Coping: A Cool Head in the Hot Zones

I can’t count the number of emails making their way around the net in the past 24-hours with provocative headlines like “Fed’s Murdered (the vic) at Roadblock…”

Toss onto that the flurry of emails on the Fed action (not raising rates) at their decision meeting Wednesday that sent the market down more than 200 points before the close.

And with that, we have the “debate” tonight with up to 80-odd percent saying they won’t watch it because no Trump, no audience. 

That and the water heater in Panama’s apartment blew out yesterday..mind you it was covered by a six year guarantee so it failed at 75-months.

Time to do some “cool head” exercises.

Talked to Elaine.  “Dear, you know that porch and desk paint we put on (and discovered after the fact that it said not for exterior use)?  Well, it’s flaking in one spot…:

Yes sir, this was one of those days to be sure.  “Chill, dog,” I told myself.

I don’t have a hot temper  If I did, I’d been doing box time by now.  Seriously.. In fact, I’m more toward  the other extreme:  I like to maintain a kind of Raymond Reddington personality; 5-jumps ahead and ready for whatever.

So this morning a couple of ideas on how to maintain a good attitude so as not to screw up the weekend.

1.  Yes.  One of the people involved in the stand-off in Oregon is dead.  Sorry about that.  BUT you can bet there will be a ton of lawyering on the part of the family members who survived and we will see a ton of videos on Youtube,  Ultimately, though, both sides are partisans.  The demonstrators were distinctly anti BLM and, by extension, anti-government.

I’ve worked in some fairly regulated industries in my time; higher education and broadcasting.  Without exception, I’ve never seen a government auditor get angry.  They don’t have to.   They have the power to tax, the power of a standing Army, and a damn fine Navy.

And, did I mention the government has outlived all of us and can make up money to boot?

I used to tell my kids it is always smarter to run away from al fight you can’t win.  Only an idiot picks a fight where the outcome isn’t certain.

Look, I don’t think BLM land should be off the tax roles.  Since the Feds have some much land, only those areas that at unfenced and open to real public access should be called “public lands.”

Anything else is a real estate operation – and what is the Fed Gov running a real estate operation in huge areas of the West?  State could likely do a better job of it and would certainly meet the test of government closer to the people which is, to my way of thinking where it belongs.

I am sad for the family’s loss, but it was not a fight where there was a clear set-up to win.  The only way to change government without risk of death is at the polls or in a courtroom.  When people forget this, which does happen when wrapped up in a serious grievance, the first rule of fighting is broken.

Never pick a fight you aren’t certain you can win.

There is a word that people often forget, especially when emotions run high and a crowd of people becomes self-reinforcing in their views.  That word is pragmatic.

It means acting in accordance with the data, not theory; high-minded or otherwise.

It’s all about living in the world that is, not trying to live in a world that may become.

The Oregon group was, in a sense right:  Why does GUS (government, U.S.) hold claim to so much land?  I mean other than it’s power and requires taxes to run, and a big supporting infrastructure?

The key is the manner of change:  Confrontation with a government (see Army, Navy,a Air Force and ownership of the Courts) is very unlikely to result in a long-term change to a world without BLM.   Because we live in the world that is, and in this world government is self-reinforcing, self-perpetuating, expansionary, and armed to the teeth.

Sure victory for the 98-pound weakling doesn’t come from getting in a ring with a prize fighter.  Rent lawyers and send them into the ring. 

2.  The Fed is trying to do the right thing on rates, but it isn’t working out well.  See the top story in the news section (when I get to it).  The markets are not likely to call apart today.

Again though, while I don’t think there should be a) a Federal Reserve and believe Congress abdicated by giving private banksters control of the nation’s money and b) the Fed rents us our money and has systematically watered down its purchasing power to only 4.2% of what it was when the banksters got the vault key in 1913, we need to remember here that the same observation about keeping cool applied to the banksters, too.

Like BLM, the Federal Reserve has what it has (power) and by extension, they are backed by Congress (crooks of a feather?) and they, in turn, are backed by a damn fine Army and a first-rate Navy.  (I haven’t mentioned the Air Force, but count them and the Coasties too.

See the previous rule:

Never pick a fight you aren’t certain you can win.

Bitcoin isn’t going to win, unless its part of some negotiated lay-down.  And gold and silver and cash are slowly being criminalized.

