Thursday, August 07, 2014
Waterskiing if you haven't got a boat...
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Does inequality lead to "decline and fall"?
Seeking to draw parallels between modern America and decadent Rome, Washington's Blog links to this:
A dwindling middle class, the flight of the rich to safer places (think of the recent Chinese and Russian expatriates)... it's suggestive.
The above arises indirectly from Barry Ritholtz's latest piece, in which he lists many economists and professors who also claim that widening income inequality harms the economy and generates boom-bust cycles.
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A dwindling middle class, the flight of the rich to safer places (think of the recent Chinese and Russian expatriates)... it's suggestive.
The above arises indirectly from Barry Ritholtz's latest piece, in which he lists many economists and professors who also claim that widening income inequality harms the economy and generates boom-bust cycles.
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
Wednesday, August 06, 2014
A Moral Principle gets wet
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| Tarr Steps - Exmoor |
“Down, you base thing!” thundered the Moral Principle, “and let me pass over you!”
The Material Interest merely looked in the other’s eyes without saying anything.
“Ah,” said the Moral Principle, hesitatingly, “let us draw lots to see which shall retire till the other has crossed.”
The Material Interest maintained an unbroken silence and an unwavering stare.
“In order to avoid a conflict,” the Moral Principle resumed, somewhat uneasily, “I shall myself lie down and let you walk over me.”
Then the Material Interest found a tongue, and by a strange coincidence it was its own tongue. “I don’t think you are very good walking,” it said. “I am a little particular about what I have underfoot. Suppose you get off into the water.”
It occurred that way.
Ambrose Bierce - Fantastic Fables (1899)
One of Bierce's many word cartoons where the reader supplies their own image. A great alternative for those who can't draw. My mental image for Bierce's two chaps on the bridge is in the style of a Punch cartoon by Sir John Tenniel. For me it maintains the vintage aura.
Mind you, although there is a vintage aspect to Moral Principles fighting Material Interests on a bridge, the outcome is bang up to date.
One of Bierce's many word cartoons where the reader supplies their own image. A great alternative for those who can't draw. My mental image for Bierce's two chaps on the bridge is in the style of a Punch cartoon by Sir John Tenniel. For me it maintains the vintage aura.
Mind you, although there is a vintage aspect to Moral Principles fighting Material Interests on a bridge, the outcome is bang up to date.
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| From Wikipedia |
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Tuesday, August 05, 2014
A smile
A blood-feud in Iceland, a thousand years ago: Halldor and others have just killed Bolli in his dairy, while his wife Gudrun is out...
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| (From Laxdaele Saga, tr. Muriel Press) |
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| (pic source) |
I've never forgotten it.
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A light dies down
It is certain that up to a point in the evolution of Self most people find life quite exciting and thrilling. But when middle age arrives, often prematurely, they forget the thrill and excitements; they become obsessed by certain other lesser things that are deficient in any kind of Cosmic Vitality. The thrill goes out of life: a light dies down and flickers fitfully; existence goes on at a low ebb — something has been lost. From this numbed condition is born much of the blind anguish of life.
It takes a certain kind of observer to see this kind of social issue, to identify it as an issue and present it cogently. It requires a sceptical cast of mind grounded in what is rather than what ought to be. A degree of detachment from approved social narratives.
Our weird culture has become obsessed with what ought to be as opposed to what simply is. A frantic political correctness is on the march and doesn't know when or where to stop and look around. Our supposedly technical and rational culture has meekly succumbed to swivel-eyed hysterical posturing.
The delicate flowering of each individual human spirit becomes a feared strangeness, unwanted. A thing to be covertly damned from every secular pulpit and quietly rooted out from our fanatically domesticated garden where nothing grows naturally.
Our weird culture has become obsessed with what ought to be as opposed to what simply is. A frantic political correctness is on the march and doesn't know when or where to stop and look around. Our supposedly technical and rational culture has meekly succumbed to swivel-eyed hysterical posturing.
The delicate flowering of each individual human spirit becomes a feared strangeness, unwanted. A thing to be covertly damned from every secular pulpit and quietly rooted out from our fanatically domesticated garden where nothing grows naturally.
We grow up in our feverish, artificial civilization, believing that the real, satisfying things are complex and difficult to obtain. Our lives become unnaturally stressed and tormented by the pitiless and incessant struggle for social conditions which are, at best, second-rate and ultimately disappointing.
G K Chesterton - What's Wrong with the World (1910)
Chesterton had his allegiances too, his treasured notions none could challenge, his core beliefs of right and wrong. Yet he also had a sceptic's eye, a genial observer's eye unclouded by fashionable enthusiasms. A century later we haven't quite lost his gift, but in spite of his enduring popularity we never learned Chesterton's lessons. And really - it's not as if they were even new.
Yet I think what he didn't foresee was how the evolving world of electronic communication would become a tool of mass propaganda. How the spread of information could so easily we turned into the spread of misinformation.
In his day, the great concern was the power of newspaper proprietors. What he probably didn't foresee was the kind of large scale collusion we see in mass communication. It isn't merely the narrative-weavers, but our own failure to understand the pitiless and incessant struggle for social conditions which are, at best, second-rate and ultimately disappointing.
Perhaps for most of us, the light dies down too early.
Chesterton had his allegiances too, his treasured notions none could challenge, his core beliefs of right and wrong. Yet he also had a sceptic's eye, a genial observer's eye unclouded by fashionable enthusiasms. A century later we haven't quite lost his gift, but in spite of his enduring popularity we never learned Chesterton's lessons. And really - it's not as if they were even new.
Yet I think what he didn't foresee was how the evolving world of electronic communication would become a tool of mass propaganda. How the spread of information could so easily we turned into the spread of misinformation.
In his day, the great concern was the power of newspaper proprietors. What he probably didn't foresee was the kind of large scale collusion we see in mass communication. It isn't merely the narrative-weavers, but our own failure to understand the pitiless and incessant struggle for social conditions which are, at best, second-rate and ultimately disappointing.
Perhaps for most of us, the light dies down too early.
