Friday, April 22, 2011

The Unbearable Meaninglessness of Politics

This is why I've given up on the political process to address anything important in a meaningful way:

"Sadly, the budget 'cuts' proposed so far in Washington DC are too minuscule to assist in any credible way, and they practically represent a rounding error, given the numbers involved..."

More to the point: "For the record, these 'cuts' work out to ~$3 billion less in spending each month, or less than the amount the Fed has been pouring into the Treasury market each business day for the past five months." same source

‎"...the entire $38 billion is just 2.3% of the deficit and slightly under 1% of the total 2011 budget."

http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/breakdown-draws-near/56594

Monday, April 18, 2011

Rev. Peter Panagore's "Daily Devotions"

I am so fortunate to live in a place where I can view this 2-minute God-shot every single morning on TV. For those not so fortunate, here's a taste.



You can get the text version in your in-box for free. Please consider donating regularly, as I do.

Blessed Be All.

Saturday, April 16, 2011

The Power of Words

Maybe the most powerful 1:48 you'll ever watch...



I particularly like that it was made by other Feather People...

Silence is.... Eloquent

I'm trying to avoid politics, but every so often something just grabs me by the neck and shakes me like a terrier with a rat... Wow.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Fear or Faith: Your Call

Your entire life
is flavored
by the choice you make
between Faith and Fear.

All else
flows from that.

It is written:
"As ye believe,
so your All Is"
And it is true.
The wide world is
for you
just as you expect.

Seek and ye shall find.
Choose well what you seek.

Free to copy elsewhere, with link to my site and this attribution: Written by Jackson W Barnett, all rights preserved. 2011

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Things to Do or Think About Now... for Tomorrow



Stoneleigh's talk about the economy invites us to imagine what life might be like if you had 1/10th or 1/100th of the buying power you do today. Whether that be from deflation or scarcity of goods, what would life be like? The exercise in our "End of the Economy" gathering could go like this:
Think of all the things you currently purchase with money. These would be all the things you don't make or grow yourself, all the things you can't barter for within your community. Which of these are absolutely essential, and which are something you could live without?
Of those things that are absolutely essential, how could you possibly go about obtaining them without money? If you could redesign your habits and your community so that you COULD make, grow locally, or barter for these essentials, what action might you take right now? What systems would you put in place? What skills would you personally need to acquire? What tools and supplies would you need to have on hand?
And after hearing Stoneleigh's talk, what's stopping you from putting those things in place right now?
... within [this new awareness] lies, as in the bleak opening chapters of most adventure stories, a call to adventure. You will come to look back on this as a major, but positive, transition in your life.

--Rob Hopkins, The Transition Handbook

Economic Contraction | Energy Bulletin

Economic Contraction | Energy Bulletin

Monday, April 4, 2011

Blowing Green Smoke - Clusterfuck Nation

Couldn't resist posting this...
A special shout-out here to The New York Times, whose abysmal reporting on these issues, once again, is due to their reliance on a single source: the IHS-CERA group, Cambridge Energy Research Associates, the paid public relations auxiliary of the oil industry, led by that mendacious sack of shit Daniel Yergin, whore-in-chief.
How do you REALLY feel, James?

Sunday, April 3, 2011

The earthquake kit: How to unpack for a disaster and survive the unexpected | Grist

The earthquake kit: How to unpack for a disaster and survive the unexpected | Grist

Excellent post.

In a disaster, you will want to bring your identity, so we are often instructed, meaning some government-issued form of identification. But you will also want to bring a deeper identity, a sense of who you are and who we are. This matters greatly, because disaster tests our nature, even as it requires us to cooperate with those who are in it with us.

The usual emphasis on "panic" in disasters implies that, in a crisis, we're all sheep wheeling around idiotically, incapable of making good decisions, and selfishly trampling those around us. The emphasis on looting implies that, in a crisis, we're all wolves, taking ruthless advantage of and preying on each other. Both presume that during a disaster social bonds will break. In fact, as the records of disaster after disaster show, mostly they don't. In fact, those who study the subject (and reams of testimony by those who have lived through it) confirm that, in catastrophe, most of us behave remarkably beautifully, exhibiting presence of mind, altruism, generosity, bravery, and creativity.

Most of us.

Who, then, does it serve to imagine that we are wolves and sheep, fools and savages? Lee Clarke, a disaster sociologist and professor at Rutgers, wrote after Hurricane Katrina, "Disaster myths are not politically neutral, but rather work systematically to the advantage of elites. Elites cling to the panic myth because to acknowledge the truth of the situation would lead to very different policy prescriptions than the ones currently in vogue." That is to say, if we are wolves and sheep, and so not to be trusted, then they are the shepherds and the wolf-killers.

12 Warning Signs of U.S. Hyperinflation -- FORT LEE, N.J., Mar. 26, 2011

Just a snippet of things to come...
6) Year-Over-Year CPI Growth Has Increased 92% in Three Months...
7) Mainstream Media Denying Fed's Target Passed.
You would think that year-over-year CPI growth rising from 1.1% to 2.11% over a period of three months for an increase of 92% would generate a lot of media attention, especially considering that it has now surpassed the Fed's informal inflation target of 1.5% to 2%. Instead of acknowledging that inflation is beginning to spiral out of control and encouraging Americans to prepare for hyperinflation like NIA has been doing for years, the media decided to conveniently change the way it defines the Fed's informal target.

The media is now claiming that the Fed's informal inflation target of 1.5% to 2% is based off of year-over-year changes in the BLS's core-CPI figures. Core-CPI, as most of you already know, is a meaningless number that excludes food and energy prices. Its sole purpose is to be used to mislead the public in situations like this....

The fact of the matter is, food and energy are the two most important things Americans need to live and survive. If the BLS was going to exclude something from the CPI, you would think they would exclude goods that Americans don't consume on a daily basis. The BLS claims food and energy prices are excluded because they are most volatile. However, by excluding food and energy, core-CPI numbers are primarily driven by rents. Considering that we just came out of the largest Real Estate bubble in world history, there is a glut of homes available to rent on the market. NIA has been saying for years that being a landlord will be the worst business to be in during hyperinflation, because it will be impossible for landlords to increase rents at the same rate as overall price inflation. Food and energy prices will always increase at a much faster rate than rents.
This is why by turns, I laugh at, and tear my hair out over, the news as presented by the mainstream media (MSM). When they aren't leaving out or glossing over important stories, they're actively distorting the truth.

It's not foolish to be paranoid if the whole power structure is lying to you.