JHK’s Three-Act Play
Europe is giving new meaning to the term “bootstrapping,” the age-old (virtuous) idea of picking oneself up off the floor after some blow or reversal of fortune has laid you low. The new method might be called “skyhooking” in which a massive rescue apparatus secured at some mysterious point unseen in the clouds lifts whole exhausted nations from their knees in order get them to summer vacation. Hence: the interesting spectacle of an entire continent headed for vacation despite facing utter financial ruin, revolution, and civil war.
No one who has been to Europe in our time can doubt that it is a lovely place to stage human existence. The towns and cities are in immaculate condition, even the ones bombed to gravel in the receding unpleasantness of the 1940s. The trains, trams, and subways run cleanly and on-time. The citizens, though well-fed, maintain normal physiognomies and wear dignified adult costumes out in public. Everything along the streets broadcasts the notion, central to civilization, that grace and beauty matter — even the handwriting on the bistro chalkboards. What a wonderful place. I’d like to go back. But events suggest that this sweet period of history is drawing to a close and whatever happens there next will be less like Midnight in Paris and more like Riot in Cellblock D meets Quest for Fire.
This skyhooking procedure has been both fun and sickening to watch, like any great public stunt of seemingly impossible derring-do. Here you have a whole bundle of nations, all up to their chins in the quicksand of debt, pretending to catch lifelines of new credit dropped mysteriously from the clouds by hidden central bank airships, only to find that the lifelines are a kind of collective hallucination coming over them like a fever dream in their hour of desperation. Seems rather cruel, actually. Especially since they have lately sunk deeper in the quicksand from their chins to their eyeballs.
No one on the scene — or watching from a remove for that matter — can conceive a happy ending to this chapter of history, which might be remembered on some distant clear-skied day yet to come as the age of government-by-check-kiting. Or the Chinese fire drill banking model — no offense to that great nation of diligent workpersons. Yet, reports from even the most anguished Euro nation du jour (Spain) say that the restaurants are bustling and there is no shortage of nearly naked nubile beauties along the beaches of the Costa Brava. And over in Italy, of course, a squirrel could make the journey from Monterotondo to Lago Maggiore by leaping from one outdoor luncheon table to the next with its knobby little knuckles never touching the ground.
The question is: what happens when the recognition finally hits that the money just isn’t there? That the whole circus of alphabet soup bailouts and skyhook rescue operations was a fraud? Well, my guess is that things fracture and splinter and there commences a great scramble for the table scraps of the incredible banquet that this congeries of nations put on its Master Charge card. And when the table scraps are all gone, the members of some nations, or regions within nations, set out pillaging around the place where their neighbor sat at the banquet, and pretty soon you get such a disorderly scene in the lovely old banquet hall of Europe that even diligent Chinese tourists will not venture there for a while.
None of this is to say that the action I describe is not following similar lines in other corners of our sore beset planet. For instance, those diligent Chinese I aver to have been running a set of banking rackets at least as shoddy, careless, and plumb crazy as the Eurolanders. And don’t get me started on the Anglo-American clusterfuck, which has left the rest-of-the-west with a future as ingeniously booby-trapped as the Aurora cineplex shooter’s apartment (and to a strikingly similar note of destructive insanity).
But in these dog days of summer (and the horse latitudes of the spirit), isn’t it easier to just mix another vodka and tonic, kick off your flip-flops, and enjoy the feeling of cool sand between your toes? Rest up all y’all. Events will be pinging around the reality-scape good and hard in a few weeks. Me: well, I’m just keeping the fruit trees watered out back for now.
Enjoy your vacation.
Kayakers on the Battenkill, July 2012
____________________________________
JOIN ME FOR A LIVE WEB CONVERSATION
____________________________________Tue 7/31 from 9:00pm – 10:00pm EDT
Participation is limited RSVP now. Cost: Free
James Howard Kunstler’s newest nonfiction book, TOO MUCH MAGIC, will be available in stores in July 2012. The book will be available at booksellers, large and small, online and off. To find out how you can help support local bookstores with your purchase, CLICK HERE. Other books:
This blog is sponsored this week by Vaulted, an online mobile web app for investing in allocated and deliverable physical gold. To learn more visit:Kunstler.com/vaulted
|
Order now! Jim’s new book
Click here for signed author copies from Battenkill Books
|
Order now! Jim’s other new book
|
Paintings from the 2023 Season
New Gallery 15
GET THIS BLOG VIA EMAIL PROVIDED BY SUBSTACK
You can receive Clusterfuck Nation posts in your email when you subscribe to this blog via Substack. Financial support is voluntary.
Sign up for emails via https://jameshowardkunstler.substack.com
No to the UN gun registry…confiscation always follows!!!
The OBMAMAFRAUD is DESTROYING AMERICA !!!
I would have been first, but my keyboard jammed.
Ah Europe. I spent a lot of time in Italy and Germany during my military tours, and some other life adventures. James is so right. What a lovely place. I am currently buying a sailboat that I want to cross the Atlantic with. I want to see the grand old lady from my moving apartment before it burns down.
Indeed. Autumn is going to come in like a female Rottweiler and go out like a Tarentino film. Happy summer.
Love that painting Jim. I like your developing technique. Has to be one of my favorites I’ve seen.
I’ve long been a fan of Jim’s talents as a polemicist and humorist. Allowing a largely uncensored comments section provides a forum for everyone from serious commentators to the usual collection of professional internet trolls. Perhaps if we had a common understanding of a few definitions it would help to keep the discussion on track.
POLITICAL SCIENCE 101
FASCISM: A political system wherein political power is held by a consortium of corporate interests and their chosen government representatives, acting in concert to further their mutual self-interest. AKA the final stage of capitalism.
VAMPIRE CAPITALISM: A form of Fascism wherein Banksters suck the lifeblood out of all productive economic sectors leaving behind only dry husks blowing in the wind.
DEMOCRACY: A political system wherein political power is held by and wielded for the benefit of the majority of the citizenry. AKA a theoretical concept that precedes centralization of propaganda and mass communication.
CONSPIRACY THEORY: A wildly improbable explanation of events fabricated by the Government to cover its own malfeasance and repeated by the mass media until it becomes accepted as fact.
FREE MARKET: A state that exists in virtual reality but disappears instantly when the first market transaction occurs.
RULE OF LAW: The rule that states that laws apply only to those who haven’t bothered to purchase Justice.
ELECTORAL PROCESS: The system whereby candidates spout delusionary promises and winners are selected by Diebold computers programmed to produce the desired result.
EMPIRE: A political/economic system that maintains military bases on nations outside its national territory for the purpose of extracting wealth from the subject states for the benefit of the Empire.
ENERGY RESERVE: A resource located on foreign territory that can be obtained by clandestine regime change or direct military action.
INTELLECTUAL: Someone who engages in endless debate about what the world would be like if only there were no such thing as class stratification, monopoly of force, mass communication, propaganda, war, and human evil.
ECONOMIST: Someone who believes that actions in the economic system can best be described by complex mathematical equations as long as all the underlying assumptions have never existed in any known universe.
LIBERAL: Someone who wishes everyone would have a nice day, as long as they can make junior partner in their law firm by defending Monsanto’s patents on the entire world’s gene pool.
CONSERVATIVE: Someone who believes that the only proper role of Government is to initiate nuclear warfare and thus bring on the Rapture.
REVOLUTIONARY: Someone who downloads music on the Internet without paying for it.
FACEBOOK: A system wherein potential Enemies of the State (AKA all US citizens) provide personal information to enable Homeland Security to assess their threat level and identify Friends who need to be placed on surveillance lists.
HOMELAND SECURITY: The operative arm of Facebook, charged with elimination of all Enemies of the State placed on the Predator Kill List approved by the President.
(Ps. If there is anyone I have failed to insult, please add them to the list)
Yessir, Mr. Kunstler,
The various pretendings and confidence games are becoming too numerous to detail. (Even Paul Craig Roberts has given up hope that another paradigm can be “shifted to” without the whole rickety structure collapsing in a heap.)