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Election mess
Electoral Calculus is currently predicting a 40-seat majority for Labour in the 2015 General Election:
You'll see from the above that despite polling nearly twice as many voting intentions as either the LibDems or "minority" parties, and nearly five times that of the "nationalists", UKIP stands to get no seat whatever. But if votes translated into seats in an exactly proportional way, then on this showing UKIP would be on course for 88 Parliamentary seats out of the total of 650.
Instead, the boundary system and unevenness of political support result in a heavy bias towards the two major parties and against all others. This is how the above prediction looks in terms of votes to seats gained:
EC's analysis of UKIP's chances suggest that the party needs to poll 16% of the national vote to get a single seat, and wouldn't get a fair ratio of votes to seats until it got somewhere around 30%.
Even then, because of the first-past-the-post arrangement, if UKIP gained votes solely at the expense of the Conservatives, the net effect (up to about a 24% vote for UKIP) would be to increase Labour's majority:
This certainly looks like an incentive for Cameron's Chameleons to talk to UKIP, or at least temporarily take on some of the latter's coloration in the hope that you can fool enough people for long enough.
In any case, DC can look forward to a wealth-multiplying post-Parliamentary life of directorships, consultancies and highly-paid dinner talks, just like his hero Blair, for whom he led the Opposition applause* in Parliament when the latter abandoned his constituents to do something more lucrative (and above all, attention-getting):
So really, why should Cameron care anyway? And as the saying goes, he who cares least has all the power.
Where does this power come from? Last week's Spectator leader drew a really thought-provoking contrast between the UN and the EC:
"There is a subtle but enormous difference between the European Convention on Human Rights, on which the Strasbourg court bases its decisions, and on the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The latter states:
How will you vote in the General Opinion Poll of 2015?
But maybe, even after the debacle of the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum, electoral reform is still possible, particularly in the event that Scotland decides to vote this autumn for secession from the Union. Already the Scottish Parliament has a much fairer system; perhaps the Scots will once again show us the way.
_________________
* I should like to know the names of those few who sat on their hands - they would be part of my first Cabinet if I were "in power".
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| Layout slightly modified; page accessed 04 August 2014 |
You'll see from the above that despite polling nearly twice as many voting intentions as either the LibDems or "minority" parties, and nearly five times that of the "nationalists", UKIP stands to get no seat whatever. But if votes translated into seats in an exactly proportional way, then on this showing UKIP would be on course for 88 Parliamentary seats out of the total of 650.
Instead, the boundary system and unevenness of political support result in a heavy bias towards the two major parties and against all others. This is how the above prediction looks in terms of votes to seats gained:
EC's analysis of UKIP's chances suggest that the party needs to poll 16% of the national vote to get a single seat, and wouldn't get a fair ratio of votes to seats until it got somewhere around 30%.
Even then, because of the first-past-the-post arrangement, if UKIP gained votes solely at the expense of the Conservatives, the net effect (up to about a 24% vote for UKIP) would be to increase Labour's majority:
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| http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/Analysis_UKIP.html |
This certainly looks like an incentive for Cameron's Chameleons to talk to UKIP, or at least temporarily take on some of the latter's coloration in the hope that you can fool enough people for long enough.
In any case, DC can look forward to a wealth-multiplying post-Parliamentary life of directorships, consultancies and highly-paid dinner talks, just like his hero Blair, for whom he led the Opposition applause* in Parliament when the latter abandoned his constituents to do something more lucrative (and above all, attention-getting):
So really, why should Cameron care anyway? And as the saying goes, he who cares least has all the power.
Where does this power come from? Last week's Spectator leader drew a really thought-provoking contrast between the UN and the EC:
"There is a subtle but enormous difference between the European Convention on Human Rights, on which the Strasbourg court bases its decisions, and on the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The latter states:
The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage.
The former states only that:
The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.In other words, the European Convention respects the right to free and fair elections but does not demand that those elected respect the wishes of those who elected them, nor that a country’s legislature should be in ultimate charge."
How will you vote in the General Opinion Poll of 2015?
But maybe, even after the debacle of the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum, electoral reform is still possible, particularly in the event that Scotland decides to vote this autumn for secession from the Union. Already the Scottish Parliament has a much fairer system; perhaps the Scots will once again show us the way.
* I should like to know the names of those few who sat on their hands - they would be part of my first Cabinet if I were "in power".
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Monday, August 04, 2014
A dumb question
And what will happen next?READER: PLEASE CLICK THE REACTION BELOW - THANKS!
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Ayn Rand quote of the day
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| (Pic source) |
"A trader does not ask to be paid for his failures."
- http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/trader_principle.html
Discuss, with reference to the banking system.
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Iceland - top country
The Global Peace Index for 2014 ranks Iceland first (htp: Tony Blair Faith Foundation). Here are the top ten:
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| Source |
Iceland's come a long way since the time of the Sagas:
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| Source: Wikipedia |
But then, so has everyone else.
The UK is 47th, overall. You can look at our country in detail according to various indices for 2012, here - and the US is here (Vermont looks good).
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Sunday, August 03, 2014
The challenge of contentment
The good life in ancient China was to be free from work, sit quietly in a house in the mountains, drink wine and contemplate the moon, in the company of your friends and concubine.
Thanks to cable TV, there is no need to go elsewhere. Whether on holiday or even unemployed, we can stay at home and have drink, pals, sex and watch nature programmes.
The trick is to become the kind of person that can simply enjoy it.
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| Pic source |
Thanks to cable TV, there is no need to go elsewhere. Whether on holiday or even unemployed, we can stay at home and have drink, pals, sex and watch nature programmes.
The trick is to become the kind of person that can simply enjoy it.
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Saturday, August 02, 2014
Children's games
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| http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children's_Games_(Bruegel)# |
In Philip K Dick's "Minority Report" anthology there is a short story called "War Game" (1959). A foreign power is subverting capitalist culture with a Monopoly-type board game in which the objective is not to get rich but actually to get rid of money and property. In the story, the children love it.
We were given similar messages in the Sixties, ironically by people who were or became millionaires - think of Pink Floyd's song "Money", the film "The Magic Christian" and so on. And as late as 1979, Pink Floyd were telling us "we don't need no education", though all its members were at technical colleges when they met each other. It is as though the long march through the institutions, having installed many bright grammar-school-educated Boomers in key positions, was to end with the systematic discouragement of similar competition from the next generation.
