October 6, 2021 · 23:03

What sells better?

That is the question that was racing through my mind today. We all know (or have heard of) the expression ‘Sex sells’. It is used to market, to advertise and to entice (usually the men). But what if that is merely the setting? What if in actuality fantasy is the part that sells better? I had a small daydream this afternoon. I was in Toronto and I was chosen to be the backup goalie for the Toronto Maple Leafs (yes, the dream is not very realistic). I was sitting in some cafe, the staff was nice and suddenly addressed by Sheldon Keefe (their coach) and he said to me “Lawrence, today your most desired dreams becomes a reality”, my dry response was “What? You arranged a weekend of wild and passionate sex with Laura Vandervoort?” The team was howling with laughter and the coach deadpan response was “Well almost most desired then” and I was given the 62 Jersey to be the backup goalie that week, and lets face it, not unlike my blog name, if we want to have a fantasy, lets go for the really satisfying ones. 

So there I was with my jersey there were a few other jokes and giggles after that I woke up from my daydream (without the LV special), such is life. But the dream stuck and when I was watching someones drawing of Alice in wonderland I started to put things together. What if we are not looking at a porn or some sex movie, but what we used to call in the old days a soft porn movie (all innuendo and little or no show, except for the boobies). What if the movie is a new take in Alice in Wonderland? We go through the motions (or Alice does) and the Cheshire Cat, the Caterpillar, the rabbit, they are all men with masks and onesies. A movie that is like not some cheap movie, but high end special effects (not unlike The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus) and a storyline that does follow the book, but with a twist at the end. The end being that [CENSORED]

A stage that reminded me of a movie that impacted with me, Jacob’s Ladder. So what happens if Virtual Reality takes over our lives too much? There are settings (Elite Dangerous) where I would love to have the hardware to do just that, but the hardware for now is too expensive and (for now) not immersive enough. So when that changes (most likely in 2-3 years) what are the applications? What happens when we can dig into the fantasies of any person (like The Cell) 

So what can we learn? I am not merely thinking healing, but interrogations, information retrieval and a few other avenue’s. So when we take the stage and turn on the fantasy, what could be achieved? We have seen this in the past but always as the end goal, as far as I can tell it was never used as a mere waypoint. Why was that? It cannot be the limit of Hollywood, it could be the limit of any producer yet I believe that this path could lead to a load of green as the faith of Americans go. I believe that there is a host of options here, and as streaming channels are competing more and more, whatever we can do that is truly original is one that streamers will entice, I merely hope that they wake up before they cancel the series too soon (way too many examples) because it is the slow start and the deep story that entices a crowd and engages them. Not the Marvel versions. This is not me having a go at Marvel movies, because I love them, but there is more and that part is not explored, or perhaps explored too little. I personally would have loved where Dollhouse season 3 would have taken us. Eliza Dushku, Dichen Lachman, Enver Gjokaj, Tahmoh Penikett, Fran Kranz, Olivia Williams, Harry Lennix and Amy Acker were all beyond good, the story was engaging and enticing, yet we were sold short, a cancellation after season 2. So will a new approach to Virtual Reality as a weapon make it? I honestly do not know but as far as I can tell no one took that route and in a stage where games can almost take us there, the lack of such a direction seems like a loss.

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October 6, 2021 · 14:26

The worst is almost here

There is a truth in the expression “The worst is yet to come”, that is a truth that has been around longer than I have been alive. The setting that things can be worse than they are now is a reflection of positivity. Things are not at it worst, but what happens when that part is around the corner? It is a very real danger we now face and even as 600 journalists are digging into the Pandora papers, trying to create click bitches, all whilst we get (source: BBC) “There is no suggestion that either the Qatari family or the sellers of the two properties acted illegally”, what a waste of space have these people become? All whilst there is still the stage of setting up the billionaires for a ‘tax the rich’ scenario. The tax laws were never overhauled (for over 20 years), we get pollution stories and how rich people should not use their private jets, but the report of the European Environmental Agency setting a clear stage that 147 facilities are reason for 50% of ALL POLLUTION, how much longer will you get played?

And I need to keep with the true reason, the reason why I state the worst is almost here. For those who were addicted to Game of Thrones there is a saying that applies ‘Winter is Coming!’ And there lies the real rub. This we get from several sources.

First the Dutch NOS, who gives us (at https://nos.nl/l/2400511) ‘Another strong increase in gas price, already eight times as expensive as a year ago’, plenty of Dutch houses and apartments rely on Gas for cooking and heating and consider that the price for that has gone up 800% in ONE YEAR. And they are not alone. 

Sky News offers (at https://news.sky.com/story/surging-wholesale-energy-prices-add-to-inflation-pressures-as-firms-call-for-emergency-help-12426926) “The British day-ahead contract for natural gas hit 277p per therm, 32% higher than Monday and surpassing the 275p per therm level seen during the “Beast from the East” weather system in 2018”, with a larger setting. Consider your heating in December-March when it is 30% more expensive. A stage I foresaw in ‘A fence is for fencing’, an article I wrote on January 17th 2021 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/01/17/a-fence-is-for-fencing/) and at the time there were some statements of utter negativity when I gave the readers “the UK (aka United Kingdom) has a problem, it is coming up short to a much larger degree with energy and that will go on 3-5 years at the very least.” Personally, I had hoped there would be more time, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. And when we add another article by the Dutch NOS giving us (at https://nos.nl/l/2400494) ‘EU summit on high energy prices, such as in Italy: ‘I hold my breath’’ where we learn that households can no longer afford the energy bills. The NOS makes mention of Slovenia and Italy, so how about the other nations? We the the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, but what about Poland, Estonia, Czech Republic, and Finland? Sweden has Vattenfal, yet as the Swedes need more, the UK will end up with less and I wonder how that will impact Norway. The bulk of the media is not on board is it? But at least we get the Pandora papers with no top-line reference and articles that give us “there is no suggestion that either the Qatari family or the sellers of the two properties acted illegally”, yes we really needed that, especially after ignored articles on the EEA and lame pushes for billionaire jets. Yes, it all makes sense to some people (stakeholders) yet does it make sense to you? So whilst Italy pays 30% more for electricity and 14% more for gas, I wonder how much reporting will happen in the next month whilst we get pandora article after Pandora article. If there were reporting of ACTUAL criminal activities it would be different, but a mention of ‘could’ is a waste of energy and this is not 1 journalist, in this case we see mention of 600 journalists, so you tell me, how useless have ego driven journalists become? 

And that whilst the worst is almost here, there is a winter coming and this winter people will sing around the Christmas tree on how they are freezing. And when too many people decide to burn their Christmas tree in the living room just to stop shivering to enjoy their new version of a Christmas meal there is every chance that some houses will catch fire, so how many need to catch fire for the London Fire brigade to give up? You think I am kidding? Then do the math and see how many people in Europe will get by, merely get by because that list is dwindling down fast. A stage I personally never saw coming and a stage the media is not loudly reporting on. Yes, I am giving you some links, but the people in Europe should get several articles EVERY DAY in pretty much EVERY EU nation, is that happening?

You tell me!

A stage that is sliding by whilst the media is doing their click bitch act. Fell free to disagree, that is fair enough and your right, but consider on what you do not get to see when the larger papers should ALL have been on this page and they are not, why is that? 

To add spice to the equation, the ONE sale of arms to Saudi Arabia would have settled the energy requirements for all people in the UK for well over two years. So when the cold is getting to you feel free to thank all those Tea Nannies of the CAAT. In the cold high moral issues are so much better to swallow, high moral settings that are not wrong, but as others take over it was a mere laughing matter in the eyes of the new delivery parties to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

All settings that are open to interpretations and you might not agree. I get that and that is fine, but what option remains? In the mean time, as my mind was racing over all things bright beautiful and in the past, it also gave me a new idea for TV, a setting that starts with the protagonist/antagonist to set the stage to circumvent the US Secret service to complete an assassination, but to what end? When you consider a few items you might figure it out, but that would be mean of me, I have written over 2000 articles, yet there is a larger setting, what happens when any assassination is merely a small cog in a decently complex timepiece? What is the station when it is about specific cogs? Precision is a stage we often overlook and when we consider what the connections were between two parties, we tend to look at the big wigs which makes sense, but what happens when the cog is Marty Walsh? What happens when we take the United States Secretary of Labor out of the equation? Do not worry, he is a mere example. Can’t give away the story at this point, but the premise still stands. We are all about the big people and the media is about heralding (according to their stakeholders), so what happens when the play is larger and the people thinking that they decide the play are played the fool card?

But even as the people understand the card, what side was the one that mattered? It is more than Faith versus Judgement. It is a stage of understanding based on what we were given, what we trusted. A stage that the media themselves changed, and at times I wonder when they decide to catch on regarding what they are doing.

And at this point, I took another look at the front page of the BBC,  we see a whole row of Pandora papers articles, like the Blairs saving £312,000 stamp duty, yet there is no stage that they did anything wrong or illegal, and that list goes on, yet the energy bills are not making the front page, why? Not important enough? Sky News gives us “The cap, which affects around 15 million families on standard variable deals with their suppliers, has already just gone up by 12% adding a typical £139 to dual fuel bills”, at this point I ask You tell me, what was more important, one person avoiding a bill totally legal the other setting a dangerous premise to 15,000,000 families. Take your time, I am not going anywhere and in Australia summer is starting, so days of 30-42 degrees will be our Christmas feast to endure. 

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October 5, 2021 · 16:44

Netflix beware

I have been in a bad place. It was not because tools like Gerard Ryle and his ICIJ are playing a presented game to misinform the people, to set a stage of abuse and deception. It was because things suddenly sounded very familiar. This had happened before, it happened before in Europe. In famine and in a stage of utter poverty. Yes, it had happened before and as my mind was taking the road from the past, I suddenly realised that I missed something on TV. Among the sully of reality TV (which I happily avoid), the setting of filtered information and the change of settings to take what is not theirs to take, only because the people who had the option were too cowardly and the US has seen 5 cowardly administrations, but they are not alone. The EU is in precisely the same place. 

So what did I miss? Well, when I was young (in the age of B&W TV) players like the BBC had educational programs. And then it hit me, what I had written about in the past and now I see a new TV series. A sort of mini-series in 6-8 parts. Not drama but as real as it gets, as historically accurate as possible, whilst still pleasing the people. It will not be for all, but it will be for a lot more than too many could contemplate.

Auvergne
France was a different place in those days and change was coming, it wasn’t coming in a carriage, not on horseback. It was nothing less than a Tsunami that would change the landscape in under 100 years. 4 generations would change everything and close to entire Europe. It was 1095 and from the 17th to the 27th of November a meeting was held. Yes we know about the Crusades that followed, but it is not about the Crusades, it is about the meeting the created the Crusades. There were a significant amount of players who heeded the call of Pope Urban II. And there is a need. I grew up with a misplaced feeling of pride being a Catholic. We stopped the barbarians in the holy land and for decades I grew up with that lie, a lot of us did. And it is time to give the people the real deal. The meeting had amongst others:

Joannes, Cardinal Bishop of Porto
Dagobert, Archbishop of Pisa
Richard, Cardinal Priest and Abbot of S. Victor in Marseille
Teuzo, Cardinal Priest of SS. Joannis et Pauli
Albertus, O.S.B., Cardinal Priest of Santa Sabina
Joannes Gattellus, the Pope’s Chancellor
Gregory Papiensis, deacon
Hugo of Verdun, deacon
Hugues de Die, Archbishop of Lyon and Papal Legate
Amatus, Archbishop of Bordeaux and Papal Legate
Rainaldus, Archbishop of Reims
Bernard de Sedirac, Archbishop of Toledo and Legate in Spain
Geoffrey of Vendôme, cardinal-priest of the titular church of Santa Prisca on the Aventine
Ivo, Bishop of Chartres
Joannes, Bishop of Orléans
Roger, Bishop of Beauvais
As well as: 

Fulcher of Chartres (optional spin off). He is important as he wrote ‘Gesta Francorum Iherusalem peregrinantium’ (1101-1127) giving us a real rundown of the first Crusades. The series should focus on a few people, not all. 2-3 per episodes with Fulcher of Chartres as a red line through all the episodes. With a part of every episode around Joannes Gattellus and Pope Urban II. 

A real rundown of what happened there and there is plenty of documentation. It strikes a chord as we see the games some are trying to play on us. There might be enough of a reason to give the people the interactions and the consequences of the acts by Alexios I Komnenos requesting assistance to fight the Seljuk Turks we should, but it is not essential.

And consider the setting, when was the last time we had the option to see a real history lesson on TV? Is that not weird?

Anyway, the BBC used to be a real power player there and I reckon that new players could pick this up. And when you consider that the Gesta Francorum Iherusalem peregrinantium has not been published since 1913 makes one wonder why not. There is no conspiracy theory here, just the idea that one of the best and likely most accurate writings of the Crusades was taken from the publication shelf is a little weird, almost offensively so.

So whilst this is merely an idea consider to reject it, yet it came as I realised that I was lied to in primary school and secondary school, I and many others were educated with a false set of stories, in this, does the entire Pandora Paper situation start making sense? It has been done before and I am not stating that the documents are false, but the players have a different game in mind and the ICIJ and its connected journalists were all too eager to adhere to that play and claim some digital click bitch money in the surplus. And their game is not finished yet. 

So consider the setting of Pope Urban II and a war that lasted for almost 2 centuries and took the life of 1,000,000 people and this was the lowest estimate. Yes, I agree in those days killing 1,000,000 people would solve poverty and famine. In a world that had roughly 325,000,000 million people at that stage. When we see a death count that high would it not make sense to take a long hard historic look at how we got there? There is a second voice in my mind to have two narrators, one with the story, one who give the dissenting views at the time (like the Gesta Francorum, an anonymous piece written in 1100-1101) and there are a few more, those views should not be ignored. But it is merely an idea, and it feels good to feed the creative side in me.

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October 5, 2021 · 08:33

A waste of space

Yes, some people are that, I believe that the tool ICIJ director Gerard Ryle is such a person (he will clim it is me). Yet how did I get there? That is important too. Those who read the previous articles will remember that I stated that a top-line display would give us the parts we initially needed. But no, after all this time, with 600 journalists at his back, Ryle never walked the walk. However I see ABC, the Guardian, BBC and others all do the motion of jabs, to create flames, to create click bitches. In a dying light they want to grab any digital dollar they can. Even the useless leader of the Democratic Party (President Joe Biden) via his administration gives us today “The Biden administration said it would “crack down on the unfair schemes that give big corporations a leg up” in the wake of the Pandora disclosures.” It is a pointless exercise in a waste of time, it is merely the prequel to something much worse.

You see the top-line would give us a better look at the “130 billionaires from 45 countries, including 46 Russian oligarchs. Bollywood actors, soccer stars, corrupt sports officials, a king’s lover, feuding princesses, movie directors and stars, supermodels, acclaimed designers and world-famous singers, 330 politicians and high-level public officials in more than 90 countries and territories, including 35 current and former country leaders” and this is linked to the even less useful quote “By some estimates 10 per cent of the world’s total economic output is parked in offshore financial centres, costing governments billions of dollars in lost revenue” 

Why is this?
The top-line would give us where the impact is. The 130 billionaires? You see there are 165 in Dubai and they are in the 0% bracket. I stated the dangers two days ago. Then from all these numbers, how many are in which nation, ho many are governmental versus non-governmental. When we see those numbers, we will likely see a created a storm in a teacup. 

And this is linked to the first setting proving that Gerard Ryle is a useless and optionally corrupt tool. “The source of the documents hasn’t been revealed to media partners but made it clear to the ICIJ he wanted the public to see where dirty money is really flowing. Ryle says the source had two conditions for leaking the documents. “First of all the source wanted anonymity. I presume for safety reasons,” he says.” Presume my ass! When we investigate the sources we see that some have well above decent protection, in my view there are only two players involved here, the CIA and the NSA. Both Russian and Chinese investigations would stopping their local laundry, as such there would be nothing on oligarchs outside of Russia. 

I believe this all to be a well managed (speculative) ruse. When it all comes out, we will get a flame of ‘tax the rich’ and that is what that useless democratic leader needs, his land is BANKRUPT and when the default hits grabbing (not taxing) whatever the American billionaires have is on the short list, reparations come later and if it all goes to shit the politicians will run for cover in any nation that will put up with them (Australia and UK). 

And when you truly read the articles you will see statements like “the documents reportedly tied prime minister Andrej Babis to a $22 million estate near Cannes, France. Speaking in a television debate, Babis, who was a billionaire before he entered politics, denied any wrongdoing.” 600 journalists and not one has added evidence of wrongdoing, merely a billionaire doing what he is allowed to do, buy a house in the south of France and France is not even a 0% tax land, so where are the incriminating papers? 

All the flames I see are about people no one cares about (the King of Jordan), yes Jordanians care about him and that is OK, people in the UK less so. And the truckloads of articles are just that small jabs to keep the readers angry, but no one is taking too much notice of “ICIJ director Gerard Ryle says the Pandora Papers reveal that some international leaders who could tackle offshore tax avoidance have themselves secretly moved money and assets beyond the reach of tax and law enforcement authorities as their citizens struggle” as such I reply “Gerard you fuck, why did the press not do enough over 30 years to make politicians tackle tax laws?” And in HIS statement we see ‘could’ and ‘secret’, but if a person buys a house in Monaco or Dubai they can have money there, it would be legal and it would be tax exempt. You (as I personally see it intentionally) overlooked that part, there is also the Caymans and a few other places, but it does not match the need of the governmental hacker who got into 14 systems, 5 of them had good security, and you could have seen that from day one, but you need click bitches, you need digital revenue and you need to make sure you are not obsolete. So where is that part of the equation?

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October 4, 2021 · 15:14

Utter insanity

To get to this part, I need to grab back to another article which I wrote on May 6th 2020 called ‘New World Order’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/05/06/new-world-order/), yet that one also takes a step back and refers to an initial article I wrote in 2013 called ‘It hurts every time, but we love it’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2013/02/06/it-hurts-every-time-but-we-love-it/) . In 2013 the US debt was $17,000,000,000,000 (17 trillion), and over 8 years 8 trillion was added, a nice $8,000,000,000,000. This implies that the US government overspends a trillion a year with no exit strategy on how to cope with the debt and it is on both Republicans and Democrats. They raised debt ceiling again and again and this president might be the one who gets to live through the fallout of such stupidity. We (me too) might grab at the ludicrous waste of billions upon billions in only two defence contracts (F-35 and USS Zumwalt) but the problem is a lot larger. The decades wasted by not overhauling the tax system (I suggested changes in 1999, might have been 1998), it would not have solved everything but it could have optionally solved a few things. It is the relentless boasting government approach towards “My Credit Card is too big too refuse!” Yet that is at this point exactly what is going to happen next week Friday. Unless there is another ceiling raised and it merely pushes the problem forward. The larger problem is not merely the politicians, it is their favourite tool the media as well. 4 days ago the Financial Times gave us ‘The US debt ceiling needs to be raised’, and they do give us “The very regularity of fiscal cliff edges inures people to their seriousness. The markets expect Washington to fear default enough to do what is needed in the end.” However none of the media told in clear harsh language to politicians (and naming them) that they need to act and as it is soon too late, the US population will get one of the loudest and harshest wake up calls since December 7th 1941. It will hit them square in the face and there will be no escape. A setting of pensions gone (the US is bankrupt), for many their homes will be lost (the debt collectors will collect on EVERYTHING), infrastructures will collapse (the money is gone) and systems will stop functioning (the US credit card will be destroyed). A setting that continues on for decades, unless the US has any friends left, the US seizes to exist and on the side lines China and Russia will howl with laughter. 

Yet not all is lost, the US could become part of the Commonwealth again, although the US politicians will mostly be out for a job, Canada could oversee issues for London and the political seat of power will be in Ottawa, did anyone consider that there was more to my ‘We stand on guard for thee’ article? The article (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/10/03/we-stand-on-guard-for-thee/) had a small reference to “CANZUK time, is Canada ready?” When drenched in “Canada has a chance to be a major player in CANZUK to usher in a more politically stable and mutually beneficial version of a modern Commonwealth”, it is the modern Commonwealth part. And in this there is every reason to trim a lot of fat, especially political fat. In 2013 I gave the reader “Those two, when a change is set might mean that the US could be bankrupted overnight” I never saw a pandemic coming, but that pandemic pushed the US straight over the edge into an abyss of debt. It also gave me shivers to sell my IP to an American player, my 5G and I left without anything? Screw that! I would rather take my chances with China. And that is the larger setting, when the brain drain starts and China pays for the IP the avalanche will be complete (not merely me, dozens of others too), the US will have a dwindling IP vault, manufacturing will go to Asia (optionally India too) and the US will be a container of lard, no bones or muscles holding it together. A body of mass with merely the strength of the barrel containing it all. 

So as Reuters gives us a day later ‘U.S. debt ceiling impasse warrants nuclear options’ (at https://www.reuters.com/breakingviews/us-debt-ceiling-impasse-warrants-nuclear-options-2021-09-30/) with “That could spare the United States a default, but would force other cuts, possibly in areas like Social Security or military pay.” We see the beginning of a larger stage where the people would soon be left with nothing, it takes a whole new vibe out of “We the people” doesn’t it? And the “Unable to borrow more, the Treasury would have to cut some 40% of federal spending by mid-November”, it is the icing on the cake, a setting of larger dangers to a large chunk of 331,000,000 people in the US. Did you think I was kidding on the US stampede into Canada? The rich will prefer 30% more taxes against nothing and an angry mob at their doorstep. Up to $3.4 trillion in personal wealth will take any option against losing it all in the US. House prices in Monaco will soar (for the really rich) so if Jeff Bezos can offer me €150,000,000 for all my IP (payable in Monaco) I will seriously consider it. Google, Netflix and Amazon will take to the global skies and they will double register their IP to keep it safe and keep it out of governmental hands, because that will be the next stage, the US will need to find money wherever it can be found. A station the US has never faced before. There is one upside, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia can get their required hardware for dimes on the dollar and optionally buy out a few factories and all their patents putting them on par for their 2030 promise of taking home based defence build projects to a whole new level. The US laughed and sniggered when Wall Street offered vulture solutions to Argentina in 1998, now the vultures are ready and set to rip the US carcass apart. Is it a fair view? That is not in question, yet the stage is now that it is becoming a likely view the only people treated fair are the hard workers who just tried to get by. 

Should there be an 11th hour solution of debt ceiling raising, the people will need to consider that the end is nigh and the US did this to themselves. Irresponsible spending for well over 2 decades and with no exit strategy the USA will enter a field it so desperately tried to avoid and with innovators moving to other shores their field of choice becomes ever more limited. 

And when you wonder why no one is writing about those dangers, consider that I opted for this day to come for 8 years, I never saw a pandemic, but when you realise that the US was overspending a trillion a year, 83.3 billion a month for 8 years. Did no one catch on that this clambake could come to a sudden stop? Wonder about that part of the equation. I reckon that a lot more people should have seen the dangers after the 2008 events. Now 14 years later the people of the US will face hardships that is 10 times worse than the events of 2008, not merely because of what is now, but it happens when it’s infrastructures, social security and healthcare are totally gutted. 

Mozart wrote Requiem 230 years ago, I doubt he ever envisioned it used on an entire nation, but that is life, or the lack thereof. 

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October 4, 2021 · 04:41

A disregarded shelter setting

The Guardian was at it again and they are not doing anything wrong (at least I think they aren’t) but the stage created is calling for a nice stage and it is getting close to immediate that we take a hard look at the meaning of hypocrisy. 

The article ‘Pandora papers: biggest ever leak of offshore data exposes financial secrets of rich and powerful’ (at https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/pandora-papers-biggest-ever-leak-of-offshore-data-exposes-financial-secrets-of-rich-and-powerful) gives us a few items and before you think we are digging into the air, lets take a look at a few essential parts. It starts with “companies hired by wealthy clients to create offshore structures and trusts in tax havens such as Panama, Dubai, Monaco, Switzerland and the Cayman Islands” first, this is not an illegal act, then we need to look at Monaco and Dubai. Monaco gives us over two sources “You can apply for a Carte de Residence once you have an address in Monaco (either bought or rented a property for a minimum of a year). You must also agree to live there for more than three months of the year. Resident individuals are not subject to personal income tax in the Principality of Monaco”, now this is not the easiest setting as decent apartments tend to start at €3,000,000 going up to €387,000,000. As such I wish you good luck finding something you like. In Dubai we see “There is currently no personal income tax in the United Arab Emirates. As such, there are no individual tax registration or reporting obligations.” These are called tax havens and they are perfectly legal. It is the way THAT nation operates and it works for them, so when we see the Guardian give us “But the secrecy offered by tax havens has at times proven attractive to tax evaders, fraudsters and money launderers, some of whom are exposed in the files”, which is a debatable setting. You see someone who takes effort in buying an apartment in Monaco or Dubai, or most of these places is not a tax evader, that person is involved with tax avoidance and it is not the same. Black letter lawyers found a setting where the rules work FOR their clients and they are allowed to do this. Yet the Guardian inserts ‘tax evader’ whilst knowingly adding “some of whom are exposed in the files”, some implying not all and some is seemingly inserted hoping that the people are flamed to the list of “more than 100 billionaires, 30 world leaders and 300 public officials” hoping that they are all painted by the flamed audience. And in light of this, did anyone take a long hard look at “the cache includes 11.9m files from companies hired by” what is not looked at is the source of that information and how that source got the information. A setting not dissimilar from my article ‘The same gramophone’ on September 16th (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/09/16/the-same-gramophone/) regarding Pegasus and in light of evidence given (lack thereof) to the people by the Washington Post an interesting repetition of flames lacking evidence. The article on tax issues does not once, NOT ONCE mention tax avoidance, or give the setting of tax evasion versus tax avoidance. One is illegal the other is not. In this the text “They also shine a light on the secret finances of more than 300 other public officials such as government ministers, judges, mayors and military generals in more than 90 countries” could be seen as “They also shine a light on the private finances of more than 300 other public officials such as government ministers, judges, mayors and military generals in more than 90 countries”, yet they chose to not use the word Private did they? Private and non evidence could be seen as intrusive and harassing, the media really does not like it when their actions are seen in that way. 

My view?
You see if there was clear ‘tax evasion’ we would be getting this, instead of “leaked data with select media partners including the Guardian, BBC Panorama, Le Monde and the Washington Post. More than 600 journalists have sifted through the files as part of a massive global investigation”, so are they incompetent or is there too little remaining? The price of 600 journalists cannot be cheap so the more they flame, the more they ‘earn’ back, but that part is not really given is it? There is no top-line, a flaw we have seen more than once before. If it was clear 300 people can be shown in a top-line like Nation, government, non government easily enough. That would take an hour, perhaps two, but we do not get to see that, do we? We also get all kinds of embossed examples, with the added text “This is the Panama papers on steroids, it’s broader, richer and has more detail”, my view would be, then give it Ryle you dumb fuck! Do not posture, present facts! The top-line, the setting of tax evasion versus tax avoidance and a few other facts, including the source of the data, but we do not get any of that, do we?

I see it as a mere approach to the upcoming US debt ceiling and someone flaming that if ‘they’ had paid their taxes, there would not be an issue. Well, my view “Well, you stupid fucks, if you had clearly focussed on the tax laws that needed an overhaul for THREE DECADES we might not be in this mess either!” So whilst we are given “The files include disclosures about major donors to the Conservative party, raising difficult questions for Boris Johnson as his party meets for its annual conference”, an anti-tory smear setting. No matter who donates and to what party, if these people are not proven criminals, there would be no issue and I wonder how far these 600 journalists got. So when we consider “Many use shell companies to hold luxury items such as property and yachts, as well as incognito bank accounts” we need to see whether laws were broken and let’s be clear, they stated that these are people in over 90 countries. So which have laws against these acts and if they have an address in Monaco or Dubai, are any laws broken? This took me 5 minutes and we see a lack of a lot in one article seemingly the source of 600 journalists. 

I personally see only one option for a person like Gerard Ryle. Either give us that top-line clearly or become an Uber driver. As I personally see it, someone posturing absent of evidence should be somewhere else, not be some director of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, but that is merely my call on the matter we see here now.

Oh, and before I forget the meaning of Hypocrisy is “the practice of claiming to have higher standards or more noble beliefs than is the case”, a setting too many journalists fall into lately.

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October 3, 2021 · 18:48

We stand on guard for thee

This is a special edition, this is for my Canadian fans (there are a few). And there are a few items that concerns them. First off, we have a little funny go at their prime minister Justin Trudeau (for form sake). I see the too much negative stories about him.

I do wonder about that at times, but others have their right to a view too. In this side there are two images. And yes, I do have a reason, you see the home-front is part of him, he married Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, a lady of 27 springs, which is fine, but why does he insist on looking 10 years younger than her? All men know that looking younger than your wife will be our downfall in a few ways, so as I thought he had gained insight during the pandemic, we suddenly started to see him with a posh beard (a beard loaded with silver), so we thought someone whispered a few facts of life to him, but no, recently he has gone beardless again and I reckon there will be a fallout in Maison Trudeau soon enough, but that is enough about him. 

You see, Canada will be in a tough situation soon enough, I reckon in 4-6 weeks hell comes calling. And when we realise that Canada got through the pandemic a lot better than plenty of others. The NY Times reported that 1,639,169 had the disease, less than 28,000 died from the disease making them 26th on the mortality list. With 72% fully vaccinated and 78% at least one shot they are in a good place, the US has only 56% fully vaccinated and 65% with one doze. 

The Canadian setting is a lot better than many European nations and it comes to 0.7% of American casualties of a permanent nature. Canada has reason to be proud and it happened when Trudeau was at the helm. Here I distinguish ‘was at the helm’ versus ‘was steering the nation’, that difference requires me to know a lot more and I do not.

But the pandemic is merely one side, the larger problem will be the US, when the debt ceiling is reached the impact will be seen in many ways. Not merely in the stage of the debt, larger changes, dangerous changes are at foot. The IP Watchdogs might trivialise it with ‘Leahy Bill to ‘Restore the AIA’ is Too Unbalanced to Pass’ yet, I am not convinced. The senator from Vermont has a collection of powerful companies backing him, optionally merely to protect their own needs. A source gives us “Bernie Sanders supported some parts of the bill but had misgivings over the “no strings attached” emergency appropriations available to the semiconductor industry”, it is a fair call and both sides have merits, but the larger station is now, when the US decides to use ‘nationalised’ patents and IP to bank the second credit card, the US will give a larger chunk of the battle field to China and South Korea, who have a massive IP setting. That stage and the debt default gives rise to the dangers. Millions of Americans will choose larger taxation and safety over US exploitation, in the we end up seeing Canada in the same predicament that the US had with Mexico and there is no Rio Grande between the US and Canada, there are the Niagara Falls, but apparently you can cross it in a barrel. I wouldn’t know. The larger station for Canada is now 4-6 weeks away and it sets a awkward stage. How dangerous is this? It is not merely the US, there are plenty of people in the EU and Australia that see more options in Canada and the Pandemic is pushing for brain drains all over the field. One might argue that we have seen this before. In the era 400AD – 600AD change hit Europe “The Great Migration took place in the waning days of the Western Roman Empire. Hunted by the advancing Huns and lured by the riches of the politically weakened Western Roman Empire, from the fourth century onwards several mainly Germanic tribes invaded Western Roman territory.” We now see something similar as the US is crumbling as the powerhouse the once were and then pretended to be a bit longer. I do not think it is the blame of President Biden, the six presidents preceding them did close to nothing to stem the debt and as it is now surpassing $25,000,000,000,000 (25 trillion), all whilst we see arms deals cancelled, fiasco’s in naval and airforce construction, fiasco’s that wasted well over 10% of the entire US education spending, two projects the waste was THAT much and the people will see the numbers and realise that staying in the US is going to get less and less healthy, as such the problem for Canada, they will get a massive influx of people hoping that they might find happiness there. I would like to state that the Commonwealth nations stands with them, but to be honest, I have no idea where the G20 Commonwealth politicians from Australia, UK, South Africa and India stand. They are too much about enabling America and too little about holding them too account and I fear it might cost Canada at some point. What happens then? 

I honestly do not know.

Yet we need to return to the Prime Minister. We see several online settings of anti-Trudeau. One seen in the Conversation is “Accusations that Trudeau has betrayed Canada was a common theme as we began studying grassroots Facebook pages in 2019, another election year. We found no Trudeau meme pages celebrating the leader. Instead, we watched anti-Trudeau pages describe him as a traitor who deserved to be treated with contempt.” It seems to be that there is a flock of Trudeau trolls and the CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) as well as the RCMP will need to look into this sooner rather than later, because trolls are like rats, they will leave the sinking ship at the second sign of trouble and they will become a Canadian problem soon thereafter. This gets us to one source (a debatable one) called the Hill Times. We see there (at https://www.hilltimes.com/2021/09/30/canzuk-time-is-canada-ready/319763) ‘CANZUK time, is Canada ready?’, there we see “Canada has a chance to be a major player in CANZUK to usher in a more politically stable and mutually beneficial version of a modern Commonwealth”, in this weirdly enough it is Canada and New Zealand that are the stable making elements, the other two are deep in the American pockets and that is about to backfire largely. This is not about submarines, it is not about local settings it is about them siding with the US against Chinese matters all whilst there is a failing level of evidence. No, China is not innocent, but it all got tainted through the Huawei stage and China (understandably) took offence. There is no way that China can absolve too many events, but some they can and the US in a failing IP grip, a failing debt grip and a failing power grip is trying whatever they can to seem important. New Zealand has been steering clear and Canada needs to make up what to do, they do have the US (aka South Canada) on their border so it is not an easy decision, yet should all talks in the US fail and the debt ceiling becomes cemented, the people harmed by it will desperately seek a way out and north is the one move that makes perfect sense to many American.

Canada, we stand on guard for thee, yet the clarion call can, and should only be made by Canada, we cannot do it for them.

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October 3, 2021 · 10:09

The balance of one and zero

I just woke up from the weirdest dream, so take my word on this, this is not about reality, this is entertainment (or the future). The dream was nice and ‘uplifting’ there is nothing not sexy about a dozen women in tight outfits defending a location killing anything in sight. I am sitting in a chair (I think), the women are patrolling the place, there are at least 4-5 women in my room and a lot more outside. But the difference between peace and the other thing is a mere switch. From one moment to another all the women change from tranquil to deadly, waves of attacks start and the women kill whatever comes in view and there is a lot coming their way, yet in the end it does not matter, nearly all are killed, the exercise is over. It was a training, but not one you would see. This was the training of a true AI. You see, AI’s lean differently. They had similar training a child has, but the AI becomes mature a lot faster, a thousand times faster and to teach an AI they get pointers. They literally get data points and point references. This is called aggregated evolution. 

This specific AI is owned by the CIA and the year is 21xx something. 

The evolution happens through what will call an Exabyte drive. The parsing of that data takes a little while and it is done in the background, and the AI takes in every aspect of the training. It makes the AI the dangerous thing it is, and it is truly dangerous. So at this time there are only a few true AI’s, some are economic, some are logistic, some are tactical, some are operational. And only the big players can afford them, a true AI is not some server, it is like making the 1984 comparison between an IBM model 36 mainframe to an IBM PCXT. There are other AI’s, they are not true AI’s, but are a lot similar. They are a lot smaller and they are evolved deeper learning systems. They bring the bacon but only to a degree and the world is in a stage to create stronger AI’s, and as people find cheap ways to evolve their AI, a hacker team is dedicated to finding and hacking streams with data from Exabyte drives. They cannot comprehend the data, but any AI can and the evolution of an AI is worth a lot of money, so as these hackers seek they find the wrong Aggregation file. They find the one that was highly secure, but still someone found a way and got the stream of the CIA and there the problem starts. At some point the wrong one is pushed into a zero (yes, it had to be a sexual reference). But here we get a new lesson, one that as out there, but not the one we envisioned. When you were young, you tried to play with matches and your parents stopped you, just like you were stopped playing with knifes. You were told danger, and evil, bad and dangerous. It was how we learn. An AI does not learn, it does not merely learn the game of chess, it gets handed the history of EVERY chess game ever played. It gets pointers and create the experience, free of morality, free of ‘burden’, so when it gets data it never had it learns in its own way and has no morality baggage, yet what it learns could be anything. The pointers the AI creates evolves it and it makes it worth a lot more. 

So as we turn a page to another time we see a young woman dressed in retro miniskirt (70’s) and tight tank-top, she is looking in a store for a 4K movie, she picks up the Notebook (off course she did) and walks to the counter to pay, but now the stage changes, the operational AI in that mall was fed the CIA drive and recognises the woman, it sees a danger and EVERY system in the mall is now out to kill her and her kind (basically all women overly nicely dressed). The woman has no problems dealing with any attack, the security guards were easily dispersed but it suddenly happens all over the mall, and the security guards and the police accept the alarms that AI’s give them, the AI locks down the mall to protect the people outside but the mall becomes a deathtrap and all the other nice women who have no idea what’s going on are killed almost instantly. Those women who were not alone are suddenly seen as group dangers and women, men and children are executed, the AI never understood foundational stages and disperses as it was taught that a transgressing danger must be killed. And it happens all over the place, not merely in one mall, in any mall that had the same operational AI. 

It becomes over time the dangers that short cuts, hackers and greedy overseers represent, it is not some avoidable setting, when we consider Solarwinds, Microsoft and a few other hacked places, they all gave the goods, but we need to understand that true AI’s have foundational differences. We have seen this in many movies, but did we learn anything? 

You see, we saw periodic tables of what one day might be an AI, we see ‘Knowledge refinement’, we see ‘Relationship learning’ but they are separated entities, and the AI is supposed to operate like this and it does not matter what you think or say, someone will come, someone will be stupid enough to enlarge any AI for a lot of cash and there lies the rub, once we give any true AI the exabyte drive it is out of our hands, we do not get to become ‘caring’ parents, we merely unleash what we have wrought and there is no cautionary tale, because the greed driven will not care. In this the news is already there. Bloomberg gave us a week ago ‘Trained in the American intelligence community, cyber-contractors are now making their expertise available to governments around the world’, and today the Financial Times give us ‘Hackers stole cryptocurrencies from at least 6,000 Coinbase customers’ (at https://www.ft.com/content/43ab875b-2e96-48b7-926d-be17e925f1c3) there we see “by exploiting a flaw in its two-factor authentication system. The news, first reported by Bleeping Computer, comes just a week after the company had to drop its plans to launch a new lending product following the threat of legal action from US securities regulators.” It is followed by a lot of yaba-yaba and with “Coinbase said it had “immediately” fixed the flaw, but it did not reveal when it had discovered the vulnerability or the hacking campaign” we see that whatever it fixed was AFTER the fact and the use of ‘immediately’ indicates that no one was cruising their system trying to find optional defects, so it could happen again. All this whilst there is a debatable situation on the timeline that was out there getting to 6000 clients, so now consider a CTO using hackers to make its system a lot more valuable. 

Are you catching on yet?

Yes, the story I started with was merely the setting for entertainment, a movie or a TV episode, but it is founded on the dangerous premise we see every day, we use servers, we are online and hackers are a danger, yet what happens when we see the adaptation from Bloomberg, who gave us “To meet the surging demand for their services, these firms recruited cyber-operatives and analysts from U.S. intelligence agencies, offering what one former Federal Bureau of Investigations agent described to me as “buy-yourself-a-Ferrari” salaries. For some, their job description evolved from playing defence against hackers to going on the offence, heading attackers off at the pass. Others were assigned to counterterrorism operations, doing for their new clients what they had previously done for their country, and often using the same tools.” These nations evolved their systems with the experts that they could afford. Were they wrong? We seem to forget that US greed allowed for this setting to evolve and everyone wants people with top notch cyber skills. As I see it they did nothing wrong, they merely went where the financial security takes them and when we see the US as bankrupt as it presently is, all those nations get to go on a shopping spree and start a digital brain-drain of the US (and Europe too). 

We are seeing the impact of billion in damage and an almost absent stage of stopping it from happening. Close to a dozen events in this year alone and how long until the damage ends at our desk, the insurance and banks can no longer foot the bill, and that is happening now. We are handed phrases like “Potential future lost profits. Loss of value due to theft of your intellectual property. Betterment: the cost to improve internal technology systems, including any software or security upgrades after a cyber event”, so consider the dangers we saw with solarwinds, at this point there is still debate whether the full extent of that damage is known and it has been more than 6 months. So change back to the AI story I had, when it is an exabyte of data (which is 1,000,000,000 gigabyte), how long until this is parsed? That is before you realise that there is almost no rolling back from that setting, the cost would be?

This is the balance of one and zero, we need a larger change in what people are allowed to do, not because we want to, but because we have to, a change that final needs to pushed to a larger station, and this is not merely against hackers, the greed driven need to be held to account, optionally doing double digits in a holiday location known as Rikers Island. We have entertained ‘fines’ for too long, it only fuelled what needs to be seen as a wave of enriching crime, but that might be merely my point of view on the matter.

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October 2, 2021 · 00:41

The waste of overrun

The BBC gave us news today, the news is open to interpretation. This is not their fault, but it calls for a larger setting. This is seen in “In solidarity with France, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has questioned whether the EU would be able to strike a trade deal with Australia”, now I never regarded Ursula to be a useful tool, in this my setting for that was seen in 2019 when we were given by Politico (and a few others) “Ursula von der Leyen is planning a new career as European Commission chief in Brussels, but the German defence minister still has questions to answer back home”, so she is like that physician running from location to location, to avoid a malpractice suit. The quote “Last November, she told the German parliament there had been “mistakes” in how external consultants were hired and said “this never should have happened.” But she defended the use of such consultants, saying they had been required to undertake a huge overhaul of the ministry.” Yes, there are always mistakes, there are always miscommunications, that happens, and in this we can have all kinds of directions on those consultants, even when they are tools or stakeholders for others. Yet when we return to the reason why France is angry “Australia cancelled a $37bn (£27bn) deal with a French company building diesel-powered submarines, and, what’s more, France – a traditional Western ally – found out about the new pact only a few hours before the public announcement” we need to consider another source. Business Insider and a few other sources gave us “France’s deal to build Australia’s new submarines was dogged by years of problems”, as well as “The project to replace Australia’s aging Collins-class submarines was supposed to cost $US36.5 ($AU50) billion, Politico reported, but the cost had nearly doubled by this year to an estimated $US66 ($AU91) billion”, so we see a cost overrun of nearly 100%, and so far the BBC and a few other sources are extremely willing not to mention that. If I go to my boss and tell him that something was 10% more expensive, I will get fired and I will not be able to get a job for years to come, the French double the cost and they are heralded as victims? By the way, the more advanced Los Angeles class a nuclear powered submarine is less than $2,000,000,000, as such the cost overrun will pay for 15 submarines, as such, did anyone in France (or Strasbourg for that matter) do the math? So cancelling the 12 French submarines at $66,000,000,000 will get us 15 at 50% of the price and in this is anyone surprised that the deal was cancelled? The fact that the BBC is also willing to overlook a few matters in this calls for a little vetting in the BBC. Now, should the BBC find debatable evidence of the ‘evidence’ that Business Insider and ABC gave us, that is fine, we can take that into consideration. Yet it is odd that such a large setting is overlooked by France and the BBC, not to mention some former excuse for a German defence minister. 

And in this, is anyone paying attention? Even as France has its idea’s and shakes on ‘Gaullist’ temperament and dreams of greatness, it does help if they can keep their builders in a stage of competitiveness, which does mean that cost overruns that approach 100% is totally out of bounds. In this the US is not absent of such settings either, but to get a diesel submarine at twice the price of a nuclear powered submarine, all whilst the diesel version lasts 18,000 miles and the nuclear one can travel non-stop for three decades is a bit of a stretch. Yet the cost overruns are left outside of plenty of newspapers. The ideology of non-nuclear is fine, but when it comes with a cost overrun of 100% we need to ask questions and the news seemingly is not.

This is a different stage, even as the USS Zumwalt failed all its objectives and reached the unique objective of being the ugliest dinghy in US naval history, the US nuclear submarines like the Los Angeles class has proven itself and is also a nice looking vessel. People go out to the shoreline to watch submerged submarine races hoping to see the shadow of an LA class vessel, it is a spectator sport.
As such the Naval builders got the job done and then some. Especially in an age where we look for cheaper solutions, the idea that any submarine needs to refuel thrice a century is a bit overlooked as well. 

So whilst we might show some level of understanding on the sentiments of French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian who called this “a stab in the back” it needs to be state that le petit Jean-Yves needs to take a look at cost overruns and set the proper tone to that side of the sliding scale. In addition to this, the ideas of 12 submarines needing refuelling every 18,000 miles is also a setting for debate, which is not on France mind you. 

So as the clock passed midnight and I complete my 2,000th article I will do a small victory dance after which I will try to break my record of being the loudest snorer in the nation (we all have goals). We all have records to break and France might do the same by trying to limit their cost overrun.

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October 1, 2021 · 19:59

The idea as it came voiced

I was browsing some real estate magazine and I saw the image. A home theatre for the not so poor. A place where a family can watch a Blu-ray or 4K, stream Netflix or play a game.

The image shows a nice place, a place most would want, and it is made to size, it all makes sense, but then I wondered, what if the family changes? One person loses a partner, the empty chair next to theirs, reminding them every time that their life turned to goo. Or the reverse, they can finally share something, but they end up with one lap dancing the other, or behind one another. Yes the solution is so simple. I cannot tell whether this was done here, but I saw a few solutions where it was not done. It is simple, like the image below.

Consider LEGO, consider the setting of LEGO, a room where we have chairs and support, the support that can be altered to some degree allowing for a change in furniture whilst keeping it a home theatre. It is such a simple elegant solution, yet it is ignored by more than a few, all whilst anyone who ever played with a LEGO set could have come up with the idea, however as far as I can see this, less then a few is taking a long hard look at what ingenuity LEGO could bring their ideas, so could another invention Meccano, invented in 1898 by Frank Hornby from Liverpool (that city where the Beatles are from). It is part of a larger truth I believe in, only limitations tends to push the larger form of creativity. It has been a truth in engineering, IT and design and it is an almost absolute given that will never change. It is when a limitation hits us, we look for workarounds. When SPSS could not give us an age pyramid, I designed a syntax that did just that, it was always there, in the High-Low chart and I published it in 1993 (or 1994). Limitations are there to test us, make us creative and we are not seeing enough creativity. The LEGO idea is merely one side but when you take a larger look at the solutions LEGO, Meccano, Wilesco Steak kits, and Wise Elk toys, all toys that fuel the ideas that kids have, all fuelling the foundations that they have as adults. A foundational step we overlooked for way too long. We all relied on IT greats to give us the foundations, but they are the foundations that THEY want us to take. Microsoft might have its azure, but when we see hack after hack, all because people overlooked security and if it is not there, it will be the Amazon Web services, the Google cloud, IBM cloud, Oracle cloud and so on. So what happens when they all overlook similar stations? It is not an accusation, but it is a larger stage. The assumption that they are all flawless is delusional to the umpteenth degree. 

We might not see the larger stage, we might not see the larger goals, but to give a person a LEGO set for IT is not the worst idea. To seek in limitation is what awakes up the mind and as you can see several players preceded us. 

There is a larger stage and it is not on any of those players, but it is on us, if we rely on the people telling us where to look, we end up looking in the wrong direction. We end up not looking where we desperately needed to see in the first place. To be honest, I am not giving you advice where to look, it all merely started with an interior decorator, reminding me of others that took a limited view on the needs of a customer, so when you get the option of invoice A at 100%, or invoice B at 115%, yet invoice B give you options and invoice A does not, is invoice A really 15% cheaper or will it end up being 30% more expensive down the track? 

I will let you mull this over, and consider where you limited your options at the advice of others. 

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