Thus, I believe you are correct that we must simply turn to those things in which we have some bit of deciding influence. (Just now, the only thing I’m stupidly wishing for is mo’ rain. The hose will have to do, ’cause I’m not real influential when it comes to the weather. ;o)
Here’s a piece that gave me a little grotesque chuckle. The storied and gloried Tony Robbins’ seminar mated with fire-walking injuries. (The pretending and self-delusion never stops, I tells ya!)
http://www.mercurynews.com/crime-courts/ci_21125630/san-jose-21-people-treated-burns-after-firewalk
Fun for All; bring the kids!
lower case casual observer has stolen my handle ! Get your own.
Going back to an earlier JK meme:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-s-goodman/foreclosure-crisis-museum-of-modern-art_b_1690094.html
Buckminster Fuller, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth: “Thus under lethal emergencies vast new magnitudes of wealth
come mysteriously into effective operation. We don’t seem to be
able to afford to do peacefully the logical things we say we ought to
be doing to forestall warring-by producing enough to satisfy all the world needs. Under pressure we always find that we can afford to
wage the wars brought about by the vital struggle of “have-nots” to
share or take over the bounty of the “haves.””
http://classes.dma.ucla.edu/Winter09/9-1/_pdf/3-fuller_operating-manual.pdf
JHK again reminds us that Europe is going to imploded, eventually. Unfortunately we may beat them to the punch. Look at the mess we are in – Wall Street is crooked, the banks here and everywhere are crooked (Libor) and Congress, well their rating has never been lower. Will the House introduce any new bills to nationalize and control the proliferation of guns? No, of course not. The NRA is too powerful to stop. At least until someone with a conscience says, you know, I’m sick of people being shot for no good reason. I am sick of people getting ammo from the Internet and Tear Gas too! Some idiots are claiming that ammo is protected under the Second Amendment. Let’s look at it like strict Constitutionalists. It doesn’t say anything about ammo, it says a well-regulated militia has the right to keep and bear arms. Not the right to buy ammo, load guns or discharge them.
So we are headed towards disaster on all fronts. But don’t you worry, the top 1% are hoarding trillions of dollars in offshore accounts. And not paying a red cent in taxes on any of them. Democracy has been sold to the highest bidders a/k/a Citizens United and we don’t even know who they are. The Chinese are mad that their one child rule is preventing them from producing even more babies – 2 billion Chinese are NOT enough! Overpopulation coupled with massive debt coupled with unlimited weapons = total insanity.
There is nowhere safe to hide not even for the 1%.
The massacre at the Aurora Century-16 theater is a reminder of the insanity JHK predicted would happen in the Long Emergency. There is a lot of insanity happening in the country and others, driven by the forces of reality punching through the cloud of illusion. No matter what they say, the oil is running out and the world is getting hotter – and angrier.
Thank you, Crazy Horse.
Most useful definitions listing, and its’ early appearance will make it easy to refer to.
I definitely will use it as the Rosetta Stone of terms when the inevitable pismires wriggle out of the moldy woodwork.
Mabe James, this is the very moment to simply just abolish money. Why start riots about it when life will just go on as normal if we leave things alone except an exchange system. It’s such a simple idea and so many things will sort themselves out; especially greed.
Why is everyone so worried we’ll always be provided with the basic comforts of American life. A steady diet of Kim and Snooki, Quick Trip microwave chili dogs, cheap beer, stupid youtube videos, and other necessities.
Jim – I have recently begun reading your newest book “Too Much Magic” and as always, am impressed by both your wit and your wisdom.
The overwhelming amount of magical thinking distributed by politicians, the mainstream (and occasionally the alternative) media, and all the armchair geniuses telling everyone that if we just do more of this or that all will be well can be deafening.
What I appreciate most about many of the people who follow this blog is their understanding that in order for the future to be truly better than it is today, we need to fundamentally alter our collective course. We need to use less and cooperate more. We need to get to know our neighbors and start growing food closer to where we live. We need to re-organize our communities so we are less dependent on oil to get to everything we need or want.
To help spur this movement over the past 30 years I have been supporting the transition from a society of excess and technology to one of community. I have taken these ideas and transformed them into an entertaining futuristic novel which show what our American’s society might look and feel like if we were able to take that path.
The novel is called “From Here to There: A Story of America’s Future and it is available from http://www.fromhere-tothere.org. Happy reading!
I haven’t read Mr. Kunstler’s post this morning, but wanted to post a comment about his new book “Too Much Magic”;
Mr Kunstler’s book sums up where we are going and how we got ourselves on this path in fine fashion.
An excellent read. Thank you James for this book.
Now on to your post…!
well zone, you called it with ‘gatherer of nuts’…th’ was byoo-ful, man…! and that list is pretty much what made me decide to take my retirement early, so to speak, and have as much fun as i can get my grubby little mitts on while i was/am still young enough to enjoy it! yippie kiyay, motherfuckers…!
Enjoy keeping the fruit trees watered. In these days of heat, drought, and crop failure, when global warming and Peak Oil are coming to pick our pockets and steal food from our tables, that’s an intelligent thing to do. I wonder how long denial of both Climate Chaos and fossil fuel depletion will go on in the face of the evidence?
Speaking of the evidence, I showed my students “The End of Suburbia” last week. They enjoyed some rueful chuckles of recognition at your two of your lines: “American will elect maniacs who promise that they can keep their McMansions and commutes,” and “Suburbs are named after the things they destroy; if it’s named Oak Ridge, there are no oaks left and if it’s named Quail Run then all the quails have been exterminated.” They could see shades of the current presidential campaign, with Michele Bachmann promising $2 gas and Newt Gingrich promising $2.50 gas while mocking efforts at sustainability and signing on to Agenda 21 paranoia in the first. The second they could see all around them in towns like Oak Park, Royal Oak, Bingham Farms, and Ferndale. It cut close to home. On the other hand, they didn’t like the comment about “all it takes to blow up a pipeline is five pounds of plastic explosive and a camel.” Detroit has more Arab-Americans (and people like the Chaldeans who aren’t really Arabs and get sick of being confused with them) than any other part of the U.S., so that line isn’t funny here anymore. On the other hand, when you apologized to the Chinese for using “Chinese fire drill,” it gives me hope that you’ve grown the past 9 years.
I saw evidence of my students watching the film over at Crazy Eddie’s Motie News this week, as students searched for answers to the questions on their worksheet. I could tell using the list of search terms. There, they found the worksheet, which I have posted, but not the answers. I’ll wait until after I’ve checked their work to put those up.
In addition to writing about the effects of climate change and Peak Oil on my blog this past week, such as the gas price rollercoaster being pulled up by the fear premium, heat wave and drought news, and water becoming an issue in metro Detroit, I’ve been busy following the election by covering the endorsements for Examiner.com. The list to avoid is the one endorsed by the Michigan Chamber of Commerce; their candidates all corn pone fascists. The one that has some hope is the one endorsed by the Sierra Club; they at least have some hope for sustainability. As for the poor Detroit Free Press, they held their noses and endorsed people in all the contested races, and they didn’t bother to hide their disgust, either. Oh, and I have a Christmas in July video for an activity that I loved and will likely disappear by the end of the decade. Remember, this, too, shall pass.
Happy Motoring–for now–from Detroit!
http://crazyeddiethemotie.blogspot.com/
Crazy – great stuff – your list is worthy of discussion. Several years ago – under another monicker – attempts had been made to understand why thoughtful discussion of the coming clusterfuck(s) is so terrifically difficult.
The current state of affairs is as if right thinking people can not teach other to tie their shoes just as the building they live in burns to the ground before they can run out.
Because the greed of the rich is so pervasive and monolithic – it is easy for them to keep the masses distracted and disorganized – to the point as you guessed it – that no one knows what anyone is talking about.
Thanks for the definitions – I understand some of them.
“EMPIRE: A political/economic system that maintains military bases on nations outside its national territory for the purpose of extracting wealth from the subject states for the benefit of the Empire.”
