Uncertainty...

Greetings good citizen,

As we slog forward into an uncertain future those who would drive our civilization over a cliff to mask their crimes against humanity care not what happens after that.

My advice, as always, is to prepare. (And NOT like the idiots on ‘doomsday preppers’ who obviously have a screw loose…besides being decidedly homicidal! If you need further convincing that the world after the collapse is going to be uncommonly hazardous, watch the show!) Hint: it’s the trigger happy preppers you have to watch out for! Stumble upon their ‘hide’ and they will open fire first and ask questions afterwards!

In a flicker of insight on an otherwise direction-less horizon we have this article that belabors the obvious in a couple of directions…

Our Economic Pickle
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE

The debt-ceiling debate is unlikely to alter one major factor contributing to income inequality: stagnant wages.

Now that it is ‘on the table’, who (and how) will the issue of ‘stagnant wages’ be addressed?

‘Employers’ have no problems raising their prices in pace with inflation (driving inflation ever upwards) but are ‘strangely reluctant’ to raise their ‘employee/customers’ purchasing power.

The ‘strategy’ could be called ‘out-waiting the competition’, the longer they wait to raise their employees pay, the more they keep for themselves.

Ultimately, your NOT being paid a living wage is being driven by the ‘owners desire’ to wax rich (at, ultimately, ALL of our expense.)

It’s lower prices we don’t pay and fair wages you don’t get, because the idiots who sign your paycheck follow their mother’s advice and PAY THEMSELVES FIRST!

Funny how this advice isn’t so sound when you put it into this context, is it? It creates a ‘penny-wise and pound-foolish’ situation that is crumbling all around us as we sit here contemplating how we got ourselves into such a, as the article calls it, ‘Pickle’?

We will see in the article after this next one who WON’T be working to save us from employer greed

But the other article first:

News Analysis
The Low Politics of Low Growth
By ANNIE LOWREY

What if it is the weak economy that is driving the fiscal failures in Washington?

How odd is it that the question answers itself? (But this can be attributed to the ‘muzzle’ the ‘write for hire’ crowd is forced to wear.)

I find it astounding that our, and let’s face it, none of them has a grip on reality, ‘politicians’ continue to flog the concept of ‘perpetual growth’ as the key to future prosperity.

How can you ‘grow’ when there has been NOTHING ‘new’ since Pong? Every other technological marvel is merely the ‘fleshing out’ of potential that was already there.

So ‘exporting jobs’ (to make it more profitable for the ‘owner’) also doesn’t encourage (local) economic growth. It really only serves to make the owner richer than he/she deserves to be.

But are our politicians focused on their ‘primary job’ of managing our civilization for the benefit of our species?

Let’s have a look:

TOP NEWS
Obama Will Seek Citizenship Path in One Fast Push
By JULIA PRESTON

President Obama and lawmakers from the two parties believe that their best chances for passing substantial legislation on immigration will come early in his second term.

Like healthcare, NOBODY is looking for a ‘solution’ to an already over-populated, far too competitive job market!

It’s been opined that this (European satellite) was built by ‘immigrants’. (It was even somewhat true when most of the immigrants hailed from Europe…)

Not that providing EMPLOYERS with a ‘cheaper labor pool’ to exploit is ever a justification to ‘streamline’ the immigration process, especially when you get a load of how they intend to go about it.

You’ll get your ‘citizenship’ all right but first you’ll have to do your military service. You will be sent to foreign lands, meet new, interesting people and kill them.

What used to be scabs to keep the factories humming (cheaply) will become fodder for the endless wars the capitalists wage, merely to keep the population (and by extension, the unemployment rate down.)

There won’t be any ‘resource wars’. Resources are all sold openly on the (alleged) ‘free markets’ so what’s to ‘fight’ over?

Even the current conflict in the Middle East is over a police problem that should have been handled ‘internally’ by local law enforcement.

BUT NO! Our (block-headed) government had to use military force instead of foreign aid and providing foreign governments the tools to handle the problems itself.

Worse, our (rogue) government supports criminal regimes like the Israelis who openly subjugate the former inhabitants of the nation they now ‘occupy’ and use military force to maintain the upper hand, in open defiance of international law…not that ‘respect for the law’ is real strong here either.

But that’s another issue altogether as the ‘over fifty crowd' prepares to fight for its survival!

