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The School of Globalism

“…we may be headed into a world where capital is abundant, deflationary pressures are substantial and demand could be in short supply for quite some time.”

—Lawrence Summers, former Secretary of the Treasury

Professor Summers must be reading Ben Bernanke’s new blog. Or maybe he’s writing it for walking-around money. At $250,000 a pop for making a speech, Mr. Bernanke can certainly afford to pay high-toned hacks to polish his spin-o-nomics. Raillery aside, Mr. Summers’ utterance provokes some pretty fundamental questions: what exactly is this world we’re heading into, and what exactly does that capital consist of?

It is, first, a world of unraveling globalism. So many people who should know better — members of the supposed thinking class who have suspended their thinking — swallowed Tom Friedman’s dictum that globalism was here to stay, a permanent new feature of the human condition. File that idea in the dead letter office, along with Francis Fukuyama’s The End of History. With the help of competitive central bank racketeering, desperate nations have propelled themselves from financial disorder to geopolitical turmoil and history marches on — lately to the ululations of gleeful beheaders. Friedman’s flat world was predicated on a dominant and sound American polity, and we’ll have neither in that world Mr. Summers says we’re moving into.

In fact the first condition was predicated on the second: that America would continue to dominate the global economy because its polity was sound. We have clearly blown that by rigging together a corrupt troika of banks, market swindlers, and captive eunuch officials who expanded the financial sector of the economy from 5 percent to more than 40 percent, largely by pillaging the middle class and destroying the basis of their income. The USA set the tone for 21st century magical finance, in which “wealth” was “created” by digital accounting fraud. The effects at home are visible on our landscape of suburban hyperwaste and decrepitating older towns and cities.

One might say the main effect of the 50-year-long Friedman globalism orgy was the schooling of other nations in American-style financial fraud. Surely China has now surpassed the USA, considering the structural perversities of their banking and government relations. They really don’t have to account to anybody, including themselves, and the numbers they publish must be even more fantastical than the junk statistics produced by the US BLS. Europe has been a star pupil and only a few months ago announced a Quantitative Easing (fake capital creation) program as ambitious as America’s have been. Japan, of course, is just marking time until it quietly slips away and goes medieval.

Global disintegration has advanced furthest, not surprisingly, in the fragile band of regions most strung out on the primary commodity: oil. The Middle East / North Africa / Central Asia war zone is steadily combusting, and there is no sign of resolution across the whole of it, only the promise that conflict will get worse. Saudi Arabia was the cornerstone of that district, and the senile Saudi leadership finds itself in peril as its military pretends to support splintering Yemen. The other Arabian princes of other non-Saud clans must be watching the spectacle with wonder and nausea. When Arabia blows up, that will truly be the beginning of the end.

The foregoing leads to that other original question: what is that “capital” we’re counting on? I’d propose that it doesn’t exist. It is a figment engraved on the hard drives of the world, a ghost that haunts the people still in charge of that disintegrating global economy. There is still wealth in the world, but a lot less than people such as Larry Summers say there is.

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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.

363 Responses to “The School of Globalism”

  1. Cold N. Holefield April 6, 2015 at 9:44 am #

    You knocked it out of the park again, JHK. Mondays wouldn’t be the same without your weekly offering. It’s an anchor in this anchorless world of sexless wolves and rabbits, or a world pulsating with passels of crazed chickens who see spots of blood everywhere and are on a pecking frenzy. In such a queer, and cowardly and cruel, world, who and/or what is Andreas Lubitz and what he did? Great metaphor, that’s what, as is most news spectacle these days.

    Snap, Crackle and Pop!

  2. Smoky Joe April 6, 2015 at 9:52 am #

    Well said. I could read Larry Summers’ remarks out of context as actually looking rather gloomy, instead of–if I understand your point–a plug for Ben Bernanke’s way of thinking.

    On the other hand, I see your point clearly about the chaos spreading in the Middle East. With the Saudis now bombing the Iranian proxies in Yemen, the slow-mo WW III spreads.

    In America, however, we’ve already donned the flip-flops of summer. You never hear the financial advisers and neurotic suburban mommies in Panera chat about ISIS or its agenda. That is too difficult and disturbing. We pay poor people to fight for us, anyhow.

    Better to fret over which mutual fund to pick or Brandon’s or Courtney’s chances at making some selective program to better groom him or her for the “right sort of college.”

    Gah. At least the coffee at Panera is good and the refills free for now, until Chaos washes over it like a tsunami. And they have multiple options for milk to put in our mugs. God Bless America.

    • Neon Vincent April 6, 2015 at 10:32 am #

      “Professor Summers must be reading Ben Bernanke’s new blog.”

      Paul Krugman confirms that he is in his blog, if not his NYT columns. The two of them are debating about secular stagnation and its causes. At least the mainstream economists are beginning to beat around the bush about our current economic circumstances, although the idea that resource shortages, especially that of cheap oil, are causing them is not one they find worthy of consideration–yet. They may have to wait until oil goes over $100/barrel for that to even begin happening.

      “The Middle East / North Africa / Central Asia war zone is steadily combusting, and there is no sign of resolution across the whole of it, only the promise that conflict will get worse.”

      In general, you’re right, but what about the preliminary agreement with Iran to restrict its nuclear program? The oil markets delivered their verdict upon the announcement and it was Iran nuclear deal eases fear premium as Brent fell 4% and WTI 2%. The prospect of more Iranian oil might just keep prices below $100 for another couple of years. That’s not good news for the U.S. oil industry, as layoffs in that sector made last Friday’s jobs report weaker than expected. The effects of cheap oil on fracking that you expected are finally being felt.

      Speaking of fracking and the U.S. oil industry, Jerry Brown’s announced water restrictions for California didn’t include any constraints for either oil extraction or farming. Environmentalists and residential consumers are livid. As an expatriate Golden Stater, I can tell the people left behind that it’s all about the money. Those enterprises make money with water, while homeowners don’t.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 2:53 pm #

        Uh, we need farming. They grow food. And we need energy too, dirty or not. You really are special as in special Olympics.

        Of course if the drought continues then some radical things will have to be tried – or else farming will have to be given up there and a lot of people will have to go elsewhere.

        • Petro April 6, 2015 at 4:18 pm #

          Yep, food production needs to continue, which means continued water for operations. But should ALL farming have equal access? Vegetable and fruit production is, I would say, more important than sod farms or (I hate to say it) vineyards. And definitely shut off the water to the kale growers.

          • Exscotticus April 7, 2015 at 1:35 pm #

            The price of water in Cali is highly regulated and certainly does not reflect the current shortage. Dare I suggest that we allow market forces to resolve the delicate issues of who uses how much and what crops are grown?

            I read that 80% of water is used by agro, which accounts for only 2% of state GDP. Hard to take Cali seriously until the largest users of water are part of the solution. For example, regulations that force farmers to use water more efficiently…

          • City_of_76 April 7, 2015 at 9:42 pm #

            The people of California and the arid West will sort out their water problems after they get smarter about pricing the resource.

            Urban users will always be able to pay more than agricultural users.

            Some places, like San Francisco, have their water supply locked up (Hetch Hetchy). Other places, like much of Los Angeles, get water from multiple sources, each with their own crazy dynamics. Farmers may draw from state and federal water projects, as well as from unregulated groundwater pumping.

            How water districts price their water will need to be done wisely, and you can bet there will be lots of argument over those numbers.

      • K-Dog April 6, 2015 at 4:44 pm #

        With current gas prices oil production in Cali could certainly be cut back if it frees up significant water. We need food and we need energy. What you need is context. Oil does however buys votes and this will remain to be true until residntial homeowners get brains. I guess that being the case oil will be buying votes and influence for a long long time to come.

        • K-Dog April 6, 2015 at 4:48 pm #

          My comment was intended as a reply to the vampire. That is Janos S. for those who do not know. I’m at lunch on an I-phone which is why it wound up being attatched incorrectly.

          • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 8:13 pm #

            Where do you stand on Garmergate? Are you one of the many friends of Zoe Quinn?

          • Neon Vincent April 11, 2015 at 12:10 pm #

            I have written very little about Gamergate, but what little I have would probably oppose what Impaler thinks of it. I consider that to be a good thing. Recycled comments about the men’s rights movement shows that I’ve been at loggerheads with the political and social movement that swallowed Gamergate whole for a decade. As for how Gamergate has affected media other than video games, 2015 Hugo nominees for movies and television reports on how Sad Puppies successfully influenced the Hugo nominees. Fortunately, in the categories I care about most, they didn’t screw things up too much.

      • Actually, its not true. Fundamentally all money is made with water. This is a basic principle stretching from chemistry through biology to economics.

        Common knowledge is the Agriculture sector comprises 2% of California’s GDP.

        California grows food, using toxic chemical pesticides, and fossil fuels.

        It grows oil using much of the same stuff.

        Why bother? China’s population wants to eat California’s surplus.

        Talking heads (industry or laypersons) are right when they propose Ag’s mission “To feed the world”.

        The reason is that Agriculture is long past the point of feeding America. It exists now to reap profits, improve trade balance sheets, debase foreign competition, and useful political leverage all over the globe.

        Meanwhile, the “food insecure” millions of America wait on corners for handouts as the grocery stores are stuffed with food. Food banks are overflowing. Food has never been cheaper or more plentiful.

        In the absence of any real purpose in life, denied ecstatic pleasures of real social connection, or even affordable nontoxic recreational drugs, we have become a nation of binge eaters.

        Meanwhile the California model has widely been adopted across the country. Faux suburban communities built around burning fossil fuel. Spiritually vacant caricatures of country living, occupied by obsessive shut-ins animated by long-dormant, misunderstood urges to spend hours of “free time” hacking, slashing, poisoning, and ripping at their simplistic artificial environments.

        I’m saying the problem of Suburbia is still the main problem – the idea that “development” is essentially destroying the local flora and fauna, replacing it with invasive and non-native species. What species of citizen then takes possession of these areas?

        Highly mobile urban professionals and other internal migrants. With them comes their comfortable culture of anonymous impersonal franchise businesses.

        Cultural homogeneity. Ecological homogeneity. A regression toward the mean, whether is it oil, water, or biodiversity.

        The bottom line is CA has a water crisis, and your location (no matter where or how wet) is next. It is only a matter of time because the cause is people, and people with the mentality that created this problem in one place are metastasizing and are going to bring their problem-production to your area. Its climate change- of your communities’ political economy- its cultural uniqueness- and its basic mental and physical health.

        The destroyers are coming. They look banal, because evil is banal.

  3. Cold N. Holefield April 6, 2015 at 9:53 am #

    JHK said: The foregoing leads to that other original question: what is that “capital” we’re counting on?

    I’d say it’s the Confidence component of this Confidence Game they’re playing. The question is, is The Game more likened to a Merry-Go Round or Russian Roulette with one bullet in the chamber? The answer depends on the eye of the beholder. It’s all relative. Always has been.

    • abbybwood April 6, 2015 at 2:46 pm #

      “The Game” seems more likely to be “Musical Chairs”.

  4. Jeremy April 6, 2015 at 9:53 am #

    Meet your brother in arms!

    http://ponziworld.blogspot.co.uk

    Thanks for another great Monday piece!

  5. christiangustafson April 6, 2015 at 10:09 am #

    The cheap shot at Francis Fukuyama is unnecessary. His was a subtle and important argument running from Xenophon through Hegel and down to Leo Strauss.

    Fukuyama applied modern neoliberal economic thought to it and wrote an important and thoughtful book. The limits of his analysis are obvious enough, and acknowledged by the author.

    The typical mention or dismissal of his 25 year-old book usually shows that the writer has not read it.

    You’re better than this, Jim.

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

    Well, I believe that Mr. Summers’ paradigm is correct. Bad money flooding the world has led to deflation in order to try to get rid of it, which in turn is causing people to forgo spending.
    I love the metaphor of capital being a figment of the hard drive’s imagination – priceless Mr. K!

    • City_of_76 April 8, 2015 at 12:02 am #

      In San Francisco, a donut shop sells coffee for $1.75 a pint. The worker is a Chinese woman in her early 20s.

      A nearby hip cafe sells a deluxe drip coffee for $6.00. The workers are a white American woman, and man, in their mid 20s.

      Which drug will you buy today?

      • Dentshop April 8, 2015 at 11:58 am #

        The first place was selling coffee. The second was selling something completely different.

  7. DA April 6, 2015 at 10:21 am #

    The foregoing leads to that other original question: what is that “capital” we’re counting on? I’d propose that it doesn’t exist. It is a figment engraved on the hard drives of the world, a ghost that haunts the people still in charge of that disintegrating global economy. There is still wealth in the world, but a lot less than people such as Larry Summers say there is.

    Too much magic, indeed!

  8. noel bodie April 6, 2015 at 10:22 am #

    My ideology sez there is plenty of money, it is mostly in the mits of the Mitt-types. Meanwhile various local school districts are broke and the local tax whiners are trying to figure a way to get something for nothing. No use looking for more dollars in the broke middle class…..tax the rich!

    • bossier56 April 6, 2015 at 11:30 am #

      Depending on the definition of rich. The government seems to classify anyone with their nose above water rich

      • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 1:25 pm #

        Does anyone have a list of what is taxed? As in paper towels, food eaten in eateries, etc.

        • hineshammer April 6, 2015 at 3:57 pm #

          That all depends on where you live.

      • noel bodie April 6, 2015 at 3:56 pm #

        How does taxing at 90% any income over 2 mil sound?

        • Q. Shtik April 6, 2015 at 4:10 pm #

          How does taxing at 90% any income over 2 mil sound? – Noel B

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

          How does doing away entirely with income based taxes and instead having a single large percentage consumption tax on every friggin thing sold, from a stick of gum to a Lear jet?

          Yeah yeah, I know, progressive/regressive.

          • Exscotticus April 7, 2015 at 2:16 pm #

            The idea of a VAT replacing every other tax is seductive. The problem is that it wouldn’t replace every other tax; it would be yet another tax added to all the others. Plus any tax that actually encourages saving over spending is DOA.

    • orbit7er April 6, 2015 at 12:18 pm #

      A sure sign of the times is the latest NY state budget negotiated by
      neoliberal Gov Cuomo which includes a tax cap for any yachts above $240,000. So truly we see whose interests are being protected and where the money is going…
      Whether those yachts could be repurposed to restore maritime commerce on the Hudson in the Great Contraction is a big question.
      I doubt it would be very efficient but you never know…

      Back in the late 60’s my parents bought a house in the way of further Auto Addiction expansion and had it moved by a contractor who used surplus tanks for his house moving business…
      So reuse can be creative and surprising for the toys of the plutocrats after their post-Versailles moment which is coming…

      • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 10:39 pm #

        Surplus Tanks? You mean like Sherman Tanks from WW2?

    • abbybwood April 6, 2015 at 2:50 pm #

      Taxing the rich worked very well for Governor Mark Dayton:

      http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carl-gibson/mark-dayton-minnesota-economy_b_6737786.html

  9. K-Dog April 6, 2015 at 10:22 am #

    Lawrence Henry “Larry” Summers, President Emeritus and Charles W. Eliot University Professor of Harvard University.

    How’s it hanging Larry. Participated in the popping of any economic bubbles lately? Is your sociopathic ass hard at work preserving the wealth and assets of Harvard Alumni and the upper east side of Manhattan? I have to ask as capital is not abundant in the pockets of the American people. There are only so many Wall Mart greeter jobs to go around you know.

    Was the brain dead missive of Larry’s sociopathic brain worth repeating? Capital is and will be abundant in the pockets of people he cares about; the 1%. That’s what happens when profits accumulate in the pockets of insanely rich people and the moms and pops and sons and daughters of America are left jobless in front of the blue glow of their X-Box. It did not take a genius to tell us that.

    And their fingers twitch.

    Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?

  10. EvelynV April 6, 2015 at 10:27 am #

    JHK is the first thing I read every Monday morning and often send copies to friends when he writes a especially good one.

    Some of the fawning praise for this morning’s one compelled me to login to post.

    Today’s piece, at best, was boilerplate. I don’t think your heart was in it today Jiimbo.

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    • davidreese2 April 6, 2015 at 10:37 am #

      Are we reading the same blog?

      • EvelynV April 6, 2015 at 11:45 am #

        david,

        Perhaps the difference is that you are new to this site or have not read it as faithfully as me, hence the novelty is a factor.

        I’ve collected a bouquet of phrases you might be able to work into a lullaby…this is not meant to be a bash but I do seek to defend my point of view in the previous post by moi..

        a world of unraveling globalism.
        central bank racketeering,
        predicated on a dominant and sound American polity,
        a corrupt troika of banks, market swindlers, and captive eunuch officials
        digital accounting fraud
        suburban hyperwaste and decrepitating older towns and cities.
        American-style financial fraud.
        Japan…goes medieval.
        strung out on the primary commodity: oil.
        that will truly be the beginning of the end
        disintegrating global economy

        • Exscotticus April 7, 2015 at 3:16 pm #

          JHK is an exceptional writer who strives to come up with a free blog entry every week. And yet some people feel the need to rate and rank these entries as if they’re paying for a service and not quite achieving the contractual terms of satisfaction. Since “fawning praise” might be the only recompense Jim receives, why not just let him have it without comment?

          • EvelynV April 8, 2015 at 1:34 am #

            Jezzussss Kreist! R U kidding me?!

            He’s not that much of a simpleton. I’m guessing he is more appreciative of a discerning readership than ones who mouth the same old hackneyed praise regardless the quality of whatever he churns out.

            His blog this week was regurgitation but I’m not criticizing him for it. It isn’t possible the produce the high octane stuff every single week come rain come shine. He probably had a busy week and had to crank out something as quickly as possible.

    • K-Dog April 6, 2015 at 10:47 am #

      And the boilerplate sez!

      The only globalism that we are going to get from here on out is global war.

      I know what you mean EvelynV. Waxing poetic about global finance is so, so, so; safe! Not exactly a walk on the wild side this morning and the comments about global disintegration this morning are nothing to lose your head over,

  11. lsjogren April 6, 2015 at 10:33 am #

    Wonder where that statistic that financial services are 40% of the economy comes from?

    I have long believed that the more advanced an economy, the smaller the financial sector should be. The purpose of the financial services business is to serve as a lubricant to the real economy. If you’re spending 40% of your income on lubricant, that’s a heck of a lot that could be going instead to real goods and services.

    • lsjogren April 6, 2015 at 10:35 am #

      And probably a better analogy would be: If financial services are 40% of the economy, then we are spending a huge portion of our income on the financial counterpart to the stuff they sell to pour into your gas tank to make your car run better.

    • russ April 6, 2015 at 11:08 am #

      Agreed; that’s the way it should be. Still, when some of those externalities that get shoved off the accounting books, but exist nevertheless – start to reappear again in the real world, rates of return for investments in natural resources and in products manufactured from those resources begin to decrease.

      Better rates of return can be manufactured just playing with money. And pretty soon that becomes the economy. Hence, we wind up with a financial-rentier bubble as the biggest one of all. It’s the ‘bubble that’s too big to pop’, it’s ‘the mother of all bubbles’.

      My only suggestion would have been to not bother clarifying the statement about spending 40% of our income on lubricant instead of real goods and services. After all, isn’t that what we do? Kind of a Robert Palmer ‘addicted to love’ kind of thing?

      Sure that’s what we do. Serious problems in the world? Our general approach for the past 40-50 years has been to spend more on, uh, ‘lubricants’.

  12. davidreese2 April 6, 2015 at 10:33 am #

    As always, JHK gets it right.

  13. lsjogren April 6, 2015 at 10:41 am #

    As to how real is this “capital”? Well, not very, but the very foundation of a fiat currency monetary system is the creation of artificial “money” with no intrinsic value.

    The best defense of our monetary system is that it may be insane, but what is the alternative? A monetary system based on a gold standard is pretty much also a “faith-based” monetary system, since gold has very little more intrinsic value than paper money does, although as its defenders point out, it can’t be printed.

    • Greg Knepp April 6, 2015 at 12:45 pm #

      Excellent observation!

      Gold is as abstract a medium of exchange as any currency. Its value rests on its physical and chemical stability as well as its relatively limited supply. But, outside of a few niche industrial applications, gold has little to offer an advanced economy…Even its worth as jewelry is largely based on the perception that it is rare (and therefore ‘precious’). Hell, polished brass is as aesthetically pleasing.

      Nixon did well to discontinue the convertibility of the dollar to gold back in 1971. He recognized that the ‘gold standard’ was antiquated and ill-suited to meet the needs of the mega-economies then emerging.

      I like Mish’s economics blog and read it regularly. But I can’t for the life of me understand his stance on this issue. Uncontrolled money printing (or coining) recessions, depressions, panics, inflation, deflation and the like didn’t begin in 1971. These devils have been plaguing economies forever – gold or no gold!

      • messianicdruid April 7, 2015 at 10:16 am #

        Silver has much to offer an advanced economy. Its advantages, in addition to those of gold, are in an agrarian economy into which we a going, if not headed, are it’s smaller divisibility, health uses and affordability.

        Gold is a sapling, silver is an acorn.

  14. George April 6, 2015 at 10:44 am #

    “Global disintegration has advanced furthest, not surprisingly, in the fragile band of regions most strung out on the primary commodity: oil.”

