Kauai_Kahuna wrote:

I just want to be first in line

Do you accept Euros?

Rajesh wrote:

Do you accept Euros?

You can buy with Euros, right?

sm_landlord wrote:

You can buy glod with Euros, right?

[checks bloomberg terminal] Yup, as of 30 sec ago.

HomeGnome wrote:

You'd better; we've got people to SUE!

A friend of mine last night had his car stolen for the second time in two weeks. Despite my sincere empathy for him, all I could do was list in my head the prima facie case for a couple of intentional torts. I think that I do in fact need to sue somebody as soon as I pass the bar and get admitted, or else I'll never become human again...

Hi CR,
what would make you to rethink where the economy is heading?

thanks

MBW wrote:

his car stolen for the second time in two weeks

Read this on our DC forecast discussion.:

EXTENDED-RANGE MODELS HINTING AT A PATTERN CHANGE LATE THIS WEEKEND
AND ERY NEXT WEEK AS LARGE-SCALE TROUGHING DEVELOPS OVER THE ERN
CONUS. THIS WOULD LEAD TO A BREAK IN THE OPPRESSIVE HEAT...BUT MAY
BE ACCOMPANIED BY A SVR TSTM EVENT EITHER LATE SAT OR SUN WHEN THE
COLD FRONT MOVES THRU.

The possibility of severe thunderstorms this week-end has already caused us to think about where we would go if the power went out for more than a few hours.

Latest power fiasco has led to renewed calls for underground cables. Pepco says it would cost 4 billion.

Local regulatory agencies have blamed themselves for not more strictly regulating the utilities.

HomeGnome wrote:

Have you posted a poll about it yet?

No, there is a prediction for the June payroll report.
June Non-Farm Payroll jobs | Hoocoodanode?

a long time ago.
TJ and The Bear wrote:

Care to point to the country that fixed its debt problems with more debt?

Do you think they ran big surpluses to reduce their debt ratios? LOL
...
Check the U.S. after WWII as well. Many, many more!

Well, here is the U.S. picture after WWII as concisely as I could show it. Clearly running budget surpluses didn't reduce debt ratios whereas inflation/additional debt accompanied by growth did.

U.S. Post War Debt

Revisionist history? Hmmm.

Happy Independence day CR...whats left of it.

the answer to bad governance is more bad governance

i'm consistently amazed at how terrible the American culture has become... and how stupid its constituents are.

Rob Dawg wrote:

We are still allowed to bitch so there's something left of independence.

Apparently.

Macy's Fireworks in 2012 looked very similar to this:
YouTube - July 4th Fireworks seen from the Rooftops of Brooklyn NYC
...
a lot more red this year ... grim foreboding, perhaps...
the wishes everyone a Happy July 4th!
this is still a great country, nonetheless, and trust me
"I've seen things!" (Blade Runner)
YouTube - Khmer BladeRunner & Babe on a Bike: (Rutger Hauer's Death Scene)
...
I raise my glass of to Bill, KCoop and those who are no longer with us!

One of my dad's ancestors was a signer of the DoI... we can blame him.

RockyR wrote:

the answer to bad governance is more bad governance

Not really. Understanding how the system works is essential to good governance.

Again: Private Sector Surplus or Net Saving = Government Deficit + Current Account Balance

Without a government deficit the private sector cannot nominally savegrow given a balanced current account.

Duke of Con Dao wrote:

this is still a great country

Yes, but there are forces of dissolution at work. No doubt we can all disagree about what they are, which is another negative. While we argue with one another the forces continue to work.

RE wrote:

given a balanced current account.

When am I going to be given a balanced current account?

Rajesh wrote:

Humans are genetically predisposed to optimism when they are young, and pessimism when they get older.

Link?

HG:

Rajesh wrote:

When am I going to be given a balanced current account?

Calendus Graecus.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

Folk wisdom.

Genetics = folk wisdom in what universe? Link?

Aaaarrrrrrggghhhh, the Equation is back!

Feckless Ness wrote:

Genetics = folk wisdom in what universe? Link?

I don' need no stinkin' links.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

Latest power fiasco has led to renewed calls for underground cables. Pepco says it would cost 4 billion.