It may be too early to pop learned questions on you, but I don’t suppose you know who Mohamed A. El-Erian is, do you?   You should:

Mohamed A. El-Erian (Egyptian Arabic: [mæ??æmmæd el?e??jæ?n]; born August 19, 1958) is Chief Economic Adviser at Allianz,[1] a multinational financial services company.[2] He is the former CEO and co-Chief Investment Officer at PIMCO,[3] a global investment firm and one of the world’s largest bond investors, with approximately $2 trillion in assets under management as of December 2013. PIMCO is a company of Allianz.

El-Erian serves as chair of President Obama’s Global Development Council.[4] He is a columnist for Bloomberg View,[5] as well as contributing editor to the Financial Times and a member of their A List.[6] In 2014 and 2015, he served on the panel of experts that judged and selected the Financial Times/McKinsey Business Book of the Year. He is also a regular contributor to “Project Syndicate”, Business Insider as well as Fortune/CNN[7] and Foreign Policy.

El-Erian’s new book hit the top of my Kindle reading list Wednesday. The Only Game in Town: Central Banks, Instability, and Avoiding the Next Collapse.

It sounded like a “This is your nuts in a vice” kind of book.

Seems to have some good stuff in it, and despite the Fed’s current lock on American finance, there are two important head-coolers to keep in mind on this topic:  One is that the rich don’t want the system to collapse, either, so it’s a safe bet they will attempt to salvage things at some level.

The other is where I mentioned that the courts or the ballot box is where long-term change without Quik-Clot comes from.

3.  The Debate Tonight is eminently missable – and would have been even if Donald were to appear.  And do I care what an anchorette may sling in the way of barbs and arrows?  Not no, but hell no

If people haven’t figured out but by now that Jeb is trying to perpetuate a Dynasty, they must be pretty dumb.  This week even Donny Rumsfeld copped to that.  (Why his new vidgame Double Solitaire doesn’t seem to be ported to Win-10 is just beyond me, but perhaps it’s because I am spectacularly stupid from writing too much and spending insufficient time joining the Steam legions…)

I would go further:  If people in CaucusLand don’t know Trump is rich, Carson is talent and smart, that Cruz is a slick lawyer, and that no one else has a chance in hell, they should all stay home and leave the voting to us grownups.

The other ones who could stay home include Christie and Rubio.  Maybe they missed my memo:

Never pick a fight you’re not certain you can win.

4.  Between 9 AM and 11 AM, Panama took out his old water heater while I ran into Lowes and picked up a replacement ($347, thanks). 

It was done by 11 AM.

Along the way, Panama suggested from improvements.  But I explained no, we’re not going to do any “make the round hole rounder” work on the water heater.  Same size tank, same location, new feed tubes and we’re gonna “get ‘er done.”

And this really gets us to the point of this morning.

It is fine to cheer this politician, cause, or trend.  But when comes down to it, most of us are really faced with a lot of other tasks in life that are much closer to home.

And so it was that I dutifully followed my instincts, and in two hours including travel time, we had the project done.

The fact is we followed a simple rule.

We picked the one fighting Wednesday I knew we could win.  And win we did.

The Internet is a fine community where people can try to work things out, but with all our time as a society on social media, sorry,. but I’m not seeing a payback.  If anything, we’re getting more cocooned with devices and more acerbic and less tolerant.

In the end, I keep coming back to the one thing that keeping making sense to these tired old bones.

I pick a fight I can win and then I go ‘get ‘er done.’  I figure we could have a lot less news and a lot better country is more people were focused on that.

Write when you break-even (or get something done)

George   george@ure.net

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George Ure
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26 thoughts on “Coping: A Cool Head in the Hot Zones”

  1. Never pick a fight you aren’t certain you can win. Christ George, if the founders had that attitude we would still be drinking tea and paying dearly to do so.

    • I disagree: the Founders had almost all the people of the Colonies on their side. Victory was certain. They just may not have recognized the value of popular support. Conversely, issuing death threats and speaking of a “free for all Armageddon” is not going to resonate with the country, or at least hasn’t so far at anything other than token levels.

      Credit Ammon Bundy for having the sense to say “Go home.”

      • Or maybe it was explained to him that in a very real ‘personal sense’, it was a good idea . . . as in a better possible legal outcome, or better possible living conditions while incarcerated . . .

