Hard landing...?

How about the Crash of "Civilizations"? More
evidence on that in a future post.

When you add it all together on the demand side and the supply side it comes to a 0% growth for Q4. Hard landing and recession are ahead for the US economy and the wishful thinking forecasts of the consensus that growth will sharply recover in Q4 from the anemic Q3 level are being shattered every day as the onslaught of bad macro news increases by the day.

If you're interested in the numbers, take a look.

The Gun in the Room (Part 2)

Compliance is not Freedom

I certainly understand that the simple reality of universal state violence makes many people very uncomfortable – and they are quite right to feel uncomfortable! Once you really get this idea under your skin, your life will change irrevocably. You will no longer be tempted to base your arguments on tedious and complicated abstractions. When talking to people about freedom, you will cut to the core of the issues very rapidly. This will have enormous effects on every single relationship in your life. You will very quickly discover the true moral natures of those around you – and this can be quite shocking. So I certainly understand why people are hesitant to accept this idea, and why they prefer to label me as an “extremist” rather than to begin exploring the reality of state violence in their own hearts and with the people around them.



Of course, there is also an empirical method by which the existence of “the gun on the room” can be tested. It’s really quite simple, although I certainly don’t recommend it.



Stop obeying the law.



If you are right, you have just saved yourself enormous amounts of time and money. If I am right, though, we may never see you again – which would be a real tragedy, because libertarianism needs all the supporters it can get!



If, however, you hesitate to flout the rules of the state, then it is important to examine why. If you’re honest with yourself, you will find, as I did, that you tremble in fear before the guns of the state, and that the humiliation of being ordered around for your entire life is almost unbearable.

Full essay.

A note on institutionalized insanity

Now if we could just get over our insanity, that of
doing the same thing over and over, getting the
same fucked up results we may get to the stars or
wherever else we want to go.

By the way, this insanity would not be such a big
deal suffered on an individual basis, but
institutionalized it could easily be deadly.

Stay tuned.

More debunking of peak oil

The CERA study debunks the so-called Hubbert
Peak Oil Theory, first espoused in 1956 by
geologist M. King Hubbert. Working at the time
for Shell Oil Co., he predicted that world oil
production would follow a bell-shaped curve in
which production grows steadily until it peaks,
followed by a rapid decline.

Hubbert was pretty accurate on the timing of
U.S. peak oil production, coming within two years
of 1970, the year experts now recognize as the
peak of continental U.S. production.

But his theory failed to recognize that new
technologies enabled reserves to grow over time.
His theory preceded the exploitation of massive
oil reserves in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico.

Read.

Ripped from Roger Sizemore

Another look at The Great Idiocy

Baker, Gates and their Iraq Study Group will

report to President Bush next week. Judging from

press leaks and the public record, they will

propose a ghastly misevaluation of Iran,

identical in character to their misevaluation of

the Soviet Union a generation ago. As widely

reported, they will propose to "engage Iran"; but

for what object should Iran be engaged?... The

ghosts of defunct European monarchies mingle with

the shades of failed policy in Washington. Who

you gonna call? Not the neo-conservatives, whose

effort to turn the sow's ear of Middle Eastern

politics into the silk purse of democracy has not

a shred of credibility remaining. The Reagan

administration did not win the Cold War by

proposing regime change in Moscow, but by

humiliating Russian power to the point that its

will to fight evaporated. There is no one to

interpret the fiery letters on the wall. For the

past five years I have counseled the United

States to learn to live with the chaos that it

can do nothing to prevent. No matter: Americans

will learn, late and at cost, the way they always

do.

Full article.

A look at the language of the psychopath

One way to stay out of the Matrix...

The fact that such language, and the resultant conversive thinking, is pervasive in our own political discourse is not a promising sign for the health and future of humanity, and should prompt an immediate and in-depth analysis of the nature of psychopathology and its presence in the leaders of our governments, military, and intelligence services. The history of "man's inhumanity to man" is actually one of pathocracy, and if we can learn one thing from the pathocracies of past generations, it is that millions will die as a result of the present one. With the advent of depleted uranium munitions (used during the current occupation of Iraq), white-phosphorous (used in the recent Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Palestine), and current advances in ethnic-specific weapons, to name but three modern weapons of mass-genocide, things are looking far worse than ever before.