Last week, Julie Burchill wrote an excellent piece for The Spectator ("Meet the new faces of nepotism") on how the ladders of opportunity for the aspirant working-class have rattled up the walls. What matters now (again) is having the right parents:
"Yes, you chirpy Cockneys and you stoic Northerners, not only have the jobs your parents did — making things — disappeared, but the cushy jobs that a blessed few of you once might have escaped the surly bonds of the proletariat by nabbing — modelling, acting, writing for newspapers — have now been colonised by the children of the rich/famous/well-connected, too."
Now, the - well, now they are the underclass, thanks to GATT and Schengen, listen to hard-nosed rappers and play GTA5 with their primary age kids. I do wonder what this diet of violent games is doing to their imaginations and mental model of what society is really like. Perhaps the next revolution won't be students having self-righteous fun.
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Friday, August 01, 2014
Overpopulation and the New World Order
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| (Pic source) |
Meanwhile, as the world's population increases and we are crushed closer together, our social and political arrangements move towards tighter control, says JimQ on Washington's Blog, developing the ideas of Aldous Huxley, who "foretold all the indicators of a world descending into totalitarianism due to overpopulation, propaganda, brainwashing, consumerism, and dumbing down of a distracted populace in his 1958 reassessment of his 1931 novel Brave New World."
In the animal world, a population "correction" can be devastating:
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| (Source) |
But that is because animals lack foresight and management. In the event of global social breakdown - civil war or anarchy - such a disaster might happen to us.
The UN offers a range of projections:
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| (Source) |
And a heavily interconnected world is more vulnerable, in all sorts of ways. Rulers seem to think that centralisation is the answer, whereas diversification and dispersion may offer the best chance for species survival.
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Thursday, July 31, 2014
Scotland's Government-appointed godparents
I don't know how I missed this...
"The proposal to appoint specific named persons from the NHS and councils to monitor every young person's well-being from birth to 18 is considered one of the most controversial aspects of the bill."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-26208628
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"The proposal to appoint specific named persons from the NHS and councils to monitor every young person's well-being from birth to 18 is considered one of the most controversial aspects of the bill."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-26208628
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Police pornography
"Police... arrested the teen and took him to juvenile jail, where Foster said they took photos of the teen’s genitals against his will.
"The case was set for trial on July 1, where Foster said Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Claiborne Richardson told her that her client must either plead guilty or police would obtain another search warrant “for pictures of his erect penis,” for comparison to the evidence from the teen’s cell phone.
"Foster asked how that would be accomplished and was told that “we just take him down to the hospital, give him a shot and then take the pictures that we need.” "
- Washington Post
For more on absurd and invasive officialdom, see this article on Ron Paul's site.
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"The case was set for trial on July 1, where Foster said Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Claiborne Richardson told her that her client must either plead guilty or police would obtain another search warrant “for pictures of his erect penis,” for comparison to the evidence from the teen’s cell phone.
"Foster asked how that would be accomplished and was told that “we just take him down to the hospital, give him a shot and then take the pictures that we need.” "
- Washington Post
For more on absurd and invasive officialdom, see this article on Ron Paul's site.
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Wednesday, July 30, 2014
Gone Goondi-very-windy
Expat Paul Tredgett recounts the challenges of an outback B&B in a hurricane...
Every business has difficult times, makes mistakes and disappoints customers. It is what you do from there which makes the difference. Sometimes the circumstances are beyond your control, but still how you respond makes the difference. What gets up people's noses is when nobody cares, when your are referred to somebody else to get rid of you, and you have to state your case again and again. Where you can’t even contact anybody with the authority to make a decision or resolve the issue. We’ve all been there.
Enter B&B. Or ‘Hosted Accommodation’. In nearly all cases, the owner is the operator on a property they own and consider home. I am one. I not only consider it a business obligation to provide the best service that I can, it is also part of my pride and emotional well-being to share my beautiful environment to provide an enjoyable and satisfying experience. And you have to go far to find the boss who can make decisions and resolve issues, he or she probably greeted you on arrival.
Recently Cyclone Ita molested this part of the coast and brought inconvenience to many.
The cyclone was only a cat 1 when it went somewhere near a couple of days ago. Pretty windy but only one tree across the track, not like the hundreds in the last 2 cyclones. But it rained a bit. 246 mm yesterday and most of that in 3 hours in the afternoon. In the middle of that wind and pelting rain, a guest arrived but I told him to stop at the top of the hill as the creek was 30m wide, navel deep and doing quite a rate of knots. Couldn’t even risk wading through. Fortunately, there is the bridge near Blackbean Cottage. It wasn’t visible, being 400mm underwater, but I assured him that there was one and please follow directly behind me, as it is quite narrow. I had one end of his wheelie suitcase. I disgraced myself twice by missing the bridge and plunging into the water, but had the presence of mind to let go the luggage which he manfully struggled to keep above the waters.
He later agreed that although he is very well traveled, he has never before had quite that experience when arriving at a hotel reception, with storm and tempest and disappearing receptionist/porter. Fortunately, he had a sense of humour.
The rest of the party has arrived yesterday, having flown from Sydney , but the plane made 2 aborted landing attempts before the pilot made a decision between discretion and valour and headed back to land in Brisbane. My guests were accommodated and flown back today at the airlines expense. Both the Gillies and Kuranda range still closed, probably land slips, so they came up the Palmeston. I do appreciate the effort they all made to get here. Lesser mortals would have just cancelled out.
Next day I assembled the able-bodied guests down at the bottom of the waterfall in the rainforest also known as ‘leech central’, due to their abundance there. The occasion was hauling the hydro generator out of the creek as it had been swept away in the floods. It weighs 110 kg and I needed the help.
B&B’s can provide personal service, direct involvement, interesting experiences and perhaps even an educational opportunity. A hotel or motel can provide predictable comfort ranging from adequate to luxurious depending on your budget, but B&B’s often provide something special that you have never experienced before.
Possum Valley is a bit on the wild side. Many offer gentle luxury. Choose carefully.
