The Present in Plain Text

Point of No Return for the Dollar

From Jim Sinclair last night comes his daily recap on the spot U.S. Dollar and Gold markets. Jim has stated that a close of the $USD below 0.8000 would signal a continued freefall of the dollar and confirm that things have reached crisis proportions. His tone may be more 'Chicken -Little" than Walter Cronkite, but the substance is hard to argue with. Part of me really wishes Jim was a crank, but, unfortunately his pedigree speaks for itself and his ability to analyze markets is worthy of imitation.

Consider the following quote carefully:

It doesn't matter if the U.S. dollar puts on a rally from say, the .8000 to .8300 area, because it is going nowhere for any significant period. The U.S. administration is not going to change course economically or geopolitically. No polices will be put into place that have the teeth to reverse the deficits to surplus. The gold community is selling its gold shares into strong hands. The dollar needs more than sun-spots to produce a real bull market. It needs a miracle.

The remarks about the $USD not reversing course are absolutely spot-on. Markets don't change because the Fed raised interest rates 25 or 50 basis points. Markets as big as the $USD are moved by a series of events all of which on the scale and magnitude of the recent disaster off the coast of Sumatra. Our Federal Government would have to institute the kinds of sweeping, wholesale changes to the way our capital is organized that would destroy their lives and the lives of their cronies. Ergo, the dollar is doomed, and we'll pay fo it.

If you think that things are getting better for the dollar because 5,000 households called by a statistical rating group report that they as consumers "feel better" at Christmas, and therefore consumer sentiment is on the rise, you really do believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy.

Whoever said that economics couldn't be both tragic and funny at the same time must have invested in Enron in 2001. The Mogambo does this kind of 'shock therapy' treatment on his readers weekly, Jim usually refrains. Now, that's funny, right there.

If you believe things are going well in Iraq, and therefore the dollar should improve in tandem, the following is an important message from the sponsor of the Iraq war, Iran. The message transmitted to the U.S. by the following article is quite simple. Russia and China have financial and geopolitical interests in Iran, so if the U.S. and/or Israel get too feisty with the unseen third-party motivator, Iran, they could end up facing Russia and China as a united force.

This is, by far, the most disturbing aspect of the the coming economic meltdown, something that a good friend and I have been discussing for years on and off. He has told me on multiple occassions that there is flat-out, no way that China and Russia will ally overtly. He literally said this to me 3 weeks ago, after I brought up a point of Jim's about China and Russia are using Iran to do their bidding in keeping the U.S. distracted while they ramp up their economies to fill the void left by the husk of ours.

This is something that Mr. Sinclair has been talking about for over a year.

I'll end this entry with a quote from Babylon 5:
"The avalanche has started, and it is too late for the pebbles to vote." -- Ambassador Kosh

Ta,

A Mighty Mogambo Nugget of Christmas Joy (AMMNoCJ)

Here it is, the monday after Christmas, I'm at my desk catching up on the state of the world after a holiday weekend spent mostly playing World of Warcraft (my Druid's nearly 27th Lvl!) whne I decide it's time to read last week's Massive Missive from the Magnanimous Mogambo (MMftMM)... My eyes have barely focused on the page when I read the opening sentence.

- In the banking sector, things are relatively calm, as they are no doubt awaiting Santa Claus to bring them some economic salvation.

Thank you Mighty Mogambo for summing up the all my thoughts and prayers this Holiday season. Alas, when I woke up on Chrstmas morning not even a bottle of 'Christmas Scotch" was in view, no less "economic salvation."

Now that I've returned to the real world as I look around this morning I see things haven't changed at all:

1. Gold is still rising and the US dollar is still falling.
   
2. The NHL is going to cancel the season on January 14th.
3. The killing and bombing rage on in Iraq

How useless do you think that makes Santa feel? I mean he goes around dispensing gifts and good cheer to any and all who are willing to participate and no one seems to listen.

In the midst of writing this post up I found links to the massive earthquake off the coast of Sumatra, where tsuanamis have killed over 22,000 people. This will be another opportunity for human beings to show off their inherent decency in the help and capital that will be sent without a thought to the affected areas. Sadly, I will spend most of next year arguing with people who will tell me that only government can organize disaster relief, while individuals work to rebuild their lives.

Ta,

LewRockwell vs. Cato:

The above to a link from Tom G. Palmer, senior fellow at Cato, who has a bone to pick with Mike Rogers over this post to the LRC blog. He has another outraged entry here. I found both of these through an entry at Freespace.