    Curiously not mentioned was the “Deal” with Iran. Some opposed to that deal have been quite vocal and made quite the spectacle of themselves on the Sunday talk show circuit. I suspect the Secret Service really has their hands full now! There are those who always seem to get their way though they never seem to dirty their own hands in the process. Maybe not this time. Get ready for a final scandal, a scandal that could advance that disintegration far more than we could possibly imagine!

    http://www.thesisa.org

  15. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 10:45 am #

    If you don’t know what the capital is, just look at the new Chinese Asian Development Bank: they are taking American virtual digits (their truckload of US Treasuries) and converting it to electric plants, roads and ports while they are still worth anything, creating millions of jobs in the process.

    US should do the same, while there are still somebody around capable of not just whining, but actually doing something useful.

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    • nclaughlin April 6, 2015 at 10:50 am #

      Is the Fed printing money or is it printing debt? If the former, we get inflation, if the latter, deflation.

  16. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 10:50 am #

    “The best defense of our monetary system is that it may be insane, but what is the alternative? ”

    A credit-based fiat system when new money are put into circulation not based on existing values/property, but future productive projects, based on the project technological/scientific value.

  17. fodase April 6, 2015 at 11:01 am #

    There are only so many Wall Mart greeter jobs to go around you know.And their fingers twitch.

    speak for yourself and your fellow CFNers. Like I said a few days ago, my 3 kids all studied scientific areas at university and are all doing fine financially.

    Walmart greeters jobs are for the illustrious grads of hip hop studies, feminist studies, art history studies, Black history studies and more in that vein.

    Chemical engineers, ultrasonographers, computer/web programmers etc. will have little to no difficultly landing jobs in the $50-150K/annum range.

    when you study nonsense you’re left with walmart and a CFN-endtymes attitude as your last redoubt of fantasy.

    And their fingers twitch? what, is that a reference to the wallyworld greeters getting ready to shoot the place up?

    HAHAHA, keep dreaming, along with kunstler.

    “Revolution in the streets. In 2016 for sure”

    Technological advances are really showing CFN folks up as being major wrong.

    Spain using wind to supply 41% of its total electrical production as we speak…

    Millions of barrels less oil needed to produce that energy.

    Whining about “fake” money is nonsense, it’s part and parcel of human history to debase currency. Still, it’ll buy whatever you need.

    Learn to protect it better, i.e. tax strategies, investments.

    If all you can see is walmart greeter nation…

    man oh man, learn a simple trade for gods sake.

    fodase

    • bossier56 April 6, 2015 at 11:50 am #

      I agrree with you about learning to do something useful. I don’t think most on this blog would disagree with that. The trades are in as high demand as stem graduates. Welders were making 100K before the crude price crash but i bet they are still doing well. Our local four university hates our two year technical college becuase the technical students get jobs faster at higher pay. Of course, some of the technical jobs are not air conditioned and you have to actually, you know, work.

      • swmnguy April 6, 2015 at 1:46 pm #

        One big problem is the deal Higher Education made with Big Business in the ’70s, when the last of the Baby Boomers left college. At that moment, there was a dramatic oversupply of colleges, built to handle the enormous surge of people wanting to go to college, from the GI Bill after WWII and their kids, the Baby Boomers.

        Business hated spending money to train people on the job, so Higher Education and Finance came up with a way to take that expense off of Business, and put it onto the prospective employees themselves. This saved thousands of colleges from closing, and created a huge opportunity for profits creating huge amounts of debt tied to the Social Security numbers of students. As we see know.

        That’s when you started seeing vocational programs take over colleges. I went to a small 4-year college that survived on Accounting, Hotel and Institutional Management, and Agricultural Management degrees. All stuff a person had used to learn on the job.

        The point of a college education, and particularly of a Liberal Arts education, had used to be that when you graduated, you knew how to think. You could define a situation, gather information, sort it, evaluate it, formulate solutions, and address the situation. The “Scientific Method,” applied to the more abstract and subjective things that human beings are constantly trying to deal with.

        I’d be the first to say that many of the Liberal Arts programs out there aren’t delivering that, or at least that many of their students aren’t doing that. Absolutely a valid criticism.

        But I, who dropped out before completing a double-major in Literature and Theatre, have been fully and rewardingly employed in a variety of small business jobs for the past 30 years. I’m not directly using anything I learned in college; but it turns out that somebody who can approach a situation, find, sort, evaluate and utilize information, and make decisions accordingly, can be useful almost anywhere doing almost anything. I can learn how to do the specific things that need doing. Nothing I’ve ever learned has ever become obsolete or required “retraining.”

        If colleges are teaching specific skills but not teaching how to learn other skills, that’s as worthless as a non-specific degree that also doesn’t teach how to learn. Learning how to learn is what you’re supposed to get out of Education. If you can do that, the specifics take care of themselves.

        • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:06 pm #

          Excellent post! A college degree in the 2000s is little more than certificate.

        • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 10:46 pm #

          Good insight there, Swmguy.

          Those words should be distributed to every HS guidance office in the country.

  18. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 11:06 am #

    “Is the Fed printing money or is it printing debt? If the former, we get inflation, if the latter, deflation.”

    It depends. As far as QE is concerned – it is pure monetary inflation, since the collateral is mostly junk bonds, probably not worth the paper they are printed on. Money as debt is mostly created by commercial banks using reserve ratio – home mortgages are the best example.

    But there is THIRD way: print money to underwrite the large infrastructural projects – that’s Credit Money. Of course, FED will have the responsibility to audit the use of that credit – Project Based Financing.

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:04 pm #

      Therein lies the rub.

      As far as QE is concerned it has all been monetary reinflation, as it’s been used to re-inflate phantom bank debt that vanished in the crash of 2008, and which will likely vanish once again when the next imminent crash reveals the holders to, yet again, being incapable of making good on their promises to pay.

      Money as debt using a minimum reserve ratio was definitively exposed in 2008 as being a barely minimal (and easily avoided) criminally fraudulent standard that Wall St walked all over. Think it will be any different this time?

      It’s funny that we in the US continue to go round and round this same little con, all the while naively hoping for better outcomes and all the time sharpening our Wall St criminals responses.

  19. malthuss April 6, 2015 at 11:15 am #

    ‘At $250,000 a pop for making a speech, Mr. Bernanke can certainly afford to pay high-toned hacks to polish his spin-o-nomics.’!!!!!!

    When is the jig up?
    USA money supply has been soooooo overinflated. When do things go bust?

  20. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 11:16 am #

    There are several reasons why the monetary inflation in US have not translated yet into price hyper-inflation – partially, the bloated stock market absorbs the extra money and keeps growing, but mostly is the ability of US to use the political and military influence of reserve status of US dollar and push the extra mass of dollars outside of the country.

    That influence is rapidly vanishing, in 3-5 years it will be completely gone, if we don’t have a global war between major powers.

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    • elysianfield April 6, 2015 at 4:08 pm #

      Perhaps one more reason why there is no raging inflation. A working definition of “inflation” is…”too much money chasing too few goods”. As the middle-class is the engine of our economy, and as the middle-class is found with little “discretionary income”, there is no apparent inflation for them, nor the poor (working or otherwise). There is, of course, inflation, but not hyper-inflation.

      Keynes opined in his text on employment, interest and money, that the true wealth of a nation is…a nation of consumers willing and able to spend. We are willing, yes, but not able.

      I suspect that David Stockman is correct in predicting deflation, before the vicious inflationary period occurs.

      Where the beginnings of hyper-inflation can be seen is in the playthings of the 1%. Manhattan luxury apartments, mega-yachts, fine paintings, classic vehicles, etc. have taken enormous jumps in price.

      Our future cannot be other than austere. Remember, God must love the poor, as he made so many of them….

      • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 6:32 pm #

        Don’t make that David Stockman’s mistake – as soon as American dollar will be dethroned by Chinese yuan – there will be American Weimar republic.

  21. Cold N. Holefield April 6, 2015 at 11:23 am #

    Fuck it said: speak for yourself and your fellow CFNers. Like I said a few days ago, my 3 kids all studied scientific areas at university and are all doing fine financially.

    That’s all fine and dandy, but not everyone can be a scientist, can they? Or if you think everyone can, then who, pray tell, do all these scientists experiment on? There are the experimenters and the experimentees, and the two cannot share the same designation. Just as someone’s gotta make the french fires, someone’s gotta be the guinea pig, and Jesus Christ (in honor of Easter) I’m here to tell ya, pigs are flying fast and furious right now.

  22. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 11:30 am #

    “When do things go bust?” — malthuss

    Currently, the pieces are being set on the playing board: Europe, ME. Asia-Pacific. The players – China/Russia vs US/Japan.

    (1) US can not wait too long, because the potential of China will continue to grow – a maximum of 5-10 years

    (2) the need to prepare allies for the conflict – if not the Europeans, which by hook or by crook trying to get away from fighting, then at least the Ukrainians – a minimum of 3-5 years.

  23. fodase April 6, 2015 at 11:33 am #

    Yeah I know, all you CFNers can retort is empty phrases.

    “pigs flying fast and furious”

    “I call bullshit”

    “not everyone can be a scientist”

    Thanks for the logic lesson.

    Oh btw if someone’s gotta make the fries, then what the hell are you complaining about there’s no jobs?

    oh btw2, not everyone needs to be a scientist. typical failed reasoning taking things to extremes.

    how about, a lot more US americans could study to become scientists, or at least something that has a chance in the job market.

    There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of openings for qualified jobseekers.

    Qualified = have a real skill.

    Like I said, learn a trade e.g. appliance repair, it’ll make you quite a bit of money and there’s no lack of demand.

    CFNers are whiner losers for the most part.

    like k-puppy, ‘only globalism now is global war’

    such armchair adolescents

    US americans, at least millions of them, have no ambition.

    fodase

    • Paulo April 6, 2015 at 11:56 am #

      Fodase:

      re: Qualified = have a real skill. Well said.

      Furthermore, if you have read past Kunstler and/or Greer that is exactly what they say is needed in the future. As for computer work, coding, etc…it won’t last. Whenever a job can be offshored to a lower paid venue, it happens. FTP, video conferencing, or foreign workers in California all tend to argue the point information work can be done, anywhere and by anyone. It might not be done as well or as creatively, but if it is done cheaper so it shall be.

      I used to teach CAD. My students used to get jobs. Now, they don’t or won’t. Occasionally past students report they are running CNC machines which is similar. Drafting? Hah.

      I could work everyday as a carpenter where I live in this rural valley. I choose not to, having retired. That is what a real skill offers.

      regards

      • Exscotticus April 7, 2015 at 4:02 pm #

        Actually they already tried outsourcing software dev to places like India. It didn’t work very well and many of those jobs have come back.

    • hineshammer April 6, 2015 at 4:30 pm #

      What’s with the phrase “US americans”?

  24. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 11:42 am #

    George Friedman: What the hell the Germans are going to do?

    Special for CFN “political virgins” (hello, volodya) ….

    https://youtu.be/QeLu_yyz3tc?t=3550

  25. 99 cent nation April 6, 2015 at 11:43 am #

    Really good. Short, simple and covers everything. Now is the time to kick those rat bastards out of town. But then they are hiding behind their mercenary armies to protect them. And that must be giving them the nightmares they deserve knowing full well these same mercenaries are very likely to turn on them and do the job for us. This same thing has happened before all through modern history. Take em out. The rats are starting to implode.

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    • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 2:47 pm #

      That’s exactly what started WW2. They’re not going to go easily.

      • 99 cent nation April 6, 2015 at 3:43 pm #

        You probably realise we are already in world war 3. Different times different types of war. This one in the long run will have way more impact on the entire living world with or without the nuclear threat although we are just a couple of minutes from that scenario. This war is really about class and just how important you and I are in the idealised fantasy of corporate power which already has more power and control than any country has ever had. No this war is for complete control of our minds and developing living humans into non thinking machines to do the slave masters bidding. All other living things on this planet mater not. Only places like this blog even attempt to bring this to anyone’s attention.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 8:02 pm #

          Yes one of the Commandments in the Orange Bible will be, “Thou shalt not make a machine in the image of the human mind.”

          I think all that Alex Jones stuff is real, but what’s his conclusion? Calling a Ted Cruz/Sarah Palin ticket “a wet dream”. The man is a cone, huge with knowledge on one end, and tiny with solutions on the other. In other words, he’s using the Truth to lie. Maybe he was sincere at one point, but he married into the Tribe and now must serve it.

          I don’t think you can download consciousness into a robot, per se. But they might very well create cybogs and use the rest of us for spare parts. And indeed, they might well be able to greatly expand life in the near future, if they aren’t already. And yeah, they don’t need us. The 500 million on the Georgia Guidestones is probably also a lie. I bet they plan to go way lower.

  26. BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 11:54 am #

    Jim, if you are looking in …

    The US is growing in one important area, and that is in population — at the rate of 2-3 million new residents per year. House builders, for example, are happy about this, for as they point out, these newcomers will all need a place to live. Some elitist in the financial press claim this represents a sort of human capital that will bring us into a bright and prosperous future. In fact, some cynics think that the borders have been thrown open to the 3rd world to mask failure on every other front. For example, in NYS where you live, tens of thousands of Syrian refugees are being resettled, reversing a long standing loss of population in that area.

    What about it, will 2-3 million newcomers per year make us more stable and prosperous, or bring more chaos and poverty?

    brh

    • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 12:17 pm #

      One thing is for sure: the newcomers are much better adapted to more spartan ways of living, may be they could teach the rest of Americans how to do well with much less wasteful consumption.

      • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 1:20 pm #

        I call bullshit. Mexicans in USA have bigger families.
        Welfare money means huge Gov.inc to distribute to the ‘refugees’, the ‘needy’, the ‘underserved’.

        People dont move to USA to tighten their belts but to indulge in a pig out.

        • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 2:43 pm #

          First off, there is no more ‘welfare’ in US – Clinton eliminated it back in 90s. Most of refugee help programs have about 6 months expiration date. There are probably some help for needy families, but I doubt you could live large on that pitiful allowance.

          I give you an example: when my mom used to live in Chicago, she was over 65 at the time and she was getting around $450 a month in SSI (Social Security Supplemental), out of which she had to pay around $120 for rent in Chicago Section 8 housing (we paid $2000 in bribes to help her get there). That was back before 2005.

          In addition, she was entitled to about $65 in food stamps + Medicare/Medicaid assistance.

          Using her Russian experience, she was able to stretch that money and even save a little. How? For example, breakfast. She would boil couple of eggs, have a cured salmon sandwich – she was buying salmon on sale at 99c a pound and cured it herself, a little butter and coffee – overall cost of around 55 cents.

          Her American neighbor would go to McDonald for the same breakfast and manage to blow on some shitty sandwich made of who-knows-what and soda around $4.50.

          • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 8:00 pm #

            You are lying.

        • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 2:51 pm #

          If you wish, I could send you a wonderful recipe how to cure salmon – beats the hell out of Norwegian “smoked” salmon.

        • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 3:05 pm #

          I still miss the way she made gefelte-fish – that was something!

        • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:32 pm #

          People don’t move to USA to tighten their belts but to indulge in a pig out.

          Agreed. Just like Americans themselves.

        • EvelynV April 9, 2015 at 5:21 am #

          The Mexicans I’ve encountered aren’t here for “pigging out”.

          They come here willing to work hard to earn their share of the pie. They are probably motivated by what motivates most people even fat asses who have the same motives but do it by prodding their employees to work longer hours for the same money or less, or by urging their brokers to find my lucrative investments. They want a better life, difference being they willingly endure greater suffering than the typical couch potato who spends half the day watching MSM demagogues preaching about the evil aliens who pick their fruit and vegetables and cut their lawns etc.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 2:40 pm #

        You hate real nations – which are culturally and ethnically homogenous by definition. In the final analysis, you are one of the nation wreckers.

        Iceland drove out the International Banks, yet continues to corrode since it wont stop taking in third world refugees – as if it owes such people anything.

        • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:30 pm #

          You long for an earlier time Janos. I’m with you so far, but how do you propose to implement it in a time of seemingly rising material wealth? I would propose that Iceland’s driving out of the International Banking influence wasn’t nearly as complete as you thought.

          • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:08 am #

            You may be right about Iceland of course. They are hard to push out and I’m not reading specialty blogs about it. Or talking to Icelandic financial people. I’m just pointing out that the universal or globalist mindset is already embedded there and will destroy them in any case.

        • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 10:52 pm #

          With a population of less than 300,000 how many refugees can Iceland take in before it is no longer Iceland?

    • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 1:18 pm #

      For example, in NYS where you live, tens of thousands of Syrian refugees are being resettled, reversing a long standing loss of population in that area.

      And when normal people are among savages they flee the area.
      White flight. Or any race that can flee will flee.

      As usual, I like yr posts from the frontline of the collapse. In the land of the millionaires and billionaires you see the real USA Today.

  27. PeteAtomic April 6, 2015 at 11:56 am #

    you know, Reality has a beautiful & powerful way of grinding ideology into irrelevance– and the financial crises in the past 15 odd years has done just that. Whether it has been globalism, or socialism, or ‘anarcho-capitalism’– these ideologies are at their best in illustrating human limitations. For one example, decades of free market ideology was literally dismissed overnight in 2008 when Reality pointed out that really, nothing is ‘free’ when account magic is involved, and the powermongers & cashmagicians went apeshit & burned all of their own playbooks in complete panic.

    Human nature is one of the only constants in human history, and with that inalienable rule in mind– when there is this much destruction occurring in the economy more failed ideology reappears once again to offer a return to the gravy trains. It’s just a matter of how many people will be thrown out of airplanes, or beaten to death in basements.

    • ozone April 6, 2015 at 12:29 pm #

      PeteA,
      ” …Reality has a beautiful & powerful way of grinding ideology into irrelevance–”

      Dark ‘n’ gritty, but irrefutable (unless one has been smoking too much gov’t-grown hopium).

      “… Friedman’s flat world was predicated on a dominant and sound American polity, and we’ll have neither in that world Mr. Summers says we’re moving into.

      In fact the first condition was predicated on the second: that America would continue to dominate the global economy because its polity was sound. We have clearly blown that by rigging together a corrupt troika of banks, market swindlers, and captive eunuch officials who expanded the financial sector of the economy from 5 percent to more than 40 percent, largely by pillaging the middle class and destroying the basis of their income.” — JHK

      Also irrefutable, unless, as Upton Sinclair wrote:
      “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

      (We see copious evidence of that ri’cheer on this very comment space.)

  28. fodase April 6, 2015 at 12:23 pm #

    As for computer work, coding, etc…it won’t last. Whenever a job can be offshored to a lower paid venue, it happens. FTP, video conferencing, or foreign workers in California all tend to argue the point information work can be done, anywhere and by anyone. It might not be done as well or as creatively, but if it is done cheaper so it shall be.

    Not as obvious as it sounds. Lots of Indian coding shops produce such substandard junk code, delays, misunderstandings, horrible ‘quality’ etc. that many US firms will not offshore many projects.

    I have seen indian firms way underbid US software firms for contracts, in which the indian firm had LITERALLY no idea what it was doing. Ergo, they went into a major meeting and said ‘We dont know how to do it but we are getting people’. Fast exit for that firm.

    Plenty of work for coders – several hundred thousand openings as we speak.

    i totally agree being able to do carpentry, appliance repair, fix cars etc. is a wonderful and profitable skill to have.

    fodase

  29. BeerBarrel April 6, 2015 at 1:14 pm #

    Career Alert! Handy with those snippers? Become a Pot trimmer!

    These guys start out at $12/$15 per hour, and can move on up to $50/$60K per hour jobs!

    Why get an education when you can make the big bucks in the pot industry?

    • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 2:44 pm #

      Yes and they can do circumcisions under the table.

      • capt spaulding April 7, 2015 at 12:32 pm #

        It’s a handy skill to have, there’s no getting around it.

    • Q. Shtik April 6, 2015 at 3:41 pm #

      and can move on up to $50/$60K per hour jobs! – Beer

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

      Oh come on, I don’t think Warren Buffet even makes 50/60 thousand per hour.

      • BeerBarrel April 9, 2015 at 1:07 pm #

        Oops, I must be high!!

        50/60K per year!

  30. RocketDoc April 6, 2015 at 1:21 pm #

    It’s a fairness thing. Careful stewards of the money supply is one thing. Gross dereliction of duty another. Give me the magic wand, I hate having to suck up to thieves who pretend to be saviors. If I could pay the prosecutors….what fun we would have!

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  31. malthuss April 6, 2015 at 1:25 pm #

    BRH —-will 2-3 million newcomers per year bring more chaos and poverty?

    They already have brought environmental wreckage, crime and disease. All in the name of ‘MultiCulturalism’.

    • vengeur April 6, 2015 at 2:45 pm #

      Yes, bringing in millions of legal and millions more illegal immigrants does wonders for the environment. We all need to conserve more of everything so that we can bring in millions MORE third world people.

      • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 3:01 pm #

        Well, when you stop sucking the living blood out of third world countries, nobody in the sane mind would come over.

        Desperate people do desperate things – even moving to America.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 5:29 pm #

          Finc wants to import poverty and savagery into America – so we can “learn” from the savages.

          He has revealed his hatred, has he not?

          • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 6:08 pm #

            Actually, what I said was: “Leave the world alone, and the World will leave you alone”. First, you are creating a huge refugee crisis by bombing Yugoslavia – a very stable European country – into stone age, and then you complaining that Yugoslavian refugees are flooding America? And the list goes on and on….