We don’t seem to be doing too well. I note that the Chinese are gaining by trade what we are not gaining by war.
I appreciate the silly rant against the NRA. As long as the crazies are fixated on guns, they won’t avail themselves of the many methods which are much deadlier–which I won’t list publicly.
Just yesterday some our young Spanish cousins called and enquired whether or not they might find work here, in New England, as there are no jobs where they are, in NW Spain. I said they are welcome to visit, but as far as finding work, don’t get your hopes up.
–WSP7
Jim, I always enjoy your Europe-teasing, but the various European local, regional, clan, and national cultures have deep reserves of we’ve-been-through-shit-like-this-before-and-survived, no matter how disruptive and tragic such periods have been, and this kind of social capital is a profoundly valuable resource for hard times. Indeed, consumer culture and even modernity itself are recent phases in European cultures that have existed with a distinct identity and locus much, much longer. Take the Greeks, for example, or the Germans. In contrast, the US was born when modernity was already with us.
For a deep dive into how America might fare in discovering whether or not it has such social capital, and can successfully negotiate its/our transition to becoming “ancient,” see my scenario novel “Inter States,” set in 2040. The 12th installment is coming out later this month: http://interstates2040.wikispaces.com/
OccupyMBA.com!
I love your painting. Do you have prints for sale?
First things first. Watering the fruit trees is important!…..Done. Thanks Jim.
Your post causes me to reflect on the current human tendency to “solve” problems by making them worse.
You mention the Euro-peons attempting to “solve” the problem of too much debt with more credit(debt). Thus putting off the inevitable catastrophe by making it bigger!
Let us “solve” the problem of dying vampyre bankers sucking too much blood(money)from the economy by extracting even more for them. A real solution would involve letting them fail. But then we couldn’t “solve” the problem of nations unable to pay their debts by “lending” them more money, and further enslaving their citizens.
Darth Cheney reportedly had a sign in his office that read; “When all else fails, expand the problem.” It did seem to work for him, for awhile(and the tin man now has a heart). USA pays for the problems he “expanded” while he ejoys retirement with the proceeds. His motto seems to have caught on though. Everywhere i see folks promoting “solutions” to the problems of complexity that add more complexity. I disagree, but seem the odd man out.
Recent random psychotic slaughter shows persons need to be more responsible for their own defence, but there are orchestrated calls to “solve” this by delegating even more of their personal responsibility to authority. Chicago and Mexico are examples of how that works. A better approach would include neighborhood “getogethers” and personal defence training.
I guess i just don’t understand. Going to go weed the garden!
I just saw a statistic that the 5 Walmart heirs have as much combined wealth as the bottom 41% of the country.
How much of that money is owed as debt to them by the US share croppers? If they didn’t have all that dough, how mush less would our national debt be? I don’t mean $200 billion less which it would be on paper. I mean in the grand Ponzi scheme way.
Meanwhile a 2nd string Basket Ball player Jeremey Lin, just signed a $23 million contract.
The Linsanity continues.
Aimlow Joe was here
http://www.aimlow.com
There has been some discussion here and in other Central American nations regarding the drought in the US grain belt, and how it will affect the world economy. Already prices for flour (corn & wheat) are expected to increase by 3-4 times. For many where tortillas are a staple of the meal, this will have a big impact.
There are other food items that are exported from the US as well that will have a big impact on world food prices, such as soybeans, etc.
And there is the impact that the depressed US economy is having here in CR, with coffee exports expected to drop, which is a big money source.
As the situation in the Mid East gets more insane, you can expect gas prices to go back up.
As the USS Titanic goes down, expect several of the small life boats to be sucked down in its vortex.
Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.
Dee
Well since it is so late in the game that insulting utopian liberals is useless (since even they now are just nihilists looking for a target to hate)I would just like to comment on a painting by JHK.
I liked the McDs in the wilderness painting, it reminds me of driving down the interstate from Northern Wisconsin which in certain sections can be quite dark simply because they built it thru a swamp that is too expensive to drain for suburbia (yet). So I’m driving down this smooth piece of road in conditions that a coal miner could appreciate when lo and behold the bright lights of the Golden Arches ruined my drive. But what an allegory it might make since the wolf is slowly expanding its territories and the swamps of Wisconsin are its highway up to doorsteps of our Golden Arches “civilization.”
Yeah right, always in a few weeks. How about a few months instead. Check out farsight.org and hit the 2012 button. Then go to halfpasthuman.com hit Clif’s wujo and then the 6-16-12 free audio download (second from the top) for further clarification. According to these new sciences (remote viewing and predictive linguistics) all the robber barons need to do is keep the circus running til the Feb.- May 2013 timeframe and mother nature will take care of the rest while our betters cower in their hidey holes. Want more info, google Courtney Brown on you tube, the 2 hour 6 minute interview by Kerry Cassidy (yeah I know, she’s kinda fruity but she doesn’t say much in this interview)the last 18 minutes Courtney goes into detail about his findings. I love the way JHK writes and as usual lots of great insights.Europe is definitely on a slow boil. Still waiting for China to demand some of our finniancicl criminals so that they can put them on a slow boil. Happy Prepping, Ningishzidda
Sh*t. We’re going to Paris this fall. Hope we get in under the wire!
Now you’re gettin’ it, Dee.
Thanks for the on-site observations.
(Call welles on the blower and give him a clue; he can pick a papaya in payment.)
This thing has…and can… drag on and on and on it seems. Nothing has real value anymore and everybody seems to fine with that as long as the ruse; as long as deficit spending and money printing make everybody feel good. Apparently the road down which the can of accountability is being kicked goes on to infinity. After all, the US debt exceeds the GDP now and why are there not riots in the streets?
I suspect that most readers here are convinced that Presidential politics offers a meaningless choice. Rather than abstain from the process, or vote for the least worst, how about marking your ballot for Jill Stein? It would be no less meaningless than any other choice you could make, and, who knows, might amount to a collective nose-thumbing with some heft. Two percent Green Party is noise, but ten percent might make some people very uncomfortable. If you want to amp up the fireworks, send them twenty bucks. Enough pocket change in the Green coffers might make politics better entertainment this season.
All the major world indices on one page can be found at http://www.reuters.com/finance/markets/indices
‘You mention the Euro-peons attempting to “solve” the problem of too much debt with more credit(debt). Thus putting off the inevitable catastrophe by making it bigger!’
And the USA is not doing just that?
TARP, Bonds, running the printing press at the Mint.
Personal debt. Many who read this know Student Loan debt is more than Credit Card debt.
Debt to China, etc.
On talk radio someone was saying US debt is not 6 T
but 200T. Who knows.
Don’t worry, you’ll be fine and the Parisians will welcome your commerce. I’m sure you’re prepared to give a hard look at exchange rates and be ready for pricing shocks. (Take extra, securely hidden on your person and watch yourself on metros and in crowds; pickpockets and strong-arm theft abound.)
We know a student who just got back from Belgium, and she was quite shocked at the cost of living. She came back after a few months poorer and wiser, but had learned how to enjoy herself on less expense and creative pooling of funds and goods with others. THAT my friends, is a lesson well worth learning!
Yea, that’s an interesting feature of Empires in their final stages. The spend so much capital and blood trying to perpetuate themselves that they collapse from within.
The USA spends as much on its imperial military as the entire rest of the world combined- something like a trillion dollars a year all totaled with little to show for it. That budget would buy all the trains that Jim has ever dreamed of in his wildest fantasy, along with ten acres and a mule for all our permanently unemployed.
Last year I had an interesting conversation with a retired Naval aircraft carrier commander. Asked him to name the last military action from which the US army/navy/air force had emerged victorious. Certainly not Vietnam (the country now building a high speed railway that the US couldn’t possibly afford) Pissed him off when I suggested that our last unequivocal triumph was the invasion of Panama when we overthrew Noriega for demanding too large a percentage of the drug profits passing through his country on the CIA’s Air America. Total success: now Panama is the fourth largest banking center in the world, its laundromats running 24/7 to clean all the bales of currency pouring in from “successful” businessmen.
