About two weeks ago my doctor notified me that I had experienced a heart attack previously. I had the "event" about 4 or 5 years ago and remember when it happened and how it was in some ways a new beginning. Having the doctor confirm it didn't sink in immediately. At first it was no big deal, I mean I knew it when it happened. Still, there is something about having it confirmed that is on my mind. It is not the idea that I could have died that is interesting to me, I mean we do all die and that should not surprise any of us. What I think is truly interesting is that I didn't die.
So, recently I came across this article. Zen Haven - How Near-Death Experiences Transform People. We all know that a number of people have had Near Death Experiences (NDEs) and I am just one of hundreds of thousands of others. What intrigued me about this article was the statistics of what leads up to them, I had never considered it before.
Here is a quote from the article. "Before such an episode occurs there are stressors, conditions in the experiencer’s life, that point to either unrest or inattention. And these are present universally. What caught my eye with near-death and near-death-like states were episodes that occurred under these conditions". The author then lists a series of "stressors" that are common among people who do have an NDE and going through major life changes is listed. Well, I was in the middle of my divorce and my life was full of stress in every area of my life.
So, untold numbers of people have had NDEs. Many were in a physicians care when they had them and were being monitored. After they had their experience many came back and completely changed their lives. Many report similar things, being above their body, going through a tunnel of light, meeting family and friends who have passed away previously, sensing a higher being... Many, if not most, then report knowing that they had to return to this life and not wanting to. They are very personal experiences and it has always fascinated me that there are those who wish to trivialize them.
Every now and then someone who has had an NDE will come forth and write a book or go on television and discuss their experience. Recently, a doctor named Dr. Eben Alexander wrote a book about his experience. Esquire magazine then published an article attempting to "debunk" his book. The author questioned whether or not Dr. Eben could have been making up a story and what his medical condition was. Pretty sloppy work, either the man was in a medically induced coma or he was not. Either the man had a serious medical condition or he did not. It seems highly unlikely that he intentionally wanted to be in a coma and almost die.
Therein is the problem for debunkers. If we assume that all people reporting NDEs are liars then why do some people who almost die feel a need to lie about it? While I had been told that I was a fantastic candidate for a heart attack, it certainly was not something I sought out just so I could have a good story to tell at parties. In fact, I do not go into detail about my experience online and have really only discussed it with close friends and family when it happened. In response to the Esquire article, another writer corrected the article. Esquire article on Eben Alexander distorts the facts.
Here is what I am attempting to examine. Why should anyone be bothered by the Dr's NDE. Look at it this way, the people who have NDEs are already at extreme stress levels, suddenly have serious physical challenges and come back saying that they had a mental experience while it was all going on. What is there to question? Why not just chalk it up to a heightened dream state? I have often said that an NDE is of value only to the person having it, it is not proof of anything for anyone else. Up until 2 weeks ago, I could not "prove" that I had had a heart attack because I refused to see the doctor after it happened. I told a few people at the time; but, that is circumstantial evidence at best for anyone other than me. So why do so many people feel a need to attack the Dr for telling his story?
In my opinion what many fear is that people who had NDEs are telling the truth. It is easier to believe they are liars or delusional than to accept the possibility that there is more to the human experience than the physical world that we see. Whether one is a believer or not, once they have an NDE, the question of whether or not there is more to the human experience than this present physical existence is no longer an issue in their life. From a control standpoint that is a very scary thing.
This world is managed using a carrot and a stick. Our fears and fetishes are used to control us. People are trained to chase treasures be they physical (money, sex, objects) or mental (ego). All the things used to control us rely upon our believing that you only go around once, that you only have this one existence. Esquire magazine is about the "sophisticated" up and comers. It is a magazine written for young stock brokers and presents them with all the things that they are to seek out, fancy cars, pretty women with class, the newest watch, the place to vacation, the house to own. It is a continual reminder of what their god should be, success in the material world.
One of the things that happens in an NDE is that you recognize you are dying. There is a moment when you know that you have passed some point and accept that you are not coming back, there is a moment of acceptance to the situation. I have almost died more than once; but, only have had one NDE and it was the one time that I knew I had passed that point. It is one thing to know in the abstract that you will die one day and quite another to face that moment whether it be real or imagined. When I was a young teenager another kid attacked me and I ended up choking him. As I regularly tore telephone books in half and was a gymnast, the last thing you wanted was my hands on your neck. As he was passing out and had been denied air for more than a minute, a look passed over his face. I could see the moment he knew there was nothing he could do and that I was not going to stop. We never talked about it after; but, I saw that moment of acceptance in his eyes and he changed after that.
Where am I going with all this. From what I see people fear an afterlife more than death itself. Heck, the fear of death is what is used to motivate us to benefit the economic system in ways that don't make sense for us or society. The people that have cheated the financial system are afraid of death; but, believe in it. They are even more afraid of there being an afterlife so they deny it. What they really fear is that there are consequences for what you do in this life, what they really fear is that the hierarchy in the afterlife doesn't give them an insiders advantage. While most of us hope for an afterlife, these sad people hope there is not.
Monday, August 19, 2013
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Not a very good post
YouTube - Peter Allen - I Go To Rio.
YouTube - Could It Be Magic _ BARRY MANILOW
YouTube - The Ballad Of Ben Gay
YouTube - The Temptations - Papa Was A Rolling Stone
YouTube - Biff Rose - Buzz the Fuzz
YouTube - The Monkees - "Pleasant Valley Sunday" - ORIGINAL VIDEO - HQ
YouTube - Where Angels Go, Trouble Follows - Theme Song
You figure it all out. LOL. Have a great weekend.
YouTube - Could It Be Magic _ BARRY MANILOW
YouTube - The Ballad Of Ben Gay
YouTube - The Temptations - Papa Was A Rolling Stone
YouTube - Biff Rose - Buzz the Fuzz
YouTube - The Monkees - "Pleasant Valley Sunday" - ORIGINAL VIDEO - HQ
YouTube - Where Angels Go, Trouble Follows - Theme Song
You figure it all out. LOL. Have a great weekend.
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Wall Street Versus Capitalism
I like capitalism. I like the idea of choice. I don't believe in free choice. I think choices should be associated with consequences. I think you should learn from your choices, that choices come with responsibilities and consequences. Having said that, I also believe that people should not be given the death penalty for stealing a sandwich when they are going hungry. I also believe that as a nation we should make sure people have certain basic needs even if it means I have to be taxed. I put my money where my mouth is, give to charity and have taken in the homeless. Big banks and Wall Street do not believe in capitalism, they believe in something else. They believe in information manipulation and market manipulation and I want to talk about that.
Wall Street is basically a bunch of ivy league frat boys who have consistently been caught working together to fix rates and markets. Most traders and brokers are just poor dumb fools that either play along to get along or are totally clueless as to how the market is gamed. There is however a group of insiders who get to decide when the game will be played and in what manner. If this were not so then the LIBOR scandal could not have happened. Now I want to explain how they violate the intent of the law.
