Don't worry, be happy!

Greetings good citizen,

I can begin by belaboring the obvious, that there are several more disturbing developments in the news or I can summarize by announcing (once again) that the destruction of our civilization proceeds apace, which is to say ‘unimpeded’.

Does anyone else find the sheer lack of anyone willing to champion the cause of the ‘average/common’ people disturbing?

Apparently not, all mention of the ‘working class’ has vanished from the vocabulary of the Corporate Owned media.

Speaking of ‘wage slavery’, our first offering of today is a propaganda piece that flies in the face of all of the evidence…

“I was earning $50,000 a year, and now I get $200 a week,” said Jan Thomas, 62, an unemployed marketing executive from Sarasota, Fla., who has been laid off from two jobs in the last three years. Ms. Thomas said in a follow-up interview to the poll that she recently dropped her health insurance “just hoping all will be well” and that she would soon lose her unemployment benefits, leading her to think about applying early for Social Security. “And I’m giving up my apartment and moving in with my mom because my unemployment will be running out,” she said.

The toll that unemployment is taking on families is not just financial, according to the telephone poll, which surveyed 445 unemployed adults from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus five percentage points. More than half of those polled said that they had experienced emotional or mental health problems like anxiety or depression because of their lack of work, and nearly half said that they had felt embarrassed or ashamed not to have jobs. More than a third said that they had had more conflicts or arguments with family and friends because of being jobless. The top reason people cited for not getting work: Too many applicants. [snip]

But the unemployed continue to believe in the American dream. Two-thirds of those surveyed said that they still believed it was possible to start out poor in this country, work hard and become rich — only a little lower than the three-quarters of all Americans who said that they believed that, according to a New York Times/CBS News nationwide poll that was conducted at the same time as the poll of the unemployed adults.

Um, it’s that last paragraph that has me scratching my head. Where is this ‘fantasyland’ that full grown adults claim to still believe in ‘upward social mobility’ despite the last living example of such a phenomenon is now in his sixties…

Truth be told, Mr. Gates isn’t exactly a ‘rags to riches story’, he had some ‘advantages’ your average person didn’t have…just as our ‘he came from nowhere’ president was better connected than his vagabond childhood would lead one to believe…

Which is to point out what most of us already know, the list of ‘self-made’ men is longer on the criminal side of the ledger than it is on the business side.

Which is NOT to say that those who ‘make it’ in business do so, er, ‘honestly’.

But I digress…

Let us move on to a related subject, that of politician directed policing

Long before any act of violence occurs on the streets, a series of command decisions are made, and it is those decisions that ultimately determine whether a protest will be largely peaceful or descend into chaos. Smart crowd control requires letting protesters protest – giving them an outlet. In Oakland on Tuesday evening, long before anything bad happened, police decided to deny Occupy Oakland that outlet. A peaceful, if rowdy march was headed from the main library toward Frank Ogawa Plaza – the location from which they'd been forcefully evicted the night before. They were headed off by a hastily assembled line of police clad in riot gear. The protesters decided to change course and head toward the jail where, according to a National Lawyers' Guild observer on the scene, 105 protesters were being detained.

Again, the police blocked their route. They made another turn (I don't know what the objective was at that point) and were again blocked. The police did not have the manpower to actually block the many cross-streets we crossed, but somewhere a commander decided to put five or six cops on every side street. This was a stupid move, as five officers cannot keep 500 protesters, now angrier than they had been at the onset, at bay.

It was only then that I witnessed the first violence. Protesters swarmed around these five officers, they started swinging batons, made two arrests and then found themselves completely surrounded. I am certain it was a scary moment for those officers. There was another, thicker line of riot police a block away. At some point they realized their comrades were in a jam, and maybe two dozen came running and responded with extreme force. (It was at this point that a flash-bang grenade came flying toward me, going off about three feet away and leaving me shaking for about an hour.) One officer, at the front, was firing less-than-lethal projectiles at the crowd – which, at that point, was in full retreat --

This particular article was written from a position in sympathy with the protesters. Those of the now downright hostile ‘right wing’ (really Libertarians!) are considerably less understanding in their point of view…

A large majority of our population believes our political system is FUBAR and the ‘bar’ part of that acronym means ‘beyond all repair’.