I think we had this discussion before, but you and the missus might want to look into a generator if you don't already have one.

Little publicized Revolutionary War fact: Paul Revere was court martialed for his leadership "failures" on the Penobscot Expedition.

How were the fireworks, liz? People looking at the photos they were framing with their iPhones instead of looking directly at the real thing?

RockyR wrote:

we can create our own wealth RE.

Well, if you count it in dollars it won't happen without government deficits.

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

Which grave do you speak from?

Everyone's.

YORICK TO HAMLET

Folly, folly, why do we go on?
Delusions of glory and of memory,
We are all forgotten

Imprinted on the wind, on the stars
But so faintly done
I am unreadable by anyone

My track grows dead, is cold
In what footsteps do you tread
That by sundown are so old?

By love I hold on, by love I follow
Where true love leads
Though my ribs are hollow

See what mercy I become
In this milky skull -
Through the socket blows the wind

I too, though comic, were as you
And though I am forgotten
I am as once, as new

Inside these holes? But where?
Pick up my skull and see
New ramparts rising there

For on them walks no ghost
But the spirit of the dead
In a different host

Hear not that demon
Calling for revenge
Or put me down

Pavel
June 30, 2012

Really, RiF, the playing field is level on this one - at the least. Unless you are speaking from experience. But what would you be doing here?

pavel.chichikov wrote:

Latest power fiasco has led to renewed calls for underground cables. Pepco says it would cost 4 billion.

So what are they estimating this outage is causing for them? And for their customers?

traderwalt wrote:

azurite, you've got Mail again.

Back at you.

lawyerliz wrote:

Aaaarrrrrrggghhhh, the Equation is back!

Ever since I learned F≠Ma I've been suspicious of simplifications.

YouTube - Beastie Boys - Three MC's and One DJ

azurite wrote:

According to the article older people may be happier, partly because their memory becomes selective--they remember the good stuff, not the bad.

In Thinking, Fast and Slow, Khanman discusses experiments where people are subjected to sessions of long periods of intense pain followed by short periods of reprieve, and sessions of shorter periods of intense pain followed by no periods of reprieve. When asked which sessions they would repeat if given the choice, subjects mostly choose the former because their memories focus on the reprieve rather than the pain.

Rob Dawg wrote:

Ever since I learned F≠Ma I've been suspicious of simplifications.

Facts?

skk wrote:

and the map of wisdom to truth ?

On a finance and economics blog?

lawyerliz wrote:

Actually no, they were looking, Feck.

They've figured out that someone will post the fireworks on youtube anyways.

Feckless Ness wrote:

Poor form to reply to your own comment, I know, but it just occurred to me that for the iPhone generation who experience every live event vicariously through their cellphone screens, there's no difference between looking at your cell photos during a live event and reminiscing over the photos later. The map has become the territory. "Cell" is the right word.

I've been thinking about this, primarily in terms of the relation between autobiography, letters, and fiction for former centuries, as writing filtered memory and the self. For the youth, the cellphone and Facebook plays a similar function, although I don't think the experience is as highly processed, given the ephemeralality of the representation. But that probably gives letters and diaries too much respect.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

skk, have you become more stupid as you've grown older?

I for one have, but your results may vary.

RE wrote:

Rob Dawg wrote:

Ever since I learned F≠Ma I've been suspicious of simplifications.

Facts?

Yes. The derivation of the formula using calculus drops the ∂t higher orders.

Nice prog on the Isle of Man countryside by Auntie Beeb.. - part of it is has John Noakes on his tiny ( 125 cc ) BSA Bantam trying to get round the TT course - background musak ( Shadows and Apache of course ) - Bike and countryside lovers should catch the prog.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

And death, we believe, "shall have no dominion."

I quoted Death Be Not Proud for Nova last night. Thomas's poem was another possibility.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

I think I'm about as stupid as I always have been. But I write better.

Me too, but I'm not sure intelligence has much to do with it. Or maybe it's a more focused intelligence, stripping off the other functions.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

skk, have you become more stupid as you've grown older?

I know my fallacious arguments, you cunning old misanthrope..

