Cage match to the death: Banks vs. Manufacturers

In order for Richie to make ridiculous amounts of money, the globalisation thing had to tick along and people in the West had to keep on working and spending and borrowing like drunken sailors.

OOOps, somebody screwed up.

The economic model failed.

The bankers put their heads up their own buttocks.

Doc: Turn and coff. Give 'em a trillion or two and don't call me in the morning.

I think that one part of the new world order wasn't speaking with the other part. Are we seeing a rift growing between manufacturers and bankers?

This is especially true in the US where bankers have been cashing government cheques, no questions asked, while GM and Chrysler are being asked to commit suicide.
You'll be interested to know that a strong economy needs manufacturing while we can do without the present, useless bankers because they're easy to replace.

You see, in an economy like the one I describe below*, the best entrepreneurial minds had migrated from manufacturing to financial speculation. It's so much easier without government regulations (Thanks to Bush43 and Brown!).

You'd be stupid to open a factory in this type of situation. Who wants to make health insurance payments and destroy unions, even if the law allows? Instead of building stuff, the brains played with paper and were they ever clever! In fact they played with Cartesian reality.

Bad is Good.
Junk loans are an investment vehicle.
Sub-prime teaser loans are actually illegal predatory loans
made especially for poor minority people with bad credit!

Even Isaac Newton would have said "that financial balloon is coming down like a lead weight."

So, let the fighting begin. I'm grabbing a box of microwave popcorn and taking a front-row seat.

Cage Match!
Business vs. Banks

* Just reviewing an old theme, because of globalisation, the Western economies were descimated by the escaping factories which were magically reappearing in the Third World. So, (whether consciously or not) our economy was buoyed by nothing else except consumption and the fake sense that we had strong investment portfolios in shares and real estate when our economy wasn't producing but a fraction of the manufactured goods that it was consuming. Can you say 'balance of payments'? We were effectively growing our market by borrowing (from China, from the future).
Why would banks lend money to poor people by teasing them with the illusion of a cheap loan? Because they had no more ideas about how to make good money, so they repackaged these bad loans and sold them as investment vehicles. All they were thinking is "somebody's gonna pay my bonus. Screw the economy."
It was all fake. We should have been living in reality, but it was too sh*tty for politicians to get re-elected, what with the factories gone and the people up to their eyeballs in debt, so it looks like the government helped to cook the books (mainly the US and UK) in order to stay in office.

theories on the meaning of middle-class life

by-line: this story is more profound than funny. My apologies; it's an important subject and my brain hurts.

I've never accepted the wisdom that we must pay the banks a trillion dollars of borrowed money or else the economy will crumble. Nobody's explained exactly how this can be. So, I'm working on a theory and watching umpteen documentaries.

The derivatives market was nothing but gambling, with hot air as collateral. This fake market imploded, like a dead star, into a black hole and sucked in the real stock market. Real money and money-on-paper just started disappearing because of a lack of confidence and because people were plugging financial holes caused by this first crisis.
Unfortunately, that money was thought of by many as a stock portfolio, 401k, or my nest egg, or my company pension, or my private pension. So, what I understand is that a lot of this money is gone, at least on paper. These are the vicissitudes of investments. Too bad. So, the banks, mostly the casino banks, pumped up a fake market, took real money home that somehow had come from the real market,

and left the common man holding the bucket.

So they ate discretionary savings. Some people will not be able to retire, but so be it. Not many countries were at risk of going bankrupt. Most countries would still be viable because they didn't invest in crazy derivatives, right? Just let the losers lick their wounds and learn their lesson. Right?
So, why did governments give money, hand-over-fist to the banks?

Well, I believe that, if certain countries, particularly the US and UK, had not given masses of money to normal banks and even casino ones, then those banks, before declaring bankruptcy, would have eaten our government pensions as well, by fatally weakening the bond market that most countries (and some other institutions like private pensions) rely on to provide a modest profit on deposits.

[hand over the money or your pension gets it!]
At the same time, other countries (bond sellers) need the bond buyers so that the these bond-sellers can fund their debt. So China, Japan and the Oily Kings buy bonds and fund our governments as we spend like drunken sailors.

Those banks, like I said, were about to eat up this massive market as well i.e. destroying everything from savings, to state pensions to bond values, money for expected government services like health-care, everything! chaos, anarchy, no news at 6pm.

now serving: NOBODY

That's why our governments are only telling us half truths that don't make sense. They had to make it look like it's business as usual. So, no more bankruptcies, and no more admissions.