          • vengeur April 6, 2015 at 6:28 pm #

            In other words, he thinks we deserve the massive environmental degradation caused by millions and millions of illegal (and legal) immigrants. Well, at least it makes HIM feel better about the whole thing.

          • DA April 6, 2015 at 7:50 pm #

            Learn from the savages? That’s rich! The fucking savages live right here and make 6 figure salaries or better.

          • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 8:45 pm #

            DA is wrong. Where will this comment appear

        • EvelynV April 9, 2015 at 5:29 am #

          What was that blather all about???

          Do you think you really know what reality is?

          • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 8:44 pm #

            Who is blathering, Evelyn. It could be DA, vengur, fincain, janos, or malthus. Must have been DA, is all I can surmise, since he’s the only one who’s wrong out of that nested bunch.

    • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 8:48 pm #

      So now I make a response to malthus to tell him that he is totally correct and DA is wrong. And I can’t tell which blather tree Evelyn V is blathering against. Wonder where this will post?

      • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 8:51 pm #

        And my post to malthus, inexplicably, appears down here at the bottom of this nested mess.

        This comment thread is perfect for people who are never wrong, and who never go back to read what others think of their ideas.
        Otherwise, it’s just a mess.

  32. Q. Shtik April 6, 2015 at 2:38 pm #

    Off topic, yet in light of tonight’s NCAA final, timely …… have you noticed ‘the black male athlete’ if I may generalize, and in particular the basketball player, has taken up a new, sort of, anti-coiffure fad of which Justise Winslow sports a prime example. And there are plenty more among the Duke and Wisconsin squads.

    http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaab/2015/04/06/justise-winslow-duke-nba-draft-lottery-pick-ncaa-tournament/25338631/

    For whatever the reason blacks, more than any group I can think of, are creatures of and slaves to the latest fad. Why is that…or is my observation off?

    I’ll give the 5-pounds-of-dangling-dreads look 6 to 12 months before it is largely gone. Fading fast also will be the body covering tatts except, of course, for those foolish enough to have already gotten them.

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 7:49 pm #

      Your observations might be right, but what’s the point?

      When you speak of blacks being slaves to the latest fad, you’re speaking of young blacks first and foremost, so mostly you’re just talking about youth of whatever race being slaves to the latest fad. Hardly a groundbreaking observation there. And if you’re talking about high level basketball players, once again, they are overwhelmingly black in the first place, so hardly a remarkable observation.

      Dreads and tats? You might well be right. Or not. Who cares? I’m damn sure not getting them either way.

    • Q. Shtik April 6, 2015 at 9:50 pm #

      Update:

      Five out of five Duke starters have the new preferred do.

      • Q. Shtik April 6, 2015 at 11:31 pm #

        Duke wins it……….it must be those new hairdos.

      • BeerBarrel April 9, 2015 at 6:23 pm #

        I remember remarking to myself that it was a new “ghetto look” whatever that means. I guess it’s like the judge who said about porn, that he knows it when he sees it. I can say the same about the ghetto.

    • Buck Stud April 6, 2015 at 11:41 pm #

      You may be on to something Q 🙂

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXz5YVHaOWA

    • EvelynV April 7, 2015 at 2:51 am #

      No fad is as deleterious to human culture as the one that results in the same vignette we see every place we go.

      People humped over their electronic teats like rats eating cheese.

      • Q. Shtik April 7, 2015 at 2:58 pm #

        I agree totally with the contempt you express about the electronic devices but that is a phenomenon of a completely different order than black hairstyle fads…which, btw, I don’t consider deleterious. I simply made an observation. My question is/was, what makes blacks so much more prone to jump on a fad? Or is their prone-ness a figment of my imagination?

  33. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 3:32 pm #

    “Yes, bringing in millions of legal and millions more illegal immigrants does wonders for the environment. We all need to conserve more of everything so that we can bring in millions MORE third world people.” — vengeur

    I hope, vengeur, that you are not doing your own taxes – you are totally lost in elementary accounting. America’s collective – including your billionaires – is the biggest welfare recipient the world’s welfare history has ever known.

    Just take a look at your budget deficit and trade deficit – it is only in fancy imaginations of your FED chairman is some kind of fancy accounting game, but somebody need to cover it with real products and services in exchange for nothing.

  34. fodase April 6, 2015 at 4:41 pm #

    apparently there are 3-4 million unfilled sciences hi-tech style jobs in the US States of America.

    walmart greeter?

    you have to be a dolt.

    you can teach yourself lots of computer programming. start with html.

    stuff ain’t rokkit scyence.

    US American firms are crying for people who can help them with their online presence.

    companies will hire you without a college degree if you show you can do the programming.

    ALL THIS KNOWLEDGE IS FREE ONLINE FOR THE TAKING.

    fodase

    • Janos Skorenzy April 6, 2015 at 5:31 pm #

      Yeah programmers are getting 10 dollar per hour now I hear.

      • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 5:58 pm #

        Still way better than 10 hours per dollar.

      • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 7:55 pm #

        I do not know. What people looking for those jobs tell me is that ‘apps are in’.
        And there is a glut of programmers, so new graduates are not getting entry level jobs. There are no ‘entry level’. The businesses want the experienced but now jobless IT workers.

        • DA April 6, 2015 at 8:37 pm #

          If you’re looking for a start in work in programming you’re already at least 20 years behind. Unless you’re an MIT grad level security/encryption guy, all the meaningful and profitable work’s already been done.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:05 am #

          I kid you not: I heard a Temp Agency advertising Programmers who would work for 10/hr.

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 7:42 pm #

      Let me guess. You’re a paid shill?

  35. newworld April 6, 2015 at 4:41 pm #

    Denninger’s One Dollar of Capital is one idea. One little idea is to remove the cap gains tax on silver and gold, make it a competing money which would almost be nearly a %100 global currency.

    Other than that our current predicaments are being tackled by Baby Boomers, a mostly worthless lot of infantilized brats who refuse to grow up, even the conservative ones who are mostly petty bourgeoise in nature will refuse to do anything that might require them to miss a meal.

    Whatever anyone thinks of GHW Bush he was the last real adult in a visible leadership position.

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    • FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 5:28 pm #

      “Denninger’s One Dollar of Capital is one idea” — newworld

      The dork is suggesting what the most of 3d worlders already have. And how in the world did that help them?

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:21 pm #

      Whatever anyone thinks of GHW Bush he was the last real adult in a visible leadership position.

      I think so too. Nonetheless, just like FDR, he was presiding over a bankrupt philosophy. Capitalism is dead on it’s feet at this point, killed off for good by US greed.

      • EvelynV April 9, 2015 at 5:34 am #

        No he wasn’t. He’d of strangled his simian kid when he was still a young chimp.

        And to spend his life living with that fat grandmother…not that I have any use for Ayn Rand but her assertion you can judge the quality of a man by the kind of woman he sleeps with seems to be worthwhile to think about in his case.

  36. FincaInTheMountains April 6, 2015 at 5:56 pm #

    As reported in the UK’s Daily Telegraph on March 4, the commander of US troops in Europe, General Frederick “Ben” Hodges, has accused Russia of having 12,000 troops inside eastern Ukraine, which was irresponsible nonsense.

    In February the Wall Street Journal reported Hodges as saying “I believe the Russians are mobilizing right now for a war that they think is going to happen in five or six years—not that they’re going to start a war in five or six years, but I think they are anticipating that things are going to happen, and that they will be in a war of some sort, of some scale, with somebody within the next five or six years.” Just what President Putin was supposed to make of that is anyone’s guess — but it is certain that Hodges’ bellicose meanderings did nothing to persuade Moscow that there would be any attempt by the US-NATO coalition to modify its policy of uncompromising enmity.

    http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/04/03/nato-is-building-up-for-war/

  37. fodase April 6, 2015 at 6:17 pm #

    California first state to generate more than 5% of electricity from utility-scale solar

    California has become the first state with more than 5% of its annual utility-scale electricity generation from utility-scale solar power, according to EIA’s Electric Power Monthly. California’s utility-scale (1 megawatt (MW) or larger) solar plants generated a record 9.9 million megawatthours (MWh) of electricity in 2014, an increase of 6.1 million MWh from 2013. California’s utility-scale solar production in 2014 was more than three times the output of the next-highest state, Arizona, and more than all other states combined.
    The increase in California’s solar production came the same year that drought conditions caused hydroelectric generation to fall 46% compared to the previous five-year average. Although solar is only available at certain times of the day, the annual increase in California’s solar generation in 2014 offset 83% of the decrease in hydroelectric generation. Along with increases in generation from wind power and geothermal energy, solar power helped make California the top state producer of nonhydroelectric renewable electricity in 2014, narrowly topping Texas.

    California = most populous state, so the 5% figure is enormous.

    Technofantasy? HAHAHA = Reality

    CFNers, you lose, THIS is just the tip of the sunberg.

    Energy Ascent, baby.

    Aside: Troubadors rock

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijqNBpOU5Vs

    fodase

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 7:39 pm #

      Ahh, the naive optimism of youth! Dream on young’n. That’s as good as it’s ever going to get for you and yours.

  38. BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 7:40 pm #

    On the immigration-environmentalism thread … one of the publications I subscribe to is Mother Earth News. Lots of good practical knowledge in there, but every few months or so an article encouraging 0 population growth in the US thru families having only 1 or 2 children. They never address 3rd world immigration as the source of population expansion in America. They seem blind to it. Its a taboo subject apparently.

    brh

    • malthuss April 6, 2015 at 7:58 pm #

      Better ‘Mother Earth’ than ‘Mother Jones’. Who owns ME?
      Leftists? Some corporation?

      ‘every few months or so an article encouraging 0 population growth in the US thru families having only 1 or 2 children.’. They are being dishonest and intentionally so.They know the only reason USA has gone from under 200M to 330M and rapidly rising is immigration.

      • DA April 6, 2015 at 8:32 pm #

        The reasons are irrelevant. And it doesn’t matter on which side of which arbitrarily drawn political boundary people live once there’s too many of us. Too many is simply too many. The fact that they’re coming to the US only makes sense. That’s where the waterline is. The fact the waterline is relentlessly rising nonetheless is cruelly inescapable, as we’re all finding out these days.

        • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 9:35 pm #

          The only reason i brought this immigration issue up is to try to reconcile one of the themes of this site — the end of growth as we’ve known it — and the dramatic growth in our population. Conventional thinking might say that more people — tens of millions of more people — might add to the GDP and all the other ways economists measure the economy. That doesn’t seem to be the case, however.

          One thing specious is when they announce the number of jobs created every month, as in 200,000 jobs were created in the month of February. What difference does it make when 300,000 foreigners entered the country looking for jobs in February? Its a loss any way you look at it.

          brh

          • DA April 6, 2015 at 10:02 pm #

            Good points. But US based job stats overall are also irrelevant. It’s WORLD employment numbers we’re interested in if we’re interested in keeping he Capitalist “nightmare” alive now, but even at that, that’s based on a rising consumer culture (presumably third world) based on non-existent profitably exploitable natural resources. To take your final comment a step or two further, it is indeed a loss any way you look at it, to say the least, NEVERMIND who’s entering or exiting our borders!

  39. fodase April 6, 2015 at 8:00 pm #

    Ahh, the naive optimism of youth! Dream on young’n. That’s as good as it’s ever going to get for you and yours.

    haha, same old empty fraseology, because your side can’t argue in the face of alt energy success.

    Solar provided California – by far the biggest state – with 5% of its electricity in 2014!

    The renewable energy movement is especially strong in California, where the state government has pledged to generate at least one-third of its overall electricity from renewable sources — including solar as well as windpower and biomass energy — by 2020. The state recently unveiled two of the largest solar photovoltaic plants in the world, the Topaz and Desert Sunlight plants, each of which will have the capacity to produce 550 megawatts.

    That’s 1.1GWh of solar electricity that says you’re wrong on alternative energy.

    You’re squarely in the wallyworld greeter category along with the bulk of CFN goers.

    CFN itself is squarely rooted in the typewriter age.

    fodase

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 8:26 pm #

      Hope it works out for you nimrod. Platitudes are cheap and plenty these days, just as they always are. Reality is much harder.

  40. fodase April 6, 2015 at 8:24 pm #

    We are in the age of energy ascent – solar supplies so much free electricity in Australia that overall electricity consumed from conventional power plants is falling dramatically –

    Rooftop solar panels are becoming such a powerful factor in the energy market that they now can push the price of electricity to negative territory in the sunniest regions of the world. This is possible because powering down fossil fuel energy generators during peak solar power periods would be more expensive than paying customers to use the electricity.
    The negative energy price barrier was breached in Queensland, Australia, where low demand and high rooftop solar power generation pushed the wholesale electricity price to AUD -$100 per megawatt-hour [that’s NEGATIVE AUD $100, meaning that’s what the utility pays YOU to use their power] on Wednesday afternoon, July 2. This is mid-winter in Australia, so daily temperatures are mild. Household appliance usage dips in the early afternoon and peaks in mornings and afternoons, so an early afternoon during a sunny Australian winter is the period when solar power is at its zenith.
    Queensland is a special case due to local overbuilding of coal power plants and bad policy decisions. This is an example of how the rapid growth of solar energy is catching governments off guard. More than a million Australians have already installed rooftop panels, causing demand for electricity supplied by traditional utilities to plunge. Apparently, 350,000 buildings in Queensland alone are generating 1100MW of electricity. According to analysis from UBS, demand for electricity in Australia has dropped by 13% over the past four years. 75% of Australia’s residential buildings and up to 90% of commercial buildings may be equipped by rooftop solar panels within 10 years.

    that old nemesis technology at work again.

    German, Denmark, Spain, now Australia – all startling solar/wind successes. Electricity demand falling like a brick. The US’ biggest state at 5% solar electricity….

    Tipping point fast approaching….

    Nevertheless, we salute you as we soar high, high above you and your stores of rice and beans as we rocket into the age of superabundance and limitless energy.

    fodase

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    • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:09 pm #

      Didn’t you post this tripe already? Going for the overt propaganda angle already are we?

  41. Florida Power April 6, 2015 at 9:21 pm #

    Speaking of jobs or no jobs, an entry at Zero Hedge (via Heritage posted at Stockman — all you lefties raise your shields) today contains among other interesting observations the fact that there is, at present, a trucker shortage which is projected to grow worse: right now a 30,000 shortfall growing to 240,000 by 2022.

    The author notes that WalMart raised the minimum wage because of the worker shortage and not out of the goodness of their corporate heart.

    In the link below the title betrays the author’s point of view, which some might find too rightist for comfort. I would submit as anecdotal comment animal spirits are in short supply. Bought off by bread and circus perhaps?

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-06/how-alleviate-alleged-worker-shortage-stop-subsidizing-non-work

    • DA April 6, 2015 at 9:45 pm #

      Trucking is increasingly becoming private contractor work with higher attendant capital and overhead costs. Trucking for a major corporation is thus increasingly becoming minimum wage shit work like everything else. All the rest about education and all that is mere hand waving.

      Synopsis: Everyone in the US now feels entitled to earn money (!!!) for doing absolutely nothing, and if you actually labor for a living you deserve to be ridiculed for your efforts. Does that just about cover it?

      • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 11:05 pm #

        Man, whats it cost to own and run you own semi-truck? The expense must be astronomical. Every single day they’re crashing, rolling over, bursting into flames, smashing into cars, jackknifing and wrecking on the highways going thru this state. If you own your own truck and work as a contractor, and one of the above happens, i guess you’re out of business real quick.

        Seems like a sh-tty way to make a living.

  42. Pucker April 6, 2015 at 10:10 pm #

    I’m posting this primarily because I want to see if it posts at the bottom of the conversation, or whether, like last time, it posts somewhere in the middle of the conversation?

    JHK: “…They really don’t have to account to anybody, including themselves, ”

    I’m now reading “Don’t Make the Black Kids Angry”. The ultimate in American denial and reflective of the current American proclivity to deny accountability is “Critical Race Theory”. Critical Race Theory is the dogma now of US public institutions and private universities and basically provides that black mob violence, criminality, and ignorance is all explained and justified by White Racism, which is Everywhere.

    Many young, indebted US university graduates now aspire to get jobs in government because that is where many of the highest paying jobs are. They don’t mind repeating the dogma, such as “all white public school teachers should be fired because they can’t connect with black students.” Of course, in the long run this dishonesty will be a total disaster for black people, who will remain unemployed, ignorant, and in jail. You can’t make this shit up.

    • BackRowHeckler April 6, 2015 at 11:09 pm #

      Pucker, i don’t think anybody takes ‘Critical Race Theory’ seriously. Just more bullsh-t mumbo jumbo coming out of places like Berkeley and Harvard. And who gives a sh-t what those dooshbags say?

      • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:50 am #

        No one take is seriously yet it is a billion dollar industry and the ruling ethos of our Society. Some say the Soviet Union collapsed ultimately because no one believed the rhetoric anymore and the actors couldn’t keep their lines straight anymore. Maybe the same will happen here – but it will get far worse before it gets better.

  43. Pucker April 6, 2015 at 10:15 pm #

    Does anyone remember how during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the Maoists filled China’s elite universities with illiterate peasants? This is basically what Critical Race Theory hopes to accomplish. What a disaster!

    • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:56 am #

      Fine analogy. Spot on. Underdogism is a disease of the psyche. Jim Jones used to have people fight. His favorite scenario was a woman beating up a man.

      The answer to the rule of bad Aristocrats is the rule of good ones – not the rule of the unwashed.

  44. beantownbill. April 6, 2015 at 11:48 pm #

    Technology is starting to make the vast majority of jobs unnecessary. People better get used to the idea that they’ll soon have to figure out what they’ll do with their lives on a day-to-day basis. At the same time, societies better figure out how to get necessities of life to their own citizens, as working to earn money to pay for things will go by the wayside. As technological progress gears up along the exponential curve, that same technology will profoundly alter almost every aspect of our lives.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:02 am #

      They intend to get rid of people by making us sterile or unable to afford children.

  45. Cold N. Holefield April 6, 2015 at 11:57 pm #

    Wouldn’t you like to be a Massa (instead of a Pepper) too? Massa K would — and is. His plantation’s called Duke. The Duke basketball program makes ~$30 million per year and Massa K gets one third of that, or ~$10 million. That’s ~$8.5 million more than the college’s president. I know, I know — he works hard for his money. The players? They get tuition and board — a paltry sum compared to Massa K. The guy looks like a rodent, doesn’t he? I can’t help but think he should be the coach of Wisconsin considering it’s the cheese state, but Wisconsin’s too White for Massa K considering his starting line-up is all Black. My, how the starting line-up of Duke has changed over the years. I remember twenty years ago it was at least three White starters and one or two Blacks. Not any more. Affirmative action doesn’t work the other way around. Funny that.

    Wisconsin, on the other hand, had four White starters and one Black starter. And, almost all of Wisconsin’s players were born and raised in Wisconsin — something unheard of in college sports these days. And guess what? Wisconsin proved the racists wrong. Blacks are not superior in basketball. Whites can hang with Blacks. If they have coaches and schools that believe that. The irony is, most White coaches and White school administrations don’t believe that and so have selected for Blacks for at least three decades running now, if not four. So much so, White people don’t even bother to encourage their kids to pursue basketball — instead opting for soccer, lacrosse and hockey.

    So, with the aid of obviously biased and perhaps paid off refs, Massa K won another National Championship and his cocky punk slaves, in the spirit of unsportmanship, acted like a bunch of provocative jackasses that need their heads smashed in. Heads without brains. Suckers! Massa K wins the pay day. What do you get? You get to act like apes for a night or two — that’s your reward.

    Congratulations to Plantation Duke and Massa K. Slavery’s alive and well. It’s just been upgraded. Say Cheese.

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    • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:00 am #

      Yes, White Basketball is a very different game – full of team work and lots of passing, some of it fancy behind the back stuff. And of course three pointers. Black Basketball is about the fast break and the slam dunk. White Basketball can be effective against Black Ball as long as they refs stop letting the Blacks travel. Olympic refs don’t let them get away with that crap and thus Bosnia can win.

      Your point is interesting. Blacks will tend to have the advantage because of their height and speed, but obviously some Whites can compete nonetheless. And others have come to the same conclusion – that College and Pro-Sports have been taken over by political correctness and Whites are getting discriminated against.

      • Buck Stud April 7, 2015 at 12:10 pm #

        Ironical, the basketball style/tactics that you mention above are the very same qualities that proponents of women’s basketball tout.

        Maybe they should invoke Bob Cousy and form a couple of new leagues for the Janos types: The White Male/Women’s Basketball Leagues!

        • Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 2:07 pm #

          I dont know, Buck. I don’t call this basketball.

          Dribbling’s For Ladies and White Boys — If You Want To Dribble Get Your Own League

          • Q. Shtik April 7, 2015 at 2:36 pm #

            Now THAT’S what I call TRAVELING!!

          • Therian April 7, 2015 at 3:44 pm #

            That’s hilarious. That player dribbled ONCE once he was past the half-court line. He took SEVEN steps before laying it in.

          • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 6:59 pm #

            Yes we need a League of our Own, a Room of our Own, a Land of our Own – in other words a Nation of our Own, for Ourselves only, Ourselves alone.