The remainder of this essay will provide contemporary examples of such distortions of language. As a warning, I should say that stripping the veneer of ideology from the following words and phrases may come as a shock to some readers. As Lobaczewski warns, "even normal people, who condemn this kind of [pathocracy] along with its ideologies, feel hurt and deprived of something constituting part of their own romanticism, their way of perceiving reality, when a widely idealized group is exposed as little more than a gang of criminals. Perhaps even some of the readers of this article or Lobaczewski's book will resent the unceremonious stripping away of all of the literary motifs of the psychopathic mind.

The fact is; there is no romanticism in the global "War on Terror". The men and women promoting it are nothing more than a "gang of criminals", as Lobaczewski puts it. There is no epic "clash of civilizations"; there is no primeval "good against evil"; there is no heroic "protecting Western freedoms and values". These are simply ideological "literary motifs", and the truth is much more prosaic.

Take a look at the terms identified in this essay.

Highly recommended reading.

Capitalistic communists

Kiteboy over at bureaucrash wants to know how

Vietnam and China have become such economic

powerhouses in capitalist ventures while

remaining communist.



Simple, kiteboy.



Now they're more capitalistic communists than

they were...power to the people and all that.



I know. Confusing as hell, ain't it.

Illusions die hard

When the day comes that the gold and silver
dealers won't take that worthless paper dollar (or
any other worthless paper) in any amount for their
product you'll know it's too late. You'll also know
then that the illusion's over.

At that point you might have to trade your donkey
for some hard cash...or a few sacks of
potatoes, carrots, etc.

Don't wait. Buy now.

"Buy what?", you say.

You figure it out.

Politics and unintended consequences

Politics and its attendant government have been
shown wanting. It's pandemic, this realization.

Most everyone I talk to in daily conversation
believes it, having been beaten black and blue
by it at least in one area of their lives.

It's probably not going to be what is commonly
thought of as a "patriot" that fires the first
shot. It's probably not going to be a political
activist from the left, the right or the center.
Most of us would rather sue you than shoot you,
and most of us have heavily ingrained value
systems which restrain us from outright whacking
some of these noodniks and shooting them where
they stand, although they do deserve it. The
first shooting of the bastards will probably be
by average citizens who tried to comply but were
not allowed to, and whose lives were
overcomplicated by that inability to comply. The
subsequent shootings of the bastards will be by
common criminals who have hated authority all
their lives and find that they can now easily
assassinate an LEO and get away with it.... And
in case you have any doubt . . . when THAT time
comes . . . yes. Me, too. And probably someone
sitting next to you. Maybe your next door
neighbor. Maybe that friendly legislator or
congressman from a neighboring state who believes
in liberty. That bureaucrat who unbeknownst to
you is a secret believer in liberty. That agent
who fancies himself a true patriot and wants to
restore the republic. Maybe even the governor or
the President you just elected, for all you know.

Because we are literally everywhere. And you
don't know who all of us are.

What should you who are tyrants do? It's simple.
Choose life.

Read.

Collateral damage

Upset Over Tax, Man Throws Coffee In Clerk's Face

More "irrational" behavior on the way...

It was too much trouble to go to the tax collector's
office and do it. Er, I guess he did go to the right
place. The clerk was collecting the tax.

Will you be enforcing some law or collecting some
tax for the state when someone goes bonkers for
good reasons?

Chaos is coming and she's pissed.

Around and around we go

Any Australian nuclear power plants would most likely need to be built on the coast where gigalitres of seawater could be used to cool them, suggest experts. "Because we've got a water shortage in this country it would be best to place them on the coast," says nuclear power engineer Professor John Price of Monash University in Melbourne. Price's comments come in the wake of a draft report from Prime Minister John Howard's nuclear taskforce that proposes constructing 25 nuclear power plants to meet Australia's future energy needs.

Another bunch of idiots added to the barrel.

Nuclear power stations by the sea?

Remember Chernobyl.

Is your blog blocked?

Routing around censorship...

Is your blog blocked in India,

Pakistan, Iran or China?