    • Wrong. Here’s a cite for you:
      Historian Robert Calhoon wrote in 2000, concerning the proportion of Loyalists to Patriots in the Thirteen Colonies:

      Historians’ best estimates put the proportion of adult white male loyalists somewhere between 15 and 20 percent. Approximately half the colonists of European ancestry tried to avoid involvement in the struggle—some of them deliberate pacifists, others recent immigrants, and many more simple apolitical folk. The patriots received active support from perhaps 40 to 45 percent of the white populace, and at most no more than a bare majority

      The brits didn’t have a majority. You have to look at raw numbers on this stuff. Uninvolved don’t matter. So you had max 20% tory and likely 30-35% revolutionaries.
      As applies to the current world, the BLM sit is nowhere near as polarizing. Need to reread Mao’s Red Book again.

  2. I see you brought up Quik-Clot again for those who are bleeding out. Thought I would just send along a little reminder for those who don’t have that product handy that sugar works just as well and is probably more available. If you don’t believe sugar will stop bleeding almost instantly wait until the next time you cut yourself with a kitchen knife and try it. It is something you will never forget after that. (Unfortunately it does not work for your bank account or stock account though.)

    • It also does not work, as I had an “opportunity” to test this by 09:00. Still bleeding.
      In coagulation class, we learned that the cascade is activated by (factor 12?) contact with just about anything. But apparently, not for me.

  3. The “Revolutionary” war was a set up by a faction of the British from the very beginning. Nothing particularly changed after the war. Of course there were parties that took the war as serious, which explains the need for the war of 1812, to set these parties straight. It took a while for the Rothschilds to get enough ducks in a row, but they got their plan implemented by 1913. Patient buggers aren’t they? Kind of makes one wonder who exactly is on the Moon.

  4. wrt Oregon stand-offand the original Bundy stand-off, etc, and et al, the militias are definitely unorganized, full of egos and lack any sort of coordination, logistics, strategy or tactics.

    Pfft. The ‘militias’ in Oregon said, ‘Send food!’ If I’d said that, the same militias would’ve told me to get a job. In comparison, they make the government look competent.

  5. “The rich don’t want the system to collapse either” and are willing to spend your last dime to see it doesn’t happen!

  6. George, I agree re: social media as time-wasting mess, but the net itself does allow for some price comparison shopping (whether you then buy in a store or online) & for a sort-of quality/durability-of-product review sampling. Helps sometimes. Also the net is a great research tool (online journals, Wikipedia, non-front-page news info, instructions on how to repair stuff – as you’ve mentioned before). It also can be helpful in connecting organizations. Not to mention sites like this where THINKING people from around the world contribute some relevant info re: conditions in their location related to stuff like economies/banking, living conditions, weather issues, etc that allow for maybe a better view for everyone of the global “jigsaw puzzle” pieces – with a side of out-there entertainment.

  7. from Oregon — sorry but those cowboys are worse than the government. They think it’s fine to ruin the environment, kill all the wild animals, torture and mistreat animals in things like ‘rodeo’s’ and ill kept farms and do anything else they please so long as they can MAKE MONEY doing it. The same mentality that slaughtered buffalos for fun and Indians as well! Keeping the environment away from them is the best idea I’ve heard of.

    • We hold these truths to be self evident! Not one buffelo was hurt by the fellas in oregon. Nor was any of the enviroment, or animials harmed or injured, not one rodeo was ever conducted by those cowboys. The fact is, the only wild animal that was killed was one of the militias members.

      Ya see?

      • Check the footage from the drone that the Bundy crowd allowed to be flown over the refuge – trenches were dug in sensitive areas by earth-moving equipment and damage was done. I am a born and bred Oregonian, unlike these ‘imports’ – damage was done, and it will take good money to clean the mess up.

        Do not attempt to break through police road blocks if you want to stay ‘hale and hearty’.

      • You assume im going there? You are mad about dirt being moved? Really? Im not a malitia member. But everytime you drive down the road, realize that the road your driving on?? Dirt was moved to and from there.

    • Fyi: if ya wanna go holding generations guilty for the crap that their fore fathers did. Start with spain. They wiped out the aztec’s, the myans and eveyone else in south america. The spanish were responsible for capturing african tribes, loading them on ships and bringing them to the colony’s and selling them as slaves.

      Where do you think the “N” word originated???? Go look up the spanish word for the color black and educate yourself.