            Think of O’s as open nets and as Basketball (no need to call it Nigger Ball) as a metaphor for Life.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 2:23 pm #

          Women’s Basketball? Those lumbering behemoths would ruin a sunny day. Don’t compare them to “White Ball”.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 1:43 am #

      You’ll like this more: the influx of Spanish baseball players is for the cheap labor, not prejudice or political correctness. That makes it Ok, right?

      http://www.vdare.com/posts/major-league-baseball-may-require-spanish-interpreters-for-diverse-players

  46. Pucker April 7, 2015 at 12:00 am #

    The world according to Critical Race Theory: Unemployment is not due to technology; it’s the result of pervasive white racism. White people need to have an honest conversation about race and confess their racism.

    • capt spaulding April 7, 2015 at 2:54 pm #

      Racism is common amongst all people and cultures, not just whites. You can find racism in any population if you bother to look. I’m not saying that that justifies racism, it’s just a common condition in every human society.

  47. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 1:30 am #

    A leaked 2012 US Army Military Police training manual, entitled “Civil Disturbance Operations” described how soldiers would be ordered to confiscate firearms and kill American “dissidents.” The manual also revealed that prisoners would be detained in temporary internment camps and “re-educated” to gain a new appreciation of “U.S. policies,” in accordance with U.S. Army FM 3-19.40 Internment/Resettlement Operations.

    So who would those “dissidents” be exactly? Anyone who believes in “conspiracy theories” is a possible threat. Others that the government is concerned about include those opposed to abortion, globalism, communism, illegal immigration, the United Nations and “the New World Order.” Basically, many of you on CFN.

    Of course, if you allow the confiscation of your firearms and do not resist state authority, then you will not be considered a dissident.

    If y’all resist and create anarchy, martial law could be imposed and the 2016 elections cancelled. That should not bother many of you, since you love the military and do not believe in the role of government to provide for the general welfare anyway.

  48. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 1:36 am #

    Beantown, technology replacing people and the retirement of baby boomers explains the workforce participation rate. I agree with you when you say: “Technology is starting to make the vast majority of jobs unnecessary.”

  49. jloughrey April 7, 2015 at 1:42 am #

    Brilliant commentary today, Jim. China’s economy is an even bigger sham than ours, as they build entire cities of glass towers that lay empty while the majority of the populace lives in abject poverty. Their cesspool environs make our fracking wastelands and endless destruction of forests, farmland and aquifers seem pedestrian in comparison.

    The US MSM omits pretty much any news from the rest of the world, including droughts in Thailand and Malaysia, mysterious craters suddenly appearing in Siberia that are spewing clouds of methane, record high temperatures in Antarctica and conditions around Greenland that could alter the conveyer belt ocean currents that keep Europe warm. Any number of issues in the geopolitical realm could let loose like a calving glacier at any moment. Yet if you watch the MSM, you would think that gay rights at an Indiana pizza joint were far more urgent.

    At any rate–I am focusing on my edible garden and hope yours is fruitful this year as well. Thanks as always for giving me a reason to look forward to Mondays.

  50. Pucker April 7, 2015 at 2:03 am #

    How should we describe the core value system of young white Americans? Are they serious, thrifty, family-oriented? Or do they want “to party”?

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  51. FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 5:31 am #

    Ukrainian immigrant from Kiev is behind gas building explosion in New York: he illegally tapped into gas line

    Plumber confesses: I rigged illegal gas-blast line for landlord’s son

    A plumber who worked at the East Village building where two people died in an explosion last month has admitted to illegally tapping into a gas line there — but said the landlord’s son ordered him to do it, The Post has learned.

    The building’s landlord has been identified as Maria Hrynenko, who inherited it and several others from her late husband, Michael Sr. The husband ran the East Village’s iconic 24-hour Kiev diner before his death in 2004.

    The March 26 explosion ignited a massive fire that destroyed the five-story former tenement and two other buildings.

    http://nypost.com/2015/04/06/plumber-says-landlords-son-made-him-illegally-tap-gas-line/

    Apparently, stealing gas from Russia or from New York gas utility is deep in the Ukrainian blood. America knows how to peak its partners in crime.

    • malthuss April 7, 2015 at 4:39 pm #

      Pick its partners – for a pack of pickled peppers.

  52. FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 5:46 am #

    Summers: A global wake-up call for the U.S.

    This past month may be remembered as the moment the United States lost its role as the underwriter of the global economic system. True, there have been any number of periods of frustration for the United States before and multiple times when U.S. behavior was hardly multilateralist, such as the 1971 Nixon shock ending the convertibility of the dollar into gold. But I can think of no event since Bretton Woods comparable to the combination of China’s effort to establish a major new institution and the failure of the United States to persuade dozens of its traditional allies, starting with Britain, to stay out.

    United States stands alone in the world in failing to approve International Monetary Fund governance reforms that Washington itself pushed for in 2009.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/a-global-wake-up-call-for-the-us/2015/04/05/6f847ca4-da34-11e4-b3f2-607bd612aeac_story.html

  53. FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 5:52 am #

    “Rooftop solar panels are becoming such a powerful factor in the energy market”

    I hear that the firefighters refuse to contain fires in the buildings equipped with rooftop solar panels, since the cannot be disconnected in case of a fire and present a danger of electric shock to the fire-fighting crew.

    They have to wait till the sun comes down.

  54. The Ed April 7, 2015 at 6:41 am #

    “Capital” comes from the Latin for “head”. Money is known as “capital” because through most of history an image of the head and-or seal of the sovereign (usually a monarch, but a term still in use eg “sovereign bonds”) adorned gold and silver coins. This indicated the sovereign certified the coin was pure gold or silver, so the value of money was (meant to) hold. Debasing coinage with lead or some other metal was a capital offence (debasers lost their heads). Since Richard Nixon kicked away the last vestiges of the US gold standard in 1972 (71?) the American currency has been backed by the word of the Federal Reserve (and has lost nearly 90% of its value in terms of how much milk, bread, meat, fuel or car it can buy). Capital is now an abstract expression of the amount of debt banks create. With QE the Sovereign (government) has let the banks create debt without considering the risk (debt might not be paid back). Hence the debasement of this abstract, imaginary currency. So, to expand on your point, modern capital is not just a figment of the imagination. It is an adornment on a figment of the imagination.

    • FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 8:06 am #

      Listen, Ed, you are confusing the hell out of everybody. Money is not a Capital – Capital is something that can actually work and create additional value. Money could be turned into a Capital by somebody’s creative plan to build some new productive facility that, by employing professionally prepared people, could start adding to humanity common wealth – like new cars, additional power generation, and so on.

      Money’s just accounting units helping control the efficiency and productivity of the project,

    • FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 8:28 am #

      I still continue to maintain that the Gold Standard – especially its literal understanding by certain part of American public – could only cause greater harm to economic development.

      However, it could be totally different picture in the international trade. Ideally, international trade should be based on mutual 100% barter – zero trade deficit. But since it is practically impossible to achieve, than the trade deficits – and deficits only!!!! – should be settled by something more tangible than government’s IOUs – gold seems to fit the picture (probably due to long-standing human sentiment).

      That would provide by far greater stability in international relationships.

    • Florida Power April 7, 2015 at 10:10 am #

      Ed — thank you for the comments on capital. JHK’s post begs this discussion. Wealth ultimately resides in the capacity of human populations to modify their environment to human purposes. Gold and scrip redeemable in gold have served as proxies for wealth or wealth stored for future deployment which is capital. The reasons for gold are numerous and probably related finally to the deep structures of the human psyche (c’mon, even brass oxidizes and loses its luster — failure to catch “the light”). Ann Barnhardt rightly points out the limits to gold-as-money but she also rightly insists that money is the ultimate expression of our humanity and to have TPTB diminish this via mismanagement or worse ultimately strips us of our humanity. This is a criminal act.

    • Lidia April 9, 2015 at 3:43 pm #

      Just like in English, in Latin and modern Italian the word for livestock, like cows, is “head” (capo, capi). If you have a lot of head of cattle, you’re a rich man, and these riches will perpetuate themselves if well- managed and if their population along with the human population doesn’t outstrip the land-based resources.

      It is ridiculous, however, to consider cars or factories “capital”, since they are not self-perpetuating: to the contrary, they are dead-end waste products. Steve Ludlum is a good read on this score.

  55. FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 7:52 am #

    During Iran’s nuclear talks Russian FM Lavrov demonstrated to Kerry that he is nobody and his name is nothing

    The plan assumed that Iran would send their materials from which you can create nuclear weapons to Russia. However, negotiators were practically halted when Russian Foreign Minister left the talks and returned home … to meet with Minister of Foreign Affairs of Vanuatu.

    Vanuatu??? A tiny nation on god-forsaken island in Pacific nobody knows about?

    The Republican Senators by sending a collective letter to Iran denouncing Obama’s negotiations contributed greatly to growing disrespect for US.

    We have a Czech President telling US Ambassador to f*ck off, the Conference of Latin American countries demanding that all American military bases should be removed from their territory.

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  56. Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 10:05 am #

    Janos, thanks for that link about Spanish basketball players earlier. More grist for this mill.

    Wisconsin got the same deal they got in the Kentucky game. They played against a 6th man — the refs. It’s hard enough to win a national championship, but to do it against six men on the court versus the traditional five is a tall order. It was too much to ask Wisconsin to overcome that disparity twice.

    Massa K adds another national championship to his illustrious total. Maybe his salary will be $13 million next year versus the paltry $10 million it is this year. The players? They get to thump their chests for a night or two and feel good about all that cotton they picked for Massa K.

    https://twitter.com/CNHolefield

    I can’t believe this is the same Duke (it’s not the same Duke really) that won back to back national championships in the early 90’s. All the unsportsmanlike chest beating and fist pumping in the last four minutes was pathetic and telling. Massa K is now in it for the money after building his cache in the early years. I think an investigation of Duke basketball is in order after this despicable display. Something doesn’t add up, and it’s time to take this icon down just as Paterno and Penn State were taken to their knees with faces in the dirt.

    In fact, the NCAA needs to be investigated and put out of business once and for all. It is an illegitimate and corrupt organization run by and for lawyers who ride the student athletes like bucking broncos.

    As for the announcers — they were clearly pulling for Duke. I had to mute it in the second half, otherwise I would have reached through the 60″ flat screen and stuffed a sock in Raftery’s incoherent mug. As for Jim Nance — there’s no bigger sycophant on the face of this planet. His fawning turns my stomach. Why can’t basketball announcing have their own version of Johnny Miller who can “keep it real?”

    • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 2:21 pm #

      “It’s not the same Duke really” – hold that thought, it’s the seed of Enlightenment. Because you aren’t the same Cold who watched Duke back then either. Just as all the players have changed since then, so have all your cells and many of your thoughts. So who is the real Cold? Indeed, you must find out.

      • Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 2:24 pm #

        You’ve forgotten already. There is no me, and there is no you. That’s the Golden Rule.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 10:24 pm #

          Yes, Yes! As Harada Roshi said, “For forty years I’ve been selling water by the river. My efforts are wholly without merit.”

          Pretty good business, eh? One without profit. Only that is true profit.

    • Therian April 7, 2015 at 4:10 pm #

      Wisconsin had to beat Oregon, North Carolina, Arizona, and Kentucky to get to the championship game. No Humpties in that group.

      Duke was in the weakest region and it’s biggest “test” was facing Gonzaga who plays in a conference (the WCC) that’s SO weak that most of their opponents play in what looks like high school gyms with about 1000 seat capacity. Little wonder that the Elite Eight game was as far as the chronically over-seeded Zags have ever gotten.

      Other schools Duke played were the likes of San Diego State and Utah who are in the all-defense/no-offense school of winning ugly. Three of the teams Wisconsin beat are STORIED programs. That was true of NONE of the Duke victories.

      I just hate seeing a frat boy school like Duke win with their token blacks on the court. Wisconsin ran out of gas as would any team who played Kentucky two days earlier (which is like a pro team in college). Duke blew out an overachieving 7 seed in Michigan State.

      Duke’s a good team but they would NEVER have won if they had to go through the gauntlet of teams Wisconsin faced. Of course Duke was fresh as a daisy for the final. They had no real tests.

  57. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 10:39 am #

    There are 222 presidential candidates for 2016 (who have formally filed a Form 2 with the FEC). Today Rand Paul becomes 223. The one who wins will probably be the one who receives the most electoral votes. Although that is not always the case, as Al Gore found out. Sometimes the vote count is stopped and the winner is decided by the Supreme Court.

    • Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 10:47 am #

      Bullshit. The contenders are chosen in advance and the indicator of who will get the nod out of those two chosen contenders is the amount of money “raised.” Bush “raised” more money than Gore in 2000 — $192 million to $133 million. Electoral votes had nothing to do with it —they’re a mere archaic formality to make it appear legitimate. In 2000, they screwed it up and I’m sure some heads rolled we’ll never hear or know about.

      Go Jeb! You heard it from me very early on. When he wins in late 2016, I want you to kiss my ass. Okay? Is that a deal? I already said at my blog if he doesn’t win, an impossibility, I will eat my hat.

      • Therian April 7, 2015 at 4:19 pm #

        Bullshit, indeed, Mr. Holefield. The candidates for both parties are groomed a decade in advance of their actual candidacy. I’d even bet that they’re scientifically selected based on the combination of their pedigree and what the party moguls assess as the current vibe in the country.

        Jeb Bush has been groomed since BEFORE Y2K. The Repubs know that Rand Paul and the Teabaggers are ultimately too extreme to be electable. They’re also hypocritical e.g., Rand Paul likes to talk a libertarian philosophy but then suddenly call for us to go to war with ISIS or something else antithetical to his alleged philosophy.

        Both parties are the two wings of the Mo’ Money Party. Their actual differences are negligible.

      • Q. Shtik April 7, 2015 at 5:57 pm #

        wpa has to kiss your ass but you only have to eat your hat ……… doesn’t seem fare.

        • malthuss April 7, 2015 at 9:51 pm #

          Fair.
          You should know that.

  58. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 10:46 am #

    “Why can’t basketball announcing have their own version of Johnny Miller who can “keep it real?”

    Isn’t Larry Wilmore the “keep it real” guy?

    • Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 10:51 am #

      Never heard of him. But if he is, where was he for the Final Four? Anybody but Nance and Raftery. Does Raftery even knows what he’s saying? I know the other announcers haven’t a clue what he’s on about. He reminds me of a loud and obnoxious version of CBS’s lead Gold Commentator, Nick Faldo. The guy says the most bizarre, idiotic things and you’re left with this WTF expression on your face when he ejaculates his incoherent nonsense.

  59. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 12:01 pm #

    No way the moderate Jeb will even get all the Republican votes. His positions on immigration and Common Core are way too liberal. Given the level of love toward Mexican immigrants, are Republicans ready for a First Lady who was born in Mexico?

    Cold, do you only have one hat? What is it made of?

  60. fodase April 7, 2015 at 12:17 pm #

    Didn’t you post this [alt energy] tripe already? Going for the overt propaganda angle already are we?

    sorry man, it must be really galling seeing how solar is providing entire countries with a way to cut fossil fuel usage while reducing pollution and helping people save money, all at once.

    by the way, do you have any counterarguments, or just silly empty retorts.

    we are all waiting for them. we keep posting real examples and get nothing from your side but empty phrases:

    california …. 5% from solar in 2014
    denmark … 25% from solar+wind
    germany … ca. 5-7% from renewables
    spain … 40% from wind energy
    new zealand …. 80% from hydro+solar+wind
    australia …. electricity demand fallen 13% in last 4 years due to rooftop solar
    iceland … 98% from hydro

    Two 550MW solar plants being built in California. A 750MW solar facility being built in India…Apple and Google run almost 100% on renewable energy, wow.

    Tell me what I should tell them about how they’re all wrong, c’mon you an do it DA.

    Spain getting 43% of its total electricity production from wind as we speak….look it up online.

    fodase

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  61. Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 12:25 pm #

    In support of renewable energy, it would have been nice if Obama put several wind turbines around the White House grounds, especially where Eisenhower used to hit golf balls. Also, in an effort to conserve, he could have turned the heat down in the White house and had the staff and family wear cardigans in veneration of Carter’s ill-timed efforts.

  62. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 2:14 pm #

    Some are spreading the idea that TPTB have already chosen the next president. Having that idea out there encourages voter apathy. What is the point of voting if the elections are rigged, right? Who is spreading that idea, and why?

    So, who benefits from voter suppression, who benefits from spreading the idea that there is no difference between the two major political parties? Republicans. The fewer people who vote, the better chance the Republicans have of winning the White House.

    Don’t allow yourself to be manipulated or cowed into apathy. Right now there are 223 candidates who have declared themselves as candidates for president. Vote your conscience. Even if you don’t believe it makes any difference, vote to honor those who sacrificed to win the right to vote. Many, both Democrats and Republicans, have fought and died for the right to vote.

    I expect a very large voter turnout in 2016 because the spirit of ACORN voter registration among the multicultural minorities is alive and well, even though Republicans cut off the money.

    • Cold N. Holefield April 7, 2015 at 2:23 pm #

      There’s no need for all the unnecessary verbiage to say what you could have said in two words; “Vote Democrat.”

      For the longest time I thought that was just a toupee on your head, but upon closer inspection I now realize it’s astroturf. I’m lying — I knew all along it was astroturf and it’s not just relegated to your bald pate.

  63. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 2:32 pm #

    CORRECTION

    There are only 222 candidates who have filed for the 2016 presidential election. Rand Paul has not yet filed.

    http://www.fec.gov/press/resources/2016presidential_form2nm.shtml

  64. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 2:35 pm #

    No, Cold, I never said “vote democratic” …

    I don’t care what party one votes for. Just vote. There are 222 candidates to choose from. Vote your conscience is what I said.

  65. goat1001 April 7, 2015 at 2:54 pm #

    Looks like a cyber attack on the Washington DC power grid. Or else, maybe Obama plugged too many space heaters under his desk again….

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  66. goat1001 April 7, 2015 at 2:56 pm #

    The White House is the dark house right now. They are laying the blame on an explosion outside the city. Not sure what that’s all about…

  67. FincaInTheMountains April 7, 2015 at 4:02 pm #

    300 are not necessary, one is enough

    This is a famous photo. Georgia, 08.08.08, after the defeat of the Georgian army, its retreating group decided to return to Gori, but ran into a Russian checkpoint.

    The picture shows a soldier of Russian Armed Forces, with a machine gun at the ready, opposing the motorized column of infantry of Georgian armed forces as Georgian officers threatened the lone gunner that he stepped out of the way and let them pass. What they have heard in response was “go f*ck yourselves”.

    As a result, the column turned around and rolled back to where it came from. Foreign journalists embedded with Georgian army then published an article titled “300 are not necessary, one is enough”.

    http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/muravei_s/73777426/433635/433635_900.jpg

    http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/muravei_s/73777426/433811/433811_900.jpg

  68. Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 9:02 pm #

    Half Black Japanese Beauty Queen advocates that Japan open its borders. You are Japanese if you want to be she says. Luckily the Japanese are unlikely to go for such pablum – while we already have. It’s too late for us, but other may learn from our coming demise.

    http://www.amren.com/news/2015/04/beauty-queen-wants-japan-to-open-minds-and-borders/

  69. Janos Skorenzy April 7, 2015 at 9:17 pm #

    The disgraced author of the Rolling Stone rape article apologizes to everyone except the Fraternity she defamed. They are going to sue. Hope they take Rolling Stone for millions.

    http://money.cnn.com/2015/04/05/media/sabrina-rubin-erdely-rolling-stone-virginia/index.html

  70. wpa_ccc April 7, 2015 at 9:28 pm #

    “Japan, of course, is just marking time until it quietly slips away and goes medieval.” –JHK

    Japan Economic Outlook March 31, 2015

    “The economy rebounded in Q4 as the negative impact of the VAT hike faded and the weakening of the yen and lower oil prices bolstered business sentiment. More recent economic data suggest that private consumption is now supporting growth, reflecting improvements in the labor market and rising wages. Against this backdrop, consumer confidence hit a six-month high in February. Moreover, despite moderating, the manufacturing PMI remained in expansion mode in March for the 10th consecutive month.”

    Hardly marking time. Japan is a long, long way from going medieval.

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  71. malthuss April 7, 2015 at 10:55 pm #

    BRH, ‘here my dear’,

    Here is a curious story on the meaning of “disability”.

    Please consider Lack of English Meant Puerto Ricans Got Disability Benefits.

    A federal audit has found that some Puerto Ricans living in the U.S. territory have received disability benefits in part because they could not speak English.

    The Office of the Inspector General for the Social Security Administration said in a report issued this month that there were 218 cases from 2011 to 2013 in which benefits were granted under those circumstances.

    The report said Social Security determined it was difficult for those people to find a job because they did not speak English, but the inspector general said they could have found work given their Spanish-speaking skills in a largely Spanish-speaking island.

    More Details

    The above version is from ABC News. In another curiosity, Sputnik News, appears to have far more details.
    Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/#HJoIj4q2xi5oUDCI.99

  72. Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 12:04 am #

    http://www.counter-currents.com/2015/04/john-robb-the-american-way/

    How does Kunstler, Gilmore Girls, Guenon, and little Homes movement relate?

  73. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 1:49 am #

    “How does Kunstler, Gilmore Girls, Guenon, and little Homes movement relate?”

    Janos, let me take a guess: they all appear near the end of Kali Yuga.

    This present Kali Yuga ends in 2025. We only have to hang on for another ten years. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy.

    The end of the Kali Yuga in 2025: Unraveling the mysteries of the Yuga Cycle by Bibhu Dev Misra

    http://www.grahamhancock.com/forum/DMisraB6.php

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 5:01 am #

      Thanks for not reading the piece. You can only destroy – a true son of Kali.

    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 12:53 pm #

      Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy. – wpa

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

      The life-weary hard-boiled former Philly bad cop character, Mike (Breaking Bad and its current spin-off, Better Call Saul) used the phrase “easy peasy” in Monday night’s episode. Is that what prompted your use of those same words? Subliminal?

      • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:47 pm #

        The original (as far as I know and it’s probably wrong) was from the Shawshank Redemption and runs “easy peasy japonaise”. They may well have picked up slang from the time for the movie. If so, I’ve never heard anyone say it so it was before my time.

  74. FincaInTheMountains April 8, 2015 at 2:38 am #

    American kleptocracy

    In 1995, an employee of Northrop Grumman found substandard parts in the satellite, which the company was building to the order of the Pentagon. The employee reported it to his superiors, and was immediately punished, and his report was hidden from the state inspection committee. Satellite, as might be expected, was not able to work normally. In the subsequent investigation, no one was punished.
    In 1999, the same company supplied the US Air Force with not flying planes, for which it was then lightly fined but not suspended from the state defense contract. Among the smaller sins may be mentioned overpriced radars, not-functioning navigation and electronic warfare systems massively installed on the American bombers.

    The wide recognition in the US, the company has achieved after its computer system serving all state services in Virginia, unplugged itself and refused to work during the entire week. There was no limit to state resident’s happiness.

    But the most famous fuckup of this company was the incident in which the Russians were able to get copy of the Northrop Grumman source code of the navigational and control program of personal aircraft of the American president, the famous Air Force One. So, if once the Barack Obama plane suddenly stops listening to the pilot and fly itself in Kathmandu, you will know who is responsible for this.

    It is necessary to note: for every American company of the Military Industrial Complex similar list could be made. By the way, you may have guessed why Northrop Grumman still receiving government contracts. They pay. Officially, and not very. A lot. To everyone. To the Republicans and the Democrats. That’s what allows obtaining record profits year after year.

    The American model, with all the success, is very different from the liberal myth about it. For it to succeed, with all its extravagance and corruption capacity, you need to rob half of the world. And that is what United States is actively involved in.

  75. Pucker April 8, 2015 at 7:19 am #

    Zeus would come down from Mt. Olympus and fuck women on Earth, and Zeus’s wife, Hera, would get pissed.

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  76. fodase April 8, 2015 at 7:46 am #

    “Japan, of course, is just marking time until it quietly slips away and goes medieval.”

    right up there with jimmy’s bold statement that learning to drive a mule is going to be necessary.

    plus his dire Y2K predictions, which failed spectacularly.

    but, like financial ‘advisors’, he can say anything and not be held accountable.

    Japan….going medieval.

    Just the opposite is happening.

    The CFN hoardes make one fatal mistake – they ignore all of human history, which is the record of unending progress in finding solutions to pressing problems.

    Denmark producing the following at this very moment:

    Solar power 361MW
    Wind power 692 MW

    this is 23% of all Danish electricity production right now…

    and thousands of barrels of oil / tons of coal that are being left in the ground as a result.

    This site’s premise has been smashed.

    fodase

  77. Cold N. Holefield April 8, 2015 at 8:27 am #

    wpa has to kiss your ass but you only have to eat your hat ……… doesn’t seem fare.

    Was someone substituting for you yesterday? Grammatical mistakes like that are not your typical fare. What do you think, ZrIx? The Game must go on.

    How about I eat my towel instead?

    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 1:09 pm #

      Grammatical mistakes like that are not your typical fare. – Cold

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

      That’s spelling, not grammar.

      • Cold N. Holefield April 8, 2015 at 3:45 pm #

        Fair enough, but what about all those periods? Prove to me that’s grammatically correct.

        • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 9:25 pm #

          It’s a liberty I take. Rather than use merely the standard 3 periods (they have a name for it which I forget) I will add as many more as I feel are needed to create an expressively longer pause.

  78. Cold N. Holefield April 8, 2015 at 8:32 am #

    wpa said: Janos, let me take a guess: they all appear near the end of Kali Yuga.

    Please, I beg of you, it’s too early for this eastern mysticism bullshit, or whatever you want to call it. It’s only Wednesday. Sure, I know it’s a slow week and you have to get to 300 or greater posts to make quota but do it another more interesting and enlightening way and spare us innocents yet another foray into the fog.

    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 1:06 pm #

      Yeah, what he said.

  79. DA April 8, 2015 at 10:06 am #

    Yet another white cop in the news today showing what he’s made of.

    http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/08/us/south-carolina-officer-charged-with-murder/

    It’s beginning to appear that we need to legitimately ask if white Caucasian males can be trusted at all with positions of authority, especially if they involve handling a firearm. Their track record of late is disturbing, to say the least.

    • DA April 8, 2015 at 10:15 am #

      And it only gets better. According to the North Charleston Police Chief the stop was for a brake light being on on the individual’s car, a 50 year old black father of 4. No ghetto banger here. It most definitely appears that black males have a legitimate concern for their life when encountering white cops, no matter what the circumstances are. And that’s not a good situation for white cops or black males, or the rest of us either for that matter.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:36 pm #

        I just want to thank you for your resistance to the Truth. Light needs a material medium in which to manifest itself. By your resistance you provide the opaque medium or screen necessary for the Movie to show.

      • EvelynV April 9, 2015 at 5:45 am #

        Is generalizing about all cops because of the rotten ones who make the news a lesser form of stereotyping than generalizing about all blacks because of the rotten ones who make the news?

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 1:53 pm #

      If Blacks are in authority over themselves, they never advance to the level of civilization (and having a police force) at all. And if Black attain power IN a Civilization, they begin to drive that area out of civilization into poverty and chaos because of their corruption, nepotism, laziness, and incompetence.

      • EvelynV April 9, 2015 at 5:48 am #

        FIXED IT FOR YOU SO IT MAKES MORE SENSE

        If humans are in authority over themselves, they never advance to the level of civilization (and having a police force) at all. And if humans attain power IN a Civilization, they begin to drive that area out of civilization into poverty and chaos because of their corruption, nepotism, laziness, and incompetence.

  80. Cold N. Holefield April 8, 2015 at 10:26 am #

    DA said: It’s beginning to appear that we need to legitimately ask if white Caucasian males can be trusted at all with positions of authority..

    I think it’s becoming increasingly clear that only “males” belonging to the LGBT “community” and “Vote Democrat” can be trusted with said authority, right DA?

    Don’t worry, though, you can be sure LGBTNN (also known as CNN & BNN) is out front, pregnant cleavage and all, on this latest wedge issue story/spectacle.

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  81. fodase April 8, 2015 at 10:47 am #

    It’s beginning to appear that we need to legitimately ask if white Caucasian males can be trusted at all with positions of authority, especially if they involve handling a firearm. Their track record of late is disturbing, to say the least.

    This cop was definitely wrong to shoot, and will be charged correctly with murder. what an intentional killing, the video makes clear. no reason to shoot at all. i feel for his family.

    other than that, DA is clearly a racist since he is lumping all white men into one group. judging them based on their skin color, the definition of racism.

    should we say all black men are dangerous, since they do most all of the killing and shooting in the US of America?

    it’s beginning to appear that we need to legitimately ask if black males can be trusted at all, seeing how blacks are like 10% of the population and commit what, 60-90% of all crime.

    A two-year-old case involving the shooting death of an unarmed 18-year-old white man by a black police officer is gaining attention on social media in the wake of this week’s protests and rioting in Ferguson, Missouri.
    Gilbert Collar, a white, unarmed 18-year-old under the influence of drugs was shot and killed Oct. 6, 2012, by Officer Trevis Austin, who is black, in Mobile, Alabama. Despite public pressure for an indictment, a Mobile County grand jury refused to bring charges against Officer Austin, concluding that the officer acted in self-defense.

    uh, how come no one ever heard of this or talks about it?

    blacks are among the most racist groups out there, and breed massive violence and criminality.

    if you can’t see that, you are blind.

    fodase

  82. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 10:48 am #

    “Their track record of late is disturbing, to say the least.” — DA

    Of late? Whites have conducted a reign of terror against Blacks throughout American history:.During slavery, reconstruction, Jim Crow,
    and today whites murder Blacks with impunity.

    This latest murder would have been no different. The white cop lied. His white lawyer lied. They would have gotten away with murder again if the video had not appeared.

    To Capt Spaulding: prejudice is found in all races and cultures. Racism is not. Racism is institutionalized prejudice.

    The systematization of prejudice into legally sanctioned structural racism is not a feature of all races and cultures.

    The USA has specialized in racism against Blacks for 300+ years now. Just by chance there was a recording. A video got this cop arrested. He was on his way to murder with impunity, which is the norm.

  83. Cold N. Holefield April 8, 2015 at 11:02 am #

    Is there any other color of Caucasian besides White? I’m open to all possibilities.

    As far as A League of Their Own is concerned, I’m sensing a movie and book deal in the next several years after it gets up and running.

    I’ll name it The Janos Skorenzy Traveling All-stars & Motor Kings. I don’t think that title’s taken yet. If things get as bad as some say they will, I will replace Carriage for Motor to make it more relevant.

    • volodya April 8, 2015 at 12:37 pm #

      “Caucasian” is a matter of definition. Human genetics is a gigantically complex thing, the science of which is just getting up and running.

      Geneticists are examining DNA found in the ancient remains of post-glacial, neolithic people in Europe. And they’ve found examples of genes for brown skin. It looks like brown skin was the thing in Europe 5,000 BC. Not only that but it came with brown hair and blue eyes. Seems that the world has changed in terms of “race” and quite recently at that.

      It looks like depigmentation among Europeans and west Asians is a relatively recent thing that happened somewhere in the vicinity of the Black Sea and Caspian Sea and spread into Europe possibly via the migration of farmers. It possibly became an adaptive mutation as a result of a grain-based diet. But finding testable DNA in ancient remains isn’t easy and ancient human remains are not that common so such a proposition is difficult to test.

      East Asians also went the route of de-pigmentation. They have some genes in common with western Eurasians that account for whitening but more are distinct to eastern peoples.

      Things change, you know, with migration and population replacement. Anatolian and middle eastern farmers mostly replaced post glacial European hunters. I’m betting that what happened to those hunters is what happened to modern Amerindians. The modern folk that genetically most resemble those same brown-skinned Neolithic Europeans now live along the shores of the Baltic.

      The people that most resemble Asians that lived in Siberia 50,000 years ago now live in Papua-New Guinea, the people that most resemble Asians that lived in Siberia 25,000 years ago now live in the jungles of the Amazon. The people that most resemble the “ice-man” Otzi now live in Sardinia. The people that used to live in your own place of national and ethnic origin 3,000 years ago wouldn’t likely be big contributors to your own genetic make-up, having been replaced or having moved on. At least that’s how things look. Genetics is a work in progress. Not much in the way of settled science.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:12 pm #

        Yes it all comes down to what you can hold. There’s a Tribe of 1500 in the Amazon that has held a piece of jungle the size of Rhode Island for 500 years against all comers but dint of their utter ferocity.

        And Pope Benedict wanted “dialogue” with the Muslims! There’s nothing to talk about – it will be determined by strength. And instead leading he capitulated, lessening the chances of a European revival.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:34 pm #

        Why would eating grains lead to White skin? Any idea? Offhand, I would think it an adaption to a cold, cloudy climate. But I know there are strange genetic combinations: like nearsightedness and high IQ. For that matter, light skin and high IQ. But it is harder to live in colder climates and that might select for higher IQ as well as lighter skin. Of course the sun is strong at high altitudes and that’s a factor too in places like the cold Andean or Tibetan plateaus. One can get sunburned and frostbitten at the same time at such heights.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:28 pm #

      http://www.vdare.com/posts/top-20-most-hated-duke-basketball-players-by-race-whites-most-hated-by-far

      People can’t stand that Whites can play Basketball – even other Whites believe it or not. Such is the self hatred of the pale skinned Boobus Americanus.

      One is reminded of Ken Burn’s jazz documentary and its slight of the countless great White Jazz Men – and the studious ignoring of the Western roots of Jazz.

      It’s incredible how much I now seem to know about Basketball and even Jazz. Race is the alchemist’s touchstone, turning to gold anything that it touches. I could do the same thing with Chemistry or Physics. Like Long John Silver, I can speak like a book when so minded.

      God is another such touchstone – indeed even greater than Race. Putting Race and God together – that’s the ticket to greatness all other things being equal. That’s the winning formula behind National Socialism and of course the endurance and triumph of the Jews.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 3:00 pm #

      Great idea Cold, in addition to our Goldshlagger mining, we could collaborate here too. I want consulting fees on the movie. Beyond that, the sky’s the limit. Why not have a traveling White Team that makes fools out of a Black Team? The Harlem Globetrotters in reverse.

      And of course, we could co-author a book and do the talk show/book signing circuit. Like Ernst Zundel, we would always wear helmets and bullet proof vests going in and coming out studios. We could even keep them on now and then just to show the people at home what heroes we are. And yeah, we could sell cars using White Basketball Stars as the link.

  84. volodya April 8, 2015 at 12:03 pm #

    Deflation my ass.

    There’s no deflation. The agenda, folks, is negative interest rates so the banks can pillage your savings.

    And to justify negative interest rates they spin this fantastical story about “deflation”, this awful monster that will scythe down the economy. And for which the only cure is for you to pay your bank to park your money. Of course it’s all nonsense.

    But Wall Street and the oligarchs don’t tell a lie. They NEVER tell just an ordinary lie like ordinary people would tell. No, they tell a gigantic lie.

    Such audacity. Applause and more applause. A standing ovation. What a con. The best yet.

    The oligarchs will pay the banks too. But they also own stocks. Bank stocks that pay dividends. And so they get the money back. And they get the money back via the Wall Street swindle machine that gets propped up by ZIRP and NIRP.

    A cautionary note. You have to make allowances because these economists are not top notch intellects. And, not having guiding lights among them like Stephen Hawking or Paul Dirac or Albert Einstein, economists get confused. Larry too. Maybe he needs somebody to stand at his shoulder: Larry say this, Larry don’t say that, Larry let’s go over what you’re going to say today. Because here he doesn’t seem to know which side of his mouth to talk out of.

    He talks demand being in short supply. You don’t say. Good thing the perfesser is here to tell us these things. Of course there’s a lack of demand. For there to be demand, money needs to be in the hands of people that need to spend it. You know, something like a middle class. But the oligarchs and their Wall Street vampire squid suck the economy dry. They spent the last two generations systematically destroying that very thing that generates demand for the oligarchs’ products.

    So how can there be this burgeoning demand? See, they argue in favor of unleashing the full, ravenous, destructive power of the squid, they argue that regulation is burdensome and unnecessary, that the market will do the job. Now Larry is perilously close to admitting the truth of the matter. Cripes Larry…

    My advice to Larry is to shut the fuck up about this lack of demand. Raises too many questions.

    • beantownbill. April 8, 2015 at 4:25 pm #

      Prices for essentials have been rising, so in that sense there is inflation. The velocity of money, for several reasons, has been decreasing, and that’s deflation. So what we have is a form of stagflation. But these are just terms; the bottom line is that the average person is getting screwed no matter which way they turn.

  85. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 1:10 pm #

    Volodya: “The agenda, folks, is negative interest rates so the banks can pillage your savings.”

    Volodya, take your money out of banks and move your money to a Canadian credit union, like Servus Credit Union or Meridian Credit Union.

    Meridian’s Guaranteed Investment Certificate (GIC) is a Canadian investment that offers a guaranteed rate of return over a fixed period of time, currently 2.0% for five years, compared to 1.6% on savings accounts.

    In Canada you do not have to pay negative interest to a bank. Just switch to a credit union with a guaranteed rate of return.

    Unless your real intention was to create fear by using loaded words like “pillage.” In which case, you failed.

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    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 1:43 pm #

      As usual, only half the story from wpa.

      The Canadian dollar has lost about 12% of its value vs the US dollar in the past 6 months and is showing signs of going much lower.

      Go ahead wpa, move your money into a Canadian credit union and take a bath on the exchange rate.

  86. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 2:18 pm #

    Qshtik, I was talking to Volodya who is already in Canada, moving Canadian dollars. No exchange rate is involved. Get with the program, Q. Volodya was formerly Cash and lives in Canada.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:40 pm #

      And how would you know about Cash since you are supposedly a relative newcomer?

  87. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 2:37 pm #

    Cold: “Please, I beg of you, it’s too early for this eastern mysticism bullshit, or whatever you want to call it.”

    Cold, you must not have read the piece Janos linked to. Here is a quote from it:

    “First, the big picture. We are, of course, in the Kali Yuga.”

    See, I did not start anything. I am just responding to Janos. Get off your knees, Cold. Your begging is unseemly.

    10 more years to the end of Kali Yuga. Easy peasy.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 2:43 pm #

      The article says nothing about Kali Yuga ending in 10 years. Indeed that’s an extreme minority opinion. Prabhupad for example, said it would go on for another 400,000 years or so. I don’t venture to know but things are obviously going to be getting worse for decades and generations to come.

  88. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 5:58 pm #

    Janos: “And how would you know about Cash since you are supposedly a relative newcomer?”

    I can read archives and recognize writing syles. Or in Cash/Volodya’s case, questioning styles.

    And thanks for not reading the piece. What is it with you and A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada? Were you a Krishna devotee with ISKCON? Prabhupad is obviously wrong about Kali Yuga.

    The end of the Kali Yuga in 2025: Unraveling the mysteries of the Yuga Cycle by Bibhu Dev Misra

    http://www.grahamhancock.com/forum/DMisraB6.php

    • Janos Skorenzy April 8, 2015 at 7:28 pm #

      Nobody “reads the archives”. That’s as obscure as the Akashic Records.

    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 9:30 pm #

      Jesus H. Christ, they’re doing it again , Cold.

  89. nsa April 8, 2015 at 7:50 pm #

    Hindus believe all white people are reincarnated as crows. You know…..the winged critters pecking the eyes out of corpses floating in the Ganges cesspool.

  90. wpa_ccc April 8, 2015 at 9:21 pm #

    nsa: “Hindus believe all white people are reincarnated as crows.”

    Christians believe Hindus have not accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior and will go to hell and spend eternity in lakes of fire suffering eternal torments and tortures.

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    • Q. Shtik April 8, 2015 at 9:46 pm #

      Let’s take a poll.

      Which of these religions has the most preposterous backstory:

      Christianity

      Islam

      Mormon

      Other (fill in blank) ______________

      All are preposterous beyond belief

      • Janos Skorenzy April 9, 2015 at 1:27 am #

        American Finance – which believes something can come form nothing and that they, the Bankers are Gods who make it so.

  91. FincaInTheMountains April 9, 2015 at 1:10 am #

    The stakes in the oil game continue to grow
    In Shiite areas of Saudi Arabia, riots broke out.

    There are dead and wounded

    Saudi authorities sent troops into the two cities on the east of the country – Avam and Katif. In localities where there are Shiites, demonstrations continued for a few days against interference Sunni countries in the Yemeni conflict, reports Newsru.co.il with reference to the Arab press.

    Among the dead – four protesters and army corporal Saudi Maggio Bin Turki al-Haftani. Six people were injured. At least 10 protestors were arrested. It is also reported the seizure of protesters weapons. Residents claim that the number of wounded exceeded 30 people, and arrested more than 20 residents of Avam. According to them, the operation involved a significant number of troops, shooting in the city did not abate for several hours, and the soldiers were shooting civilians in their homes.

    Shiite east of Saudi Arabia is a constant source of tensions. Eastern provinces rich in oil, but these resources are mostly going to rich western regions, inhabited by Sunnis. The standard of living of their inhabitants is much higher than the standard of living of Shiites. Saudi Arabia has accused Iran of interfering in internal affairs. The authorities of the Kingdom believe that the ayatollah regime is doing its best to destabilize the situation in the Shiite areas. Locals Riyadh residents are suspected of disloyalty and links with Tehran.

    http://www.regnum.ru/news/polit/1912877.html

  92. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 1:31 am #

    Q, in your backstory poll you left out the religion favored by CFN called scientism. Scientism is excessive belief in the power of scientific knowledge and techniques. Scientism has an incredible (which means not credible) backstory.

    According to scientism, our universe sprang into existence as “singularity” around 13.7 billion years ago. Uh, OK. Say what? You want me to believe that?

    Scientism believes our universe is thought to have begun as an infinitesimally small, infinitely hot, infinitely dense, something — a singularity.

    OK, then what is a “singularity” and where does it come from? The scientists don’t know for sure. Just believe the theory!

    Why did it appear? We don’t know. Just believe the theory.

    Scientism has an incredible (not believable) creation backstory which is believed only by the gullible (including many believers in science on CFN). Nobody really knows for sure.

    • Therian April 9, 2015 at 3:15 am #

      Biology is NOT science. Physics and chemistry are. Obviously, Asoka, you are not a scientist because people who’ve done science all their lives know that it’s not an “ism”. It neither has a “belief” in itself or a “disbelief” in itself. Nobody’s observations and theories get to become religions. Everybody’s observations and theories are subject to exhaustive scrutiny, testing, and replication. THAT is real science.

      Even an astrophysicist doesn’t know what a singularity is because ALL astrophysicists know that the Einsteinium rules for the behavior of matter and energy in spacetime are null and void in a singularity because we cannot see inside something that has no volume and no time. Maybe in 100,000 years we’ll know more.

      It’s guys like you that talk about the fringes of science like singularities where even physics is lost but then you accuse the physicists of deifying their knowledge. As to the POWER of science, there isn’t an appliance in your home that would work for a week without the awesome combination of scientific knowledge and precise engineering. Every stupid post you write here depends on computers, programs, and the Internet backbone which is truly an awesome accomplishment.

    • Q. Shtik April 9, 2015 at 2:51 pm #

      The difference between the scientism you describe and all the big man in the sky religions is that, to my knowledge, they haven’t murdered umpteen thousands for failing to believe as they do …………………….. or even one, for that matter. (String of periods are for Cold.)

      • Therian April 9, 2015 at 5:54 pm #

        Well put, Q.. But even with your well stated point, I would submit that Asoka is confusing “scientism” with “techno-triumphalism” which JHK has described with great and humorous acuity. Science is merely a way of stating fundamental truths about the universe after an enormous amount of testing and replication. Science has an enforced humility. Technology most assuredly does not.

        This is most humorously seen in the way that CEOs of technology firms self-deify e.g., Jobs, Gates, Ellison, etc.. They’re obnoxious twits with a God complex. I can’t recall any scientist engaging in the kind of self-promotion that is so common in Silicon Valley.

  93. FincaInTheMountains April 9, 2015 at 1:45 am #

    Pepe Escobar: Eurasian emporium or nuclear war?

    A high-level European diplomatic source has confirmed to Asia Times that German chancellor Angela Merkel’s government has vigorously approached Beijing in an effort to disrupt its multi-front strategic partnership with Russia.

    Beijing won’t necessarily listen to this political gesture from Berlin, as China is tuning the strings on its pan-Eurasian New Silk Road project, which implies close trade/commerce/business ties with both Germany and Russia.

    The German gambit reveals yet more pressure by hawkish sectors of the U.S. government who are intent on targeting and encircling Russia. For all the talk about Merkel’s outrage over the U.S. National Security Agency’s tapping shenanigans, the chancellor walks Washington’s walk. Real “outrage” means nothing unless she unilaterally ends sanctions on Russia. In the absence of such a response by Merkel, we’re in the realm of good guy-bad guy negotiating tactics.

    The bottom line is that Washington cannot possibly tolerate a close Germany-Russia trade/political relationship, as it directly threatens its hegemony in the Empire of Chaos.

    Thus, the whole Ukraine tragedy has absolutely nothing to do with human rights or the sanctity of borders. NATO ripped Kosovo away from Yugoslavia-Serbia without even bothering to hold a vote, such as the one that took place in Crimea.

    Watch those S-500s

    In parallel, another fascinating gambit is developing. Some sectors of U.S. Think Tankland – with their cozy CIA ties – are now hedging their bets about Cold War 2.0, out of fear that they have misjudged what really happens on the geopolitical chessboard.

    I’ve just returned from Moscow, and there’s a feeling the Federal Security Bureau and Russian military intelligence are increasingly fed up with the endless stream of Washington/NATO provocations – from the Baltics to Central Asia, from Poland to Romania, from Azerbaijan to Turkey.

    This is an extensive but still only partial summary of what’s seen all across Russia as an existential threat: Washington/NATO’s intent to block Russia’s Eurasian trade and development; destroy its defense perimeter; and entice it into a shooting war.

    A shooting war is not exactly a brilliant idea. Russia’s S-500 anti-missile missiles and anti-aircraft missiles can intercept any existing ICBM, cruise missile or aircraft. S-500s 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.

    Some on the U.S. side say the S-500 system is being rolled out in a crash program, as an American intel source told Asia Times. There’s been no Russian confirmation. Officially, Moscow says the system is slated to be rolled out in 2017. End result, now or later: it will seal Russian airspace. It’s easy to draw the necessary conclusions.

    That makes the Obama administration’s “policy” of promoting war hysteria, coupled with unleashing a sanction, ruble and oil war against Russia, the work of a bunch of sub-zoology specimens.

    Some adults in the EU have already seen the writing on the (nuclear) wall. NATO’s conventional defenses are a joke. Any military buildup – as it’s happening now – is also a joke, as it could be demolished by the 5,000 tactical nuclear weapons Moscow would be able to use.

    When in doubt, bully

    Of course it takes time to turn the current Cold War 2.0 mindset around, but there are indications the Masters of the Universe are listening – as this essay shows. Call it the first (public) break in the ice.

    Let’s assume Russia decided to mobilize five million troops, and switch to military production. The “West” would back down to an entente cordiale in a flash. And let’s assume Moscow decided to confiscate what remains of dodgy oligarch wealth. Vladimir Putin’s approval rate – which is not exactly shabby as it stands – would soar to at least 98%. Putin has been quite restrained so far. And still his childishly hysterical demonization persists.

    It’s a non-stop escalation scenario. Color revolutions. The Maidan coup. Sanctions; “evil” Hitler/Putin; Ukraine to enter NATO; NATO bases all over. And yet reality – as in the Crimean counter coup, and the battlefield victories by the armies of the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk – has derailed the most elaborate U.S. State Department/NATO plans. On top of it Merkel and France’s Francois Hollande were forced into an entente cordiale with Russia – on Minsk 2 – because they knew that would be the only way to stop Washington from further weaponizing Kiev.

    Putin is essentially committed to a very complex preservation/flowering process of Russia’s history and culture, with overtones of pan-Slavism and Eurasianism. Comparing him to Hitler does not even qualify as a kindergarten prank.

    Yet don’t expect Washington neo-cons to understand Russian history or culture. Most of them would not even survive a Q&A on their beloved heroes Leo Strauss and Carl Schmitt. Moreover, their anti-intellectualism and exceptionalist arrogance creates only a privileged space for undiluted bullying.

    A U.S. academic, one of my sources, sent a letter to Nancy Pelosi copied to a notorious neo-con, the husband of Victoria, the Queen of Nulandistan. Here’s the neo-con’s response, via his Brookings Institution email: “Why don’t you go (expletive deleted) yourself?” Yet another graphic case of husband and wife deserving each other.

    At least there seem to be sound IQs in the Beltway driven to combat the neo-con cell inside the State Department, the neo-con infested editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, an array of think tanks, and of course NATO, whose current military leader, Gen. Breedlove/Breedhate, is working hard on his post-mod impersonation of Dr. Strangelove.

    Russian “aggression” is a myth. Moscow’s strategy, so far, has been pure self-defense. Moscow in a flash will strongly advance a strategic cooperation with the West if the West understands Russia’s security interests. If those are violated – as in provoking the bear – the bear will respond. A minimum understanding of history reveals that the bear knows one or two things about enduring suffering. It simply won’t collapse – or melt away.

    Meanwhile, another myth has also been debunked: That sanctions would badly hurt Russia’s exports and trade surpluses. Of course there was hurt, but bearable. Russia enjoys a wealth of raw materials and massive internal production capability – enough to meet the bulk of internal demand.

    So we’re back to the EU, Russia and China, and everyone in between, all joining the greatest trade emporium in history across the whole of Eurasia. That’s what Putin proposed in Germany a few years ago, and that’s what the Chinese are already doing. And what do the neo-cons propose? A nuclear war on European soil.

    http://atimes.com/2015/04/eurasian-emporium-or-nuclear-war-pepe-escobar/

    • AKlein April 9, 2015 at 8:08 am #

      British, and American foreign policy since at least before WW1 has been to keep Germany and Russia from banding together. Even Stalin realized that Russia and Germany together would be phenomenal. Britain, and now America, are committed to financial vampirism – grifting, finagling and other forms of financial legerdemain. That difference has set, and comntinued to set, the battle lines.
      Oh yes, one more observation you may care to comment on, Fincaln. Several years ago, after the inebriate Yeltsin was (thankfully) removed, the Russians traded some of their debt with Germany for a minority, but significant, equity share of Gazprom. A day after this was made public it was redacted from the public press. I checked with a friend of mine about this news item who in turn checked with a friend of his in the CIA. The response: his friend “could not comment” on the topic, but implicitly verified that it happened.

  94. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 2:01 am #

    Janos: “American Finance – which believes something can come from nothing…”

    Kind of like the big bang theory! But I like the Buddhist theory better:

    “Since all phenomena are dependent upon multiple causes and conditions, it can not be said that there was a first cause or event that sparked the creation of the universe. Thus Buddhist philosophy refutes the concepts of either a creator god or an initial event as posited in the “big bang theory.”

    https://indiaphilosophy.wordpress.com/tag/dependent-origination/

    Actually, the best real way something can come from nothing is if you own land. Your capital is the land you are standing on and you can use it to grow food and form earthen structures, like adobe buildings, used by more than 30% of the world’s population (according to Asoka).

    • Therian April 9, 2015 at 3:18 am #

      No … NOT like the Big Bang Theory because a singularity is NOT a “nothing”. We just don’t understand the idea of infinite density and infinite spacetime curvature. Give the human race a few thousand years. Be patient … the Buddha was.

      • Janos Skorenzy April 9, 2015 at 5:49 am #

        Once the Buddha was engaged in walking meditation, with folded hands and slow measured step. A thief intended to rob him but couldn’t catch up with him no matter how fast he ran.

        Thus the tortoise can outrun the hare if he can just keep on the curve and avoid the tangent. The circularized square while Asoka is nothing but tangents or the squared circle, the square halo, the letter not the spirit.

        • Q. Shtik April 9, 2015 at 3:35 pm #

          Waaay too deep for me, Janos.

  95. Janos Skorenzy April 9, 2015 at 5:55 am #

    In other words, the situation is hopeless but not serious.

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  96. Pucker April 9, 2015 at 6:58 am #

    Does Hillary Clinton worship crystals?

  97. BackRowHeckler April 9, 2015 at 7:10 am #

    Tues. afternoon, down New Haven way, Sanjay Patel, gas station clerk, took a round to the forehead and three quick rounds to the chest before he hit the floor. Security video shows 2 hoodied ‘urban youths’ casually reaching around into the cash register, and sauntering out, laughing.

    Another spectacular arson fire in Hartford, which is beginning to resemble Detroit in form and function.

    Did anyone else see the BBC report this morning about 100 billion barrels of oil ‘discovered’ in Southern England?

    Picked up this book in a used bookstore ‘Ultimate Guide to Farm Mechanics’ 1050 pages written C1880-1922, chapters like ‘Planes and Planing’, ‘Drainage and Pipefitting’, and ‘Projects in Rope Work’, figure it may come in handy if we return to Year 0. I already tried one project — moving a boulder using chains and a winch — and it worked pretty good. I’ll put this on my bookshelf next to work on gunsmithing and blacksmithing, most likely not for myself but for those coming up behind me.

    I’m trying to figure out where the wealth is coming from ’round here, what with no farms, factories, mines or commercial fishing, no nothing it appears except hundreds of thousands of people driving around in automobiles every day going God knows where. That’s all thats left.

    brh

    • ozone April 10, 2015 at 9:50 am #

      BRH,
      Looked up that old technology (a book) on the new technology, and it looks like an excellent reference manual!

      …..Now we just have to make sure that someone is left who might still know how to read in the next couple generations….

  98. Cold N. Holefield April 9, 2015 at 8:47 am #

    Q. Shtik said: The life-weary hard-boiled former Philly bad cop character, Mike (Breaking Bad and its current spin-off, Better Call Saul) used the phrase “easy peasy” in Monday night’s episode. Is that what prompted your use of those same words? Subliminal?

    Great characterization of that bloke. DA was right, this show is excellent. I didn’t think they could equal Breaking Bad, but they have. They have me hooked. It’s different but also similar to Breaking Bad and it’s given deep dimensions and humanity to these two former antagonists to Walt’s protagonist. This show will allow us to see Walt, in the end, from a completely unique and mutually exclusive perspective. Without great story telling, life wouldn’t be worth living.

    I notice you neglected to use Mike’s last name — Ehrmantraut. Now, I don’t know what an Ehrmantraut is, but I’ll be damned if Mike doesn’t look like one. Come to think of it, he looks liker Shrek as well. He’s one surly, ugly son-of-a-bitch with a heart of gold encased in a mile of concrete.

    It’s funny how certain people resemble animals, isn’t it? For example, Larry Bird looks like some sort of a bird and who can deny Massa K looks like a rat and what do you know, Krzyzewski means rat face in Polish. Weird, that. Or not. Speaking of Massa K………

    I don’t know why you think Massa K colors his hair.

    Finally, I’m still exploring Russian cinema, what little there is, and let me tell you — I understand their compulsion to drink and drink heavily. For the past year I’ve gone through three 1.75L of Polish potato vodka when before this past year it was less than one a year. Russian cinema is bleak. It pulls your heart out of your chest and sticks it a meat grinder then places it back ever so tenderly. Vodka’s the only cure until you draw your last breath. Two Russian movies I’ve watched this past week are The Italian and The Thief. To be Russian is to suffer — and suffer tremendously.

    • Janos Skorenzy April 9, 2015 at 2:46 pm #

      I thought Mike died in one of the last episodes of Breaking Bad. Did he just pretend to die to make Walt leave him alone?

      Don’t forget the raw onions with the Vodka. It’s good for your heart.

      In the astral plane after death, many people will take the forms of the animals they resemble inwardly in terms of their propensities. In other words we turn inside out, no long able to hide what we are. A pig will become a pig literally.

      • Therian April 11, 2015 at 10:06 pm #

        Mike did die in the last season of Breaking Bad. Walt shot him. However, remember that Better Call Saul is a prequel, not a sequel.

        • Janos Skorenzy April 12, 2015 at 9:53 pm #

          Ah, that would explain it. As Yuddisthera said, the nature of man is to forget.

    • Q. Shtik April 9, 2015 at 3:18 pm #

      I notice you neglected to use Mike’s last name — Ehrmantraut. – Cold

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

      I did not know that. I would bet that one of the writers had a kid who lived on his block decades ago whose last name was Ehrmatraut. Giving Mike such a last name requires no explanation. It just is what it is.

      As to Massa K, I never thought of him as looking rat-like but I HAVE marveled at his tiny rectangular mouth opening.

  99. JBPravda April 9, 2015 at 10:39 am #

    Ah, I do love the sound of ululation in the mourning…………

    ‘Hearty Helping of Donny Darkoness’, JBPravda, Raconteur

    Postscript or Postmortem—

    Summers is the same clown shoe magnate cum Este Lauder what deregulated the banksters and their de-riv-ah-tives (hear Clinton crooning?) in 1999, calling it the real ‘bridge to the 21st century’s financial freedom’.

    clusterFuckers

  100. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 10:42 am #

    “moving a boulder using chains and a winch”

    How did you get her to cooperate?

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  101. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 10:48 am #

    “Did anyone else see the BBC report this morning about 100 billion barrels of oil ‘discovered’ in Southern England?”

    There are many such reserves still to be discovered, inexhaustible really, more than we will ever need as demand continues to fall, and alternatives continue to replace fossil fuels. As fodase says, the whole peak oil doomsday premise of CFN is discredited.

  102. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 10:53 am #

    Therian: “Give the human race a few thousand years. Be patient ”

    I love this optimism! I will gladly take your advice.

    • Therian April 9, 2015 at 5:05 pm #

      We don’t need a post for every minute little “You go girl!” type of phony “affirmation” from you. We don’t need to see 15 or 20 posts of yours in a day … sometimes exceeding 30. Nobody here sees you as an oracle, as sagacious, or even as a generally positive force on the board. You are what you’ve been for years i.e., a data cherry picker, a half-truther, a guy who worships some technology but then rants about “scientism” which even scientists rarely do, and a man who enjoys being a gnat in the ear of people while hiding under your phony Buddhistic mien.

  103. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 11:00 am #

    “It’s a liberty I take. Rather than use merely the standard 3 periods … I will add as many more as I feel are needed to create an expressively longer pause.”

    Just who do you think you are? Patrick Henry? This is scandulous, wanton liberalism!

    • Q. Shtik April 9, 2015 at 3:54 pm #

      This is [scandulous] – wpa

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

      At great risk of banning ……… scandalous.

      • wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 4:47 pm #

        Scandulous is a neologism, Q., not found in any dictionary because I invented it. Scandulous is a cross between scandal and incredulous. The scandal, what you did, was unbelievable, and required a new word. And being a liberal, I am permitted such license. And that, as Paul Harvey says, is the rest of the story.

        • Therian April 11, 2015 at 10:08 pm #

          Yes, we know you’ve never made an error in your life. Nice post hoc rationale for “scandulous”. I almost buy it. Nah!!

  104. BackRowHeckler April 9, 2015 at 11:06 am #

    Rand Paul is fielding some pretty tough questions from aggressive reporters all the sudden …

    What’s this? John Kerry in a sit down Q+A with Judy Woodruff at PBS about Iran. PBS, agitprop for the Democratic Party, whose got their head stuck so far up Obamas ass you’ll need a 3 ton winch to pull it out! Talk about an adversarial interview. Not many tough questions, much fawning and ass kissing. Not to be outdone, Obama gets himself interviewed by noted Obama syncopant and butt cheek kisser Tom Friedman. Not much too see here. Love was in the air, that’s all.

    brh

  105. volodya April 9, 2015 at 11:11 am #

    Why would eating grains lead to White skin? Any idea? Offhand, I would think it an adaption to a cold, cloudy climate. – Janos

    There’s different ideas as to how these mutations took root and got selected for. One idea is that, as you say, de-pigmentation is an adaptation to less sunlight in more northerly latitudes.

    Another is that a grain-based diet is less nutritious than a meat or fish based diet and therefore people had a lot more difficulty with vitamin D deficiencies. Sunlight is needed to metabolize this vitamin and so light skin would give a leg up.

    But nobody really “knows” with certainty how these changes came about. There’s “evidence” that points in certain directions. But this isn’t like physics. All this stuff happened a long time ago before people kept records. And the remains they left behind don’t generally give a complete or accurate picture.

    One thing seems likely though. Post glacial re-forestation led to the diminution of large herds of grazing animals and therefore less game for humans to hunt. And then, one supposes, people took to eating grain. Grain, in the form of wild grass seeds, was maybe at first a fallback to stave off starvation. But after a while grain became a mainstay.

    But this wasn’t instantaneous. It took a while for wild grass, that is, the ancestors of wheat, barley, rice, to become domesticated and suitable for systematic cultivation. It appears that as far back as 20,000 years ago seeds were gathered and cooked (as per remains found in archeological sites in the middle east).

    There’s some evidence in remains of people and their encampments in Europe, that after the ice-age, their material living conditions and their physical health became a lot worse. No more glorious cave paintings. Life was tough, IOW, for a long time. It was a big problem just to stay alive.

    And then these poor folk got pushed aside as the first farmers trickled out of what is modern day Turkey. For a long time people thought that European hunters saw the west Asian farmer with his tools and bag of seeds and adopted the new technology and that this accounted for the adoption of farming in Europe and also the expansion Europe’s population.

    But genetics is pointing to the repopulation of Europe by these west Asian farmers as being the predominant factor. The semi-starved post glacial hunters seem to have got pushed to the north and fringes of the continent. Seems to me to have been a process similar to what happened to Amerindians post-1500.

    Having said all this archeology and genetics is a work in progress. There’s conflicting theories and accounts. Nothing is cut in stone.

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  106. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 11:13 am #

    “As to the POWER of science, there isn’t an appliance in your home that would work for a week without the awesome combination of scientific knowledge and precise engineering. Every stupid post you write here depends on computers, programs, and the Internet backbone which is truly an awesome accomplishment.”

    Spoken like a true believer! Cast out the demon infidels who do not bow down to “the POWER of science” and feel its awesomeness!

    • Therian April 9, 2015 at 5:12 pm #

      Do you DENY that every single device you use in your home is a product of science and engineering. If you’re really a “back to the caves” type of guy, throw out your computer (so we don’t have to see any more of your posts), throw out any radios or TVs or cellphones, throw out even your plumbing.

      I do not worship science. I merely note that without it we wouldn’t even have light bulbs. If you want to talk about an “ism” that really DOES produce a lot of ridiculous “products” then let’s talk about technology which is not the same as science. Technology is often about “solutions” for problems that don’t exist which is why we have stores full of video games, Playstations, X-boxes, and a myriad of cell phone “apps” so that people can play Tetris at a cafe instead of being with people.

      You’re the same doosh you’ve always been and you’ll always be that person because you enjoy being a pain in the ass. It’s your raison d’être. SOME technology uses SOME science but it most certainly is not the equivalent of science. Learn to make important distinctions instead of just hitting the “SUBMIT COMMENT” button whenever any mental diarrhea enters your head, okay?

    • DA April 9, 2015 at 9:11 pm #

      Yep the POWER of science has brought us some good shit alright. Just lately, remotely controlled drones capable of delivering terror anywhere in the world with no political risk/blowback to it’s operators. Nuclear bombs now more powerful, reliable, and accurately delivered than ever before. Remote spying on domestic citizens by more means than can be recounted than ever before, not to mention the POWER of science to exploit limited, non-renewable resources to box us into a situation from which we likely have no escape. Yep, that’s some POWER alright.

      Humans! Just the latest band of savages to rise from the mud and imagine that their shit don’t stink.

      • Therian April 10, 2015 at 1:02 pm #

        There’s no doubt that ENGINEERING implements the ideas of science, often in ways which are quite awful. I’ve always been very vocal about that.

        However, your pal, WPA, has been very vocal about the successes of wind and/or solar power. Sometimes the engineering implementation of science is good, sometimes it isn’t. Your post is obvious as a fart in church and, therefore, makes a point that’s been obvious since WWII. So what? Does it mean you want to be a Maori Tribesman or perhaps one of the Chukchi people in Siberia? I’m guessing “no” is the answer there.

        Will you willingly, today (!!), throw away your computer, your cell phone, your electric appliances, your indoor plumbing, and any high tech gizmos (tablets, pads, etc.) that you own?

        By the way “spying on domestic citizens” involves a little science and a lot of high tech that is by no means science. Computer “Science” is a contradiction in terms. It’s a collection of fads (like “Object-Oriented Programming”) that have absolutely no empirical backing.

        So if you’re going to post here, try to make important distinctions and know the differences between science (which is just a research methodology) and engineering and between engineering and “high tech”. Otherwise, you’re just another CFN spewer and we have sufficient of those.

  107. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 11:16 am #

    BRH, I remember when you guys insisted on using Obama’s complete name: Barack Hussein.

    Why don’t you do the same with John Ellis and Randal Howard?

    • elysianfield April 9, 2015 at 5:07 pm #

      Barak…the name of the steed that Mohammad (peace be unto him) rode on his ascension to heaven…or so I’m told.

    • DA April 9, 2015 at 8:40 pm #

      Complete names in the absence of any discussion of ideas. Typical. Of course none of the fucking idiots posing as “leaders” have any ideas either. Go figure. Nor do you ‘wpa_ccc’.

  108. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 5:12 pm #

    Hussein, derives from the Arabic word Hassan, which means something inherently good. As it refers to Obama, the name is apropos.

    • Therian April 9, 2015 at 5:14 pm #

      Sorry. We don’t care.

      • wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 5:41 pm #

        Geophysicist M. King Hubbert published a theory of oil field development in 1956 that predicted total U.S. oil production would “peak” by about 1971 (at the latest) after which it would decline.

        Hubbert also predicted that the world would see a decline in total oil production by about 2006. Hubbert was wrong about the world, but for a while it looked like he had nailed the U.S.

        In the United States the nice peak oil bell shape started turning around in 2009 and took off like a rocket in 2011. Hubbert’s “peak oil” no longer applies even to its one success story.

        Looking at monthly figures, U.S. field production of crude in December 2014 and January 2015 were the highest values since 1972, and not far behind the all-time record set in 1970.

        Although the sharp decline in the world price of oil since last year may halt the rapid spike in U.S. output, it is obvious that Hubbert’s mechanistic model of “peak oil” theory is incorrect.

        http://www.rightsidenews.com/2015040935692/life-and-science/energy-and-environment/peak-oil-theory-may-have-peaked.html

        • Therian April 9, 2015 at 6:02 pm #

          We’re 2 million bpd behind 1970 but why are you posting this as a “reply” to a thread about the meaning of “Hussein”? I already refuted your contention that we’ve exceeded the production at the Hubbert Peak. Moreover, anyone with any acumen about oil knows that the shale boom is going to be a historical blip and is already creating terrible trouble with water wasting in a region of the country that can scarcely afford that.

          Try not to be an airhead by posting NON SEQUITURS as “responses” to posts. I find it hilarious that you, a liberal, would get your oil “news” (which is rubbish) from a right wing blog with a huge political agenda. You never cease to amaze … on the downside.

        • DA April 9, 2015 at 7:27 pm #

          wpa,

          I think the Archdruid was speaking directly to you in this week’s post:

          This is where we get into the psychological dimension. What James Howard Kunstler has usefully termed the psychology of previous investment is a massive cultural force in today’s America. The predicaments we face today are in very large part the product of a long series of really bad decisions that were made over the last four decades or so. Most Americans, even those who had little to do with making those decisions, enthusiastically applauded them, and treated those who didn’t with no small amount of abuse and contempt. Admitting just how misguided those decisions turned out to be thus requires a willingness to eat crow that isn’t exactly common among Americans these days. Thus there’s a strong temptation to double down on the bad decisions, wave those iPhones in the air, and put a few more television screens on the walls to keep the cognitive dissonance at bay for a little while longer.

          • DA April 9, 2015 at 8:07 pm #

            Thanks for that rightsidenews link though. That’s some pretty damn good comedic theater there. I’ll think of you every time I drive back to see my nutso relatives in flatlandia now. I think McMurtry had about as good a commentary as any about the old sods that were too stupid to leave or do anything else.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-D824LHti4

          • BackRowHeckler April 10, 2015 at 8:07 am #

            James McMurtry, unofficial CFNation Troubador.

          • ozone April 10, 2015 at 9:44 am #

            DA,
            That’s an excellent shout in the wilderness from JMG.
            He makes it clear that very few have the intestinal fortitude to take a hard look at our stalking predicaments, and all this techno-triumphalist bullshit and screen slavery is actually a wall of denial to hide behind! Who woulda thunk it? Fantasy and pretend on a massive and deadly scale.

            What the professional disruptors [quite intentionally] fail to mention (or reverse reference to) is that this pretending that “they’ll think of something” is a PARALYTIC. Absolutely. Diabolically. Intentional.

            Waiting to be saved is not a strategy for changing anything.

            (Sorry for adding to the post count.)

    • Q. Shtik April 9, 2015 at 10:28 pm #

      This would be the same guy you’ve said a dozen times over the past few years (under a previous handle which must not be spoken) that should be tried for crimes against humanity, isn’t it?

  109. Pucker April 9, 2015 at 10:07 pm #

    Clint Eastwood has publicly called the Millennial Generation the “Pussy Generation”.

  110. wpa_ccc April 9, 2015 at 11:49 pm #

    Therian: “I find it hilarious that you, a liberal, would get your oil “news” (which is rubbish) from a right wing blog with a huge political agenda.”

    Therian, that is what being liberal means: being open-minded, thinking critically about different perspectives, and reading on the left, the right, and in the center. This is also what you do, right? Do you find yourself hilarious?

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    • Therian April 10, 2015 at 1:17 pm #

      YOU lecturing US about “thinking critically”. Bwa-hahahahahahaha!!! That’s precisely why you’re such a detestable person. You’re about what you’ve always been about i.e., winning arguments even if you have to lie (Hubbert’s Peak in the US has NOT been exceeded nor will it be) by commission or lie by omission (about the US economy under Obama … which is a disaster). Then you pose as being about absolute truth.

      You pose as a pollyanna about the glorious future that awaits us yet here you are, morning, afternoon, and evening of every day sitting at a fucking keyboard. My theory about you is that you’re actually very ANGRY because you don’t have anything like a life and it’s low cost to sit all day and write posts which are designed mainly to rankle people.

      You’re just another multiculti, techno-triumphalist liberal. You’d love it here in Palo Alto. Of course, these “humanity lovers” here will ask you for $3200/month for a frigging dump of a 1 BR apartment to live in. That’s what most Democrats are all about i.e., a social stance which makes them look hip and egalitarian but when MONEY is involved they’re every bit as rapacious as any Republican only more disingenuous and denying about it.

      • malthuss April 11, 2015 at 4:14 pm #

        Priceless, you deserve an award.

  111. Pucker April 10, 2015 at 3:01 am #

    I wonder what the absence of community in the US means for the development of the personalities of young people in the US?

  112. BackRowHeckler April 10, 2015 at 7:52 am #

    “There’s a strong temptation to double down on bad decisions …” – from DA’s last post …

    At this moment, across the state highway, about 500 yards from here, 6 McMansions being built as I type this, for which a beautiful meadow along the river had to be plowed under. They slapped the 1st one up in a week, asking price: $1 million.

    After everything, this seems to be the only game in town, still!

    Let see here in the local rag, search for signs signs of hope. Bristol CT, home of football star and accused triple murderer Aaron Hernandez. Man found dead at bottom of cliff, suspected suicide. Two men named Jose rob liquor store, threaten to shoot clerk. 4 dead in past week of heroine overdose. Two arrested in massive foodstamp fraud, facing 20 years in prison. That’s just for starters. Not much hope here, but plenty of angst.

    brh

    • malthuss April 10, 2015 at 3:15 pm #

      ‘heroine overdose’, That is Hillary. Or Hitlery as some like to post.

      ‘heroine’, Heroin.

      • BackRowHeckler April 11, 2015 at 2:14 am #

        You got me on that one Malthus. You even nailed Q the other day. In fact, you’re out Q ing Q!

        brh

        • malthuss April 11, 2015 at 4:19 pm #

          Do I deserve such rich praise? You are far too kind.

  113. wpa_ccc April 10, 2015 at 12:22 pm #

    “There’s a strong temptation to double down on bad decisions …” – from DA’s last post …

    And hang on to bad theories like peak oil. A bell curve has an upward slope, a peak, and a downward slope. That was Hubbert’s curve.

    When a J curve suddenly appears in the downward slope… peak oil theory is proven wrong. Period. A bell curve does not predict a return almost to peak on the downward slope. A bell curve is not supposed to look like a camel’s hump.

    Hubbert was wrong about world production and wrong about U.S. production. There does not have to be a new peak to see that… though we are close. The interruption of the smooth downward slope by a J curve says it all. Hubbert did not take into account technology.

    Next, CFN will start saying the data are lies, like the CFN CW on BLS. That is the conspiracy theorist’s fallback when the data does not conform to his cockeyed theory.

    Or that fracking is a one year blip. I recall that was said in 2011. Then again in 2012, 2013, 2014… and Therian is still repeating it in 2015.

    Maybe it will be 2016 when shale oil production collapses? Or 2017?Or 2018? Always in the future… collapse is there waiting.

    A new energy source to make a new camel hump? That is too much magic! I’ve been hearing that refrain since 1970. Technology? Evil!

    • Therian April 10, 2015 at 1:24 pm #

      I have NEVER said fracking is a “one-year blip”. Neither did JHK. What he does say is that well lifetimes of fracking wells are about a year, 18 months max, which is why we have to drill tens of thousands of them.

      The “collapse” is the destruction of the middle class. It’s already happened and you missed it. Monetary Velocity in 2015 is actually lower than at the 2008 bottom. MUCH lower. Workforce Participation is at 38-year lows. A dollar of debt in 1960 produced $2.41 of GDP. Now a dollar of new debt adds THREE CENTS to GDP.

      People all around the US, but especially here in California, are moving around like Bedouins because they’re being economically chased out of their hometowns which they can no longer afford to live in. On the other hand, you’ve had a life of leisure for a long time and whatever is true of Asoka must be true of everybody, right? Until YOU are destroyed,it’s a “boom time”, right?

      Everything is about YOU YOU YOU. Reminds me of the old adage that “when your neighbor loses his job it’s a recession but when YOU lose your job it’s a depression”.

  114. wpa_ccc April 10, 2015 at 12:30 pm #

    Correction

    That is the conspiracy theorist’s fallback when the data do not conform to his collapsitarian theory.

  115. FincaInTheMountains April 10, 2015 at 12:51 pm #

    The disproportional amount of financial industry in US could be easily explained by the fact that large US banks conduct policy of colonial management and sucking of the resources of “developing” Nations through various “pure financial” mechanisms – various carry trades, currencies attacks, sovereign debt rip-off schemes. And of course, the all-time favorite – dollar printing. Under that neo-colonial scheme of running things, there is much less need in tangible industries.

    Obviously, that all requires huge amount of propaganda, that most of Western “economists” are involved in, starting from the FED chairman all the way down.

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  116. FincaInTheMountains April 10, 2015 at 1:35 pm #

    Vladimir Putin is facing a problem few could have anticipated: The ruble is becoming too strong.

    Last year’s worst-performing major currency is this year’s best and while that’s buoying the nation’s bonds, driving yields to the lowest in four months, it’s also crimping Russia’s export revenue.

    http://finance.yahoo.com/news/putins-surprising-ruble-problem-threatens-210001722.html

    • Therian April 10, 2015 at 2:26 pm #

      Re Putin: Do the opposite of what the talking heads would have you do. A month ago it was Russian collapse. Since then, the Templeton Russia Fund is up more than ten percent. Hilarious.

      Russia, unlike Japan and the Western Powers and even China has virtually zero foreign debt. Putin can just sit back and be amused by the absolute frenzy everyone’s getting into to discredit him.

  117. FincaInTheMountains April 10, 2015 at 1:46 pm #

    Project “Breakthrough” implies a transition from the demonstration of some innovative technologies in the field of fast neutron reactors to create a pilot demonstration plant with near-station nuclear fuel cycle.

    Russia is the only country that has extensive experience in the creation, optimization and development of fast neutron reactors, said the scientific head of the project “Breakthrough” Yevgeny Adamov.

    The project “Breakthrough” is implemented by the State Corporation “Rosatom” and involves the transition from the demonstration of some innovative technologies in the field of fast reactors to the world-class integrated solution – the establishment of pilot demonstration plant with near-station nuclear fuel cycle. Experimental demonstration power complex (ODEK) with BREST-300 will be built in Seversk, Tomsk region. The project is working to substantiate the effectiveness of the project commercial industrial reactor BN-1200.

  118. FincaInTheMountains April 10, 2015 at 3:45 pm #

    US is no longer satisfied with the vassal relationship with the EU, they need full and complete submission and looting of Europe. America is in a hurry, because the second wave of its internal structural crisis is already knocking at the door and you need to get at any price all the capital and material resources, and ignite the rest of the world.

    For the final enslavement of Europe, the United States promotes the signing of “Transatlantic Free Trade Agreement” (TTIP), where actually trade is irrelevant. The main element of the proposed treaty is full and unconditional subordination of the EU to the system of private arbitration courts, which serves American corporations. Here Jesuit logic of the agreement: a document should protect the interests of US companies in the European Union and, consequently, the American business should be able to force European governments to indemnify and repeal laws that are detrimental to the interests of US companies. Obviously, the European courts cannot provide such protection, and then European countries should submit themselves to decisions of private arbitration courts, in which US companies will defend their interests.

    To simplify things, it turns out that in practice, the American private courts will control everything: customs duties (they affect the profits of US companies), sanitary standards (cannot prohibit GMOs and meat with hormones which are made by US companies), financial rules for banks and investment funds (US banks – are sacred!) and even contracts for the purchase of oil and gas from Russia – revenues of US oil and gas companies even more important than income of US banks. This is the complete colonization. It is even steeper than what the US did to Russia in the 90s.

    Just one example of the consequences of signing TTIP – EU agriculture. Step one: the abolition of protective duties and permit imports of GMOs. Step Two: European farmers cannot compete with cheap American GMO products, and subsidies from the European states are abolished by private American courts. Step Three: The Europeans have to buy GMO seeds from US companies such as Monsanto. Step Four: European farmers are left without their own seed (GMO seeds can be bought only from Monsanto) and have to buy each year in the US and seeds and license to use, because DNA GMO seeds are protected by US copyright laws. As a result, in a few years, European producers to sow the field will have to buy a license, just as we are buying a license to use the American computer programs. This is not colonization, it is actually slavery.

    http://politrussia.com/world/nam-nuzhen-berlin-779/

  119. wpa_ccc April 10, 2015 at 4:54 pm #

    Therian: “well lifetimes of fracking wells are about a year, 18 months max”

    JHK’s pronouncements on fracking go back more than ten years and you and JHK both made a big deal out of EROEI on CFN related to oil prices and extraction rates/profits… all of which have been proven wrong.

    At one time unrest in the middle east was going to lead to $200 a barrel and economic collapse. Wrong. At one time the ppb of crude over $100 was supposed to lead to game over: societal collapse imminent. Wrong. Then it was if oil went under $50 a barrel. Wrong.

    Whatever happens a way is found to say that it is a negative development and will lead to disastrous consequences. QE will lead to hyperinflation, etc. All wrong.

    Now you comment on “well lifetimes.’ It is easy to make uninformed comments about fracking technology, well depletion rates, etc. But when you are proven wrong, at least be honest enough to own up and admit you suffer from uninformed paranoia.

    Do you even know about recent advances of ultra-light weight proppants (ULWPs) in fracking? Do you know about enhanced recovery methods like Huff-and-Puff? Do you know about multiple-well enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) or the effects of fracture initiation pressure in oriented perforation techniques (OPT) or the use of mechanical specific energy (MSE) to improve drilling rates?

    Instead of reading blogs on the internet, try reading serious researchers who publish in peer-reviewed journals like Applied Energy, Pure & Applied Geophysics, Marine & Petroleum Geology, Journal of Energy Resources Technology, Geothermics, Mechanics of Materials, etc.

    While critics like you are saying the same you have said for years about EROEI and well depletion, the industry is moving on, improving techniques and extraction rates.

  120. wpa_ccc April 10, 2015 at 6:52 pm #

    Therian: A month ago it was Russian collapse. Since then, the Templeton Russia Fund is up more than ten percent. Hilarious.

    Templeton Russia and East European Fund Inception date June 15, 1995

    Initial offering price ……….$15.00
    Closing price 4/09/2015 … $10.75

    Invest in Russia. Lose 25% of your money (plus fees). Hilarious, as Therian says.

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    • Therian April 11, 2015 at 1:05 pm #

      But I didn’t compare TRF to “initial offering price”. I compared it to the recent events where even deeper doom was forecast imminently and it did not come to pass. This is yet another disingenuousness ruse you’ve engaged in repeatedly over the years. You argue against points that posters did not make. That’s why you’re regarded seriously by maybe one or two posters. Every tactic you engage in uses some quiver from your illogical rhetoric bag of tricks: false attribution, claiming that a poster made a particular point (that he did not) and argue against that, cherrypicking data from weak journals, … the list is endless. But nice try. HILARIOUS!!!!

      • Therian April 11, 2015 at 1:08 pm #

        By the way, the reason why Russia’s Micex is down is largely because, UNLIKE THE EU AND US MARKETS, it’s not rigged via printed money. It actually floats freely. If you think the Dow would be at 18,000 without the rich getting tons of interest free money you don’t seriously think it would be above around 5000 or 6000 do you? If you do I have some swampland in Arizona to sell you.

  121. FincaInTheMountains April 11, 2015 at 12:40 pm #

    Idiots guide to crypto-colonial system

    The main feature of the modern crypto-colony is economic exploitation of natural resources and labor in favor of metropolis that necessarily leads to inhibition of economic development and degradation of the colony.

    The exact date of the signing of the Russian colonial agreement is June 2, 1992. That same day, Russia became the 165th member of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Over the next 3 months in accordance with the Convention of the IMF (one of the main authors – John Maynard Keynes) adopted the Law of the Russian Federation from 25.09.1992 N 3537-1 “On the monetary system of the Russian Federation.” Consisting of only 15 articles. The law puts very severe restrictions on self-management of the economy of the country.
    Under the Convention, adopted by the IMF and the law – the Central Bank has lost the right to credit the Government of the Russian Federation. How can then rubles be in circulation? The IMF has limited opportunities to one way – through the purchase of foreign currency at the exchange. Thus, the Central Bank could print rubles only as much as amount of dollars and other currencies were bought by CB on the open exchange.

    Robbery for the beginners. Level 1.

    We have found that severe restrictions on the IMF’s monetary emission led to the need for the huge flow of exports. In order to create a minimum of rubles for economic development – the country was forced to sell oil and gas.

    Instead to oblige the Central Bank to emit sufficient number of credit money supply for the economy (excluding seigniorage ~ 0.6%), Russia had to pay about $500 billion dollars for the privilege to have the ruble money supply.

    If we consider the scheme from the point of view of the Russian company – the robbery appears not to be there. The Russian company sells oil, gas, metals, and other resources for foreign currency. The company then sells currency at the exchange, and finally gets rubles, which you have to pay in taxes and salaries.
    And now consider the situation from the point of view of foreign financial holding company, having in the group Development Bank. Development Bank issues a loan of 10 billion dollars to Russian company extracting oil. The company produces and sells crude oil during the year oil foreign holding 5 billion dollars. Due to restrictions – Russian company is forced to sell all of the resulting currency to the Central Bank, in exchange for rubles. This is another15 billion dollars. The central bank, due to restrictions – forced to place these 15 billion dollars in securities of foreign holding.

    The result: Foreign holding without spending a single dollar, get oil worth 5 billion dollars.

    Robbery for the beginners. Level 2.

    The basis of the method is still foreign reserves. Relationships occur in the system of international lending.

    Consider the 4 participants in the financial market in Russia. (1) The Ministry of Finance, (2) a large commercial bank, (3) small commercial bank, (4) the average manufacturing company. Suppose that all these participants want to enter the market of international lending and borrow from an American bank.
    Interest rates on loans will be approximately (credit for 2 years) – for the Ministry of Finance (1) – 6% (2) – 8% (3) – 11% (4) – 15%. Loan currency – US dollars. All participants agreed to take the credit. International Development Bank gave each 1 billion dollars.
    Assume that each of these market participants immediately sells the currency received on the exchange. Foreign exchange reserves are increased by $4 billion dollars. The Central Bank places these 4 billion in Treasury securities of the US government by buying them from the lending bank. Circle is closed.

    Everything seems to be fair and square. But there is a difference in the rates and the rates, in turn, depend on the country’s credit rating. The system is fitted so that any developing country (in the terminology of the IMF) has severely limited credit ratings. International credit rating is set by 3 credit agencies.

    The difference in rates is enormous. 4 members of the Russian market were able to obtain credit in the average rate of 10%. Central Bank of Russia placed the foreign reserves in Treasury bonds at a floating rate, based on the discount rate the Fed. In fact, placement rate hovers around 2% -3%. – now it is much less.

    Outcome: Russian companies and banks take foreign loans at the rate of 10%, and place the resulting currency under 3%. The difference is 7% – if the size of the country to operate – is enormous. Take the average realized foreign reserves figure for 2009 as $ 400 billion dollars.

    Conclusion: The Russian economy annually pays 400 * 7% = 25-28 billion dollars in favor of the countries of the currencies of which makes up its foreign reserves.

    Robbery for the beginners. Level 3.

    Metropolis, besides that have great potential for collecting tax tribute from the developing countries. One of the easiest instruments is the discount rates of the Fed and the European Central Bank.
    If in any year in the US economy enters recession, the Fed responds instantly lowering the discount rate. Lowering for every 0.25% basic discount rate bring the US economy approximately 25 billion dollars per year.

    And the money is paid by Russia, China and other countries with large foreign exchange reserves.

    If metropolis wants the milk cows to slightly gain fat – they raise interest rates. This leads to a significant increase in economic activity and welfare of dependent countries.

    Our budget deficit – is your problem.

    US budget deficit a year is about 1.5 trillion dollars. A country can live with such a budget deficit only if the inflation in the country is approximately 15-16%. But actual US inflation is only about 3%. So, the rest of the country’s budget deficit must be offset from other sources. One of the main sources of balancing budget deficit is the colonial payments. Analyzing the worldwide amount of international reserves in different countries (about 12 trillion dollars.), it can be concluded that the budget deficit by at least 600-800 billion USD per year is compensated by other countries.

    Conclusion: The US national debt is the amount by which colonies were looted.

    And now turn our attention to a great board, set in the heart of New York City. It displays a meaningful number of public debt, which seems endless to anyone. But look at it from the other side. In the financial capital of the world is a monument to the greatness of the American metropolis. Monument to Great American Robbery. Each new billion dollars on this board – should cause awe in any American because the money had been withdrawn from the colonies and injected into the US economy. And while this number was not reduced – every American can be calm because the greatest financial minds of America care about them.

  122. wpa_ccc April 11, 2015 at 1:26 pm #

    Therian: “But nice try. HILARIOUS!!!!”

    Thank you, Therian. I appreciate your support. It makes me happy that you find my posts hilarious.

    I would contest your characterization of peer reviewed research as weak, but that is a popular misconception due to ignorance of how big science proceeds.

    See Derek de Solla Price’s Little Science, Big Science, a classic from 1963. It might amplify your understanding of the rules theoretically governing the life cycle and behavior of science. Your appreciation of international scientific networking through invisible colleges seems a bit… weak.

  123. fodase April 11, 2015 at 3:25 pm #

    By the way, the reason why Russia’s Micex is down is largely because, UNLIKE THE EU AND US MARKETS, it’s not rigged via printed money. It actually floats freely.

    that’s gotta be an all-time classic!

    yep, the russian market is not rigged!!

    thanks for making me laugh, almost out loud.

    btw, where did you get this information from hahaha, woohooooohooooo hahahahahahahah

    “load up on russian bonds” he said oh so smugly. HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA

    in real news, the Wind + The Sun generating about 30% of all electricity in Spain today.

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

    fodase

  124. lsjogren April 11, 2015 at 4:32 pm #

    Fodase, you seem pretty level headed in general, I’m surprised you are so out to lunch when it comes to renewable energy.

  125. wpa_ccc April 11, 2015 at 5:48 pm #

    lsjogren, could you explain how using alternatives to provide 30% of a nation’s electricity is “out to lunch”?

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  126. fodase April 11, 2015 at 6:46 pm #

    Fodase, you seem pretty level headed in general, I’m surprised you are so out to lunch when it comes to renewable energy.

    isjogren?

    Almost half of Spain’s electricity in March was generated by renewable sources — mostly wind and hydroelectric. About 22.5% was from wind and 17.5% from hydro, with the rest produced by solar PV, solar thermal, and thermal renewables.

    i mean, come on, what are you saying when almost HALF of Spain’s electricity was generated by out-to-lunch technologies?

    Spain is well on its way to 70-80% energy from wind+solar within 2-3 years.

    What do you say? How is this being out to lunch?

    Fossil fuels are used to create the alt energy infrastructure, yet studies show windfarms, for instance, generate 20-25 times more energy that they initially require from fossil fuels.

    How long before CFN caves and admits technology has solved allegedly endtymes cataclysms caused by The End of Fossil Fuels?

    Kunstler is so wrong about this it’s become laughable….Jimmy, show us how we’re so wrong about Spain, Germany, Denmark, Iceland, California whipping the Hubbert curve?

    Give it up guys, you lost a long time ago. Technology is continually saving the day.

    it’s become tiresome pointing out the stunning successes.

    fodase

  127. fodase April 11, 2015 at 7:41 pm #

    a BIG by the way, too –

    were 100 BILLION barrels of oil just discovered in England?

    the Death of the Oil Age has been greatly exaggerated.

    You can thank improvements in technology for this discovery and its eventual extraction.

    Anyone care to tear down this latest megadiscovery? How many more are out there?

    CFN endtymers are getting stale, oh so stale and looking more like Stonehenge dwellers with each triumph of modern man over purported resource shortages.

    fodase

    • Therian April 11, 2015 at 10:20 pm #

      Yeah, the end of the American middle class is just so many skeletons to be discretely placed in closets. What good will oil be if Bill Gates is right and robots will replace us in just about every task in life?

      People are distinctly ill-functioning when they have no mission in life but endless leisure. However, this world of self-driving cars and Amazon deliveries via drones will never arrive in full because life will become unbearably entropic way, way, WAY before then.

      I actually made a LIVING as a technologist and I’m acutely aware that it has enhanced life in its early days and DEGRADED it in recent days. Or do you think phone menu hell is an “improvement” over a human answering the phone? Does the idea of using technology to eliminate all face-to-face interaction with humans strike you as a positive step in our social evolution? If you answered “yes” then you might well have Asperger’s Syndrome.

  128. Pucker April 11, 2015 at 10:59 pm #

    To a certain extent, the illusory promise of racial equality may have been masked by the remarkable class and income equality in the US in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Even if the races weren’t equal in fact, they could still be economically equal because they could still work together on the assembly line. However, when the economy restructured, eventually morphing into a high tech, knowledge-based economy, the illusion of racial equality popped. Now the blacks are freaking out.

  129. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 2:24 am #

    Or do you think phone menu hell is an “improvement” over a human answering the phone?

    You robots get off my lawn! lol … you have a funny definition of hell. I have had very cordial casual conversation with phone robots who spoke perfect English, understood my request, and efficiently directed my call. It was better than dealing with humans.

    Does the idea of using technology to eliminate all face-to-face interaction with humans strike you as a positive step in our social evolution? If you answered “yes” then you might well have Asperger’s Syndrome.

    How dare you suggest we might have Asperger’s Syndrome… you who uses caps to scream at us and insult (nay deny) our intelligence; you who has trouble accepting data for what it is and is uncomfortable praising technology. You who mischaracterizes hell and dares to criticize robots.

    Give robots a few more years to improve. Follow Buddha’s example: be patient and practice lovingkindness. Screaming at us in caps really is not necessary.

    • Therian April 12, 2015 at 2:48 pm #

      Insult or deny your intelligence? What intelligence is that? The constant posting of “data” [sic] that you cut and pasted from an online article (often without citation) that makes you an “expert”? The LFTR post of yours is symbolic of your modus operandi here. You don’t really know jack about LFTRs and you’re prepared to share your ignorance with the world, disguised, of course, as your own painstaking research.

      Oh and here we go again with Buddhism as if you practice loving kindness (sorry, but I’m not a cultist so I insist it’s two words) here or anywhere else. You are the emperor who wears no clothes and you were unmasked here years ago. Why do you stay? To piss people off. That’s about it.

  130. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 2:36 am #

    To a certain extent, the illusory promise of racial equality may have been masked by the remarkable class and income equality in the US in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

    Pucker, what “remarkable class and income equality”?

    If you were a Black woman in the 1950s and 1960s, you had to struggle for basic human rights as both a woman and an African-American. There was no racial equality. There was apartheid and white terror in the form of beatings, bombings, rapes, and lynchings. Still, some brave Black woman stood up for dignity and for their humanity, insisting then, as we do now, that Black lives matter.

    http://www.shankerinstitute.org/sites/shanker/files/Cobblestone-pages-24-50.pdf

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    • Therian April 12, 2015 at 3:00 pm #

      White lives matter, too, and your beloved blacks commit rape, murder, and mayhem against whites at a far, far greater rate than whites commit the same against blacks. That’s not my opinion. That’s fact. Black America is a sad collage of poor education (because they drop out), horrible music (rap/hip-hop), uncivil behavior, and constant carping about “rights” while they don’t avail themselves of the favoritism of Affirmative Action and other policies which put blacks at the head of the line.

      Here in Palo Alto, CA the city of East Palo Alto is now largely Mexican and, what do you know, murder and violent crime rates have plummeted since the 1980s when EPA was almost entirely black. Mexicans here, illegal or not, actually work hard instead of trying to Three Card Monte the system.

  131. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 2:47 am #

    Now it makes sense why John Ellis “Jeb” Bush speaks Spanish and married Columba, a Mexican woman. He is a self-identified Hispanic!

    Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) identified himself as Hispanic in a 2009 voter registration application, according to a Miami-Dade County document published Monday by The New York Times.

  132. Pucker April 12, 2015 at 4:49 am #

    From “Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis”: “… Darleen left the marriage badly damaged, and all she will say about it today is that it was “a bad move.” After the split, Darleen got a job at Pizza Hut where she struck up a casual relationship with her boss, Joe. Within two months, she was pregnant.”

  133. Pucker April 12, 2015 at 5:18 am #

    In America in the Good ‘Ole Happy Days, you could graduate from high school, get a girl knocked up, get a working class job at a factory, buy a car and a house—live High-On-Hog!

  134. Pucker April 12, 2015 at 5:23 am #

    In the 1950’s and 1960’s in the US, one could be a redneck dumb ass and still live High-On-the-Hog.

  135. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 10:19 am #

    In the 1950’s and 1960’s in the US, one could be a redneck dumb ass and still live High-On-the-Hog except for rural poverty in Appalachia, Hispanic farmworkers dying in poverty in the fields, people of color living in red lined Jim Crow urban poverty, native Americans living in poverty on reservations, gays could be fired for who they are, women earned 67% of what men earned… Things were so bad in the 50s and 60s a rebellion against oppresion was inevitable as was a War on Poverty,

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    • Q. Shtik April 12, 2015 at 2:05 pm #

      rebellion against [oppresion] was inevitable

      • malthuss April 12, 2015 at 2:52 pm #

        ‘oppression’. What are you trying to tell him?

  136. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 3:39 pm #

    During the 1950s and the 1960s the civil rights movement made a real impact against the oppression of inequality and prejudice. The rights of Africans and then African-Americans had been wiped out during almost 400 years of oppression.

    Oppression. Watch the movie “12 Years a Slave” if you need a clue. Here is the CliffsNotes:
    http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/twelve-years-a-slave/at-a-glance

    • BackRowHeckler April 12, 2015 at 7:09 pm #

      You sound like a potential Elizabeth Warren voter.

      • wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 8:35 pm #

        Elizabeth Warren is not a candidate.

  137. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 5:39 pm #

    When they say, ” we want our America back”
    Well, what the…f%#k do they mean?
    Before the gays had their agenda, before the slaves were free
    Before that man from Kenya took the presidency

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8GWimVK6Sk

    • Q. Shtik April 12, 2015 at 8:33 pm #

      Yes, that’s what ‘they’ mean…before all that.

  138. Pucker April 12, 2015 at 6:37 pm #

    According to the author of the book, “Our Kids:The American Dream in Crisis”, during the 1950’s and 1960’s southern blacks fled the Deep South to northern cities like Chicago and Detroit to take highly paid jobs in factories and thereby live High-On-the-Hog. All of this reckless talk about “Oppression” and “Liberation” is not going to do a black person any good as no employer outside of government will hire them. Employers will hire the Mexicans. Blacks would be better off if they behave like Forrest whitaker’s character in the movie ” The Butler”.

  139. BackRowHeckler April 12, 2015 at 7:02 pm #

    To pick up an earlier thread …

    Pucker you mention a neighborhood in Palo Alto where Latin Americans became the majority, pushing blacks aside, and the neighborhood actually improved.

    PBS is giddy over the prospect of whites becoming a minority in the US — “New Demographics” — they talk about it all the time in their news hour, but it will only be a generation or two before these Latinos begin to identify with the majority culture and become another white ethnic group. I see it already happening.

    That might be the end of the Democrats identity politics campaign until they find another ethnic group to exploit … by whipping up grievances and race hatred, which then can be capitalized on, trading votes for promised largesse from the US Treasury.

    brh

    • malthuss April 12, 2015 at 9:26 pm #

      I thought Palo Alto was the home of the million dollar tear down.

  140. fodase April 12, 2015 at 7:03 pm #

    well, not much was resolved this week

    the battle lines are still drawn

    welles spouting off about solar and wind energy

    the cfn acolytes bleating meaningless endtyme phrases for lack of substance to argue one

    wpa_ccc countering nicely with incisive comments

    re the 50s and 60s, enough of this jack bullshit about ‘gee a guy could raise a family working one job’.

    it was a unique conflagration of circumstances, an expanding population thirsty to buy everything, and America the only place that had any real manufacturing…so the jobs were all here to satiate that demand.

    you can still do it today, you just have to be lots more intelligent about things – study something that pays 75-200K, don’t get into the debt trap.

    i see younguns all the time that have achieved this. it ain’t the proverbial rokkit scy.

    fodase

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  141. progress4what April 12, 2015 at 7:34 pm #

    “….that America would continue to dominate the global economy because its polity was sound. We have clearly blown that by rigging together a corrupt troika of banks, market swindlers, and captive eunuch officials who expanded the financial sector of the economy from 5 percent to more than 40 percent, largely by pillaging the middle class and destroying the basis of their income. The USA set the tone for 21st century magical finance, in which “wealth” was “created” by digital accounting fraud. The effects at home are visible on our landscape of suburban hyperwaste and decrepitating older towns and cities.” – jhk –

    Good stuff, JHK, embedded in another good week’s work.

    Not much point in commenting, though. Minds are made up. Asoka in his lying nastiness again dominates the board, now as wpa/ccc for some reason. DA furthers the illogic that size of the US population is not important – or some such. I’d make a response, but nobody would read it. Funny stuff about Duke, ColdN. When WAS travelling in basketball made legal? Sure did change the game for the worse. Kind of like when this strange system of nested comments was implemented here @ CFN.
    Howdy, right? Oh well.

  142. Pucker April 12, 2015 at 8:55 pm #

    One thing that Americans still make better than the competition is Bad Decisions.

    • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 9:00 pm #

      “AMERICA’S CHICKENS ARE COMING HOME TO ROOST!!!!”
      – Rev. Wright, while asking God to damn his home country –

      So you’re correct, pucker, IOW.

  143. progress4what April 12, 2015 at 8:55 pm #

    Who is blathering, Evelyn. It could be DA, vengur, fincain, janos, or malthus, based on where your comment appears in the “nest.”

    http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-school-of-globalism/#comment-234793

    Wow. Just wow.

  144. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 8:56 pm #

    P4W, you sound discouraged. Watch Hillary’s video and get out of your funk.

    The amazing thing in Hillary’s video is… it is 90 seconds into the video before you see Hillary. The video itself is inspiring because the star is you and me, the American people, multicultural, gay, lesbian, Northerners, Southerners, etc. … All are included. All are welcome in this great nation.

    I doubt we will ever see a Republican candidate who explicitly solicits input from all segments of the American public, including LBGTs. Hillary will get the growing LBG and transgender vote.

    It doesn’t matter which Republican is nominated. None of them have lived in the White House for eight years; none of them have been Secretary of State and visited 112 countries; none of them have been a Senator for New York state; none of the Republicans have anything like Hillary’s life experience and Hillary’s job experience.

    Hillary will easily raise more money than Sheldon Adelson or the Koch brothers are willing to donate to the Republicans. She may raise $5 billion. According to Cold, it is all about the money, so we will have another President Clinton, like it or not.

    It is reassuring. Doesn’t matter which white person wins: Hillary Rodham or John Ellis, because both favor immigration reform and because both are qualified to run the country. Very reassuring.

    The American people are wise and will choose well. They did in 2008 and 2012, anyway

    • progress4what April 12, 2015 at 9:46 pm #

      Asoka/epa/ccc/pkrugman/whatever/you’re/calling/yourself/this/week –

      You vile, uselessly provocative, needlessly argumentive, lying hater of truth and waster of bandwidth – over the past five years on CFN you have taught me more about the nature of deceit, deliberate obfuscation, and smarmy dissembling than any other human being or human sponsored spam robot on the entire WorldWideWeb.

      I did not know that genuine evil could consistently exist and incessantly pretend itself to be “good” until I discovered you here.

      So, thanks are in order, I suppose.

      Carry on.

  145. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 9:00 pm #

    Getting Started (Hillary’s video)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uY7gLZDmn4

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    • Q. Shtik April 12, 2015 at 10:24 pm #

      There is nothing more revolting than blind political ambition.

      I wonder what she paid for that under 3 minute video.

      What I fear the most is that if she gets in my brother-in-law will actually kill himself.

      • wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 11:49 pm #

        Q: “I wonder what she paid for that under 3 minute video.”

        Why do you think she paid anything for it? Money is speech, said the Republicans, and there is no need to reveal sources of your money, said the Supreme Court in the Citizens United case.

        For all we know China or Saudi Arabia or ISIS could be funding her… all legally. Republicans got what they wanted in Citizens United. It lets you play big in politics, keep your donors hidden and game the IRS. Great stuff.

        Perhaps the conservatives didn’t think far enough ahead to realize that Hillary can play the game more effectively than they can and now people like your brother-in-law are suffering needlessly.

        The coming eight years of a Hillary Rodham Cinton presidency won’t be so bad, though it was amusing to watch the anti-Hillary machine jump into action today and see certain people feign an apoplectic fit.

        It is going to be great political theatre this coming 18 months. I’m already enjoying it… and registering multicultural voters like cray cray.

  146. fodase April 12, 2015 at 9:05 pm #

    When WAS travelling in basketball made legal?

    basketball, UGH what a thugsport it has become, just like football

    talk of travelling. the PALMING of the ball is EGREGIOUS.

    basketball is symbolic of the decay that the US of America has become.

    it’s all devolved into despicable lowlifeness

    i havent watched it in years, good riddance to bad rubbish

  147. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 10:07 pm #

    than any other human being or human sponsored spam robot on the entire WorldWideWeb

    Interesting that you don’t consider autonomous robots as a possibility. Job security for humans!

    P4W, while we disagree on multiculturalism and immigration, I have enjoyed your posts over the years and consider you to be my brother in Georgia.

    Hope you are feeling better soon…

    • Q. Shtik April 12, 2015 at 10:34 pm #

      Hope you are feeling better soon… – wpa

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

      You could cut the disingenuousness with a dull butter knife.

      • wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 11:10 pm #

        P4W is suffering needlessly, and harming only himself, though his anger and hatred prevents him from seeing that.

        • progress4what April 13, 2015 at 12:08 am #

          I’m not suffering at all, you disingenuous sniveler, and certainly not from considering this multitudinous bullsh*t only once a week.

          There is much about you that is worthy of anger and hate, but I no longer care to help you understand. Go and sin some more.

          Nothing lasts forever.

  148. wpa_ccc April 12, 2015 at 11:51 pm #

    Q: “I wonder what she paid for that under 3 minute video.”

    Why do you think she paid anything for it? Money is speech, said the Republicans, and there is no need to reveal sources of your money, said the Supreme Court in the Citizens United case.

    For all we know China or Saudi Arabia or ISIS could be funding her… all legally. Republicans got what they wanted in Citizens United. It lets you play big in politics, keep your donors hidden and game the IRS. Great stuff.

    Perhaps the conservatives didn’t think far enough ahead to realize that Hillary can play the game more effectively than they can and now people like your brother-in-law are suffering needlessly.

    The coming eight years of a Hillary Rodham Cinton presidency won’t be so bad, though it was amusing to watch the anti-Hillary machine jump into action today and see certain people feign an apoplectic fit.

    It is going to be great political theatre this coming 18 months. I’m already enjoying it… and registering multicultural voters like cray cray.

  149. wpa_ccc April 13, 2015 at 12:41 am #

    “Nothing lasts forever.”

    P4W, this contradicts the Law of Conservation of Mass-Energy, which states that mass can neither be created nor destroyed.

    So, according to believers in science, mass-energy lasts forever.

    There is no non-circular proof of energy conservation. You just have to be a believer in scientism. Sorry, bud.

  150. Slaren July 8, 2021 at 6:51 pm #

    Unfortunately, our educational system is now geared to constant writing, which does not teach anything practical. I have already realized this for myself, engaged in self-education, found a special service that helps me solve current writing problems, it is such a thesis proofreading services and they have never failed me for what they have special praise. I hope that I was able to help you.

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