That's a "when did you stop beating yer wife" question.

waits for the inevitable riposte.

money is debt
money is wealth
debt is wealth

pavel.chichikov wrote:

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:
There's a pill for that!
C'mon, that's cheap world-weariness.

No, it's the only hope left for people who have become too sophisticated for religion. Deus ex machina, without that bothersome "God" to think about.

skk wrote:

I know my fallacious arguments, you cunning old misanthrope..

I'm not misanthropic so much as distrustful. But when I see self-giving in other people it breaks up the ice in me.
I merely meant that comment about the question of age and illusion.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

Pepco says it would cost 4 billion.

A mere trading error at one of the big houses.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

It is most fitting that the poet should grow less,
Being is a burden, that he welcome nothingness

Essential Oils—are wrung—
The Attar from the Rose
Be not expressed by Suns—alone—
It is the gift of Screws—

The General Rose—decay—
But this—in Lady's Drawer
Make Summer—When the Lady lie
In Ceaseless Rosemary— (675)

RockyR wrote:

money is debt
money is wealth
debt is wealth

Yep. But "money is debt" may be temporary if monetized but initially it is always deficit. Check the Forex for resolution.

Tests ordered by Yasser Arafat's widow show polonium traces - latimes.com

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

REAL hipsters have never had a mundane experience!

It just looks that way on youtube.

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

You too might be one of those old guys some day.

No worries ... there are pills for that.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

I merely meant that comment about the question of age and illusion.

I liked this comment by Eric Sykes - UK comedian, RIP 7/3/2012 at the ripe age of 89 - perhaps a bit of a .. - but that's for another time -

Sykes himself reflected late in life: "I tend to live in the wonderful world of my head, where every day the sun shines. Because of my age I like to live in an armchair and do just that."

Eric Sykes, gentleman of comedy, dies - Telegraph

I think it's time for shower and bed.

'Night all.

Relinking this from earlier today - very interesting.

Max Keiser Goes BALLISTIC on Barclays/Libor | The Big Picture 

Outsider wrote:

Relinking this from earlier today - very interesting.

Unproductive comment.

pavel.chichikov wrote:

I find this very moving, and anything I say would be inadequate.

Thank you. We simply lack an adequate substitute for what we gave up, but going back is not an option either.

But but California has earthquakes.

Who was looking at FRED 10 years ago when we should have been paying attention.

indeed, indeed.

I forget when I discovered FRED -- maybe 2 years ago -- but the enlightenment I've gotten from it has been immense.

at the risk of tooting my own horn, I think I plumb its data better than anyone else on the web. Not that I get around all that much tho.

All we need to be wealthy are bigger deficits. We musn't work to create surplus, we must only encourage congress to create bigger deficits.

That's a log scale too.

for your amusement

Pontius Pilate had been a topnotch economist with the central Roman bank before his appointment as governor of Palestine. In effect, he was kicked upstairs by the anti-inflationists who had taken over the Roman Treasury under Tiberius, a notorious believer in high interest rates in order to maintain a low inflation rate even at the risk of a certain degree of unemployment in the nonslave sector. Pontius Pilate was a full-employment supply-side economist, like Jesus. Privately, Pilated applauded Jesus's monetary policy, and he was perfectly willing to set him up as a King of the Jew, like Herod before Him, but always under Roman rule.

Now, James was one of the arbitragers driven from the Temple and so hew was opposed to the inflationary policies of his populist brother. Yet James had a vsision, too, based on the messiah myth which will never die in Jewish circles. James was obliged to follow his brother in all things. James also thought that once Jesus and Pilated had struck a deal, James would be able to edge the prime rate up, since Jesus would be too busy arranging for the Day of Judgement and the establishment of the Jewish State as the first in the world in order to make it easier for Got to wind up the whole show.

Asit turned out, the treasury at Rome ordered Pilate to eliminate Jesus and bring the Temple banking system back into line under the governor's direct control even if that meant occupying the Temple precinct itself, something that could not be done without civil war. So Pontius Pilate, very sadly, crucified the first low-interest rate monetaris that the Jews had produced since Jesus's ancestor King David, also an easy-money freak.

~ Gore Vidal, 1992

America is a third world country. Just one with a REALLY big military.

If you have no power how are you moving these electrons?Mary.

So, create bigger deficits and make all of us in the private sector stinking rich. i'm tired of working.

Outsider wrote:

Hmmm.

thank you le Penguin. saves me from throwing a fit - having a stroke- at least one other American apart from me knows the facts of the matter. that'll do.

Outsider wrote:

Sitting in my comfortable house, on the internet, with a fridge full of food and a pool out back, having just gotten back from a leisure trip in the car with a/c on, took a hot shower today and didn't worry about my safety...

Better buy some online, you may need it to trade for food soon, and heating oil when the winter comes!

danks for relink

lawyerliz wrote:

Outsider is rich. Tax her!

Outsider wrote:

didn't worry about my safety...

Clearly you were not hanging out with the menfolk charged with launching the pyrotechnic displays.

"Here, hold my "

aye. This storm was uncanny, all of 20 minutes high wind 30 - 70 mph, very little precip in my area.

I filled up once, it was enough. We've only heard water conservation warnings, because the mains continued despite power failure at treatment plant, day 1 - 3. PEPCO purportedly prioritized restoration.

Nothing in the frig was salvagable to my taste. I didn't bother to open it until the power came on today. So I cleaned it out and sluiced the shelves. This was good work with the Yamahas blasting at notch 5.

RockyR wrote:

I'm being overly harsh to call us third world, but give it time.

Wealth distribution will come to closely resemble those of a corrupt third world regime. Albeit on a higher tier of the economic ladder. That's why it is so difficult to see or understand, as most of us simply HAVE NO CONCEPT of the levels of wealth that exist within that top 1% Much less of the skullduggery and subterfuge which will be required in order to keep it.

the world has been willing to loan us a lot of oil, often at the end of a gun. that makes us feel pretty rich.

RockyR wrote:

the world has been willing to loan us a lot of oil,

If it was a loan, I have some bad news for that world: it ain't getting it back.

RockyR wrote:

the world has been willing to loan us a lot of oil, often at the end of a gun. that makes us feel pretty rich.

Indeed it does make us feel pretty rich. It also makes us pretty rich.

well, no they aren't gruntled. we'll give them some currency back one day. maybe. dare they challenge us? look at our military!

like I said, give it time.

right, rif, it does. so long as we never have to pay it back.

what are your thoughts on the renewed build up of troops in the middle east? ready to get some more wealth?

Not really. Do the math. If you have 0 free time, you have 0 wealth, same with health. Just a thought.

well, gas is getting expensive in part due to all that wealth RE has us creating.

RockyR wrote:

look at our military!

Every time I read another article about how wonderful a flyover of AF jets was at some event ("makes me feel proud"- proud of what? I always wonder) I wonder how great the person would think that flyover was if he/she had to pay $7/gal (today's dollars) for gas in order to pay the DoD's fuel bill. http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R40459.pdf

I'd be more impressed w/HSR that I could afford to ride cross country, and/or a real UE of 5% w/most people earning a living wage w/good health care benefits or a health care program such as many other "advanced nations have).

RockyR wrote:

by that equation, you could be broke, unemployed, and in perfect health and be very wealthy.

I think Thoreau makes that exact argument in the first two chapters of Walden. Not that he's right, necessarily.

very wealthy and very hungry.

azurite wrote:

Every time I read another article about how wonderful a flyover of AF jets was at some event ("makes me feel proud"- proud of what? I always wonder)

Well, proud of the demonstration of Big Daddy's ability to kick ass when the family is threatened! He can be abusive and a tyrant at times, but he keeps us safe

RockyR wrote:

very wealthy and very hungry.

I think Thoreau ate OK, although he did hike over to his Mom's house several times a week. I guess her basement wasn't big enough or didn't have a Playstation.

Walden Ch I: ECONOMY

"Most men, even in this comparatively free country, through mere ignorance and mistake, are so occupied with the factitious cares and superfluously coarse labors of life that its finer fruits cannot be plucked by them. Their fingers, from excessive toil, are too clumsy and tremble too much for that. Actually, the laboring man has not leisure for a true integrity day by day; he cannot afford to sustain the manliest relations to men; his labor would be depreciated in the market. He has no time to be anything but a machine. How can he remember well his ignorance- which his growth requires- who has so often to use his knowledge? We should feed and clothe him gratuitously sometimes, and recruit him with our cordials, before we judge of him. The finest qualities of our nature, like the bloom on fruits, can be preserved only by the most delicate handling. Yet we do not treat ourselves nor one another thus tenderly.

