Tag Archives: BBC

The old joke

There is an old joke, I heard it in the 70’s. The joke goes like “John, I have no idea how this firm has any chance of surviving without your presence, but as per this coming Monday, we will give that a try!”, and whenever I see staff removals happening, including me getting made redundant years ago, that joke goes around my brain. So when the BBC gives us ‘Boss says sorry for ‘blundered’ Zoom firing of 900 staff’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/business-59573146). So we get the outrage linked to “Mr Garg was heavily criticised after he sacked 900 staff in an online meeting”, There is one other setting that I do not get. You see, we get the following part “A deal is likely to value the business – which Mr Garg founded in 2015 – at between $6.9bn (£5.2bn) and $7.7bn”, so in 6 years a firm has grown to $7,000,000,000 and he casually fires 900 people? Didn’t they help the business grow? So, as we set the larger stage we get ““Organisations do have to make job cuts sometimes, it is a hard reality,” says Rachel Suff, senior policy adviser on employee relations at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. “But how they go about it and the humanity they approach it with can have a fundamental impact on how people deal with that shocking news.”” Yes, we can be humane, and we can be callous. Yet the stage of firing 900 people when you went from (assumed) zero to $7,000,000,000 in 6 years is quite the success story, as such the move makes no sense, unless he wants to hang his coat up and retire a multi billionaire. As I see it, the setting of “to float the company on the stock market”, a choice that might be valid, it might not be. I cannot tell, it is not area of expertise, yet the question becomes towards it mission statement “Better.com, which aims to use technology to make the house buying process “faster and more efficient””, is that one direction, was it also safer to do that, or has someone figured out that the faster and more efficient comes with larger safety holes? I actually do not know, but that is the first question that pops into my head. 

You see, we do see “The market has changed”, yet I also find “Home values in New York (statewide) have risen 14.2 percent (current = $363,990) in the last year and will continue to rise in 2021. Over the last year, home values in New York City have increased by 4.5 percent. The latest market forecast is not available for NYC”, so I am not sure what is going on and before we go all high and mighty on the 900 removed people, it represents 15% of removed staff, implying that better.com did one hell of a job, it implies that he still employs 5100 people. The article does not really bear that out does it? I am not blaming the BBC for that, but the setting of what still is remains important. If there is one critique on this, then it is their homesite that still has a career page that is hiring. I reckon that there should be a clear page setting something like “Due to volatile market settings, all hiring activities are temporarily suspended”, as such I reckon that this Vishal Garg optionally missed the ball twice over. But that small part was not picked up either by the media. The website actually looks decent, so the business is seemingly not too shabby.

So whilst the BBC is all about slapping him around, and that is fine. No one is considering the fact that 5100 are still employed and that a startup has grown from close to zero to $7,000,000,000 a feat that is pretty rare to say the least. 

I find it hard to condemn the act (I had been made redundant more harshly then that in the past). It happens to us all one day, unless we are on the board of directors, in which case we get a huge bonus and we are escorted to the limousine.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance

Ego versus tax dollars

Yes, that is the setting. It is not a new setting, we have seen it before and it comes with a surprise, just like the Ferrero kinder surprise.

It is a chocolate egg, but in the middle there is a toy, a surprise. And ego versus tax dollars also have a surprise for the people. Yet in this case it is a little less nice, in this case the people, the tax payers pay either way and optionally they get to pay both ends of the equation. This is seen in BBC article ‘Multi-billion EU bid to challenge Chinese influence’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59473071). Here we are given “It’s regarded as part of the West’s efforts to counter Chinese influence in Africa and elsewhere. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will present the “Global Gateway” initiative on Wednesday. The EU is looking at how it can leverage billions of euros, drawn from member states, financial institutions and the private sector”, now consider the setting:

  • member states
  • financial institutions
  • the private sector

And here is the rub, here we see how the tax payer gets that bill twice. Or a speculated once for the duration of twice the timeline. The member states sounds nice, yet the credit cards of France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Italy are severely overdrawn. So who will pay? Poland? Austria? Hungary? Estonia? Gimme a break please.

Then we get the second setting the ‘financial institutions’. Yet they will BORROW you the money for an interesting percentage, which means that a load with up to 15% interest is still payable by the tax payers. 

The private sector? Who has that kind of cash? I reckon that Webuild SpA (formerly Salini Impregilo SpA) will take the job, as long as they get the job with a few long term tax benefits, optionally at cost + 3% + tax benefits. And who do you think pays for it in the end? Yup you got it, the poor poor taxpayer (you). 

As such when I see “It has been criticised as a means of providing “predatory loans” in what is labelled “debt-trap diplomacy”” I am not opposing this (as I never looked at that data), yet the wording is almost exactly like the big tomato of MI6 (you say potato, I say tomato). Isn’t that a nice coincidence. Almost orchestrated. Now, I accept that it might be true, but in that same way Iran has been doing all over the Middle East and the same parties were eager to avoid shining the limelight there, and now that Huawei has a much stronger case (made in Saudi Arabia) and their 5G is 700% faster then anything the US has. The link here us that both Huawei and Saudi Arabia have a larger case for Egypt and that matters. With Neom city smack in the middle, they are likely have an operating 5G network long before the US figures out that marketed speed is not the same as real speed, but they will and they will see the cost involved. In that same light the BS approach to the arms deals with Saudi Arabia, China has a larger stage now, a stage that will cost the US well over 9 billion with a nominal maximum of $23,000,000,000 over the next 5 years, revenue handed to China and we see European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen getting ready for a presentation that is as I personally see a joke the EU cannot afford. Not with the US handing business over to China as they did over the last 12 months alone. 

