHeckler April 23, 2015 at 3:23 pm #

          Wait a minute, Malth.

          I thought Bill got to fly around free in the private aircraft of the billionaire convicted sex offender, along with the Price of Wales, to some remote island in the Caribbean, where they raped underaged girls?

          I don’t know, maybe I’m wrong on that. The media doesn’t seem to eager to get to the bottom of it.

          brh

  91. Janos Skorenzy April 23, 2015 at 5:12 pm #

    The True Church fights back against Homo Evil.

    https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/nuns-walk-out-of-san-francisco-catholic-school-as-students-push-gay-activis

    • malthuss April 26, 2015 at 1:22 am #

      ACLU is suing CC, its Charity refuses to provide abortion.

      Amazing how evil the left and TWMNBN are.

  92. fodase April 23, 2015 at 7:17 pm #

    I’m with you DA I’m 56 and I don’t listen to the I got mine crowd anymore. They haven’t been laid off yet. Somehow, they think they’re special and with record corporate bankruptcies going on in this country that their “special asses” will continue to live the good life. They don’t realize, that one day, they will be laid off too, and can’t afford that house they overpaid for,

    well i’ve been laid off suddenly as an IT guy with 3 children and that expensive as heck mortgage.

    so i don’t take any living the good life for granted. at one time afterwards i had $300 to my name.

    doesn’t change the fact that, if you have a skill that’s valuable – plumbing, fixing appliances, programming, welding – you will find another job.

    i am very fortunate in that i speak several languages and can work as a translator as well – but breaking into that took a few years as well.

    age is irrelevant if you can do the work. jamie moyer pitched at 49 in the big leagues – because he could.

    if you’re 56 and can program in php/css/html or cobol/jcl or a HUNDRED other languages you can find work, and it pays oh about 5-10 times what you’d make as a greeter as walmart, since that’s the only reference job all CFNers talk about and think typifies the US labor market.

    it does if you don’t have a skill.

    it’s that simple.

    do a search on Dice for greeter, then do a search on php or html, or even excel, DA’s forte.

    oh DA, can you send us some links to those studies you write?

    lol, tx for the chuckle.

    fodase in brazil

  93. wpa_ccc April 23, 2015 at 8:30 pm #

    fodase: “it pays oh about 5-10 times what you’d make as a greeter as walmart, since that’s the only reference job all CFNers talk about and think typifies the US labor market.”

    fodase, I think in addition to Walmart greeters, CFNers have also referenced fast food workers as a “typical” job in the US labor market.

    It is no use to cite hard facts or provide statistics about how things are getting better. Many are bitter, and feel left behind. They have no arguments.

    They are victims of invisible conspiracies, making them believe the CFN refrain: “We’re all fucked” (and believing that paralyzes them)

    But we are not all fucked. All you have to do is learn a skill for which there is a market.

    Others are demanding a living wage for all who work 40 hours a week.

    http://fightfor15.org/april15/

  94. fodase April 23, 2015 at 10:22 pm #

    Spain using pollution-free WIND to generate 5% of all its electricity as we speak. A very bad day for the country, typically it generates 30% from the free WIND, saving millions of barrels of oil per year.

    https://demanda.ree.es/eolicaEng.html

    Ah, but DENMARK getting 48% of all its electricity from the free WIND as we speak!

    http://energinet.dk/Flash/Forside/UK/index.html

    So, HALF of DENMARK’s (population ca. 6 million) electricity is being provided by pollution free clean electrical power from nature, cutting greenhouse gas emissions and slashing petroleum usage drastically.

    And it was 62.5% !!!! a few hours ago.

    Technofantasy? Too much magic?

    It’s called reality, wake up to it CFN disbelievers.

    Ireland getting 11% of all its electricity from WIND as we speak!

    https://www.energyelephant.com/page-traffic-light

    The world has passed doomsayers by, we welcome all who would embrace progress as we rocket into the golden age of cornucopia.

    Endtymers have a perfect track record of being wrong.

    Nevertheless, we salute you as we roar on wings of clean, limitless energy high, high, high above your earnest yet misguided delusions of demise and catapult into a stellar age of cornucopia, filled with boundless technological progress that is only beginning to show the first glimmers of the wondrous transformations yet to come….

    fodase

  95. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 1:06 am #

    The worldwide transition from fossil fuels to renewable sources of energy is under way. As fossil fuel resources shrink, as air pollution worsens, and as concerns about climate instability cast a shadow over the future of coal, oil and natural gas, a new world energy economy is emerging. The old economy, fueled largely by coal and oil, is being replaced with one powered by solar and wind energy.

    In China, electricity from wind farms has eclipsed that from nuclear power plants. The costs of both solar- and wind-generated electricity are falling fast, undercutting fossil fuels in more and more electricity markets.

    In parts of Australia, which is experiencing a solar boom, the cost of producing electricity from the sun has fallen well below that from coal. Even if the coal itself were free, coal-fired generation couldn’t compete with solar.

    It is great to live in an era of energy ascent. We are witnessing the rise of sustainable and clean energy alternatives to oil.

    We are in the long emergenc-y alright, the emergence of alternatives. Earth is in transition, the great energy transition to solar and wind happening before our very eyes for those who care to look. No longer 1% alternatives… now nations are getting half… or more than half… from sun and wind, and the alternative energy revolution is just starting.

    Climate change deniers… Alternative energy deniers… Both ignore the data. And when the number goes from 50% to 99% for alternative energy, some will still say oil is the most important resource… even if we are no longer fighting wars over oil because we live in a post-fossil fuel world. LOL

    Read Lester Brown’s, The Great Transition: Shifting from Fossil Fuels to Solar and Wind Energy.

    http://www.earth-policy.org/books/tgt

    The Great Transition details the accelerating pace of this global energy revolution. As many countries become less enamored with coal and nuclear power, they are embracing an array of clean, renewable energies. Whereas solar energy projects were once small-scale, largely designed for residential use, energy investors are now building utility-scale solar projects. Strides are being made: some of the huge wind farm complexes under construction in China will each produce as much electricity as several nuclear power plants, and an electrified transport system supplemented by the use of bicycles could reshape the way we think about mobility.

    It is data-driven. The data are public. Here is the link: http://www.earth-policy.org/books/tgt/tgt_data

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  96. BackRowHeckler April 24, 2015 at 7:15 am #

    The premise here is there’s no $$$ left, but we find out this morning 298 ‘luxury units’ being built on 19 acres on the property of a former textile plant, along the Farmington River.

    Also, beginning today, illegals can access city issued ID cards in Hartford, ‘so they can access city services like free medical care’. This goes into effect the same day the State announces cuts for mentally handicapped adults and teenagers. JHK states we cannot accept everybody in the 3rd world who wants to come here and get free stuff; I beg to differ, not are we accepting all illegals but we have thrown down the welcome mat. Of course, resources are limited, and somebody has to pay, and its the weakest among us who are going to pay. Another example, cuts in higher education and raising tuition next year in the state U system 5%. Only program increased: tuition waivers for illegals, ‘because that’s who we are’.

    Read Orwell’s ‘1984’ to see what the lies, BS, and obfuscation emanating from the Agit/Prop Dept in Airstrip 1 are all about.

    brh

  97. bob April 24, 2015 at 7:55 am #

    The ongoing political circus will move us further into the land of ideology make believe. When you operate outside of the realm of reality then you escape into imaginative beliefs,the simpler the better.
    There has to be a way to make a buck in this ongoing conflict with reality.

  98. FincaInTheMountains April 24, 2015 at 8:02 am #

    Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal

    The article in Pravda, in January 2013, detailed how the Russian atomic energy agency, Rosatom, had taken over a Canadian company with uranium-mining stakes stretching from Central Asia to the American West. The deal made Rosatom one of the world’s largest uranium producers and brought Mr. Putin closer to his goal of controlling much of the global uranium supply chain.

    But the untold story behind that story is one that involves not just the Russian president, but also a former American president and a woman who would like to be the next one.

    At the heart of the tale are several men, leaders of the Canadian mining industry, who have been major donors to the charitable endeavors of former President Bill Clinton and his family. Members of that group built, financed and eventually sold off to the Russians a company that would become known as Uranium One.

    Beyond mines in Kazakhstan that are among the most lucrative in the world, the sale gave the Russians control of one-fifth of all uranium production capacity in the United States. Since uranium is considered a strategic asset, with implications for national security, the deal had to be approved by a committee composed of representatives from a number of United States government agencies. Among the agencies that eventually signed off was the State Department, then headed by Mr. Clinton’s wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

    As the Russians gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions from 2009 to 2013, Canadian records show, a flow of cash made its way to the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One’s chairman used his family foundation to make four donations totaling $2.35 million. Those contributions were not publicly disclosed by the Clintons, despite an agreement Mrs. Clinton had struck with the Obama White House to publicly identify all donors. Other people with ties to the company made donations as well.

    And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-foundation-as-russians-pressed-for-control-of-uranium-company.html?_r=1

  99. fodase April 24, 2015 at 8:53 am #

    It is clear no one wants to discuss energy.

    Spain getting 11% of all its electricity from the wind as we speak…

    https://demanda.ree.es/eolicaEng.html

    Denmark getting 24% of all its electricity from solar + wind as we speak…

    http://energinet.dk/Flash/Forside/UK/index.html

    Ireland getting 10% of all its electricity from wind power as we speak…

    https://www.energyelephant.com/page-traffic-light

    Germany has brought on record amounts of wind and solar generating capacity in the last few years, helping it now meet more than a quarter of its electricity demand with renewable sources

    The central premise of this blog is destroyed.

    fodase

  100. FincaInTheMountains April 24, 2015 at 9:42 am #

    Democracy is all about freedom of choice. Coca Cola or Pepsi. Republicans or Democrats. Mac Donald’s or KFC. ISIS or Al Qaeda.

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  101. fodase April 24, 2015 at 12:16 pm #

    well i think d.a. has been expunged from the record…

  102. FincaInTheMountains April 24, 2015 at 1:41 pm #

    Will Vladimir Putin revive American evangelicals’ faith that Jesus is coming soon? He just might.

    Over the past 150 years, evangelicals have used global chaos to propel their movement forward. Lining up world events with ancient biblical prophecies, they have offered adherents secret knowledge of the past, the present and the future. Evangelicals know how to make their beliefs relevant to the day’s headlines in a way that no other American religious group has matched.

    Putin offers fresh ammunition for evangelicals’ apocalyptic views. The more unpredictable and aggressive the Russian leader becomes, the more passionately some evangelicals will preach Jesus’s imminent return. His mix of daring ambition and overtures of peace in Ukraine while hinting that he might arm Iran remind the faithful that the world is careening towards the apocalypse predicted in the book of Revelation. After all, the Apostle Paul predicted that when God’s enemies claimed peace, “sudden destruction would cometh.”

    Russia has long been a prime target of evangelical scrutiny. Shortly after the Civil War, an Irish preacher named John Nelson Darby reintroduced Americans to a Christian apocalyptic tradition that had long been dormant. Darby taught that at the end of time, a series of wars would culminate in the battle of Armageddon. There, Jesus Christ would face off against Satan’s early representative, a global political leader called the Antichrist. But in order for the Antichrist to achieve world domination, he would have to defeat competing devilish empires.

    The most powerful one, according to Darby, was Russia.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/04/22/could-vladimir-putin-battle-the-antichrist-how-some-evangelicals-debate-the-end-times/?tid=hpModule_99d5f542-86a2-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394

    I think, as usual, the evangelicals got it exactly in reverse. Russia represents the world balancing scale so necessary in modern world gone evil.

  103. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 1:47 pm #

    More proof immigrants are job creators, not “takers”…

    “Charlotte, North Carolina, like many southern metropolitan areas, has grown rapidly in recent decades. In 2013, when Charlotte declared itself a “welcoming city,” one in ten residents (10.1 percent) in the Charlotte-Gastonia-Rock Hill metropolitan area were foreign-born, while one-third (32.6 percent) of “Main Street” business owners were foreign-born.

    “Main Street” businesses are the shops and services that form the backbone of neighborhoods around the country, typically in three sectors: retail, accommodation and food services, and neighborhood services.

    These are the types of businesses that characteristically contribute to the vibrancy of neighborhoods, as a new study—Immigrant Businesses, Place-Making, and Community Development: A Case from an Emerging Immigrant Gateway—by geographers Johanna Claire Schuch and Qingfang Wang of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, confirms.

    Their research explores “Main Street” immigrant business contributions to community development in Charlotte. The study finds that “immigrant businesses have transformed deteriorating and abandoned street fronts into vibrant and well-frequented urban environments conducive for further development.”

    http://immigrationimpact.com/2015/03/25/charlotte-nc-capitalizing-on-the-benefits-of-immigrant-entrepreneurs/#sthash.R4oQZR35.dpuf

  104. fodase April 24, 2015 at 1:51 pm #

    DENMARK
    —————–
    Denmark set a new world record for wind production in 2014, getting 39.1 percent of its overall electricity from the clean energy source.

    UK
    —–
    In the UK, wind power also smashed records in 2014, as generation rose 15 percent from 24.5 terawatt-hours (TWh) hours to 28.1 TWh.

    That’s more than any other year, and the country now generates enough wind energy to supply the needs of more than 6.7 million UK households.

    GERMANY
    ————–
    Renewable energy was the biggest contributor to Germany’s electricity supply in 2014, with nearly 26 percent of the country’s power generation coming from clean sources.

    That’s according to Berlin-based think-tank Agora Energiewende.

    Electricity output from renewables has grown eightfold in Germany since 1990, and the latest data further highlights the dramatic shift towards clean energy taking place in Europe’s largest economy.

    SCOTLAND
    —————
    With another record month experienced in December, 2014 was a “massive year” for renewables in Scotland.

    Last month, wind turbines alone provided around 1,279 megawatt-hours (MWh) of electricity to the national gird, enough to supply the electrical needs of 164 percent of Scottish households, or 3.96 million homes.

    The latest figures further highlight the record year seen for renewables in Scotland, with wind turbines providing an average 746, 510 MWh each month—enough to supply 98 percent of Scottish households electricity needs.

    IRELAND
    ————-
    Windy conditions in Ireland meant the country saw not one but two wind energy records set already this year.

    According to figures record by EirGrid on Wednesday (Jan. 7), wind energy had created 1,942 MW of energy, enough to power more than 1.26 million homes.

    And while we are still only a week into 2015, this announcement marked the second time this year the country has seen this record broken. On the Jan. 1, wind energy output was at a previous high of 1,872 MW.

    This is only WIND. There is also SOLAR.

    You have seen the massive successes.

    The debate is over.

    fodase

    • elysianfield April 25, 2015 at 10:12 am #

      Wind power…

      What is the effect of removing billions of joules of energy from the system that provides for our weather? What is the “Butterfly Effect” of wind energy production? How does this loss of wind energy effect global climate change? I suspect that there is no “free lunch”…

      At one time, there were many buffalo…now the buffalo is gone….

      • Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 9:46 pm #

        What is the effect of removing billions of joules of energy from the system that provides for our weather? – Elysian

        ==============

        This is an angle that never crossed my mind and I must say it sounds absurd on its surface. Are you seriously suggesting that as the wind passes over and turns the turbine blades “billions of joules of energy are being REMOVED from the system”?

        Is this like the admonition against long blog comments which are using up cyberspace?

        • elysianfield April 26, 2015 at 8:56 pm #

          Conservation of energy…. I am not suggesting anything, other than there is quantifiably less wind energy downwind from the wind farm then on the windward side. The absurdity is that it has not been studied and explained away. Our Jet Stream molds our climate on the Pacific Northwest, as well as most everywhere else. Surface winds impact other factors such as tidal surges, and cooling, heating, and humidity changes amongst many others. Who is to say what macro or micro changes in that this loss of energy might effect local or global weather? Yes, energy is being removed from the system…where else would the energy produced come from?