Some of you, we all know, are poor, find it hard to live, are sometimes, as it were, gasping for breath. I have no doubt that some of you who read this book are unable to pay for all the dinners which you have actually eaten, or for the coats and shoes which are fast wearing or are already worn out, and have come to this page to spend borrowed or stolen time, robbing your creditors of an hour. It is very evident what mean and sneaking lives many of you live, for my sight has been whetted by experience; always on the limits, trying to get into business and trying to get out of debt, a very ancient slough, called by the Latins aes alienum, another's brass, for some of their coins were made of brass; still living, and dying, and buried by this other's brass; always promising to pay, promising to pay, tomorrow, and dying today, insolvent; seeking to curry favor, to get custom, by how many modes, only not state-prison offences; lying, flattering, voting, contracting yourselves into a nutshell of civility or dilating into an atmosphere of thin and vaporous generosity, that you may persuade your neighbor to let you make his shoes, or his hat, or his coat, or his carriage, or import his groceries for him; making yourselves sick, that you may lay up something against a sick day, something to be tucked away in an old chest, or in a stocking behind the plastering, or, more safely, in the brick bank; no matter where, no matter how much or how little.

I sometimes wonder that we can be so frivolous, I may almost say, as to attend to the gross but somewhat foreign form of servitude called Negro Slavery, there are so many keen and subtle masters that enslave both North and South. It is hard to have a Southern overseer; it is worse to have a Northern one; but worst of all when you are the slave-driver of yourself. Talk of a divinity in man! Look at the teamster on the highway, wending to market by day or night; does any divinity stir within him? His highest duty to fodder and water his horses! What is his destiny to him compared with the shipping interests? Does not he drive for Squire Make-a-stir? How godlike, how immortal, is he? See how he cowers and sneaks, how vaguely all the day he fears, not being immortal nor divine, but the slave and prisoner of his own opinion of himself, a fame won by his own deeds. Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with our own private opinion. What a man thinks of himself, that it is which determines, or rather indicates, his fate. Self-emancipation even in the West Indian provinces of the fancy and imagination- what Wilberforce is there to bring that about? Think, also, of the ladies of the land weaving toilet cushions against the last day, not to betray too green an interest in their fates! As if you could kill time without injuring eternity.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

When we consider what, to use the words of the catechism, is the chief end of man, and what are the true necessaries and means of life, it appears as if men had deliberately chosen the common mode of living because they preferred it to any other. Yet they honestly think there is no choice left. But alert and healthy natures remember that the sun rose clear. It is never too late to give up our prejudices. No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. What everybody echoes or in silence passes by as true today may turn out to be falsehood tomorrow, mere smoke of opinion, which some had trusted for a cloud that would sprinkle fertilizing rain on their fields. What old people say you cannot do, you try and find that you can. Old deeds for old people, and new deeds for new. Old people did not know enough once, perchance, to fetch fresh fuel to keep the fire a-going; new people put a little dry wood under a pot, and are whirled round the globe with the speed of birds, in a way to kill old people, as the phrase is. Age is no better, hardly so well, qualified for an instructor as youth, for it has not profited so much as it has lost. One may almost doubt if the wisest man has learned anything of absolute value by living. Practically, the old have no very important advice to give the young, their own experience has been so partial, and their lives have been such miserable failures, for private reasons, as they must believe; and it may be that they have some faith left which belies that experience, and they are only less young than they were. I have lived some thirty years on this planet, and I have yet to hear the first syllable of valuable or even earnest advice from my seniors. They have told me nothing, and probably cannot tell me anything to the purpose. Here is life, an experiment to a great extent untried by me; but it does not avail me that they have tried it. If I have any experience which I think valuable, I am sure to reflect that this my Mentors said nothing about."

thanks for typing all of that in, rob. I gotta hit it

On this holiday, I am reminded that our 250th will be in 2026.