BUSINESS
Over 50, and Under No Illusions
By CAITLIN KELLY

Many people aged 55 to 64, who had been dreaming of easy retirement, have had to remake their lives to find work during the recession and its aftermath.

As many of us close in on the ‘finish line’ of our professional careers (most of them in tatters…the careers and our humble selves.) We are encountering the above mentioned ‘lawlessness’ that offers us no recourse to what is likely to turn into a very deadly confrontation.

While we have long lamented the ‘rudderless’ condition of our crumbling society, this was no accident. It didn’t ‘wear out’, it was snapped off by those who could (through manipulation) afford to ‘buy’ the justice system…(something many will pay dearly for because so many already have!)

Note how the capitalist credo is parroted here in the headline. How the ‘over fifty crowd’ are (unsuccessfully) ‘making themselves useful’ as they ‘sprint’ (more like limp/drag) themselves toward a finish line that (mysteriously) keeps backing away! (So a wretched few can be rich…)

Yes, good citizen, we’re all going to be each other’s ‘financial advisors’ and manage each other’s money and sell each other houses neither of us can afford.

With those ‘encouraging words’ I thank you for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Beneath it all...

Greetings good citizen,

Every few months I feel compelled to restate the mission of this blog, which, due to its subject matter, is widely considered a ‘Doom and Gloom’ site.

How sad is it that it isn’t my purpose to frighten anyone nor am I intent upon twisting your mind toward my way of seeing things. (Although part of my mission involves, er, ‘educating’ you in the finer points of my creation, A Simple Plan.)

That said, some of you might find that education bordering on ‘indoctrination’.

I can be rabid when the feeling moves me and I’m forever racing ‘off the reservation’, a fault I readily admit.

Um, to opine that my posts are, er, ‘unbiased’ would be exactly that, an opinion. We’re all biased and there’s no getting away from that fact.

The editor of the local rag was ‘editorializing’ on the subject of biased fact checkers just last night…and you know why the conservative liar was crying about that subject, don’t you?

Yes indeed good citizen, the closer we get to the election the more it looks as though Ol’ Mitt is gonna pull off an ‘upset victory’ much Like W. winning Florida due to ‘hanging chads’.

And they’ll pin it on ‘waitresses’!

But I digress.

We all know those waitresses are working in dives across the nation, just waiting for a One Percenter (like Mitt) to waltz in and sweep them away from the drudgery of being a working class drone.

Billionaire, Princess, same difference.

And, bizarrely, YOU are expected to BELIEVE that it was that sort of BULLSHIT that swung the election in favor of the man who gave HALF OF US the fucking MIDDLE FINGER less than a month ago!

I don’t know how they expect this to play in Peoria but I’m fairly certain it won’t go down well with the decidedly non-conservative 80% of the NATION!

Especially when we have seen first hand how the bullshit with the banks went down.

But again, I digress.

Let us return to the topic that underlies the foundation of modern civilization, a topic that will ultimately bring an end to life as we have come to know it, peak oil and those whose power derives from fossil fuel.

We seem to hear two versions of the story of limited oil supply:

1. The economists’ view, saying that the issue is a simple problem of supply and demand. Substitution, higher prices, demand destruction, greater efficiency, and increased production of oil at higher prices will save the day. [HA!]

2. A version of Hubbert’s peak oil theory, saying that world oil production will rise and at some point reach a plateau and begin to decline, because of geological depletion. The common belief is that the rate of decline will be determined by geological considerations, and will roughly match the rate at which production increased.

In my view, neither of these views is correct. My view is a third view:

3. An adequate supply of cheap ($20 or $30 barrel) oil is no longer available, because most of the “easy to extract” oil is gone. The cost of extracting oil keeps rising, but the ability of oil-importing economies to pay for this oil does not. There are no good low-cost substitutes for oil, so substitution is very limited and will continue to be very limited. The big oil-importing economies are already finding themselves in poor financial condition, as higher oil prices lead to cutbacks in discretionary spending and layoffs in discretionary industries.

