cryptogon.com
   HOME
9/30/2006

The Antifederalists Were Right :.

September 27 marks the anniversary of the publication of the first of the Antifederalist Papers in 1789. The Antifederalists were opponents of ratifying the US Constitution. They feared that it would create an overbearing central government, while the Constitution's proponents promised that this would not happen. As the losers in that debate, they are largely overlooked today. But that does not mean they were wrong or that we are not indebted to them.



Charleston City Councilman: Sterilize Parents of Delinquent Kids :.

Everything old is new again as America collapses into oblivion:

Charleston City Councilman Larry Shirley says the robbery of a downtown video store - allegedly by a band of kids, including one too young to be charged - is a sure sign society has gone awry, and it's time to start a "dialogue."

And one of the things he says needs to be talked about is whether bad parents should be sterilized.

"What we've got is a failure in society, whether it's in Mount Pleasant with yuppie parents or whether it's on the East Side with poor crackhead parents," Shirley said Friday. "We pick up stray animals and spay them. These mothers need to be spayed if they can't take care of theirs. ... Once they have a child and it's running the streets, to let them continue to have children is totally unacceptable." Deadbeat dads might ought to be sterilized as well, he said.



Are You in Breach of an Allegiance or Duty to the United States? :.

Greed is a bottomless pit
Our freedom's a joke, we're just taking a piss
And the whole world must watch the sad comic display
If you're still free, start running away

Bright Eyes - Landlocked Blues
Don't look back:

Subsection 4(b) (26) of section 950v. of HR 6166 - Crimes triable by military commissions - includes the following definition.

"Any person subject to this chapter who, in breach of an allegiance or duty to the United States , knowingly and intentionally aids an enemy of the United States, or one of the co-belligerents of the enemy, shall be punished as a military commission under this chapter may direct."

For an individual to hold an allegiance or duty to the United States they need to be a citizen of the United States. Why would a foreign terrorist have any allegiance to the United States to breach in the first place?



Britain Doomed: Personal Debt Runs Out of Control :.

Britain's "buy now, pay later" consumer culture has led to unprecedented levels of personal debt. The average Briton now has more than twice as much unsecured borrowing - including overdrafts, personal loans and credit card debt - as the typical European, according to a report published by Datamonitor.

...

The consumer borrowing crisis is set to become the most pressing concern for Gordon Brown's successor as Chancellor of the Exchequer. George Osborne, the shadow Chancellor, said: "Gordon Brown is presiding over an economy increasingly built on debt. This has left many families vulnerable to the triple blow of rising mortgage rates, taxes and energy bills."

...

There are increasingly worrying signs that many borrowers are struggling to stay on top of repayments. The average person has debts that total 150 per cent of their annual income, according to the Bank of England, half as much again as in 1997.



The Dark Side of Debt :.

The world is once again in the grip of a spree of lending, but this time to companies rather than countries. What is striking is that much of this lending is happening not through public share and bond markets, nor exclusively through banks. The issuance of syndicated loans vaulted to $3.5 trillion last year, from $2.3 trillion in 2000. Thanks to the low cost of debt, private lenders, such as hedge funds, are extending vast amounts of credit to leveraged buy-out firms and other private borrowers. Forsaking the sunlit uplands of global finance, the market for capital is plunging into the shadows.


9/29/2006

Family Values, Florida Republican Style :.

I noticed the word crusaded in the article. Indeed, Mark "Family Values" Foley is rated 84% by the Christian Coalition!

Note to Christians: Don't allow Mark "It's for the Children" Foley visit Jesus Camp:

Florida Rep. Mark Foley's resignation came just hours after ABC News questioned the congressman about a series of sexually explicit instant messages involving congressional pages, high school students who are under 18 years of age.

In Congress, Rep. Foley (R-FL) was part of the Republican leadership and the chairman of the House caucus on missing and exploited children.

He crusaded for tough laws against those who used the Internet for sexual exploitation of children.


"They're sick people; they need mental health counseling," Foley said.

But, according to several former congressional pages, the congressman used the Internet to engage in sexually explicit exchanges.

...