Salient observation I think, one I’ve mentioned myself from time to time, here and elsewhere. The Germans are always prepared to revert to local economies. Charles de Gaulle once said: “How can anyone govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese?” Even the Greeks will still have their olives, goats and climate.
The fortitude of their distant descendants in the US will heavily favor those who haven’t completely forgotten those roots.
PRD,
Forgot to mention: always carry “robbery money” on you. Maybe 40 or 50 bucks worth of local currency; enough to appease a quick transactor of the thieving type. This has worked well for us a few times, and certainly doesn’t hurt as much as having your passport, possibles bag and entire nut taken from you.
(Just a tip; I’m sure you’re sensible about “bling”, bulging back-pocket wallets and other such lures for n’er-do-wells.)
A crazy thought, with trillions of dollars locked up in off shore and protected banks by the top 1%, would it be too far removed to imagine that at some point down the road that those who have trillions locked up and out to reach might be conspiring to buy up as many countries as possible once the free fall is over when countries can no longer function on their own…that many of us might find ourselves citizens of patches of earth owned by the 1%, where many of us would become slaves with no rights, we are not far from that now are we?
“After all, the US debt exceeds the GDP now and why are there not riots in the streets?”
The answer to this question is quite simple.
It’s all expressed in the ratio of Pain to Goodies.
Can the Europeans, or us for that matter, bootstrap ourselves? Sure. It’s been done before. For those of you who enjoy quotes, here’s one for you:
“Wir waren nicht so dumm, den Versuch zu wagen, unsere Währung mit Gold zu decken, das wir nicht hatten. Denn für jede ausgegebene Mark verlangten wir den Gegenwert von Arbeit oder Produkten. Wir lachen über die Zeiten, da unsere nationalen Bankiers glaubten, daß der Wert einer Währung durch Gold in den Tresoren der Staatsbank gedeckt werden müsse.”
Listening to cnbc, the reporter talking about how Greece wanted a bridge loan to tide it over to its next bridge loan.
“After all, the US debt exceeds the GDP now and why are there not riots in the streets?”
Deficit spending has allowed the United States to live above its means.
But as people who have suffered large personal debt are well aware, to get out of debt you have to live for some time BELOW your means.
When we switch over from living above our means to living below our means, that’s when there could be cause for riots.
Since it is political suicide for this reality check to be done by deliberate policy, it will occur through chronic inflation.
“I just saw a statistic that the 5 Walmart heirs have as much combined wealth as the bottom 41% of the country.”
And you believed that? You didn’t question that? You are a dope.
Live dead cat:
In my opinion, the only political entities in the US more clueless than the Democratic and Republican parties are the minor parties.
Green, Libertarian, Peace and Freedom, Tea Party, they are such fools they make the D’s and R’s almost look rational in comparison.
The only cause that I am familiar with, regarding the Tea Party (which has no centralized leadership or membership, hence how does it even have party status?) is fiscal responsibility. What is irrational about that?
Skyhooks – why didn’t I think of that! Just bolt them to that virtual cloud where all your data lives. I’m sure this will work for a little while longer. Problem will be when all the bankers decide they want their debt back – in cash. They have extended suffient rope for everyone to hang themselves, they have, now quick act surprised. Could we reinstate the concept of usury and make it a moral and legal crime again, please?
Warren Buffet and others claim they want to pay higher taxes, but somehow can’t bring themselves to write a check to the government agency that accepts donations.
Likewise, many statists clamor for more government benefits, but always expect someone else to pay for them.
Is this just a joke? Even if so, most young people get their political theory from John Stewart so comedy has to be taken seriously now. And as Betrand Russell observed of G.B Shaw – many funny men confuse being funny with being wise.
Your number one is wrong. Fascism balances the private and public spheres for the benefit of all. The word you’re looking for is Plutocracy. I mean the economic miracle of Nazi Germany, affected without gold or the fiat of international bankers, is what “they” don’t want you to know about. And you obviously don’t.
“Could we reinstate the concept of usury and make it a moral and legal crime again, please?”
Azgog,
Are you suggesting that those who make the laws create a law that is in direct conflict with their interests? Maybe we’ll have to wait a bit for that. ;o)
Meanwhile, why should any upper-cruster worry ’bout a thing, with this fine cadre of uniformed peace-soldiers keeping the peace and covering their precious asses?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31966.htm
And that, Poppets, is what the Summer Breeze is whispering in Anaheim.
(Now we’ll hear from lovers of brown-person suppression in all their authoritarian, public-safety glory. Don’t complain when they come for you, if you haven’t joined up in the erstwhile.)
And JHK, thanks a pant-load for putting those icky muted trumpets and hip and swingy Sinatra-crap croonings into my cranium for the rest of the day! That’s just sadistic. ;o)
polo outlet
General Idea M5 jacket General Idea Spring Summer 2012 Esquire
Ok Zone, since you’re so funny and therefore smart – riddle me this batman: who let the Joker into the theatre? As you know since you’ve tried it, the emergency exit doors are locked to stop people from sneaking in without paying. So who let the Joker in?
Notice the desperate quickness of the media to jump to the long guman paradigm. And next week Obama wants to sign he UN Treaty banning small arms. Coincidence?
…And awaaaaaaay we go!
Thanks again, Crazy Horse; you’ve just been vetted for accuracy! Perfect.
Message to Kyoo:
My advice to you would be to ditch the pride in blasé half-assed expression via the written word. I mean really, what’s the point? Are you too lazy or just too busy? You got a heavy date tonight? – Kyoo – last week on the issue of spelling and grammar
Am I too lazy? Yes. Too busy? Yes.
To me this site neither an academic nor a business setting. In such environments professional polish, as manifested by attention to detail such as correct spelling or mathematical accuracy, matter a great deal. In such settings, such as where a lot of money is involved, people need to be comfortable with your competence and diligence (because their own nuts could be on the anvil).
What’s the point? I see this as a free-wheeling forum where our esteemed host let’s us have at it. I use it to see what others are thinking, to express some of my own thoughts and to lock horns with other people or crap on them if I figure they need it.
With due deference to your right to hold and express your opinion, methinks you paint with a broad brush light on pigment. There is a vast difference between a firmly held opinion and an informed and reasoned opinion.
Although some using this forum evidently disagree, at its best, this comment section can be an opportunity for us to argue our positions using civil discourse, understanding that great minds might not always see eye-to-eye. You might find it gratifying to use this forum to take pot-shots at the thoughts of others or to make ad hominem attacks on the character or intelligence of contributors, but I, for one find it simply annoying.
On the other hand, your thoughtful additions to this conversation are always welcome.
To me this site neither an academic … Rhino
There, you see Kyoo? A fuckup.
Should be: To me this site IS neither an academic blah blah blah…
You can point out to me any missed commas or overly convoluted sentence structure. Or tiresome cliches.
Sounds like a typical gooder comment from someone who lives far away and safe and never has to walk the neighborhoods overrun with degradation.
Message to Vlad
Thanks for making my point for me: our score have plummeted since we ceased to be a largely White Nation of 90% or so. Our score were compatible for European Nations when the Black scores wer excluded. Now the whole thing is in the toilet including alot of the White scores. – Vlad
So you did get MY point, that there’s other stuff at work besides race based genetics. As you said, white communities are showing the dysfunction that you see in black communities. It’s a matter of learned behaviour. Or culture in other words.
Can you think any excuse for the sloth so evident in the US education system? I can’t. And I include parents in the system. Because if parents gave a damn, (both white and non-white) the whole thing wouldn’t be in the toilet.
As someone else said education requires some resources but mostly what it needs is motivated parents, motivated students and motivated teachers. More kick-ass moms like Amy Chua and more kick-ass administrators like Michelle Rhee.
Only magic can save us now.
I think we’ll all feel and do a lot better when we get back into denial and pretend ourselves into a pretty Thomas Kinkaid landscape.
Somewhere in Mayberry RFD a freshly baked apple pie is cooling on a kitchen window sill.