At what point, good citizen, do the police ‘lose their legitimacy’?

When do they stop being ‘lawmen’ and turn into armed thugs?

I submit that the above story provides evidence that this particular police force fit’s the ‘armed thug’ category.

Compound this with the current ‘accepted wisdom’ that ‘the police ARE NOT your friend’ and you have an extremely hostile set of working conditions, fostered by the emerging ‘security state’.

I will never tell you what to do good citizen.

Unlike empty-headed conservatives, my readers don’t need to be told what to think, they merely need something to think about!

So I will share my opinion that these situations (Out of control cops/politicians) are EXACTLY why the constitution provides us with our 2nd amendment rights.

An amendment that our ‘freedom loving’ conservatives will repeal in a heartbeat when the time comes.

The ‘end’ draws near, not that you will see it on the TV or read about it in the corporate owned press but it’s there if you know what you’re looking at.

The ‘showdown’ is coming…prepare!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Masquerade

Greetings good citizen,

Um, since the truth matters little to the corporate owned media I always find it worrisome when the media ‘voluntarily’ prints what is commonly accepted to be ‘the truth’.

With Election Day just over a year away, a deep sense of economic anxiety and doubt about the future hangs over the nation, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, with Americans’ distrust of government at its highest level ever.

The combustible climate helps explain the volatility of the presidential race and has provided an opening for protest movements like Occupy Wall Street, to highlight grievances about banks, income inequality and a sense that the poor and middle class have been disenfranchised.

Almost half of the public thinks the sentiment at the root of the Occupy movement generally reflects the views of most Americans.

Er, that last bit of only ‘half’ of Americans, er, ‘supporting’ the 99% movement is typical Corporate Owned Media ‘propaganda’. The ONLY thing/factor ‘keeping the peace’ right now is the media induced psychosis that we are still ‘evenly divided’.

If you AREN’T one of the richest 1% then guess whose ‘side’ you’re on?

You may ‘Want to be’ one of the 1% but the bad news is membership in that club is restricted to ‘by birth only’ these days. If you weren’t BORN a Gates or a Koch or a Buffett, fer-ged-a-boud-it!

But seriously good citizen, WHO are you going to vote for in the next election cycle?

I told you after the last election cycle the, er, ‘betrayal’ of Obama was ‘proof positive’ that the ballot box no longer works…and four years is far too long to wait for a chance to rectify a ‘mistake’.

Can we ‘survive’ another four years of the current spineless wonder?

Perhaps more damning is the fact that the incumbent is still running ‘unopposed’ by the alleged ‘good guys’…what does that tell you good citizen?

Not that the party of the, er, ‘working class’ had a deep bench to draw from.

Who, besides Elizabeth Warren, would you run for the Oval Office?

I suspect Liz is too smart to run, considering what she’d be inheriting

Attacked by 500 cops in a surprise assault. Tear gas, rubber bullets, shotguns, flash bang grenades. Many injured.

The Oakland occupation's website goes into some more detail, saying over 70 (some reports now say 85) were arrested:
 
This morning at 5am over 500 police in riot gear from cities all over central California brutally attacked the Occupy Oakland encampment at 14th & Broadway. The police attacked the peaceful protest with flash grenades, tear gas, and rubber bullets after moving in with armored vehicles. Apparently the media was not allowed in to document this repression, and the police established barricades as far apart as 11th and 17th. Over 70 people were arrested and the camp gear was destroyed and/or stolen by the riot police.

We see several conservatives lined up and chomping at the bit to take control of our burgeoning police state. I’d like to think that’s why the Democratic side of the field is empty, that our now spineless defenders at least don’t have the stomach for becoming our tormentors.

Well, most of ’em anyway.

So, what’s up with the media suddenly beating the drum on the ’disappointed public’ theme? 