So when we consider “Mrs von der Leyen said in her State of the Union speech in September: “We want investments in quality infrastructure, connecting goods, people and services around the world.”” We need to see the word ‘investments’, which is nice, but does that not imply that you have the funds? If not (which is the case) it ends up being a mere ego loan and that is not what is supposed to happen. I am not against it, as long as CORPORATIONS are properly taxed and that has been a horse no show for over two decades. I wonder what happens if Huawei and not Amazon decided to buy my 5G (and a few other matters). We then get a setting that shows that the European ego race was over before it even began, it was over when the ego driven tailored to stop the innovations because it did not give them a nice percentage, that is the larger stage we need to see and that is merely one of 4 elements stopping this ego driven presentation that is coming in hours. So even as we are given “Wednesday’s 14-page document isn’t likely to explicitly pitch itself as a rival to China’s strategy.” A setting that gives us the not explicit, it is relying on implied settings, a stage that can be revamped any given stage and there is the second rub, if you cannot go out and say what you mean, you can never mean what you say. That has been a truth for a lot longer than we had the internet. The EU relying on nudge-nudge-wink-wink settings (sorry Monty Python). When was the last time time you saw that going well? And now it involves multi billion euro plans that they cannot even afford. So in the end you the tax payer (if you are in the EU) get to pay that bill too. So hows that going against the rising prices of energy, Gas and petrol? Oh and how about the food prices, inflation of food which was 0.1% in April 2021, which is 2.3% in October 2021. Which is nothing to what I saw at the supermarket. I saw minced meat go up almost 20% in the last few months. So enjoy that extra tax bill with all the expenses you have in Europe. You elected what is there, so you get what is coming. 

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Politics

Stupid people never learn

This is not an accusation, it is merely a setting we need to accept. This all started half an hour Aho when the BBC gave us ‘Protesters hit Amazon buildings on Black Friday’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-59419572), with the setting “An international coalition of unions, equality and environmental groups called “Make Amazon Pay” is staging a day of action, demanding concessions”, it is like the approach of a hurricane, and making the one person who left a window open giving him (or her) a bill for the draft damage. People just do not get it, and I am at a loss why that is. It is not hidden information, it is not secret information, it merely is information out in the open for anyone to read.

The setting is not “Amazon takes too much and gives back too little”, the setting is that governments would not overhaul tax laws for the longest of times. I first make a case for overhauling tax laws in 1998, now 24 year later none of it EVER happened. Amazon did not take too much, it took what Amazon was entitled to take. Amazon (only) gives what it is mandated to give. There are las out there and Amazon, Netflix, Apple, Facebook and Google adhere to these laws. All the rest is merely discriminatory bullshit. So when I see “Worldwide, nearly 50 organisations have signed up to a list of “common demands”, published by the Make Amazon Pay coalition”, so I wonder who they are. And it does not really matter as they cross over from one into the other. Consider “A global union federation representing 50 million workers in 140 countries in a range of sectors”, this implies less then 350.000 per nation, which includes the US, which imply that they basically amount to nothing. Then we get “A global union federation of journalists’ trade unions, representing more than 600.000 media workers from 187 organisations in 146 countries” I merely wonder whether they include the same essay writers that grace the ICIJ, a fair question, because journalists are supposed to be smarter than this. All the flames, the bullshit and the need for click bitches that spike digital revenue, all to have a go at a company that struck it big by being actually innovative. 2 years ago Amazon would not be on the mind of console gaming. Now the Amazon Luna overtakes what Google and Microsoft have and that is just for starters. They equal Apple in a few ways and there is no end to Amazon at present. All that and they adhere to laws, or lets just states that they adhere to what their legal department states that they need to adhere to. And no one is putting actual and factual pressure on the politicians that need to get shit done (like overhauling tax laws) but then people get quotes like “It is a really complex situation”, so complex that in 24 years nothing was done, so the utter nonsense of 50 organisations that have call signs making them close to ludicrously useless. If they were not useless, they would put pressure on politicians overhauling tax laws. 

The lesson has been out there for almost 25 years, the facts were out there for almost 25 years and still the people will not learn, the politicians do not want them to learn, because they will have to do something and over time it might amount to something pissing of the rich friends they have. In all this, the setting is much larger then the FAANG group. It includes people like the Walton Family, the Green family, the Koch family, the Yuan family and as such several dozens more. All billionaires, all doing what the law allowed them to do. The feigned anger against Amazon is just pointless bullshit and we need to wake up. Flames and emotions will not get us anywhere and that is the problem with Grassroots people, all about anger and emotion and when the anger subsides, when they realise (if ever) that the law was adhered to we see the pointlessness of the situation and stupid people never do so, in this, how come the journalists are part of this? Who do they serve? Because in the end they serve the shareholders and advertisers. But what of their stakeholders? Who are they and why are they embracing pointless actions? Did you ever consider that part of the equation? 

