9/20/2003
Deficits �ber Alles: Dollar Could Collapse at Any Moment :.You guys all know how I feel about banking. Well, don't take it from me; get is straight from the horse's mouth: The International Monetary Fund yesterday warned that the colossal United States trade deficit was a noose around the neck of the economy, emphasising that the once mighty dollar could collapse at any moment.
Arguing that the world's big economies were already too dependent on the willingness of American consumers to live beyond their means, the IMF said the US could not continue to run a current account deficit of 5% of GDP.
The IMF's chief economist Kenneth Rogoff said that it was just a matter of time before the gap closed, tipping the dollar into a potentially steep fall.
"If we were looking at a poor developing country, the world gives them just enough rope to hang themselves. A country like the United States, they give them enough rope to tie the noose around their neck several times. But it does happen in the end," he said.
posted by Kevin at 3:38 AM
Electric Sports Car: 0-60 in 3.7 Seconds :.This thing is great! It has a range of about 300 miles and a top speed of 100mph. There's one problem: it costs $220,000. Well, at least the Greenpeace-t-shirt-wearing-Berkeley-Democrats-who-sold-their-shares-at-the-top crowd can now take on B Gates in a mano-a-mano, balls to the wall, billionaire take all, 1/4 mile drag race. Now, can someone tell me why this company can't produce a $20,000 electric vehicle with a 300 mile range that will get you from point A to point B at some sane rate of speed? With the throttle and brake pedals fully pressed, the bright yellow sports car shudders with power � but rather than the roar of a caged Lamborghini, the only sound is a muffled whine. Though the whine becomes only marginally louder when the brakes are released, everything else changes as the car lunges forward in a jaw-dropping, stomach-clenching and near-terrifying blur. In 3.7 seconds, it's all over. That's the time it has taken for this little electric sports car, the Tzero by AC Propulsion, to reach 60 miles per hour. And its only power is from a simple array of lithium-ion laptop computer batteries.
posted by Kevin at 3:21 AM
9/19/2003
CIA-owned Voting Machines Ensure Bush Victory in 2004 :.This writer has a more severe case of apoplexy than I do! It's a shell game, with money, companies and corporate brands switching in a blur of buyouts and bogus fronts. It's a sinkhole, where mobbed-up operators, paid-off public servants, crazed Christian fascists, CIA shadow-jobbers, war-pimping arms dealers -- and presidential family members -- lie down together in the slime. It's a hacker's dream, with pork-funded, half-finished, secretly programmed computer systems installed without basic security standards by politically partisan private firms, and protected by law from public scrutiny. It's how the United States, the "world's greatest democracy," casts its votes. And it's why George W. Bush will almost certainly be the next president of the United States -- no matter what the people of the United States might want.The rest of the article is as good as the first paragraph. Pass it around. Related: Here's my writeup on Sequoia/De La Rue
posted by Kevin at 9:56 PM
Evidence of Second Shooter in J.F.K. Assassination Released :.Who knows... Lee Harvey Oswald did not act alone in the J.F.K. assassination, says former L.B.J. attorney Barr McClellan, and he has posted new evidence on a website promoting his forthcoming book, "Blood, Money & Power: How L.B.J. Killed J.F.K."
McClellan states that images posted on the website www.BarrMcClellan.com, identify fourteen match points to a finger print found at the Texas Schoolbook Depository with that of a known assassin, Mac Wallace. The website also matches a police composite of a suspect involved in an earlier murder with a photograph of Wallace.Research Credit: NF
posted by Kevin at 9:52 PM
Britain is Hell on Earth :.I would feel more comfortable visiting Beijing than London. The U.K. is leading the world in the race to bottom: Ensuring web sites are easy for disabled people to use is no longer an option - it is a legal obligation.
The Royal National Institute of the Blind in Peterborough is warning that anyone running a site faces prosecution if they fail to comply with the law.
posted by Kevin at 4:12 PM
9/18/2003
Janus' $150 Billion Problem :.Oops: Heck, a lot of people drank the Kool-Aid back in 1999; Janus just had seconds. However, there is no spinning this week's news, if the very convincing 44 pages of allegations prove true: Janus demonstrated that it would breach fiduciary responsibility for the right price. There are questionable fund-industry practices that firms can rightly, if cravenly, defend by saying "everybody does it," but this does not appear to be one of them.
posted by Kevin at 2:24 AM
Two Incomes, One Bankruptcy :.Elizabeth Warren, who teaches bankruptcy law at Harvard, and her daughter Amelia Warren Tyagi, a former consultant with McKinsey & Co., make their case in The Two Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke (Basic). It's a potent cocktail of dire statistics and sympathetic interviews with families whose finances have gone off the rails. ''Every new report on consumer debt or bankruptcy blames families for frivolous buying,'' Warren says. ''Our data show families in financial trouble are working hard, playing by the rules -- and the game is stacked against them.''
The final score in this rigged game? ''Walk down any street in any middle-class neighborhood in America today,'' Warren says, ''and one in seven families are on the brink of financial collapse.'' Home foreclosures have more than doubled since 1980. Bankruptcy rolls are up 430 percent: A record 1.6 million Americans filed for Chapter 7 or 13 protection in 2002.
And the single biggest predictor that financial failure lies ahead for a family? Having children. Even just one of them. . .
posted by Kevin at 2:20 AM
The Monster Eats Its Own: Grasso Quits While the Quittins' Good :.Forget about the fact that he presided over the largest corporate bankruptcies in history. It's all winkin', blinkin' nod at this point. I bet we wouldn't even want to know what this guy knows: Richard Grasso, the head of the New York Stock Exchange, resigned on Wednesday in the face of mounting pressure from investors, regulators and top Wall Street firms over his $140 million pay package.More from NY Post: NYSE directors praised Dick Grasso to the skies before sticking the knife in him in a boardroom showdown yesterday.
posted by Kevin at 12:39 AM
9/17/2003
Mad Pig Disease: Cops Raid Wrong Home, Taser Man in Front of Wife and Child :.This guy could have just as easily been killed: Okanogan County sheriff's deputies seeking a person on outstanding warrants broke down the door to the wrong home and then jolted a man with a Taser in front of his wife and child.
Sheriff Frank Rogers says the bottom line is officers messed up.
posted by Kevin at 3:17 PM
9/16/2003
Lyle Barkley Injunction Fails: Armed Standoff Imminent in Michigan :.According to Lyle Barkley, the legal attempts to prevent the removal of the structures from his property have failed. Lyle, his family and an unknown number of militia members are preparing to defend the property by force of arms. Mr. Barkley is at the end of his rope. He and his family have no money and all they are trying to do is put shelter in place to survive to cold winter months. That's not good enough for the Nazis that run Charlevoix County, Michigan. Faced with the option of licking the boots of tyrants and becoming homeless, these people have decided to fight. Indeed, what do they have to lose? This type of incident is typical of how states devolve into civil war. Unfortunately, we are going to see many more like it. Update: Stay Denied; Standoff Still a Possibility :.A Bay Township resident who vows a militia-assisted shootout rather than comply with a court order to remove manufactured homes from his property may be finished with his attempts at court appeals.
Charlevoix County District Judge Richard May on Tuesday denied Lyle Barkley's demand for an order staying earlier rulings. May in August ordered that two, 12-by-60 foot trailers and a 24-by-34-foot former school portable be removed by Thursday from Barkley's four acres on Camp Daggett Road.
The buildings were not properly permitted, and violate both township zoning and construction codes, May ruled.
After learning of the judge's decision Tuesday, Barkley said he would forward the ruling to attorneys who are assisting him. But the ruling states that for Barkley to appeal to the county circuit court he must file an appeal bond of $7,600.
posted by Kevin at 6:42 PM
America's Hegemony Dream Becomes Nightmare :.I personally think we're going to experience another incident, and then all bets will be off: If events in Iraq continue on their present trajectory, the window of opportunity that neo-conservatives in Washington seized after the September 11 attacks will soon close.
posted by Kevin at 2:58 PM
World Trade Organisation Cockup in Cancun :.The Kenyan delegate, George Oduor, came out of the closed meeting saying: "It means that the conference is ended now."
posted by Kevin at 4:58 AM
Dizzying Dive to Red Ink Poses Stark Choices for Washington :.Steady yourself, dear reader, before you attempt to grasp the significance of this one: When President Bush informed the nation last Sunday night that remaining in Iraq next year will cost another $87 billion, many of those who will actually pay that bill were unable to watch. They had already been put to bed by their parents.
Administration officials acknowledged the next day that every dollar of that cost will be borrowed, a loan that economists say will be repaid by the next generation of taxpayers and the generation after that. The $166 billion cost of the work so far in Iraq and Afghanistan, which has stunned many in Washington, will be added to what was already the largest budget deficit the nation has ever known.
posted by Kevin at 4:30 AM
U.S. Homelessness and Poverty Rates Skyrocket While Billions Are Spent On Overseas Occupation :.(Repost) As I watch far-away images of body bags being filled, I see much closer images of bodies. I went by a local park the other day and it looked like a concentration camp crossed with a mass murder scene.
There were people in rags and covered with filth lying scattered all over the place. At least twenty people were on crutches, had parts bandaged, or with open wounds not even covered. They were all hungry and a large majority were sick.
All around this city I live in, and nation-wide, the level of homelessness and poverty is growing alarmingly. From the last counts and estimates nation-wide, there has been at least a 35-45% increase in homelessness and poverty. The increases have come over the last two years with the biggest increases being in 2002 and especially in the first six months of 2003.
Add to that the barely subsisting or borderline homeless/poor, and we start to see a very alarming trend that shows no sign of going away. Over 30% of Americans are on the borderline of poverty. A lot just do not quite make the cut to receive food stamps or some kind of benefits and live on a razor edge of desperation and starvation.
posted by Kevin at 4:27 AM
Another Satisfied Employee: Three Dead in Japan Hostage Blast :.Three people have been killed and more than 20 others injured in an explosion at a Japanese office building after a knife-wielding man took several hostages and then set light to the area.
The attacker, identified as 52-year-old Noboru Beppu, entered the building in the city of Nagoya at around 10 a.m. (0100 GMT) on Tuesday morning, armed with a knife and carrying a flammable liquid, Kyodo news agency reported.
Demanding back wages, Beppu took eight hostages from the courier company, but later released seven of them.
Ten minutes later, shortly after 1 p.m., a blast rocked the fourth-floor office of Nagoya-based Keikyubin Co., shattering windows and engulfing the floor with flames.
posted by Kevin at 4:17 AM
The Weird World of the Big Money Psychopath :.This goes to show you what The Them are capable of doing in order to make their ridiculous whims a reality. Think about the countless man hours and the resources that went into this! It's probably safe to say that millions of dollars were spent on this project. And for what??!!? Now, imagine what people like this would do if billions of dollars were on the line... Welcome to the world of the Big Money Psychopath: Canepa imported a pair of 959s for Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen in the early 1990s, but the cars never made it past U.S. Customs officials in Oakland, California. Little did Canepa know it would be the first step of a frustrating and confusing, but ultimately rewarding, decade-long project.
His initial instinct was to declare himself a manufacturer to facilitate the federalization process. He quickly discovered that route was mined. �Had we decided to become a manufacturer, the feds should have allowed it. But politically the car was a hot potato. So they stonewalled us.�
Gates, who was becoming increasingly frustrated at having his 959 eternally tied up in the Port of Oakland�s �free trade zone,� suggested to Canepa that perhaps they could federalize the car by buying a number of sacrificial 959s to �crash and test.� But Canepa felt that wouldn't solve the problems.
posted by Kevin at 2:09 AM
9/15/2003
Mutual Fund Investigation Should Worry All Investors :.The scandal-a-week machine on Wall Street served its latest offering earlier this month when New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer accused Bank of America and other firms of cheating mutual fund investors to gain business from a favored client.
The new allegation is especially disturbing because it focuses on mutual fund companies.
Funds are supposed to be the safe haven for small investors. By spreading your investment among dozens or hundreds of stocks, a fund ought to minimize the damage done by fraud involving any one stock. That protection is lost if the fund company is breaking the rules itself.
posted by Kevin at 1:43 PM
Diffusing the Lyle Barkley Situation in MichiganUpdate: Optimism Not Warranted at This Time Nobody really knows what's happening at this moment. The militia groups appear to have provided legal help to Mr. Barkley and his family that has brought this situation back from the brink. I will continue to monitor. Word on the street is that Mr. Barkley will be on Alex Jones soon. Use these links to stay current on the situation: Lyle Barkley's BlogGoogle Newsawrm.org (crawling with both undercover feds and legit militia members)
posted by Kevin at 1:04 PM
Creeping Patriot Act :.Everyone who warned about this turned out to be right. It's only a matter of time before everything you do is considered terrorism: In the two years since law enforcement agencies gained fresh powers to help them track down and punish terrorists, police and prosecutors have increasingly turned the force of the new laws not on al-Qaida cells but on people charged with common crimes.
Civil liberties and legal defense groups are bothered by the string of cases, and say the government soon will be routinely using harsh anti-terrorism laws against run-of-the-mill lawbreakers.
posted by Kevin at 2:04 AM
9/14/2003
Solar Power Energy Conversion Efficiency at "Way More Than 50 Percent" :.Conventional solar panels are terribly inefficient at converting sunlight into useable power. The development out of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is extremely exciting! This story also proves that the reason we don't have viable energy alternatives is because there is no will in corporate or government circles to create them. I've been saying it for years, and I'll say it again: The barriers to clean power are political in nature, not technological. Let's do some simple arithmetic to demonstrate the point. This solar project at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has cost $700,000 over a period of three years, and has already increased solar power conversion efficiency by over 100%! Again, this was accomplished with only $700,000. Let's take a look at the costs associated with the U.S. occupation of Iraq. You better be sitting down for this: Cost of the U.S. occupation of Iraq per month: $4,000,000,000 ( source) Cost of the U.S. occupation of Iraq per week: $1,000,000,000 Cost of the U.S. occupation of Iraq per day: $142,857,142 Cost of the U.S. occupation of Iraq per hour: $5,952,380 Cost of the U.S. occupation of Iraq per minute: $99,206 In eight minutes, the U.S. Government spends more money on running an illegal and unnecessary war than it took for a group of researchers to develop photovoltaic technology that is over 100% more efficient than previous designs. This cannot be explained away as merely "the vagaries of a big government," or some sort of endemic negligence. I'm not even sure this can be chocked up to criminal collusion at the highest levels. Nope. What we are witnessing is nothing less than death throws of a system that has gone totally insane. Read this article and think about what we could accomplish if a criminal gang hadn't stolen our entire existence at gunpoint: These photovoltaic window shades quietly capture the sun's rays of heat and light, focusing them into the small silicon squares, also called solar chips. The chips convert the light energy into electrical power and feed it into the building's electrical system; the energy goes into the heating and cooling systems.
While Dyson won't comment on actual costs and efficiency rates until the research is published this fall, she did reveal that Bernie Sater at Photovolt, Rensselaer's manufacturing and design partner, has developed a new manufacturing process that "gets the cost down far enough that you can use it."
Dyson said a single solar cell will cost about 25 cents. The cells are situated about a square foot apart and will have a "way more than 50 percent" energy-conversion rate, she added.
posted by Kevin at 7:03 PM
Dollar Falls Against Euro for a Third Week on Economic Reports :.Jobless recovery? My bollix. The U.S. in position to receive an economic killshot at any moment: The dollar fell for a third week in New York trading against the euro, reaching its lowest level in a month, after economic reports showed the U.S. economy shed jobs and consumer confidence declined.
Concern the U.S. won't attract the $1.5 billion a day needed to finance its current-account deficit, the broadest measure of trade and investment, dragged the dollar 1.7 percent lower on the week, the biggest decline since July.
"The whole psychology of the dollar market has shifted" after three straight months of gains from June through August, said Tim Stewart, New York-based chief foreign-exchange strategist at Morgan Stanley. "There are doubts about whether the recovery will be sustained, especially if the U.S. doesn't get job growth."
posted by Kevin at 7:02 PM
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:. Reading
Fatal
Harvest: The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture by Andrew Kimbrell
Readers will come to see
that industrial food production is indeed a "fatal harvest"
- fatal to consumers, as pesticide residues and new disease vectors
such as E. coli and "mad cow disease" find their way
into our food supply; fatal to our landscapes, as chemical runoff
from factory farms poison our rivers and groundwater; fatal to
genetic diversity, as farmers rely increasingly on high-yield
monocultures and genetically engineered crops; and fatal to our
farm communities, which are wiped out by huge corporate
farms.
Friendly
Fascism: The New Face of Power in America by Bertram Myron Gross
This is a relatively
short but extremely cogent and well-argued treatise on the rise
of a form of fascistic thought and social politics in late 20th
century America. Author Bertram Gross' thesis is quite straightforward;
the power elite that comprises the corporate, governmental and
military superstructure of the country is increasingly inclined
to employ every element in their formidable arsenal of 'friendly
persuasion' to win the hearts and minds of ordinary Americans
through what Gross refers to as friendly fascism.
The
Good Life
by Scott and Helen Nearing Helen
and Scott Nearing are the great-grandparents of the back-to-the-land
movement, having abandoned the city in 1932 for a rural life based
on self-reliance, good health, and a minimum of cash...Fascinating,
timely, and wholly useful, a mix of the Nearings' challenging
philosophy and expert counsel on practical skills.
Silent
Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth by David Bollierd
In Silent Theft, David Bollier
argues that a great untold story of our time is the staggering
privatization and abuse of our common wealth. Corporations are
engaged in a relentless plunder of dozens of resources that we
collectively own—publicly funded medical breakthroughs,
software innovation, the airwaves, the public domain of creative
works, and even the DNA of plants, animals and humans. Too often,
however, our government turns a blind eye—or sometimes helps
give away our assets. Amazingly,
the silent theft of our shared wealth has gone largely unnoticed
because we have lost our ability to see the commons.
The
Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It: The Complete Back-To-Basics
Guide by John Seymour The
Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It is the only book that
teaches all the skills needed to live independently in harmony
with the land harnessing natural forms of energy, raising crops
and keeping livestock, preserving foodstuffs, making beer and
wine, basketry, carpentry, weaving, and much more.
When
Corporations Rule the World by David C. Korten
When Corporations
Rule the World explains how economic globalization has concentrated
the power to govern in global corporations and financial markets
and detached them from accountability to the human interest. It
documents the devastating human and environmental consequences
of the successful efforts of these corporations to reconstruct
values and institutions everywhere on the planet to serve their
own narrow ends.
The
New Organic Grower: A Master's Manual of Tools and Techniques
for the Home and Market Gardener
This expansion
of a now-classic guide originally published in 1989 is intended
for the serious gardener or small-scale market farmer. It describes
practical and sustainable ways of growing superb organic vegetables,
with detailed coverage of scale and capital, marketing, livestock,
the winter garden, soil fertility, weeds, and many other
topics.
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