Saturday, February 25, 2012

Links 2/25/12

Eagle owl at 1000 frames per Second towards a camera Dogwork (hat tip Lambert) I’ve featured this before but it is still cool.

ADVENTURES IN BEHAVIORAL NEUROLOGY—OR—WHAT NEUROLOGY CAN TELL US ABOUT HUMAN NATURE Edge (hat tip reader Aquifer)

Smallest legal apartment in California is prefab, adorbs Grist (hat tip reader Aquifer)

There is no ethical smartphone Andrew Leonard, Salon

Eighth grade teacher ‘caught in bed having sex with her student, 15, by his 12-year-old brother’ Daily Mail (hat tip reader May S)

Finally, a smoking gun connecting livestock antibiotics and superbugs Grist (hat tip reader Aquifer)

German Economic Striving at the Expense of Workers and Neighbors Will Backfire Marshall Auerback, Alternet

Germany softens resistance on ‘firewall’ Financial Times

Family of three dies from apparent starvation in Japan Guardian (hat tip reader Emiliano Z). Really sad. Their cat died too.

Fresh questions overshadow launch of Sun on Sunday Guardian (hat tip Buzz Potamkin)

Why the super-rich love the UK Guardian (hat tip Buzz Potamkin)

Solidarity within the Eurozone: how much, what for, for how long? Notre Europe (hat tip Swedish Lex)

Rising prices of Iranian sheep’s intestines triple costs for German bratwurst makers Der Spiegel

Saudi Arabia backs arming Syrian opposition Guardian (hat tip reader May S). Warmongering on the other side of the pond.

U.S. does not believe Iran is trying to build nuclear bomb LA Times (hat tip reader May S). Please tell Elizabeth Warren.

Payroll tax cut undermines Social Security’s security LA Times (hat tip reader Aquifer). They are finally figuring this one out.

Wall Street Shills Hype How Much Preet Bharara Could Make If He Stopped Shielding Wall Street Marcy Wheeler

The 10 Most Excellent Reasons to Attack Iran David Swanson (hat tip reader Aquifer). You have to read this.

Fisher: Qur’an blunder has made Afghan mission more dangerous Montreal Gazette (hat tip reader May S)

Students Physically Attacked for Interrupting Israel Talk in New Mexico Atlantic Wire (hat tip Lambert)

Donovan: The Foreclosure Fraud Settlement Is Strong Because of the OCC Settlement Dave Dayen, Firedoglake

THE OCCUPY SUPER PAC NON-STORY: HOW LAZY HACKS HELPED BREITBART SMEAR THE OCCUPY MOVEMENT Yasha Levine, eXiled

UK House of Lords Asked to Investigate Massive International Financial Fraud Nation of Change. This looks completely batshit, except you can click through and find the excerpted text on what looks to be the Parliament’s website, and Lord James said RBS verified the transfers attributed to it.

Bonus cuts hide bigger problem for investment banks Financial Times. This is salutary. Investment bankers will have more power, and they care for their franchises more than traders do (not that bankers are princes, but traders are more ruthless). That will constrain some of the worst predatory behavior.

Have labour will travel MacroBusiness. There are some important observations in this piece, marred by a bit of gold standard thinking

Would We Have Drugged Up Einstein? How Anti-Authoritarianism Is Deemed a Mental Health Problem Alternet (hat tip Aquifer). Today’s must read.

Antidote du jour. This is reader Scott’s cat Allie. Her brother D’Art (for D’Artagnan), who has an Austrian survival of the fittest outlook, got a profile in NC after he made his hostility to Marshall Auerback’s free-spending monetary views quite apparent. Allie’s been jealous ever since.

Topics: Links

Email This Post Email This Post Posted by Yves Smith at 4:39 am

147 Comments » Links to this post

147 Comments:

  • Chris E says:
    February 25, 2012 at 5:38 am

    Suggestion for link – though this might merit a response post of it’s own:

    http://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/16/so-what-would-your-plan-for-greece-be/

    Reply
    • Foppe says:
      February 25, 2012 at 11:06 am

      Not all that interesting imo.. basically all of the options are extremely status quo friendly, dismissing anything that might do good as “politically infeasible” etc.

      Reply
  • YankeeFrank says:
    February 25, 2012 at 5:43 am

    That cat looks seriously anti-authoritarian. I wonder if there is a personality type more offensive to me than the authoritarian… sociopaths are horrible, but there is clearly an organic root there. The authoritarian is made, and is fully complicit and accepting of their fate. They accept the domination of those above them all too willingly, and relish the domination of those “below”. Perhaps narcissism is worse… interesting that they are frequently encountered together.

    Reply
    • JTFaraday says:
      February 25, 2012 at 8:45 am

      “I wonder if there is a personality type more offensive to me than the authoritarian… Perhaps narcissism is worse… interesting that they are frequently encountered together.”

      It’s like you read my mind.

      Reply
      • Klassy! says:
        February 25, 2012 at 9:10 am

        O-bots authoritarian.
        Obama narcissist.

        Perfect match!

        May I add, that is one seriously handsome kitty.

        Reply
      • aeolius says:
        February 25, 2012 at 10:11 am

        I fear you have let psychobabble shape your thinking.
        JD Laing said some time ago that society designate someone (the psychiatrist) sane and gives him the task of decidingg who is insane.
        Unfortunately the APA DSMs are all about getting third-party payments. A quote I didn’t anchor to author, on the new DSM decision manual was for an expert discussing autism. The complaint that too many children would not be labelled properly as autistic (and able to mandate special schooling) suggested that if too few were being diagnosed we could lessen the number of criteria (needed for the diagnosis)
        Anti-authoritarian by its defenition involves an authority to be anti-. I suppose right now that Homs is filled with anti-authoritarian types.
        Our society now consists of individuality of what brand of designer blue jeans you wear, what hyped albums you must have and who you think should win the Oscar.
        Great men and heroes need be self-absorbed.

        Reply
      • Mel says:
        February 25, 2012 at 12:27 pm

        “Do we really want to diagnose and medicate everyone with deficits in rule-governed behavior? ”

        If we had, then maybe those Pooling and Servicing Agreements would have been honored in the observance rather than the breach. And those damned Hippies: “If it feels good, man, just do it!”. If they hadn’t ended up running banks, the world would be a better place.

        Reply
    • tom allen says:
      February 25, 2012 at 8:54 am

      Clearly she needs to be prescribed more cream. And tuna when indicated. :-P

      Reply
  • SR6719 says:
    February 25, 2012 at 6:11 am

    Amnesty International’s Report on Libya: “Out of control” militias commit widespread abuses, a year on from uprising:

    “Armed militias operating across Libya commit widespread human rights abuses with impunity, fueling insecurity and hindering the rebuilding of state institutions, warned Amnesty International in a new report released Feb 15, 2012, a year on from the start of the February 2011 uprising.

    The report, entitled “Militias threaten hopes for new Libya” documents widespread and serious abuses, including war crimes, by a multitude of militias against suspected al-Gaddafi loyalists, with cases of people being unlawfully detained and tortured – sometimes to death.

    African migrants and refugees have also been targeted, and revenge attacks have been carried out, forcibly displacing entire communities – while the [US-NATO] authorities have done nothing to investigate the abuses and hold those responsible to account….”

    “….Militia members are seen on video footage obtained by Amnesty International hitting and threatening to kill a group of 29 men in their custody. One is heard saying “take them all and kill them”. Their bodies were among those found three days later at the hotel, many with their hands tied behind their back and shot in the head….”

    Not a single effective investigation [by the US-NATO humanitarian mission] is known to have been carried out into cases of torture……”

    http://amnesty.org/en/news/libya-out-control-militias-commit-widespread-abuses-year-uprising-2012-02-15

    Reply
    • SR6719 says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:47 am

      Everthing is obliterated from memory on the TV or computer screen. We live in the era of events without consequences: The war in Libya, oil workers massacred in Kazakhstan, Iraq, Fukushima, etc…. Compared to a white Ford Bronco transporting O.J. Simpson down the freeways of Los Angeles on June 17, 1994, the 800,000 people killed in the Rwandan genocide from April 6 until mid-July, 1994, had less importance for the U.S. media and the American public than a drive-by shooting in L.A. It wasn’t until August 1994 that Newsweek even bothered to feature the Rwandan genocide on its cover.

      Nothing has changed, for the U.S. media and those members of the American public who still attach importance to its coverage of events, the war in Libya ranks right up there in importance between a toothpaste commercial and a drive-by shooting. The Libyan war is yesterday’s news, under the guise of a humanitarian mission, Western powers got what they wanted, now they’ll steal Libya’s oil while the media focuses our attention on atrocities in Syria, and beats the drum for war in Iran, and so forth….

      Reply
  • Richard Kline says:
    February 25, 2012 at 6:36 am

    Regarding the ‘Swift note’ money-kiting scheme suggested for RBS in comments in the House of Lords, that, on the face of it, is literally the craziest presentation I’ve ever seen in a major political forum. It will be downright fascinating to learn whether there’s any substance to it that wasn’t ingested before dissemination. I’m not just punning, it’s an interesting conundrum.

    On a less sanguine note, the discussion of ‘disruptive disorders’ in the Alternet article raises concerns which I share. ADHD and ODD are fundamentally crap, illegitimate ‘diagnoses.’ There is no basis to propose a ‘diagnosis’ of specific behaviors _alone_. One can diagnose an organic problem with particularly common behavioral results; not demonstrated for those ‘conditions.’ One can diagnose a pattern of behaviors linked with thinking and emotional responses which can be demonsrated to have no basis in real world events, i.e. distorted thinking. That is not demonstrated for these ‘diagnoses.’ Slapping a label on behaviors judged undesireable, generally by those not demonstrating them, so that it is legally premitted to prescribe pharmaceuticals which suppress the ability to present those behaviors isn’t ‘treatment.’ It’s a sentence to live a lesser life at the discretion of others.

    There are certainly individuals with significant psychiatric problems who display anti-authoritarian behavior that is partly or wholly delusional in its origin—but the behavior of those is broadly and demonstrably disturbed in other repects. Diagnosis there involves a broader description of unreal thinking and destructive, as opposed to merely disruptive, behavior. And there are really individuals who have attentional deficits relative to a normative level in the larger population; typically for organic reasons though these are not always by any means diagnosable or directly susceptible to intervention. But is drugging those with attentional deficits an appropriate intervention? I would say no, barring massive and identifiable organic deficits and prior thereputic intervention in behavior management. Sure, it’s _easy_ to put kids or young adults on upppers, downers, or nullifiers. They don’t help anyone ‘think differently’ or manage their behavior though. And they get in the way of neuro and emotional development. They stunt growth, in a word. One can’t argue for a case of one but consider: the only definitely attentionally disordered child I have known as an adult did not have pharmaceutical intervention imposed on him, but got behavioral management. He ended up a math major, married a wonderful woman with a doctorate, has a kid now, and earns three times what I do (for what that’s worth). He was fortunate in that his father was a child psychiatrist who know what meds can and can’t do and what therapay can and can’t do. Most people are given pills with the implication that they should stop being a problem for others. My advice would be, “Think for yourself.”

    And a money passage from the same article, on the politics of ‘diagnosing’ autonomous behavior as defective: “Americans have been increasingly socialized to equate inattention, anger, anxiety, and immobilizing despair with a medical condition, and to seek medical treatment rather than political remedies. What better way to maintain the status quo than to view inattention, anger, anxiety, and depression as biochemical problems of those who are mentally ill rather than normal reactions to an increasingly authoritarian society? . . . The reality is that depression is highly associated with societal and financial pains.” I couldn’t agree more.

    Reply
    • Skippy says:
      February 25, 2012 at 7:49 am

      Post 20th century America – is seemingly – ground zero for mental disorders, the amount of input to quantify this observation is staggering.

      College Campuses: Ground Zero in America’s Depression Epidemic

      On this blog, I have warned about the growing epidemic of severe depression in the USA, pointing to signs that this growing wave of depression is concentrated in the young. The latter development is especially troubling and ominous because depression that onsets early in life often has a worse course than later onset depression. Depressed college students are likely to become depressed 30 somethings and depressed 40 somethings. Early adulthood is a tender age. Depression that onsets in early adulthood disrupts important developmental milestones like starting a career or starting a family.

      If you are skeptical, or think I’m exaggerating, please read this story. It describes the new release of an important survey, The American Freshman: National Norms Fall 2010,” involving more than 200,000 incoming full-time students at four-year colleges. The data in the survey indicate that emotional health of college freshmen is at its lowest point since this survey began collecting data 25 years ago. For example, the percentage of students who said their emotional health was above average fell to 52 percent. It was 64 percent in 1985…. snip

      http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/charting-the-depths/201101/college-campuses-ground-zero-in-americas-depression-epidemic

      Global mental health: a failure of humanity

      So ground zero in global mental health is not the 15% of the global burden of disease accounted for by the cost of mental disorders; nor is it the under 2% (and often less than 1%) of expenditure on health that is estimated to go to services for psychiatric conditions in countries in Africa, Latin America, and south and southeast Asia (compared to over 10% in the USA). Nor is it the absence, or extremely small numbers, of psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses, psychologists, and psychiatric social workers in these impoverished nation states. No, bad as these indices of the deficiencies of care are, they are not ground zero. Ground zero is the routine local condition of people with mental illness (including those with dementia and autism, for example) in communities, networks, and families. It is their pain and suffering. Their moral life. The fundamental truth of global mental health is moral: individuals with mental illness exist under the worst of moral conditions.
      The widespread stigma of mental illness, which prevails in countries as disparate as China, India, Kenya, Romania, Egypt, and the USA, marks individuals with severe psychiatric disorders as virtually non-human. None of the world’s major religions—no matter how strong is its message of support on behalf of the most marginal and vulnerable sufferers—has been able to break this cycle of misery. Nor have modern anti-stigma campaigns and mental health laws. They have somewhat improved practices inside the asylum, but have had limited effect on those in society at large. Mental health professionals themselves and family members, moreover, have repeatedly been shown to be the most effective and efficient transmitters of stigma. Globalised cultural changes have brought about important reductions in the discrimination, fear, and isolation surrounding depression and anxiety disorders in many countries, and this is no small improvement that holds practical relevance for global mental health in general. Yet the moral conditions for people with psychosis, dementia, and mental disability remain horrendous most everywhere.

      http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2809%2961510-5/fulltext

      Skippy… that’s some stored potential no one wants to see pop one day.

      Reply
      • tom allen says:
        February 25, 2012 at 9:05 am

        Perhaps depression is just a realistic response to the state of the world. Young people are fairly perceptive.

        On the other hand, things do change. Once you hit bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up. I have a severe anxiety disorder and I’m changing, mostly by opening myself up to the ridicule that I’ve always feared, and welcoming it.

        Hang in there. :-P

        Reply
        • skippy says:
          February 25, 2012 at 9:24 pm

          Tom,

          Having had acute anxiety attacks as a early teen (once hyperventilated to the limit of my lung capacity (inhale / exhale) for 6 hours and ice pick like sensations located at my sternum (um… once every month), I can relate. I fought back with out guidance or knowledge (got PO’ed about it), all whilst having medical practitioners of considerable experience within the family.

          In the end I had a ice pick sensation after a lovely meal with family at a gathering in Seadona, AZ, at an old restaurant near Zane Greys old cabin. The adults were having coffee and aperitifs, so it was time for the kids to go out side and muck about. There in the crisp air of fresh snow and pines I had a massive attack, dagger like sensation emanating from sternum and growing like an icicle inwards, shoulders being drawn forward and collapsing into chest. I was in an alcove of the small building complex alone, others off to another end. At some point I decided it was IT or ME and with that I expanded my chest and arched my body back, a rifle like crack hit my ears and a huge physical click feeling (almost like cartilage being rapidly separated from bone) at sternum. The feeling afterwards was semi euphoric, an easy confidence, walking a bit lighter washed over me. I never said a word to anyone about it after wards.

          The rest was sorted after joining the adventure ed. club in my last year of high school and subsequent military experiences, could have chosen a better mechanism than the military and achieved the same out come in hindsight.

          The point of all this personal anecdotal regurgitation is… now I’m married too someone with debilitating anxiety attacks as a symptom of OCD. They come with the on set of relaxation, double head fook, can’t relax for fear of an attack. All whilst being a highly regarded medical professional, by peers and betters, awards, does both clinical and uni (two different uni’s). This duality between public life and private creates a huge problem at home, 4 kids of which the oldest daughter is exhibiting OCD tendency’s. This is further compounded by unreconciled past environmental conditions – events, a family history going back to ancestral beginnings in a small village in Scotland and their genetic thyroid problem due to breeding constraints.

