Debt Rattle May 3 2019

 

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  • #47102

    Paul Klee In angel’s care (In Engelshut) 1931   • Day of the Long Knives (Kassam) • Is The Media Driving America Insane? (LN) • How The News Took
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle May 3 2019]

    #47103

    Continuing from yesterday’s thread, and Chris M’s comment about lawmakers wanting lawyers to question Barr because they don’t know the law: First, many of them are lawyers themselves. And second, as the GOP said (see the video above): “Over the 206-year history of this committee, staff have never questioned witnesses in an oversight hearing. Never. Not once. So, to say Chairman Nadler’s demands are unprecedented would be an understatement.”

    They’re afraid of Barr, it would seem. Well, the first indictments are about to hit home. You think it’s ugly now, just watch.

    #47104
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Another, superb, reality bending Calvin and Hobbes…

    On another note: I thought it rather interesting that Ron Paul said that Guaido is now at the point of being more useful to the U.S. if he were dead/killed.
    He’d be perfect for a false flag op right about now…
    The U.S. would/could use that to launch a military op against Maduro.
    Let’s hope the fat one and the Stache are smarter than that.
    Lavrov, apparently, made it pretty clear (in a phone call made by the fat one) that Russia and China will have none of that.

    #47105
    democritus
    Participant

    According to https://www.theccc.org.uk/publications/ we don’t need to change our driving habits. We just need to have electric cars. And then we need to have time of day tariffs, to stop the grid collapsing. This is madness. How much will electricity cost when it is used by all the cars?

    As for Facebook, don’t worry, I am not on there either. I think it is a good place for the masses to congregate and leave the rest of the internet smart people like me.

    #47106
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Don’t worry abou that: we don’t have a grid, we are not upgrading it AT ALL, and are actively closing all kinds of power plants.

    So never fear you will be driving your electric cars: you won’t. The cities will go dark.

    #47107
    Dr. D
    Participant

    The Angel’s Care looks like Casper the holy ghost.

    “Day of the Long Knives (Kassam)”

    They are doing a lot of this, and unfortunately, it’s very often a result of slander, which is difficult and expensive to prosecute. This is a great example of why, if a thing is legal, it must be allowed on Facebook, Twitter;,allowed to be in McDonald’s or WalMart, because otherwise, one crank claims something spurious and you’re banned because the company doesn’t care and doesn’t have time to pursue whether it’s true or not. –And mostly on purpose.

    But this is why IF your rights are going to be removed, like being unable to go into a restaurant, a store, THEN your case must be adjudicated in a court of law. Instead, you are being adjudicated by how popular you are to a far-distant billionaire who could care less about you, or even hates you from his(her) own personal prejudices. So if it’s legal, it should be allowed, and allowed unless a judge or someone says, “Oi! Calling for violent X is a thing you can serve time for!” P.S. as it always has been, since the begining of the West.

    Far, far crazier – if such a thing is even possible these days – is that they are now banning a friend-of-a-friend, who followed somebody, who had dinner once with someone who is banned. No one can defend against that level of nonsense, which is of course arbitrary in the extreme. …Exactly as long-wished, and published since 1949. So we can ban all my enemies, and move all their (collapsing) ad revenue to my friends, and even better, PRETEND we’re being high-and-mighty, just “following the rules” with great equality and restraint. Because it’s really the ILLUSION of truth, the ILLUSION of justice, heck, the ILLUSION rule and law other than arbitrary one for my enemies, that they are defending. If everyone knew they were lying, conniving, psychopathic billionaires roaming the earth killing people at whim in a quest for more power, the game would be off. YOU have to believe them, and believe they AREN’T banning any argument they don’t like. …And the friend of a friend of a friend who once made that argument.

    Note above, being poor, gay, Jewish, female, black, whatever, is no defense whatsoever. They beat these people in the streets as well as off “ultra-progressive” Facebook and Twitter. The only thing that matters is your politics and whether you obey the billionaire lords. Because isn’t publicly disagreeing with a billionaire really hate speech?

    “The media is in this game for two reasons: 1) To earn a profit, and 2) to achieve their political objectives. They have no incentive to inform rather than persuade.”

    Except for the part about earning a profit. They are not making those, or sacrificing them by the $275 millions to pursue part 2). So the point of media is what, Mr. Bernays?

    “But Trump’s eclipse of all other news”

    Ugh. And that fact is entirely due to The Guardian. Without them, he’s just some guy.