If Yes then you can still access your blog

anytime using pkblogs free Blog Gateway.

Simple. See it here.

The Big One?

Former Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, now an executive at Citigroup, has been up-front for months in warning of the unsustainability of the Greenspan "wall of money" economy. In statements widely circulated on the Bloomberg financial wire Nov. 15, Rubin said the failure to stem the growing U.S. budget deficit may spook the central banks, hedge funds, and others who have been buying U.S. Treasury notes. "It seems almost inconceivable that this will continue indefinitely," Rubin said, in a videotaped message for a dinner hosted by the Concord Coalition. In a panel discussion at the event, former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker concurred, saying that the U.S. borrowing requirements raise the risk of "crisis." "It's incredible people have gone on so long holding dollars. At some point, you will get a situation where people have had enough."
...
While the value of the U.S. dollar is already falling, the collapse in foreign capital inflow could turn it into a rout.

Most of the rest of the article is devoted to
diverting attention away from the results of
The Gun in the Room.

Expect the usual idiots to call for more of
those guns.

See the article.

Political science, that contradiction in terms

It is yet to be seen whether civilisation can defend itself against a horde of morons armed with degrees in political science.

What civilisation? The lack of it created
these slugs.

Political science is nothing more than a study
of what kind of a gun to bring to the room and
how to shoot it.

Ripped from The Joy of Curmudgeonry.

The Age of Unreason

The Gun in the Room again...

How frightful our ignorance is! How horrified we would be if we knew that the laws we support make our problems worse. How dismayed we would be if we discovered that time, patience, and doing nothing but allowing individuals to work by themselves on the problems would have alleviated them.

But no. Instead we see that the law invokes power, and power makes things happen. If we want energy efficiency, pass a law and mandate it. Manufacturers will have to make their engines more efficient. If we want less energy loss, pass a law and mandate tighter windows or more insulation or more efficient furnaces. Builders will have to obey. Sure, prices may rise, we will have to pay, but we will save energy. The law solves our problems. We can see that it does. If new problems should arise, pass new laws. What’s to stop us? We feel good. We are doing something, and we do not want to hear anything that might disturb us in the comfort of our belief.
...
By such logic and belief, the law is become mankind’s main tool of progress. Our wise laws are what drive progress onwards. So we think, and so we err. Our machines have advanced faster than our thinking has.

Read.

Ripped from the Zone.

Timetable of measures...

On this date Reuters news service reported that Washington DC's top officials in Iraq said that Iraqi leaders have assured the United States they will stick to a timetable of measures over the next year to curb violence and allow U.S. troops to go home.

Laugh robustly.

In itself a timetable of measures would be amusing, but to read the related news illuminates the hilariously extensive details of a lack of useful meaning in the sum of those words selected to easily fool gullible news journalists, people who commonly believe journalists, and the government fools who pander the words to fool themselves. The "timetable of measures" was designed to replace the "stay the course" phrase, as an excuse to keep fighting yet another hopeless war because the fighters, inherently including the leaders and supporters, have no intellectual ability to ask any effective questions about the glaring contradictions of fighting a war.

Read.

Can I or you be blamed?

I don't support them. If you been reading here for
any period of time, you already know that.

I wasn't in charge.

Were you? Are you?

If this gang of criminals is to be held answerable to the rest of humanity, the case against them ought not be advanced by those who, by their lynch-mob enthusiasm, helped facilitate these wrongs. The stench of hypocrisy would be far too suffocating, making a mockery of the moral principles to which the emerging ersatz outrage appeals for support. It would be like Mafia hit-men wanting to bring the leading figures of organized crime to justice for their violent ways.
...
Most Americans have failed to live up to their responsibilities under this alleged “social contract.” This includes most Democrats who, throughout these past five years, have done little more than opportunistically await the day that they might recover the White House in order to continue the same statist agenda “under new management.” You will not find the Democrats proposing repeal of the Patriot Act – or any of the other recently enacted additions to police-state powers – or the dismantling of the Homeland Security system. Neither will they do what any morally decent person would do in the conduct of a war against wholly innocent people: stop the killing. As Nanci Pelosi has expressed it, more money will be needed for the military, and the troops will be brought home but only after they have achieved victory, rhetoric that differs not one iota from that of George W. Bush.

See it all.

China 'to boost gold for years to come'

The other choices are almost all government issued
paper controlled by the respective issuer.

Gold surged more than $19 an ounce to $635 in New York trading after China's central bank chief said the country was eyeing "lots of instruments" as alternatives to US dollar reserves. Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said the bank had a "clear" plan to lower the dollar share of its exchange reserves, now $1 trillion and rising fast.

The scale of Chinese holdings means any move would shake up the currency markets, with a leveraged effect on the tiny gold sector. China holds roughly 70pc of its reserves in dollar instruments such as mortgage bonds. Dennis Gartman, a gold veteran and publisher of the Gartman Letter, told an RBC conference yesterday that China's moves to diversify reserves would power gold upwards for years to come.

"China holds 1pc of its reserves in gold, which I expect to rise to 5pc-6pc over the next 15 years. China will be a quiet, consistent, slow taker of gold," he said. He predicted Beijing would keep its dollars but use fresh reserves to buy euros and gold. It is unclear whether the poisonous trade relations between Beijing and the EU could cause China to lose its enthusiasm for the euro.

Read.

What is government?

After discussing some of the more talked about
players in The Big Den of Thieves and the various
wings flapping Left and Right, Neil finally gets to
the point below...Whew!

Reading thru the rant I thought of this quote again,
attributed to Peter Medawar:

"What is relevant is what solves the
problem. If we had thought through real
relevancies, we would be on Sirius by now."

This is all that's relevant. Which "wing" has
or is currently flapping isn't:

Government is about stealing; that's all it's about; that's all it's ever been about; that's all it will ever be about. The kind of society government needs most is a society at war with itself, torn by violent crime, crippled by poverty, intellectually and technologically stagnant. A peaceful, prosperous, progressive society is a threat, because it eliminates all the excuses traditionally used to steal from us.

No election is ever going to change that.

And neither will "reform" or another traditional revolution.

Full rant.

Ripped from Uncommon Sense.

The Gun in the Room

It is a wearying but essential task to keep reminding people that the state is nothing but an agency of violence. When someone talks about “the welfare state helping the poor,” we must point out the gun in the room. When someone opposes the decriminalization of marijuana, we must point out the gun in the room. When someone supports the reduction of taxes, we must point out the gun in the room – even if one bullet has been taken out.
...
So forget about esoteric details. Forget about the history of the Fed and the economics of the minimum wage. Just keep pointing out the gun in the room, over and over, until the world finally starts awake and drops it in horror and loathing.

A fine meme, the gun in the room.

Highly recommended.

War on net terrorists

During an appearance with his wife Barbara on Fox News last night, George Bush senior slammed Internet bloggers for creating an adversarial and ugly climate, echoing the rhetoric of fellow Neo-Cons and the White House itself in trashing the reputation of the world wide web.
...
In addition, the Pentagon recently announced its effort to infiltrate the Internet and propagandize for the war on terror.

That will likely be the last war lost by bummint.
By that, I mean they won't win another.

...The European Union, led by former Stalinist and potential future British Prime Minister John Reid, has also vowed to shut down "terrorists" who use the Internet to spread propaganda.

Yup, the war is on. The clowns have declared themselves.

Full article.

The Real News

Democracy at its best...

Here’s the real scoop about Tuesday’s elections, which is going unreported by media:

IT WAS A LANDSLIDE!

Non-voters swept all national, state, and local races, garnering a nationwide non-vote landslide of 59.6% among registered voters. In addition, about 30% of Americans eligible to vote remain unregistered, further increasing the anti-electorate landslide. Frank Chorodov’s “quiet revolution” of non-voting, which he declared 61 years ago, continues.

Thanks to Wally Conger.

So you think you're safe from The Master Thieves...

So there you go. For the foreseeable future, my PayPal account will remain locked, I'm afraid. If you want to buy a signed book, you'll need to mail me a check or money order. And I guess I won't be bidding on nearly as many knights on ebay, since so many sellers "prefer PayPal."

If any of you are PayPal users, however, and are accustomed to allowing a significant amount of money to sit around in your account... take it out. Take it out NOW. Your name could turn up on a list as easily as mine did, and then, like me, you'll find yourself cut off from your money with no right of appeal.