Lets say I was a purchasing agent for the federal government and I was about to issue a $100 million contract to a defense contractor. Lets say I had my elderly father buy $20,000 in options against the competitors for that contract. In other words I have my father make a bet against all the other competitors for the contract. In this case, once the contract was awarded, my dear old dad is going to make a lot of money. That is insider trading. Even if the contract award was 100% right, the fact that I used that insider information means the playing field was not even. This is exactly what the banks and traders do everyday. They have inside information and use it to their own benefit at the expense of most investors (not their friends of course). That is a form of capitalism; but, it is not the reason that we created capitalism. I thought the PURPOSE of capitalism was to make sure that those who worked hard and made good bets benefited did well.
IF Wall Street doesn't believe in competition then is it capitalistic or criminalistic? If it believes in competition then why is it constantly involved in insider trading? The game is called front trading and I will explain how it works. Lets say you deposit a check at your bank when it opens at 9 in the morning. The money is transferred to your bank at 9:30. Now, at 4 in the afternoon a check you sent to your landlord is deposited and at 4:30 your bank makes the transfer from your account to your landlords. Everything should be fine, you deposited before the withdrawal was made and your bank actually had the funds before the withdrawal was made. Well, your bank will not "post" your deposit until the following day; but, will show the withdrawal the same day. Because of that they can charge you fees for having been overdrawn, it is an accounting trick, it is not the truth and it is not capitalism. That is what is called front loading.
King World News - Madoff Whistleblower Tells KWN Banks Stealing From Pensions
FOR DECADES the banks and Wall Street have been pushing their losses onto public pension funds while giving their personal friends the benefits, they do this by front loading. And we call this capitalism? Now, these same firms are saying that they should be paid before the pensions are paid in Detroit. THINK ABOUT IT.
It should be apparent that I am in fact feeling better.
I enjoy playing poker and have won a couple of tournaments. Nothing big; but, I have taken out some professionals. I haven't really played much in the past three years; but, I used to play everyday. If I am playing poker and one of the people at the table is marking the deck or palming cards, I would call that cheating and not capitalism. I am more than willing to risk my money in an honest game; but, I hate it when the game is rigged and the games today are rigged. I will explain how.
The terms gambler and gambling are misleading. Gambling means taking a blind risk, gamblers, true professionals always have the advantage and play games where their knowledge of the game will give them an advantage. I spent years playing poker and came away ahead. My game of choice was tournament Texas No Limit Holdem. A great game that rewards skill over the course of time. When I first began playing, you would put in your $100 or whatever and that was all anyone could put in. It was an even playing field, you could be a millionaire; but, the buy in and the amount of chips you got was the same for everyone.
As poker became more popular, the rules for some games started to change. ReBuys became more popular. A Re-buy is where if you lose all your money, you can buy back into the game. We also began to see more and more games that had levels of buy in. You could start with a thousand chips or 2000 chips depending on your initial investment. Let me put this in terms of a running race at the olympics. What if rich countries could pay money to the Olympic committee so that their runners could start 20 feet further in front of the track than the people from poor countries? They actually used to do that in the Olympics, some kings were allowed to compete; but, they had to have an advantage. It reminds me of this scene from a movie.
YouTube - The Dictator Movie - Full 100 Meter Race Extended HD
Capitalism, for me, assumed honesty, it assumes fair dealings. Without enforceable contracts, without some rules, you cannot have capitalism. Instead you have cronyism which is what we currently have. Does capitalism mean that a bank can promise me that I will be able to safely deposit my money with them and that they will give it back to me when I ask for it or that they can make outrageous bets with my money and if they win, they keep the winnings; but, if they lose, I suffer the loss. That is what is going on and has been proven to be going on with public pensions and with most peoples bank accounts.
I voted for Ronald Reagan. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal. I am not a libertarian because they don't believe the game should have any rules and for the same reason, I am not an Anarchist. I believe that if we are going to have rules, they should apply to all. I believe that if we are not going to have rules, everybody is free from the rules. That is the problem with the current system, those in charge want the rules to only apply to some of us.
Wall Street is basically a bunch of ivy league frat boys who have consistently been caught working together to fix rates and markets. Most traders and brokers are just poor dumb fools that either play along to get along or are totally clueless as to how the market is gamed. There is however a group of insiders who get to decide when the game will be played and in what manner. If this were not so then the LIBOR scandal could not have happened. Now I want to explain how they violate the intent of the law.
Lets say I was a purchasing agent for the federal government and I was about to issue a $100 million contract to a defense contractor. Lets say I had my elderly father buy $20,000 in options against the competitors for that contract. In other words I have my father make a bet against all the other competitors for the contract. In this case, once the contract was awarded, my dear old dad is going to make a lot of money. That is insider trading. Even if the contract award was 100% right, the fact that I used that insider information means the playing field was not even. This is exactly what the banks and traders do everyday. They have inside information and use it to their own benefit at the expense of most investors (not their friends of course). That is a form of capitalism; but, it is not the reason that we created capitalism. I thought the PURPOSE of capitalism was to make sure that those who worked hard and made good bets benefited did well.
IF Wall Street doesn't believe in competition then is it capitalistic or criminalistic? If it believes in competition then why is it constantly involved in insider trading? The game is called front trading and I will explain how it works. Lets say you deposit a check at your bank when it opens at 9 in the morning. The money is transferred to your bank at 9:30. Now, at 4 in the afternoon a check you sent to your landlord is deposited and at 4:30 your bank makes the transfer from your account to your landlords. Everything should be fine, you deposited before the withdrawal was made and your bank actually had the funds before the withdrawal was made. Well, your bank will not "post" your deposit until the following day; but, will show the withdrawal the same day. Because of that they can charge you fees for having been overdrawn, it is an accounting trick, it is not the truth and it is not capitalism. That is what is called front loading.
King World News - Madoff Whistleblower Tells KWN Banks Stealing From Pensions
FOR DECADES the banks and Wall Street have been pushing their losses onto public pension funds while giving their personal friends the benefits, they do this by front loading. And we call this capitalism? Now, these same firms are saying that they should be paid before the pensions are paid in Detroit. THINK ABOUT IT.
It should be apparent that I am in fact feeling better.
I enjoy playing poker and have won a couple of tournaments. Nothing big; but, I have taken out some professionals. I haven't really played much in the past three years; but, I used to play everyday. If I am playing poker and one of the people at the table is marking the deck or palming cards, I would call that cheating and not capitalism. I am more than willing to risk my money in an honest game; but, I hate it when the game is rigged and the games today are rigged. I will explain how.
The terms gambler and gambling are misleading. Gambling means taking a blind risk, gamblers, true professionals always have the advantage and play games where their knowledge of the game will give them an advantage. I spent years playing poker and came away ahead. My game of choice was tournament Texas No Limit Holdem. A great game that rewards skill over the course of time. When I first began playing, you would put in your $100 or whatever and that was all anyone could put in. It was an even playing field, you could be a millionaire; but, the buy in and the amount of chips you got was the same for everyone.
As poker became more popular, the rules for some games started to change. ReBuys became more popular. A Re-buy is where if you lose all your money, you can buy back into the game. We also began to see more and more games that had levels of buy in. You could start with a thousand chips or 2000 chips depending on your initial investment. Let me put this in terms of a running race at the olympics. What if rich countries could pay money to the Olympic committee so that their runners could start 20 feet further in front of the track than the people from poor countries? They actually used to do that in the Olympics, some kings were allowed to compete; but, they had to have an advantage. It reminds me of this scene from a movie.
YouTube - The Dictator Movie - Full 100 Meter Race Extended HD
Capitalism, for me, assumed honesty, it assumes fair dealings. Without enforceable contracts, without some rules, you cannot have capitalism. Instead you have cronyism which is what we currently have. Does capitalism mean that a bank can promise me that I will be able to safely deposit my money with them and that they will give it back to me when I ask for it or that they can make outrageous bets with my money and if they win, they keep the winnings; but, if they lose, I suffer the loss. That is what is going on and has been proven to be going on with public pensions and with most peoples bank accounts.
I voted for Ronald Reagan. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal. I am not a libertarian because they don't believe the game should have any rules and for the same reason, I am not an Anarchist. I believe that if we are going to have rules, they should apply to all. I believe that if we are not going to have rules, everybody is free from the rules. That is the problem with the current system, those in charge want the rules to only apply to some of us.
Monday, August 12, 2013
Needles, the Internet and Maybe Some News
Firstly, to the reader who asked how I was doing and asked not to have their comment published. I am doing better, send me your new e-mail address in a comment.
Today I had another doctors appointment and am being a good little Pimpernel. As with all doctors appointments it ended with me getting blood drawn. I had a lovely young Phlebotomist who did a fine job. I met with a specialist in blood who said they were testing me to see if I had a genetic disease; but, he agreed that I probably do not and just have sleep apnea. He did however make sure to chastise me for smoking and tell me how bad my cholesterol was. I don't believe the two are related.
So, I picked up food, went home and am resting. I decided to read some stuff on the net and for whatever reason began looking up the history of the net. While doing so, it occurred to me that it has now been 20 years since I first got online. I was online before there was America Online and still have a Compuserve Account. I was online as part of the first ten million people in the world, my; but, I am getting old.
I first started using computers in 1972 when I was in Junior High. By the time I was in college I was using a mainframe to write statistical programs. I never sought out these things, wrong place at the wrong time and a passing interest. In 1989 I was one of the first people to use a personal pc in my organization. Again a fluke; but, I decided to be an early adopter and must say it has certainly been a part of my career. In 1992 or early 93, I was asked to investigate this thing called the internet because most of the systems people were not interested and were more focused on mainframe applications. Out of about 1,500 I had the only pc that even had access to the outside and one of about 40 for the whole organization.
I am telling you these things to explain the history of the internet as I saw it. In 1993 I decided to go online from home. I started trying out Prodigy and then Compuserve, AOL didn't come online till the end of the year. I would surf on Internet Bulletin Boards. Basically, you would direct dial into peoples servers that were shared with others. FTP was still primary and the everything was textual unless you downloaded it to your computer. By 1994 I decided to join an independent Internet Service Provider that had just opened locally. It was cheaper to have a local provider because back in the day you paid for long distance and used land lines, local calls were free. The local provider was a startup in a garage by a couple of Nasa employees for them and their friends. I ended up beta testing the original Microsoft Internet Explorer and showed the Nasa guys how to configure it for their server and then teaching some of their friends because everyone else was using Mosaic or Netscape browsers.
As part of my job I ended up learning to make web pages for my organization and was responsible for figuring out where this whole internet thing was going. I would go to seminars that seemed like Amway meetings where people tried to explain why the internet was going to be the next big thing; but, the reality was that nobody really knew what it was going to evolve into. At the time it was more of a social thing for the casual user and an academic and esoteric thing for those who had been involved in it for any real period of time.
In the beginning most web pages were all textual with maybe a picture or two. They looked like my blog but lacked a color background. Once AOL came online and people began using visuals rather than textual links, everything changed. The net became more and more visual and usage blew up. It also became more commercial, slowly at first; but, that grew too. As the internet grew, I did well in my career although I had long since stopped being directly involved in programming for it. I ended up being a high level administrator and managing, amongst many other sections, a systems section.
While I used to teach people how to use computers, it was always an aside and merely because I had been an early implementer that I even knew how to use them. After the internet became common place, I began asking people who owned it and nobody was ever able to tell me. Back in the day most people assumed that it was owned by AOL, Prodigy and Compuserve because they were the face of the internet on television; but, I had attended seminars and knew better. The internet was created and owned by our own Federal government. It was created by the precursor to DARPA and was still controlled by them. Well, the essence of it, the part that makes it function is controlled by them.
We used to call the internet the World Wide Web; but, it wasn't much. Internet usage was pretty much an American thing for it's first few public years. Being the jerk that I am, in 1995 I posted my own web page. It made fun of animal rights groups and I was quickly threatened with death. I kept it up anyways.
I never got into chat rooms; but, watched as they grew more and more popular. I never really used the social aspects of the net and didn't use it for financial transactions. I sort of just watched it change. It wasn't until about 1998 that I started using it for personal business, mostly e-mails because prior I didn't know many people who had e-mail.
Of all the things I have seen in my life, the internet has made the greatest impact. The internet has made bigger changes in this world than the computer did in and of itself. The personal computer gave people abilities that they never had before; but, the internet made people want to use the pc and made it easy. Smart phones are nothing more than small pcs with access to the internet. In the future, everything will be connected to the internet, they call this "the internet of things"; but, what does that really mean?
The internet of things means that everything you do will be monitored, assisted and managed online where it can be seen by anyone who is smart enough to. It means that you will be able to access and control every part of your life using your phone. Pluses and minuses to all technologies.
I had intended to write about ICANN and how 13 servers rule the world. Someone had written about how that is no longer true; but, they were either trying or were too young to really understand. The internet is still controlled by 13 root servers, those root servers now have slave servers; but, the essence remains the same at a time when it does not need to. Of those 13, only a few are truly public. All of them are still under contract with the federal government.
That is my boring history of the internet, now, let me tell you why it matters. Yes, the government can see everything that happens on the internet. When people used to have individually owned servers running bulletin boards that were not connected to the world wide web it was different. Those days are not likely to come back.
YouTube - CBC Archives: The Internet 1993
YouTube - 1993 The Internet The Computer Chronicles
YouTube - The Internet As It Was In 1996
Yahoo - The Internet as seen in 1997
Iana - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority - Root Servers. If you really want to understand the fundamentals of the internet, this is the website. Just go through their links. Look at how boring a page they have visually, just like my blog. As you go through the servers, you will discover one of the thirteen was controlled by Nasa at the Ames Research Center. I wonder if that is where the guys from Nasa that I knew when I got my internet account worked? I will never know as I lost touch with them years ago.
Wikipedia - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority
IANA is nothing more than another government contractor, just like the one that Snowden worked for. ICANN is nothing more than another government contractor just like the one Snowden worked for. The internet is controlled by 13 servers and one of them is a secret. Younger systems people that think they get it will tell you that there are more than 13; but, they don't understand how each of those sets is still controlled by the 13. The government can shut down the whole internet and is the only group that can restart it. That mean they have a copy of everything that is and has been on the internet. It was the whole purpose of the thing when it was created.
For anyone who has read my blog for any period of time, it should be apparent that I keep a sharp eye on technology. I am not a systems person officially and gave up on programming a long time ago; but, I understand organization and infrastructure and I understand the internet and computers. One of the most fundamental things that systems people get wrong is that they think in a paradigm that is by definition wrong.
Computers are really just a series of numbers. The numbers are 0 and 1. It is a logical assumption that every choice can be either yes or no; but, that assumes their can be an absolute 0. There cannot be an absolute 0 because there is a 1. If I know for a fact that there is one thing in the universe then there cannot be a nothing in the universe. The act of being aware of this means that there can be more than one thing. This is sort of philosophy 101. All computers assume that there can be an absolute 0 which means their base programming is incomplete and can never be fixed. In simple terms, systems people assume that there is such a thing as an absolute 0 and base all their calculations on that possibility and therefore can and must be flawed in their understanding.
Let me put this in a theological manner. Nonexistence is not a possibility in the universe because you exist. To attempt to prove that you do not would be completely illogical, to try and prove that you could not has the same consequence. The only thing one is left with is to attempt that they can cease to exist; but, it means others could. The same cannot be said of the material world. Quantum physics cannot prove that we live in a material world. Nope, they keep proving that we do not. I can prove that if one exists, two can. I cannot prove that if nothing exists anything can, that is the philosophical problem with the big bang theory.
Today I had another doctors appointment and am being a good little Pimpernel. As with all doctors appointments it ended with me getting blood drawn. I had a lovely young Phlebotomist who did a fine job. I met with a specialist in blood who said they were testing me to see if I had a genetic disease; but, he agreed that I probably do not and just have sleep apnea. He did however make sure to chastise me for smoking and tell me how bad my cholesterol was. I don't believe the two are related.
So, I picked up food, went home and am resting. I decided to read some stuff on the net and for whatever reason began looking up the history of the net. While doing so, it occurred to me that it has now been 20 years since I first got online. I was online before there was America Online and still have a Compuserve Account. I was online as part of the first ten million people in the world, my; but, I am getting old.
I first started using computers in 1972 when I was in Junior High. By the time I was in college I was using a mainframe to write statistical programs. I never sought out these things, wrong place at the wrong time and a passing interest. In 1989 I was one of the first people to use a personal pc in my organization. Again a fluke; but, I decided to be an early adopter and must say it has certainly been a part of my career. In 1992 or early 93, I was asked to investigate this thing called the internet because most of the systems people were not interested and were more focused on mainframe applications. Out of about 1,500 I had the only pc that even had access to the outside and one of about 40 for the whole organization.
I am telling you these things to explain the history of the internet as I saw it. In 1993 I decided to go online from home. I started trying out Prodigy and then Compuserve, AOL didn't come online till the end of the year. I would surf on Internet Bulletin Boards. Basically, you would direct dial into peoples servers that were shared with others. FTP was still primary and the everything was textual unless you downloaded it to your computer. By 1994 I decided to join an independent Internet Service Provider that had just opened locally. It was cheaper to have a local provider because back in the day you paid for long distance and used land lines, local calls were free. The local provider was a startup in a garage by a couple of Nasa employees for them and their friends. I ended up beta testing the original Microsoft Internet Explorer and showed the Nasa guys how to configure it for their server and then teaching some of their friends because everyone else was using Mosaic or Netscape browsers.
As part of my job I ended up learning to make web pages for my organization and was responsible for figuring out where this whole internet thing was going. I would go to seminars that seemed like Amway meetings where people tried to explain why the internet was going to be the next big thing; but, the reality was that nobody really knew what it was going to evolve into. At the time it was more of a social thing for the casual user and an academic and esoteric thing for those who had been involved in it for any real period of time.
In the beginning most web pages were all textual with maybe a picture or two. They looked like my blog but lacked a color background. Once AOL came online and people began using visuals rather than textual links, everything changed. The net became more and more visual and usage blew up. It also became more commercial, slowly at first; but, that grew too. As the internet grew, I did well in my career although I had long since stopped being directly involved in programming for it. I ended up being a high level administrator and managing, amongst many other sections, a systems section.
While I used to teach people how to use computers, it was always an aside and merely because I had been an early implementer that I even knew how to use them. After the internet became common place, I began asking people who owned it and nobody was ever able to tell me. Back in the day most people assumed that it was owned by AOL, Prodigy and Compuserve because they were the face of the internet on television; but, I had attended seminars and knew better. The internet was created and owned by our own Federal government. It was created by the precursor to DARPA and was still controlled by them. Well, the essence of it, the part that makes it function is controlled by them.
We used to call the internet the World Wide Web; but, it wasn't much. Internet usage was pretty much an American thing for it's first few public years. Being the jerk that I am, in 1995 I posted my own web page. It made fun of animal rights groups and I was quickly threatened with death. I kept it up anyways.
I never got into chat rooms; but, watched as they grew more and more popular. I never really used the social aspects of the net and didn't use it for financial transactions. I sort of just watched it change. It wasn't until about 1998 that I started using it for personal business, mostly e-mails because prior I didn't know many people who had e-mail.
Of all the things I have seen in my life, the internet has made the greatest impact. The internet has made bigger changes in this world than the computer did in and of itself. The personal computer gave people abilities that they never had before; but, the internet made people want to use the pc and made it easy. Smart phones are nothing more than small pcs with access to the internet. In the future, everything will be connected to the internet, they call this "the internet of things"; but, what does that really mean?
The internet of things means that everything you do will be monitored, assisted and managed online where it can be seen by anyone who is smart enough to. It means that you will be able to access and control every part of your life using your phone. Pluses and minuses to all technologies.
I had intended to write about ICANN and how 13 servers rule the world. Someone had written about how that is no longer true; but, they were either trying or were too young to really understand. The internet is still controlled by 13 root servers, those root servers now have slave servers; but, the essence remains the same at a time when it does not need to. Of those 13, only a few are truly public. All of them are still under contract with the federal government.
That is my boring history of the internet, now, let me tell you why it matters. Yes, the government can see everything that happens on the internet. When people used to have individually owned servers running bulletin boards that were not connected to the world wide web it was different. Those days are not likely to come back.
YouTube - CBC Archives: The Internet 1993
YouTube - 1993 The Internet The Computer Chronicles
YouTube - The Internet As It Was In 1996
Yahoo - The Internet as seen in 1997
Iana - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority - Root Servers. If you really want to understand the fundamentals of the internet, this is the website. Just go through their links. Look at how boring a page they have visually, just like my blog. As you go through the servers, you will discover one of the thirteen was controlled by Nasa at the Ames Research Center. I wonder if that is where the guys from Nasa that I knew when I got my internet account worked? I will never know as I lost touch with them years ago.
Wikipedia - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority
IANA is nothing more than another government contractor, just like the one that Snowden worked for. ICANN is nothing more than another government contractor just like the one Snowden worked for. The internet is controlled by 13 servers and one of them is a secret. Younger systems people that think they get it will tell you that there are more than 13; but, they don't understand how each of those sets is still controlled by the 13. The government can shut down the whole internet and is the only group that can restart it. That mean they have a copy of everything that is and has been on the internet. It was the whole purpose of the thing when it was created.
For anyone who has read my blog for any period of time, it should be apparent that I keep a sharp eye on technology. I am not a systems person officially and gave up on programming a long time ago; but, I understand organization and infrastructure and I understand the internet and computers. One of the most fundamental things that systems people get wrong is that they think in a paradigm that is by definition wrong.
Computers are really just a series of numbers. The numbers are 0 and 1. It is a logical assumption that every choice can be either yes or no; but, that assumes their can be an absolute 0. There cannot be an absolute 0 because there is a 1. If I know for a fact that there is one thing in the universe then there cannot be a nothing in the universe. The act of being aware of this means that there can be more than one thing. This is sort of philosophy 101. All computers assume that there can be an absolute 0 which means their base programming is incomplete and can never be fixed. In simple terms, systems people assume that there is such a thing as an absolute 0 and base all their calculations on that possibility and therefore can and must be flawed in their understanding.
Let me put this in a theological manner. Nonexistence is not a possibility in the universe because you exist. To attempt to prove that you do not would be completely illogical, to try and prove that you could not has the same consequence. The only thing one is left with is to attempt that they can cease to exist; but, it means others could. The same cannot be said of the material world. Quantum physics cannot prove that we live in a material world. Nope, they keep proving that we do not. I can prove that if one exists, two can. I cannot prove that if nothing exists anything can, that is the philosophical problem with the big bang theory.
Must the Mainstream Media Spin Everything
A friend had invited me to dinner. I had accepted; but, after church I was very tired and took a nap. When he got here he said I looked a little pale and maybe we should reschedule; but, I wanted to have dinner with him so we went out. I was so tired that we ended up coming back earlier than intended. I guess I am still adjusting to my new medications.
It is getting harder and harder to find straight news. Every outlet now resorts to spinning every story to some agenda. It used to be that the mainstream media that was worthy of respect tried to be objective. All we see now is a rush to make every story have a morality lesson. That is opinion influencing, not reporting.
CNN - Where Obamacare premiums will soar. Lets start with the title, it says that Obamacare premiums will go up and that is just incorrect. Worse, the author knows better so it is a lie. There is no Obamacare premium, the health law did not set any rate for insurance and it is not government insurance, it is still private insurance companies. What he later explains in the article is that some states allow insurance companies to offer plans with little if any benefits and allow the insurance companies to exclude sick people from getting insurance. Those plans would need to offer more benefits, like hospital stays, and that will increase what they charge.
The article is basically propaganda with a political agenda. Now, you may or may not agree with the agenda; but, the presentation is overly biased for an organization that claims to be a news agency. My blog is not a news agency, it is commentary, it is opinion and that is how I describe it. If the article from CNN had been labeled as opinion that would be one thing; but, is is in the Financial section.
What some states allow is that insurance companies can charge small rates when someone is young and healthy and increase the rate as you get older or sick. In addition they can refuse you insurance as you get older or sick. Basically, it is insurance that only makes economic sense for those who don't need it and is refused to those who will or do. It is like life insurance that costs more as you age and need it less. Eventually you pull out of the plan and never get the benefit of the 30 years that you paid the premium. The article could have been titled, "Under Obamacare some states will be required to let everyone have insurance". In my opinion that title would also have been propaganda; but, at least it would have been an accurate title. An objective title might have been, "The economic costs in different states "under the new healthcare laws". It is okay for reporters to explain the effects of things without taking a position.
CNBC - Spreads show 'big trades' for US, emerging stocks.
Mail Online - Could this be the end of cash-in-hand? New Chip and PIN device for tradesmen is launched (but will anyone actually buy it?). Just another example of how we make all transactions electronic.
The SLOG - GLOBAL LOOTING: The new EU bailin law was passed 8 days ago….did you notice?. I don't follow this blog and know nothing about it. The only point is that the EU has agreed with the IMF, the Eurozone, Canada and the United States, we will have bail ins.
The Telegraph - 56 police hurt in Belfast riots. A number of years ago in Northern Ireland, the Protestant government made a law that allowed the government to keep Catholics in jail without a trial. Some celebrate that change in the law and some do not. Here is the thing that they miss in Northern Ireland, those laws can now be used against all their citizens if they wish to reapply them and they now have a history of allowing such things. In the 1940s we placed the Japanese in "internment" camps. Now, I will make a statement that is both right and wrong. Wrong morally, correct factually.
In the United States, we had legal slavery and it was a horrible and morally wrong thing. What we did to the Japanese-Americans was less morally wrong; but, worse from a legal standpoint. In both cases we took away people's freedoms. The slaves were treated worse; but, in both cases they were prisoners. Slavery was legal under the constitution and the constitution allowed us to change the rules and abolish slavery. The internment of the Japanese was unconstitutional and yet, it was allowed to be done anyways. What if in 1776, the northern states had created a federal government where slavery was illegal and the southern states had created a nation where it was legal. Would we still have slavery in the south today? What if the civil war had never happened because we had never been a United States?
Now, lets get back to the Northern Ireland story. Can you imagine white people marching through little Tokyo to celebrate when we put all the Japanese into internment camps in the west during World War II? Can you imagine people celebrating destroying their own rule of law? What would you think if large groups of young white men attacked black people for celebrating Martin Luther King day? What we allow to be done to others is what we allow the government to do to us all. If you cheat your friends, you are saying it is morally okay for crooks to cheat you.
People - Eydie Gormé Dies, Singing Legend Was 84. Just to show that even in Hollywood, marriages can work.
ABC - Can You Pass This 8th Grade Exam From 1912?. This article has been placed all over the internet and media. What is the point of it because no, most people could not pass the test today because we are not taught the same things today. The article is propaganda for "Common Core", it is aimed at conservatives and appeals to their wish to have education get "back to basics". It all goes back to spin. Spin is appealing to something you know that should be done; but, it appeals to your emotion and ignores the details that are unpleasant.
Let me attempt to make up an example. Can we all agree that every school child should learn their ABC's and that every child should learn to count? Now if I define that as a common core curriculum that should be in every school, who would argue the point? It sounds pretty good when you look at it that way. Now, if I say that every child will be taught the exact same thing and that will include history and sociology and government and other areas where there is not universal agreement, would you feel the same? Now lets look at how this works.
If I am teaching History, there is no one answer. If I teach someone to count to 100, the answer is the same for everyone. When I was growing up, we were taught to count to 100; but, then the new math came in. It sought to make math relative and one of the first things kids learned was number sets that they would never use and didn't help them learn to understand math. They started by teaching kids that we had a base ten number system; but, that we could have a base six, seven, two or any other number system. The problem was that we don't have a base six number system, we have a base ten number system. So, why spend all that time teaching kids that there were alternatives to the numerical system that we used. Well, the intent was to get us to move to the European metric system for everything and the law actually required that we do it. We just refused to learn it. The purpose of having a federal mandate on education is not about making sure that kids learn to read and write and add. It is about being able to control what they learn about history and geography and the social studies. It is about conformity of belief.
We allow our world view to be manipulated when we only listen to what we want to believe. The more we seek answers that fit into our existing world view and the less we consider alternative views, the easier it is to manipulate us. The media is degraded to the point of two people yelling slogans at each other. Now, I want to talk about Trayvon Martin again.
Lets say you are a 15 year old white kid wearing a nice suit while returning from working at a charity for homeless people all day. As you are walking home thinking about how you are going to feed even more people tomorrow, you spot a 22 year old black man following you in his car. You call your friend and she tells you that there has been a rash of older black men catching and raping young white boys. You tell your pursuer to leave you alone and he doesn't. Might you attempt to protect yourself and attack him first. In Florida you have the right to stand your ground.
The media has sought to portray both Mr. Martin and Mr. Zimmerman. They either wish to portray Mr. Martin as just another black kid being abused by a white guy or as a wanna be thug. Mr. Zimmerman is either portrayed as a valiant young man trying to defend others or a hateful bigot. Assume any combination you want and you miss the real point, guilt or innocence. The question is about what someone should be able to do on a neighborhood watch. Should they be allowed to follow people? If you say yes then the next question is should they be allowed to stop people and ask them questions? Should the cops be allowed to stop anyone for no reason and force you to tell them what you are doing? That is wrong thinking. I see people like Mr. Ted Nugent saying that we live in a police state and that our rights are being violated while also saying that Mr. Zimmerman was right to kill Mr. Martin while ignoring the fact that Mr. Zimmerman was doing exactly what Mr. Nugent believes the government should not be allowed to do. The media presents us with the thoughts of a complete idiot (Mr Nugent) while avoiding the bigger issues about how we should treat one another when we don't have prior experience with each other.
Mr. Zimmerman is half Cuban. He is a person of color. Still there are those who portray him as "white" because one of his parents is. The president also has a white parent; but, most would consider him black. Still, there are those who will say the president is black and that Zimmerman is white. While issues of color are still in people's minds, the question we can deal with is how we write our laws and what it means to break them. I cannot look into the soul of another; but, I can question whether or not a person has a right to stop me on the street and demand that I explain myself to them.
Now, lets look at the court case. Mr. Zimmerman was found not guilty. By definition, the jury found that in Florida, you have the right to follow someone and approach them, at night, and demand that they explain themselves to you. They are not entitled to attack you even if they feel threatened. If they do, you can kill them. That is the law that was upheld and that we all get to live under in Florida. The real question was how could this all have been avoided and that if it did occur because one of the parties was a horrible person they would have been prosecuted or let go because they stayed within the law and the law was just. I think the media focused too much on the unknowns and ignored what could have been knows.
Oprah Winfrey compared Trayvon Martin to another case. The other case involved a young black man who flirted with a young girl. Some white guys kidnapped him and killed him. She is as bad as Ted Nugent. Lets assume this young black man was a gang member and a drug dealer and even wanted to take advantage of the young white girl. Would you think it was okay for him to be kidnapped, tortured and killed or could we find a way to outlaw kidnapping, torturing and killing regardless of race or even who?
What if the law in Florida said that it was okay to follow people and even stop them; but, that if you did, they had a right to protect themselves and force you to leave them alone? What if that law said that once you stopped someone, you would go to jail for life or suffer the death penalty if you wrongfully stopped them? Mr. Martin has not once been accused of breaking and entering or committing any crime prior to being stopped.
The reason I took so long to talk about the case is because I wanted everyone to establish their positions first. Now, we can examine how we were manipulated into taking polarizing positions and re-consider the choices that were presented to us. The media has ceased being objective because they are fighting over readers and if we can get the left to follow the Huffington Post and the right to follow Fox News, the two most polarizing media groups both make money. The sides are chosen and the truth becomes spin. If we read everything through our per-conceived and comfortable biases, sometimes we may understand the facts and sometimes we will be wrong; but, our analysis will always be wrong because we based it on our biases.
It is getting harder and harder to find straight news. Every outlet now resorts to spinning every story to some agenda. It used to be that the mainstream media that was worthy of respect tried to be objective. All we see now is a rush to make every story have a morality lesson. That is opinion influencing, not reporting.
CNN - Where Obamacare premiums will soar. Lets start with the title, it says that Obamacare premiums will go up and that is just incorrect. Worse, the author knows better so it is a lie. There is no Obamacare premium, the health law did not set any rate for insurance and it is not government insurance, it is still private insurance companies. What he later explains in the article is that some states allow insurance companies to offer plans with little if any benefits and allow the insurance companies to exclude sick people from getting insurance. Those plans would need to offer more benefits, like hospital stays, and that will increase what they charge.
The article is basically propaganda with a political agenda. Now, you may or may not agree with the agenda; but, the presentation is overly biased for an organization that claims to be a news agency. My blog is not a news agency, it is commentary, it is opinion and that is how I describe it. If the article from CNN had been labeled as opinion that would be one thing; but, is is in the Financial section.
What some states allow is that insurance companies can charge small rates when someone is young and healthy and increase the rate as you get older or sick. In addition they can refuse you insurance as you get older or sick. Basically, it is insurance that only makes economic sense for those who don't need it and is refused to those who will or do. It is like life insurance that costs more as you age and need it less. Eventually you pull out of the plan and never get the benefit of the 30 years that you paid the premium. The article could have been titled, "Under Obamacare some states will be required to let everyone have insurance". In my opinion that title would also have been propaganda; but, at least it would have been an accurate title. An objective title might have been, "The economic costs in different states "under the new healthcare laws". It is okay for reporters to explain the effects of things without taking a position.
CNBC - Spreads show 'big trades' for US, emerging stocks.
Mail Online - Could this be the end of cash-in-hand? New Chip and PIN device for tradesmen is launched (but will anyone actually buy it?). Just another example of how we make all transactions electronic.
The SLOG - GLOBAL LOOTING: The new EU bailin law was passed 8 days ago….did you notice?. I don't follow this blog and know nothing about it. The only point is that the EU has agreed with the IMF, the Eurozone, Canada and the United States, we will have bail ins.
The Telegraph - 56 police hurt in Belfast riots. A number of years ago in Northern Ireland, the Protestant government made a law that allowed the government to keep Catholics in jail without a trial. Some celebrate that change in the law and some do not. Here is the thing that they miss in Northern Ireland, those laws can now be used against all their citizens if they wish to reapply them and they now have a history of allowing such things. In the 1940s we placed the Japanese in "internment" camps. Now, I will make a statement that is both right and wrong. Wrong morally, correct factually.
In the United States, we had legal slavery and it was a horrible and morally wrong thing. What we did to the Japanese-Americans was less morally wrong; but, worse from a legal standpoint. In both cases we took away people's freedoms. The slaves were treated worse; but, in both cases they were prisoners. Slavery was legal under the constitution and the constitution allowed us to change the rules and abolish slavery. The internment of the Japanese was unconstitutional and yet, it was allowed to be done anyways. What if in 1776, the northern states had created a federal government where slavery was illegal and the southern states had created a nation where it was legal. Would we still have slavery in the south today? What if the civil war had never happened because we had never been a United States?
Now, lets get back to the Northern Ireland story. Can you imagine white people marching through little Tokyo to celebrate when we put all the Japanese into internment camps in the west during World War II? Can you imagine people celebrating destroying their own rule of law? What would you think if large groups of young white men attacked black people for celebrating Martin Luther King day? What we allow to be done to others is what we allow the government to do to us all. If you cheat your friends, you are saying it is morally okay for crooks to cheat you.
People - Eydie Gormé Dies, Singing Legend Was 84. Just to show that even in Hollywood, marriages can work.
ABC - Can You Pass This 8th Grade Exam From 1912?. This article has been placed all over the internet and media. What is the point of it because no, most people could not pass the test today because we are not taught the same things today. The article is propaganda for "Common Core", it is aimed at conservatives and appeals to their wish to have education get "back to basics". It all goes back to spin. Spin is appealing to something you know that should be done; but, it appeals to your emotion and ignores the details that are unpleasant.
Let me attempt to make up an example. Can we all agree that every school child should learn their ABC's and that every child should learn to count? Now if I define that as a common core curriculum that should be in every school, who would argue the point? It sounds pretty good when you look at it that way. Now, if I say that every child will be taught the exact same thing and that will include history and sociology and government and other areas where there is not universal agreement, would you feel the same? Now lets look at how this works.
If I am teaching History, there is no one answer. If I teach someone to count to 100, the answer is the same for everyone. When I was growing up, we were taught to count to 100; but, then the new math came in. It sought to make math relative and one of the first things kids learned was number sets that they would never use and didn't help them learn to understand math. They started by teaching kids that we had a base ten number system; but, that we could have a base six, seven, two or any other number system. The problem was that we don't have a base six number system, we have a base ten number system. So, why spend all that time teaching kids that there were alternatives to the numerical system that we used. Well, the intent was to get us to move to the European metric system for everything and the law actually required that we do it. We just refused to learn it. The purpose of having a federal mandate on education is not about making sure that kids learn to read and write and add. It is about being able to control what they learn about history and geography and the social studies. It is about conformity of belief.
We allow our world view to be manipulated when we only listen to what we want to believe. The more we seek answers that fit into our existing world view and the less we consider alternative views, the easier it is to manipulate us. The media is degraded to the point of two people yelling slogans at each other. Now, I want to talk about Trayvon Martin again.
Lets say you are a 15 year old white kid wearing a nice suit while returning from working at a charity for homeless people all day. As you are walking home thinking about how you are going to feed even more people tomorrow, you spot a 22 year old black man following you in his car. You call your friend and she tells you that there has been a rash of older black men catching and raping young white boys. You tell your pursuer to leave you alone and he doesn't. Might you attempt to protect yourself and attack him first. In Florida you have the right to stand your ground.
The media has sought to portray both Mr. Martin and Mr. Zimmerman. They either wish to portray Mr. Martin as just another black kid being abused by a white guy or as a wanna be thug. Mr. Zimmerman is either portrayed as a valiant young man trying to defend others or a hateful bigot. Assume any combination you want and you miss the real point, guilt or innocence. The question is about what someone should be able to do on a neighborhood watch. Should they be allowed to follow people? If you say yes then the next question is should they be allowed to stop people and ask them questions? Should the cops be allowed to stop anyone for no reason and force you to tell them what you are doing? That is wrong thinking. I see people like Mr. Ted Nugent saying that we live in a police state and that our rights are being violated while also saying that Mr. Zimmerman was right to kill Mr. Martin while ignoring the fact that Mr. Zimmerman was doing exactly what Mr. Nugent believes the government should not be allowed to do. The media presents us with the thoughts of a complete idiot (Mr Nugent) while avoiding the bigger issues about how we should treat one another when we don't have prior experience with each other.
Mr. Zimmerman is half Cuban. He is a person of color. Still there are those who portray him as "white" because one of his parents is. The president also has a white parent; but, most would consider him black. Still, there are those who will say the president is black and that Zimmerman is white. While issues of color are still in people's minds, the question we can deal with is how we write our laws and what it means to break them. I cannot look into the soul of another; but, I can question whether or not a person has a right to stop me on the street and demand that I explain myself to them.
Now, lets look at the court case. Mr. Zimmerman was found not guilty. By definition, the jury found that in Florida, you have the right to follow someone and approach them, at night, and demand that they explain themselves to you. They are not entitled to attack you even if they feel threatened. If they do, you can kill them. That is the law that was upheld and that we all get to live under in Florida. The real question was how could this all have been avoided and that if it did occur because one of the parties was a horrible person they would have been prosecuted or let go because they stayed within the law and the law was just. I think the media focused too much on the unknowns and ignored what could have been knows.
Oprah Winfrey compared Trayvon Martin to another case. The other case involved a young black man who flirted with a young girl. Some white guys kidnapped him and killed him. She is as bad as Ted Nugent. Lets assume this young black man was a gang member and a drug dealer and even wanted to take advantage of the young white girl. Would you think it was okay for him to be kidnapped, tortured and killed or could we find a way to outlaw kidnapping, torturing and killing regardless of race or even who?
What if the law in Florida said that it was okay to follow people and even stop them; but, that if you did, they had a right to protect themselves and force you to leave them alone? What if that law said that once you stopped someone, you would go to jail for life or suffer the death penalty if you wrongfully stopped them? Mr. Martin has not once been accused of breaking and entering or committing any crime prior to being stopped.
The reason I took so long to talk about the case is because I wanted everyone to establish their positions first. Now, we can examine how we were manipulated into taking polarizing positions and re-consider the choices that were presented to us. The media has ceased being objective because they are fighting over readers and if we can get the left to follow the Huffington Post and the right to follow Fox News, the two most polarizing media groups both make money. The sides are chosen and the truth becomes spin. If we read everything through our per-conceived and comfortable biases, sometimes we may understand the facts and sometimes we will be wrong; but, our analysis will always be wrong because we based it on our biases.
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Financial Oddities and Educational Destruction
Yahoo - Reuters - Japan $80 billion public fund may shift funds to stocks from bonds: sources. See, they want to steal pensions worldwide. This will end very badly. Their pension fund has $1.2 trillion in assets mainly in the form of secure government bonds. There is no claim that the fund is in trouble; but, the money is going into their stock market where there is high risk. It is therefore just a matter of time.
Global Research - The Detroit Bail-In Template: Fleecing Pensioners to Save the Banks. This is one of the few articles I have read that pointed out that bail-ins have already become the chosen method for future bank failures and even discusses the G20s part in the plan.
Bloomberg - NYC’s Good Times May Sour Like Detroit’s, Bloomberg Warns. It doesn't matter where you go all the politicians blame our problems on public pensions. It doesn't matter that people went to jail for taking bribes over the New York pensions. He also wants to change the healthcare plans, here is a line from the article, "“We will seek a data-driven, modern health-care plan that will focus on prevention, provide higher-quality care,” the mayor said. He estimated the savings at $400 million a year." What is a data driven health care plan? It sounds good; but, what does it mean? It means that employees will be required to have their health monitored and participate in mandatory health programs. I cannot believe the people of New York ever voted for Bloomberg.
Yahoo - Sun's magnetic field "is about to flip", warns NASA. It happens regularly; but, there has been more talk about it this time.
Huffington Post - Common Core Standards Already Being Taught Despite Political Controversy, Survey Shows. Common Core is just one more step in destroying the educational system. Here is a quote from the article, "Recently, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) came out against Common Core, saying that "curriculum reform should be done at the state level."". This is basically the same thing I wrote about in my last post. We are nationalizing what kids are taught while also ensuring that fewer and fewer will ever attend college.
Yahoo - Reuters - Nikkei leads Asian stocks lower; dollar dips. To be specific, their stock market just lost 4% in one day. Sounds like the perfect market to invest all those Japanese pensions in.