Are they ‘prepping’ us for the next phase of the eminent collapse?

Looks that way to me but ‘doom and gloom’ is my stock in trade.

If I were all about the ‘happy’ these pages would be notoriously blank.

In fact I do write a ‘happy blog’ but don’t bother looking for it; it has zero entries.

The decidedly ‘unhappy’ real world tends to dominate the news cycle.

This, ironically, would not be so in a world managed by rational people.

Unlike the the media circus the Euro-Zone has become.

Stocks in the United States and Europe sank Tuesday as the markets got another jolt from the European Union — this time the abrupt cancellation of a meeting of finance ministers that was meant to precede a leaders’ summit meeting on Wednesday.

The sovereign debt problems in European nations that share the euro have loomed over the markets for more than a year, with investors able to price in some of the twists and turns in the efforts to resolve them. But on Tuesday, stocks that had opened lower dipped further on concern about what the cancellation of the meeting might portend.

Financial stocks in particular declined steeply, more than 3 percent. Europe’s leaders said they had made some progress over the weekend on measures aimed at addressing their financial and economic problems, but a big issue that analysts had expected to be tackled on Wednesday was how to expand the stability fund of 440 billion euros, or $611 billion, so that it would cover Spain and Italy, if necessary.

If you haven’t been paying attention due to being faced with larger problems in your personal domain, the ’debt’ this proposed ’stability fund’ is supposed to be protecting from default is 5 times larger than the fund…and there’s no place to get more without, er, ‘diluting’ what’s already there.

But that shouldn’t be a problem for the people in charge!

Reality be damned, we’ll make it work!

Large-scale twin studies have shown that these traits are highly heritable – identical twins, who share 100% of their genes, are much more similar to each other in this trait than fraternal twins, who share only 50% of their genes. In one study, over 80% of the variation in the callous-unemotional trait across the population was due to genetic differences. In contrast, the effect of a shared family environment was almost nil.

Psychopathy seems to be a lifelong trait, or combination of traits, which are heavily influenced by genes and hardly at all by social upbringing.

The two defining characteristics of psychopaths, blunted emotional response to negative stimuli, coupled with poor impulse control, can both be measured in psychological and neuroimaging experiments...They do not seem to process heavily loaded emotional words, like “rape”, for example, any differently from how they process neutral words, like “table”.

In a nutshell, good citizen, these people don’t know the difference between right and wrong. Sometimes its mild and sometimes its severe but left unchecked, it proves to always be disastrous!

This is why I propose to end ‘incarceration’ as a form of punishment and replace it with exile.

If we don’t ‘weed out’ this genetic trait we will keep returning to the point we are at today, with civilization itself on the verge of collapse.

Understand, the ONLY thing capable of ‘repairing’ our badly broken ‘global economy’ is a massive Jubilee, debt forgiveness on a scale not seen since biblical times!

Once forgiven the placing of another into debt must be criminalized. It is the first step towards sharing the planet’s bounty ‘equitably’.

And if that’s NOT a Desirable Goal, good citizen then I do not wish to remain a member of this species!

Remember the Golden Rule (which doesn’t go ‘those with the gold make the rules’.)

Look to your conscience and act accordingly.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Evidence under the radar

Greetings good citizen,

As constant reader knows I frequently warn of the dangers of social collapse.

No irony should be lost on the fact that the surest signs of eminent danger are indistinguishable from, er, ‘criminal activity’.

Which is to say evidence of collapse is omnipresent but it is being reported as ‘criminal activity’ rather than ‘social desperation’.

Here are just a few examples:

"Rustling Costs Ranchers Millions in Poor Economy"

checked on his livestock and found a ghoulish scene: Piles of entrails from two Black angus calves he says thieves gutted "like they were deer." They made off with the meat and another 400-pound calf in a heist he estimated cost him $1,800.

"Gosh, times are tough, and maybe people are truly starving and just need the meat," he said. "But it's shocking. I can't believe people can stoop that low."