The robber says: Stay cool. Just hand over the money and nobody gets voted out of office.

No politician had to raise the spectre of a centrally-controlled economy, at least not visibly, because that would be communism. Still, governments couldn't admit that they had let the financial system go into real meltdown (as opposed to the kidstuff in today's news). My guess is, if the majority knew the full truth (if it's anything like what I've figured out) we would have all freaked and run into the streets screaming for blood.

Everything we and our forefathers have ever worked for may have disappeared. Well, actually I think it has disappeared, and it's the work of our descendants that will pay to "bring it back." Where does that leave you and me?

Update: an economist named DeSoto was on channel 4 news today and says that the toxic derivatives are tentatively valued at least 600 trillion dollars. (Why's he the only one who's said this?)

The only other explanation has our governments placing us (i.e. the stakeholders & final payers of government debt through our taxes) into virtual slavery to those rich countries, for the sole purpose of giving money to the same rich guys who ate/lost the other pile of money, the real one. In other words, we're funding the lifestyles of the rich and famous. This would be the cynical conclusion and yet I have seen some convincing evidence from the US (see GritTV below).

So either way, no mobs, no blood, business as usual, well, except for the unemployment, foreclosures and bankruptcies. But the common man has had cataclysmic fate at his doorstep throughout history (plague, pestilence, war, religious conflict, lack of justice or democracy).

It's only in the last century, the one we'll be praising as heaven on earth, where hard work, planning, saving and intelligence could lift the common man out of penury and drudgery; where democracy might have meant something other than corruption, subterfuge and magic tricks. We had even largely stopped killing one another.

Poof! All gone.

That's all, folks.

I hope I'm wrong, but I can't see any other theory that works yet.

Please, prove me wrong.

Now, for your entertainment:

pictures royalty-free from fotosearch.com

our language is changing. Thanks a million, bankers

In my dad's day, the mafia hoods in the movies talked about "10Gs" like it was all the money in the world.

In my younger days, when you wanted to express the idea of "a lot of money", you said "a million." However, in the last couple of decades, during which we have been allowed to see the government's finances, the meaning of a lot of money has changed.
We had multi-billion-dollar Olympic building projects. Multi-billion-dollar defecits. Then Enron showed how a company can make billions of dollars disappear. So the word billion came into common use, meaning a lot of lucre.
Now, stimulus packages in the US have scratched the trillion-dollar mark. How soon will it be that kids will be playing cops and robbers


or corrupt politician and investment bank manager, and then the robber, or investment bank manager,

shouts something like "stick 'em up, I want a trillion dollars in unmarked bills."

It really is surprising how our language is way ahead of reality. Most of us will never see anything nearing a million dollars passing through our hands, from pay-check to bill payments.
Meanwhile others, namely derivatives traders, were trading billions per day, and taking millions per-year home with them as their cut. Much of what they were doing was trading fictitious monetary vehicles, but that doesn't matter.
They, and their bosses, still got to take home real money. And I've been wondering lately where all our money went, because a lot of money just disappeared.
Now I have my answer.

Update: Economist DeSoto on Channel 4 news, used the word quadrillion which could be the size of the toxic derivate paper. Luckily, nobody's sure about the actual size of this black hole.

The Julius-Ceasar tyranicide act, UK style

I've found that the British people, if they are indeed voting for their governments, are quite comfortable with bad governments; what choice do they have? But, at some point, a time which is clearly visible to me, everyone turns against the Prime Minister, including his own party.
What they are all saying is:

"the joke's getting old."
"you're a laughing stock."
"enough already"
"Go on, git!"

The leader's party delivers the 'Brute' move, because the people can't.
It happened to Thatcher. A recent biopic advert had the 'Thatcher' say "what about loyalty to me?" and I had to laugh. This was the post-stabbing quibbling of an ego-maniac who hadn't yet realised that her public persona was persona non-grata.
It starts when the PM in question becomes so omnipotent that his/her behaviour comes to resemble that of Julius Ceasar:

They begin to believe their own bullsh*t.
The veneer of sanity starts to wear thin;
dementia sets in.
Chinks in the armour start to appear.
The vultures start to circle.

A strange version of this happened to Blair. No inquiry could get rid of him, until he handed the poison chalice to Crash Gordon. Blair actually turned the knife on himself, which took some of the joy out of it.

[harakiri perhaps?]
Nevertheless, everybody has enjoying trashing him since then.
The "Ceasar's" image is usually so soundly smushed that you wonder who had actually voted for him/her in the first place.