As such will you learn, or will you just pointlessly embrace a coalition that wastes another two decades going nowhere? It is up to you, you can chose and making the choice that goes somewhere is always better, even if the destination is not better, sometimes things get worse before they get better, that is the outcome of change, the changing process is never better, the outcome can be, it is up to us to make that so, and it is not an easy fight, that much is an absolute given.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Media, Politics

Wow, it was actually worse

Yes, that was pretty much the first thought I had when I was hit with the article (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-59290301). The BBC gave me ‘Beirut blast: UN ignored plea for port disaster evidence’ this morning, a story that was out several hours at that time. There we see “the UN has repeatedly ignored requests from bereaved families for information to help the official investigation into the Beirut port explosion which killed 219 people in August last year”. This is seemingly poured on by worse data collection with “The Beirut Bar Association represents nearly 2,000 families and survivors at the investigation. Its chairman sent three separate letters directly to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, asking for some specific details. They requested two things. Firstly, all available satellite photos taken on the day of the blast by member states. And secondly, whether Unifil (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) checked the MV Rhosus – the ship that carried the explosive material which caused the explosion – back in 2013, before it arrived at Beirut port”. There is a larger play in motion. You see, I always had issues with Stephanie Kirchgaessner (an essay writer for the guardian), I showed this a few times over and in this case lets get back to January 28th 2020 when I wrote ‘The incompetent view’, there we see ““The issue is now the subject of an investigation by two independent UN investigators“, we see an almost completed path.” The issues of a blast are not investigated, and the ramblings of a highly debatable investigation by FTI Consulting apparently is. Even as cyber experts (a lot more in the know then me) had shone their light and found the report debatable. The article gives you more if you need it (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/01/28/the-incompetent-view/). There is more, bit it is less relevant than I need it to be for this. 

You see, when we see that the UN is ignoring please for a blast that pretty much wiped a city of the map, all whilst it is allegedly investigating debatable information on a member of the Saudi Royal family, they act? So is the UN the paper tiger is has been seen as for too long, by too many members? Has the UN become nothing more than a political tool for players like the United States? It is not a weird thought, plenty have said so, I merely act on evidence that the media releases, then again on information other media releases, so the thought is not out of bounds. And whilst I await my good fortune (see other stories), I might as well fill it with act on waking people up. 

And this remains on Beirut, the UN seems eager to ignore what happens there. I saw the massive blanket media ignoring the simple facts that a fire could not ever create this amount of an explosion, especially as the fire was near, not on the ship. And the massive explosion implies that there were explosives on the ship and that is what Hezbollah fears will come out and there we see the Iran play, the need it to be about something else and it is far fetched, I will admit to that immediately, but the powers that are controlling the stories dropped a few items and that gets noticed, especially the digital advertisement hungry media. They like their flames in a controlled manner, to make it last longer. Beirut would blow that setting out of the water (and it seemingly did so with additional help). 

So whilst we might take notice of “Until this day we don’t know what caused the explosion, we don’t know if it was an intentional act, we don’t know if it was caused by negligence, we have no idea”, we do need to take notice of “The first of the families’ letters was sent by the Bar Association on 26 October 2020. A follow-up was dispatched three weeks later on 19 November, noting “it has been more than 100 days since the blast, to date none of the member states or Unifil has sent any photos or information”. The third letter, dated 17 March 2021, states: “Seven months have passed since the blast and five months since our letter, and unfortunately our letters remain unanswered and unacknowledged. Lebanon is a founder member of the UN and is asking for help.”” So, is it a lack of support, or is it all about specifically directed support, support that the US hopes will ‘aid’ their need to make Iran heel, all whilst it is aiding Iran to set up delay after delay. And in all this the UN is happy to cater to the ignoring of Beirut whilst bashing Saudi Arabia for good measure. And do not take my word for it, Search for “the Guardian + Stephanie Kirchgaessner” on Google. Should you doubt one of the two parts, when you do set it next to the station of the UN and their 7 months of not looking at the Beirut situation. It can not have the resources as they had it to waste on matters that do not relate to UN activities. So you tell me.

In that station we are all the piggy in the middle. And it is a game with four parties, we are the piggy, the UN is one player, the US is allegedly the other player, but who is player four? Lobbyists? Stakeholders governments? At present still unknown parties? I actually do not know, yet I wonder who does. It is not because I am not trying, it is because the players are really good on keeping their presence, both natural and digital unseen, we can speculate that they get serious amounts of help, but that too would be speculating. You see it is set to the premise of a 4 player piggy in the middle, but that is instinctive speculation, if the speculation is wrong, the field looks different, but there is one clarity, the 7 months silence, the acts of an essay writer and the setting of the biggest non-nuclear blast I have ever seen sets that stage. But I will admit upfront that there are speculative sides, if the speculation is wrong, then so is the view. I will let you do your own searchings and decide for yourself. It is all I can do, it is all I should do.

So as I conclude today, the view is seemingly worse than even I thought it would be, the BBC brought that to the surface and as some media will give more visibility to the failings of the United Nations, feel free to wonder how much they are getting paid and what they should be doing. Consider their failings in Yemen due to acts by Houthi and Iranian stake holders, how far did they get? How often was Saudi Arabia blamed whilst Houthi forces as well as their Iranian benefactors were unmentioned? Now consider the stage of Beirut and what the United Nations has achieved there. We can agree that Hezbollah is part of that equation, but it is not enough for the failing to be this big, there needs to be another player in this game for the math to work decently.

Leave a comment

Filed under Media, Military, Politics

A media spoke or a media joke?

Yup, we all have jokes, we all have jokers and the media is no difference. That is how I personally see it and I was proven right again by the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-59277977) by Matt McGrath. I always patted myself on the back by not making any attack personal, it is the karmic way to be. Today I am going to break that (kind of) solemn promise. This happened as I saw ‘Evasive words and coal compromise, but deal shows progress’ some hours ago. I touched on his ludicrous stage in ‘Big Oil in the family’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/07/01/big-oil-in-the-family/) on July 1st 2021. He was all about making the ultra rich not fly through “Global ‘elite’ will need to slash high-carbon lifestyles”, because that would solve a lot. So the 1235 ultra rich people, optionally flying their machines sometimes, all whilst over the last 15 years flights have increased by a million flights every year giving us now an additional 41,000 flights EVERY DAY. How stupid does a person need to get? Now we see “Observes also say there is the “start of a breakthrough” on the key question of loss and damage”, so what is he, the personal BBC jester trying to keep fossil fuel people happy? Lets be clear, I have nothing against fossil fuels, they are essential to our needs, yet we need to get clever fast on how to use them. The part that was in my article and I still ignored by the media is that 50% of the damage comes from 147 facilities. One hundred and forty seven facilities create 50% of all the damage! This is not me making that statement, it came from the EEA, and it is 1% of the European facilities. So why is the BBC and other media not all over that? Where are these polluters? It has been almost a year and the media ignores it, as does that so called environmentalist Matt McGrath. So when we get the headline with ‘promise’ I wonder who spikes his coffee. Anyone who sets some premise that the COP26 showed promise needs to get his head examined. Deforestation will not stop in 2030, these nations will not get the billions and the US remains the largest supplier of lumber. All whilst Brazil beat its own record this year by 5%. We have serious problems and having the media cater to whomever they cater to is a little upsetting, especially when it is not catering to the people, the readers but as I personally see it the shareholders, the stakeholders and the advertisers. 

Should you doubt that, consider the quote I gave you from the BBC article “The global top 10% of income earners use around 45% of all the energy consumed for land transport and around 75% of all the energy for aviation, compared with just 10% and 5% respectively for the poorest 50% of households, the report says” then consider that airlines have increased their flights by 41,000 every day, a gradual increase over 15 years that added 1,000,000 flights every year. And that is increase. I am not even including the flights already going. Now consider what a Gulf-stream takes and what a Boeing takes and consider the 41,000 flights a day that airlines pushed for (and they got them). And then reconsider the top 10% income earners, how many of them ACTUALLY have a plane? The numbers are not panning out end the use of emotional language is them hoping you might not notice. If I can find this flaw, why did he not see this? So comparing that on the people on well-fare, how stupid is that? It is a way to make the numbers sound sexy, but that is not sexy, it has become pathetic. So when we now see something as close to a failure as COP26 seems to be, the words ‘deal shows progress’ should not be coming from the lips or fingers of anyone in journalism. Politicians have has a luxurious stay, all the limelight they can bare, and as I personally see it we have nothing to show for it, again. So do you blame other nations for not abiding by requests when they do not end up getting anything? That part is missing as well and anyone taken in by the graphs on where we are (52.4Gt) and where we need to be (26.6Gt), all whilst by 2030 we will have close to 50% of the forests we had around 1918 we should see a very different graph soon enough, but who will bring it? Will we hope for actual journalism? In the age of digital lobbyists, you can hope, but you are most likely to hope in vain. 

So, enjoy breathing for now, you might live to the day when that too is a luxury you can no longer afford.

Leave a comment

Filed under Media, Politics

1095 minus one

I’ve had some questions. Some are about my state of delusion, some are on my mental state and some are actually interesting. How I got there, what my evidence is. As I stated, it is highly speculative, but I got there, so how did I get there?

The Montgolfier principle
Think of the world as a balloon. There is the balloon with oxygen, it keeps us up, there are the burners and there is the basket. The burners are the Forrests, they provide oxygen for the balloon that keeps us up, as oxygen is added, CO2 is removed, the buoyancy of the balloon goes up. The basket holds all the people, as there are more people, more oxygen in the balloon is required. This is the most rudimentary of settings. To see the impact we need to consider the two stages that we have been exposed to. The burners are 33% smaller, as one third of all forests are gone. So the burners heed to be cranked up, but that is not possible, the trees work at a set speed, there is little we can do to change that. In the last 25 years, as the forests got cut down, the population grew by 38%, the basket got up to 38% more heavy. So as the balloon has less oxygen and more people, it will sink, we will die. You want an upside? There isn’t one at present, not until the politicians actually achieve something. Agreements, talks and compliments do not do anything and the members of COP26 are all about that, until they achieve and actually do something they deserve nothing. 

I might have oversimplified things, but the Montgolfier principle holds up. It is not accurate, it is not defining, but it gives you the story you need to hear. Even as I made comments on the research by McGill University, it is an event that matters. It will be harder to regrow the trees we chopped down. 

At present we see the news giving us Boris Johnson on the need for an ambitious agreement, it sounds nice but talking in the next 2 years whilst the nations halt and await actions is a much larger problem. Somewhere between 50,000,000 and 80,000,000 are needed to be planted in the next 2 years to give us some level of oxygen level change in the next 10 years. Did people forget that growing a tree will take that long? It takes decades to grow what is cut down in days. We might see the setting of Indonesia, but they are not alone. Brazil is in an equal place and as deforestation continues for another 8 years, there is every chance that the forests will have diminished to a total of 50%, so what do you think will happen to the balloon? I might actually live long enough having to pay for oxygen, not something I expected when I went to primary school. There we were told that the sun and the air was free, we were being lied to (it was a truth at the time). We screwed up our planet to that extent and we are all equally guilty, we remained inactive. Some sources give us that global warming are about to set at 2.4 degrees, I believe it will be much more towards 4 degrees, time will tell who is right, the setting of 1.5 degrees is no longer achievable, not as deforestation continues optionally at increased speed for another 8 years. Then we will get excuses from Indonesia and Brazil who need to protest the rights of the people and there we have it. We have the setting of non-action for a few more years and we have so much time left.

They all have something to say, none of them are acting. Consider over the next 6 months, how many nations will have planted trees, not in space, not in expected numbers, but in ACTUAL NUMBERS. What are the chances that the total will not even amount to 5,000,000 trees when 500% of that should be required? 

And as the media is silencing a few more items we will soon forget about all of this, that is the reality of it all and when pneumonia becomes the number one killer again, what will you say? It is due to hearts diseases are better managed? Cancer has a less deadly curve or will you realise that we have more problems, not less. I leave it up to you to make up your own mind.

1 Comment

Filed under Finance, Politics, Science

The enemy within

It was an expression that alerts us to the fat that not all the enemies are the ones attacking us. And as we might have seen. All those generals giving Americans the threat from Russia and China, they have nothing to fear, Americans will destroy America long before that becomes a fact. This is the setting that the BBC gives us. So the title is not merely ‘Metallurgist admits faking steel test results for US Navy subs’, it becomes how weak is the current American navy and were try trying to sell that weakness to Australia? You see, the article (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59186655) gives us “Prosecutors say Elaine Marie Thomas, 67, gave false positive readings for strength and toughness tests in at least 240 cases between 1985 and 2017” This would put a large stage of the Los Angeles class attack submarines in a weakened stage. One could argue that a nearby explosion towards arctic ice might create enough pressure for that steel to fail. And when they give you “Ms Thomas suggested that in some cases she gave metal positive results because she thought it was “stupid” that the Navy required the tests to be conducted at -100F (-70C)” you know that you are being lied to. The fact that the steel can not pass the test sets a dangerous premise and US law is weak, very weak. Elaine Marie Thomas is not seen as a traitor, a person who put American armed forces in a dangerous place, no she gets faces up to 10 years in prison and a $1m fine. She will be sentenced in February, guilty of fraud. A very clear case that crime pays in America. The stage that we are given “This offense is unique in that it was neither motivated by greed nor any desire for personal enrichment. She regrets that she failed to follow her moral compass – admitting to false statements is hardly how she envisioned living out her retirement years” that is nothing more than a false representation. It was about money, it was about a part unmentioned ‘living out her retirement years in luxury’, because if the tests failed, the bills would follow and she had nothing to fall back on. And the falsehood does not end there, there is a consideration. We see this with “the government’s testing does not suggest that the structural integrity of any submarine was in fact compromised”, it does, if the -70 tests failed, the submarines are useless in arctic and Siberian conditions. The submarines might only function towards optimum stages in warmer waters. A setting the Russians would be eager to exploit. I think that any criminal would want to hire John Carpenter. A setting of treason has been washed by “took shortcuts and made material misrepresentations” At that point we need to concede that I could end nuclear dangers (by making the Iranian reactors meltdown) which might be a misrepresentation and is not in any way treason (I am not Iranian). I could do more, but I think I have proven a point. To convict a traitor of fraud is like selling water as undistilled Gin at $11 per 500ml. And this is all the BBC gives us at present, what I do not understand is the lack of anger towards Elaine Marie Thomas. There are 28 Los Angeles in use, each with a complement of 125 and that just one class. And there is no clear image of how many are compromised. Optionally Elaine Marie Thomas has been endangering hundreds, optionally killing in them in the  future, not as many as the attack on Pearl Harbour took, not as many as the amounts of victims on 9/11 in New York, yet equally as devastating and it was done by an American. 

I can only guess how these generals feel now that they have been caught with their pants down trying to run like penguins. Fraud? Screw that!

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Military, Science

The call of a budgie

Yes, that is almost the foundation of a new cartoon, the story of Sylvester the cat and his sunny side show, Tweety. A show that was funny when we were younger than 13, but now? That is the stage we face (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59182278) with ‘Twitter poll calls on Elon Musk to sell 10% stake in Tesla’. What is this? It is like the BBC has lost its senses. Just like the Dutch government who claimed that they gave in to Twitter pressure when they made a deal with Sywert van Lieden, and no one is asking questions that matters. 

In the first Twitter is no valid source of information, none of the vote can be verified. It could will be three politicians each wielding a troll army of 235,000, we cannot tell. Don’t get me wrong, I love Twitter, it updates me from sources that give me information. Newspapers that have a good reputation, movie productions that give me time lines and optionally a trailer or two, new games. And sometimes a link to something that matters, but polls? A shouting app that allows the rude and the loud to set policy? Never! Its like giving the power of policy on meat to the vegetable store down the road. Or perhaps it lets the NBA make NHL rulings. The proverbial ‘fuck that!’ comes to mind. 

So in this case it is about a poll that allegedly (because a Twitter account can always be hacked) Elon Musk put in the field and the BBC turn it into a lie. They give you “Voters in a Twitter poll have urged Elon Musk to sell 10% of his stake in Tesla in order to pay tax.” That is not what happened. Elon Musk (allegedly) put a question to an audience where he stated “Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock. Do you support this?” The response was that 57.9% said yes. We see no numbers, but it could be that 579 out of 1000 said yes. And it is a mere question he aired. And the setting is more. Tax avoidance, or black letter law is legally allowed, it merely means that he would pay what he is due, not what we THINK he is due and the larger stage is that it is again about tax laws, a setting both democrats and republicans have never ever adjusted, not in 2 decades. 

Then we see a part that matters, the BBC gives us “In an earlier tweet on Saturday, Mr Musk said he took no salary or bonuses from any of his companies – meaning he has no earnings on which to pay income tax. But he has made billions of dollars through a compensation package, which gives him power to exercise large amounts of stock options when the company meets performance targets and its shares hit certain prices.” He is legally allowed to do this and certain stupid players need to stop baiting the hook, the law is there, he can do this and he does. It is not good, it is not bad, it is allowed. To be honest, it a certain Randy Lennox takes the steps I could (hopefully) end up with 10% of $400M-$600M. Do you think I will not take these steps? You have got to be joking. The tax laws allow me to do this and I will, it is the law. 

And I am not alone, more and more take this step, because the law allows me to do this. The tax overhaul,. The one step that stops this is avoided by politicians, why is that? Why are these (stupid) people relying on Twitter to try to pressure people? We know it is not a valid source, it can be an informative source, but cannot be verified (so you need to take care on what to believe) and the list goes on (and on and on and on). So there we have a setting and the BBC justly adds to this with “Mr Musk has an option, which expires in August next year, to buy 22.86 million Tesla shares at $6.24 each – a fraction of Tesla’s closing share price on Friday of $1,222.

Under plans proposed by the Democratic Party in the Senate, billionaires could be taxed on “unrealised gains” when the price of their shares goes up – even if they do not sell any of their stock.” This would add another $23,000,000,000 non taxable funds (at the moment). The law allows him to do this, I saw some of my bosses (in the past) do this with much smaller numbers and it has been legal for at least 30 years. If it was such a taboo why didn’t they stop it them. In that time the US had Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and now President Biden, and so far none have done anything. Well the proposition is from the current president, but I reckon that the votes will fail. And even if it holds up, I feel 99.335% certain that there will be a hiatus and there will be ways around it. Thousands of tax lawyers ill be ready to take that proposition apart and drive wedges through its X, Y and Z axis. 

And as some players claim, the value does not always go up. Elon Musk is one man but hundreds of others do the same, if one gets taxed up to these hundreds can use that setting to make it all tax deductible a side the people are eager to avoid staring at, because they see this one Elongatedly uberly rich Musk and they forget that the one winner comes with 999 losers. Do you really wanna give a tax cut to the 999 that follow?

And credit to the BBC to add the comment by Berkeley economist Gabriel Zucman who gives us “Looking forward to the day when the richest person in the world paying some tax does not depend on a Twitter poll” the one sane view in the article. Especially as one of the other Musk polls or statements got ‘altered’ to attain the flaming audience. I too would have questions for Elon Musk, but it would be on his new mobile and other settings that accompany this. I wonder if there is a side that is the danger of a much larger dangerous issue in the works. I am not claiming it is, I am merely wondering on the chances of this, and not from him or his endeavour, but on the dangers of third parties doing something stupid (as they tend to do when their pupils turn to dollar signs). For now I merely wonder, perhaps I will see an opposing view when the clear facts are presented to the world. 

I know, it is merely the view of little (and seemingly old) me, and that does not constitute evidence, but it calls for all kinds of questions, does it not? The call of a budgie is nice when you are drinking tea (or coffee) yet the stage of Twitter remains that we can switch it off when we do something that is important to us, did you consider that? And I get that the BBC saw this as an opening, but I reckon they could have written it differently, but that is my personal view on the matter. Have a fun day!

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Law, Media, Politics

The riddle

Yes, there is a riddle here. It is not a riddle that is on you, or for you. It is a riddle that is within me. Even as I am about to dig into a matter I have dug in before. There is another play in motion. I set the stage, I left the clues and it is all linked to Toronto (a village in Canada). I cannot tell whether the people will catch on, but the gains are massive. The problems is that if I give away the game, the profit dwindle too much. It is a stage where one side gets the group $25M-$45M, yet the unspoken one, if left under the radar gives the group $400M-$600M. It is quite the conundrum, and it is not about greed. It is about some wannabe’s should not ever be allowed to get to this goal. I am willing to give it all away to merely achieve it so that some people get egg on their faces, in public and in the limelight. That is more rewarding to me then the millions I could get. It would give voice to the ‘I told you so’ choir, but not merely 5 voices. A choir like a symphony orchestra giving a few players the ‘You are an idiot’ dialogue with soprano’s and tenors. The view will be magnificent and the window is not that big. I have time, but every month that window shrinks a little more and I am willing to wait, I am willing to lose it all just as long as the wannabe’s openly lose it. It matters that much to me, my feeling of rage and anger is just that big. It comes back to the riddle, the riddle of the two sided sphere. Oh and for the clever people, this is not a clever way to describe a digon (a polygon with two sides and two vertices), no the riddle of the two sided sphere is different and until you get it yourself, you will never truly understand it, giving away the clue defeats the purpose. The riddle was given to me in 1983, it took some time to work out, but when I did doors opened, ways of thinking unlocked and the feeling of that key unlocking is both mesmerising and overwhelming. It gives the larger stage and that stage is kept clean and away from as many eyes as possible at present, winning that, seeing how the other failed means more than millions, it optionally shows I won several wars that others are in denial of.  Yet the limelight also takes away their ability to remain in denial, others will ask these wannabe’s why they never saw it and whilst they come up with excuse and excuse and rely on levels of miscommunication they will enter the blame game and I will stand in the back watching chaos unfold. The idea that I am almost at that stage is exciting, more exciting than holding a KFC bucket filled with diamonds. And I am so close, I can almost taste it.

So that is enough about the riddle, related to the riddle there is also another riddle, and that can be explained. It started two days ago, all whilst some give the setting that the COP26 is a failure. I do not disagree, I merely wonder if some realise the dangerous game the media is playing. To see that, I will have to give you a few stages.

Stage one
Stage one is not new. It started on December 10th 2020 when I wrote ‘Hatred of wealth’ where the BBC article was the centre piece ‘Climate change: Global ‘elite’ will need to slash high-carbon lifestyles’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-55229725). There we see Matt McGrath yielding the floor to Oxfam. They give us “The global top 10% of income earners use around 45% of all the energy consumed for land transport and around 75% of all the energy for aviation, compared with just 10% and 5% respectively for the poorest 50% of households, the report says” I debunked that BS in less than 5 minutes. You see Statista also gives us numbers (you can see them in that article, but the setting is that in the last 15 years plane travel went up by well over 15,000,0000 planes, this implies almost a million planes per year more. The article does not give this, does it? The article was lacking a lot more, especially when you consider the reports by the EEA (European Environmental Agency) and the UNEP (United Nations Environment Programs) so whilst I made chop suey of both  Matt McGrath and Tim Gore my work was done. 

Stage two
So what happens? The Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/05/carbon-top-1-percent-could-jeopardise-1point5c-global-heating-limit) gives us on November 5th almost the same BS the BBC gave you all a year earlier. Here too we see “The paper shows that the fight to keep 1.5C within reach is not being hampered by the consumption of most people on the planet, but by the excessive emissions of the world’s richest citizens, said Tim Gore, author of the briefing and head of the low-CO2 and circular economy programme at the IEEP.” As I see it, the same bloody tosser gives us the same shit we got a year ago and the overextension of blaming the rich, whilst we now see TWO media outlets ignoring the report that 50% all ALL damage is created by 147 facilities. Now, if they would be in opposition of the report I gave you all in the earlier stories, if they were in opposition of the EEA numbers, it would be one thing. I have nothing against opposition, it forces us to double check. No these two players openly ignore presented numbers and if you seek those who did, you are not likely to find one. Why is that? Why do we give credibility to some person relying on “the fight to keep 1.5C within reach is not being hampered by the consumption of most people on the planet” whilst not presenting clear documentation of how they got there, all whilst (via statista) I showed that over the last 15 years more flights were created by almost a million flights a year, every year. The media is playing a dangerous game by misrepresenting the facts and this is exactly what COP26 is doing, helping each other being utterly useless in protecting the environment. By aiding some delusional setting to aid politicians and industrials via stakeholders. The question becomes has Oxfam become just such a player, aiding industrials so that their little niche might have some expected virtual protection for a few more months. If we turn back the clock today and scrap the 15,000,000 flights how much more will we save? I will bet decent money that it will be a hell of a lot more than what the top 1% uses with their jets, especially when you realise just how often he flies that thing and the 41,095 daily flights that the extra planes bring to the equation. But that is not how it is presented, yet I remember being on a flight (Amsterdam-Budapest) where there were less than a dozen people on a 767, so how much carbon did these 12 people (including yours truly) bring to the CO2 equation. 

Consider these elements and consider how you are getting played by large media on what they want you to think, and not what is optionally really the case. Playing the introduction towards ‘blaming the rich’ so that a seemingly useless president can play his tax the rich plan as he is now only 6 weeks away from another shutdown as he will hit another debt ceiling. The media has as I personally see it become willing to such a level of catering. And no one asks who are they actually catering to? As I consider it, it cannot be the truth and if that is the case they cannot be newspapers and they should pay their 6% added sales tax, not hide behind a zero tax option, is that not too what they accuse others of?