"Pharmacy Robberies on Rise as Addicts Turn to Guns"

Two armed robberies were enough. So he stopped stocking the drug. And he posted signs to tell everyone -- especially desperate addicts -- "We don't carry OxyContin!"

He thought the signs were helping -- until last month, when a man wearing a mask entered the pharmacy with a sawed-off shotgun.

He jumped over the counter, told three employees and a customer to get on the floor, and tied their hands. Then he left with money and more than $12,000 worth of prescription drugs, including other narcotic painkillers.

"Thieves Stealing Pickup Truck Tailgates"

reports that six times in six months crooks have taken the tailgates off pickup trucks in parking lots in Oswego. They can actually go for a decent chunk of cash. They sell for $4,000 new but the "hot" tailgates can go for $600-$700 and the crooks are still making decent change.

Most of these are real yawners compared to other events lurking at the edges of civilization…until you insert yourself and your stuff/personal safety into the picture.

YOU ‘could have been one of the customers tied up on the floor in that drug store heist…it could also be YOU as the one who discovers the family pet’s gutted remains on the edge of your property. (Today it’s cows but tomorrow, ‘meat is meat’..and as the author of ‘The Road’ points out, some humans aren’t that ‘fussy’ as to where their meat comes from.)

Which is to say it’s only a matter of time before ‘monsters’ make the news.

The distinguishing factor is that these ‘zombies’ won’t just be ‘undead’, they’ll be downright certifiable too!

So slaughtering one of these ‘opportunists’ won’t be ‘murder’, considering what they had planned for you…

But I digress, and rather morbidly at that.

Let us return to the signs that our economy is on the verge of collapse

Bankers have an odd-sounding problem these days: they are awash in cash.

Droves of consumers and businesses unnerved by the lurching markets have been taking their money out of risky investments and socking it away in bank accounts, where it does little to stimulate the economy.

Though financial institutions are not yet turning away customers at the door, they are trying to discourage some depositors from parking that cash with them. With fewer attractive lending and investment options for that money, it is harder for the banks to turn it around for a healthy profit.

During the ‘alleged recovery’ it was the vaults full of cash that were used as ‘proof’ the economy was on the mend.

In fact, the banks have been ‘sitting’ on heaps of…money since BEFORE the crisis struck!

If we roll the clock back to the 1970’s we’d see the exact same phenomenon. Too much money chasing too little opportunity.

What do you suppose was the cause of that?

Too much capacity (like right now?)

Capitalism is RETARDED because it puts the focus on growth rather than sustainability.

But the short term needs of the few have long outweighed the long term needs of the many. And when the two factors collided, the few steamrolled the many with stolen money.

It really is as simple as that.

Worse, the solution set is just as simple…although it involves invoking our 2nd amendment rights rather than our first.

Why are the banks loaded with cash while the streets are filled with the homeless?

Obvious answer = mismanagement.

Second question: Which of our, er, ‘constitutional rights’ will allow us with the surest method of correcting said mismanagement?

The ballot box or the weapons locker?

It’s time to decide just whose hand is going to be on the trigger…

Will it be yours or will it belong to those who created this untenable situation?

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Beggars Banquet

Greetings good citizen,

After Friday’s ‘fantastic’ (as in fantasy) performance we are once again ‘treated’ to soaring market numbers for, as usual, no discernable reason.

Not a reason a sane person would accept anyway, here we have the ‘cook the books’ version…

Stocks Rise on Upbeat Earnings

Stocks in the United States rose Monday, extending the trend in global markets on strong corporate results and mergers, as well as hope for agreement on resolving Europe’s debt problems. [snip]

the financial sector was up 2 percent, and the materials and industrial sectors were each up by more than 1 percent. [snip]

But we still doubt that the new plan, which is likely to be finalized on Wednesday, will be enough to bring the crisis to an end,” said economists from Capital Economics.

After tanking the markets repeatedly for more than a year, the latest ‘fantasy’ bailout (of the already bailed out PIIGS) does NOT do anything to solve the problem of why the Euro-zone keeps slipping deeper into debt.