      How come you are not spouting off about the only thing worse than the government is the spanish!

      Cant we all just get along? I dont care if you are a different color or a drag queen. Human rights are human rights. And no oganization who is in the pockets of cooperations should infrindge on our liberty by owning any of land that we the people dwell within. And as far as i can see, we all live her on the tiny blue speck.

  8. Since both the courts and the votes are rigged, we may need to find another means to induce change. Not even the laws are enforced evenly nor in some cases even understood by those “enforcing” them.

  9. You can change things through the ballot boxes? Not likely! Think Diebold. Think of all the previous elections where the results didn’t match the exit polls, and to have them match is the litmus test for honest elections. Think Diebold again. As for the courts, there have been far too many bizarre, blatantly dishonest, horrid court rulings in recent years to think the courts are any less corrupted than the government. Courts and ballot boxes are no longer the way to change things. They now merely reinforce the status quo. There’s only one way left. Although the BLM challengers didn’t think things out too well, at least they gave it a try. One of these days, one of these challenges will succeed, and that’s the only way we’ll finally rid this country of its ruling criminals. Freedom is for fighters.

  10. Question you gotta ask is how do you get those percentages in the USA? Keep in mind that during the revolution very few colonists were destitute, and probably only 1-2% were on the government payroll compared to at least 50% of American households receiving some kind of government money.

    It’s going to be a long hard miserable slog to the bottom for the USA. First they take your wages(IRS), then they take your savings(inflation,0% interest), then your retirement accounts(bail ins), then they indebt you (credit cards for necessities), and then you resist?

    Either you live a free man, or you die a slave. It has nothing to do with winning or losing. No war is ever won with one battle. The first battle is just to prove you have what it takes to fight the war. Do you remember the words of Patrick Henry?

    The people in the USA government are experts at manipulating the sheep. For years, the IRS would drag some “tax protester” before the media and millions would slink to the mailbox before April 15. Fewer than 50% of those paraded in the media were ever convicted on tax charges. Burns Oregon was the same way. Kill one man, and millions cower even though he had his hands up. Earlier in America, if you killed an unarmed man or shot someone in the back, you hung.

  11. On the topic of picking a fight. The Les Schtroumpf’s are by far, most tenacious on-line junkies i have ever met. (still hold the record there for the most 1 stars ever given to an introductory thread and the only “hello” pin) they are even tenacious than the general managers over at the other place. (And im sure he remembers) almost every thread there was looking for nobody.

    Still i aint out picking a fight. Just wondering about a few things. That is all. It’s really simple, like i advised the dome rishi years ago, ya gotta clean up all that trash. But he didnt listen. It’s either about the truth or its about the money. Always ends up there eventually.

    As far as the high art goes, i say this whole World War Z. stuff reminds me of moses and the plagues of egypt.

    Where Moses said,”Let my people go.” Perhaps, its just another cyclical round of that archtype, cept this time the Pharoah is the bankers.

    What would Jesus do?

    Maybe its nothing but a G thing?

    Uh huh.

    Well am going to be off conductting an a etheric experiment for a few months or more.

    Later dude.

  12. Changes to a water heater. I always replace the plastic drain valve with a good ball valve. This allows a full opening. Add a garden hose fitting and a garden hose cap for safety. You don’t want a kid throwing the valve open.
    Blow the tank, then wait 30 minutes to let the stirred up stuff to settle, and blow the tank again. Every 6 months.

    • Great idea with the ball valve, especially for those of us with gyppy waters. Another one is to pull the anode every couple of years, just so the threads are easy to screw. Change it as necessary. No anode left and soon there’ll be a leaky heater. Pull the anode on installation to be sure it can be pulled without moving the heater. If you use hot water very little(single, hermit, etc), then install a tankless flash heater.

  13. “That and the water heater in Panama’s apartment blew out yesterday..mind you it was covered by a six year guarantee so it failed at 75-months” Microcontroller in it?

  14. Beyond the ballot box and the jury box, and before the bullet box there remains the most powerful and legal weapon of positive change:

    The Soapbox!

    This is what Donald Trump is doing, and doing well. It works because he’s verbalizing the thoughts of the majority in a coherent way and presenting a path for positive change to those who are unable to conceptualize that path. He has the resources, the desire and the talent to do this, and I’m grateful.

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