          The only reason I can cope, with any of this, is past experience and good information. What about all those out there that have none, are diminished for seeking? And seemingly the increasing complexity, manufactured desire, refutation of old control mechanisms, unrelenting competition, fear over the basics in life for the foreseeable future, what does this portend? Peak world, peak energy, peak resource depletion, all topped off with peak anxiety. Yet the solutions being proffered from above are more of the same activators above?

          Skippy… class defective. Me, I can’t sit quietly or sleep during a artillery assault, just angry about the hole mess and the inability of citizens to access information. MSM, private sector, governments (see private influence), to minimize these effects, but, rather use them to profit in the short term.

          Reply
      • psychohistorian says:
        February 25, 2012 at 11:56 am

        Thanks for the comment.

        I agree that we are wasting human talent at an alarming rate.

        All for a class struggle that many are convinced doesn’t exist.

        Reply
      • Aquifer says:
        February 25, 2012 at 12:35 pm

        Skippy,

        I remember writing a L.ed, about 10 years ago, suggesting that, because we, as a society, had all become convinced that this new world order of globalization, in which we no longer had any power, as communities, to “fix” our problems, and could only subsidize the wealthy, hoping for crumbs from their table – that this state of affairs was “inevitable” and “irreversible” – necessarily resulted in profound psychological discomfort – manifesting in depression, anxiety and ulcers, born out by the fact that we were increasingly finding our “fix” in the drugstore – antidepressant and anti-acid drugs being the most common ones taken …

        I think young folks recognize and feel alienation at a much more acute level – they haven’t been beaten down to the point where they have succumbed to the “need to surrender” – but they begin to see that perhaps their natural rebellion may have nowhere to go, no possibility for them to be meaningful agents in their own lives – and this cognitive dissonance, especially if they can’t quite give a name to it’s source, can be profoundly depressing ..

        Just a thought …

        Reply
        • skippy says:
          February 25, 2012 at 9:54 pm

          Agree…. the amount of people, within a confine, with the cyclic amplitude of the gift that keeps giving.

          Skippy… well… you wrote for L. nuff said.

          PS. sometimes the ancestor in me wants to storm the castle with the mob ( warts and all ), yet the thinker wants to plant a seed some where, if that’s still possible.

          Reply
        • ambrit says:
          February 26, 2012 at 12:55 am

          Just as in Dickens’ day about ten percent of the population of London were gin guzzling alcoholics. Breaking these cycles takes inspired leadership. Instead we have insipid leadership.
          As for OCD like symptoms, I remember coming out of full blown fugue states a couple of times after my “dear sainted” Dad would go off on me. Thank heaven my Mom woke up to it eventually and took my two younger sisters to al-Anon metings regularly as they grew up. Compensation neurosis grow wild like mushrooms after a spring rain in such conditions. Skippy has noticed. He sees a lot, but plays his cards close to his chest. I also agree that the Scots connection has something to do with it. I have such a connection, and our eldest daughter has flare ups of serious OCD symptoms. She now has daughters of her own. We watch warily.
          Be of good cheer, and don’t let anyone medicate you!

          Reply
      • Walter Wit Man says:
        February 25, 2012 at 1:41 pm

        I see a real failure by many middle and upper class Boomers to realize the difference between coming of age now and when they came of age.

        The boomers had it much easier. Their future was rosier and they were given much more. I think many assume things have gotten better because of technological advances and the idea that things always advance but the reality is that unless one is in the top 20% or so, it is really hard for a young person now while it was much easier for average young people 40 years ago.

        How much could a general laborer make at age 18 in 1964, or 1974? How hard was it to get this job or support a family or get medical care or buy a car or save for college or buy a house? Now, a kid of 18 is lucky to get a minimum wage job with no health care and no ability to support anyone else . . . . .

        Plus, the realization that our country is full on fascist is depressing. That’s actually part of the fascist ideology–to psychologically convince the majority that all resistance is futile and that they are a cog in a wheel told to obey and accept whatever austerity their masters wish.

        Reply
        • Lambert Strether says:
          February 25, 2012 at 5:37 pm

          We did have it easier. When I was in my twenties, I worked for several years in factories, making stuff, repairing machines, and so on. Light manufacturing. Looking back, I feel very privileged to have done that (no irony whatever intended) because that culture and those opportunities are gone now. Although most of this work was near minimum wage (ie, would not have supported a family), and the working conditions were not good, I’d still prefer that work over service jobs where one’s livelihood depends on tips, or shelving product at WalMart, or, heaven forfend, working in one of Amazon’s sweatshops.

          Reply
          • Walter Wit Man says:
            February 26, 2012 at 11:12 am

            Yep.

            And minimum wage probably went a lot further. And one didn’t need drug testing and a background check to take a part time job.

            The trades is where one see a big difference. The trades are what paid really well back then (and still do to a certain extent) and these were the bulk of the jobs and they were open to lots of people.

        • Up the Ante says:
          February 25, 2012 at 10:34 pm

          This is the cause of much of the college kids’ depression,

          “Plus the realization that our country is full on fascist is depressing. That’s actually part of the fascist ideology–to psychologically convince the majority that all resistance is futile and that they are a cog in a wheel told to obey and accept whatever austerity their masters wish. ”

          They know the fascism is beatable, and instead are seeing much of the adult world go with the futile. Acquiescing to fascism is not adult, and isn’t/never has been lost on them.

          ‘Stuck on stupid.’, as they say.

          Reply
          • Walter Wit Man says:
            February 26, 2012 at 11:14 am

            The Boomers have the most political and economic power right now so they are the group that can really make a difference.

      • Walter Wit Man says:
        February 25, 2012 at 4:08 pm

        Instead of Obamacare we would have been better off putting a counselor or two in every school. Actually, I think schools should have a nurse practitioner/doctor in every school to act as the child’s GP. So there should basically be a small health clinic, including mental and reproductive health, in every school big enough to support it.

        I wonder how many kids a counselor could see in a week. Say they could see 6 to 10 kids a day. The could serve up to 30-50 kids by seeing them for one session a week. I would rather country provide this than wage endless imperial war against a phantom menace.

        Reply
    • barrisj says:
      February 25, 2012 at 2:54 pm

      Morris Berman, discussing his latest book on CSPAN this a.m.,
      “Why America Failed: The Roots of Imperial Decline”, noted that the US public consumes over two-thirds of world-wide prescribed anti-depressants, this with only 5% of world population. I would be curious to know how anti-depressant usage correlates with socio-economic status, and amongst which groups usage is increasing relative to the others.

      Reply
  • Skippy says:
    February 25, 2012 at 7:59 am

    Now for something completely different…

    Fotoshop by Adobé.

    This commercial isn’t real, neither are society’s standards of beauty.

    http://vimeo.com/34813864

    Skippy… there is no reason to be ugly now! Buy it!

    Reply
  • jackalope says:
    February 25, 2012 at 8:08 am

    This story in todays NYT is a bit like the Einstein story http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/us/a-military-diagnosis-personality-disorder-is-challenged.html?hp

    Reply
  • Goin' South says:
    February 25, 2012 at 8:24 am

    This move to drug dissidents and potential non-conformists is par for the course for totalitarian regimes.

    Grace Slick once formulated a counter-attack that nearly succeeded. Invited to the Nixon White House under her maiden name because she shared Finch College as an alma mater with Tricia, Grace decided to go, taking Abbie Hoffman and some LSD destined for the punch bowl along with her. Alas, the Secret Service realized who the rock goddess and Hoffman were upon arrival, and they weren’t allowed in.

    Reply
  • John L says:
    February 25, 2012 at 8:27 am

    Small apartment – prefer this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/24/homes-self-build

    Reply
    • MyLessThanPrimeBeef says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:14 pm

      Regarding small dwellings, all else being equal, smaller people are greener…less energy consumption, again, all else being equal.

      So, I think this a good sign to take to your next NBA or NFL game:

      SMALLER PEOPLE ARE GREENER PEOPLE

      in fine print, all else being equal (maybe put it on the back of it).

      Reply
  • ex-PFC Chuck says:
    February 25, 2012 at 9:00 am

    There’s no link in the “Drugged Up Einstein” item. Here’s one: http://bit.ly/wWNimF

    Reply
  • Klassy! says:
    February 25, 2012 at 9:33 am

    The Mental Health/Einstein article was excellent. He’s correct– the mental health profession weeds out anyone with an antiauthoritarian streak and medicalizes anti authoritarianism to be treated with drugs and/or talk therapy.
    I am heartened that the author spoke up about real stressors– financial insecurity and lack of (living wage) jobs that affect mental health (and health in general). I feel attacking these problems would do more for people’s health than channeling them into our mental health system.
    For more on the history of “conduct disorders” (would it surprise you to hear that the military is involved?) there is an excellent chapter in this book:
    http://www.amazon.com/Against-Health-Morality-Biopolitics-Technoscience/dp/0814795935/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1330179898&sr=1-1#reader_0814795935

    Reply
  • Lowell says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:05 am

    The most important part of the tiny apartment is the borrowed view captured in the rear light illuminated
    photo mural. It was taken from a three million dollar
    condo in one of the human hives recently built South of Market in San Francisco.
    You thought that was really the view?
    (The flag never moves).

    On the other hand, maybe there’s an app where you can have an I phone slide show of different views on the back wall of your cell…hey, why not do these in prisons? Maybe it would calm the cons down?

    Back to San Francisco,
    Row after row of these hideous bloc towers, each touting their smart address and their uniqueness, each blocking the others views and casting shadows and creating a wind tunnel effect, is being built just a few blocks away from the San Francisco Fed and what was once the glorious main street of the city but is now Bum’s row.

    These units form a mini-bubble of hype in the city. When the Big One hits, the costs of seismic damage repair is going to make them unrepairable. “Special assessment to inspect, repair and realign building frame–$800,000 for your unit”…

    Reply
  • René says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:22 am

    RE: Eighth grade teacher ‘caught in bed having sex with her student, 15, by his 12-year-old brother’ Daily Mail

    We have to keep it real. This is a dream come true for most 15 year old boys overflowing with testosterone.

    Reply
  • Bill C says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:38 am

    RE: Bratwurst — Germans will certainly not like this, Nuernberger bratwurst costs tripling !

    Though Nuernberg bratwurst is THE best, so it’s still worth it. One of the things I still miss after moving back to the States.

    Reply
    • Klassy! says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:48 am

      I remember ordering a plate and getting eight. They were kind of small but still.. eight? I ate three and my husband finished the rest (as well as his plate of eight!). Heroic effort on his part.

      Reply
      • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
        February 25, 2012 at 12:21 pm

        One might want to re-consider eating such sausages in light of prion research.

        Reply
      • Bill C says:
        February 26, 2012 at 11:26 am

        I could normally eat 12, and when I moved to Germany, I didn’t even like sausage (in USA that is). The creamy “mehrrettish sosse” (horseradish) makes them even more delectable.

        Reply
  • jsmith says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:45 am

    From the article on Syria.

    Here’s war criminal Barack Obama calling for more murder in Syria.

    “It is absolutely imperative for the international community to rally and send a clear message to President Assad that it is time for a transition,” Obama said.

    “It is time for that regime to move on. And it is time to stop the killing of Syrian citizens by their own government.”

    But it’s AOK for foreign entities to spark a civil war and also kill the innocents of said country?

    It’s just fine and dandy for the fascist United States to pick and choose sides in a civil war which they have helped foment?

    Just to recap, everyone:

    The Nobel Laureate for peace is sponsoring yet another civil war in a country that has done nothing to harm the US.

    Our strongest “allies” in the region are the genocidal and apartheid Israelis and the murderous and fundamentalist Saudis.

    The murderous results of our last intervention in Libya are only accelerating.

    Would some international body please start a second Nuremberg RIGHT NOW so that when all of this bloodshed is past us, we can hold these war criminals to account?

    They could begin the cases in absentia so that justice could be served at the earliest possible moment.

    From the United States we will have for starters:

    Bush
    Rumsfeld
    Cheney
    Rice
    Obama
    Clinton
    Tenet

    Feel free to flush out this rogue’s gallery as there are many more minions in this parade of murder from both the US and abroad.

    Reply
    • Klassy! says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:49 am

      You forgot Panetta.

      Reply
    • ohmyheck says:
      February 25, 2012 at 11:19 am

      Freudian Slip? That’s “flesh out”…but “flush” has its merits.

      Reply
    • SR6719 says:
      February 25, 2012 at 11:40 am

      To hear the Western media tell it, the reason Western powers had to intervene in Libya was because Gaddafi was going to commit ethnic cleansing at the level of a Slobodan Milosevic or the Hutu majority in Rwanda 1994. However, there was no evidence from Gaddafi’s past to suggest he was capable of a massacre of innocent civilians on that scale. Nothing from his past indicated he was capable of a massacre remotely resembling the one that took place in Rwanda, or even the one in Srebrenica.

      After all, how likely was this is in Libya, where almost all Libyans belong to the same ethnic group, being Muslims of Arab-Berber descent.

      And yet, the media assured us this massacre was going to take place in the future and this was used to justify Western intervention. But if Western powers are so humanitarian, why didn’t they intervene in Rwanda or Darfur?

      Also, did anyone notice the absence of women among the Libyan rebels? In Tunisia and Egypt we saw many women among the protestors, but not a single one in Libya. And if Libya was such a populist revolt, like the media kept telling us, then why were there no banners, posters, flags and signs, like the ones we saw in Tunisia and Egypt?

      Reply
      • jsmith says:
        February 25, 2012 at 12:03 pm

        Yes and the only DOCUMENTED massacres in Libya were the NATO-backed rebels slaugtering black Africans.

        http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=26643

        http://humanrightsinvestigations.org/2011/07/07/libya-ethnic-cleansing/

        Reply
        • SR6719 says:
          February 25, 2012 at 3:04 pm

          It seems that the main target of Libya’s Nato-backed rebels are black African prisoners. Anyone who searches the Internet can find some harrowing video clips which claim to show black prisoners being severely mistreated by Nato-backed rebels in Libya.

          For instance, I won’t link to it, but just the other day (Thurs, 2/23/12), Angry Arab blog put up a video which claims to show Libyan rebels mistreating blacks who are being held in cages, and who appear to have been tortured. As far as whether or not these video clips are authentic, the abuses they show are similar to the ones being documented by human rights groups in Libya, such as Amnesty International.

          Reply
    • jsmith says:
      February 25, 2012 at 11:58 am

      Yes, we must flush these war criminals out of their dens of murder and thievery so we can flesh out our list of those to put on trial.

      Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:25 pm

      Jsmith, We the People of the U.S.A. attend the REVOCATION of the Nobel Peace Prizes bestowed on 1) Barack Obama, 2) Henry Kissinger, 3) Jimmy Carter (who did Brzezinsky’s bidding for war hawks).

      Reply
    • Walter Wit Man says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:12 pm

      The main reason for this shocking injustice that you so well describe, is the decades of mind control we have been subjected to.

      We are victims of propaganda and controlled media. They have had decades to hone their skills and the current fascists have learned from their earlier attempts.

      It’s quite amazing to me how well this propaganda works. It’s like the most powerful lighthouse spotlight in the world being aimed at someone. Only it’s not illuminating them, so maybe that’s not the best analogy, it’s also playing a false picture.

      They really are magicians to take one of the most blatant series of wars of aggression and to justify it in the way they have to the American people.

      The American people have been conquered by fascists with the means to control the masses through mass manipulation.

      Reply
    • Walter Wit Man says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:33 pm

      You’re absolutely right. These are war criminals. Americans have killed millions over the last 100 years is wars of aggression and secret wars.

      The list above has caused the death of at least a million victims.

      If you are a Democrat or a Republican, by definition, you are agreeing to let war criminals lead and control you. There is no reforming these people from inside. There is no moral justification for trying to simply minimize their killing.

      One must stand up to these criminals and refuse to work with them politically. Why caucus with criminals who don’t respect you anyway?

      Plus, not only have these people betrayed their country through their war crimes, they have also betrayed the country by handing it over to corporate interests.

      These people are traitors and war criminals should be treated accordingly.

      Why shake hands with a war criminal? There is no difference between shaking the hand of Hitler and shaking the hand of Obama. The difference only exists in the American mind because you he is the victim of mind control. The American can kill millions of people and it’s okay whereas it’s wrong if Hitler does it. Bullshit. Same thing. Actually, America has taken the lead so we are going to have to update our rhetoric and use USA instead of Nazi as a euphemism for barbaric killing.

      Reply
    • Lambert Strether says:
      February 25, 2012 at 5:49 pm

      I’d add all the Congressional leadership that the executive branch shares intel with, as well as information on upcoming operations. Not sure of the list, but at a minimum should include Pelosi, Boehner, Reid, and McConnell, as well as the entire membership and staff of the intelligence committees of both houses, who knew about warrantless surveillance, torture, and yet remained silent, and who doubtless also know about whatever big plans Obama has for domestic drones.

      Reply
    • Up the Ante says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:38 pm

      Not promoting it, but they will also be motivated by Iraqi ‘insurgents’ having crossed freely to and from Syria.

      Reply
  • El Snarko says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:51 am

    The drugged up Einstein piece is priceless! As an exercise for the brain and funny-bone consider this: Einstein, Hemingway, Beethoven,John Coltrane, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs and say Hillarie Clinton all working at a GM plant circa 1955. All raise poor, without computers in their teens, with no German speakers in sight or tests in that language, the typical social mores of the day. HUMM, anti social or frustrated people??

    What does it say about a culture when the most lucrative things you can do, involve you not being you?

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:28 pm

      ES, your last questions says it all. Americans are CURSED by *education* for slavery to the Corporate State; and the enforced ignorance, even stupidity, that the creation of a *docile, submissive* population that this requires.

      Reply
  • Wells Fargo Must Die says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:52 am

    link recommendation:
    http://nymag.com/news/features/gop-primary-heilemann-2012-3/

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:44 pm

      WF, the link leads to a wolf in sheepskin. Why is it a *given* that Obama will be the (fake) Democratic candidate? Any Republican and Barack Obama are the same debased coin. We the People the REAL Democrats REBEL against .01% Rule of the Monopoly Finance Immoral Reich and their .99% Agency.

      OCCUPY Charlotte 2012: “Regime Change Begins At Home” (Charles Derber)

      BILL BLACK/YVES SMITH 2012: RESTORE MORALITY

      American Rebels Unite! We have nothing to lose but our shame.

      Reply
  • paule says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:55 am

    Re Have Labour Will Travel MacroBusiness

    “Put another way, labour remains a problem of the nation state whilst capital has transcended the nation state.”

    Where have they been for the last 4 years? Many of the major banks, and by extension large parts of the financial system, have just been bailed out by the nation state.

    Reply
  • brian says:
    February 25, 2012 at 11:53 am

    re the US Atty and the revolving door
    justice for sale

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/04/13/322755/-Did-Debra-Wong-Yang-get-$15-million-to-stop-investigating-Rep-Jerry-Lewis

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:55 pm

      brian, thanks for the *Grand Guignol* Bush Crime Family-Asian link. History shows that *Asian* criminal Agents for the .01% Reich have *no problem* with this role. Just look at the actions of the *Asian* Mayor of Oakland v. Occupy Oakland. How far back does the Bush-Triad connection go?

      Has the name “Crutcher” been dropped from “Gibson Dunn”?

      Bring RICO. Cry TREASON. File “The Tyrannicide Brief” against George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, Traitors-in-Chief.

      Reply
  • Pwelder says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:07 pm

    Thanks for that piece from Macrobusiness on the differing impacts on labor and capital from free trade.

    Commenter “Hugo Chavez” over there said the following (without including any reference):

    “Hugo Chavez says: February 25, 2012 at 11:47 am

    Worth pointing out that Riccardo actually understood the two conditions under which gains from trade via comparative advantage are predicated: 1) no or minimal labour flow across borders; 2) no or minimal capital flows across borders. Without both of those conditions Riccardo conceded that there were no gains from trade. You can read this bloke at econlib.org.

    Those two conditions held until the freeing up of capital flows. These days condition 2) doesn’t hold. The idea that we can gain from trade in 2011 via comparative advantage is a fairy tale. Riccardo knew it. Not sure why economists now don’t know it.”

    PW here. My ignorance of the intellectual history of economics and of the contributions of David Ricardo is way too extensive. All the same, I am surprised to hear that Ricardo clearly stated the above conditions for maximizing welfare on both sides of international trade.

    Question for the econ mavens: Does “Hugo” have that right?

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:27 pm

      Pwelder, the term *free trade* was invented by the *British East India Company/Victorian British Empire* to cover their Crimes Against Humanity, and the term was promulgated as a *virtuous process*–called *free trade* and *Neoconservative/Neoliberal Capitalism”–by the Agents of a Foreign Power at the University of Chicago and other institutions bent on destroying the Government of/by/for the People of the U.S.A. and our Rule of Law.

      Learn all about it at http://www.youtube.com –

      “Dr. John Coleman: The Club of Rome, Chatham House, And The Committee of 300″ and other items featuring the cogent arguments of Dr. Coleman;

      “Three Cities Rule the World” (xlucifer on Dec 30, 2008): the supranational city-states known as: City of London, District of Columbia, Vatican State.
      ————————————

      http://econintersect.com — “Social Fractals and the Corruption of America” by Guest Author Charles Hugh Smith, “Of Two Minds”;
      —————————
      http://dealbook.nytimes.com — “A.I.G. Buys $2 Billion in Maiden Lane Bonds” by Kevin Rose –best read in entirety, including Comments. LINK may work:
      http:// dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/02/24/aig-buys-2-billion-in-maiden-lane-bonds/src-dlbksb
      —————————
      http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com — “European Crisis Realities” by Paul Krugman blog 25 February 2012. LINK may work:
      http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/european-crisis-realities/
      —————————-
      http://www.nytimes.com — “A Revolutionary Idea” by Joe Nocera – 24 February 2012, anent Santorum within the frame of Roger Williams and the Puritans. LINK may work:
      http//www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/opinion/nocera-a-revolutionary-idea
      —————————–
      http://www.law.harvard.edu — “Bruce Fein and Ralph Nader at Harvard Law on ‘The Lawless American Empire’”–Text and video. N.B. Nader’s list of 10 Grievances by Jonathan Turley. LINK may work:
      http://www.law.harvard.edu/news/2012/02/10_nader-fein-americas-lawless-empire.htm/

      Reply
    • Jim says:
      February 25, 2012 at 7:54 pm

      Comparative advantage and specialization does allow for the creation of a greater surplus than without it. Just imagine where we’d be if the cars sold in the UK had to be made in the UK. Or if Ford had to make every car by hand, without the assembly line.

      Instead of blaming comparative advantage and/or specialization, why not blame the governments which have refused to effectively use fiscal policy to ensure that the returns are not too concentrated at the top?

      Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 9:53 pm

      Pwelder, this issue compounded by skewed *balance of payments*–the root cause of the Germany v. PIIGS *Euro* crisis, apparently. “Beggar thy neighbor* arbitrage policies drive the race to the bottom. This is how Red States compete with Blue States: via *beggar thy neighbor* policies of *tax arbitrage* and *cost of labor arbitrage*. A continual race to the bottom.

      Reply
  • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:18 pm

    RE: Iranian sheep intestines used for German Bratwurst:

    Brain-devouring PRIONS cannot be killed by any known means. See:

    “DEADLY FEAST” by Richard Rhodes.

    People might want to reconsider eating sausages wrapped in an enigma.

    Reply
  • Susan the other says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    Just one point on authoritarianism. I would dearly love to see a little authoritarianism applied to investment bankers. Put them all on xanax.

    Reply
  • MyLessThanPrimeBeef says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:33 pm

    Perhaps D’Art was wrong to oppose MMT.

    It’s possible his distractors are right that in a free country of people of free will, money should be free.

    Not free to the government, but free to the true sovereign – the people. And not just free moeny to pay off the highest amount of debt owned by the most debt ridden citizen, but free money with no absolute theorectial limits.

    Reply
  • barrisj says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:37 pm

    More on the Afghan front here in today’s NYT:

    2 Americans Killed as Afghan Unrest Enters Fifth Day
    KABUL, Afghanistan — Two American officers were shot dead inside the Interior Ministry building here on Saturday, and NATO responded by immediately pulling all advisers out of Afghan ministries, in a deepening of the crisis over the American military’s burning of Korans at a NATO army base. The order by the NATO commander, Gen. John R. Allen, came on the fifth day of virulent anti-American demonstrations across the country, and it was a clear sign of concern that the fury had reached deeply into even the Afghan security forces and ministries working most closely with the coalition.