Curiously, 2026 - 62 is 1964, meaning the entire baby boom will be eligible for SS by then.

The story of our economy 1965-now has been all about the BB, and it will remain so.

By 2016, 24 years of Presidents -- Clinton, GWB, Obama, and even Romney will have been all boomers.

I wonder at what systemic changes can and will be made this decade to get our ship squared away for the baby boom burden.

In some ways their retirement will be immensely stimulative, in that their pension and Medicare benefits will flow through them right into working America, who could clearly use the work.

But, their size is immense -- 80 million boomers compared to 130M current working Americans today.

We were supposed to have our fiscal affairs in order by now to be able to handle this burden, but we elected some bad people who did a lot of stupid things to our economy and national finances.

It's all reversible, but we're really running out of time. The events of the next year -- it's upcoming budget battle Armageddon -- look to be interesting, if not frightful.

Frankly, I don't think we have it in us any more. There's nobody of import to Obama's left now, and Obama himself is center-right to my eyes.

The Republican primary clownshow may be over but the cold reality (to me) of at best divided government remains.

And if the Republicans take all 3 branches of government again . . . They did an immense amount of damage 2001-2006 and don't even seem to be cognizant of that at all, let alone the active role they played while in the majority 1995-2000.

Guess I don't "Believe in America", sigh. Good luck, all.

i think you are probably right, rob, but I am barely older than he was at the time of that writing.

Comrade Troyski wrote:

I wonder at what systemic changes can and will be made this decade to get our ship squared away for the baby boom burden.

Aside from practicing a convincing rendition of "Hoocoodanode?!" lament and perfecting their crying on demand, I'm expecting next to nothing from

RockyR wrote:

i think you are probably right, rob, but I am barely older than he was at the time of that writing.

It was more irony at myself, not you--I assumed you were younger. (Part of my fondness is personal--I'm not sure I would have gone to grad school if I hadn't read Thoreau back in high school.)

I think Thoreau makes that exact argument in the first two chapters of Walden. Not that he's right, necessarily.

Wealth at its most primary is the state of being well.

I am wealthier than Steve Jobs -- the nation's greatest capitalist in our history -- now, for cancer laid him low last year.

Wealth is also the things that make us well, that give us utility of satisfying our needs and wants.

It is the roof overhead to keep the rain out, the furnishings to keep stuff off the floor, and the sidewalks and streets to facilitate getting around. It is the food we eat and the air we breathe. For some reason I like calling this "direct" wealth.

The next level of wealth is the productive capacity to create the above hard wealth, and the skills we need to be efficient wealth creators. We call this capital wealth, or maybe "indirect" wealth.

The next level is monetary wealth, the financial and legal creations we use to facilitate trade in capital and direct wealth.

Wealth is many things, but at the end of the day if you are happy, you are wealthy, at least for then.

Mr Slippery wrote:

I like it, too, but it's just a scaffold for thinking about stuff.

A scaffold for thinking about stuff is right.

Fireworks have been going off now for about a hour strait. People must still have enough money to burn or blowup.

Bad Dawg Bobby wrote:

Fireworks have been going off now for about a hour strait. People must still have enough money to burn or blowup.

Same here. GODDAMN KIDS! GET OFF MY LAWN!

Bad Dawg Bobby wrote:

I guess fireworks is cheep at half the price when it comes to getting out ones frustrations.

Unless you count it in $40 star shells!

: Ah, plebes... can't live with 'em... can't kill 'em.

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

can't kill 'em.

let em drown

BBC News - Florida lifeguard fired for helping drowning man

tg wrote:

let em drown

or drone!!

BG: exactly. of course assassinations ordered by the king aren't subject to judicial review.

Speaking of quiet desperation, I have to get up for work tomorrow... so let's hope I can sleep through the noisy fireworks going on all around me, and

No one is more of a slave than he who thinks himself free without being so.
Enjoy when you can, and endure when you must.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

nite all

The PEPCO blessed us this morning. duh.

Why blame America?

I don't "blame" America. I just don't "believe" in it.

To "Believe in America" to me is to "Believe the BS".

Blame the crooks.

"The crooks" didn't screw us over. We did all that to ourselves. Pointing the finger upwards avoids the ugly reality all around and among us.

http://i.imgur.com/qWrCD.jpg

Comrade Troyski wrote:

We did all that to ourselves.

you can carry the can if you want to for the banksters.

not me.

To "Believe in America" to me is to "Believe the BS".
Blame the crooks.
"The crooks" didn't screw us over. We did all that to ourselves. Pointing the finger upwards avoids the ugly reality all around and among us.

Depends on what you think America is. America can be someone's home in a small town where they go to work and pay their rent. America can be someone's address and home. Sure, to an extent, people do stuff to themselves by thinking they are doing the right thing at the time. Mistakes are made. To say crooks don't screw folks over is an unusual sentiment. In your world, then guess we don't need laws or law enforcement. We do things to ourselves. The woman who was raped had it coming. It was the homeowner's fault their home was burglarized. Elderly folks who are scammed had it coming. Maybe shoulda known, etc. That sort of thing. Weird way to look at things.

So many people waiting around for the rules of the game of life to change. Change they will, but for the worse.

Cooking two pizzas tonight.

Antipodes wrote:

Cooking two pizzas tonight

TWO ! that's the road to hell mate - look at this pietist painting 1866 - see the pizza joint on the right ? you can't ? proves my point - no pizzas on the road to somewhere under the rainbow..

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/Der_breite_und_der_schmale_Weg_2008.jpg

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

but he keeps us safe

Who is this "us" you speak of? BBC News - World News America - Indian reservations battle high teenage suicide rates

Poor justice on Arizona Indian reservations has crime running rampant

"*Persons age 18 to 21 were the most
likely to experience a serious violent
crime, and blacks in that age group
were the most vulnerable--" http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/ascii/APVSVC.TXT

Bob Diamond says he learned that Barclays had lowballed Libor only this month. Do you believe him? - Results (poll 6364907)

Bob Diamond says he learned that Barclays had lowballed Libor only this month. Do you believe him?

skk wrote:

no pizzas on the road to somewhere under the rainbow..

Then why's it called a PIEtist ... pffft

Bubblisimo Gerkinov wrote:

PIEtist

lol. Thank you, no. I think I learned my lesson this past week. ebook ain't all that. And a good librarian is hard to find.

What goes around comes around
~ Ch. 30, Tao te ching

Comrade Troyski wrote:

80 million boomers

What % do you assume will reach 66, 67, whatever the age of full retirement for SS retirement benefits will be (changes depending on year of birth)? Anecdotally, there seem to be a fair number of people around here dying in their 50's. There's already indications that the lifespan of people in the US is decreasing. Life expectancy across the U.S. - The Washington Post

merchants of fear wrote:

Did he say this under oath?

Would that matter?
Seriously.

Antipodes wrote:

5 cheese pizza? What kinds of cheese?

Limburger, Blue, Stilton, Roquefort and Squeeze snack.

ResistanceIsFeudal wrote:

Same here. GODDAMN KIDS! GET OFF MY LAWN!

Also here. More fireworks tents this year too (fireworks sellers set up tents in parking lots-that's how fireworks are sold where I am). Town;s fireworks display starts around 10pm, I think, but it sounds like some people have decided to make the neighborhood's pets miserable setting off their own fireworks instead.

azurite wrote:

sounds like some people have decided to make the neighborhood's pets miserable setting off their own fireworks instead.

I lost my poor pooch a few weeks ago, and she hated the 4th .. seems sort of sad to not be petting her in her favorite hiding spot ...

YouTube - Neil Young 5-18-92 Clev Music Hall 18 Old King 1.mpg

Doc Holiday wrote:

I lost my poor pooch a few weeks ago,

I'm sorry to hear of your loss. Loss of a canine companion can be hard.

Doc Holiday wrote:

I lost my poor pooch a few weeks ago

I'm sorry for your loss. It's never easy losing loved ones. We lost our pup about 1 year ago.

Antipodes wrote:

We lost our pup about 1 year ago

Yea, it's hard ... she had me pretty well trained through the years; it was funny how she would pick out people for me to meet along our walks, and she hated other dogs until her last breath; she was great!

• If I've seemed a little on edge lately and more bitter than usual, I apologize for being creepier than normal ...