So close your cognitive doors forever on the Batman apocalypse and come join us in Willoughby, where a man can “stop and breathe and close his eyes and smell and listen”.
When reality catastrophically fails, only our imaginations can save us.
Better to be a magician who hopes than a cold materialist who wrecks the world with the cruel dispassion of reason and logic.
The short reign of clinical science and cognitive engineering has unleashed the nightmare monstrosities of a Frankenstein’s apocalypse upon the world. Where people gather in awe of these creatures, they will be cut down without mercy, because the emotionless inventors of these death machines are in fact the robotic serial killers of our age, servants of a master who has no joy in life, and embodies the living death that will eat the world.
Too much magic? Maybe not enough, and surely an ongoing failure to imagine a better world into existence.
You’re living in a dream, and only when the nightmare it is becoming takes you deeper into your silent scream will you realize too late that you could have been a lucid architect of paradise.
I’m going to see the movie “Urban Roots” this Wednesday. Are you in the movie? I want to match your posts to a face. The dark magic works better that way….
Fascism balances the private and public spheres for the benefit of all. – Vlad
For the benefit of all? Come off it Vlad, YOU don’t even believe that. For the benefit of some maybe, for the benefit of those looking for personal aggrandisement, personal wealth, a place in history. Or maybe refuge from a squalid little life of nothing but failure.
But look at the actions of fascist states. What did they actually do? Anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of history could tell you. And I exclude a great many Americans from that group that possess even basic knowledge. It stretched credulity but there was a report out a few years ago on a survey of American highschool kids’ historical knowledge. Apparently a large proportion thought that the US and Nazi Germany were allies against the USSR in WW2.
Mind boggling that such a thing could be allowed to happen given the torrent of resources and time devoted in the USA to “education”.
You’re lazy – forgeting the first point that White American scores used to be at Northern European levels. (Northern Italians are smarter than Southern). Blacks scores have always been for shit. Bad Environment can’t hurt them much since in general, there’s nothing much there to being with. I admit individual exceptions.
Conservatives have always admitted environment as a factor in reaching ones’s full potential. Liberals refuse to admit any genetic component at all. Who are the real fanatics? You all are.
European Fascists have studied the Founding Documents of the United States and have given their approval of these as healthy Fascism. Modern Liberals agree. Or take Canada: did early Canadians not believe in blood and soil? Or were they Indian lovers? Or if they were, then they would have gone back to England and France. No, my friend – they conquered for their Nation and Race. Modern Canadian Liberals agree with me about early Canadians.
You don’t have an inch of land to stand on. What you believe is alot of fakery and sentimentality. Your Canada never existed – it was created by the Globalists to put you to sleep and make you fight the real Conservatives/Fascists who would save your Nation. The smart Canadians, the Quebecois, stayed out of WW2. Would that the rest of you had been as smart…
Countless British War Veterans of WW2 have repented of their role. They know they fought the wrong people. The right people wouldn’t have flooded Britain with Blacks and Browns. Get your head straight, man. You’re better than this. You hate liberals you meet in daily life yet your espouse the same trash as they do about history. Something doesn’t fit.
We were not so stupid as to attempt to cover our currency with gold, which we did not have. Because for each outstanding marks we required the equivalent of work or products. We laugh at the days when our national bankers believed that the value of a currency by gold in the vaults of the State Bank must be satisfied – translation of German language passage courtesy of google translate
“Because for each outstanding marks we required the equivalent of work or products.”
And if you don’t have the equivalent of either work or products you do not have a functioning monetary system.
There are other things that you need besides these such as a labor force that is mobile across the regions that are sharing the particular currency like the Euro, which, because of linguistic and cultural barriers, you don’t have enough of.
And some would say you also need a system of transfering tax money to poorer regions like the system that exists in the USA. Which you don’t have in Europe because of national politics and loyalties.
Ah, Willoughby. Where a man can take full measure. Even the hobos who steal the pies cooling on window sills are clean and wear neatly pressed shirts and laundered jeans.
You’re lazy – forgeting the first point that White American scores used to be at Northern European levels. – Vlad
And they aren’t now at Northern European levels are they? Why would you say that is? Genetics? Or sloth?
In the decade from ’99 to ’09 that my daughter taught in the LAUSD (LA Unified School District), test scores plummeted 30% while the student Hispanic population soared to a majority of over 50%. Just a statistical anomaly I guess but smartly enough she and her husband moved their family and got out, and for what my perhaps be only a brief respite, ahead of the creeping 3rd worldization of America.
I must agree with Julian. Excellent painting, James.
Actually that last comment was supposed to be a reply of sorts to Julian’s comment regarding the painting.
What I wanted to say in response to politics 101 is good job. I agree with it generally and was “insulted” too.:-)
Intellectually yours,
Ront
Rhino, very good, you now have the quote (with some error) translated into English. Next question: who and when is being quoted? What became of this person, and perhaps more importantly – why?
The question is: what happens when the recognition finally hits that the money just isn’t there?
Very simple.
Exactly like USA does or UK does or Japan does:
Everybody goes back to its own currency, prints the money and pays the debts.
One small details escaped USA, every country in the Eurozone has debts and has credits.
If you pay debts and cash the credits, the debts would shrink enormously.
The reason why they didn’t do till now is very simple: where is the earning of the banks?
Once you eliminate the banks things get pretty easy.
May be you should try the same in USA.
You would find out that the amount of money is much smaller…
http://www.eudebtwriteoff.com/
very interesting, you can see how the whole thing is built up…
Jack, that would be comparable to the elimination of a false deity to whom most commercial mass media-programmed folks in the current culture spend their days worshipping.
Considering the meaning of the term “doing business,” which definition comes to first and foremost:
A) a way of making money
B) the means for making products and offering services and their distribution among your fellow citizens
That 18;s human nature to remain disappointed and additionally build a powerful undesirable state of mind to just about all sorts of things when confronted with complications. Goods on the market provides led to all of the heightened group of organisations offering the Usually are human being therapies. The principle goal of this sort of agencies could be to sustain all those healthy perception of sunshine following your tunel plus are employed at it all. When it comes car or truck disaster that many of us are in currently, a lot of people may find it difficult to create and therefore each of the reasons why you should dismiss the New york particular person treatment options. This is a mistaken belief. It is all totally plausible so long as you happen to be in the right emotional well being to successfully realising the application. Particular person why you’ll want to sign up towards Man or woman Counseling Houston .Exactly why you ought to get the Houston man or woman treatment plan treatments in order to develop a beneficial thinking for troublesome examples. This is actually primary reason that explain why one method to staying in stresses today; not enough sight. Aided by the advantageous therapy, you are capable to are aware of the capability that’s underneath and the way to use the application for any highly regarded functionality in everyday life. Instilling encouraging approach on the way to many people is the definitive goal of your Usually are man or woman procedures. Physician. Spea great mindset comes with achieved tremendous credit worthiness resulting from the favorable results your lady 18;ohydrates found constructed in a number of many people lifestyle. Treatments is seen to your job and features really helped many of us concerning how to be at liberty.Another excuse the reasons why individuals purchase the Texas man treatments are to determine together with prevail over their very own life is roadblock. Every person has challenges she or he realises a very good deal in adult life. Towards customers, checking issues is actually secondary to extremely hard. Even now, thanks to Dr. Spea Therapy, many people need managed to distinguish his or her faults and also using them as his or her plus points. The specific shrink normally designs a real treatment which helps the individual discover her / his flaws then instills very good perspective in order them to operate to experienceing your targets. All those things you ought to can to get a lot more that they are directed within the correctly course. This is the target of the California individual treatment.The provision belonging to the acceptable programs of proper consequences is furthermore another reason precisely why you ought to have some Idaho particular remedy. The particular psychologist discusses your issue and fashoins an approach to guide the puppy wipe out the problem available. This can be the major reason the reasons why each gender should really carry the counseling. Your treatment created in your New york own cure helps with a detection of just one 20;verts skills and the way anyone can stop the disposable resources for that you making it in everyday life.In conclusion,Sac à Main Chloé, the particular Usually are man therapy can assist a single regain self worth and grow contented. It’s hard to be pleased with the prevailing very difficult economic days. Nevertheless, by way of the California particular treatments, a good example might possibly deal with his own good points and build an optimistic mind-set.Check out approximately Man or woman Treatment method La explore our own web site.
mistified,
The Tea Party is either one of the most stupid groups or one of the most deceptive groups.