    Although there was no official statement that the shooter was an Afghan, in an e-mail sent to Western officials here from NATO headquarters the incident was described as “green on blue,” which is the military term used here when Afghan security forces turn their weapons on their Western military allies.
    [more...]
    https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/26/world/asia/afghanistan-koran-burning-protests-enter-fifth-day.html?_r=1

    This country-wide protest against US/Nato forces – ostensibly as a reaction to Qu’uran burning – is a culmination of years of war-weariness, and of midnight raids, indefinite detention (and torture), drone attacks on wedding parties, sheepherders, and in general war against the entire Afghan population, who are viewed with increasing “suspicion” by occupying forces as not being 100% behind Western objectives. This could well morph into a “Tahrir Square moment”, and at long last put paid to Western interference in Afghanistan, and blow up forever all matter of “doctrines” espoused by military strategists for “winning” insurgencies against client governments and/or occupying forces. It has been obvious for a while now that the Afghan “mission” is in failure mode, and the spectacle of increasing “green-on-blue” assaults cannot but hasten the removal of all foreign troops and their “enduring bases” from Afghanistan asap.

    Reply
    • Walter Wit Man says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:53 pm

      NATO just killed 7 children, ages 7 to 16, and a mentally handicapped adult, earlier this month.

      This is similar to another incident where NATO killed around a dozen children that were herding goats, if I remember correctly.

      After both incidents there was a Koran burning incident that further enraged Afghanis.

      I am suspicious that both Koran burning incidents were U.S. government psy operations designed to spread propaganda to both the American and Afghani people.

      Half of the Americans are mad at Afghani barbarity! Gingrich said there is nothing to apologize for!

      Obama hasn’t said a word about those children. Instead he’s pretending that the Afghanis only have the burning to be upset with. As if they are ungrateful, irrational crazies.

      We’re the crazies! We are the killers engaging in mindfucking! This is right out of the Nazi playbook.

      Reply
    • Walter Wit Man says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:03 pm

      You’re right there is no longer even an official rationale for this war.

      It’s such complete bullshit . . . . didn’t Obma himself say there were only about 100 Al Qaeda in Afghanistan when he came into power? Which is funny because Al Qaeda is a government invention and operation . . . so it’s fake anyway. But they aren’t even bothering with that anymore.

      We’re there for the opium and oil. The Taliban shut down opium production and now that the U.S. has taken over it is back to record highs. This is not an accident. Those tons of opium do not get transported by goat . . . they are flown out in cargo planes under U.S. watch.

      Plus, it’s obvious the U.S. is going to occupy the country for the long term.

      Plus, what is it, like 80% of supplies have gone missing or not delivered, etc? It’s a boondoggle.

      And the U.S. media is of course complicit.

      This one war of aggression and the crimes we have committed there is enough to put the entire administration in jail, imho. Yet this is merely on aspect of our global crimes of aggression.

      Both Democrat and Republican parties are members of the same American Fascist Party. The bipartisan support for war on Afghanistan proves it.

      Reply
      • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
        February 25, 2012 at 1:40 pm

        WWM, connect: the Bush Dynasty, esp. *Poppy* Bush, with *The Opium Wars*, Russell Foundation of YALE, Russell’s Skull and Bones, Malon of Drexler (and Malon Bush), CIA, BCCI, Opium/Oil Afghanistan, *War on Terre*, Enron + PA’s Tom Ridge + Department of Homeland Security.

        Cry Treason! File “The Tyrannicide Brief” against G.H.W. Bush and G.W. Bush for TREASON while in Office as President/Commander in Chief, against the Government of/by/for the People of the U.S.A. and our Rule of Law.

        Reply
        • Walter Wit Man says:
          February 25, 2012 at 1:51 pm

          Yes indeed LBR, there is a connection to these approximately 100 years of fascist global corporate wars: it’s pretty much the age-old tale of a few pricks wanting to control everyone else and using war and mind control to do so. But the modern fascist has been very effective because of modern tools of mind control–like the teevee.

          You name a number of prime perps. . . .

          Reply
      • SR6719 says:
        February 25, 2012 at 4:14 pm

        Walter Wit Man: “You’re right there is no longer even an official rationale for this war.”

        “The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous. Hierarchical society is only possible on the basis of poverty and ignorance. This new version is the past and no different past can ever have existed. In principle the war effort is always planned to keep society on the brink of starvation. The war is waged by the ruling group against its own subjects and its object is not the victory over either Eurasia or East Asia, but to keep the very structure of society intact.” – George Orwell

        Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:33 pm

      barrisj, I viewed Allen’s address on BBC video: he’s “what’s wrong with America”

      Reply
  • Susan the other says:
    February 25, 2012 at 12:41 pm

    Ramachandra on behavioral neurobiology. That is the kind of conversational essay we should expect our secondary level students to read regularly. And then have a open discussion. It could be the equivalent of growing up in a household of scientific thinkers as it takes the reader effortlessly through the research questions which need to be eliminated. On that level I enjoyed the article. Ramachandra guides us through brain anatomy and scientifically provable hypotheses in classic fashion. But when you come to the end you say, So what? That is the frustrating thing about defining perception, pain, cognition and consciousness. The science says finally: its all in your brain. Right here where these adjacent regions got cross wired. I want a little more scientific synesthesia, please.

    Can you tell me how my wild morning glories mimicked my impatiens’ leaves without a brain at all. Let alone eyes. Where is the new research using new, sensitive laser spectroscopy? Where is the analysis of electronic fields surrounding everything and generated by everything? And Crick. Please. He waddled around something he called a sense of unity, of consciousness, in a barely concealed fog. I think I’ll take Rupert Sheldrake in spite of his unfalsifiable ideas. At least he’s got some.

    Reply
    • Aquifer says:
      February 25, 2012 at 12:59 pm

      I thought it interesting, indeed, but sort of on the level of a sidebar – this is the “mechanism” for this interesting phenomena.

      Perhaps that is the best we can do – as the ultimate question, the source of consciousness itself, has yet to be answered by the scientific community.

      One can argue (“hope”) that stuff like this is “sneaking up on it”, but frankly i rather doubt it – there is too wide a gap between these quirky phenomena and the “fact” of consciousness at its core. Correlation does not prove causation and i think that with regard to consciousness, correlation as the best that we can ever do ..

      As for plants, it seems to me we need to broaden our concept of “consciousness”, maybe?

      Reply
      • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
        February 25, 2012 at 1:48 pm

        This is why MKUltra and other *mind control* by the 1% v. 99% works. What are T.V., Google, Facebook, organized *religions*, *sex drugs and rock&roll* by Brits, violent games/films and children’s cartoons for?

        See at http://www.youtube.com –

        “The Tavistock Agenda”

        “The Tavistock Institute for Global Manipulate” – acknowledging the mind control contributors: Theodore Adorno for *The Beatles* et al, meant to destroy America as a unified nation; to the RAND Institute, to Stanford University, to the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, to M.I.T.

        The *British Empire* strikes back!

        Reply
      • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
        February 25, 2012 at 2:48 pm

        RE: *consciousness* –

        “COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS: A Study in the Evolution of the Human MInd” by Richard Maurice Bucke, M.D. (“Formerly Medical Superintendent of the Asylum for the Insane, London, Canada”) – New Introduction by George Moreby Acklom (New York, E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc, 1969; 1923; 1922 by Edward P.A. Connaughton; 1901 by Innes & Sons) — re *cosmic consciousness* experienced by Dante, Shakespeare, Francis Bacon, Balzac, Hugo, Whitman et altera;

        “THE AWAKENING OF INTELLIGENCE” by J. Krishnamurti (New York, HarperOne, 1973);

        “Peace and Education” by Dr. Maria Montessori [M.D.--first female physician of Italy and student of the development of the human brain and personality] (Wheaton IL and London, The Theosophical Publishing House: Adyar, Madras 600 020, India, 1965, Printed at the Vasanta Press; First Edition 1943) NOTE: Dr. Montessori went to India in exile from Mussolini’s Italy, after he demanded that she *educate/train* youth for the fascist empire, due to her extraordinary success with educating *slum* children in her *Casa de’ Bambini* in Italy.

        “THE TRIAL OF SOCRATES” by I.F. Stone (New York, Anchor Books:Random House, Inc., 1989; 1988);

        “MORAL POLITICS: How Liberals and Conservatives Think: by George Lakoff (Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press, 2002; 1996);

        “MORAL CALCULATIONS: Game Theory, Logic, and Human Frailty” by Laszlo Mero – translated by Anna C. Gosi-Greguss, English Version Edited by David Kramer (New York, COPERNICUS: Springer-Verlag, 1998);

        “BURSTS: The Hidden Pattern Behind Everything We Do” by Albert-Laslo Barabasi (New York, DUTTON: The Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2010);

        “THE HONOR CODE: How Moral Revolutions Happen” by Kwame Anthony Appiah (New York, W.W. Norton & Company, 2010);

        “MORAL CLARITY: A Guide for Grown-Up Idealists” – Revised Edition – by Susan Neiman (Princeton and Oxford, Princeton University Press, 2009).

        Reply
      • craazyman says:
        February 25, 2012 at 4:08 pm

        It’s the sun, but that’s too obvious for them to realize it. So they look all over in the dark and only confuse themselves.

        -Mr. Akka Naten, page 488, loc. cit., ibid, QED

        Reply
        • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
          February 25, 2012 at 6:27 pm

          craazyman, surely you don’t object to my lengthy quotation from “THE REBEL” yesterday? I don’t have *Camus App on Droid*, so I had to wing it.

          “MOSES AND AKHENATEN: The Secret History of Egypt at the Time of the Exodus” by Ahmed Osman (Rochester VT, Bear & Company, 2002, 1990);

          “WHEN SCOTLAND WAS JEWISH: DNA Evidence, Archeology, Analysis of Migrations, and Public and Family Records Show Twelfth Century Semitic Roots” by Elizabeth Caldwell Hirschman and Donald N. Yates (Jefferson, NC and London, McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2006).

          Bard of Clan Robertson (inter alia)

          Reply
          • craazyman says:
            February 25, 2012 at 7:10 pm

            No, you picked the quotes out perfectly.

            I was impressed.

            Usually I think you’re a lunatic, but now I think you may only be a lunatic most of the time. :)

          • ambrit says:
            February 26, 2012 at 1:13 am

            Dear LBR;
            I much prefer Velikovskys’ “Oedipus and Akhenaten” for an analysis of Twelth Century B.C.s’ moral and political development.

    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 2:12 pm

      “THE TELL-TALE BRAIN: A Neuroscientist’s Quest for What Makes Us Human” by V.S. Ramachandran (New York, W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2011);

      “INCOGNITO: The Secret Lives of the Brain” by David Eagleman (New York, Pantheon Books, 2011);

      “BRAIN BUGS: How the Brain’s Flaws Shape Our Lives” by Dean Buonomano (New York, W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2011);

      “THE HIDDEN BRAIN: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Control Markets, Wage Wars, and Save Our Lives” by Shankar Vedantam (New York, Spiegel & Grau, 2010);

      “NEURONAL MAN: The Biology of Mind” by Pierre Changeux – translated by Dr. Laurence Garey – New York, Pantheon Books, 1985);

      “DANCE OF THE PHOTONS: From Einstein to Quantum Teleportation” by Anton Zeilinger (New York, Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2010).

      Reply
      • craazyman says:
        February 25, 2012 at 4:15 pm

        Leonova, for us lazy dudes, can you summarize all those in a paragraph or two? :)

        I just can’t see taking time away from drinking and channeling to read all that, but I’m open minded. Every once and a while something is worth reading, like Big Al C., the Shoesalesman and Nobel Prize winner. Can you imagine buying a pair of shoes from Albert Camus. I wonder if he’d be snarky about his job. Somehow I doubt it. I think he’d be a consumate professional, but I’d be very very uncomfortable and would only want to shake his hand and say “Dude, let me lace ‘em up for you, you just hang back and chill. And can I help put ‘em back in the back if I don’t like them? I’d hate for you do have to do it. I mean, leave early if you want and I’ll finish your shift for you so you can get back to the typewriter and the Gauloise.” :-)

        Reply
  • MIWill says:
    February 25, 2012 at 1:11 pm

    Allie informs me that the great idea I had yesterday is still stupid today.

    Reply
  • Susan the other says:
    February 25, 2012 at 1:36 pm

    About Lord James and the very naughty US Fed and Treasury. A 15Tr dollar scam? Done in 2006? Can’t call it fake money, not really counterfeited cuz we can print it. So what is going on? They mention Rupert Murdoch as a hero, tapping Cameron’s phone – so by that single sentence we also know Cameron was in on it. That’s the British way around libel. Ha. And there is that pesky number again – actually ranging from one quadrillion to 1.4 quadrillion – as the amount of “money” that is required to buy “everything” in the world. Why toss that in? Also an admission that the shit did hit the fan in 2006 because every bank in the Western “system” was insolvent. This does sound like fact-based information. Kind of like Lyndon Larouche, or that looney Wanta Fund piece put out just as the foundation crumbled (Hank Paulson was jailed in Switzerland and then escaped and was shot and killed all because he was trying to get back 45 Tr in cold war loot belonging to the US, etc.)

    May we please live in less interesting times?

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 1:50 pm

      Susan, so tell us the PURPOSE of the address of Lord James of Blackheath. This is what we need to know.

      Reply
    • Patriot says:
      February 26, 2012 at 4:10 am

      The name Yohannes Riyadi comes up on a Fed website as connected to an internet scam: http://www.ny.frb.org/banking/frscams.html

      The real question is whether Lord James actually had RBS verify the transfer, or whether he’s only seen receipts provided by “Mr. Riyadi.”

      If it’s the former then that is a pretty big sign that something real has happened. If it’s the latter, then Lord James has been taken for a ride.

      Reply
  • Walter Wit Man says:
    February 25, 2012 at 2:13 pm

    Re Drugging Anti-Authoritarians

    My partner and I watch MTV’s “Teen Mom” and I was surprised to see one of the moms, Janelle, so easily get diagnosed with bi-polar disorder and get put on drugs. She basically diagnosed herself, if the clip MTV showed was an accurate portrayal. And then they put her on drugs.

    Dr. Drew hosted the reunion show and he bugs me . . . and this article explains why! He is definitely the authoritarian whereas Janelle is not! She is quite the anti-authoritarian.

    I actually think Janelle’s mom is the one that needs “help”, but all the authority figures told Janelle the problem was hers and she seemed to agree she was damaged goods.

    She also went to a rehab center for marijuana use instead of jail for a possession charge and then relapsed so she’s in trouble again and Dr. Drew was basically telling her to keep on drugging herself with the psych drugs (as he prodded the girls inappropriately at the same time–in order to antagonize them for ratings–he was part carnival barker and part therapist).

    Anyway, Teen Moms (2 I think) is pretty good reality tv . . . as far as it goes. Dr. Drew only appears for the follow up shows thankfully.

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 3:00 pm

      WWM, consider how many *Mothers* see their daughters as RIVALS; they often are envious of their daughters’ advantages, their relative freedom, esp. sexual freedom when they are NOT “married with children.” Such threatened and psychologically oppressed daughters–many of whom may have been sexually abused by male *family* members–become *repressed* unto states of *bulimia* and *depression* that are *CORRECTED* by drugs approved by the Authoritarian Parent. Such daughters became *Girls in Convents* and *wayward girls* otherwise institutionalized, if not girls abandoned to prostitution. They became the *The Woman in the Attic* of the *Victorian Era* still evident in the Authoritarian purpose of *Republican* politics.

      Reply
  • Jim says:
    February 25, 2012 at 3:03 pm

    What does the progressive community consider as legitimate authority?

    When does authority cease to be authoritative?

    Can culture exist without authority?

    Is culture at a breaking point when it demands less and permits more?

    Can authority be horizontal rather than vertical?

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 3:30 pm

      Jim, yesterday in NC comments, “THE REBEL” by Albert Camus was offered as a potential guide for us *Rebels* and those of the *Occupy* Movement who are now claiming our own *Authority* as *Agents* participating in our own *governance* and *government*, within the C.21 FRAME of the open-system democracy. We resist the Authority of the .99% Agents of the .01% Global Reich, which declares its members to be *above the Law* of any nation.

      Hence, we have come to regard with suspicion those asserting that THEIR SPURIOUS Authority over the Rebels is a valid substitute for OUR OWN Authority over our own Government originally of/by/for the People of the U.S.A., which our Agency is bringing into being day after day.

      We do accept as our Moral Leaders, subject to our critical evaluation, Yves Smith and William K. Black. We encourage the REAL Democratic Rebels to:

      OCCUPY Charlotte 2012: “Regime Change Begins at Home” (Charles Derber)

      BILL BLACK/YVES SMITH 2012: MORALITY-JUSTICE NOW

      If not now, when?

      American Rebels Unite! We have nothing to lose but our shame.

      Reply
  • Glen says:
    February 25, 2012 at 3:16 pm

    The 10 Most Excellent Reasons to Attack Iran – Hire that man to write for the Pentagon!

    Ha! I’m sure I’ll be hearing these reasons twisted into a Rumfeldian conundrum and presented as “the truth”.

    Reply
  • heretic says:
    February 25, 2012 at 3:41 pm

    Hello Yves,

    A comment on your selection of the blog from Macrobusiness “Have labour will travel”…

    An excellent observation about economics policy and metrics…’It is good for scorekeeping, but bad for policy’.

    I would argue that the power of market forces, such as supply & demand, and sectoral balances (which is just accounting with no hopeful theories attached concering the the investor or human nature) are universal…they apply to capitalist and communist and feudal economies. Hence it is important to understand actual market forces…the factors that affect the transaction and the relationship between various parties in the economy at the the working level…not via bold large scale theories such as Ricardo’s bullshit. However, just as engineers utlize the forces of nature to produce the machinerey to accomplish our desires, so an intelligent policy maker acknowledges market forces and either utlizes them or must provisions against them, when designing policy to achieve a desired outcome. Hence Free trade drastically increased the supply of available labour relative to employers and relative to demand (since the poor people of other nations often recieved very little net income rise), hence capitol shifted away from labour to other countries and the bargaining position for labour to maintain income was undermined. The solution, is once again constrict capitol freedom, and force local production for local use, and encourage the such in the other nations. The government (via its soverignty over its local currency) shall provide transition funding and new work opportunitues for workers who must transition from the excessively export oriented industries to industries whose work output to benefits the local community. (like pollution control, environmental remediaton, and alternative energy). Their needs to be discussion over trade of crucial imports so that monetary imbalances do not become excessive..

    Reply
  • b. says:
    February 25, 2012 at 4:55 pm

    “Please tell Elizabeth Warren.”

    What did I miss? Let me guess: Her foreign policy stinks even worse than the rest of her ‘stablishmentarianism? Excuse me for a quick google… nah, just the usual spineless blather in response to the usual repug rhetorics, and 2011 at that. That’s so last year. Onwards….

    On a related note, Greenwald exhibits some unusual tap-dancing around the standard issue Feingold blather… I suppose, everybody has their blind spots. Now, who am I too nice about?

    Reply
  • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
    February 25, 2012 at 5:46 pm

    WalterWM, this one’s for you (relate also to ECB Monti piece from Yves today):

    http://www.planbeconomics.com –

    “The Story of Your Enslavement” – Posted by Mark Motive on February 24, 2012 (Society, Video) — A MASTERPIECE of terse yet comprehensive, timely social commentary re “The nature of the cage we were born into” – “human farming” – human beings as a “resource”–We are vulnerable because of the human fear of death. Worthy of the PULITZER Prize LINK may work:
    http://www.planbeconomics.com/2012/02/24/the-story-of-your-enslavement

    Reply
  • craazyman says:
    February 25, 2012 at 6:04 pm

    Doug Noland over a Prudent Bear put on the steel-toed boots and rammed a few kicks up MMT’s butt this weekend. Just in case anyone needs something else to read, with the sherry by the fire.

    Reply
  • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
    February 25, 2012 at 6:06 pm

    Susan et al, there’s no end to *incredible* crime. Anything’s possible.

    Schlumberger heir, Roger Davidson, was scammed beyond belief by Friends of Wachovia Bank. (One of the scammers is *Vikram* Bedi. Is *Vikram* a family name? If so, connect with *Vikram* Pandit.) Story on two sites:

    http://www.courthousenews.com — “Bizarre Tale of $33 Million, & Where It Went” by Iulia Filip (Friday 6 May 2012). LINK may work:
    http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/05/06/36386.htm

    http://www.istognosis.com — “‘Da Vince Code’Grifters Fleece Man in $20 Million Computer Virus International Conspiracy Scam” — which the author [unnamed] calls “a social engineering scam worthy of a Cohen [sic.] Brothers treatment.” LINK may work:
    http://www.istognosis.com/en/technology-news/155-qda-vinci-codeq-grifters-fleece-man-in-20-million-computer-virus-international-conspiracy-scam

    Our world is like the House of Mirrors in the film by Orson Welles, “The Lady From Shanghai.” With psycopaths in charge, anything is possible.

    Reply
  • Jim says:
    February 25, 2012 at 8:13 pm

    LBR:

    Does our political movement need a creed beyond self?

    Do we need to have or to create a culture of constraint?

    To what does “The Rebel” submit?

    Does any new authority have to engage itself in some discipline of obediance?

    If such steps are not taken don’t we risks self-deification?

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:09 pm

      Jim, of course knowledge and self-knowledge, critical intelligence, circumspection, experience, self-disicipline (through years of practice) and self-restraint are key to legitimate authority and authority figures. The best of them are humble and responsible, respectful and worthy of the respect of many, just, and receptive to criticism. They are *honorable*.

      Yves Smith and William K. Black are prime examples of legitimate authority figures in their spheres of expertise, and as qualified leaders of the People. Many contributors of blogs and articles to NC are examples, and so are a number of writers among the NC *Commentariat*.

      “BLACK SMITH 2012: Forging a New America” -someone said in NC comments. Quite a fetching idea, wouldn’t you say?

      Reply
  • Abe, NYC says:
    February 25, 2012 at 8:48 pm

    I love Marshall Auerback’s piece. There’s no stronger contrast than Versaille vs Marshall Plan. But I continue to be amazed at how Germans believe the Greeks deserve their fate and should be punished. Practically all of my German friends, highly intelligent and with a lot of international exposure, go moralizing about Greece. They refuse to see the human tragedy in Greece just as so many with jobs in this country refuse to see the tragedy of those that haven’t.

    And to think that sectoral balances is not curvilinear integrals or differential equations, it’s just second-grade arithmetic…

    Reply
    • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
      February 25, 2012 at 10:20 pm

      Abe, Germans are loath to deal with human error and fallibility, which they equate with human *failure*; they also tend to reject *peer relationships*, as they are comfortable with their tradition of the dominant/submissive polarized relationship–which can flip, but which never can lead to a peer relationship. This is typical of the *Authoritarian* model that (falsely) promises to simplify and impose *order* on a baffling and insuperably complex world of human beings.

      Within Bavarian Roman Catholic and Prussian frames of reference, the Authoritarian Teutonic mind must castigate Greece for its moral failures, in order to justify its harsh penalties against the Greeks or its abandonment of them, and especially for the *Anschluss* currently taking place.

      Reply
  • Lambert Strether says:
    February 25, 2012 at 9:32 pm

    Happy birthday, George. Missed this one…

    Reply
  • brian says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:11 pm

    banksters
    there is a special place in hell

    http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2012/02/waitress_tip_get_a_real_job.php

    Reply
  • Up the Ante says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:19 pm

    A friend of my enemy is ..

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/24/saudi-arabia-backs-arming-syrian-opposition

    Godless.

    http://www.countercurrents.org/swanson210212.htm
    I would seek to amend no.7, Mr. Swanson.

    “7. b. Oh, and stupid people should be bombed. They’re not civilized. [Nor entitled.]”

    Mustn’t forget the entitled.

    Reply
  • LeonovaBalletRusse says:
    February 25, 2012 at 10:38 pm

    No-one remarked on the fantastic *Eagle Owl* — serious power! A Precision Raptor keener than a Patriot Missile. Perfection of purpose in action.

    Reply
  • Up the Ante says:
    February 25, 2012 at 11:15 pm

    “And now we know the price Bharara expects when he cashes out: $6 million. ”

    Is THAT how much Louis Freeh sold for ?

    http://www.emptywheel.net/2012/02/24/wall-street-shills-hype-how-much-preet-bharara-could-make-if-he-stopped-shielding-wall-street/

    Preet is managing ‘risk’, is he ?

    Reply

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