Originally posted on Paul's blog as "Awkward Moments."
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| Satellite image: Google |
Every business has difficult times, makes mistakes and disappoints customers. It is what you do from there which makes the difference. Sometimes the circumstances are beyond your control, but still how you respond makes the difference. What gets up people's noses is when nobody cares, when your are referred to somebody else to get rid of you, and you have to state your case again and again. Where you can’t even contact anybody with the authority to make a decision or resolve the issue. We’ve all been there.
Enter B&B. Or ‘Hosted Accommodation’. In nearly all cases, the owner is the operator on a property they own and consider home. I am one. I not only consider it a business obligation to provide the best service that I can, it is also part of my pride and emotional well-being to share my beautiful environment to provide an enjoyable and satisfying experience. And you have to go far to find the boss who can make decisions and resolve issues, he or she probably greeted you on arrival.
Recently Cyclone Ita molested this part of the coast and brought inconvenience to many.
The cyclone was only a cat 1 when it went somewhere near a couple of days ago. Pretty windy but only one tree across the track, not like the hundreds in the last 2 cyclones. But it rained a bit. 246 mm yesterday and most of that in 3 hours in the afternoon. In the middle of that wind and pelting rain, a guest arrived but I told him to stop at the top of the hill as the creek was 30m wide, navel deep and doing quite a rate of knots. Couldn’t even risk wading through. Fortunately, there is the bridge near Blackbean Cottage. It wasn’t visible, being 400mm underwater, but I assured him that there was one and please follow directly behind me, as it is quite narrow. I had one end of his wheelie suitcase. I disgraced myself twice by missing the bridge and plunging into the water, but had the presence of mind to let go the luggage which he manfully struggled to keep above the waters.
He later agreed that although he is very well traveled, he has never before had quite that experience when arriving at a hotel reception, with storm and tempest and disappearing receptionist/porter. Fortunately, he had a sense of humour.
The rest of the party has arrived yesterday, having flown from Sydney , but the plane made 2 aborted landing attempts before the pilot made a decision between discretion and valour and headed back to land in Brisbane. My guests were accommodated and flown back today at the airlines expense. Both the Gillies and Kuranda range still closed, probably land slips, so they came up the Palmeston. I do appreciate the effort they all made to get here. Lesser mortals would have just cancelled out.
Next day I assembled the able-bodied guests down at the bottom of the waterfall in the rainforest also known as ‘leech central’, due to their abundance there. The occasion was hauling the hydro generator out of the creek as it had been swept away in the floods. It weighs 110 kg and I needed the help.
B&B’s can provide personal service, direct involvement, interesting experiences and perhaps even an educational opportunity. A hotel or motel can provide predictable comfort ranging from adequate to luxurious depending on your budget, but B&B’s often provide something special that you have never experienced before.
Possum Valley is a bit on the wild side. Many offer gentle luxury. Choose carefully.
Originally posted on Paul's blog as "Awkward Moments."
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
It's okay to be free, as long as you don't tell anyone
"City officials ignored her activities until she went public and discussed them with Liza Fernandez, a reporter for a local TV station."
What activities? Disconnecting from city utilities and using rainwater and sunlight instead.
(htp: Ron Paul)
Sshhhhh!
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
What activities? Disconnecting from city utilities and using rainwater and sunlight instead.
(htp: Ron Paul)
Sshhhhh!
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
The encroachment of the State can't be stopped if people increasingly give it the justification
The case after case listed at the Ron Paul site is interesting, not just for the encroachment of the police state but for the stupidity and/or borderline criminality of the punished anyway:
All the while, state institution administrators draw fatcat salaries - witness the Baby P payout to Shoesmith. So what we have on the one hand is a society progressively debilitated, e.g. by the single parent family on benefits, the rise of gay adoption and so many other factors contributing to the death of the two original parent family which cost considerably less and gave a better chance to the child. Single parent families have issues.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/3235650/Children-in-single-parent-families-more-likely-to-suffer-emotional-problems-report-finds.html
Even left-leaning publications acknowledge certain facts:
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2012/07/single_motherhood_worse_for_children_.html
No one's suggesting it is the only factor - there is the world culture at an earlier and earlier age, dark gaming, children isolating themselves online, whereas once they were part of the family and so on and so on. The point being that the question of bad or irresponsible parenting is increasingly hard to define. It used to be the child found in squalour, with faeces about, having not being fed. But now even middle-class families which might have passed muster before fail on the criteria of increasingly empowered state agencies - hence the issues quoted and linked to above.
And every one of those defends to the death that the children are loved and are being brought up well, that the parent knows "tons" of other cases where the original parents are abusive to each other and so on. And once again, these people are not wrong. Nor are those pointing the finger at single parents' situations.
They're all correct on their side of the argument. The issues, not cut and dried and fiercely contested, are simply an open invitation for the Mentor Service to step in. The Mentor Service is the foot in the door. It's the Mentor who notices "the problem" and passes it on to Social Services. It is Social Services which take it up from there. Encroachment. It couldn't happen without something to point to and this vanguard of the state does have many things to point to, to justify its intervention.
Which intervention is, in principle, wrong and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Especially with Common Purpose and its brainwashing present in every council in England near the mayor's office. Common Purpose gets in on everything - witness Leveson. Some try to remove themselves from the State, from the grid but even that is fraught and anticipated. The Ron Paul site again:
So therefore, what chance that anything can change and halt the advance of the State via the backdoor route of bureaucracy at local level? The enormous danger is that the root causes are so diffuse, so hard to pin down, so removed from events further along the chain and so many people have bought into them that there is an inert but still collectively massive barrier to anything being done.
If, for example, the "all must have prizes" paradigm in schools is but a tiny issue on the surface of a wider malaise and a group of teachers have bought into that, those teachers are not going to support any connection made between that and the malaise of society which allows a portal for the State to move in, even if the case can be made. There's something for these individuals to lose here.
And that's how Them operates. It brings in legislation piece by piece via the backdoor, in response to some need perceived by people.
When they see that contrived need addressed, they're hardly likely to see that they have just enabled further totalitarianism. When the State publishing organ - the MSM - brings up obesity and paedophilia and smoking and this and that., it wants the people who love banning things to all speak up.
And slowly, the State, on the say-so of such people, bans this, then there's a new crisis and it bans that and onwards and onwards and then it extends it to everyone, just to be on the safe side, as in that Scottish Children's Ministry Mentor Number for all.
And there we are. Ninety Eighty-Four for a new age.
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Whether it’s the working mother arrested for letting her 9-year-old play unsupervised at a playground, the teenager forced to have his genitals photographed by police, the underage burglar sentenced to 23 years for shooting a retired police dog, or the 43-year-old man who died of a heart attack after being put in a chokehold by NYPD officers allegedly over the sale of untaxed cigarettes, the theater of the absurd that passes for life in the American police state grows more tragic and incomprehensible by the day.
In Georgia, a toddler had his face severely burned when a flash bang grenade, launched by a SWAT team during the course of a no-knock warrant, landed in his portable crib, detonating on his pillow. Also in Georgia, a police officer shot and killed a 17-year-old boy who answered the door, reportedly with a Nintendo Wii controller in his hands. The cop claimed the teenager pointed a gun at her, thereby justifying the use of deadly force.
Then there was the incident wherein a police officer, responding to a complaint that some children were “chopping off tree limbs” creating “tripping hazards,”pulled a gun on a group of 11-year-old boys who were playing in a wooded area, attempting to build a tree fort.The trouble is, the criticism of both sides is justified. Yes, the SWAT team and female police officer were not only way OTT but they were criminal as well. On the other hand, the burglar shooting the police dog needed to be put away all right. But for 23 years? The public itself is making it so easy for the enforcers to get in and do what they shouldn't. Much has been written about Mentoring programmes and these look nasty. It's become a science with its own sets of qualifications, extending the social service departments of local authorities to almost ravening monsters, ready to step in and remove a child at a moment's notice. The product of Children's Minister Aileen Campbell's backers:
Unfortunately, this dystopian future has arrived a little faster than I imagined, as last week the Scottish Government’s plan to give every child a state guardian from birth was launched. This state-appointed overseer will be a specific, named individual, and every child will have one, from birth. The responsibility for creating this named guardian will fall on the heads of the health boards for the first five years of a child’s life, before being transferred to councils. Perhaps the most worrying aspect of this development is that it clearly comes in large part as a mechanism to target and prevent child abuse.It's not just over here:
Boston Children’s Hospital and the Massachusetts Department of Youth and Families take another child hostage because hospital staff disagree with the parents on the child’s medical diagnosis. In California, “Baby Sammy” was taken from his parents because they left one hospital to seek a second opinion at another before subjecting the child to open-heart surgery. In Ohio, an Amish family was forced to flee the country to spare their daughter unwanted and dangerous chemo-therapy, including a cocktail of drugs not approved for children by the FDA. Reports indicate the girl is in remission through natural means, but the Ohio hospital and child services department are livid.In every case though, there were ostensible justifications which many might agree with. In other words, there is a new era of parental irresponsibility, particularly with the young and single parent. Over here, Labour acknowledges the problem but as it always does, tries to sheet it home to poverty because that ties into inequality and that means the rich can be slugged and the middle-class further attacked and eroded to "even the playing field" to that of stagnant mediocrity.
All the while, state institution administrators draw fatcat salaries - witness the Baby P payout to Shoesmith. So what we have on the one hand is a society progressively debilitated, e.g. by the single parent family on benefits, the rise of gay adoption and so many other factors contributing to the death of the two original parent family which cost considerably less and gave a better chance to the child. Single parent families have issues.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/3235650/Children-in-single-parent-families-more-likely-to-suffer-emotional-problems-report-finds.html
Even left-leaning publications acknowledge certain facts:
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2012/07/single_motherhood_worse_for_children_.html
No one's suggesting it is the only factor - there is the world culture at an earlier and earlier age, dark gaming, children isolating themselves online, whereas once they were part of the family and so on and so on. The point being that the question of bad or irresponsible parenting is increasingly hard to define. It used to be the child found in squalour, with faeces about, having not being fed. But now even middle-class families which might have passed muster before fail on the criteria of increasingly empowered state agencies - hence the issues quoted and linked to above.
And every one of those defends to the death that the children are loved and are being brought up well, that the parent knows "tons" of other cases where the original parents are abusive to each other and so on. And once again, these people are not wrong. Nor are those pointing the finger at single parents' situations.
They're all correct on their side of the argument. The issues, not cut and dried and fiercely contested, are simply an open invitation for the Mentor Service to step in. The Mentor Service is the foot in the door. It's the Mentor who notices "the problem" and passes it on to Social Services. It is Social Services which take it up from there. Encroachment. It couldn't happen without something to point to and this vanguard of the state does have many things to point to, to justify its intervention.
Which intervention is, in principle, wrong and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Especially with Common Purpose and its brainwashing present in every council in England near the mayor's office. Common Purpose gets in on everything - witness Leveson. Some try to remove themselves from the State, from the grid but even that is fraught and anticipated. The Ron Paul site again:
Meanwhile if you’re one of those hoping to live off the grid, independent of city resources, you might want to think again. Florida resident Robin Speronis was threatened with eviction for living without utilities. Speronis was accused of violating the International Property Maintenance Code by relying on rain water instead of the city water system and solar panels instead of the electric grid.Only an American phenomenon? Blogger Macheath, over here, tells this tale:
Decades ago, in the maternity ward of a hospital later castigated in the national press for its shortcomings, a combination of indifference and brutally rough handling provoked me into expressing my opinion of the ‘skills’ of some of the nursing staff. As the objects of my fury stalked off, another nurse remained behind; “Please be careful,” she said, “if you say things like that, they will report you as having postnatal psychosis and have the Social Services in. They might even take your child away.” Parents, it seems, criticise those placed in power over them at their own peril.The two points coming out of that are the danger and that it has been going on for a long time in the background in this country, only now it is coming to a head and reaching the press. The Ron Paul site again:
Now we can shrug these incidents off as isolated injustices happening to “other” people. We can rationalize them away by suggesting that these people “must” have done something to warrant such treatment. Or we can acknowledge that this slide into totalitarianism—helped along by overcriminalization, government surveillance, militarized police, neighbors turning in neighbors, privatized prisons, and forced labor camps, to name just a few similarities—is tracking very closely with what we saw happening in Germany in the years leading up to Hitler’s rise to power.
