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Note: This being Saturday, today's update is for Peoplenomics.com subscribers only.  Subscription information may be found here.  Today we get into the reasons behind a whole host of economics non sequitors (things that don't follow) many of which can be tied to this coming Monday's emergency Fed meeting...

 

Good Friday, Except the Employment Data

You'd think that after being up until 4 AM to be on CoastToCoast with George Noory and Cliff High (www.halfpasthuman.com) that I would be where?  In bed, of course.

 

But there is too much going on, starting with the unemployment numbers just out from the Labor Department. 

Link after 7: 30AM

A couple of things to ponder as you look through these:  The first item is the timing.  With the stock market closed today (Good Friday) what better time to get honest about the unemployment rate without having the markets go into fibrillations which could involve other [financial] organs, like banks and such?  Not too often a window like this comes along.  So while the Labor Department says what it wants, the ADP report earlier this week noted a drop of 23,000 jobs in the past month.

 

Speaking of which, this reader email is very much on point:

"I did want to give you some feedback on your ADP Report versus BLS number. (My qualifications were 30 year career of working for the nation's largest Payroll company in various Sr. management positions. I was in the know.) The BLS report was designed to be a market mover. It surveys companies which don't have to tell the truth or report at all. The ADP report is the balance of Terminations and New Hires on the raw payroll data which is crunched to create paychecks. It is massaged by some consistent factors arrived at by a slew of heavy duty SME consultants. It is more reliable than BLS!! If you didn't know, Alan Greenspan sat on ADP's Board for quite a long time. Their report was designed to be sold to for commercial purposes not just reported by Joe Kernan on CNBC.

Well, gosh, which set of numbers would I trust?  Hmmm...lemme think: ,political appointees turning out numbers called for by a political boss, or raw terminations and hiring off payroll data.  Gee...hard choice

 

NOT!

 

Of course the real slapstick isn't apparent until you look into the CES Birth Death Model which sort of 'makes up' on whatever statistical pretext is in vogue in geek circles.  To wit:

Link after \7:30 CDT

 

As I mentioned to George Noory last night...the Biggest problem in this economy is the whole world has nearly enough stuff and America already has too much stuff.  Without a new core technology (and no, neither one of us thinks 3D glasses will be 'it') the whole Western economic paradigm simply blows up.  Jury's only out on one item and that's whether 'blows up' will be literal or figuratively speaking.

---

Off on the horizon, slowly at times, but picking up speed again this week, is the real killer for Western-style excessive consumption lifestyles..  I'm talking here about Peak Oil which although bit delayed, seems to be running out faster than the happy talk department figured.

 

Want to play "Good news -- Bad News"?

 

A while back (several years, in fact) I told you how Matthew Simmons (who wrote a most excellent book Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy ) has been warning of this for years and as an energy banker he knows his stuff.

 

You were probably busy in February when Simmons did a presentation to the Marsh's National Oil Companies Conference - it was in Dubai at the new Intercontinental, so you would have stuck out a bit, more'n likely. But Simmons says now, not only do we have an oil crisis to deal with but along with that is a coming crisis in fresh water.

 

Of course, if this is beginning to sound familiar, and there's something about all this which is somehow vaguely familiar, one of three things may be at work.  First, you may be too tired (and hung over) to make sense out of anything but large print and easy to digest ideas, OR 2) you may have read

 Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict With a New Introduction by the Author OR 3) You may remember back in 2004 when guess whichj daily economic news rag started talking about the coming "Manufacturer's Resource Wars."  (Big hint, here)

 

How did I get off on this tangent?  Oh...because Simmons pointed out that one of the few saving graces to a world running out of oil and water (couple of year back was when he mentioned this) was the idea of a 'good depression'.

Not 'good' as in 'fun and happy' but 'good' as in take a 'good handful' of something.

 

You can continue to see the canyon walls narrow here, can't you?

 

So while the day to day perturbations of this number of that can be hotly debated, I won't waste your time on such trivialities this morning - just too damn tired to quibble.

 

When resources run out, humans come to a screeching halt.  That's the message in the job figures (which is why starvation is out there ahead somewhere) and why a draft will be back in public policy before year's end in response to some crisis, or other, and why people take off days like this from work - ostensibly to go think about things.

 

Pun Attack!

Say, you don't think Iran is Hu's Who is Obama talks, do you?

 

Naw: Iran is going forward with its nuke ambitions.

 

Passover?

No, make that fly over and drop some ordinance on Gaza.

 

And Indians

...have been rioting, too.

---

Why, I can almost Feel the love busting out all over the world...I assume you can, too?

 

Undude Optimism

Headline: "Report: By 2020: more senior citizens to be homeless."

 

Ure's World: Try the end of the month.

 

--- snip and save section ---

 

Coping: A Fine Woo Woo Report

How's this one?

Hi George I was watching the toob the other night....I get over-the-air digital...no cable-when in the middle of the screen flashed a small brief circular pixilation; CONCURRENTLY, I noticed a black enturbulated mass/shadow above me in better-than-peripheral vision range-but not direct sight. I actually thought to myself: "Gimee a frikken break OK?-im trying to watch SEINFELD" (!)-thinking shadow people or the like as I read here...I was absolutely unfazed. In the next instant, though, an opaque white object appeared over the tele in direct vision this time, again briefly. This time my hairs stood on end and a freezing shiver of...being kinda unnerved went thru me. I sat pondering this for a while wondering what was up. Nothing else came of it; No drugs, drinking or april fools here

Another odd thing: I listen to the radio regularly, KEXP FM here in Seattle, and there is a once a week program of alt country, folk, swing etc on from 6-9p on Thursdays; For about a month of 4-5 shows, when it came on I would be in shock thinking "Hey wait-this show just was just on a night or two ago" (each night has a different dedicated specialty show-so it was not a "repeat") It was very eerie to feel that time SHRANK or was lost in between several consecutive Thursday evenings. It has now stopped."

If - over the next several weeks, your head starts to spin around while spewing pea soup-like stuff, drop us a line so we can get out of town.

 

CNB

Crash N Burn time.  Getting too old to pull all-nighters.

 

Back to our normal - well rested -and cynical selves for Peoplenomics.com subscribers tomorrow morning.  Free users: We'll be back Monday at the usual time - 7:55 AM - provided the world's still here.

 

Send your comments to george@ure.net

---

Shop Till You Drop Department:

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"Live on $10,000" A Year

Having a hard time making ends meet?  (Like who isn't, right?)  A good starting point to better match up income with outgo is our $10 e-book "How to Live on #10,000 a Year...or less!"

 

 

 

It's an automatic download.  It's written in an information dense style: The whole thing runs about 65 pages, but it gives you a vision of how to not only live on the cheap, but also how to migrate up the economic foodchain if you have a little hustle left.  A bonus section called "How to Build Anything" should instill confidence if you've never taken on a home improvement/home creation project before, too.....  Click here for the index and details.

 

MyGroPonics

My commodity broker JB Slear and I have written a simple book to get you started on high density hydroponics.  It's an example of how someone with a little creativity, access to a few 'dollar stores' and willing to try out some new farming techniques can grow an amazing amount of produce sin a very small space - like even an apartment balcony (if it gets some sunlight).  Sound interesting?  It's just $10 bucks here...

 

       

 

Pass It On

A different take on things - that's what you'll find here most mornings.  If you know of anyone who might also like our content, simply click here and send a link to them.  Or, if you hated what you read, send the link to all your 'worst enemies'.  Like they say in Burbank, "Ain't no such thing as bad press..."

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 Last week's report is here.    For back issues of this site, click here.

 

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Thursday April 1, 2010

The Economy & The Calendar

Don't know how this works exactly, but The Talking Heads may have been onto things when they sang "Lifetime Piling Up" and since this is April Fool's Day, what better place to begin than with a review of the economy?

 

The Dow started the ball rolling on Wednesday by dropping 50-points, after 17 readers in all spotted our coverage of the "Global Warming activist freezes to death in the Antarctic" story as a prank. Not as good as the daily dose of hoaxes from the MainStreamMedia, but we take our pleasures where we can find them.

---

In all seriousness (or nearly so), the past couple of weeks out here on the ranch have been full of activities:  The well project now needs only the electric and manual pumps inserted and the well house finished, the expansion of my office is done save a bit of finishing trim, the ham radio tower is up and working dandy and tonight my friend for 57-odd years flies into Tyler for a week of ham radio, target practice, tractoring, fencing, story telling, and new get-rich-slowly schemes.  And just about the time we're done with that conversation, I'm on CoastToCoast with Cliff High to talk about the latest predictive linguistic "Shape Of Things To Come" report.

 

Oh, and we replaced about 600-feet of water line feeding the property, put in a new septic system for the office expansion and probably a few dozen smaller projects (insulate and air condition a storage shed, for instance) that are hardly worth mentioning.  Busier than a one-armed paper-hanger.

 

So forgive the somewhat abbreviated report this morning, but I still have a half dozen new light fixtures to tame, two branch circuits to wire into breakers, my office to clean, and 8-hours of to-do list before noon and then I'm going to grab some shut-eye for what will likely be a 24-hour non-stop marathon.

---

The first joke of the morning (on investors) is how the global stock markets were being 'buoyed by global manufacturing data".  A few sips of go-juice and the re-arrival of mental clarity, however, reveals this is CHINESE manufacturing data.

 

In order to see the humor in today's round of hype & BS, you need to understand how most purchasing manager indices work:  They are usually 'normed to 50"...in other words, if there's no change in purchasing, the levels ought to come in about 50.  So when the index rose from 52.0 in February to 55.1 in March, pardon me while I grab the closest can of whipping cream since the local welding yard isn't selling nitrous oxide anymore.

 

Near as I can figure, we'll see when the Amateur Hour begins (the first hour of trading on markets) how gullible J.Q. Public is.

---

The Biggest Problem for the US over coming months will be creating ever higher levels of debt - but not so much as to crowd out government borrowing. 

 

Here's the thing:  My deflationist pal Jas Jain points out that although the government has a printing press for paper (so-called money) creation, there's a step in the whole process ahead of that - namely, the creation of debt.  You saw where the recent Treasury auction was anemic? The reason we see headlines like "Dollar fades as ADP Jobs Report disappoints" flying around this week is that as long as the American Consumer is not piling on debt at former house afire rates, there's not going to be enough underlying debt creation needed to give Helicopter Ben & Co. something to print into.

 

In other words, the Fed can create all the money it wants, but it's like pushing on a wet noodle  without a rebound in borrowing to drive things.

 

Ergo, "Interest rates fall in bond market after jobs data" explains the problem Pinocchio (who I assume runs the Stats office for the Labor Department) has with tomorrow's "offishul" jobs report.

 

Since the ADP report says something like 23,000 jobs disappeared, that leads me to expect that the only way to jigger the federal report will be with a sizeable downward adjustment in the workforce number.  Reduce that far enough and you can still have unemployment fall to 9.6% or even 9.5%, so long as not too many people figure the hidden variable was the reduction in the number of people in the workforce.

 

But, we shall see.  That's tomorrow's adventure.

 

Warrant-less Wiretaps ARE Illegal

So says a federal judge.  But come on!  Is Gov't going to sit back and take issuance from the third arm of government?  Hell no.  They'll appeal. Of course, just for form, they're saying "no decision on appeal" yet, but get real...big surveillance is big business and we must have perpetual war (for perpetual security) in order to float the trillion-dollar security-defense-pharma bubble.

---

Security for Goldfish sales?  How about "Pet shop owner fined L1,000 and told to wear an electronic tag...for selling a GOLDFISH to a boy aged 14". 

 

Now:  You see why our forefathers & foremothers left England?  Seems the Security State followed us here, though...a Royal Pain.

 

Dose y Dough

Speaking of Big Pharm - here's an April Fools' mother for you: "More than 70-million doses of H1N1 vaccine may have to be discarded."

 

But wait!  No refund from the manufacturers?  WTF?  Designer disease...where's the refunds?

 

Twilight of Religions

Want to see an interesting case of predictive linguistic fill starting?  Need nothing more than the NY Times articles on the sexual abuse cases being alleged.  Oh, and toss in the "Vatican attacks New York Times over abuse coverage" during holy week.

---

Speaking of which, tomorrow a good chunk of the financial world will be taking the day off ('cept those heathen commodity and bond fellows traders) as the NYSE and the Euronext markets observe Good Friday.

---

I've long held that all Friday's are good, but this one is either better because of your religious beliefs, or it means the opening of the fresh-water fishing season is nearly here.

 

I just assume you know the reason Easter and fresh-water fishing open on a different weekend is so that a few sportsmen will show up at church?

 

Big Wet Spot

No, not that kind of 'wet spot' - perv!  I mean like wet, rainy, soggy, messy, floody kind of wet spot covering a whole state - in this instance, Rhode Island.

 

If you look up Providence, Rhode Island's weather almanac (here) you'll see that 'normal' is around 12.25" for a year.  But this year, they're at 24.18 inches of rain and that was through midnight last night.  Clean up (or bailing?) will take months.

 

How are things going in neighboring states?  Swimmingly.

 

Another Day, Another Lockdown Department

Seems that anti-government group fears caused some increase in security at the Nevada capitol this week.

---

The article specifically references "anti-government groups advocating an anarchist ideology".

 

Seems to me that we need to apply a little mental acuity here.  Is it, for example, 'anti-government' to advocate and vote for a return to Constitutional governance, not the current system of  'for sale to highest bidder -- lobbyist corrupted -- form so prevalent now? I'm a strong Constitutionalists...but the smear in gear seems aimed at equating upholding America's founding documents and ideal as 'anarchist', doesn't it?

 

CSI Questions

Here's a first for yah:  "A federal judge says that crime scene forensic evidence should be more carefully scrutinized."  No 'assuming' the forensics are 'perfect' - despite the impression on PTB media.  Good judge...still interested in justice.  Hallelujah!

 

Nukes to Go

Lemme see here: an Iranian nuke scientist has defected to the US.  Then Iran sends an envoy to China to - I'm guessing here - confess maybe there's more to their nuke plans that they forgot to tell the Chinese?   China's open to all bids...I mean suggestions as they play swing vote on what's next.

 

That, my friend is evidence of who is running the world now.  Not the US/Israel/West, not the Islamics...China.  Sort of like the tie-breaker vote.

 

--- snip and save department ---

 

Coping: Mark of the Beast Department

India is in the process of photographing and fingerprinting every over age 15 in their country.  Have these people gone mad, or is this the cultural hangover from being dominated by the British Division of the PowersThatBe long enough and still - even to this day - doing the globalist agenda's bidding?

---

Can you imagine what the reaction would be if Census workers start3ed showing up in fiercely independent states like, oh, TEXAS with a camera and a fingerprint pad?  I mean with no warrant?

---

Sometime today I may get around to answering the short-form census questionnaire sent to us.  I would have sent it in earlier, but the questions were about how many people were living here on April 1...and so how could I possibly answer that until today?  I mean, come on people!

 

When I see headlines like "City census returns at 45%" I'm thinking, gee,  I may not be the only one willing to wait for April 1...that is what the instructions say on ours...don't want to speculate when dealing with G-persons, do we?

---

My tax refund - speaking of government timelines and such - was going to be back on March 26th.  But, then it was moved back to March 30, and last time I looked it wasn't due to hit the direct deposit until April 6.

 

This morning, lo and behold:

"Your tax refund is scheduled to be direct deposited on April 2, 2010. If your refund is not credited to your account by April 7, 2010, check with your bank to find out if it has been received. Please wait until April 7, 2010 before you contact us again because we are unable to take any action until then."

So, bad as the last Treasury Auction was, they still have enough for my refund...so far.

---

Hey!  Speaking of taxes:  Elaine happened to be listening to a Black talk radio show out of Chicago in her car on the way back from the store last night.  "George, they pointed out something really interesting:  You realize the Obama administration "tan tax" is discriminatory against white folks?  That's what they were saying..."

 

Gotta ponder that, but seems logical that people of color would spend less tanning...right?  So is this a reverse-discrimination tax?  Hmmm...gotta ponder this...

---

But, back on the Mark of the Beast and such...found a very interesting Jewish studies group which has been going back to the roots of ancient Hebrew and know what they have found?  First finding:  All Hebrew is made up of only 22 symbols and anything else is distortion because there's a sophisticated error-correction system built-in.

 

Second finding is that most of what we learned as 'religion" is based on misinterpretations  of original (error-correcting) Hebrew...they've got a corrected version of Genesis (which turns out to be multiple books, BTW) and then things get strange from there.

 

Working on trying to distill this down into something of edible size, but the work is quite remarkable and - also interesting - no publishers want to touch it because the material is too hot and shakes too many of the foundations of...well...everything in that whole segment. 

 

I mean, if someone said "Here's an error-correcting language and the stations of various 'heavenly entities' works out like this and that sure fits with Earth being some kind of terra forming project with contested ownership and then things get complicated...oh my. 

 

Still: something to gnaw on till I figure out how to boil things down to shorter than a book length treatise.  Not sure whether put it on the free side or save it for Peoplenomics subscribers. 10-ages - maybe 20 would be the goal.

 

Pondering...

 

Energy from the Vacuum (Cleaner)

Gotta love this here April Onest headline.

 

Down at the WuJo

Here's a good one:

"HI George: Would you please ask your readers, if in the last 2-3 days, before falling into a deep sleep if they see like "Lighting flashes that go side ways kinda left to right, kinda break off and start again, kinda reminds me of morris code , dots and long dashes /Never before had anything so weird happen. Its a brilliant type flash of white light. Last a few seconds.

I just read on line that they had Cern up and going, and was wondering if it did something that they are not aware of? Maybe a kinda black hole, but instead created a lighting flash that is now and forever in space? Does this make any sense?.

I'd normally say something snappy like "Swear off, or at least change brands, or go cold turkey with 5 mg diazepam twice daily until the visions pass..." but that was before I saw some odd light flashes myself yesterday. Curious - about the size of a thumbnail at arms length - tiny little flash-bulb like things.  We're them pills?  Surreal days, huh?

 

Tend Our Own Gardens

There is hope!  Email of the day (so far, but it's early...)

"George FYI:

Garden Writers Association has a garden trends survey online that reports USA vegetable gardening increasing.  Folks must have been listening to you!

Link to article here

Sample:

• Households doing vegetable gardening were highest in the South and lowest in the West.

• Vegetable gardening was also highest with the 25-44 age group and lowest with the 18- 24 age group.

• First-time edibles gardeners came mostly from the South and least from the Northeast.

• The more experienced edibles gardeners came mostly from the South and least from the West.

• Consumers who planned to grow more edible plants in 2010 were mostly in the West and least in the Northeast.

• Using the Internet for gardening information was most popular in the South and least popular in the Northeast.

Way I figure is the people in the Northeast are still mostly swimming - they're bound to come around when The Flood is over.

 

 

---

Wednesday March 31, 2010
Depressions Last HOW LONG?

My friendly deflationist Jas Jain called the other day to remind me we're still in a Depression and more downside is likely to come.  By his count the Great Depression really lasted almost 20-years - from 1929 to 1949.  And he makes a valid point since arguably, the Korean War was a 'transition war' which allowed the West to more gradually transition from war machine to consumer goods machine.  And since this cycle seems to have peaked out in 2000, neither one of us is very optimistic about how it all works out over coming years of the Second Depression...at least for people who are trying to retain purchasing power of their savings.

 

Which gets us to this first time from "The Pragmatic Capitalist"  titled "On the (perceived) Unimportance of Income".

---

Around here, income is important, despite what the (presently manic, needing treatment) markets may think.  The reason is that Income funds independence.  I trust you've seen what's happening in the UK?  There, the national budget picture is so bad (under gold-seller Gordo can this really be a surprise?) that there's talk by the PTB of an an Economic Government of the EU."

 

If you were looking for how Banksters and their allies, the PTB are taking over the whole freakin' world you have only to look at the technique.  I don't care whether you're talking local city government, county government, State government, or even National government, the plot goes something like this:

• Bankrupt Cities so they  Merge with Counties

• Bankrupt the County so it will cede power to the State

• Banko the States to give power to the Feds

• Bankrupt the Feds so they will swallow World Government and the global currency

 

The problem is there's not a proper word for this phenomena.  I mean, if this was being done in the 1950's we'd call it Communist and a latter-day Joe McCarthy would be busting blood vessels and holding hearings.  Not in this asylum, though.

 

Communism is gone - poof - vanished. And in it's place is corporate fascism - banksterism perhaps - a kind of merger between the profiteers on the one hand and the ego-maniacs mad with power on the other.

 

And, in the back rooms, the lobbyists and other check purveyors buying the shots with only the smallest wiggle-room allowed to select paradigm-supporters to keep the game going as long as globally possible.

 

Since we don't have a word for this (the corporate/Fascist State is admittedly revolution/reactionary sounding) the process continues unchallenged with a continuing concentration of wealth in the upper crust, a maintenance of subsistence for the lower crust and a busting of the Middle  Class to reduce us all to subsistence.

 

Healthcare's Major Role

While there are numerous States planning to appeal healthcare (Indiana is number 13 joining the lawsuit which is based on States hadn't ceded that power to the federales), the truth of the matter is that the entire healthcare debate overlooked two really vital facts.

 

First:  The arguments about Americans not being covered by healthcare were specious.  The Obama plan will spend $30,000 over 10-years for each additional person to be covered....that part's true.  And yeah, we're already paying taxes for that which won't be provide for a good long time to come.  But that's just facts - not debatable.

 

What gets overlooked is that when someone with healthcare goes to the doctor, if a disease is communicable, the person going may 'share the cure' with others in the same household.  Example: Elaine and I both had been eating a few too many Tums for over-acid stomach.  She went to the local Doc and he said it's a form of acid-reflux.  Simple diet change, an OTC pill for a week and she's better, but more important, I'm better, too, since her solution was also mine.  Don't stuff out then go right to bed - eat earlier...that kind of thing.

 

This is the minor example, but a pertinent one, based on real life.  There actually MAY be some portion of the public that doesn't need a lot of doctoring.  If there wasn't big money in it, corpgov would never have passed it...simple as that.

 

Second:  If the Obama plan was really serious about delivering care the health reform act would have mandated that all states accept telemedicine.

 

I mean this deadly seriously because I was talking to a doc friend about this yesterday (he's one of the real Good Guys in healthcare) and I asked him "Why not leave your practice and launch into telemedicine - you could serve a lot more people at a much lower cost...why between tele-docs and tele-meds we could trounce healthcare costs to near zip.

 

"Oh no, George: What you don't understand is that tele-medicine was lobbied actively against by the medical community even though it could dramatically reduce costs and you're right...it could spawn a whole new industry of PC-USB home medical devices like ECG's which your friends with the OPENECG project have adapted to cell phones.  It threatens the franchise."

 

"So you're saying it's the doctors who are being roadblocks to innovative telemedicine?"

 

"Well, through their lobbyists and the big pharmaceutical outfits - sure - that's why the bans on practicing telemedicine outside of any state you're not licensed in have been enacted almost everyone...."

 

"Oh, fer cryin' out loud...why aren't we solving the core problem?"

 

"You got me..."

---

My point is what?  There really are innovative and inexpensive options to deliver healthcare in a PC equipped world.  We are just not able to go down certain real problem-solving paths because of special interest groups.

 

Now let's talk about design patterns here for a moment:  Are you getting the picture of the Big Business Template for All Things here?

• Get a good forward view of where things could be going

• Install roadblocks to it happening or buy it for yourself

• Coalesce a special interest group to fund it

• Manage the outcome to the most profitable outcome

• Profiteer happily at the expense of others...

 

Now, near as I can tell, this doesn't get us optimum anything.  Other than PAPER gains, I mean,  which are illusory and just concentrate more power in the hands of the sociopathic manipulators.  It just perpetuates an old-world style paradigm of exploitation.

 

And how long do paradigms take to bust?  Hmmm...Jas was right about the Depression lasting 20-years. But thanks to the abandonment of media concentration laws that were (wisely) embodied in the Communications Act of 1934 (another dandy case of the design-pattern template application by industrialists masquerading as good guys to screw the public with their sub-optimal concentrated power in single corpgov media entities as the ultimate profiteering answer) the first one lasted 20-years and no reason why we can't get this one to blast out to 30-years plus, at least long enough to be considered an 'economic dark ages' near as I can figure.

----

Next time some fool who buys left/right (MSM defined) socioeconomic/political paradigm urges you to buy into their viewpoint, do me (and yourself) a favor and tell 'em to 'piss off'.  They don't have a nickels worth of sense and have no vision of what's possible.  Small people love small ideas and small solution sets.  Bounded thinking is soooo very much easier than Big Picture / Big Solutions.

 

Oh...when I can turn on my web cam, plug in my USB ECG, and get a reasonable consult paying via PayPal, I'd be thrilled to back off my skeptical view of this whole healthcare POS behind which neither side got around to asking the fundamental question on:  What's the problem and what's the most innovative/cost effective way of solving it?

 

As long as we live in a world of sub-optimal design templates working (because they address profits instead of underlying problems and thus maintain old paradigms) we are stuck with what we have - and this means in Middle East politics, in healthcare delivery, in law enforcement, in education...in virtually all areas of human endeavor, we've been sold small/bounded BUT PROFITABLE solution sets as a 'bills of goods' we can't recognize for all the hype, bullshit, and media coverage of the 'bounded' solutions proffered.

 

Till that changes, this Depression can last ad infinitum.  My low cost  USB uploadable home medical devices industry will just have to wait and my friend the good-guy doc who would be among the likely be among the first to open telemedicine will have to keep playing the old system.  Now, plug in your webcam and point it down your throat for me, would you?  And say "Ahhhh...."

 

Dangerous thinking, this.   But isn't it time we start solving underlying problems instead of only the most convenient or most profitable layers, boxed and bounded for the profit of the few???

 

Ask yourself at every turn:  Am I solving the RIGHT PROBLEM?

 

ADP's Truth Detector

What Depression, you're thinking?  I have a lot of faith in the ADP National Employment Report and the one for March 2010 is out this morning:

"Nonfarm private employment decreased 23,000 from February to March on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to the ADP National Employment Report®. The estimated change of employment from January 2010 to February 2010 was revised down slightly, from a decline of 20,000 to a decline of 24,000.

 

The March employment decline was the smallest since employment began falling in February of 2008. Yet, the lack of improvement in employment from February to March is consistent with the pause in the decline of initial unemployment claims that occurred during the winter.

 

Since employment as measured by the ADP Report was not restrained in February by the effects of inclement weather, today’s figure does not incorporate a weather-related rebound that could be present in this month’s BLS data. In addition, today’s figure does not include any federal hiring in March for the 2010 Census. For both these reasons, it is reasonable to expect that Friday’s employment figure from the BLS will be stronger than today’s estimate in the ADP National Employment Report. "

Go read the whole report, but I know - you're thinking "George, do you trust the ADP numbers more than the BLS numbers?"

 

Duh: ADP is a company specializing in the jobs market and provides job services like payroll.  The BLS is a government agency (with political appointees in charge)...yeah, you don't really need help figuring this out, do you?

 

Political Expediency Department

Guess which ostensibly environmentalist political group is now backing offshore drilling in the GOM and off the Atlantic Coast?

 

Informant in the Woodpile

As I told you to expect, there was an undercover agent working the Hutaree militia bust this week.  So, once again, back to the question:  Agent provocateur or slowing the groups intent?

 

Terra Bites

Word of an undersea volcano off Italy is not the part of the headline that holds our attention this morning: It's word that the Marsil volcano has fragile walls and that could set off a tsunami 'any time'.  Still, like the potential for a mega tsunami from the Canary Island's Cumbre Viejo, figuring the exact "When?" is always the hard part.

---

Not much happening in the US, however, the quakes in the Sonora, and near Mexicali, Mexico area - and up toward the Salton Sea - bear watching, too.

 

Climate Note

Something ironic about how a global warming activist and journalist died of  being frozen to death in the Antarctic.

 

Swimmingly

Rain in Spain may stay mainly on the plain, but in the US Northeast it's everywhere.  All kinds of 100-year and longer records are falling.

---

Just looked at the YTD precip data for NYC and as of midnight, the Big Apple (now Soggy Apple) was at 19.45" for the year, which is about 9 inches over overage.

 

Sorta hard to do much spring planting...never tried it with scuba gear on, and not sure I'd want to.

 

ConCERNed?

A reader sent in a Good Trend Labs report which looks at occurence of searches under 'protons', 'time travel' and CERN and asks "See a correlation?"  We won't get overly concerned until Europe is gobbled up by a growing Black Hole.  And besides, when that happens, won't have much time other than to bend over and kiss your...well, you get the picture.

 

But no Earth-gobbling events just yet, although the science community is getting all excited about smashing this, that, and them other protons into one another.  Maybe I've been lived too much of the 'good times, fast cars, fast woman, sailboat life, and cocktail hour pupus for din-din life - but this is definitely NOT my idea of getting smashed or fun...know what I'm sayin? 

 

Hell, this oughta be "Geek Prevention Week'.  Ban pocket protectors in the workplace and...and...say, you seen my slide rule around anywhere?

 

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Coping: Laser Turns 50

Here's something that may not be making big headlines, but it's an important marker of how fast the 'times are a changing':  The Laser just turned 50 this week; a fact brought out by our Canadian bureau which sent along a link to the Vancouver Sun's article on it.

 

We notice that technology is speeding up on certain propitious occasions like this.  The first transistor wasn't invented until 1947.  The first nuclear power plant wasn't even ordered until 1953, and it wasn't until 1960 that the world got stated seriously on computing...1960 or so.

 

Wasn't till 1971 that Intel released the first single integrated circuit processors - the 4004.  Then it was 1975 before the first Altair 8800 went on sale.  And it from there that giants like Microsoft and Apple arose.

 

It was then almost 10-years before the first DNS server went online and 1988 when the first virus showed up.

 

So far today, my computer has backed up a terabyte of data, written a DVD of key files, downloaded a Windows 7 update, updated an antivirus detection list file, a malware file list, scanned for viruses, and updated both 32 and 64bit Java subsystems.  Oh - and a new QuickTime update.  All this before I got into the office.

 

The speed up in the rate of change - something to think about now that the laser's turned 50.

 

Time Traveler Follow-Up

I asked an interesting question the other day about whether a somewhat out of place-looking fellow in a 1941 picture from British Columbia might have been a 'time traveler'.  Best answer I got was from an artist of some renown who offered this:

"Unless he has a genetic defect that makes his legs about a third as long as they are supposed to be.

Look at his proportions in comparison to the surrounding folk. Yes, he’s generally bigger, which one could attribute to better nutrition. But let me explain something about the human body: In art we have, what is known as: The Canon of General Proportions. DaVinci’s Vitrius Man is a good example. General guide here: This canon is a general guide to how the modern (ie. not Neanderthal or other “proto” humans) bodies are constructed.

The first thing you learn is that the head is about 1/6th to 1/7th of the figure. The taller and more lanky you are, the smaller your head is in proportion. (Runway Models have pinheads. Smallest head in comparison to body is ideal for that look)

Now, try this for yourself (because my rate for graphics production is 50.00 an hour) take a ruler (centimeter is preferable in this case) and measure each person’s head from crown to chin, on the image I’ve provided.

The shorter/younger folks are going to be 6 to 6.5 heads tall. The short man directly in front next to the car is about 6.5 to 6.75 heads tall. If you wanted to get really geeky, find the model car shown in the pic. (or get the specs.) and measure the window and use it as a guide to how big the people are.

If the “time traveler’s” body is 7 whole units, then he’s standing in a hole. Or has mutant legs.

And although it’s difficult to see, because the artist did (indeed) do a very good job of shadow matching, the shadows are very slightly off, less than a couple of degrees. But it jumped out at me even before the odd proportions. And generally, in comparison the core shadows (darkest shadow on the object) on the face of the gentlemen to either side of him (marked A and B) his face is too light.

The man nearest to the car is getting reflected light from the hood, which washes his face out somewhat. But “time traveler” is only getting bounce off a black felt hat. So the shadows are no match.

And that’s why I get paid the big bucks……

All of which had me thinking...yeah, dammit George...more logic on this stuff!  But then along come this email from a different reader who is not so sure the subject of our inquiry was Photoshopped in:

"Picture from behind at bridge event: Here

Not photo shopped, looks like person on far left???"

Still...that doesn't answer the question "Why would a time traveler suspect even want to be in this part of British Columbia? It's off in the frigging middle of nowhere west of 70 Mile House..."  A reader in Nanaimo (my favorite town on Vancouver Island, BTW) figured out the answer:

"Hi George Your time traveler picture has been holding my interest, thanks hahaha I was wondering, that if this guy really was a time traveler than why would he be interested in some old back water mine in a very remote part of BC.

The answer: GOLD!!! Bralorne Gold Mines is developing the unexplored gaps between the historic Bralorne, King and Pioneer gold mines of southwest British Columbia. Together, these three historic mines represent the largest historic gold producer in the Canadian Cordillera producing 4.1 million ounces of gold.

Recent discoveries between the Bralorne and King mines have opened up significant new mineralization. Phase III exploration, now underway, is focused on expanding new zones and outlining reserves for a 280 tpd operation. The current Bralorne mill operates at 120 tpd with ample room for expansion. Bulk testing is complete with all permits in place.

OK, so how far is Bralorne BC (and the ghost town of Brexton, as long as we're talking about ghost towns and gold mines and such) from the site of this bridge picture with our 'out of place' looking fellow? 

 

Microsoft Streets & Trips (2010) shows it as 5.25 miles from Bralorne.

 

Turning down monkey mind and putting on MBA mind, sure makes a hell of a movie plot, doesn't it?

 

 

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Tuesday March 30, 2010

13 Bankers

Not too often that a new book comes out which becomes a lead item on a financially-oriented website like this one, but the headline "New Book by MIT Sloan Professor Warns of Next Financial Meltdown In 13 Bankers, Simon Johnson calls for breakup of nation’s biggest banks..."  OK,. more?

"Channeling Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt, MIT Sloan School of Management Professor Simon Johnson warns in a book being released today that a “new financial oligarchy” threatens not only the nation’s economy, but its political core. In 13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown (Pantheon), Johnson, a professor of entrepreneurship and management, says the book provides “the back story” for the 2008 financial crisis “and for all the issues being raised now around financial reform. We hope the book helps people have a badly needed conversation about what we must do to push back against dangerous, narrow interest groups that now threaten our economic well-being.”

“That thought should frighten us into action.” In 13 Bankers, Johnson, a former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund, and co-author James Kwak cite historical precedents and offer financial analysis to conclude that a second financial shock is inevitable unless the financial and political stranglehold held on Washington by the nation’s biggest banks is broken. “The best defense against a massive financial crisis is a popular consensus that too big to fail is too big to exist,” the authors write. “This is at its heart a question of politics, not of economics or of regulatory technicalities.”

The book points out that the current concentration of financial and political power is not unlike other moments in American history. President Theodore Roosevelt, for example, challenged the monopoly powers of banker and industrialist J.P. Morgan. “No one thought he could win,” Johnson says in an interview, “but he did succeed in the first prosecution of a corporation under the Sherman Antitrust Act.” Roosevelt, he said, began a process that helped people understand the need to rein in the power of corporate giants, such as John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil, “which was arguably more important as a single company in 1910 than J.P. Morgan was then or J.P. Morgan Chase is now,” says Johnson.

Similar leadership is needed from the Obama administration and Congress now, according to 13 Bankers, which concludes that regulatory changes and other responses to date have been vastly inadequate. Johnson supports the administration’s proposed consumer protection measures, but overall, “You can’t just tweak a few rules and expect to rein in these big institutions.” Instead, the book calls for the six biggest banks to be broken up and for hard limits to be imposed so that banks cannot rebuild themselves into political and financial powerhouses. “Saying that we cannot break up our largest banks is saying that our economic futures depend on these six companies,” notes 13 Bankers. “That thought should frighten us into action.”

13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown is available from Amazon for $18-bucks (*I always get something else to get the order up to $25 to get the free shipping...cheap is as cheap does...).

 

Iran Around

The well-connected Deka-file has a most curious story headlined "G8 skips Iran sanctions to boost secret US opening to Revolutionary Guards."  the gist of it seems to be that the US is trying to step-around the hard-line clerics and deal directly with the RevGuards leadership on things like nuclear power.  But, of course, as anyone knows, nothing ticks off a lader (or boss) more than going outside of the established 'chain of command" so while this looks promising maybe at one level, I figure it'll do nothing more than piss off the clerics (even more) at another.  You know who's cockamamie idea I think this is?

 

May keep that front quieted down during Passover, though...

 

They Paid How Much for a Volvo?

Another $900 million plus $1.8 billion is...er....coffee needed...uh....$2.7-billion? Oh, well, gotta spend them dollars on something, I suppose...

 

Terror Watch

The NYC MTA and presumably others around the country are on higher alert following the double suicide bombing in Russia Monday.  Washington's got bomb sniffing dogs out around the Metro.  Wonder how they react to corned beef on rye? Or, wonder if bomb-sniffing dogs have to eat a super-bland diets?  Never tried to train one, just wondering...

 

Indicted or Incited?

I'm watching the follow-up to the arrest of nine Christian militia members on charges they were planning to wage war on the USA.  I guess the thing I'm not seeing answered yet (maybe at arraignment?) is how did the government know which seems to me it might circle back to the question of government informants and that in turn could lead to the fine line between informing and inciting...but I suppose all that will come out in the wash.  Unless it's the white wash, of course.

---

You saw the report I assume, where a hacker was on the Secret Service payroll as an informant at $75,000 a year when a hack was carried out in 2007?

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Don't know if you've seen it, but up in Colorado, a lawsuit has been filed over a 2007 SWAT drug bust - based (once again) on a confidential informant.  Looks like the charges have been dropped as there was no evidence of anything illegal going on and that could cost authorities a fair bit of dough. 

 

Again, gets me to wondering who's more dangerous: purported (but sometimes incorrectly as in the Colorado case,) perps or the government that's hiring telltales that sometimes...you know... tell tales.....

 

Lumbering Toward Disaster

Couple of weeks back I was whining about crappy lumber quality since we're adding on to my office.  Comes this from a reader now:

"A couple of weeks ago you were complaining about the quality of the 2 x 4's that you were getting. Seems the pine beetle is destroying many of the Western Forests and reducing quality and quanity of wood products.

I have read where lumber prices are up 40%, but I have to ask why this is the case with lower New homes being built. Could it be that everyone is working hard to fix up what they have?

A local lumber yard here where I live sells all of their hardwood logs to the Chinese. Plus another thing that I have noticed is that many trailer loads of lumber are traveling around without being tarped properly, even in the rain. Could too many drivers be falling off of loads and getting injured forcing up Workers Compensation rates for trucking companies play a factor in this too? Just my 5 cents worth, it used to be 2 cents but due to inflation, well you know the rest. "

I don't know, but the whole lumber yard experience which was one a joy has turned into a nightmare for the 'home handy-bastards' of the world like me.

 

Sealing the Exits

A number of readers have pointed to the fine tyler Durden piece about how "It's Official - America Now Enforces Capital Controls" which, as any student of Germany priors to WW II knows, is the kind of things (sealing the financial borders) that can often be a prelude to be international blow-ups (literally and...).

 

One of the more interesting theories floating about is that the US - and other countries run by the corporate cannibal capitalists of the PTB is that the borders and populations will be increasingly 'confined to quarters' [a fine pun, if I do say so] in the period leading up to whatever the Big Tipping Point of 2011/2012 is.

 

So, what else might be in store.  In other words, as a 'thought experiment' what are the kinds of actions that leaders of countries/governments could take if they knew there was some kind of planetary shift ahead?

 

For one thing, like we've been hinting, there would likely be storage of large supplies of food and materials going on.  We periodically here of such things - rumors of massive truck convoys moving foods into underground storage bases, but seldom with enough substance to print and never with pictures.

 

On the other hand, there's been enough 'leaked' out of Hollywood about UFO/Alien Wars (War Between the Worlds kind of stuff and should I mention the 2012 movie with the billion Euro price per ticket?) that we have to wonder.
 

Terra Intrudes

Then there's the whole matter of Terra Entity stuff which is supposed to put this year so far into the record books that there won't be any question that things have changed - and with it, dwindling food supplies to come.  In the lead-in, we're now seeing precursor events like "Heavy rain threatens to topple records in East".

 

Minor inconvenience now, but start clipping these stories since its the floods, droughts, tornadoes and insect infestations that screw things up as the year goes on that this all leads into that you'll want to be looking for.

 

Without sounding like an old Kung-Fu episode, yes, Grasshopper, this is to be taken most seriously - grasshoppers.

 

The good news, such as it is, is that both our cat out here on the ranch seem to like grasshoppers.  Might be able to save a few bucks on cat food this year.  Of course, the other things that seem to thrive on grasshoppers are birds and scorpions, which we get a fair number of.  Which is why we keep enough Demon and other pesticides & sticky-traps around to at least keep the home and office free of too many critters.

---

Then there's the problem of colony collapse:

"George,

I live in Pasadena, TX. I've been reading for a year and a subscriber since the fall. I very much enjoy your information. I wanted to let you know that I have an orange tree covered in blooms and not 1 bee. Last year I had numerous bees and ended up with 200 oranges off of this 5 yr. old tree. It looks like I'm going to have to help Mother Nature along and hand pollinate this year. I have a small vegetable garden in my yard that I guess I'll have to hand pollinate, also.

Keep up the good work. The more information I have, the less stress I have...."

Yeah, but the more I seem to get:  no bees and grasshoppers all over the place...which one of the Four Horsemen was Famine, again?

Wasn't it Conquest (hmm...seems to be that going on...), War (ummm...), Commerce with a measure of wheat for a day's wages...close on that..and Death via famine, plague and by the wild beasts...

 

Say!  Speaking of which - rumors about that deer and other wild critter populations are falling.  Like this reader note:

"George, we had some sort of significant impact on our deer herd in south Alabama this past deer season. There seemed to be a lot of missing young deer. Usually a large percentage of the deer killed are young bucks, from six month to 1 ½ years of age. They were no shows for the season, everybody saw less, a lot less deer. I have been in contact with our district game warden, and mentioned the prediction of less animals being in the game population. He wants to talk to me in person. Do you remember the reference from one of Cliff’s reports about less animals? I bought the reports, but can only find the last one, I think it was in one from like Nov-Dec 09.

No, but talk to the game warden and let us know?  Our herd here seems down a fair bit, too.

---

Some 'good' news?  The Gulf Stream is not slowing down, at least so say science types.

 

So are the oceans getting healthy?  I think not - especially when there are stories about how a "Mysterious Whale Die-Off is Largest On Record."  So no, fish & chips will probably disappear somewhere in the future.

 

Marketing, Marketing

How often have I told you that the extreme of marketing are the benchmarks of the world's decline?  So comes before the court of public opinion our next case this morning under the headline "Singer Erykah Badu strips at JFK assassination site in new video".  The singer involved reportedly "responded to the controversy via Twitter."

 

That must'a been some set of twits....er...tweets....  OMG what's 'correct' anymore? Is the whole world nuts?

---

Oh, it is?  Why of course!  That explains everything...including why market futures are up ahead of the open. 

---

Even professional entertainers of the clown variety (on stage, not the ones in office) are noticing the shift:

"My job as a clown is one of the first professions to feel the negative impact caused by a dwindling disposable income. Thanks to the slap-stick government, we are now entering the largest economic depression in the history of the USA and possibly the world. Desperate for funds, the political elite are seeking to tax the service industry, including entertainers.

 

These ruthless thugs in office will soon be sending us hard working clowns to the tax slaughter-house. Who is next? We need to t-ax the politicians out of office and take back our constitution, at least what's left of it."

Want to place bets on the turnover rate in the November elections?  Well take jokes & humor where we can find them...although like America's sense of humor, things are getting a little tense.

 

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Coping: The Quakes Ahead

Seems as though a number of people have been 'seeing' (through various means) a major West Coast Earthquake.  Not that one isn't possible, since we're expecting up to 6-7 more great quakes to occur this year -- such will be the level of Terra Intrudes into planetary life.

 

Interesting note, though:  I must be reading too much email because I awoke on Monday morning with a strange 'sign' popping out of what's usually a rotating mass of rune-like characters.  While off in the background was the usual rotating vortex of rune/symbols, what popped into the foreground was this (approximated in CorelDraw):

 

 

Not exactly the normal things to have as a near-waking state - but I think (or at least hope) that it's nothing more than what happens when George monkey-mind gets swamped with too much input (reader predictions of quakes) and then subconsciously distills everything down into a graphic - curi8ously, all lower case.  The sense that something would happen of newsworthy/notable in Los Angeles Wednesday was pretty interesting - and out of the ordinary enough that I actually have as an item on my 'do list' for today hooking up my old phone patch to the HF ham radio set...since a phone patch is about THE most useful thing to have one hand for emergency communications.

 

First time I ever used one was when a late neighbor, W7IMF, spent about 18-hours non-stop running health & welfare traffic from emergency-powered ham stations in the Anchorage area (Elmendorf & Ft. Rich, too)  right after the 1964 Good Friday quake.

 

When I see something like the 4.5 this morning in Sonora Mexico I wonder...is that just a blender making noise in my head?

---

Like I say, odds are high this is nothing more than my subconscious turning on the blender of thoughts are coming up with this as a mental 'smoothie'...Still, no harm getting the phone patch online, pointing the beam out west, and keeping an eye on the USGS near real-time quake displays.

 

Don't know why the brain comes up with that it does, especially in light of the fact I've been demanding Texas Lotto winning numbers with no success, either.

 

Life In the Memetime, Redux

Yep, Cliff & I are scheduled to be on CoastToCoastAM with George Noory on Thursday night/ Friday morning of this week - talking about the latest "Shape of Things To Come" report.

"Cliff's chart from Volume 0 issue 2 of "Shape" shows the beginning of a large increase in tension beginning March 21,2010....seemed unusual at the time for it to begin on a Sunday...but .."Lo, and Behold"..it turns out that was the day of the big health care vote.....seems like a "hit" to me....

yeah, sure was...but we don't go around score-keeping on this stuff.  Reason?  It would be contentious and if the success rate was something like twice as good as chance, or four-times as good as chance...so what?  One of the things that's bothered me no end since grad school is the amount of time people spend trying to 'assign numbers' to situations (I'm guilty, too, LOL).  But whether the web bot technology is two or even 20 times better than chance, so what?  I mean having a number makes it what?

