The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it - Henry David Thoreau

Thursday, March 04, 2010

With a caveat that the sequel is rarely as good as the original....

I wanted to follow up on Hal’s post from a couple of days ago on the financial turmoil that’s been going on in Greece.  This has been an object of somewhat obsessive attention over at Zerohedge the past few weeks, and the focus has largely been on the similarities between this and what happened when TARP was being debated.  While I can certainly see this as applied to a continental rather than national scale, I think the implications here are far greater.

In my opinion, what is going on in Greece marks it as a bellwether on the survivability of the EU in the short-term, and the welfare state in the long-term. The EU has two choices--1) come up with some sort of bailout plan for a member nation who, economically speaking, is something of a red-headed stepchild due to its lack of economic diversity (most jobs in Greece are in government or tourism); or 2) tell them “Sorry, we can’t throw good money after bad,” and Greece ends up leaving the EU to go back to a vastly devalued Drachma.

If the EU picks the first option, it’s going to open the floodgates.  Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Ireland are all in way over their heads in government debt, with France, the UK, and Germany not too far behind.  It will be impossible for the more stable members of the EU to justify denying bailouts to the the other PIIGS, when they spent all this time agonizing over how to fix the problem and came up with a bailout as the way to fix things.  The “austerity measures” put in by Greece are a joke, because it doesn’t change the fundamental culture of entitlement that’s infected the populace, so they’ll likely end up having to come back to the trough again in a year or so begging for more.

If the second option is chosen, what motivation would Greece or the other PIIGS have to stay in the EU?  The whole idea behind the EU was to create an economic superpower that could compete with the US and Russia for global trade.  If the EU won’t prop up a member of its own economic alliance, why should Italy or Spain or Portugal bother staying in?  Better to just cut loose and try to figure things out on their own without subjecting the country’s citizens to endless agonizing uncertainty on the economic direction of the nation.

Either way, count on what happens with Greece to eventually filter over to the United States at some point.  As Hal pointed out, Greece’s welfare state, like most European nations, is quite robust and the populace has come to depend on entitlement programs--specifically, the national pension system--as their means of survival.  In the same way, Social Security, Medicare, and pension systems here in the US are seen as necessary by most Americans--an entitlement that comes with putting money into a system and expecting financial compensation at a later date.  The problem is that these programs have finally reached the breaking point of sustainability.

Why?  Check out these graphs, the first from Zerohedge and the second from Mish:

Friday, February 26, 2010

I did not watch that 7+ hour freakshow that the democrats were hoping to use as a vehicle to paint the republicans as evil “no sayers” with no ideas or plans on healthcare with the help of the usual suspects in their controlled MSM – while anyone that had the ability to navigate a web browser and Google could see these donkeys were full of it – and I am glad I didn’t waste my time. The democrats pretended to care and to want bipartisanship, only they meant by bipartisanship that the republicans should do what they wanted and be happy about it. The leftist twits are now threatening reconciliation – a process that has never been used in the way they intend to abuse it, but we are talking about the party of the end justifies the means after all here – despite the public objection to this debacle. It is now or never and all or nothing with these fools. And they are continuing to pretend that they are doing it to help the country and the people economically, while also providing care to all those poor people that can’t afford it. How noble, but al bullshit. The end game still is to have government literally take over and control 1/5th of our economy. Not to mention get the power over life and death decisions. Fun stuff, but I want to talk about the cost to us tax payers.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Ever getting more desperate to lay blame on everything but the failures of the collectivist ideology and the stupidity of those that actually think they can make the wealth redistribution scheme work, we now have Zapatero in Spain -another one of the collectivist hell-holes in Europe that after the Madrid bombing took a turn for the worst, abandoned the changes instituted by the previous administration to reverse the damage done by dumb collectivist economics, and destroyed its economy in the process - blaming, hold your horses cause this is a doozy, the Anglo-Saxon media?

Socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has ordered Spain’s official intelligence agency, the National Intelligence Center (CNI), to investigate whether the “Anglo-Saxon media” (aka English-language press) is conspiring to undermine the Spanish economy. According to the center-left newspaper El País, which is close to the Zapatero government, the CNI is investigating “whether attacks by investors and the aggressiveness of some Anglo-Saxon media are being driven by market forces and challenges facing the Spanish economy, or whether there is something more behind this campaign.” In recent weeks, the UK-based Financial Times newspaper and the Economist magazine, as well as some publications in the United States, have all published stories that have been highly critical of the economic policies being pursued by the Zapatero government.

Let me get this straight. The Spanish PM has sicked the Spanish intelligence service on the Anglo-Saxon media, in particular the financial media, for having the temerity to point out that the Spanish economy is a basket case due to the collectivist policies that simply are unsustainable? Where are the calls of fascism from the left on this? Cause you can’t get more fascist than concocting a phony conspiracy for the reason your economic practices fail and then using the power of the state to make it look like you actually have a case. I am sure the Spanish are now all feeling better that their PM has figured out who to go after while the unsustainable collectivist house of cards implodes around them. If you dig a little deeper though you find out what the problem really is.

Spain now faces the prospect of a downgrade of its government debt, which would make it more expensive for Spain to finance its debt. Indeed, investors anxious that a debt crisis in Greece could create a domino effect in Spain are already demanding higher interest rates to hold Spanish debt. As a result, the Zapatero government is working overtime to try to reassure debt markets that it will quickly return to fiscal prudence

We once talked about the domino effect when addressing the expansion of collectivism in the form of communism. The left hated that then, and has done its best to discredit the idea, or the danger posed by said communist expansion. The bad guy was always the west for fighting it. Communism was no threat at all! It is hilarious, at least to me, that we are now seeing a similar terminology applied to the collapse of another collectivist ideology that has crippled the western world. If man would but learn the lesson that stealing from those that produce to buy privilege and power through the redistribution of the ill gotten gains, all under the guise of helping the less well off, is a recipe for disaster, we would have a chance. Of course, with the left hell bent on doing the damage no matter the resistance, we might just be doomed no matter what. Maybe Obama can blame the economic implosion he is presiding over on Bush too....

Thursday, February 18, 2010

I can’t believe the many levels of irony wrapped up in the Greek anger at the German refusal to bail the m out. Literally class warfare at its best! The poor Greek are now angry at the rich and well off Germans for not feeling obligated to save them from decades of their own mistakes, mismanagement, and misfortunes. And this is going on in collectivist Europe! Greece is broke, but because it is part of the EU, it can’t simply use the old standby of the pre EU days, and devalue its currency. So the other EU states demanded austerity measures. Germany’s leaders which just recently upped the retirement age from 65 to 67, in large part to address the unsustainable costs of the nanny state and the looming fiscal disaster, simply decided that handing the Greeks, whom can retire at 61 and were refusing to even go along and only promising (one that they would not keep I bet) to do something around 2015 by going to the hard age of 63, a wad of cash was not going to be well received by the German voters, and decided to put their foot down. And that pissed of the Greeks.

The Greeks feel that the greedy damned Germans don’t want to do their civic duty and pony up cash. Conversely the Germans are pissed that the lazy Greeks just want to make them pay for their sweet life. You have the Greeks – whom aren’t very well known for any kind of work ethic and love to party – angry at the Germans for not wanting to subsidize their ride. Where have we seen this before? I mean, is this hilarity or what? This kind of economic model was doomed from the start, but the evil ones are the ones that do not feel obligated to part with the fruits of their labor for whatever sad story the other side wants to use to keep the cushy life. If we were not heading the same way, this would be classic comedy. As for the future of the EU? My guess is the Euro goes bye-bye soonish. The Greeks are not interested in changing the way things are. The better off Euroepean countries are drawing the line because if they do this for Greece now they will have to do it for Portugal, Spain, Ireland, maybe Italy, and sooner than later Greece again. The end result is the same though: sooner than later the golden goose dies off, or cuts off the parasites feasting on it.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Just after one year of “Hope and Change” it looks like people are wising up that they got sold the same bill of loser collectivist goods of the Carter years, and pining for those bad days they told us we had when republicans were in charge. As reality clashes with fantasy and things like this, this, this, this, this, this, and this keep happening, the democrats continue to pretend that what people want is bigger government, a complete takeover of healthcare - 1/5th of the economy - by that big government, and a massive migration from jobs in the private sector to a fraction of the number of jobs lost there in the public sector. And that doesn’t tackle the complete collapse of the AGW scam which wanted to expand the government take over globally and other such stupid ideas. At least Clinton was smart enough to be saved by a republican takeover of congress in 2004. I doubt Obama, a true believer, will be able to make the same connections. After all, he was told he was the messiah and could walk on water.

As I said before, a few years of the democrats in power would be enough to make many see the light. I just didn’t think it could take but one year for that to happen. I could not believe that the democrats were really this inept and stupid, but they are hard at work proving me both right and wrong. Democrats are good at manipulating the news, with help of the complicit MSM, to attack their opponents when they are in power. Unfortunately now that they are in power, even with massive help covering up for them by the MSM, they can’t hide how inept they are. Reality has a way of destroying most collectivist fantasies, and what is happening isn’t anything new. The fun thing is that I get to bring out my latest find, a poster on some highway in the Mid West that tells the story better than anything else:

Give it time. The numbers are getting bigger and bigger, and all but the most hard core leftists are agreeing that for all his faults, and he had them believe me, Bush was heads and shoulders a better president than the current community organizer in chief….

Saturday, January 23, 2010

About time too:

The director of a company which sold a bomb-detecting device to 20 countries, including Iraq, has been arrested.

ATSC’s Jim McCormick, 53, was detained on Friday on suspicion of fraud by misrepresentation, Avon and Somerset police said. He has since been bailed.

It comes after a BBC investigation alleged the ADE-651 did not work.

Earlier, the British government announced a ban on the export of the device to Iraq and Afghanistan, where British forces are serving.

...

Mr McCormick has said the device, sold from offices in Sparkford, Somerset, used special electronic cards slotted into it to detect explosives.

But a BBC Newsnight investigation reported that a computer laboratory said the card it examined contained only a tag used by shops to prevent theft.

There are concerns the detectors have failed to stop bomb attacks which have killed hundreds of people.

This device is essentially a dowsing rod and is a complete sham.  But because it’s cheap and well-marketed, Iraqi police stocked up on them.  But this particular brand of bullshit was killing people.  It’s estimated that over a hundred people were dying every month because of this piece of claptrap.

Fraud and misrepresentation seem a bit weak for this.  I would suggest treason.  Stick his head on a pike in front of Buckingham as a warning to other pseudoscience frauds.

Thursday, January 07, 2010

No matter how bad things get in this country, we can comfort ourselves with the words everyone has used since the Battle of Alesia: at least we’re not France:

If you insult your wife or husband repeatedly, you could soon find yourself in court if you live in France.

The charge? Psychological violence.

That’s what the new offence will be called if a bill backed by the government is passed by parliament.

Once considered a purely private domain, rows between married or cohabiting couples could now prompt intervention from the state.

The French government wants to take the controversial step of introducing a new law banning “psychological violence” between married couples or partners living together.

I’m not going to defend people who are verbally abusive toward anyone.  I’ve know women (and men) in abusive relationships and have little but contempt for the perpetrators.  They illustrate it with a story of a man who was vile to his wife.  I knew a similar case where a man’s constant harassing of his girlfriend on the subject of her weight made her anorexic.

But I am going to go out on a limb and ask government how it judges these things, how it proves them and how it justifies fining or jailing or someone because of it.  This seems to be a law against being mean.  With my aforementioned friend, I don’t think the cops would have helped.  What ultimately prevailed was her friends getting her to dump the motherfucker.

There’s also the problem that abuse is in the eye of the abusee.  I know people who go to pieces over the slightly bit of criticism.  And I know people who can weather the most vile slanders without a problem.  These sort of laws wind up going into problematic gray areas that criminal law should avoid.  One of the reasons we can outlaw physical abuse is because we can define it for every case.  Verbal abuse ... not so much.

Lawyer Laurent Hincker, a fervent supporter of the bill, said it would not be the only crime on the books that is difficult to prove.

“There are other crimes which are also hard to prove, such as bullying or harassment in the workplace,” he said.

“For a long time people said you can’t have a law against bullying because it’s too difficult to prove, but now there is a law and people get convicted.”

Bullying shouldn’t be against the law either, but that’s a subject for another post.  Notice, however, the eternal creep of the Nanny State.  And remember that there are many people in this country who wants laws against bullying.

I also like the “we know when we see it” evidentiary standard given by the psychiatric profession for how this sort of violence can be proven in court.  In short, the French want to put shrinks in charge of the justice system.

Yeah, that’s going to work out just great.

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Good grief:

The British government decided it was “in the overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom” to make Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber, eligible for return to Libya, leaked ministerial letters reveal.

Gordon Brown’s government made the decision after discussions between Libya and BP over a multi-million-pound oil exploration deal had hit difficulties. These were resolved soon afterwards.

The letters were sent two years ago by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, to Kenny MacAskill, his counterpart in Scotland, who has been widely criticised for taking the formal decision to permit Megrahi’s release.

The correspondence makes it plain that the key decision to include Megrahi in a deal with Libya to allow prisoners to return home was, in fact, taken in London for British national interests.

The dirty little secret of Europen’s policy on the Middle East is that oil concerns tend to dwarf everything.  The imperative is to not piss OPEC off and risk recreating the embargo of the 70’s.  But this is a step beyond even that.

If the accusations are borne out—and the paper of the people who actually do run the country makes a good case—I have to think this is the final nail in Labour’s coffin.  Te decision to release Megrahi was unpopular at best.  But releasing a mass murderer for oil?  Only evil Bushes are supposed to do that.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

What?:

Jenny Palmer, 28, was asked for her ID at the checkout after she went to the retailer’s Derby store to buy the £1.50 item.
“I’m only two years off my 30th birthday and hardly look like I’m going to go out and physically harm someone,” she said.

“I told the checkout woman I was buying it because I was moving into a new house, but she said her screen was telling her to ask for ID. I think she could have used some common sense. I can’t believe I had to go through all of that just to buy a pizza-cutter, of all things.”

M&S insisted its employee was right to demand proof of age from Ms Palmer under the ‘Challenge 25’ policy.

Staff are required to ask for identification from any customer who tries to buy alcohol or a bladed item and appears younger than 25.

Thanks God for M&S pushing the UK crusade against knives to such an absurd extreme.  My new job will require periodic trips to the UK and I’m in terror of being set upon by vicious gangs of British thugs wielding pizza cutters.  If they knew what they were doing, they could turn the cutters to one side and beat me with them.

(H/T: Popehat and Overlawyered.)

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Germany’s reaction to the recent school shooting—tougher gun laws—didn’t surprise me.  But this story makes me think they’re trying to win some kind of gold medal in European Wussiness.

Like gamers around the world, Germans love their shoot-’em-ups. Sure, video gaming isn’t quite the industry in Germany that it is in the U.S. (or some other parts of Europe), but it’s still an enormous market for the industry.

Those days are quite likely to come to a screeching halt in a matter of weeks, as Germany is well on its way to banning all “violent video games,” defined (via translation) as games “where the main part is to realistically play the killing of people or other cruel or inhuman acts of violence against humans or manlike characters.”

...

The move isn’t just one politician banging a shoe on the podium in outrage. All 16 German states have already agreed on the move and are set on implementing it—and soon. The only real hurdle remaining is pushing the law through German parliament, and that could happen before the end of the summer.

Pure panic.  How much evidence is there that violent games cause violence?  Not much, actually.  The Germans would probably achieve an equivalent reduction in their (already low) level of violence by banning lederhosen.  Fat drunken men in leather shorts certainly brings out my violent side.

I could rehash my argument on the violent entertainment question.  But instead, I’ll just take the lazy writer’s out and quote myself.

I believe that human beings are a violent species. We have to be. We are carnivores who have come to dominate the planet. The quest of civilization is not to end those violent urges, but to channel them into less destructive paths. Hence, the pretend violence of movies or video games, I believe, is a good thing. It satisfies our violent urge without doing any real harm.

People who think that violent entertainment is new need to get some historical perspective (in fact, everyone needs to get some historical perspective about just about everything — but that’s another post).

Two thousand years ago, entertainment consisted of tossing Christians to lions. Real people, real lions, real screams, real blood, real suffering. And the Romans considered it good for children to watch — it built character.

Five hundred years ago, the Spanish were torturing heretics as entertainment. Real people, real hot irons, real screams, real blood, real suffering. And they considered it good for children to watch and see the fruits of blasphemy. Around that time, cat-burning was popular in France. This consisted of lowering a bound cat over flames and laughing and feasting as it screamed. The medieval world and parts of the modern world are replete with similar examples.

A hundred years ago in this country, we performed executions in public. It was considered good entertainment if the noose failed to snap their neck and the condemned kicked and struggled while slowly choking over hours or days. It was considered good for children to go and see the fruits of criminality.

In light of this bloody history, I just can’t get worked up over two guys firing blanks at each other on TV or some kid blowing away pixels on a video screen.

I would add that many parts of the world—Sudan, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan—somehow find ways to wreck unspeakable violence in real life without any prompting from Doom.  I would make that point, but it would be too pedantic even for me.

The game-grabbers are certainly aware of all this—at least on some level.  The problem is that the push to restrict violent video games and movies had nothing to do with real violence—which is currently very low in Western countries.  It’s about control.  It’s about keeping track of what we say, do, watch or enjoy and making sure it conforms to their warped view of what human beings should be like.  They can not possibly accept that we are what we are—a flawed and troublesome product of evolution that is trying its best to muddle through the universe.

Monday, May 18, 2009

It sounds like the members of Parliament are shocked that there was gambling going on in their establishment:

Battered and in grave political peril after a series of humiliating disclosures about the liberties they take with their expense accounts, members of Parliament vented their frustration on their own presiding officer on Monday, saying he had lost moral authority and should resign immediately.

In an extraordinary scene in the usually smooth-running House of Commons, Michael Martin, the speaker, attempted to maintain order even as legislators from all the main parties, their voices vibrating with indignation, demanded that he go.

He kept his composure, but power and authority all but drained out of him as the session went on. He was heckled whenever he spoke, so that he would repeat “Order! Order!” in the middle of his own remarks.

“The reputation and standing of this house, in the views of those that send us here, is at the lowest point I can ever remember,” Richard Shepherd, a Conservative member of Parliament, declared, addressing his remarks to Mr. Martin, sitting in the speaker’s chair overhead.

Not being that familiar with British parliamentary procedure, I’d be curious to see how far they are able to take this. Would this be the equivalent of Republicans calling for Nancy Pelosi to resign?

Tuesday, May 05, 2009

What the?

White supremacists, Islamic clerics, a controversial Kansas pastor and a U.S. talk show host are on a list of 22 people banned from Britain for “stirring up hatred,” the British government said Tuesday.

Britain’s Home Office said it decided to exclude the 22 in the last several months. That decision follows measures introduced by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith last year against people “who have engaged in spreading hate,” the Home Office said.

The Home Office named only 16 of those on the list; it said it was not in the public interest to disclose the names of the other six. A spokeswoman declined to elaborate on why the Home Office would not publicly identify six of the 22.

One of the most recognized names on the list may be U.S. radio talk show host Michael Savage, who is listed under his real name, Michael Alan Wiener. The conservative’s daily show can be heard nationwide in the United States.

This list included Fred Phelps, Stormfront’s Don Black and several violent Islamic leaders and ... Mike Savage?  Mike Savage?  I’ve only listened to his show once and thought he was stupid as all fuck, but putting him in the same category as Fred Phelps, neo-nazis and Islamic murderers?  Really?

Honestly, this looks like a list compiled from a few hours of google.  Smith clearly picked out a Right Wing talk show host to throw into the mix to give a frown of disapproval.  Whatever.

Sunday, May 03, 2009

Is a new baby boom in the making?

Defying predictions of demographic decline, northern Europeans have started having more babies. Britain and France are now projecting steady population growth through the middle of the century. In North America, the trends are similar. In 2050, according to United Nations projections, it is possible that nearly as many babies will be born in the United States as in China. Indeed, the population of the world’s current demographic colossus will be shrinking. And China is but one particularly sharp example of a widespread fall in birthrates that is occurring across most of the developing world, including much of Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. The one glaring exception to this trend is sub-Saharan Africa, which by the end of this century may be home to one- third of the human race.

So, it would appear that all the concern about the “Death of Western Civilization” by declining birthrates may be overrated. And it would mean that Europe and America may still wind up with at least another generation of workers-or, as is probably more likely, welfare state dependents. Either way, the reports of demographic death appear to have been exaggerated.

Monday, April 27, 2009

The Germans, in bucking the trend of their neighbors, seem to be rediscovering the benefits of a free market economy:

Around the world, the economic crisis is raising concerns about unfettered markets and leading to more government intervention in the economy. But in Germany--a country long skeptical of freewheeling capitalism--a political party that believes in freer markets and smaller government is benefiting from the crisis.

The Free Democratic Party, whose credo is getting the state off the back of the individual, is riding high in opinion polls.
....

The FDP is benefiting from the fact that Germany’s two large ruling parties, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democratic Union and its partner, the Social Democrats, have backed away from business-friendly policies and shifted to the left.

“In this context many citizens find it refreshing that the FDP has remained in the center,” says the party’s leader, Guido Westerwelle, in an interview. His party currently enjoys the support of 14% to 16% of voters, according to recent opinion polls. This is up from the FDP’s 9.8% support in Germany’s last election in 2005.

What Mr. Westerwelle calls his party’s “center” stance has long appeared to many Germans as a right-leaning economic policy of tax cuts and deregulation that would mainly benefit high earners. The FDP’s image as a rich people’s lobby helped keep the party’s share of the vote low in the 1990s.

Today, however, many middle-class voters are concerned about the government’s expanding role in the economy in response to the crisis, on top of longstanding grievances over Germany’s high and complicated taxes and its jungle of bureaucratic red tape.

The FDP as Germany’s version of the Republican Party? Could our own Republicans learn something from this? Stranger things have happened.

Friday, April 24, 2009

Capping off WVR’s happy story, I give you this comforting statistic.

Roughly one in twenty 15-year-old German males is a member of a neo-Nazi group, a higher proportion than are involved in mainstream politics…

The study, conducted in 2007 and 2008, also revealed that neo Nazi-symbols—in either rock music, stickers or special clothing—were used by one in 10 of the youths surveyed. The swastika and other Nazi symbols are banned in Germany.

The highest proportion of neo-Nazis was in former communist eastern Germany, where almost one in eight youths were in such groups. More than 14 percent of those questioned were described as racist, and anti-Semitism was rife.

More than 14 percent of those asked were inclined to brush off the Holocaust as “not awful” while a similar number tended to believe that Jews, through their behaviour, were not entirely blameless for their persecution.

Just in time for a recession!