tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38383296824250589182024-03-14T07:26:35.230-04:00Trousered ApesAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.comBlogger61125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-58356679615236481942015-01-13T18:32:00.000-05:002015-01-13T20:06:06.684-05:00Reading The Tea Leaves For 2015Happy New Year to all of my readers (I have no clue how many are legit readers or web bots, but the blog will continue nonetheless)! First post of Year 3 of a blog I thought would last five posts and I figured I'd cobble together a summary of happenings for 2015. Hope that's ok.<br />
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As discussed in previous posts, the world keeps changing and pivoting AWAY from America, World Police to a more Eurasian-centric balance of power. I pound home the point that the BRICS nations are here to pluck power away from our economic system, via death by a thousand cuts. I'm not going to restate the obvious of where the wind is blowing, but when your economy is built on fraudulent derivatives, six years of 0% interest rates, and $3.4 trillion of monopoly money printed out of thin air, you are ripe for the pickens. And Vladimir Putin knows this. But lets do the appropriate 'what did you call vs what did you totally miss the boat on' for 2014. It helps gauge the accuracy of alternative media and whether or not my tinfoil hat is in need of tightening.<br />
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Here is last year's post:<br />
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<a href="http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2014/01/what-to-watch-out-for-in-2014-fear.html">http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2014/01/what-to-watch-out-for-in-2014-fear.html</a><br />
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<b>"Dude, you're onto something"</b><br />
- I wrote about how Russia would become Public Enemy #1. I said watch for escalation after the Sochi Olympics. Within days, the Crimea takeover occurred. MH17 got shot down in July, blamed on Putin before the final ashes were put out. Sanctions. Alternative forms of international settlement. Etc etc.<br />
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- Ramp-up in big-ticket cyberattacks. We saw it with 'The Interview' and blamed on North Korea (though ultimately a disgruntled employee, nothing to see here folks). Continued delays in market trading on large exchanges. Big retail companies being hacked into, personal information compromised. The big ISIS attack on CentComm Monday. Source of hacks continues to be Iran, North Korea, China, Russia, ISIS. Expect anything less in 2015? Look for these to even emanate from inside the DC beltway as a pretext to map out 'comprehensive internet security regulations'. CISPA under any other name. We can blame on whomever we want. As long as we get big internet regulations, mission accomplished. <br />
- Amnesty in 2014. Hussein Obama announced in November that there would be comprehensive changes. 5 million are impacted at last count, expected to expand in 2015.<br />
- BRICS Currency closer to launch. Russian sanctions forced them into the loving arms of China. They are now attached at the hip. I previously recapped the financial mechanisms to launch the currency (this will be the last step). Development bank alternative: check. SWIFT alternative: check (as of May 2015). BRICS bank: check (by early 2016). Revaluation of gold reserves in 2015: oh baby you gotta watch. China revalues every xxx years. Rumors abound that their stated 2 thousand tons will be updated to 15k PLUS this year. That more than backs a gold currency.<br />
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- Watch Pope Francis on the world stage. Yup, he's officially Catholic Rock Star. Critical in the recent Cuba reset of relations (neutral, just give me my cigars), multiple overtures to other branches to unite the Christian message (good), subtle overtures to other religions for united message (ummm....slight concern), lashing out against global banking system (good but what is your alternative, if its 'one world' in nature you are playing into the Revelation trap and I distrust you). Read his new papal encyclicals on proper doctrine. Pope Frank the man: awesome. Love him. Pope Frank the transformational figure, in light of Revelation's mention of a 'false prophet' and his fulfillment of St Malachy's prophecy of the Popes (112th and final Pope): Keep one eye open.<br />
- Obamacare nightmare. Easiest call. The Jonathan Gruber fiasco. The 2-10x anecdotal increases to John Q. Public. The subsidy nightmare that means tax implications for anybody that took one on their 'affordable' healthcare. The corporate mandate starting in 2015 with increased fees. Can only go down from here folks.<br />
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<b>"Boy who cried wolf too many times"</b><br />
I love getting less than savory feedback. In my personal life, in my professional career, on my blog posts, whatever. Hashtag 'own it'. Here are some huge-ass misses:<br />
- End of the gold/silver smackdown. Nope. Still hovering around $1200 GLD/$16 SLV. Central planners can keep the gig going as long as it takes for the public to notice. It'll end, yes, but never on the timeline expected. Watch the BRICS gold-backed currency announcement, its the game changer.<br />
- Deposit confiscation. Nope. Well, kinda nope. It didn't HAPPEN per se, but the European Union and...wait for it....OUR DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED CONGRESS this past December signed into law through the cromnibus $1.1 trillion budget resolution that the public (depositors) now become creditors which means when the derivatives crisis hits (or any banking crisis for that matter), guess who is on the hook to PAY for it via 'bail-ins'? [holds up mirror to face]. So no, nothing in 2014, but the legislation was set up for a future event.<br />
- Treasury yield explosion. Nope. Last check is was sub-2%. I called for 3%, but that never happened, mainly due to the fact that the yen, ruble, euro, etc instability resulted in capital flight to old-reliable dollar, the cleanest dirty shirt, the best smelling homeless person.<br />
- Stock market collapse. Never happened. Will happen, just not last year. They wound down the QE, are teasing rate increases in 2015. More on that later.<br />
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So those were the hits and misses. Now onto what I think will be happening in 2015.<br />
<ul>
<li>QE4 - the Federal Reserve officially wound down Quantitative Easing #3 back in November. The market has been experiencing larger swings ever since, and correspondingly the price of oil has cratered. Not to say the Dow can't climb above 18k again, but without the steroid, the athlete cannot obtain prior glory. The same can be said of an unsterilized monetary system that chases money into asset bubbles. As the oil plunge continues, and the high yield bond market of $500 billion implodes, look for the Federal Reserve to stem losses with fresh bond buying and other cash injections. Heavier than ever before. Probably third quarter 2015. </li>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Peter Schiff has it right, like he did in 2006</td></tr>
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<ul>
<li>Greece gets kicked out of the Euro. This has been in the offing for three years, finally to come to fruition in 2015. Germany has already prepared its economy and its people for a 'Grexit'. It's technically the right thing to do for Greece, since it can revert back to the drachma, take large haircuts, and decouple from the Euro before other countries leave en masse and the whole thing falls apart. </li>
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<ul>
<li>QE, Rest of World takes on a life of its own. Japan took the baton in November within HOURS of the Fed closing down QE3. As I've said before, they are the human shield for the US dollar. All currencies aligned with the United States are circling the wagons around the USD. Japan has debauched and pulverized their currency. Now the Euro is next to fall. With a Grexit on the horizon, ECB chief Mario Draghi will be initiating Euro QE within weeks. This will further drive a wedge between Germany and the EU, forcing them to pivot East (as discussed in prior posts).</li>
<li>Interest Rate increase will take place in June 2015. The Fed carefully wordsmiths every announcement because it has such an impact on the markets. 'Taper' announcements caused tantrums, 'kicking the can' on rate increases causes 1000 point Dow increases. Based on three or four sentences. They've teased it for a year, now they will make good. This will make debt more expensive due to interest and will kill whatever real estate recovery we've had. If you are buying a house this year, do it sooner than later. </li>
<li>Oil Crash before our very eyes. I think it bottoms out at $30-$35, and hovers there for six months before slowly climbing back up to around $100-$115 by end of 2017. As mentioned in a prior post, this is CURTAINS for the shale industry that we were so happy about. Cheaper for us to gas up = great. Weekly rig closings, 200k+ job losses domestically, global slowdown, $500b of high yield energy bond exposure. All to keep Russia in line. Solid work.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Market Crash in September 2015. US GDP is really close to 0%, despite headlines of 5% annualized Q3 cheerleading (driven by strategically dumping all of 2014's Obamacare expenditures into one quarter). Oil crash weighing heavily on this as well as a built-up tolerance to stimulus. Contagion of energy company bankruptcies, bank exposure, derivative exposure, and lower earnings will all hit between August 28th-September 13th. </li>
<li>The Syria attack was rekindled in 2014 under the guise of this ISIS war. We couldn't get congressional approval nor general public support for a full-scale invasion two years ago. Now we have the ISIS threat that will magically go deep into Syria and....shocker....will try to overthrow the Assad regime. We will bomb ISIS and, well lookie here - we might as well bomb Assad too! Q3 bombing campaign. </li>
</ul>
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<ul>
<li>Large false flag sometime in late winter/early spring in the Middle East to move things along against ISIS. We are constantly inching towards a global conflict and somehow keeping the balancing act going. Canada, Australia, France, soon country xxx will have a 'lone wolf' attack. These are small ball for the terrorists and a larger attack will solidify their power. Big happenings to go down in order to drive us deeper into Syria and 'validate' our mission. </li>
<li>Sleeper cells awakening in the US. We've seen it in other countries and even saw several cases of radicalized jihadists domestically last year. The eternal scary muslim boogeyman must be kept alive, so expect a lot more 'lone wolf' attacks across the west. Apparently the 'violent white christian libertarian 2nd amendment activist' never materialized. The heavy rumor (as the Monday cyber attack by ISIS implied) is that US military and law enforcement are no longer safe. I pray this doesn't happen, but the suspicion is that they will be hunted down at their homes and slaughtered for 'crimes against xxxx'. </li>
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<ul>
<li>Russia morphs into a hot shooting war with NATO. If you are paying attention, you would notice that since Crimea, Russia has refused to significantly escalate the battle for the heart of Ukraine. They've shown impressive discipline despite the fact that NATO has violated their own treaties from twenty years ago to not keep creeping up to Russia's borders (of which always noble NATO denies on their website through carefully selected verbiage). Patience is running thin, Russia wants payment for loans to Ukraine (financed by US taxpayer this past summer, thanks so much). I say towards the end of they year Russia has had enough and attacks back when the US is distracted with economic troubles. The world is waiting for Putin to go off the rails, but he continues to show remarkable restraint. As mentioned in a prior post, he is being punished by the West with crashing oil prices (premeditated action by the Saudis, contrary to public pronouncements). Call it the 'cut off nose to spite face' club. This is what energy independence looks like for the US - cratering oil prices, closure of rigs to engage in Russian/Saudi Arabia proxy wars. Russia can bear 18 months worth of sub-$60 oil. They are more disciplined than the West and more patient. Watch the Ukraine/Russia border later this year.</li>
<li>Ebola returns to the US. We had a czar named (since moved on), hospitals designated as treatment centers, and under-reporting of the explosion of cases in Africa. No flight bans were initiated and while Senegal is now Ebola-free, this has been far from contained.</li>
</ul>
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So that's the view for 2015. Exciting things right now, with all of the pussy-footing around the Paris terror attack last week and the ISIS cyberattack early this week (oh sorry, 'cyber trespassing', 'cyber graffiti', 'cyber vandalism'). Happy New Year! </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-30697139871942246452014-12-17T12:04:00.001-05:002014-12-17T12:04:06.114-05:00Cratering Oil Prices - What It Means For US and What It Means For RussiaAfter a few weeks of lazy hiatus ('I'm gonna blog tonight, I swear....' only to have my head hit the pillow at 9:15 each night), I'm back with hopefully a well-timed post about the downward spiraling oil price and what it means for the markets, namely the US, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. While the low-info voters are distracted with race-baiting and organizing meaningless protests to honor their slain heroes Mike 'Thug' Brown and Eric 'Arrested 31 Times' Garner (though for the record, the grand jury got it wrong on Garner), bigger stakes are in play on the global stage. That's where I choose to focus my attention.<br />
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So if you are out of the loop, I did a post in September about the ongoing Ukraine crisis and how we got there. Instead of repeating myself, please find the link below, since things are getting a lot hotter and heavier:<br />
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<a href="http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2014/09/supplanting-america-bric-by-bric.html">http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2014/09/supplanting-america-bric-by-bric.html</a><br />
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Updates on monetary systems referenced in above post - Russia has fast-tracked their SWIFT alternative transaction platform to May 2015 with a slight chance of even sooner. Southstream energy pipeline to Southeast Europe has been cancelled in light of sanctions. Capital expenditure rerouted to - you guessed it - Turkey. Behold the 'Turkstream' deal of December 2014. Turkey - the group spurned repeatedly by the EU for membership, the secret home base for ISIS, the group that facilitated the gold-for-oil hocus pocus between Iran/Russia once Iran got sanctioned for its nuclear weapons program. I'm telling you, folks, Turkey is flipping East. Very soon.<br />
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Anyway, we are engaged in a non-shooting Economic War with Russia right now. Sanctions started in the Spring after Putin took Crimea (without firing a shot). Then they intensified after MH17 got shot down (by Ukrainians, it now appears). Now we are in an environment where Russia has dumped its US Treasuries, US/Europe are cutting business ties with Russia, France has halted the delivery of two Mistral amphibious assault ships to Russia, the Russian ruble has crashed more than 50% since late September, currency brokers REFUSING to settle USD/Ruble transactions and thereby automatically closing out existing positions. Russian interest rates went up overnight by 70% (10% to 17%) to stem the currency dumping, and the US will be voting to officially provide LETHAL aid to Ukraine by the end of the week. To employ the overused line from Anchorman - 'things escalated pretty quickly.' So what prompted this acceleration of chaos? Why, the cratering price of oil!<br />
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The currency war is playing out similarly to what was 'floated' in Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, with roles reversed somewhat:<br />
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The US and Saudis are attached at the hip when it comes to punishing Russia (though Saudi Arabia wants to punish in the short term while slowly pivoting East when the time is right. US wants Russia completely obliterated). Brent crude (sweet crude global benchmark) trades at a handle of around $60, down from $100 in mid-September, which is a 40% decline in three months! Don't tell me its supply and demand related, this is strictly punishment to keep Russia in check. Here's the aspiration - since Russia relies heavily on energy revenues (70%!!!!), stopping Putin's gravy train on the tracks will slow down his 'aggression' in the Ukraine.<br />
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So Saudi Arabia pushes OPEC to leave production as is (cutting production would result in an uptick in oil price, increasing supply or leaving as is would put downward pressure on oil prices). This means Russia gets less oil revenues, and their budget projections are all out of whack, since they probably assume $90-$100 oil when making their revenue targets. This also slows the Russian economy as well as GDP growth forecasts, spooks the Russian stock market, puts added downward pressure on the ruble, resulting in intense selling, panicked Russian central banks upping the interest rates on bonds, pisses off the citizens, makes them question whether Putin is an effective leader, military and local upstarts consider a coup, and voila - civil unrest in Russia, Putin loses control of his country, and can only reclaim credibility by tucking his tail between his legs and pulling any and all military personnel along the Ukraine border. We are in a full-fledged currency war. This worked in the 1980's to bring down the USSR and again in the late 1990's with the ruble. It's the best way to neuter a country without using bullets and missiles, which are ugly and hard to get people to support.<br />
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Let's put this in perspective, though. Saudi Arabia is playing both sides. Pretending to hurt Russia, but also smirking as lower oil prices means their main competitor (US) will suffer because of a negatively impacted shale industry here. Thus, continued dependence on Middle East oil. Mainstream media tells you that oil decreases mean lower gas prices, which is great, but it also means 1) looming global slowdown, 2) lower revenue sticker shock to shale companies in the US (remember how we just celebrated this past summer passing Saudi Arabia as top global oil producer due to our shale deposit explosions in Texas and North Dakota?). This results in more and more oil rigs taken offline since the break-even point for many of these is between $80-$100. NOT <$60. 3) According to Deutsche Bank AG, since 2010, energy producers have raised more than $550 billion in energy bonds at ZERO % BORROWING COST (thanks Bernanke/Yellen). Plummeting oil price means bond issuers run the risk of not meeting debt obligations. Think of this as a commodities/energy market subprime loan about to go bust. But thanks to the Federal Reserve's QE meaning easy money for capital formation and zero % interest rates, borrowers could get their hands on whatever amount of liquidity they wanted. Now that QE is over (or passed to Japan within 24 hours of 'ending') and rumors abound of an interest rate hike around June 2015, the Federal Reserve is out of magic bullets, and guess what usually rears its ugly head every 7.5 years? An economic recession! 2015 is smack-dab in that timeframe.<br />
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Now that I've demonstrated what the impacts are with plummeting oil prices, what will Russia do now that it is the cornered bear being poked with sticks by the international community? Putin still has a few options:<br />
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<b>1) Cyberattack the hell out of us. </b>He's done it before and he can do it again, Whether it's our biggest corporations, our stock market exchanges, our commodities markets, our government systems. He has the resources and we are ripe for the pickens.<br />
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<b>2) Closer ties with China, coordinated economic warfare against US.</b> Russia has already dumped its treasuries. China continues to dump its treasuries. Both continue to hoard any and all gold. I've spoken about the BRICS nations and 130+ others just waiting on the sidelines to flip and dump the dollar. I've spoken about the alternative institutions and payment mechanisms to sidestep the dollar and its settlement cohorts. Did you know Russia approached China to work together to flood the market with Fannie/Freddie shares, maximize Wall Street turmoil, increase bailout burden and exacerbate the 2008 Financial Crisis in the US? Did you know Russia and China salivate at the idea of a gold-backed BRICS currency? Did you know China has been buying up US real estate in various parts of the country in lieu of a game-changing bulk treasury dump? Did you know a Chinese real estate conglomerate bought JP Morgan's US HQ and now own its gold vault at fire sale prices? Sleep with one eye open if you are a USD loyalist.<br />
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<b>3) Go scorched earth, pluck US allies and make them flip East. </b>I've already mentioned in previous posts that Saudi Arabia, Germany, and Turkey are 'at odds' with the US/EU as it relates to foreign policy, over-indebtedness, EU flirtation but rejection, growing calls for gold repatriations, funding of ISIS, and bailing out other EU countries. Germany has had enough, and relies on Russia for energy, while Russia relies on Germany for well-made vehicles, machinery, and chemical products. Turkey has had enough, because they never seem to get invited to the EU dance, and they've just signed the Turkstream energy deal with Russia. Saudi Arabia, while at constant loggerheads with Russia, is the scared bully who doesn't know whether to stick by the US in the short-term or completely flip to Russia so that the Ruskies can act as their new military protector in the event of ISIS gains, civil unrest from depleted Saudi oil revenues, and a shattered oil industry as a whole. Getting Germany, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia to change sides 1) guts the EU and will probably encourage it to fold 2) undermine ISIS containment and 3) officially end the petrodollar scheme of energy settlement if Saudi Arabia presses the 'FU' button and flips East.<br />
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<b>4. Continue to play chicken with the West. </b>Russia can technically survive without unrest as long as oil trades above $40/$50. They have $450 billion of foreign cash reserves. They have 1.2k tons of gold, and all of the BRICS systems in place (IMF replacement, World Bank replacement, Bank of International Settlements replacement, SWIFT payment replacement, BRICS currency as dollar replacement). They've signed epic energy deals with China, India, and now Turkey. The cash flow will continue to be there. Wait out the storm, let Hussein Obama and the West tire out and admit defeat over Ukraine. Another unique play (suggestion courtesy of former assistant Treasury Secretary and co-founder of Reaganomics, Paul Craig Roberts) would be to buy some paper gold contracts on the market and then DEMAND PHYSICAL DELIVERY once they expire. We couldn't do it, because we don't have physical possession of the gold we currently have 'registered'. Thus the repatriation requests by Germany, France, Holland, and recently Switzerland (failed referendum on full gold repatriation notwithstanding). Won't that make for some interesting TV?<br />
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<b>5. Start World War III. </b>A highly likely scenario. Putin would curb-stomp NATO if they ever touched his soldiers. He would ratchet up relations with Iran and China, he would cyber-attack the US to bring us to our knees (the 'Hands Up Don't Shoot' crowd would riot due to EBT not functioning, yeah I said it), detonate an EMP above the East Coast US, move on and reclaim the Novorossiya region of Ukraine, snatch Estonia and Transnistria, and sabre-rattle against Poland. As mentioned above, the US will have voted to provide Ukraine lethal aid in their quest to contain Putin, This could be seen as an act of war to the Russians, who will undoubtedly up the ante with increased military buildup. You can bet a false flag in the Middle East will be used to turn public opinion (yet again) on Putin and his ilk (most likely Iran, since we've been trying to hit them since 2005). So let's say the winter months features escalation, and no military movements. All of a sudden, late Q1 2015, ISIS attacks a pipeline, or Iran-linked terror groups are implicated in a high civilian casualty event. Or another plane magically gets 'shot down' at the border. Remember, we tried this in Syria in 2013 and lied about Assad using chemical weapons attacks (was later determined to be US-funded rebels). We need Assad out of power to contain Russia's expansion. We need Iran nuke-free to contain their expansion. We have a need to 'stir things up' in the region to satisfy the neocons in Washington.<br />
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My bets are on Option #5 with Option #3 as a backup. Putin will not go down quietly, and never underestimate a well-timed economic crisis/ebola crisis/terrorist crisis to paralyze US in the midst of all this so that our response is muted. Stay tuned, 2015 is going to be a wild year.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-57087096426631862282014-11-12T20:16:00.000-05:002014-11-12T20:16:20.161-05:00Revamping the Grocery Shopping ExperienceEveryone on earth has pet peeves, yet for some strange reason, my pet peeves seem to dominate my psyche minutes after an off-putting incident. This occurred recently at a Sunday grocery shopping experience. But since I am a "don't complain unless you have a better idea" advocate, I felt it best to put my money where my mouth is and provide suggestions to enhance the grocery shopping experience, weed out undesirable behavior, and streamline processes so that we obtain maximum efficiency at all times. Here goes.<br />
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<b>Deli Line Efficiency and Waste Management</b></div>
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We all hate being in the deli line, but have we really ever asked WHY we are there so long? It's simple - you're all wasteful hogs who buy too many different meats and cheeses, throw out 25% of it each Sunday morning, and then go and repeat your filth when you do your weekly shopping. You're paying forward wastefulness and sloth. You then pull a ticket number, repeat your order seven times to the deli clerk, and then watch them move slowly as they cut your meat. We don't want anybody rushing, since they work with really sharp equipment and could severely injure themselves, but more importantly, get AIDS all over my salsalito turkey. So here's what we do to keep you honest, limit waste, and ensure the line moves quickly - we install usage labels with sensors that track how much of the deli meats you eat, and how much you throw away. It calculates (somehow, someway) a 3 week average of how much you consume, and maxes out how much you can request. So if you order a pound of roast beef, but throw out 50% of it each week for xxx amount of weeks, this locks in a 'waste ratio' and you can no longer order anything over a half pound (or anything above the waste %). Because you like to waste shit. You also probably get ham, turkey, two types of cheeses and then either bologna or salami, the white trash meats. And then you throw out a lot to make room for next week's items. Uh uh. Not no mo'. There's a new sheriff in town. Here's why. </div>
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My proposal would limit interaction with the deli clerks and strictly result in you using an automated terminal. With a twist. You scan your shopper card (mandated), it pulls your 'moving averages', and then it asks you to 'apply your punishment mechanism.' The punishment mechanism (PM) is a mini-jumper cable that gets attached to your breasts or crotchal region. If you submit a dishonest deli request, and have a track record of being a waster but you are trying to trick the system, it will give a limited electrical jolt to your body. The jolt should be enough to get you back on track so that you don't make absurd deli requests again. The computer remembers your joltage, so if you pull a stunt like this the next week, the voltage will double, and so on and so forth until you are a smoking sizzling corpse. This will aim to: 1) limit deli meat waste 2) encourage folks to ask for less during each trip to the deli 3) speed up the process so that the line moves faster, and 4) Scare the shit out of you every time you go to the deli. <b>Downside - none.</b> </div>
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<b>Targeted EMP Strikes In Aisles</b></div>
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I hate zombie texting and oblivious shoppers, slowly meandering in and out of aisles, blocking traffic, gabbing about nothing of substance, texting things like "OMG, I'm like shopping with my pahhhrents....this is like so ratchet." My new proposal would be to have special tile lanes in the center of each aisle where an EMP kills any cell phone service, which in essence frees up the busy aisles for people to get through. You want to text? Totally fine, just do it in a designated 'texting area' or hug the sidelines of each aisle, where service is restored. But sure as hell don't be diddling your phone in front of the meats, milks, yogurts, cheeses and breads. It's high throughput areas, so moving at a fast pace is critical. This also keeps the shoppers moving at a brisk pace, with a slight sense of urgency because they can't otherwise their phone in a relaxed setting until they are done with what they need to do. Not much to dissect here. <b>Downside - none.</b></div>
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<b>Check-out Line: Forgetful Florences</b></div>
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We've all had situations where you are checking out and the dumb birdbrain in front of you forgets butter or olive oil or Uncle Ben's rice. They leave the line, slow things down whatever conveyor belt momentum you have, and you are left in a holding pattern while they awkwardly book it down the aisle to grab the forgotten item (which invariably becomes two or three since they have a stay of execution). No more. I want a healthy fear of failure when you go grocery shopping, and I want failure to be met with punishment. So here's what happens - a claw from one of those kiddie games at arcades comes down from the ceiling of Johnny's Food Mart. It takes all of your items and places them in the back room to be inventoried and subsequently restocked. You've basically lost every grocery item because you were forgetful and foolish. Make a list, stick to it, and don't forget shit. It's really simple. And if you forget something, don't tell those in line that you forgot it, simply finish your order, check out, and re-enter the store to obtain aforementioned forgotten item. It's like when someone needs to be in a certain lane on the highway but they didn't plan properly and now need to jump two lanes to the left with no space and inconvenience countless others in the process. You go up the road, take the next exit or street, and retrace your steps the right way - you don't screw over others, you selfish whore. You lose, start over. But guess what I guarantee won't happen again? You will never leave line to get a forgotten item again. <b>Downside - none.</b></div>
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<b>Check-out Line: Ill-prepared Isabelles</b></div>
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Not sure if this is common knowledge for some, but here goes - when I food shop, I intend to pay with either soft fiat currency or debit card. There is a 100% change that I will have to pay for my groceries at a given time whilst in the grocery store. To that end, the second my last grocery is on the conveyor belt, I remove my wallet and get in ready position to pay. The numbers are in - 8 out of every 10 unprepared shoppers are women. The pocketbook comes into play AFTER the final system tabulation. The purse gets unclicked, the credit card is fumbled, or change is foolishly counted even though you are about to give an amount back to the cashier that results in them just staring at you cause it doesn't even make sense. The new automated prompt will come from a sensor on the grocery cart that identifies when the last item has been removed. User will be reminded, "Please ensure your method of payment is ready for processing. You have 10 seconds." Once those ten seconds are up, the cashier presses a button and you're either safe to proceed or.....Alternative B - instant removal. You see, as you are unloading, you are stepping on collapsable tiles that are connected to a grid on the cashier's register. If you are bobbling your money and coins and not ready to pay after your 10 seconds, then the cashier presses a button and you fall through the floor into a dank, dungeony environment and have to fight either an angry centaur or some Gamorrean guard creature from Star Wars. If you survive, you get to come back upstairs and reshop (cause that claw has since come down and taken all of your items for restocking purposes). If you die, then I don't have to worry about you not being ready to pay for your groceries in a timely fashion. <b>Downside - none</b><br />
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<b>Fire All Baggers</b><br />
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I have nothing against baggers, but they are going the route of the elevator button presser. Let's free up space, keep things moving, and utilize technology. The bagging area becomes a circle 'tub' with a hole in the middle where you press a button and a bag it flayed open like a dissectible frog. Items circle the 'tub drain' and land in the back, and when a certain threshold is reached, the bag closes/ties itself and is moved via robot arm into your cart. Your cart goes in a 'loading zone', you sit on a bench and watch this all unfold. Next bag is automatically queued up to load. Sensitive items like eggs, deli meats, cheeses etc get put to the side (I mix them together with dish soap and fruit because.....gasp.....nothing actually happens if you mix them). Delicate items then get hand packed into the bag and put in manually by the cashier. This solves two problems: 1) Gets rid of baggers and their minimum wage demands for simple work and 2) speeds up the throughput and gets you out of line and out of the store faster. <b>Downside - none</b><br />
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<b>Boxing Gloves At The Express Lane</b><br />
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Why would there be boxing gloves at the Express Lane, you ask? Real simple. In case someone disobeys one of life's five golden rules (ie - don't get more items than the Express Lane allows), boxing gloves rest on top of the scanning terminal. If someone of any age, gender, race, creed, or religion decides to purchase more items than the Express Lane, an alarm goes off, metals bear-traps wrap around the perp's feet and holds the in place while the boxing gloves get deployed and hit the them about the face and upper torso. Cashier also has a yard stick with a plastic index finger and middle finger on it that they shove into your eyeballs, 3 Stooges-style. A bucket of semen gets dumped on your head from above and then sawdust gets shot out of a hidden compartment underneath the Nestle's Crunch bars. You are then thrown out of the store and have to do the walk of shame to your car. You will never make that mistake again, you hear me? <b>Downside - none.</b><br />
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Now, these are some very simple ways to improve the shopping experience. I guarantee earth is a better place (less waste), people are more considerate (lest they be shamed), and you are in and out about ten minutes faster due to the technological advancements. Feel free to float your own ideas. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-2831010778854847022014-11-03T19:53:00.002-05:002014-11-03T19:53:14.225-05:00Why We Shouldn't Get Excited About The GOP Tidal Wave On Election Day 2014Here we are, 24 hours away from another mid-term election and if this were the World Series, the police on horses would be lined up in anticipation of a GOP blowout victory. Years ago, I'd normally be a sore winner, taunting, rubbing in, bragging about how much more wonderful life would be under Republican leadership. Then I woke up.<br />
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Hate to deliver some perspective here, but the GOP winning back the Senate and maintaining the House will not lead to anything of substance. I'll be thrilled to see that sack of monkey shit Harry Reid lose his job as Senate Majority Leader. But we can expect more of the same from the Republican Establishment. Mitch 'The Turtle' McConnell will be Senate Majority Leader (yawn). John 'Blubbering Vagina' Boehner will keep his job (undeserved as he's a scoundrel sissy). Lindsey Graham, leader of the lisping warhawk wing of the party, will get re-elected in South Carolina. The same Establishment wusses who survived their Tea Party/Libertarian primary competitors will beat their Democrat counterparts. And I'm supposed to be excited for these bozos? What are they going to do to make our lives better? NOTHING. Let's break down 25 years of the Two Party Pendulum:<br />
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<b>2001-2006</b> - Republicans own the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives. 9/11, Patriots Act, DHS and TSA launched, Iraq War, Afghanistan War, Recession, snail-like recovery, eventual full employment. Wiretapping. Nothing to write home about. Debt increases significantly.<br />
<b>2006-2010</b> - Democrats win back the House, the Senate, and win the White House in 2008 when a junior senator/community organizer from Chicago who used to snort coke and give blowjobs to old elite men in crime-riddled Chicago ('Down Low Club' within Jeremiah Wright's Trinity Church of Christ) wins the Presidency. Global Economic Crisis. Bailouts. Iraq and Afghanistan wars drag on. Zero % Interest Rate Policy. More bailouts. Obamacare passed. Debt increases significantly.<br />
<b>2010-2016</b> - Democrats keep the White House. Lose the Senate and the House. US credit downgrade Fiscal Cliff theatrics. Sequester theatrics. Government shutdown. Benghazi. Fast & Furious. NSA spying. Wiretapping. IRS scandal. Solyndra scandal. VA scandal. Obamacare atrocity. Quantitative Easing. Zero % Interest Rate Policy continued. ISIS created/funded/trained by CIA and Western allies. US-initiated Ukraine debacle. Obama signs official amnesty in Nov/Dec 2014. Ebola. Stock market on steroids. QE3 ends and QE4 rumored. Epic market crash between Dec 2014 and Oct 2015. Hillary Clinton wins Presidency. Debt increases significantly.<br />
<b>2016-2024</b> - Republicans squander House, keep Senate. Middle East spirals out of control, ISIS flourishes, US/Mexico border gradually melts into an amorphous North America. Hillary Clinton gets re-elected. US gets downgraded twice. US dollar falls. Resurgent Yuan/Ruble gold-backed BRICS currency becomes new official reserve currency of record. Debt increases significantly.<br />
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Do you see the trend here? A hot potato gets passed between two parties who average a 10-14% approval rating, yet get re-elected 90% of the time by schizophrenic voters who insist on the status quo. We get what we deserve. It was over 9/11/2001, but reiterated 11/6/2012. We basically have Stage 4 cancer but act like we just got told to lose five pounds. There's $1.5 <b>quadrillion </b>of derivatives on the market right now. $200 trillion plus of unfunded liabilities. $18 trillion debt right now. So much momentum and inertia is behind that figure that no matter WHO wins the White House, Senate, House we are STILL going to incur $750 billion -$1 trillion of incremental deficit a year (don't pay attention to politicians saying the deficit has been cut in half. They quote the highest annual deficit and then use an unconfirmed estimate on the lower end, which always gets revised upward by 25%). But you didn't know that, because.....'war on women' and 'RAAAACISSSTTT!!!'<br />
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Both parties got us here - Democrats with chronic bleeding heart syndrome and 67% of the mandatory budget spend on entitlements, with the other 33% of mandatory budget spend going to Republican-sponsored military industrial complex that shoots anyone that may smell remotely like camel semen. You know, links Saddam to 9/11, refuses to attack the source of the nineteen 9/11 hijackers in Saudi Arabia, let ISIS run roughshod over the Middle East, expanded drone programs, 2 billion + of hollow point bullets, etc etc. The normal numbers I spout on this blog. So THOSE are the neocons that will inherit Congress and push the GOP agenda. Remember John McStain taking selfies with Free Syrian Army rebels who ultimately joined ISIS? And the old coot couldn't put two and two together? That's our neocon leadership in action! Can't wait!<br />
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Here's a quick rundown of how the Republicans will use their newly won Senate majority and reigning House leadership to 'change Capitol Hill':<br />
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<b>Immigration Reform</b> - Remember what the GOP did with immigration from 2001-2006 when it had total control of the WH and Congress? Jack shit. Now Bathhouse Barry is going to amnesty 10-34 million illegal aliens and turn them into Democrats (cards already printed, look it up). What will the GOP Establishment do to block it? Nothing. Cause they can't. They need the cheap labor under the table and barely registering on payrolls too. They'll do the Paul Ryan approach of making it as painful as possible to gain citizenship here (good, fine so far). Maybe throw in some incentives to sweeten the deal of playing by the rules (we'll give you a pass on the whole initial trespassing part). Marco Rubio did this by sticking his little toes into the debate and almost gotten them bitten off. Expect nothing except capitulation.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bear in mind the two lowest years for Obama either haven't happened yet or will be revised upward</td></tr>
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<b>Budget Discipline - </b>The debt exploded under Bush due to the combined defense spending and sizable tax cuts. You do one or the other, but not both. Entitlements increased a good deal (albeit not at the accelerated rate that Obama increased them). Homeland Security was launched, as were thousands of federal subsidy programs. All told, the debt shot up about 50% in the Bush years, which were mostly dominated by Republican Congress. Why would NOW be any different because they are back in power?<br />
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<b>Foreign Policy </b>- Republicans get the bad rap as warmongers. Though Obama bombing seven different countries in his first six years, fomenting unrest in Ukraine, Middle East, and Libya has to count for something. They sold us on WMD's in Iraq, used 9/11 to give us a blank check to attack any country we wanted, push boots on the ground at will, insist on regime change, overuse the word 'liberty' and 'freedom'. McCain and Graham, the warhawks of the party, wanted Syrian war badly. They wanted Iraq war badly. They want Putin pushed back along the Russia/Ukraine border. The neocons want boots in every country to export American Democracy on uneducated, rock throwing, goat molesting Middle Eastern theocracies. Democrats are just more slick about it, and instead of boots on the ground they pay unsavory rebels to cause chaos so that public opinion is easily manipulated. Do we think the Republicans will suddenly show an isolationist streak?<br />
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<b>Growing The Economy </b> - 2001 through 2006 featured 'ehhhh' growth, 5-6% unemployment, slow stock market rises, the Real Estate Bubble, The Stock Market Bubble Part I, The Derivatives Bubble Part I, and the Bailout Bubble. Republicans allow themselves to be blamed for 2008, but weren't vocal enough five years earlier when signs of a bubble in these asset classes were evident. A few wise members of the GOP cautioned the need to curb sub-prime lending, insisting on tougher regulations to buying a house, more documentation, cutting down on 'liar loans', and not giving Fannie/Freddie cart blanche to loan to any slob they wanted to. Investment Banks were allowed to continue investing in derivatives even though like seven people on earth could accurately price them. Nobody of substance was prosecuted for the near collapse, other than Bernie Madoff, black sheep of the hedge fund industry. Republicans took their eye off the ball, kept their mouths shut, embraced the 'steady as she goes' mentality, never fought back, never pushed innovation, never pushed domestic pipelines other than ANWR, didn't revamp the tax system, didn't foster innovation for the small business owner, didn't give significant tax breaks to John Q. Entrepreneur, looked the other way while corporations exploited loophole after loophole. Stuff went bust, Republicans were stuck holding the bag, allowing the Democrats to simply point fingers and save the day. The Obama administration has been living off of QE, ZIRP, and a dead cat bounce on GDP growth for six years. Workforce participation is at a 40 year low. "Oh but the unemployment rate is 5.9% and I operate in five second sound bytes so can't peel the onion back for context." Would a GOP landslide tomorrow night suddenly cause growth in the economy, better workforce participation, spurn job creation and innovation? Hells no. They didn't do it last time they had power, and haven't really been effective since the Reagan Recovery of the 1980's. Don't hold your breath children.<br />
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These are but a few issues that show no significant solutions and differences. As has oft been stated, the Democrats are the party of BAD ideas, the Republicans are the party of NO ideas. Both suck, Republicans are the lesser of two evils, so if you have to vote, hold your nose and press R. Or do what I will be doing and vote for either the libertarian candidate or write in names like Joren Van der Sloot, Zombie Robin Williams and Thomas Eric Duncan. Get some wine, candy, and chips. Sit back and enjoy another useless midterm where one party pretends to claim things can only get better only to watch things get worse. As if that's possible.<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-80771681652048487652014-10-21T19:11:00.004-04:002014-10-21T19:11:43.937-04:00Reimagining The Catholic Mass (I Don't Think This Is What They Had In Mind)Sorry its been awhile since my last post (pretty sure two people give a shit, but they're too busy finishing their homework and NEED TO CLEAN THEIR ROOMS AND STOP FIGHTING EHEMMMMMM). Anyway, an esteemed colleague and I were shooting the breeze today and he suggested, out of the blue, that Sunday Mass would be a lot more exciting if they had a concession stand in the back. We then expanded on some other suggestions. Figured this needed to be blogged about. So enjoy.<br />
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Disclaimer - Catholic bashers can pound sand. I don't want your synopsis about your views on the church, organized religion, how your life is over since the Hobby Lobby decision came down, and that you're thinking of leaving Christianity because there aren't enough women priests and 'people hate the gays' (not true). If that's your reason, good riddance. There's always Unitarianism and Buddhism, so have at it. This is a 100% serious attempt to bring people back to the Catholic Mass. I repeat - 100% serious. So have an open mind. Remember, it's easier to complain about the darkness than light a match.<br />
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<b><u>The Procession</u></b><br />
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I am a huge pro wrestling fan. This is well known by those close to me. Last I checked, there's nothing in the Bible that forbids the incorporation of WWE theatrics into the Sunday Mass. Therefore, my first proposal is to have the clergy process down the aisle in the motorized little rings from WrestleMania III:<br />
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Priest and Deacon carry the Word in their own ring, while the lectors and eucharistic ministers cram into another ring (but ahead of the officiants). Altar boys walk to the side and are never allowed to ride in the ring. Part of the lawsuit settlement(s). These rings will go up to the altar, where the officiants depart, make a respectful bow, and begin ceremonies. Aforementioned rings will then automatically use their built-in Roomba technology to juxtapose themselves next to the choir section, where they will wait until the Mass concludes. and crew will take their positions and exit the aisle in reverse procession format. Entrance music changes based on calendar, but suggestions include 'King of Kings' by Motorhead, 'Welcome To The Jungle' by GNR, or 'Royalty' by Gang Starr.<br />
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<b><u>Removal of Children, Mine Included</u></b><br />
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Before Mass even begins, local volunteers will call forward the children, who will then be spirited away to go play dodgeball in the church basement. Other games include: 'Pin The Tail On The Heathen', 'Chutes and Jacob's Ladders', 'Catechism-...gories', and Monopoly (JK - Jesus HATES that game, he was the original inspiration for flipping out and knocking tables/games over, just ask the money changers). There's also a religion Q&A section where kids can ask church elders popular questions, like 'Why was Mohamed so violent?' 'Was Martin Luther really a dick?' 'Can my iPhone go to Heaven too?' and 'Seriously, why was Mohamed so effing violent?' Kids will be kept in the basement until the Eucharist is put in the tabernacle. This will prevent the hellfire that awaits those who exit immediately after receiving Communion (more on this later).<br />
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<b><u>Five Minute Sermons with 360 Degree Feedback</u></b><br />
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Ever sit through a sermon that feels like it's never going to end? Was the point lost in the translation? Not when you have a 'shot clock' in the background. Priests have no more than five minutes to get their point across. No rambling, no tangents, no corny jokes, no pandering to the crowd about the local sports team. There will be a clock that starts counting down the second the sermon starts. Five minutes, no more, no less. This ensures the crowd is attentive and hanging on their every word. Buzzer goes off when five minutes is up. Make it good, Pastor Courvoisier. When you are done, you will ask the crowd a simple question - "Fist or five?" Five fingers for a top rating, fist for a zero rating on the quality of your sermon. Priests get ranked nationally on 'Most Exciting Sermons' based on moving 52 week average. Those with the highest three year average are eligible for Archbishop status or Vatican appointment. Those who can't hack it will be given the GE treatment - bottom 10% in the rankings will be let go or will be set up with a falsified story as a pretext to boot them from the parish. But like a Benghazi witness, they can be relocated and start over on the other side of the country.<br />
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<b><u>Groundbreaking Choir</u></b><br />
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In order to jazz things up, the lead cantor will be equipped with a T-Pain autotune straw/mic whatever the hell its called. DJ Skrillex would remix all of the popular hymns with a dubstep beat to get the crowd more involved. The kids choir would merge with the adult choir to create a Sister Act 'slow-begets-fast' song layout. Those who were caught falling asleep at last week's sermon were thrown into a windowless van by masked churchgoers the morning of and trained/forced to dance against their will at this week's Mass to the aforementioned dubstep music. This ensures dual participation/dual accountability to stay engaged in both sermon and sing-a-longs.<br />
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<b><u>Concession Stands In The Narthex</u></b><br />
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Mass can be long. As an Armenian-American who happens to be Roman Catholic, I've been in Armenian Masses that last as long as two hours. I clocked a 15-second 'Amen' in 2003 at my grand-aunts funeral. Now, in case you didn't know, Armenian Apostolic is the closest textbook branch of Christianity to Catholicism. In a two hour ceremony, folks get tired. Folks zone out. Folks fall asleep. If a concession stand is set up in the narthex of the church (ie - 'the back' or the 'front lobby'), then people can come and go during the ceremony and drop a dollar in the bucket for candy, pretzels, or coffee. Those that are adventurous can get a hot dog for $2.50 or even a microwaveable pizza for $4. All money goes back to the church. Think of it as a kind of 'Church Boosters Club'. This supplements the two collection plate offerings during the actual ceremony. Additional funds can come from lotto tickets (old people love that shit to supplement their income). Convenience stores sell them to the church at an agreed 10% discount because they feel guilty and then the church turns around and marks them up 25%. Rules are rules. Beer will be sold (strictly Guinness and Merry Monks ale), but with a significant markup. Doesn't float your boat? Be a eucharistic minister and help the priest down the port wine after communion/post-Mass.<br />
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<b><u>Electronic Padded Benches</u></b><br />
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There's that part of the Mass where the priest has a seven-minute schpiel that re-enacts the Last Supper. "Take this all of you, and drink from it - for this is my body, which will be given up for you." Usually the lame, the lazy, and the young will use this as an opportunity to lean their ass cheeks on the bench while still keeping their knees on the pews. We don't do both. Jesus died on a cross for your salvation. The least you can do is sweat it out for seven minutes. I get it - it's hard. I am clenching my butt-cheeks together so hard to keep from farting and singeing the eyebrows of the poor slob behind me. So I compromise here - the benches will be padded and a lot more comfortable when you come to church, but during specific times when you should be kneeling, electric currents will be shot through them so that anyone (other than designated rows) will have their asses shocked with electricity if they lean against them. This ensures that we are all leaning forward for the Eucharistic Prayer. The electric shock dulls the haunches and loosens the glutes to the point where the perpetrator will literally shit their pants if they lean back. Bet you'll think twice about being lazy next time you go to Church.<br />
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<b><u>Hellfire and Brimstone to Early Leavers</u></b><br />
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One facet of church-going that gets my goat is the early leavers. Those that leave after communion to beat traffic because it's more convenient to them. Kinda like an abortion. When you leave Mass early, you take a dump on the previous 45 minutes of the service. You want to get home and watch football or go food shopping or rake leaves. You are a jerk for doing such activities. This process improvement involves shooting EMP sensors and/or food dye water balloons at your car so A) your car doesn't start or B) it gets multi-colored dye spilt all over it so you drive home in shame, and people say to themselves, "That color combo implies that they left Mass early. What a bunch of assholes." Each of the well-placed 'ushers' have a remote in their pockets that instantly EMP's the parking lot so that any scoundrel leaving early sits in a dead car. Almost as dead as their black souls.<br />
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<b><u>Strict Dress Code</u></b><br />
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As I get older, I become more disgusted with humanity. Sunday Mass is no different. What used to get me excited 17 years ago now makes me shake my head in disgust. Teenagers and other young adults dress for Mass like they're going clubbing. Yoga pants, mini-skirts, super tight low-rise leggings, form-fitting tops, and the boys wear meathead gear - Ed Hardy shirts, designer jeans, curb-stomping steel-toe boots. I should never see a thong or a human labia poking out, and yet I do. Routinely. Why do people dress disrespectfully to enter the Lord's house? I want standard attire for folks when they attend Mass - men wear slacks and a blazer, women wear dresses to the knees and a bonnet or if not a bonnet, then they need to braid their hair in thin strands and then tuck behind their ears cause that's kinda hot. This is not negotiable. We need to bring respect and reverence back to the service, and this is one of the last vestiges of yesterday that can be preserved.<br />
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<b><u>Kiss of Peace Fist Bump</u></b><br />
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No longer a handshake. Too many viruses going around. This has been downgraded (or is it upgraded?) to a fist-bump. Less germs change hands, sweaty palms do not come into play, and you can bump without having to say 'Peace be with you' cause the fist bump is universal and implied. I also don't want your AIDS or Ebola to get on me. Nothing personal.<br />
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<b><u>End-Cap Communion Holders</u></b><br />
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In order to limit the lines and shuffling of human freight, each row will have the Host(s) in a container that sits in a cupholder pre-positioned before Mass. At the proper time, the first person in each row will take a communion, and pass to the person to their right. Once complete, the container will have moved from left to right across the row and then fastened to the cupholder on the right hand side of the aisle. Everyone will have gotten their communion, taken a knee, and prayed to the Lord for guidance and blessings for the upcoming week.<br />
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<b><u>Wrap-Up</u></b><br />
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The Mass in its new format should be no more than 30 minutes due to the shortened sermon and the self-serve communion process. The message has been more enriching and the assembly have gotten more out of it, since their kids are in the basement and not spilling Cheese-Its and fruit snacks all over the pews and screaming 'butthole' every five minutes. Now the priest will say a quick word in summary, and hop in his WWE mini-ring and ride up the aisle. People are free to depart henceforth, which is standard protocol. Anyone displaying road rage in the parking lot will have to get out of their car and wait for everyone else to leave (since the ushers will have their EMP remote control devices to monitor behavior). You've learned nothing if you exit Mass and become an asshole again. You have to stay and make small-talk with some old women about their grandkids until the traffic dissipates.<br />
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Hope this provides enhanced enjoyment for your church-going experience. As always, ideas are welcomed (to be ignored/discarded).Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-7225739796798009672014-09-21T11:06:00.002-04:002014-09-21T12:06:13.294-04:00Supplanting America, BRIC by BRICIt's been a very interesting year so far if you are following world news (note - following 'X-Factor' or the Royal Dutchess' pregnancy does not constitute 'world news'). One of the main hot topics this year is the ongoing conflict in the Ukraine, one that I've already addressed in previous posts but something germane to the ongoing 'repositioning' of global superpowers. You are probably hearing the phrase 'BRICS' if you are loosely following the global markets and the world's geopolitical landscape. Simply put, BRICS consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, but also includes 130+ other nations quietly waiting to latch their wagon to whatever horse ballsy enough to supplant the United States and its western cohorts as the globe's new superpower. Anyone not drinking the Kool-Aid knows that we are slowly being replaced, and the watershed/Waterloo moment is the Ukraine Crisis. This post aims to distill, clarify, simplify, and inform the reader on what is really going on behind the scenes.<br />
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<b><u>The Players</u></b><br />
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<b>The West </b>(primarily the United States, but also England, France and select others) - current world superpower. $18 trillion in debt, responsible (with London) for $1.5 quadrillion in derivatives exposure through sketchy, opaque financial instruments. Home to Citi, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, and the creature from Jekyll Island, the unaudited Federal Reserve. $3 trillion of Monopoly money printed since 2008. Trained, funded, and armed what we now know as ISIS. Funded the Ukrainian uprising aimed at making Russia Public Enemy #1. Lied about WMD's. Rehypothecated China's gold, Germany's gold. Took Saddam's gold, Gaddafi's gold, and Ukraine's gold to keep the scheme going. You get the point. This ain't Reagan's America anymore.<br />
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<b>Russia</b> - resurgent sleeping bear that Hussein Obama poked back awake (dumbass). Biggest energy provider on planet earth. Government-controlled Rozneft and Gasprom are some of the biggest energy companies in the world. While just as corrupt as any other leader, Putin has a 61% approval rating among his people (compared to Bathhouse Barry's approval of 41%). He also has his hand on the energy spigot and drooling at the prospect of a veddy veddy cold winter coming to Eastern Europe, who source about 75% of the their energy needs from Russia. Now phasing heavy sanctions (boomerang sanctions that also hurt Europe) from the West.<br />
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<b>Ukraine </b>- biggest free agent on planet earth now that Lebron went back to Cleveland. While they are not technically members of NATO or the European Union, they are a pivotal country that could make or break western dominance. Strategic gas pipelines go through Ukraine, reserves sit in the eastern regions, and they are split between pro/anti-Russian sentiment. See: Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk. They are the main pivot point that has enabled BRICS nations to expedite their plans to supplant America as dominant superpower.<br />
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<b>China</b> - Crooked, corrupt, mischievous emerging superpower (based on sheer volume, size, and momentum). Limited transparency of GDP growth as advertised (averaging 7% over the past decade, while we putter along at around 2.5%), but noteworthy nonetheless. Ghost cities litter the landscape due to overbuilding, overmanufacturing, overindustrializing. Recent 'Holy Grail of Energy Deals' was signed with Russia a few months back. Russia and China, through the recent Russian sanctions, have now skipped the bilateral foreplay and are officially an item, attached at the hip. Also - 100+ countries are waiting in the wings to enter into swap agreements with China. Second biggest US creditor to the Federal Reserve. Victim of rehypothecated gold scheme of the 1990's. Placated with US real estate (including landmarks and JP Morgan HQ). The only thing stopping them taking over the United States is the unilateral disarming of US citizens (forthcoming).<br />
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<b>Germany</b> - the main adult in the room among the EU. While damn near close to a recession, they, along with faltering France, are the only ones holding up the European economy right now. Constantly asked to bail others out, their patience is wearing thin. An unspoken alliance to export vehicles, chemical products, and agricultural produce to Russia (a Top 10 trading partner) in exchange for continued energy from Gazprom persists. Germany is also pissed about the NY Fed dithering on the return of their 330 tons of already rehypothecated gold. In the two years since Germany request it repatriated, the US has returned a paltry 10% of it. Germany is now Free Agent #2 on planet earth, and if they join the BRICS, well, sayonara EU and USD/Euro two headed dragon.<br />
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<b>Honorable mention</b>:<br />
Saudi Arabia - pumping out 90% water instead of oil. Scared. Funding ISIS along with US, Turkey, Qatar. Free Agent #3 - want to keep things civil with Russia, despite destabilization efforts with regards to Chechen rebels under their control. Pivotal country rumored to be flipping East to the BRICS.<br />
Turkey - Free Agent #4. ISIS benefactor and training post. Assessing current repositioning of global assets to the BRICS. Pivotal country rumored to be flipping East to the BRICS.<br />
Syria - allied with Russia, Iran. Blocking Qatari pipeline to Eastern Europe. Wants to be part of Iran/Russia pipeline through Syria/Turkey/Jordan. Saudi Arabia says No. Victim of false flag chemical weapons attack via rebels, world doesn't fall for it in 2013. Cue up Saudi/Turkey/CIA-created ISIS to destabilize and allow a beachhead for eventual attack on Assad (next blog post).<br />
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<b><u>The Timeline (skipping Arab Spring, Libya, Egypt, Yemen, etc disaster)</u></b><br />
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<b>Fall 2011 - </b>BRICS Forum held to build cooperation and chart united effort to supplant the current economic world order (40% of world's population, 20% of global GDP, but over 50% of the world's growth over the past decade!!!!)<br />
<b>Spring 2013</b> -BRICS Summit yields proposal for a global financial institution. Cyprus bank deposit confiscation. It's the 'Cayman Islands' for rich Russian oligarchs and billionaires. Subtle reminder to back off of the middle east and Ukraine. The first salvo lobbed against Russia.<br />
<b>Summer 2013</b> - botched Syria invasion. As mentioned repeatedly (and now on mainstream dinosaur media), the failed effort to villainize Assad in Syria still stings the globalists. Putin stuffs Obama at the one yard line. No invasion, no soup for you.<br />
<b>Winter 2014</b> - as the Sochi Olympics dominate the globe, Ukrainian protests persist, US/Soros-funded provocateurs stage a coup on the democratically elected government, President Yanukovych flees to Russia. Puppet regime installed.<br />
<b>Spring 2014</b> - Putin takes Crimea. Referendums in Donetsk and Luhansk follow. Russian sanctions. Putin now PE#1.<br />
<b>Summer 2014</b> - Sabre-rattling on the Ukraine border with the Russia-controlled separatists. More sanctions against Russia.<br />
<b>July 15, 2014 - </b>$100 billion BRICS Development Bank officially created, led by Russia/China.<br />
<b>July 17, 2014</b> - MH 17 gets shot down (false flag if you ask me - aimed at tilting pubic opinion against Putin). Before final embers hit the ground, the world points its insolvent, fiat-currency tinged finger at Putin. Suspicious. More Russian sanctions.<br />