Global Research - The Detroit Bail-In Template: Fleecing Pensioners to Save the Banks. This is one of the few articles I have read that pointed out that bail-ins have already become the chosen method for future bank failures and even discusses the G20s part in the plan.
Bloomberg - NYC’s Good Times May Sour Like Detroit’s, Bloomberg Warns. It doesn't matter where you go all the politicians blame our problems on public pensions. It doesn't matter that people went to jail for taking bribes over the New York pensions. He also wants to change the healthcare plans, here is a line from the article, "“We will seek a data-driven, modern health-care plan that will focus on prevention, provide higher-quality care,” the mayor said. He estimated the savings at $400 million a year." What is a data driven health care plan? It sounds good; but, what does it mean? It means that employees will be required to have their health monitored and participate in mandatory health programs. I cannot believe the people of New York ever voted for Bloomberg.
Yahoo - Sun's magnetic field "is about to flip", warns NASA. It happens regularly; but, there has been more talk about it this time.
Huffington Post - Common Core Standards Already Being Taught Despite Political Controversy, Survey Shows. Common Core is just one more step in destroying the educational system. Here is a quote from the article, "Recently, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) came out against Common Core, saying that "curriculum reform should be done at the state level."". This is basically the same thing I wrote about in my last post. We are nationalizing what kids are taught while also ensuring that fewer and fewer will ever attend college.
Yahoo - Reuters - Nikkei leads Asian stocks lower; dollar dips. To be specific, their stock market just lost 4% in one day. Sounds like the perfect market to invest all those Japanese pensions in.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Take Your Time and Watch Some Informational Stuff
CNBC - Bond market takes violent turn, but Fed taper seems on track
New York Times - Health Care Law Raises Pressure on Public Unions. It is sad how gullible the public is. People who believe that Obamacare will be more expensive are also supporting putting all government workers on it. Huh? In either case a bigger trick is being played.
New York Times - A Plan to Avert the Pension Crisis. Municipalities are failing to contribute to their public pensions, that is the bottom line. The real game being played is that civil servants are seeing a better than 10% pay reduction. By having them fully fund their pensions our of their salary, they are constructively seeing a pay cut. We can agree or disagree as to whether or not this is necessary; but, the pension and health care excuse is just that.
NBC News - CNBC - Pandemic of pension woes is plaguing the nation. More of the same.
YouTube - English News Today - Keiser Report: Fake it till you make it or Potemkin Policies.
Now I want to explain how Quantitative Easing works. QE is basically where the Federal Reserve buys up about $85 billion a month in bad mortgage debt. At the same time the Federal Reserve and other central banks throughout the world are also lending money to banks at about 0% interest. The banks take this money and then buy other assets to hold onto that pay 2% interest, for instance. The amount of profit is on the difference between what they borrow the money for and what they either loan it out for or invest it in. The amount made off of the difference is in the hundreds of billions of dollars and is kept by the banks. The Federal Reserve could do the same deal with local municipalities and the profit would then transfer to the municipalities which would then be able to continue services and meet their obligations. That would then increase consumer spending.
This begs the question, why is the Federal Reserve and the federal government failing to help municipalities? In my opinion it is to straighten the power of the Federal government by weakening the strength of states and local governments. Lets look at schools. Schools have traditionally been funded by the local government and were free to set their criteria based on local employment realities. In Detroit all the schools taught auto class. Now schools seek and get federal funding for their programs so long as they follow the federal guidelines. The same thing is now happening with healthcare and you know what, most people will support it. Next up, somehow the federal government is going to take charge of the public pensions, it could happen through bankruptcy proceedings or willingly by offering some sort of guaranteed national pension program insuring all promised benefits that have already vested and putting limitations on future participants. The price tag will be turning over all of the existing assets held by local and state public pensions.
The big move is not about healthcare, it is not about salaries, it is not about public pensions, it is about the federalization of local decision making. That is the real transfer of power. There is and was an alternative. The Federal government "gives" the states money do do what the states should be doing already. If the Federal government taxed less, the states could tax more with no additional burden on the tax payer. If the Federal government charged you 1 cent less on each dollar of income and the states then taxed for just that 1 cent, your total tax is a wash, it is the same; but, the difference is that the control over how the 1 cent was spent would be left up to the states and not the Federal government.
The Federal government now has control over healtcare, water, roads, farming, schooling, the list goes on and on and it is not the way it was 50 years ago. Currently, the biggest bully in the room has been the banks and the game is complete when they get broken up, just like is outlined in the BOE-FDIC paper I previously linked to.
New York Times - Health Care Law Raises Pressure on Public Unions. It is sad how gullible the public is. People who believe that Obamacare will be more expensive are also supporting putting all government workers on it. Huh? In either case a bigger trick is being played.
New York Times - A Plan to Avert the Pension Crisis. Municipalities are failing to contribute to their public pensions, that is the bottom line. The real game being played is that civil servants are seeing a better than 10% pay reduction. By having them fully fund their pensions our of their salary, they are constructively seeing a pay cut. We can agree or disagree as to whether or not this is necessary; but, the pension and health care excuse is just that.
NBC News - CNBC - Pandemic of pension woes is plaguing the nation. More of the same.
YouTube - English News Today - Keiser Report: Fake it till you make it or Potemkin Policies.
Now I want to explain how Quantitative Easing works. QE is basically where the Federal Reserve buys up about $85 billion a month in bad mortgage debt. At the same time the Federal Reserve and other central banks throughout the world are also lending money to banks at about 0% interest. The banks take this money and then buy other assets to hold onto that pay 2% interest, for instance. The amount of profit is on the difference between what they borrow the money for and what they either loan it out for or invest it in. The amount made off of the difference is in the hundreds of billions of dollars and is kept by the banks. The Federal Reserve could do the same deal with local municipalities and the profit would then transfer to the municipalities which would then be able to continue services and meet their obligations. That would then increase consumer spending.
This begs the question, why is the Federal Reserve and the federal government failing to help municipalities? In my opinion it is to straighten the power of the Federal government by weakening the strength of states and local governments. Lets look at schools. Schools have traditionally been funded by the local government and were free to set their criteria based on local employment realities. In Detroit all the schools taught auto class. Now schools seek and get federal funding for their programs so long as they follow the federal guidelines. The same thing is now happening with healthcare and you know what, most people will support it. Next up, somehow the federal government is going to take charge of the public pensions, it could happen through bankruptcy proceedings or willingly by offering some sort of guaranteed national pension program insuring all promised benefits that have already vested and putting limitations on future participants. The price tag will be turning over all of the existing assets held by local and state public pensions.
The big move is not about healthcare, it is not about salaries, it is not about public pensions, it is about the federalization of local decision making. That is the real transfer of power. There is and was an alternative. The Federal government "gives" the states money do do what the states should be doing already. If the Federal government taxed less, the states could tax more with no additional burden on the tax payer. If the Federal government charged you 1 cent less on each dollar of income and the states then taxed for just that 1 cent, your total tax is a wash, it is the same; but, the difference is that the control over how the 1 cent was spent would be left up to the states and not the Federal government.
The Federal government now has control over healtcare, water, roads, farming, schooling, the list goes on and on and it is not the way it was 50 years ago. Currently, the biggest bully in the room has been the banks and the game is complete when they get broken up, just like is outlined in the BOE-FDIC paper I previously linked to.
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