My conclusion after last year's primary: Most of the people WANT TO BE FOOLED most of the time.

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

to skippy – hallajueh brother.

to dan – may the author credited in the link excuse me for forgetting quotes, but i can not take credit for the words.

as far as the white russian, aren't mystics & charlatans as much a product of the time & homeland as novelists?

and yes, gurdjieff would make a classic viagra spokesman, even better than orson welles.

to downsouth – yes, the profit prophets are coming out of the dark corners. but as dan says, they've always been here. gotta give it up to Pastor J tho for pulling the once and future present american zeitgeist right on the shrinking pursestrings.

to vinny – sorry to rile you with the new age BS papa. if you were to read pythagoras, you would see that the father of mathematics (for which we have used to imbed ourselves into an economic gordian knot as you well know) was also a serious musicologist.

besides, i've always been fond of that zen story about the monk who became enlightened when finding a pile of BS on the road.

cheers

Now we stagger around like a lush, and hurl insults and spittle at them. We whipped it out in front of the world and peed all over the Middle East while passing out umbrellas that never opened.

We fought a cold war with Russia, but Europe fought a few hot ones. Still, we insist that Poland be defended against Iranian missiles by putting a useless missile shield right next to Russia’s butt crack.

Meanwhile, Georgia was wishing we developed a tank and artillery shield. Now there is something we could have sold.

They have to listen to us play “Remember When” as we steal their silverware and pocket bread from our own poor.

Everyone keeps waiting for America to check herself into Betty Ford, but that won’t do the trick. Not when you have politicians like this playing Stump-The-Nobel-Prize-Winner on Capitol Hill, and thinking he won.

“In school we have drummed into us that America is the land of the free, free to be misinformed, free to be ripped off, free to be forced in to plea deals, in fear of the outcomes no matter the reality’s, free to be sucked dry to make hole those that brought destruction to our houses, with sophisticated mechanisms beyond most peoples wildest dreams, free to be governed by a system that in effect protects at all cost the 1% of the population with little fear of the future. They will always have means to fulfill their needs, housing, food, lifestyle.”

Hear, hear! In high school U.S. history I was taught that our country has never made a mistake and foreigners are to blame for everything that has gone wrong. Sad to say, most of the kids there with me still believe that.

Going back to the original topic (Stress Test White Paper), is there a better line in the entire thing than “traditional role of capital, especially common equity, is to absorb unexpected losses and thus to protect depositors and other creditors.”

Clearly America has broken with tradition and outsourced this function to the taxpayer.

skippy

I have lived through many constructs of life (militarily-both Government and private, corporate and as a swag man roaming the planet) and the common/repetitive denominator in all these experiences was in order to have a beneficial relations, one must speak the truth. To reveal all and work out solutions to group survivability, as a group.
This is what I find missing today and for maybe the last 40 odd years in America, the inability of people to communicate on a personal level with out fear of being found wanting.

@VG Chicago said…America remains the most desirable place on Earth.

Um to some yes, but not to all and for what reasons. the casinos chance of wealth, the successful are splayed across the media, but what of the failed. The chances of higher success are akin to making the top ten of the GPA golf money makers, of all the people in the world that play golf only 6% play professionally and only 1% of those can make a living out of it. I find this observation very true to the wealth construct as a hole.

To the stament…Personally, I am amused by some of the European contributors to this and other blogs, who obsessively focus so much of their energies on America, while ignoring similar (and usually worse) problems in their own countries.

Could it be Americas projection of status/power over others lives, personal business. America made out quite well do to the North Atlantic treaty, effectively ending British colonialism, only to replace it with American corporatism. I think we rubbed them raw, cops worst nightmare is a domestic eh.

As far as your comments on Dan D, I believe you better than that and as some here can testify, I have my moments too. I look forward to to more of your regular brand of comments mate.

@DownSouth…conccur with a hole lot of what you put forth. Puritan belief systems seemingly have this innate desire to reward good behaver, when its about ones soul and not the wallet. Boy did some one pick up that ball and run with it shezz, generation shift that Lenin would be envious of.

Skippy…again what a plesure it is to discuss these topics with all here. Oh, lest we forget!

I really enjoyed reading these comments. I feel like I get to skip all the mundane stuff and only soak up information that others felt I should be exposed to.

I try to do the same for others, and just to make sure some basics are covered, I found it particularly interesting that Ayn Rand, when pressed on native American Indian land rights, didn’t exactly come out in favor of that.

It seems that it’s tough to talk and be consistent from the heights of a soapbox.

I generally like you comments, but there was a lot of ad hominem in that. I’m leaving the comment up for a wee bit so the curious can see what is over the line, and then it gets deleted.

You can argue with the philosophy or say it’s badly off topic, but you do not need to throw personal insults in as well.

And Dan wasn’t the guy who wrote what you found offensive either…..

I hate to be the one to break the news to you, buddy, but you really should cut down on your intake of red, blue, and Viagra pills, because your post makes no sense. I’ve never seen so much absurd New Age BS anywhere else. You might also consider finding a better life philosophy than The Matrix, unless you’re a teenager, in which case it’s ok. One to consider is Razor’s Edge.” Finally, in addition to cutting down on the pills, I also recommend you reduce your alcohol consumption, before your obvious delirium becomes a permanent state.

Kindly yours,
Vinny GOLDberg (ROFL)