John Day
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Gail Tverberg, “Gail the Actuary” from The Oil Drum blog, has traveled to Cuba, and has her usual excellent level of analysis of energy, economics, and societal dynamics.
This is such a good find! (Cuba is opening up, and is lots closer than New Zealand.)
Cuba: Figuring Out Pieces of the Puzzle (Full Text)Back in 2010, no real macroeconomic theory predicted a Greek return to growth, under the imposed conditions. The conditions were worsened by 2012 changes to the “bailout”.
The rationale given was NEVER CREDIBLE.
What if the purpose of the experiment was NEVER to see if it could improve Greek economy under prevailing macroeconomic conditions?
I believe that our shadowy puppet-masters, the 0.001% and the 0.01% who directly serve them are smart. It hurts, but they are probably smarter than I am. Our interests diverge, and I’m smart enough to see that. They lie to keep the herd moving in the same direction. I’m smart enough to see that. They shoot their guns and shout to spook the herd into sudden, rapid changes of direction. When do we get that again?
They overgraze the herd whenever possible, then massively cull the herd when overshoot leads to starvation, and that is called “war”. When do we get that again?
The global herds of people are getting quite different treatments since 9/11/01, and particularly since September 2008.
What if these smaller herds are being observed under experimental conditions?
It’s inevitable that the different conditions of herds will give different patterns of movement and survival and economy to different nation-states. It’s impractical to think this valuable information is not being studied intently, at great cost.
The Masters-of-the-Universe know no “moral” bounds, and see the limits of possibility from a very different vantage than we do.
WW-3 is always a viable policy tool.
What kinds of losses can be expected, under what kinds of conditions, and where, and when, and how will that affect chain of command?
Questions that big need really big models, as big as Greece, Libya, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, Ukraine, and so on.
George Soros, coming of age as a brilliant Jewish boy in Fascist Budapest in WW-2, has insight into this sort of thing. He gave a warning recently. Who was warned? I’m not saying he’s our friend…“Project Bookend” an in depth study by the Bank of England, was a top secret investigation of the implications and consequences to expect if the UK exits the Euro, and likely different scenarios for doing that to minimize blowback. The existence of this research got “accidentally” emailed to The Guardian UK newspaper.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/may/22/secret-bank-of-england-taskforce-investigates-financial-fallout-brexit?CMP=share_btn_tw@Polistra,
I’ve had that thought.
And maybe we are being fattened up for something by our herders.
Maybe (more likely) it is just good for business. We are programmed to like certain combinations of fat, sugar and salt, which are addictive and don’t satisfy our craving for the nutrients in fresh fruits, vegetables and the flesh of naturally fed animals from the wild.
It’s like the science behind making cigarettes more addictive.
Still, it’s not one or the other. There is a Zeitgeist, I believe.Yes, this is the critical point in the game, where the deal is being sweetened, and it comes down to 2 players, not 3, to put the Grexit referendum to the people, in such a way as to satisfy the back-benchers, and pressure the EU to satisfy the Greek voter just-enough…
Masterly played, Yanis, masterfully played, now just step back and let it unfold.I thought I had mostly seen it all in the variations on Tiny Houses, mainly bounded by RV trailer regulations for US roads. The top can be about 13 ft off the ground, and it has to be under 8.5 ft wide when traveling. Most folks keep them to about 24 ft long for practical reasons, but they can be longer.
Here is something more than 2 standard deviations from the mean for this kind of endeavor, and it truly is an impressive expression of vision, attention to detail, persistence, and that form-following-function can also express as art. 11:30 video, pics and text. The creators don’t get to talk much, which is a shame. An engineer, an acrobat, and their baby, somewhere in New Zealand (I’m guessing North Island).@TheTrivium4TW
Everybody wants to know how to preserve wealth going into massive wealth destruction.
“Wealth” means the ability to command what you want to be done, and the “right” to certain physical properties. When the fuel runs low, and supply chains don’t work, and people break ranks and pick winners and losers, what is “wealth” then, and where is it located?
Electronic money allows the masters of the universe to take a bit and then a bit more from everybody, and to starve all those who don’t participate.
How do you think that will play out?
I think it will be subject to collapse, and parallel, physical currencies will prevail.
It could be really ugly for awhile, maybe longer than you and I will live through.
WTF is “wealth”?I’m gardening, and I know how inadequate it is, but it is something.Pope Francis giving this talk to Congress in late September is likely to be during another market crash, and a more useful message than Hank Paulson gave.