When all is said and done, what these incidents reflect is a society that has become so bureaucratic, so legalistic, so politically correct, so militaristic, so locked down, so self righteous, and so willing to march in lockstep with the corporate-minded police state that any deviations from the norm—especially those that offend the sensibilities of the “government-knows-best” nanny state or challenge the powers that be—become grist for prosecution, persecution and endless tribulations for the poor souls who are caught in the crosshairs.The people themselves must shoulder much of the blame for what they have become. They're almost inviting the State in with their irresponsibility and excessive self-centredness or even being innocent and finding themselves drawn into things made easy for them to be drawn into. The kindly offer of help. The kindly pay-day loan people. The kindly Mentor. Plus the infantilization of society in which parents would even countenance such things.
So who or what is to blame for this bureaucratic nightmare delivered by way of the police state? Is it the White House? Is it Congress? Is it the Department of Homeland Security, with its mobster mindset? Is it some shadowy, power-hungry entity operating off a nefarious plan?
Or is it, as Holocaust survivor Hannah Arendt suggests, the sheepish masses who mindlessly march in lockstep with the government’s dictates—expressing no outrage, demanding no reform, and issuing no challenge to the status quo—who are to blame for the prison walls being erected around us?
The author of The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt warned that “the greatest evil perpetrated is the evil committed by nobodies, that is, by human beings who refuse to be persons.”How many of the people described above are going to be remotely aware of what is happening? And of those who are aware, e.g. readers of this blog - how many dismiss it because it might criticize them either directly or obliquely?
So therefore, what chance that anything can change and halt the advance of the State via the backdoor route of bureaucracy at local level? The enormous danger is that the root causes are so diffuse, so hard to pin down, so removed from events further along the chain and so many people have bought into them that there is an inert but still collectively massive barrier to anything being done.
If, for example, the "all must have prizes" paradigm in schools is but a tiny issue on the surface of a wider malaise and a group of teachers have bought into that, those teachers are not going to support any connection made between that and the malaise of society which allows a portal for the State to move in, even if the case can be made. There's something for these individuals to lose here.
And that's how Them operates. It brings in legislation piece by piece via the backdoor, in response to some need perceived by people.
When they see that contrived need addressed, they're hardly likely to see that they have just enabled further totalitarianism. When the State publishing organ - the MSM - brings up obesity and paedophilia and smoking and this and that., it wants the people who love banning things to all speak up.
And slowly, the State, on the say-so of such people, bans this, then there's a new crisis and it bans that and onwards and onwards and then it extends it to everyone, just to be on the safe side, as in that Scottish Children's Ministry Mentor Number for all.
And there we are. Ninety Eighty-Four for a new age.
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The Human Fruit Machine
At the Marldon Apple Pie Fair, Devon, 26.07.2014
On a count of three, the children pull out a random fruit. We won! Brilliant.
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| The apple pie, served with clotted creammm |
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| The Exeter Pipe Band |
I was struck by the last tune they played before the march-off, so I asked Pipey. He gave a wry smile and told me it was "The Gael" from "Last of the Mohicans." Ignorant Sassenach, eh?
But I don't see why it can't be authentic if it's not ancient - after all, when the MacCrimmons composed theirs it was new to them. One day they'll honour the name of Dougie Maclean, too. Besides, I think the band's rendition was better than the film's soundtrack.
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Monday, July 28, 2014
Frederick Forsyth on freedom and security
Frederick Forsyth's latest thriller, "The Kill List", is as you'd expect, topical and gripping. An evil Islamic propagandist on the US Pesident's weekly-reviewed assassination list is tracked down and eliminated, using all the sophistication of computer hacking, spy drones and massive databases.
Forsyth's fiction is built on well-researched fact. The Presidential "kill list" really exists, and so does the secretive behemoth of Joint Special Ops Command (J-SOC). Here is an extract from Chapter Two:
"Nine Eleven had triggered a sea change in the American Armed Forces and governmental attitudes to any even remotely conceivable possible threat to the USA. National alertness inched its way towards paranoia. The original sixteen intel. gathering agencies of the USA ballooned to over a thousand.
"By 2012 accurate estimates put the number of Americans with top secret clearance at 850,000. Over 1,200 government organizations and 2,000 private companies were working on top secret projects related to counter-torrism and homeland security at over 10,000 locations across the country. [...]
"The most fundamental increase was in Joint Special Ops Command, or J-SOC. This body had existed for years before Nine Eleven but as a low-profile and principally defensive structure. Two men would convert it into the largest, most aggressive and most lethal private army in the world.
"The word 'private' is justified because it is the personal instrument of the President and of no other. It can conduct covert war without seeking any sanction from Congress; its multi-billion dollar budget is acquired without ever distrubing the Appropriations Committee, and it can kill you without ruffling the even tenor of the Attorney General's office. It is all top secret."
After this, I anticipated some moral complexity in Forsyth's story, but it concentrates on procedure - how the goodies finally get the baddies. Still, maybe he feels he's given us enough to think about here. After all, a novel is not a lecture.
For freedom and civil rights do seem to matter to him. Here he is in the Daily Express four years ago, commenting on David Davis' 2008 resignation on terror legislation issues:
"He resigned on a point of principle and that principle was the systematic annihilation of chunks of traditional British rights and freedoms by Labour on the usual grounds of “secooooority”. It happens he regards civil rights as damned important, hardly the hallmark of a hang-’em-and-flog-’em dinosaur.
"If to blow away your career on a point of humanitarian principle is “Right wing” some newspapers need a new dictionary. He is actually a traditionalist and things such as habeas corpus, presumed innocence until conviction and no detention without charge are traditional British rights."
How much does J-SOC cost? A secret, though it's thought to be in the billions. And how many lives has it saved - net, discounting for the innocents killed in Hellfire missile strikes and the like? Would the same money spent elsewhere do more good for less expense - for example, the $1,928 estimated cost per life saved in improving neonatal care?