 

On the other hand, corralling up concepts is way more important than having a simple number.  Numbers are going to drift all over the place.  The main thing is the Big Picture so as not to be cause unawares - or shocked and awed into inaction (think people on the beach staring at the incoming tidal wave...that kind of shocked into inactivity).  That's the whole purpose...

 

No, still no better ideas on what the big "release events" will be around November 8-14th this year, or the 'tipping point' in spring 2011, but with them coming, we have time and resource now to prepare for a wide spectrum of possible outcomes...while we 'enjoy' the building tension language through July and then the saw-tooth minor release events over summer.

---

Suggested background reading if you're planning to listen in: The discussion of TimeCreep/Hypercronism (free) here.

 

Daylight UFO in China

If this is made up, it's pretty good video here.  A little side bet?  Sure...how about China has pulled together enough intel over the years to make a take-off on the Nazi Bell technology which was probably at the core the the breakaway Aryan group that headed for South America (and the Antarctic) after WW II and secrets runs one of the global factions today?  Uh...where's my pipe?

 

Half-Step to Bi-Location

The fancy name for it is "putting an object into a mixed quantum state - both moving and unmoving at the same time..."  have to assume this is a half-step either toward science coming up with a way to do teleporting or holodeck replicators, OR maybe the bi-location practiced by Don Juan Mateus in the Castaneda books, maybe?

---

Why next thing you know, science will be able to duplicate the msyerious powers of government:  being up, down, and nowhere all at the same time while being both all-powerful and the weakest force, all wrapped up into an infinitely redundant...or is that infinitely expensive package?

 

Hell Yes!  But....

A loyal reader sends this:

"This is your loyal subscriber that was offended by the phrase "those of the Jeffersonian stripe were just as duplicitous, self-righteous, and morally inconsistent as the current cast of characters/clowns/bozos inside the Beltway today." I love your line slap-stick government. Your doing an awesome service in informing the general public of the global political scene and how to prepare for the unexpected. I was wondering if I can add you as a website link and also use your quote?"

Here's a blanket answer:  "Hell yes!"  Since the rankings of a web site are proportionate (theoretically, anyway) to the number of incoming links, if you have a web site, a link to this one is always appreciated. 

 

That quote sounded like something I wrote in a suspiciously lucid moment - but sure, if you can find them (a paragraph is fair use, 4 paragraphs is an in-depth citation, copying a whole report or big pieces of the website is intellectual thievery) then by all means, go ahead.

 

Please do, however, keep in mind that I figure anything I say can and will be used against me some day to try to keep any quotes in context so that when the roundup of dissent goes viral, I won't have to answer questions alleging I said this - or that - in an un-American way.

 

In  this day & age I figure everything posted on the 'net, or sent as email should be weighed as though it were going to your ex's divorce attorney or the Gestapo...or both.  Which is why I have a FaceBook account and such, but decline adding bunches of people.  No telling what the ubber-govver social maps that can be so easily derived could be used for, but I'm just guessing it wouldn't be for Christmas gifts...

 

Low Frequency English

Couple of low frequency (of occurrence) words from Visual Thesaurus today: provender and prebend.  Provender the goats since we get no government prebend.

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Say - all this word play strikes up an interesting 'million dollar idea":  How about a word-puzzle series aimed at literate readers of porn?  We'd call it "crotchword puzzles".   (rim shot, audience groans) Think there's a market there?  (What's in this coffee?)
 

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Monday March 29, 2010

Life in the Memetime

Say, not to start things off on a boring or repetitive note here, but I assume you have noticed that the global rebellion/revolution meme is starting to pick up steam?

 

It has been a slow starting meme - and unless you've been watching somewhat detached, you may not have noticed it coming, but it sure seems to be here now.

 

The prequel/predecessor events have been things like the freeway side billboards which are headlined "A citizen's guide to REVOLUTION of a corrupt government" under which a banner "prepare war - live free or die" is displayed.

 

Of course, we never encourage anything other than legal actions within the framework of the Constitution, but the arrival of the global rebellion/revolution meme is getting to be and interesting case of 'linguistic fill' in process.

 

Before you leap to the conclusion that I'm somehow referring to the massive FBI/Homeland Security raids in three states this weekend, which ended up with a number of people being arrested, in Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio this weekend, you'd only be partly right.

 

Yes, this certainly fills a lot of expected language - not only about the rebel/revolt kinds of word-sets, but also the kinds of headlines which include frequent references to 'militia' and 'terrorism' and is certainly brings public attention to websites like www.hutaree.com and www.michiganmilitia.com, the latter, by the way was not raided or involved in the action this weekend.

 

But let's set that aside for a moment and note how the meme is arriving elsewhere:  In Moscow this morning, suicide bombings by female bombers have killed at least 35 people so far.  The Federal Security Service of Russia figures a group from the North Caucasus is responsible.

 

Oh, sure, it would be easy to blame Greece, but let's not: Pick a region and you're likely to see rebels making headlines:  In Colombia, rebels have released a soldier who was held for nearly a year.

 

In Africa, CNN reports that "Rebels kill, kidnap hundreds in remote Congo area" but this charges are refuted by LRA rebels who have commented to the BBC that they weren't responsible.

 

Asia?  Sure, there, too: Philippines government forces are trying to root out Muslim extremists and they've had some luck, overrunning a 'rebel encampment'. Abu Sayef aside, there are NPA rebels who raided a Dole pineapple plantation.  A small-scale attack, perhaps, but the kind of thing to keep an eye on when a meme is arriving; especially when its a direct action against a large corporate interest.

 

We get the dailies out of Afghanistan and Iraq, but look at the continuing rebel operations in Yemen where "Yemen says Shi'ite rebels kill accused collaborator" or over in Darfur where rebels claims to have shot down a pair of Sudanese helicopters this weekend.

 

We'll keep an eye on parallel words, too: like "riot" (as in Seattle's King County Jail which is in lockdown this morning) and "flash mobs" of the type that are reaching 'hysterical' levels in what could be looked at, I suppose, as a kind of Philadelphia [social] experiment.

 

Is the 'evidence' of a linguistic 'hit' conclusive?  Nope, never is.  It's just the ratio change, the twist of the flavor of current events that changes the character of the discussions around the water cooler, seems to read out for soldier-gathering by multiple groups (both literally and figuratively).

 

That's how memes arrive...an uptick here, a change of direction there and - as more than one reader has suggested "Is this the kind of thing designed to give the PTB reason to garrison/restrict movement/travel as we head toward calamity in the 2011-2012 period?"

 

Might be...but .we'll just keep resisting the thoughts of throwing in with any particular group and minding our own 'plan to work and work the plan' to remain as 'free' as possible and avoid the burdens of becoming a partisan in the memetime.

 

Personal Income?

I want you to set down the coffee and make sure no one will be able to hear you as you read this next bit: The new report on Personal Income and Expenditures released today.  Sitting down?

"Personal income increased $1.2 billion, or less than 0.1 percent, and disposable personal income (DPI) increased $1.6 billion, or less than 0.1 percent, in February, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $34.7 billion, or 0.3 percent. In January, personal income increased $30.4 billion, or 0.3 percent, DPI decreased $26.0 billion, or 0.2 percent, and PCE increased $38.5 billion, or 0.4 percent, based on revised estimates.

Real disposable income increased less than 0.1 percent in February, in contrast to a decrease of 0.4 percent in January. Real PCE increased 0.3 percent, compared with an increase of 0.2 percent.

Private wage and salary disbursements increased $2.0 billion in February, compared with an increase of $16.6 billion in January. Goods-producing industries' payrolls decreased $3.5 billion, in contrast to an increase of $5.2 billion; manufacturing payrolls decreased $1.4 billion, in contrast to an increase of $5.0 billion. Services-producing industries' payrolls increased $5.5 billion, compared with an increase of $11.4 billion.

Government wage and salary disbursements increased $0.7 billion in February, compared with an increase of $6.8 billion in January. Pay raises for federal civilian and military personnel had added $7.1 billion to government payrolls in January.

Employer contributions for employee pension and insurance funds increased $2.7 billion in February, compared with an increase of $3.2 billion in January.

Employer contributions for government social insurance increased $0.3 billion in February, compared with an increase of $11.5 billion in January. The January change reflected an increase in the tax rates paid by employers to state unemployment insurance funds, which had boosted January contributions by $10.2 billion. (Changes in employer contributions for government social insurance do not affect personal income, because employer contributions for government social insurance are also included in total contributions for government social insurance, which is a subtraction in the calculation of personal income.)

Other personal income

Proprietors' income decreased $6.1 billion in February, the same decrease as in January. Farm proprietors' income decreased $7.1 billion, the same decrease as in January. Nonfarm proprietors' income increased $1.0 billion, the same increase as in January.

Now comes the punchline stuff:

"Personal outlays -- PCE, personal interest payments, and personal current transfer payments -- increased $36.4 billion in February, compared with an increase of $40.4 billion in January. PCE increased $34.7 billion, compared with an increase of $38.5 billion.

Personal saving -- DPI less personal outlays -- was $340.0 billion in February, compared with $374.9 billion in January. Personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income was 3.1 percent in February, compared with 3.4 percent in January."

Only way I can figure this kind of savings rate is by counting things like money being saved for college and other 'statrickstical' concepts.

The new Case-Shiller/S&P 20-City housing numbers will be out tomorrow which I find extremely credible. Lots of 'filler' type numbers, but the unemployment rate is due out Friday morning and that'll be a 'biggie'.

 

But since the market has a cut of statrickstical nose candy and this is Monday futures are a-poppin' and a higher close today is almost a slam dunk.  Hundred higher, anyone?  Do I hear 125?  135?  Don't Bogart that index - let's say 148 up today...just to throw a dart...and be happy with anything over 75...and why not?

 

Whistleblower Insurance

Another item tracking is the arrival of multiple whistleblowers in the news: people who are 'outing' plots and plans of the PowersThatBe.  Example:  Remember that guy who was volunteering to 'out' the Big Bank that had offered him a chance to become more actively involved in the gold/silver price suppression schemes of the PTB?  Well, he (and his wife) were the target of a "mysterious" hit and run driver attack in the UK this weekend.

 

This is obviously just a coincidence, we're so sure...but just in case: You won't see it on the MSM.  Can't have too much 'truth out' all at once, can we?

 

Smart Gird So Smart?

Good AP story was out last week about how some of the new-fangled power meters have possible 'holes' which might be exploited by hackers.

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The ultimate height of complexity is reached when each 'new solution' brings with it one - or more - new problems...

 

Things You Don't Want to Read

Dr. Laurie Roth's article this weekend on CanadaFreePress titled "Hitlers and Obama's health enabling acts."

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Fortunately the Obamacare bill was signed on Tuesday, otherwise all the Illuminati/322 references would be flying around the net instead of the rhyme on  Hitler.

 

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Coping: Is This a Time Traveler, Or What?

Been pondering a picture which a reader noticed a while back at the VirtualMuseum.ca site and sent along to ruin whatever free time I'd been dreaming about. 

 

It's a picture of the "Reopening of the South Fork Bridge after flood in 1940" and it was snapped at the South Fork Bridge at Gold Bridge BC in 1941.  When my reader-friend sent this in he asked a simple question...but first click here to see the picture itself.

 

Assuming you're a good and compliant reader (like those exist, right?) you will have glanced at the snap and said..."yeah?  So what"

 

But along comes the readers question: "What is the guy in sunglasses doing in this picture? If it’s Photoshop, it’s an excellent job."

 

Hmmm...well, since part of the UrbanSurvival Monster 2 terabyte i7 quad-core powerhouse workstation includes Corel Photo-Paint X4, I decided to do a little snooping around.  If it's 'Shopped' it is damn good...

 

Well, now, this is interesting, for sure. Not sure how cold it was when the picture was taken - but seems the fellow has on something like a golf shirt then a sweat shirt over that, and then a sweater over that.  Hmmm.  Still, not a big deal and as another party to this exchange noted "He probably would look less out of place hanging out in late 1940s Greenwich Village in NY...  He seems like a proto-Beatnik with spare WWII aviator goggles who came back home to visit the parents...."

 

Well fine, says the writer  of the email, but look a little closer: "With a silkscreened t-shirt? Or is that something else? It looks like he has three garments on, something that shows as a ridge on his shoulders, the “t-shirt”, and a rough-woven or knitted sweater. What about the camera? "

 

Bit odd about that shirt, alright, when you read a history of silk-screening here.

 

No, I hadn't paid much attention to the camera, but it has at least the outline of something that might be construed to be a modern digital SLR type, or is that just a Brownie or early Leica?  I just don't know for sure.

 

But a look into the background of Leica cameras led me to think "Hmmm...might this have been an SLR?  No, since the Leica IIIf didn't come out until 1950, or so.  And the more typical camera of the day would be something like my old 2-1/4 X 3-1/4 Speed Graphic.  But, whatever that camera is, the usual highlights with a little bit of chrome seems missing and in its place is the modern matte black look.

 

Then there's the matter of the sunglasses.  These are wrap-around types, not unlike the special use ocean kayaker series today.  What I remember from reading Like Magazine as a kid didn't have anything but the oversized 'aviator look" popular especially by the mid 1950's when polarized lenses came along from Polaroid.

 

Old-style aviator goggles were as much about wind protection as anything else for folks flying N3N torpedo bombers and such in the war.  If you find a picture of sunglasses like this is other 1940-1941 era pictures, let me know?

 

All of which gets me to the woo woo question of the day:  Has anyone ever gone through the Library of Congress or other good sources of original imagery and actually looked for temporally displaced articles?  I mean like sunglasses, odd camera gear, clothing out of its proper time, and maybe things like modern tennis shoes/joggers in pictures before their time?

 

An interesting question, indeed.  Seems to me the odds would be good around natural disaster pictures and maybe in socioeconomic impact pictures like soup lines or other archetypical events of a particular time & place.

 

Then, just supposing, for example that we found this one guy in multiple pictures over a long period of time...would that be evidence of a time traveler?  Or, just look at enough pictures and everyone has a clone or close copy somewhere?

 

And then (it gets worse as mental exercises go) what would we do with that information?  I mean if someone said "I have found an anomalous 'guy' over a long period of time with a strange camera...what then?

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I'm sure you have read up on the claims of supposed time traveler John Titor over at Wikipedia.  But the part that is most interesting is that while his predictions of a US Civil War (II) starting in 2004 seem 'off' but the spread of  civil disruptions which could broadly be fitted under the 'rebellion/revolution' meme is interesting, particularly this part of the Wikipedia entry:

"Titor claimed that as a 13-year old, in 2011, he fought with the "Fighting Diamondbacks", a shotgun infantry unit of Florida, for at least four years. However, in other posts he describes himself as hiding from the war. As a result of the war, the United States splits into five regions based on various factors and differing military objectives. This civil war, according to Titor, will then end in 2015 with a brief, but intense, World War III:

"In 2015, Russia launches a nuclear strike against the major cities in the United States (which is the "other side" of the civil war from my perspective), China, and Europe. The United States counter attacks. The US cities are destroyed along with the AFE (American Federal Empire)...thus we (in the country) won. The European Union and China were also destroyed.[11]

Titor refers to the exchange as "N Day". Washington, D.C. and Jacksonville, Florida are specifically mentioned as being hit. After the war, Omaha, Nebraska is the nation's new capital city.

Titor is vague as to the exact motivations and causes for World War III. At one point he characterized hostilities as being led by "border clashes and overpopulation"[12] but also points to the present conflict between Arabs and Jews as a harbinger of World War III. "

Just something to ponder and maybe another project to toss in my "Citizen Science" pile - which is turning into quite a mound:  Science projects which conventional science doesn't have the time/energy/resource to staff up, but with massive public participation could yield some damn interesting results.

 

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