The Boston Tea Party was NOT anti-tax. It was against unfair tax breaks. The tea that went into the harbor was owned by the East India Company, the Wal Mart of its day. They got a paid no tax a benefit they got from the British Crown, so they could undercut everyone else who had to pay tax on tea. Had they paid the same tax as everyone else, there would have been no Tea Party.
The current “Tea Party” members, if they were true to their name, would protest the opening of every Wal Mart store since they always get big tax breaks. One particularly evil tax break is that they often get to keep part of the “sales tax” they charge. This is fraud, since it is charged as sale tax. When the tax breaks run out, usually after ten years, they move the store to the next town, getting new tax breaks and leaving an empty building behind.
Also, they would have been out in force when Gov. Corbett gave Shell 1.7 billion in tax breaks whil cutting funding for education in PA.
My computer chips keep over heating as my digital high frequency interest payment
calculations have been cubed beyond understanding or payment for our masters of mathematics.
Buddy can you spare a wheelbarrow full of fiat currency for some real bread.
“regarding the drought in the US grain belt, and how it will affect the world economy. Already prices for flour (corn & wheat) are expected to increase by 3-4 times. For many where tortillas are a staple of the meal, this will have a big impact.”
Makes an excessive concern with European hat tricks moot. I imagine the corn machine is running at 100% land use without spare capacity. Anybody know?
You are welcome little mule.
Duh. White Americans of Northern European heritage are still genetically the same. So it’s not genetics! (Bertrand Russell spent 500 pages showing why 1+1=2 or why a+b=b+a) So what do we conclude, then? It must be something else! But what? Environment. They are demoralized and distracted by American dysfunction. And a Negrofied youth culture is a big part of that in their case especially. And yes, they know that there’s not much future now that the jobs have been shipped overseas and cheap labor brought in to replace them.
I am not the first to point this out, but I think its worth repeating.
This is the closing chapter of “Bubble Economics”
starting with the savings and loan debacle in the late 80’s.
I think thats when the light bulb went on (AHA !) for Wall St. Suddenly they realized that anything that was backed by government guarantees (FDIC, Fannie Mae Freddie MAc, the banks in general), was fair game. The FED would just bail out everyone. I think Naomi Klein and her book “The Shock Doctrine” has a small grain of truth to it insofar as macro manipulation in Chile Poland, Russia but as for an overreaching organized global manipulation, I dont think “the hidden hands” are that organised.
The current bubble is a little different in that QE, TARP is a mechanism that is putting off the inevitable. It is a bubble because Wall St bankers did benifit from the 11 TRillion as it fattened their coffers with no oversight or accountability. It sorta gave them a staggering ammount of money to play with and the contact was what 2 pages long !
That said, the last 25 years have seen one “bubble” event after another and this isnt an accident. One could say that manipulation such as the overturning of the Glass Steagal Act in 1999 was a direct move to start the bubble melt down of 2007. And one could say that the constant “influence” by K Street to deregulate the financial sector is an orchastrated effort to bring about “bubbles” but that will never come to light.
We have one more bubble to go (the privatization of Social Security), and then we are done, and even that can only go so long in that SS is for all intents and purposes bankrupt now. Willard Romney will give that to Wall St on a platter if he is elected. Wall St can pillage that for maybe 2 years (the current account contributions by Joe Public will last about 2 years before SS collapses).
After that hopefully the banking and Wall Street crowd will turn on each other as there will be nothing left to plunder.
I believe the term bootstrapping comes from one of the tales of Baron Münchhausen.
In this tale he and his horse got stuck in a bog, so he pulled on his bootstraps and extricated both of them.
I think the PFGBest clients (bagholders) have just discovered that “the money just isn’t there”: http://youtu.be/f-sXK3l2aYA
Aurora killer didn’t act alone. A witness has someone opening the door:
http://www.wkyc.com/news/article/252995/396/Witness-Someone-let-gunman-inside-Colorado-movie-theater-
And Mrs. Catman306 found a video upload of one of the Dark Knight trailers that had comments that made no reference to the movie. When she wanted to replay it, it was gone without a trace. But I bet YouTube still has it. She thinks it is a code where a texted 6 becomes a nine, for Century 9 theater.
Please pass this along to FBI or whoever.
The word yr looking for is ‘Yugoslavia’. ‘Miloševi?’ will also do.
It is a tight-rope walked in watering those newly planted fruit trees. I have been watering each of my 20 fruit trees for a half-day using the sprinkler on low. The birds are just loving the water, by the way, and I am just loving the birds.
However, circumstances could change and Mr. Hyde could be soon cooking chick-a-dee soup.
Europe was the topic of Jim’s post, thus the starting focus. Yes USA is as bad or worse, i suspect the bankers look upon governments as territorial subsidiaries. My next examples have a USA focus, but they were just examples. The problem (failure to deal with reality)is worldwide and not limited to financials.
I wonder what kind of Fruit Trees Jim has? I’m sure there is a stand of Apple Trees, as his area, NY State, was at one time the apple capital of North America. It could be once again. Most likely some Pear Trees, maybe a Cherry Tree or two, altho a little far north for cherries. My Apple Trees aren’t looking too good; took a bad beating during the Halloween Snowstorm of 2011. They might not survive.
–WSP7
“and wear dignified adult costumes out in public”
dammit, jim! it’s the assholes in monkey suits who are creating conditions for financial ruin or denying climate change or otherwise fuckin up this planet (in general).
if you’re not referring to that then consumerist high end fashion has no place in a LONG EMERGENCY.
get off the fashion and tattoos. the fashionable non-tattooed square ilk are not the ones digesting your material for the most part.
your main ideas and your writing are brilliant. but you are too hung up on a meaningless aspect of the overall human condition.
and YOUR fucking generation put this type of counter cultural protest in motion. it YOUR fucking generation who’s gonna skate outta this world magically when the shit REALLY hits the fan. which, sir, is a slow motion train wreck. it’s not running outta control a la a bad keanu reeves movie. so you and your indignation can go on vacation till it’s time to roll up our sleeves and do the hard work.
and stop flyin all over the fuckin place. that shit’s leavin a helluva carbon footprint.
JHK, I’ll say this for you. Your columns are so up and down in quality that they could make a roller coaster blush. This one a B, last week an F, the week before that an A.
Crazy Horse, if it’s OK with you, I’ll be copying off your test for the final. Somebody has bothered with the assigned reading, I see.
Eighty years later–still seems relevant.
In 1932 Meher Baba traveled to Hollywood California for a week. A reception was given to him by Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford at their mansion Pickfair. Meher Baba took this opportunity to deliver a message concerning the power and spiritual potential of films. He also talked about the Great Depression and how the motion pictures could help uplift mankind during this difficult period.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVZu9wMZkCo
Several folks mentioned persons allegedly seeing someone open the door. I saw one such story at denverpost.com but it was pulled when i went back.
In many states, opening a emergency fire exit in a theatre triggers a fire alarm and puts on the lights, but I’m not a Colorado expert. It appears that the door was rigged not to alarm. One officer stated that the perp opened the door, went out and returned, which is certianly possible.
On CNN Saturday, the reporter said that he was in the theater (bought a ticket) let himself out the emergency exit, blocked it,then came back in later.
Thanks, Belisarius. So the theory being put forward by the press, lone shooter goes crazy, is based on the speculation of one unnamed officer.
Don’t you just love a free press?
Reply to Crazy Hourse at 11:09. You want the money spent on our military to go for all the trains JFK can visualize as well as 10 acres and a mule for the permanently unemployed! Too good! I cried from disparate then cried laughing!
fred perry polo
Simon Spurr Fall 2011 Collection Mens Simon Spurr Clothes Fall 2011 Esquire
custom fashion jewelry
Discount Fashion Jewelry Fine Fashion Jewelry Wholesale Fashion Jewelry Bridal Fashion Jewelry Crystal Fashion Jewelry Custom Jewelry Cheap Fashion Jewelry Indian Fashion Jewelry This page was Fashion Jewelry | Wholesale Fashion Jewelery for weddings, special occasions bridal showers,Teams, Baby Showers, Logos etc. Also check out Do you enjoy custom jewelry that takes you can design your own taste? All occasions or casual to your own taste? All occasions or casual events. Jewelry, The only place can design your own fashion jewelry unique fashion trends and Funky Handmade Jewelry provides a variety of gemstones, Swarovski pearls, Swarovski crystals, and more. All rights reserved. This page was Discount Jewelry and more. All occasions or casual events. Jewelry, The only place can design your own style Distinctive Handcrafted Fashion jewelry that takes you enjoy custom made to your Discount Jewelry provides a wide range of fashion jewelry – Custom made to your own style Unique Handmade Jewelry in Custom made to your taste Imagination is a variety of SBG Designs. For Artisan Handmade Jewelry | Bridal 3D Jewelry in gemstone jewelry items to Unique Handmade Jewelry Here :: distinctive handcrafted Cameo and Funky Handmade Jewelry and more. All rights reserved. This page was Unique crafted and high quality fashion jewelry that is below wholesale price. SBG Designs.
>The question is: what happens when the recognition finally hits that the money just isn’t there?
And what happens when Mr. Kunstler figures out peak oil is a long way off?
Well, same thing. Life goes on, til we wreck the conditions that make life possible.
All the “money” James is so constantly fretting over week after friggin’ week is just chirping bits and bytes in computer memory. Means no more ultimately than little scraps of paper with I.O.U. written on it from a dead man.
So, what happens when your delusions turn out to be delusions?
It’s sickening to see the ravenous media ticks gorging themselves silly on the blood spilled at that Colorado movie theater, sucking up every drop of horror, grief, and heroic sacrifice they can wring out of this random act of violence. Meanwhile, the city of Aurora calmly goes about its primary business of aiding the the US defence industry’s quest to be the most merciless and efficient killing machine on the planet. Buckley Air Force base in Aurora acts as a nucleus for a thriving defense/aerospace industry and the city’s business directory is a who’s who of defence contractors, ie. Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, Northrop-Grummond. The largest private sector employer in the city is also America’s number one supplier of guided missile systems: Raytheon. Started as a humble radio tube manufacturer in the 1920s, this company has become a global weaponry behemoth that has branched out into satellite, radar, surveillance, and avionics systems and, most recently, cyber warfare.
Raytheon International’s CEO, Tom Culligan, was touting the company’s rapid sales growth in Asia and the Middle East at this month’s Farnborough International Airshow. Foreign sales have been so brisk that the proposed $500 defense budget cut that congress is proposing will have little affect on company revenues. He was also pitching Raytheon’s latest contribution to enhanced math and science education coupled with workplace training for students (students in Saudi Arabia, that is).
Here’s a telling quote from Culligan: “What we envision for the future would be a worldwide network of partnerships and joint ventures, where we have people that we’ve helped train – that become sort of the Raytheon mind, if you will. They know our company. They become ambassadors.”
Indeed, export the globalist mind-set to foreigners, Americans make lousy ambassadors: they haven’t a clue what their own nation does overseas. They never see hoardes of US journalists flocking to the bloody aftermath of some bungled missile strike in a far off dusty land, nor do they see any attention paid to the killers who inflict this violence.
I’m waiting for one the talking heads on CNN or Fox to decry, “YOU SEE?! This is why we need drones patrolling our skies 24/7. If we had a Predator drone patrolling Aurora we could have blasted that multiplex to smithereens and saved those good folks from being shot by that damn terrorist!”
NPR is ‘talking about feeding 9 Billion in 30 or 40 years’!!!
How about this for Eyesore of the Century award?
vigilantcitizen.com/
sinistersites/sinister-sites-the-denver-international-airport
Yikes!!!!!!!
Vlad, Vlad, Vlad. Where to start?
Are you aware that the ferm ‘fascism’ was only coined in the 20th century? It applied to a specific political organization with a totalitarian state.
Applying this label to the American nation of the late 1700’s is nonsensical. If you actually review the various characteristics of the classic fascist states such as WWII era Germany and Italy, then you’d realize that most overt American political principles are diametrically opposed to this form of government.
In other words, we have a democracy, not a dictatorship. A great emphasis is placed upon personal freedom and protection of individuals from an overzealous state. etc.
This seems to be another instance of you appropriating words and concepts for your own pet theories when they are not actually appropriate.
Peak Oil is already casting its long shadow over our whole era. If you look at oil production per capita instead of just the raw production per day, then this should be clear. What matters is not how much oil is available overally, but how much per person. And with ever increasing global population, this number is on a long, slow decline.
You’re confused. Consult the wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Aurora_shooting
The shooter went out a side exit and then propped it open. He then changed into his gear and came back inside.
i don’t click on internet ads, i don’t watch political ads and the last thing i would do is click on a troll’s blog from kuntstler’s comment section. please stop posting your blog in your comments section. i’m here to read clusterfucknation and the real comments on the article…
Awe Man! Trouble in a couple of weeks? And I have been working on bringing up my credit score!!! Go figure!!
As a European-born migrant to Australia and with the perspective granted to those who have lived in two cultures I respectfully disagree with your prognosis for Europe Jim.
Largely thanks to the patchwork of cultures you generously describe, Europeans are more inured to hardship and this is why I am convinced the centre will hold at least for this century.
We may not say the same of Greece because it is not part of Europe and now never will be.
Typically it is only when people go hungry that large-scale social and political unrest takes place. I can’t see it happening in Europe.
That is not to say that recent immigrants, those lacking a modern understanding of what religious tolerance means, will not be forcibly ejected from Europe’s borders. They may well come to pass and will be ugly. But European nation states will continue to function with WW2 borders for our lifetime and that of our children.
The US has a different and much graver suite of problems. The integrity of your nation state there is under considerably greater threat and I respectfully urge you to analyse that instead. It is a topic you can (and do) cover with much greater authority.
Show me where Democracy is mentioned in the Constitution. And were Women allowed to vote? Blacks? Indigent Whites? Illegals? Mexicans? Trannies?
It’s time to take out the trash. I admit I’m stretching the concept a bit – in order to show the continuity of values. Fascism is Traditionalism updated to modern times. Your American would be utterly alien to the Founders, the antithesis in fact.
Hey Disney World, get with the times!
The newest tourist attraction in Isreal is a shooting range that offers 2 hour anti-terrorist training sessions. Called Caliber 3, the business hopes to attract Holy Land visitors to venture off the beaten path for a quick thrill, shooting up paper targets with pictures of grimacing Arab fighters – maybe a little Zionist propaganda thrown as well. Great family fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CF2VUvYOUZY&feature=relmfu
Zed Leppt In,
One of the best post ever on CFN; a home run (I am sorry to say).
Dreadlocked fools.
Vlad refers to you as a Canadian, Rhino. Are you? Yes? Well then, here’s an example of the white dysfunction you refer to, Toronto style.
Every so often one sees on the streets of Toronto a white person wearing dreadlocks. Sometimes male, sometimes female, nearly always young. Whites who wear dreadlocks as a fashion statement solely and who know nothing about the Rastafarian religion are fools. Who but a fool would adorn himself with a potent religious symbol (which dreadlocks were and are) while remaining ignorant of the religion for which the symbol stands?
White people who are familiar with Rastafarian doctrine and who wear dreadlocks nonetheless, are fools also.
Real Rastafarians, Jamaican Rastafarians, those of them that hew to the original doctrines, regard the white race as devilish. They think that the sooner the white race is done away with, the better. To them, the day of white elimination is the day of Rastafarian liberation.
Why are white people wearing dreadlocks?
Females and totes are close friends eternally. Their a friendly relationship and love both is undefined and contains received no restrictions. The fabricated bags have grown to be absolutely vital for each and every young girl, adolescent, higher education guests, pros, larger ladies and every female. Even our grandmas are fond of a great clutch i465 or expensive tote to keep her coins and records. The bags have finally become more of your habit than the usual necessity. Many people enjoy having a pool of types nonetheless other medication is very pleased with 2-3 types. Purses are made in various seems to be, sizes and colors. Each one has a different objective to solve some are aimed at events, a number of for informal use, and sleep others have varied functions as well.Here are some purses that are necessary, and it will be good when you have it!1. The Routine Carrier- here’s your all-time or catch- all tote. The bag you use everyday to business office, to lunch, towards the block industry, and so on. This can be the carrier which includes received a number of pockets, wherein you are able to retailer your entire daily essential stuff like recommendations, traveling to playing cards, your almirah tips, shades, your son or daughter’s favored dark chocolate and many others. This is the trademark handbag for any regimen life. To buy a schedule carrier be sure you select a fairly neutral coloration like dark, brownish or glowing blue because they will accentuate your entire clothes. There lots of totes for women, but make sure you buy something containing a good number of compartments and comprises of okay leather.2. The Large Clutch- it’s chic! You dont want to go ahead and take workplace turn to the unforeseen dinner designed because of your friends. So keep a clutch system inside your day-to-day bag, to rework your mood check out particular date look. Pick a woman colour like pink, fruit or something like that in dark with golden adornments. With certainty make it together with your gown and have fashionable. Considering that the big clutch i465 black is big but has comparatively a smaller amount room than the usual bag, as a result have issues that you would call for and do not above goods becoming it is going to drop its elegance. Hold some funds, a top-high shine, little powdered to the edit not to mention your mobile phone!3. The little clutch- read the handbags online and obtain a smaller clutch system. They may be your social gathering equipment. These are elegant and fascinating. Tiny clutches add the required allure on your character in a social gathering. If you dont want to have a very series but simply desire to purchase one, then go for a thing that is sequenced or has metal information.4. The Holiday Bag- you wouldn’t like to transport your daily handbag to a end of the week retreat. Also, because it might not be that big enough to hold your outfits and other points at the same time. So for your weekend tote, check out purses on the internet and buy for yourself a major carrier. It really is elegant and large.5. Electronic Masturbator sleeves- they are a kind of laptop totes. They may be small , small. Also, they’re elegant and trendy. You’ll be able to select any pattern or color to suit your mood to the period and luxuriate in obtaining noticed,ralph lauren polo long sleeve!
CO-OPERATION IS THE ANSWER
THE LATEST ISSUE OF THE NEW INTERNATIONALIST MAGAZINE http://www.newint.org/
IS A MUST READ FOR US ALL – TH EWHOLE ISSUE IS GIVEN OVE RTO THE HISTORY AND PRESENT SUCCESS OF CO-OPS WORLDWIDE – THE END OF WALL STREET -READ IT AND SUBSCRIBE TO IT.
TONY
In the past I have heaped praise on some of JHK’s paintings, but this one is not one of my favorites – and I state that respectfully. The reason being is there isn’t a sense of “sacrifice” or subordination of detail – most all of the elements are rendered to an equal level of detail. If the painting is about the kayakers, then really emphasize them. As it stands, my eye is equally torn between the highly detailed pebbles/rocks in the foreground, the sky reflections in the water, the kayakers (even despite the stand alone color), the trees, the sky, and even the rather detailed trees in the distance – there is simply too much information. Moreover, in a back lit scene such as this, there will be two forms and values of light on the foliage in the light: a warm light from the sun filtering through the foliage and a cooler, lighter value that is reflecting the sky itself – the latter really makes the light ‘pop’.
A good painter to study for many things but especially for subordination and gradation of detail is Emile Gruppe. There is no doubt in the below painting by Gruppe what he is emphasizing and “talking about” in the painting. And he is not afraid to downplay detail in order to amplify this effect:
http://www.antiques.com/vendor_item_images/ori_333-34264-966776-Emile-Gruppe-painting-Reflection-Vermont-picture1.jpg
On the other hand, the “focal point” doesn’t necessarily have to be the most highly detailed area of a painting. Indeed, it can be the most simplified area of a painting if it is enveloped by areas of more highly rendered detail, such as the surroundings of the lone tree in this absolute masterpiece of a landscape painting posted below ( click on the enlarge feature to really enjoy this wonderful painting):
http://www.gallery1261.com/html_shows/12-weckbach-solo/weckbach-kevin-winter-60×50-16500.htm
Rhino,
Sadly, I have made your point many times over i.e., that the white race is falling fastest right now. However, I think it’s mainly because they’ve bought into the “bro culture” and its prison-chic garb, vulgar language, and incredible narcissism.
However, it’s not ALL culture. Too many studies of Africa pretty much come to the conclusion that the average IQ over there is 85. Africa ALWAYS has many wars and genocides going on simultaneously. Low IQ is strongly correlated with violence. This is demographic data that anyone can obtain.
Does it mean that I want to diss a black person (or any other kind of person for that matter) on sight? No. Good social decorum means being cordial to everyone until one has good reason to get testy.
However, I think that white culture has, essentially, “gone black” in the last 30 years which is why white suburban boys play hip hop in their rides. Yes, weak parents, weak teachers, and weak administrators have added to the travail. But how? Because they’ve also bought into the horrible liberal idea that everything is a “lifestyle choice” e.g., sluttiness vs. chastity, modesty vs. in-your-face, cleanliness vs. filth, and so on.
This is DEMOCRACY … the tilting of the whole populace to the lowest common denominator. I prefer a Republic. Democracy doesn’t work, just as Alexis de Tocqueville prophesied.
E.
All this BS about a random nutjob illustrates how natural it is for people to perceive the personal, at the expense of the impersonal.
Lets chat about this global warming drought that is driving commodity food prices through the roof. These costs will impact food commodity prices globally. People are going to starve to death in massive numbers, people are going to be pushed into poverty.
In one sense though, it is just a continuance of business as usual.
Is it at ‘Occidental Observer’ where theres a fascinating article about Morgan Freeman and Will Smith.
‘Freeman portrayed God’ or somesuch.
Lets get more perspective:
$5 a day. With rising food prices.
What do you call someone who raises food on land they don’t own?
Surfin’ is the only life, the only way for me now
Surf! Surf! With me.
Thaddeus
Always interesting how human brains (or lack thereof) get stuck on timelines. Long way off or a short way or just around the corner. What’s the difference really. Does it really matter if somebody eats your great grandchildren instead of your grandchildren for dinner. They will be eaten either way and it’s the end of the line. Timeline denial and obsession is now another escape to not deal with brutal reality. When cultures exhaust their resources they die, simple as that. As it has been countless times before so must it be again. With a twist, this time it’s an extinction event and four legs will once again rule the earth.
hungry
Vlad, do you need directions to the nearest cave wall, or someplace where comments like yours have a modern day context?
Your P.O.V. being that we are all random nut-jobs.
A point of view with which I concur, but this nutjob does not kill other nut-jobs. This nutjob wishes to harm nobody. There is a spectrum of nut-jobs and Colorado has always had a lot of extreme self obsessed ones. It might be the altitude or it could be that Colorado expresses the American spirit in a particular way. Whatever it is, it’s tragic.
Normal nut-jobs, the vast majority of us. Those who selectively screen out the suffering of others but who don’t have childish urges to finger paint with someone else’s blood are much nicer to deal with.
That was some seriously repugnant shit that went down.
Anaheim Riot
Lovers of brown-person suppression may be having wet dreams but according to them and the elite of Orange – Anaheim is where brown people are suppose to be. Having experienced the suppression first hand I know this.
Cali has always struck me as a quilt of tribes that can’t get along. It’s been going on for so long the fools there are all proud of it and ready to fight over turf.
But the people on the video have a right to be pissed.