Westboro Baptist to Protest in Joplin

I cannot believe how long these people have been doing this without getting their teeth knocked down their throats.  BTW, the Westboro Baptists are the religious nuts who protest at military funerals and other gatherings, with signs praising the deaths as God's retribution against the relative tolerance of the U.S. towards homosexuals.  Now, they are planning to picket in Joplin, where 125 people died in the tornado this past week. 

A View Of Our Political Future

I saw a good video interview with Niall Ferguson, and there were comments.  One of these was very good, and the person outlined a series of phases surrounding electoral systems of countries around the world in the wake of austerity measures and bailouts.  It ends with the realization amongst the voting masses that their unhappiness at their circumstances is really unrelated to which party happens to be governing.  It's a fundamental problem of overpopulation and resource limits that no one in government can hope to solve. 

Phase1:
Huge swings in votes, due to the dissatisfaction of the population.
Countries move sharply to opposite political spectrum.

Phase2:
Population discovers that the recently elected political opposite spectrum is unable to solve what makes them dissatisfied at the first place. Most obvious country: USA.

Phase3:
Population will refuse to vote for traditional political parties. Population will search out unusual third parties. Countries: USA: Tea Party, Finland: True Finns.

Phase4:
Population will realize that unusual third party political forces are unable to govern or being hijacked by traditional political parties, as a front.

Phase5:
It becomes obvious, that the fundamental reasons of dissatisfaction is not a matter of which party governs.

No one in politics can solve the collision course of the following trends:

1) Resources are finite - while all the current econo-political systems are based on the assumption of unlimited resources.

2) Population is increasing *globally* - which is on collision course with the fact of limited resources.

3) While population is growing, less and less people are needed to run the economy.
Unemployment goes global, from structural unemployment ("these jobs are not coming back, there there will be new industries, which will provide new jobs to everyone" to "overpopulation unemployment".

But population is declining in many European countries, how come Spain has over 20% unemployment? True, however "Overpopulation unemployment" is a global trend, shifting work to cheaper labor cost centers (Asia currently) does not negate it. This trend is fully exploited by current leaders in economy, to increase profit, while also say to "expensive" US, European labor to take a cue at the Asian wages. None of this is solving the long-term collision course: it is profitable exploitation financially and empty political rhetoric.

4) While wages have been declining, they can never decline fast and deep enough. The solution is stepping up innovation to deploy more and more technology. In the focus of every single innovation is the desire to get something done with less human intervention. This is of course further eroding the need for labor.

Phase6:
After moving from unsuccessful and ever more expensive bailouts to bailouts, from North America, to Europe, then to Asia, there is less and less appetite for austerity measures. It will become obvious that austerity measures and all bailout packages are not designed and they are unable to solve the long term collision course trends, described above.

This realization will lead to complete political and economical collapse.

It will force to find solution how to deal with the growing population, the acknowledgement that we need socio-political economy that is built on resource-based economy, the complete radical re-thinking of how human labor, wealth creation and distribution can be ft in the world, where there are almost unlimited labor, while the need for labor is steadily decreasing - without any sign that the current models of economies and societies can create a balance of supply and demand.

Since this balance can not, will not be restored - society will have to figure out a complete reset, how humans will exist using the resources most efficiently.

It will not be market economy, as the framework of market economy offers labor market as the solution for human participation in creating and distributing goods and services, but free market economy can no longer provide a supply/demand in this field. Without it the entire system is useless, collapsing, as we are experiencing it now.

Funny & Informative Rap/News Video

There is a site out there called The Juice Media, that is making these rap/news hybrid videos that are both informative and utterly hilarious.  I have only seen this latest one, on the killing of Bin Laden, and it is a must-watch.  I'll be sure to watch the others, which talk about personalities like the Tea Party and Julian Assange (founder of Wikileaks). 

Exploding Watermelons

This sounds like something I'd see in a comic or a video game, but it really happened.  In China, farmers applied a chemical called forchlorfenuron, which is a growth accelerator, to their watermelons.  The melons ended up exploding.  Forchlorfenuron can increase a crop's growth time by up to 2 weeks and can make them bigger, bringing a higher price when it comes time to sell.  It doesn't work so well with watermelons though, judging from what happened here.

This should be looked upon as tying in to population growth and the constant pressure to increase food output.  I know that the main concern from many reading this article would be "is this safe to eat"*, but it's deeper than that.  Byproducts of oil (which is what fertilizer is, and I'm sure this chemical was, at least on some level) are being used to expand food production as the population continues to increase.  As oil becomes more expensive and scarce, tricks and shortcuts such as this one designed to grow more food will become tougher and tougher to implement.



* Although, this is a legitimate and fair question.  The article also states that many farmers in China (and I'm presuming, many other places) grow their own food seperately from their chemical brethren.  

U.S. Credit Card Maxed Out

The government has hit its $14.3 trillion debt limit, and a vote on raising our debt ceiling is needed by August 2.  In the meantime, Geithner is starting to raid government pension funds in order to keep everyday operations of the government afloat.  To make things even more dicey, House Republicans say they won't vote to raise the ceiling unless there are spending cuts that are greater than the debt increase to go along with it.  Oh, and I don't think those pension funds involve our congresspeople, either. 

Reactions

I have a new feature on the blog, called 'reactions'.  At the bottom of each post, there will be several words you can click on to state how you feel about what I just posted.  This is an alternative to having to post a comment.  I will add new words when I come up with them, but for now, there are four (funny, interesting, cool, and that's not right). 

The Home of the Pussies

Free we may be (and even that's debatable), but brave?  That, we are not.  Less than a week after the death of Bin Laden, or "public enemy #1", two imams were pulled off a plane because passengers were uncomfortable, since the men were wearing traditional Muslim dress.  It gets better.  These men were headed to a conference on prejudice against Muslims.  It's one of those things you can't possibly make up. 

I will say that,  after 9/11 and the various attacks carried out around the world by Islamic extremists,  I do support profiling to a certain extent.  I don't think bearing an extra layer of scrutiny against men such as the ones on the airplane while going through security is unreasonable (although, they probably wouldn't be wearing Islamic garb if they were about to kill a lot of people, that'd be too obvious).  And that's exactly what happened prior to the flight.  These men went through security, then through "secondary security" (I guess that means when someone is pulled aside and has a wand run over them or they're frisked), and then were allowed to board.  That should have been that.

But no, in the "home of the brave", there were people in the airplane who were pissing themselves when they saw these two guys in dress and wearing turbans.  The plane was already taxiing down the runway when the pilot had to come back.  They were then re-screened, were again found to be absolutely no threat, and the pilot refused to re-board them and took off.

I hope these guys take Southeast Airlines for a lot of money, they deserve every penny.  To me, the bigger story is how we pound our chests with this macho, patriotic bravado (like we did last week) and then get goosebumps and shit ourselves when we are face-to-face with the purported "other", no matter how harmless that person may be.  This was nothing but blind, irrational racial fear, and we should all be ashamed of the passengers and the pilot on this flight.  What a bunch of pussies.

U.S. Loses Space Fight to Russia

Well, it looks like our Apollo 11 moon landing back in 1969 might have been a case of "winning the battle, but losing the war".  There are only two shuttle launches left, and NASA isn't even accepting astronaut applications.  These days, American astronauts are spending at least six months out of each year in Russia, training with Russian astronauts.  Private companies, such as Virgin, are also getting into the business of space travel.  As a "space psychologist" quoted in the article says, "imagine John Glenn or Alan Shepard speaking Russian. 

So, many of us have said over the years that the U.S. won the Space Race, but that seems to have been premature.  I know next to nothing about the history and the future of space travel, but it looks like the Russians are still going strong, at least compared to us.  Obama's cancellation of Constellation, as well as this development, in a way, symbolizes the pending collapse more poignantly to me than most events.  

Oil Production Cut Back in Iraq

Adding a fresh blow to our oil supply problems, Iraq is going to cut its target for oil production in half.  Remember when we were at the onset of the invasion of Iraq, and many people were cheering for it since it would lead to ultra-low oil prices?  So much for that, I guess.  http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/iraqi-oil-production-cutback-plan-adds-to-global-supply-fear/story-e6frg8zx-1226050749186

The Death of Bin Laden

As the world knows, Osama Bin Laden was supposedly killed by U.S. forces in Pakistan last Sunday.  I found out about this when I was working.  Someone happened to initially misspeak (or was it a Freudian slip?) when she told us that "Obama was shot."  We were like "what", and she quickly corrected herself to say that "Osama was shot".  Everyone was very happy and uber-patriotic, saying things like "don't fuck with us", shit like that.  I kept my feelings to myself; in that crowd, if you say the wrong thing, you might find yourself hanging by your testicles. 

Anyway, although I have no solid belief system or empirical evidence to back it up (other than what I read on the net), I think Osama has been dead for awhile, possibly years.  The video releases of him have simply been too erratic and disjointed for me to believe that it was anything other than an orchestrated hoax.  I also factor in that he had kidney disease, and had a silly time envisioning him evading hordes of U.S. troops in the mountains of Afghan/Pakistan with his dialysis machine and his followers.  We've had a powerful interest in keeping him "alive" to serve as an Emmanuel Goldstein type of nemesis (read Orwell's 1984 if you don't understand that reference).  Putting a face to the war on terror was the only way Washington was going to get the support of a majority of Americans. 

So, assuming that I'm right (and who knows), deciding to "kill" Osama now, to play that card, must mean that things are afoot, and that we need a big distraction, something to placate us.  I have several theories.  One is that as the rising gas prices undermine what economic "recovery" there is (and which will ultimately kill it), Obama needed something that would buy him some time and appease the public.  I think killing Osama would certainly be one thing he could give us.  Another thing is that Obama needed a victory, in a big way, politically.  I think that he might have seen Donald Trump as a viable threat going forward.  So, between releasing his long-form birth certificate and putting Osama's head on the wall, he has marginalized Trump and has gotten a head start towards winning re-election; although, if the economy continues to tank, people might have awfully short memories.  Yet another theory is that the shit is about to hit us in a really big way (peak oil, rising food prices, tanking economy, etc.) and our government is trying to paper these over with stories like Bin Laden getting killed. 

I didn't watch much of the news footage concerning Bin Laden's death, but the masses seemed to be thrilled.  Why?  Yeah, it looks like we got him, but at what cost?  Starting two wars, hundreds of thousands dead, a bankrupt empire (that being us, BTW).  We could have probably easily gotten him and his cohorts by pursuing a "Munich" type strategy.  What we did was basically the equalvant of killing an ant with a flamethrower. 

"Good Will Hunting" Got It Right

I haven't seen the movie "Good Will Hunting" in a very long time, and actually did not recall this scene at all, but it's a very good and timely one (or timeless) that echoes many themes that we can relate to today.  The only thing is the $2.50/gal. gas comment.  Many people wish it were that price.  Other than that, wildly accurate.  Just look at our last President. 

Energy Information Agency Defunded

On reading Jim Kunstler's latest column, I found out that the Department of Energy has defunded the Energy Information Agency (EIA).  The EIA is responsible for collecting oil production data outside the U.S., where two-thirds of our oil comes from.  Is the EIA a victim of the budget-cutting that's going on (as I said, the Tea Party faction is going after programs whose portion of government funding is miniscule, although this agency is actually important IMO) or was it a victim of something else?  Like, people in Washington being scared that a painful truth can be revealed to the American people? 

$10 Million Skyscraper Sells for $1,700

I believe the headline says it all.  Our economic movers-and-shakers desperately want to keep the price of real estate up, but stories like these prove that they are failing miserably at it.  I am trying to look for as many stories as I can to prove that this "recovery" is bullshit, and I'll tell ya, I don't have to look very far. 

As to Bin Laden, yeah, I have some things to say about that.  But I'm going to a ballgame, so that'll have to wait.  

Man in Cow Suit Robs Walmart of 26 Gallons of Milk

LOL.  A day after posting an article about Walmart's troubles, and the broader U.S. economy, I find this funny article about a man dressed in a cow suit, who stole 26 gallons of milk from a Virginia Walmart.  He then handed out the milk to customers outside the store, and was later apprehended at a nearby McDonalds, with the cow suit in the back seat of his car.

I am not posting this as some kind of connection to what I posted about yesterday, but I just found it funny.  You may be amazed that a man can nearly get away with taking 26 gallons of milk, but I actually hear of such things all the time at the place I work at.  People walking out with big-screen TVs and things like that.