I wonder how soon it will be that we'll see Crash's moment. I already think he's a joke, but I actually follow the blogosphere news. He's complicit in the economic disaster, up to his eyeballs. Even Sun readers must have realised this. If you stink so bad that Sun readers take their eyes of the page 3 titties, you know you're in trouble.
-Costick67 (8^P
pics from fotosearch.com

habeus corpus and having bodies

Remember the story where the police raided a politician's office and put him in jail for 9 hours for NOTHING (see my previous stories)?
Well, you'll be happy to know that this is an issue of habeus corpus (having the body),

which means you have to have some proof before you lock someone up. Otherwise, you've got, for all intents and purposes, a dictatorship. This is an old law, from the 17th century, even before the short-lived Cromwellian Republic (that's Cromwell below). You know, long curly hair, talc, doilies, mens' hosiery. What do they know about law? A lot more than today's parliament.

Well, thanks to all those terrorists going around destroying something, who knows what, the government thinks it has the excuse to erode this habeus shmabeus.

So, now they've locked up a Conservative politician, and you're Labour or Lib Dem, so you think this is getting back at Thatcher. WRONG. Actually, you're next, if you step out of line or if you put the wrong nose out of joint. They'll just lock you up indefinitely, oh, sorry for 28 days now, is it? No problem. Think of it as a vacation, unpaid of course; a vacation from democracy.

checkitout: The Economist- Bagehot, the unfinished revolution
art: fotosearch.com, royalty-free

UK government wants race riots, not economic protests

by-line: the government promotes racism

A month ago, when parliament made a right-wing Dutch politician (I don't care to publicise his name) famous by inviting him to talk IN PARLIAMENT and SHOW HIS ILLEGAL PREJUDICED FILM and, then, not letting him in, they were giving him a stage.
He had created a video which justaposed the Quran text with violence from the Middle East, trying to connect the two. What could they possibly gain by showing such a film in Parliament anyway? More than likely, the government's intention was likely to get more Brits to buy/download this crap and start race riots or to have Brits spying on their Muslim neighbours.
The big story is that all this is likely part of multi-pronged government policy to help get the heat off their backs, while the country languishes in the economic muck that Labour created. They'd rather that the country burn.
So, I thought I'd give you a comparable analogy, just to see if it makes sense to you.

Say there was this filmmaker named Adolph Hitler (see him waving to the nice people?)


who was a politician, and he had made a film about "evil Jews".

Now, the Chamberlain government, in 1935, decided to invite Adolph to town to talk about his film, even though it was clear that his work was heavily biased and inflammatory. So, to get the most attention possible, Chamberlain gets the media to be there when Hitler is turned back at Dover and so it's in every newspaper. So, every Jew-hater finds out about it and tells his friends, if he has any. This creates an uproar, especially the banning, and so starts a mini-pogrom in the UK.
So, now that I have your attention, by inviting someone to present his illegal, racially-inflammatory work and then simultaneously inviting and banning that person, creates more of a fuss than just letting him sit at home. So, the government's intention is to subvert the intent of their own anti-incitement (to racist acts) law, and start anti-semitic (Arabs are semitic too) and anti-Muslim race riots.
By the way, MPs watched the film anyway.

1 photo royalty-free from fotosearch.com

adapt or die? Humans or dinosapiens?

This is a maxim from Darwin that was intended for animals. Unfortunately, it will also apply to humans, if it hasn't already been used to excuse the deaths of billions of poor.
How will mankind live through this economic crisis?
How will it live through the coming environmental juggernaut?
Are you consuming less now. Are you recycling more? Are you driving less?
I don't think anybody will be willing to stop consuming altogether, and go back to subsistence farming.
The oil and gas exist. If the world doesn't use every last drop, then I don't know what I'm talking about.
The question is, if we use it all within 50 years, what will it do to the world. Will we need oil reserves to run the things that will save us from the environmental hell that I foresee?

hypocritical humans and animal lovers

I always like the moniker 'animal lover' as I imagine people 'doing' a quadruped, doggy-style, I guess. Visions of Clerks II, and Bachelor Party; smiles all around. see below


On a serious note, I hope to once and for all cut through the bullsh*t on the things that we eat, keep and kill. Firstly, I don't understand vegetarians and vegans and their attitude to their own holiness. But they're only the worst of a sad lot; humankind, that is.

argument 1- Plants are not beings, so we can eat them: Actually, I've heard research which says that when plants are cut, they emit a sound like a scream. They have circulation. They tilt towards the sun. They have evolved to meet the threats in their environment. Does that sound like an inanimate object to you? (especially now that they're genetically-modified. they'll be talking soon, saying "pick me!")

argument 2- Humans are not somehow part of the cycle of life: Some animals kill other animals or insects in order to live. Why shouldn't we? (right, Heston Blumenthal Ponce?)

Are we somehow holy?
Although, on BBC 4, Japanese sushi chefs cut up a fish that's still wriggling, there are animals which, when they can, also eat humans: crocodiles, lions, etc.
I have to agree that meat is vastly overrated and it's production is horribly damaging to the environment. While crops are somewhat less so, the carbon-intensive system of worldwide distribution is as much a part of plant cultivation as it is for meat.

argument 3- I'm an animal lover but I eat meat: Certain animals are thus too cute to eat. If they're not cute, then they're fair game. Who could love a cow?
(see the pup, pretty and WHITE. don't kill that)
argument 4- Meat animals are fed crap: True, but crops are also full of chemicals and pesticides, unless they're organic. The same holds for meat, though.
argument 5- I'm an animal lover, but I think that zoos are okay: I can agree if a species is threatened (a victim of our greed, no doubt), it must be protected. But putting animals into confinement for our entertainment is vile, horrid treatment. If it were a human, this would be a discussion of 'jailing'. What have these animals done wrong?
I just heard of a Swedish chimp (it was probably born there) that stored rocks to throw at people. Some where surprised that it could plan its battle, like a human. Others were sadened that the chimp was castrated to make it more docile as a result of its behaviour (don't worry, they'll be doing it to humans soon). The only thing that was not discussed was the fact that the chimp didn't like being where it was. But, we're so inured to their suffering that we were actually entertained by this story.




argument 6- I'm an animal lover, but I confine my pet to my house for 23 hours a day: You're doing that for your own pleasure, ignoring the fact that animals are meant to be outside. You're also damaging your health since cat and dog skin sheds and can get into your lungs, or your kids', causing them asthma. That's not to mention the feces they track into the house. I can smell a 'dog' house (the ones with a mortgage) within seconds of entering. They stink. These most unlucky of domesticated animals have many of the same illnesses we have from eating manufactured foodstuffs and sitting around all day. Is that not cruelty to animals? (it's a dream-come-true for vets, I'm sure)
(meow! if you pet it, she purrs)
argument 6- I'm an animal lover, a vegetarian or a vegan but I'm in favour of the invasion of Iraq: Someone ought to invade your home with a weapon and spray "hypocrite" on the wall, in red.


argument 7-We are not animals and so we should reject any and all harm to any human: This is on its face good, but tough to do. When I see a story or situation of any kind of abuse towards children, it truly hurts. While vigilance against this is a good thing, some kids are still going to suffer no matter what we do.
There is so much unnecessary death and suffering in human history. And it doesn't look like it's going to change in the near future either. What about all those crying kids in Africa who are being videoed by well-fed cameramen? Why doesn't any rich guy sort them out? Because we're animals; the potential saviours and the idle watchers.
The latest attrocity I heard about is quite old, actually. The Norwegian government mistreated all of the children that were fathered by the occupying Nazi soldiers, as if it was the kids' fault. I suppose I should be happy that they weren't all slaughtered in 1945. So who were the animals there, though, the Nazis or the Norwegians?
They call all such things inhuman treatment, but it happens every day. It's not inhuman, it's inhumane (but that's only a theory). This treatment is, in fact, very animalistic and yet fully human. Things go on in much the same way in the animal kingdom. Some turtles hatch thousands of young and most of them are eaten before they hit the sea. You see, we're not that different from the animals after all.
It's just the cycle of life. We are merely lucky that we are well-insulated from the true meaning of this because we have safe homes with lots of food. Animals cannot easily eat us. Other people go off to war in our name and kill others, like in Iraq and we sit and watch it on tv. Nobody complains well enough to get it stopped. Why? Because we're animals. i.e. we're good at looking after our brood and little else.

We have farmers to raise our food, and slaughterhouses to kill it for us, so somehow we are these holy beings looking down on the animal kingdom, right? wrong. We are just insulated and apart from it, but not different from it, or above it. In fact, we're uniquely animalistic and actually on the fringes because we're fratricidal, unlike any other animal, even those fighting over territory (one of our specialties).
This separation is the reason why we find environmental action so hard to put forward. We don't want to give up this gilded cage (we ride to work in a metal box, goddamit!). We control nature in order to feel safe.

Solutions?:
I think that the closer we are to the raising and culling of our food, the more respectful we will be towards the earth and its goods.

I think the more we know about the skills of war, the more we will respect the deadliness they can unleash and thus the more respect we will have for peace. I'm a pacifist but I benefited from my military training. I'd never want to go to war. But I appreciate the fact that I am trained, if the need arises to defend myself and my family.


all snaps fotosearch.com royalty-free
checkitout: BBC4 Fish! A Japanese Obsession

BIG BROTHER, big media and jade-size money

I'm working on a theory here that much of the bathos surrounding Big Brother lately, has been completely manufactured. Here it goes:

From watching the news, it became clear that Jade Goody had a contract with Big Brother when she went to India to join the show there. It might have been in the interest of BB to give her a contract so that she could redeem herself. That's low-brow, but not bad. It was only during the India show that we discovered that her previous cancer tests had proven very bad. So, she's now terminally ill.
Why is it that I'm assuming that she made the promotional contract for big bucks (where BB helps promote her), before all of this mess started, when she was just an actress (I think). In other words, the contract was for all the above: the BBshow including the racist comment, the redemption, and (importantly- here's the theory) the cancer story knowing full well, in advance of the contract, that she was terminal, or at least really badly-off.
Although it has brought cancer testing to the forefront, so more people in this cancer-ridden country will get tested and saved, it has also made BB a staple of the modern news (even though everything else about the show is fakery), cementing its place and guaranteeing future income.
Why am I so cynical? I'm not sure, but in the age of non-news, and pre-packaged news, why shouldn't I think it's a set-up. The only thing which has saved BB from ridicule for milking a woman's death has been the secrecy of the start date of the (imagined?) contract. So, when did it start?

starving footballers use dinner coupons

by-line: Rooney dines at a discount; 50% off, to be exact.

"Money conscious" northern boy, Wayne Rooney and wife, net worth:

35 million quid

Dinner bill (at Gusto, Alderley Edge, up north):

27 pounds 80
or
13.90 (w/ coupon)

average wage of kitchen and serving staff (minimum wage):

5.70/hr

Coupons are given out because the restaurant is not as full as the owner would like it to be.

What do you think will happen if the owner doesn't pocket enough lucre from his Gusto?
He's gonna sack/fire any number of his "lazy, poor" staff who may have to turn to crime to pay the bills.
So much for

trickle-down economics*

Ronald Reagan must be spinning in his grave.

I hope the coupon was saved and signed. Only then can Rooney actually save a few jobs, because the owner could sell it. It'll become a prized part of the

Marie-Antoinette
Let Them Eat Cake Museum

of disgusting rich people.
And, you know what happened to M-A's dainty neck, dontcha?

"Aaaaaaaaahh, I just saved thirteen pounds ninety. Fookin' 'ell!"

checkitout: Guardian Tues 10 Feb 09 G2 p3 Dinner vouchers: should we be embarrassed?
http://www.manutdpics.com/pics_205/Wayne-Rooney-Gallery.html
*I got trickle-down for you. WR is pissing on all of us

BLACK-BOX SECRETS

I just heard a new word for the (often disingenuous) after-the-crash wisdom coming from rich people:

The

black-box secret.

A kind of

'WOOPS, YOU're broke!'

message that would have made me grab a weapon, if I had had any money to lose in the first place.

It is called so, because the plane (or in this case, the economy) has to crash for the secret to be revealed.
That's another reason why Jon Stewart, baby boomers nearing retirement and most intelligent beings are upset with government and journalists.
Some people from both quarters knew what was going on, but only a few black sheep had the guts to say anything. One is Peter Schiff.

watch and learn:

-Costick67 (8^P

Jon Stewart for Pulitzer Prize

Update: story that scooped me five days before my story 'went to press' by
James Moore, Huffington Post
brilliant minds think alike.
check below for some bon mots on Stewart from Moore.
e.g. It is a curious fact that people are never so trivial as when they take themselves seriously." - Oscar Wilde
checkitout: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-moore/and-a-comic-shall-lead-th_b_173734.html

MY ORIGINAL STORY
Isn't it the height of disinformation when a comedian is looking like the best person to win THE journalism award in America?

We have a man, Jon Stewart, who is a comic, and who likes doing interviews, and dead-pan faces, so somebody put him behind a desk and gave him 18 writers. He impersonates a
talking head (i.e. a news-reader/anchor -nice metaphor, bottom of the ocean),
and not even a journalist. And yet he appears, functionally, to be providing the services that we used to expect from journalists.
I give you the headline of a Rolling Stone front-cover story:

America's Anchors
Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert faked it until they made it.
Now they may truly be the most trusted names in news.

He is finding dissident stuff and commenting in such a clear way that he makes all the talking heads, not to mention their social-climbing, embedded, spooning journalists look like complete meat-heads. Nice hair, good expression, empty head, no morals, okay? LOOK!

[unbelievably, that last one is a racist and spends her time on-air mocking the poor.]

See how Stewart calmly, politely and eruditely skewers the financial system and the reporting of it on CNBC in his interview of Cramer. The best are the latter 2 of 3

Checkitout:
-http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=221517&title=jim-cramer-unedited-interview
-http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=221518&title=jim-cramer-unedited-interview

-see also my other attacks on "journos": 'BBC lackeys' 'freedom of the press to kiss buttocks'
-goto www.alternet.org and search for Malkin

some clips from MOORE'S STORY , Huffington Post (copyright)
-I am inclined to wonder if there is a line somewhere in the Book of Revelation that proclaims "and a comic shall lead them."
- If a writer for the Wall Street Journal or even the Boston Globe had put together a piece deconstructing the fallibilities of Jim Cramer's advice they would have had great problems with publication. Lawyers would have been engaged and editors would have furrowed their brows and worried about being counter-attacked or whether CNBC's advertisers would have stayed away from the paper. Sadly, no editor or reporter would have even thought up the idea of doing an analysis of Cramer's nonsensical babblings.
-Analysts doing the autopsy on newspaper reporting and the corpse of mainstream journalism are constantly lamenting the fact that so many young people and an increasing number of others are getting their news from Jon Stewart and Comedy Central.
THIS IS A DAMNING INDICTMENT OF TV NEWS:
-Cable news shows can proclaim "no bias, no bull" all they want but every story is framed for a purpose, which is drama and conflict. The viewers and the readers aren't there without the dramatic tension. You might as well be watching Law and Order: Special News Unit.
THIS SHOWS MOORE'S FAITH IN OLD-FASHIONED CYNICISM:
-Unfortunately for traditional journalism, the audience increasingly realizes that much of the material presented is manufactured controversy that requires no resolution.
HIS CONCLUSION? LET'S WORRY:
-The only thing worrisome about Stewart's ascension in American culture is that his schtick and acerbic wit might be a canary in our red, white, and blue coal mine. We've got a funny guy in charge of how we think. Can that be good?

Protests against British soldiers are wrong?

It is true that the decision to invade Iraq was made by the British government. And, if you read the text a few stories ago, their silence about the decision to invade is an admission of culpability.
So, the soldiers were sent there to do their bosses' bidding. They are not to blame.
Right?
If you saw my previous text (How to make people kill for us again) soldiers are just supposed to be these unthinking machines which (not 'who') are devoid of personal morals, just doing what they're told. Robo-soldier, the real-life video game.
In fact, what we have seen is that many soldiers from the UK and US armies have morals and do not wish to kill innocent people. They have deserted their armies. They even protest against the war/invasion.
Even the saving of Iraq from terrorists is a stupid argument, since the foreigners' war brought the terrorists. Terrorists are all bad, unless a foreign aggressor's terrorism caused them to seek to defend the defenseless; the people of Iraq. In that way, the Coalition has given terrorists a good name.
So, if the soldiers had morals, they would choose not to fight. They chose to fight and they are being judged for their lack of morals. Nobody on tonight's Question Time could get their heads around this idea. "Support the boys" is just a cover for militarism. All a government has to do is call a war in secret and anything a soldier does is blessed. It then becomes impossible to bring moral weight to bear on the soldiers.
Everybody already knows government politicians have no morals, so what's the use protesting in front of them. So, what polite society is saying to protesters is "chase your own tail" or "Fl**k your own self".
If UK soldiers kill innocent people, there must be a MORAL price to pay, at least.
It doesn't matter that the protesters were not from Iraq themselves. They still have the right to voice their opinions in defense of the defenseless.
Or else the next call will be to "support the torturers".
The fact that the protesters were called 'Muslim' was a cheap ploy to set up another 'us and them' dichotomy in society. Divide and conquer is what it's called.
Will and strength must be used to defend people and defend peace, in the way it was once used to foment hatred, and propagate and fight wars.

trip to Budapest

This rennaisance cum communism theme park is really fantastic but the people are typically quite poor. I won't bore anyone with the 'tourist blog'. So, here's some of the somewhat interesting stuff.

I was walking the waterfront promenade and in front of the massive modernist foreign hotels, I was approached by two ladies who looked like galley cooks, except they weren't. They started off asking if I wanted a massage, in very good English. I tried to politely bore them by being non-commital. They offered for us to go back to their place for "sex, blow-job, it's okay?" So I said that I prefered walking and walked away quickly before the spaz reflex could kick in. Those happened to be about the only short, fat, ugly young ladies I saw in the whole town.

Strip clubs also have 'salesmen' outside advertising 'big boobies', with a rising intonation. Meaning: are you interested in ___. But, they're nowhere near as pushy as their Prague colleagues. Of course, this is Europe, so strip clubs are a tour of the netherworld and a window to the Mafia. Fungoul!
Don't bother with that. Ah, how I miss Canada. There, if you want to sit and drink a beer, no problem. A girl glued your face? no problem.

A lot of the communist era is still visible. The tram system is one (another is the underground) but I took the waterfront run and imagined myself being in 1975. It was really awesome, replete with the buzzing incomprehensible intercom system.
One old central control problem was the fact that no one could legally sell me a stamp on a weekend, so brought the postcards home and posted them from here.

I checked out the underground/subway, which is the oldest on the continent and the set for the massive uuuuhhhhh... "underground" movie, Kontroll. It's motto was "tichket, tichket!" The inspectors nowadays only check people as they enter, but the hollow look in their eyes as they glower at you is great!
One time, I misread the signs and went to a dead end on the subway train. No problem. The driver walked past me grumbling and got in the cab at the other end and took off again.
As I walked out at the first station, you guessed it, I got the glowering looks, because I was stupid, but I wasn't assaulted. Bonus!



Generally, I'd heard that the Hungarians were surly, but I didn't find this. I learned one word basically and the use of it typically brought a smile to even the most stony face:

thank you = kosonom (with umlauts on each 'o')
so it's more like 'kusunum'.
try also 'nem toodok'= I can't speak (Hungarian)

Hungarian sounds like it's mostly Turkic with a bit of Finno-Ugric.
I tended to be greated in Hungarian. Perhaps this was just my interpretation, but, either I didn't look like a tourist or they just hedged their bets that I was local.

It's odd that in my business, teaching writing at university, I've seen just about every nationality from Europe and beyond, but not Hungarians. I can kind of see why. While, some people clearly have money, most don't. The place is full of foreign banks, something that a British tv news brief said about Hungary while saying how the country is close to bankruptcy. Is that a coincidence?

There were lots of Brits in town, and Italians, French and Austrians. Slovakia is also not far away.
Another thing I noticed was that the Gypsies were particularly nervous. I was worried but didn't understand whether they were thieves, violent or just scared. It's only afterwards that I found out that Gypsies are falling victim to racist killings there.

I'd heard something about the plenty of hot spring public baths. Unfortunately, I was told afterwards that they were a good place for a relaxing afternoon and not someplace to get painfully anally gang-raped.

Saw a church in a cave. Impressive, but not unique.

Margaret Island is found off of one of the northernmost bridges, the 'boomerang bridge'. It's a good walk in the woods. Just be aware that if you're a lone male you'll be looked at like you're a sexual pervert of one kind or another. Luckily, I can do the 'piss-off!' look in any language.

Eating dis-orders: Most of the restaurants that have English menus, especially if they're on sandwich boards, are tourist traps. They suck money out of you. You're not required to pay any service charge either, but there it is, on your bill. So, you have to fight the garcon just to get your way. Not worth it.
Until I went in to one of these places I was wondering why there were so many American fast-food places, McChucks, Burger King, Subway. Now I know why. Nobody harrasses or cheats you in those places. It's just not food, unfortunately, so I just refused to go there as well.
The solution is to go to 'authentic' restaurants, but they have one two-by-four window, so I couldn't see what was going on inside (It's a left-over from communism. they didn't want their customers to be ratted by passing on the street). I didn't know if they had sandwiches or human sacrifices. I'm gutless, I know. No goulash for me.

The hotel, Radio Inn, was great. It was a 15 min walk to the centre of town, up Andrassy street, and my room was bigger than my London flat. Kitchen, fridge and all that for 30 pounds a night! It had funny proctology toilets, with a shelf, so you get to examine your feces, whether you want to or not. Then somehow it goes away without splashing putrid water everywhere. Patent that!

The Inn was close to Hero's Square, the Fine Art Museum and the Modern Art Gallery, another, Disney-like castle, the duck lake and the quadruple-size outdoor skating rink. Massive! The UN, EU and many embassies were set up there as well. Tereszvaros. Theresa's place!

Advice: Don't get your camera out first thing. You'll be photographing every second building and you'll get a sore neck.

Succumbing to the art thing. Found a felled hollow tree trunk that could house a family... of raccoons.


Half the town is for sale or for rent. Business is pretty bad. Old people selling dried flower arrangements. The vast majority of the poor don't bother anyone. They seem to be very proud. That is except for the Krishna monks who apparently feed some of the destitute. The amount of open freeganism was also shocking. It goes on all day, in most places.

Tourist thing: I wasted almost no time inside buildings of any kind, but I toured the Opera House. Real nice. Gold leaf on the walls, ancient gods painted on the ceiling, e.g. Dionysus. And yet they've got fake marble walls.

It had English tours, but most of the other visitors weren't English, but Japanese, Chinese, Turkish and Greek.

Update on randy Mandy and his green shandy

Temporal Lordy Peter Mandelson has so often berated his 'people' in his role as Minister of Silly Threats (see below). His latest period of trough-feeding has been done without even the need for him to be elected by the people.
Why bother?
It's only democracy!
Anyway, crass democracy begets direct-action democracy. My favourite direct-action demo crew, Plane Stupid (see old story "plane stupid yet brilliant") refused to swallow Mandy's condescending sputum and in fact returned the favour by spewing green pudding on His Lordsh*t, giving him a technicolor raincoat to spice up his bland, black mortician's garb. According to the SUN, this is "sending shock-waves across London."
Reality-show winner Garth Gates, who is staring in the West-end show "Joseph and his colourladen jacket", or some crap like that, was worried about losing his staring role to the former (unelected) E.U. Minister for Shady Deals with Russian Oligarchs. (see old story 'Middle earth')
"I know people see guys like me as johnny-come-latelies and shameless self-promoters, but politicians are the real whores. His Mandyship could send me to Guantanamo if he wanted," quipped GG, on a fag break.

Update: Historians react to this earth-shattering event
This was an auspicious occasion, according to Oxford Prof Dand Ruff. He noticed that it is surprisingly close to the Ides of March as well as St. Paddy's. That adds historical significance to the attempted assassination of the Minister's ego through the use of GREEN pudding. Interestingly, the minister was heard retorting characteristically to his attacker,
"Et tu, you bruuuute?"
much like Julius Ceasar, even though his attacker was a woman.

History does often repeat itself. Autocratic, self-important, not to mention unelected, politicians are often knocked off.

Checkitout: Google "Ides of March", okay?

Labour's Mandelson vows to crush postal unions

Where does the oxymoron in the title begin and where does it end?

Mandelson is, if nothing, an opportunist and an equal opportunity harrasser. He doesn't care if it's unions, just so long as it's not his 'special friends' like Russian oligarchs and his pork-trough hangers-on.

I really enjoyed the tone: "I'll shove it down your throats, so you better open up."

I love democracy.

I really hope that people will enjoy weekly home mail delivery because that's what the market will deem fair. No sense in giving the poor and infirm daily delivery to their door. How uppity can those people get?
Daily home delivery!? HA!

Our business friends know how to do postal service. They will pocket some lucre by selling off Royal Mail's assets, and then lose money because the government will put them back in the black, with the public's money anyway. Some of that same money will find its way into Labour's coffers, as a pay-off, completing the cycle. Oh, except for the cash that Mandy gives to his friends, as above.

Dismissed!
that means you and most of RM's employees.

Tony Blair teaches Gazans a lesson, in English

Apparently, Tony Blair snuck into Gaza yesterday, through a tunnel. This is because the Palestinians have been short of English teachers due to an unfortunate local incident (read: they were blitzed), and Tony hasn't been doing anything lately, despite having a job description -

DIPLOMAT (believe it or not).

So, Tony-boy went into an English class with a guitar. I can just picture it now:

Tony: Can you say 'imperialist'? (strumming in B-flat)

Class: -silence-

Tony: I'm in charge here! (E-7th ipsolidian scale)

Class: (Chorus) we've seen worse (in G)

Tony:
I can see that you people are impossible to re-educate.
No wonder you're in this STATE. (a guitar string snaps)

School Head:
Actually, it's not a state.
It's an occupied territory.
A kind-of permanent, open-air jail.
It's inhuman and immoral, but you know that.
Right, Elvis?

Showing that English self-control when they get angry-
Tony : _______!

As Tony was leaving, the kids opened up and exchanged bon mots... in English, finally!

"Bush's lapdog" was heard, as was

"I think he's Catholic now" as well as

"same difference" and lastly,

"if the bombing starts again, do you think he'll leave?" which brought howls of laughter.

"Inshala"

-Costick67 (8^P