The government is caught up in this, as layoffs lead to more need for stimulus funds and for payments to unemployed workers, at the same time that tax revenue is reduced. There can be a temporary drop in oil prices (as there was in late 2008), as recession worsens, but eventually demand rises again, oil prices rise again, and the pattern of layoffs and increased governments financial problems occurs again. [snip]

What the Economists’ View Misses

The economists’ view misses the fact that it is external energy that makes the economy operate the way it does. (See my earlier posts, here, here and here.) If energy products are higher priced, energy importers can afford less of them, and there is a tendency of their economies to shrink back to what their economies can afford—fewer employed workers and fewer government programs. I talk about the connection between employed workers and energy consumption in The Close Tie Between Energy Consumption, Employment and Recession.

Back to the beginning, where I was explaining the objective of this blog.

I can’t help it if the truth sucks…that said I am also not telling you that ‘all is lost’ (although it might be if we don’t, er, ‘rid’ ourselves of those who were born thinking they are the only ones who deserve to live here. The rest of us are ‘excess baggage’ to be disposed of however and whenever necessary.

Worse, the only thing saving our sorry asses in their indecision about how many of us to keep around!

Although there is a building consensus that they should exterminate us wholesale and then let the few that survive breed the ‘servant class’ back up to full strength.

Pretty gloomy, but it doesn’t have to turn out this way.

There are alternatives to the eminent return of a ‘slave economy’ and the bloodshed this will cause.

We just need to bring everyone associated with this ‘New World Order’ (more commonly known as ‘The One Percent’) to Justice…after we purge the now corrupt beyond belief justice system.

The situation IS salvageable…but you need to have faith.

It all starts with small steps and A Simple Plan points the way!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Thought Experiment

Greetings good citizen,

I have finally solved my ‘personal transportation crisis’ and can resume posting. (Yes, the past couple of days have been crazy, made that much crazier by the necessity of borrowing a small sum of money with a tiny personal income. A feat I pulled off, I might add.)

As usual, a couple of day’s silence leads to a backlog of stories I would have liked to bring to your attention. Some of these were too good to pass up so I’m including them in tonight’s offering.

This particular link leads to a thought experiment reminiscent of the homily ‘be careful what you wish for’ (You just might get it!)

And naturally enough, the wish in question here good citizen is nothing less than ‘Conservative Utopia’ where all of the ‘Red States’ to secede from the Union and start their own nation.

The million marble question is how long would it be before ‘Conservative Utopia’ bore a striking resemblance to that other ‘capitalist paradise’…Somalia?

With that as a given good citizen we are left to ponder just how the ‘one in fives’ regained control of the nation’s purse strings…again?

Worse, it’s looking like ‘Bush’s third term’ is conspiring to hand the White House back to the ‘party of no’ in what should be considered record time…

Last time the Republicans screwed up the nation’s economy they lost control of both houses of congress for forty years, this time they were back in charge in two!

Who do we have to ‘thank’ for this impossibility? The ‘corporate owned’ media, who lies through their teeth every time one of them opens their mouth.

But I belabor the obvious…

Moving along we have this Government Report: Rich White Men Are Most Likely to Survive Nuclear Blast well written article.

The ‘frightening’ part about this story is the release date, it was put out by Obama’s people! We’re almost 70 years into the so-called ‘Cold War’ and they are still getting it wrong!

But that should surprise no one, what do you suppose is wrong with this picture? New York Struggles as Blizzard’s Impact Chastens Bloomberg

Okay, the recent ‘blizzard’ was a pretty big storm…but we’ve had bigger and it didn’t tie things up for days on end. Worse, this isn’t pointing to a labor problem as much as it is pointing to a budget problem.

They have the people to do the job but they obviously don’t want to pay them to get the job done in a timely fashion.

Most ‘snow removal’ is done by ‘contractors’…if you can’t pay the contractors, you can’t hire them…and boy are they mad that they spent all of that money getting their fleets ready for winter!

So next year will be a real snafu!

Did I mention ‘mismanagement’? the whole fucking society is mismanaged but that’s kinda besides the point!

And if that’s not disturbing enough, try this on for size… or this one

Naturally this is why I predict that everyone will be, er, ‘shocked’ by both the scale and the intensity of the violence, once it erupts.

As we approach the New Year we see the clock running out for a large portion of our former society.

What remains to be seen is what the weasels who are responsible for this fiasco intend to do about it…and ‘nothing’ will be a non-starter.

They will be unable to ‘ignore’ the social earthquake of massive human suffering brought on by the combination of their arrogance and their deliberate mismanagement.