And there are so many other ways to save life in the USA:
Instead, we have CIA torture (this from Texas Republican Ron Paul, who calls for the Agency to be shut down), and as Washington's Blog says, the crushing of dissent not only abroad but inside the US, plus the backing of ultra-violent groups in foreign countries.
And terrorist attacks on US citizens abroad?
Time for an enquiry into the cost-effectiveness of carte-blanche blank-cheque security arrangements?
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
Forsyth's fiction is built on well-researched fact. The Presidential "kill list" really exists, and so does the secretive behemoth of Joint Special Ops Command (J-SOC). Here is an extract from Chapter Two:
"Nine Eleven had triggered a sea change in the American Armed Forces and governmental attitudes to any even remotely conceivable possible threat to the USA. National alertness inched its way towards paranoia. The original sixteen intel. gathering agencies of the USA ballooned to over a thousand.
"By 2012 accurate estimates put the number of Americans with top secret clearance at 850,000. Over 1,200 government organizations and 2,000 private companies were working on top secret projects related to counter-torrism and homeland security at over 10,000 locations across the country. [...]
"The most fundamental increase was in Joint Special Ops Command, or J-SOC. This body had existed for years before Nine Eleven but as a low-profile and principally defensive structure. Two men would convert it into the largest, most aggressive and most lethal private army in the world.
"The word 'private' is justified because it is the personal instrument of the President and of no other. It can conduct covert war without seeking any sanction from Congress; its multi-billion dollar budget is acquired without ever distrubing the Appropriations Committee, and it can kill you without ruffling the even tenor of the Attorney General's office. It is all top secret."
After this, I anticipated some moral complexity in Forsyth's story, but it concentrates on procedure - how the goodies finally get the baddies. Still, maybe he feels he's given us enough to think about here. After all, a novel is not a lecture.
For freedom and civil rights do seem to matter to him. Here he is in the Daily Express four years ago, commenting on David Davis' 2008 resignation on terror legislation issues:
"He resigned on a point of principle and that principle was the systematic annihilation of chunks of traditional British rights and freedoms by Labour on the usual grounds of “secooooority”. It happens he regards civil rights as damned important, hardly the hallmark of a hang-’em-and-flog-’em dinosaur.
"If to blow away your career on a point of humanitarian principle is “Right wing” some newspapers need a new dictionary. He is actually a traditionalist and things such as habeas corpus, presumed innocence until conviction and no detention without charge are traditional British rights."
How much does J-SOC cost? A secret, though it's thought to be in the billions. And how many lives has it saved - net, discounting for the innocents killed in Hellfire missile strikes and the like? Would the same money spent elsewhere do more good for less expense - for example, the $1,928 estimated cost per life saved in improving neonatal care?
And there are so many other ways to save life in the USA:
 |
Source: Wikipedia |
Instead, we have CIA torture (this from Texas Republican Ron Paul, who calls for the Agency to be shut down), and as Washington's Blog says, the crushing of dissent not only abroad but inside the US, plus the backing of ultra-violent groups in foreign countries.
And terrorist attacks on US citizens abroad?
 |
Figure 2-01. Leading causes of injury death for US citizens in foreign countries, 2009–20111,2 (Source) |
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Tuesday, July 22, 2014
The rise and fall of the gentleman
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| Source |
Do you know any gentlemen? Perhaps you do - perhaps you are even a member of that apparently dwindling band? For we chaps it's not an easy question is it - am I a gentleman?
In my case the answer is a reluctant "no". It may not even be a practical proposition in the modern world yet I have a sneaking suspicion that those with no wish to be a gentleman probably aren't.
I may as well add here that I prefer not to pose a similar question our lady readers. If I may I'll stick to the gentlemen - to coin a phrase.
gentleman
Pronunciation: /ˈdʒɛnt(ə)lmən
NOUN (plural gentlemen)
1 A chivalrous, courteous, or honourable man: he behaved throughout like a perfect gentleman
Historically a gentleman has been many things and chivalrous might be a tad tricky in most areas of modern life, but courteous and honourable shouldn't be too difficult surely? Our leaders could easily set the trend - leading by example in fact...
...oh dear. I see this line of reasoning might compel me to say something ungentlemanly about our leaders. Which is something I usually enjoy but for the moment I'd better say nothing and move on to a less unsavoury subject.
In fifty years there will be nothing in Europe but Presidents of Republics, not one King left. And with those four letters K-I-N-G, go the priests and the gentlemen. I can see nothing but candidates paying court to draggletailed majorities.
Stendhal - Le Rouge et le Noir (1830)
When Stendhal wrote these words, the use of the term gentleman already seems to have begun its apparently terminal decline although there has been an uptick in recent years. Not exactly a hockey stick though and I'm sure the meaning has shifted anyway.
Not that we should put too much weight on gentlemanly shoulders because at least some were mountebanks, seducers of virgin innocence and even bankers. Dickens created a few, such as the ghastly Pecksniff who certainly posed as a gentleman, albeit not one of independent means.
So coming back to our less than illustrious leaders as I suppose we must in these troubled times, how about our current crop? Are they gentlemen? Mr Putin? Mr Cameron? Mr Obama?
Would it help if they were - or have we been seduced by the myths of realpolitik?
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Ukraine: Raedwald's take
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| Cartoon: Taylor Jones |
Raedwald's piece on possible sanctions against Russia includes the potential harm to Eurozone's industry and its banks (which have made big loans to Russia).
So the question is, how much does the USA care about the European side-effects of its geopolitical strategy?
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Monday, July 21, 2014
Russia and the Great Game revisited
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| (pic source) |
A couple of months ago I looked at Russia's possible longer-term evolution ("Russia's big plans", April 28); now Peter Hitchens, still struggling to get a balanced message across all the shrilling, reminds us of the bigger picture as seen by the USA:
"It’s useful, at this point, to recall words written by Zbigniew Brzezinski( Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser, and the unsung architect of Moscow’s doomed intervention and eventual downfall in Afghanistan. He wrote in his 1997 book ‘The Grand Chessboard’ : ‘Ukraine, a new and important space on the Eurasian chessboard, is a geopolitical pivot because its very existence as an independent country helps to transform Russia. Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be a Eurasian empire.’
"‘However, if Moscow regains control over Ukraine, with its 52 million people and major resources as well as access to the Black Sea, Russia automatically again regains the wherewithal to become a powerful imperial state, spanning Europe and Asia.’"
This provides a context for what seems to be an economic war using European gas consumption as its battleground, as discussed earlier today ("A dirty war for clean energy: Ukraine and beyond").
The attempt to contain Russia, which is under pressure to expand economically in order to stave off a kind of collapse, could potentially be as dangerous as the imperial hemming-in of Germany before WWI, or the victors' pound-of-flesh approach to Germany after 1918.
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A dirty war for clean energy: Ukraine and beyond
From Martin Armstrong today (emphases mine):
"We are getting info from reliable sources that there may be another layer to the USA v Russian conflict. Just as the entire Syrian agenda was to arm terrorists to topple the Syrian government in order to push through a pipeline to cut off the energy monopoly in Europe held by Russia, we may be actually seeing another motive here. The projections of fracking technology that the USA will become a net exporter of energy has set the stage for another perhaps covert move – sanctions against Russia to open the European market for energy. In this new war of words and sanctions against Russia, it is the Americans who seem to be marching either totally brain-dead, or with another energy secret agenda. This very will may be all about one thing -:taking the Russian energy market from them. To turn off Russia as a competitor, the Russian president is to be internationally isolated. The shooting down of flight MH17 is playing into this agenda and comes precisely at the right moment to aid the U.S. strategy on energy. We will keep you advised on this matter."
And from an October 2012 VT article:
"The significant question to be asked at this point is what could bind Israel, Turkey, Qatar in a form of unholy alliance on the one side, and Assad’s Syria, Iran, Russia and China on the other side, in such deadly confrontation over the political future of Syria? One answer is energy geopolitics.
What has yet to be fully appreciated in geopolitical assessments of the Middle East is the dramatically rising importance of the control of natural gas to the future of not only Middle East gas producing countries, but also of the EU and Eurasia including Russia as producer and China as consumer.
"Natural gas is rapidly becoming the “clean energy” of choice to replace coal and nuclear electric generation across the European Union, most especially since Germany’s decision to phase out nuclear after the Fukushima disaster. Gas is regarded as far more “environmentally friendly” in terms of its so-called “carbon footprint.”
"The only realistic way EU governments, from Germany to France to Italy to Spain, will be able to meet EU mandated CO2 reduction targets by 2020 is a major shift to burning gas instead of coal. Gas reduces CO2 emissions by 50-60% over coal.[xiii]
"Given that the economic cost of using gas instead of wind or other alternative energy forms is dramatically lower, gas is rapidly becoming the energy of demand for the EU, the biggest emerging gas market in the world.
"Huge gas resource discoveries in Israel, in Qatar and in Syria combined with the emergence of the EU as the world’s potentially largest natural gas consumer, combine to create the seeds of the present geopolitical clash over the Assad regime.
Is our navy fighting for oil interests?
"In July 2011, as the NATO and Gulf states’ destabilization operations against Assad in Syria were in full swing, the governments of Syria, Iran and Iraq signed an historic gas pipeline energy agreement which went largely unnoticed amid CNN reports of the Syrian unrest..."
There's more, lots more, in that VT piece.
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
"We are getting info from reliable sources that there may be another layer to the USA v Russian conflict. Just as the entire Syrian agenda was to arm terrorists to topple the Syrian government in order to push through a pipeline to cut off the energy monopoly in Europe held by Russia, we may be actually seeing another motive here. The projections of fracking technology that the USA will become a net exporter of energy has set the stage for another perhaps covert move – sanctions against Russia to open the European market for energy. In this new war of words and sanctions against Russia, it is the Americans who seem to be marching either totally brain-dead, or with another energy secret agenda. This very will may be all about one thing -:taking the Russian energy market from them. To turn off Russia as a competitor, the Russian president is to be internationally isolated. The shooting down of flight MH17 is playing into this agenda and comes precisely at the right moment to aid the U.S. strategy on energy. We will keep you advised on this matter."
And from an October 2012 VT article:
 |
| (source: Veterans Today) |
"The significant question to be asked at this point is what could bind Israel, Turkey, Qatar in a form of unholy alliance on the one side, and Assad’s Syria, Iran, Russia and China on the other side, in such deadly confrontation over the political future of Syria? One answer is energy geopolitics.
What has yet to be fully appreciated in geopolitical assessments of the Middle East is the dramatically rising importance of the control of natural gas to the future of not only Middle East gas producing countries, but also of the EU and Eurasia including Russia as producer and China as consumer.
"Natural gas is rapidly becoming the “clean energy” of choice to replace coal and nuclear electric generation across the European Union, most especially since Germany’s decision to phase out nuclear after the Fukushima disaster. Gas is regarded as far more “environmentally friendly” in terms of its so-called “carbon footprint.”
"The only realistic way EU governments, from Germany to France to Italy to Spain, will be able to meet EU mandated CO2 reduction targets by 2020 is a major shift to burning gas instead of coal. Gas reduces CO2 emissions by 50-60% over coal.[xiii]
"Given that the economic cost of using gas instead of wind or other alternative energy forms is dramatically lower, gas is rapidly becoming the energy of demand for the EU, the biggest emerging gas market in the world.
"Huge gas resource discoveries in Israel, in Qatar and in Syria combined with the emergence of the EU as the world’s potentially largest natural gas consumer, combine to create the seeds of the present geopolitical clash over the Assad regime.
Is our navy fighting for oil interests?"In July 2011, as the NATO and Gulf states’ destabilization operations against Assad in Syria were in full swing, the governments of Syria, Iran and Iraq signed an historic gas pipeline energy agreement which went largely unnoticed amid CNN reports of the Syrian unrest..."
There's more, lots more, in that VT piece.
READER: PLEASE CLICK THE REACTION BELOW - THANKS!
All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Cabinet reshuffle
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| Pic: Facebook |
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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.
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