See the whole story.


Update:

The Power of the Blog? I expect so.

Out of the blue, I have received an email from
PayPal informing me that they have reconsidered
my case and unlocked my account. (Yes, it's true.
I went in right away and got my forty bucks).

Take a look.

News flash by Bill St. Clair

Wise words from Dr. Lenny

Take a look.

Nancy Pelosi

[This page intentionally left blank.]

What to do...

Put any 5 people in a room to discuss "how to take
Amerika back", you get 5 different plans to do it.
Never did understand what that cliche meant.

Did they ever have it? Who are they? What will
they do if they get it, install a new bunch of tax
collectors? Sheeeit. Take it back to when?

When Amerika really hits the fan, I expect
there'll be a passel of idiots holding a meeting to
find out what to do about it, pickin' their noses
and scratchin' their asses.

Then some of these Dull Sparks will grab their
rusting shotguns and pitchforks, hitting the
streets in an attempt to do it.

Just so I'm on record saying it, I don't like it any
better than they do.

I just know there's nothing to do but let it die
from natural causes and start all over without
the collective scratching and picking.

It's terminal.

Let creative destruction do its work.

Then pick up your own pieces because you won't
have the energy to pick up anyone else's.

Gringo wetbacks

It's going to be a race to see which country loses
more people to the other...when the baby boomers
start retiring.

What few people -- at least, outside of Mexico -- have bothered to notice is that while all the nannies, cooks and maids have been heading north to tend the luxury lifestyles of irate Republicans, the gringo hordes have been rushing south to enjoy glorious budget retirements and affordable second homes under the Mexican sun.

Yes, in former California Gov. Pete Wilson's immortal words, "They just keep coming." Over the past decade, the State Department estimates that the number of Americans living in Mexico has soared from 200,000 to 1 million (or one-quarter of all U.S. expatriates). Remittances from the United States to Mexico have risen dramatically, from $9 billion to $14.5 billion in just two years. Although initially interpreted as representing a huge increase in illegal workers (who send parts of their salaries across the border to family), it turns out to be mainly money sent by Americans to themselves to finance Mexican homes and retirements.

Forget Baja and visit real Mexico. Better prices, if
for no other reason.

Full article.

Out with the old...

The shell game continues in The Biggest Circus on
the planet.

A couple o' clowns changed suits. Even a passel
of "lesser" clowns did so.

Look closely.

Whaduyasee?

Notes on Amerika's future

As for me, though, I continue to struggle with the apparent contradictions of American "culture" as it enters the late stages of monstrosity. On the one hand, America — or the United State, at least — is trying not just to retain but even expand its foreign empire. On the other hand, and a limp-wristed hand it is, many of the white Americans who are still willing or able to have kids seem determined to twist them into the most ruined kind of pantywaists. (Make that tattooed and nose-ringed pantywaists.) Can a nation of pansies really run an empire? Rome, in its ultimate degeneracy, had to rely on barbarians to do it, with consequences that are famous.

Perhaps I need to seek a new synthesis. Here's a possibility. A nation of men who were truly manly and women who were truly womanly might be less likely to support, and serve, an empire transparently dependent on deceit, scare-mongering, and (not to put too fine a point on it) sheer wickedness. At the minimum, true men and true women surely would not abandon their spouse and children to volunteer for an evil, criminal enterprise at the behest of the pissant Bush and the big spiders behind him.

Bush will eventually go.

The big spiders will stay.

The pansy population will go up.

Read.

FBI willing to go under the covers in Congress if necessary

...or how to keep your job for the life of Congress.

WASHINGTON - The new chief of the FBI's Criminal Division, which is swamped with public corruption cases, says the bureau is ramping up its ability to catch crooked politicians and might run an undercover sting on Congress.

Assistant FBI Director James Burrus called the bureau's public corruption program "a sleeping giant that we've awoken," and predicted the nation will see continued emphasis in that area "for many, many, many years to come."

Separating the corrupt from Congress is like trying to
sift piss from the water in the toilet bowl.

Read.

Sticky ends

People who used magic without knowing what they were doing
usually came to a sticky end. All over the entire room, sometimes.
-- Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

Who Needs Government?