The links in tonight’s offering are all ‘signposts’ for those with eyes to see and the wisdom to comprehend what these portents foretell.

Once gain, my time has run out.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Blowin' in the wind...

Greetings good citizen,

Markets around the world are ‘mixed’ this morning on ‘stable’ employment data and strong retail numbers…so go fuckin’ figure, eh?

Which you should take as a ‘warning’ good citizen; that things are, just as you suspect, worse than they appear.

Our lead story for today falls under the ‘off-shoring’ category as the NY Times reports on China’s Push Into Wind Worries U.S. Industry

As you might suspect, the story, as far as the corporate owned media is concerned, discusses the ‘inevitability’ of ‘superior’ Chinese technology overtaking ‘inferior’ domestically available products.

Here are those Bush Tax cuts right in your face, up close and personal good citizen! If you want ‘renewable energy’ you’re going to have to buy it from China because that’s where Wall Street investors have plunked down their tax savings!

Is this what Obama and his GOP BFF’s are pushing for?

While it is not ‘too late’ for this nation, it is definitely too late for this, er, ‘system of government!’ Put a fork in it, it’s cooked!

Anyway, we are told by many sources that government data is 100% accurate…which means it is the ‘reporting’ that is suspect!

Thus we have This Horseshit

No. 339: November Inflation, Retail Sales, Production Subscription required December 15th, 2010
• Beware Unstable Economic Reporting!
• Inconsistent Seasonal Factors Depressed CPI
• Bulk of Gain in November Retail Sales Was from Higher Prices

Typical, higher prices while they claim inflation to be ‘non-existent’…

It’s like inflation less food and energy because almost nobody buys energy or eats! It’s not ‘bad data’, it’s the ‘incomplete’ part that is kicking our ass!

Seems we keep coming full circle with the ‘basic dishonesty’ issue.

This means the question becomes ‘what are we going to do about it?’

Speaking of matters we aren’t doing anything about (just another feature of ‘government, in your name only’.) We have this hair-raising tale

Hope and Change: Obama Regime Hiring Mercenaries ‘At a Rate That Would Make Bush Blush’

As I have said previously good citizen, the problem with ‘Soldiers of Fortune’ is that they are only loyal to the people cutting their paycheck, which could be more than a little worrisome because the taxpayer is a few steps removed from this procedure…

Is this just another example of the people elected to run this nation
Moving the Wrong Way?

No irony should be lost on the fact that the ‘Wrong Way’ article is really another take down of ‘happy talk’.

No, if you want evidence that things are going poorly have a gander at this article about the pending US sovereign debt crisis that has been percolating on the back burner since 2007.

Keep in mind that the U.S. remains the proverbial elephant in the bathtub in terms of pending effective sovereign bankruptcies. The various European crises remain an intermittent foil for the U.S. dollar, pulling market attention away from the unfolding solvency crisis in the United States and a likely move to massive selling against the U.S. currency.

Accordingly, high risk of the early stages of a hyperinflation beginning to unfold by mid-2011 continues. Rising inflation should become increasingly broad, reflecting an increasingly serious problem in the first-half of 2011.”

Once again I could be justly accused of sending mixed messages so I’ll temper this with the question how much would prices have to rise to put YOU behind the proverbial eight-ball?

The answer, for most of us, would hardly constitute ‘hyper-inflation’. Five-dollar a gallon gasoline and something near that for heating oil would do the job. Throw elevated food costs into the equation and we have the ‘heat or eat’ drama playing out up close and personal across 90% of the households in this nation.

Here it is Christmas and we already have $3.00 a gallon gasoline…we aren’t talking a huge leap to $4.00 a gallon.

And there ain’t a fucking thing we can do about it if it does go up.

So there.

Just remember, if your paycheck doesn’t crack your nut, it’s not your employer’s problem…it’s yours!

Which, unsurprisingly, brings us full circle to the question of what’s the point of belonging to a society if that society fails to protect you (and yours.)

It merely adds insult to injury to see society protect your persecutor while doing nothing to help you or to mitigate your plight.

High time we had some genuine ‘change’ around here…

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Posturing

Greetings good citizen,

I know only too well how difficult it is to frame a debate so there is no mistake about the subject at hand.

In tonight’s first offering we have a reiteration of a point of view that I ‘pontificate’ upon frequently…although I don’t try to pass myself off as a ‘reality based, average guy’.

I provide the excerpt below as a ‘quibbling’ point:

It strikes me that the solutions offered by the Federal Reserve-policies of quantitative easing and of corporate bailouts and "printed" monies for food stamps and unemployment insurance and Medicaid, etc.-that these policies are poorly disguised attempts to let the rest of the world devolve into global austerity-driven conflict, while America uses the extra time bought by such policies to eventually pursue "righteous and just" wars; wars fought on foreign soil, to clean up the mess and to once again come to the rescue and to make the world a better and safer place for humanity.

You’ll get no argument from me that war, when it comes, will be dressed up in ‘wolves’ clothing’. That much is a given. Just like the ‘War on Terra’, we will be admonished to make certain ‘sacrifices’ for the war effort. We’ll probably be asked to go shopping (again.)

But war just ain’t what it used to be, is it?

But there’s a little, er, ‘flaw’ in the logic here because the ‘sides’ in upcoming conflicts are definitely not ‘equal’. Which is to point out the ‘N’ factor, which is ignored here.

Then there’s the alleged/assumed ‘altruism’ at play here, that we’re going to gird ourselves for battle in order to preserve and protect ‘The American Way.’

Given the recent ‘death’ of the American Dream, won’t that be a rather ‘hard sell’?

It will be quite difficult to convince people who have their heads being held in a vise by government supported bankers that they should lay down the lives of their children so the bankers can keep on raping the people of this nation with impunity…don’t you think?

Isn’t this what ‘America’ has become?

Makes you want to march down to the polling place and cast a ballot for ‘none of the above’ (as Joe Bageant proposes) or ‘fuck this bullshit!’ as I propose…

Before we commit the lives of our youth to another, er, ‘foreign adventure’ it is high time we asked them to perform some desperately needed ‘police work’ our own backyard. While it’s always dangerous to go shooting up the neighborhood, some things just can’t be helped.

Pay me now or pay me later but pay you will…(or 'freedom ain't free!)

So yes good citizen, there will be ‘war’ (especially if the ‘empty suits’ propose that we invade yet another defenseless nation for the purpose of ‘fighting them there so we don’t have to fight them here!’)

Worse, chances are excellent that our own streets will already be ‘running with blood’ long before we are, er, ‘asked’ (by legislators who don’t listen to us) to defend our (alleged/imagined) ‘freedom’.

Perhaps pursuing policies aimed at "extending and pretending" is in fact better than the alternative. Perhaps continuing on the clearly unsustainable, and I would argue eventually disastrous, path of debt monetization in order to extend unemployment benefits to those without jobs and in order to provide food stamp subsidies to those without any other way to feed their children and in order to fund health care benefits for our nation’s elderly and infirm; perhaps that is the better choice-at least for the near term, in the eyes and hearts of our political leaders, as a way to prepare the nation for the inevitability of the great wars to come.

Perhaps you can see now what ‘stuck in my craw’ regarding certain assumptions made by the above article.

Statements such as “I am a nominal man with a pretty good understanding of how things work in the real world.” Tend to raise ‘red flags’ in my suspicious little mind.

Me? I’m a whack job who readily admits that I see things far differently than the ‘average’ person sees them. I’m neither a ‘Lefty’ nor a ‘Righty’ but tread that mythical ‘middle ground’ that all anarchists walk.

Talk about subjects for another post, it tickle me to no end to see veritable Nazi’s being described in the CO media as ‘centrists’.

Let me assure you good citizen, there is NO SUCH THING as a ‘capitalist centrist’ just as there is no such thing as a communist ‘centrist’.

So where is ‘the center’?

Like I said, that is a topic for a post all by itself.

I (once again) find it ‘interesting’ to see ideas that I put forth for your consideration ‘popping up’ in other places.

Maybe now is a good time to reiterate the notion that I don’t see this ‘ending well’ for anybody that ‘admires’ capitalism…

Finally, in yet another Man bites dog story, we have this offering that belabors the obvious.

How does a government that is dependent on collecting taxes for its survival manage when it fails to prosecute its richest citizens for turning the nation into an economic desert?

Looks like the ‘short answer’ (it doesn’t) is the correct answer once again!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner