Same creep factor; different message.
Of course these are the kids of "enlightened" and "progressive" media and Hollywood folks. Exploiting them is OK. Because it was totally grassroots.
Sawada {who directed and posted the video} is a teacher at an elite and expensive Colburn School of Performing Arts in Los Angeles as part of the Piano faculty. Colburn just built a $120 million 12-story high-rise addition for their musicians.
Does a concert-quality musician in an elite school in the middle of the most ego-centric city in the United States count as a "grassroots" effort?
Here's a partial list of those who helped produce this "grassroots" effort:
* Jeff Zucker — American television executive, and President & CEO of NBC Universal.
* Post-producer (former choreographer?) Holly Shiffer.
* Motion picture camera operator/steadicam specialist Peter Rosenfeld (appropriately enough, worked in "Yes Man," a movie about " a guy challenges himself to say 'yes' to everything for an entire year."
* Darin Moran, another motion picture industry professional, who just finished filming — how appropriate — Land of the Lost.
* Andy Blumenthal, Hollywood film editor.
It's not surprising that the hysterics about evil Republicans spending our tax dollars! to bail out the rich and line their friends' pockets has subsided. The bailout bill was voted on, and generally, of course, it was Democrats voting for and Republicans against. As one would normally expect of such a thing. The tenor on the left has become a bit more subdued, if not a little angsty about why such a plan would fail, when obviously something has to be done. Actually, it's true - something must be done. But what?
It is true that the financial system must be rescued; it must be rescued from the institutions holding bad debt that are currently draining capital while waiting for a bailout and adding little in return. It is they that are preventing wealth-generating activities in the financial sector and the other parts of the economy from expanding real wealth.
The problem is a grave lack of understanding of economic adjustment. The great boogeyman, recession, is seen as Armageddon instead of the necessary period that occurs between times of over-regulation and a return to a free market. The cures for the alleged problem are worse than the disease; and guarantee far worse diseases in future.
Conventional thinking presents economic adjustment — also labeled as "economic recession" — as something terrible, even the end of the world. In fact, economic adjustment is not menacing or terrible; from an economic point of view, it is nothing more than a time when scarce resources are reallocated in accordance with consumers' priorities.
Allowing the market to do the allocation always leads to better results. Even the founder of the Soviet Union, Vladimir Lenin, understood this when he introduced the market mechanism for a brief period in March 1921 to restore the supply of goods and prevent economic catastrophe. Yet for some strange reason, most experts these days cling to the view that the market cannot be trusted in difficult times like these.
If central bankers and government bureaucrats can fix things in difficult times, why not in good times too? Why not have a fully controlled economy and all the problems will be fixed forever? The collapse of the Soviet Union's centralized system is the best testimony one can have that controls don't work. A better way to fix economic problems is to allow entrepreneurs the freedom to allocate resources in accordance with society's priorities.
Sigh. But really, go read the whole thing; it's too important to miss. We're forestalling recovery and ensuring a much more difficult (if at all possible) recovery in the future - or we can run head-on into full socialism and wait for the inevitable collapse from which there is no recovery - such as mandating socialism by voting for a bailout bill that literally gives the Treasury Secretary carte blanche to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, to ENSURE the economic welfare of the US Citizens. Not sure where there is any liberty in there, but right off the bat it's antithetical to the constitution. Go figure.
Only a few weeks ago, we saw that the liquidation of a large bank such as Lehman Brothers and the sale of Merrill Lynch did not cause massive disruptions. In fact, the adjustment was swift and almost invisible. The reason for the smooth adjustment is that the market was allowed to do its job. If government and Fed bureaucrats had tried to intervene with bailouts, the whole process would have taken much longer and would have been very costly in terms of real resources.
Tell that to the barbarians at the gates, or the ideologues holding torches. I'm sure they'll listen.
In the midst of silly, shrill screaming matches about why we're at where we're at economically, and how it's Bush's fault (and now McCain's fault, since he's on the front page more) and Sarah Palin is funneling all federal money into appointees for some puppet government and pulling all the strings (don't ask me - the left is in full unhinged meltdown mode) let's take a minute to find out who broke it, who TRIED to fix it before it was irreparable, and who BLOCKED them from fixing it, how's about that? This information has been available forever, but someone has finally been kind enough to put it into a very user-friendly format that should take care of even the most stupid. Or not.
Huge hat tip to TheCivilLibertarian !
(2:58) Couric: What, specifically, in your view, could be done to convince the new government in Pakistan to take a harder, tougher line against terrorists in that country?
Palin: At a time when new leadership comes in, that is the opportunity to forge better, tighter, more productive relationships and that’s what we’ll take advantage of with new leadership in the US and in Pakistan. And I’m sure that President Zardari, too, will agree with us as we commit to the support that Pakistan needs, that other nations in the region need, in order to win this war on terrorism. (3:32)
(5:39) Couric: But what lessons do you think you have learned as you’ve watched this unfold in terms of implementing the democracy and the challenges inherent in that goal?
Palin: Well, one is that America cannot be counted on to do this solely, to be the savior of every other nation, but we need friends and we need allies and we need this nation-building effort and we need to forge new alliances, and that is what a new election will provide opportunity to do.
Couric: What happened if the goal of democracy, Governor Palin, doesn’t produce the desired outcome, for example in Gaza, the US pushed hard for elections and Hamas won.
Palin: Especially in that region, though, we have got to protect those and support those who do seek democracy and do seek protections for the people who live there. And you know, we’re seeing today, in the last couple of days here in New York, a speaker, a President of Iran, Ahmadinejad, who would come on our soil and express such disdain for one of our closest allies and friends—Israel—and we’re hearing the evil that he speaks. And if hearing him doesn’t allow Americans to commit more solidly to protecting the friends and allies that we need, expecially there in the Mideast, then nothing will.
If Americans are not waking up to understand what it is that he represents, then nothing is going to wake us up and we will be lulled into some kind of false sense of security that perhaps Americans were a part of before 9/11.(7:25)
What do each of these three Palin answers have in common? They portray her as a foreign policy moderate who seeks multilateral coalitions with allies and who advocates for human rights, caring about better lives for Middle Easterners.
The same thing was done on ABC to make her look more Hawkish on Russia. Guess that no one's learned from Rathergate, and the press is just so unbiased as they throw hardballs (dodge!) at one VP candidate and gush praise over the opposing P candidate. This isn't the bias you're looking for. Move on.
Interesting how Biden and Obama aren't anything alike - poor Biden keeps putting his foot in his mouth because he doesn't really share Obama's politics. Plus he's kinda slow. This ad is very interesting on that score:
If there was no deal (and there wasn't) what happened in the White House Thursday?
RUSH: Now, folks, I want to tell you what happened at the White House meeting yesterday, and you are going to be stunned. You wouldn't believe it. Well, sadly, you will believe this. At the meeting, you had McCain and Obama, you had John Boehner, you had Dingy Harry Reid, you had Barney Frank. Chris Dodd was in there. Pelosi was in there. There were some others, but these are the principals. The meeting ostensibly was requested by McCain. Well, no, the meeting was originally requested by Paulson. Remember, Paulson -- and this is crucial here. Paulson, the Treasury Secretary, called Lindsey Grahamnesty. This according to Bob Schieffer of CBS.
Paulson called Lindsey Grahamnesty and said, "Look, I need the House Republicans. I need Republicans on this. We can't get anywhere without them. You've gotta call McCain. He's the only one that can do it." So that's why McCain goes to Washington, and they end up having a four o'clock meeting at the White House yesterday. They all think they're going into a negotiating session. The president, in order to let everybody be heard, deferred to various Democrats, and every one of the Democrats -- Pelosi, Reid, Dodd, and Frank -- declined to speak and deferred to Obama. So Obama became the official Democrat spokesman in the meeting. This was to hype Obama's leadership and presidential aura and so forth. What happened next, the first thing out of Obama's mouth -- Paulson is in the meeting -- is he starts ripping the House Republican proposal and asks Paulson what he thinks of it.
This led Boehner and the other Republicans in there to think they have been sandbagged. We found out this morning that Obama had no clue -- because he was in transit doing other things, he had no clue -- what the House Republican position was. What happened was that on the way to the meeting sometime during the day, Obama's staff received an e-mail from Treasury Department employees who work for Paulson detailing the House Republican plan. So when the Democrats deferred to Obama, he launched into that. He had no clue what it was. That's why he asked Paulson for his comments. I don't know what Paulson said, but this is what led to the fireworks. This is what led to everything breaking down in there. This is why Dingy Harry walked out, 'cause it didn't work.
It ended up with Obama essentially chairing the meeting, with the meeting falling apart. The president was described as "beleaguered," trying to regain control of the meeting. McCain didn't say hardly anything. Everybody was yelling and screaming in there. McCain did not. He said, "We've gotta put these differences aside, work together," you know, typical McCain. "According to an Obama campaign source..." and this is from the American Spectator blog today. "According to an Obama campaign source, the notes on the Republican position, House Republican position were passed to Obama via senior aides traveling with him who had been e-mailed the document via a current Goldman Sachs employee and Wall Street fundraiser for the Obama campaign. The Obama campaign source said, 'It was made clear the memo was from friends and it was reliable.' The memo, which basically briefed Obama on the Republican position..."
You see, Obama did not defend the Democrat position on this. He led off with an attack on the Republican position, as though it was a shock and a surprise, under the auspices that this deal had already been agreed to. When of course there's no surprise about what House Republicans believe and there's no surprise what conservatism is. "The memo allowed Obama and his fellow Democrats to box in Republican attendees and essentially took what President Bush had billed as a negotiating meeting off the rails." Now, "'Paulson and his team have not acted in good faith for this President or the administration for which they serve,' says a House Republican leader who was not present at the White House meeting" and told the American Spectator. Paulson -- Goldman Sachs -- is a Democrat. He's very close to Chuck Schumer, and obviously close to Obama.
So this whole meeting yesterday essentially was established to show off Obama's leadership skills and negotiating skills, and he blew it! People who disagree with him, he has no idea how to negotiate with. Even Obama ended up last night on TV. I think the Democrats were so frightened that the truth would come out about what happened in this meeting. Obama started flooding the TV networks about 6:30. He was on Fox News with "Brett" Hume. He called him Brett. He was on World News Today. He was all over the place, doing a bit of a CYA without explaining why he was doing a CYA. But I want you to listen to what he said to "Brett" Hume on the Fox News Channel last night. It was a bit of a press conference. It wasn't that he called the networks and said, "I want to be on." But he held the press conference and listen to what he said.
OBAMA: Well, h--h- here's my, uh... --
RUSH: Number two!
OBAMA: I think that the way that I've been working over the last week, constantly in contact with the secretary and the congressional leaders, um, uh, eh, you know, may end up creating an environment in which you can actually get somethin' done.
RUSH: So he's admitting nothing got done in there. It's probably not good for him to be in things like this. It's better for him to be away, somewhere on the sidelines in constant contact with everybody on the phone. Obama said, "You know what? It's just better if everybody else gets in the room and then I arbitrate on the phone." I watched his statement when he got on his campaign plane today and heading down to Oxford, Mississippi, for the debate, he said same thing. "Well, anymore constant contact. I have been talking with," and he mentioned all Democrats. "I've been talking to them all morning today. I'll continue to talk to them and I'll continue to be available if necessary." This, ladies and gentlemen, I think it's a tremendous indication.
I don't know why... Pepole ask, "Why didn't the White House put this out?" (sigh) The White House is interested in the deal getting done. They don't want to insert themselves in presidential politics. Dana Perino was asked about this in her press conference this morning or her White House briefing. She was asked about the White House meeting and then what happened. "Well, you know, we're gonna protect things that are going on. We really don't want to insert ourselves into presidential politics" and so forth. But I'll tell you what: This disaster that was Obama attempting to take over and chair the meeting yesterday, makes sense of what's happening today. The Democrats have unleashed this blitzkrieg of insults and bizarre accusations directed at McCain. "He shouldn't have shown up. We could have gotten this done without presidential politics. He came in here and blew it up."
McCain did put some stuff out last night to the people in the press on their mailing list, and from the sounds of the things from McCain's campaign. Obama was off -- they're confirming this, too, but not in as slam-dunk a way. But they're confirming that without the prompter he doesn't know what he's doing in there; things broke down quickly after his first point was raised. It was a disaster with Obama at the helm, and he probably made a fool of himself in that room, and the Democrats are running interference today trying to lay all this failure and all this off on McCain. It is no wonder he didn't want to be in Washington when the sausage was being made, to use a cliche. It's no wonder. McCain forced him there, dragged him there kicking and screaming. That post-meeting statement -- by the way, it took a few hours to come up with this, you know? He and his 300 PR advisors had to craft that statement. Play sound bite number two again. Listen to this.
OBAMA: I think that the way that I've been working over the last week, constantly in contact with the secretary and the congressional leaders, um, uh, eh, you know, may end up creating an environment in which you can actually get somethin' done.
RUSH: I can't get over that. He's admitting something can't get done with him in the room, in charge of things. He's admitting it here! He was in charge and the meeting ended in chaos. Apparently Obama works best when leaders get their hands dirty and he can talk to them by phone. Because that way when he's on the phone his thinkers can sort out what his reaction should be to what he is hearing on the other end of the phone.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Something interesting, ladies and gentlemen, from The Politico today, posted last night about all of this: "And the whole sequence of events confirmed Treasury's fears about the decision by Bush, at the urging of McCain, to allow presidential politics into what were already difficult negotiations." Now, wait a minute. Treasury's fears? There wasn't a deal. There was never a deal all day long yesterday. The Democrats lied through their noses about this. There was never a deal. There was an attempt to pressure McCain, or to make it look like McCain was irrelevant to getting a deal. They announced they had a deal before McCain got there. The Republicans in the House had been cut out of all the discussions. Now the Democrats are desperate for the House Republicans to come back and give them cover on what they're telling us is a wonderful bill. I still don't understand why the Democrats won't just go ahead and sign this thing or pass it. They've got the votes to do it. Well, I understand why. I explained it in the first half hour. But Treasury's fears? They had no deal. It was bleak going into this White House meeting. Even before presidential politics, quote, unquote, was inserted.
Bob Schieffer said it was Paulson who contacted McCain through Grahamnesty in order to get him there, yet The Politico is reporting that it was McCain who wanted the meeting and so forth. Regardless, what you have to know here, there was no deal on the table that had any consensus. It was all setup, folks, to make it look like McCain wasn't needed. It was all posturing to prevent dialogue, to prevent the opportunity to bring an improved piece of legislation to all of this. Obama's post-meeting comments said he thought a deal was done. Of course it wasn't done. I don't know what he really knew or what he had been told. I don't think the guy knows much of anything until somebody tells him. So I don't know if he was told there was a deal and this is the way to play it in the meeting and in the post-meeting press conference. I really don't. But it wasn't done. McCain was never part of any deal, neither were House Republicans, and probably not Senator Shelby and DeMint, either.
So Obama wanted a quick and dirty piece of Bush legislation to fly through, he could taste the money available from the sale of those assets and going to his ACORN buddies. He didn't even pretend not to be obsessed with getting his hands in that deal. He ran to it like half-starved animal, but when he got there, he indicated and illustrated that he hasn't the slightest clue in handling a meeting. More of a press conference here. This is on Fox News Channel's Special Report with Brit Hume. After Obama's press conference, Obama did make some rounds of the TV networks. One of them was Fox. Brit Hume said, "Look, if tomorrow midday we are where we are, meaning today, and we still got an outstanding problem with a package that isn't agreeable, so you can get majorities of both parties, both houses, would it make sense for you to go down to Mississippi, or would it be better for you to stay here and try to do what you could?"
OBAMA: Well, here -- here's my observation, "Brett," and I think it may have been confirmed in the meeting today. When you inject presidential politics into delicate negotiations, uh, sometimes it's not helpful. For us, precisely at this difficult time, to be able to say to the American people, for 90 minutes, that it's possible to fly down to Mississippi and back fairly quickly, that this is where we want to take the country, and this is what this potentially means for you, I continue to think that's the most important thing we can do.
RUSH: All right. So once again, Barack Obama admitting that his presence in the White House meeting was a disaster. That's what he's admitting. Now, you wouldn't know that watching last night, if you didn't know what happened in there. But now that you do, it's easy to interpret the sound bites. "Well, it was my observation, may have been confirmed at the meeting today, when you inject presidential politics into delicate negotiations." McCain didn't say much in the meeting, folks. The yelling and screaming took place, and it broke down, but McCain was not part of it. By the way, what is this insertion of presidential politics? We have a president involved in this. Now, yeah, he's a lame duck, but he's still in there, it was his meeting. It was a courtesy call to bring McCain and Obama in there. Why does presidential politics screw this up? To me, it's the insertion of congressional politics that's making a mess of this. It's the insertion of Democrat Party hack politics.
They're not interested in a good deal here for the country. That's not what this is about. This is about power. This is about securing the White House for themselves and their majorities in both houses of Congress. They're looking at this purely through a political prism, and as usual, the Republicans here are trying to stay tried and true to their principles which is based on what's best for the country. Again, for my liberal and moderate listeners, if this bill that the Democrats and Paulson and Bush crafted is such a great bill for the country, why don't they say so and sign it and then point fingers of blame at the Republicans? "See, you didn't want to help us help the country. We're gonna get all the credit for this, Boehner, we're going to get all the credit for this, Senator Shelby, and you're going to be left out in the cold." That alone should answer the question why they will not continue, ladies and gentlemen, to go ahead and make this bill a reality with their own votes. They want Republicans so the Republicans can share and take the heat, so it will be bipartisan heat, because, remember, the messages coming into there are a hundred to one from the public against this, and the Democrats need cover. As a side benefit, if they can get the conservative Republicans to repudiate conservatism and get the conservative Republicans to repudiate their base, well, then they get a twofer.
Now, since Obama performed so inadequately, caused a meeting to blow up and could not regain control of it, after basically one or two questions that he raised, or points that he made, the Democrats starting last night had to circle the wagons and get the spin out, and they're being pretty successful at this. I mean, from how many other places have you heard what really happened in the White House meeting? You want to know why, by the way? Hank Paulson practically begged everybody in that meeting not to say a worded about what happened. I wonder why? I wonder why?
Considering the debate (tie? LOL) it ain't looking good for dingdong unless the press continues to keep anything negative about Obama (Ayers, etc.) under wraps - which is of course what they'll do. He's unelectable, but that doesn't mean the people can't be fooled.
Reid yesterday: "We need the Republican nominee for president (McCain) to let us know where he stands and what we should do."
Bluff called. Bigtime.
Reid today: "While I appreciate that both* candidates have signaled their willingness to help, Congress and the administration have a process in place to reach a solution to this unprecedented financial crisis."
Flipper says? Huge lols!
*Except not.
It really doesn't matter which party takes charge of the economic concerns. And make no mistake, both parties will - usually with the left they want to take control of business before there's a problem (pre-emptive strike - i.e. socialism); the right does it after a crash, but either way it's still government distortion of the market and less liberty for the citizens and citizen-businesspeople.
Barney Frank was a little too candid in admitting this, I think - "FRANK: Well that's, frankly, the Democrats, some Republicans. We are the ones who have said, "Look, we're going to buy up some of these assets," and many of them will be mortgage securities. What we're saying is, "Buy them with an eye towards assembling enough of them so we then could be the landlord, in effect, and reduce the foreclosures," and that's one, frankly, that the administration has been resisting."
What's tragic is that nobody even notices. You can have the federal government for a landlord now or later, I guess.
Hope may be unwarranted at this point. Will we ever have access to the American dream - free trade - again? Who the hell knows.
Maybe I'll post something more uplifting tomorrow.
I guess women really can be as vile and anti-woman as the next guy.
First you have Bernhardt threatening Palin with the spectre of gang rape by black men, should she ever make the mistake of going to Manhattan. Now I don't know if that was just a racist thing, or if that part was unintentional. The rest of her rant is pretty solidly just hissing about how Sarah Palin is an "uncle woman bitch whore" and vicious remarks about her appearance, in detail. I'm trying to picture a scathing commentary on Obama that includes a threat that if he ever shows up in Birmingham he'd be lynched - and coming up short.
Then you have Margaret Cho telling us Palin is completely evil, but she'd like to hate-"fuck" her. She describes it graphically.
"But even though I would never, ever vote for Palin, I am kind of obsessed with fucking her. She is sexy and hot in a MILF/Cougar way. Like you could have that real mature, straight to the point, adult, over forty, gonna cum multiple times with a big, oversize t-shirt on and nothing else and “I don’t care what I look like cuz I am gonna bust nuts in your curl” kind of fucking with her. I want to steam up those glasses and show her what a pitbull with lipstick really needs – doggy style!
Seriously – I wanna eat her Alaskan pussy from behind. Like an Eskimo. What?! I’m just trying to keep warm!
Although you know that thing is frozen and my tongue would probably stick."
Are you still with me? I know that was really off-putting. If you have the gumption, read the next entry on how she's really "a Christian, you fucking fucks." LOL God told her she could use his name in vain, so it's ok.
They can get a pass because they're women and they're gay and they're leftist, therefore any misogyny they post is just incidental, and probably the result of what bad men and the patriarchy did to them. Yeah, no. No pass here. They ought to both be horsewhipped in town square. But then I'm mean that way.
Thank goodness we have the gaffe king (Biden) to lighten the mood from these vicious kinds of violent sexual images being directed at a female candidate who just might be on the way to the White House.
Just the past day or so Biden's gaffed on coal, saying the Obama/Biden ticket doesn't support any more coal in the US (when Obama promised something like $200 million for clean coal), gaffed on the depression, claiming Roosevelt was president in 1929 (Hoover was) and that he then went on television (there was no television) to give the people confidence (oops), gaffed on guns and accidentally threatened his own running mate ("Barack Obama ain't taking my shotguns, so don't buy that malarkey. If he tries to fool with my Beretta, he's got a problem.") and attacked the Obama campaign's own ad that railed on McCain for not being a net junkie (below.) It turns out he can't use a keyboard due to old war injuries.
"BIDEN: I thought that was terrible. (rimshot)
COURIC: Why did you do it, then?
BIDEN: I didn't know we did it, and if I had anything to do with it, we'd have never done it, and I don't think Barack -- you know, I mean I just think that was, uh --
COURIC: Did Barack Obama approve that ad? He said he did, right?)
BIDEN: Yeah, the answer is -- I -- I don't think anything's intentional about that. (rimshot) They were trying to make another point."
He caught himself there - he was trying to say Obama didn't know anything about it, then realized it was almost as bad as telling a man in a wheelchair to stand up so everyone could see him, and got a tad pwned.)
The funniest bit is that he said he was way on his guard because Repubs were going to jump on every little boo-boo. That's Biden being super-duper CAREFUL. Which makes it funnier.
But at least it breaks up the vicious smear campaigns and gives you a chance to laugh, right? Well, it makes me laugh. I don't know about you.)
Who changed Democrats into Republicans while I wasn't looking? This one is too funny to resist. Even if I do not buy the wage gap myth, it's funny.
"Based on these calculations, Obama's 28 male staffers divided among themselves total payroll expenditures of $1,523,120. Thus, Obama's average male employee earned $54,397.
Obama's 30 female employees split $1,354,580 among themselves, or $45,152, on average.
{snip}
On average, according to these data, women in John McCain's office make $1.04 for every dollar a man makes. In fact, all other things being equal, a typical female staffer could earn 21 cents more per dollar paid to her male counterpart -- while adding $10,726 to her annual income -- by leaving Barack Obama's office and going to work for John McCain."
Talk that talk, Obi-wan.
Kim Gandy's response is the icing on the cake.
"It depends on what positions they’re in," Gandy told CNSNews.com. "Certain positions are paid more than other positions. I do know quite a number of women very high up in his staff and in his campaign who are extraordinarily strong supporters of women’s rights. We don’t advocate people be hired because of their gender. We advocated people be hired and paid without regard to their gender."
Talk about a flip-flop! I'm pretty sure people have been telling you this for a LONG TIME, Ms. Gandy. For that to be your word on this? Is very funny. I mean hypocritical.
My husband collects these coins from the Roman Empire, which eventually collapsed due to a debased currency. You can clearly see the evidence of inflation just looking at the clipped edges. You can clearly see it in our own coins if you have a quarter old enough. Or, at least you can hear it. Just drop a 1964 quarter onto a hard surface. Take it in your hand and hold it. Look at the edges. Look at the sides. Examine it next to a modern quarter. Drop it too. Hear the difference? Feel it? Look at the sides. We are ensuring our own destruction with debased currency same as the Roman Empire did.
Lew Rockwell has just posted an excellent article about understanding the crisis. It's not what the press passes it off to be, and not what most people think it is, but that's hardly their fault - it isn't like government schools are teaching economic basics despite the desperate need to do so, and if they did, they sure wouldn't be teaching Austrian or Monetarist economics anyway. He's quite right; if it is to be summed up in two words, those words are "fiat money."
"What caused this? It is a simple question, and yet answers are all over the map, as you might expect. Here's mine in two words: fiat money.
The word "fiat" means "out of nothing." Money out of nothing is money that is eventually worth nothing. The possibility of precisely that happening emerged in August 15, 1971. Since Nixon severed the last tie of the dollar to gold, the world's monetary system has not been restrained by anything physical. We've depended on the discretion of central bankers. We can't trust that, and this crisis shows precisely why."
This is a pretty simple concept, and of course it's a huge threat to the powers that be if people start figuring it out. This is why it's essential that we do just that. He's quite right; there is nothing restraining the creation of money anymore. Nothing real. We demand that the government give us more of it, and there's nothing real to give, so we get this debased, inflated currency or a piece of plastic instead. It's bread and circuses time! Turn on the reality television and sit on the couch.
"The first time that people hear this, they find their minds rather boggled, and they want to know more. My whole experience in this area is that once people start digging around the area of monetary theory, they find that (1) it is not as difficult a subject as it seems, (2) it is endlessly fascinating, and (3) it explains far more than they realized before."
Thank you. That is my experience as well. Hell, it happened to me. It happened to my children. Studying economics opened their minds in a way the typical school studies never could. It explains everything. The concept of ownership, the meaning of value, the need for justice - it's all right there in the study of economics. When presidents used to talk about this topic, I would tune out immediately; perfectly sure that economics was so impossibly complex that in reality no one understood it. That was very naive. Thankfully, it is not true. Not so thankfully, once you wake up you realize what a pickle we're in here and there may be nothing stopping our downfall. There's no reason to think we're any better off than the Romans munching their breadsticks and watching their circuses. It could be time to take off for Luxembourg. Maybe Switzerland.
I have always lamented that von Mises' works were not translated in time to stave off disaster here. But then we got the New Deal despite Hayek, didn't we? Ignorance was our enemy then same as now.
"In the American context of the Great Depression, one book captures the whole onset and response. It is Murray Rothbard's America's Great Depression. He shows that it wasn't the 1929 crash that was the problem; it was the response to the crash that created the Depression. Bailouts. Price controls. Wage controls. Government programs. Trade restrictions. Crackdowns on the capital markets. And who did all this? It originated not with FDR but with Herbert Hoover — clear echoes of today. There is no understanding the present crisis without this book."
Tragically familiar, isn't it?
I'm off to buy some books. The greedy government just gave us back some of the debased money we slaved to pay them this year, so no time like the present.
Trivia - lolcats and the rickroll were started at 4-chan. Michele Malkin didn't quite know what 4-chan was, or what /b/ was, or who Anonymous was, so she blamed Gawker, who were only posting the stuff. (Not to say that no one at Gawker is also anonymous - lots of people are.) Someone very kind has taken the time to explain it all, straight from the horse's mouth, and now he's going to have to kill all of you.
"I missed the original incident, but monitored the discussion and repostings afterward to see what I could learn about what had happened and who was responsible.
There are several misconceptions and errors in most accounts of this story, including your post. Most significantly, the perpetrator(s) were not members of an infamous group of hackers. I don’t blame you for misunderstanding this, because in all the media coverage regarding the war with Scientology the media has completely failed to explain what Anonymous is.
Anonymous is not exactly a group. It is people using the umbrella of a web discussion board for cover to be as offensive, funny, strange, or whatever as they want.
Here’s the short version: there is a site called 4chan.org. It is an image posting site based on a popular Japanese site. The site contains multiple boards, each of which is dedicated to a particular subject. The most notorious of these boards is called /b/. /b/ is the board dedicated to random images. /b/tards, as its denizens are called, are interested only in their own amusement. Their sense of humor runs the gamut from sick to cruel to merely strange. Lolcats, as made famous by http://www.icanhascheezburger.com, originated on /b/. A lot of memes start there. There is a lot of racist humor — pictures of excited and happy black people in proximity to fried chicken abound. There is a lot of pornography. Sometimes it’s child pornography, although posting that is moderator grounds for banning — no, it’s not a pedophile ring; /b/tards post it because they think doing so is funny.
4chan does not log participants. Most people don’t use or have usernames, and post instead as “Anonymous.” And every so often, a number of /b/’s anonymous denizens decide to make somebody’s life hell. Sometimes it’s a random person who offends /b/’s sense of propriety. Sometimes it’s a forum dedicated to a serious topic. Sometimes it’s Scientology. And Tuesday, it was Sarah Palin. Or it would have been.
Sarah Palin’s email account was hacked by one person. Not a group.
This person read her emails, then posted the username and password on /b/. This happened at about 4 in the morning on Tuesday. The idea was that the sea of Anonymous /b/tards would download the emails, upload porn, and cause all manner of mischief. Anonymous is not a group of hackers. Anonymous is more like gremlins. They are hyperactive adolescents in search of amusement and joy, which they often get by upsetting people and making messes. That’s what was happening here. Anonymous did not hack the account. A hacker tried to throw Sarah Palin to Anonymous. Not all of Anonymous was having it. One person threw a crowbar in the works. Other /b/tards were displeased to miss a chance at the lulz. The moderators stepped in. The thread was deleted.
Later, other individuals created threads reposting screencaps of emails and the inbox, and put together a collection of these files. All mentions of these were purged by the moderators. So then some bright /b/tards decided to email what little stuff they had to the media.
That’s pretty much it.
This afternoon, in a thread that was later deleted, an individual claiming to be the original poster gave his account of what happened. I’ve attached screencaps. Here’s the text. The original poster used the name “rubico.” The linked email address for the poster was rubico10@yahoo.com.
This is what rubico said:
rubico 09/17/08(Wed)12:57:22 No.85782652
Hello, /b/ as many of you might already know, last night sarah palin’s yahoo was “hacked” and caps were posted on /b/, i am the lurker who did it, and i would like to tell the story.
In the past couple days news had come to light about palin using a yahoo mail account, it was in news stories and such, a thread was started full of newfags trying to do something that would not get this off the ground, for the next 2 hours the acct was locked from password recovery presumably from all this bullshit spamming.
after the password recovery was reenabled, it took seriously 45 mins on wikipedia and google to find the info, Birthday? 15 seconds on wikipedia, zip code? well she had always been from wasilla, and it only has 2 zip codes (thanks online postal service!)
the second was somewhat harder, the question was “where did you meet your spouse?” did some research, and apparently she had eloped with mister palin after college, if youll look on some of the screenshits that I took and other fellow anon have so graciously put on photobucket you will see the google search for “palin eloped” or some such in one of the tabs.
I found out later though more research that they met at high school, so I did variations of that, high, high school, eventually hit on “Wasilla high” I promptly changed the password to popcorn and took a cold shower…
>> rubico 09/17/08(Wed)12:58:04 No.85782727
this is all verifiable if some anal /b/tard wants to think Im a troll, and there isn’t any hard proof to the contrary, but anyone who had followed the thread from the beginning to the 404 will know I probably am not, the picture I posted this topic with is the same one as the original thread.
I read though the emails… ALL OF THEM… before I posted, and what I concluded was anticlimactic, there was nothing there, nothing incriminating, nothing that would derail her campaign as I had hoped, all I saw was personal stuff, some clerical stuff from when she was governor…. And pictures of her family
I then started a topic on /b/, peeps asked for pics or gtfo and I obliged, then it started to get big
Earlier it was just some prank to me, I really wanted to get something incriminating which I was sure there would be, just like all of you anon out there that you think there was some missed opportunity of glory, well there WAS NOTHING, I read everything, every little blackberry confirmation… all the pictures, and there was nothing, and it finally set in, THIS internet was serious business, yes I was behind a proxy, only one, if this shit ever got to the FBI I was fucked, I panicked, i still wanted the stuff out there but I didn’t know how to rapidshit all that stuff, so I posted the pass on /b/, and then promptly deleted everything, and unplugged my internet and just sat there in a comatose state
Then the white knight fucker came along, and did it in for everyone, I trusted /b/ with that email password, I had gotten done what I could do well, then passed the torch , all to be let down by the douchebaggery, good job /b/, this is why we cant have nice things
________________________________________
The “white knight fucker” was the /b/tard who thought that going through Sarah Palin’s email wasn’t cool. He logged in, changed the password, and sent an email to a friend of Palin’s warning her and letting her know the new password. Unfortunately, he then posted a screenshot of this email to let the other /b/tards know their fun was over. He failed to blank the password, and they all tried to log in and change the password — which tripped the automated Yahoo! freeze. Since then, the account has been deleted. “Rapidshit” refers to rapidshare.com — i.e., rubico wanted to download the emails, put them into one file, and put that file up on rapidshare for /b/tards and the world at large to download. But he panicked, or didn’t know how to download the emails, and so pawned that task off on Anonymous, which he didn’t realize wasn’t monolithic and in his favor.
As Paul Harvey would say, “And now you know…. the rest of the story.”"
So. There it is. And now you must die.
Either that or /b/'s going to order you a buttload of pizza and then laugh at you at Encyclopaedia Dramatica. One or the other.
Scuttlebutt is that Rubico was a Democrat Congressman's son. I don't know yet.
Not a bad movie, that. Angelina Jolie stood out from the first time I saw it, when it came out.
So the internet strikes - hackers got into Palin's yahoo email, and Gawker/others started posting all sorts of private emails, including pictures of her kids. They didn't find much of interest though; just a voicemail from Bristol, which was posted online, and a couple private numbers. Duh, did you think she was going to leave a smoking gun in a yahoo account? I wouldn't.
I don't know, apparently the "feds are investigating" but does it really make much sense? Could the feds know more about hacking than, well, actual hackers? I can't blame Gawker for posting stuff (though it was shitty, especially when there was nothing there to use against her) but that doesn't mean they were behind it. They did point the finger at 4-chan, though, which is interesting. If they're not connected, anonymous might not like it. I wouldn't point at them any more than I'd leave a smoking gun on yahoo.
Just some thoughts.
I had to laugh reading some leftists bitching about McCain's reaction to the stock market events. Now he may or may not understand much about it or how to fix it (er, in the case of government maybe I should say stop fixing it so it can work already) and I suspect it's the latter. That doesn't mean the ones criticizing him understand what they're talking about either. Actually, they definitely don't.
However, we'll just take a step back from "both" sides and marvel for a moment at the invisible hand and the work it does. "The Glories of Change" by Jeffrey Tucker of the Ludwig von Mises Institute (Austrian - one of the few schools of economic study that have any validity) will give a fresh perspective here. I'll only quote briefly; please go read it for yourself.
"No one person is in charge. Layers upon layers of decisions by millions and billions of people are the essential mechanism that makes the process move forward. All these decisions and choices and guesses come to be aggregated in a single number called the price, and that price can then be used in that simple calculation that indicates success or failure. Every instant of time all around the world that calculation is made, and it results in shifts and movement and progress.
But as wonderful as the daily shifts and movements are, what really inspires are the massive acts of creative destruction such as when old-line firms like Lehman and Merrill melt before our eyes, their good assets transferred to more competent hands and their bad liabilities banished from the face of the earth.
This is the kind of shock and awe we should all celebrate. It is contrary to the wish of all the principal players and it accords with the will of society as a whole and the dictate of the market that waste not last and last. No matter how large, how entrenched, how exalted the institution, it is always vulnerable to being blown away by market forces — no more or less so than the lemonade stand down the street."
Interesting stuff. You won't hear that in the NY Times.
For shits and giggles I might take a minute to groan and or giggle to myself about how these things bring out every variety of stupid and silly comments. First McCain was quoted: "You know, that there’s been tremendous turmoil in our financial markets and Wall Street and it is — people are frightened by these events. Our economy, I think, still the fundamentals of our economy are strong. But these are very, very difficult times."
Oh...groan. Now I can spot lots of things wrong with those few sentences. Immediately they call to mind, as well, just how and why things got there - knowing all the time that what he means by things being bad, and what the left means, and what the reality is, are three different things.** Just for one example of the ways in which any leftist commentary on McCain's statements (not necessarily indicative of conservative) about economy are a hotbed of miscommunication and wrongness on both sides.
Then follows a litany of economic woes (seen through the eyes of the left) ending with quite an example of melodrama. Now this is definitely something I don't like about McCain; he's probably not very knowledgeable on economics and unfortunately he's not really conservative either (conservatives will often tend to do more right economically even if they don't really always understand why, than the left could ever do - being fundamentally socialist in nature) so he *plays right into the hands of* the left by agreeing that things are very very bad and dire indeed. That's the problem with being "moderate" which is often worse than being either left or right. Moderates are generally willing to cede liberty on the social and economic end, a little at a time, while conservatives tend to cede more social liberty than economic (which at least leaves the people strong enough to fight for their rights) and the left generally cedes economic liberty and then as Atlas shrugs and everyone grows poorer, we have to cede social liberty as well. Not to mention the oppressive restrictions imposed by political correctness on free expression regarding religion and any number of matters of individual social liberty. But we'll see, right?
"And don't think for a minute that the current administration is not going to do everything possible to keep things propped up until election time. After that fateful day, who knows what will happen to the likes of Lehman Brothers, or the likes of American citizens for that matter."
Oh...groan. That was the melodrama. And did a leftie just express concern for a huge corporation and for other huge corporations? The litany of woes was just your standard stuff - you can probably read it in any newspaper and you probably know it by heart. Though it's always funny to see socialists complaining about it. Maybe that's just me.
Well, enjoy the Glories of Change piece. Like I said, Lew Rockwell and I parted company some time ago, but you can hardly beat von Mises for a reality check.
**And that isn't even counting the conservative viewpoint. There might be more, but who cares? At any rate, this is one reason the mainstream media sucks. You can get the left (ubiquitous) and you can get the right (a little bit) but you can't get the truth. And that's one reason people on "both" sides are frightened, as McCain put it, albeit by different things.
"Canadian Doctor warns Sarah Palin's decision to have "Down baby" (sic) could reduce abortions."
Sarah and Todd Palin's decision to complete her recent pregnancy, despite advance notice that their baby Trig had Down syndrome, is hailed by many in the pro-life movement as walking the walk as well as talking the talk.
But a senior Canadian doctor is now expressing concerns that such a prominent public role model as the governor of Alaska and potential vice president of the United States completing a Down syndrome pregnancy may prompt other women to make the same decision against abortion because of that genetic abnormality. And thereby reduce the number of abortions.
Published reports in Canada say about 9 out of 10 women given a diagnosis of Down syndrome choose to terminate the pregnancy through abortion.
Dr. Andre Lalonde, executive vice president of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in Ottawa, worries that Palin's now renowned decision may cause abortions in Canada to decline as other women there and elsewhere opt to follow suit.
He says not every woman is prepared to deal with the consequences of Down babies, who have developmental delays, some physical difficulties and often a shortened lifespan.
Wider use of blood screening and amniocentesis during pregnancies can now accurately predict the presence of Down syndrome.
Lalonde says his primary concern is that women have the....
...choice of abortion and that greater public awareness of women making choices like Palin to complete a pregnancy and give birth to their genetically-abnormal baby could be detrimental and confusing to the women and their families.
I really can't believe this. I am about the only person I know who is practically agnostic on the issue of legalized abortion for a lot of reasons, but did I just read this? That 9 out of 10 "Down pregnancies" are aborted upon diagnosis and that's the way it should be? That they are AFRAID that fewer women will abort babies with Down syndrome and that is Sarah Palin's fault? Are you fucking kidding me?
And the language of abortion-first, choice second, and the implication that women are too stupid to make that choice - holy hell. Of course, with socialized "health care" I guess it makes sense and our numbers are creeping up there too. Prevent future costs and all that.
So I've heard clips from one prominent Democrat after another proclaiming that Jesus was a community organizer and Pontius Pilate was a governor. Indicating once again, of course, that Obama is a messiah and Palin is a murderous villain. Indicating yet again the utter contempt of the left for Christians and Christianity. I realize there is a subverted, Marxist version of the gospel that is the only form of Christianity that is palatable to the hard left, but it isn't what Christianity is; and Christianity has had a core definition for millenia.
And now Jesus the Savior of the World is a fucking community organizer. God help me.
Oh, here's the spurious comment from the house floor, for your edification.
When he tries to deny that he was directing this at Sarah Palin, just remember that the crowd *got it immediately*. And I don't blame him for being pissed; she's the one ruining his shot at the gold, and she was definitely able to use humor and sarcasm against him as well. But, uh, real good way to win the women back, Obama - you know, all those women that were Hillary supporters, who you ignored when you went for Biden? Win them back by not-subtly calling another woman VP candidate a pig (followed immediately by a comment about the smell of fish. No, really.) (In case the reference is lost on anyone; he was, as his crowd understood, alluding to her not-that-funny joke about the difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom. I didn't think it was funny, but neither is this.)
And for more contortions on how he just *didn't mean it that way* when he so obviously did, keep this in mind (and again, the crowd certainly knew what he meant) - either he's stupid or he thinks we are.
For the record I don't think it's "sexist." I just think he's an asshole.
I can't deny it. He has some points. He just couldn't leave us to be happy for a few more days, but I have to give him his due here. He's partially right. And...he's partially wrong. Because he's too cynical.
Let's be clear, LewRockwell and I parted company as soon as most Americans learned to point out Afghanistan on the map. An act of war was committed upon us, and going after the networks that perpetrated it, and the countries that host them and cheer them on and fund them, was necessary. Rockwell of course didn't see it that way.
Cheerfully titled "Sarah Palin's Career Ends in Tragedy," we find that Mr. Rockwell likes Sarah Palin very much in fact. A lot. So much, that he doesn't want to see her ruined. Which, let's face it, can happen.
"The frenzied reaction of the middle class all over the country toward Sarah Palin has no real precedent that I can remember. Indeed, the reaction especially among women is completely understandable. She provides a much welcome cultural break from the chip-on-the-shoulder, grudge-against-the-world model of public women that have been held up to us for years, embodied in the belligerent and insufferable person of Hillary Clinton.
Sarah, on the other hand, is both beautiful and professionally accomplished, a wife and mother and a natural politician, both religious and secular, both feminine and fearless of tasks — such as hunting — that are usually associated with men. She offers a different model of a woman who has excelled not through intimidation and aggressive demands for reparation, but through her own efforts, charms, and intelligence."
Yeah, like that. He goes on to applaud her libertarian outlook and political stance.
"The claim against her that she lacks "experience" is one of the most bogus things out there. For starters, the vice presidency shows a long history of people with very little of what is called "experience" today. And contrary to what media pundits say, what is far more important than experience are the political values you hold."
"The demand for experience seems to imply that somehow we are seeking social and global managers for public office, and that is manifestly what we do not want. In a truly liberal society, the job of a White House executive could be held by anyone or no one."
Quite freaking true. I was glad he dealt so cleanly with this nonsensical bit about "experience." That kind of experience is not what is needed. What is needed are people who truly believe in what they believe, and understand the proper place of government and the sovereignty of the individual.
He then goes on to tell us the bad news; how we get excited when good people are elected, not realizing that they have to, of necessity, become part of the machine they once opposed, or fail. That there are now high-ranking people who used to be libertarians but who have become part of the machine instead of changing it. Now I know that is the case, but have a little hope, man. I know - and I saw hints of it during her speech - that she has to support McCain's policies and be an apologist for him (and we didn't love his policies so much to begin with, right? Which is why she energized the base where he couldn't.) However, that does not mean that she will sit back and be window dressing while letting him do whatever she wants. She just might be the one who can stand up against being caught in the combine. I'm counting on it. And that's where we differ, LewRockwell - I have a little hope. It doesn't have to get THAT bad; indeed it might not.
He also mentions the oft-whispered about bit regarding her alleged involvement in the secessionist party, the AIP. When I first heard about that, that she was supposedly a "member" of this secessionist party, I kinda said, "So? So what?" Because that, as rockwell points out, is a perfectly reasonable and liberal thing to do. Except she totally wasn't a member of the party - she gave a remote address to kick off their convention, in which she expressed what they had in common, and that she too believed in competition. That they shared the goal of a financially independent state that adhered to their own constitution. As to secession, well frankly if their state is independent financially, and their liberty exceeds that which exists on the mainland (because, perhaps, they actually adhere to their constitution where we don't) then why not? This is supposed to be a loose conglomeration of *Sovereign* states under a constitution that is there to promote free trade and to *stop* people's rights being infringed upon. So whatever. Here is the actual tape, and clearly she is not a member of the party and the secessionist claim is shown to be false:
But you know what? I'm counting on this. I'm counting on her to be stronger than that. I'm counting on a lot of things. I have faith in Americans, even when they become politicians.
(Hey, it's funny and I hope it's largely true.)
I know it's hard to read my byline, but it says "Strong Views. No Bullshit. No Tippy Toes". I need *someplace* to put my strong views that have nothing to do with fat, I figure. Not the least of which because some people on the fat liberation feed might not prefer to read about my views on the election or on the media.
I didn't have any strong views on this election once the candidates were basically locked in. I do now. Well...unless you count wishing like hell the election would DIE and never rear its head again as a strong view. 'Cause that's what I wanted; I refused to let people speak about it in front of me. "I don't want to know; don't even tell me when it's over."
And of course there are tons of other political things to talk about over the course of time.
I don't care about the charge of partisanship - it has no sting for me. I don't belong to any party or support any party. That doesn't mean I don't have very strong core beliefs, and when someone in this or that party really exemplifies at least a significant subset of those, I might support that person. But while it gets emotional, I assure you that it's all based on logical, reasonable, definable core theses and experience; emotion and party are never at the root of political decisions or beliefs for me. However, they can be a nice plus, like they are right now.
Look forward to writing more in here, but that's the intro. Only for hardcore political junkies who can take it if they want to dish it. If it's bound to make you spitting mad...well I dunno, I guess you're an adult. Read it if you want.