<b>August 2014</b> - David Cameron calls for the ceremonial removal of Russia from the SWIFT banking transaction system<br />
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<b><u>How does the BRICS arrangement impact current geopolitics?</u></b><br />
<b><u><br /></u></b>
<b>Energy</b><br />
Current scheme: Middle Eastern nations, led by Saudi Arabia and OPEC, dictate world energy flow and are the anchor to the petrodollar arrangement forcing settlement for energy in USD. If that arrangement falls, the dollar falls, the west falls, WE fall.<br />
Proposed BRICS scheme: Russia, Russia, Russia as new provider of energy. China, India, Eastern Europe, and secretly Germany/Turkey/Saudi Arabia on board for the big pivot. No longer mandated USD settlement. Remember - sanctions work on intended target, but can also boomerang and impact others (ask Poland, whose seen a 40% reduction in gas from Russia over the past month). When we sanctioned Iran over nukes, sure, they felt the pinch. They also emboldened Russia to circumvent the USD for energy settlement, which was brokered by Turkey via GOLD settlement. Beware unintended consequences. Look for gold/yuan/ruble settlement.<br />
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<b>Internet</b><br />
Current scheme: Eurasian nations under certain leadership can have censorship, and NSA has the power to enact the global internet killswitch, shutting out any country it wants from internet access. Just ask Syria what happened in 2012 for two days.<br />
Proposed BRICS scheme: set up BRICS internet pathway to bypass NSA spying:<br />
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It also warrants mentioning Friday's largest IPO in NYSE history via the Alibaba (newest e-commerce juggernaut) launch. In one day, market cap of $220b surpassed Facebook, eBay, and Amazon. China's here to stay, independent of it's lack of financial and economic transparency. Some of our biggest hackers originate from Iran, North Korea, China, and Russia. A fortified BRICS cable blunt impact and leaves a flaccid western tactic to isolate.<br />
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<b>Financial Institutions and Mechanisms of Transacting</b><br />
Current scheme: the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and World Bank both serve to foster global monetary cooperations, facilitate global trade, and promote economic growth. They are dominated by pro-Western leadership aimed at preserving the USD as world reserve currency but also ensuring the Euro is a stable backup currency. Primary transactions occur through the SWIFT banking transaction, of which over 200 countries conduct confidential financial telecommunications. This is the default medium for institutional and sovereign transactions. To be excluded from SWIFT is a death sentence.<br />
Proposed BRICS scheme: Due to the recent Cameron proposal to boot Russia from SWIFT, along with NSA having unfettered access to every SWIFT transaction, Putin has proposed that Russia create it's own national payment settlement system. These national settlement mechanisms have already gained traction in China and Japan, and should there be closer cohesion among BRICS nations, a BRICS-based SWIFT equivalent would undoubtedly create global economic upheaval. From a financial institution perspective, the $100b BRICS development bank will rival the IMF (growing over time), and the BRICS Emergency Fund will rival the World Bank. They are starting small with $50b, but will ultimately increase steadily over time.<br />
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<b>Death Knell: The Gold-Backed BRICS Currency</b><br />
Current scheme: As mentioned earlier, the USD is the default global reserve currency. Severed from the hard-asset of gold backing in 1971 by Nixon, the impact was seismic to the dollar stability, which resulted in severe devaluation over the subsequent decade until interest rates were juiced to the ceiling by the Volker/Reagan administrations. Luckily, globalist pig/former Sec of State Henry Kissinger brilliantly negotiated a decades long petrodollar scheme that basically forced the world to settle only in dollars, which meant continued interest in US treasuries. It's now widely assumed that Fort Knox and the NY Fed are either empty (in Ft Knox' case - by empty I actually mean 'nerve gas pumped into vaults in the off-chance people want to know the real truth'), or running on empty (in NYFed's case, by empty I actually mean 'underground tunnel system to JPM's recently sold HQ to China real estate company).<br />
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Proposed BRICS scheme: It's no secret that the vast majority of any above-ground or currently-mined gold is going STRAIGHT to the East (has been for the past decade, but accelerating since 2011). China/India have a culture of precious metals accumulation, and Russia is loosely behind, albeit at a slower pace. They are hoarding as <3% of Americans invest in precious metals. Cause it's evil to not rely on King Dollar around here. Anyhoo, the ultimate nail in the coffin to the USD is the announcement of a gold-backed yuan or ruble or new currency altogether. This brings the post home - <b>Putin (energy), Saudi Arabia (petrodollar), China (largest sovereign US investor) all have the ability to press the 'Eff You' button and sink America. </b>They are biding their time, and once the alternative institutions are set up, the alternative transacting systems are set up, and the alternative currencies are set up, <b>the world will pivot to the BRICS nations</b>. And we'll be stuck with our trendy iPhone 6's, insurmountable debt repayments, hyperinflation, and a crappy Fantasy Football roster.<br />
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I realize this sounds harsh - after all, China and Russia are immature economies without a stable currency that the world can trust (I get that). Their military isn't as good as ours (I get that). Their leaders are corrupt (I get that). But for the love of God, stop being a 'homer'. You know the people who never think 'their' team can lose? 1998-2001 Yankees fans, 2007 Patriots fans, 2013 Broncos fans, you know what I'm talking about. Stop thinking we are unsinkable like the Titanic. Stop thinking we can't crash the economy (psssst - we never recovered from 2008). We are basically Johnny Football Hero that returns to his old high school to sling passes to sophomore wide receivers thinking we've 'still got it'. Everyone acts polite, gives Johnny Football the microphone, let's him think he still has the stuff, but when he leaves, they exclaim to one another, "He's lost some zip on his throws (lower GDP growth). I heard he's a drug addict now (QE/debt addiction) and gets in barfights all the time (foolish wars in Iraq/Afghanistan/Libya, and now the looming abortion that is the rebel-arming to stop ISIS). He doesn't work well with the new guys (BRICS) and has a real big ego and worships himself instead of God (insert any narcissistic American you know here)." The show is about to conclude. Still remember our great country for what it was, not for what it's about to become.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-78380524124496115072014-08-30T08:42:00.001-04:002014-08-30T08:50:03.245-04:00Ferguson and the Emerging Police StateThere's been much ado about the recent fatal shooting of 18 year old Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO on Saturday, August 9th. It started as a news headline later that day, when 'a white cop shot a defenseless african american who had his hands up and his back turned for no good reason.' Instant response by most (myself included) - 'This is despicable. Why would a cop do that, especially with all of the recent police #fails over the past year (botched SWAT team missions, injuring babies in their cribs with explosives, choking out a Notorious BIG look-a-like for loitering in front of storefront)?'<br />
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As usual, media reports THEN does their due diligence. Predictably, the official story unraveled and completely reversed over the past week. What started out as innocent Mike Brown minding his own business turned into 1) surveillance video showing him reaching over the counter to steal handfuls of cigar packages 2) putting the tiny indian store manager in a headlock despite being twice his size 3) hot pursuit by local police once the robbery was reported 4) taunting his eventual shooter, Officer Darren Wilson while he bum-rushed him in his car 5) busted up Wilson's face in an altercation to gain possession of Wilson's gun (unconfirmed reports of a broken eye socket). And we're supposed to riot and protest against cops in defense of Mike Brown, who officially became human fecal matter the second he robbed a store and choked out a cashier?<br />
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As I write this, media and National Guard have pulled out of Ferguson, MO. Protests have died down (ironically as more evidence was released), and the facts of the case are starting to make the looters and aggressive demonstrators second guess their blind racially-based support for the deceased. So that's promising at least. We had the corrupt Attorney General Eric Holder fly in to ensure things were 'going smoothly'. Hint - if you want Eric Holder to be actively engaged with an issue, make sure the victim is black. See also: Fast & Furious, Benghazi, IRS, AP wire-tapping, and at least five other scandals. Had the victims painted their faces, those responsible would feel the full force of the law! So now you have the AG, the police chief, and the Governor Jay Nixon using suggestive language to encourage an indictment of Darren Wilson.....cause.....cause he shot a black kid!!!! Circumstantial evidence be damned! At this point Mike Brown could have pushed a geriatric out of a wheelchair, stolen ice cream from a toddler, and hijacked a police car and people would still be on his side 'because he was black'. Contrast this circus with the recent shooting of 20 year old Dillon Taylor by a non-white cop. Bet you didn't hear about it. Cause no one rioted. And the media ignores it:<br />
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<a href="http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/08/nonwhite_cop_kills_unarmed_white_youth_national_media_ag_and_potus_ignore.html">http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/08/nonwhite_cop_kills_unarmed_white_youth_national_media_ag_and_potus_ignore.html</a><br />
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Where am I going with this? Real simple - I'm not losing sleep over the Mike Brown shooting. One less thug on the streets (look it up - he had a juvenile criminal record and was arrested in a case involving second degree murder, not to imply that he COMMITTED the murder. But 'Gentle Giant' is not how I would describe this guy). There, I said it. Was Dillon Taylor a budding criminal? Don't know, but if he was, we no longer have to worry about it. I don't see black or white, I see contributor to society or future goon. What I DO care about is the police response to general unrest. That's what folks seem to be missing here. These controversial cases flare up from time to time, but the real concern is how the police forces are martialed, how they treat the peaceful demonstrators, and what means they resort to. Here are some recent developments in Ferguson that will be connected to a wider theme:<br />
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- Repeated injury or harm to journalists or various members of the news media. This one sticks out in my mind, only because the media should never, under any circumstances, be touched by police if they are simply doing their job. Independent of how you feel about media bias or slanted reporting, they cannot and should not be manhandled. Well guess what - they were in Ferguson:<br />
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1) Washington Post/Huffington Post reporters Ryan Reilly (WP) and Wesley Lowery (HP) were roughed up and accused of resisting arrest in a McDonalds. The video was recorded here (not shown: cuffing and arrest):<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_52783586"><br /></a>
<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/posttv/national/post-reporter-detained-in-ferguson/2014/08/13/b0fc5720-2354-11e4-8b10-7db129976abb_video.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/posttv/national/post-reporter-detained-in-ferguson/2014/08/13/b0fc5720-2354-11e4-8b10-7db129976abb_video.html</a><br />
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2) Al-Jazeera news crew reporting Ferguson school closings hit by tear gas canister. Video here:<br />
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<a href="http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/local/2014/08/14/crews-hit-with-bean-bags-tear-gas/14042747/">http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/local/2014/08/14/crews-hit-with-bean-bags-tear-gas/14042747/</a><br />
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3) Irate officer approaching 'photojournalist' (whatever the hell that is) and threatening to 'f*cking kill' him. Video here:<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_52783594"><br /></a>
<a href="http://photographyisnotacrime.com/2014/08/20/cop-ferguson-aims-gun-photographer-will-fucking-kill/">http://photographyisnotacrime.com/2014/08/20/cop-ferguson-aims-gun-photographer-will-fucking-kill/</a><br />
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Honorable mention:<br />
- tear gas on protesters. Not the first time, not the last time. BTW - tear gas is not allowed to be used in international wars.<br />
- rubber bullets fired at close range. Remember Victoria Snellgrove, shot through the eye after the Red Sox won the 2004 ALCS? Rubber bullets cause damage.<br />
- deployment of MRAPS (used in the Iraq/Afghan war, now on our streets).<br />
- gas masks<br />
- 40mm wooden baton rounds<br />
- M4 carbines<br />
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Should we be shocked by anecdotal bush-league incidents, or should we come to expect this? I tend to side with the latter. Expect more 'police state gone-awry' as we increasingly move to throw any and all high-grade military equipment at local police in an effort to further militarize/federalize them to be in full alignment with their Department of Homeland Security big brothers. Here's some interesting developments in the past decade:<br />
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- <span 13px="" 16.25px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" imes="" line-height:="" new="" roman="" serif="" times="">“Since 2006, state and local law enforcement have acquired at least 435 armored vehicles, 533 military aircraft and 93,763 machine guns, according to an investigation by the New York Times published in June. This was made possible under a department of defense program that allows the agency to transfer excess military property to US law enforcement agencies. More than $4.3bn worth of gear has been transferred since the program was created in 1997, according to the Law Enforcement Support Office (LESO)."</span><br />
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">- SWAT team raids are through the roof. 3000 estimated raids per year in the 1980's, up to 45,000 annual by 2005 (and over 50,000 by 2013). 62% for drug-related raids, and 79% in private homes, </span><b><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">of which only 7% were related to the initial intended use of hostage situations and barricades. </span></b></span><br />
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;"><b>- </b>The oft-debated '1.6 billion rounds of Genova-convention-banned hollow point ammunition' purchased by DHS, recipients including National Weather Service, Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement, Social Security Office and countless others. To be fair, these were renewals in bulk but no one seems to be questioning the overall NEED to have them.</span></span><br />
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">- The gun confiscation/martial law in New Orleans after Katrina, especially around the Superdome.</span></span><br />
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">- The limited martial law in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy</span></span><br />
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">- The infamous Watertown martial law in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing. 10,000+ militarized police with Humvees, K9's, scary guns, raised voices, SWAT team gear, shut down subways, 'stay in your homes' (cause that's a normal response to a glorified manhunt - how many murderers have 'escaped' and been on the run and we do nothing other than report on the 6 o clock news to 'be on the lookout'? And GUESS WHAT? Some sweaty slob goes out to his back yard to smoke a cigarette and notices blood on his boat and solves the crime. Case closed. Civilian saves the day. </span></span><br />
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<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;"><br /></span></span>
<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span 16.25px="" line-height:="">The government loves strife. Us versus them. Police vs civilian. Black vs white. Man vs woman. Rich vs poor. Straight vs gay. Christian vs Muslim. They need to keep themselves relevant, so these types of flare-ups help reinforce the need for the police state to exist and expand. We always need a bad guy - communists, Nazis, ISIS, Al Qaeda, the Japanese, the British, you name it. Guess who the next enemy on the list is - the US citizen. And this all proves that. Watch the mission creep as unrest begins to become widespread. We've pumped over $3 trillion of Monopoly funny money into the zombie banks and created the worst asset bubble in history. We still have 100 million people on some type of government assistance. We are approaching $18 trillion of debt. The government is broke, the system could fall at any time. What will the government do when EBT cards stop functioning? You saw this last year at select Walmarts where folks started looting and rioting. And that was over a few HOURS of no service. The police need to know how to respond. Ferguson, Watertown, New Orleans are all SCRIMMAGES for the grid shut down, the mega terrorist attack from (insert bad guy here), the solar flare, the cyber attack, the New Madrid fault rupture, the economic crash, you name it. </span></span><br />
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<span 13px="" font-family:="" font-size:="" georgia="" new="" roman="" serif="" times=""><span style="line-height: 16.25px;">It's no secret the FBI/DHS have run urban warfare training in over 38 cities in the past three years alone. Look it up. Youtube the scary videos. Youtube the news reports warning 'its only a test'. Why is there coordinated training for urban unrest? Is something coming? Or is it just wasted money? Why don't we train for mass Zoo Evacuations? Because it's NOT LIKELY to happen. Why do we not plan for alien landings? Because it's NOT LIKELY to happen. Why do we not plan for crazed nuns going trigger happy during 8:30 Mass? Because it's NOT LIKELY to happen. Urban warfare is likely to happen when the system goes down. Subject of another blog post, but over 200 military leaders have stepped down from their positions after the Obama administration questioned them on whether or not they would fire on US civilians in a time of need. Rand Paul famously filibustered over the droning of US civilians on domestic soil after we droned US civilians (terrorists, mind you) abroad. Drones + NSA snooping + attack on 2nd amendment = Scared US civilians. Check out what DHS/Armed Forces now qualifies as a domestic terrorist in the various links below:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="line-height: 16.25px;"><br /></span></span>
<span 16.25px="" line-height:=""><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 13px;"><a href="http://info.publicintelligence.net/SLATT-TerrorismTraining/terrorismindicators.pdf">http://info.publicintelligence.net/SLATT-TerrorismTraining/terrorismindicators.pdf</a></span></span><br />
<span 16.25px="" line-height:=""><br /></span>
<span 16.25px="" line-height:=""><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/162321199/2161-docs#page=32">http://www.scribd.com/doc/162321199/2161-docs#page=32</a></span><br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_743423272"><br /></a>
<a href="http://joemiller.us/2013/04/101st-battalion-commanders-outrageous-e-mail-to-subordinates-characterizing-traditionalists-as-haters/">http://joemiller.us/2013/04/101st-battalion-commanders-outrageous-e-mail-to-subordinates-characterizing-traditionalists-as-haters/</a><br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_743423274"><br /></a>
<a href="http://thetruthwins.com/archives/72-types-of-americans-that-are-considered-potential-terrorists-in-official-government-documents">http://thetruthwins.com/archives/72-types-of-americans-that-are-considered-potential-terrorists-in-official-government-documents</a><br />
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That should get you scared enough. The last link especially - it appears devout Christians, constitutionalists, 2nd amendment advocates, libertarians etc are eventually going to be targeted. Can't wait. You saw it with the IRS scandal. You see it with all of the domestic shootings - the first people blamed are the 'gun nuts' or the 'preppers' or the 'tea party', and then silly things like facts emerge to dispel those theories. Expect more of it. It's ironic - we impose a police state with guns and weapons we try to get out of the hands of everyday Americans and if you don't go along with it, well, you get put on some type of terrorist watch list. This is the future of America. Whether under Obama, Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie or whomever - be afraid, be very afraid.<br />
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<span 16.25px="" line-height:=""><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-83545243691938809072014-08-27T19:24:00.001-04:002014-08-27T19:24:16.192-04:00Hillbilly HotelI'm not going to bore my 1.4 readers with tales of my fun family vacations and the good times had. After all, that's what Facebook is for. However, on my last night of vacation, it warrants providing a chilling synopsis of a 'penny wise, pound foolish' decision that will haunt my kid's lives forever. <br />
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We drove out to Missouri (from Eastern PA) to visit family this past week, and went balls deep on the front-end by getting a nice hotel suite right over the Indiana/Ohio border. Great experience, ate like swine, super amenities, pools, workout rooms, etc. Really broke up the 14 hour drive nicely. However, the way back meant going the equivalent distance (9 hours) and stopping somewhere in West Virginia or Western Pennsylvania. I swallowed hard, was firm in my decision that we weren't going to break the bank on a hotel room after renting a minivan, gassing up, incidentals, etc on our Missouri trip. $85 to stay a night at the xxxxx hotel (name withheld due to me suddenly growing a conscience). Boring blog post so far, right? Hold on. </div>
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The second we saw the oversized pillars supporting a sub-standard structure, we knew something wasn't right. We walked into the lobby to find 1970's meets Poconos cabin theme coupled with stale cigarette smoke and some cheap air neutralizer - not even a freshener, but merely a neutralizer. They apparently gave up on anything smelling 'good' so they said 'screw it, let's just make it not smell like a smokey whorehouse.'</div>
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We walked up to our room and passed what appeared to be a construction crew staying for a few nights. Which is great, cause none of them smoke or use foul language. There was the token 'old coot/codger' in overalls with no shirt underneath and a long white goatee in a rocking chair rambling about yesteryear and growing up on a farm. Like, this caricature of a human being actual existed on the way to our room. Think token Deliverance scene reference, combined with The Hills Have Eyes and Wrong Turn 1-4 horror movies. Somehow southern accents made their way into the equation. Keep walking kids, don't breathe the air.<br />
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Shitty Buckcherry or Quiet Riot were blasting from one of the rooms, along with the smell of weed. Friggin weed. At a seedy hotel. We kept our heads down and reached our room - smokey smell continues (despite being a smoke-free room). Spotty internet (whatever), and a proud PROUD sign on the bed talking about how the hotel takes pride in not washing sheets if the same guest stays multiple nights. If that's the future of 'green', I want off. Luckily our youngest ensured it would be closer to 'yellow' by morning. We had our kids sleep in their sleeping bags ON TOP of the beds in the off chance there was unwashed construction guy jizz lurking all over the sheets. We probably left with the pubes of five different men and trapped farts from late June all over our legs but whatever, I think we'll be ok. </div>
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In order to kill time, my wife took the three kids to the pool while I went through my work emails. There was a layer of philm (phylm? film?) on the water, and some random Dave Chappelle look-a-like in jeans and a wife-beater lumbered over and put his mangy feet in the water whilst smoking a cigarette. "Ooooo weeeeeeeee. Ooooooooo weeee it's cold." Check please. Fam was back in the hotel room faster than you could say 'Michael Brown'. The kids were whimpering and not like their normal jovial selves, and I think they always expected hotels to be nice (not like we actually stay at super nice hotels, but rather 'nice enough' hotels). We agreed we would get up at 4am and get the hell out of dodge as soon as we could. Kill time till they get tired, make them crash and then leave while they are still half-asleep so they could lay in the minivan while we finish the trip. Screw the continental breakfast, as the muffins probably had crack rocks in them and the omelets had used maxi pads (no wings). I'll take Dunkies at that hour any day. </div>
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We drove through the sketchy surrounding area where everyone had underbites, cutoff flannel sleeveless shirts, weird hairlines, ten inches of flab dangling from their triceps, three quarters jean shorts (jorts) that stop at the shins, fleshy jowls, and gyrating jaws but no dentures. Naturally a Denny's was nearby, which allowed us to kill another hour. Our youngest, however, felt the need to act like the biggest dickhead in his 3.5 year existence. He wouldn't eat, kept talking about how he needed to poop (I'm not putting his ass on one of those STD tawlets), and refused to do anything but stack jelly packets into a mock St Louis Arch to relive his vacation experience. That gets old after a few minutes. Our oldest asked to run to the bathroom - not to pee, mind you, but just have a private place so that he could cry since the town/hotel/sights and sounds were so depressing. Our daughter continued whimpering, at one point asking 'if we are going to get any diseases from the hotel room'? I had no simple answer for her, so I allowed the children to just fart freely at the table without fear of consequence. We didn't have appetites per se, but rather stomach knots that needed to get covered in unhealthy fried foods. Thank God kids eat free on Tuesdays. </div>
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We got back to the room without getting butt-raped and forced ourselves to go right to bed. Out the door by 5:00am, with token peel-out noise as we left the Hillbilly Hotel, never to return. Lesson learned - don't cheap out on a family hotel room. Make sure it costs no less than $150. If you're on a family trip, you're probably paying out the ass anyway, so what's another $50 for better quality? Now please excuse me, I have to go think of ways to get myself off the family shit list.......</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-62600943166992539972014-07-31T08:19:00.003-04:002014-07-31T08:19:35.404-04:00Cloward-Piven Strategy Deployed On The BorderThe United States border continues to buckle under the weight of Central American illegals (we say 'illegals' around here, not 'undocumented' or 'unaccompanied'). Tens of thousands continue to flood the border each month in hopes of getting through - news got out south of the border that 'now is the time to cross' due to recently relaxed immigrant-friendly policies, along with the perception that if border jumpers say they have family here, they can be granted temporary status with the *promise* to check in within 30 days for re-evaluation. Cause honor system always works here. Combine that with drug cartels chasing these families north to the border and you can see why this is such a chaotic state of affairs. Let me establish some context, because the mainstream networks are doing a great job of confusing everybody and covering up 'their guy's' tracks.<br />
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Many in the media will be quick to point to the oft-talked about William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 signed under George Bush that basically granted asylum to any child believed to be victim of assorted types of trafficking. Now Bush did nothing substantial to defend the border in his eight years in office (which disgusts me), but this law is HARDLY the reason why in 2014 we would see a spike from an 6,800/year average from 2004-2011 to 100,000+ this year and an incremental climb of 25-50% in subsequent years. That's a problem we can't blame on George Bush. Sorry Obamabots. Liberals are obviously using a form of Common Core math to equate 6,800=150,000=Bush! This is all manufactured to play on people's emotions. Check out the links below - they knew this was coming, and DHS even advertised jobs based on November 2013 reports of the influx:<br />
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<a href="http://www.usccb.org/about/migration-policy/upload/Mission-To-Central-America-FINAL-2.pdf">http://www.usccb.org/about/migration-policy/upload/Mission-To-Central-America-FINAL-2.pdf</a><br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1474735535"><br /></a>
<a href="http://www.thedailysheeple.com/stunning-dhs-solicited-bids-for-vendor-to-handle-65000-unaccompanied-minors-in-january_062014">http://www.thedailysheeple.com/stunning-dhs-solicited-bids-for-vendor-to-handle-65000-unaccompanied-minors-in-january_062014</a><br />
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Anyway, as mentioned in a prior post, this is all aimed at achieving the Hegelian Dialectic of 'Problem- Reaction-Solution'. Flood the border with unaccompanied minors (80% are males in their late teens, it's not like a bunch of pudgy legged toddlers in saturated diapers are waddling up from Guatemala). Relocate illegals across the United States against the will of the citizens. Have the mainstream non-Fox media in your back pocket to sell the idea that it's 'all about the children'. Guilt law-abiding Christians into adopting these children, and question their religious faith if they don't automatically agree to adopt them. Infuriate the general public so that 'something needs to be done.' Whip out pen and phone and sign an executive order to grant official amnesty to millions of illegals. Game. Set. Match. Democrats win general elections for life, the country collapses, and government replaces rugged individualism and capitalism with socialism. This is what's going to happen. But it's not the brainchild of Barack Hussein Obama - it's the liberal wet dream of the Cloward-Piven Strategy.<br />
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Husband and wife political activists Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven (never trust someone who insists on being called three names) gained notoriety in the 1960's by developing a diabolical plan from their Columbia ivory towers. The strategy was straightforward - eradicate poverty in the United States by agitating activists within the Democrat party to come out in force through demonization of the middle class and ethnic working class. Pitch the idea of mass redistribution of wealth. Combine with Alinsky tactics of dividing voting blocs into targets, personalizing them and ridiculing them to the point where no sympathy can be garnered for said bloc. This also involved bloating the welfare system to the point that it became unsustainable for taxpayers to maintain without broad and far reaching reform. Basically enable the poor and destitute to rise up and crash the system with their new demands since it will be a public relations nightmare to do otherwise. Success would mean bringing in the right administration to 'do the right thing' and usher in a national system that guaranteed a salary for EVERYBODY, thus wiping out poverty forever. In the process, Democrats would lead this mission, and through their victory guarantee loads and loads of new voters. Because if there's one thing liberals like, it's free stuff that they don't have to pay for!<br />
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So how has Cloward-Piven worked over the past five years? Pretty damn well. Those on some type of government dependence have surpassed 100 million. Food stamp usage approaches 50 million. The left continues to demonize the rich, choke out the middle class through tax hikes, cripple the heavily indebted youth demographic with an unfair burden of healthcare premiums despite the fact that they face lower quality/lower paying jobs. Manufacturing ain't coming back, people (thanks NAFTA, CAFTA, and granting most favored nation status to China). Jobs lost pre-2008 crisis have been replenished with either 1) lower wage jobs or 2) more folks taking on a second job. That's not what you're being told. We have an unemployment rate of 6.1% (good), but yet have the lowest workforce participation rate in 40 years (62.8%, not good). The debt remains unserviceable, the country politically/morally/economically bankrupt, and now we are poised to witness the signing of an executive order around Labor Day (ironically) that fundamentally transforms this nation forever (didn't I hear that line on the campaign trail?).<br />
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The final stage of the Cloward-Piven strategy will play out as follows - Obama will sign legislation that in essence grants instant amnesty (was previously de-facto amnesty, so shame on the failed Left-Right paradigm that 'has our best interests'). 11-20 million illegals then become citizens. Trespassing will become legal, so feel free to exploit this wherever you go. <b>"But what about the children?" </b>The border will become a joke (ok, more of a joke) or dissolve completely. Wages will be driven down, legal citizens here will get mad, have more competition for jobs now. <b>"But what about the children?" </b>Since we refuse to do what Australia does with its immigrants (ie - admit people based on what they can do for the country), expect more menial/manual labor jobs, swelling of government welfare rolls, civil unrest, 'calls for sweeping change', and even phony impeachment calls (just recently voted down by Wussy Speaker of the House, John Boehner). Impeachment inquiries build compassion for the victim and allow the base to coalesce around him (so Obama benefits by taunting GOP with this - he WANTS them to push for impeachment, its the only shot the Dems have of keeping the Senate in November). The resulting civil unrest will cause more extreme legislation to grant some type of comprehensive welfare reform that accommodates these illegals. Taxes go up, middle class decimated, we all know the rich get richer (whether D or R in the White House), poor but legal citizens get poorer, and the Big G that we used to know as God (since thrown out of America for being too offensive), now becomes Government. Mission Accomplished.<br />
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Stay tuned for Labor Day......Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-28241898882625335512014-07-03T20:00:00.005-04:002014-07-03T20:10:47.994-04:00ISIS Origins and Their Surprising Benefactors2014 has been a wild year and its only half over. We've got a border crisis, a Ukrainian crisis, a 'chained in the basement' economic crisis looming, and out of nowhere, the Iraq that we have spent trillions of taxpayer dollars on, suddenly has to deal with a seemingly 'brand new' terror threat, one that is even WORSE than Al Qaeda (didn't think that was possible did you?). This post will give a holistic view of the ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham) problem in Iraq - where they came from, who funded them, what do they want, and where this crisis is ultimately headed. Hope it's more interesting than another 1-0 World Cup game.<br />
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So first things first, I'm not a poli-sci major, have no history degree, am not an expert on muslim studies or geopolitical studies (so I guess that means I'm 'gainfully employed'), or give a shit who wins the Sunni vs Shiite war (I'm in the 'nuke them, let God sort them out' group, as they probably feel about us, so whatever). In case things get testy to any wimpy knee-jerk liberal reader who lacks contextual interpretation, nonlibs feel the need to provide disclaimers so here goes:</div>
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"I don't dislike followers of Islam. 99% are nice people. I know a handful of them and they are all good people who do not hold extreme and dangerous beliefs. They've been hijacked by fanatics and are probably embarrassed to even be associated with them." <end disclaimer></div>
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Anyway, ignore what you are hearing on cable news, as its just finger pointing. CNN/MSNBC/ABC/CBS/NBC/PBS/NPR/NYT will all pull the 'I told you so' card with Iraq (and like a broken clock, they would be right). Fox News and mainstream talk radio will blame Obama's hasty withdrawal of troops (as if he put them there in the first place). Anything coming out of a Bush administration official should be summarily dismissed, because they were wrong. Their criticism of Obama is invalid. Stick to making fun of Obama on every other policy that he screwed up (there's upwards of 40), but he gets a pass on Iraq because YOU put the troops there in the first place. Hell, I voted for the Bush twice and supported the war and have friends who proudly served, and I can actually look back and say "Saddam was a piece of shit, but he kept these fringe groups at bay." Watch this 1994 clip from none other than Dick Cheney on how BAD it would be to invade Iraq, because it would be a quagmire from which we would create even more havoc and a power vacuum:<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9YuD9kYK9I">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9YuD9kYK9I</a><br />
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They KNEW going in that it would be a disaster that could give rise to extreme elements of a mentally unstable Islamo-fascist groups. But....but '9/11' so therefore all bets are off. Here's the rundown of where we are today.<br />
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<b>Sunni vs Shiite Battle</b><br />
If you take away one thing from this, its that the rise of ISIS stems from the boiling hatred between Sunni and Shiite factions within Syria and Iraq. Both sects have hated each other for centuries, and its not going to change any time soon. ISIS aligns themselves with the Sunni side of the fence (mostly Saudi Arabia), whereas Iran is predominantly Shiite. Both groups have had their core principles compromised by the extremist islamofascists, and much like the Catholics of the 12th through 18th centuries, they have themselves a public relations nightmare. Please indulge me in a Tale of the Mohammedan Tape:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9MdUR6FCVgqJVDL-4YIC4S9-gJ_dde4SRkz7sdKQ4blOFNdW3LjGUPwiZzZhCDsFn5faVzXNJMrHpqALf7v6TXZ51z5RfmqhruMcnBQDd5vexZ5MJPMBknF5hUPc4xTOSdHdpHH0pYY06/s1600/chart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9MdUR6FCVgqJVDL-4YIC4S9-gJ_dde4SRkz7sdKQ4blOFNdW3LjGUPwiZzZhCDsFn5faVzXNJMrHpqALf7v6TXZ51z5RfmqhruMcnBQDd5vexZ5MJPMBknF5hUPc4xTOSdHdpHH0pYY06/s1600/chart.png" height="267" width="400" /></a></div>
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This is a Christian capturing a lazy Cliff's Notes version of the Shia/Sunni war. If I overlooked or oversimplified, get over it. So here's the deal - 2010, post US troop surge, Iraq holds elections and prime minister, Iranian-backed Shia Nouri Al-Maliki retains power and refuses to tap his opponents for positions in his cabinet (as promised). Over the next three years, there is an antagonistic attitude against Sunnis by the Shia-led government, which results in unrest, rampant poverty, and job discrimination (among other things). ISIS breaks away from Al Qaeda after a handful of victorious village skirmishes, and breaks 500 militant prisoners out of Abu Ghraib in Baghdad. Fast forward to now, and ISIS keeps taking over large cities like Mosul and Tikrit (Saddam's hometown). On Sunday, they did the ballsiest thing yet - they declared an Islamic Caliphate across Syria and Iraq. That is a huge development, as this is the equivalent to rebuilding an ancient empire. Here is their new map:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQMhzEnsBYDKOHAA7JnkCqpAis0t1xI2aiCtMOJBqsCmUV4nadELzugzXLhhwgNrKdrltYUkBaUrc9E5UUWyZrquIA_DyFcv1s0UUbJXJJ45PGVgOoxR4B_wVKiCcmkmdJ4j5b6xYKqUpJ/s1600/20140701_isis.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQMhzEnsBYDKOHAA7JnkCqpAis0t1xI2aiCtMOJBqsCmUV4nadELzugzXLhhwgNrKdrltYUkBaUrc9E5UUWyZrquIA_DyFcv1s0UUbJXJJ45PGVgOoxR4B_wVKiCcmkmdJ4j5b6xYKqUpJ/s1600/20140701_isis.jpg" height="313" width="400" /></a></div>
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They have declared a caliphate ("Islamic State"). Their five year plan involves Northern Africa, Russia, and most of Europe. Their religious and political leader is the newly declared caliph, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. They are deemed too extreme by Al Qaeda. No one is stopping them. They are planning to take Baghdad within weeks, and will basically claim the state of Iraq for ISIS, which has now just been renamed Islamic State. They've also just asked for all muslims to pledge allegiance to them (calls not returned by 99% of well-behaved muslims). All this in a few weeks span. US can't do anything except gradually send in hundreds of troops every so often. The Shiite government says they have everything under control (because Iran is funneling troops and weapons to them). Russia is also arming them, but I fear ISIS will cut through them like a knife through butter. But one question that no one is asking is this: Who the hell is arming these savages? Where did they get their weapons? The answer may surprise you.<br />
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It's no mistake that Saudi Arabia has special status with the United States. 15 of the 19 terrorists on September 11th were from Saudi Arabia (yet we attacked Iraq and Afghanistan). Saudi Arabia loses if Russia, Iran, and Syria unite to build oil pipelines through their countries as an inroad through Turkey and up into southeastern Europe. They also control the Chechen rebels in the Russian Caucasus, who also happen to be Sunni. So we have Sunni Saudi Arabia who gaves us Sunni Saudi 9/11 attackers orchestrated by Sunni Saudi Osama Bin Laden, who control Sunni Chechen rebels, refuse to stop Sunni Al Qaeda, and now we watch as Sunni ISIS takes over the Middle East. Notice a trend?<br />
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Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and little cute baby Kuwait that we 'liberated' in 1991 are showing their gratitude by engaging in major money laundering in Kuwait. Funds, weaponry, and personnel are being kicked to the ISIS cause by wealthy Gulf donors. The splintered Sunni rebel factions in Syria (you know, the ones we armed against Assad last year?) are now joining ISIS in droves because of their hatred of the Assad regime. Saudi Arabia coordinates with Kuwait Sunni donors the funneling of funds through Jordan and Turkey ultimately to the rebel groups in Syria. It creates chaos for the Syrian regime as well as the al-Maliki government, which both have Shiite ties. It also keeps Iran nervous and 'at bay' in the conflict (despite Iran supporting the Iraqi government). <b>But most importantly, chaos in the middle east fomented by Sunni terrorist groups, funded by oil-rich nations who NEED a petrodollar recycling scheme to stay relevant prevents a Russia/Iran/Syria gas pipeline to Europe.</b> So again, I'm not a 'war for oil' guy, since we aren't benefiting from this (gas up from 2003-2008 followed by crash then up again since 2009?). I'm firmly in the 'war for stabilization of the petrodollar' camp. Saudi Arabia is now pumping 90% WATER instead of oil these days. They are desperate. Their money train (the US) is about to crash and their oil revenues that served them well since the Kissinger Petrodollar Scheme of the early 1970's will start to dry up. They can't let this happen under any circumstances. So they create unrest. They quietly and tacitly allow terrorists to run roughshod through Shiite strongholds. They harbor terrorists of different spectrums inside their borders. They've also engaged the US to help them train the rebels.<br />
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Jordanian officials have come forward to explain how the US specifically TRAINED Syrian rebels in Safawi, Jordan in 2012, with the intent on being used to overthrow Assad in Syria. Remember - we have Alawite Assad (friend of Iran, various high ranking Shiite leaders) against Sunni rebels. US was on record arming rebels in Syria, as we did in Libya. Except we didn't properly 'vet' the rebels. Turns out they were extremists and have now aligned themselves with what we now know as ISIS. According to German newspaper Der Spiegel and London's Guardian news site, we trained these rebels in anti-tank weaponry at a Safawi training base. According to WorldNetDaily, it also appears that A) Obama has known about the advancing forces for two months and done nothing and B) we also had a joint training exercise at the Icirlik Base in Adana, Turkey that also trained ISIS personnel, and it was upon completion that a good number of these rebels made their way through Syria to enter Iraq. To date we've given upwards of $150 million to provide support to various unvetted rebels, most noble, but a portion diabolical, maniacal, and pure evil. Obama is now asking Congress to approve an additional $500 million for the rebel causes in the middle east, but this time its for MODERATE Sunni rebels. To me that is an admission that we blew the vetting process in Libya and last year in Syria. Remember McCain going apeshit when he was accused of hanging out with known terrorists last summer? Poor guy sounded like an old woman who'd been ripped off by a telephone scam. "They sounded so nice...... I thought I could trust them...."<br />
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To reiterate, we started training what we thought were noble Free Syrian Army rebels, non-terrorists that simply wanted to overthrow the Al-Assad regime. Ok, cool. No beef with the US policy and Obama at that point. But then we just started training every Tom, Dick and Hassan without even vetting their background. Inevitably, Al Qaeda and ISIS started to take advantage of this and infiltrate the ranks. There was growing a rift between the two groups in January - while most stayed in FSA, many went to ISIS since it was the shiny new toy. The rest was history. It's almost like a redeux of the 'Rumsfeld armed Bin Laden in the early 1980's' meme that resurfaced ten years ago. The world is a wild place, and the enemy one day becomes the reluctant ally the next. My infantile brain can't process it.<br />
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So here we are. ISIS is forming a caliphate, we aren't doing a damn thing to stop it (although watch the slow, quiet ramp-up in troops. It started with 250 military advisers. Now its been upped to 300 new ground troops. Air strikes are expected if Iraq can't quell the invasion). Combine this with the looming Ukraine crisis I've spoken off twice recently, as well as the growing Mexico border conflict (I would imagine islamofascists are slipping through every day). Can you see a recipe for disaster if ISIS takes the middle east and northern Africa? Hit your knees and pray for peace. Until next time, Happy 4th of July to liberty loving Americans. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-32023345469844096372014-06-22T12:48:00.000-04:002014-06-22T12:48:13.557-04:00Wheels Coming Off The WagonApologies to my 2.3 readers that I haven't posted since April (busy forecasting period at work, kids activities, blah blah blah no one cares). Lots of stuff going on in the world and it warranted getting back in the game to disseminate the news that our lamestream media flat out refuses to report with any coherence. The credibility of the US government continues to plummet as the IRS scandal, hemorrhaging Mexican border, NSA scandal, Benghazi scandal, Iraq 3.0, VA scandal, Ukraine crisis, Bundy Ranch standoff are making the failed two party system look like Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels in 'Dumb and Dumber'. My renewed goal as I rejoin the blogosphere is to create friction among readers still subscribing to the left-right paradigm. You NEED to decouple ASAP from having a (D) or an (R) after your name, because both sides will let you down. They keep lowering our expectations. I defended Bush and he made me look stupid. Liberals defend Obama and he makes them look REALLY stupid. I see an Obama bumper sticker and question how the driver successfully got dressed for the day. But what's the common denominator? WE the American public look stupid. Stop looking stupid. I feel like this is a Direct TV 'Get Rid of Cable - Slippery Slope' commercial. Decouple, take a step back and laugh at how foolish both sides look.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVugloN-Jy9SHO42kUCu-H0ghPIwpE4pDGACxAkmoPdBgEqdvHSWrJQbedX3KQ-nUl-T95hmcGUBwh574LzNReX1o3VTvqNcePz2vUoU37SnDal4Z6K9_2Voqoym8kt32T9NVPWRIi0Fpw/s1600/obamazuckerberg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVugloN-Jy9SHO42kUCu-H0ghPIwpE4pDGACxAkmoPdBgEqdvHSWrJQbedX3KQ-nUl-T95hmcGUBwh574LzNReX1o3VTvqNcePz2vUoU37SnDal4Z6K9_2Voqoym8kt32T9NVPWRIi0Fpw/s1600/obamazuckerberg.jpg" height="229" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b>IRS Scandal Rekindled</b><br />
The Lying Lois Lerner Debacle gets worse by the minute. We're now hearing that two months after the steepest period of hijinx (January 2009-April 2011), her hard drive broke and the email couldn't be retrieved. The hard drive crash is dated around June 13, 2011. Ok, fine, whatever. Pull it from the server where every company is mandated to keep email backups. "The hard drive is broken." Yeah I heard you buddy, please retrieve these emails from the mandated backup server. "Yeah, but...but the hard drive is broken, we can't." You and I are not on the same page, IRS. I realize in lots of companies anything after 6 months typically gets deleted from local computers for storage space issues; my company has a 1 year policy. Others never 'outlook janitor' their emails. But everything is backed up on a server. See IRS Manual blurb below reminding us that copies of each email are placed in a Microsoft Exchange Server:<br />
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1.10.3.3.1 (07-08-2011)<br />Don’t Slow Down the System</span></h3>
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Use Arial or another simple font on a plain background.</div>
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Do not use animation, fancy background, "wallpapers," borders, graphics and photographs as part of your "stationery" or message format. Exceptions will only be allowed for special IRS Commissioner initiatives.</div>
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Refrain from sending large attachments to work groups or audiences. <b>Remember every email message and any attachments, embedded graphics and photographs require a copy for each Exchange server store where each recipient’s mailbox resides. </b>Instead store the document on an IRS public web archive or SharePoint repository and insert a hyperlink into the message. Ensure the permissions allow access by all recipients prior to sending the message.</div>
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And then this subtle implication (not sure what extent of service was, but even if they no longer do business together, a backup server process EXISTS):<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd1nlkISW1FiSZjlncIMhBo_KTejzCPvm6Fc-gMpZ2Cl_-w1lSiKQKdH5dF7AqkpjK2i5_dtKqGstNrqboH3xU2zHJ_CECW5ofiOlQz9fJzgHYzGRIDQFOhOeQEVkByk9E_Z8aTp-DU1DD/s1600/sonasoft-IRS-tweet.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd1nlkISW1FiSZjlncIMhBo_KTejzCPvm6Fc-gMpZ2Cl_-w1lSiKQKdH5dF7AqkpjK2i5_dtKqGstNrqboH3xU2zHJ_CECW5ofiOlQz9fJzgHYzGRIDQFOhOeQEVkByk9E_Z8aTp-DU1DD/s1600/sonasoft-IRS-tweet.png" height="190" width="320" /></a></div>
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You. Are. Being. Lied. To. Typical liberal response: "Yeah, but WMD's, Halliburton, Bush ruined the economy." Take a step back from ideology and read the above, and then put on your hypothetical cap and pretend the IRS was targeting liberal groups and a republican was president. Feel free to have the same anger and vitriol. It's the first step to going independent. So what's the resolution here? More stonewalling. Nothing will happen. Those that perform the best on the stand will receive promotions within the next eight months. One more thing - I mention above that her hard drive crashed around June 13, 2011. On June 3rd, 2011, Chairman of House Ways and Means Committee, Congressman Dave Camp, wrote the below letter to then IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman about the potential of unfairly targeting conservatives:<br />
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<a href="http://waysandmeans.house.gov/uploadedfiles/non_6103_ltr_final.pdf">http://waysandmeans.house.gov/uploadedfiles/non_6103_ltr_final.pdf</a><br />
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Let that timeline sink in for a few minutes. Ten days after the cat leaps out of the bag, Lerner and six others' hard drives start to magically crash, and the same IRS that mandates YOU the taxpayer keep 5-7 years of tax records, claims that there is no server with backups of employee emails. Methinks this letter got passed around the IRS like Ke$ha's vagina at a Grammys afterparty. Folks panicked and stuff got 'broken', 'disappeared', 'crashed', 'deleted' (insert other past tense verbs here), aaaaand here we are. Not sure about you, but I don't like being held to a different standard than government. What do I know, though, I'm just a racist tea-bagger, right Obamabots?<br />
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<b>Hemorrhaging Mexican Border</b><br />
Not saying this is necessarily Obama's fault, but the overall lack of border security has reached comical levels. Neither Bush nor Obama have done a thing to quell the flow of illegals. "But Obama has deported more illegals than ever." Cause his administration changed the formula. Now 'catch and release' applies, where you block at the border and count it as a deportation. We have tens of thousands of unattended minors being shipped up and dropped off on the border as we speak, mainly on the misinformation that any mothers with young children traveling to the border will be given permits to stay, and that US border protocols have been, como se dice, 'relaxed'. Families come in, husbands are quickly deported, then mothers and children are shipped to the closest US-based relative on the taxpayer's dime via free bus vouchers. Feel free to pass go, feel free to collect your $200. FEMA coordinates the process (you know, the Katrina and Sandy FEMA), while the mothers slowly fall off the radar within the mandated 30 days to 'check back in'.<br />
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And then THIS nugget comes out:<br />
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<a href="http://downtrend.com/robertgehl/proof-obama-knew-illegal-immigrant-minors-were-coming-has-no-plans-to-deport/">http://downtrend.com/robertgehl/proof-obama-knew-illegal-immigrant-minors-were-coming-has-no-plans-to-deport/</a><br />
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It now appears that administration officials KNEW some type of mounting crisis would occur, so they started building up capability/resources ahead of time to properly plan the mission. This is what you get when there are three decades of inaction on the border. Everything begins to explode at once (driving down wages, giving up on strict border security, more burden on the taxpayer to support these people, spread of new diseases (oh yes, this is already happening), rising crime, path to citizenship ultimately culminating in millions of new democrats! Yay!!!! Soooo excited for my children to inherit this!<br />
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The gameplan is this - stage a 'crisis' at the border, pretend to talk tough, force the issue into the news so that the president 'has to do something' with his limp wrist, pen, and a phone. Boom - executive action to expedite path to citizenship 'because we are too overwhelmed at the border'. Cloward and Piven strategy (subject of a future blog post) in full view to weaken America and build reliance on government Watch for this to politically 'catch fire' over the next few weeks.<br />
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<b>Malaysian Plane</b><br />
Ummm.......pssst........it didn't crash in the Indian Ocean. In fact, it didn't crash period. Oh, it WILL crash, but not until it's retrofitted with new electronics and some unsavory weapons. Think of it as 'on sabbatical'. Next stop: Tel Aviv or some other ally so that we can concoct a reason to attack Iran/Syria (you know, for the tenth year in a row).<br />
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<b>Ukraine Crisis</b><br />
As widely expected, Vladimir Putin continues to play chess while the NATO/West play Angry Birds. He is biding his time, slowly swallowing up pro-Russia regions of Ukraine (Crimea through secession referendum, Donetsk and Lugansk through 'self rule' referendums, but for all intents and purposes, they flip to Russia's side). We've now seen a largely unreported explosion on the biggest pipeline from Ukraine to Germany, Italy, France, and eastern European countries. This was ONE DAY after Russia basically refused to supply Ukraine gas unless it is paid for in advance. This is called s-a-b-o-t-a-g-e. While it was quickly 'quelled', we should expect more of the same type of stuff this summer. I've talked before about how the US and Saudi Arabia have assets in the region aimed at destabilization. We've spent $5 billion over the past 15+ years fomenting unrest in Ukraine so they would turn on their Russian neighbor and join NATO/the EU. We are failing miserably, and our dollar will ultimately pay the price.<br />
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The method is this - we pay off activists/terrorists in the region to start skirmishes with Russian military on the borders, start fires or flat out bomb areas close to major pipelines, stir up civil unrest in the major cities, etc. Basically draw Russia in so that they can be viewed as the aggressor, and then BOOM something happens: protesters die, gas supplies get disrupted and blamed on Russia, and then we issue more useless sanctions on big bad Russia and Vladimir Putin. Demonize the opponent as a bully/jerk and public opinion for foreign intervention is an easier sell. We succeeded (from a public opinion sales pitch perspective) with Iraq, kind of succeeded in Libya (through a NATO invasion), got our asses kicked in Syria when the whole 'blame Assad for chemicals weapons even though it was really the (US-funded) Al Qaeda-linked rebels who used them' fiasco was exposed. Now we're doing it in Ukraine and out of nowhere, Iraq, with another attempt at Syria sometime later this year waiting in the wings.<br />
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So what happens next? Based on the alternative media sites that I read and insider intelligence/financial newsboards that I subscribe to (I have no connections, I'm just a loser with a keyboard so I need to get the info from connected 'sources' not named Alex Jones....so spare me the 'get over yourself, dude, you're not important' speech), there is....financial 'chatter' in the heavily manipulated commodities markets that include strong buy signals/'pings' on silver and a HUGE looming uptick in oil very soon. Oil spikes are indicative of market crashes and heavy/instant recessions since everyone, everywhere relies on oil for their day to day existence. BTW - Bush and Obama don't dictate the price of oil/gas, so don't blame them and make it political (just an aside). Additionally, there is geopolitical intelligence that suggests a serious escalation in the Ukraine region in which Vladimir Putin plans to do something drastic to 'resolve' the crisis. Both financial and geopolitical intelligence have a mid-July timeframe for these events. Again, this is based on what I've read and heard through recent posts. I shy away from 'date-setting' due to humans generally having a poor track record with this art form. I will say that these alternative media crusaders have been right about the metals markets, Syria, banker suicides before they started happening, the disaster of Japans economic policy, and the multitude of bilateral non-USD energy deals being signed internationally. Therefore the credibility of these alternative media personalities is through the roof.<br />
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Given the daily happenings in border skirmishes, the 65k troop buildup on the Russia/Ukraine border for 'military drills/exercises' and the intense need to distract countries from their domestic economic woes, my guess is that sometime this summer, most likely around July 15th, Vladimir Putin will launch a full-scale attack on pro-Western areas of Ukraine, which will force NATO intervention. Putin will then unequivocally beat the shit out of NATO. Like, curbstomp them. Embarrass them. Send them running in the opposite direction faster than an NBA player on Father's Day. This will spook the world and our spineless president won't do a damn thing. He can't do a damn thing. He's powerless to do anything, because RUSSIA was the one that cock-blocked us in Syria. RUSSIA is the one that coordinated the chemical weapons destruction/handover in Syria. RUSSIA is the one that says 'You won't lay a finger on Iran, do you understand me?' RUSSIA is the one that just signed the Holy Grail gas deal with China, with $250 billion of non-USD denominated funds changing hands (so long, petrodollar). I'm no Russia apologist, but I can detect when someone means business, and Vladimir Putin means business. No red lines, no equivocating, no gray area, no fake threats, etc. He's a bad dude. You don't mess with him. <br />
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So that's a snapshot of my two-part 'Welcome Back to Trousered Apes' post. Later this week I will have updates on the emerging Iraq crisis (and our role as one of the benefactors of ISIS), as well as the widely expected HYPERINFLATION we are seeing in the food we eat, the energy we consume, and basically anything we spend our discretionary income on besides batteries and shampoo. Have a good week.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-33867463604590408982014-04-10T20:03:00.000-04:002014-04-10T20:03:20.737-04:00Radically Change America: Choose Where YOUR Taxes Get Spent!I decided instead of just whining about our worthless, incompetent, lifer-infested, self-serving, loser government, I'd start to crap out ideas on how to restore the country back to those who deserve it - the taxpaying United States citizen. My idea is far-fetched and 99.9% unlikely to ever be adopted anywhere on earth because government knows best. But it fixes a fundamental problem with our country - the misappropriation of our tax revenues. I'm basically proposing a survey that is filled out when filing taxes that let's the taxpayer CHOOSE (by percentages) WHERE and WHAT their taxes get spent on. Here's how it works.<br />
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Step 1: You need to be a federal taxpayer. If you are a taxpayer, move on to Step 2. If you are not a taxpayer, come join us when you pay taxes. Until then, GFY.<br />
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Step 2: When you file your federal income taxes, you will get a list of budget line items and a percentage next to them. It's almost like filling out your 401k contribution/allocations. Looks a little something like this:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8YvzjZv010LBtpxkVHG_jW4T8OuvauzsGBjMbsNURtW-1gH1-VEW7XAG-TpVgmHp07uZgI7MDHmY32URg-NK86QCGX5pohPfNwMjKFE8_yzogVOecTHGf0GOFCesNyZvSF1L84zvAw0am/s1600/Budget.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8YvzjZv010LBtpxkVHG_jW4T8OuvauzsGBjMbsNURtW-1gH1-VEW7XAG-TpVgmHp07uZgI7MDHmY32URg-NK86QCGX5pohPfNwMjKFE8_yzogVOecTHGf0GOFCesNyZvSF1L84zvAw0am/s1600/Budget.png" height="640" width="466" /></a></div>
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The form will show what the recent spending allocations were, and you can then add in YOUR preferences on the right hand column. You will notice that the government spending is in brown highlights, because they are poop. Big smelly toilet bowl poop. They suck at life and if government were a person, I hope they would fall in a sewer, break their neck and then have their dick eaten off by a rat. Anyway, this is where your political leanings come into play.<br />
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Step 3: Create a transitionary five year window to ease in and reallocate funds based on emerging trends. In other words, say the first five years we see an emerging trend where taxpayers have asked to give less to the military and entitlements. The CBO or Budget Appropriations Committee gradually reallocates more and more each year as we get to our new 'taxpayer approved' budget funding amount.<br />
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Step 4: No matter what you choose, you are on the hook to have an 'off the top' amount of your taxes go to paying interest on our lovely $17.6 trillion debt. If that doesn't make you pay more attention to government expenditures and what the Federal Reserve is doing to print money into oblivion to monetize the debt, I don't know what will. Right now it's about $250 billion annually, and only going up (wait till treasury yields spike and it doubles). Scared or pissed off yet?<br />
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Without getting to soapboxy, here's my mindset as I filled this out (in case you can't figure it out, I've turned heel on the failed two-party system and am a full-blown libertarian):<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- We have troops in 150+ countries. No need. Constitution was set up to for DEFENSIVE purposes not OFFENSIVE purposes. So beef up the border and defense capabilities. Cut offense. Boost veteran benefits. <b>30% of my taxes will go to benefits and defense boosting.</b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- Cut Medicare in half. If you are over the average age of 78 years old, you are on your own for healthcare. It's been a nice ride, and if you make it to 90 years old, we throw you a big party and then drop an anvil on your head to kill you. All partygoers are onboard with this, and you sign off on the timing/circumstances. Government funds your party, and you can actually choose how you get killed. Ok 100% kidding, you humorless douchenozzle. Stop getting all worked up. <b>18% of my taxes go to the sloppy healthcare system.</b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- Cut social benefits. Food stamps cut in half, housing assistance, and supplemental income as well. You're already getting supplemental income by selling drugs. Let's be honest with each other. You're not actively looking for a job for 94 weeks but kick it into second gear from 95-99 weeks. I'm onto you. <b>12% of my taxes go to social benefits.</b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- Quadruple education spending, but to new categories. Let charter schools flourish, because public schools aren't getting the job done. Instead of throwing good money after bad, time to throw it somewhere else. My suggestion is to put most of the increases to vocational schools so that it dovetails with my previous suggestion in a prior blog post to redirect students who are not a perfect fit for college and would waste their four years with a stupid useless major when they could skip all that debt and choose a vocation. This changes the game and also deflates the tuition cost bubble (ever so slightly) for universities due to slightly lower demand. <b>13% of my taxes to education.</b> </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- Other neat areas to defund: International Aid, Foreign Affairs, discontinue $1 billion annual dues to United Nations, space is cool, but we've done what we've set out to do, so sorry NASA. But reallocate to border security (as mentioned earlier), and give our veterans more benefits (as mentioned earlier). <b>This loosely takes care of the other 27% of my tax dollar.</b></blockquote>
This can be a fun exercise - feel free to print out the image and fill this out yourself. I took it from the Congressional Budget Office website (I think) and made my own excel file with it. You feel empowered filling it out, and it helps you cope with the fact that your vote no longer counts in this country. So instead of being bitter about 'your guy' not winning, you can at least rest assured knowing you have some say in where your hard-earned money gets spent. But what does this mean for the future of our country?<br />
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Presumably, if enough people 'wake up' and start to question the government's ineptitude as steward of our tax revenues, we will start to see improvements. If a democrat wins, that won't necessarily mean entitlements go through the roof, because we the people have seen the wastefulness and have had enough. If a republican wins, that won't necessarily mean misguided foreign adventures and corporate welfare, because we the people have seen the incompetence and have had enough. Over time, military spending contracts (or gets reallocated to areas of military spending important to our nation's defense). Maybe removing us from other countries that we have no business being in will make other countries hate us less? Did that occur to anyone? Less terror attacks? Less reliance on foreign oil? Do we reinvest our tax revenues in energy expansion so that it's all in house? Who knows - YOU would get to choose that!<br />
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What else could happen? Social program funding begins to subside when we realize people got jobs 4x faster in the post-Depression era than they do now. Pssst - there was also a flimsier safety net 70 years ago. And they still got it done. What about healthcare? If we start reducing healthcare subsidies, will that perhaps change our behavior? Do we take care of ourselves better? You know one of the main drivers of expensive healthcare here is adult onset diabetes and preventable diseases that we funnel craploads of money into treatment because Americans are careless eaters? Through behavioral economics, WE could stem the tide of rising healthcare costs. Finally, we reform the education system because the usual sacred cows are put out to pasture and a new wave of thinking gribs academia. Charter schools abound, which are privately funded and have better success rates. Vocational schools help redirect millions of students away from traditional four year colleges where 80% of graduates choose a career outside of what they actually majored in. Over a 10-20 year period, we have the power to change the very complexion THE VERY complexion of the United States expenditures. Does this excite you?<br />
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Next post: radically changing government.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-72400253333124100902014-03-23T19:43:00.001-04:002014-03-23T19:43:47.037-04:00Newest Craze - 'Motor Oil-Pulling'If you are like me, you can't get through a day without researching the latest trendy craze sweeping social media or the internet. There has been much hullabaloo recently about a new way to detoxify - it's called 'oil-pulling', which is the act of swishing around any type of oil in your mouth for twenty minutes a day, and in the process you are bringing forth all of your mouth's toxins and spitting them out in one fell swoop. This can result in whiter teeth, fresher breath, stronger gums, a better night sleep, and lower overall tooth sensitivity.<br />
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I tried it for a few weeks and it worked pretty well. My sleep improved, my teeth got 2% whiter, and I didn't wake up with dick-breath every morning (ummmm....). But I wanted more. When I do an internet trend, I like to shoot for the stars and get out-of-this-world results. Balls to the wall. So I took this trend one step further and created my own journey - it's called 'Motor-Oil Pulling'. Boy, did I get more than I bargained for!<br />
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So here's what you do - go to your nearest Pep Boys and find a preferred motor oil. My go-to is Castrol GTX, since it collects soot and mouth sludge, uses only organic additives, and protects my body against viscosity and thermal breakdown. Obvi. Swish it around for 45 minutes (no less) and spit it out in a homeless person's face (if you don't live near homeless people, a lazy goth with black nail polish will do). You will notice things start to get better right away. Here's a few of the outcomes:<br />
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<b>Blackened/Sooty Teeth</b><br />
The first thing I started to notice was that my teeth instantly blackened. It appeared that motor-oil pulling does its stated job of collating sludge, but when you spit it out, the sooty glaze will linger. You might wanna get used to that, cause I don't think it's going away any time soon.<br />
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<b>Mechanic Breath</b><br />
After I spit out the oil, I noticed a numbing feeling in my mouth. I think it's cause I had MOTOR OIL in it! Whatever, agree to disagree. Feedback from family members and colleagues was that my breath smelled like the inside of an auto repair joint. It was so bad, I went to kiss my kids goodnight and their eyebrows singed the hell off! What's the big idea? I thought this was supposed to collect and remove toxins from my mouth? Why does it have to be so hard? Did my taste buds get sucked out too?<br />
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<b>Creates Hangover/Increases Sleep</b><br />
Normal oil-pulling techniques 'supposibly' (white person version of mis-pronouncing 'ask') cure hangovers, or at the very least limit them. Not so with motor-oil pulling. My head was pounding, I felt like I ate a cooler full of jelly beans that were soaked in Zima, and then had an anvil dropped on my dome. My urine was jet black, yet the consistency of sweet crude, which led me to the conclusion that if I professed a misplaced hatred of Jews and a willingness to behead Christians, then OPEC would consider doing business with me on a regular basis! My poop looked like fresh clumpy tar/newborn baby meconium. That's a normal side effect of oil-pulling, right? No? My hangover and GI issues continued for two weeks. And then I flat out almost died. Woke up each night, wandered down the hallway, stood in front of the bathroom mirror as I sized myself up, invoking the 'Larry David Staredown' in a hallucinatory state. Then I wet myself. I'd come-to no less than fourteen hours later and find myself in the garage/face down on the wet morning dew of my front lawn. But yes, a better night sleep was obtained.<br />
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<b>Intense Skin Dryness</b><br />
After motor-oil pulling for a month, my skin lost any moisture inside of it and started flaking off all over the place. Picture a pile of powdery eczema near the copy machine and multiply it by 10. The hair on my arms fell off, and I grew scales, black bags under my eyes and open sores all over my neck and genetalia. When people would shake hands with me, five layers of skin would fall off and stay in the palm of their hand, creating an awkward situation that 'deflecting with humor' couldn't resolve. My company tried to fire me, but I couldn't generate enough strength to hold a pen still enough to sign my severance package without leaking out blood and veins all over the document. I felt like a mix between Beetlejuice and Bill Murray's dead boss in 'Scrooged'. <br />
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<b>Elongates your teeth/gums/jaw</b><br />
Something happened when I started doing motor-oil pulling - my mouth region turned somewhat ape-ish. The teeth actually GREW a centimeter, my blackened gums started to pus over and grow up my teeth, and my bottom jaw began to protrude like I was cro-magnon man/steroid user. Combine that with my Armenian features and I was one step away from being in a Geico commercial/prehistoric exhibit in a museum. In fact, you could have hung me up mid-gait in the 'bipedal' wing of the museum and folks would think nothing of it, had I not been wearing a Brooks Brothers shirt and LL Bean moccasins.<br />
<br />
<b>Extreme hormonal imbalance</b><br />
I flat out grew a vagina. Started menstruating oil (southern phonetic spelling 'erl'). Used mechanic rags in my boxer shorts to stem the flow. Got overemotional and developed an extreme false sense of urgency for everything. I lost the ability to compartmentalize the drama in my personal life and lashed out at others in the workplace. I refused to change the water bubbler when it was empty. I started snapping selfies of myself with a trout-pout. Started complaining to anyone who would listen about equal pay. Exclusively ate yogurt and salads, and held in my fahhhts for five days. Randomly called female associates 'girlie', 'sexy mama', and 'bestie'. I don't think coconut oil pulling yields the same side effects, but I could be wrong.<br />
<br />
So that's the basics so far. Gonna continue this for another two weeks then may go back to coconut oil. Plus the jury is still out on this new fangled 'oil pulling'. According to the first dentist that showed up in Google, a man calling himself 'Dr. Isaac Yankem' (who moonlights as WWE superstar Kane) was quoted as saying, "The long term effects of oil-pulling have yet to be proven. Like any study, the results will be contradicted 15 years later by another study, so have at it. But using motor oil is ill-advised. You'd have to be mentally deranged to do such a silly thing." Well there you have it. My 'holistic' approach doesn't JIVE with the experts. Shows what they know. Until next time....<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-60825095039456202982014-03-16T19:09:00.001-04:002014-03-16T19:09:04.524-04:00The Next Penn State In The Making? New Hampshire Colleges Caught With Their Pants Down<div class="MsoNormal">
It recently came to light in the New Hampshire local news that a close friend of mine was the victim of several sexually explicit overtures during his time at New England College by a trusted member of the community, the former head men's basketball coach (look it up). Arguably worse, when my friend and his teammates (also victims of this individual's sexual abuse) told NEC school officials, they did nothing....sound familiar? As this story unfolds, we could be potentially looking at a large-scale cover-up of sexual abuse on multiple college campuses in one concentrated area. These institutions and their "guidelines to protect the students" they are "sworn to protect" are ironically the SAME "guidelines" that these child sexual predators are using for their own protection. What might soon be uncovered in NH, is a raw look into "how" these predators swarm our college campuses like a plague of locusts only seen or heard of in Biblical times. Make no mistake about it parents, friends and neighbors - this is a problem of epic proportions...one that affects us all NOW and for the foreseeable future...</div>
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In 2014, after the national spectacle of Penn St./Jerry Sandusky, the atrocities that were performed, not only by Sandusky, but everyone that covered it up, are apparently being repeated on an albeit smaller scale. How can this happen again? Didn't we as a society set a scary enough precedent/example by punishing Penn St. and Jerry Sandusky? Didn't we send a message to the perverts that were still on campuses or thinking about making school campuses their "safe havens"? Apparently not! Not as a legal system, or as citizens!!! I thought the children were our future according to Whitney Houston? How can we have the moral authority on anything when we don't even act to protect our own?
Now in NH, as in the Penn St. case, this is about to turn into an out of control freight train...we find out that numerous people and organizations that have the power and authority to take action, did quite the opposite...it appears this individual's work roles on campus via a school website page were deleted while an ongoing investigation is still going on (no indication who performed this 'scrubbing'), and not nearly enough resources were allocated to investigate even though the campus knew the severity of the problem. These kinds of allegations are always a nightmare for an institution, especially in the aftermath of the Jerry Sandusky scandal here in Pennsylvania. But the collective 'deer in headlights' response by these blowhards to any accusation is comical yet predictable. Nobody wants this stuff to happen, and nobody intends to cover it up. But what inevitably happens every single time is just the opposite of the intended response - the issues get covered up and eventually the poop starts leaking out the top like a clogged toilet. And instead of pie on their face, it's fecal matter. THAT is what the University System of New Hampshire is now dealing with. Let's quickly go back in time and recap the allegations.
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<b><u><br /></u></b>
<b><u>New England College</u></b><br />
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Before I go any further, this is all part of the public record and corroborated by other parties as determined by the academic institution, culminating in the termination of said employee, so I'm not trying to be a 'super-sleuth' and destroy someone's reputation for no reason. Read the Keene Sentinel newspaper for a great summary of this (what follows below is the detailed CONTENT of what led to this individual's termination). Ok, so a former head coach of New England College's mens basketball team garnered a creepy reputation by constantly asking his players sexual questions about their genitals and what kind of sexual acts they like to perform. He would gain his players' trust and then ask the normal basketball questions like (WARNING: GRAPHIC):<br />
<ul>
<li>"How big is your penis?" </li>
<li>"How, and how much do you masturbate?"</li>
<li>"Rate the players penis sizes on the team from biggest to smallest."</li>
<li>"How long do you last when you masturbate?"</li>
<li>"Would you like me to tell you ways you can last longer?"</li>
<li>On a few occasions would also be masturbating on the phone while asking a common player/coach question like, "Would you like to stay over my house? I only have bunk-beds but that's ok, kiddo, you can have the bottom."</li>
</ul>
This went on from 2000-2002 during the coach's tenure there. It caused anger, emotional anguish, bouts of depression (traumatic events such as rape and sexual assault have, aside from obvious physical traumas, profound long-term psychological effects on all victims including but not limited to children who are assault victims. These include: denial, helplessness, dislike of sex, anger, self-blame, anxiety, shame, nightmares, fear, depression, flashbacks, guilt, rationalization, mood-swings, numbness, promiscuity, loneliness, social anxiety, difficulty trusting oneself or others, difficulty concentrating. Family and friends experience emotional scarring including a strong desire for revenge, a desire to "fix' the problem and/or move on, and a rationalization that "it wasn't that bad"). But no worries - the coach was "allowed to just leave the college" and because he was never reported, eventually joined Keene State College in July 2005. Emails of his misconduct were sent to NEC school officials beginning in 2002...and again in 2005. This was reported in the Keene Sentinel recently, so again, I'm not casting baseless aspersions here. Nothing was done at the time (typical), and one official at NEC asked the anonymous victim to forward the email to Keene State College directly. End transmission out of NEC.<br />
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<br />
<b><u>Keene State College</u></b><br />
<br />
This individual resurfaced as the Director of Basketball Operations, program coordinator at the Youth Student Center, and ran the Nite Owl Cafe at the student center. He was also the 'voice' of Keene State's athletic broadcasts, culminating in a tenure as Director of Basketball Operations for the school in 2010. Unfortunately, they were employing a sexual deviant all along and no action was taken to rid the community of him. The claims from NEC victims started in 2005, to the then athletic director, and then began pouring in May of 2011 by multiple past NEC players. What did the senior leadership including athletic directors and mens basketball coaching staff of Keene State College do about these serious allegations? NOTHING! Sound familiar? How could a guy so involved in the school community be a perv? This just can't be! As a devout Catholic, I'm overly sensitive to pedophiles and others of their ilk being allowed to simply 'move jobs' and sweep stuff under the carpet. Nobody has any patience for it, and it seems like we as a society always instantaneously blame the whistleblowers whenever our rosy view of reality is tampered with. This looming 'scandal' is no different.<br />
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<b><u>University of New Hampshire</u></b><br />
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Last week, news broke of a UNH athletics employee who was terminated and subsequently arrested for locker room voyeurism, which was alleged to have included secretly photographing players changing after a game. Yet another member of the community who volunteers his time with lots of athletic and community programs. How could he ever do such a thing? Anyway, when confronted by police via a search warrant, he hastily tried to hide/destroy evidence on his cell phone and generally engaged in resisting arrest. Preeeeeetttty sure that constitutes tampering or falsifying evidence, brosef. But I'm sure you weren't hiding anything related to your spelunking. No confirmation of whether or not he asked the police officers if they needed to take a quick shower or not before their search. <br />
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So now we have three New Hampshire schools embroiled in less-than-savory happenings, and the question begs to be asked - are these events linked? What is being done to keep creepers like this off of university campuses? Is there a 'coaching tree' that arranges for these sleazeballs to land work at basketball institutions across New Hampshire? Rumors at Penn State is that Sandusky was part of a larger child prostitution/rape ring with wealthy community members - is this a Division III version of that in NH? How did the NEC coach become a coach so quickly and rise to a prominent rank in the athletic community despite a three year stint at Bank of America in the years preceding his head coaching gig? Why weren't emails responded to at NEC when complaints were filed? Why weren't they responded to at KSC? How did UNH let this video camera creeper into their inner circle? Is there someone connected to these two perverts? Have investigators looked in to WHO brought these men to campus? Is mens basketball such a sacred cow at these schools that sexual deviants must have their acts swept under the carpet? WHO HIRES THESE PEOPLE?!?!?<br />
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Luckily, things are moving. To her credit, New Hampshire Governor Margaret Hassan has reached out to Todd Leach, chancellor of the University System of New Hampshire (USNH) to make any findings from these investigations available to the general public. Contrast this response to the response of current Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett (then State Attorney General) - an insistence on more victims before fast-tracking the case and applying the full-court press on the investigation. Feet Dragging 101. He was also interested in running for governor at the time, so naturally didn't give this the time of day. Finally, it was Penn State and Joe Paterno's football program. We can't let anything disturb that. Hassan at least appears to get it (conveniently in an election year). Here's a recent letter that she sent out - so kudos to her acting as quickly as she could:</div>
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But it needs to go beyond that. Listening to school personnel spew platitudes about how they have a specific process and protocol for these types of cases and then constantly breaking that protocol and panicking when trouble lurks does not instill faith in the student community. Ignoring emails, hoping they'll go away, and allowing staff to move on to different gigs is no different than what's going on in the Vatican and various archdioceses (sp?) across the globe. Let's hope this spate of scandals is the last for quite some time. More to follow as things heat up!
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-68423959236875464832014-03-02T22:08:00.004-05:002014-03-02T22:08:43.401-05:00Cold War II: Ukraine and the Proxy War with Russia (Or "What The Lamestream Media Isn't Reporting")The news has been ablaze with Ukraine coverage over the past two weeks, and my fellow slovenly Americans have had to actually put down their iPhones for two minutes and look up Ukraine on a map. Just kidding, they have the MapApp so they luckily don't need to surgically detach the device. Phew.<br />
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We are witnessing the latest chapter in the long fall that is the petrodollar's imminent demise. If you think the US is a conscientious objector, you are dead wrong, and you should probably consider getting your news from somewhere OUTSIDE of the mainstream media (and that includes Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR, NYT, WashPost, WSJ and countless other news media - PS - if you are calculating in your head, 82% of those networks/publications just listed are liberal leaning, so in my book the news media is still biased). They operate in five second sound bytes - alternative media doesn't. So let me break it down for you.<br />
<br />
<b><u>What's Happening Now?</u></b><br />
<br />
First and foremost, I'm not supporting anything the West (US/Europe) does with Ukraine, nor am I actually supporting anything Russia is doing with Ukraine. But you need to hear something other than "Putin is being a mean bully and Obama is a pussy." Cause that's what the US media is pushing. You see, the US wants Ukraine to fall into anarchy, only to have the IMF and NATO pick up the pieces, bail them out, and suck them into the vacuum that is the European Union. Doing so keeps Russia isolated, unable to expand it's natural gas empire as fast as they would have liked. The 21st century has quickly evolved away from military-driven warfare to covert, bankrolled proxy wars where local dissidents are paid off to cause trouble (see Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Syria to name a few, and now Ukraine). Did you know that the US has spent $5 billion over the past twenty years pushing for Ukraine to detach itself from Russia and conduct itself like a wannabe EU-eligible country? Don't believe me? Jerk off to this, Kool-Aid-drinking faux patriot:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37599.htm">http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37599.htm</a><br />
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Assistant Secretary of State for Europe and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland let it slip that we have been pushing for a new Ukrainian government for four years, ever since pro-Russia leaning Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych (democratically elected) took power. He's always maintained close ties to Moscow, so by default he is a thorn in the side to the West. Like any other country, Ukraine eventually fell on hard times and needed a bailout. The past two parties in power in the Ukraine were wildly corrupt and have somehow lost billions of dollars and run the country into the ground (sounds like the US). The citizens wanted the EU to bail them out, which would be a condition-laden package pulled together by the IMF that would basically culiminate in abandoning their sovereignty and local currency (the hryvnia) by folding themselves in with the European Union (an insolvent leviathan that has spawned the PIIGS nations of Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, and Spain, among 10+ others, fraught with high unemployment, negative growth, civil unrest, technical default, and downward-spiraling standards of living). President Yanukovych basically saw this and said "yeahhh.....we're gonna go ahead and just ask for a no strings attached $15 billion loan from Russia." This did not sit well with the country, and here we are. Unfortunately, peaceful protesters were killed and injured. That part sucks, I wish it never happened. However, it is on record that billionaire globalist rabble-rouser George Soros has thrown millions of dollars to central European activist NGO's to destabilize governments that his ilk don't like.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiscuceaecaI8Tc0J8at4vCUTDQ30q7IGe2DhBIwid76bzXs3hd5uQXJ_8uKwbQbj9c1AqgrwIk_zdLg-GdunhUF3rOEOE2ob9kLjF1JRWJmnQCTLAQF5NytU5d6Sl71e_W74hJD8uQGDlz/s1600/20140223_ukr+(1).png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiscuceaecaI8Tc0J8at4vCUTDQ30q7IGe2DhBIwid76bzXs3hd5uQXJ_8uKwbQbj9c1AqgrwIk_zdLg-GdunhUF3rOEOE2ob9kLjF1JRWJmnQCTLAQF5NytU5d6Sl71e_W74hJD8uQGDlz/s1600/20140223_ukr+(1).png" height="285" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The darker the berry, the sweeter the.....Eastern GDP. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Combined with the more subtle US/Western involvement in destabilizing the region, it now becomes clear that Ukraine is basically Egypt all over again. Cause that worked out well (fund protests and civil unrest, put Muslim Brotherhood in power, only to watch it get kicked out after a year despite Obama's unending support). Same shit in Libya (overthrow Gaddafi, replace with Al Qaeda, funnel weaponry through Benghazi 'consulate'/safehouse in order to arm the rebels in Syria). And then we had Syria - where a false flag chemical weapons attack by rebels was intentionally blamed on President Assad as a means to launch a war. We got to the one yard line before.....Vladimir Putin saved the day and negotiated the surrender of Syrian CW's, averting war in the process. Reiterating how much Obama is a giggle-inducing lightweight on the global stage. Remember, our Nobel Peace Prize-winning President was gung-fucking-ho about attacking Syria. Then UK buckled, then Saudi Arabia buckled. Why? Russia, that's why. Not because they necessarily fear their rusty and atrophied military, but because Russia has all of the natural gas in the world at its disposal, and Ukraine and Syria are huge, strategic pipeline conduits. Gazprom is the largest energy agency in the world. See the below graphic, courtesy of zerohedge.com:<br />
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Russia officially needs to be handled with kid gloves, kind like that quirky-but-wealthy benefactor that you need to constantly pacify to keep the gravy training rolling. If Putin shuts off the energy switch, eastern Europe freezes to death. Can't let that happen, can we? So what results is a huge battle for the future of Ukraine. The European Union/the West want Ukraine in its corner to stop Russia dead in its expansionist tracks. Putin desperately wants Ukraine so he can keep the energy revenues coming in (estimates show that the loss of Ukraine pipelines would reduce overall Russian GDP by 25%!!! That's worth fighting to protect!!!)<br />
<br />
<b><u>What's Happening Next?</u></b><br />
<br />
Contrary to some reports, this will NOT morph into World War III. We are bound to protect Ukraine's democratic sovereignty as a result of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, and can do so militarily.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_766416752"><br /></a>
<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2570335/Former-British-Ambassador-Moscow-warns-Russia-invaded-Ukraine-difficult-avoid-going-war.html">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2570335/Former-British-Ambassador-Moscow-warns-Russia-invaded-Ukraine-difficult-avoid-going-war.html</a><br />
<br />
I doubt this will happen, since Ukraine is not worth setting off nukes over. Plus, as mentioned earlier, Obama is a pussy. He'd rather attack his own citizens than another country's. Especially if they're conservative or libertarian. As we found out this weekend, Russian troops have overrun Crimea, the pro-Russia southern peninsula of Ukraine, <b>AT THE REQUEST OF ITS PRIME MINISTER. </b>Now to be fair, Sergey Aksyonov had just been installed, but this was not some out of the blue event. Crimea predominantly identifies as pro-Russian, as does most of the eastern half of Ukraine. The Chernobylized, negative growth, insolvent, bail-out needing unproductive half of Ukraine is - you guessed it - the protesting, pro-EU western side!!!! So basically, Russia is sending troops to maintain stability in one of its supportive areas. Kinda like if Greenland invades Canada. We would protect Canada, because they are our friends. But this brands Putin as a 'really mean bully jerk' by the Western media, while bumbling Obama and Biden struggle to look tough (their only foreign policy success was ordering Seal Team 6 to pump bullets into Bin Laden, but then this turned into a security failure, as 20+ Seal Team 6 members were systematically taken out over the next 24 months like they were living a fucking Nelson DeMille novel - subject of another post once a few more die under mysterious circumstances). Here's the divide linguistically, and why it makes perfect sense that Putin would be protecting the pro-Russia half of Ukraine:<br />
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Watch the Russian troop response expand across the eastern half of the country for stability purposes, but then stop without stirring the pot further. This is merely a show of Russian strength, and the ultimate solution will be to unfortunately split the country in half - the West goes to the Europian Union, and the East goes to Russia. Case closed. No need to fight a war over it. Also, knowing our propensity for false flags and instigations, expect our friend Prince Bandar Bin-Sultan (head of Saudi Intelligence) to rear his ugly head and 'activate' various terrorists groups in the region to destabilize Russia and make them look ripe for the pickens, and 'unable' to accommodate a Ukraine secession - at the very least, Crimea will fall to Russia and so will control of the ports along the Black Sea. Putin is being portrayed as the bully, but in the end he will be the victim. Again, not taking sides here, I just think it's important to establish context outside of the narrative that our 'homer' mainstream media likes to pump out.<br />
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Big picture - as I've said before - the petrodollar scheme is winding down. Forty years ago, Nixon's Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (high level globalist/Illuminati scum) arranged for the US dollar to be the main means of settlement for all oil transactions. It led to our growth as the #1 world economic power, and it will ultimately be our undoing when Russia expands their energy footprint and revenue-generating pipelines, entering into energy settlements in currencies outside of the US dollar with countries like China, India, and other parts of Europe. Saddam tried an alternative means of settlement, and he lost. Gaddafi tried an alternative means of settlement, and he lost. Chavez tried to circumvent the dollar/US and died of cancer (you know the kind that doesn't respond to any chemo treatments, then infects the lungs, then gives you heart attacks when you are otherwise healthy - 'CIA Cancer'). Iran wants to work around the dollar, and has had its nuclear program cut out from underneath them. Assad wanted to help Russia expand its energy pipelines in Syria - and was promptly accused of using chemical weapons on his own citizens, bringing us to within five minutes of World War III. The below picture tells you everything you need to know about false flags and international actors. This is John and Theresa Heinz Kerry dining with eeeeevil Bashar Al-Assad and his wife in 2009:<br />
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Are you getting the picture folks? The American people and global community will fall for anything and everything as long as the storyline is drummed home (WMD's in Iraq, war on terror, protests over youtube videos, 'if you like it you can keep it', 'there is no real estate bubble', 'we have no domestic drone program', 'Bear Stearns and Lehman Bros are solvent', etc). We need to isolate Russia and do whatever necessary to keep them at bay. That keeps our fraudulent economy alive and our toilet paper currency the fiat monetary note of record. Obama is no different than Bush and Clinton. They have different means to an end but still the same outcome - destabilization and strife in other countries to make us look like the cleanest dirty shirt in the hamper. It's worked so far, and it's working in Ukraine. PS - how's that Russian Reset Button working out for you, Barack Obama? Consider yourself informed. Until next time.......Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-77375367971520768022014-02-20T18:29:00.001-05:002014-02-20T18:29:03.085-05:00'Suicided' Bankers and the Human ResponseThere has been much made in the alternative media lately about a spate of international executives/bankers dying under mysterious circumstances. You probably wouldn't see this on the mainstream news channels nor would we ever want to interrupt the latest 'Vanderpump Rules' episode. So don't worry - I've got you covered.<br />
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The following high level have met their fate in 2014 alone*:<br />
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1. William Broeksmit - former senior executive at Deutsche Bank AG (the embattled German bank that is slated to become the Lehman Brothers of Europe in a matter of months). His former employer is facing charges that it hid $12 billion of FOREX losses and accused of rigging the overnight LIBOR rates. Suicide in London.<br />
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2. Gabriel Magee - JP Morgan trading platforms VP for the European division. He was responsible for JPM's fixed income and interest rate derivatives system. 'Jumped' off of the 33rd floor to his death, despite calling girlfriend to tell her he'd be home shortly.<br />
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3. Ryan Henry Crane - JP Morgan trading platforms executive director, Global Equities Group. Worked closely with Gabriel Magee in coordinating enterprise-wide trading platforms. Toxicology reports still to be released. Otherwise healthy.<br />
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4. Mike Dueker - chief economist at Russell Investments and former VP at St Louis Federal Reserve. Russell Investments is being implicated for 'pay to play' schemes in NY pension plans. The same pension plans that will be the first of many government confiscations to pay off our out of control debt and make up for our departing US treasuries investors. Dueker was found at the Tacoma (WA) Narrows Bridge, allegedly having fell 40 feet down an embankment to his death. Case treated by local police as suicide.<br />
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5. Richard Talley - American Title Services founder. 'Suicide' by shooting himself in the dick, torso, and head repeatedly. Cause that's a normal way to kill yourself, just like tossing yourself down an embankment into a briar patch. Under investigation by insurance regulators for improper behavior. Despite being a seemingly small player, title companies have been known to be complicit in the Bank of America 'robosigning' of fraudulent mortgages over the past five years. It is unknown whether this is any way related, but the significant linkages in the past have been made between megabanks and title companies helping keep the scheme alive. <br />
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*Information sources across multiple sites but primarily consolidated in a recent article by investigative reporter/podcast personality Douglas Hagmann. Full article here:<br />
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<a href="http://www.homelandsecurityus.com/archives/10482">http://www.homelandsecurityus.com/archives/10482</a><br />
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Other seemingly unrelated deaths have also been reported, including the August 2013 suicide of former Zurich CFO Pierre Wauthier and Swiss Re AG communications director Tim Dickenson dying under 'mysterious circumstances' last month. Also, Wall Street Journal reporter David Bird has been missing since January. He was on the case regarding commodities and energy price/market manipulations. It is well known that JP Morgan has been engaging in precious metals manipulation over the past three years.<br />
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The big question here is why this is suddenly happening. I realize suicides are a statistic that can be found in any occupation - but why so closely related? According to noted economist Jim Willie, "We are not seeing bad bankers removed - we are seeing bankers removed who are on the verge of revealing big data details." We know that the financial service industry and any linked markets can be easily manipulated. This is the case with mortgage backed securities, interest rate derivatives, commodities markets, LIBOR, foreign exchange, the looming burst of the bond bubble, the artificially inflated stock market. There are scandals all over Wall Street right now. JP Morgan keeps coming up because they are the capstone of the global financial economy. But they are the top of a shaky deck of cards, a deck that could fall any day now.<br />
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I bet you didn't hear that JP Morgan recently sold its $2.5 billion Manhattan HQ to CHINA for the bargain basement discount price of $750 million. It's also noted that multiple stories below the 'basement' of that building is one of the largest gold vaults in the world. With an underground tunnel to another large gold vault - that of the New York Federal Reserve. On record. You see, JP Morgan and all of the other big banks have been doing some naughty things with the gold China loaned them in the 1990's - they've loaned it out to OTHER parties ('rehypothecation') and have lost track of who wear the original gold is. That's why we are invading countries like Iraq, Libya, Mali, and other African countries under questionable motives (their leaders have epic amounts of gold). It's also why we told Germany to get lost when they asked for their own gold back last year, and we gave a paltry 5 tons of the owed 674 tons. We expect to give them the rest over the next six years. Yeah, good luck with that. The straw that broke the camel's back was the disastrous 'London Whale' scandal, in which JPM trader Bruno Iksil (nicknamed 'London Whale') placed obnoxiously sized credit default swap derivatives trades and racked up a loss of $2 billion for the firm. That number has now increased to around $10 billion. This would have sunk JPM when combined with the missing gold fiasco, so they put up their very own headquarters as collateral. And ultimately sold off to Chinese real estate developer Fosun International, an investment property conglomerate. Game, set, match.<br />
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This appears to be the tip of the iceberg. The 'Too Big Too Fail/Jail' bankers are petrified that someone will come forward and expose the investment banking for the fraud that it is. What Edward Snowden did to destroy the NSA and expose the emerging police state that is our elected government, so to will a rogue banker that spills the beans. And don't think this is the end. According to 'V', the Guerrilla Economist (a prominent alternative media financial insider making the rounds), we are watching one big house cleaning before the whole thing comes crashing down, and that there about 15-20 more 'suicides' or large-scale takeouts of high ranking bankers by mafia banker hit squads. I've also mentioned before that 1) we have a derivatives market estimated at $1.5 quadrillion that is built on quicksand and 2) each and every type of derivative is being manipulated and artificially valued. No one knows what the hell these things are, and we certainly have learned nothing from the 2008 crisis.<br />
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Stay tuned for future posts on this topic, as I'm sure we will be reading more about this in the coming weeks. Feel free to also put your head in the sand and pretend these are all coincidences. I've outlined before the lengths that government, central banks, investment banks, economists, and other companies will go to fool the general populace with cooked numbers and fluffy vague optimistic remarks about how wonderful things are. Now is no different. Open up your eyes!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-91567027500684050452014-02-06T19:41:00.002-05:002014-02-06T20:24:05.285-05:00Tectonic Plate-Shifting In The Global EconomyI've been writing this blog for a little over a year, and while a lot of the doom and gloom has been more of a 'slow burn' than a devastating one-off event, it appears we are officially on the cusp of the greatest global collapse of all time (I know it sounds dramatic, cause it is). If you have been following the markets (ok you probably have been more concerned with Philip Seymour Hoffman's inevitable drug overdose to care), you would notice that the Dow Jones has been tanking, Quantitative Easing has been tapered, Emerging Markets are in meltdown mode, and numerous currencies have hit the panic button. No one knew WHEN or HOW the big collapse was going to happen, they just knew it would start in Japan, where the wacky 'Abenomics' policy of it's PM Shinzo Abe kicked off in 2013 - an unprecedented quantitative easing, yen depreciation, and negative interest rates (among others). Now it's impoverishing it's rapidly aging generation due to costlier prices on imports and the government keeps issuing shit bonds to keep the financial system flooded. Well, that contagion is now spreading.<br />
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At no prior point in human history have this many economies, markets, and currencies been so inter-connected. Look back over the last few centuries and there was always one dominant currency - but it was always backed with gold. This chart details the past 600 years:<br />
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Now we are at a point where the top currencies like the USD, Sterling, Euro, and Yen are not backed by gold. They are fiat ('by decree via government') currencies that freely float and are not anchored by a stable tangible asset. Therefore they are able to appreciate and depreciate based on central bank intervention (note - NOT government intervention). This has given rise to currency wars in which certain countries will debase their currencies in order to improve their attractiveness and bring in more export revenues. Correspondingly, their competitors now look more pricey and less desirable in the global marketplace (as we are seeing with Japan). The wheels are starting to come off - and here are a few areas impacted.<br />
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<b>Emerging Markets and Currency Instability</b><br />
The most obvious leak in the boat right now is the Emerging Markets countries that are witnessing unprecedented capital flight. Turkey (doubled its overnight repo rate last week to keep it attractive), Argentina (devalued by 25% two weeks ago), Venezuela (devalued 44% in December), Russia, South Africa and Brazil are all experiencing selloffs due to their relationships with suddenly troubled and exposed China. Folks, when China cools off, the rest of us get hypothermia. Their inflated and cooked growth numbers of 7-9% are 2x the real growth and they have overbuilt and overbought. Additionally, it must be known that when the Federal Reserve started to cut it's QE program in December by $10 billion, and then another $10 billion last week (down to $65 billion of CTRL P each month), all of that money went into the hands of the 1% and the banksters, who then invested in areas of biggest growth - Emerging Markets! Various ETF's for Emerging Markets are in liquidation mode, and this is starting to catch up with the rest of the global economy. That's what happens when investors think the gravy train is leaving the station! Look at the below graph and the way markets performed when news of a taper and subsequent non-taper broke:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Those with young kids are familiar with temper tantrums. Well this is a 'taper' tantrum in the global markets. </td></tr>
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Fed Quantitative Easing allowed easy money to flow into hot economies from 2010 onward. Now that the spigot is tightening, so is the money flowing into these countries, which causes volatility, then panic, then more volatility until its contagious to the global economy. Bubbles and busts are more psychology than fundamentals. This is simply the latest iteration of it. <br />
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<b>Dow Jones Plunging</b><br />
Fears of a global collapse are starting to send the Dow Jones composite into tailspin mode. Down 1000 points since it's peak in mid-January. Anyone with a functioning brain knew a market correction of at least 10-20% would occur in 2014, but what the cheerleaders refuse to point out is that our economy is not getting better. Estimates of 1.9% GDP growth in 2013 will inevitably be revised downward in the coming weeks, and the unemployment number of 6.7% becomes more and more irrelevant as time goes by, since we are at 40 year lows in the 'workforce participation' pool. It almost doesn't matter if the unemployment rate drops tomorrow, because it's a massaged number that doesn't tell the real story.<br />
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Which is stronger in your book - a 6.7% unemployment rate with a workforce participation rate of 66% (like last decade), or a 6.7% unemployment rate with a workforce participation rate of 62% (like now)? What? You didn't get that context on MSNBC/Fox/CNN/CBS/PBS/ABC/NBC/NYT/Jon Stewart? And oh by the way, the CBO has just released a report indicating that Obamacare will cost the economy 2.5 million jobs over the next decade. REMINDER about any CBO calculation - they are chronically WRONG by a large percentage in their estimates. I work in budgeting and forecasting and we are usually within 1-6% within our target/benchmark. The CBO is always 30% or more OFF in their calculations and, when restated, the numbers are always WORSE. So keep that in mind as you look at these charts.<br />
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We've also watched the 3.0% yield (cost of US Treasuries interest) crash down to 2.6% since all of the embattled foreign currencies are flocking to the dollar. When yields go UP, it means people are dumping dollars/treasuries. When yields go DOWN, it means people are buying up dollars/treasuries. The USD is the equivalent of the cleanest dirty shirt in your laundry. Or the skinniest person at fat camp. Doesn't mean we are desirable, it means China/Russia aren't ready with a BRIC currency to wreak havoc on the global system. Watch the markets in the coming weeks as we hit debt ceiling talks again (see what happens when you constantly kick the can?). Watch new Fed chairwoman Janet Yellen REVERSE the taper in panic mode sometime in March. We are crack addicts when it comes to free money getting printed, and we are going through withdrawals<br />
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<b>Banker Suicides On The Rise</b><br />
A lot has been made in the news recently about the uptick in banker suicides (just kidding, they don't report this stuff). We've seen a Russell Investments exec, a JPM exec, and a Deutsche Bank exec 'suicided' in the last few weeks. Note the word 'suicided'. These aren't real suicides. These guys know shit is about to get real and were going to either spill the beans or leave the industry. Mind you, the bankers have been responsible for creating a $1.5 quadrillion derivatives market based on hocus pocus financials, rigged the LIBOR and ForEx markets, inflated the shit out of the US bond and stock market, and these Too Big To Fail (TBTF) scumbags apparently haven't learned from their mistakes in the leadup to the 2008 crisis as they play fast and loose with their investments. Expect more suicides in the coming weeks/months, and according to the chief insider at Rogue Money who goes by the name of 'V', The Guerrilla Economist, a high level Citi exec is in the crosshairs - think of this as a major sweep-up before the shit hits the fan. Just to be clear - these men are not killing themselves. Mafia-style witch-hunts are occurring behind the scenes.<br />
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<b>Up Next: Bank Insolvency, Capital Controls, and the MyRA</b><br />
I told you it was going to be a wild year for the markets in 2014, and so far, so good. At this point we are awaiting the first bank to fall. HSBC, Citi, Deutsche Bank, and any number of smaller institutions could drop at any time. It will most likely be a European bank. We are starting to see capital controls on large transactional amounts, withdrawals, monthly fees for just OWNING an account are doubling. Physical and paper precious metals are starting to decouple, the last gold/silver smash appears to have run its course, and the US government has begun its first overture towards snatching retirement savings via the 'MyRA', a retirement account invested exclusively in US treasuries!!!! You've been warned - this will NOT end well.<br />
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So that's the latest after a crazy month - watch the Sochi Olympics and pray for no terror attacks. If there is one, it will probably be a Chechen-rebel group linked to Saudi Arabia, because they are still salty at Russia for the whole Syria debacle. Anyway, have a good weekend and stay tuned!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-53194032499981812522014-01-19T20:02:00.000-05:002014-01-19T20:02:08.964-05:00Anatomy of a 'Trendy'I've made numerous references to 'trendies' in my posts, mainly because I hate them and find them to be multiplying like gremlins who've been exposed to water. Tonight I aim to shed light on who these people are, where they congregate (sure as hell ain't church), and ways to identify them by their fruits. Think of this is the 'Create-A-Superstar' option in the latest WWE PS3 game.<br />
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We're gonna go head to toe, so take notes. Take some Dramamine cause this is gonna be a Tour de Force.<br />
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<b>Head shape - </b>boxy, square jaw, pulsating cheekbones. Neck like a stack o' dimes due to impoverishment and constant search for gluten-free and milk-free foods.<br />
<b>Head attire - </b>knitted cap, beret. Non-sports hat with bizarre logo. Indoor scarf around their neck.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"What is a 1st down? Football is for the birds!"</td></tr>
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<b>Glasses Type </b>- thick, black-rimmed. Even if they have 20/20 vision. Helps them look and feel smarter.<br />
<b>Build - </b>stringy, muscle-less, lanky, wiry. Probably no chest hair. Basically the body of DJ Qualls.<br />
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<b>Torso attire</b> - slim-fit flannel, untucked. Blazer with t-shirt underneath. Turtleneck that flows up to the chin but doesn't touch the neck because trendy is malnourished.<br />
<b>Legs - </b>chicken-like. Hairless. About 5% have leg hair. But that's the bohemian chicks.<br />
<b>Legs attire - </b>tight jeans. Most likely black, but beige tight corduroys would suffice as well.<br />
<b>Political persuasion </b>- liberal. All of them. Ever hear a trendy bloviate on the pitfalls of abortion and gun registries, or even praise Jesus? Yeah me neither.<br />
<b>Favorite sayings - </b>"Thahhht's hilaaaaahhhhrius" (said with a straight face). "Rehhly?" "That's wrong on so many levels."<br />
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<b>Type of shoe </b>- Converse. Converse. And maybe some loafers. If you ask them if they got the new Lebrons or Durants, they'd think you were talking about some new indie band. Speaking of which....<br />
<b>Favorite bands</b> - The Killers. Capital Cities (to be fair, my new favorite band so LAY OFF!!!). Muse. Passion Pit. Dashboard Confessional.<br />
<b>Stance on capitalism </b>- hate it. But they'll spin some yarn about how Apple, Google, Starbucks, and Pinkberry are exempt and 'good' companies.<br />
<b>Hangout spots </b>- tree groves, Starbucks, Barnes & Noble, the unemployment line, Occupy protests (remember that colossal failure?), Coachella music festival, Lilith Fair if it were still around ("Adia I doooo believe I failllllled youuuuuu"), and The Burning Man Radical Self-Expression Art Festival (kind of like a metrosexual Bohemian Grove, except instead of global elites/world leaders, we have unemployed trendies).<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"OMG Brandon Flowers looked at me HE LOOKED AT ME!!!"</td></tr>
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<b>Employment status </b>- 76% unemployment rate among trendies. Useless majors have led them to this quandry. No, 'Starving Artist' doesn't count as a job. Mommy and Daddy usually kick in living expenses to help 'get them through a rough patch.' Still looking for the fictitious 'dream job that they want to fall in love with'. Usually involves schlepping old Rembrandt paintings from art museum to art museum.<br />
<b>Diet </b>- lots of quinoa, goat cheese, fair trade coffee (as if they give a shit), Kashi Bars, Nutella sandwiches washed down with almond milk.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Ewww I'm not eating a burger. That's dead animal spirits." </td></tr>
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<b>Go-to latte - </b>Iced, Half Caff, Ristretto, Venti, 4-Pump, Sugar Free, 3 Pump Monkey Semen, Cinnamon, Dolce Soy Skinny Latte with AIDS. Shut. The. Fuck. Up. Trendy.<br />
<b>Interests </b>- waxing philosophical about how they'd eradicate poverty (cause the ideas of their commie/socialist ilk have worked so well since the beginning of time), trading war stories on how they still haven't been able to sign up for healthcare through the Obamacare website, giving their first blow job at a Passion Pit concert, sharing reviews of the latest over-rated David Sedaris or Michael Chabon book.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Me? Work on a Friday night? No way, Todd."<br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Ok that's enough of that. Trendies aren't bad people. You may actually know some of them. But keep an eye on them. They are the future of our country. The next generation of 'manly men'. The future leaders of our country and stewards of our foreign policy. God help us. </span></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-37986858693466829162014-01-13T21:03:00.002-05:002014-01-13T21:04:13.083-05:00Assorted January 2014 Ramblings Drive-ByIt's January 13th so we can stop wishing each other a happy new year. You've probably quit your diet, are back to yelling at your kids, drinking heavily again, and letting miscellaneous receipts and wrappers litter your Ford Fusion. It's ok, the world needs ditch-diggers.<br />
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This entry will probably be a short one, and it's everything I hate about blogs - the whole "random musings/world according to me/things that piss me off" routine. I try to limit them to once a year, but you know what? I put a lot of thought into my posts to make this site unique. I don't post food porn pics, I don't use the phrase 'no filter', and I sure as hell don't post dashboard temperature pics, so please let me take the foot off of the Illuminati accelerator once in a while, mmmkay? Here's some random microcosms pushing the world to the brink of disaster, and why we should probably man up a little bit:<br />
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<b>Coffee Splashguards at Starbucks</b><br />
Starbucks prides itself with being cutting edge and hip, so they've somehow managed to fix something that normal people just sigh dramatically and move on from - coffee splashguards. You know, those green tooth-picky things that prevent coffee droplets from leaking out when you walk. Neat in theory. But unnecessary to devote factory machinery to creating these jawns. Some hipster pussy probably spilled some java on his indoor scarf while texting his mom to come pick him up, got all worked up and complained to management about his inconvenience. I say man up, lick your hands, and move on with your life. They'll probably start charging for these in 12 months, so get them while they're free. Wuss.<br />
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<b>Styrofoam Cup Koozies For Iced Coffee</b><br />
Not sure where this started, but I've seen it a ton since 2011 in Massachusetts (where I grew up). Basically it's no longer safe to have a plastic cup of iced coffee at Dunkin Donuts. You need to protect your little vagina hands with a styrofoam cup so that the coldness from the iced coffee doesn't make them chilly and wet. Is your 1st world lifestyle so hard that you can't tough out a refreshing drink? Can you handle life? Do you stay home from work if there is frost out cause your shoes might get damp and it might feel uncomfortable? When you have AIDS and you live in the Serengeti and wild monkeys peck at your guts while you sleep in your hut made out of your own shit, THEN maybe it warrants the cashier handing you an empty styrofoam cup, probably because she feels bad for you cause of the whole AIDS/shit-hut mumbo jumbo. But seriously, tough it out. Troops are dying in the Middle East for your freedoms. [NSA - you're probably reading this since I'm on some red list - did I sell the whole 'freedoms/troops/dying' propaganda line correctly?]<br />
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<b>Obsession with 'Hump-Day'</b><br />
My mind is still boggled that we are useless/lifeless slobs on Monday, count down to Friday, and give ourselves a mid-week pick me up in the form of celebrating Wednesday as 'Hump Day'. This is your life until you retire, assholes. Get used to it. People work five or six or seven days a week. Mondays universally suck, but you get through them because it could be worse (see above A/SH example). Fridays don't always mean early release and no work until Monday morning. And why the eff are you celebrating Wednesday? Is it that hard to progress through a week of work? Maybe you should leave the DMV if it is so stressful for you. Maybe being a corporate stiff isn't all it's cracked up to be for you and your dumb ass xxxxxxxx degree (again, don't want to offend any readers who may have not chosen a wise major in school). If I had an employee who bitched about Mondays, waxed philosophical about the wonders of Wednesday Hump-Day, and from Thursday morning onward kept verbalizing a need for it to be Friday, I would fire the shit out of them, because they are probably chronic complainers, incapable of stepping up their game, working late, hitting a deadline, etc. Fiiiiine I wouldn't fire them. Instead I'd beat them to death with their OWN keyboard, and then for fun stick Keurig K-Cups up their asshole (Tully's Italian Roast and Donut Shop Blend in case you're wondering). <br />
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<b>Injury-Prone Athletes</b><br />
After watching all of the NFL games this weekend, I noticed an emerging trend - people get injured a lot easier these days. The games were stopped literally every five minutes so some non-conditioned slob could limp off the field with a WRIST injury. Stingers, ankle tweaks, concussions from projectile missile-ing yourself into your opponents neck - there were more bodies on the field this week than the Battle of Antietam during the Civil War. As a Pats fan, I get to deal with Rob Gronkowski getting injured every other game, and Seahawks fans got to see Percy Harvin injured for the 54th time in ten weeks. You can't trust these guys to stay healthy. A huge part of me is petrified that Julian Edelman will sprain a couple digits finger-blasting some Dorchester hoodrat at a Boston nightclub and we'll get smoked by the Broncos. Same with baseball players. You run to first MAYBE five times max in a game, so just don't injure yourself running straight. And you get a ball hit to you in the outfield MAYBE ten times a game, so just don't injure yourself looking up at the sky for a ball. Boggles my mind how you can get paid that much money for your athletic skill yet you are a dainty fuck who can't handle a hangnail.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hsssss.....ahhhhhhhh........hsssss..ahhhhhhhhhhh</td></tr>
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<b>No Sense of Urgency at Redbox</b> <br />
I've vented about this on Facebook before (I think people were too busy having a life to comment), but Redbox protocol is extremely important in a post-Blockbuster world. You need to go in with a strategy - either 1) Know what you want, thumb through the selection, pick your format, and get out of dodge, 2) Loosely know what genre you are looking for, so you can weed out the riff-raff movies or 3) Get away from the Redbox kiosk. There's no gender-specific trends, I just see an assortment of buffoons who are unsure, unprepared, and quite frankly, unwelcome at my Redbox. Wallet should be out (easier for guys, women tend to act surpised at any checkout line when it's time to actually pay for the shit they just got, thumb through their purse, take time out of everyone else's day, etc), select should be made, and hand should be on the dispenser. Get your kids the hell away from making a selection, get off the damn cellphone, don't forget a medium to pay for the movie, and don't just be standing there 'seeing what's ayout' because I actually have a tactical gameplan. Thanks, I can breathe now.<br />
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Honorable Mention: "Keep Calm And xxxxxxxxxx" shirts. Just stop. Please.<br />
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Glad I got these gripes out of my system. So many more and so little time, but we can table that until February's ramblings. Pats 63 Broncos 59. Seahawks 27 Niners 17.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-33545592150713536742014-01-06T11:56:00.000-05:002014-01-06T12:10:31.181-05:00What To Watch Out For In 2014 (Fear-Mongoring)Happy 2014 to all of my readers (I think we're up to six now, five of which are web-bot related). Wanted to do a quick brain dump of big-ticket items coming down the pike this year given the tumultuousity of 2013 (yeah I made that word up, but just deal with it). 2012 was the Mayan fake-out, 2013 was the table-setting, and 2014 is the main course. We saw a lot of central planning manipulations, false flags, scandals, and out in the open deception from our leadership. Congress stooped to new lows (6% approval rating, but with the usual 90% re-election rate from the knuckle-dragging American sheeple come voting time). Expect a deeper descent into tyranny in the new year, with a naked sprint across the finish line by the Obama admin.<br />
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Just to be honest and consistent, I had done a post last year about what to look for in 2013. Link below:<br />
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<a href="http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2013/01/weekly-fear-mongoring-scary-global.html">http://trouserapes.blogspot.com/2013/01/weekly-fear-mongoring-scary-global.html</a><br />
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This was all based on research I had done across all of the alternative media space, blogosphere, and financial analysts that I read up on. I love reading this stuff, so don't think I'm trying to be some armchair Nostradamus - this is fun for me to postulate on. And I was off-base on a lot of items. I totally overestimated the Sandy Hook response by Congress, and luckily the looming 'gun confiscation' did not take place. The Democrats got nowhere with their gun control legislation, so it's back to the drawing board for them. Gold and Silver suffered a 30%+ loss in 2013, and I thought the opposite was going to happen. It appears the paper shorts have been weighing down the value of precious metals, while actual physical ownership has gone through the roof in hoarding nations like China, Russia, and India. Yet only 5% of Americans own some type of precious metal. I underestimated the Obamacare disaster and just thought of it in terms of job losses. It's a million times worse than anyone every imagined. Additionally, there wasn't a credit downgrade nor was there an attack on Iran. More of a can-kick in my book. Still going to happen before 2015 is out.<br />
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I had some victories, though. I was on-point with Syrian government being blamed for a false flag chemical attack perpetrated by rebels or Al Qaeda, the predictable establishment GOP pussy-out on the government shutdown (Ted Cruz - keep up the good work!), and the continued growth of the BRIC nations, who will ultimately launch a gold-backed currency that knocks the USD from it's perch as reserve currency. Our foreign treasuries investors (China, Japan, Brazil), as expected, leveled off their investments and China has stated they will begin to unwind over time. Also, I made reference to further expatriation requests and physical gold demand increasing, and sho' nuff, it did. More banking institutions are starting to settle in cash when folks ask for their gold back. JP Morgan's NYC HQ (you know the one with the gold vault and tunnel to the NY Fed?) SOLD to a mega Chinese real estate conglomerate. Read between the lines on that one. Food stamp usage DID approach the 50 million mark, and expect it to surpass that figure in 2014. Finally, the rumor of martial law always persists each year if the right emergency springs up. Well, did you notice what happened in the suburbs of Boston in April after the Marathon Bombing? What? You were too busy chanting 'USA! USA!'? That's a microcosm of 2014-2015. More on that later. So let's get into it - here is a list of headlines before they happen. The bullet points are short and sweet, but let them serve as an 'accountability checklist' to measure my level of tinfoil-hat syndrome. If I'm wrong, well, then don't read the blog. If I'm right, then reevaluate your hatred of alternative media.<br />
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<b>2014 - The Year of the Deposit/Pension Confiscation</b><br />
The biggest story to keep an eye on in 2014 (outside of the Obamacare abortion) is YOUR bank account and pension/retirement accounts. This is the year deposit confiscations become widespread. 2013 was the table-setting as we saw Cyprus hit with a deposit bail-in, Poland had a STEEP pension 'overhaul'/grab, and Detroit filed for bankruptcy, culminating in up to an 80% pension haircut. This is just the beginning. Order of confiscation: 1) state/federal pensions 2) bank deposits 3) 401/retirement accounts. In the aftermath of Cyprus, the IMF has crafted the bail-in as the new standardized template for legalized ROBBERY of YOUR bank accounts. If you hear the words 'bail-in', 'haircut', 'unsecured creditor', 'debt restructuring', RUN FOR THE HILLS!!!! You are no longer officially a 'depositor' anymore according to your bank. As of 2013, you became an 'unsecured creditor'. If your bank becomes insolvent, it can take your money (oh, but it will convert your portion into worthless bank shares). Imagine a 10%-20% hit to your savings. Or 40%-60% to your accumulated pension. THAT will become commonplace in 2014.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nothing to see here, sheeple. Everything's fine.</td></tr>
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<b>Russia vs. Saudi Arabia</b><br />
2014 began with successive terrorist attacks in Volgograd by Chechen rebels. This was a message sent by Saudi Arabia from Prince Bandar Bin Sultan (head of Saudi Intel), who is still pissed off that Russia brokered a last second deal to avert war in Syria this past fall and continues to support the Iran regime. Harken his quote to Putin from last summer - <span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 16px;"><i>“I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics in the city of Sochi on the Black Sea next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us.”</i></span></span><br />
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Guess what's coming up in a few weeks? The Sochi Olympics! Keep an eye on this development. Saudi Arabia has all but severed diplomatic ties with America at this point, and Russia continues to thwart globalist plans for a Qatari pipeline through Syria. Look for the plot to thicken in 2014. Remember - Russia is Globalist Enemy #1 - Cyprus was the first shot fired (that's where Russian oligarchs plop their assets).<br />
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<b>Treasury Yield Explosion</b><br />
The downward spiral of the US dollar continued in 2013. On May 2nd, the 10 yr treasury yield was 1.63%. By year-end, it was almost doubled at around 3%. That means demand for US treasuries has decreased considerably. A higher yield means higher consumer and business loans, as well as mortgage rates. It also means the US Treasury needs to pay a higher interest rate to attract investors. Our main investor now is the Federal Reserve, since China has maxed out it's investment, and Japan is literally melting (more on that later). Did I mention our current debt is over $17 trillion? Still think quantitative easing and sustained deficit entitlement spending is a brilliant idea? I am expecting 10 year yields to approach 4% by year-end, causing a nervous frenzy in Washington as they plot sleazy ways to spin this utter rejection of the United States and its toilet paper fiat currency.<br />
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<b>The End of the Gold Smackdown</b><br />
The assumption now is that the worst of the gold/silver smackdown is over. I wrote last year about how the metals were artificially taken down through paper derivatives that put downward pressure on the actual metals prices (more than 30% losses in 2013). This seems to be winding down as legal attention has been paid to the matter and investors are starting to wake up. Also, JPM is getting out of the precious metals derivatives market (and they were a prime manipulator), see also above reference to the sale of its NYC HQ to China. Gold and Silver will explode once a dollar crises emerges or some other worse scenario. Expect gold back up to $1700 and silver back up to $30 by year-end.<br />
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<b>The Dreaded Cyber-attack</b><br />
As ex-Department of Homeland Security director Janet Napolitano exited government for academia this summer, she left a warning to her eventual replacement Jeh Johnson to expect a serious cyber-attack at some point. We have seen this in the news throughout 2013 whether it was a big bank, NASDAQ, Living Social, Target, Walmart EBT glitches, or any other large company with YOUR personal information, cyber attacks are on the rise. Our biggest attacks have come from China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. They keep getting worse and worse. I've mentioned the deposit confiscations above, but what if there is a false flag attack that wipes out EVERYONE'S savings? This would link bail-ins, cyber-attacks, and martial law into one orgasmic globalist power play. Expect an increase in the severity of these attacks in 2014. <br />
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<b>What The Eff Is Up With Fukushima?</b><br />
I'll tell you what's up - RADIATION LEVELS. They never 'fixed' anything. This is one of the biggest government cover-ups in history. Well that radiation has spread to the West Coast. Radiation levels have SPIKED, folks in the cleanup efforts are now DEAD or DYING, fish are showing up all wonky-like in the Pacific Ocean, Cesium-137 levels are multiples over the appropriate limits, and oh-by-the-way, THIS little nugget came out last week: our government has just ordered 14 million doses of potassium iodide for the end of January to help minimize impacts from radiation poisoning. No emergency declared!!! Yayyy!!!! And Japanese scientist David Suzuki has been quoted as saying one more heavy earthquake near the Daiichi reactor would mean curtains for Japan and hellfire and brimstone for the West Coast United States. But don't worry - this shouldn't impact your reality TV lineup. Keep an eye on this, especially if you are on the West Coast.<br />
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<b><u>Other stories to watch-out for</u>:</b><br />
<i><b>China vs. Japan over the Senkaku Islands</b></i> - worthless islands that these countries will go to war over. Don't get it but too important to ignore.<br />
<b><i>BRICS Currency</i></b> - expect increased bilateral trade agreements, more abandonment of the petrodollar, more movement of gold from West to East to help launch this currency as a stable USD alternative.<br />
<b><i>Obamacare Collapse</i> - </b>as I wrote last year, Obamacare will wreck the economy. Expect sticker shock 1st quarter 2014 for patients, and reimbursement shock in 2nd quarter 2014 for doctors. Then the next boom lowers in the form of corporations drastically increasing plan prices going into 2015 and kicking spouses/kids off your work plan into the healthcare marketplace. All this designed to put insurance agencies out of business to pave way for eventual single-payer system.<br />
<i style="font-weight: bold;">Stock Market Collapse</i> - Dow is around 16,500 right now - red flags are all over the place that this bubble is ready to pop. Anyone who saw the 2008 collapse sees the same exuberance this time around. I think we max out at 17k and the large-scale market correction begins. Late summer expect a redux of 2008. 2014 is the Shit Hit The Fan (SHTF) year.<br />
<i style="font-weight: bold;">Amnesty</i> - Expect 19 million new amnestied individuals once Congress sells out the American people (again). Comprehensive immigration reform will pass mid-year, enraging the general populace.<br />
<i style="font-weight: bold;">Bitcoin </i>- the first great digital currency has had an interesting ride so far, trading between $50 and $1000 in the past 12 months. So tough to predict, but more and more establishments are accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment. But then the next day some large country will ban Bitcoin transactions. I say this catches on and Bitcoin hits $10,000 at some point in late 2014.<br />
<i style="font-weight: bold;">Israel/Palestine Peace Deal</i> - something meaningful will be signed in the summer after fruitful April meetings, and the term 'framework' will be tossed around like a baseball. There will be a tie-in with Palestinian statehood. Beware any '7 Year Peace Treaty', though, as that portends some biblical shit is about to get real.<br />
<i style="font-weight: bold;">Pope Francis</i> - keep an eye on his statements. I actually like him so far, except his foolish anti-capitalism statements, which made him sound like some Starving Artist/Occupy Wall Street/brainless/low-information voting liberal. Beware the spiritual or political figure that achieves early rockstar status. I've already written that he is the prophesied 'Petrus Romanus' (112th and FINAL Pope according to 12th century seer St. Malachi). I think he's going to try and unite Christians and Muslims into some diluted 'Chrislam' religion and he could become an assassination target by some hard-line parishioner (God forbid, of course). Pray for his continued safety and humble spirit.<br />
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Damn that's a busy year, and it's only the first week of January! I honestly don't care if I'm right or wrong, especially with the bad stuff. We are wayyyyy overdue for some crazy shit to go down. The world is being run by Luciferian globalists. It's time we pushed back. Well, you guys can push back, I'll hang out here in the shadows with my seltzer water.....Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-33607060502370078522013-12-18T17:27:00.001-05:002013-12-18T17:27:13.691-05:00Christmas 2013 Brag LetterIt's that time of year where children refuse to smile for pictures while dressed in flannel garb, Christmas cards are hastily put together, and the one thing more obnoxious than 'Christmas Shoes' is written up - the 'Year In Review Christmas Brag Letter'. My family never did these growing up (not much to brag about I guess?), plus they're pretty pretentious and ALWAYS boring. No one gives a shit if you got a dog and went to Aspen with your husband Gordon's bonus. He's probably cheating on you anyway. You make it look like your kids are the best, when in actuality your son is into heavy drug use, bullies the mathletes, and your slutty daughters lead the school in 'forced abortions'. But you don't see that in the Brag Letter now do ya?<br />
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So we'll play your game. Here's our 2013 Christmas Brag Letter. Sorry it's not the viral 'pajama-clad' home video of a family jumping around in elf PJ's that smell like stale farts. You'll have to bear with us and internalize the awesomeness of our family. We're just doing a 'Kid Brag', since my wife and I are tired and boring people who are already past our prime - hold onto your seat, these accomplishments may knock your socks off.<br />
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<b>Brian (Age 8)</b><br />
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Brian, our oldest, had a fantastic year. He's currently in 2nd grade and loving every minute of it. Smartest boy in the class, by far. Best looking. Most respectful, friendly, and caring individual. So all of those qualities were obviously inherited from my wife. But what you just read is what makes Brag Letters boring. Here's what Brian really accomplished this year:<br />
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- Perfect attendance since kindergarten. We've sent him off to school with a broken leg, green boogers dripping down his face, open sores on his neck, and gangrene on his right foot from an infection I was too cheap to treat. Our mantra is "Tough it out, you pussy". When I was your age, we never had things like 'aspirin', 'tissues' and 'Sudafed'. What? We did? So you're saying I was LIED to?<br />
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- Perfect scores on his 'Mad Minutes'. Remember those things? Crank through a shitload of multiplication problems in 60 seconds. Remember how YOU struggled to get through it? Yeah, well Brian didn't. Not only did he typically finish 20 seconds early with no mistakes, he also managed to help the poor slob next to him, kinda like the condescending Nick Burns 'Company Computer Guy' that Jimmy Fallon played on SNL. MOOOOOOVE!!!!!<br />
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- Great baseball year. I guess the quinoa wraps/acai juice/weekly B-12 injections are starting to pay off. I shit you not, here are his numbers for 2013:<br />
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.313 BA 26 HR's 109 RBI's .487 OBP 4.1 WAR 32 SB's 8 dive-ahhs<br />
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That's like a fantasy league wet dream. Plus he was a great locker room leader, could grind out at-bats, and always showed a proper 'sense of urgency' to kick-start a rally.<br />
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- 4.0 GPA. I know they don't calculate this in 2nd grade but it's the rough equivalent of what he's gotten every semester. He's excelling at math, loves science, can spell 15+ letter words without breaking a sweat, and has an extensive vocabulary. This Spring, we will be enrolling him in the elite 'Mission To Mars' program, which grooms intellectual youths for future NASA roles. Daddy also thinks of this as a beachhead to cracking the Area 51 mafia code of silence. If Brian can be an 'insider' on the ground, we can finally validate the existence of aliens and the globalist plan to re-animate the dreaded Nephilim at some point to enforce the New World Order, bowing subservience to a supernatural alien agenda.<br />
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Honorable mention:<br />
- Broke his leg at gymnastics. Why he was in a gymnastics facility in the first place is still a 'bone' of contention in our house. The kid that ran into him did not make out so well. Lots of peeps at the funeral though, so that's gotta count for something.<br />
- Broke his mini-iPad. I guess when you break your leg, your mother-in-law needs to get you an overpriced gadget. Not sure my father-in-law knows about this purchase yet. Nor the 'replacement purchase' made five months later for Christmas.<br />
- Read the entire Boxcar Children series cover to cover WHILE brushing his teeth/making his bed. Your kids probably can't even READ!<br />
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<b>Meghan (Age 6)</b><br />
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Meghan, our middle child and only daughter, continues to thrive in kindergarten. Beautiful girl, fun to be around, great sense of humor, and well liked by her classmates. But again, that's boring and no one gives a shit. 2013 was a banner year for Meghan:<br />
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- Awesome gymnast. She's been doing this for a little over a year, and somehow rocketed to the top of her peer group. For $173/month, I was expecting nothing less. She completes very complicated moves 1) without accidentally farting and 2) without falling over. She can do a Front Aerial with her eyes closed. A Double Layout, Half In, Half Out from a standing position with no running start, as well as a Triple Tuck while blindfolded. I mean, the list goes on and on - but the common denominator remains - my daughter can do this shit, and yours can't.<br />
- Fantastic dancer. While all of you were out 'twerking' (overused word of the year), Meghan was perfecting her dance routine. Fields of Gold 2014 will be the performance, and I have no doubt she will own the night. How many six year olds can do a Grand Jete? Fouette? Leaping Pirouette? Straight Leg Scorpion? Answer: 'not your dopey child'. Meghan can, and she does it with an innocent smile and humble disposition.<br />
- Expert swimmer. We've enrolled the children in swimming classes 'just to better round them out.' And it's working ($600 later). Meghan has the fastest breast-stroke for her age group in all of Bucks County, PA. She actually CORRECTS her lifeguard/swim coach when HIS form is wrong. Her diving is starting to improve a great deal as well, ever since we installed a balcony to the side of our house for her to jump off of into a kiddy pool.<br />
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Honorable mention:<br />
- Still thinks "vagina" is pronounced "bagina"<br />
- Says she will get married so that her husband can "get her snacks and pick up her toys" for her. But she is not sure about having children when she grows up because "there is blood and it hurts and people see your privates" (namely the bagina).<br />
- Had allergic reaction and needed to go on steroids for a few days, which resulted in hyper-behavior, trying to jump off the top of the stairs, and ripping off of doll legs/heads. Steriods and children do not mix.<br />
- Sneaks lipstick to school in her Monster High backpack so she can glam up in the kindergarten bathroom. I think I may have to kill myself when she is a teenager.<br />
- She has always rocked very long hair styles but recently she got an adorable 'bob' haircut with layers, and was cautioned on the pitfalls of pixie cuts. <br />
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<b>Matthew (Age 2)</b><br />
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Matthew, our youngest, is a proud toddler with adorable little blonde curls, a cherub face, and cheeks you could just squish/bite. His little personality is developing by the day, and he keeps us on our toes! Yup - he sure does!! Ha ha ho ho!!! SHUT UP!!!! Crumple crumple your dumb letter goes in my trash. STFU about how cute your kid is. No one cares. Matty was amazing in 2013:<br />
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- Conquered his YMCA Mommy and Me class and then some. Got a sticker for behaving EACH WEEK and made his way through the tumbling obstacle course in 43 seconds, a historic mark that stood for one week before he BROKE HIS OWN RECORD with a 41.6 second romp. He OWNED that shit and instead of taunting his inferior classmates, he simply wandered to the water fountain and politely asked to be lifted up for a lukewarm sip of wa-wa.<br />
- Fully potty-trained. The child shows discipline, patience, and calm demeanor when he has to go pee and poop. Simply waddles to toilet, exclaims to no one in particular, 'I have to pee in the potty', drops 'trou' and lets it fly. Skidmarks have been reduced by 63% since May. I think making the switch from Pixar undies to Marvel Comics undies was a game-changer. Food for thought.<br />
- Takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'. Forget the 'Tough Mudder' - this child survives daily beat-downs from the Brian-Meghan gauntlet and rarely cries. Meghan's patented move is the scrunching of her teeth followed by a Scorpion-from-Mortal-Kombat-esque 'GET OVER HERE' culminating in a head-squeeze/hair-pull/chest-shove triple hit combo. Matty sits back up like The Undertaker, adjusts his wrists and gets back to work (probably picking his nose or eating fruit snacks). Brian is more sneaky - he waits until our backs are turned and gives Matty a subtle pinch in a fleshy spot and shoves him over. I've taught him to fight back with a two-attack arsenal - shout 'Shorrryuken' and slap your sister and brother across the chest, and 'Haduuuuuuken' followed up with a swift mule kick to the guts. Let's just say the attacks have subsided since he received this training.<br />
- He's also been walking and talking since way before his first birthday and by now is having full back and forth conversations including jokes and asking and answering questions.<br />
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Example:<br />
Matthew - "I want to play with my Batman car and make him run over your head."<br />
Me - "Not now Matthew."<br />
Matthew - "Why not?"<br />
Me - "It's getting late out."<br />
Matthew - "But its not dark yet."<br />
Me - "It'll be dark soon."<br />
Matthew - "Shut up fat loser, you mind your business and do what I say."<br />
Me - "OK." (hangs head in shame after being bullied by a 2 year old).<br />
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He can run like the wind and jump over boulders, and even has perfected his somersaults and headstands. What does YOUR kid do, eat his boogers? Shit his pants? Shit someone else's pants?<br />
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Honorable mention:<br />
- Some new words and phrases have made their way into his vocabulary, which is cause for concern:<br />
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<ul>
<li>'Penis'</li>
<li>'Mind your business, hog'</li>
<li>'Shut up, pig'</li>
<li>'Butthole'</li>
<li>'Shut up, fat loser'</li>
<li>'Poopy guts'</li>
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- Recently overcame an irrational fear of Brian's Batmobile remote control car. Would run and hide every time the sounds played, scream in fear, whimper in the corner. Now he takes it all over the house with him and even cuddles on the couch with it, even though it's 1/3rd the size of his little body. Look it's cute so shut up. </div>
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- Inability to pivot away from yogurt, grilled cheese, pasta, and mac & cheese. So basically, he's just like every other child his age. Stop judging - no one gives a shit that you feed your kids organic kale sandwiches pesto-flavored hot dogs made of bison entrails. They're probably gonna get adult onset diabetes anyway. </div>
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I think that should do it for the 2013 Christmas Brag Letter. See how obnoxious this sounds? THAT'S WHAT YOURS SOUNDS LIKE!!!!! Hopefully this puts an end to your self-important cards. Stick to the Merry Christmas script from here on out. </div>
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This concludes 2013 from a blogging standpoint. 5,000 views in the first year, which was a lot more than I ever thought I'd get in a lifetime, let alone one year. This is strictly organic through Facebook, so hopefully I will think of creative ways to expand readership in 2014. Suggestions and feedback welcomed. Thanks to those who have read the Trousered Apes blog in 2013 - I wish you all a Merry Christmas and healthy, happy, safe 2014. God bless!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-46792399277135414582013-12-16T17:53:00.001-05:002013-12-16T17:53:29.445-05:00Time To Pop The Student Loan Bubble<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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One topic snatching headlines every so often is the ongoing student loan bubble (or lack thereof, according to conventional wisdom, the same conventional wisdom that missed the real estate bubble and corresponding crash in 2008). For so long we've heard that college is key if you want to make it in life, and while that may very well be true in some cases, the undue burden that student loans have put on us over the past two decades has begged the question - is college even worth it?<br />
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We've all heard the statistics trotted out every time someone wants to reinforce the importance of a college education - "You'll make $1m more in your lifetime over someone with just a college degree." "You can't get a good job without a college degree." I totally agree on the former and totally disagree on the latter (which I will flesh out shortly). The person will then shake their head with a smug, self-satisfied look on their face like they just dropped a truth-bomb on you. They themselves are probably at least twenty years older than you, but had significantly less student debt to pay back. They probably have a really good degree that they were able to parlay into a great job at a great company that they stayed at their whole life. God bless them, they've had a nice run. But that's not the over-arching reality in 2013 for us young-ins (of which category I'm leaving in the next few years).<br />
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The student loan bubble is out of control. Tuition costs (which I will use interchangeably with 'student loans' throughout this post since I believe them to be intrinsically linked, so just deal) are out of control. The student loan industry is about $1 trillion as of 2011. When compared against 1990 consumer price index (CPI), the Moody's ratings agency has listed tuition costs as having TRIPLED in the last 25 years. Since 2008 alone, tuition costs have been increasing 2/3x the rate of inflation (which according to the government is between 2-3% each year). But noooo, of course there's no bubble. This is all normal. It's basic supply and demand. Everyone's getting college degrees (the new 'high school degree'), so you need to pay to play. Why is this happening? What is the driver of these high costs? One simple answer - GOVERNMENT.<br />
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The main culprit of the student loan/tuition cost bubble is our wonderful government. To be fair, this process has been unfolding over the past 30 years, under both Democratic and Republican leadership, so both are guilty. Much like the real estate bubble, we have been socially engineered to 1) own a house and 2) obtain a college degree. The two most expensive propositions in our lifetimes. We've been shamed into thinking renting and not going to college is a bad thing. At the top of the list of guilty parties is a government that continuously feeds the college beast. Stafford Loans, Pell Grants (which have nearly doubled since 2009), Perkins Loans, and more - in total, government shelled out $112 billion in student loan subsidies in 2012, an ever increasing number. There's two rules of thumb with government involvement - 1) when government gets involved, costs go up, and 2) if you subsidize something, you get more of it. Insert government into the student loan process and voila - you get more in student loan subsidies and a corresponding bubble. Methinks this smacks of the same attitude that got us into the real estate bubble - people who had no business owning homes were given the false impression that they could take on the large mortgage. And when shit hit the fan in 2008, these people found themselves with ballooning interest rates and an underwater mortgage that they simply walked away from. Well guess what's going to happen when the student loan bubble bursts? People will stop paying, ask for frequent deferrals and forbearances, and, in a less dramatic fashion than the housing bubble, costs should and will stabilize. The goal of this post is to make it a soft landing as opposed to a crash landing.<br />
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As it stands right now, government keeps loaning out subsidies because it's good business - after all, recovery rates on these tend to be between 105%-122% when interest is included. Government keeps the profit. The party in control gets to politicize the always looming 'rate increases' each June/July where the threats of doubling the rate to 7-8% seems to be an annual false alarm, and then at the last second everyone agrees to leave rates as is. Plus there's the perception of America as a global leader in college education when millions of high school seniors decide to go on to higher education - when in reality, the brightest international students engage in 'brain drain' and take their talents back to their countries of origin and set up shop there.<br />
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Now that government has created the bubble and artificial demand by providing easy access to credit for college purposes, the schools are getting into the act too. How many schools have you visited that were undergoing massive expansions with lavish campus centers, new dorms, state of the art classrooms, futuristic athletic facilities, and astro-turf fields that get used for five years and then scrapped in favor of new projects? On a semi-related note, what about these overpriced textbooks that never get cracked? Forced to get the latest edition that adds about ten pages of verbal diarrhea for $110? And if you go to sell it back at the end of the semester it's suddenly only worth $40? Only to reappear the following September selling at $70? Everything about college is a racket - the only thing not going up is keg and six pack prices. For that we are eternally grateful. I understand that colleges are all competing to attract students, but shouldn't they bear more responsibility for churning out deeply indebted entry level workers who are unable to find jobs instead of building exquisite and showy facilities? Or is that onus on the student for pursuing college in the first place? Is it a chicken and the egg scenario? What about the fact that 15-20% of students actually land jobs in the field of their major? That implies 80-85% of college majors are wasted!<br />
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Seems to me like schools will push a ton of core curriculum with bullshit courses that you wouldn't dream of taking were they not mandatory. For what? To say I'm more cultured? How about if you are a biology major, you shouldn't be forced to take Greek Civilization courses (which I actually enjoyed, by the way). What if you are a business major, can you opt-out of the Religious Studies class that mentions Jesus five times the whole semester even though you are at a Jesuit institution? I speak from experience. I went to a private four year Jesuit school in Connecticut that ended up educating three of the four children in my family. I majored in Marketing but have worked in the Finance field for the past ten years I've been out of school. I started out with $120k in expected expenses, minus $40k in accumulated grants, leaving a sizable $80k to pay off. My wife had one semester of school to pay for once she graduated (we got married two weeks later), and we conceived three months into our marriage, and she entered retirement a year later to stay home with our children. That of course was a choice, and she will most likely go back to work at some point. Not blaming college on that one. But to pay back a shitload of debt on a major that I chose of my own free will, applied to marketing jobs, didn't get them, and ended up pivoting to Finance (my minor)? Bad choice of a major on my part? Inability to connect and network with appropriate parties? At least Marketing fell under the 'Business' umbrella, and Finance was a hedge in the event Marketing didn't work out for me. I knew I wanted some type of Business degree, because I wasn't some pie-in-the-sky dreamer who thought I'd find my ideal job in whatever field I set my mind to. How many others are in a similar spot? And could it have been avoided if I had a different strategy? Blame at this point rests with <b>government</b> for subsidizing it, <b>universities</b> for taking the money and not churning out quality and relevant majors that align with the needs of the job market, and the <b>student </b>who doesn't know what they want out of life, let alone college. How do we align all three?<br />
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<b>1. College isn't for everyone - identify candidates earlier on in the game. Weed out those who wouldn't thrive in a four-year school.</b><br />
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This is gonna hurt, I know that. But it helps weed out those that aren't serious about college. Don't look at this from a 'who can afford it and who can't afford it' perspective, look at it from the standpoint of the prospective student. Parents, student, and HS guidance counselors should meet and determine the best course of action for Little Johnny, preferably half way through high school. If Little Johnny showed a proclivity to constantly lose focus, need extra attention, flunk classes, not apply himself, slack off, pass in homework late, then perhaps college isn't for him. Let's save ourselves the heartbreak of a crippling student loan and ask HIM what he wants to do with his life. Offer life skills classes in high school that prepare students for the real world. If that commitment of time, money, and focus is too much, then start to float an alternative plan. Please note, what I say above is not to disparage those that don't go on to college - everyone has different reasons why they don't go, and that's ok. To the emotional knee-jerk buffoons who don't have discernment - I'm not implying those that don't go to college are slackers. Get it through your coconut brains. But outside of 'it costs too much' (which is 100% accurate), and getting useless majors (more on this later), you can look back on some college friends and say "You were better off skipping these last four years if (job x) was going to be what you did with your career. You are the bubble-blowers that we can weed out and correspondingly begin to get this student loan bubble to deflate a little bit." According to a Northeastern study conducted by the Center for Labor Market Studies, 36% of recent college grads with degrees were working in jobs THAT DON'T REQUIRE A DEGREE (up from 30% in 2008). Call it a crappy job market, or call it jobs that they want to actually be in, but that is the reality.<br />
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How about more vocational schools for those not moving on to higher education? Find a trade that can still be lucrative - just because you don't have a college degree doesn't mean you are resigned to working jobs you don't want the rest of your life. Get an apprenticeship (equivalent of a corporate bitch-tern...sorry...intern). Become a mechanic, healthcare technician, programmer, get certified in specific areas of expertise that don't require college degrees. I've come across quite a few people in my lifetime who were wildly successful without a college degree. We need to back off this idea that the only path to a successful life is through an overpriced college and debilitating loans that we pay off into our 40's. How about our high schools teach more 'real world' classes on entrepreneurialship (is that even a word?) and how to manage your expenses when you are an adult? What is wrong with channeling and cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit for those not moving on to higher education? Hello, future small business owners! If you get a chance, try to pick up the book 'The Millionaire Next Door' by Thomas Stanley and William Danko. It uses extensive research to show that the wildly successful, eeeeeevil rich people that liberals always bitch about aren't just CEO's, executives, doctors, surgeons or lawyers, but they are the everyday small business owners that excelled at something, had a vision, and put heart and soul into making their small business flourish and thrive. You can't put heart and soul into a corporate job. You get a paycheck every two weeks and there is stability. Small business owners run on grit and sheer determination, because they are not guaranteed anything unless they hustle. A four-year degree isn't a prerequisite to make that happen. Plus - who is the driver of job creation? The ivory tower exec running a corporate leviathan or the small business owner who is close to his/her expenses and knows the ins and outs of his/her business? Hint - it's the small business owner. Food for thought.<br />
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<b>2. Get rid of exotic majors that can't fill classrooms and engage in market research to determine what kind of majors are needed in the here and now. </b><br />
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What made America exceptional and innovative over the years was rugged individualism and a well-oiled capitalist system (not perfect, of course) that dictated winners and losers. Those with the right amount of drive, hard work, luck and rudimentary education would win, and those who were lazy, out of touch, and tending to rest on their laurels would lose. So it goes in the job market here in 2013. We are in the prolonged 'Great Recession' (which I think will be rebranded as the 'Second Depression' within the next two years), and numerous fields that used to be successful paths to job security are no longer thriving. Lumber, building supplies, luxury goods, non-automobile manufacturers are all on the downswing due to the the shitty economy since 2008. So if you know that, pick your major accordingly. If you want to choose a major that's easy but not lucrative, take accountability for your decision and live with the consequences. I'm intentionally being vague about garbage majors because I don't want to offend anyone (I have three readers after all, wouldn't want to piss them off or its back to TMZ and Us Weekly toilet reading as an alternative to the Trousered Apes blog!). If each university had a mini-job market department that assessed popular jobs, overall demand (not likely to DRASTICALLY change over the course of a 2-3 year period), they can promote themselves as adroit specialty schools and attract the right target market. Going the 'specialty' approach means less buildings to maintain, less professors to employ, and less overall demand across the board for college since there is less administrative and physical overhead. Relevant, specialized majors get matched up with relevant, specialized jobs and there is less 'waste' of a degree.<br />
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Here are some recent unemployment numbers for various majors, according to a Georgetown Public Policy Institute study. As the jobless rate has slowly decreased in the year since the study was conducted, assume slightly lower rates as of December 2013:<br />
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Architecture - 12%<br />
Arts - 10%<br />
Computers/Math - 9%<br />
Social Science - 10%<br />
Humanities/Liberal Arts - 9%<br />
Business - 7%<br />
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Is demand slipping in some categories? What are the 5-10 year trends? Give college students guidance along the way and educate them to the pitfalls of picking a shitty major.<br />
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Full study here: <a href="http://www9.georgetown.edu/grad/gppi/hpi/cew/pdfs/HardTimes.2013.2.pdf">http://www9.georgetown.edu/grad/gppi/hpi/cew/pdfs/HardTimes.2013.2.pdf</a><br />
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This would be a fundamental game-changer if schools could show how nimble and versatile they were. Time will tell.<br />
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<b>3. Carve up the core curriculum. Rebrand the colleges to go straight to the courses you want to take. </b><br />
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Another game-changer - get rid of the needless courses we don't want to take. I knew I was going to be a Business major of some sort when I went off to college in August 1999. Spare me the music, art, history, spanish, ancient civilization, and diversity courses. Not that they were bad, but they are $3k a pop plus textbooks and I don't need to be studying them. <b>I repeat - I don't need to be studying them. </b>Give me Economics, Business 101, Accounting, Marketing, Investments, more Investments, Financial Institutions, let me weasel my way out of a Derivatives course and then let me finish with a capstone International Management course. Game. Set. Match. Give me my degree and I will find a job, with less debt to worry about when I am gainfully employed and my six month payment stay of execution is over. This ALSO means that colleges can cut down on staff, buildings, other administrative costs. Let the Art school take the Art students. Let an Accounting school take the CPA-wannabes. Let the Lesbian Hebrew studies school take all the Lesbian Hebrew studies students. What? There's no demand for it? THEN PICK ANOTHER FUCKING MAJOR and stop wasting your parents'/your money!<br />
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I think this item is self-explanatory and probably the most popular among the 2.4 people reading this post.<br />
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<b>4. Once the above three items are done, government can slowly start to cut student loan subsidies. </b><br />
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If and only if the aforementioned ideas take shape, government can stop throwing money at the bottomless pit that is student loans. Does this big shakeout mean less people overall will go to college? Maybe, maybe not. Will it create a new generation of entrepreneurial superstars that say 'screw college, I know I'm good at xxx and I can become profitable at xxx without an expensive and perhaps useless college degree'? You bet your ass. Will it slow the rate of increase and even deflate some of the ever-increasing tuition costs? There's a good chance of that. Imagine a country with more innovation, more small businesses providing specialization (and correspondingly, jobs), less wasted degrees, less student loan debt hanging over our heads, the marketplace deciding which majors are bound for the trash heap, and a more enriching college experience? It may sound like a pipe dream, but the possibilities are endless. I'd love to hear your comments and feel free to poke holes in the analysis!!!! Ad-hominem attacks and insults encouraged!!!!<br />
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Crazy Christmas 2013 Brag Post coming later this week. Stay tuned. <br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-87762623830996271132013-12-03T20:41:00.000-05:002013-12-03T20:48:21.177-05:00My Top 5 'Hall Passes'I'm sitting here watching Thor I with my wife, older two kids and my mother-in-law, and I am deep in thought. Not because I've seen the movie twice (1.4x really, since I turn into a narcoleptic during each movie I watch unless I have jumper cables attached to my balls to zap me awake), but because it got me thinking - the actor that plays Thor is really good looking, muscle-bound, and downright irresistible. Is it so wrong for a married man to think this? By thinking this, do the floodgates suddenly open so that any other person on earth can have their looks analyzed in this fashion? You bet your ass. Here are my Top 5 'hall passes' as granted by my supportive wife, in no particular order. You will notice a curious common denominator.<br />
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1. Randy Orton, WWE Champion<br />
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I think I've had a man-crush on WWE superstar Randy Orton since 2003. The son of 80's legend Cowboy Bob Orton, Randy Orton is the second generation superstar that was thrust into our TV sets along with Triple H, Ric Flair, and Batista as part of the 'Evolution' stable. He was billed as the future of the WWE as the infamous vulgar/violent 'Attitude Era' of the WWE (1997-2002) came to an end. They needed new stars, so Orton, John Cena, and Edge filled the void. <strike>Instead of filling a void, Randy Orton filled my jeans....with a boner.</strike> Washboard abs, nice definition, and a clean, short haircut combined with a deep voice and pulsating jaw when angry. Then he started to get that noise all over himself ('tattoos'). He now has dual tattoo sleeves, a flat top and a mean disposition. Still one of my faves, and going through a messy divorce. So you're saying there's a chance!!!! Maybe a one night stand?<br />
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2. Chris Hemsworth, actor - (only as Thor)<br />
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Chris Hemsworth plays the regal Thor of Asgard in the Avengers series. He's had two of his own movies where he feuds with his brother Loki over control of the throne that will ultimately be vacated by Odin, King of Asgard. But that's all dumb back story. What is front and center is how hot Thor is. So hot that he singes off my eyebrows so I look like Jerry Seinfeld's Uncle Leo. His hammer is one of the most awesome weapons in the history of movies. With it, he's damn near invincible. <strike>Without it, let's just say I would have my way with him.</strike> His ignorance of basic Planet Earth protocol is kinda cute, so I'd love to be his tour guide. I'd teach him weird things about 'how we do things in 21st century America'. And it would involve us making out H.A.M. ('<b>H</b>ard <b>A</b>s a <b>M</b>uthfuckah'). I vividly recall my wife and I gripping each other's forearms during a shirtless scene during a theater viewing of Thor 2. My requirement (if I ever get to be in his presence) is that he <strike>Thor-hammers his dick into my ass</strike> holds my hand as we prance along the rainbow gateway to the eight other worlds.<br />
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3. Freddie Prinze Jr, actor in garbage movies<br />
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Freddie Prinze Jr, also known as 'Mr. Michelle-Gellar', starred in numerous movies you may have unfortunately watched - Summer Catch, She's All That, I Know What Those Kids Did That Summer, and Scooby Doo. He's got an all-American boy look, he's a conservative Republican (rare for Hollyweird, probably why his career took a downward spiral after he declared it), and a decent build. He was an ace pitcher in Summer Catch, but strikes me as a mini-Keanu Reaves with his doofiness. <strike>Not a problem if I tape his mouth shut and ravage him.</strike> But he's got a gorgeous face. Probably one of the nicer Hollywood faces out there. Better than George Clooney, hands down. I hope Sarah Michelle-Gellar Prinze knows how lucky she is. BTW - his movies suck, don't see them.<br />
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4. Orlando Bloom, actor - (only as Legolas)<br />
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"<i>Boe a hyn neled herain dan caer menig? Natha daged dhaer." - Sindarin (Elven) language</i><br />
Translation - "Come here and sit on my face. Are you into water sports? You ever seen a grown elf naked?"<br />
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Orlando Bloom achieved stardom from his role in Lord of the Rings as token hot elf Legolas (of the Silvan Woodland Realm, OBVIOUSLY. As if his dialect didn't give it away?!?!?). I liked his long flowing locks, puke-green leggings, and pinpoint accuracy with a bow. He had a fast draw and could also gut you like a fish with a dagger if you got too close. Just ask an orc or an oliphaunt!!!! Right?!?! Anyway, he looked like a girl, dressed like a girl, and talked like a girl. Since I love blondes (namely my wife), I figured I'd add him to my 'To Do' list. Who needs Cupid to shoot a love arrow when Legolas could shoot his OWN love arrow and we would fall in love and frolic throughout Rivendell together for eternity? <strike>Plus I think he'd be real submissive.</strike> A man can dream, right?<br />
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5. Viggo Mortensen, actor - (only as Aragorn)<br />
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Sticking to the LOTR theme, Viggo Mortensen played the uber-manly role of Aragorn, eventual king of Gondor (sorry to ruin it for you, jugheads). He was scruffy, well-trained with a sword, had good leadership qualities and NEVER lost his cool. I like that in a guy. Patient with the loser hobbits who couldn't hang with the rest of the gang, always willing to share knowledge, and always deferential to the other kings he would encounter. A humble man. Scored a higher battlefield rating than General George Patton. Looks hot in mithril armor. I loved the sweat that gathered on his brow after the battle for Helm's Deep when he pushed the doors open, and his tired, victorious frame lurched in slow motion towards the camera. <strike>I may have had some pre-jac.</strike><br />
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Honorable Mention - Alan Rickman, actor - (only as Severus Snape)<br />
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Ok just kidding. But he friggin OWNS this character.<br />
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That's it before I get carried away. Next post deals with creative ways to pop the student loan bubble. Stay tuned and have a great week, readers!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-82118419973690855412013-11-10T19:21:00.002-05:002013-11-10T19:21:56.377-05:00'You Might Be A Conspiracy Theorist' QuizI got a suggestion from my an extended family member to do a 'You might be a conspiracy theorist....' post to help others gauge how awake they are. Well, here it is!!! What follows is a questionnaire that tests how you rank on the mindless sheep scale. While these questions were pulled out of my ass, they still provide insight based on the response of the reader. Are you a 'head in the sand' citizen that typifies the ideal low-info/low-life voter that both parties prey on. Or can see through the bullshit and detect the ulterior motives and wider agenda of the ruling party so that you can be a trusted ally when shit hits the fan? Enough foreplay - let's get to the quiz!<br />
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<b>1. Al Qaeda headquarters is located in:</b><br />
A) Somewhere in Afghanistan<br />
B) Somewhere in Qatar<br />
C) Somewhere in Saudi Arabia<br />
D) Langley, VA (CIA HQ)<br />
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<b>2. The Benghazi controversy all centered around:</b><br />
A) A Youtube video making fun of Mohammed. Obvi.<br />
B) Terrorists who are jealous of our way of life.<br />
C) Poor security.<br />
D) A gun-running operation sponsored by Ambassador Stevens aimed at arming/handing off weaponry from Libyan rebels to Syrian/Al Qaeda rebels in their fight against the Al-Assad government. <br />
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<b>3. The recent Syria chemical weapons attack in August was committed by:</b><br />
A) The Al-Assad government<br />
B) George W. Bush<br />
C) The Muslim Brotherhood<br />
D) Christian killing, organ-eating Syrian rebels that we arm, many with links to Al Qaeda.<br />
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<b>4. The real story behind 9/11 is:</b><br />
A) Whattya mean real story? 19 terrorists from Saudi Arabia hijacked planes and crashed them into the Twin Towers. We need to go out and kill muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan to avenge this atrocity, naturally.<br />
B) The Bush administration had no idea. They thought something may be coming down the pike, but had a failure of imagination, according to then-Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld.<br />
C) We knew this was coming, wanted to stop it but couldn't. However, just think of the sweeping foreign and domestic policy changes we can implement with a large scale domestic terror attack! Let's pretend we were powerless and then go to war to exact revenge!<br />
D) We knew all along this was coming and encouraged it to happen. We had Bin Laden on our CIA payroll in the early 1980's against Russia. We had a controlled detonation of Building 7. September 10th, Rumsfeld in a hearing said $2 trillion was 'missing' and 'unaccounted for' from the Defense expenditures. That wing of the Pentagon had a 'plane' hit it the next day. Iraq and Afghanistan war blueprints were prepared in August of 2000. DHS, TSA, and Patriot Act didn't exist but needed to. We just needed the people to demand it. Ok I'll stop.<br />
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<b>5. The 2008 Financial Crash was caused by:</b><br />
A) George W. Bush<br />
B) The evil Republicans<br />
C) George W. Bush<br />
D) The repeal of the Glass-Steagal Act as part of the Gramm (R) Leach (R) Bliley (R) Act of 1999, signed by Bill Clinton (D), which previously prevented the creation of giant financial supermarkets that could own investment banks, commercial banks and insurance firms. Deregulation followed, which led to an overheated and lax lending environment and a resultant toxic market for ARM loans, subprime loans, and mortgage backed securities. Then shit hit the fan when the first leg of the bubble popped in 2008. Or you could just select A or C because MSNBC told you to.<br />
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<b>6. The Boston Marathon Bombing was:</b><br />
A) Committed by a bunch of crazy Chechnyans. T'is all.<br />
B) Committed by a bunch of crazy Chechnyans, with links to George W. Bush.<br />
C) Committed by a bunch of crazy Chechnyans, who were linked to extremist organizations and we did a poor job of tracking them. <br />
D) Committed by a bunch of crazy Chechnyans who were on FBI payroll and surveillance. They were trained by members of the FBI and were used as double agents to gather intelligence information from Chechnyan terrorist cells. The resulting shutdown/martial law of Boston in the aftermath was a test-run for <i><b>national</b></i> martial law. We passed with flying colors.<br />
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<b>7. The Quantitative Easing policy from the Federal Reserve is aimed at:</b><br />
A) I dunno. Probably to fix something George W. Bush did.<br />
B) Lowering the unemployment rate and giving TBTF ('Too Big To Fail') banks the chance to stabilize their balance sheets and build confidence in the stock market, bond market, and the US dollar.<br />
C) Allow us to hyperinflate our way out of paying back our debt. The more worthless and devalued our dollar is, the easier it is to pay back our $17 trillion debt.<br />
D) Build a dependency on 'out of thin air' money creation to drive stock market and bond market bubbles. Allow us to hyperinflate our way out of paying back our debt to China, Japan, Brazil and any other creditor. Put Band-Aids on our financial insolvency as we continue to pivot from financial crisis to financial crisis (three already in 2013! Fiscal cliff, sequester, debt ceiling). Allow the other countries to also inflate their way out of paying back their respective debts through fiat currency printing. Simultaneously crash the major economies so that Special Drawing Rights (SDR's) officially become the much sought-after one world currency since Biblical Times. Or we will have a gold-backed Chinese currency because both they and Russia have all of the gold at this point.<br />
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<b>8. The true purpose of Obamacare is to: </b><br />
A) Help those with pre-existing conditions get access to insurance and help insure the 30m + without insurance, silly!<br />
B) Enroll young taxpayers in a 'superior' plan* than their existing plan to help pay for older enrollees in the program, as well as provide additional revenues for the Medicare program. (*Note - 'superior' plan means getting services that you never would have used in a million years just so that the Obama administration could say you previously had a crappy plan and its so much better because you enrolled with Obamacare)<br />
C) Enroll new previously 'uninsured' peeps so that they vote Democrat and ensure general election victories from here on out.<br />
D) Intentionally put private insurance out of business. Bastardize the system to the point where the people face 300% increases to monthly payments and 15-30 million people demand answers for their increased costs. The White House then acquiesces and says, 'Ok, we'll agree to fix it - let's move to ONE single-payer system, in which the government handles all transactions related to healthcare.' Problem, Reaction, Solution. <br />
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<b>9. Barack Obama was born in and his religious affiliation is:</b><br />
A) Hawaii, Christian<br />
B) Indonesia, Christian<br />
C) Kenya, Christian<br />
D) Kenya, Muslim<br />
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<b>10. Jesus Christ:</b><br />
A) Was a really popular counter-revolutionary. Not much more.<br />
B) Never died on a cross, never came back to life, but brought people to God and fostered peace and turning the other cheek. So I guess he served a purpose.<br />
C) Never died on a cross, never came back to life, but the Catholic Church and Vatican lied about it to ensure centuries of control, fear, and tithing.<br />
D) Jesus Christ was the Son of God. He suffered, died, and was resurrected on the third day. He is impervious to government, two-party systems, the Illuminati, and any other conspiracy theory. (Hint - it's 'D')<br />
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Personal note - I don't necessarily go with 'D' in all of these, as I'm still on the fence with 9/11. Anyway, there's your quick quiz. Assess your results below:<br />
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'A' answers = 1 pt<br />
'B' answers = 2 pts<br />
'C' answers = 3 pts<br />
'D' answers = 4 pts<br />
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1-10: You are a worthless, piece of shit sheep. You are the reason America is becoming the laughing stock in global opinion. Try to get your news from a source other than MSNBC, CNN, Fox News, NPR, PBS or Air America (jk - Air America went out of business because liberal talk radio sucks and no one listens to it).<br />
11-20: You show signs of hope, but still rely on the failed two-party system. You vote for the 'lesser of two evils'. Break away and become an Independent.<br />
21-30: You are so close to waking up! What do you need to happen at this point? The Immigration Bill to require RF ID chips? Just admit it - you completely distrust government!!! You don't believe if 'your guy' wins the election next time out, things will automatically turn around.<br />
31-40: You 'get it'. You distrust the government, hate both parties, and believe most of what Alex Jones says (whether you want to admit it or not, he is right 75% of the time, albeit on a longer timeline).<br />
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Well, there it is. Hope you enjoyed the quiz, and I really hope you are scoring really high on this, since my readers (all three of them) tend to be really intelligent cynics who simply want the truth. Until next time.....Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04966236313612005475noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3838329682425058918.post-63696723120033530442013-11-07T16:37:00.001-05:002013-11-07T19:35:26.215-05:00Horror Movie StereotypesI was watching some random horror movie on FEARnet the other day and it occurred to me that someone other than the wildly over-rated Jamie Kennedy of Scream fame should be chronicling the common denominators of horror movies. If you haven't seen the Scream movies, Jamie Kennedy plays the role of the horror movie buff who knows all of the inside secrets, what not to do, how to evade the killer, etc. I hate cliche 'me-too' posts, so I will strive to break new ground, but may fall short in my analysis. I just don't think he peeled the onion back enough. Who gets targeted first? Why are you in that situation in the first place? Does the killer wait until after I 'finish' in the bedroom? These questions need to be answered, and this post will hopefully provide well-researched clarity*. (*whatever I can find on Google at the time of the writing)<br />
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<b>Theme #1 - Teens/College Getting Their Comeuppance In The Middle Of Nowhere</b><br />
One of the most common threads throughout horror movies is cool teens or college kids going off on their own, away from their parents for a weekend of partying at a far-off location. But it's never anywhere near the rest of humanity. It's always an isolated run-down cabin, a desert, a mountainside shack, a camp run by stoners, a haunted house, or a shady hotel/motel in eastern Europe or Mexico with less-than-savory clerks and managers. We are trained to feel bad for them because of the predicament they are in, but in essence, should they really have been going to those locations in the first place? Can't you vacation somewhere that other folks occupy? I always need to have a police station, hospital, or town center at least five minutes from where we vacation. It basically guarantees we'll never be murdered, because our screams will undoubtedly be heard by a neighbor or a trendy wearing tight jeans going into Starbucks.<br />
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All too often, the victims are at a family member's second home, one that is invariably rustic, without adequate power, screwy locks, shoddy/creaky wood panels, prone to a lack of heat in the winter, and the lights are never replaced. Why can't you stay at a half-decent hotel? Does it have to be bug-infested with a front clerk that has a drooling conjoined twin head attached to it? Marriott rooms start as low as $129 a night. If you are with a group of friends, these costs can be easily defrayed and spread out over four or five nights. What about miniature golf? That's too gay you say? How can golf be gay? What about going to Atlantic City or Busch Gardens? Six Flags? A local farmer's market? No? If you can't afford that, then you probably shouldn't be going on vacation. Stay at your parents' house and pick up some hours at Rite-Aid - your beer fund will thank you once Spring Break is over.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If this is greets you at a motel, please run. For your life. </td></tr>
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The victims also refuse to complete a thorough car inspection before setting off on their journeys. Frequent calamities include flat tires as a result of under-inflation and poor driving around turns (inevitably hitting a pothole due to lack of infrastructure funding for middle of nowhere roads), faulty brakes due to driving a shitty 2001 Jetta with 140k miles that has never been properly serviced, the ever-popular 'engine trouble' that prevents the car from starting (SAE 5W-30 or SAE 10W-30 oil viscosity designations can be found in bottle form at your local grocery store), and finally, non-maintained keys with gunk and grime on them that inhibit timely starting of car in a moment of need. Throw in a high likelihood of at least three beers in the system before driving and a quick round of puff-puff-pass at Doug's house, and you have a recipe for disaster. Folks - rent a fucking car from Enterprise, split the costs and your likelihood of surviving goes up 25%.<br />
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<b>Theme #2 - Black People Always Die First (Ok, most of the time)</b><br />
Let's be honest - the second we typically see the token jive-talking black person in a horror movie, you know they will be the first to go. Like Clay Buchholz in the 2013 MLB Playoffs, these guys can't make it past the equivalent of the 4th inning. My calculations show that they usually wind up dead within thirty movie minutes of arriving at the vacation destination. It's just the way it is. Unless you are LL Cool J, who somehow defied logic and survived a Michael Myers movie. Probably the bullet-proof vest and pocket glocks through his security guard gig. But you name it - Scream movies, I Know What You Did movies, pretty much every Friday The 13th movie - they are the first to go. I don't know why. Do they know too much? Will the killer have less of an uphill battle if they take out the black dude first since they are probably the strongest and most athletic? Is killing the squawking black chick first really a wise tactical move? You're supposed to leave the confrontational pigeons till the end so that they give away everyone's position because they can't resist starting unnecessary fights about mundane things (ok that's every woman). But either way, the minority character unfortunately bares a disproportionate percentage of 'initial kills'. Yes, I intentionally kept this theme short. Moving on.<br />
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<b>Theme #3 - The Hot Blonde and Token Meathead Die During Raucous Sex</b><br />
No horror movie has a completely ugly cast. MTV learned that after Real World London. The head cheerleader/resident cum-dumpster needs to be romantically linked with the dumb jock meathead (or as I like to call him - "Richie Incognito"). Usually about 45 minutes into the movie, we get the obligatory sex scene while a killer is on the loose. You know the hot blonde isn't long for the movie due to the fact that she's probably a dummy and that her biscuit-necked boyfriend ain't too much brighter. Find a rickety mattress or jizz-stained futon and these savages are good to go. Part of you wants the scene to continue, but the other part of you wants the killer to stumble upon the sexcapades and put it to an abrupt end. Both usually get slaughtered within mere seconds of each other. If the killer is smart, he brings a javelin or a spear to shove through both sets of their guts so that they are intrinsically and sexually linked as they meet their maker. Blood burped up into each other' mouths as they snog and canoodle. Hopefully AS the guy blows his load (think of it as the horror movie version of autoerotic asphyxiation or Whip-Its. Dude it's such a high!!!!)<br />
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It's a damn shame that these two are dead, since one of them is usually the niece/nephew of the homeowner or lead contact with the hotel booking agents. A secondary character needs to now step up against their better judgment. Looks like we're now left with the frumpy/nebbishy brunette and the coke-bottle glasses wearing nerd. <br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Richie Incognito is every meathead in a horror movie. They can't die soon enough.</span></div>
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<b>Theme #4 - Nerds Somehow Outwit, Outlast, Outplay</b><br />
With the token minority, hot blonde, and meathead out of the way, the mantle of 'hero' is now inherited by the socially awkward nerd. Stringy, Edward Snowden-looking dweeb in a black Metallica or Lando Calrissian Star Wars shirt with an IQ of 160 or above. They have somehow eluded capture throughout the movie, by laying low and being pussies. If there's a closet to hide in, they will be in it. If there's a wardrobe to hide in, they will be in it. Hell, they'd hide in a boat, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev-style as long as they didn't have to fight alongside their 'friends'. Let's face it, they only dragged the nerd there to make fun of them. Trust me - I am one, I know this stuff. They weren't your friends, so maybe its ok that they get killed first - you were their whipping boy. But water under the bridge. You're alive, they aren't. The nerd looks like they are going to finally defeat the evil villain, and then they go and fuck it up. Remember - they are all brains, but no brawn. They're like the Moneyball Oakland Athletics - good enough to get to the playoffs, not built to win. Or an NCAA college basketball team that makes it to the Elite 8 against all odds. They eventually get clumsy and outsmarted at their own game. Mincemeat. They walk into a wall or a net contraption and then wake up on a table with half their organs missing.<br />
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They don't have the upper body strength because by nature they are ectomorphs. They couldn't overpower a Jack Russell Terrier. On the flip side, you also have the endomorphs of the bunch - the slow moving oafs who can't keep pace with the killer, fart as they run, and are quick to piss/shit their pants when the going gets tough. This is why nerds need to work out. If they did, they survive every horror movie.<br />
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<b>Theme #5 - Frequent Tripping and Other Sloppiness</b><br />
On the 'breaking new ground' front, this is nothing new, so apologies. People choke under pressure. Just look at Roger Clemens and A-Rod (2009 notwithstanding). Brett Favre and Tony Romo are always good for a late game pick-6. Same deal with horror movies. Usually the tripping is left for maximum drama towards the last scene or two of the movie. From a numbers standpoint, the nebbishy brunette is 7x more likely to trip on a tree root or rake than a male. Late movie brain farts are more likely to be made by the remaining guy (65% vs 35% for women). Physically the males hold up, but their dumb brains pickle in dicey moments. Women tend to have their heads screwed on straight with the overall strategy, but the execution goes wrong. They step on a rake and whack themselves in the head. They fall in a ditch and sprain an ankle. They slip on ice and fall face-first into a mud puddle. Some silly shit that costs them dearly. Guys get cocky and tough. They try to go one on one with the villain, but forget a weapon. They get so hare-brained that they grab a rubber veiny dildo and start flinging it around for the last hurrah. Ok I made that part up, but it is a funny mental picture isn't it? ISN'T IT? They overcompensate in the first half of the skirmish and then tucker out while a dagger gets plunged into their guts as they make the motion for a 15 second time out. Curtains. El fin.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stupid meathead.</td></tr>
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Ok that's the end of the post. These are some top themes that I think get overlooked in the multitude of internet horror movie analyses. Hope they've shed some new light on common threads. I leave you with this:<br />
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