Nothing, nada, zip.

Not that the math actually helps…why do they expect anyone to believe that roughly 500 BILLION Euros will cover two and a half TRILLION dollars in debt?

They are ‘investors’ but seriously, who besides that fatally optimistic crowd believes it?

Truth be told good citizen, I’m pretty sure the investors the credibility challenged media keeps referring to are largely imaginary.

NOBODY is that stupid.

But anyway…

After the initial surge the markets traded sideways for the remainder of the day, finishing pretty much where they started…which wasn’t a particularly encouraging sign.

In local news, one of the members of the conservative piss and moan committee was spelling out the ‘demands’ of the Occupy Wall Street movement in typical conservative style.

His list was a complete work of fiction but that never bothers a conservative.

Which got me thinking about the vitriol that I (regularly) heap upon conservatives.

I frequently make allusions to the fact that most conservatives are traitors undeserving of the benefits of civil society and that they should suffer a traitor’s fate.

Well, for the record, I’m not joking.

When the tide turns and the 99% boots the conservatives to the curb, I’ll be one of the many pushing to see that justice is served.

We cannot, as a species, move forward while the self-interested dominate our civilization.

And until steps are taken to, er, remove the self-serving from our midst we will remain a crippled race.

This is why I designed A Simple Plan the way I did. It is intended to place the law beyond the reach of the self-serving.

And since all money is funny, the only thing left is the justice system as far as what’s broken goes.

So no irony should be lost on all of the pointing and wailing over the collapsing financial system, it’s all an act.

The real problem is the justice system, which could (and eventually WILL) snap back into place with a vengeance.

THAT is what has the self-serving liars worried.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Telltales

Greetings good citizen,

I don’t usually follow the, er, ‘specific’ trials of the Euro-Zone because it is commonly acknowledged that the banking system is global, so pointing to problems of a particular geographic region is really a media attempt at deliberate ‘mis-direction’.

But when one is handed Lemons, one strives to turn them into something more palatable.

Under the headline of ‘Euro crisis’ we have this tale of, what else but ‘contagion’…

Dexia’s problems are not entirely caused by Europe’s debt crisis, but some issues in its case are a matter of broader debate. Among them are how much of a bailout banks should get, and the size of the losses they should take on loans that governments cannot repay.

Among Dexia’s biggest trading partners are several large United States institutions, including Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.

To limit damage from Dexia’s collapse, the bailout fashioned by the French and Belgian governments may make these banks and other creditors whole — that is, paid in full for potentially tens of billions of euros they are owed. This would enable Dexia’s creditors and trading partners to avoid losses they might otherwise suffer without the taxpayer rescue.

Whether this sets a precedent if Europe needs to bail out other banks will be closely watched. The debate centers on how much of a burden taxpayers should bear to support banks that made ill-advised loans or trades.

Let us spend a moment and digest what this means to the average individual.

First off is how the government HAS NOT reached into YOUR pocket to make these shiftless bastards ‘whole’. They waved their ’magic wands’ and conjured a bunch of brand new debt into existence…debt that YOU’RE NOT ‘technically’ on the hook for…today.

All of this is being done in the realm of ‘creative accounting’, the, er, bondholders/creditors don’t actually NEED the money, it is all the ‘principle of the thing’ involved.

No irony should be lost on the fact that this is being done to satisfy ‘the rules’ (at the expense of even more important rules…which cannot and will not be, er, ‘avoided’.

This perhaps is one of the most disturbing facets of the current economic environment, the ‘wrong’ principles are being enforced while more basic functions are being ignored.

In the end the, er, ‘historians’ will point to greed and they will be correct.

The real question good citizen is when will we break the boom-bust chain?

Since the question is, at this point, rhetorical we don’t have a definite answer but we do have this curious graphic that is useful more so as a teaching tool than a graphic representation of ‘global fiscal interconnectedness.’

To begin, let’s look at who is being depicted as the ‘Fat Man’ in the room, are any of you wondering why?

In fact the real question is why certain circles are ‘gray’ and why others are ‘red’ for they certainly aren’t representative of the economic well being of the labeled nation’s populace…although the labels start to make more sense when viewed by the ‘percentage of whales/fat cats’ residing in a given nation.

How disturbing is that, good citizen?

Naturally, the thickness of the arrows shows us how much each, er, ‘group of taxpayer supported fat cats’ are on the hook for.

Looks like the US is on the hook for some serious dinero!

How big are those fat cat banker’s balls now?

Let me direct your attention to to a site that has been all over this Euro mess

I leave the choice to visit up to you.

I feel compelled to return to the issue of ‘principles’ and of being ‘on the hook’.

I have frequently asked the (rhetorical) question of ‘what is the PURPOSE of commerce?’

If there is a single issue that defines the ‘political divide’ in this nation, that issue is it.

Since commerce is, by definition, the endeavor established to ‘supply’ society with the essentials of life, we have to ponder where ‘credit scores’ come from?

Worse is being forced into debt to obtain life’s essentials (which are ‘free to the owner’.)

Conservatives (those who wish to preserve the ‘status quo’) are quick to re-direct you to the somewhat insane concept of ‘ownership IS freedom’.

This, somehow, begins with the concept of the ownership of ones’ self…sort of totally missing the whole point of civilization (but it does clearly explain their complete lack of appreciation for the efforts of others, which is brushed off as the ‘stupidity‘ of others, which appears to be the ONLY thing they are genuinely grateful for!)

Well, all of this, er, ‘ill conceived’ debt is exactly that. The ‘investor class’ ran out of opportunity so they ‘created’ one out of the last possible resort, the full faith and credit of the nation!

Take the full faith and credit of the nation and hand it over to people who don’t give a fuck for anything or anybody besides themselves and what do you get?

In a word, Chaos!

Again we return to the initial question, what is the purpose of commerce? Understand, without civilization, commerce doesn’t exist!

Only uncivilized savages exist outside civilization so how do these self-centered conservatives (specifically Libertarians) justify their place in society?

Well, the ‘own’.

Not that ONE of them has a legitimate title to ANYTHING…

But, lo and behold, WHO is a big supporter of ‘government’ now?

Why it is the same assholes that want to abolish ‘government oversight’.

They’re all for ‘starving the government’ until their property rights are jeopardized!

Anyway, in the end what we’re seeing is the cooking of the books at YOUR expense.

When we slip back into a Stone Age level of existence the excuse will be ‘we don’t have the money to pay teachers or maintain the roads’ (or to feed all of you useless bastards!)

We ‘spent’ that money ‘rescuing’ the now defunct banks!

I don’t need to remind anyone that ALL MONEY is FUNNY, do I?

It isn’t the entry on the ledger that dried up the goods in the marketplace, it was the entry in the bank account of those with more than they could spend, who didn’t ‘re-invest’ their income and voted against ‘re-distribution’ of ‘their’ money.

I have opined before that the conventions that prevent us from killing one another on sight are wearing thin…pretty soon it will become the only logical outcome.

I don’t know about you but I didn’t raise my kids to be murderers…

The question here is, did they?

And the answer, at least partially, is they aren’t raising their kids at all!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Deeper than it looks

Greetings good citizen,

As I recently commented, the more you reflect, the harder it is to escape the circus-like atmosphere surrounding the major events unfolding around the world.

Those perpetrating the crimes/events are the first to defend their actions with comments like, “It’s a crazy world where crazy things happen all of the time.”

Which isn’t entirely true and we all know it.

The ‘bizarre’ doesn’t smack you in the face until somebody tries to pull the rug over something…that is usually why the ‘explanation’ doesn’t quite fit what you’re witnessing.

What should be dawning on most of you by now is the, er, ‘cover-ups’ are getting lamer mostly because of the undeniably criminal nature of what’s being covered up.

Usually it is violations of your constitutional rights that are being ‘tread’ upon…by, of all people, those flag waving patriots, the Tea Partiers!

At a Republican candidate forum outside Fort Worth last week, a Tea Party activist turned Senate candidate proclaimed the Occupy Wall Street protesters “unemployed, uneducated and uninformed.” To which the conservative radio host moderating the panel added, mirthfully, “This is the first occupation many of these people have seen in years.”

I will once again draw your attention to the decidedly ‘Libertarian’ quality of the Cato Institute spawned Tea Party. Somewhere down the line what formerly passed for ’political opposition’ morphed into a totally illogical movement to abolish government altogether…

And Tea Partiers don’t see anything ’wrong’ with this.

Probably because Tea Partiers DON’T KNOW what ‘the purpose of government’ is.

But let us digress a bit for a moment.

Doesn’t it strike you as ‘ballsy’ that the mostly retirement aged (and SENILE) Tea Partiers are calling the youthful “Occupy Wall Street” crowd ‘out of touch?’

There is also another glaring difference between the Tea Partiers and the Occupy Wall Street crowd. The Tea Partiers (again due to their stunning display of ignorance, although it COULD BE ‘stupidity’) DON’T blame those running the FIRE economy for bringing our civilization down around our ears.

No irony should be lost on the fact that Tea Partiers value freedom higher than civilization, worse, most think the two are 'unrelated'!

Um, the bad news is ‘the kids’ of OWS are tarring ALL, er, ‘seniors’ with the same brush.

A factor the largely aged and senile Tea Partiers aren’t helping with.

Let us take a mental step backwards and refocus on the Big Picture for a moment.

It seems Mr. Obama isn’t ‘weaseling’ when he says they’re pulling ‘everybody’ out of Iraq…(although Sec. Of State Clinton says we won’t ‘abandon’ Iraq, whatever that’s supposed to mean.)

Ironically, let’s take a peek at why ‘negotiations’ broke down:

Pentagon lawyers insisted that the Iraqi Parliament grant soldiers immunity from legal prosecution. In recent weeks, American negotiators in Baghdad concluded that it would be impossible to obtain that protection, essentially scuttling any chance of a substantial troop presence there next year.

Um, aren’t we right back where we started good citizen with legal ‘wrangling’ over what was, up to this point, settled law?

Worse, good citizen, now other criminal organizations are taking advantage of the gaping holes left in the justice system by those who DON’T want ‘financial crime’ prosecuted.

Gangs like the Bloods and the Crips are engaging in crimes, such as identity theft, counterfeiting, selling stolen goods and even bank, credit card and mortgage fraud, said a new FBI gangs threat assessment.

“We’ve seen it, but we’ve seen them doing it even more now and we attribute to the fact that the likelihood of being caught is less, the sentences once you are caught are less, and the actual monetary gain is much higher,” said Diedre Butler, a unit chief at the National Gang Intelligence Center.

Did you see that/ the crimes are more lucrative, harder to prosecute AND it is less likely you’ll do time IF they catch you.

Why do you suppose THAT is?

Do you think it has a connection to our ‘anti-government’ Tea Baggers?

Ask yourself; how demented ARE these people?

They make no secret of it:

Obama and Dems have seized on other reactions from audience members — the “let him die” moment, the booing of the gay soldier — to build a larger case about the clash of visions and values the 2012 election campaign will embody. Obama has taken to claiming that “we’re all in this together,” and has framed his call for tax hikes on the rich as an argument over national unity and the social contract, while deriding GOP opposition to shared sacrifice as a Darwinian “you’re on your own” worldview.

I end today’s…‘puzzle’ with the mental image of the world that the Tea Partiers would saddle you with is IDENTICAL to the place I would ‘exile’ criminals to…

Chew that one over as you ponder who to vote for.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Unchained...and more than a little unhinged too!

Greetings good citizen,

Once again the East bleeds while the West (miraculously) watches its profits soar!

There is no rational explanation, nobody is buying stocks except traders themselves (and they don’t intend to hold them, which should scare the shit out of all of you!)