What is his problem? His critique of Mike Rogers' posts is nothing more than projection on his part, not intellectual or philosphical honesty. He states that Mr. Rogers advocates the killing of Americans, when it is clear from both posts that while Mike clearly wants us to leave Iraq, he never once stated (or even intimated) that he wants to see Americans killed. That is an assumption. Mr. Rogers and most of the 'denizens' of LRC view the U.S. Government as imperial and as libertarians are prone to distrusting the motives of said government first and foremost. Mr. Rogers toasted 'The End of the Evil Empire," which is what he believes the American Government has become. He did not toast the deaths of the soliders, but, as they are there in full conscience of their actions and it is their moral obligation to question any immoral order he would be perfectly consistent to have done so. I find it really ironic that everyday I see those yellow ribbons saying "Support Our Troops!" and I always think to myself, "I do. I support every soldier who wants to come home, who refuses to carry out immoral orders, and is committed to preserving the peace and prosperity of my home and family."

In response to LRC writer Anthony Gregory Dr. Palmer asserts the following:

Anthony states that "To support the occupation is to objectively support the deaths." Does that mean that "To oppose the occupation is to objectively support the deaths" that would result from withdrawing? I think we could be confident that there would be quite a number of public beheadings and disembowlings. If those are a consequence of something that one supports, does one objectively support those deaths? Or does it matter that someone else did the killing? If it matters that someone else did the killing, who deserves the blame for the deaths of American soldiers?

Aside from ignoring the original question, which is nothing more than simple cowardly evasion, his question regarding the deaths that would result from withdrawing is facile. Without having an absolute knowledge of the future, you cannot say that deaths would occur. But, what you can say, is that by withdrawing the troops you can, for a certainty, know that no deaths will occur from your/our direct support. But, by making that decision you can now separate the issues into their component parts. Withdrawl from Iraq is an action of ceasing hostility. Staying in Iraq is an inherently hostile act, because it is, in it's purest form, trespassing. Therefore, by withdrawing you are stating unequivically that you wish to cease hostile activity and explicitly DO NOT SUPPORT any further killing, as evidenced by your williingness to cease doing so. That argument is implicit in any advocate's argument for withdrawl. Dr. Palmer's argument comes back to practicality to attempt to salvage his point, not philosophy or principle, even though he tries to appeal to the principled in his audience by doing so.

How that simple, well-reasoned stance, becomes the advocacy of killing American Soldiers, I don't know? I will re-iterate. I do not wish to see any more Americans or Iraqis killed because of the actions of the U.S. Federal Government, but at the same time I have no sympathy for the deaths of the agressors in any combat situation, and seeing as we are the aggressors in this case, well... figure it out. What Dr. Palmer is obviously having a problem with is the identification of the U.S. as an agressor, and that those who stand in the way of our benevolance deserve their fate. Hmmm... sounds really libertarian to me. Worse than that, on the front page of his site he states...

I've devoted much of my life to eradicating coercion and securing liberty for all and I've learned that it's a lot of work, but it can be fun, too. (I hope that my site reflects the joy of working for freedom.)

So, I wonder how successful he's been given the above lack of intellectual honesty or philosphical consistency with regard to the principle of non-agression. Most of his site is a simple and ugly ad hominem attack on those who disagree with him coupled with juvenile emotional outbursts that I don't tolerate from my dogs no less a grown man with a Ph.D. When I do the similar I, at the very least, have the decency to identify it that way.

The last thing I'd like to say about Dr. Palmer's particular set of neuroses is that as a fellow as the Cato Institute (a place co-founded by the great Murray Rothbard, who would not approve of this war, btw) it must stick in his throat the diference in readership between LRC and Cato.org. Gotta love the free market of ideas.

On this day of all days, it should be a time to reflect just what the consequences of our individual actions have been. My rawest sympathies go out to everyone who has been affected directly by this war. Words fail me when I consider the horrors unleashed with my money and capital and the little I've done to mitigate their effects. My shame and frustration is reflected back to me every time I talk with my Iraqi co-worker and friend. This blog is a feeble attempt to stem the tide of the horrors of collectivism. I may do this out of the seemingly conflicted senses of both arrogance in my positions and humility of what I haven't accomplished in their service, but nevertheless I do it in the fervent hope that someday Christmas will truly be a day of peace.

Ta,

Some pre-Christmas Stupidity

Sent from a good Friend is the following thing to do (he called it a meme, and I have no earthly idea what that is)

My task should I choose to accept is as follows:

For each of your fandoms (geeky 'franchises' you are a fan of), name:
1. A character you absolutely worship.
2. A character you like.
3. A character you could take or leave.
4. A character you don't really care for.
5. A character you hate.

Starting with the Biggie:
Star Wars (all 5-6 episodes):
1) Vader. The. Single. Best. Villain. In. Movie. History.
2) R2D2 and Chewbacca -- Because with out either of them, no one gets off Cloud City alive.
3) Boba Fett -- okay, the armor's cool as hell, but, dude.... a personality is not against the Bounty Hunter By-Laws.
4) C3PO -- Great characterization, I want to punch his lights out every time he speaks anymore.
5) Sio Bibble and Padme Amidala : Him for being a walking cue card and her for making me doubt that a chick as cool as Leia could be this robot's daughter. See the Babylon 5 segment for her real life-mate.

Farscape:
1) I've gotta agree with my friend who sent this to me. They are all excellent. With the notable exception of:
4) Za'an : Tall, Blue, Bald and on repeated viewings terribly annoying in her earnestness.
5) Commodore Cleavage -- She is not an improvement over Scorpy as a villain, and she needed to be to up the stakes properly.

Babylon 5:
1) John Sheridan -- He's a hero worth rooting for and a man worth emulating. Brilliant performances by Bruce B.
2) Vir Cotto -- a character of suprising strength and power. Vir's is a great story.
3) Jeffrey Sinclair : commander Wooden Post's story is compelling, to bad the actor playing him wasn't.
4) the entire cast of Crusade.
5) The Vorlons and the Shadows, because they were really just boring and arbitrary in the end.

Star Trek (all flavors)
Feh! A pox on the entire house. Two good seasons of Extra Krispy (three and four) and 1 good Original Recipe flick (Khan!!!!!!!) does not a fandom make. But Bones and the Doctor from the holodeck (The incomparable Robert Picardo.... "You see Outlaw Yosey Vales? What a Flik!") kick serious ass.

Ta,

Gimme Some Sugar Baby.

From FilmThreat comes a great interview from April 2004 with the inimicable Bruce Campbell, the man who should have played Batman, talking about Bubba Ho-tep among other things.

The best bit is this, though:

Is it true that New Line Cinema is considering brining your Ash character into the next Freddy vs. Jason sequel?

There are rumblings about it. Just don’t underestimate how difficult it would be, getting three film franchises to agree to terms. And I ain’t doing it if I lose, I’ll put it that way. I could beat them for that one movie and then they can come back, I don’t care after that. I don’t want to kill the franchise, there’s just no point having Ash there if he loses. I mean, they can beat the shit out of him, but he should still win.

Groovy!

Ta,

P.S. For those who haven't seen it.... Bubba Ho-Tep is quite cool. Two great performances by Campbell and Davis and an unabashed sense of fun and wonder. The pacing is a little off and ignore the obvious budgetary limitations, this is a great little redemption plot starring two of the biggest icons in American mythology. Rent the DVD and sit through the hilarious commentary by Elvis (as performed by Campbell) on the movie. Bladder-failingly funny.

Charge Drop Pending: What happened in Kurdish Halabja?

Via Jude Wanniski at today's LRC I found the above link.

I had heard some things in the past about the the real culprit in the 'Gassing of the Kurds,' but hadn't taken much time to investigate it. Eventually, something conclusive would come of this and the report that the charge of Genocide against Saddam Hussien is going to be dropped due to insufficient evidence. While this is still technically a rumor (and will be, unfortunately until the US press corps gets around to reporting it), if true, would definately qualify as substantial.

Here is the letter that Mr. Wanniski says he received from Dr. Mohammed Al-Obaidi:

Dear Jude: I have just been informed by Mr. Al-Khasawnah, Chief lawyer of Saddam's legal team, that after the Iraqi lawyer, Mr. Khalil Al-Dulaimi met with Saddam a couple of days ago, the American legal authority in Iraq informed the lawyer that they have dropped the charges of Halabja and genocide in the south against Saddam due to insufficient evidence.

This clearly indicates that the information the legal team had about the responsibility of what happened in Halabja lies on Iran and not Iraq and made the American authority drop this charge against him.

Best regards
Mohammed

Let's watch in the coming days to see how this plays out... if at all.

Ta,

... While We're on the Subject of the Economically Illiterate

I bring you a quote of staggering incompetence blogged yesterday by Larry Kudlow:

Drug reimportation is a terrible idea. 30 million Canadians cannot supply enough drugs for 300 million Americans.

Let's see.... where to begin:

1. That statement is not only prejudiced against the ingenuity and ability of Canadians to leverage their division of labor it is insulting to anyone with a shred of intellectual capacity.
2. Mr. Kudlow must not believe in the the Law of Supply and Demand to make such a statement. 30 million Canadians can most certainly supply enough drugs at specific prices to as many people as are willing to buy them. If there was a shortage of Canadian drugs either prices would rise or supply at the current price would increase.
3. I thought the very definition of re-importation was that it was us 300 million Americans making the drugs, shipping them to Canada, who then, in turn ship them back at a lower price then those 300 million Americans sell to each other? I think the confused Mr. Kudlow meant simple importation of drugs from Canada. Otherwise, the above sentence is difficult to parse.
4. The link to the Washington Post article is nothing more than fear-mongering masquerading as analysis. If the drugs the Canadians provide are of dubious quality then the marketplace will reject them as inferior and choose the hypothetically higher quality US-made versions.

To further ilustrate point #4 I offer up:

The problem, according to the report, is that most of those medicines were produced in laboratories and distributed by suppliers that are not under the watchful eyes of FDA inspectors, calling into question their purity and safety.

1. While it is true that these imported drugs are not inspected by the FDA, it does not follow logically that their purity and safety are questinable in nature. FDA inspection carries with it no guarantee, a level of oversight I'll grant, but a guarantee? No.
2. Implicit in that statement is a rebuke of any quality control protocols put in place by either the Canadian firms which produced the drugs or the Canadian government's own version of the FDA. A baseless assumption.

All of this is nothing more than classic monetarist and mercnatile protectionism masquerading as functional analysis. Real markets punish shoddy producers far more efficiently and ruthlessly than any government bureaucrat ever could.

Warning ad hominem attack coming: Larry Kudlow is a tool who wears bad suits and blinks too much when on TV! It's guys like him that give Economics a bad rap.

Ta,

When Does an Argument Need to be Referenced?

In a corollary to this week's Homespun Symposium an issue was brought up in reference to my repsonse that I'd like to address. Simply put, one of the other members felt my post wholly inadequate because I did not provide factual backing, otherwise known as outside links, for my arguments (ne opinions) about the attacks on Mr. Rumsfeld.

Because I expressed that which I clearly defined as a personal opinion and kept my remarks about Mr. Rumsfeld's performance in his capacity as Secretary of Defense relevant to how they affected me and mine I felt it completely unnecessary to provide links to back up said opinion. The idea that doing so would somehow make my opinion more understandable or defensible is laughable. It is truly the nature of opinions that they are personal and therefore not in need of outside material. If I have proven inept at explaining myself or communicating why it is that I feel the way I do, then fine. I would ask you to please address the problem that way or stop reading.

Now, I was also very careful in the stating of my opinion of the principles underpinning them. And, having re-read my original post on the matter, added two further clarifications thereof in order to pound the point home about where my principles lie.

Being both new to blogging but an old hand at internet conversation/argumentation I have encountered this type of attack too many times to be fooled by it. It is simply a passive-agressive attempt to attack someone's beliefs without appearing to do so by asking for positivist 'proof' of an principle not provable by positivism. Personally, in my opinion I find the process both childish and rude and (for this I will be accused of being both presumptuous and arrogant, a judgement I can live with) is usually concomitant with an insecurity relative to their position thereof.

In other words, if I state, "Bourbon is nasty. I prefer scotch." And someone counters by asking for references to prove my statement about the nastiness of Bourbon, that person is being disengenuous about their motives, especially when it is common knowledge that they are avid bourbon drinkers. I could care less that someone else likes bourbon, if you want to look down your nose at my because I don't like bourbon that is wholly your prerogative. Where you will raise my ire and gain my derision is when you make me drink bourbon and take away my choice of scotch.

So, when I state that bombing indiscriminately is wrong and am shamed by my taxes going towards such activities, and then I am asked for links to where we (the US) have engaged in indiscriminate bombing recently, I know exactly where the question is coming from. The question is designed to move the discussion away from the question of whether bombing civilians is right or wrong and towards the semantic minutia of a word, in this case, "indiscriminate." The person fundamentally disagrees with my position that our government should not be engaged in this kind of activity and therefore wants me to validate myself to them with others who agree with me. This is an emotional response masquerading as rational discourse. BTW, the same can, and will, be said about me vis a vis the previous statements and frankly, there's not much I can do about that.

The defense against this avenue of attack is to ignore their feeble attempt to set the terms of the argument and fall back on a simple restatement of fundamental principles by which you live, which are easily defendable if, and only if, they are wholly self-consistent. Because, ultimately, what you believe is what you believe and it does not matter one whit whether anyone else holds that belief along with you or not. An individual should not need such crutches, though they don't hurt. If you find that you cannot adequately defend your position based on pure logic and rigor, then it would be time to do as Ayn Rand suggested and "Check your premises."

For me, the only defensible position is one of non-agression. For further clarification of my position on this subject, ask nicely and I'll gladly discuss it in the comments or wait for when I get the urge to expound on it at length. Otherwise, I've chosen the links at the right very carefully, and there is a wealth of knowledge and illumination available in them. Understand that I provide them as a means to understand the contents of not only my posts but all of that which passes in front of your eyeballs. A truly arrogant presumption on my part, but, alas, I am only that which I am.

Ta,

Do you think Satan Left a Forwarding Address?

From Mike Rogers over at the LRC Blog comes this article about the U.S. military operations in Fallujah:

[discussion of U.S. Military Objectives in Fallujah] Lastly, it appears an additional declared tactical/political objective of the American Military's task was to engage in a "fight of good versus evil". Additionally it appears (presumably per their intelligence reports) that the mission also was to "destroy" "Satan" since it appears that "he lives in Fallujah"

On the face of it, it appears as if none of these tactical/military objectives have been met, including, it appears, the desire to presumably meet Mr. Satan, resident of Fallujah.

I'm sure Satan would have procured a summer home during his relationship with Saddam, so, this makes more sense than it would appear on the surface.

Ta,

It's The End of Oregon as We Know it....

... and I feel fine.

How I missed this i do not know, but way back on November 2nd, the people of Oregon passed Measure 37, a ballot initiative to force the government to either compensate land owners if a land-use regulation impacts their property value or not enforce said regulation on that piece of property.

It passed with just over 60% of the vote.

Let's hear it for my side!!!
I don't presume to speak for anyone else in property matters)

This measure exposes the deep, dark underbelly of Smart Growth, and the Myth of Orgeon as Land Use Nirvana. I hear about this over and over from leftist-environmentalists (usually people who are either transients or renters or both) about how Oregon is the model for land-use that we must all adopt. The basic tenets of Smart Growth have been debunked on their own terms by many individuals, try here , or here for starters.

I simple google search yielded wonderful political hyperbole from both sides of the issue, but the simple fear-mongering of one Heather Henderson is breath-taking in both its shrillness and ineptitude:

When my mother moved to Portland in 1952 to marry my father, the Willamette River was virtually an open sewer. She said the smell and sight of it was so revolting that people never walked along the waterfront, and the only boats you saw were cargo ships. Industries and cities up and down the river discharged their wastes directly into the water.

I wonder what the reason was for her parents moving there inthe first place was? It must have had something to do with finding profitable employment, I'm sure.

Her description of Florida is apt, but irrelevant:

Florida is a stunning example of where Oregon was headed in the 1960s. Most cities there consist of strip mall after strip mall, and the only limit to helter-skelter development is the availability of land (or swamp).

Florida is flat and land is plentiful. By the way, I live 25 minutes outside of Gainesville (and a quater of a million people) and I can see the Milky Way at night, as deer and turkey walk across my front yard. The truth is that like any stupid regulation that tries to direct the flow of capital, the result is a spill-over to another complimentary use. Ergo, single-use inner-city zoning has created leap-frog, strip mall development. High commercial property taxes indexed to land value discourage redevelopment of existing infrastructure. It is the very laws and regulations that were put in place by people such as Ms. Henderson that have created the kind of Mad Max-like apocalypic urban landscape they perceive.

The worst part of people like her is that they want to live in a world they can't afford to buy for themselves, or are too friggin' lazy to figure out how to do so without stealing from their neighbors. Simply put, most environmentalists that I know have nothing but disdain and derision for their fellow man and it is their soulless hatred of humanity (manifested by their hatred for things like SUV's and strip malls, which, btw, they all buy and shop at) which drives them to institute disgusting and egregious acts of violence (via local government) against them.

There are far better solutions to land-use issues than pointing guns at people and condemning their land. And, btw, Ms. Henderson, you don't own Oregon, you own whatever you have title to.

Another side to the issue of Measure 37 is expounded upon here, by a former State Senator who details the history of how this Measure restores the original intent of the state government of the time.

Ta,