Time to turn over a new leaf, share the austerity, and keep one’s head…It was the fake Bin Laden that Obama blew the story on.
The real Osama Bin Laden died 12/13/01.
https://humansarefree.com/2011/05/proof-that-osama-bin-laden-was-cia-and.htmlThe EROEI for large political unions has been a losing proposition for awhile, but the realization of that has been lacking, and their credit has remained good, so…
Every level of organization within a system has it’s costs of support.
Costs exceed political will to pay now.The antarctic ice sheet has lost a lot of mass in the past decade.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150430191140.htmGood points, Nelson. (By the way, we liked Nelson, NZ a lot when we biked around South Island in 2006, as a family.)
There is the adaptation of the person/family/group, which takes some years also. It comes with making the physical changes, then discovering that one actually has a lot to learn about gardening, and the back and knee problems are a limiting factor.This buys more time for transition than each little kick of the debt can does, but requires major changes in EU finance to even begin, maybe impossible changes.
It is an alternative, which must now be addressed.
Good.“Punctuated Equilibrium” is the evolutionary model where resources feed an expansion and mixing of genetic traits in “good times”, then select the most successful combinations in “bad times” of 90% die off, and so on.
It’s harsh. It’s easier to die quickly. Accepting the hard assignment before it is assigned, and with foreknowledge of the implications, probably contributes to survival of linked subsets of the gene pool, like families with foresightful grandparents.
sigh…Hi Ilargi,
Recall the story from January, where a female Greek physician was working secretly as a prostitute to make ends meet?
It got a lot of attention, and I think you put it up, too.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30914039
The Greek medical system is breaking. Nobody is paying doctors and nobody is getting taken care of unless they get shot in the liver or something.
This medical society couldn’t afford a decent public relations firm, and presented their case in such a way as to fall on their own swords, where they now squirm, impaled…
Sad.
I have worked very hard for very little in 1992 -1994, as a small town country doctor, sometimes the only doctor at the only hospital in Caldwell County Texas, doing ER, OB, inpatient and outpatient 24:7. It was the hardest I ever worked, and the least I ever earned, but I think it’s worse in Greece. I just fulfilled my contract and learned an important lesson, and went and did a Family Practice OB fellowship, which paid more and was less work.
Since then I have still worked in public health, but gotten paid pretty good money to take care of poor people. I don’t expect it to last, but I’m grateful.Plant Okra and black eyed peas, if you haven’t already, and squash, watermelons and sweet potatoes. Summer’s coming.
“Take care of the little things, and the big things will take care of themselves.”
(Prob’ly save the last bullet for yerself, too, though…)No Job?
Grow Food.
It’s the human way, after all.
This is simplistic, but it can be brought up to speed and be self perpetuating, once in place.
Growing your own food is valuable employment.
https://www.oftwominds.com/blogmay15/cash-gardens5-15.html
Sadly, it does weaken the control of the oligarchs a bit, but it is also stabilizing to society.This is from The Vineyard of the Saker.
It is the best strategic analysis I’ve read of the current global struggle to retain American global hegemony, and the different interests of Russia, embodied in Vladimir Putin.
If Ukraine cannot be won by the US, as a power hostile to Russia, on Russia’s border, then it must be so destroyed when it is lost, that Russia is bled dry to rebuild it.
This cannot be done while sparing Europe. Europe will be deeply wounded in this, and then where will Europeans turn? Various ways? To Eurasian Union?What does Putin want? A major analysis by Rostislav Ishchenko (must read!)
If I have this right, Chinese banking is so big and growing so fast that it will take over the world, just as it collapses from such vast accumulation of leveraged bad loans, which funded ghost cities, roads to nowhere, and graft. The reduction of reserve ratios somehow makes this all better and worse simultaneously.
Is that close?The “plastic only” decree for Greek resort islands may lead in various directions. Certainly, bankers want no more cash, just credit instruments, managed electronically by banks. All risk and expense falls upon the pawns.
It also sets the stage for Bitcoin…@ jal:
Capitalism has sealed borders, so that desperate people generate profits.
For $10,000 an American, Brit, German, Kiwi or Aussie can fly anywhere and be pleasantly received, but not an upper middle class Eritrean woman of marrying age.Thanks Hotrod :”…the reason why hate radio is so successful. As a retired minister, his answer was priceless, “Because there is always somebody lower than you are.”
The immigration “problem” is from exploitation of people based upon natural and artificial boundaries, by which they are confined.
Yes, global capitalism excels at this, and has since the East India Companies.
Militarism supports this bottling-up of desperation and suffering.
Logical argument declares that “we” must reduce populations of “them” to spare planetary life, to save it from, well, us.
The global capitalist-militarist-hegemonic empire, ruled by our shadowy puppet masters, whoever and wherever they are, can afford some humanitarian PR.
It cannot afford justice, compassion, brotherhood or humanity.
“Be the change”, brothers and sisters. There is not more to do.
Contribute to the victims in Nepal, Syrian refugees, Yemeni refugees and any other need you see, if you can. Right? That’s good.
Mainly help another person grow food, use less, tune up a bike, and so on, Right again?
“There is no political solution…” Name that song 🙂@Diogenes
Keeping tabs on the Wal Mart closings.
Still not explained are they?
All that plumbing to be done, and no plumbers involved…Destroying Libyan fishing vessels seems like a win-win situation for global multinational capitalism.
The problem has been addressed by creating and punishing an external bad-guy, who was competing with your trawlers for dwindling fish catches, anyway.
The military gets to look useful and decisive and stuff.
The containment of human desperation behind borders is the prime driver for global capitalism. The higher the concentration gradient of suffering and poverty, the higher the profits.
The Clintons got the first gold-mine permit in Haiti for 50 years.
https://investmentwatchblog.com/there-are-only-2-gold-mining-permits-in-haiti-the-first-one-in-50-years-just-got-issued-to-presidential-candidate-hillary-clintons-brother-guess-paying-for-that-was-where-our-disaster-donations-di/#3GgLtzk3herTsCzf.99Global reset when one of the critical bluffs fails, like EU or China, then war with Russia to enable reset?
How totally insane is this for anybody without a 30 year reservation in a deep, hardened bunker?
Grow food. Collaborate with other humans.
Meditate/Pray. Become spiritually conversant. It’s in us all.Jeb Bush: Warmongering Neoconservative Criminal.
Hillary Clinton: Warmongering Neoliberal Criminal.
The choice is clear, right?
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-15/enormous-differences-between-jeb-bush-and-hillary-clintonMeet Josephine Witt, the girl who got the jump on Mario Draghi.
Good pictures.
What a spirited filly! 🙂
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-15/meet-mario-draghis-attacker-her-own-words@Charles Alban,
Thanks for the Marinaleda article. It is righteous.
@jal
None will be spared by the changes.
I want to help as I can, so that I may die easily.
Growing food, year #2 now.@Dr. Diablo
Yep, reset is spreading here in Uh’merica, too.
It started in 2007, right?“Demand will peak way ahead of supply”, at $100/bbl, of course, and for reasons well-explored here, since a $25/bbl economy cannot be sustained at $100/bbl energy cost.
It was a “clever” statement at the time. This year looks like the peak. The Saudis have a strategy, as must China and Russia and the US/NATO/Israeli empire.
It is clear that containable destructive war at the periphery to punish non-compliance, and destroy demand, while maintaining global capitalist structures is the imperial plan.
Other plans may show more subtlety.
Grow food, resist imperialism!(“Inconceivable” , that GE Capital could be considered systemically important after changes, since most action outside US. Heh, heh, heh, Princess Bride reference. Good one 🙂
Greece is auditing it’s debt for legitimacy (or illegitimacy). An important move.
https://www.truth-out.org/news/item/29936-interview-eric-toussaint-of-the-committee-for-the-abolition-of-third-world-debt-discusses-greece-s-new-debt-audit-commissionThe empire is in an awkward position when it must treat NATO “allies” (even junior allies) like enemies, or rebellious vassals to be punished.
It’s cracks like this that should be a big signal of the end of an era.
Quicken this end!
Also, prepare for chaos.Our current society grew, step by logical step, from the feudal world, where we were fully integrated into steady state local ecologies.
It is a reduction to absurdity, yet every step was logical and an improvement of some sort.
We are not the critters we were born to be, but don’t tell us. It’s depressing. We’re fine…
Zoo Animal MDGreek Plan-B is BITCOIN.
Yanis Varoufakis: “Greece Will Adopt the Bitcoin If Eurogroup Doesn’t Give Us a Deal”
BOOM!
Woo-woo!
Greece goes Icelandic.
It’s DIABOLICAL!
I love the concept of Iceland making bankers into simple bookkeepers.
It one-ups the Bank of North Dakota in a way.
Yes, this smacks of the kind of change which could actually be brought about and could dovetail into the transition of money into a steady state system. This is a reset, which could be reset as needed, but politically, not by game theory.
It does not require systemic collapse in order to come about.
Go Iceland!