          • Q. Shtik April 26, 2015 at 9:02 pm #

            Isn’t the amt produced equal to the amt removed?

          • elysianfield April 27, 2015 at 9:43 am #

            No, not possible. Factor in inefficiencies of conversion process…friction, heat loss, etc. etc.

  105. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 1:59 pm #

    Just like Republicans are beginning to change their attitudes about gay marriage, soon Republicans will have to change on other issues, like climate change and Obamacare.

    More proof Americans are happy with Obamacare:

    ” J.D. Power uses a numerical index, from zero (low) to 1,000 (high), to measure consumer satisfaction. The figure for Affordable Care Act consumers was 696. To put that in perspective, the figure for people with employer-sponsored insurance — the source of coverage for most working-age Americans — was 670.

    The survey found that people who were buying plans for the second consecutive year were more satisfied than those buying for the first time. Those buying plans through marketplaces that the federal government operates, rather than marketplaces that the states run, also tended to be happier.

    The J.D. Power study is not the first to suggest that the majority of Obamacare consumers are content with what they are getting for their money. ”

    All the catastrophic predictions about Obamacare failed. The only ones still opposing Obamacare are ideological fanatics who ignore the tsunami of data favorable to Obamacare.

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  106. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 2:26 pm #

    fodase: “You have seen the massive successes. The debate is over.”

    CFN and TheOilDrum used to be places very concerned about impending doom due to “peak oil.” TheOilDrum closed down shop years ago and CFN has gone silent on peak oil. The fact that we are in a Great Transition to safe, clean, and sustainable alternative energy sources, cheaper than fossil fuels, is being ignored, or flippantly dismissed as “too much magic” all the while ignoring the data.

    The trend away from fossil fuels is only beginning, but already the data do suggest that, indeed, the debate is over. The fossil fuels have to remain in the ground. To extract and burn them would be destructive.

    Humanity’s rationality, humanity’s ability to apply critical thinking to energy problems, is on display for all who have eyes to see. In China, Australia, India, Indonesia, Brazil… these are not small European countries. These constitute almost half the world’s population.

    The future is bright. This is change we can believe in.

    “India announced that it plans to increase the 22 GW capacity addition target to 100 GW by 2022. This target has been officially endorsed by the government in its first full-year financial budget.

    The Finance Minister of India outlined the medium-term renewable energy capacity addition targets in the recently proposed annual budget. India now aims to have an installed renewable energy capacity of 175 GW by 2022. 100 GW of this would come from solar power, 60 GW from wind energy, 10 GW from small hydro power, and 5 GW from biomass-based power projects.”

    It is only the beginning.

    http://www.inspiremusic.com/its-only-the-beginning/

  107. fodase April 24, 2015 at 3:29 pm #

    Bingo wpa_ccc

    it’s over.

    the cfn-jhk adulators will just fall silent on this (they already have) and go on to make wild unsubstantiated banshee shrieking claims about other purported endtymes events.

    highly funny when they talk about foreign policy.

    “oh yeah, ok well the russians will get a few nice ports in the mediterranean, the US is inept, doesn’t know anything about history, China is stupid if they [fill in the blank], Putin is this/that/some other thing” LOL

    really childish, and utterly off point and useless.

    the fact that kunstler no longer talks of peak oil says it all….

    this blog’s dogma has been thoroughly discredited.

    i mean we are offering incontrovertible proof that entire nations are regularly getting up to HALF (and on some days in excess of 100%) of their electricity from solar+wind plants….

    yet this is ignored, sloughed off, met by invective.

    in short, all the wailings of a dying argument that has no legs to stand on and whose adherents can no longer offer any fact-based counterweighting to support their utterly failed premise.

    fodase

    • beantownbill. April 24, 2015 at 4:37 pm #

      Don’t be concerned, Welles, the doomer crowd has other examples to draw upon, so they aren’t going away. Why, didn’t you read the headlines today about the Yellowstone magma pool that is orders of magnitude larger than previously thought, and if it blows will destroy North America and change the world? And, if that doesn’t work out, there’s always Nibiru lurking around the fringes of the solar system.

  108. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 5:55 pm #

    BTB (tongue in cheek, said): “Nibiru lurking around the fringes of the solar system.”

    Meanwhile, back in the real world, Hawaii Island (also known as the Big Island) is running on nearly 50 percent renewable energy, cheaper than petroleum fuels in Hawaii.

    Yet, all Republicans have done is make jokes about Al Gore, and talk trash about “green shoots” being a fantasy, with references to Solyndra… as if isolated failures in new alternative technology damn the whole effort.

    Meanwhile, Hawaii has at least 50 renewable energy projects spread over five islands. Hawaii (the whole state, not just the Big Island) is on track to 100% renewable energy.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 24, 2015 at 6:06 pm #

      If true, that’s against the wishes of the Native People of Hawaii. They feel volcanoes are sacred to the Goddess Pele and the energy is not to be used.

  109. Janos Skorenzy April 24, 2015 at 6:15 pm #

    Beautiful Heroine defies Black Savages who were trampling on the Flag. Ignorant, slob cops arrest her and not the trouble makers. In Russia, Cops and Citizens would have united to thrash these untermensch.

    http://news.yahoo.com/georgia-university-cancels-classes-flap-over-flag-protest-111857196.html

  110. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 6:21 pm #

    Janos: “that’s against the wishes of the Native People of Hawaii.”

    No, Janos, you are stereotyping native Hawaiians. Not all native Hawaiians believe what you say they believe.

    The Innovations Development Group is a native Hawaiian owned company that wants to harness geothermal energy in a sustainable way while conserving native traditions.

    After all, many native Hawaiians say free energy from the earth is a gift from the goddess and they feel grateful for her bounty.

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  111. nsa April 24, 2015 at 6:37 pm #

    WPA,
    Solar Power – how does it work at night?
    Wind Power – how does it work when there is not enough wind?
    Store energy in a giant battery and then replace it constantly….like some kind of giant crappy Prius? Any sympathy for critters that fly? Spanish wind farms murder 20 million birds and bats a year. What about the condor radio collar found in a mound of feathers underneath that ultra-ugly Palm Springs wind farm?

    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 6:43 am #

      “Solar Power – how does it work at night?” = it doesn’t
      “Wind Power – how does it work when there is not enough wind?” = it doesn’t.

      Installing a wind or solar power unit would requires installing an equivalent backup system that is capable of providing sufficient energy during the multiple power “blackouts” from renewable energy. It would also required a massive battery storage unit of equal capacity.

      The total price of installed “reliable” system will be at least triple the normal cost and could only be sustained only by massive tax subsidies.

      When the tax subsidies will be eventually removed, the unfortunate countries that been stupid enough to follow the “renewable energy revolution” will be faced with massive energy price hikes.

      • Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 9:17 pm #

        I linked to an article a week or so ago that pointed out the obstacle of all the major countries subsidizing solar (and I presume, wind). The successes that fodase endlessly repeats would never have happened without those subsidies. But that is not to say that subsidies are a bad route to take. The belief is that technical advancements and economies of scale will eventually make these alternative sources of energy cheaper than carbon based fuels…and not by a small amount. I am coming to believe this myself despite Jim’s Too Much Magic.

        Take a look at the solar ETF (Exchange Traded Fund) that goes by the symbol TAN.

  112. hortonz April 24, 2015 at 7:44 pm #

    Once again we, the enlightened American public who values critical-thinking and facts over dogma and fairy tales, finds ourselves without a voice to represent us in 2016 Vote Democrat? Forget it folks. The multicultural and diversity police are firmly in control and anyone with a contrarian point of view, like JHK, winds up wasting all their time defending themselves from accusations of being anti-gay, anti-women, anti-black, anti-Hispanic etcetera. Vote Republican? You got to be kidding. The voices of rural idiocy will drown out any enlightened viewpoint by calling it anti-American, pro-Communist or Liberal and that will be the end of the discussion. The only hope for rational, intelligent voters will have to be a third political party headed by a gadfly like JHK or Dmitri Orlov, which will be lucky if it gets .1% of the vote.

  113. wpa_ccc April 24, 2015 at 8:26 pm #

    nsa: “WPA, Solar Power – how does it work at night? Wind Power – how does it work when there is not enough wind?”

    nsa, you have identified a tremendous opportunity, a sector that is seeing tremendous growth: energy storage. The energy storage market is exploding. Problems in grid stability are being solved as we speak.

    Thanks for identifying yet another problem that human rationality is addressing. The future is bright.

    http://energystorage.org/energy-storage/facts-figures

  114. wpa_ccc April 25, 2015 at 12:23 am #

    nsa, thank you also for your concern about the birds and bats. There are ways to minimize the hazard to them. Here are the mortality facts:

    243,000 (thousands) of birds die from wind turbines

    1,000,000,000 (billion) die from collisions with windows

    4,000,000,000 (billions) die from feral cats

    174,000,000 (millions) from high tension wires

    72,000,000 (millions) from pesticides

    60,000,000 (millions) die from cars

    Perhaps you concern for bats and birds and wind power is misplaced?

    In any event, nsa, human rationality is addressing the problem in several innovative ways to eliminate bird and bat deaths at wind farms.

    The issue you raise is valid, and through critical thinking and rationality it can be solved.

    http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/energy/blogs/6-ways-to-protect-bats-and-birds-from-wind-turbines

    • nsa April 25, 2015 at 1:27 am #

      Why not just address the real problem directly……overpopulation? Get rid of 98% of the humans and the planet would be quite livable….or at least tolerable. Right now, everywhere you look are the botched, the useless, the worthless. We here in Ft. Meade and Langley will soon be releasing the first of our designer diseases…..the plan is to reduce the earth’s population to about 140 million humans….total….by the year 2050.

      • Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 8:46 pm #

        That would be overkill. I like the number 500M better.

    • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:25 pm #

      I had read the ‘death stats’ on Cats [in USA] from birds is 100,000,000 a year.
      True?

  115. BackRowHeckler April 25, 2015 at 1:32 am #

    Just finished reading yesterday’s WSJ cover to cover.

    WPACCC and Fodase maybe you’re right …

    2 young dudes in Silicon Valley, suddenly, worth $100 million thru some start up brought public, NASDAQ at an all time high, $40 million mansions selling like hotcakes from LA to Brooklyn, a feminist artist whose paintings go for $1.3 million each (and there’s a waiting list) Tickets for the big boxing match selling out in 1 minute front row seats $70,000. There’s plenty of money around, maybe too much money.

    brh

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    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 6:51 am #

      There is an ocean of money out there, unfortunately, all in wrong hands waiting to break through the FED dam and bury US population and the rest of the world.

      The rest of the world is busy building the dams of their own – let America drown.

    • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:26 pm #

      Who is this ‘feminist artist’?

  116. Janos Skorenzy April 25, 2015 at 5:56 am #

    http://www.infowars.com/following-obamas-lead-frat-boys-disrespect-disabled-vets/

    Jewish Fraternity members (Zeta Beta Tau) spit on and abuse wounded veterans and urinate on American Flag

  117. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 6:31 am #

    Russia and Argentina signed a memorandum on the construction of the Argentine nuclear power plant

    “We offer to Argentina the latest in atomic energy technology generation 3+ that fully meet modern requirements of nuclear safety and characterized by high economic efficiency. The unique Russian experience of NPP construction is known throughout the world and the high quality of these stations is confirmed in practice. I am confident that an agreement on which we are already working, will be mutually beneficial, long-term oriented and meet the real capabilities of the Parties “, — said the head of Rosatom.
    http://www.atomic-energy.ru/news/2015/04/24/56538

    When US will get frustrated enough with false promises of “renewable” energy from wind and solar cells, they could start ordering Russian Nuclear Power stations as well as Russian fuel for them – America practically lost the ability to produce its own nuclear fuel.

    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 6:34 am #

      More than 20% of the electricity produced in Argentina is produced with Russian equipment. Areas of cooperation – from the supply of turbines to the full modernization of the Argentine hydroelectric power plants.

      About 15% of US power production is done with the Russian nuclear fuel.

  118. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 7:09 am #

    Cleptocratic Clinton family took an active part in the transaction, as a result of which Russia gained control over much of the strategic uranium deposits in the United States and Canada. This was reported in the article, the investigation published in The New York Times.

    Hundreds of thousands of dollars came to the Clinton Foundation from Russian banks.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-foundation-as-russians-pressed-for-control-of-uranium-company.html?_r=0

  119. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 7:20 am #

    “Don’t you someday want to see a WOMAN President?” – asks Hillary on her Facebook page.

    “Yes, but not YOU”

    https://www.facebook.com/ReadyForHillary/photos/a.570613096354409.1073741827.380516878697366/841207682628281/?type=1&theater

    • Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 9:26 pm #

      “Don’t you someday want to see a WOMAN President?” – asks Hillary on her Facebook page.

      “Yes, but not YOU”

      ==============

      Not necessarily and, in any case, definitely not you.

  120. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 8:14 am #

    Obama Says Sorry for Vaporizing Two Westerners With a Drone. Brown People Still Fair Game

    Have you noticed anything strange recently in the 24-hour news cycle? Like, maybe the fact that the US has actually apologized for one of its many “mistakes”?

    The mistake? The accidental killing of two aid workers, an American and an Italian, during a drone strike on an al-Qaeda compound in Pakistan.

    These words actually came out of the American president’s mouth:

    “One of the things that sets Americans apart from many other nations, one of the things that makes us exceptional is our willing to confront squarely our imperfections and to learn from our mistakes.”

    Sorry, what?!!

    http://russia-insider.com/en/obama-apologises-killing-two-westerners-drone-what-about-rest/6040

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    • Buck Stud April 25, 2015 at 9:05 am #

      I know your revered Putin would never commit any heinous crimes against humanity but if he did –yes, even imagining such a thing is hard to fathom from ‘Saint Putin’– would he own up in the same way as President Obama?

      Give the Russian propaganda a rest Fibcal; you’re talking primarily to Americans here, not some corny Russian fool.

      • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 9:19 am #

        The entire operation of re-taking Crimea went without a shot being fired, without a single civil casualty.

        So, what is it, American incompetence?

      • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 9:24 am #

        The whole “droning operation” with young Americans sitting at the Play Station consoles thousand of miles away from their crime scenes and by pushing buttons eliminating thousands of human lives hardly helps promoting American image.

  121. Buck Stud April 25, 2015 at 8:51 am #

    The below article speculates that many will find it hard to believe that 15% of NFL players end up filing for bankruptcy. Somehow, I doubt that many readers here on CFN will find this ‘hard to believe’:

    http://fortune.com/2015/04/15/nfl-players-bankrupt/

    • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:29 pm #

      Easy money.
      easy come, easy go.

      Read ‘100 Yard Lie’. Good book.
      However since it was published NFL has become ‘National Felons League’.

      What happened to Aaron Hernandez?

  122. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 10:17 am #

    Price of civilian genocide

    In the beginning, when the American “soldiers of fortune” went to Ukraine, the standard compensation was about $700 per day.

    After they lost in Donetsk airport more than three dozen mercenaries, prices of services rose almost threefold: now “American specialists”, the camp of which is not far from Mariupol are getting $1500-$1700 dollars per day. Such is now the price of civilian genocide.

    The ISIS/Al-Qaeda “soldiers” are much cheaper. Their pay does not exceed $50 a day.

    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 10:59 am #

      The pay of Americans mercenaries is subject to “Foreign Earned Income” deduction and not being taxed at all, neither Payroll Tax, no State Tax, no Federal Tax. Not sure if they are supposed to pay small unemployment tax – that one is being levied by the Sate.

    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 11:05 am #

      I doubt that the ISIS “soldiers” are required to file their US annual income tax forms, so they do not get to take advantage of Foreign Earned Income deduction.

      http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Foreign-Earned-Income-Exclusion

  123. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 11:18 am #

    Disclaimer: I am not a licensed tax adviser, so please before you make a decision to go to Ukraine to kill some civilians, please consult your licensed Tax professional or Certified Public Accountant.

  124. FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 1:22 pm #

    Disclaimer: I am not a licensed tax adviser, so before you make a decision to go to Ukraine to kill some civilians, rape some little girls (if you happen to be a heterosexual), or rape some little boys (if you happen to be a homosexual) please consult your licensed Tax professional or Certified Public Accountant.
    =====
    Yeah, I think that one turned out a little better.

  125. fodase April 25, 2015 at 1:29 pm #

    The pay of Americans mercenaries is subject to “Foreign Earned Income” deduction and not being taxed at all, neither Payroll Tax, no State Tax, no Federal Tax.

    BUT if they are self-employed they will still have to pay 15.3% self-employment tax (SS and Medicaid contributions) since they are both employer and employees.

    The 2015 FEIE (foreign earned income exclusion) is approx. $100,000 meaning you don’t pay INCOME tax on that sum, but you continue to pay SELF-EMPLOYMENT tax on it, the abovecited 15%.

    nsa, your objections about the wind not blowing and the sun not shining….haha, you might think that countries getting HALF their electricity from these sources solved this problem eons ago, and you’d be correct.

    as wpa_ccc says, battery storage to even out electrical flows due to alt energy, plus grid fixes to handle same, is going gangbusters as an industry.

    YET ANOTHER way you endtymers are 100% wrong about energy problems. we SOLVE energy problems, not succumb to them.

    jeez, do a little research on the net.

    these problems are being licked handily.

    fodase

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    • FincaInTheMountains April 25, 2015 at 2:15 pm #

      Could you qualify he ISIS head-choppers as self-employed? I guess you could, but having them to pay the self-employment tax for 15.3% would be a public-relation nightmare.

      Besides, I think you are wrong and Foreign Earned Income deduction is valid for FICA taxes as well (Social Security and Medicare).

      If half of that taxes is supposed to be paid by employer, who should foot the bill? The State Department, the CIA or Department of Defense?

  126. fodase April 25, 2015 at 2:24 pm #

    No Finca, the FEIE only means you dont pay INCOME tax on the first 100,000, but you continue to pay SELF-EMPLOYMENT (FICA) tax of 15.3% on that amount.

    The foreign income exclusion will reduce the federal income tax, but it will not reduce the self-employment tax. The foreign earned income exclusion cannot be used to exclude income for self-employment tax purposes.

    http://www.expatstaxes.com/tax-guide-for-us-expats/self-employment/

  127. Janos Skorenzy April 25, 2015 at 2:38 pm #

    Corporations can’t stand the idea of you owning what you bought. Why, as John Deere exclaims, you might use the software in their Tractor to download music! The major car companies gravely agree. The software is theirs so therefore the whole car is. Don’t you dare pop that hood, yokel.

    http://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere/

    And you thought computers were going to make you free. You really are a yokel. Hayseed. Rube. Trailer dwelling White Trash. CHUD – Carnivorous Humanoid Underground Dweller. In other words, a Morlock.

    • malthuss April 25, 2015 at 3:31 pm #

      You license the software. You do not own it.
      And Apple prefers if you pay monthly.

    • Therian April 26, 2015 at 1:59 am #

      That’s right, Janos, and Chevy wants you to know that freaking WI-FI is enabled in their cars. Why interact with actual humans when you can take your laptop to the cafe, walk down the street staring at your cellphone, get irritated because sales clerks in stores have the audacity to ask you a few questions interrupting your iPhone call, and now you can do the Internet while driving (I know that cops will love that … helps ’em meet their quota).

      Brave New World is here and all the goofy non-technologists and a few dilettantes are here to cheer it on whilst I, a REAL technologist, realize that the founders of Cybernetics wrote books like “God and Golem” where they stated that the purpose of computers was to LIBERATE people from machinery, not tie them every waking minute to it.

      WPA, FODASE, and others are here to CHEER ON “Brave New World”. To them, it’s Utopia, an ultimate victory of the human race. Yet here in the heart of Utopia, Palo Alto, EIGHT teenagers have committed suicide in the last year. The town only HAS about 5000 total teenagers. I guess they didn’t get WPA and FODASE’s message that the quality of life is so high we should be dancing in the streets.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 26, 2015 at 4:59 pm #

        If we don’t get to own the cars, maybe we shouldn’t have to fix them either? Just trade it in for a new one. Dream on, right?

        The utter alienation killed them? Yeah, I could see techno-obsession as being part of that. Also the kids are brutal to each other online and that sours their real lives. If it was just one or the other, it would be better. But it becomes a sordid mixture of both, as if all the characters on CFN had to see each other in real life and know who was who.

  128. fodase April 25, 2015 at 5:01 pm #

    come on people, there is such a thing as free open-source devices that do the same things apple’s/android’s junque does

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_open-source_mobile_phones

    i mean, there are only about 500 free open-source alternatives to Windows, for example, that you can use, e.g. Puppy linux, just to name one.

    internet’s a great way to find information, in case you hadn’t heard yet

    fodase roasting ponta de costela in brazil, supercold beer non-optional

    • Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 9:02 pm #

      supercold beer non-optional – fodase

      ===============

      How cold can beer get before it freezes solid? Colder than water?

    • BackRowHeckler April 25, 2015 at 11:38 pm #

      Sounds like you may be an Inside Party member, Fodase.

      Which Ministry? Ministry of Plenty? Ministry of Love? Ministry of Peace?

      War is Peace!

      Freedom is Slavery!

      Our Diversity is our Strength!

      brh

    • Therian April 26, 2015 at 2:02 am #

      Internet is a great place to find information AND disinformation. It’s also another excuse to STARE AT SCREENS and avoid actual human beings. You should live here in Palo Alto and see the contours and forms of HELL. It’s a sterile boomtown with a teen suicide epidemic.

      Seems that CFN has been taken over by the techno-triumphalists. I can hack Unix Kernel and I know a dystopia when I see one.

  129. Pucker April 25, 2015 at 11:07 pm #

    Do you CFNers grow any Weed in your gardens?

    In the 1970’s TV show “Kung Fu”, the reason that they called him “Grasshopper” is because he was always smoke’n Grass. There’s a “coffee shop” in Amsterdam called “The Grasshopper”.

  130. Q. Shtik April 25, 2015 at 11:49 pm #

    I have been away from the blog all day today (till 9PM) out back building a wooden gate…I am happiest with a hammer in my right hand and a mouth full of nails.

    This small project should be done in a day or two (if I can borrow my neighbor’s wood router to bevel some edges) and if worthy, I may post a pic soon.

    Without going into too much detail, this gate is necessitated by a Pulte Homes project under construction on roughly a NYC block of land (about 7 acres) which begins behind my house and extends all the way up the block. There will be 99 units in all, 82 townhouses, 12 individual homes and 5 “affordable units.” The price range is $335K to $640K (I wonder which ones are considered affordable?)

    JHK would probably class this project as urban sprawl but the fact is it’s less than a mile walk to the nearest train station (in New Brunswick, NJ) on the main corridor to NYC (a 45 to 60 min ride depending on schedules) and only a half mile walk to the main drag of the town of Highland Park of which this new development is now a part.

    My wife was told by a local real estate agent friend that nearly all these units sold out in a matter of weeks of their opening of the onsite sales office.

    My mother-in-law used to ask “where do these people get this kind of money?” I would respond “they’re all drug dealers.” She would ask, “This is true?” I would reply, “No, this is sarcasm.”

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    • malthuss April 26, 2015 at 1:26 am #

      ‘The price range is $335K to $640K (I wonder which ones are considered affordable?’

      The ‘affordable’ are rental units, presumably. For somalis and wetbacks.

      You heard about 90k people asking for the 44 low income units in NYC?

    • Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 10:44 am #

      Q,

      I presume you’re presenting these homes sales as evidence of a healing economy. While that is no doubt true it also illustrates the ever-increasing attenuation of household budgets due to escalating housing costs. In other words, the puppet strings of ‘economic recovery’ are very thin indeed and thus more susceptible to minor perturbances.

      IMO, the economic recovery is not all that sound from a structural aspect. But then again, perhaps alternate types of ‘economic structures’ have been and are being created that one ‘can’t quite grasp’. After all, once upon a time many scientifically verified truths were considered ‘magic’.

      And speaking of structurally sound, why aren’t you screwing that fence together? Don’t you covet that final moaning torque of the screw gun which declares at least a ten year fastening time length over its nail counterpart? On the other hand, what a manly appearance you must present, pulling one saliva covered fastener at a time from your mouth as you ‘nail that bitch’ together.

      The metaphorical wood carver of life soon learns that it is best not to always ‘go with the grain’ because inevitable one always encounters the ‘against the grain’ dynamic. So one works across the grain with the intent of marginalizing grain and curbing the rebellious tendencies of grain altogether in order to more easily sculpt the wood in any damn manner one chooses. Thus “going with the grain’ is reserved for appropriate strategic moments and after the ‘across the grain’ sculpting has formed the texture that engenders a grab, bite and traction for those final with the grain strokes.

      Seeking to always work with the grain results in a too slick surface too soon in the process. And it reveals a lack of confidence and surety of process. And not unlike in real life when seeking to always go with the grain results in a inhibition of expression in order to not offend or put one’s neck on the chopping block.

      And speaking of one’s neck on the chopping block, in the parlance of wood carving we refer to this as ‘undercutting’ the material before the final form has had a chance to be developed:” Fucking up” in other words.

      But you can’t always ‘see around the corner’ in order to determine what wood needs to be removed or not–and thus potentially undercut– without actually walking around a blind corner or actually removing material in an uncertain manner in order to more clearly clarify form development.

      Life is a risk any way you cut it but sometimes you swing the mallet anyway or don the jungle hatchet just in order to ascertain your bearings.

      In those moments of clarity one can swing the mallet with the passionate surety of Fire; in those uncertain moments, with the inhibited consideration of Ice.

      But in between those moments of clumsy fearful bumbler or passionate and inspired artist, we work across the grains of extremity with plodding confidence and thus become worthy of the title “Working Man”.

      • BackRowHeckler April 26, 2015 at 11:35 am #

        Hey Buck those last 8 paragraphs or so should be lifted and preserved somewhere, not lost and forgotten in the CFN comments section.

        Have you ever read Van Gogh’s letters to his brother Theo? You’d think Jesus Christ himself wrote them they are so beautiful.

        If you include any kind brochure or accompanying text with your work when you sell it, put what you wrote above in. It will add value, if nothing else.

        brh

        • Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 10:53 pm #

          Thanks BRH kind of you to say. For some reason I didn’t think you were fond of the Van Gogh letters but I’m obviously mistaken. But I also think they’re incredibly beautiful and so did Kenneth Rexroth:

          http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexroth/essays/art/van-gogh.htm

      • Q. Shtik April 26, 2015 at 1:10 pm #

        I presume you’re presenting these homes sales as evidence of a healing economy. – Buck

        ==================

        Not at all. In fact I can’t figure how in the hell this economy is holding up. (Reasons for my trepidation abound in the daily David Stockman blog titled Contra Corner, a must read.)

        This property behind me is probably a success story because of its very favorable location … a stone’s throw from J&J World Headquarters and, as well, a bedroom community, filled with academic types, to Rutgers University (the football field is two miles down the road from my house) and I have already mentioned the nearness of the train line to NY.

      • Q. Shtik April 26, 2015 at 1:47 pm #

        And speaking of structurally sound, why aren’t you screwing that fence together? Don’t you covet that final moaning torque of the screw gun which declares at least a ten year fastening time length over its nail counterpart? On the other hand, what a manly appearance you must present, pulling one saliva covered fastener at a time from your mouth as you ‘nail that bitch’ together. – Buck

        =================

        Great paragraph Buck.

        The hardware goes on with screws but the 3.5 inch wide boards are fastened with headless nails which are counter-sunk and at a few feet distance are virtually invisible. I like that clean look. You may recall me mentioning that the wood pyramid I built last summer was screwed together but done in such a way that none are visible. Well, actually 8 screws are visible up near the pointy top so that I can temporarily remove it and lower stuff inside like my brother’s ashes and, eventually, mine and my wife’s.

        • Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 10:58 pm #

          Somehow I’m not surprised that you’re fond of ‘the clean look’. I also recall your pyramid and liked it–I thought I made a comment but who knows?

          But you could have also eschewed wood and gone all post -modern in honor of Janos and constructed a pyramid out of fake concession stand hot dogs, buns and some ketchup for good measure. If you had done so perhaps your project would now be sitting in a museum 🙂

          • Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 11:45 pm #

            Yes, in true post-modern spirit, I think you should “appropriate” Janos writing and turn it into a sculpture out of hot dogs, buns and ketchup and not out of fake materials but the real thing. In other words, it will be a hybrid sculpture/performance art piece.

            The hot dogs inside buns aggregately constructing the shape of a pyramid will be a visual representation of ancient Egyptian culture: the hot dog represents the ancient remains of royalty and the bun, the mummification. And Q, dressed up as a concession stand sales person will roll his pyramid around on wheels shouting “get your hot dogs here”.

            With each hot dog sold and eaten, the pyramid will phenomenologically represent the commodification and entropic dissolution of culture that inevitably occurs under the umbrella of capitalism.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 26, 2015 at 4:40 pm #

        The post-modern artist is a essentially a word smith and jongleur. Only such art can make modern visual “art” palatable to those who can’t see because they’re not looking.You’ve charmed these here serpents with it, but not me. Do you still stand with Hillary and the forces of Corruption?

        You are a good Smith btw. And of course, you don’t sound like a modernist in art, at least not entirely. I just read Ruskin’s Faery Tail “King of the West River”. The King tells Gluck, Holy Water not used for holy purposes is no longer holy. Artistic ability must return to its real purpose, the production of Beauty. And what else is Beauty but the Glory aspect of God?

        • Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 11:21 pm #

          Maybe you’re painting with too broad of a brush concerning post-modern art? After all, Ruskin thought the idea/narrative/concept was paramount to great art and which is also championed by many post-modern artists. If post-modernism was something of a reaction to and evolution beyond modernism then perhaps modernism should be defined. In short and IMO–ridiculously simplified no doubt– modernism was all about the formal aspects of any given piece of art, or to roughly paraphrase Clement Greenberg ‘art/painting all about itself’ and devoid of any narrative crutches.

          I suspect that what reviles you concerning so much post-modern art is a lack of ‘beauty’ and which is a sentiment that I also share. But then again, what is beauty? To many, so called beauty is simply kitsch,’prettified art etc. As Rodin wrote, “when an artist, intending to improve upon nature, adds green to the springtime, rose to the sunrise, carmine to young lips, he creates ugliness because he lies”.

          And let’s face it, in seeking to artistically honor “the Glory aspect of God”–whatever does that mean anyway–too many artist have ended up telling idealized lies and created an ironical ugliness instead.

          If “GOD” is truly the omnipotent creator of all life then one should also recognize the many ugly occurrences and circumstances that have littered God’s various canvasses throughout time and history.

          In fact, couldn’t we say that “GOD” –presuming one believes in the notion– is the supreme and ultimate post modern artist?

  131. fodase April 25, 2015 at 11:59 pm #

    Sounds like you may be an Inside Party member, Fodase.

    no idea what that means friend.

    i only tell the facts, ma’am.

    btw beer cans down here, when they’re very cold, if you touch ’em wrong they instantly turn into ice.

    i’d never seen that in the US America.

    apparently it’s cuz beer here is 3% vs. 5% alky in the US and A.

    we got lotsa meat leftover so tomorrow it’s carreteiro for us, look it up, better yet do a google image on it to see what it is.

    fodase over and out

    • BackRowHeckler April 26, 2015 at 12:17 am #

      We have 3.2 beer, ‘near beer’.

      Nights here still down in the 20s (F) so not much thought of cold beer, but brandy and hot chocolate.

      Q, the projects like the one near you all over the place round these parts. After ’08 I thought they’d be a thing of the past. This development behind your property, what was there before? Orchards? Meadows? A brownfield?

      • BackRowHeckler April 26, 2015 at 12:25 am #

        Its those ‘affordable units’ you have to worry about, ha! Some ‘affordable units’ went in here about 10 years ago. Since then its been the scene of 2 brutal rapes, numerous drug raids, assaults, stolen cars, you can imagine — basically a chunk of the ghetto and all that means moved out into the countryside. They looked pretty good when they went up but are dumps now, falling apart already. Good luck with all that!

        brh

        • malthuss April 26, 2015 at 1:27 am #

          Forced integration.
          Diversity.
          Section 8.

          etc.

          I wonder when the Chinese will ‘pull the plug’? 2015?
          Then what will be affordable? And who can afford it?

      • Q. Shtik April 26, 2015 at 12:45 pm #

        BRH,

        An ugly forest of fallen rotting trees and brambles. At its upper end (I’m at the lower end) was a big old, and mostly unused building, formerly called Midland Ross. They befouled the soil with chemicals and such and when Pulte acquired the property they had to do a massive soil reclamation. They cut down all of the old forest except for a piece behind my house and one and a half neighbors houses. In essence I came out smelling like a rose landscapewise.

        Pulte removed an old chain link fence which was the dividing line between their property and mine, and all the neighbors up the block. They replaced it with a new board on board fence which we (affected property owners) chose by democratic vote from a list of alternative fence choices. They set this new BoB fence back 18 inches on their property, effectively adding that additional foot and a half length to my property. Pulte also gave (and planted) two new trees to each household up the block to help mitigate the loss of trees when they stripped the forest.

        If/when I post a pic of the new gate I’m building you will see how it ties in to the board on board fence.

        I am one of the few people on my block who did not fight this project from day one. To me it is a net positive with additional traffic effects yet to be seen.

  132. FincaInTheMountains April 26, 2015 at 8:14 am #

    Israeli scientists sound an alarm: the world is rapidly increasing the level of “anti-Semitic violence.” Exception is … Russia. According to experts, even liberal, in Russia, in principle, the level of xenophobia and ethnic tensions decreases. And all this against the background of a sharp increase in patriotism. It turns out interesting. The higher the level of patriotism in Russia, the lower the level of radical nationalism …

    http://politrussia.com/society/uroven-ksenofobii-v-229/

    I don’t think we could even speak in such terms as “patriotism” regarding US and West in general, maybe patriotism to one’s pocketbook?

  133. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 9:00 am #

    When I was a teenager I used to get “Blue Balls”.

  134. Buck Stud April 26, 2015 at 9:55 am #

    And the right-wing lunatics wonder why rational, intelligent people will end up voting for Hillary:

    http://www.fakeblog.de/2014/02/24/the-excess-democrat-religion-vs-science-update-t-rex-hatte-zu-kurze-arme-um-nicht-masturbieren-zu-koennen/

  135. Cold N. Holefield April 26, 2015 at 1:36 pm #

    Old Macky’s Back In Town

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  136. Cold N. Holefield April 26, 2015 at 4:16 pm #

    Alright, you’ll like this one — it mentions Bruce Jenner since no one else has this week.

    Stockings Make The Man

    • Janos Skorenzy April 26, 2015 at 6:30 pm #

      I saw the interview with Diane Sawyer. He seemed sincere and I have no doubt he has been tormented by this. Of course the idea that gender reassignment surgery can cure this doesn’t follow at all. And he is naively consenting to being part of a huge Federal Initiative to Trans America.

  137. FincaInTheMountains April 26, 2015 at 4:21 pm #

    In today’s 2-hour interview with Russian Channel 1, Putin directly accused US of sponsoring Chechen terrorism in Russia.

    “… In the early 2000s, the Russian special services have recorded direct contacts between the North Caucasian militants and US intelligence officials in Azerbaijan.”

    “There’s even helped with transport,” – said Putin.

    According to the Russian leader, when he heard about this, he immediately asked for clarification from the current US president (G.H.Bush) who promised to deal with this problem.

    “And ten days later my subordinates, leaders of the FSB, received from his colleagues in Washington a letter: “We have supported and will continue to maintain a relationship with all the opposition forces in Russia. And we think that we can do it and will do in the future “

    Also in the interview the head of the Kremlin administration Sergei Ivanov was quoted. He said that after the attacks in New York on 11 September 2001, Putin has decided to cancel the drill of Russian strategic nuclear forces, which were scheduled for the same day.

    According to Ivanov, this was done in order not to escalate the situation difficult for the United States.

    I heard the theory that the real goal of organizers of 911 was to provoke the nuclear exchange between two superpowers.

    I wonder when Kremlin will publicly release the wealth of information they have on real events of 9/11?

    • FincaInTheMountains April 26, 2015 at 4:24 pm #

      Correction – that was G.W.Bush, Bush the Second

  138. wpa_ccc April 26, 2015 at 5:19 pm #

    Tonight on 60 Minutes an exposé of the US role in the deep space arms race.

    • Cold N. Holefield April 26, 2015 at 8:10 pm #

      That’s a mischaracterization of the segment and its topic. Firstly, it wasn’t about deep space and secondly, it was about satellites, not weapons per se. The most concerning take away is the potential to turn near earth and far earth orbit into an unnavigable debris field that where no satellite and/or space craft can fly travel again. In otherwords, a clusterfuck in near space. Why we don’t quit calling ourselves humans and instead call ourselves clusterfucks — it’d be more fitting, don’t you think.

      • wpa_ccc April 27, 2015 at 12:10 am #

        “The way the US military fights depends on space. Satellites are used to communicate with troops, gather intelligence, fly drones and target weapons. But top military and intelligence leaders are now worried those satellites are vulnerable to attack. They say China, in particular, has been actively testing anti-satellite weapons that could, in effect, knock out America’s eyes and ears.” (From 60 Minutes own description of the segment.) http://cbsn.ws/1E9WvuE

  139. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 7:05 pm #

    Off duty police officers often “moonlight” as kidnappers in Mexico City. This may be bit like the current “Two Party System” in the US? The People are held hostage by The System? How can things still function in Mexican society when the police are moonlighting as kidnappers? One would think that there would be zero trust in the society and it would all fall apart?

  140. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 7:18 pm #

    “Maybe things’ll get better if I vote for a bunch of people who want to steal my stuff?”

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  141. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 10:46 pm #

    Don’t these people have anything better to do? The US would have better government if they vigorously implemented conflict-of-interest laws rather than this N,,a,zi rubbish:

    Part 2: “Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ml123
    Hi everyone,

    Question here, I’m a 30 year old guy and starting a job soon for a federal contractor where I start first and then apply for secret or TS clearance. Interim is not important for me, just final adjudication.

    I travel for vacation internationally from time to time. Sometimes while on vacation, I meet foreigners. For example, I might meet someone from China or Japan or Germany.

    Would it affect the clearance process negatively if I exchange contact info such as email or Facebook info with foreigners while traveling? Would it be bad if I accept an invitation with a foreigner to have dinner together at a restaurant? Or go around some tourist sites?

    In general, is it bad to keep in touch with foreigners? (Assuming they do not ask me about anything that would tigger security flags). I thought about making a policy for myself to make no foreign contacts. But life is long and who knows whether I will work as a federal contractor forever. International connections might become useful career wise someday. It seems overly shortsighted/restrictive that I should not make any foreign Facebook friends just because of the possibility of security clearance issues? What do you guys think?
    I think you should look at the adjudicative criteria, rather than ask a message board. These are the things the investigator will look for and ask about, and the adjudicator will weigh in whether or not to grant you a clearance. Here’s the pertinent paragraph:


    [CENTER]Guideline B:
    Foreign Influence
    [/CENTER]
    6. The Concern. Foreign contacts and interests may be a security concern if the individual has divided loyalties or foreign financial interests, may be manipulated or induced to help a foreign person, group, organization, or government in a way that is not in U.S. interests, or is vulnerable to pressure or coercioon by any foreign interest. Adjudication under this Guideline can and should consider the identity of the foreign country in which the foreign contact or financial interest is located, including, but not limited to, such considerations as whether the foreign country is known to target United States citizens to obtain protected information and/or is associated with a risk of terrorism.

    7. Conditions that could raise a security concern and may be disqualifying include:

    (a) contact with a foreign family member, business or professional associate, friend, or other person who is a citizen of or resident in a foreign country if that contact creates a heightened risk of foreign exploitation, inducement, manipulation, pressure, or coercion;

    (b) connections to a foreign person, group, government, or country that create a potential conflict of interest between the individual’s obligation to protect sensitive information or technology and the individual’s desire to help a foreign person, group, or country by providing that information;

    (c) counterintelligence information, that may be classified, indicates that the individual’s access to protected information may involve unacceptable risk to national security;

    (d) sharing living quarters with a person or persons, regardless of citizenship status, if that relationship creates a heightened risk of foreign inducement, manipulation, pressure, or coercion;

    (e) a substantial business, financial, or property interest in a foreign country, or in any foreign-owned or foreign-operated business, which could subject the individual to heightened risk of foreign influence or exploitation;

    (f) failure to report, when required, association with a foreign national;

    (g) unauthorized association with a suspected or known agent, associate, or employee of a foreign intelligence service;

    (h) indications that representatives or nationals from a foreign country are acting to increase the vulnerability of the individual to possible future exploitation, inducement, manipulation, pressure, or coercion;
    (i) conduct, especially while traveling outside the U.S., which may make the individual vulnerable to exploitation, pressure, or coercion by a foreign person, group, government, or country.

    8. Conditions that could mitigate security concerns include:

    (a) the nature of the relationships with foreign persons, the country in which these persons are located, or the positions or activities of those persons in that country are such that it is unlikely the individual will be placed in a position of having to choose between the interests of a foreign individual, group, organization, or government and the interests of the U.S.;

    (b) there is no conflict of interest, either because the individual’s sense of loyalty or obligation to the foreign person, group, government, or country is so minimal, or the individual has such deep and longstanding relationships and loyalties in the U.S., that the individual can be expected to resolve any conflict of interest in favor of the U.S. interest;

    (c) contact or communication with foreign citizens is so casual and infrequent that there is little likelihood that it could create a risk for foreign influence or exploitation;

    (d) the foreign contacts and activities are on U.S. Government business or are approved by the cognizant security authority;

    (e) the individual has promptly complied with existing agency requirements regarding the reporting of contacts, requests, or threats from persons, groups, or organizations from a foreign country;
    (f) the value or routine nature of the foreign business, financial, or property interests is such that they are unlikely to result in a conflict and could not be used effectively to influence, manipulate, or pressure the individual. ”

    Read more: http://www.city-data.com/forum/work-employment/2080498-security-clearance-dont-talk-foreigners-employee.html#ixzz3YTPVqJ42

  142. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 11:36 pm #

    Somebody in the US government somewhere is think’n “Internment Camp”.

  143. Pucker April 26, 2015 at 11:58 pm #

    Having a family relative who lives in China or Russia is now like having a criminal record. Totally insane.

  144. FincaInTheMountains April 27, 2015 at 12:37 am #

    Full spectrum dominance is a hyped fantasy cooked up by the crazed minds in “official” Washington

    Russia’s S-500 anti missile missiles and anti-aircraft missiles can intercept any existing ICBM, cruise missile, or aircraft. S-500’s travel at 15,480 miles an hour; reach an altitude of 115 miles; travel horizontally 2,174 miles; and can intercept up to ten incoming missiles. They simply cannot be stopped by any American anti-missile system.

  145. FincaInTheMountains April 27, 2015 at 12:48 am #

    The actual behavior of the Bretton Woods banks has had an equal if not greater role in fueling global dissatisfaction with the two institutions than the issue of voting rights, veto powers, or feudal prerogatives

    The IMF has never been able to shake off its reputation for helping to trigger the Asian financial crisis by promoting capital account liberalization, then worsening the plight of the affected countries by imposing harsh austerity policies. The World Bank has also failed to live down its partnership with the IMF in the imposition of painful and ineffective structural adjustment policies in over 90 developing countries in the 1980s and 1990s. Hardly any of these programs succeeded in bringing about growth and reducing poverty.

    With the institutions it controls having such dismal records in managing the global economy and promoting development, the United States should have expected that at some point, the world would begin looking elsewhere for institutions that could deliver. It’s clear that Beijing is now stepping into the vacuum.

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  146. FincaInTheMountains April 27, 2015 at 12:53 am #

    Mike Whitney:

    “Washington needs to rethink its approach. Stop meddling and antagonism , rebuild relations through trade and mutual trust and accept the inevitability of imperial decline. Asia’s star is rising just as America’s is setting. Deal with it.

  147. wpa_ccc April 27, 2015 at 2:05 am #

    Pucker: “Off duty police officers often “moonlight” as kidnappers in Mexico City.”

    On-duty police officers in the United States often handcuff people who are not a threat, put them in a van without seatbelts and give them a rough ride.

    Gray, 25, suffered a broken neck that left his spine “80% severed” and his voicebox crushed, according to his family. Gray’s injuries were sustained at some point during his arrest on the morning of 12 April after which he was transported in a police wagon.

    Black lives matter.

  148. wpa_ccc April 27, 2015 at 2:12 am #

    “Just this week, Michele Bachmann actually predicted that I would bring about the biblical end of days,” Obama said in his speech Saturday night. “Now that’s a legacy. That’s big. I mean Lincoln, Washington — they didn’t do that.”

  149. Cold N. Holefield April 27, 2015 at 6:24 am #

    wpa_ccc said: “The way the US military fights depends on space. Satellites are used to communicate with troops, gather intelligence, fly drones and target weapons. But top military and intelligence leaders are now worried those satellites are vulnerable to attack. They say China, in particular, has been actively testing anti-satellite weapons that could, in effect, knock out America’s eyes and ears.” (From 60 Minutes own description of the segment.)

    Nice quote, but it still doesn’t make them weapons. Yes, some satellites, particularly the ones in geosynchronous orbit, have a military purpose but they’re not weapons per se. What the Chinese have developed to destroy or disable these American military satellites are weapons. The irony of China’s endeavors, and Russia’s too, is that the American Airforce allows the entire world to use, free of charge, its highly advanced satellites for global positioning purposes including China and Russia. If China, with its aggressive testing regiment, screws up and paranoically becomes hostile in earth orbit space, they’ll screw themselves and everyone else on the planet for hundreds of years to come if not thousands. Of course, it’s China we’re talking about — the House that Mao built on tens of millions of dead bodies. The Chinese don’t think twice about sacrificing tens of millions or even hundreds of millions once their collective Mao mind is set.

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    • FincaInTheMountains April 27, 2015 at 8:05 am #

      “If China, with its aggressive testing regiment, screws up and paranoically becomes hostile in earth orbit space, they’ll screw themselves and everyone else on the planet for hundreds of years to come if not thousands. ”

      You are forgetting about successfully functioning Russian alternative to GPS – GLONASS.

      • Cold N. Holefield April 27, 2015 at 9:23 am #

        I didn’t forget it, it’s just that it’s ancillary to the discussion. America has its own version of GPS-GLONASS called GPS-GONADS.

  150. JB April 27, 2015 at 6:54 am #

    Empty discussions are slowly starting again, trying to understand whether Hillary will be a good president or not. This is, as Kunstler points out, completely false prejudice, because she will be just another PR figure which will consume our attention, without actually doing something remarkable. It is more about us, and what can we do with it. We need to do something before we all become slaves to the monetary or real estate market. It is hard to imagine freedom with no meaning. This is where we are headed. Spend hours in an office talking about our private lives just to forget that our work and purpose is absolutely meaningless. Kunstler, thanks for your nihilistic prophecies and stories, you are right, this is going way too far.

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