Raúl Ilargi Meijer
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v.arnold.
The ‘swan keeper’ says it doesn’t matter if the other black swan is male or female. that got me thinking: how many species are there for which that would be true?
But I’m just theorizing there, thinking out loud. One thing I think is certain is that the volatility index won’t come back down anytime soon. And that WILL have a large effect on economies, on loans, on everything. I don’t think anyone -other than John McCain and his ilk- really want to throw a nuke bomb, but the prospect of it happening is here to stay for the foreseeable future.
bluebird,
There’s no doubt finance could play a role in this. the VIX volatility index was up 50%(?!) yesterday, though from lows so low they are essentially meaningless. What’s saying more is the tendency to move money out of emerging markets (wait till everyone reads their weekend papers). And gold of course is strong. So yes, as a way to move out of risk and back to America, it would seem to fit a pattern.
rheba et al
If supporting a president is provocative, that’s quite something. “He looks like he wants war” may have something to do with the impression the media have been giving of him through time. Obama didn’t look it, I guess, and to his credit he held off some ‘creative’ ideas from warmongers, but he did set out to murder Gaddafi, and is largely responsible for the mess in ME/NA.
Trump might not shy away from a Grenada style ‘war’, but he has nothing to gain from a conflict so close to nukes. That can only go wrong, and he would get all the blame while McCain etc. get the ‘game’ they want.
American politics is in a very deep crisis, much deeper than most people seem to realize, and other than Trump there’s no-one in sight who can do anything about it. Trump lay bare that crisis, by having everyone turn against him. It shows us how tight the powers that be, are. McCain, Hillary, CNN, NYT, it’s all the exact same thing.
None of that makes me a Trump fan or anything remotely like it. He should not be president. But he is. And looking at the other options, I understand why he is. His role is to show us what an amoral cesspit Washington has become.
I wouldn’t expect everyone to agree with me, and perhaps hardly anyone at all. But what I see is:
• There are no good choices in Washington.
* Trump is certainly not the worst choice.
• Trump is the elected US president.
• Far too many people try to unseat him, on all sides of all aisles.
* Trump doesn’t want to start a war (he’s afraid of it).
Charlie Hall sent me a mail questioning my omission of energy factors (biophysical elements, in his words) in the productivity discussion. Charlie’s right (as usual), of course they would have to be part of a broader discussion, but I wanted to stick with the two graphs as the main ingredients of the story.
But I sure still like “A cowardly braggart!”. Hard to best that.
I mean, when’s the last time you called someone that? But you know you should have…
yeah yeah, unwise-ass
as for the pic, that how it’s presented at the site the pic links to, and you make sense, but I can’t always check every single letter
as for SNL, who cares what their shit is called anymore, even if I spelled that wrong? I sure don’t they threw themselves back by lightyears
what I was thinking after posting this was it’s not about Scaramouch, it’s about Trump and King Lear, and I saw that too late to change the title.
It’s about the whole drama of kings and presidents and their demise. I didn’t do that justice
In my view, the Tragedy of the Commons is an abstract. Its abuse for various reasons confirms its validity, rather than contradicting it. It offers an accurate description of our entire supposedly democratic systems as well.
Yes, with the GMO deals coming, ironically China, like America, is on its way to high fructose corn syrup and mass obesity.
Greece will get a lot worse. Bulgaria may be poor, but it is not being strangled by Berlin, Brussels and their banks. It doesn’t have 60,000 refugees on its soil either.
The Chinese people are very much anti-GMO, quasi hysterically so. That Syngenta move will have to be shoved down their throats with force.
The case of Greece is a little different from most. Having shrunk 27%, they could ‘grow’ 10% and do well with that. Greece needs money to flow through its veins. To keep businesses open that simply sell simple daily necessities to Greeks; the minimum requirements to keep functioning are being destroyed right now. there is no reason or justification for that. Unless you want to buy up all they have for pennies on the buck.
I think maybe the thing is that you keep on paying your barber to cut your hair. If he loses his job, so will you.
Point kind of taken, Tony, but all those millions of civil servants now have to abide by the rules dictated by the EU’s 33,000. Where applicable, for sure, but they’re applicable in very many cases. Not saying that’s always bad, or even in most cases, but it is Europe’s reality. And it’s often a good thing: you don’t want Bulgarian products on the shelf without any rules or quality control. It’s the top that screws it all up with grandiose vistas of power. And it’s the bottom -Greece, Italy, that pays the price. The lower levels do a lot of good work. But that work is being defeated by the likes of Juncker and Dijsselbloem. A feature, not a bug.
True enough Chris, but she’s an interesting voice given that she’s an insider, even if her recent attention comes from having written a book, which still demands a lot of ‘media prostitution’, I wish a knew a better term.
Greeks haven’t risen vs Tsipras because all other options are worse; anybody but him, with the possible exception of the communists, belongs to the parties that got them into this mess.
I actually do have an idea where the Midwest is, but as you say it doesn’t seem to be in the same spot for everyone. The Ogallala to me was always -under- the Great Plains. The Great Desert Plains for the next 10 generations or so.
neoh,
Thanks for your trust. I want to thank everyone who’s helped me help Greece for that trust.
As for shutting things down, we’ll see; it’s all we can do really. Until then, There is no choice but to keep doing what we do here in Athens, keep rowing against all currents.
Dijsselbloem blames it on the Calvinist culture he says he’s from. So he probably expressed his secret desires. In one attempt at an excuse, he even said that he wasn’t talking about southern Europe, he was talking about himself. Which confirms my suspicion.
The only thing surprising about the letter bomb for Dijsselbloem sent from Greece is that it took so long.
It’s funny that Comey will testify about Trump-Russia links that nobody, including US intelligence, has so far provided any proof for? What is he going to say? That they found something just last night? Or they’ve held back evidence all that time?
ExpAbs
Higher prices do not equal inflation. And you give a good example of why that is, by mentioning taxes. Which should never be included in any calculation of inflation, because it would mean a government can induce higher or lower inflation simply by raising or lowering taxes. We all know that’s not true; if it were, all inflation issues would be solved. It’s velocity of money (spending) that is the missing ingredient in most inflation discussions.
That craziest thing about the Yellen and Fed rate hike is that they say it’s to FIGHT inflation. After they spent years trying to CREATE inflation. And it’s still not there, but they don’t know how to define inflation, they simply don’t know what it is. Orwell’s everywhere these days.
That’s so cute; Reuters just said what I said earlier:
Dutch voters snubbed the far-right, but analysts think France might be a different case
It can. but why try the hard road? A central bank can just say: from tomorrow 7am, our Zwops is worth 20% less against the USD. Done.
“One thing the WikiLeaks files accomplished is they made and and all accusations of Russian hacking, and of links between Trump and Russia, utterly meaningless in one fell swoop. ” I have followed your posts for many years and enjoyed them, particularly when you could still differentiate between fact and assertion. I have an incredibly low level of trust for the CIA but I still find myself disappointed to read statements like that above and
Thank you.
you taking it as a given that Obama backed off in order to avoid assassination.
I said: Obama allegedly gave in to the CIA for fear of ending up like JFK How that translates as taking it for a given I don’t know.
That’s some real tin-foil hat stuff and I always pictured you in a fedora.
It would be fair to say that accusations of Russian hacking are suspect in the context of the latest revelations but not “meaningless” nor, how did you phrase it “utterly blown to pieces.” I’m not going to play your polarization game where Russia = Good and CIA = Bad. You used to do nuance quite well but now…in the words of your new hero…”Sad!”
You’re overplaying your hand. But yes, since all Russia accusations could now have originated with the CIA -we will likely never know-, they are now all meaningless. Nothing to do with Russia = Good. I would agree with CIA = Bad though. And calling Trump my hero is just real cheap and dumb.
It’s still quite possible that Russia subverted our election process and it’s still quite possible that we know this from multiple sources rather than a single avenue where the Dark State (whatever TF that is around here from one moment to the next) planted a smoking gun with Vlad’s prints all over it (“You coppers got it all wrong I tell ya…I’ve been framed!!!”).
It doesn’t matter anymore. In CSI terms, the evidence has been tainted and is no longer admissible in court.
I agree that Snowden and some others should get medals rather than condemnation but wouldn’t necessarily say that about Assange until I see his pay stubs.
That’s baseless innuendo. Why do it?
Putin should get one too for working with a crap budget, a good temperament and a heart of gold (It’s gold right? Something down the periodic chart…maybe Plutonium?).
Trump will start a shooting war long before he does anything about the Hydra you call the Deep State. He is cross-breeding with reptiles as we speak and making the swamp warmer, deeper and more fetid. If he’s our only remaining hope then, as the saying goes, ” Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”
Trump is not the biggest problem, America in the run-up to Trump is. For now, the Deep Swamp doesn’t look to be aligned with him. It may yet come to be.
I’m going down my list of formerly rejected POTUS candidates like they were old girlfriends I let get away. Romney looked so bad a few years ago and looks like Lincoln today. There are others. Sigh.
Here’s hoping you don’t pre-select for sociopaths only when it comes to girlfriends.
It’s easy to just discard these ideas as communism or something, but Paine and Henry George were not fools.
And then we haven’t yet discussed why we tax work, instead of for instance land. Look, it’s simply not true to say that anyone would need to work and not eat for everyone who doesn’t work (and that’s presuming people wouldn’t work; some might not, but many do not now).
The oil beneath our communities’ land provides us all with an average of at least 100 energy slaves. That’s the energy required to feed 30 billion Americans, presuming an American can feed himself with his work. Now we run into entirely different problems and issues.
There are many who work hard and live in poverty. There are many who live in luxury and don’t work.
Private ownership of land and resources is disputable enough in itself. That all revenues of them must also be paid out exclusively to private owners, and not taxed to a degree by the community living on the land for its benefit, is quite another step. None of these things is as obvious as our ‘education’ makes them seem; what we learn is goal seeked towards a particular point of view.