We could ask what is behind this irrational behavior but the answer is obvious, it is all part of the ‘everything’s fine’ Kabuki Dance.

Like the actions of a group of overpaid morons has anything to do with reality…

Yet it does…but not in the way most of you think.

As I have stated before, the only thing the stock market tells us is how rich the already rich have made themselves…the part I keep leaving out is the ‘at the expense of the rest of us’.

As long as you keep buying this bullshit you will continue to get ripped off.

Purely because they say so.

And THAT (to me) is the most fucked up thing about the whole situation…

Let’s have a look at how the corporate owned media spins this unlikely tale

Stocks were lifted earlier this week by modestly better news about the U.S. economy. The number of people claiming unemployment benefits declined this week. Housing construction picked up last month, at least for apartment buildings. Inflation remains low.
Among the companies reporting earnings late Thursday or Friday:

— General Electric Co.'s income rose 18 percent as its lending business recovered, but profit margins shrank in key business. The stock fell 1.5 percent.

— Microsoft Corp.'s income rose 6 percent and its revenue beat Wall Street estimates. The stock rose by a penny.

— Verizon Communications Inc.'s income doubled from last year, mainly because of pension adjustments. Its adjusted earnings beat expectations. But Verizon's bottom-line result masked a weak quarter for its local phone business, which faced a major worker strike and post-hurricane repairs. The stock rose 1.9 percent.

How does that grab you good citizen?

Commerce is BASED on the concept that companies PROFIT from performing/providing goods and services to society.

Did you catch the explanations for the three cited companies’ rise in profits?

The FORMER largest manufacturer in the world (GE) saw a recovery in its BANKING business! Which is actually a bit of ‘misdirection' on the media’s part.

You see, it says right on the back of the stock certificates that GE is a wholly owned subsidiary of the J.P. Morgan guaranty trust.

Oddly, being a profitable ‘bank’ isn't as good a PR message as ‘pretending’ your manufacturing arm returned to profitability…which it DID NOT!

Then Microsoft ‘beat expectations’…talk about your ‘captive audience’! If you’re not a PC then you’re a Mac (and there isn’t a REAL difference between the two!)

Worse, Microsoft being ‘more profitable’ only means their ‘forced migration’ actions are working…big whoop!

And our last ‘example’ of strong profitability is attributed to Verizon screwing its pensioners!

Capitalism at it’s finest!

THIS caused the Dow to climb almost 200 points…WTF!

Let’s have a closer look at GE as it warranted its own article in today’s NY Times business section…

General Electric, the nation’s largest industrial company, on Friday reported net earnings for the third quarter of $3.2 billion, up 57 percent from the same period in 2010 despite what the chief executive called a “volatile” economic environment. [sidebar, GE USED TO BE the largest mfr IN THE WORLD!]

The company said it had operating earnings per share of 31 cents, exactly in line with expectations of analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters. That excluded the $0.08 per share impact of its redemption of Berkshire Hathaway shares, which it subsequently redeemed this month for $3.3 billion. But the company said it expected that retiring the stock would improve annualized earnings per share by $0.03 in future quarters.

Revenue for the period from July through September, 2011, was $35.4 billion, which the company described as flat when compared with the third quarter of 2010. When the impact of the sale of NBC Universal to Comcast was excluded, the revenue for the quarter was up 12 percent.

Which returns us to a very serious issue, good citizen.

Have you noticed how much of our economy can be attributed to ‘creative accounting’?

Worse, creative accounting has nothing to do with economic performance…but you knew that.

IF we let them continue to ‘whitewash’ true economic performance we will soon be faced with a very real supply problem that the meaningless data helped conceal.

When you’re being told that what’s on hand today is all of the bread you will have UNTIL NEXT YEAR it will be too little, too late to execute the people who ‘cooked the books’.

IF you can find them at all.

As bad as this sounds, once the dam breaks we will (suddenly) be faced with problems that should have been seen months ago…

And the ‘witch hunt’ will begin…after the damage is done!

Don’t let them get away with it.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner