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The John Brown Moment

     When Gaia gets pissed off enough at the antics of humanity, she sends in her hit-man, Reality, to settle accounts. Reality is blessed with a cloak of invisibility. The human race is so busy concocting stories about what it is doing, that Reality steals onto the scene unnoticed – until bodies start to fall over, and the sort of bad political weather known as a shit-storm fills the skies, the streets, and the assembly halls.
     One of the cockamamie stories circulating this week is that the Euro bailout of broke member nations is fait accompli, baked in the cake, a done deal, no problemo, because the December 2011 Long Term Refinancing Operation makes it so. The European Central Bank can supposedly eat bad bond paper until the cows come home without choking to death at the same time that it can run a back-door money-printing racket without the results showing up in currency degradation. And the Greeks will bend over and receive what they’ve got coming good and hard because, well, they are Greeks, and it is their way!
     Excuse me, but something’s got to give. History is a lot of things, but it is not silly putty. Its cousin, Reality, slips through it performing its deeds one way or another. The Greeks have lately remembered some of their own history. The Germans have beset them before, they now recall, and some of the money currently labeled “debt” may have been filed incorrectly, the Greeks say. It actually belongs in the folder labeled “war reparations.” (Granted, it is hard to read folders when you are bending over so far that things look upside-down.) Germany, it happens, remembers too the last time that this folder was flopped out on the table. Things didn’t work out so well for the Weimar finance ministry in those dark days ninety years ago.
    Meanwhile, Athens and several other Greek cities ignite in an overture to what might come to be called the European Spring.
     Reality steals onto the scene bearing a message from Mother Gaia: “None of your shenanigans make the numbers add up. The European financial arrangement will blow up because it must.” Therefore, expect it to blow up. Germany will not keep pounding sand down the rat-hole of PIIGS insolvency for another year. Anyway, the proverbial can that everyone was kicking down the road – it fell down the rat-hole, too, so there is nothing left to kick except Greek civil servants, both current and retired and, alas, they represent that part of the Greek economy not occupied by olive cultivation, which is to say most of it. It turns out, when you kick Greeks down the road (probably Spaniards, Italians, Portuguese, and Irish, too) sparks fly off them and things catch fire.
     The bottom line seems to be that Europe can either go broke or burn down, or do both. But it can’t go back to what it was doing before: pretending to be rich and care-free.
     Over on this side of the Atlantic, America’s experiment in pervasive control fraud took a new turn with the pretended “settlement” of massive, widespread, robo-signing allegations that will allow a bunch of “the usual suspect” TBTF banks off the hook from future liability and criminal prosecution resulting from hundreds of billions of dollars worth of swindles. The TBTF banks will have to pay, when all the “principal reduction credits” and other dodgy subtractions are made, a couple of billion altogether, which is obviously little more than a cost of doing business for such supernaturally fabulous returns. And then that is supposed to be the end of the whole disgusting episode.
      Last to cave in on this legally squooshy agreement between fifty states was New York’s own Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, newly enlisted in the elite national corps of cads, bounders, and sell-outs. This was the week that the same Schneiderman agreed to lead President Obama’s so called Mortgage Fraud Task Force, which, any child of eight can see, is a smokescreen to conceal the fact that the US Department of Justice has failed to initiate any action whatsoever in the vast and gruesome pageant of fraud that has transformed the rule of law into a rule of larceny.
     Do you think the late Whitney Houston was a lost soul? Then look for the soul of your country – if you can find it in the wilderness of self-denial, self-double-dealing, and suicidal self-perfidy that it has blundered into with eyes wide shut. No lie is now too big for the United States to swallow. If Europeans ignite and blow up when kicked down the road, here is what will happen to America: it will blunder down its own road until it reaches the next John Brown moment. John Brown put his proverbially famous body in the middle of that road some ways back. He mounted an insurrection at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, in an attempt to fast-track the abolition of slavery. Brown was hanged in 1859, but less than two years later the Civil War commenced, the greatest convulsion in our history. So far.
     Slavery was yesteryear’s abomination in America as pervasive control fraud is today’s. Somewhere out in America right now is the new American John Brown, a righteous fanatic whose act is waiting to alter the course of history. The next John Brown will also precipitate what was a long time coming. Reality is busy in the background, even while we blog and dither, setting things up.

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About James Howard Kunstler

View all posts by James Howard Kunstler
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.

1,186 Responses to “The John Brown Moment”

  1. Nicholas Frank February 13, 2012 at 9:42 am #

    James, your amusingly serious words in your books Geography of Nowhere and The Long Emergency (among others) have been buzzing in my head for years and I have urged many to read them. My numerous years of thinking about how to go from sprawl to a sustainable social, economic, and environmental reality is beginning to take shape. On February 18 our group will hold an advisory meeting to start laying our nonprofit organizational foundation to take the first step, “The Holigent Seed Project,” toward a local to global transition program that could prepare communities to survive and thrive in the approaching collapse. I know we live far apart but if you happen to be in our neighborhood (Los Angeles) I invite you (and others) to join our meeting. See Contact at http://www.holigent.org

  2. kulturcritic* February 13, 2012 at 9:42 am #

    James, I am not sure what is worse the Superbowl or the Grammys as a diversion from our pressing realities. kulturCritic
    http://kulturcritic.wordpress.com/posts/war-games-comic-relief-and-diversionary-tactics/

  3. TrE February 13, 2012 at 9:44 am #

    Great post, Jim.(Interesting that you talk about Gaia’s coming revenge; I’m currrently enjoying a great book about permaculture, Gaia’s Garden.)
    Although you’re not a Doomer, your ongonig work does encourage us to become more self-reliant and better prepared for a very different reality. We sincerely appreciate it—thanks also for introducing us to Orlov, Foss, and others who help keep our eyes open. I managed to mention all of you (and even the new National Geographic reality show about preppers) in yesterday’s post.
    http://newveganage.blogspot.com/2012/02/prepper-culture-practical-choice-for.html

  4. jimbolio February 13, 2012 at 9:48 am #

    Excellent read this week, Jim.

  5. RyeBeachBum February 13, 2012 at 9:57 am #

    US and European finances are at the brink. I wonder what about Asia, I heard there are 60,000,000 unsold condos in China, and that all that money the ROC supposedly has was put into infrastructure, so that they do not have much financial leeway left either. When the Asian economies start looking sick then the Sh*t will really start hitting the fan.

  6. jgalt6 February 13, 2012 at 9:58 am #

    Your comments, warnings, about the next John Brown will surely get the attention of our Injustice Department and the Homeland Insecurity Agency, as they monitor their wayward children, us. Your voice is too strident and consistent for their taste, that I am sure. Hope you, and we, can avoid being incarcerated in one of their concentration, nee rest, camps. Our marxist administration is counting on chaos and violence this summer to further their grip on power, as they suck the lifeblood from our once-great country.

  7. The Mook February 13, 2012 at 9:59 am #

    This will be the big one, forget WWIII. Armed and ready in PA.

  8. The Mook February 13, 2012 at 10:02 am #

    All the musicians who praised Whitney Houston at the Grammys made Nascar people (and football coaches)look intelligent. At least Paul McCartney’s performance was crackhead free and spot on.

  9. RyeBeachBum February 13, 2012 at 10:03 am #

    I also wonder how long before the fraud of the US public pension schemes is revealed. Like in Greece and Europe, our public employees with their lifetime Defined Benefit Plans, are woefully unfunded, and can not be sustained. Many of those are to be going reduced sharply or even traded in for a small lump sum payment.

  10. RyeBeachBum February 13, 2012 at 10:07 am #

    I thought that it was 49 states, that Oklahoma did not agree.

  11. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 10:08 am #

    EXAMPLES OF AMERICAN BELIEF THAT REALITY DOESN’T AFFECT US: [1] All urban/suburban housing erected above ground since the invention of nuclear weapons and especially hydrogen thermo-nuclear devices, which of course suck up houses like 400 mph tumbleweeds; [2] Continued use of drinking water to flush turds away as opposed to implementation of either composting or incinerator toilets; [3] Sending millions of antisocial illiterates to “high” school; [4] Abolishing the military draft in 1973; [5] Constructing the interstate highway system to encourage urban sprawl in utter obliviousness to the effect such an enterprise would have on rail transportation; [6] Government assent to construction of tens of millions of giant work trucks with obvious intent to employ them as privately owned vehicles rather than what they were designed for, namely work, to exploit the loophole in the fleet mileage standards passed by congress after the oil embargo; [7] The government not learning anything from the Indochina debacle.
    Let’s face it: we’re assholes!

  12. mika. February 13, 2012 at 10:08 am #

    our once-great country
    ==
    There’s nothing great about living off stolen war booty. Stolen war booty from World Wars that you financed and engineered. You are a nation of imperialist thieves and mass murderers. The most disgusting bunch of low-life animals since the days of Imperial Rome.

  13. deni February 13, 2012 at 10:10 am #

    Do Americans have what it will take to kick the bums out? Sadly, I doubt it. What is necessary will be a Herculean effort which simply does not possess any compatibility with our well entrenched national psychology of consumption, celebrity and success. A serious response will only begin when it is light years too late to actually effect the changes needed to free ourselves from the lifestyles and psychology of the rich and famous (the destructive and sociopathic monsters running things). Will Americans be capable of living with and, more importantly, accepting the ugly truth that they will have to live with less, a lot less – and like it? Absolutely not – absolutely. Our national lifestule is homicidal. Proof? Ask the long legacy of the dead for proof – the hundreds of thousands of Afghanis, Pakistanis, Iraqis, Vietnamese, Central Americans and the soon to be dead Iranians. We’ve murdered millions since the two grand went down in the towers and nary a peep from us compared to how much effort we spend convincing ourselves that our personal lives have a deeper meaning than the deaths of millions. You can only continue murdering innocents, that’s INNOCENTS, children, women, the aged and infirm and destroying civilizations for so long before Mother Earth and the gods above wave their hands and lay the big STOP order into our lives. Of course, this process will involve many of our own innocents, but, sadly, putting an end to our murder and mayhem will not include discriminatory decisions. A simple truth – the lushness and abundance of America is, ultimately, anti-life. It costs many lives elsewhere for us to “LIVE LARGE” and like all processes of excess, it finally turns on itself and begins devouring its own flesh. Good luck to all! Hang on tight because it’s going to be a wild ride!

  14. 3rd Generation February 13, 2012 at 10:19 am #

    I LIKE the part about ‘when he was hanged’.
    When WILL that commence here ?
    Whitney Houston got off easy.
    America, a POS Nation of Nothing, save for liars, cheaters, fraudsters, two-faced punks and felons.
    RUMBLE. Coming soon to your neighborhood. America WILL get bent over-the-rail, just like Greece, only much, much worse. LA/Watts/Chicago and New Jersey will look like picnics under blue skies with unicorns in residence, I predict.
    tick, tick, tick (Oops, 60 Minutes uses this too).

  15. newworld February 13, 2012 at 10:19 am #

    John Brown came from a confident WASP sub-culture with no self doubt about its supremacy, none. The only doubt about the Transcedentalists was from Melville and that was tepid in its critique.
    Better rethink this one Jim, there is no John Brown in America. America wants neck flames.
    The above written by a WASP with a family heraldic from the Danelaw.

  16. Jack Acme February 13, 2012 at 10:23 am #

    Mr. Kunstler,
    “And the Greeks will bend over and receive what they’ve got coming good and hard because, well, they are Greeks, and it is their way! . . . (Granted, it is hard to read folders when you are bending over so far that things look upside-down.)”
    Your hyperbolic rants are often laugh-out-loud funny, but the sentences above are just sad. They remind me of the sniggering, infantile homophobia of grade-school boys circa 1957. You should leave that crap to Mel Gibson. You’re better than that.

  17. endofworld February 13, 2012 at 10:33 am #

    Yup–had to read Jim’s missive to know we are surronded by bullshit–cant change anything outside of me own life so try to live my own with as much dignity and grace that i can muster.thats my solution…

  18. Al Klein February 13, 2012 at 10:35 am #

    Mika…
    Spot on!
    “Auferre trucidare rapere falsis nominibus imperium atque ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant.”

  19. AllisonV12 February 13, 2012 at 10:38 am #

    So a summary would be,fake rattle and roll.
    With the fake being the Euro and American bank loan sharking scheme starting to spin out of control and the stopgap measures.
    The rattle would be a mob of tear gassed huffing Greeks burning down a few touristy shops and overturning a few iPhone Apple carts.
    The roll would be a Jim Brown moment of suicidal desperation the would ignite the seething credit card slavery state of mind into outright rebellion.
    The Yin and Yang of Mad Max dystopia has two versions
    With a little love we all can live in some Upstate Nirvana commune with wind generators ,heirloom vegetable seeds and a hairy pit girlfriend tending your needs.
    I must admit it is more entertaining then most comments coming from the Neanderthals about gold guns and forty acres of bunkers and concertina wire.

  20. Jon Flatley February 13, 2012 at 10:38 am #

    Well done! We need more folks like you around. Then we wouldn’t have the mess we have now!

  21. Al Klein February 13, 2012 at 10:41 am #

    Bubblehead, you are absolutely correct. We are assholes. And those of us who are not assholes are yet still assholes for allowing the primary assholes set the agenda and rule the day.

  22. Widespreadpanic7 February 13, 2012 at 10:42 am #

    I don’t know, Jim; According to the talking heads this morning on CNBC the situation in Greece is pretty much settled. Nothing really to worry about from that quarter. Sure, there are some hotheads in Athens, rioting in the streets, burning the place down, but that’s to be expected. After all, thay can no longer retire at age 35 and have the Germans pay for it. I’d be pissed too! Meanwhile the Dow is headed for an all-time record of 15000 sometime in early summer. Here in the USA Buffalo Wings and Gasoline are still readily available, altho Gas is getting a little bit pricey. I hope the price come down so we can once again go cruising for burgers this summer in our 8 cylinder Silverados.
    –WSP7

  23. highcountry February 13, 2012 at 10:44 am #

    This was just published at The Land Report:
    “Since the President of China is touring Iowa farm country next week, there is a obvious push for foreign ownership of farm land to feed their growing populations. Higher wages in China are pushing up the standard of living there and the population is demanding more western style food and thus more grain fed products and higher prices for the the farm land they buy.”

  24. steve February 13, 2012 at 10:45 am #

    who or what is “gaia” – maybe the next john brown? And, then, Jack raises the hoary spectre of “homophobia” – whatever that is

  25. anglo February 13, 2012 at 10:46 am #

    Very well said !!!

  26. ront February 13, 2012 at 10:50 am #

    “They remind me of the sniggering, infantile homophobia of grade-school boys circa 1957. You should leave that crap to Mel Gibson. You’re better than that.”
    Well said, Jack. I fully agree with your observation and suggestion to JHK.

  27. Al Klein February 13, 2012 at 10:52 am #

    Let’s not forget another part of Reality: THe engines of production, as Marx called them. As JHK says, there’s a gigantic load of valueless paper floating aboout in the world. That includes most “financial instruments and products”, such as derivatives, as well as specie. OK, so it all collapses. What then? Who has the capacity to restructure and take their lives forward? Well, in the EU that would be Germany. They have the productive capacity and the productinve workers. Elsewhere it’s China. Same thing. Plenty of factories and plenty of willing, produvtive workers. And the moral of this story? The Greeks better start learning German and we better start learning Mandarin. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who will be barking the orders in the future. Thgis advice is of course only useful to those who actually survive the adjustment/reckoning period.

  28. anglo February 13, 2012 at 10:53 am #

    For god’s sake buy yourself a dictionary.

  29. LaughingAsRomeWasBurningDown February 13, 2012 at 10:54 am #

    JHK, great column this week. Expected to hear a Santorum riff in there somewhere after the Greek buttsex jab (pardon the pun).
    Laughing as Athens was burning down. Just doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it? Greece, Rome, it’s all just a big toga party to us anyway.

  30. Smokyjoe February 13, 2012 at 10:54 am #

    I don’t think the US of A will see it’s “John Brown Moment” until it is a rearview-mirror event.
    I also don’t know if CF Nation readers saw this slide show from the Sunday NY Times, about the “Ghost Estates” of Ireland. Have a look and listen:
    http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/02/10/magazine/ireland-ghost-estates.html?src=tp&smid=fb-share
    Having just been there, I can tell you, they are not us. They were, briefly, during the Boom. Now they are saying “Aw, begorrah, we are poor again. That’s normal in Ireland. What the HELL were we thinking? Yes, I’ll have another please.”
    And the result? They are bulldozing these greed-fueled “developments” back to farmland, because Suburbia has no future, and they know it. I admire the Irish sense of fatalism…we Yanks could use it.

  31. ront February 13, 2012 at 10:55 am #

    “…try to live my own with as much dignity and grace that i can muster.thats my solution…”
    Endo, you are on target with this attitude.
    “If you want to awaken all of humanity, then awaken all of yourself; if you want to eliminate the suffering in the world, then eliminate all that is dark and negative in yourself. Truly, the greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation.” — Lao Tzu

  32. empirestatebuilding February 13, 2012 at 10:58 am #

    I spent the entire day yesterday watching The Walking Dead marathon. And by waling dead I mean the AMC series, not coverage of the Euro Debt Crises and the Mortgage settlement scheme.
    There is also a new series on Nat Geo called Preppers. People prepping for the end of civilization. I’m prepping too. And by prepping I mean doing enjoying the time we have left and not worrying about what will come.
    Aimlow Joe was here
    http://www.aimlow.com

  33. loveday February 13, 2012 at 11:04 am #

    Hey Jim
    Yup, all the sirens are screaming, the red flags are flying, and the game kick off is just a few weeks away. Beware the Ides of March. Even the internet is scheduled by the FBI to be partially shut down due to infected servers in March, according to their website. Sure whatever.
    Meanwhile, Obummer blunders around further alienating any miniscule residual support he may still have… “Middle class taxes are going up, get used it”. What? What middle class? I thought that particular class has been extinct for over 2 years. His crowning achievement to date is the settlement he forced on the country to protect banks from prosecution for mortgage fraud. Really breathtakingly disgusting. I wonder what he sees in the mirror these days, or has he just had all mirrors removed from his vicinity in true vampiric style.
    In Greece I think a point of no return has been reached. The masses simply have no choice, they must openly revolt or they won’t survive, literally. It is just that simple. So, the battle lines have been drawn and the mortal struggle commences in earnest. Maybe a modern day Greek hero will emerge to visit hubris on the savagely arrogant bankers. We can at least hope. Perhaps the Gods and Goddeses will put in an appearance, why not? The world is a very strange place these days.
    cheers clusterfuckers,
    loveday

  34. ozone February 13, 2012 at 11:08 am #

    Jim,
    Great posting; maybe it’s time to change your name to: James Cassandra Kunstler! (You must admit, it has a certain reckless panache to it, eh? ;o)
    Nice DJ name, too! Put your slickest shades on, lean to the side with arms crossed over your chest and intone your awesome moniker in a low menacing voice: “Yeeah, I AM Master Jimmyjam CK, who needs to know?”
    ANYhoo, as to this:
    “Do you think the late Whitney Houston was a lost soul? Then look for the soul of your country – if you can find it in the wilderness of self-denial, self-double-dealing, and suicidal self-perfidy that it has blundered into with eyes wide shut. No lie is now too big for the United States to swallow. If Europeans ignite and blow up when kicked down the road, here is what will happen to America: it will blunder down its own road until it reaches the next John Brown moment.” -JHK
    Yep. And the large problem with that explosive moment, is that it will likely be seized by the corn-one nazis who feel their time has finally come. This is probably because of the immature nature of our “culture” and that our knee-jerk reaction to crises is akin to a 3-yr-old’s tantrum in the horror-filled realm of the candy aisle. Try telling a bloated ‘Murkin that he can’t have what is unavailable, and their response will be to cleave to any huckster who tells them lies of perpetual abundance, withheld from them by comm’uh’nust lib’ruls.
    You’re right, we’ve become a nation of bullshittery (tm, MyrtleMay). Bullshit artistes, braying to those who fervently wish to be bullshitted.
    “Pretendering is more funner than harsh-y stuff like reality! I thought YOU were bringin’ the Doodles; or were you just pretendering?” -New ‘Murkin Brownshirt

  35. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 11:08 am #

    We are programmed in this all encompassing consumer culture to “get along by going along” in effect unthinkingly caving in to all the assholes so as to avoid ruffling anyone’s feathers. Just try running a service business where the stated policy is “no assholes will be served”. At one location the landlord started giving us shit for not waiting on unreasonable people saying that he did himself as a matter of course. What that taught me was this: persons who object to such a policy are themselves assholes and part of the problem. It was largely because of him that I refused to buy that business in his building since operating the business would have entailed dealing with him and his asinine expectations such as attempting haircuts on people who were so inarticulate they couldn’t even describe what it was that they wanted. Other people, not our customers themselves, actually expected us to attempt haircuts on babies who were incapable of sitting down. If we refused such ridiculous requests they would verbally assault us accusing us of being hungover or high on drugs! Then when you evict them from the shop they file bad reviews with Angie’s List. Fuck all of them. This country sucks. The person above who said we’re mass murderers on a global scale is essentially correct, unfortunately. Just take a look at the drug war we’re currently prosecuting in Latin America. People forget that coca leaves are a legal product there and there would be no cross border smuggling without American demand for such products. Yes indeed we are a nation of assholes and will get our just desserts.

  36. ccm989 February 13, 2012 at 11:08 am #

    Reality is a bitch, I hear. Reality is something that most people deal with daily and others ignore blithely. Facts have gotten very flexible lately (FOX News anyone?). The new reality is not dealing with any reality until it bites you, hard. But things could still be fixed. The rich could be taxed on their dividends and interest at 30% instead of the current 15%. Tariffs could be put on all Chinese imports. And the humongous subsidies for Wall Street and Big Oil and Big Ag could be taken away (but probably won’t because Congress is in bed with them with the window curtains open for everyone to see). So we can either vote in people who try to do the right thing or people who will do whatever their big money masters tells them because they have a direct line to them (President Romney, Sheldon Adelson is on the line for you and he wants you to blow up Iran because he owns you).
    None of it looks good. The NYT carried a very interesting article Sunday – http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/12/us/even-critics-of-safety-net-increasingly-depend-on-it.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2
    The recipients of most social welfare type programs are very willing to take the government handouts and then bite the hand that feeds them because the recipients can’t admit the fact that THEY are the losers who can’t cut it in today’s economy so they blame the government or Obama or somebody, anybody else BUT themselves. Its funny that the majority of Medicare recipients are actually older, white folks but when polled, those very same people thought the majority of recipients were black people living in ghettos! Those pesky fact things!
    So John Brown is coming, huh? Just hope its not Rick Santorum. Ugh, creepiest creep of the Republican Creep Fest. Makes Flip Romney look reasonable. So get your guns loaded, folks, and check your supplies of canned goods and bottled water. Because your neighbor, who enrolled his 5 kids in the school breakfast/lunch programs and takes the Earned Income Credit, cause he can’t support his own family has his own economic collapse program too -– take Your Stuff with his gun. And he’ll probably tell ya what a good Christian he is too.

  37. noel bodie February 13, 2012 at 11:12 am #

    Happy 200 Charles Dickens: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Was he talking about the 1% and the Greeks, Irish,etc? Like Jim I think we are just now viewing “previews of coming attractions”.

  38. ozone February 13, 2012 at 11:12 am #

    LOL! Now thet thar be some dry snark!
    Good ‘un, WSP.
    :o)

  39. ozone February 13, 2012 at 11:17 am #

    Oh, as to bullshit and the bullshitted upon, here’s a fine example:
    Rick Santorum for President of The United States.
    You’ve GOT to be fucking kidding me. This is what we’ve come to? Jesus wept. WTFTSTFizzat?

  40. pedal pusher February 13, 2012 at 11:18 am #

    The growing power of the corporation over the now skeletal nation-state is at work here. The government won’t prosecute the corporate masters because it can’t. Governments are no longer in control – neither here nor abroad. The concept of ‘nationhood’ has been reduced to little more than a motif – a design element, if you will, much devoid of its original function.
    Meanwhile the masses are given fireworks on the Fourth of July, wear flag pins, sport patriotic bumper stickers and gladly send their sons and daughters off to resource wars. The maintenance of the illusion that such behaviors are done for “God and Country” is a necessary part of society’s transition from an organizational framework centered on nationalism to one based entirely on corporate oligarchy.
    Culturally, the ice has been officially broken with Romney’s declaration that “corporations are people too.” Soon we will hear such phrases as “corporate rights” and even “corporate Sovereignty” being bantered about.
    “My sheep will know their master.” JC

  41. ozone February 13, 2012 at 11:22 am #

    Yeah, and what was that old and moldy lesson about supply lines? Oh, that’s right… the longer they are; the more easily they’re cut. Oopsie.

  42. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 11:23 am #

    Is it not amazing the lack of comprehension, by the vast majority of humans, of the magnitude of the catastrophic forces over hanging the future of the Earth?
    An apropos article in SAGE Journals, a few days ago, by APS (Association for Psychological Science) “Bright Minds and Dark Attitudes: Lower
    Cognitive Ability Predicts Greater Prejudice Through Right-Wing Ideology and Low Intergroup Contact”.
    From the study’s abstract: “In an analysis of two large-scale, nationally representative United Kingdom data sets (N = 15,874), we found that lower general intelligence (g) in childhood predicts greater racism in adulthood, and this effect was largely mediated via conservative ideology. A secondary analysis of a U.S. data set confirmed a predictive effect of poor abstract-reasoning skills on anti-homosexual prejudice, a relation partially mediated by both authoritarianism and low levels of
    inter-group contact. All analyses controlled for education and socioeconomic status.”
    The article explains the allure of conservative authoritarianism, to many in the lower economic arena, by elucidating the impact of lower levels of general intelligence exhibited during childhood. The authors contend that those with reduced cognitive ability are enamored by right-wing ideologies which are socially conservative, authoritarian, prejudicial, resistant to change and promote inter-group inequalities.
    Read the entire research article at: http://pss.sagepub.com/content/23/2/187.full.pdf+html
    SNAFU

  43. charliefoxtrot February 13, 2012 at 11:24 am #

    heh heh heh…! “in bed with the curtains open” THAT S funny! sadder’n’fuck, but funny…

  44. LaughingAsRomeWasBurningDown February 13, 2012 at 11:27 am #

    The corn-pone nazis gearing up here in Tennessee at least. Got one of those “papers please” citizenship laws in the works now, since we saw how well it worked out for Alabama. And taking all mentions of slavery out of our schoolbooks. Tennessee Uber Alles!

  45. WestCoast February 13, 2012 at 11:28 am #

    Jack Acme,
    Two old Greeks are talking,
    One says,
    “I’m thinking of going back to to Greece”
    the other replies,
    “I think I’ll stick with Vaseline”.
    “Homophobia” a phoney activist invented word created for the purposes of attempting to semantically ignore the majority of society’s disgust at the promotion of homosexuality.
    How about an alternate? “Degeneraphobia”?

  46. lsjogren February 13, 2012 at 11:31 am #

    If you want an even more dismal outlook consider this.
    The people that comment here one would hope would offer the best hope of providing some solutions to the mess mankind is in.
    But for the most part I would say people here are at least as delusional as those who are currently in charge.
    What solutions do we find here: Of course there are the obligatory leftists that feel what we need is happy motoring under an even more centralized and authoritarian government.
    Or Tea Partiers that think all our problems can be fixed by simply restoring fidelity to the Constitution. Try to fix Peak Oil that way!
    Then we have the Back To the Stone Age folks. Hey, you are probably right that’s where we’re headed but it’s nothing to be happy about. Do you realize when those surviving humans are feeding themselves by traditional farming methods, things like modern medicine will be a thing of the past?

  47. george February 13, 2012 at 11:34 am #

    Sadly, America is not alone when it comes to the game of self-delusion. Witness the behavior of our once-rational Canadian brothers and sisters, who decided to put their country’s future in the hands of a bunch of Dick Cheney wannabes whose goal is to turn the entire area from north of the 49th parralell to the Arctic circle into a giant playground for multinational oil companies. The human race has been badly served by leaders who tell the tell the populace comforting fairy tales while fleecing them at every opportunity. Meanwhile, here in the Motorless city, the Obama administration has cancelled all plans for light rail while the city cuts bus service and those without a car wonder how they’ll function now that they have no way to get to the grocery store, doctors’ office etc.

  48. sevenmmm February 13, 2012 at 11:38 am #

    Ha! So far!
    It is funny the Greeks elected airheads in the first place, the reason they took the Euro credit hook line and sinker.
    But what really gives the whole of the Greek Nation the title “airheads”, is the fact they burn their own buildings.
    Sure, I might sit here on my ass reading blogs from time to time, but would much rather go dither fishing than try to convince the “American Nation” of airheads not to burn their own buildings, as they will.
    Coming soon to a town near you!

  49. charliefoxtrot February 13, 2012 at 11:57 am #

    google ‘medicine is the leading cause of death’ and see for yourself… i would link to it for your convenience if i knew how…

  50. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:58 am #

    You have not been to LA lately!
    LA Times did a story on the ‘defend illegals’ rally in Nashville [yikes]
    ‘The corn-pone nazis gearing up here in Tennessee at least.’
    Those who what US borders defended are not Nazis.
    Are you a nazi?

  51. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 12:00 pm #

    The article explains the allure of conservative authoritarianism,
    Im in LA..plenty of ‘Liberal’ ‘authoritarianism
    here.
    Let the Scientists stick to science, not ‘social’ “science”.

  52. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 12:03 pm #

    To Charliefoxtrot
    I raise a glass to you, prost!

  53. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 12:04 pm #

    I am well aware. Hospitals KILL.
    WH just died, perhaps it was the pills.
    50,000 a year in US die from those pills, yes?

  54. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 12:05 pm #

    To Widespreadpanic7
    Thanks for the kind words last week. I enjoy your posts also.

  55. bearfoot February 13, 2012 at 12:06 pm #

    john, do you know what a “marxist” administration would look like, do you think that ayn had a clue? neither do i! good luck with the dreamscape!

  56. newworld February 13, 2012 at 12:09 pm #

    How do you explain the low cognitive abilities of blacks, hispanics and Amerinds? Are you white liberals so dumb, so blinded with anti-White hatred you cannot process any logic?
    Do you think the big city public schools with their 50% graduation rate are turning out coupon clipping young white bread Republicans?
    I guess being white and “liberal” means nothing but being an anti-white these days, or you submerge yourself in a nearly irrelevant cult like the vegans or the oildrum world is gonna burn up cult, and safely out of harms way.

  57. jerry February 13, 2012 at 12:10 pm #

    John Brown was a famous figure in the abolition movement and got hung; yet, William Still was a key figure in the Underground Railroad and the movement of slaves into the North and Canada. His role is known by only a few compared to the role John Brown played.
    On the EU—if the Greek people continue to gather momentum and protest by the millions, they will be a game changer when their elections come up in the spring. It will change the face of the world’s economic problems!!!
    It appears that China’s output is slowing. Consumerism is also slowing not only in the U.S, but in the EU, as well. What the GOPies seem to fail to understand is that austerity doesn’t improve an economy or Treasury revenues. It shrinks the economy and causes hardship; therefore, can destroy an economy no matter how much they wish to shrink the public sector. It will create more foreclosures and business failures.
    The Fed is out of ammunition to improve the economy. The GOP are a bunch of extremely regressive morons and idiots.
    Here is quote from Macbeth:
    “The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
    Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
    that struts and frets his hour upon the stage;
    And then is heard no more. It is a tale
    Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury
    Signifying nothing.”
    http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com

  58. bearfoot February 13, 2012 at 12:11 pm #

    whose fault was that?

  59. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 12:14 pm #

    To Ozone
    “but hell, ain’t the natch’al woild (including that cosmic stuff) ENOUGH without adding in deities with whips or love shackles?” – Ozone last week
    “Enough”? I don’t know. Regardless, I think religion is a pursuit that’s gone nowhere. Looks to me to always run into the same dead ends. I don’t think we have the mental machinery or any other means for that matter to fathom anything other than the natural “woild”. So the natural woild is what we’re stuck with.

  60. wisewebwoman February 13, 2012 at 12:14 pm #

    Thanks for expressing my thoughts and so well, Jack. JHK’s homophobia and misogyny (occasional rants on HRC) gets in the way of his otherwise brilliant analysis.

  61. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 12:17 pm #

    Interesting column. I thought that when JHK started talking about the revenge of Gaia, that he would be talking about hurricanes, wildfires and floods, or something actually relating to reality, since the term Gaia refers to Mother Earth.
    But, no, he’s talking about fiat currency, which has absolutely no basis in reality, if by reality you mean the earth, land, air and water of our small planet.
    I’m pretty sure that Gaia doesn’t give a shit about the euro, or the dollar, or the gold standard. Or credit derivatives.
    But the destruction of the oceans, the blowing up of mountains, the polluting of fresh water, the rapid burning of the stored carbon of many millions of years?
    THAT would be the reality which may cause problems for the human race, now having reached 7 billion.

  62. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 12:22 pm #

    To Vlad,
    “You don’t want to know and therefore you wont.” – Vlad last week
    That’s right. Even if I “know”, what of it. What do you propose I do with the knowledge? Nothing good will come of it.
    And how much do we “know” and how much gets constantly revised through continual research and re-investigation. Seems to me that what we “know” today could be proven to be incomplete/erroneous later.
    Not long ago anthroplogists were convinced by invesigating the differences between sapiens and neanderthal mitochodrial DNA that there was no interbreeding between neanderthal and sapiens. Now they’ve changed their minds. Now they say that non african DNA is 1% to 4% neanderthal. And will that number get revised? Up or down? Who knows.
    So if you intend to act on what is “known” scientifically best beware.

  63. bearfoot February 13, 2012 at 12:23 pm #

    it seems to me, bubbleheaded::bubbleheadedmarc, that your doublebubbleheaded bubbleheadedness would, require that you have one of the LARGER Aholes! could you design an ‘app’ for your doublebubbleheadedness? ? ? ?it would sure be wecomed by all of your fellow troubleheaded commenter!!!!!

  64. charliefoxtrot February 13, 2012 at 12:34 pm #

    raising coffee mug backatcha: so what s prost? like cheers, maybe…?

  65. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:35 pm #

    One thing hasn’t changed: the massive level of immigration. Their Elite, just like our’s, in committed to a Brown Ireland – a genocide of the Irish People. What other explanation can their be? The jobs are gone yet they keep pouring them in.

  66. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 12:37 pm #

    I don’t use “apps” because I don’t live inside of a cell phone. Are you called “bearfoot” because you weigh 500 pounds and wear extra wide shoes you special order through the mail since such shoes are not commonly stocked in stores which cater overwhelmingly to persons of normal size? And more to the point, have I offended you because you’re one of the assholes who object to merchants who refuse to wait on assholes? And have you ever encountered a bear outside the confines of a zoo?

  67. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:37 pm #

    Mika’s not American – are you? You are? Just because you live here? Really?

  68. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:43 pm #

    It’s worked out very well in Alabama. If the Feds can’t reverse it soon, everyone going to have a job. You are a total fool – as are all pro-illegal advocates and indeed all immigration advocates in this economic climate.

  69. Dirk February 13, 2012 at 12:44 pm #

    As I have said to anyone who will listen: WE are the terrorists!!

  70. Neon Vincent February 13, 2012 at 12:44 pm #

    “[T]he next John Brown moment”
    I

  71. mow February 13, 2012 at 12:46 pm #

    Best post ever

  72. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:47 pm #

    Ozone can’t wait until the Blacks start rioting here. He’ll join right in.

  73. Dirk February 13, 2012 at 12:49 pm #

    My significant other gave me so much grief last night as she watched the Grammies and said she ‘felt sorry for me’ that I did not enjoy the show; said how can you, a musician, not like this? I said it is BECAUSE I am a musician that I do not like this! Not to mention I’m thinking about something ELSE we could be watching with some redeeming intellectual value. God help us.

  74. Neon Vincent February 13, 2012 at 12:50 pm #

    Sorry, hit the wrong key.
    “The next John Brown moment” is straight out of Strauss and Howe’s The Fourth Turning and Generations. It’s considered to be the crisis catalyst for the Civil War. This makes two references to the Fourth Turning in a month. I’ll make a note of that on Crazy Eddie’s Motie News this week, as well as on The Fourth Turning Forums, where your last mention of the concept started a discussion thread. Keep reading the books; they’ve been very useful in predicting the general shape of the past 20 years and should be helpful for the next 60.
    As for my own blogging, I celebrated Darwin Day yesterday, noted how climate change has resulted in a very mild winter so far, and kept throwing spitwads at the corn pone fascists. Happy Motoring, for now, from Detroit!
    http://crazyeddiethemotie.blogspot.com/

  75. San Jose Mom 51 February 13, 2012 at 12:51 pm #

    Inspite of all the troubles, local governments are busy, busy, busy making little annoying laws.
    Los Angeles County passed a law making a $200 fine for playing with a frisbee or football on the beach. The only balls allowed are volleyballs. Also, if you dig a hole in the sand deeper than 18 inches, you will get a big fine. The nanny state has to keep everyone safe.
    On another note, a guy in San Jose was wearing red while taking his 7 lb. Yorkie for a walk. (Wrong color–Norteno or Surano) Some guys from across the street doing a carwash to raise funds for their friend’s funeral (a 20-year old gangster got shot) came over and beat the shit out of the dog owner and killed the little dog. No one around is willing to ID the bad guys because they know they could get beat up or killed.

  76. Kurt Cagle February 13, 2012 at 12:51 pm #

    At the time, the insurrection wasn’t seen as anything beyond one of many political flashpoints, it was ironically a song commemorating the event (to the tune of what would become the Battle Hymn of the Republic) that started out “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in his grave,”, a marching song from the Massachusetts 12th regiment that became a rallying anthem for Union troops, that served to fan the flames of war.
    The Irish borrowed money largely at the insistence of US tech companies (Microsoft being the big one) that were looking for cheap, skilled, non-unionized European labour. The buildup of infrastructure necessary to support this was seen at the time as an investment in the future, but as this was being done, the investment vultures of Goldman Sachs et al., urged the development of new (expensive) housing for all of the up and coming Microsoft millionaires. When the tech bubble collapsed, the need for Irish MacMansions disappeared over night, the few wealthy bankers and tech veeps hightailed it back to London, leaving the Irish gov’t and tax payers holding the bag – a saga that was then repeated throughout Europe.
    Ireland will survive, just as Iceland has, because they are an Insular People who have become used to self-sufficiency. In many respects, letting their lands go fallow and burying the sparkly tech past may be the best thing they CAN do, because it means that as the rest of Europe collapses, they’ll already have adapted, and will likely miss out on the upcoming wars. The rest of us will likely not be so lucky.

  77. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 12:52 pm #

    To BeantownBill
    “Right on, Rhino. You and me are on the same wavelength here. I have nothing against liberal/progressives, even socialists. I just don’t get along with supercilious people of any political, economic and philosophical stripe.” – BTB last week
    I don’t get along with them either.
    People have a right to think what they want and say what they want. Personally I have a distaste for both “ends” of the political spectrum. IMO both ends are leading us down the path to destruction. On the “right” they argue for what experience shows to be against the interests of the vast majority. They believe in unfettered free markets. “Unfettered free markets” are “good”. Good for who exactly? Does “unfettered” mean you get to lie like hell, commit gigantic frauds and walk away? We can see the cumulative results over the last 40 years. Are they “good”? Maybe for the 1%.
    On the so-called “progressive” side, can we say that society has “progressed”? Maybe by some measures and for some people. Yet look at where things are at, the divorce rate, the rate of family breakdown and the misery that comes out of that, the rate of single-motherhood, the rate at which boys are mentally checking out of the educational system, the rate of incarceration of black men. Have women’s lives improved? I look at how the women that I knew lived 40-50 years ago and I look at the women I know now. Is this “progress”? Seems to me that the personal anything goes-ism espoused by the “progressive” side, the abolition of standards of personal behavior (after all, who’s to say what’s “right” and “wrong”, doesn’t it all depend? Or so the thinkers think. And besides you don’t want to be seen as uptight, right maaan?) has taken us nowhere good. Both sides of the spectrum took the idea of individualism and personal liberty to absurd extremes. A pox on both their houses.

  78. bossier22 February 13, 2012 at 12:53 pm #

    Is there or is there not a difference between retired folks who at least think they have paid there way, and those who have been on public assistants their whole lives. Probably for several generations. I’m curious as to what you think.

  79. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:54 pm #

    You’re afraid of Christians with Guns? Those are the neighbors you’re going to want. You are hopeless. Go live near Blacks and Hispanics and just keep watching TV. I know that Blacks and Hispanics are usually Christian, but you were talking about Whites, right? You don’t hate Black or Hispanic Christians. Only Whites. But you’re not a racist? Only Conservatives can be racist? Get a dictionary and learn how to use it.

  80. Elrond Hubbard February 13, 2012 at 12:54 pm #

    Yup–had to read Jim’s missive to know we are surronded by bullshit–cant change anything outside of me own life so try to live my own with as much dignity and grace that i can muster.thats my solution…

    It’s sad that this attitude of helplessness and passivity about American dysfunction is so prevalent, but it’s also understandable. Everything about the way American élites operate is designed towards two ends: (1) to distract attention away from how things really work, and (2) to ensure that Americans are pre-inoculated with exactly that kind of defeatism when anyone tries to change #1, say by making a serious third-party run for political office.
    Much as I enjoy JHK’s rants, it’s clear that he doesn’t believe in even the possibility that politics could change in the U.S. peacefully or constructively. Instead, he writes ominously about forthcoming “convulsions” and nudges his readership into accepting a narrative of inevitable downfall and destruction. (Please note that I’m talking about his opinions about the political system, not the economic system, where I largely share his views.) In this way, instead of being part of a possible solution that might not require a violent revolution, Jim K. makes himself part of the dysfunction.

  81. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 12:56 pm #

    The Superbowl and the Grammys are but tiny blips of distraction in our diet of bread and circuses.
    The biggest and most long-running and irrelevant circus of all would be the presidential election.
    Billions of dollars, millions of TV hours and trillions of words spent to convince us that it matters to us who our ruling overlords use to front their agenda.
    Talk about lack of reality!

  82. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 12:57 pm #

    Women are always taken in by pop culture. No resistance whatsoever. When they got the right to vote, America took another step towards destruction.
    Most men shouldn’t be voting either of course – if that’s any consolation to the ladies.

  83. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 12:59 pm #

    Good post.
    “Is it not amazing the lack of comprehension, by the vast majority of humans, of the magnitude of the catastrophic forces over hanging the future of the earth?”
    Yes, in a sense it is amazing. But then just stop to think about the overwhelming majority of the population which has never truly escaped the built environment, not even to attend summer camp for a limited period, for instance. Of course most kids sent to camp remain at the base camp and never really get away to do any authentic camping. So the end result is that they have never observed or interacted with nature in the raw. Which is why they mistakenly think that the built environment can be perpetuated in its present form with only limited adjustments or fresh inputs.
    The fact is, the global warming dynamic currently operative contains multiple self reinforcing positive feedback loops which if not counter-acted will totally bake the entire planet rendering the surface virtually uninhabitable. As the warming trend accelerates massive quantities of sequestered carbon will be released not only from subaquatic methane hydrates but also from the soil, into which a great deal of carbon dioxide currently rests just waiting to be baked out! And to think that most are only worried about tail pipe emissions! But not to worry because in the long run we’re all dead anyway.

  84. ofthehands.com February 13, 2012 at 1:00 pm #

    If we’re lucky, the next John Brown will be a critical minority of citizens opting out of this national hallucination and beginning the long and unending work of rebuilding localities, reskilling, forming local economies, and so on.
    This is the sort of thing we need now and will need more of in the future, of course, and I imagine it’ll all speed up to a significant degree when all these political and financial shenanigans inevitably cause money to no longer get money. That’ll create a rough transition, indeed.
    We all need to stop pretending we’re rich and care-free. We’re very much so neither.
    Joel

  85. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:00 pm #

    Psychology also finds Blacks have a much lower IQ yet you don’t believe that yet you believe this. Maybe the rednecks are more in touch with reality than you are.

  86. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 1:01 pm #

    yes….cheers, salud, na zdravje….

  87. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 1:04 pm #

    Not only is your post true but it is self-evidently so to all but the most obtuse so congratulations on your unparalleled intellectual penetration and discernment. And never forget: alcohol prohibition came right on the heels of women being granted the vote. I will now don my wide brimmed hardhat to weather the shit-storm of verbal abuse about to emanate from posters of the fairer sex!

  88. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:05 pm #

    Hundreds have frozen to death in Europe, especially Eastern Europe. The Danube is frozen and coal cannot be shipped. In northern Italy wolves are threatening small towns.
    In any case, last week on of the original “signers” of the Global Warming Statement repudiated it completely. Maybe someone can provide a link. He was not the first and he will not be the last. The whole thing is a blatant attempt to consolidate power amongst the Global .1%.
    For my part I’m going to get a Flat Top and lead a torch lit march of Flat Top Zombies with pitchforks to your shop. We will demand that our Flat Tops be “touched up” and you will comply even if it takes all night.

  89. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:08 pm #

    You linked to my Black IQ post – a Freudian slip? Marc be careful! Thanks for the support though – we’ll fight them together grabbing an occasional breast here and there.

  90. Elrond Hubbard February 13, 2012 at 1:11 pm #

    Sure, there are some hotheads in Athens, rioting in the streets, burning the place down, but that’s to be expected. After all, thay can no longer retire at age 35 and have the Germans pay for it.

    There is a lot of glib horseshit spun in this forum by people who wish they could be as tartly funny as Jim Kunstler, and this is a pretty bad case of it. The myth that Greek workers are lazy is easily exploded. In 2010, Greeks worked an average of 2,109 hours per year, versus the OECD average of 1,749 and the U.S. average of 1,778.
    http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=ANHRS
    Average age at retirement in Greece is 61, not 35. If you think that’s low, fine. If you think I’m a prig for pointing it out, also fine. But don’t just make shit up to suit your prejudices. You get a lot farther when the facts are on your side.
    http://seekingalpha.com/article/187774-a-review-of-retirement-ages-in-oecd-countries
    As Jim K. has observed, we have abandoned real standards in how we run our societies in favour of econometrics. Whatever is good is what raises GDP, and whatever doesn’t raise it is evil. Well, economics is not a morality play. The banks and investors who loaned hundreds of billions to Greece weren’t doing it out of the goodness of their hearts: they expected a return. In other words, they were following economic incentives just as Greek borrowers were doing when they bought cars, houses and vacations on credit they turned out not to be good for. Let’s hear how many snide words you have for the bankers who are now being made whole at enormous cost to EU taxpayers, not to mention the freedom and sovereignty of an entire country.

  91. deni February 13, 2012 at 1:13 pm #

    Thanks for the look, Dirk. Appreciate it. It’s not strange anymore that most people have absolutely no conception of what awaits us. Talk about Karma. In any case, I’m a musician, too and long ago gave up trying to have a ‘hith’ and be famous and it was then that my music began to have meaning. As for the grammys – anytime more than two Americans get together and actually create something, the second thing they invariably create is an awards ceremony for their first creation. Good luck, man.

  92. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 1:14 pm #

    The way I look at it, money isn’t “lost” it changes hands. They say trillions are lost in stock market melt-downs like the tech bubble disaster in 2000. Prices came down and the folks that bought no-hope internet stocks will never get their investment back. But there were two sides to the trade and what someone lost someone else gained. The sellers of those no-hope stocks pocketed the buyers’ (suckers’) money.
    Same thing in this debt crisis. Lenders will get screwed out of their investment and they may never lend again, banks may fail and the pipelines that formerly directed funds from savers to borrowers may break. The money may stop flowing as it once did but the money doesn’t disappear.

  93. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 1:15 pm #

    Some jerk threw a frisbee onto my radio and broke the antennae, years ago at Huntington Beach. Screw them.
    Also, I remember my black co-worker warning me against going to one of my favorite diners in San Francisco, telling me that gangs were rampant, and wearing the wrong color could get me killed.
    My teacher relative scoffed. “You have to wear the wrong colors and have an attitude” he said.
    And he was right.
    As I’ve pointed out before, the majority of assault victims I get are frequently drunk and obnoxious. I wonder about the guy and his dog.

  94. deni February 13, 2012 at 1:15 pm #

    Hey, Impaler, Pop Culture = Successful marketing and that’s that.

  95. Mike Hunt February 13, 2012 at 1:17 pm #

    Vlad –
    Consider this for a moment… you just might be the next John Brown.
    MK

  96. deni February 13, 2012 at 1:19 pm #

    Power To The Penis! Hard On!

  97. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:21 pm #

    Yes we know more all the time. You have a problem with that? If so, you are a barbarian. It’s natural to want to know.
    Yes Blacks seem more and more alien the more we know. East Asians have Neanderthal genes and are much closer to us. The Aboriginees do too but they are even dumber than the Blacks. They are the farthest from each other genetically of any two groups. So the Black skin is the least of it. There is far more to genetics than skin color.
    You have a Roman take on Life. Like Cato the Elder you distrust all that Greek intellectual stuff. You value works and deeds. It’s not the worst philosophy of life by any means. It is a bit crude but it does save one from many moral dangers that arise from higher culture. I can understand how you got this way from my own contact with our own mandarins – a despicable, arrogant lot.

  98. turkle February 13, 2012 at 1:22 pm #

    “When they got the right to vote, America took another step towards destruction.
    Most men shouldn’t be voting either of course – if that’s any consolation to the ladies.”
    Vlad is so conservative that he’s actually petrified.

  99. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 1:26 pm #

    We have faced this situations before, and FDR explained it well. Too bad that so many people believe that Obama is the kind of progressive that FDR was.
    From his first inaugural address-
    “In such a spirit on my part and on yours we face our common difficulties. They concern, thank God, only material things. Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone. 2
    More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return. Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.
    Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are stricken by no plague of locusts. Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for. Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.
    True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish. 5
    The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit. 6
    Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow men. 7
    Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing. Small wonder that confidence languishes, for it thrives only on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection, on unselfish performance; without them it cannot live. 8
    Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This Nation asks for action, and action now. 9
    Our greatest primary task is to put people to work. This is no unsolvable problem if we face it wisely and courageously. It can be accomplished in part by direct recruiting by the Government itself, treating the task as we would treat the emergency of a war, but at the same time, through this employment, accomplishing greatly needed projects to stimulate and reorganize the use of our natural resources. 10
    Hand in hand with this we must frankly recognize the overbalance of population in our industrial centers and, by engaging on a national scale in a redistribution, endeavor to provide a better use of the land for those best fitted for the land. The task can be helped by definite efforts to raise the values of agricultural products and with this the power to purchase the output of our cities. It can be helped by preventing realistically the tragedy of the growing loss through foreclosure of our small homes and our farms. It can be helped by insistence that the Federal, State, and local governments act forthwith on the demand that their cost be drastically reduced. It can be helped by the unifying of relief activities which today are often scattered, uneconomical, and unequal. It can be helped by national planning for and supervision of all forms of transportation and of communications and other utilities which have a definitely public character. There are many ways in which it can be helped, but it can never be helped merely by talking about it. We must act and act quickly. 11
    Finally, in our progress toward a resumption of work we require two safeguards against a return of the evils of the old order; there must be a strict supervision of all banking and credits and investments; there must be an end to speculation with other people’s money, and there must be provision for an adequate but sound currency.” 12

  100. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:27 pm #

    Look around the room folks – everything you see has been created by men – mostly White Men at that. If it was up to women, we’d still be living in mud or grass huts.
    We need a new Holiday – an Appreciate Men Day. Whites can celebrate Appreciate White Men Day. Men are great. And women should remember and repent of their arrogance.

  101. turkle February 13, 2012 at 1:28 pm #

    Maybe someone will provide a link for your unfounded, moronical assertions? AHAHAHAHA. Par for the course for you, I guess. Please, do my homework for me! I’m too dumb to use the Google!

  102. turkle February 13, 2012 at 1:31 pm #

    If that’s the case, Vlad, why are you such a sad loser with no accomplishments whose only purpose in life seems to be trolling Jim Kunstler’s blog?

  103. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:32 pm #

    Yes like Scalia, I’ll take my Constitution dead not “living”.

  104. MADMAX February 13, 2012 at 1:34 pm #

    Too bad for the Chinese; eating grain is one of the factors that have made Americans so fat. But you will never get corporate agri-business to admit this, since all they care about is enormous profits.

  105. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:35 pm #

    Oh sorry to tell you the Truth about your little god – Women. I was there too Turk. I’ve had to educate myself – pop culture wants you to do just as you’re doing. Why don’t you listen to an older, wiser man?

  106. Rhino February 13, 2012 at 1:36 pm #

    Like Cato the Elder you distrust all that Greek intellectual stuff. – VK
    The Greek intellectual stuff is fine. I just don’t think anything is written in stone. I distrust people. They can be wrong and often are. So I take what is told to me with a grain of salt.
    Yes Blacks seem more and more alien the more we know. – VK
    When you say “we” who exactly do you mean?
    And when you say “Blacks” who are you talking about? Look at the average San. Look at the average Nigerian. Both are supposedly “black”. They don’t look the same to me.
    I would be a little bit careful with this overgeneralizing. Look at the wide range of skin tones among people considered “white”. Are they all “white”? Where do you draw the line? Look at the overlap in Eurasia between “white” Europeans and “yellow” Asians. There’s wide swathes of Asia where it’s tough to tell who is white and who isn’t.
    What I’m saying is this business about “race” is overblown. You’ve read no doubt that subsaharan “blacks” differ more from one another genetically than “white” Europeans differ from East Asians. So are White Europeans and East Asians really one and the same “race”? Does it even make any sense to talk about a “black” “race” given their genetic diversity?

  107. messianicdruid February 13, 2012 at 1:40 pm #

    “I don’t think the US of A will see it’s “John Brown Moment” until it is a rearview-mirror event.”
    Wasn’t “smoky joe” the guy that flew his C172 into the tax building in Ftworth? I didn’t see it but USAw it.

  108. messianicdruid February 13, 2012 at 1:42 pm #

    Maybe it was “aimlowjoe”.

  109. endofworld February 13, 2012 at 1:43 pm #

    not passive one bit-took control of my own life,my future–do not look to the god of govermint for solutions-helplessness? you took the opposite meaning of what i was trying to convey-but maybe that is all you wanted to see…

  110. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 1:43 pm #

    “Im in LA..”
    My condolences; the last time I was in LA was back in the mid 80’s. It was a shit-hole then, (far too many humans living in a small space (my definition), likely has not improved in the ensuing 30 years.

  111. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 1:52 pm #

    “We”? That included American Jews too, right? I mean Jews are 40% of the Billionaires and obviously share much of the blame. And they are very concentrated in Banking and Media – or haven’t you heard?

  112. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 1:57 pm #

    From the keyboard of newworld: “How do you explain the low cognitive abilities of blacks, hispanics and Amerinds?”
    Abominable home lives, unsafe neighborhoods, piss poor schools, incessant marketing advertisements convincing them to desire shit products for the benefit of the MFWWAIC (0.1%)……
    MFWWAIC = mother fuckers what who are in charge
    Apparently you are incapable of comprehending the gist of the article which had not to do with the cause of low “g”, rather with the effects of.

  113. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 2:00 pm #

    danke

  114. Al Klein February 13, 2012 at 2:02 pm #

    Vlad…
    I don’t get what you are intimating. Yes, at least theoretically I am an American because I was born in the US and I carry a US passport. I would also say that, unlike Mika, I beleive that the US was once a great country. Unfortunately that was a long time ago. Some would opine, with good reason, that the Civil War ended the US experiment with real freedom. It’s hard to determine when exactly we went “off the rails” so to speak. Others would say 1965 when the US changed its immigration rules so we could unload our distinctly American culture that evolved by that point and bask in Diversity (please note that I capitalize it so as to demonstrate the appropriate reverence.) In any case, to more fully answer your question, I consider myself primarily a taxpaying resident of the North American continent. I didn’t say citizen because, frankly, I’m not certain what that means any more.

  115. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 2:05 pm #

    From the keyboard of Vlad: “Psychology also finds Blacks have a much lower IQ yet you don’t believe that yet you believe this.”
    I’ll pass along a similar comment to you as I did to newworld. Apparently your IQ is insufficient to enable you of comprehending the gist of the article which had not to do with the cause of low “g”, rather with the effects of.
    SNAFU

  116. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 2:07 pm #

    Yes Race is a fuzzy set just as color is. So because pink gradually merges into red thefore it doesn’t exist? Is that the idea here? Doesn’t really make it, does it? Pink exists. Whites exist. Yes there are populations that are mixed East Asian and White. So? No doubt like any mongrel they share characteristics of both but lack their respective virutes in their purity. And lack their weaknesses in purity too perhaps.
    The Bushmen are considered a different race btw. But yes, the Negroes contain much genetic diversity. But have eneough in common to still be seen as a group. East Asians and Whites are more logically considered as two separate groups. Remember “Asian” is too broad since East Indians are Caucasians – our cousins if not our brothers.
    Aboriginess, New Guinea, etc are a different race too btw. They tend towards very low IQ and a high level of violence. They tend towards introversion and quiet though – very different from the noisy Negro.
    Whites traits are recessive indicative that we are the youngest race. Cross a Black and a White and you get a Black. Cross an East Asian and a White and you get something more like the Asian. We are being genocided and must protect our genotype. Walk around Central London and you wont see a White Face. Anyone else in Lagos or Tokoyo would call it genocide if it happened to them. Only we put a positive spin on the ugly fact.

  117. Elrond Hubbard February 13, 2012 at 2:07 pm #

    “Homophobia” a phoney activist invented word created for the purposes of attempting to semantically ignore the majority of society’s disgust at the promotion of homosexuality.

    Homophobia, n. “Hatred and fear of people who engage in private, consensual activity that a diminishing minority of people finds distasteful even to think about and concludes therefore must be eeeevil.”
    http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2011/09/28/americans-move-dramatically-toward-acceptance-homosexuality-survey-finds
    “Promotion” of homosexuality is pointless and no one does it. In fact, what has been promoted with great success in our lifetimes is long-denied civil rights and equality for people whose private lives are none of your damn business or mine.
    How much “promotion” would it take to make you try out this whole homosexuality “thing” that everyone’s talking about? The answer, of course, is that you wouldn’t do anything that wasn’t natural for you to do in the first place. Pierre Trudeau said “The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation”, and he was right. If you’re terribly disturbed by the thought that Right This Minute people are getting away with acts that were abominated by the auhors of Leviticus, maybe you can just take a deep breath and go play some Monopoly or something. I’m sure the bad feeling will go away.

  118. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 2:13 pm #

    Yes the opening of our borders in 1965 was the greatest triumph of American Jewry, the result of decades of dedicated labor. Once effected, the destruction of America was assured. It was greater than the Federal Reserve Act which can at least theoretically, be reversed. Once the blood of the founding race is attenuated, the Nation is finished. The future of “The United States” now is just as a Brazil North.

  119. Elrond Hubbard February 13, 2012 at 2:13 pm #

    Alas, ’tis true – my home and native land is succumbing to the Resource Curse. Here’s a bitter joke (all the more bitter because it’s for real) from a few months back: the town of Fort McMurray, Alberta, which if you don’t know is THE oil sands boomtown, has been making plans for future growth. They foresee a day when the number of commuters to the oil patch will overwhelm local roads. The proposed solution? An LRT.
    That’s right, an LRT to the oil sands. I laugh, that I may not weep.

  120. MADMAX February 13, 2012 at 2:14 pm #

    Ireland just recommended that their young folk emigrate to Australia, where the jobs and good life are. Crikey!

  121. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:18 pm #

    Whats going on in Eire?
    [Im more than 1/2 Irish DNA].
    Also this is whats going on in UK:
    Locked in a cellar where she was allegedly raped and beaten for nearly a decade, a young deaf and mute Pakistani woman told a U.K. court on Monday how she was trafficked into Britain and forced to work as a virtual slave.
    The woman, whose age is not known, said she was around 10 when she was brought to the northern city of Manchester as a domestic servant in 2000. She cannot be identified for legal reasons.
    A Pakistani couple — 83-year-old Ilyas Ashar and his wife, 66-year-old Tallat Ashar — are charged with false imprisonment, human trafficking, sexual offenses, violence and benefit fraud. Both have pleaded not guilty to the charges……………………………………………………………………..
    muslims and slavery..hahahahahah

  122. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:19 pm #

    DO YOU KNOW THERE ARE ONLY 2 [TO MY KNOWLEDGE]
    COUNTRIES WITH ANCHOR BABY STATUTES?
    USA and Ireland.

  123. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 2:20 pm #

    Great article by a conservative genius about the failure of the Church.
    http://ricochet.com/main-feed/American-Catholicism-s-Pact-With-the-Devil

  124. LaughingAsRomeWasBurningDown February 13, 2012 at 2:22 pm #

    The “papers please” law is unconstitutional at best, and doesn’t really defend *anything* except finding a scapegoat for those unemployed drywall hangers that JHK mentions now and then. Plus, more crops will go unharvested and your food will cost more when it’s imported from Mexico or someplace as a result.
    And those rewriting history by taking all mention of “slavery” out of school textbooks sure seem like nazis to me. Are you a nazi, too?

  125. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 2:27 pm #

    Redistribution of wealth is not charity. It is not Christian because it is not voluntary. The “givers’ gain no merit therefore, and the recipients feel no gratitude since it was not a personal gift.
    And even in the case of a personal gift: giving is an art and can easily engender a feeling of inferiority in the reciever and therefore hatred for the giver. Liberals can’t understand why Minorities feel more and more hatred the more they get. So they just move away from them and ignore it. Look and see: the Blacks and Brown have one hand out and the other clenched in a fist. Poor Whites now are becoming the same with rising levels of crime, welfare, and illegitimate births.

  126. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:27 pm #

    ‘You’re afraid of Christians with Guns?’
    Not I, I am wary of Crazies with guns, goin postal.

  127. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:34 pm #

    Its much worse now….very crowded and ‘ethnic’.
    Do you remember the ‘Bluffs’ north of SM Pier?
    Fulla homeless and Russians and Iranians now.
    Traffic jams on the streets as well as the freeways.
    Yet ‘they’ say Cali will be 50 million in a few more decades.
    Water is cleaned up sewage in some areas.

  128. Hugh Culliton February 13, 2012 at 2:34 pm #

    It’s probably because of my MA in War Studies, but whenever I hear the phrase “American Exceptionalism” used in a sincere way by supposedly sincere people, my bullshit proximity alarm goes off. The BSPA’s been squaking alot these days. Perhaps it is always so with empires, that they can never see that as with every other empire in human history, they too have an expiry date. Thus, no empire is able to prepare for reality, because they are cognitively incapable of seeing it, let alone determining some measured responses for mitigating its effects. Thus, in some ways (emphasis on some) it might be good for America to elect Santorum as Prez – good like quickly ripping duct tape of a hairy chest is “good” compared to slowly peeling it off. It would allow America to hit bottom much quicker and therefore start to deal with reality that much quicker. That, unfortunately, would be the only good thing to come from the Ahiatollah-in-a-Sweater-vest being elected.
    I’m going to go listen to Leonard Cohen now, even he can cheer me up these days.

  129. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:37 pm #

    No you are!
    And theres a huge cost to ‘cheap’ labor!

  130. Hugh Culliton February 13, 2012 at 2:38 pm #

    Yes, but it can be argued that Rome left the world a far greater legacy than the US ever will: concrete or cheeze doodles? Suburbia or Roman Roads?

  131. Elrond Hubbard February 13, 2012 at 2:38 pm #

    Vlad is so conservative that he’s actually petrified.

    You shouldn’t slander the good name of conservatism by associating it with the likes of Vlad. Conservatism is about preserving existing value in society. Vlad is actually a deeply radical reactionary, not a conservative. He would overthrow the Enlightenment and discard all the accumulated value of the past quarter millennium, if he could. That’s the opposite of a conservative.

  132. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 2:39 pm #

    Heh, heh. It’s really best not to picture anyone that you know having sex.
    I remember a particularly unattractive (physically and personality-wise) co-worker.
    Someone told me that she was a lesbian, and we both said “Oh, I don’t want to picture that”.
    But, said my informant, she’s thinking about going straight. Again, we both said “Oh, I don’t want to picture that”.
    It also works with your parents. Don’t picture that. It will be sure to disgust you. But I’ve never heard anyone saying that people shouldn’t reproduce because it will gross their kids out.
    I agree with you that it’s best to consider people’s sex lives their own business, as long as they don’t do it in the street and frighten the horses.
    But in the commodified world we live in, in which so many human needs can’t be met without State sanction of relationships, it is very wrong to deny gay people their right to buy such a license.

  133. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:41 pm #

    Amazing how Wagelaborer can rationalize violence on whites by criminal non whites, eh?
    Guess no one told her about the 30 to 40k black on white rapes here in the USD, maybe she can blame the victims.

  134. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 2:43 pm #

    3 in 4 black babies are born to single mothers.
    Prior to MLK canonization this was not so.
    How do YOU explain that my dear?

  135. Hugh Culliton February 13, 2012 at 2:44 pm #

    Agreed! However, “Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt”!

  136. newworld February 13, 2012 at 2:47 pm #

    Do you honestly believe that Blank Slate nonsense you spout? And Jim wonders why this country is going to hell. This country spends more on black, hispanic and Amerind education than they do on whites and they still fail, massively and yet you still blame whites.
    This anti-white nonsense is evil. Now I can understand the low IQ taking to it, but a college educated white person taking to it is a sign of severe mental illness.

  137. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 2:50 pm #

    She didn’t specify the race, anti. I wouldn’t assume that the victim was white.
    And I’m not justifying violence, no matter what the provocation.
    As a woman told the police, who were questioning her as to why she shot my patient in the groin
    “He was aggravating me”.
    Now I frequently tell my husband “You’re aggravating me.”
    But I’ve never shot him.
    Most people don’t resort to violence, and I think that that is a sign of a civilized person.

  138. jackieblue2u February 13, 2012 at 2:51 pm #

    Can’t imagine a guy walking a little doggie with a bad attitude.
    also that is victim blaming.
    red is surrenos. think red hot pepper.
    blue is nortenos.
    it does matter if you are wearing those colors even if you don’t have an attitude.
    it is about Them not you or your attitude.
    that’s what i think. killing an animal is sick also.
    i don’t care if the guy did have an attitude.

  139. turkle February 13, 2012 at 2:53 pm #

    “Prior to MLK canonization this was not so. How do YOU explain that my dear?”
    Are you trying to correlate the two? FAIL. Correlation is not causation. I can correlate global warming with, say, the decline in numbers of pirates. Thus, pirates prevented global warming. You see the problem?

  140. turkle February 13, 2012 at 2:54 pm #

    “This country spends more on black, hispanic and Amerind education than they do on whites”
    So, um, do you actually have a source for that rather bold assertion or did you just do the usual CFN drill and pull it out of your keister? 🙂

  141. jackieblue2u February 13, 2012 at 2:55 pm #

    surrenos = red
    nortenos = blue
    i believe.
    where charles bronson when ya need him?

  142. Kurt Cagle February 13, 2012 at 2:55 pm #

    In a zero-sum world, you’re exactly right – if someone loses money, someone else makes money, and at the end of the day, if everyone balanced out their ledgers, the amount of money should end up being the same. However, it’s a world that bankers hate, because money is exchanged for goods or services, and if a banker buys land or goods, they reduce the amount of money that they have while enriching someone else.
    In a credit based economy, on the other hand, banks create credit by placing a lien on future earnings on a given revenue stream to the person who take out a loan, then add in a percentage to that loan to compensate for the risk. The bank can further leverage their base capital because in “normal” times, the likelihood that they will have to liquidate positions (where investors into the bank all need to take out their capital at once) is small, and the money being paid back into their accounts, plus interest, more than sufficiently allows them to make additional loans.
    This means in practice that banks are creating new money (via interest) while at the same time hedging (using leverage) to turn a small amount of money into a much larger amount of credit. When banking is done responsibly, such a system can work for a while, but it means comparatively small profits for the investors. Over time, what ends up happening is that loans become more and more reckless, especially as regulatory oversight becomes lax.
    What happened in the 2008 housing bubble was that banks created loans that were almost guaranteed to fail, pocketed the healthy fees (often nearly as much as they would have made from the interest) and then sold the loans to a repackager who would in turn bundle loans together. Even though the repackager knew that the banks were creating worthless loans, but as the repackager in turn sold these loans to other investors they were perfectly happy to declaim this crap as the choicest loans on the market.
    In effect, the loans were made out of thin air and then quickly sold into the system so that accounting system wouldn’t realize (or admit) that there was no real revenue stream backing the loans. This meant that people with a $50,000 a year income were purchasing $600,000 dollar homes that with interest became $1M+ dollar homes, in great part because housing prices had been so dramatically inflated that these houses (which once probably cost $150,000 or less) were the “low end” of the market, and the rising bubble had driven rentals out of the market.
    What all this is leading to is that money was fabricated via financial chicanery and lax government with no dependable revenue streams to buttress it. (There’s also a peak oil explanation about how an oil peak also corresponds to a total credit peak, but I won’t get into that here – this is already too long). Certain banks were able to make a killing on transaction fees while sticking toxic assets to other investors, which of course meant the money invested also effectively disappeared into a small black hole.
    However, the problem with a black hole is that once it is created, it tends to devour everything within gravitational reach, though not all that once. Ownership of assets become murky. Trust breaks down. Bankers begin to become panicky as their investors pull out and the house of cards come tumbling down, and panicking people do stupid and dangerous things. That’s where we are now.
    I don’t believe there are trillionaires out there. I believe instead that there are a lot of people who now have pieces of paper saying they own the same assets or resources, and only one person will get the actual asset – all other claims essentially vaporize, because the person who sold the asset in the first place used the money to pay off other debts (or more likely the interest from those debts), or to cover shortfalls when his investors all withdrew their own funds.
    At the end of all this, a massive amount of money that did not exist before will not exist again.

  143. Bustin J February 13, 2012 at 2:57 pm #

    On my college campus (a place of higher learning where knowledge is the ultimate value) there has been a flood of Mammon. Commerce corrupts wherever it flows. If society thinks academia will come to its rescue- think again. Academia is broken.
    Academia has been reduced to being a corporate entity. In order to stay alive, your public universities are now accepting enrolment from thousands of foreign students, mainly from China, but all over the world. These are mostly rich kids and hard studiers. The rich kids, a large contingent, have the money to be sent half the world away. Needless to say, not much studying gets done for this cohort.
    The studious ones, straight from the mainland, trained since birth to get straight A’s via public school corporal punishment, spend all day in the library. They look like they’re being worn down. They will produce many economic returns for Communist China.
    Who has the balls to stand up and say publicly what is happening here? Americans pay taxes to fund public schools, which are opened up to foreign students who can pay cash. School officials are forced to turn higher learning into a cash machine, a fund it all with taxpayer money.
    The 90s saw them winging strange little bundled development deals with the state- build or remodel a new building (with Eyesore Of The Day aesthetics) and get public funds. Local businesses benefit- Joe Hardhat and the team of idiot architects, LLC. The state gets to claim that economic activity occurred. Taxes are collected. Some black ink splashes on a sea of red ink. Now those POS buildings need ongoing maintenance and resources.
    The summer school programs weren’t enough so they’ve brought in enough kids from Asia and South America to displace more than 15% of the population. They are loud, obnoxious, speak 4 different languages and are not at all interested in mingling with Americans. Campus is a babble of farsi, mandarin, and spanish. There is little evidence of their cultures’ enriching effect, unless you are a local mall retailer. They hang around “learn English” and spend money like its going out of style- on novelties like cheap fast food, cigarettes, and bottled water.
    These kids stand WAY out from the crowd, with their permanent vacation kind of attitude. They have no connection with the community or anyone else. The ‘vacation’ is accessorized with the beach-bum fashions of Hollister, American Eagle, D&C, Mossimo, Abercrombie and Fitch. The American students look like Americans, well, some of them.
    And their brass is here, to collect on American debt by buying American Assets. Its the double-edged sword of global capitalism. Now they get to rape and pillage our natural resources.
    America is an open society- the Internet is an extension. The Chinese love it. They can send a million “tourists” here to delve through American libraries for scientific knowledge.

  144. asoka. February 13, 2012 at 3:00 pm #

    “I beleive that the US was once a great country.”
    ==================
    Al Klein, your statement is representative of many on CFN, mostly older white men who think they’ve lost their country, and your lack of patriotism is sad.
    I love the USA. The USA is still a great country, with a great future. The USA was founded on an ideal and that ideal has not been tarnished in the least. Your lack of patriotism is sad.
    You make reference to some golden past when you believe American used to be great. For many on CFN that past is represented by the 1950s, a time when whites ruled, segregation and Jim Crow ruled, and Blacks suffered a reign of terror. That is when you think American was still a great nation, and that is sad.
    A Black woman in the 1950s had very little social mobility. Things have changed for the better and now a Black woman has much more opportunity for advancement and much more possibility to contribute to the nation.
    America is still a great nation because America still has ideals and strives to live up to them.
    Electing a Black president, whatever you think of Obama, shows that the nation still has faith in those ideals. A nation composed of white collar, blue collar, all ethnic groups, all races, all came together in the hope of a better future. It doesn’t matter that they have been disappointed … the nation is still a great nation and is not belittled by the shortcomings of its leaders.
    I am sorry to be lecturing you (and others on CFN) on your lack of patriotism, but I’m just tired of all the America bashers who say “America was once a great country” and disrespect the people who form this still great country.
    A patriot respects all the nation’s people (including all the immigrants), with all their diversity. That is what makes us strong and vibrant. That is what makes love of America means.
    I’m just tired of all the America haters who say “America was once a great country” and think that greatness was in the past.
    That supposed great past was a past in which large segments of the population were ignored, manipulated, abused, and lynched.
    In that past people of a different sexual persuasion (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered) had to hide themselves or risk being beaten to death.
    In that past women and Blacks did not have a vote or a voice.
    In that past the environment was just “raw material” for wealth creation and nobody had any inkling of the importance of permaculture or a true connection with Gaia.
    Al Klein, the USA of the 21st century is a great country, precisely because we have grown and matured and we have become more inclusive. America is a stronger country because it is now a more multicultural country.
    In the 60s and 70s I was pro-environment, anti-war, and pro-feminism. Many a time, when I spoke of social change, I was told: “America: Love it or Leave it.”
    That never made sense to me because I considered myself a patriot who was trying, nonviolently, to make this a better country. And I succeeded.
    I never thought gays would be able to enjoy the level of civil rights they have today, up to and including MARRIAGE. Not “civil unions”, not “domestic partnerships” … MARRIAGE just like the heterosexuals and with all the same rights.
    When I became a feminist in 1968, women were dying from coat hanger abortions. I fought for women’s rights and celebrated Roe v. Wade (1973) legalizing abortion throughout the United States.
    In the 1960s women tended to pursue female-intensive occupations such as teaching and social work, and more men than women graduated. I never imagined I would see a time like today, when more women are graduating from universities than men, and women are entering any profession they want.
    When I began to read about yoga in the 60s I never imagined yoga would become a national pastime and yoga studios would be everywhere, even in little rural towns like where I live.
    When I was creating an organic food coop in the 60s, I never thought big chain stores would one day be selling organic food, and the coop movement and farmers’ market movement would grow and blossom beyond what I could imagine.
    When I was reading Kumar Satish in the 70s, I never imagined that his ideas on disarmament, nonviolence, and ecology would flourish and that I would live to see such unity of peoples as I have seen and experienced and enjoyed these last 40 years.
    All these positive changes have come about in the last 50 years with the result of making the USA an even greater nation than it was in the past.
    Now I ask you, Al Klein: if you believe the USA sucks, why do you stay here?
    I love the USA and all its peoples (including those called “undocumented”). I love all of the USA with all its diversity.
    I am a true patriot, a true American, in the vein of Walt Whitman and Woody Guthrie. This land is our land, Black and white and red and yellow all together … our land. A great land.

  145. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 3:01 pm #

    You’re right, Jackie.
    It is always wrong to kill a dog, no matter who is walking it.

  146. Glensufi February 13, 2012 at 3:03 pm #

    I believe the general consensus here is correct and the inertia in all the systems involved is probably far too great for us to avoid some very difficult if not catastrophic times. Having said that I prefer not to withdraw into a Cormack McCarthy future waiting for the end of times. Lots of talent on this board and out there so we should take our cues from Solar Guy and others to do what we can, no matter how seemingly inconsequential, to turn the Titanic. And so ends the sermon for today.

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  148. wagelaborer February 13, 2012 at 3:08 pm #

    But I can’t believe that you believe that if you go outside wearing red or blue, that some gang member will shoot you.
    Do you really never wear red or blue?
    Aren’t you afraid that your screen name will get you killed?

  149. welles February 13, 2012 at 3:17 pm #

    When the Asian economies start looking sick then the Sh*t will really start hitting the fan
    the powers can stay solvent forever, they simply print money, and they can and will continue to kick the can almost forever.
    they have lots more room than you surmise.
    bottom line is that folks around the very developed world will just get used to living on less, earning less and doing less things…
    don’t look for any wwiii moments igniting all of a sudden
    peace peaceniks

  150. Greg February 13, 2012 at 3:30 pm #

    JHK –
    Harper’s Ferry is in West Virginia…not Virginia.

  151. Hammering Truth February 13, 2012 at 3:31 pm #

    Greece is burning while the IMF fiddles. http://youtu.be/i1zkHpcfeTk

  152. deni February 13, 2012 at 3:34 pm #

    Well, I’m sure glad yoga’s made headway and organic food has infiltrated our lives, yet it seems to me that the more the “ME” generation makes others meet its organic demands, more human beings perish elsewhere: I believe your litany of wonderful accomplishments began in the nineteen sixties, so did the slaughter of three million Vietnamese, Cambodians and Laotians. And just as yoga was beginning to take hold in the seventies and eighties so were those death squads in Central and South America and when the nineties rolled around there weren’t many other people left to murder in S.A. and Asia so we switched to the Mideast where there was plenty of waiting blood for our bottomless thirst (Yoga is so very exhausting one needs to be refreshed with fluids frequently). And the toll mounts. If we measure it as progress, we’re now successfully murdering women and children with impunity as there are very few peeps of protest or resistance to these madmen and their unquenchable hunger for death. But yoga must go on and so must organic food, but if these are the prices we must pay, I’ll stick with what comes out of our backyard. It’s the great BLIND SPOT of most idealists and lovers of our shining democracy: The nameless, faceless and hidden are the ones paying the ultimate price for that yoga class and that trip to the organic market. Someone paid heavily, very heavily, for our abundant Living Large lifestyle and it wasn’t us. However, that is about to change as when fresh flesh begins becoming scarce, the beast begins consuming itself. Yeah, yeah, don’t bother. I know I’m a bummer.

  153. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 3:57 pm #

    All the more reason for the sanies (not zanies) to have more guns than the crazies.

  154. ak February 13, 2012 at 4:07 pm #

    CF: – it’s not difficult to ‘link’ in this blog.
    The simplest way is just to include the website’s address, including the http on the beginning (without the http it isn’t clickable)
    The address itself is normally visible in the top part of your browser, but some newer ones (esp. on tablet/phone) may hide it. Eg, in Firefox: View->Toolbars->Navigation — if you don’t see any menu options, try F11 first.
    So once you have the address, hi-light it, right-click & select copy (or Ctrl-v), then in the comment text-box: right click and paste (or Ctrl-c)
    You can practice in one of the old blog entries…
    kunstler.com/blog
    http://kunstler.com/blog
    –alpha-kilo

  155. loveday February 13, 2012 at 4:08 pm #

    Wow
    Clusterfuckers are exceeding even their high level of boring racism and divisiveness this week. And by doing so completely obliterate Jim’s message that things aren’t great around the good old USA and the world. Wake up children, stop bickering and drink a very strong cup of coffee, you are definitely gonna need it. Things are set to get rougher very soon. The Baltic Dry Index is around 700, pretty low, that index reflects international trade around the world. Get it? Economic activity is slowing down to 2008 levels only this time the cushion that existed then is gone. No savings for most, no unemployment for many, social programs being cut universally, in short the fat has pretty much been cut out. So the next downturn, war or crisis will result in real hunger, homelesness and pain for many people world wide.
    Meanwhile Obummer continues to cater to his base, the same base GW catered to. The super rich. So don’t look to government to provide solutions, they won’t. Pull your thumb out, stop the hatred and do something productive. Like buy seeds for a garden.

  156. San Jose Mom 51 February 13, 2012 at 4:11 pm #

    I love dogs. Apparently the victim didn’t need to go to the hospital…but the Yorkie was his constant companion so he is heartbroken.
    Our family recently acquired the cutest little Maltese puppy. She’s 15 weeks old and weighs two pounds. She’s a darling, little white puffball. My daughter named her Lola.

  157. metuselah February 13, 2012 at 4:14 pm #

    The Baltic Dry Index is around 700, pretty low, that index reflects international trade around the world.
    ==
    No, it doesn’t. It reflects the oversupply of ships, big ships, that were built during the credit boom.

  158. bossier22 February 13, 2012 at 4:24 pm #

    many think it is much coarse society now than in the 1950’s. I can see where an african/american would not agree with this. for many in the under class of any race it is a rougher place to live now.
    think back to the st valantines day masacre. a famous iconic event. Why? Because it was so rare. now something like it happens every day and it barely registers.

  159. newworld February 13, 2012 at 4:33 pm #

    Jim should ask how a country that is ruled by an elite that professes for the PC religion could be ruled other than thru fraud. How can the Blank Slate Theory be funded except thru fraud, the communists were frauds their economic system a fraud, now it our turn.

  160. newworld February 13, 2012 at 4:37 pm #

    Study out of Georgia that was to try and figure out why the white kids were doing better on the standardized tests. So the researchers looked at school funding and found that the black kids had more spent on them and they were still way behind the white kids.
    You won’t believe that because you believe in the stupid mysticism of White Skin Privilege and other frauds. Worse, you like JHK can’t understand why everything in this country is a fraud. Well it has to be, just like the USSR a fraud maintained by fraud.

  161. malthus February 13, 2012 at 4:39 pm #

    Well we certainly all have one. Maybe it was that damned Hitler that got the ball rolling for the technology runaway and it hasn’t stopped sense. Along with highways to one city after another all looking pretty much the same and homogenized to the hilt just waiting to for the dream to come true. Meanwhile people are fleeing in great numbers to other places in the world taking their prejudices, attitudes, and believes with them. Calling themselves expats but always keeping in touch with the old country and believing themselves to be smarter and superior than the average bear stuck in the wasteland that once was but never really was. Some fun. The whole system world wide has gone pathological and the planet has become one big insane asylum.

  162. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 4:44 pm #

    Just like Sam Kineson said to Rodney Dangerfield in his college history class in the movie “Back to School” I like the way you think. And yes, not only do I have an asshole but to a certain extent I am one as well. Recently while skimming the offerings in the ER Hamilton Bookseller catalogue I even espied a book on how to be an asshole. I figured “why buy such a book when I could write my own on the same subject.”

  163. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 4:45 pm #

    On my college campus…Which? or where?
    Did you see my post a few days ago about the scandal at Iowa, 400 degrees awarded folks didnt deserve….all to Chinese and Russians.
    The guy who worked at school then went and killed himself.

  164. metuselah February 13, 2012 at 4:46 pm #

    the communists were frauds
    ==
    Our whole reality is a fraud. The communists were just another hologram created by the same people that gave us the nazism, the islamo-fascism, yankee imperialism, etc. Only, you don’t see the nazism, islamo-fascism, and yankee imperialism as frauds, because you’ve been emotionally conditioned to perceive a dialectic difference between these holograms when in fact there is none.

  165. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 4:55 pm #

    Thanks for the warning. Tomorrow I will give Denny the Redneck a daylong seminar on flattops then we’ll stencil a giant sign in the front window which says “FLATTOPS $18”. I have been concentrating especially hard on my flattops and am now nearly as good as the old Greek guy Gus. I still hate little kids though. If they act like they’re being dragged to the electric chair when they come in I still refuse to wait on them, telling their mommies “I’m too sensitive to do forced haircuts on little boys.”

  166. ak February 13, 2012 at 5:11 pm #

    Greg –
    when (and why) did West Virginia come to existence?
    W!

  167. messianicdruid February 13, 2012 at 5:49 pm #

    “Wake up children, stop bickering and drink a very strong cup of coffee, you are definitely gonna need it.”
    This country is in for a heck of a hangover.

  168. turkle February 13, 2012 at 6:08 pm #

    “You won’t believe that because you believe in the stupid mysticism of White Skin Privilege and other frauds. Worse, you like JHK can’t understand why everything in this country is a fraud.”
    You’re a real mind reader, aren’t you?

  169. bubbleheadMarc February 13, 2012 at 6:47 pm #

    Bibliography of assholism:
    [1] ASSHOLE: How I Got Rich & Happy by Not Giving a Damn About Anyone & How You Can Too by Martin Kihn
    [2] ASSHOLES FINISH FIRST by Tucker Max

  170. malthus February 13, 2012 at 7:06 pm #

    Humans are cosmic apparatuses for the transformation of food, said asshole is a necessary part of the apparatus.

  171. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 7:17 pm #

    From the keyboard of antisoak: “scandal at Iowa, 400 degrees awarded folks didnt deserve….all to Chinese and Russians.””The guy who worked at school then went and killed himself.”
    Antisoak is unable to resist confirmation of the contention promoted in the APS article I linked to up post. At Dickinson State University, just 10 of the 410 foreign students awarded joint degrees since 2003 actually fulfilled all required course work. True they were Chinese and Russian unfortunately DSU is in North Dakota. From Anti’s contention one would be led to believe a single person provided all at DSU. The Dean of the Business School did commit suicide after the revelations hit the news outlets. Not all of the affected students were Business majors.
    SNAFU

  172. Widespreadpanic7 February 13, 2012 at 7:24 pm #

    Got my honey a sweet little Remington carbine for St. Valentines Day; tied a red bow around the barrel. Sure hope she likes it!
    –WSP7

  173. Widespreadpanic7 February 13, 2012 at 7:26 pm #

    I know, I know, I’m the last of the Romantics!
    –WSP7

  174. azgog February 13, 2012 at 7:32 pm #

    Everyone must embrace “austerity” (wages cut in half, pensions eliminated, taxes doubled (unless you are in the 1%, in which case they will be reduced), all so that the bankers can be repaid with profit. Not just in Greece, the same thing is happening here. Home values decimated, unaffordable health care, most decent jobs outsourced and only service jobs at less than a living wage are left. You are seeing the greatest transfer of wealth that has ever occurred, is anyone surprised that there is some resistance, some resentment of the 1%, some burning of buildings? Oh well, they’ll get over it, the police are on our side and we’ll soon have 30,000 drones in American skies just to keep an eye on any troublemakers.
    When the liquidation of the middle class is complete we will be presented with another well justified war to keep our minds off it and thin the herd. Once they have all the wealth they really don’t need an economy anyway and certainly don’t need to waste their money providing a social safety net, health clinics or public transit. Let them eat cheese doodles and die, we don’t give a fuck. They were just burning up our gas and clogging the freeway, we don’t need them any more in our brave new Richistan.

  175. San Jose Mom 51 February 13, 2012 at 7:42 pm #

    P.S. By the way, Wagelaborer, the 32-year-old guy who was walking the little Yorkie wasn’t a low-life. He is a fully-employed flooring installer. Walking a tiny dog doesn’t shout out to the world “make my day.”
    SJmom

  176. Vlad Krandz February 13, 2012 at 8:04 pm #

    They hold the Tiger’s tail and dare not let go. To admit the obvious about Black IQ would be to admit that they are scoundrels and criminals. It would end America as the obvious destroyed the Soviet Union. Towards the end no one believed Communism was anything but crap.

  177. San Jose Mom 51 February 13, 2012 at 8:15 pm #

    I understand your point about little kids. My high-strung boy acted like I was leading him to an electric chair as a child. I usually tipped the barber $10 for putting up with his drama.

  178. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 8:25 pm #

    From the esteemed keyboard of newworld: “Do you honestly believe that Blank Slate nonsense you spout?”
    I knew not of which I spouted until I looked up Blank Slate Theory. I do not contend that all we humans manifest is learned through experience; however, I am far from a Steven Pinker devote. Did you partake in the grade school, high school and possibly college experience? If so, why? As a member of the vastly superior white race were you not sufficiently endowed with innate intelligence to make your way in the world sans additional education?
    And these gems also leaped from newworlds keyboard: “This anti-white nonsense is evil. Now I can understand the low IQ taking to it, but a college educated white person taking to it is a sign of severe mental illness.”
    College educated; check, white; check, severe mental illness; naw, slightly insane, not severely, comes with the territory 🙂
    Ah additional confirmation that the writers of the APS article I previously linked to know whereof they speak. One who fails to toe the invisible line thrown down by the narrow minded and prejudicial is automatically cast into the lot with the “others” whom have been certified to be “anti-white” simply because they are “other”.
    My first wife, who likely was in the severe category, came up with pithy comments aplenty one of which is apropos here: “you are so narrow minded your eyes are located one above the other”.
    SNAFU
    P.S. Are you and Vlad brothers? If not surely you were suckled at the same teat.

  179. Pucker February 13, 2012 at 8:27 pm #

    JHK wrote: “Do you think the late Whitney Houston was a lost soul? Then look for the soul of your country – if you can find it in the wilderness of self-denial, self-double-dealing, and suicidal self-perfidy that it has blundered into with eyes wide shut. No lie is now too big for the United States to swallow.”
    I found an old copy of Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde” recently in the English language section of a bookstore in China, of all places.
    Believe it or not, I had never read it, so I read it this weekend. Great book! And not like the many movies.
    In the book, out of moral horror of myself, Jekyll eventually chooses to stop transforming himself chemically, and his conscious mind chooses to permanently remain “Dr. Jekyll”. But, his unconscious mind chooses to be “Mr. Hyde”, thus, leading to sudden unintended transformations without warning, and in his sleep.
    It seems that his chemical transformation was only possible because of some unknown “impurity” in one of the chemicals in the formula. In the end, he couldn’t replicate the formula.

  180. Pucker February 13, 2012 at 8:37 pm #

    Meanwhile, all of the mad financial scientists in the Federal Reserve and the ECB are all frantically trying to mix the chemicals to try to fix things before the enraged populous outside breaks down the down to pummel them to death.

  181. SNAFU February 13, 2012 at 8:46 pm #

    From antisoak’s keyboard: “3 in 4 black babies are born to single mothers.
    Prior to MLK canonization this was not so.
    How do YOU explain that my dear?”
    I found no evidence that MLK has ever been canonized.
    SNAFU

  182. Qshtik February 13, 2012 at 9:09 pm #

    . and it hasn’t stopped sense.
    . taking their prejudices, attitudes, and believes with them.

    ===============
    . since
    . beliefs groan!

  183. DeeJones February 13, 2012 at 9:12 pm #

    You know, Jim should just call this the
    KKKlusterfuck Nation.
    Or dump Jaego/Vlad and his racist crap. It brings the whole tone, not to mention IQ of the discussion down to about a 8th grade level.
    Your choice, JimmyBob.
    Be seeing you – not!

  184. Qshtik February 13, 2012 at 9:19 pm #

    I am far from a Steven Pinker devote.
    =============
    devotee
    arrghh!

  185. trippticket February 13, 2012 at 9:43 pm #

    And here I thought you disappeared to read some good books. Too much to expect, I suppose….

  186. trippticket February 13, 2012 at 10:18 pm #

    “Walking a tiny dog doesn’t shout out to the world “make my day.” ”
    It does in my world;)
    Hope things are well, Jen…

  187. Silverman8585 February 13, 2012 at 10:24 pm #

    This is my first time commenting. I have been a long time reader since 2004 when I first read The Long Emergency. It was very informative on my life. I have done many of the things Mr. Kunstler has offered. I have learned to love living more locally and have found much significance in it. I no longer rely on on petroleum to fuel my transportation. I ride a bicycle to work that I salvaged from the garbage. It was a perfectly good bicycle. It was being thrown out since it was considered obsolete. I actually prefer walking but a bicycle can be handy when you want to add a little thrill to your day. I could ramble on for hours about how this man has improved my life or I could just say this: James Howard Kunstler, you sir, are an excellent writer.

  188. asoka. February 13, 2012 at 10:28 pm #

    Hi Tripp!
    I went to a focus group sponsored by our county government tonight. They are developing a survey instrument to determine peoples’ needs. We are talking rural America, less than 50,000 in the whole county.
    I had no expectations, and I was very pleasantly surprised. These were the issues brought up by my concerned citizen neighbors, the most important issues they themselves identified without any written or verbal prompt: climate change, sustainability, and food security.
    Sometimes I wonder if changes in consciousness are happening among the general population. Now I can say they are.
    Rural Americans know what the problems are and even local governments are making efforts to increase awareness and enable action. Of course, the survey instrument itself will then become a further means of wider community education.
    I was very favorably impressed that, at this level of government (county), the officials want to work on solutions to what citizens themselves have identified as the most urgent issues: climate change, sustainability, and food security.
    I love this country and its people!

  189. trippticket February 13, 2012 at 10:29 pm #

    “If society thinks academia will come to its rescue- think again. ”
    Last I checked, you were the only one who believed in such nonsense. Ta-blah-blah, yes, not that interesting. Impressive language, sure. Got it.
    Signing off.

  190. malthus February 13, 2012 at 10:32 pm #

    O BooHoo, BooHoo. You are correct. I need to edit my comments more carefully. Thanks for point out the errors.

  191. malthus February 13, 2012 at 10:34 pm #

    There it is again. Thanks for pointing out the errors.

  192. trippticket February 13, 2012 at 10:40 pm #

    That’s impressive, and obviously not where I live…these people here wonder what sort of Jewish conspriacy was at work to give the Superbowl to two Yankee squads. There’s no examination of the truth in the South, only tradition.

  193. asoka. February 13, 2012 at 10:54 pm #

    Upon further reflection I do remember about ten years ago the Green Party was very active here, with enough support to be on the ballot.
    The Green Party never won anything higher than town council seats (though that is important). b
    But now that I think about it, the campaigns the Green Party waged (pre-Obama), even they didn’t “win,” must have been effective at planting seeds.
    Again, I was amazed and pleased to hear neighbors who were strangers using language I felt very comfortable with, and find myself agreeing with them about the importance of the issues the focus group was identifying.
    Thanks for the reality check. I have never lived in the South, only visited relatives in Atlanta and Florida. Must be discouraging at times.

  194. Pucker February 13, 2012 at 10:57 pm #

    Happy Valentine’s Day!
    If any of the more sensitive males out there in Clusterfuck Nation are so inclined, please feel free to send a Valentine’s Day message to one of the women incarcerated at the maximum security Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women. I’m sure that they’d appreciate it. Thanks!
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedford_Hills_Correctional_Facility_for_Women

  195. Qshtik February 13, 2012 at 11:08 pm #

    Hi Tripp!
    I went to a focus group sponsored by our county government tonight…
    =============
    …and they threw me out on my ass ’cause I’m black. Whatta country!!
    ;o)

  196. Qshtik February 13, 2012 at 11:17 pm #

    I need to edit my comments more carefully. Thanks for point out the errors.
    =============
    pointing
    I will stop bothering you with my corrections now since proofreading is obviously not your thing.

  197. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:20 pm #

    In 2 words …Brian Stow:
    March 31, 2011, a 42-year-old Giants’ fan, Bryan Stow, of Santa Cruz, was critically injured when he was attacked by two Dodgers fans in the Dodger Stadium parking lot after the Dodgers and Giants opened the 2011 season. The suspects subsequently fled the scene in a vehicle driven by a woman.[24] Stow, a paramedic and father of two, sustained severe injuries to his skull and brain and was placed into a medically induced coma after the incident.[25]
    Louie Sanchez and Marvin Norwood were arrested and charged in the crime.[27] Lawyers for Stow say his medical care is expected to cost more than $50 milion……………………….
    [wiki]

  198. 120fsq28ik February 13, 2012 at 11:25 pm #

    You are here : Home >

  199. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:27 pm #

    What do folks say ]pause[
    about D.N.A.?????
    THE LEFT HAS NO PROBLEM WITH SAYING THAT HOMOSEXUALITY IS GENETICALLY DETERMINED, BUT WHEN IT COMES TO LOW INTELLIGENCE OR CRIMINALITY, THEY HAVE A HARD TIME WITH ADMITTING THAT THESE ARE INHERITED.

  200. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:31 pm #

    ‘A Black woman in the 1950s had very little social mobility. Things have changed for the better and now a Black woman’
    Is that why Black women are less and less marrying black men?
    And whats with the downward mobility of black males?
    1/2 are unemployed
    1/2 are HS drop outs
    1 in 4 is a felon.
    So many have a rap sheet or are juvenile offenders.

  201. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:32 pm #

    yr the best!

  202. Pucker February 13, 2012 at 11:37 pm #

    “…and they threw me out on my ass ’cause I’m black. Whatta country!!”
    Just keep insisting that you’re white….
    One of my best friends is a Cherokee Indian (Native American) who is convinced that he’s “white”.

  203. Qshtik February 13, 2012 at 11:53 pm #

    I love this country and its people!
    ================
    Every week or two Asoka takes off on a new tack. One week it’s a diatribe about the US being the only country to ever drop an atom bomb on its fellow man
    …and the next week it’s an economics lesson why there are no downsides to printing endless quantities of fiat money
    …and then he’s holed up in a mud hut near our southern border ready to bolt for South America when TSHTF.
    Well, this week it’s an abiding “love for this country and its people!”
    Sometimes I just want to puke up my dinner.
    I’ve got better things to do tonight but if someone else would like to take on the chore, I’ll bet you can go back over Asoka’s posts of the past two years and find 50 to 100 of them that any sane person would conclude express a sentiment the opposite of love for this country.
    As I pointed out last week he is comfortable doing this because he’s tight with Ralph Waldo Emerson who wrote the following:
    Speak what you think now in hard words and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict everything you said to-day.

  204. anti soak February 13, 2012 at 11:58 pm #

    One Stanford University educator has tried to answer that question:
    Over the past century, the institution of marriage has undergone a tremendous transformation in America — especially when it comes to African-Americans. Over the last half century, marriage rates in the black community have dwindled. Black women are more than three times as likely as white women to remain unmarried for their entire lives, and when they do marry they’re more likely than any other group to marry men with lower incomes, and less education, than their own.
    Although, at first glance, this trend seems like a testament to the successes of feminism, Ralph Richard Banks, the author of the new book, “Is Marriage for White People?”, argues that it represents a disturbing shift in the landscape of African-American intimacy.
    Banks, a professor of law at Stanford University, uses detailed interviews and extensive statistical research to argue that this gender and racial imbalance has dire implications for both child-rearing and the long-term happiness of African-American women. In the process, he makes provocative claims about both the importance of marriage and the reasons for its decline — claims that are sure to inflame opinion in a number of circles.
    [FROM SBPDL BLOG]

  205. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 12:16 am #

    Question: Do you know what’s “really weird” about living out here in Asia where I live?
    Answer: Everyone is absolutely, 100% convinced that they’re “Chinese”.
    I keep try’n to tell ’em: “Hey…Look Wang…You don’t have to identify with “This Shit”…. You can be whatever you want to be. If you want to be a person from the planet Venus (a Venutian) you can! Go for it!”

  206. Buck Stud February 14, 2012 at 12:24 am #

    And the love that pours out of his holy soul. Why Asoka is so filled with love and hospitality that he offered to meet Beantown Bill at some side-of-the-road greasy spoon in what would be a very long cross-country drive for Bill. What a guy.

  207. Liquid Lennny February 14, 2012 at 12:24 am #

    So, will the stress of the past few years daily b.s. manifest itself into some kind of “John Brown Moment”? Perhaps it’ll be more like a “Frank Moment” or is it “Moments”?. I suspect it will be the latter.
    Here’s a preview of the possible “Frank Moment(s)” coming to a theater near you.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aymcwkArFSY
    It’s OK to root for this guy, really…
    Also out here, in the wild wild west, our Republican state legislature is working on passing a law allowing guns on college campuses.
    Who says they don’t have their priorities right?
    Still, it will be challanging packing some heat in the swimming class.
    Hey, I’m not making this s#@t up…
    http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2012/02/06/20120206senate-panel-to-hear-guns-on-campus-bill.html

  208. JonathanSS February 14, 2012 at 12:30 am #

    Sorry, but progressives don’t think like you; black/white. The Left (those hated L-I-B-E-R-A-L-S), at least those that think, realize that human sexuality, intelligence & many other traits are a combination of nature vs. nurture. How you divide the percentages for each is subject to debate, but to say it is either culture/climate or genetics alone, is small minded thinking.

  209. JonathanSS February 14, 2012 at 12:37 am #

    I agree; he seems awfully random. One week, it’s all “good in the hood”. The next week he’s moaning that TS will HTF. I’m confused by his swings, but am still a supporter and admitted to him a month ago that I enjoy reading his contrarian views.

  210. JonathanSS February 14, 2012 at 12:39 am #

    I should cut the man some slack. I quote:
    “I’m large, and contain multitudes”:)
    A(put a sock in it)SOKA

  211. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 1:11 am #

    Sorry, SF Mom, I love dogs too. I was just sharing some of my hard earned experience.
    Never mind.
    PS Was the guy Mexican?

  212. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 1:32 am #

    Tonight was my co-worker’s last night. They’re sending him to Afghanistan tomorrow.
    The lack of sympathy for him amazed me. This is a good-natured guy who has never been mean to anyone.
    I am the only one who sympathized with him. Everyone else told him that he knew what he was getting into when he signed up, 30 years ago.
    It was like trying to talk sense into the people here. I kept pointing out that he had no way of knowing 30 years ago that we would be invading Afghanistan. They didn’t care.
    So I said, well, it’s true, he should have known that the US would be invading some small country. That’s what we do. No one wanted to admit that, though.
    Then I said to one, hey, you’re so sure that we should know who we’re going to invade next, why don’t you tell us.
    She said, well, my Halliburton friend is in Russia now, so I don’t know.
    I said, what? And she said that her Halliburton friend told her months before we invaded Iraq that the plans were all made, and the talk about all options on the table were bullshit.
    Well, what’s he doing in Russia? Surely the US isn’t stupid enough to attack a country big enough to fight back.
    She doesn’t know what he’s doing there.
    Anyway, one of my co-workers kept insisting that this guy is a draft dodger, because the last time they tried to send him to Iraq, he broke his foot.
    I tried to go Q on him, and explain that you can’t be a draft dodger if there is no draft and you’ve been in the Army for 30 years. Maybe a malingerer, but not a draft dodger.
    He didn’t care. He just kept yelling that the guy was a draft dodger, and he should be happy to go wherever the military sent him.
    The hatred spewed on this website towards non-Americans, or Americans of different races, or Americans who are against war, shows how very hateful Americans can be.
    This were white people spewing hatred toward a white guy whom they have worked with for years, and who has never been anything but nice.
    Unbelievable. Consuming ourselves? You betcha.

  213. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 2:14 am #

    Wage,
    That was an empassioned, wonderful post. There’s an incredibly high degree of latent anger in the average American that was not there even one decade ago. This anger is mostly because people’s lives are not as secure, well-paid, or loving as they were in better times.
    When people get stressed, their obsessions turn ENTIRELY inward and they lose empathy for people at roughly their station in life. It’s a tragic existential truth but bad times create bad vibes because the essential nature of bad times is economic insecurity.
    This insecurity fractures marriages, friendships, and the cohesion of the family. Why? Because the SURVIVAL INSTINCT (fight or flight) comes into play when week to week existence seems perilous.
    The seemingly cavalier attitude toward this gentleman laying his life on the line comes from people who are so consumed with worry about their own plight that there’s hardly any room left for a soft emotion towards others.
    I do not EXONERATE these people who were so cold. I merely explain it. In 1941 after the Depression, he’d have been surrounded by love. We have become an incredibly HATEFUL people … a nation of Newt Gingriches. Notice that you only need to remove two letters from Gingrich and do some rearranging and you get GRINCH. Fits him like a glove but he merely reflects what a sack of bastards we’ve become.
    E.

  214. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 2:51 am #

    Wage wrote: “She said, well, my Halliburton friend is in Russia now, so I don’t know.”
    http://www.mail-archive.com/ctrl@listserv.aol.com/msg51464.html
    One of Halliburton’s major areas of operation is the former Soviet
    republic of Azerbaijan. And, while the company’s interests there
    derive from a single concern–beneath Azerbaijan lies one of the
    largest untapped oil reserves in the world–there’s more to the
    country than just oil. Above ground, in fact, Azerbaijan is a complete
    mess.
    The country’s president, Heydar Aliyev, deserves much of the blame. In
    1993, the former Soviet Politburo member and head of the local KGB
    directed a coup against his country’s elected president. He has held
    power ever since. Among other things, Aliyev has presided over the
    latter half of a vicious war and blockade against the Armenian enclave
    of Nagorno-Karabakh and over the ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijan’s
    Armenian population. According to Human Rights Watch, his tenure has
    been characterized by “the treason trials of President Heydar Aliyev’s
    personal enemies, brutal treatment in detention, and continued
    repression of freedom of speech.” Responding to such facts (and to
    lobbying by
    Armenian-Americans), Congress in 1992 passed legislation prohibiting
    the United States from providing official aid to Azerbaijan.

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  216. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 6:09 am #

    JHK … if you saw this blatant spam, could you please block individual users. Good Lord, a Burberry advertisement on a resource and sustainability blog.
    E.

  217. bubbleheadMarc February 14, 2012 at 7:25 am #

    What still amazes me is how the Pentagon failed to foresee that we weren’t guaranteed victory in Vietnam back in the ‘sixties. Of course since you used the word “expiry” you’re probably Canadian. The Canadians went through that experience with the British during the Boer War. Of course the Boer War was more of a Phyrric victory than a loss like Vietnam was for us. My ultimate reaction to Operation Iraqi Freedom and Afghanistan is more astonishment that they’re even stupid enough to attempt to occupy and patrol on the ground such clearly hostile countries, or that war planners are still even capable of being so credulous as to think that the people there could even be won over to friendship towards us, a ridiculous concept it would appear at least to me.

  218. lbendet February 14, 2012 at 8:32 am #

    What’s in a word?
    Thanks TRE for the link to the National Geographic article on “preppers”.
    The article does discuss briefly JHK’s take Orlov and Crary, who interviews JHK every week on this blog’s podcast.
    Yes, we are moving away from the word “doomers” to “preppers”, which in my opinion bespeaks the recognition by more people of the possibility that some have developed an approach to the peak world in which we are living.
    Remember the History channels “Prophets of Doom”?
    The message is slowly getting out and there’s more people looking for ways to go local.
    Some on this blog have not made a distinction between people that really think it’s over for humanity and there will be a massive die-off and those who have tried to describe localism as the contrast to globalism which is unsustainable.
    Every distortion we see in politics, economics and human reaction to scarcity points to a system that will fall apart if they continue to go down this global path.
    What JHK has been saying all along is that a responsible, realistic governing body could make the transitions better for all.
    Instead we watch with disappointment and horror that they are codifing more of the same behaviors thinking they can avoid the collapse. It’s the ole mind over matter business. The more they dig in their heels, the worse it will be.
    The system now depends on continual war and more securitization of money, creating super levels of debt.This will only result in massive poverty and less function of sovereign states.
    The top eschelon want to create a new class of global aristocracy. They are trying to move humanity back a few centuries from enlightenment to darkness, using doublespeak as their weapon against everyone else.
    I always liken our present state to an event horizon where the closer you get to the black hole the more warped out everything gets.
    Speaking to Wage and E.’s comments about human reaction to devolution of a society, there will always be those who hold onto their humanity and others who become the screaming id.
    I hope I will be an example of the former.

  219. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 8:36 am #

    “…or that war planners are still even capable of being so credulous as to think that the people there could even be won over to friendship towards us, a ridiculous concept it would appear at least to me.”
    How do you know that the U.S. “war planners” are even trying to “win” the Afghan people “over to friendship towards us…?
    Maybe they’re playing both sides? If you finance both sides, then you can’t lose. If the Americans beat the Taliban, then the Americans get the oil pipeline and the mineral resources. If the Taliban wins, then (provided the Americans negotiate a deal with the Taliban) the Americans still get the oil pipeline and the mineral resources. All that’s necessary to negotiate the deal is a few thousand American lives, cannon fodder in the minds of the “war planners”.

  220. DeeJones February 14, 2012 at 8:42 am #

    “Over the last half century, marriage rates in the black community have dwindled. Black women are more than three times as likely as white women to remain unmarried for their entire lives, and when they do marry they’re more likely than any other group to marry men with lower incomes, and less education, than their own.”
    Or – It could be because black MEN get put in prison about 10x more than Whitey-men, and when they get out, well, their economic job prospects aren’t so great.
    Ya think that could be part of the problem?
    Ya tink? No, I’m asking do you actually THINK with that brain of yours? Oh, wait, do you still have a brain? Or did you get a Limbagotomy?

  221. DeeJones February 14, 2012 at 8:46 am #

    You know, this site USED to have some great commentary, and some really great posters.
    Now it just a bunch of crap, Jim, you really should just close the comments sections down.
    People read this shit and think that it represents you too.
    Then they don’t come back and read anything again.
    Its too bad. Moderate or die Jim. Get it focused …
    This is just a waste of time.
    Bye

  222. Widespreadpanic7 February 14, 2012 at 9:06 am #

    John Brown’s family was from right around here. They moved west in the great migration to the Connecticut Western Reserve (Ohio) in the early 19th century. The Brown homestead is still standing on a rural road in N Canton, CT. When John Brown wanted to procure weapons for his endeavor he came back here, to Collinsville, CT for pikes and to Hartford, CT for Sharps rifles.
    Hey Antisoak, the Muslims were the great slave traders of the 19th century, operating out of Zanzibar until the British shut down the whole business in the 1880s. Entire swaths of east and southeast Africa were scoured by Arab slave traders; tens of thousands of people were rounded up and brought to what is now Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Iraq. Nobody mentions this much, altho the research is there for anyone who cares to look it up. Something tells me that Cornell West and his ‘African Studies’ dept. at Princeton won’t be looking it up.
    So I picked up a copy of Daniel Yergin’s ‘The Quest’, yesterday. 800 pages means it will take a week or two to get thru. Yergin is not too popular around the CFNation, I know. Jim thinks he is a shill for the oil companies. I going to see for myself what he has to say. I know an earlier book of his ‘The Prize’ was pretty good.
    –WSP7

  223. Widespreadpanic7 February 14, 2012 at 9:09 am #

    Hey DeeJones, why can’t people say what the hell they want? Who are you, Chairman Mao?
    –WSP7

  224. lbendet February 14, 2012 at 9:09 am #

    BTW,
    As I was perusing my usual sites, Max Keiser always has a new video on Tues and Thurs and over the weekend, I came upon his latest featuring JHK who will be discussing the John Brown moment.
    http://maxkeiser.com/
    Dee Jones, I’ll be sorry to see you go. There are still many who contribute to the spirit of this blog. 90% of the time, I just scroll through and know who I want to read. The rest is unfortunately way off topic or pure spam.

  225. Widespreadpanic7 February 14, 2012 at 9:17 am #

    Pretty thoughtful post there Ibendet (8:32AM). No hyperbole, and right on the money. It does indeed sum up what JHK has been saying all these years
    –WSP7

  226. SNAFU February 14, 2012 at 9:51 am #

    “devotee arrghh!”
    mea culpa
    SNAFU

  227. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 9:59 am #

    Interesting reading:
    Face the Music | The Big Picture
    http://goo.gl/zOAhC
    .
    .
    You’re saying that Fisher argued against fractional reserve banking?
    Yes, and so did the people that more or less followed in Fisher’s footsteps, principally Charles Kindleberger and Hyman Minsky. Minsky felt that the way you prevented a major debt deflation cycle was to keep the banks small.
    Prevent them from ever becoming too big to fail in the first place?
    Right. Don’t let them merge. You don’t want them to get big. I actually gave a paper with Minsky once, in 1981, in which he advocated that position. Kindleberger was very precise in “Manias, Panics, and Crashes,” when he said that when you have a small credit problem, or many small problems, some say, you don’t want the Federal Reserve to respond. Because if the central bank comes in and bails out a small problem, then that will be a sign to those who want to take more risk that they don’t need to be cautious — they can always count on the central bank to come in and bail them out. If they do, Kindleberger said — and this was in ’78 — then the future crisis will be even greater. “A free lunch for speculators today means that they’re likely to be less prudent in the future. Hence, the next several financial crises could be more severe.”
    Too bad nobody paid attention.

  228. lbendet February 14, 2012 at 10:15 am #

    M.,
    The 1980’s was the real transition from Keynes to Free market Friedmanism. Starting with mergers and acquisitions to build big corporations and banks for global hegemony. Once they decided to go global Sherman anti-trust became obsolete.
    I love pointing to the transformation of Chase to TBTF. First there was Manufacturers Hanover, then that merged with Chemical and then Chase gobbled them up.
    They heard—they clearly had another agenda. Going for global laissez-faire and building wealth upon debt, no barriers to entry–all go well beyond Adam Smith. You have to know some group wanted to go full-tilt in this direction for a reason.
    It’s easy to see when you don’t listen to the blather.

  229. charliefoxtrot February 14, 2012 at 10:21 am #

    man, that was well put, and comprehensive; apparently more views we share…

  230. charliefoxtrot February 14, 2012 at 10:25 am #

    thanks, i ll try it…

  231. charliefoxtrot February 14, 2012 at 10:31 am #

    s#¡t man, you d better not: you owe the man $1.67 as it is; iffen you quit, you ll never get your money back…!

  232. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 10:35 am #

    True.
    But a sound historical, psychological, and econo-theoretical underpinning for that move (global hegemony) is not there. They must have known this. History is very clear on that score. Economists such as Hyman Minsky warned against this, and Fisher (the greatest economist ever) too.
    So the push did not come from the banking side of the ledger. The push to go global must have come from the corporate and political side of the ledger. So now question becomes, WHY?
    I think this leads us, very neatly, to my original thesis. The whole operation has its head in the Vatican. The push to go global is really a push to re-establish Romanism, which is basically feudal imperialism.

  233. charliefoxtrot February 14, 2012 at 10:40 am #

    busted! ‘tho i kinda like the quote…i don t think asoka (dja like the third person address there?) is quite getting what waldo meant, exactly; the old soaka is taking things too literally, and a little disingenuously at that…

  234. lbendet February 14, 2012 at 11:20 am #

    As with Vlad,
    I don’t agree with your conclusions about who is responsible.
    Both of you have boogey men behind the whole thing, but it’s has to be more gainers of the system than that.
    I think the big problem is that there is a group of winners from Financials, the post industrial-security-military complex and power mongers who want no regulations and bypass the rule of law.
    Its all about the risk-immune untouchables.

  235. budizwiser February 14, 2012 at 11:27 am #

    The concept of ‘nationhood’ has been reduced to little more than a motif – a design element, if you will, much devoid of its original function.

    Pedal – very astute comments. Thank you for posting them. Very few people have the ability to keep a sense of perspective while focusing on a world filled with skullduggery.
    I really was amazed when little public remark resulted from such edicts as “the war on terror.”
    Jim Knustler’s rantings no longer carry meaning or weight in a national venue that has become so devoid of rational thought and basic language skill that words and phrase can mean anything the powerful dictate.
    Deception has become intrinsic to national security policy. And unfortunately, the public-good has become the “enemy of the state.”
    Ride much?

  236. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 11:37 am #

    Its all about the risk-immune untouchables.
    ==
    Yes, but who decides who’s untouchable and who’s not? Who decides that Rupert Murdoch, Conrad Black, Dominique Strauss-Kahn after being good servants, are going down, while others are never heard of and never touched?
    That’s what you fail to answer.
    There is no coincidence or chance in politics. EVERYTHING is planned and premeditated.

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  238. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 11:39 am #

    Nice week’s work, JHK. Thanks to you, as always.
    “….what was a long time coming. Reality is busy in the background, even while we blog and dither, setting things up.” -JHK-
    Reality is out there, in the from of physics, biology, and the inviolable laws of thermodynamics. Most of us humans tend to ignore these facts as we live our decade-to-decade lives.
    Few argue that the Earth’s population is not already too large, and growing larger. Quality of life in the United States has visibly degraded, by most objective measures, as we went from 200 million to 300 million. Almost all of the increased demand that the US places on wold resources is due to population INCREASE due to immigration, mostly LEGAL immigration.
    Despite this, TPTB continue to pack the US more and more full – with no evident long range plans at all, except Freemarket Capitalism to infinity, and beyond.
    This can’t possibly end well.
    https://www.numbersusa.com/content/
    OK, back to your regularly scheduled dithering.

  239. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 11:40 am #

    What a beautiful summation of economic reality, summed up succinctly by this bit of wisdom-
    “At the end of all this, a massive amount of money that did not exist before will not exist again”
    Exactly
    The struggle is between the 1% that wants us to pay imaginary money back and the 99% who can’t.

  240. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 11:51 am #

    The struggle is between the 1% that wants us to pay imaginary money back and the 99% who can’t.
    ==
    The struggle is really a struggle for power. Power to keep others as slaves to a parasitic class and their parasitic system. That’s what the Vaticanism/Romanism/Imperialism is all about. That’s what religion is all about. That’s what the Babylonian system of legal authority is all about. That’s what the Babylonian money system is all about. All these systems interconnect and interweave with each other, because they’re really the same system under a slightly different guise.

  241. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 11:53 am #

    I think that you are an example, lbendet.
    Good point about the words. Doomers vs preppers. You got it.
    Too bad that the Obama administration is calling people who prepare “domestic terrorists”.
    Another conversation I had last night was with a guy who told me that someone (I forget who) said that you can tell about a society by who they have in prison.
    I think that he probably mangled the quote. I’m pretty sure that it’s – you can tell about a society by how they treat their prisoners.
    Anyway, he said that we have worthless scum in our prisons, so that shows that our country is no good.
    Mangled the quote, drew some strange conclusions.
    I pointed out that we have more prisoners than any other country, 2.3 million, with more than half being there for illegal plant ownership.
    He’s an alcholic, not a pot smoker, so he had no sympathy.

  242. Rhino February 14, 2012 at 11:54 am #

    Hey DeeJones, why can’t people say what the hell they want? Who are you, Chairman Mao? – WSP7
    Many totalitarians among us. It’s nothing new, there have been such people all throughout history. 20th Century monsters like Mao/Stalin/Hitler/PolPot/Kim were just the latest and the worst. It’s all about dominance and personal aggrandisement. They love telling other people what to think and dictating what you can and can’t say. Maybe even more than lining people up at the edges of deep pits and shooting them or stringing them up at crossroads as an example and leaving them to fester for a few days and maybe even more than imprisoning them in gulags and working them to death. And then they say it’s all for the common good. And there’s no shortage of closet psychopaths to carry out their orders.

  243. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 12:03 pm #

    Well, yeah, they want to make us slaves and they are using debt that others ran up to enslave us.
    We need to repudiate that debt. We didn’t incur it, and we don’t need to impoverish ourselves and destroy our environment to pay it back.
    Good point earlier about how they pick scapegoats.
    I do indeed wonder about that.

  244. WestCoast February 14, 2012 at 12:17 pm #

    Regarding the slave trade:
    There was a family in Spain that was kicked out by the RRCC, that’s Catholic Kings to you, circa 1492.
    They went to Portugal and bought their way into acceptance. Started business dealings that lasted for hundreds of years in Portuguese Africa exporting slaves to the New World in a big way.
    After slavery was outlawed they got very wealthy, started buying up land in the Civil War devastated South, then farming then selling supplies like fertilizers to other farmers, then farm chemicals then manufacturing fossil fuel based carpeting then branched out into pesticide manufacture and finally genetically modified seeds.
    Family name was “Holy Mountain”, or
    “Mons Santo”.
    Now you know.

  245. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 12:21 pm #

    How quickly we forget as a culture? Almost no one remembers the Continental Illinois collapse and bailout in 1984. To show how times have changed, it took the FDIC only $4.5 billion bail them out back then but that was STILL considered a real scandal!! An officer in charge of “oil lending” made a few boo-boos and down it went.
    Well, even in 2012 dollars, this “scandal” would only be around $15 billion in today’s dollar. My God … this wouldn’t even be newsworthy in 2012 because we’re used to catastrophes on a vastly greater scale.
    Your post gives me a better handle on your idea that the Vatican is responsible for the sort of “globalism” that has beset today’s world economy. I’d still be interested in concrete events that you see as a direct link between the Vatican and the US and world banking system since bank CEOs seem like a mishmash of Protestants, Catholics, and Jews when viewed broadly.
    Mind you, I am not now nor have I ever been a lover of the Catholic Church which I see as the ultimate bastardization and destruction of the original Christianity. I would actually be greatly beholden to you if you could cite “smoking gun” events that draw a thread between the Vatican and the developing feudal imperialism you see. Frankly, “feudal imperialism” pretty much describes what’s going on … the development of a “prison planet” where the developed world REGRESSES to a place where everyone is a “serf”.
    E.

  246. Rhino February 14, 2012 at 12:29 pm #

    Yes Race is a fuzzy set just as color is. So because pink gradually merges into red thefore it doesn’t exist? Is that the idea here? Doesn’t really make it, does it? Pink exists. Whites exist. Yes there are populations that are mixed East Asian and White. So? – VK
    So race being a fuzzy set I would further add that there are genetic “tendencies” as you move around the world, not airtight envelopes. I would further say that if white Europeans and East Asians are more genetically similar to one another than subsharan Africans are to each other it makes little sense to me to think of whites and east Asians as separate “races” and subsaharan blacks as one “race”.
    There are other genetic markers and characteristics than just skin color and hair texture but “race” seems to be defined just by skin and hair. Outward appearances IOW. Pretty shallow wouldn’t you say?
    If you want to base public policy, residency rights, civil rights on such a fuzzy set as “race” well good luck to you.
    Why do I say good luck? Because you don’t know what racial indicators will be fashionable at any point in time and you might be astonished when the “race scientists” and classifiers show up at your door with swabs and needles (for blood and DNA samples) and color charts for skin and eye color classification and calipers to measure nose length and width. And you might be further astonished at what the DNA samples indicate as to your own Y chromosome ancestry and mitochondrial DNA history.
    What if your mitochondrial DNA says that you are descended not from one of the seven European daughters of Eve but from an African woman that was possibly taken as a slave in Roman times or a Hunnic girl that was maybe married/sold off to a farmer somewhere in what was later called Poland? Or worse still what if the mitochondrial DNA indicates that your mitochondrial “mother” was quite probably a Semitic woman living somewhere in the Levant in near prehistory? What if your Y chromosome shows something equally surprising or distasteful?
    What if your personal rights and privileges were dependent on the outcome of such tests? What if you found yourself on the “outs”, marginalized, despised, deprived of your rights, your profession or trade and your property and maybe enslaved or exiled?
    Given the massive bureaucratic stupidities you’ve seen in your lifetime, given the various recent pogroms, massacres and holocausts and given shifting political winds and tendencies for public policies to go to nonsensical extremes do you even want to contemplate such things?

  247. Buck Stud February 14, 2012 at 12:41 pm #

    I second your enthusiasm Budizwizer; truly outstnading post by pedal pusher.

  248. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 12:42 pm #

    Judasim is the modern epitome of the Babylonian System – as is clear from the Talmud and the percentage of Jews in Banking, Media, etc. You do my work for me.

  249. Buck Stud February 14, 2012 at 12:43 pm #

    Well Rhino, I guess you’re not so easily categorized, despite Wage’s efforts to the contrary. Great questions for Vlad; it’ll will be interesting to read his response.

  250. Qshtik February 14, 2012 at 12:49 pm #

    There is endless talk on CFN of America’s enslavement of blacks. And there is further talk of the enslavement of the “99%” by the elite 1%. Well, I learned something interesting on Jeopardy last night. The word slave derives from the word Slav. Makes sense, right? but who knew? See below.
    1250–1300; Middle English sclave so called because Slavs were commonly enslaved in the early Middle Ages; see Slav
    So now, click on your Dictionary.com app and type in Slav. What you’ll see is that a very large group of peoples (I use the plural deliberately) across Europe, Russia etc were Slavs. It is quite likely there are slaves amongst YOUR ancestors. My children’s maternal great grandparents came through Ellis Island from Czechoslovakia.
    When my liberal kids (who have never even scrubbed out a toilet) hear this they’ll wear their slave beginnings like a badge of honor.

  251. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 12:53 pm #

    LB said:
    I think the big problem is that there is a group of winners from Financials, the post industrial-security-military complex and power mongers who want no regulations and bypass the rule of law.
    Its all about the risk-immune untouchables.
    **************************************************************
    Exactly. The bailout system in place since 2008 would make the TBTF’s even more brazen, not less. After all, they can personally enrich themselves with the surety that if their ENTERPRISE fails, they still get to keep their PERSONAL empire. We see this with Lloyd Blankfein, Vikram Pandit, and a host of TBTF bank CEOs. If anything, these men have had the best four years of their lives while the 99% are virtually indentured servants.
    This goes back to our discussion of the “middle class”. Well, when you step just a bit below the median household income, you soar to a situation where a household whose owners are in their pivotal 40s decade in their lives, they owe somewhere around $70,000 of debt. The percentage of Americans who live in homes has plummeted since 2005 to rates not seen since the 1960s. Those who do live in homes (somewhere around 64%) have a net equity of around $93,000.
    So, the NET WORTH of people living in homes, taking into account debt levels in their 40s around the mean income level, is somewhere in the $20K to $70K levels when you go from $10K below the median income to $10K above it. Any way you slice it, people in their 40s whose wages will NOT improve, don’t even have enough money for SIX MONTHS in a nursing home when they age. Of course, renters have no mortgage debt but they DO have other debts (car, credit card) and very little savings.
    When you get to the underbelly of this whole situation, even under THE most optimistic set of statistics, the net worth of the average American family in their 40s (which is a far WORSE plight of people in their 50s and 60s who mostly live in homes already paid off or nearly so) is just about NOTHING.
    Thus, for people under 50, the future is unusually bleak and I would expect that a great many of them will have to work until they are dead or physically unable to work. When they become physically unable to work, who will take care of them? Their kids, who are in their teens to twenties will almost be FORCED to take care of them lock, stock, and barrel but that’s often not possible is they develop medical needs that require daily attention.
    It’s not the net worth and future of the over-50s that determines the economic future of a country. It’s the net worth of the under-50s who comprise the vast majority of people in the USA. And that future is one of debt, job insecurity, and serfdom for life.
    E.

  252. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:00 pm #

    First, I want to say again, that I have no malice towards Catholics as a group of people or as individuals. Same for all other groups and individuals. (Even AmeriKKKans:). We are all victims of cultural programming. And that cultural/emotional programming is very very difficult to overcome, if at all.
    But we have to look critically at institutions and power structures for they are. We have a very long historical record when it comes to Romanism/Vaticanism to allow a very clear understanding of what it is and what it is about. E., you ask me for connections. There are many books that deal with this subject. Of-course, they have been marginalized and made scarce by those who do not wish you to know, but if you make the effort to actively seek this information, you can find it. And I’ve already provided you with a good list of authors to start on that journey.

  253. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:03 pm #

    Medical Men find value in Race – as does the Insurance Industry and Banking. Blacks die earlier – and yes they treat themselves like shit but the evidence is that it is probably genetic as well. They are born sooner and have more twins. Is that cultural too?
    Obviously, Blacks are a poor risk in terms of insurance. And loans. As you know, the Feds forced Banks to lend to Blacks and Hispanics and their defaults helped crash the economy. The are obviously other factors as it was heading for a crash in any case.
    Murray and Hernstein argue for a world where everyone has a chance – the American System at its best. But under Johnson we went for equality of outcome not opportunity – a gigantic mistake. I tried to bring this up with Prog but he wont bite. Now the underclass, Black, White, and Brown, are addicted to free everything. We’re done unless we want to fight them as in Greece. It will come to that eventually. Obviously, equality of outcome would leave Blacks on the bottom – which is where they belong. Cruel? Of course, Nature is. Watch the animal channel if you have any doubts on that score. I’d be willing to live in such a Culture, but it would be better for Blacks to have their own. And again, politically – it’s long gone.
    I’m not sure you’re right about the genetic diversity being greater among Africans than between Whites and Asians. Even if so, two groups are still far enough apart to consider them as separate. Maybe we need more categories for the Africans?
    We’re all made of largely the same stuff – it’s how it’s arranged that makes the difference. And a small difference at the genetic level can have a huge effect in the macro world of our daily life. You don’t seem to want to acknowledge any of this for some reason. Anyway, I’ll look into the African diversity question and get back to you.
    If my great, great, great, great, great, great, Granny was Black, then it’s been largely washed out by now since I am Very White indeed. In terms of a couple of generations such things are very obvious since Black traits are dominant. Why any White would want to have children who wont look like them, act like them, or be like them is beyond me. Genetically, it’s being cuckolded, used. A random White on the street is closer to you genetically than your own son or daughter. Horrible.

  254. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:07 pm #

    Slavs were commonly enslaved in the early Middle Ages
    ==
    By whom? Who were the slave masters?

  255. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 1:08 pm #

    An addendum to LB re my previous post: Average home equity in the US a year ago was around $90K. However, this accounts for ALL home owners. But I maintain that it’s the 40-somethings we must look at, not the “median” which includes old people lucky enough to buy BEFORE home prices soared.
    Although no stats are easily available for the home owners under 50 and over 30, it’s easy to hypothesize that the median equity is far below that $90K figure because of outstanding mortgage left to be paid off. Mind you, $90K of home equity with a $52K median debt at the median household income still leaves VERY little “net worth”.
    The more you dig, the more you see that in America, where the median AGE is 37, a vast majority of people (i.e., the under 50s) have either no (or negative) net worth with very poor prospects of turning this around any time soon. This makes Bernanke’s speech about the housing markets ludicrous because the median house still costs way above 3X household income (4.5X for a new home). In 1960 when economics was not as dismal a “science”, 3X was considered the POINT OF UNAFFORDABILITY.
    So we’ve got a hefty majority who can’t really afford the homes they are living in and would-be buyers won’t be able to afford it unless home prices under another FIFTY percent price fall. Bernanke’s idea that America will be better off if housing prices go up from here is as ludicrous as an idea can get.
    E.

  256. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:09 pm #

    Some Abos have red and blonde hair – without any mixing from Whites. So race is much deeper than this. In fact, I think their red hair comes from a different genetic combination than our’s.
    Abos have very thick skulls and small brains. Their skulls are much thicker than that of modern Whites – a possible Homo Erectus input. So race has to do with bone density, brain size and shape, and hormonal levels. The latter is key since it ties directly into behavior. If I shot you up with Testosterone everyday, think you might start putting your hand thru walls? Blacks are like this naturally.

  257. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:14 pm #

    What a horrible attitude – a typical liberal. Can’t standing reading things you don’t agree with and want to silence such people. And love the way you made a huge deal about King Tut being “African” (as if Caucasians haven’t lived in Africa for ages) and then went dead silent when I proved that Tut was a Northern European. You suck.

  258. Rhino February 14, 2012 at 1:16 pm #

    Vlad I think you are confusing things. Black Americans and Hispanics are also socio-economic classes of people.
    How did Blacks get to where they’re at? Was it just genetics? Or was it the cumulative effect of centuries of enslavement, oppression, being pissed on and subject to the daily rituals of humiliation and vexation?
    Imagine the tables being turned. Imagine that not so long ago your ancestors were slaves or defacto slaves, that you are a member of a despised and small minority subject to cruelties that others never have to worry about? Imagine that you and your kind have the bottom of the barrel, the worst of everything, that you are/were restricted economically, socially, politically. Imagine that headhunters and recruiters are given the directive to find someone for a position with an “all-American” look to them. No Blacks meaning, nor Hispanics, nor maybe anyone with an accent that sounds anything like Jed Clampett.
    I’m not remotely excusing the various social/behavioral ills and dysfunctions plaguing Black American society. I’m explaining their possible source and putting things in context. Things you deem to be of racial or genetic origin may be nothing of the sort.

  259. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:16 pm #

    But we have to look critically at institutions and power structures for ^what they are.

  260. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:35 pm #

    There was alot of Black Slavery in Portugal as well – the only place in Europe that ever happened. They were freed and mixed with the people – and Portugal has lost all its greatness. Let’s not let it happen here.

  261. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 1:38 pm #

    I read that after Bill and Madeline bombed the begeezus out of former Yugoslavia the USA built the largest [up till 1999 at least] Permanent Military Base there.
    Are the events related? Is there alot of oil in Bosnia etc?

  262. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:40 pm #

    Judge Napolitano: What If
    http://goo.gl/Azx1z
    No “what if” about it.

  263. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 1:42 pm #

    ‘Ya think that could be part of the problem?
    Ya tink? No, I’m asking do you actually THINK with that brain of yours? Oh, wait, do you still have a brain? Or did you get a Limbagotomy? ‘
    Gawd what a flamer you have degenerated into!
    I am saying Adults are responsible for their own behavior and that includes:
    Dropping out of HS[so much for employemnt prospects]
    Impregnating single teen age girls etc.
    Seesh yr a fool.
    I do not state my support or opposition to the drug wars, thats another post, maybe.
    flame on baybee

  264. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 1:43 pm #

    all whites are low lifes to some.
    so there you.

  265. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:46 pm #

    My ancestors on my Irish side were considered subhuman by the WASPS. They took it, fought back when they had to, and got to work. In Boston they ended up taking power and humiliating the WASPS. And now they have joined them.
    Your ancestors weren’t considered White (but they were!). But as young Correleone said to his Father in the Godfather, “We’ll get there Pop”. And they did. Now they have joined them. The whole Mafia thing was blown out of proportion by Hollywood to hide the huge Jewish aspect of organized crime btw.
    The Chinese and the Vietmanese have us all beat: they come here with not a word of English, in a couple of years they are ahead of Whites academically, and come time for college, they speak it better than Whites. A high Race are they not? Not that I want to them to rule us of course…
    And now the Blacks. What can one say after these examples? If a man is a slave inwardly taking off his chains wont make much difference. And they are slaves – of their lower nature, of their genes. And the few that can make it move right out of their slums to live with Whites. The spirit of service! African Blacks come to the West and manage to become doctors – and then stay to enjoy the lifestyle. As Dr Schweitzer said after decades of experience: the few that can work hard do so for themselves and their family. The spirit of service is not in them. And the Blacks back home? That’s the White People’s job!

  266. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 1:49 pm #

    in herr words ‘Moderate or die Jim’

  267. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 1:53 pm #

    The show was taken off the air? yes?

  268. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:55 pm #

    bombed the begeezus out of former Yugoslavia
    ==
    Not Yugoslavia, Serbia! They did not bomb Croatia or any of the Albanian enclaves. They only bombed the Serbs. The same Serbs who they falsely accused of war crimes and ethnic cleansing, while in reality they were the victims of war crimes and ethnic cleansing.
    E., maybe you could explain this? Why it was that only the Serbs were victimized by CIA/MSM propaganda, NATO bombs, and German-financed Croatian and Albanian war criminals?

  269. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 1:57 pm #

    The show was taken off the air? yes?
    ==
    Yes, it was.

  270. Eleuthero February 14, 2012 at 1:59 pm #

    I’d rather leave the “explaining” up to you since you have it all figured out.
    E.

  271. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 1:59 pm #

    The Abos are very well adapted for Austalia. The Anglo Celts get alot of skin cancer down there. And a thick skull gets in the way of having a big brain, but it sure comes in handy when you get hit over the head with a war club.
    They have great endurance and visual abilities (their visual brain center is larger than our’s) and it makes for great trackers. The English used them to hunt down their escaped Irish slaves. They would catch the Irish and beat them half to death as they brought them back. So as the Irish came into their own in the outback, things went quite ill for the Abos.
    But don’t feel too bad: they were cannibals and one tribe ate hundreds of Chinese railroad workers. East Asians taste better than Whites apparently. Whites are too dry and salty. An evolutionary adaptation against Cannibalism?
    They have proved hopeless as far adapting to modern life. With IQ’s in the 60’s it’s not to be wondered at. They should be considered fauna and be protected. The half breeds look much more White than mulattoes do since the Abos are closer to us genetically. Some of them are bright enough to function in Society.

  272. Rhino February 14, 2012 at 2:01 pm #

    What can one say after these examples? Just this: none of the examples you cite were dragged in chains as slaves and forced to work without recompense or bought and sold like farm animals or otherwise treated remotely as cruelly as blacks were. And not just for a while but for hundreds of years. You are assuming that what you see black people doing is innate behavior. That is a very dangerous assumption.
    Before you go into the bad state of subsaharan Africa just remember that black people live there, white people die there. And remember also that the state of other continents is pretty much as bad ie the condition of a billion people in China (never mind the alleged superiority of East Asians) and also the conditions in large parts of India/Pakistan/South America.

  273. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 2:09 pm #

    It was all a coincidence. No rhyme or reason behind it at all. They made up horror stories about the Serbs, because, well, someone had to be the bad guys, and the Serbs drew the short straw. It was all by chance. Yeah, that’s it.

  274. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 2:20 pm #

    White Christian Europe must be destroyed so that the Global State can come. The West is pretty much done, now for the Orthodox Slavs, a much tougher nut to crack. So use the Muslims! Putin was on his way to Wasington for a meeting. When he heard that the bombing had commenced, he turned around and went back to Russia. Serbia is Russia’s little brother and they were enraged at its treatment.

  275. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 2:27 pm #

    Yeah, talk about impudent reversal of the truth!
    Hitler tried to kill the Serbs, and the Crotian Utashe helped.
    The head of Croatia in the 90s, Franjo Tudjman, was LITERALLY a Nazi supporter.
    Yet the US propaganda at the time called Milosevich
    the “new Hitler”!!!
    As ex-Nazi collaborators massacred Serbs, as they did under Hitler, the US supported them with bombs and money.
    But they were just Slavs, so it didn’t matter.
    http://4international.me/2008/03/21/tudjman-the-croatian-ustashe-nazi-genocide-of-krajina-serbs-part-2/

  276. malthus February 14, 2012 at 2:30 pm #

    Correct again. English is not my first language and I do make mistakes with the written word. Thanks. Back to the process of learning.

  277. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 2:31 pm #

    Not quite true – millions of Whites died in indentured servitude, some of it involuntary. But involuntary or not, it was often brutal and a sentence to the sugar plantations of the West Indies was usually a death sentence. They were treated worse than the Blacks you see. Why? To get their money’s worth why they had them. Blacks on the other hand, were valuable property. Ugly, yes?
    But in any case, you show the same poor judgement as ever. No reasonable person can believe that East Asians would still be complete fuck ups generations after regaining their freedom. Life is always new every second. If you see someone out of the streets making the same excuses year after year, do you believe him? A normal person would find a way off the streets in a few months in a normal economy (not now of course). Blacks are always complaining about Whites but they are their own worst enemies. You admit this but say it’s the culture. But it’s the same in Africa – even where the White Man never was in force. It’s just who they are: fuck ups and low lifes. Separating the culture from the individuals who comprise it is one of your favorite tricks – as if a forest can exist without trees.
    One writer uses the asshole paradigm that Marc loves so much. All these homeless in San Francisco, he said, why don’t they have someone’s couch to crash on? Or any family to fall back on? Because they are assholes who have worn out their welcome with everyone.

  278. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 2:36 pm #

    Thanks to you people, all Whites are Nazis anytime the label proves useful. The Serbs are Nazis too for fighting the Muslims. You will say that when it proves expedient or when the cue to do so comes down from Party Headquarters.
    The Serbs and the Croats both hate the saintly Bosnians for converting to Islam. Be right or wrong, that’s the simple fact. All three groups are similar culturally, and have well earned reputations for savagery. So who should we support? The Christians – unless you want to help the Jihad against Europe.

  279. Widespreadpanic7 February 14, 2012 at 2:40 pm #

    Vlad, did you mention that you moved recently to Washington State?
    Big political decision being made in Washington State, this week, eh? … a decision that in all of recorded human history would have been deemed ludicrous. But there it is. How much lower can this place fall?
    –WSP7

  280. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 2:41 pm #

    Yeah, talk about impudent reversal of the truth!
    ==
    It’s an old well worn technique that they like to use. The Roman/Vatican Bible is full of it. Haim Maccoby really should be required reading for anyone remotely curious about the Roman/Vatican Bible.

  281. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 2:53 pm #

    Weird coincidence that you’re bringing this up.
    Today, one of my Vietnam vet friends and I covered the Green Party radio show.
    He talked about how his dad, a Presbyterian minister, visited one of his parishioners in the poorhouse in the early 50s.
    This was where old people went when they lost their money and homes. He said that it was like a jail cell, with a metal bed and a 40 watt lightbulb.
    So his Dad helped to found our local county nursing home. Now the county is going to sell it to a private corporation, and any workers retained will have their wages halved. Who knows what kind of care the elderly will receive, when a for-profit company takes over?
    And we talked about the housing problem.
    I pointed out (as you did) that in the 70s, rising
    housing prices were seen as a BAD thing, because it meant that buying or renting a house was unaffordable.
    Houses should not be looked at as sources of wealth. They are places to live, and, as you pointed out, hopefully, by the time people are retired, they will own them free and clear.
    Buying a house as a source of income is very bizarre. A house sucks up money, just like a car. And like a car, although it could be considered an asset, if you sell your house or car, you then have no transportation or place to live.
    Hardly a source of wealth.

  282. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 3:00 pm #

    Nope. The Croatian Utashe was an actual Nazi collaborator, although it was said that the SS was horrified by their brutality. And Franjo Tjudman was actually a former Utashe member.
    It’s not like calling anyone we don’t like a Nazi, as our ruling overlords do.
    It’s the SAME damn people. Literally.

  283. wagelaborer February 14, 2012 at 3:04 pm #

    Wait! The Serbs and Croats are both Christians.
    Or do you only consider Catholics to be Christians?

  284. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 3:36 pm #

    Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust survivor who has devoted his life to combating intolerance, says Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney “should speak to his own church and say they should stop” performing posthumous proxy baptisms on Jews.

    This is hilarious. Reminds me of the time P2C got upset because I was offering Islamic prayers for the healing of his wife.
    Does Elie Wiesel think the Mormon baptism might confuse God and that God might not be able to recognize the Chosen People?
    Bill Maher performed an unbaptism ceremony for Mitt’s father-in-law who was a scientist and an atheist. Maybe Elie Wiesel should contact Bill Maher to have him do a mass unbaptism of Jews baptised by the Mormons.
    Sometimes I wonder how we ever got to the 21st century still believing in all this God and church and baptism hocus-pocus. Elie Wiesel should know better.

  285. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 3:47 pm #

    Nice post about the root word for SLAVery being the same as the root word for the SLAVic countries. I had no idea. I wonder how the entymology of the REAL? “slavES” got so distorted??
    Regarding your kids:
    “When my liberal kids (who have never even scrubbed out a toilet) hear this they’ll wear their slave beginnings like a badge of honor.”
    That’s interesting. They might surprise you.
    I believe that the sooner all of us humans on Earth recognize that ALL of us must have some sort of genetic background as human slaves who suffered hardship at the hands of others – the better off we all will be.
    Similarily, the sooner we acknowledge that ALL of us humans on Earth must also have a background as slaveholders and oppressors who caused suffering to others – the better off we will be.*
    Even Rhino has a habit of excusing the ills of the black underclass as largely a product of slavery and oppression. Sadly, as long as there is an excuse offered – many people will seize the excuse and run with it for their whole lives – and for the lives of their children, and their children’s children, and their children’s children’s children.
    *I will try to address the apparent lack of this belief on the part of Mika, later on tonight.

  286. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 3:53 pm #

    “This is hilarious. Reminds me of the time P2C got upset because I was offering Islamic prayers for the healing of his wife.”
    -asoka-
    I got upset because YOU are a WIESEL.
    I really hate you, by the way, asoka..
    And I don’t hate many people.
    I’m not sure why, but it’s visceral and seems to transcend time and space. If you really knew me, the feeling would be mutual.
    And the more you say soothing words and pretend to express love for me “as a person,” the worse my loathing for you as a person, becomes.
    Just thought I’d clear that up, in case there was any possible misunderstanding left among the CFN community.

  287. Lou Gogan February 14, 2012 at 3:59 pm #

    John Browne II is going to have a very hard time being heard and will be wasting his/her time.
    The problem with our various so-called democracies, especially in Ireland where I live, is that the Constitution, rather than being the liberator of the citizens actually emasculates them because it strips the citizens of their power and authority and hands it over to the politicians.
    To a certain extent it is easier to rebel in places like Egypt, Libia, Tunisia and Syria because the Governments are seen as the oppressors but in so-called democracies the serf citizens are unable to get over this notion that the oppressive Government is THEIR Government.
    To a certain extent the design of the so-called democracies is foolproof – give the citizens their vote, which is in fact usueless as regards CHANGING anything, and thus they cannot revolt. Revolt against whom? They elected their oppressors!
    More of this can be found at http://www.IrishCitizen.ie
    Cheers!

  288. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 3:59 pm #

    “Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner.”
    ? Lao Tzu

  289. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 4:01 pm #

    weasel
    At the risk of maligning a fellow mammal.
    And who would have thought that the spell checker would take “wiesel?” So I have also maligned a fine family name.
    My apologies for the inappropriate insults.
    The hate stands, however.

  290. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 4:03 pm #

    “Walk into my camp and I will smash your skull.”
    -Og, the caveman-

  291. Qshtik February 14, 2012 at 4:04 pm #

    My an-10-ee are picking up signals.
    I know better than to make market predictions, especially on this blog (where I will be whipped and scourged for going off topic), as the market will make fools of 90% of those who try… but sometimes I can’t help myself.
    The activity, volume and percentage movement of an “investment” vehicle carrying the symbol VXX (not a stock, not an ETF but an ETN) is giving early signs (unless I am completely wrong, which I could be) of a market decline on increased volatility. You can make a bundle owning VXX in a sharp market sell off.
    At the very base of a pyramid of relationships on which VXX rests, having no more physical substance than an aura, an emotion, a thought or a light beam, is the S&P 500 Index. To own it (VXX that is) is to hold an M80 in your hand that has had three fourths of its fuse snipped off and a match being applied to it by someone with palsy. An explanation of this ETN and its basis may be found at the link below. I fully expect no one here will read this and it is just as well since it is as dense as a musing on fate, time and language by the late brilliant writer/philosopher David Foster Wallace. I have read it and have about as much understanding of it as I do of E = MC squared.
    What I am picking up via my antennae is that 30 minutes ago VXX was trading up precisely 8% while the underlying S&P 500 was down precisely .50%. This would be an inverse 16 to 1 relationship and highly unusual. Adding weight to my (weak) conviction that something is brewing is a perceptible increase in trading volume of VXX. Tangential support was reported by Mark Hulbert yesterday on CNBC that the data on insider selling of stocks is running at 8 times buy transactions.
    I am not suggesting for a minute that anyone purchase VXX on my say so but be assured if my vision pans out I will be shouting “I told you so” from the roof tops.
    https://www.etrade.wallst.com/v1/common/pdf.asp?docKey=1577-VXX-34FMNM86TMMT81RKPTI9QVMOKA

  292. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 4:12 pm #

    LOL! Now you are being hilarious, P2C.
    A little boy goes to his father and asks ‘Daddy, how was I born?’
    The father answers, ‘Well, son, I guess one day you will need to find out anyway! Your Mom and I first got together in a chat room on Yahoo. Then I set up a date via e-mail with your Mom and we met at a cyber-cafe. We sneaked into a secluded room, and googled each other. There your mother agreed to a download from my hard drive. As soon as I was ready to upload, we discovered that neither one of us had used a firewall, and since it was too late to hit the delete button, nine months later a little Pop-Up appeared that said: You got male!

  293. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 4:25 pm #

    “I wonder how the entymology of the REAL? “slavES” got so distorted??
    Did we give those slaves bunk information about insects or something?

  294. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 4:25 pm #

    You said:
    “The top eschelon want to create a new class of global aristocracy. They are trying to move humanity back a few centuries from enlightenment to darkness, using doublespeak as their weapon against everyone else.”
    I agree with the first sentence of your paragraph, but not the second. Bear with me for a little bit while I try to describe a future that may seem science fictional, but which I believe is very possible.
    I think that the natural course of social/political evolution is heading away from the concept of nation to a world where corporations rule. I think we are truly heading to a post-modern society where nano-tech and computers will change our existence in profound ways. This is an evolutionary inevitability independent of any elites.
    Besides human foolishness, a major obstacle to this occurring is lack of physical resources. Lack of oil, lack of food, lack of a clean, healthy environment – we know the drill. A stressful transition period between our present-day civilization and the post-modern one is ensuing against a backdrop of declining resources. This makes for a dangerous situation lasting for a period of time – 20 years, 30 years, who knows.
    I believe those we call TPTB are very well aware of this. Their current machinations result from their attempt to be well-placed in this new world, to maintain their high status indefinitely.
    I also believe they know that for humans to get through this transition period, the population must be reduced. Thus their actions admit to the possibility of a large human die-off without extinction; indeed, their actions may cause such a culling of the herd. But because they’re amoral, they will do anything to maintain and increase their status. They may even believe it’s necessary to give the human race a real short haircut in order for it to survive.
    So, I think that the so-called elite don’t want to drag us back into a dark age, but rather the opposite, by insuring they will still be in power in a world we can scarcely inmagine.

  295. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 4:35 pm #

    But why would a war in Afghanistan even be necessary for this? We helped the Taliban rid the country of Russians. If we never went to war in the first place, we’d still be on ok terms with the Taliban. If they took over the country, we’d still have a good chance to get the oil, and if they didn’t, we’d still have the same chance because the Afghan people wouldn’t hate us.

  296. Qshtik February 14, 2012 at 4:39 pm #

    the entymology of
    ============
    etymology

  297. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 4:40 pm #

    I tried to reply to your comment last week about the population densities of hunter gatherers, but somehow I managed to erase my fairly lengthy and piquant retort just before clicking ‘submit’. Too pissed to rewrite it.
    The jist was that they had no staple crops, no agriculture, and therefore no capacity to achieve the population densities of farming cultures with their crops from all over the world. Also that a sharp drop in our perception of what a “need” is, coupled with a sharp rise in applied permaculture at every home site, could possibly allow our present population to survive.
    Not that there’s a chance in hell of that happening…

  298. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 4:41 pm #

    “Did we give those slaves bunk information about insects or something?”
    Nice catch, Tripp!
    Where did that extra “n” come from. anyway?
    etymology etymology etymology etymology etymology
    That’s what my 5th grade teacher would have made me do.
    And then use the word in a long sentence, P2C.
    On the day after societal collapse, and after adding an extra “n” to a single word, our Degreed Professor of Etymology – found himself picking bugs off the crops belonging to the neighborhood permaculturalist – all the while muttering, “Our Creator has an inordinate fondness for beetles. Our Creator has an inordinate fondness for beetles.”

  299. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 4:42 pm #

    “etymology”
    Your 112 is showing…

  300. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 4:43 pm #

    lol 😀

  301. Qshtik February 14, 2012 at 4:44 pm #

    Sorry about the link. I don’t know why it is giving a blank screen.

  302. San Jose Mom 51 February 14, 2012 at 4:50 pm #

    The Yorkie owner wouldn’t give his name or let his face be photographed for fear of reprisal, but the newspaper referred to him as Miguel–not his real name. He is probably Latino.
    News update….some nice person gave him a Yorkie puppy!

  303. Widespreadpanic7 February 14, 2012 at 4:52 pm #

    Asoka you’re known here for laying it on thick but that post yesterday about ‘patriotism’ tops all. You might as well quit now because that post can never be beat. Don’t even try.
    –WSP7

  304. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 4:57 pm #

    I think there is at least a kernel of truth in the future you envisage, at least for a while. I see the world becoming increasingly technologically advanced for an increasingly smaller number of financial elites.
    However, based on my own view of the world, I’m not at all sure that the majority will give a damn.

  305. messianicdruid February 14, 2012 at 4:58 pm #

    The secret six sent JB to kanza to stir up opposition to slavery so the south could be disenfranchised of its work force. Economic slaves, owned or rented, still serve the plantation minded overseers working for minimum wage, and fewer and fewer benefits as party timers.
    They have a big sign out here on the highway with the painting of JB of Kansas, with a bible in one hand and a double barrel shotgun in the other. The little town where the republicrat party got started claims to be the “Cradle of the Civil War” as if this were something to brag about.
    JBII won’t be funded by banksters. Its more like GaltII. Workers of the World, disperse!

  306. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 5:03 pm #

    I think that the natural course of social/political evolution is heading away from the concept of nation to a world where corporations rule. I think we are truly heading to a post-modern society where nano-tech and computers will change our existence in profound ways. This is an evolutionary inevitability independent of any elites.
    ==
    I strongly disagree with your assessment, Bill. And I bet a huge majority of people will also disagree with you when you say that that is the natural course of evolution. I don’t think what you’re describing is natural at all. Quite the opposite, it’s very unnatural. The “Superman” ideology is an ideology of death, marketed to idiots.
    Also, I don’t believe that there’s anything about our future that’s inevitable. The banks and the corporations, along with the shadow Vatican elite that controls them, can and will be overthrown. We are at a nascent stage in this development. But the psychological seeds, and stirring awareness for this revolution are already there.

  307. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 5:17 pm #

    Tripp to Bill: “I see the world becoming increasingly technologically advanced for an increasingly smaller number of financial elites.”
    At least until the critical mass of wealth-holders required to support technological infrastructure caves in, that is.

  308. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 5:26 pm #

    The Ideology of Superman: Defender of the Status Quo
    http://goo.gl/THKd9

  309. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 5:31 pm #

    Thanks, WSP7.
    I’m the only patriot here on this blog bothered by the fact that every week the country I love is disparaged and the people I love (both LEGAL and ILLEGAL) are scapegoated as the source of the country’s problems.
    I’m the only patriot on CFN with the guts to publicly pay respect to the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces with this statement:
    As a person, I love Barack Hussein Obama, the Commander in Chief of our Armed Forces.
    No one else is that patriotic. It’s OK, though. I’m used to marching to the beat of a different drummer, and I know CFN has many white racists, sunshine patriots, summer soldiers, and chicken hawks.

  310. trippticket February 14, 2012 at 5:48 pm #

    As a former fairly typical American dude, I can at least describe how MY life has changed in 4 years of full-on energy descent. Maybe it will have some useful information embedded in it.
    My household is at the point where taking on any kind of debt seems absolutely foolish – pay cash or do without. We have an old reliable Japanese sedan that we keep in good repair and use as our primary transport, at the expense of many of the luxuries we used to consider normal; and a pickup truck that my grandmother gave me just before she died in October. That pickup is our potential last big paycheck, as we could probably pull 10k for it if we need to.
    Our only recurring bills are $47/mo for liability insurance on two vehicles, and $50/mo for a smart phone that also does duty as the modem for our laptop. Can’t really watch videos at Android speed. Our property taxes are about $50 this year on the piece of land we’re buying, and we don’t intend to tell the county anything different. We won’t involve them at all in our building project because we can’t afford to. We will be building a passive solar earthen house with a living roof and a small amount of off-grid electrical power (

  311. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 6:04 pm #

    It’s ok for you to disagree with me, Mika. Don’t forget, I’m basically an old techie. I do agree that most everyone would disagree with my posting. But every so often I feel the need to spread my mental wings and soar.
    Homo Sapiens has been changing and evolving since its inception. Why wouldn’t it continue to do so now? We have advancd to the point where we are about to self-evolve, that is, direct our own evolution. The universe itself is self-evolving. Does it really matter what entity, nature or ourselves, imparts evolution? So, in that sense, I don’t feel that what we are to become is unnatural. What we are now is transitory. We were different in the past and we will be still more different in the future.
    You are right that the future is not inevitable. But when I look at trends and the trend line, to me, they show where we are heading, and that’s how I base my life – according to Newton’s first law of motion: An object traveling with a certain velocity will continue to travel at that velocity unless and until a force is applied to it (FYI, velocity is comprised of two factors, speed and direction). So unless and until an external input is forced into our evolution as a species, I see us heading into a post-modern world. It is what it is, and there’s no reason to hate or fear it.
    But I am surprised that one who is a hard-bitten realist, such as yourself, thinks that TPTB will be overthrown. The Roman/Vatican entity, in one form or another has been around for 2,500 years. Surely during that very long time period other people have realized what the elite are doing, yet nobody has yet overthrown them. What makes you think that things are so different that it’ll happen now or in the near-future?

  312. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 6:05 pm #

    Tripp, sounds like you are going to come in below US$12,000 income and will not be paying any taxes to support drone bombers. Good for you! (and us!)

  313. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 6:19 pm #

    Hi, Tripp. Long time, no write. I’m surprised you at least in some manner agree with my post. When I was writing it I thought of a few people who would be vehently against it, and you were one of them. I’ve evolved a little in the past 2 years of my posting here. I used to believe our tech future is inevitable, but I’ve come to realize in may not. I’m certainly not abandoning my position, but I’m keeping a certain amount of scepticism.
    I don’t know how it is in Georgia, but in my neck of the woods it’s pretty hard to disguise ongoing construction from the authorities. It seems that someone in the area eventually contacts the local (maybe in your case, the county) building or health department, which results in a fine and tearing down of the structure, or you having to pay a bribe in the form of pulling permits for every phase of construction. You do live in a rural area, so maybe it’ll be ok for you. I just wanted you to be prepared for the revenooers dropping by.

  314. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 6:24 pm #

    But I am surprised that one who is a hard-bitten realist, such as yourself, thinks that TPTB will be overthrown. The Roman/Vatican entity, in one form or another has been around for 2,500 years. Surely during that very long time period other people have realized what the elite are doing, yet nobody has yet overthrown them.
    ==
    That’s not true, that they haven’t been overthrown. The elites have been overthrown many times, and by many different peoples. I’ll grant you that they’ve very successfully managed to reconstitute themselves and their system, but only through lies and deception, the use of ignorance and ignorant useful idiots, and a false dialectic. That avenue is quickly closing.

  315. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 6:32 pm #

    Yeah, but will it last this time?

  316. metuselah February 14, 2012 at 6:40 pm #

    It could. It could be very lonely at the top. Especially when nobody wants anything to do with you.

  317. bubbleheadMarc February 14, 2012 at 6:43 pm #

    I think that you’re giving them too much credit in the cleverness department. Kind of like in a bad CIA film where the agents are extremely ruthless and competent. In real life, they’re not that competent.

  318. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 6:46 pm #

    But what kind of society as such men capable of creating? To me it sounds like they want a high tech medevial society with themselves as the Lords and Ladies complete with hunting lodges in the forests which are forbiden to any but themselves? Family Farms? No. Everybody in the cities except them and professional food growers.
    Any Space travel? I doubt it somehow. Practical and brilliant in deception, I don’t imagine them as having much curiousity. I could be wrong. In any case, I can’t see them as humanity’s best option, but they are the best candidates to survive what’s coming. They’ll come out strong, but I don’t think they’ll have China, or Islam conquered anytime soon.

  319. messianicdruid February 14, 2012 at 6:51 pm #

    Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries which are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth-eaten. Your gold and your silver have rusted; and their rust will be a witness against you and will
    consume your flesh like fire. It is in the last days that you have stored up your treasure! Behold, the pay of the laborers who mowed your fields, and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you; and the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of wanton pleasure; you have
    fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and put to death the righteous man; he does not resist you. James 5:1-6

  320. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 6:53 pm #

    I got upset because YOU are a WIESEL.
    Another hilarious comment. I do consider Elie Wiesel to be part of my family, the human family, though he is not a direct relation.
    You made me laugh though, so thanks! 🙂

  321. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 6:58 pm #

    the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.
    Did they pass some kind of Alabama or Arizona anti-immigrant law? Papers, please?
    Some things just never change.

  322. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 7:26 pm #

    The Zionist Entity is older, stronger, and more evil.

  323. asoka. February 14, 2012 at 7:34 pm #

    Zionism got started with Hovevei Zion (lovers of Zion) societies in Russia and Romania promote agricultural settlement in the Land of Israel in the 1870s. Not very old.

  324. BeantownBill February 14, 2012 at 7:43 pm #

    The elite aren’t necessarily technologically brilliant, just political and money-making savy. I think they could keep/increase their wealth & power, but not to the extent of being a feudal lord. This type of technology can’t be kept from the general population, it’s too powerful.
    Re your last post: You know what’s older than the Jewish/Zionist or Roman/Vatican entities? Prejudice.

  325. welles February 14, 2012 at 7:50 pm #

    trippy, you da man, you actually DO what people say needs to be done, i.e. reduce, recycle etc.
    please fill me in on the non-watered toilet lol, i’m all ears.
    btw my icelandic brother in law has an old ’87 suzuki swift that’s basically non compewterized so any failures are rectified by mechanical fix.
    is it so with your old nip sedan?
    jap joke: what do you call a japanese parachutist? drum roll reply: a little nip in the air….
    disclosure: am polish & grew up hearing pollock jokes and don’t associate these jokes with racism et al
    i chekked out solar power here in brazil and it’s extraordinarily cost ineffektiv, i.e. it
    ain’t worth it…even tho’ we got it up and running.
    trippy, what would the ‘economy’ look like if 80% of the population lived like you did?
    i’m curious, and not the best at extrapolating…so i’d be interested in your thoughts. how would people do business?
    would there be massive unemployment?
    seems so on the surface, but prolly wouldn’t play out that way…
    just some thots.
    peace peaceniks

  326. rippedthunder February 14, 2012 at 8:13 pm #

    Hey JB2, Bronson is still around, I have two yorkies and if some punks feel they have the right to even touch my dogs they are wrong. With one phone call I and can pull up a hundred ” brothers” and many of them are ex-vets and belong to the NRA. Stand- up guys for the most part. They actually know how to shoot and don’t hold their damn pistols sideways. I live in a quiet neck of the woods and really don’t see this as a problem around here.Sorry to here about the degradation of Californication. I lived there for a while in the ’70’s and really enjoyed the sate and the people. “Death Wish’ indeed! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071402/

  327. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 8:16 pm #

    BeantownBill wrote: “But why would a war in Afghanistan even be necessary for this?”
    Everybody needs a “Bogeyman” to unify the people and consolidate power.
    If the Afghans end up hating “us”, I suppose that it all depends upon who “us” is? Put several layers between the primitive, uneducation Pashtu base of the Taliban and “us” (e.g., Taliban leadership, Bad Pakistani ISI, Good Pakistani ISI, Saudis, Homer Simpson, Asoka, Vlad Krandz, the CIA, and your poor average Taliban Pashtu smuck’ll never know what’s going on. All they’ll know is who they’re told to hate, i.e., an amorphous bunch of “Infidels”.

  328. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 8:19 pm #

    ‘That’s the White People’s job!’
    Yes I meet them here in LA…Africans, Filipinos,
    Chinese etc.They want the Scholarships and aid [esp the Russians, yikes]..but dont want to do anything charitable far as I can see.

  329. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 8:22 pm #

    Also, the U.S. may have an interest in building up a radicalized Taliban to be a pimple on Russia’s ass, and a pain in Iran’s neck. Once the U.S. pulls out of Afghanistan traditional religious, ethnic, and nationalistic animosities will re-emerge to pit the Taliban against the nearest neighboring Infidels. FART!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  330. jackieblue2u February 14, 2012 at 8:30 pm #

    I don’t recall saying that.
    maybe I did.
    and YES I almost never wear bright red here.
    and NO not afraid I will get killed over my screen name, blue.

  331. mika. February 14, 2012 at 8:32 pm #

    A brain fart indeed, Rhino.
    Can’t wait to see your expression when them Iranian/Russian/Chinese/Indian/Pakistani/Israeli/Taliban nukes start exploding in your face.

  332. jackieblue2u February 14, 2012 at 8:36 pm #

    I really love animals also.
    Children need animals I believe, and some adults.
    I recently met someone who doesn’t like animals.
    Can’t understand, but to each his own.
    I read the story in the local paper today,
    the bastards stomped the doggie to death.
    If I was the man well, I just hope justice happens.
    It’s a sickening story.
    Several guys beating on one guy and a little dog, and killing the dog. Very maddening and saddening.

  333. mika. February 14, 2012 at 8:53 pm #

    The Real Banking Problem 02/13 by TickerGuy
    http://goo.gl/gFYnc

  334. jackieblue2u February 14, 2012 at 9:02 pm #

    I was borned here.
    lived here, except tried tempe az for 1 month,
    my b/f at the time lived there.
    also tried different parts of CA, always back to central coast.
    but things are changing, pace of life too fast.
    too many undesirables. etc.
    but yeah love love love charles bronson.
    that’s justice.
    take the law into your own hands.
    I mean wtf? leave it to cops ? I think not.
    I don’t get it.

  335. mika. February 14, 2012 at 9:12 pm #

    My Country My Ass
    http://goo.gl/UderH

  336. rippedthunder February 14, 2012 at 9:43 pm #

    As they say “When seconds count,the cops are only minutes away!” I’ve got lots of cop friends. They can’t be everywhere at once. I always had German Shepards. They eat and shed like crazy. Not to mention the barrels of shit I had to pick up when the snow melted. Now I’m older and the kids are gone.So I’ve got the yorkies! I think the’re even smarter then the shepards and they live longer, eat 1/4 as much, don’t shed, and shit like rabbits. Nothing worse than when your best friend dies at 10-11 years old. Big dogs don’t live long.

  337. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 9:47 pm #

    I found this comment at SBPDL under ‘Cute Meet’
    article.
    I found online that 42% of Black females are unmarried, while this commenter says most:
    Most black girls know they will never be married. I taught at a black high school for several years. One day I took my class to a local art museum that is one of my favorites.
    This particular place has thousands of spring flowers planted. Local girls often take pre-wedding photos there in their wedding dress.
    My wife did. The black girls getting off the bus were full of venom. “Look how cheap that dress b” “her man out screwing utter dude” and other kind catcalls. I could not believe the level of hostility.
    It shocked me. They realized a Meet-cute is not in their future and don’t feel good about it…
    the gals from the hood shocked him!

  338. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 9:50 pm #

    ‘I really love animals also.’
    Are you vegan? Vegetarian?
    If you tend animals what do you feed them?
    Cats are carnivores and must eat meat.
    Large dogs also usually need meat.
    Its said in a human life a human in USA eats 20,000
    animals.

  339. anti soak February 14, 2012 at 9:59 pm #

    RE:
    ‘progress2conserve replied to comment from anti soak | February 12, 2012 11:11 PM | Reply
    OK, antiSoak – let me show you how third person address works.
    Asoka. is taking a SERIOUS new run at remaining the Resident Impediment over this “I love my country” stuff.’
    Actually I want to know what Nixon attempted with ‘ending emma lazarus’s huddled masses’.

  340. queenie February 14, 2012 at 10:05 pm #

    During what we call the “Dark Ages” (after the fall of Rome to the Germanic tribes) Christianity was carried on by the the Eastern Orthodox Christians in their capital Constantinople. There were numerous raids by Mongol tribes to the East.
    In the 7th century the Prophet Mohammad founded Islam and under Islam a civilization grew up, prospering beyond that of Rome. Like Rome, the Islamic peoples depended on slavery to do the dirty work. Islam spread into Europe., conquering and taking slaves.
    It was the Turks that regularly raided the Slavic nations of the present (or former) Yugoslavia & that area. The Slavs remained faithful to Christianity, tho it is practiced slightly differently, the theology is the same.
    So the Turks called the people who did their dirty work, and were often made Eunochs, “Slavs” because that is who they were. Other Muslims started to use the word and in places it was pronounced as “slave”.
    There is stil much hatred in the regions where the two cultures intersect which is why Yugoslavia fell apart after the death of Tito, who had ruled like Stalin. The conflict between Orthodox Christianity and Islam continues to this day. In the 1500, Muslim forces had surrounded Vienna.
    But in the 12th. century, The Christian forces of England, France and the the German states ruled in Jerusalem. Those grudges continue to this day.
    In America we like to believe that we have left the troubles of Europe behind. But the Muslims still intend to conquer the world so that everyone will believe in the Prophet Mohammed.
    The U.S. paid little attention to the Middle east, dismissing it as “Europe’s problem” until they found all that oil.
    BTW, Constantinople is now known as Istanbul.

  341. xhalor February 14, 2012 at 10:09 pm #

    And people wonder why I’m an atheist.

  342. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 10:27 pm #

    AntiS,
    The Nixon population reference last week came from this .pdf by Tony Federer. It’s 146 pages, and I don’t know a thing about it – except from a quick scan so far.
    http://home.roadrunner.com/~stfederer/ecoshift/ecoshift.pdf
    “In 1970 the population of the United States was 203 million and President Nixon’s Commission on Population Growth and the American Future recommended stabilizing it as soon as possible. Yet the numbers passed 300 million in October 2006..”
    =================
    And, apparently Stephanie Mills is now too old to ever have children and is accused by the author of this .pdf of “ecocentrism.” Immigration reduction sounds like a benign form of ecocentrism, but I’m unable to find any more information about Ms. Mills belief on US population control.
    “In the Service of the Wild” by Stephanie Mills documents the fervor one can feel in doing restoration work. Getting hooked on protecting acharismatic species or attacking an exotic invasive species has led many people into ecocentrism.” -tony federer-

  343. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 10:47 pm #

    Met –
    Your reply to BTB about his dystopian view of the future is about the most optimistic thing I’ve ever seen you write on CFN.
    “Also, I don’t believe that there’s anything about our future that’s inevitable. The banks and the corporations, along with the shadow Vatican elite that controls them, can and will be overthrown. We are at a nascent stage in this development.”
    -met-
    I hope you are right, Met. I’m not sure how calling some of us “blue eyed devil dogs” helps this overthrow, but – different strokes/different folks, I suppose.
    =========================
    I do believe that BTB may be on to something that you might want to consider as well, Met, when he says to vlad:
    “Re your last post: You know what’s older than the Jewish/Zionist or Roman/Vatican entities? Prejudice.”
    =========================
    and regarding *, from earlier
    I was actually going to address this statement of yours, concerning slavery and the Slavic peoples.
    “By whom? Who were the slave masters?” -met-
    Because it sounded to me as though you must be thinking that the Slavs were enslaved by some Vatican enterprise. But Queenie spilled the beans in his very informative post – saying that the slavemasters of the Slavs were Muslim. So, never mind on this one, Met.

  344. Buck Stud February 14, 2012 at 10:51 pm #

    When a particular person reveal ignorance in your particular area of expertise, it’s only natural to assume they are a flapping sciolist in other areas as well. But then again, who wants to stare at empty pages.

  345. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 10:59 pm #

    I’ve had several dreams over the last few months in which the dream and reality seemingly intersect. Typically, I will be in the midst of a dream during which an outside event in the non-dream real world will insert itself at the exactly appropriate time according to the dream story line, such that the outside real-world event is not an interruption of the dream, but rather apparently a seamless part of the dream.
    Examples include music in the outside real world which starts playing at exactly the appropriate time according to the dream story line. Or, a voice from the T.V. or a neighbor, which is spoken at exactly the appropriate time according to the dream story line. Weird…

  346. xhalor February 14, 2012 at 11:03 pm #

    Clearly, you got the good shit.

  347. xhalor February 14, 2012 at 11:04 pm #

    I could write a cheque for $5.00?

  348. Pucker February 14, 2012 at 11:22 pm #

    Maybe…but as Dr. Jekyll discovered, the chemical transformation is only possible if there is the appropriate “impurity” in the formula.
    Thus, the “Good Shit” won’t work. Poor Dr. Jekyll kept screaming at his assistant that the new chemicals obtained from the pharmacist were “not pure”, but, only later did Dr. Jekyll realize that the new chemicals were, in fact, “pure”, and that it was the original batch of chemicals (which made the transformation possible) that contained an “impurity”. In other words, be careful what you wish for.

  349. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 11:23 pm #

    Were they Hispanics? Mexican culture isn’t big on loving animals: cock fights, dog fights, horse tripping…

  350. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 11:24 pm #

    “Tonight was my co-worker’s last night. They’re sending him to Afghanistan tomorrow.
    The lack of sympathy for him amazed me. This is a good-natured guy who has never been mean to anyone.” -WageL-
    Nice post, Wage, and I see you already got a couple of good responses to it, including a good one from Eleuthero. I just want to give a different perspective.
    I think the middle class of this country is getting way-far beyond war weary, but we don’t know what to do about it. “Attacking?” your coworker is a symptom of this, perhaps. I assume you work with people who would not burn a flag, or express much open defiance of the government – but that doesn’t mean that they don’t know what is going on.
    So – you are upset that they did not express “sympathy” at the man’s deployment to Afghanistan. I don’t think the man deserves sympathy. I highly doubt he wants sympathy.
    I don’t express sympathy for Ripped Thunder or for my own kid when either of them has to go into a burning house, after all. It’s the life they chose, the duty they chose. Even though the thought of it scares the hell out of me sometimes because I’ve got a son in that line of work. But I’m thankful that there are guys like that around. And I’m proud I raised one of them.
    Another thing that your coworkers may be reacting to – and this is a half-formed thought, at best –
    but, maybe they understand that life is full of risks, and that the chances are pretty Damn good that your coworker will rotate back home in a year or less with his skin intact.
    100’s of thousands of guys have rotated through Iraq and Afghanistan. “Only?” 5000 have been killed. Don’t get me wrong, that’s 5,000 too damn many. Still, the odds of surviving a deployment are pretty good. That doesn’t anyone should want to go, don’t get me wrong. And don’t you have a bunch of military types, cop types, and prison guard types in your work people’s families, Wage? Maybe they are evaluating the odds and consequences of this man’s deployment differently than you.
    ==========
    Unbelievable. Consuming ourselves? You betcha.”
    -wage-
    No argument about that at all, though, Wage.
    In the big picture – no argument from me at all.

  351. xhalor February 14, 2012 at 11:31 pm #

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8RIs4Xgevo

  352. progress2conserve February 14, 2012 at 11:35 pm #

    I’ve got to try to clarify this:
    “I think the middle class of this country is getting way-far beyond war weary, but we don’t know what to do about it.” -p2c-
    I don’t presume to speak for the whole middle class. I speak for “some?” of that portion of the middle class that has family members and/or friends in the military – and subject to these ongoing wars without end.
    It’s a sore subject.
    I’ve probably already said more than enough about it for now.

  353. Vlad Krandz February 14, 2012 at 11:36 pm #

    How do you know it’s at excatly the same time? You’d have to be awake in the physical and dream world at the same time to know that. More likely your dream world reconfigures to match the outside stimuli and you just don’t remember what the dream context was before. In other words, your dream memory changes as your dream content changes.
    That’s why we remember so little of our childhood: “we” weren’t there. The little person who was there was very alien to who we are now. And we to them. The gap is so great it’s difficult to bridge. And even when we do, how objectively correct is it?
    As Lovecraft said, the self of dream and the physical self cannot meet – and it is well. What would I not do if I could find my Enemy in this world as I do there? How I long to burn my way up destroying all in my path, him most of all. And once done, who here would be so no longer? Perhaps tonight is the night and tomorrow the day. And who will know – or knowing prove? This way is better.

  354. San Jose Mom 51 February 14, 2012 at 11:57 pm #

    Greetings,
    I just finished reading “The Fourth Turning” by William Strauss and Neil Howe. I read it because it was mentioned on this blog–I don’t remember who referenced this book.
    This book was very interesting and prophetic. Written in the late 1990’s, some of the predictions about the “Fourth Turning” have come in right on the money.
    Do any of you know of any current discussion groups on this topic? I googled and couldn’t find anything that was particularly current.
    Jen

  355. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 12:03 am #

    I was borned here.
    ===============
    Never heard it said that way before but, hey, why shouldn’t borned be the past tense of born?

  356. Pucker February 15, 2012 at 12:20 am #

    I’m not so sure….
    I believe that a person’s conscious rational mind, and his/her unconscious irrational mind work simultaneously at different levels. For example, a man giving a speech to a large audience who notices the large, plump, succulent breasts of a woman in the audience.
    Thus, one could theoretically be (at least partially) conscious with his/her unconsious mind still in a dream state. For example, it is possible for a man/woman to murder someone without being conscious of the murder.

  357. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 12:20 am #

    As a person, I love Barack Hussein Obama, the Commander in Chief of our Armed Forces.
    ============
    You as a person or Obama as a person?
    In either case a meaningless and nonsensical statement. Some people are taken in by this sort of thing and will say: That Asoka, what a sweet guy.

  358. Pucker February 15, 2012 at 12:22 am #

    In my particular case, one question is: Why does the unconsious mind seemingly have the ability to perceive what will happen in the real world a priori before the particular event in the real world occurs? Bizarre….

  359. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:35 am #

    Yes Western Culture is under a full scale attack. The Elite are using homosexuality and feminism to demoralize us and to decrease the population. Can it get worse? Perhaps. They’re already teaching it in the classroom, what if they begin to give practicums? There has already been talk of affirmative action for gays, but nothing beyond that – yet.
    Check out this Amren article about a Black mutiny during WW2. Alot of ex military comment about Blacks shooting officers during Vietnam, running away during battle, raping women, mugging Whites on ships etc. All during WW2 it was if they were fighting for the other side. It would be better if all Black were pacificists like our own great patriot, Asoka.
    http://amren.com/news/2012/02/cover-up-of-townsville-mutiny-black-gis-turned-on-officers/

  360. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 12:38 am #

    Random.
    http://palinsdirtylittlesecret.blogspot.com/
    Here’s a new conspiracy theory for you, boys and girls. ciatookovermediaclick4proof

  361. BeantownBill February 15, 2012 at 12:46 am #

    I’m very surprised that you would consider my view of the future dystopian, Procon, when I was trying to show how awe-inspiring it could be with technological advancement and the resultant personal freedom of the masses because of that technology. I think youdidn’t understand one of the main points of my post.

  362. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:47 am #

    I’ve noticed that I’ll think of something and then realize a minute later that I saw something earlier in the day or just a second ago that brought it to mind thru association. So I think you’re right I guess. But in dreams, time is very distorted. An few minutes of time here can seem like ages there. Anything we bring back is likely to be very distorted by our ego mind which tries to make sense of it.
    Often I’ve realized that I’ll go from just observing to being a character and then another one and then back to just observing again. Or one character becomes another one. So the waking mind can’t make much sense out of it because there is none – or sometimes symbolically there is. One time a little dog was trying to bite me and I was kicking at him. I was afraid because I knew his bite was poisonous. Thinking about it later, I realized it was my aversion to the little details of life, like paying bills etc – things that must be done but are without joy. But the pain of not doing them is very great thus the poison.

  363. BeantownBill February 15, 2012 at 12:51 am #

    Your statement about the mind working on different levels simultaneously seems correct to me. but I don’t think someone could murder without consciously knowing it unless they were in a fugue state or otherwise seriously mentally ill.

  364. Eleuthero February 15, 2012 at 12:53 am #

    Wage said:
    Houses should not be looked at as sources of wealth. They are places to live, and, as you pointed out, hopefully, by the time people are retired, they will own them free and clear.
    **********************************************************
    The idea of a house as an “investment” really took wing in the 1980s. It’s an insane notion. Housing is a necessity of civilized life and the inflation of housing prices from 1.8X household income in 1960 to more than 4X currently (even after the decline) pushes most families right up against the wall such that at the end of the month, the amount left for savings or emergencies is a pittance.
    Housing is the CENTRAL FOCUS of our economic disaster and forms the bulk of household debt. What makes this even worse is the enormous amount of installment credit debt on top of that plus the decline in equity in houses.
    Bush’s “ownership” society is now turned on its ear and many are frantically selling homes at a rate that puts the percentage of ownership to levels not seen since the mid 1960s. Only in the mid 1960s you actually ;had immediate equity because the 20% down payment was not optional. No “liar’s loans” back then.
    Our middle class is fucked largely because of housing and as long as new homes cost more than 4X median household incomes, this albatross will stay around the middle class’s neck until there is no middle class any more.
    E.

  365. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:56 am #

    You are a punk who needs his ass kicked. In “love” with Obama. Why don’t you get some dignity you Black Ass Clown?

  366. Buck Stud February 15, 2012 at 1:09 am #

    ” One time a little dog was trying to bite me and I was kicking at him. I was afraid because I knew his bite was poisonous. ”
    Or perhaps you remembered yourself from earlier in the day: Vlad The Chihuahua, nipping at Lbendet’s heels 🙂

  367. anti soak February 15, 2012 at 1:24 am #

    Puppy Mills, Bull Fights!

  368. k-dog February 15, 2012 at 1:39 am #

    Very good shit.

  369. Pucker February 15, 2012 at 1:41 am #

    Actually, I believe that there’s a case that some criminal law professors used to discuss in which the defendant kills someone while intoxicated, and he can’t remember the murder. It goes to the element of “mental state”, (mens rea). For most crimes, the defendant has to have the relevant mental state.
    I have a friend who once told me that once when he was in college that he got drunk at a party and woke up the next morning in bed with some girl. He insists that he can’t remember anything after the party, and that he would have had to have driven his car 5 miles to the girl’s apartment, which he can’t remember. The human mind is a tricky subject.

  370. Eleuthero February 15, 2012 at 1:44 am #

    Vlad,
    Asoka disavowed his love for Obama just a few months ago. His opinions on many things change more often than the weather. His modus operandi, disguised as Buddhistic “enlightenment”, is to piss people off by misinterpreting their point, nitpicking an irrelevant point tangential to an argument, using statistics to misinform, and uttering minuscule positives to make you feel guilty that you’re concerned about GIGANTIC negatives.
    The only way to deal with him is SILENCE. Now and then I like to reply to his most odious misrepresentations and tactics by verbally knocking him on his ass. He’s had my vote as most repulsive member of CFN for a long time.
    E.

  371. Bustin J February 15, 2012 at 1:46 am #

    ANTI SOAK SAID, “THE LEFT HAS NO PROBLEM WITH SAYING THAT HOMOSEXUALITY IS GENETICALLY DETERMINED, BUT WHEN IT COMES TO LOW INTELLIGENCE OR CRIMINALITY, THEY HAVE A HARD TIME WITH ADMITTING THAT THESE ARE INHERITED. ”
    The “base” is slow. The “real left” already knows these things. Perhaps you are too familiar with “the base”.

  372. Pucker February 15, 2012 at 1:58 am #

    “Hello…Is this the front desk? Uh yeah…uh…I need to get another room.”
    “What’s wrong with your room?”
    “There are too many bugs in my room.”
    “Bugs?”
    “Yeah…bugs….”
    http://www.spytechs.com/bug_sweep_equip/default.htm

  373. Bustin J February 15, 2012 at 1:59 am #

    Trip said “That pickup is our potential last big paycheck, as we could probably pull 10k for it if we need to.”
    You seriously won’t sell it in time to make that money. You treat it like an heirloom. I know the feeling. Vehicles of any kind just depreciate.
    Invest in VXX I hear its hot.

  374. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 2:15 am #

    Asoka disavowed his love for Obama just a few months ago.

    No, I disavowed Obama’s policies and changed my support to Jill Stein. As a person, I still love Obama.

    His opinions on many things change more often than the weather.

    No, my basic values have not changed over seven years of posting on CFN. I have consistently said world population should be reduced. I have consistently promoted nonviolence, I have consistently advocated a simple lifestyle, voluntary energy descent, etc. I’m not going to list all my positions again. I’m just pointing out that on the important things I have been consistent over a seven year period.
    The rest of what you say is your opinion, and you are entitled to have an opinion.

    The only way to deal with him is SILENCE. Now and then I like to reply to his most odious misrepresentations and tactics by verbally knocking him on his ass.

    You are contradicting yourself here. Replying is not SILENCE. I am in agreement that your SILENCE would be preferable, but you don’t seem to be capable of practicing what you are preaching here on CFN.
    Even though I do not agree with your perspective as misanthrope, I certainly respect your right to be a misanthrope.
    I read all your posts and enjoy them. And I like you as a person. Nothing you can do can change my favorable opinion of you. That is out of your control.

  375. old69 February 15, 2012 at 3:24 am #

    Give Us Back Good Old FASCISM…
    In the 70s or 80s that which is happening in Greece would be considered, under all points of views, a Right Wing Fascist Type Coup, a Pinochet style change in government, it would be considered a pure Fascist like take of power on behalf of the Powers That Be (which are mostly the Capitalist, Free Market Ideology, Globalism Bible, Punish Workers and Anyone who is not a Superstar Winner like “Germany” and such) that want to impose a complete doctrine, an Economical Doctrine that is considered the Absolute Truth, the Bible Straight From GOD’s Mouth about how a society should function and Who Should Pay For it, etc. Or it would be seen as an Act Of War upon an entire population, a Declaration of War against the state of Greece.
    And, just as Fascist and Pinochet type governments have done in the past, the entire idea is based on Punish Workers, especially Public and Government Workers which are considered thieves, not worthy, criminals, bad people stealing money from the really hard working Rich Capitalists and Financial Market Elites, etc.
    But especially what is absurd and wrong is this completely dominating and brainwashing constant Drone of “Economic Growth”, to be “More Competitive”, to increase “Productivity”, etc. when these concepts are 1) Totally undefined, unclear, abstract, impossible to pinpoint down in practice; 2) Even if and when defined somewhat, have nothing at all to do with the medicine that societies are supposed to take to become so much more “Healthy”; 3) Do not take into account none of all of the Non Linear and completely new effects a globalized, Technological Economy that now has automation, job killing technologies and millions of very cheap and very capable workers from entire continents now available and eager and willing to take jobs away from the (once was ?) “First World” (but only from those areas deemed evil and bad and deserving to be Punished like Detroit, or Greece, or Portugal or any other of so many regions within North America and Europe).
    This constant use of words like “Competitiveness” and “Productivity” especially is so totally saturating all discourse on why the economy sucks, is considered an absolute moral truth, is considered some kind of absolute bible that no one dare doubt and put in discussion: but as soon as you try to really understand what these words mean and how are they supposed to be applied you discover that they are void of any meaning, non applicable and just a place holder and excuse to rob from the poor and give to the rich, to punish in all possible ways the working class, to punish entire countries and people, punish the victim and let the victim blame himself, punish anyone who does not abide to such a high and strict and stringent standard, just like the German corporations that are the Winners, and Greece and Portugal and Ireland should also build corporations capable of building BMWs, Mercedes and Audis and sell millions of them across the world since they are mostly Status Symbols, just like the Apple IPHONE and such, and if they do not they deserve to be punished, they deserve to be beat up by the worldwide Morality Police and such.
    Does anyone ever ask themselves, “Who are we Competing Against” ? “Exactly in what arena and in what endeavors are we “Competing against and For”” ? Exactly what are we “Producing” that must be produced even more and faster and with less inputs (mostly less workers and/or less salaries to workers). No one knows, no one questions this, no one cares, but if you are not “Competitive” and “Productive” enough your “Economy Will Not Grow” and such. What on earth does that possibly mean ? Are we competing against maybe South Korea in flat screen TVs and smart phones ? is that why Greece must be punished ? Are they not producing enough Luxury Cars like Germany ? Is that why Greece must be punished and such ?
    What a boatload of crap all of these economists and the dominating ideology want to shove down everyone’s throat worldwide: why not just cut the crap and install right out FASCIST DICTATORSHIPS THAT CAN FREELY FIRE ALL WORKERS, CUT THEIR SALARIES PRIVATIZE THE ECONOMY AND DO WHATEVER THE HELL THE MODERN ECONOMIC BIBLE IMPOSES WITHOUT ALL OF THE FAKE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS BULLSHIT, WITHOUT ALL OF THE FAKE CONSENSUS BULLSHIT AND SUCH!
    Please give us back the Good Old Fascist Governments like Pinochet, please give us back the good old fascists, they look so much more honest and genuine and not hypocritical as today, give us a dictatorship that will simply impose the bible of “Economic Growth” and “Competitiveness” and “Productivity” by force, as it should be, as it really is being done, only they want you to believe that there is some kind of consensus and “Democratic Process” behind it when it is one gigantic lie. Just be honest and cut the crap, impose whatever you want, whatever the Modern Economic Theory imposes as Correct: but they don’t want to because then when all of their statistics fail in the future because of this they would have no one else to blame but themselves and their fairy tale Economic Theory (since the entire Economic Theory and debate is based on Numbers and trying to make the numbers or forcing the numbers to coincide with an imaginary “success” like “Economic Growth Numbers”, Unemployment Numbers and such, but the numbers are essentially all fake and made up anyways, the Greeks aren’t the only ones who made up numbers, the entire world of Economics is one gigantic making up numbers and lying as much as possible).
    One day I am an extreme right wing thug, the next a left wing thug, the next an anarchist the next Pro Business and Pro Capitalist and Pro the Standard Economic Theory, the next anything at all, always changing “Political Positions”, since all positions are wrong and right, it is all useless anyways, everything will happen anyways no matter what.
    But that is part of the general philosophical problem of the flow of new configurations in your memory and the idea that you are “progressing”: if you set up the sequence of information configurations your Man Brain has been exposed to since birth and all the rules and knowledge and the idea that you are wise and such and see them one after another, you think you are progressing: but it is not so, you can jump to any past configuration in a jiffy and always be back to where you where, they are all equivalent all wrong and all right, all a combination of all others, all changing and never advancing, or advancing in any way you want to invent that they are advancing…

  376. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 3:30 am #

    You are a White Punk and Asoka a Black one. Salt and Pepper – so beautiful. You guys should have your own cop show.

  377. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 3:34 am #

    You denied any role for genetics in IQ the other day – an extreme but popular viewpoint. Do you now recant?
    We on the Right have always allowed for both nature and nurture. You on the Left have never been able to accept genetics – because it destroys your Idol of Egalitarianism.

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  379. Eleuthero February 15, 2012 at 4:15 am #

    Asoka said:
    Even though I do not agree with your perspective as misanthrope, I certainly respect your right to be a misanthrope.
    ***********************************************************
    I have consistently said that the working man/middle class is in dire trouble while you, from the comfort of your living room, get to be optimistic because you, personally, are not suffering. I’m not suffering either but my point is that the REAL misanthrope is the person who lacks EMPATHY with people who are less fortunate. You are just such a person. Until misfortune strikes you, personally, everything is just wonderful.
    You are a monster who disguises himself as a spiritually advanced being. I’m not a Christian but I love the Christian depiction of LUCIFER as a wily philosopher who deceives people into thinking that bearing a lantern makes him a true source of light. You are such a person. Only Lucifer was more clever and far less self-congratulatory than you. You are too transparent to be a subtle deceiver which only renders you a pain in the ass.
    You like me, eh? I don’t think you’re capable of “like” much less love.
    E.

  380. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 5:09 am #

    Until misfortune strikes you, personally, everything is just wonderful.

    Misfortune strikes everyone. We have no choice about that. Old age, sickness, death, are inevitable, as well as the other things in the interim. Misfortune is guaranteed.
    I have seen my share of misfortune, and almost died several times from things like broken bones, major illnesses, war, and surgeries. I have also experienced poverty, a dysfunctional nuclear family complete with physical and emotional abuse, unemployment, major relationships that did not work out, etc. etc. etc.
    These are things some think of as “misfortune.” Been there, done that.
    I have probably seen more misfortune than you … as a result of wartime experiences in the Third World that almost led to my death. I have suffered in ways you most assuredly have not.
    But my reaction, the way I have assimilated my experiences of misfortune, has not led to my becoming angry or hateful or cynical or bitter or jaded or pessimistic about human nature.
    I am a realist, based upon real life experience. Your amateur psychological assessments, based on nothing but words posted on CFN, are not realistic. They are comical.
    You, the mighty statistician and champion of the middle class, seem to think misfortune and happiness cannot coexist. That says something about you, not about me.
    In spite of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, I have not been beaten down, my spirit has not been broken.
    I am grateful for life’s misfortune since, as Nietzsche said, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
    I am not well off financially. I was not born with a certain privilege that helps one become a community college instructor and retire with a good CalPERS or CalSTRS pension.
    But I am triumphant, because I am happy and in love. Yes, everything is just wonderful.

  381. old69 February 15, 2012 at 5:56 am #

    And what is happening to Greece reminds me of what happened ten years ago in Argentina: they had their currency tied to the US dollar but could not keep such a high evaluation of their currency compared to their economy, hence they had to disconnect their currency from the dollar and such.
    Anyways, it is truly absurd that such a large continent economically wise as Europe can’t save 10 million people from poverty: the European economy GDP is more than 10 trillion euros and they can’t support maybe 100 billion Euros extra for a small insignificant region of itself, 300 million people can’t save 10 million, what c*cks !?!
    Europe sucks, should be absorbed by the USA or China, they are all special little turds, the place is a piece of crap, hate them with all of your guts, please. Oh, Norway is his own little special turd that can’t be inside a federal union, England the same, Switzerland the same (all the rich hogs want to keep on hogging the money they robbed from everyone else, slobs, snotty snobs and turds, hate them please, with all of your guts, please).
    If you are not a Superstar Economy like Germany then you deserve to die: now how idiotic can you possibly be !?!?! It is like the USA wants Missouri or Oklahoma to be like Silicon Valley California and such ! Are they sick turds and crazy ?!?! Hate them with all of your guts, please.
    And then all of the jobs and wealth that Germany has (since they work so hard and are so Competitive and such) are the jobs all the weaker countries in Europe lost since they can’t compete with Germany and such.
    So as you see, the system is all about increasing inequality, is all about Winner take all, like Apple that is the winner and takes all and such. The system worships inequality, it does all it can to increase and affirm and produce inequality, but then turns around and beats up the loser because the loser isn’t as good as the winner, and the loser is blamed for not being the winner and must become a winner no matter what. Now how turdy and crappy can you get !?!? Are they sick in the head or what ?!?!
    Hey Detroit is not Silicon Valley so Detroit must be punished, this is the idea, get it ?
    What turds, hate them please with all of your guts, please.

  382. old69 February 15, 2012 at 8:15 am #

    So they want to change the minimum salary in Greece to 400 Dollars a month: Pretty cool, hu ? So let’s see: India and China factory workers are from 50 to 200 dollars a month accordingly, so another 2 slashes on the Greek minimum wage, say 200 and then 100 dollars a month (maybe at 100 dollars a month, Greek workers will have finally become “Competitive”, “Productive” and worthy of still surviving and not starving to death, but alas, they still are not Germany…) and finally Greece will be firmly within the pay range of most of the world (mostly the Third World Pay Range as the Modern Economic Model considers correct and morally just as this Model is given to you directly from GOD and his Absolute Truth Bible on all Economic Affairs).
    And they want to fire thousands of Government Paid Workers (everybody loves to fire Government Workers, everybody loves to hate people paid by the governments, it is such a fun worldwide sport, freely hate anyone’s guts since they are paid by the governments, really cool: this begs the question: if you keep on firing people, who the hell will have any money to buy the real goods produced by the efficient “competitive and productive” private sector anyways ?).
    I think these economists and theorists are kind of living in the past: just because a short lived model of economic success based on innovation and startups and competitive companies provided a lot of new wealth in the US and JAPAN and parts of Europe during the booming 1970s to 1990s, and mostly because of a very specific and quirkry development in new Technologies, Computers, Software, Internet and Others, it is expected that this model is now the bible and will work forever and will be true forever and such. Hence, any place in the world that does not follow this bible is doomed to starve to death and such.
    But this model is Utopia, a fairy tale, impossible to achieve and expect that ever country worldwide follows this, except for a few places that have been doing their homework for decades like Germany, JAPAN, Silicon Valley, now South Korea (becoming a real Economic Powerhouse) some other places and areas, and some other sectors, etc.
    After all, Germany has always been an Industrial and Technological Powerhouse, hell, they fought the entire World War II for 5 years against the entire world, all by themselves, of course they are special, they have always had a huge Industrial Base, built tanks, weapons, you name it, they have always been economic winners, good for them.
    But how on earth can you expect puny countries like Portugal, Ireland, Greece, a good chunk of Italy (Southern Italy) a good chunk of Spain, etc. to be even closely as competitive as them ? That is absurd, that is just an excuse to beat someone up, the Powers that Be are Bored, are having a field day being Bullies and beating up poorer economic regions, accusing them of not being Industrial, Economic, Technological and Scientific Powerhouses.
    Why not beat up Somalia, and ask them why they aren’t creating new Microprocessor Industries like Intel and companies like Apple ? Why are you not Bill Gates and Steve Jobs ? So if you are not Steve Jobs, you deserve to be beat up and starve to death, great, what an idiotic Standard Economic Model all of these economists believe in, and to think these clowns pay large amounts of money to universities to get degrees in this stuff, you couldn’t invent this insanity if you wanted to.
    On the past configurations stuff, also, everything that happened in the past not only repeats (always slightly differently), but everything you thought you acquired, solved and conquered is back to zero again, maybe was all wrong, maybe will always be all wrong, and so you go back and forth forever, all different configurations of information the Man Brain remembers or processes, but mostly fails to achieve ever. Amen.
    Just like I was reading how bad government involvement in the economy can be, how much waste and corruption and such it lends itself to, right, but the alternative, any alternative like private involvement in the economy is never guaranteed to give the results hoped for, you can always be wrong on anything and everything no matter what. Just because it is the opposite (private vs public and such) doesn’t mean it is the solution or right: most likely everything is all wrong no matter what since the Man Brain sucks, this contraption must be thrown away and a new one must be inserted in its place…

  383. mika. February 15, 2012 at 8:24 am #

    I am grateful for life’s misfortune since, as Nietzsche said, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
    ==
    Misfortune is nothing to be grateful for. It has crippled you and turned you into a rat. A despicable rodent. As far as Nietzsche goes, he was a syphilitic mental degenerate. His ego and Prussian inferiority complex in typical fashion led him to proclaim his degeneracy and criminal bloodlust, a super-human virtue.
    There are no super-humans. There are only humans and degenerates.
    You need to change.

  384. lbendet February 15, 2012 at 8:43 am #

    Snookered again, my friends.
    Speaking to E. and Wage’s comments about housing, I want to add that the whole notion of supply side and trickle down was quite an illusion and the American people bought into it.
    That’s right folks, redistribute money from the middle class to the wealthy power elite and then it will trickle down again. Now that’s the ticket. Productive enterprises were no longer needed.
    HO! Let the mergers and acquisitions begin!
    As businesses got bigger, “efficiency” became the enemy of job creation. Then add in globalism and voila, The middle class started to lose ground. Debt became the engine for wealth, for the top tier.
    So what to do?
    Hey, let’s turn the houses into ATM’s! That’s the little engine that could create the biggest bubble
    the world. Slice and dice those mortgages and sell them in AAA derivatives. That, along with the stock market became the only place people can keep up with inflation with their money, uh, until there’s a big sell-off.—oops, sorry.
    That’s most likely why this latest mortgage crisis Faustian deal was made and the middle class will pay most of the $25 Billion.
    Next stop Iran. Yes the American people are weary of war. So bored with Iraq and Afghanistan, but they can get revved up for the one with Iran–stay tuned.
    Boy, are we dumb or what?

  385. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:17 am #

    “Tripp, sounds like you are going to come in below US$12,000 income and will not be paying any taxes to support drone bombers. Good for you! (and us!)”
    That’s the goal! I don’t mind paying property taxes, seems fair enough to pay for fire and police service in exchange for private land ownership (although we intend to do our schooling, one way or another). But one can control how much sales tax they pay by how much they consume, and I think income taxes are pretty much the devil’s work. I certainly have no interest in paying for resource wars, especially since I’m trying to stop using the resources they are bent on acquiring.

  386. mika. February 15, 2012 at 9:17 am #

    Met –
    Your reply to BTB about his dystopian view of the future is about the most optimistic thing I’ve ever seen you write on CFN
    ==
    Of-course I’m optimistic. I wouldn’t be hounding you degenerate fucks if I wasn’t.

  387. mika. February 15, 2012 at 9:31 am #

    Because it sounded to me as though you must be thinking that the Slavs were enslaved by some Vatican enterprise. But Queenie spilled the beans in his very informative post – saying that the slavemasters of the Slavs were Muslim. So, never mind on this one, Met.
    ==
    I already made it very clear that the Jihadis and the Vatican work hand in hand, and always have. But nice try, buckweed.

  388. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:35 am #

    “I don’t know how it is in Georgia, but in my neck of the woods it’s pretty hard to disguise ongoing construction from the authorities.”
    Duly noted. We intentionally chose an area that didn’t require building permits (probably not an option in Mass), or have a HOA, or any covenants and restrictions. I think we got lucky with the quality of the neighborhood we’re heading to, considering these constraints. But then, I have been thinking about this stuff for over 3 years now! The property is just over 2 acres, surrounded on all sides by other undeveloped wooded lots, on a slope that faces away from the nearest neighbors, almost completely invisible. We will be building a cob house by hand, in the tradition of the old Devon, England, earthen cottages, without power tools, excepting the occasional chainsaw, and a power drill. The buildings will all have living roofs, and there won’t be any paving that isn’t native stone or brick. I think it will be hard to see from above. The neighborhood is a “second mountain home” kind of place – some full time residents, but mostly weekend cabin folks. We will restrict chain saw use to week days.
    So, unless we piss someone off pretty badly, and I can’t imagine how we’d do that, I think we can get this done. Thanks for voicing your concerns, though, that always helps with refining plans.

  389. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:52 am #

    “please fill me in on the non-watered toilet lol, i’m all ears.”
    Hey, Welles, check out “The Humanure Handbook,” available online as a free download. Human waste can be composted, same as any other, but ours is much more mineral dense becuase of our diet than cow, horse, or even chicken, so higher quality. It needs to be combined with high carbon biomass and composted for at least 6 months, but then it’s a fine way to fertilize fruit trees, berry bushes, etc. Until the cultural perception of humanure changes, I won’t use it on vegetables for the sake of our lunch guests;)
    “trippy, what would the ‘economy’ look like if 80% of the population lived like you did?”
    A lot more local! And the biosphere would be in full-on recovery. We chose the neighborhood we did for another reason. Because it’s full of second home properties for Atlanta’s well-to-do, I think those properties will slowly be dumped, at a greatly reduced price, and hopefully we’ll be in a position to pick some of them up as things progress. We’re already inviting artisan friends to take a look at the neighborhood, and there are plenty of open lots available even now. It’s a fairly big subdivision, and I think, with the right people, it could sport it’s own village economy, with the town 6 miles away serving as the “big marketplace.” Atlanta is only an hour away by car, and very supportive of people like us. Unless things go south in a hurry, we can work Atlanta markets for a while as we get set up.
    This is the best plan I’ve come up with. I’m all ears for improvements!

  390. old69 February 15, 2012 at 10:07 am #

    Another simple thing many don’t understand: you can freely fire government workers, increase the age of pensions for all, do all you want and save money as much as you want, all can be done, all kinds of austerity programs, cut costs, cut wastes, don’t pay any social benefits, don’t pay any “Entitlements” (the word itself means a poor lazy welfare queen and lazy slob wanting to sponge of all the hard working folks (remember divide and conquer, and especially let the poor fight amongst themselves)), all and anything you want:
    THE BOTTOM LINE THOUGH IS THAT NO MATTER HOW MUCH MONEY IS SAVED, HOW MANY WORKERS FIRED, HOW MANY BENEFITS AND ENTITLEMENTS NOT PAID ANYMORE, NO MATTER WHAT ALL AND ANY OF THE MONEY “SAVED” WILL NEVER GO BACK TO ANYONE IN SOCIETY AT ALL: IT WILL SIMPLY BE COMPLETELY HOGGED UP BY THE ALREADY SUPER RICH, NO MATTER WHAT.
    And that is the point: the system is not out to solve the debts and get the economy going again: it is simply out to take away as much money as possible form all the possible weaker players worldwide and transfer it to the already super rich, for what on earth are job cuts good for ? How can firing people be of any benefit to the economy and such ?
    A totally huge ripoff of all time, make them believe there are all of these debts and hose them all, fire, layoff, take money away from everyone but stop short from the 100 trillion dollars those few thousand super rich families worldwide have.

  391. Widespreadpanic7 February 15, 2012 at 10:38 am #

    Pucker,
    Nice mention of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. I have to reread that book. Read ‘Treasure Island’ over vacation in the Keys. Stevenson was a great storyteller and adventurer, travelling around with his wife and stepson even tho he suffered from TB. (which would kill him, in the South Pacific, at age 40) Anybody who would spend his honeymoon with his bride in an abandoned gold mine in northern Cal., prospecting, had to be a pretty interesting man.
    Yergin has several chapters in ‘The Quest’ about Peak Oil, which he pretty much dismisses. He quotes Jim quite a bit, without identifying him. Concerning the future of energy, amount of remaining oil, the potential of renewables, the role of technology in oil exploration and recovery, the importance of Hubberts predictions, really just about everything Yergin is 180d opposite of JHK. According to Yergin there is enough petroleum to last quite some time, even as demand rises to 120 million bpd from the current 88 million bpd, and when production does finally begin to decline (in the far future) renewables and technology will be there to pick up the slack. That pretty much undermines everything we say here.
    –WSP7

  392. charliefoxtrot February 15, 2012 at 10:47 am #

    tripp- i don t know if it would be immediately applicable to your building plans, but here goes: i read an article in mother earth news (remember that one?!) in which the guy stacked beer & soda cans with mortar- he said the compression strength was many times that of concrete because of the arc of the cylinders…and that the R-value is extremely high, as well…as i understand it, water bottles would work just as well, since the substance of the ‘bricks’ is not where the strength is from; but the shape…congrats on your new digs- yes, pun intended- and we look forward to updates…

  393. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 10:49 am #

    “That pretty much undermines everything we say here.”
    And that is also the majority opinion. I’m sure you’ll be in fine company if you choose to take that perspective.
    For an erudite counter-opinion, I highly recommend John Michael Greer’s latest, “The Wealth of Nature.”

  394. Widespreadpanic7 February 15, 2012 at 10:50 am #

    About JHK’s “John Brown Moment”, you might think, with millions and millions of forclosures in the past 4 years, somebody, when the Sherrif showed up to serve papers, remove property, and put belongings out onto the street, would have resisited and refused to go. That could have been a ‘John Brown Moment’. As far as I know it never happened. Maybe those plastic clad $600,000 McMansions just aren’t worth defending, I don’t know. Other times in our history, for example Shays Rebellion (1790s) in Western New England, people did resist forclosure of their property. If citizens won’t even defend their own homes what will they defend? So I doubt there will be any ‘John Brown Moment’ here.
    –WSP7

  395. Widespreadpanic7 February 15, 2012 at 10:55 am #

    For me its still an open question, Tripp. I tend to lean toward JHKs take on the situation.
    –WSP7

  396. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 10:59 am #

    I’ve seen some of those places, and I don’t personally enjoy the look of them, but, it’s common for cob builders to bury non-comopostables in their walls as they go up. Gets rid of some hard to dispose of junk, and is often considered therapeutic, burying the old television, cell phone, ex-wife, etc, in a foot and a half of mud. Saves a bit of cob mixing too.

  397. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 11:06 am #

    “I tend to lean toward JHKs take on the situation.”
    That would make sense, as often as I see you around here. Greer gives some really great explanations based on the laws of thermodynamics for why alternative energy sources cannot replace fossil fuels. And if fossil fuels are indeed biotic and non-renewable, which I certainly think they are, it’s really just a matter of time.
    The bigger problem I see is that we are compromising our ability to persist as a species on Earth through our activity, specifically our fossil fuel-driven activity. So I’m really hoping that peak oil means what I think it means.

  398. Rhino February 15, 2012 at 11:11 am #

    Put it this way, P2C, Vlad is convinced that Black, White, Asian etc behavior is a product of genetics. I’m telling him not so fast, there are other possible explanations ie culture. Culture is nothing more than learned behavior.
    And I’m suggesting some possible origins for this culture. Given the nastiness of black treatment maybe a lot of blacks take an oppositional stance towards the larger society. Whitey wants an IQ test? Fuck whitey. Whitey says learn your abc’s and 123’s? Fuck whitey. Whitey says this, whitey says that, fuck whitey, fuck whitey. Don’t “act white”. That’s for whitey. Does it make sense from the perspective of self interest? Does it matter? People adopt bad ideas and bad behavior and such things persist.
    And look at dominant white society in the US. I don’t know if you’re old enough to remember but decades ago we had Arthur Godfrey and Dick Van Dyck and Lawrence Welk on TV. And now? Jerry Springer and Jersey Shore. We couldn’t have imagined such things hitting the airwaves 50 years ago. Back then shacking up was very uncommon, not so now, single motherhood was seen as self destructive and was discouraged, now single mothers are seen as heroic.
    So is the explanation that white people are becoming genetically debased? Or is it that we’re adopting new attitudes and modes of behavior and genetics has nothing to do with it?
    Bottom line is that “race” based “science” is too politically charged given past history. I doubt that any reputable academic or any academic that wants to preserve their career will do research that draws conclusions about black vs white vs asian inferiority/superiority. And any science that has been done I doubt is worth a damn.
    From a common sense perspective I wouldn’t touch it either. Even assuming the science is worth shit what would you use it for? Are you going to use it to pre-judge individuals? Is this fair? Are you going to end up with a race based class system or caste system? Are you going to use it for ethnic or racial “cleansing” Yugoslav style? There are a lot of bad things I can envision coming out of this.

  399. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 11:16 am #

    Here is the link about VXX I posted yesterday at 4:04PM that wouldn’t display. I hope it works this time.
    https://www.etrade.wallst.com/v1/common/pdf.asp?docKey=1577-VXX-34FMNM86TMMT81RKPTI9QVMOKA
    The situation grows more weird. The Dow is down, the Nasdaq and S&P are up. When the S&P is up the VXX should be down. But the VXX is UP and by 4%. It is essentially screaming “market selloff ahead.”

  400. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 11:21 am #

    Sorry, still won’t work and I don’t know why. I give up.

  401. lbendet February 15, 2012 at 11:25 am #

    Maybe it’s Maybelline…
    There’s a new list of 400 lipsticks which the FDA has listed as having traces of lead in them. Now that’s lovely news knowing how we lick our lips and the gents might kiss us–hmmmm
    Last week there was a breaking story that 500 dogs had gotten sick from Chinese made chicken jerky treats. How many people know about this latest story and what companies to stay away from.
    Our neoliberals keep chanting no regulations–government agencies should be disbanded, ‘cuz corporations know best..don’t get in their way.
    http://www.fda.gov/Cosmetics/ProductandIngredientSafety/ProductInformation/ucm137224.htm#expanalyses

  402. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 11:36 am #

    I think the biggest misunderstanding about energy comes right out of human arrogance. No one denies that humans are the most arrogant animals on Earth, do they? [I mean, some of them even believe that they have the ear of an omnipotent being that gave birth to the entire universe.]
    Good, OK, then what follows is that we were basically gifted this nearly immeasurable suite of energy stocks in coal, oil, and gas. Half a billion years of stored solar energy – stable, portable, fantastically powerful – providing, for all practical purposes, a nearly free energy supply, as long as it holds out. And we’re doing our damndest to use it up as soon as possible!
    It’s interesting to me that people are constantly searching for a “free energy source,” when by any realistic measure, that’s what they are burning in their quest to find it.
    Fossil fuels created us. We were just as clever, if not more so, before the Industrial Revolution, when we had to take care of ourselves with almost no energy, comparitively; and our population never exceeded one billion, so 6 out of 7 of us, at bare minimum, are completely composed of fossil fuel. It’s an important point to note that our current technostructure is a product of fossil energy, not the cause of it.
    This immense amount of energy has allowed us to experiment with some very clever technologies, even some that promise to make more energy for us, but without the fossil energy subsidy that state of affairs wouldn’t exist. And when we lose our access to crazy amounts of oil and coal, only people who had the foresight to install those technologies will benefit from them, and only then until they break down beyond the local ability to repair them.
    Oil is a primary energy source. A solar panel is a secondary good. Two very different things. And the second wouldn’t exist without the former.

  403. Mrs. Soake February 15, 2012 at 11:38 am #

    Vlad –
    When are you going to stop this embarrassing charade of a militant Israeli named Mika. Are you trying to channel this guy? It’s so sad, dude.
    Mrs. Soake

  404. mika. February 15, 2012 at 11:56 am #

    I’ll continue to poke you in the eye with my militant finger until it cures you of your deliberate blindness. As long as it takes, Dostoevsky.

  405. Rhino February 15, 2012 at 12:00 pm #

    So maybe we go back to burning animal dung.
    I saw a TV show several years ago about an archeological dig in northern Scotland. What they had uncovered were the remains of a 5,000 year old agricultural community. Can’t remember much about it, just that the folk were fairly adept in the use of stones in construction of houses and structures for religious use, burial chambers etc.
    Some interesting things that the burials revealed. From analysis of the bones they were able to figure out the ages of the people at death. They said that 80% of the people were dead before the age of thirty, all were dead before the age of forty. This was essentially a teen-aged society that managed despite such short lives to reproduce, grow food and raise their young. Must’ve been a hungry, sick, painful existence though judging by the short lifespans.
    Seems that not much changed over many centuries. I read that even at the height of the Roman empire ie the pax Romana when life was allegedly “better” – ie peaceful, civilized – that the average life expectancy for a Roman woman was 28, for a Roman male it was 35, for a Roman soldier it was 30. Less than half of what it is today.
    So maybe as energy runs out we go back to a billion people. Maybe we use donkeys instead of cars, hand held scythes with flint blades instead mechanical harvesters, pointy sticks instead of AK47s. We’ve been there before, despite the hardships and short/hard lives people still managed to develop writing, literature philosophy, mathematics. It will likely be pretty miserable for people (maybe us or our near descendants) living in that new/old state. But it won’t be the end of all things.

  406. mika. February 15, 2012 at 12:06 pm #

    Q,
    My saged recommendation to you is to buy AAPL. Put everything into AAPL. Borrow as much as you can from your broker and buy AAPL!!
    Listen to my wisdom. It will teach you well.

  407. wagelaborer February 15, 2012 at 12:09 pm #

    Your fashion choices are your own, of course.
    I just wondered if you think that a middle-aged blonde woman will be mistaken for a norteno because she’s wearing red?

  408. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 12:11 pm #

    But nice try, buckweed.
    ==============
    It’s Buckwheat, unless you meant Dickweed.

  409. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 12:18 pm #

    There are no super-humans. There are only humans…
    Your paranoia about the Jihadi-Vatican collusion, for which you have provided zero credible evidence, shows your failure to escape the misfortune matrix.
    Here is how I imagine your matrix-mired mind works:
    — The Vatican control?s almost everything.
    — Vatican control is under the cover of secret societies.
    — The secret societies are controlled by the Jesuits.
    — The oath of the Jesuits is no different from Islam.
    — “They,” the Vatican-Jihad conspiracy you believe exists, oversee Free Masonry.
    — In Free Masonry, when you get to the 33rd degree, the only book left on the altar is the Satan-inspired Koran.
    — “They” are therefore worshiping Satan directly.
    There is no credible evidence for any of the above bullet points. You are trapped in the paranoia matrix.
    You are correct that there are no super-humans.
    However, it is possible for ordinary humans to escape the matrix. Once that happens your perspective on misfortune will change.

  410. mika. February 15, 2012 at 12:18 pm #

    No, I had it right. He, the buckweed. You, the dickweed.

  411. wagelaborer February 15, 2012 at 12:21 pm #

    He did want sympathy. He doesn’t want to go.
    And, no, he will be in no danger. He is a Lt. Colonel. He will be safe.
    He still doesn’t want to leave his home, his family, his job and his life here.
    And, yes, I have a lot of co-workers who are have family in the prison-industrial complex, or the military-industrial complex.
    The prisons are the only jobs around. If there were other jobs, I think that people would take them.
    The military people usually don’t want to go. They just want the money.
    We were talking about a former co-worker, when discussing this one.
    She joined the military for the money, but didn’t want to go when the US invaded Iraq.
    So she got pregnant. OK, that works until the baby is born, and then they send you anyway. This government, which waxes eloquent about family, etc., doesn’t really care about babies, or mothers.
    Anyway, she got pregnant again. This is not a sustainable strategy.
    My co-workers told me that she is now in Afghanistan.

  412. Buck Stud February 15, 2012 at 12:22 pm #

    Excellent post OLD69!

  413. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 12:25 pm #

    For Mika and E. … a Taoist reflection on “misfortune”
    A man named Sei Weng owned a beautiful mare which was praised far and wide. One day this beautiful horse disappeared. The people of his village offered sympathy to Sei Weng for his great misfortune. Sei Weng said simply, “That’s the way it is.”
    A few days later the lost mare returned, followed by a beautiful wild stallion. The village congratulated Sei Weng for his good fortune. He said, “That’s the way it is.”
    Some time later, Sei Weng’s only son, while riding the stallion, fell off and broke his leg. The village people once again expressed their sympathy at Sei Weng’s misfortune. Sei Weng again said, “That’s the way it is.”
    Soon thereafter, war broke out and all the young men of the village except Sei Weng’s lame son were drafted and were killed in battle. The village people were amazed as Sei Weng’s good luck. His son was the only young man left alive in the village. But Sei Weng kept his same attitude: despite all the turmoil, gains and losses, he gave the same reply, “That’s the way it is.”

  414. mika. February 15, 2012 at 12:30 pm #

    That’s the fatalistic attitude, Asoka, and I don’t subscribe to it. And never will.

  415. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:37 pm #

    You are a bore and a boor.

  416. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:48 pm #

    Yes that’s always the other side… I love the idea of Trade and a hands off attitude but many people used to get sick from bad meat, medicine, etc. So now we have the AMA that wants to regulate vitamins and decide everything for us. There is no clear answer: people obviously can’t be trusted but that includes the people in Goverment Agencies.
    People need the discipline of community. They are less likely to cheat and will suffer more pain if caught – another incentive not to do it. The carrot and stick work best in tandem. With Community and its local power, a vast Federal or Global Bureacracy becomes unnecessary and thus able to be resisted. The Free Traders want to fight it but strenghten it by not taking responsibility. And they try to make us forget the reasons why regulations came into existence to begin with – cupidity and irresponsibility. Their answer? More of the same.

  417. San Jose Mom 51 February 15, 2012 at 12:48 pm #

    Hey Bubblehead, Eleuthero, Bustin, Beantown, Qshtik, Wage and Westcoast….
    I need reading suggestions! Any great political/ecomonics/sociology books that you’ve read lately?
    Much appreciated,
    Jen

  418. turkle February 15, 2012 at 12:50 pm #

    The Disaster Capitalism book by Naomi Klein…read it and weep.

  419. turkle February 15, 2012 at 12:50 pm #

    Overshoot by Catton is pretty much a humdinger, too.

  420. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:52 pm #

    Women in the military often get pregnant before action commences. No principles whatsoever.
    And the miliary mixes young men and women together in situations of maximum stress. And then they wonder why the men misbehave. The possibility of imminent death is a great aphrodisiac. Part of wise governing is understand human nature and work with it – not try to eliminate it or pretend there is none as Leftists do.

  421. turkle February 15, 2012 at 12:52 pm #

    Geodestinies is a good one too.
    http://www.amazon.com/Geodestinies-Inevitable-Control-Resources-Individuals/dp/0894202995

  422. wagelaborer February 15, 2012 at 12:56 pm #

    With Liberty and Justice for Some,
    by Glenn Greenwald

  423. anti soak February 15, 2012 at 12:57 pm #

    ‘So now we have the AMA that wants to regulate vitamins and decide everything for us.’
    I have been told the Pharma / Corporations have
    bought up the smaller ‘Natural Health’ companies.
    So who is in Charge? Large and In Charge?
    Not the FDA/AMA, the 1%.

  424. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 12:59 pm #

    That’s the fatalistic attitude, Asoka, and I don’t subscribe to it. And never will.

    OK, Mika. Good luck!
    No, wait, that’s a fatalistic attitude, too.
    🙂
    If we had choice, who would choose misfortune? The Jews do not choose to suffer pogroms.
    One day you will figure out how to escape the fatalism-free will matrix altogether. No worries.

  425. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 12:59 pm #

    Sure sucka, the Vatican wrote the Koran. That’s why they fought the Crusades. That’s why they defeated the Muslim fleet at Lepanto. That’s why the heroic John Sobieski broke the Turkish siege of Vienna.
    Just the opposite: the Muslims and Jews have often worked together against Christendom. The Crusaders knew they were fighting the Muslims and the Jews as they took back Spain. And who can forget that when the Persians defeated Byzantium in Palestine, the Jews celebrated and bought thousands of Christian Captives from the Persians – and then sacraficed them?

  426. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 1:03 pm #

    True. But the AMA wanted to do this. Which would you choose? I’d rather keep it open like it is now and let people choose what’s real and what isn’t. Because if the AMA did get more power, they’d just be taken over by one or two of the Corporations anyway. We’d end up with less choice and more tyranny.

  427. mika. February 15, 2012 at 1:14 pm #

    Asoka, I said what I said because I genuinely want to help you. Sometimes people just need a little catalyst. Maybe I started a reaction, maybe not. I do wish you well.

  428. lbendet February 15, 2012 at 1:14 pm #

    I don’t quite understand what you’re suggesting.
    The people studying these products are scientists hired by government to protect consumers from tainted products.
    Do you think all towns should have labs to test products for traces of poisons in products?
    Who’s going to know what might be wrong with products coming from abroad?
    Look, I think govt. can be effective, it’s just a question of whether people in govt get bought off by the corporations so they don’t protect the people.
    95% of the products on the list are lower cost items but a few were higher priced items.
    I think most people don’t want to be at the mercy of greed.

  429. Mrs. Soake February 15, 2012 at 1:18 pm #

    Vlad –
    Whereas I may bore you for one post on rare occasion here, you’re boring seven days a week, several posts a day. And you post to yourself – Mika/Vlad/Metuselah. That’s beyond boring, it’s sad. Do you have a job yet? Any prospects of a meaningful relationship? Just wondering…

  430. charliefoxtrot February 15, 2012 at 1:25 pm #

    you fucking cauldron of fear and slime-covered shit!! first off, rape and sexual assault is not ‘misbehaving’; and that rape has little or nothing to do with sex, you retarded pervert!! aphrodisiac, indeed, you goddamned criminal; do you watch the rape/murder porn SVU, and all the other dreck that gets pushed; nay, extruded thru the magic box?! FUCK OFF with your “she made me do it officer, look at how she s dressed” “no means beat me til i shut up” psychosis…cocksucker…

  431. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 1:29 pm #

    I also wish you well.

  432. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 1:45 pm #

    Have you tried Black, or so called Prince Hall Masonry?

  433. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 1:53 pm #

    “It will likely be pretty miserable for people (maybe us or our near descendants) living in that new/old state. But it won’t be the end of all things.”
    No, you’re absolutely right, it won’t be. But it might be perceived as sufficiently more laborious enough to keep modern humans wishing for a savior.
    And I personally disagree about it being miserable. For four years now, every “modern convenience” I discard makes me less anxious, more relaxed, and yes, I think it’s safe to say, happier. Again, if people don’t know any better they won’t care. Living to the ripe old age of 40 might just be normal. And no one who ever knew the average age of Americans to be 74 will be around to tell them any differently. Less energy will undoubtedly mean less capacity for geriatric care. But that also means less impact on our ecosystem, which will improve the quality of the years we do live. It always seems to come back to quality versus quantity.
    Although, I think it’s important to remember that farming itself took its toll on humanity. The transition from foraging to farming shortened our stature by 5 inches (from which the Turks still haven’t fully recovered), increased our tooth decay six fold, and introduced degenerative diseases like arthritis that were previously unknown. Those factors combined, one can only imagine what it did to our lifespan.
    I don’t advocate for a return to pre-industrial agriculture; I advocate for a novel move into horticulture. Which is basically what permaculture is. But that implies more than exchanging wheat for chestnuts.

  434. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 1:53 pm #

    Calm down you litte liberal nutcase. Rape exists, yes – and it should be harshly dealt with. But there are many grey areas. Much courtship and sex occur under the influence of alcohol. So has she given her permission or not? You think she knows? What a naif. How very green you are. Many women decide they’ve been raped the morning after – or a couple of days after when he hasn’t called back. Or once penetration has occured, the women then has the right to cry stop? Sure ok, I agree, but it makes her a monster I would never associate with again. But how many young hot blooded men would? Why don’t you have some compassion for men too? And locking them up with young women and expecting nothing bad to happen is just ignorance – exactly the kind we’ve come to expect from you and your ilk. Tempt not thy brother is an important moral principle.

  435. turkle February 15, 2012 at 1:54 pm #

    RE: Vlad
    “Do you have a job yet? Any prospects of a meaningful relationship?”
    AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. That’s a good one!

  436. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 1:59 pm #

    These short lifespans existed all thru history until the 20th century. They’re due to some extent to childhood diseases. There have always been a fair number of people who lived to old age or at least old middle age. Even Neanderthal skeletons have been found with arthritis – some severe that showed not only their age, but that they must have been cared for extensively.
    Obviously before the mid 20th century you didn’t have large numbers of elderly people in very poor health as we have now. That will change dramatically in the years to come. If you can’t stay healthy, you wont stay alive like people do now thru pills, surgery, etc.

  437. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:01 pm #

    How is your relationship with charlie coming along? Whose the pitcher and whose the catcher?

  438. turkle February 15, 2012 at 2:05 pm #

    My, don’t you have an active imagination. Isn’t it time for your nap yet?

  439. k-dog February 15, 2012 at 2:07 pm #

    “And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas.”

  440. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 2:08 pm #

    Eh, maybe I stand corrected on the arthritis factor, but from what I understand, degenerative diseases were a much smaller issue before agriculture. Maybe near-mortal injury in Neanderthals was the driver for the development of arthritis in those cases? I know the only joints I have it in are joints that I’ve injured in the past.

  441. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:08 pm #

    Yes, quality of people rather than quantity. But that the rub – short Middle Eastern Farmers in great numbers overcame the tall godlike Cro-Magnon/Neanderthal Hybrids of Old Europe. We still haven’t recovered. Our ancestors had lager brains and heaver bones; smarter and more robust.
    Your’s is the ruthless compassion of the great Eugenicist Nature. I like it. But there has always been a strong relatioship between radical ecology and the far right/left; as verboten as that sounds, it is nonetheless, true.

  442. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:12 pm #

    Could be. The Paleo Diet is supposed to be the best. And the Taoists are against grains. Rice on every plate is not the Traditional Diet of China -it’s survival food, one of the best. People should stock up on it and hopefully not need it.

  443. turkle February 15, 2012 at 2:12 pm #

    You are one weird dude, you know that?

  444. anti soak February 15, 2012 at 2:40 pm #

    JIM…check this!!!!
    Hula at Fuck U shima…
    ‘A Hawaiian theme park that propped up the economy of a rural Japanese town in Fukushima prefecture for 45 years was forced to close after the March 11 earthquake. Almost a year later, the hula girls have returned.
    The Spa Resort Hawaiians in Iwaki will open its indoor pools and host wedding parties and Hawaiian………………………………..’

  445. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:45 pm #

    Can you give us a specific story? You need to tell stories – you never do. Instead you try to sell us soap. Stories, not soap and not poverty sob stories either.

  446. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:48 pm #

    Genius is akin to madness, Turk. As a mundane Liberal tribesman, I don’t expect you to know anything about this.

  447. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 2:52 pm #

    What do you think of the new beach laws in California? Would Gidget and Moondogie have obeyed such edicts? After having watched, “How to Stuff a Wild Bikini”, I say no. But what do I know? You are my man in the field or on the beach in this case. Report.

  448. anti soak February 15, 2012 at 2:59 pm #

    Vlad….the govt is desperate for $ !
    In my part of town they give 100s? 1000s? of traffic tickets a day!

  449. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 3:01 pm #

    Chris Christie to fly the flag at half mast for Whitney Houston. Is this appropriate? In any case, countless Americans are sickened by the ongoing media blitz. Even ordinary Americans are begining to realize the Elite’s attempt to dumb us down as well as sleaze us.
    No disrespect to Whitney Houston – a fine singer but no heroine of any kind.

  450. ront February 15, 2012 at 3:15 pm #

    Maybe this version of the story will explain its message better for you. If not, can you please explain the attitude toward life’s circumstances that you ascribe to?
    Many years ago in a poor Chinese village, there lived a peasant with his son. His only material possession, apart from some land and a small straw hut, was a horse he had inherited from his father.
    One day, the horse ran off, leaving the man with no animal with which to till the land. His neighbors – who respected him greatly for his honesty and diligence – came to his house to say how much they regretted what had happened. He thanked them for their visit, but asked:- How can you know that what has happened has been a misfortune in my life?
    Someone mumbled to a friend: “he can’t accept reality, let him think what he wants, as long as he isn’t saddened by what happened.”
    And the neighbors went off, pretending to agree with what they had heard.
    A week later, the horse returned to the stable, but it was not alone; it brought with it a fine mare for company. Upon hearing this, the villagers – who were flustered since they now understood the answer the man had given them – returned to the peasant’s house, in order to congratulate him on his good fortune.
    – Before you had only one horse, and now you have two. Congratulations! – they said.
    Many thanks for your visit and for all your concern – answered the peasant. – But how can you know that what has happened has been a blessing in my life?
    Disconcerted, and thinking he must be going mad, the neighbors went off, and on the way commented: “does he really not understand that God has sent him a gift?”
    A month later, the peasant’s son decided to tame the mare. But the animal unexpectedly reared up and the boy fell and broke his leg.
    The neighbors returned to the peasant’s house – bringing gifts for the wounded boy. The mayor of the village offered his condolences to the father, saying that all were very sad at what had happened.
    The man thanked them for their visit and their concern, but asked: How can you know that what has happened has been a misfortune in my life?
    They were all astonished to hear this, since no one could be in any doubt that the accident of a son was a real tragedy. As they left the peasant’s house, some said to others: “he really has gone mad; his only son might limp forever, and he is still in doubt about whether what happened is a misfortune.”
    Some months passed, and Japan declared war on China. The Emperor’s envoys traveled throughout the land in search for healthy young men to be sent to the battle front. Upon arrival in the village, they recruited all the young men except the peasant’s son, whose leg was broken.
    None of the young men returned alive. The son recovered, the two animals bred and their offspring were sold at a good price. The peasant began visiting his neighbors to console and help them, – since they had at all times been so caring. Whenever one of them complained, the peasant said: “how do you know it is a misfortune?” If anyone become overjoyed, he asked: “how do you know it is a blessing?” And the men in that village understood that beyond appearances, life has other meanings.

  451. ront February 15, 2012 at 3:18 pm #

    I found the following thought provoking quotes challenging to those who are politically active and inactive.
    on Revolution
    An agitatioin to attain a political or economic end must rest upon an implied willingness and ability to use force. Without that it is mere wind and attitudinizing.
    -James Connolly 3-14-1914
    In the last analysis, all revoltions must be social revolutions, based upon fundamental changes in society; otherwise it is not revolution, but merely a change of government….
    –Madame Sun Yat-Sen 7-14-1927
    Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.
    –Louis D. Brandeis 1927
    Martyrs are needed to create incidents. Incidents are needed to create revolutions. Revolutions are needed to create progress.
    –Chester Bomar Himes, “Negro Martyrs are Needed” May 1944
    Every social war is a battle between the very few on both sides that care and who fire their shots across a crowd of spectators.
    –Robert Lindner “The Instinct of Rebellion” 1956
    Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
    –JFK 3-12-1962
    If you feed the people just revolutionary slogans they will listen today, they will listen tomorrow, they will listen the day after tomorrow, but on the fourth day they will say, “To hell with you.”
    –Nikita Khruschev 10-4-1964
    on Politics
    The political spirit is the great force in throwing love of truth and accurate reasoning into a secondary place.
    –John Morley “On Compromise” 1874
    Politics, and the fate of mankind, are shaped by men without ideals and without greatness.
    –Albert Camus 1962
    Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.
    Paul Valery 1943
    Those people who treat politics and morality separately will never understand either of them.
    Jean Jacques Rousseau 1762
    Politics: Who Gets What, When, How
    Harold Lasswell book title 1939
    Politics, n. -A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles.
    Opposition, n. -In politics the party that prevents the Government from running amuck by hamstringing it.
    –Ambrose Bierce “The Devil’s Dictionary” 1906

  452. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 3:43 pm #

    “Your’s is the ruthless compassion of the great Eugenicist Nature.”
    Except that I don’t have a preference for skin color beyond my own mandatory survival, and yes, that would be the survival of a tall white man’s family. Godlike would be a stretch.
    I think integrated culture is a product of our anomalous access to energy, and will probably fade with the loss of that energy, but as far as seeing one race as more deserving of survival than another, I don’t. Nature can pick the winners on a case-by-case basis.
    And even if I do think most of the current eco-destruction is the fault of farming cultures, particularly Indo-European farmers, I don’t think many of them had advanced knowledge of what they were doing, so I don’t think it’s appropriate to wish them ill. Therefore I’m not anti-white either.
    I do, however, see certain behavioral changes in industrial culture as more adaptive than others, so I am biased toward thinking that these are “the good guys.” Namely natural builders and permaculturalists. So I guess I have my horse picked out, just like anyone else. That horse just happens to be a paint.

  453. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 3:55 pm #

    “short Middle Eastern Farmers in great numbers overcame the tall godlike Cro-Magnon/Neanderthal Hybrids of Old Europe. We still haven’t recovered.”
    I wish I could stick around long enough to see how this all plays out. Organized farmers overcame healthier foragers with their numbers, and now they’ve put the planet’s entire biosphere in jeopardy. [I would say ‘we’, but I changed my course pretty radically when I figured this out, so I won’t.] Who knows what the tidal movement of the next century will uncover.
    The “radical ecologist” in me thinks we should plant ourselves in as pristine a place, ecologically, as we can, build a tight community around ourselves, and become very useful to the larger population. That or pick a place no one wants.

  454. k-dog February 15, 2012 at 4:00 pm #

    I appreciate this story but there is danger here as well. An attitude of passive acceptance can result. A good adjustment when dealing with cosmic realities of life but fatal when dealing with evil men or unpleasant circumstances which can be avoided by making the right choices.
    The town let all the young men be taken be taken why? The answer there was fear. Fear that blinds one from knowing that they have other choices. The peasant in his ‘wisdom’ was not able to point that out to them.
    Passive acceptance is not the answer. However overall the story is good. It portrays well the eastern concept of detachment. The big picture is the thing after all and the obvious can confuse.
    But passive acceptance like fear makes one forget there are other choices in life. A bend over and take it attitude that results from pretending that good things are bad and bad things are good is never a good answer and someone with such a mind is easily manipulated.
    Life gives you lemons, just make lemonade. But is life giving you lemons or is somebody trying to take your meat?
    The story starts in the right direction but does not take things far enough and leaves one in a state which could produce a bad life adjustment.

  455. debt February 15, 2012 at 4:06 pm #

    A while back I got one of those camera automatic red light tickets. County of Santa Cruz wanted me to pay $489 for it. I tried to fight it in court and actually showed that since the cameras were operated and maintained by a private corporation in Arizona(!) the local police department was not in compliance with the California Vehicle Code. The judge said, in essence, so what? you’re still guilty. I then asked if I could do community service. I ended up doing most of it by helping out at Shakespeare Santa Cruz over the Summer. Ushering and then enjoying several plays whilst drinking some great red wine. I do believe I had the last laugh on that one.

  456. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 4:13 pm #

    Thank you, ront.
    Your version makes the message much clearer as the story is much more explicit.
    We are so quick to judge; we think we know what misfortune is.
    Don’t worry, be happy!
    I’m still waiting for Buck Stud or E. or anyone else to explain to me how worry might be an effective strategy for preventing an attack on Iran, or reversing global climate change or resolving the Euro crisis and world economic crisis.
    Instead of worrying, one can just as easily be happy while simultaneously using reason to address the large problems we face. And if we can detach ourselves from results, it is even easier to be happy while doing what we do.
    Centuries-old cultural conditioning has given us a nasty neurosis: the belief that happiness must be “earned”. It can be “earned” only by enduring unpleasantness (e.g. work, pain, misery). But how do you know if you’ve endured enough unpleasantness to deserve happiness? Another unspoken game rule: “responsible adults” can never endure enough unpleasantness to truly deserve happiness.
    Laid on top of the first neurosis is the idea that spending money will make you happy. This is toffee coating on a bad puritan apple. If you spend enough money to give you the (advertised) conditions for happiness, the neurosis emerges in the form of apparently random worries, guilt, “feeling shitty”, etc. Worrying is the easiest and most popular way to negate happiness.
    So: we never stop working, we never stop spending money, we’re never really happy – ideal conditions, coincidentally, for a certain type of slave economy.
    Bliss is our true nature; remember it. And remember it again and again and again.

  457. k-dog February 15, 2012 at 4:27 pm #

    “short Middle Eastern Farmers in great numbers overcame the tall godlike Cro-Magnon/Neanderthal Hybrids of Old Europe. We still haven’t recovered.”
    Oh please, — I stay away from this bullshit but since I know better here I’m sayin.
    As the agricultural revolution spread. Genes from middle eastern men spread across Europe because as farmers they were a better deal for the local women. I believe that Spencer Wells determined 20% of European genes are the result of Middle Eastern Male farmer infiltration that took place over centuries and happened because farmers had bling. No other reason.
    Hardly great numbers overcoming.
    Somebody been pulling stuff out of their ass and posting it.
    But whats new.
    And recovered from what exactly?
    I’m going back to ignoring the bull.

  458. wagelaborer February 15, 2012 at 4:42 pm #

    See what I mean about keeping your sex life private?
    http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/02/15/couple-arrested-for-bondage-role-playing-on-valentines-day/

  459. wagelaborer February 15, 2012 at 4:49 pm #

    Great comment, Tripp.
    Hey, the 5-08 hurricane left many downed trees around here.
    I noticed that many different kinds of mushrooms were growing on them. I figured that meant the trees were ready for mushrooms, so, in your honor, I ordered mushroom spores.
    When they got here, the instructions said that the trees should be 4 months dead, not 3 years. Doh!
    Then I remembered a piece of agricultural tradition passed down though an aphorism – “They treat us like mushrooms around here. Keep us in the dark and feed us bullshit”.
    And I remembered that, yes, I used to buy mushrooms from a place in Whittier that grew them on horseshit.
    So what’s with the trees? And I don’t know one tree from another, unfortunately, except for oak and maple and cedar.

  460. ront February 15, 2012 at 5:21 pm #

    What you say is true as regards the more choices the better. Limited thinking, fear, and assumptions are unhealthy and unfulfilling. This story does not suggest any of these. I think you may have “found” it yourself. For instance, the fact that the young men were taken off to fight the war was what happened in the story. There choosing to buck the authority, dodge the draft did not arise in the story.
    Still your notion of reacting habitually, be it passively or aggressively, is apt not to be the wisest option that exists. Remaining patient and poised in the face of difficult circumstances, and seeking wise counsel are better habits and will foster better options.

  461. myrtlemay February 15, 2012 at 5:39 pm #

    “No disrespect to Whitney Houston – a fine singer but no heroine of any kind.”
    No, she wasn’t a heroine, she LIKED heroin. I think Judy Garland died at about the same age (47). Your body can wear out pretty fast when you abuse it with drugs, so by 50, you’re pretty much fried. That being said, may she rest in peace.

  462. turkle February 15, 2012 at 5:44 pm #

    “Genius is akin to madness, Turk.”
    Sure, Vlad, but just because you’re insane doesn’t mean you are necessarily a genius. In other words, the inverse isn’t true.

  463. turkle February 15, 2012 at 5:46 pm #

    “As a mundane Liberal tribesman”
    *sigh*
    Why do I ALWAYS get tagged as some kind of arch-liberal by morons on the internet? You people must all be reading from the same script.

  464. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 5:52 pm #

    Hi Myrtlemay,
    Have you checked with the CFN censors? You have to be careful when you make any comment related to a recently deceased person.
    I made a political joke last week that was directed at Grover Norquist, not Whitney, and got reprimanded.
    The censors said it was too soon… but they did not indicate on what date a joke would be permissible.
    The censors lack a sense of humor. Especially when it comes to comments related to the military.
    The censors themselves have tact and sensitivity and class and a sense of propriety, all of which they said I was lacking.
    Ironically, the censors were tactlessly taking cheap shots at my expense.

  465. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 6:00 pm #

    GREEN PARTY SUCCEEDS IN GETTING ON UTAH BALLOT
    For the past week, volunteers and staff for Jill Stein for President have been working day and night in Salt Lake City and neighboring communities. With Utah, the Green Party of the United States has secured 19 ballot lines, and has not missed a single deadline in working towards the goal of winning ballot access in almost every state.

  466. anti soak February 15, 2012 at 6:11 pm #

    Oh Yes! Have the cameras been removed? I think some cities are doing so.
    Long ago in Orange County we went up to the toll booth, to find it was Unmanned /Automatic and we didnt have the right amount of cash..so we drove thru and got a ticket mailed to us.
    The signage on some LA streets [like near Bundy] is so confusing, we went to the Getty Musuem, leaving the car just off Bundy and returned to a ticket..
    there were 3 signs posted, but non clearly said
    ‘permit parking only,including weekends. residential street’.

  467. Qshtik February 15, 2012 at 6:23 pm #

    I do believe I had the last laugh on that one.
    ===============
    Good story Dett but I like mine better. I told it before, about a year ago, so if you’ve read it please bear with me.
    I was busted by mail for failing to toss 35 cents in the basket of a toll booth on the Garden State Pkwy. I had been carpooling with 2 or 3 other guys for over 20 years and none of us ever tried to beat the toll by just speeding on through. This was all in the pre-EZPass days.
    What we often did however was to toss the change in the basket on the fly at 10 mph. This was common and if you were to come to a full stop you would be rear-ended, but if you DID come to a stop and got out of your car you could probably pick up several dollars of change off the ground from people whose money had bounced out of the basket. I can only assume that’s what happened to MY 35 cents.
    I was outraged by this ticket. It was going to cost me some ridiculous amount like $74 or whatever. I decided to go to court and fight it. On court day I was astonished. There must have been 150-200 people there just like me with all sorts of minor infractions including failure to pay the Pkwy toll.
    The judge, Ito or Wapner if memory serves, looking incredibly bored having probably sat through umpteen thousands of cases like this in his career, began working his way through the docket. One after the other he listened to each defendant’s sob story (cutting several of the more long-winded ones short in mid-sentence), most of them so lame I couldn’t believe this collection of fuck-ups would think they stood a prayer. Each and every person was declared guilty and directed to pay a fine of X $$$ at the cashier window to the left.
    Finally my name bubbled to the top:
    “Mr Q. Shtik”… “is Mr Q. Shtik here?”
    “It’s Qshtik your honor. The Q is not a first initial. It’s all one word. I am so famous on the Clusterfucknation blog, like Prince or Madonna or Beyonce, that I simply go by a single name. I am truly surprised you haven’t heard of me. Do you live under a rock or something?”
    Laughter from the gallery.
    Judge: “If you say the word fuck again you will be held in contempt.”
    More laughter.
    I mentally ran through my story while Ito/Wapner called the name on the ticket listed as complainant:
    “Officer Fascist Pig please step to the bench.”
    Brief hesitation..
    “Officer Pig?
    A shorter brief hesitation.
    Judge to other Court personnel: “Does anyone know if Officer Pig is here?” “Check the hallway, I’ll wait 15 seconds.”
    No Officer Pig.
    Mr Shtik, not guilty, you may leave.
    Next case.. “Mrs Zelda Gunch, you are accused of having been whupped severely with an ugly stick’ how do you plead?”
    The gallery: “GUILTY!!”
    I was out of the room with a shit-eatin grin on my face while GUILTY!! still rang in the hallways.
    The above is an essentially true account though some details may have been mis-remembered.

  468. welles February 15, 2012 at 6:39 pm #

    thanks for the info trippy, you are one of the extremely few real people on this blog, contributing to harmony/environment with your daily actions.
    there’s a lot more good in the world that the doomers out here posit.
    if 100 million americans planted a tree each it’d make a huge positive impact, something that simple.
    seems it’s up to folks like yourself to make up for the rest of us…..
    so many wonderful things sprout out of going back to the land with a mix of technology, even in a semi urban setting like yourself.
    peace peaceniks

  469. mika. February 15, 2012 at 7:09 pm #

    Ront, I love you, but as you know I’ve long ago left all that infantile superstitious nonsense behind be. I don’t believe in god, and I don’t believe in good or bad fortune, or manifest destiny, or any such crap. If you have the will and you’re competent, good things will follow. If not, they wont. It’s that simple.

  470. myrtlemay February 15, 2012 at 7:46 pm #

    Well, I didn’t really mean any disrespect. I feel bad that Miss Houston played such a vital part in ending her life too soon. I guess we all have to watch our ‘p’s and ‘q’s. 😉

  471. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 7:53 pm #

    “See what I mean about keeping your sex life private?” -wage sexting-
    Wage, that’s a funny story in the link you posted.
    For those of you who don’t click links, the story concerns a couple in Oregon, male 31/female 27, who were playing a bondage game for Valentines. (The article does not say who won the coin toss as to who was to be dom and who was to be sub.) The police were called because the woman was seen, bound and naked, with her mouth covered with duct tape – in the back of the couple’s car.
    Strange goings on on the left coast, these days.
    But the most unfortunate thing about the article was the ad running next to it – of a handsome young couple standing next to their Chevy Cruise. The only saving grace for GM was that the girl had her clothes back on and her duct tape off – for the ad picture. ha.ho.he!
    =========================
    And as far as your guy who just deployed to Afghanistan. Jeebus H. Crutch, Wage – the man is a Lt. Colonel? And you said he’d been in the Natl. Guard for 30 years?
    He’s been making some pretty serious bucks on the public teat all this years – IMO, it’s about time he earned his keep doing what he’s actually supposed to be paid to do. I would probably have reacted as your coworkers did, on this one.
    What’s he doing at your hospital anyway?
    How many jobs does one man need?

  472. myrtlemay February 15, 2012 at 7:54 pm #

    Don’t know if I mentioned it before but I got off on my possession charge. Sorry, no funny story to tell. Frankly, it’s sad that our jack-booted, thug, police force chases after civilians who aren’t harming anyone when there are murderers and thieves (think banksters) running around free.

  473. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 8:08 pm #

    “if 100 million americans planted a tree each it’d make a huge positive impact, something that simple.”
    -wells-
    Nice sentiments, wells. And I concur with you about Tripp – he’s a great addition to the blog, and probably doing more good here, even, than he realizes.
    I’ve planted close to 100,000 trees in my days.
    Of course I cut them down every 29 years or so – so maybe I don’t count in your mathematics.
    I saw forestry studies 20 years ago that suggested that the North American landmass was actually functioning as a huge carbon sink – vacuuming up global CO2 – relative to the rest of the World. This was because so much of the NA landmass was cleared of timber in the 1900’s – and all that cutover land was growing back simultaneously.
    Of course, the immigration fueled population boom in the United States has tipped the scales the other direction since then, as timberland is cleared and farmland is paved.
    Sadly for the World, those studies are now moot, and more and more CO2 just accumulates in the atmosphere.

  474. Vlad Krandz February 15, 2012 at 8:25 pm #

    You talk about Whites as if you weren’t one. You are still partially in the clutches of scientism and its alienation.
    It’s natural to prefer one’s own. In your case, that’s other Whites. If you had a child with a Black woman, that child would be less related to you than a random White on the street – a simple genetic fact.
    Liberals deny all this on the basis of bogus sentimental idealism – yet they follow it for the most part. Millions of Liberal Whites have fled the downfall of California. Their reasons: good schools, good air, less crowding etc. Never do they mention the real reason – the Bronwn Invasion. Liberal Whites are a tribe and like to hang around with other Liberal Whites. Of course, adopting 3rd world children is a ritual in their religion of Non Racism…

  475. mika. February 15, 2012 at 9:09 pm #

    Bloomberg – http://goo.gl/MsJ3w
    There are 57 Wall Street analysts in Bloomberg’s database who follow Apple Inc., and only one of them has a “sell” rating.. LOL!
    Q,
    This is your chance, don’t miss out now!

  476. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 9:10 pm #

    “Culture is nothing more than learned behavior.”
    -rhino-
    Rhino, there have to be genetic components to culture. We could argue about this until the cows come home and never settle it, though. And as you say – any such discussions or research flowing from them are forever off-limits due to political correctness. So – let’s move on:
    “And I’m suggesting some possible origins for this culture. Given the nastiness of black treatment maybe a lot of blacks take an oppositional stance towards the larger society. Whitey wants an IQ test? Fuck whitey….Fuck whitey…Fuck whitey”
    -rhino-
    Yeah, OK Rhino – but how does the black underclass ever get off this treadmill?
    Because the “fuck whitey” attitude seems worse that it did 10, 20, 30, and 148 years ago.
    That letter of the freed slave from Tennessee that Wage posted a week ago. Here was a man who LIVED slavery – yet, when freed by the Civil War he quickly found a job, made a life for himself, and either wrote that letter or found someone to write it for him.
    I started junior high in 1968. The school was freshly integrated and probably 50-50 black/white.
    (And all male – I’ve told CFN several times that it was like going to school in prison.) None of us, black males or white males, liked the situation. We didn’t want to be there and we took it out on each other and on the teachers.
    With all of that, though, the situation was tolerable – and some of us (white and black) actually learned some things from teachers and out of books.
    I KNOW that much less learning is occurring in that school today, even though much more money is being spent on it. And that school is now HEAVILY minority.
    The civil rights act was passed in ’64.
    Things were supposed to get better for blacks.
    For the black underclass, things are worse.
    You seem to suggest that “nastiness of black treatment” gives US blacks a perpetual excuse.
    So, how do US members of the black underclass ever get off of the “fuck whitey” treadmill, Rhino?

  477. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:15 pm #

    You’re quoting Vlad there, not me. You know that, right?

  478. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:39 pm #

    I’ve only got about 1000 trees to my credit so far, but I don’t cut them all down like POC does, so maybe that counts for something! Most of mine are food producing trees, too, or stock for small streambank stabilization projects.
    May sound sketchy to some, but there’s nothing like the feeling you get from interupting the waste flushing export pattern and keeping it all in the garden and orchard. It’s really a surprising amount of free, top quality compost to suddenly have on hand. Not to mention the drinking water saved, a gallon and a half at a time.

  479. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 9:45 pm #

    Hey Tripp –
    Congratulations on your new place! I’m very happy for y’all. Here follow some random observations – stuff that you probably already know, but maybe it will help someone.
    The big deal about getting a structure permitted and inspected in Georgia (and most/all other states, as far as I know) is that this process leads you the the “Occupancy Permit.”
    An Occupancy Permit grants you two important privileges. One, is the right to have permanent electric power connected. The other is the right to a USPO mailing address and a mailbox located at the closest public road to your new house.
    Sounds like you, tripp, won’t be needing a power hookup to your house. Good for you! And if you ever do happen to want power, the local power company (GPC or whichever EMC serves you up there) – will be happy to hook “temporary” power to a pole that you provide. I’ve known people who ran on temporary power for years and years, apparently there is no time limit.
    The mailing address thing is a bigger deal to work around. In fact, I can’t think of a work around for this. You can get a “911 address” very easily – but there are things that just require a snail mail address. I’m sure you’ll think of something.
    That’s awesome that you are eying the neighboring properties for acquisition, post-collapse. I do the same thing over here. A couple of my buddies will get phone calls if anything in my immediate vicinity comes on the market. And these are the same – very select – couple of buddies who have a standing invite to my place, with their families in tow, should things ever get untenable where they live.
    ================
    BTW, what are you doing about water at your new place, if you don’t mind my asking?

  480. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 9:53 pm #

    “You talk about Whites as if you weren’t one. You are still partially in the clutches of scientism and its alienation.”
    It’s not that. You know how the very religious will say that they feel more comfortable around people of the same religious persuasion, regardless of race, than they do around atheists of their own color?
    It’s more like that. I’m just in a different place than most whites. I feel more comfortable with other horticulturalists, regardless of skin tone, than I do around farmers, even if they’re white like me. Agriculture is just sort of a 10,000 year old bad dream I wish more people would wake up from.

  481. trippticket February 15, 2012 at 10:01 pm #

    “BTW, what are you doing about water at your new place, if you don’t mind my asking? ”
    Not at all. There’s an old well bore onsite that we plan to put a manual pump on. Also a spring just to the east that hopefully has drinking quality water trickling out of it. Both will be new to me, so we’ll see how it goes. Water catchment will obviously be part of the plan as well.
    Not sure about the 911 address yet. We have a PO box for now.
    Thanks for the good wishes! I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of you in the future.

  482. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 10:22 pm #

    “I’m very surprised that you would consider my view of the future dystopian, Procon, when I was trying to show how awe-inspiring it could be with technological advancement and the resultant personal freedom of the masses….”
    -bill of Boston-
    Bill, I took another look at your post last night, right before I turned in. In fact, I think I dreamed about it. So – if you’ve ever wanted your prose to be the stuff of a (no-longer-quite-so) young man’s dreams – you may have achieved that goal.
    It may surprise you, but I agree with you that the future for humanity MAY contain awe-inspiring advancement and personal freedom. And I certainly agree with you that humanity will likely have to go through some sort of population “keyhole event,” before that better future gets here.
    The reason I called it your “distopian” view of the future – was the way you invoked an elite set of Powers That Be – that are working to achieve this better future – with themselves still on top, permanently.
    Maybe it’s just the Scotch-Irish in me. I don’t like being ruled by an elite. Hell, I don’t like being ruled by anybody. I only accepted the orders of various authority figures in various chains of command in my working life – because I liked getting paid more than I liked living on the street and foraging through dumpsters.
    Beyond that, though – I go back and forth on whether there is an actual organized elite set of PTB. AND IF there is – I will always likely contend that they are not that smart at all; more likely they are dumb as a box of rocks, based on their performance to date.
    When did your PTB come into power?
    Why didn’t they realize population was going to be a problem back in the 70’s – and do something about it, worldwide?
    Why do your PTB continue to let the US pack itself full to far beyond overcapacity – even today, despite knowing death is on the horizon?
    (You call them amoral – but this seems excessively so.)
    Where do your PTB plan to live?
    Are your PTB organized by race or religion?
    If they are not so organized, HOW will they keep their elite status intact – going forward?
    Have your PTB considered that the Chinese, to name one subset of humanity with its OWN PTB – might not be on board with their same set of plans.
    ======================
    Nice post though, Bill.
    And obviously it hit a nerve with me.
    So, thank you for making me think!

  483. asoka. February 15, 2012 at 10:57 pm #

    …humanity will likely have to go through some sort of population “keyhole event,” before that better future gets here.

    An important point of BTB’s post is that the future is “in a world we can scarcely imagine.”
    Many on CFN imagine that future will be worse. The option of a more positive future is scarcely imaginable.
    BTB, in a later post, made it explicit by saying:

    I was trying to show how awe-inspiring it could be with technological advancement and the resultant personal freedom of the masses because of that technology.

    In other words, a more positive view of the future, one rarely admitted or seen on CFN.
    Equally, the possibility exists that a “short haircut” (what you call a “population keyhole event”) will not be necessary.
    There is no limit to how many people we can love.

  484. Eleuthero February 15, 2012 at 11:00 pm #

    Mika said:
    Q,
    My saged recommendation to you is to buy AAPL. Put everything into AAPL. Borrow as much as you can from your broker and buy AAPL!!
    Listen to my wisdom. It will teach you well.
    ************************************************************
    You are “Wrong Way Corrigan”, Mika. The Palo Alto Apple Store which had furious activity throughout 2011 has “suddenly” had a massive drop-off of business and is cancelling two-thirds of their classes. I know two of the employees.
    Why do people advise mortgaging the home to SPECULATE on a stock whose success is mostly in the rearview mirror?? To me, this idea of the stock market as an “ATM” is just as loony as the idea of your house being an ATM.
    E.

  485. progress2conserve February 15, 2012 at 11:38 pm #

    “There is no limit to how many people we can love.”
    -asoka.-
    Sure there is, a..
    Even when I was in my early 20’s, my limit was generally one per night.
    http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091126135747AAw6JhC

  486. k-dog February 16, 2012 at 12:10 am #

    🙂

  487. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 12:17 am #

    But that was when you were in your early 20’s.
    Love for you today does not equal sex. You can now be around women without the risk of raping them, unlike how Fox News’ Liz Trotta portrays military men.
    Men and women can be together and love one another without sex, so we need not deny ourselves wonderful non-sexual relationships with a beautiful half of the species.
    There is no limit to how many people we can love.

  488. anti soak February 16, 2012 at 12:29 am #

    From yr Link:
    ‘It is believed, on the basis of genetic evidence, that all human beings in existence now descend from one single man who lived in Africa about 60,000 ‘
    YEAH RIGHT, ONE SINGLE MAN…Im like WTF!

  489. anti soak February 16, 2012 at 12:31 am #

    Its possible Australia and all it Abos are from one woman, assuming she arrived there 60,000 years ago pregnant with twins, one male, one female…
    or even one male offspring who mated with her and his own female offspring…
    BUT ONE MALE DONT MAKE JACK S**T.

  490. progress2conserve February 16, 2012 at 12:36 am #

    “There is no limit to how many people we can love.”
    -asoka.-
    You are wrong. Of course there is a limit, for humans as biological organisms, on a planet with finite resources.
    But as long as the electricity stays on and the food trucks keep running – this limit will not be acknowledged by the forces responsible for a growing US population.
    The greater the US population – the worse the consequences, for humans on planet Earth.

  491. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 12:38 am #

    Well, it looks like the Republicans caved.
    Obama won the fight to extend the current 2 percent payroll tax cut for 160 million workers through the end of the year, saving the average family about $1,000. Damn that Obama, putting $1,000 directly into 160 million pockets.
    Obama also won the battle to prevent a cut in doctor payments under Medicare, and Obama won the battle to get extended unemployment benefits for those out of work. Damn that Obama. Vote for Jill Stein, Green Party. She has long-term solutions.

  492. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 12:43 am #

    “But as long as the electricity stays on and the food trucks keep running…”
    ===============
    P2C you are spouting nonsense. People loved each other before electricity and food trucks. Love is not dependent on fossil fuels.
    I am right about this and you know it. You are intentionally being a resident impediment by denying something so obvious.
    There is no limit to how many people we can love.

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  494. mika. February 16, 2012 at 12:55 am #

    You are “Wrong Way Corrigan”, Mika.
    ==
    I’m never wrong, comrade. Just that in your rush to execute me, comrade tavarish, you missed the heavy sarc tags. Twice! And I do believe I have called a market top, pretty much to the minute! 🙂

  495. anti soak February 16, 2012 at 12:58 am #

    Earlier this week someone posted that ‘RAPE IS ABOUT POWER’…Baa, This ‘feminist theory’ was refuted long ago…see ‘THE DARK SIDE OF MAN’..
    It has able citations.
    That was ‘against our will, men, women,rape’
    a ‘feminist classic from circa 1970’
    He refutes that with ample evidence rapists are usually poor and prefer young cute victims.
    Has nada to do with power.

  496. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 1:06 am #

    “…rapists are usually poor and prefer young cute victims.”
    ===============
    So, due to an economic draft, the volunteer army is composed of poor soldiers who cannot resist raping young cute women soldiers. Or, as Liz Trotta said, “the soldiers are raping too much” … if only the military soldiers would rape in the right amount. But those young women soldiers are so damn cute they bring it on themselves, right antisoak?

  497. progress2conserve February 16, 2012 at 1:08 am #

    “P2C you are spouting nonsense. People loved each other before electricity and food trucks. Love is not dependent on fossil fuels.”
    “There is no limit to how many people we can love.”
    -the Resident Impediment, ignoring the fact that people who lack the resources* to live, can not love-
    *resources like food, mostly from fossil fuel –
    and like water, pumped with electricity
    ==================
    “Nothing is impossible to the man who doesn’t have to do it himself.”
    http://www.dharmadam.info/best_quotes.asp?sltr=n

  498. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 1:29 am #

    resources like food, mostly from fossil fuel –
    and like water, pumped with electricity

    =============
    There you go again, as Ronnie used to say. I am happy that your hatred for me does not prevent you from replying to my posts.
    P2C, food and water are not dependent on fossil fuel. You are reading Tripp’s CFN posts, so you know that even in Georgia one can utilize permaculture to develop sustainable horticulture not dependent on external energy inputs. God provides sunlight, and God provides rainfall. For millenia before oil people survived just fine without fossil fuel. Humans didn’t just survive. They thrived and they loved one another. You cannot deny this love. Nor can you deny that, as in the past, in this very moment:
    There is no limit to how many people we can love.

  499. Vlad Krandz February 16, 2012 at 1:42 am #

    And how many non White permies do you know? And the ones in New Guinea and a few other places? They would give it up in a heart beat for flush toilets and TV. You and your fellow White Tribesmen are unique – revel in it.
    You embrace it consciously – they never had the choice. Big difference. And we had to go thru these thousands of years of development to get to the place where we could see this choice and make it.

  500. progress2conserve February 16, 2012 at 1:45 am #

    “There is no limit to how many people we can love.” -asoka., being an impediment, repetitively-
    Thus, we have a new sobriquet for asoka. –
    – – – The Resident Impediment – – –
    Asoka. may, from know on be also known as –
    – – – The Repetitive Impediment – – –
    – – The Repetitive Residential Impediment – – –
    -TRRI-
    ================================
    And this is stupid, a.. I quit.
    Love as many people as your Impedimentary Heart desires. Just subtract one love, for me.
    And add one hate.

  501. asoka. February 16, 2012 at 1:51 am #

    Just subtract one love, for me.
    No can do partner. My heart loves everyone, including you.
    If other hearts hate, so be it…
    I have no control over the hearts of others.
    From my own experience I only know about love and its limitless possibilities.
    There is no limit to how many people we can love.

  502. Vlad Krandz February 16, 2012 at 1:57 am #

    Power and sex and totally interconnected. Some kinds of rape are about power and some are about taking power in order to get sex. It’s far more diversified that Feminst Theory would allow – since their motive to smear all men. I mean what kind of person says all intercourse is rape? And then we let these scum teach our daughters? And then we don’t expect the relationship between the sexes to not go to hell?

  503. Vlad Krandz February 16, 2012 at 2:10 am #

    Bravo Prog. The White Race is the most individualistic of them all. And of Whites, the Northern European the most. And of Northern Europeans, the Celt is the most. What good high tech this and high tech that if it leads to being ruled by a bunch of Globalist Creeps?
    I like part of BTB’s vision but I love the idea of new colonies on other world’s even more. The same ideal if it fails here on Earth. Or even if it doesn’t – men want nauturally want to begin new things, things that are uniquely their own.

  504. k-dog February 16, 2012 at 2:13 am #

    Fred is very good this week.

  505. Vlad Krandz February 16, 2012 at 2:25 am #

    Yes. Yes. Yes. You are seeing. Rhino’s way is the way we took and look where it got us: always more of the same, always self perpetuating.
    Of course look at historical causes but don’t get stuck there. Life is always new. The present must not be enslaved to the past. And of course, the Jews want us “to never forget” as well. And with great cleverness have used the law of association to incriminate all Whites in their holocaust. All Whites are Anti-Semites waiting to happen – even those who helped them defeat their enemies. Nice folks, reeeeaal nice.

  506. anti soak February 16, 2012 at 2:38 am #

    Still we like you as a Person!
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .

  507. anti soak February 16, 2012 at 2:41 am #

    ‘. Agriculture is just sort of a 10,000 year old bad dream I wish more people would wake up from.’
    I am laughing as i write this, from the city with an ‘ombudsperson’….
    DEAR GOD SPARE ME FROM THE SUSTAINABILITY CROWD.
    !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  508. k-dog February 16, 2012 at 2:42 am #

    Nothing strange there really.
    A direct analogy is that I have an ancestor who lived in New England in the early 1600’s. That man has millions of offspring in North America of which I am only one of them. Noting strange because that man is thirteen generations back from me. I have many other great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfathers. He is only one of 8192.
    Back less than 400 years and ‘siblings’ of your ancestors can easily number in the millions. Families were large then. Many died but those who lived had lots of descendents. These are the yeast people of CFN land.
    So how far back does one have to go to find an ancestor from whom all are related? The answer is 60,000 years.
    And science can trace it.

  509. Eleuthero February 16, 2012 at 2:44 am #

    But, Fred, who writes on “Everything” because we’re to acknowledge that he’s an EXPERT on everything, is just another person who posits that American workers, wink/wink nudge/nudge, are somehow of lower character than their putative Mexican replacements. I beg to differ.
    Again, I hate to introduce FACTS into Fred’s soup but if you look up the demographics of CRIME in American cities, Hispanics are second only to blacks. Their educational achievement is at a low level, again, second only to blacks.
    Fred should ask displaced American construction workers if they’d like their jobs back. Fred’s Anti-Gringoism is tiresome and is just another form of reverse racism. Fred got laid in Mexico and wherever Fred got a good lay is a great place to Fred.
    Fred … should take his soliloquiys and put ’em where the moon don’t shine.
    E.

  510. Eleuthero February 16, 2012 at 2:45 am #

    See my comment about “Fred” above.
    E.

  511. Eleuthero February 16, 2012 at 2:55 am #

    I feel like continuing my rant because Fred is another of these self-anointed “seers” who engage in the romanticizing of the “noble savage”. In ALL primitive cultures, there is bravery, the relentless fight against starvation and being plundered by other tribes, etc..
    Mexico is such a bankrupt culture that even their ethnic music, Mariachi, is not of Mexican origin. It is of GERMAN origin. I am in a constant state of amazement on this site at the noble savage worship of even some of the most erudite, well-motivated souls herein.
    However, I think I’d have an immediate coronary occlusion if I ever heard the noble savage worshippers praise Danes or Germans or Norwegians or Poles … you know … YOUR FUCKING ANCESTORS … that’s all. Do you all have GUILT about your origins or do you fear that all ethnic pride in whites should be hidden in the back of an infinitely long closet.
    This is an area where your favorite target, Vlad, actually makes searingly accurate points. The idea that a Swedish-American has to mute their pride because even the smallest exhibition of it is “racist” should be a source of deep SHAME to anyone who fancies that they’re an honest intellectual and an honest mensch. It’s one of THE dumbest aspects of progressive liberalism.
    E.

  512. tegmark February 16, 2012 at 2:57 am #

    From:
    http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/64293-give-us-back-good-old-fascism/
    [quote name='michel123456' timestamp='1329337495' post='658762']
    Well I agree somehow about the analysis.
    What is your model for a solution?
    [/quote]
    I have posted my solutions extensively under the http://www.ilovephilosophy.com social forums and under http://www.kunstler.com blogs:
    Essentially:
    1) Free Salaries to all, about 800 dollars a month since we live in an excess capacity free wealth generating economy thanks to the Technological Economy’s huge economies of scale, automations, optimizations, etc. There is no longer any excuse for any poverty except if it is explicitly desired forced and planned by old fashion Ape Man ideologies and social structures;
    2) Cheap or Free Rents, since we have many empty houses, at least 15 million empty homes across the USA and maybe 20 million empty homes from Lisbon to Moscow in Europe; (I am assuming the readers are mostly from the USA, EU and JAPAN, but this is valid in many parts of the world anyways);
    3) Huge Public Private Projects like Huge Increase of Consumerism, Millions of Skyscrapers, Rockets to Mars, High Speed Trains, You Name it, anything and everything that activates huge projects for the common good, huge collective endeavors so all have a goal and function as opposed to the fashionable “small businesses” and “startup ideology” and “be your own boss” ideology that dominates today so that everyone fights everyone else and doesn’t create collective constructions and endeavors.
    4) It goes without saying that Nature is to be Used and Conquered and it is not a Religion or something spiritual: Man must use up all of Nature to finally achieve Mind Over Matter, the Final Symbol Over Matter War Won By Symbol aka as “KILL NATURE”.
    I hate the Greens, Environmentalists, and most of the dominating Standard Economic Theory.
    AMEN.
    Check out:
    http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=177835
    SKOTT FREE HANDOUTS
    I want that, I want free stuff, why don’t the OWSers ask for free stuff, free all, free stuff and you will be free! Are they afraid of “bad manners” ? Do they really think this “economic system” is based on anything else but crap, turds, layabouts and thieves ? Why is Bill Gates, who robbed 50 billion dollars considered “valuable” and all of those asking for scott free handouts “criminals” ? We need free stuff, this system won’t generate anymore jobs because they are not needed.”
    “The system has a very hard time repressing all the excess wealth it generates and has a very hard time distributing it because of stone age old fashioned economic laws. Hence the wealth accumulates in the 1 %, but the 99 %, the OWSers don’t ask for the only thing really capable of changing this situation: SCOTT FREE HANDOUTS, FREE SALARIES OF 800 DOLLARS A MONTH, CHEAP RENTS OF 200 DOLLARS A MONTH FOR A 3 BEDROOM HOUSE, ETC.
    Therefore the mathematical solution is scott free handouts to all, cheap rents, trillions of new skyscrapers, new rockets, cars, you get the idea.”

  513. desg04c0 February 16, 2012 at 3:22 am #

    As president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, Diane von Furstenberg is New York Fashion Week's unofficial hostess. So naturally, her front row is a who's who of the fashion and media worlds, from hubbie Barry Diller to Anderson Cooper, Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer, Oscar de la Renta, Solange Knowles, Molly Sims, Rachel Zoe and on and on.

    Her fall show, dubbed "Rendez-Vous" or "a meeting with suspense and expectation," was all about glamour at a moment's notice. With her lifetime of jet-setting and brand building, that is something Von Furstenberg certainly knows about.

    The designer reinterpreted her famous wrap dress as a kind of wrap jumpsuit with a plunging front. It came in several iterations, but one of the prettiest was a pink lily color, worn with a port red coat. Bright hues have been a fashion trend for a couple of seasons now, but Von Furstenberg made color theory an art form with the styling of this collection,chaussures nike, pairing a citrus lime satin halter top with a pair of beet red trousers for example, and a cerulean blue, drapey sleeveless top tucked into a scarlet red crepe pencil skirt.

    Of course, when it comes to preparing for a potential rendezvous, every woman should have a little black dress in her arsenal. And there were plenty here — shimmering with sequins, shimmying with chain fringe, or scattered with puzzle-piece-shaped chiffon appliques. Accessories, including clutches with lip-shaped clasps, and heart-shaped minaudieres, added to the romantic intrigue. 

    RELATED:    

    — Booth Moore in New York

    Photos: Looks from Diane von Furstenberg's New York Fashion Week show Sunday at Lincoln Center. Credit: Frazer Harrison / Getty Images

  514. Pucker February 16, 2012 at 4:16 am #

    My ancestors came from Wales. I understand that the warrior class of my ancestors were bi-sexual cannibals who used to go into battle naked with their bodies covered in bright blue paint and waving huge battle axes.

  515. Pucker February 16, 2012 at 4:23 am #

    E. wrote: “Fred got laid in Mexico and wherever Fred got a good lay is a great place to Fred.”
    Don’t tell Wilma.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Flintstone

  516. tegmark February 16, 2012 at 4:42 am #

    That was from:
    http://instantsingularity1.blogspot.com/
    Ok, it no longer belongs in the Rant House.
    Check out:
    The Masterpiece: Instant Singularity
    http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=177939
    To enter use:
    user. spider9629
    password: magnoliaM1
    Thank You.

  517. tegmark February 16, 2012 at 4:46 am #

    That was from:
    http://instantsingularity.blogspot.com/
    Ok, it no longer belongs in the Rant House.
    http://instantsingularity3.blogspot.com/
    Ok, it no longer belongs in the Rant House.
    Check out The Rant House on http://www.ilovephilosophy.com
    to enter:
    To enter use:
    user. spider9629
    password: magnoliaM1
    Thank You.

  518. 8man February 16, 2012 at 4:50 am #

    That was all from:
    http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/64293-give-us-back-good-old-fascism/
    Thank You. You are Welcome.

  519. 8man February 16, 2012 at 5:12 am #

    From:
    http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/64293-give-us-back-good-old-fascism/
    “You better get used to being bored, to not having anything to do anymore, to not having any goals anymore, to not achieving your “career”, to not being equal to all the other turds anymore, to not thinking that you are a special little turd who “worked hard” to have more than Mrs Jones next door, who is a layabout, welfare queen, etc.”
    Does that read right ?
    I wanted to say:
    “You better get used to being bored, to never having anything to do anymore, to never having any goals anymore, to never achieving your “career” again, to not being better to all the other turds anymore, to stop thinking that you are a special little turd who “worked hard” to have more than Mrs Jones next door, who is a layabout, welfare queen, etc.”
    or
    “You better get used to being bored, to having nothing to do forever from now on, to having NO goals forever from now on, to never having any kind of “career” again, to being exactly equal to all the other turds, hence never better than anyone else forever from now on, to stop thinking that you are a special little turd who “worked hard” to have more than Mrs Jones next door, who is a layabout, welfare queen, etc.”
    From:
    http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=177835
    That was from comment number 17 from the beginning of thread, at Tue Jan 10, 2012 9:32 am
    [quote=”nameta9″]Existentialism ?
    I know, I understand, it would be like “giving up”, like “declaring defeat”, a scott free pure FREE RIDE, HANDOUT, a FREE LUNCH just doesn’t click with our stone age mental computer program. But most of all, most people would think “Now What ?”, they wouldn’t have “Anything to Do” (as if they are actually doing much anyways in most jobs today), they have been programmed (since the stone ages, but actually during the stone ages they just did “what was necessary”, much smarter than us forcing ourselves to do a lot of make believe effort that leads to nothing, go figure) to always “Do Something”, to always have a “Goal” a “Target”, etc. Well, guess what ? The era of work labor, targets and goals are over forever, it will never come back again, it is no longer in the cards, just suck it up and get used to it, this is the “New Normal̶