    “Did international media and free press advocates who once celebrated Assange, utilized his revelations and heaped awards on Wikileaks, collectively agreed to abandon their erstwhile hero?”

    Duh yes. And why? He told the truth, which is a thing they won’t do and don’t want. They will applaud him getting shived then chopped up in Belmarsh or the American Embassy. Yay! Truth no more!

    “Democrats Rage at Empty Chair as Barr Misses Mueller Hearing (ZH)”

    That chicken was pretty funny.

    “Ukrainian Embassy Confirms DNC Contractor Solicited Trump Dirt in 2016 (Hill)”

    No matter how many crimes committed, how many murders, bank frauds, intel sales, uranium handouts, it doesn’t matter, because it’s My Side, Right or Wrong™. It only matters if the billionaires on CNN and Facebook like it. Then it’s okay and legal. When they don’t like it, didn’t profit by it, it’s horrible bad bad bad, wrong and illegal. Easy, see? It just changes every second depending on what they’re thinking, and you need to know what they want every moment of the day like a good slave, because “The law is in my mouth.” I mean, otherwise, why bother putting in every structure from 1984™ and make people defend, love, and adore the little piggies as equal masters?

    From Venezuela yesterday, I argued about the nonsense but not WHY. The why is that the compounding debt of the world monetary system is running exponential and is risking collapse. They had planned to have an event – as always! – to kill half the system in Russia, over a Syrian no-fly or elsewhere, and thereby blame “them”, and re-set the system under a new currency/rules while stealing their gas and selling it back to Europe. That stopped, and mankind reprieved for a moment or two, they have had to wander to and fro over the earth seeking someone to devour. Syria, Libya, Ukraine, Africa, specifically their massive gold.

    But with an exponential function, it’s never enough. It can never BE enough. And if it fails, the money masters will fail with them and their captive governments will break free. So as the function runs away, they need, I dunno, maybe 300B bbls x $60/bbl = $18 Trillion then hypothecated with fake bonds @ 400:1? If they don’t get this, they die. So you can’t get in their way right now, you have to let them fail on their own idiot-trust-fund-child failure and lose the earth on their own stupidity and blame. Hand them Pompeo, the CIA, and let them front idiot-child Guiado from George Washington U to the laughed off the streets of the nation for being moron. Moron? Yes, he trusted the CIA. And who is THAT dumb?

    And thus we have Venezuela or bust. And they will bust. And they will also show, not only can they not push China or Russia around, not only do they have no power in the middle east, not only have they lost Ukraine and can’t pick winners in Libya, they can’t even hold the Western Hemisphere, a mere 2,000 miles away, even when surrounded by a pack of poodle nations who will savage their own neighbors rather than tell the truth for 30 seconds. And when that’s gone, it’s gone. The U.S. will just be a place, and an empire no more.

    Downside: when the existing monetary system cracks, you won’t like it.

    #47110
    zerosum
    Participant

    “Because it’s really the ILLUSION of truth, the ILLUSION of justice, heck, the ILLUSION rule and law other than arbitrary one for my enemies, that they are defending.”

    TAE is unique in the blog world. What I like the most is the many sides of the truth that are presented.
    We are fortunate that we are getting a report of truths from all the blind observers.

    Here is My truth. Maybe you share some of my truth.
    Today’s image, Paul Klee In angel’s care (In Engelshut) 1931, is as solid as truth. There are 3 flimsy and transparent images.

    Does the truth hide behind the money, $?
    Maybe, truth lies behind oil.
    Maybe, truth hides behind power.
    The lies are everywhere pretending to be the truth.

    https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-02/maimed-yellow-vest-protestors-worse-getting-shot

    The French Flash-Ball gun should be made the symbol for the EU for it provides crushing repression of the masses with great PR spin to make it seem humane and caring. It is for our safety after all that they use these, right?

    #47111
    zerosum
    Participant

    Some people can explain truth better than me.
    see….

    Venezuela: It’s Only a Coup if the US Government Says So

    May 1, 2019
    Venezuela: It’s Only a Coup if the US Government Says So
    Media side with Trump cronies rather than common sense in labeling coup a ‘protest’
    Alan MacLeod

    #47112
    Chris M
    Participant

    Raul,

    I certainly wasn’t suggesting that was the only reason for them to bring in lawyers to do the questioning. I simply found it humorous, at first glance.

    Dark humor, perhaps.

    #47113
    zerosum
    Participant

    I don’t agree with the trend of having a beard. To me, being clean shaved is a visual sign to all, that I live in an advance social/economic structure that is capable of producing complex shaving tools. Not being able to shave will happen soon enough. I don’t need to rush to that moment.

    #47114
    Polder Dweller
    Participant

    Wow, Dr. D. I have to admit to being a bit of a searcher after doom porn from time to time, but your piece today about why takes the biscuit. Trouble is, I can’t fault your logic. I fear you’re right.

    As for the Klee, thanks zerosum, you’ve allowed me to appreciate a work I would normally dismiss.

    #47115
    PlanetaryCitizen
    Participant

    I personally don’t like Facebook and my participation in it is purely utilitarian (semi-non-existent) which annoys some of my friends and family, and I’ve never tweeted nor do I read tweets. That said Facebook is a private company and not required by any stretch of the imagination to allow purveyor’s of yellow journalism, hate speech, conspiracy theories, etc., (yes those are my words) to make a living off of Facebook’s platform. They have no right to free speech on Facebook! Actually, they have no rights what so ever! In the event Facebook, google, etc. become classified as media companies then the rules and laws change though what gets published will still be subject to an editorial board. The likes of Alex Jones and his ilk won’t likely be in the news feed. The web is a big place, if Jones et.al. can find a following, bully for them. There will still be restrictions on them even then. Fighting words, libel, etc.

    #47116
    PlanetaryCitizen
    Participant

    Perhaps oversight hearing and confirmation hearing are truly different animals but then again maybe it’s ultimate hair splitting. But I seem to recall just last year the Repubs used a lawyer to question a private citizen, Christine Blasey Ford, in the Kavanaugh hearing. Perhaps I’m mistaken? Some memories are shorter than others!

    #47118
    Dr. D
    Participant

    That MIGHT be true, except that a) they’re monopolies, which we claim to regulate, and more importantly b) they take billions in government dollars and always have.

    It shocks me that a high school football team can’t say an off-campus prayer because they took $10 from the feds, but Bezos can take $300M in CIA money, Google is a major AI/Drone defense contractor, and Facebook is the inheritor with the same code as the U.S. Army’s “LifeLog” site, and yet somehow they are NOT able liable to have free speech. Ain’t that a thing? It’s almost like the law only applies to the little people.

    This is in addition to how, as my example, WalMart can NOT kick you out of a store for off-site actions, or even for expressing opinions on-site. I mean, isn’t this EXACTLY what we fought in the Civil Rights movement, to say a private diner can NOT exclude any customers they wish, because they are PRIVATE entities? They are “Public Accommodations.” Yet when the billionaires at Facebook and PayPal erase their vocal critics and then whole political campaigns, they are NOT public accommodations. They can erase all the black, Jewish, or yes, Conservative people they want, any time they want, for any reason they want? Even when they take billions from the CIA and Congress, being their only profit and business model?

    Hey, let’s NOT reverse all of Civil Rights here? I don’t think any of us are on that side, and no one would like the results. You’re allowed free speech in WalMart, in McDonald’s, and yes, on Twitter.

    They ain’t free, and they ain’t private. They’re the corporate-state merger Mussolini warned about.

    Ask me about how, the minute they edit content, the are BY DEFINITION liable as publishers, which is another whole kettle of fish. Can’t have it both ways, people! If you don’t censor, you are a platform, great! If you DO censor –which you are — you’re legally liable for EVERYTHING ANYONE EVER POSTS. Have fun, suckers!

    #47119

    Many companies were once private enterprises, too many to mention, Standard Oil, AT&T, Bell, etc etc, and some still are, but nobody ever thought of giving them the choice of refusing customers just because they didn’t like them or their views. I think that sort of died with refusing them for the color of their skins. When these issues got out of hand in the past, for various reasons, the US government acted in decisive manners.

    What Facebook and Google are doing is very dangerous for the fabric of society. They’re turning us into China. It’s equal to saying: you cannot have a car, or gas, or a phone, a home. Because you grow a beard, or you have a crappy old car, or whatever.

    Or it’s like saying you cannot drive on a certain road, maybe that’s a better example. At some point infrastructure must be available to everyone. You can’t say: this is private, go build your own road, or put up your own telephone poles, because your skin is black and we don’t like that around here.

    Facebook is a private company is dead before you hit the water. Problem is, no politician wants to burn their hands on the issue, which they don’t understand to begin with, until it’s too late. It’s much easier to say: look over there, those guys don’t do anything either.

    #47121
    Glennda
    Participant

    <“Am I still the only one who thinks this is good news?
    • April US Auto Sales Crash 6.1%, Worst Slide In 8 Years (ZH) >

    That’s the best of news in this dismal time of lost freedom of speech.

    I’ve been re-reading Alice Friedemann’s “When Trucks Stop Running – Energy and the Future of Transportation.”

    Here in the SF Bay Area people are working towards 100% renewable electricity, but of course the catch is that trucks can’t use electricity without batteries, and the technology for batteries may never allow it become real. So “save” fossil fuels for the truck and decrease single occupancy autos. Gas prices in this area have risen from about $3 to $4 a gallon. People will just pay it. But… we will per-force have to cut back on all the many extravagant uses of fossil fuels. The sooner the better for a “Recession”. A Green New Deal could help, if not nationally, perhaps locally for a just transition of jobs from fossil fuels to rebuilding our infrastructure.

    Many city councils in the Bay Area are proclaiming a Climate Emergency, which actually makes state funds for emergencies available. An interesting strategy.

    As for 100% renewable electricity – I”m working with local 350 groups, city and county people to have a convening of the many groups in the area to work on the Emergency. We’ll see how that goes, probably very slowly.

    We also have a movement to Buy Out PG&E (with a budding Public Bank) which has declared bankruptcy, and make it actually owned by elected officials from counties served by it. PG&E admits negligence in maintaining the needed infrastructure. So it could happen. Additionally the 100% renewable energy electric service costs extra with a “100% carbon free” (that includes Nuclear) as a free option. (No nukes! I’ll be speaking against this option.)

    All of these issues are super tricky. I can only hope we can make it work well.

    As far as FB and depersoning people, that is the fad of our times. Such a nasty self righteous time we live in. I’ve had to deal with much of this in groups I work with.

    Thanks for posting about my hero Assange. I do enjoy reading you as part of my daily morning coffee and news.

    #47128
    PlanetaryCitizen
    Participant

    Facebook and Google are not monopolies. There is no overarching need for service such as Facebook and Google which is far different from Standard Oil and Bell Telephone which controlled important sectors necessary for society to function in its then current manifestation. No one needs to be on Facebook to function in life to their fullest extent. It is in reality a social network. If someone wants to communicate with “friends and family” they can send a letter with photos. I communicate with my daughter in Europe via Telegram (yes it’s via the internet). Facebook is just another avenue. I personally use Duck Duck Go as a search engine because it doesn’t keep a record of my searches. There are a whole host of other search engines. I also use hushmail as an email service because it’s a private service and I’m not a product like so many other so called free email services. Emails between hushmail participants is automatically encrypted. It’s also free up to so many megs. If I want to do move into the Gig range then I have to pay for the service which is rather nominal in the scheme of things, even for a poor person like me. Okay, so my margarita has rendered me too intellectually incapable to coherently to go on any further at this point. Ciao

    #47129
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
    Because I was not a socialist.

    Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
    Because I was not a trade unionist.

    Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
    Because I was not a Jew.

    Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
    “First they came …” is a poem written by the German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984).

    #47131
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    Wouldn’t it be better if the critics of fake news were careful to avoid exaggerations and misconceptions in what they themselves write?

    Some of the arguments above are neglecting to consider the distinctions regarding “protected groups” in the USA. Can the owner of the only bar and restaurant in town legally refuse to serve people he doesn’t like? As long as they aren’t members of a protected group, then it seems they can be discriminated against without legal repercussions.

    Look for a sign of the tensions, and you’ll find it on the front door of the one bar and restaurant in town, La Gitana Cantina. The owners have grown so fed up with the militias that they’ve posted a sign saying “UNWANTED: Members of any vigilante border militia group, including, but not limited to AZ Border Recon. Do Not Enter our establishment.
    “We’ve had confrontations with them about bringing their guns in here, or harassing people that work here,” says co-owner Maggie Milinovitch. “And so, we just put the sign up. You cannot come in.

    https://www.npr.org/2019/04/15/712264789/militias-test-the-civility-of-an-arizona-border-town

    “A protected group or protected class is a group of people qualified for special protection by a law, policy, or similar authority.
    U.S. federal law protects individuals from discrimination or harassment based on the following nine protected classes: sex, race, age, disability, color, creed, national origin, religion, or genetic information (added in 2008).
    The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission interprets ‘sex’ to include discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.”
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_group

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