Federal authorities say such messages could result in Foley's prosecution, under some of the same laws he helped to enact.

"Adds up to soliciting underage children for sex," said Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent and now an ABC News consultant. "And what it amounts to is serious both state and federal violations that could potentially get you a number of years."

Foley's resignation letter was submitted late this afternoon, and he left Capitol Hill without speaking to reporters.



Jesus Camp Trailer :.



Rushing Off a Cliff :.

American fascism---hissing, snarling, fully unfurled:

A dangerously broad definition of "illegal enemy combatant" in the bill could subject legal residents of the United States, as well as foreign citizens living in their own countries, to summary arrest and indefinite detention with no hope of appeal. The president could give the power to apply this label to anyone he wanted.


9/28/2006

Real Estate Agents Now Using Pagan Rituals to Sell Properties :.

As usual, friends, I couldn't make it up if I tried!

You want to make money? Forget about real estate. It's the people who are selling the pagan ritual kits to the imbecile real estate agents who are really cleaning up!

Kathleen Mitchell, a Coldwell Banker real estate agent, couldn't sell a bayfront Miami condo that was about to lose its water view to a high-rise luxury apartment building. So she turned to a Catholic saint who's known as "the underground real estate agent."

At the advice of a co-worker, Mitchell asked her client to bury a four-inch plastic statue of St. Joseph upside down in a planter on his balcony. He followed her instructions, and his condo in the Charter Club on 36th street sold 10 days later for around $315,000, she said.

"Every time I've put a statue in a property, it's sold," said Mitchell, a Methodist, who said she has buried statues of St. Joseph on 15 properties. "I've used it for the majority of my listings, whether they know it or not."

The folk tradition of burying a statue of St. Joseph -- patron saint of carpentry, home ownership and real estate -- has grown increasingly popular among Florida real estate brokers struggling to sell properties in a cooling market, real estate agents and vendors who sell the statues said.

Joseph, a carpenter and husband of the Virgin Mary, has long been regarded as a saintly intercessor for laborers and home buyers. Some believe the ritual of burying St. Joseph's statue originated with St. Teresa of Avila, a 16th century Catholic nun who prayed to St. Joseph and buried his medals in the earth to find land for convents.

The practice has grown so widespread that Realtors and home sellers can now choose from basic and "deluxe" St. Joseph real estate kits that include a statue, prayer book and tips on the proper way to petition the saint. The instructions usually go like this: Bury a statue of St. Joseph head first, six inches deep near the property's for sale sign. After the property sells, unearth the statue and keep it in a prominent place in your new home (failure to do so, legend holds, could reverse your good fortune).

Since the real estate market started to fizzle in the past year, stores and websites that stock the statues have been selling out.

"Sales have just gone crazy," said Phil Cates, owner of the website stjosephstatue.com. "We have really devout Catholics who call on St. Joseph for most things in their lives, and on the other side we have people who think St. Joseph is nothing more than a piece of plastic, but hey, what have I got to lose?"

Cates said the website has sold thousands of kits to Realtors and brokers who purchase the statues in bulk. Florida is his biggest market, with about 5,000 to 6,000 customers, he said.

Some homeowners are still waiting for results.



Rocket Science According to Real Estate Broker :.

A round of applause for this genius!

"Business here is just not quiet; it has dropped dead over the past few weeks," she said. "At the same time, there's a flood of inventory on the market. We run open houses, we run advertisements, but nothing works. There are no buyers, and without buyers, there are no sales."



Which Books Would Jesus Burn? :.

The Minot Daily News webserver is having trouble handling all the traffic this story is generating. Here's the full text:

Youth Group Holds Vice Burning

By DAN FELDNER, Staff Writer

A youth group at First Assembly of God church held a burning Wednesday night by burning anything they wanted to get out of their lives that they feel is hindering their relationship with the Lord.

Some of the items burned included CDs, DVDs, magazines, books and anything else they could think of. But unlike the negative connotations burnings are generally associated with, this burning was intended to be a positive event for everyone involved.

Mary Johnson, leader of the college and career group at the church, summed up what the burning is about: "Getting rid of junk in their lives that would hinder (their) relationship with the Lord."

The group has been studying the Bible, looking for ways to strengthen their relationship with God.

"We've been going through the Book of Acts looking at the early church," Johnson said. "(We've been) asking God 'would you do again today ... what you did in that early church."

The people participating in the burning included students and parents. Johnson said the burning wasn't the first burning that she has attended. She was at one several years ago in South Dakota and about two years ago was at another one here in Minot.

Johnson stated that a young man from the Air Force asked for the burning, and the church agreed.

The fire, which was contained in a wide metal bin, was on the outskirts of Minot on church-owned property. As more members of the church gathered around the fire, they started clapping and singing along to an acoustic guitar.

Chuck Holtzhower, one of the 20 or so participants of the burning, had a large stack of CDs and DVDs he was throwing into the fire.

"I'm getting rid of things that I do not need in my life for a Christian walk," Holtzhower said. "As ... somebody who wants the most out of his walk with Jesus Christ, they don't need to be in my collection."

Holtzhower wasn't concerned about the amount of money spent on the dozens of CDs and DVDs he was throwing away.

"I pretty much think it (the money) was wasted in the first place when I bought it."

He threw his DVDs into the fire with no hesitation or regrets, but accepted help with the dozens CDs from some of the small children.

Though he probably could have gotten quite a bit selling the collection, Holtzhower looked at the big picture when deciding how to deal with the items.

"If I don't feel that they're correct for my life, why would I give them to somebody else?" he said. "There's no other way around it, other than that fire right there."

After items were tossed into the fire, some offered testimony on their life and where they may have gone wrong in their life and how they were trying to correct those mistakes.


9/27/2006

Oil Bouce to $63

WARNING: The following is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument.

If you made money on this or this, please lock in profits by moving your stops up. Know that you will almost certainly be shaken out. If you got in on this move right, and want to gamble on the big move back up, consider a stop as close to $59.50 as possible. If support at these levels is real, we shouldn't drop below that.

Oh yeah, remember that stinky rat I mentioned on this recent downward price action on oil... It was a big, fat Goldman Sachs rat.



U.S. Real Estate: Hard Landing? No. Crash Landing? Yes. :.

I think this is the most grim article that I've read to date on the bursting bubble situation. I wish I had the spare change to short a portfolio of doomed retailers. It's very tempting. We could use some solar panels and some fencing materials. HAHAHA:

But this is all old news for us. The other shoe is dropping now. Loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs created from housing will act like a virus and spread throughout our economy. As real estate agents, attorneys, and mortgage brokers rein in their spending, it will affect restaurants, car dealers, advertising companies, jewelers, remodeling contractors, furniture manufacturers, bank profits, electronic retailers, clothing -- and the list goes on and on and on.

As the primary players are affected and they cut back on spending, so will the secondary players in this market. These companies will be forced to lay off employees, and the cycle will grow like a virus...


9/26/2006

Cryptogon Reader Contributes $20

Thanks, MW! It's going into the solar-hot-water-heater fund.



Another Day, Another Real Estate Crash Blog :.

Here's another site that's dedicated to the unfolding crash. I like the Google ads for mortgages. HA! Nice touch.



Israel Seen Lifting Nuclear Veil in Iran Stand-Off :.

With Israel's current arch-foe Iran seen gaining the ability to produce nuclear weapons within a few years, and preventive military options limited, some experts now anticipate another "lifting of the veil" on the assumed Israeli atomic arsenal.



Two Dairies to End Use of Artificial Hormones :.

Becky and I will soon end our use of dairies! HA

The region's biggest dairies are rushing to rid their bottled milk of artificial growth hormones in a bid to draw back customers who have switched to organic milk.



Former U.S. Army Lieutenant Calls on Military to Arrest Bush and Cheney :.

When I was a boy, we called this a military coup! And as crazy as it may sound, another military coup would be the only way the U.S. could change course. This isn't an opinion, it's a statement of the obvious and grim physical reality on the ground.

The chances of another military coup producing desirable results, sadly, ranges from slim to none. But that's the good news.

What are the chances, however, of things getting better under the U.S. version of democracy, with its two fascist parties, no choice in core economic matters and electronic "voting" machines, just in case?

Oh, what do I mean by another military coup? The JFK assassination was a military coup, it just didn't look that way to some people. The reality is that the U.S. is a banana republic with nuclear weapons (and has been since the 1960s).

How do banana republics change course?

Saturday, Septmber 23- Former Army Lieutenant and candidate for Congress in Vermont, Dennis Morrisseau, today called for the arrest of President Bush and Vice President Cheney by the American military "if necessary" to prevent an unauthorized attack upon the nation of Iran.



RUSSIA AND IRAN IN NUCLEAR POWER PARTNERSHIP :.

There goes the neighborhood:

Russia and Iran have signed a deal in Moscow to launch Iran's nuclear reactor at Bushehr in September next year, officials in Moscow say.

They say the Russian-built reactor will be fully operational in November 2007.

Iran had feared Russia would delay the launch because of international tension over Iran's nuclear activities, correspondents say.

The UN Security Council has told Iran to halt uranium enrichment amid fears it is trying to build nuclear arms.

Russian atomic energy agency spokesman Sergey Novikov said the date was fixed in an additional agreement to the original contract to build the reactor.

It came after Iranian officials apparently urged their Russian counterparts to speed up work to finish the plant.


9/25/2006

HOME PRICES FALL FOR FIRST TIME IN 11 YEARS :.

* yawn *

Prices of existing homes fell for the first time in 11 years and the backlog of available homes for sale was at its highest since current measures began, underlining the significant slowdown in the housing market.



IN PLAY: Oil Back Around $60 :.

WARNING: The following is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument.

What did I tell you about that $60 level?
Consider drop dead stops on long positions at $58, rather than $60 because a break below $60 may overshoot short. This theory is probably wrong if oil goes below $58. Again, look for reasons to go with a long bias here.

...

If there's one thing I've learned in all my years of watching financial markets, the Big Money never chases the move, and They look for (and create) opportunities to make the most money.
Oil got down to $59.52 before "buying by a European bank" caught the locals short. "There's no news as such to set this buying off," said Nauman Barakat, oil analyst at Macquarie Futures USA. HAHAHA I guess that guy didn't read Cryptogon a couple of days ago...

Now, this isn't the "something big" I was thinking about, but standby: It's make or break time for oil. $60 is the gateway to $20 and $100 oil. It's possible that this was just a short squeeze, the equivalent of using a single match to start a massive brushfire. The Them, however, have the ability of standing upwind from the thing while the retail investors get vaporized by it. As usual, this is nothing new. In The Art of War, Chapter 12, Sun Tzu writes, "When fire is set upwind, do not attack downwind."

BUT, it's also possible that a round is in the chamber and the hammer is cocked back on the move to $100. If "something big" is going to happen, it would make the fewest people the most money RIGHT NOW. Think about it. Who got long today as the price collapsed to a six month low? That wasn't Joe and Jane Six Pack or a bunch of bum change day traders.

There is so much information out there that it's impossible to know the direction now. This is by design. If you managed to "catch the falling knife" from the last move, consider moving your stops up to lock in your profits, or let it ride with the original stops in place to avoid getting shaken out if you believe we're at a support. I probably wouldn't take on new pure longs here, but some form of straddle might work. Clarity is likely to produce a powerful move from here, either way. Your straddle will cost you some profits, but, hey, that's better than getting your clock cleaned:

Oil rebounded above $62 on Monday, after briefly sliding to a six-month low on abundant supplies in top consumer the United States and fears that slower U.S. economic growth would stunt fuel demand.

U.S. crude settled up 90 cents at $61.45 a barrel on short-covering, after sliding as low as $59.52 and as high as $62.15. London Brent rose 39 cents to $60.80 a barrel.

"The rally started on buying by a European bank and the locals got caught short, which in turn set off stops," said Nauman Barakat, oil analyst at Macquarie Futures USA. "There's no news as such to set this buying off."

U.S. crude had fallen nearly $19 from its mid-July peak of $78.40, its biggest slide in more than 15 years. The 24 percent decline was set off as investors' concern faded over Iran and the Atlantic hurricane season proved unexpectedly mild.

The rout deepened last week as speculators fretted over slowing economic growth in the world's top consumer and hedge fund Amaranth Advisors registered billions of dollars in losses on natural gas positions.



The 100 Watt Hour Per Day Chest Fridge :.

Becky and I pay NZ22.3 cents per kilowatt hour, so reading this was nearly a religious experience for me.

THIS IS INCREDIBLE!

Using vertical doors in refrigeration devices is an act against the Nature of Cold Air. Understanding and cooperating with Nature rather than acting against it leads to much better efficiency.

My chest fridge (Vestfrost freezer turned into a fridge) consumes about 0.1 kWh a day. It works only about 2 minutes per hour. At all other times it is perfectly quiet and consumes no power whatsoever. My wind/solar system batteries and power-sensing inverter simply love it.


Research Credit: DR


9/24/2006

Home Is Where the Farm Is :.

This article makes the "back to the land" movement seem like a joke, but you won't be laughing if you're serious about making a try for self sufficiency and haven't gotten your land yet.

Rural land prices will increase as people cash out of the doomed cities---dumping their bubble inflated properties---and, quite literally, run for the hills.

Do you think "professionals" are buying up all this rural land just because they need a breath of the fresh country air and like shoveling horse sh*t?

Get real, man. People know that this thing is coming down right before our eyes and they don't want to be anywhere near a big city as it happens:

A growing number of professionals, like the Worthingtons, are returning to the land, if only to play farmer. Green Acres, 2006.

Such residential farms now account for nearly half of all farms in the USA, with owners who earn their income from off-farm work, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. Such "farmettes" are increasing at a rate of 2% a year.

...

These new farmers agree that the lifestyle farming trend makes the old-world farmers around them both happy and sad. Maybe resigned is the best word.

"The people here see a way of life disappearing," says Sanders. "It's somewhere between cashing in and gritting their teeth. Land here has gone up a lot in value, and it's not because of agriculture. It's because it's a desirable place to live."



Movie Review: Who Killed John O'Neill :.

I was shocked by how good this was! Maybe that's because Pi is one of my favorite films. If you liked Pi at all, you'll enjoy Who Killed John O'Niell.

There are a couple of weird moments, in terms of the information presented (Che Guevara wasn't the President of Bolivia in 1967, and Barry Seal's assassination was much bigger than a simple drug hit), but it's mostly excellent.

Think of it this way:

If 1% of the information presented in the film is true, where does that leave us? What if 5% of it is true? Never mind the fact that much of it is dead on and not controversial at all, if you've been paying attention over the past few years.

I enjoyed how the film went hard with the decent into madness. This will resonate with anyone who has made a serious attempt to examine these issues. First you try to deny all of it. When you can't deny it, you literally start to question your own sanity. I know I did, and all of the researchers I've communicated with have said the same thing.

Not a researcher? Did you relate to Winston Smith when you read 1984? You'll relate to the narrator (and his others) in Who Killed John O'Neill.

WARNING: Use the film with caution on beginners. It presents a non-stop barrage of information that---if you're not versed in the literature, so to speak---might seem impossible to believe (or overwhelming or debilitating) to the uninitiated. I'm all for getting people to take the red pill, but you don't want them to choke on it. Casual viewers might write off the entire work as delusional video art. And that's fine. Don't waste too much of your precious time trying to save horses in burning barns...

Who Killed John O'Neill is a shining example of citizen scale propaganda at its best: Informative, entertaining, highly effective.

Well done, guys!

One Actor, One Room, Seven Characters: 9/11.

Traumatized by the September 11th attacks, one man struggles to dismantle official history, at the expense of his sanity and even his life. Grappling with multiple realities - and multiple personalities - he must retreat into his mind in pursuit of the truth. In a fictional film about non-fictional events, there is a place where belief and faith will blind you, where nothing is sacred, and to get there all you have to do is ask:

"Who Killed John O'Neill?"




Google


cryptogon.com
www

:. 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.