Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Lies and World War I

I don't think most people understand what World War I was about; but, it is a history that should not be repeated. Prior to World War I the nations of Europe were competing over which of them would have the most influence in Africa, Asia and the Pacific (and to a lesser extent in South America). Basically the European countries were busy stealing land in Africa and Asia and the thing that prevented a continual war in all the countries was the alliances they made amongst themselves. It came down to if one of your treaty partners was attacked then you automatically fought with them.

Well, the king of Austria was killed by an anarchist from Serbia and all hell broke loose. One of the biggest factors for the war was Europe's wish to split up the Ottoman Empire. Little discussed now, it was a major force in Europe and Arabia for hundreds of years. After World War I it would cease to exist as would Russia which became the Soviet Union. After the king was killed, Austria attacked Serbia. Many believed that Austria was trying to make inroads against the Ottoman empire and that the killing of the king provided a convenient excuse; but, because of all the treaties the war pulled in the rest of Europe. World War I was not a religious war, it was simply a war to split up the spoils of older empires.

As for America, we had no reason to join in the fight and most people did not want to go to "Europe's War". The war began in 1914 and America did not join in until April 1917. Now most people think the United States joined the war because of the sinking of the Lusitania; but, that is not quite correct. The Lusitania was sunk in May 1915 almost two years before we entered the war. In fact, Wilson was re-elected in 1916 because he kept us out of the war. Just before we declared war on Germany it was discovered that Germany was offering to pay for Mexico to attack the United States to take back the land we had stolen from them (California, Texas and Arizona). I should point out that there is no evidence at all that Mexico had any plans on doing what Germany wanted.

As far as the Lusitania goes, it was not an American ship, it was a British ship during wartime which was most likely carrying arms from the United States. You see, even though we claimed to be uninvolved, we were selling weapons to more than one European country. We made a lot of money from that war. We also enslaved our own people by conducting a draft and forcing people in to the military. Wait, it gets better, it was made illegal to say that the draft or the war was wrong. It was a war we didn't want to join by a president who was elected on the promise not to get us into war and yet it was illegal to argue against it.

Most Americans think Germany started the war, they didn't. Most Americans think we went to war over the sinking of the Lusitania, we didn't. The President of the United States promised it would be the last war, it wasn't.

Music You May Not Be Familiar With

YouTube - Phantom Of The Paradise (Full Album)

YouTube - Vanishing Point (1971) Soundtrack

J.P. Morgan and their IPO

I don't trust JP Morgan. I don't trust them because they have plead guilty to rigging just about every financial market there is to the tune of tens of billions of dollars in fines. This recent story makes me think they are about to sell average investors and little guys some major snake oil.

Yahoo - Why J.P. Morgan IPO Access is a Huge Deal for Regular Investors.

When a company decides to "go public" or sell stock on one of the exchanges (like the Dow Jones) they make what is called an IPO or Initial Public Offering. When an IPO is set, the price of the stock is also set. This initial rate may or may not be met; but, usually the stock will increase for the first 90 days or so. For quite awhile now certain large or institutional investors were allowed to buy the stock for the set rate the day before the actual public could buy the stock.

A simple example of this might be In and Out Burger deciding that they want to sell stock in their company. The company decides that they want to raise $100,000,000 and they are going to sell 1,000,000 shares at $100 per share. The day before the shares can be purchased on the stock exchange, certain large investors are allowed to buy the stock at the $100 per share. The next day, when the stock is actually publicly traded it will go up or down depending on demand. It is very common to see the stock raise in value in those first 90 days; but, in the past the average person could not buy the stock prior to the IPO. JP Morgan says that for a $250 investment anyone can now buy prior to the IPO so long as JP Morgan has underwritten the IPO.

Why would JP Morgan, a company that is based on fraud and market manipulation, suddenly let the small investor get in on their game and a game that they reserve for their friends. I don't trust them and you should not either.