A precursor of things to come...and all without a
revolution.

Oooha.

The Czech Republic, which held general elections in June, still has no government. Judging by the atmosphere of mistrust between the main political parties, it is unlikely that the Czechs will have a government anytime soon. Five months later, the only certainty is that political stalemate is likely to continue until an early election can be agreed. Notably, the sky has not fallen. The country's institutional framework remains sturdy, the economy continues to grow apace, and some Czechs wonder if they even need government at all.

Read.

Ripped from bureaucrash.

Power cuts strike Western Europe

Power cuts have struck several countries in Western Europe, leaving millions of people without electricity.

Full report.


Are you ready?

Thanks to Rick.

Selected clips from V for Vendetta

A Guy Fawkes day special:

See them here.

Britons go bust at rate of one per minute

I expect it's not much different anywhere...

Experts said that many families were finding it
impossible to pay record gas and electricity bills,
mortgage payments and council taxes and thousands
were now throwing in the towel on their finances.
...
Mortgage Lenders said the number of repossessions
in the first half of the year was up by 76 per cent to
8,140. Further increases are expected.
...
"If people think this is temporary, they have been
misled," he said. "We are entering a new era where
personal insolvency is going to be an accepted part
of everyday life. In the past few years there has
been a complete change in people's attitude to
credit and banks' attitudes to people reneging on
debt."

Do you have your donkey yet? It might be a good
idea to do some looking for a nice one with
four-on-the-floor.

Full report. (link repaired)

L. Neil Smith telling it like it is

... what good would my ideas be by now if I had
betrayed them by becoming a yes-man? As surely as
the sun rises in the morning, I would have let
little pieces of what I stood for then get nibbled
off, a few at a time, until there was nothing
left of me at all. Maybe that’s why, in our
culture, the system seems to select for the most
evil, stupid, and insane among us. Only they can
rise to the top.….

The truth — whatever the context — is not a
welcome thing in this Age of Euphemism, in this
Empire of Lies. Someday it may be once again,
and, possibly, I may have had some small part of
making that happen.

Don't miss the first comment.

Read.

'murika's Chief Bean Counter wants an accounting

It's too late for real accounting...

Walker doesn't want to make balancing the federal government's books sexy - he just wants to make it politically palatable. He has committed to touring the nation through the 2008 elections, talking to anybody who will listen about the fiscal black hole Washington has dug itself, the "demographic tsunami" that will come when the baby boom generation begins retiring and the recklessness of borrowing money from foreign lenders to pay for the operation of the U.S. government.

This Dull Spark and all the others at The Top want to save
An Unsalvageable System.

The cost?

Your impoverishment by taxes instead of declaring
bankruptcy, selling the debt and closing the doors
of the Biggest Failure known to man.

No one on the planet will escape.

Ya happy?

The report.

More "justice" in Amerika

Repulsive as her behavior is, Leslie is merely a symptom, in much the same way that an acutely painful rectal itch might be a warning sign of a potentially fatal cancer. The key to understanding why this is so can be found in two things: Leslie's arrogant statement that as a judge she was “not in the same position” as common citizens, and the obedience rendered to her by the Bailiff and the courtroom spectators.

There's much more to this story.

Dollar down, hard and fast

Peeing on hydrants

Male aggressiveness pervades human life. It fuels the unending drive to found empires. A woman might say, “Look, Alex, you’ve got a perfectly good palace in Macedon, plenty to eat, a bar on the corner, nice women. Are you quite sure you need to conquer India? What are you going to do with it?” Men are more likely than women to favor capitalism (or “free enterprise” or “unrestricted rapine,” according to your politics) than women because it sanctifies commercial combat. Fifty billion isn’t enough, I must destroy the competition and eradicate Linux….

See what choice we have?

I'll take the latter. That way I don't have to deal with
the radioactive fallout.

The whole rant.

Looking behind another curtain

But when the dollar drops in purchasing power, the price we pay for oil seems to go up because of the reduced wallop of the underlying dollars. It takes more "weak paper" to buy the same goods.

Who issues the paper?

Who are you blaming for the increased "price" of oil?

Think about it.

link.