Enjoy the weekend, it will end in less than 50 hours.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Media, Politics, Science

As Credit Cards run dry

That was pretty much the first thing that went through my mind as Reuters gave me ‘UK could speed up criminal sanctions for big tech, minister says’ an hour ago. The article (at https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-could-speed-up-criminal-sanctions-big-tech-minister-says-2021-11-04/) gives us the first dangerous setting ““It will not be two years, we are looking at truncating that to a shorter time frame,” she told lawmakers. “I’m looking at three to six months for criminal liability”” in the first I have all kinds of emotional outbursts as to the uselessness of certain political players. Then there are a few more chapters, yet it is not yet the moment for that (it will come soon enough). When we see “Powers to make executives liable have been proposed as a “last resort” to be introduced at least two years after the rules have been set, the government has said”, we see the first part that it is a timeline change of almost 75%, then there is the statement ‘as a “last resort”’ and I personally believe that none of it will hold up to scrutiny. There is of course the ‘old’ setting of “In general, Facebook may not be held liable for slanderous or defamatory posts due to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Section 230 protects internet service providers, like Facebook, from liability for content posted to their platform by third-party users” Yet it also means that a demand could be made to hold Journalists up to those same standards, and that is where the shoe stops fitting and the dance ends real quick.

Consider Stephanie Kirchgaessner, someone at the Guardian. On July 19th 2021 she gives us “A phone infected with NSO malware, as Kanimba’s has been, not only gives users of the spyware access to phone calls and messages, but it can also turn a mobile phone into a portable tracking and listening device. In the period before she was alerted to her phone being hacked, Kanimba said she had contacts with the US special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, British MPs, and the UK high commission office in Rwanda – all of which could have been monitored

We now see:
A. ‘A phone infected with NSO malware, as Kanimba’s has been’
So where is that evidence? As such the guardian could be just as liable and hiding behind ‘big tech’ optionally constitutes a case for discrimination and the Guardian is also on Facebook, Twitter and so on, so what gives there?
B. When was the phone infected? Can the moment of infection be proven?

The Daily Mail reported on October 25th 2021 “The alarm was raised after an online harms issue known only to a few people at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport was raised by a senior executive at Facebook in a recent meeting” So we see “I’m looking at three to six months for criminal liability”, basically Facebook would be prosecuted for events that the employees of that government leak on Facebook? How insane is that train? Who would be the conductor of that crazy brain train and with that in sight, when we consider that some of these messages come from all over the globe. And in plenty of those cases the so called trolls are to blame for some messages. When we consider that the track record in the US, UK, EU and larger commonwealth fails to deal with trolls, can we demand more from Facebook? Consider that the Council on Foreign Relations reported on June 7th 2021 “Chinese trolls are beginning to pose serious threats to economic security, political stability, and personal safety worldwide”. So how long until not so intelligent politicians see a larger string of attacks and fine Facebook whilst the business shifts to China where the US, UK and EU have no say in the matter? How stupid does one need to get to consider their stretched credit cards to get fines whilst losing billions in taxable revenue and optionally global revenue? When it all shifts to China (as well as the Russian equivalent) people like Britain’s Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries were too close to clueless to understand the digital media? Yes, we get it, Zuckerberg created a Behemoth, one a lot larger then even he thought was possible, but the rest had no idea whatsoever (I used to work for a few of them). So in all this we see lofty words like ‘criminal liability’, yet that same government (as the BBC reported) gives its population just 1.6% of rape allegations in England and Wales result in someone being charged, something the government has said it is “deeply ashamed” about. Charged, not convicted, that is a mere 80%, leaving 98% of the assailants free to do it again. That government who failed its population for well over three decades thinks it can judge “big tech firms already had the capability to make their platforms safer”, how is that insight gotten? Because as I see it in too many places the people have no clue on digital media issues, especially in social media. 

I believe that this is another ‘tax the wealthy’ stage, this time it is on what I regard as ‘false grounds’. And in that light, lets take a gander into another stage (adjusted stage in this case) of ‘flawed reasoning’

6 Most Common Causes of Wrongful Convictions

Eyewitness misinterpretation.
The stage where the observer does not comprehend all the elements of a digital track and uses his or her status as expert witness, or witness to the event all whilst the stage cannot be seen as a lot of the variables involved are not visible to that witness.

Misinterpretation.
Misinterpretation is set to what is seen, the data behind it and the stage on why and who placed it. In many cases (especially with flamers and trolls) several of these elements are faked and wrong values are captured mainly because flamers and trolls know what to change. This is similar to all the scam calls showing a UK/US number whilst the scammer is in India. YouTube is filled with those examples.

Incorrect forensics.
Is slightly the wrong term, it is incomplete forensics, because governments listened to self righteous pinko’s who demanded privacy and as such digital platforms cannot capture what needed to be captured to do more, so first (overly graphically stated) the government cuts off the hands of the media giant and then tells the media giant to pick up the right ‘pick-a-stick’, how lame is that part of the equation?

False confessions.
There is the cry-baby (hoping to get freebee’s), the trolls and flamers and those with a natural aversion to one side (abortion, politics, vegans), take a subject and there will always be a crying opponent and they are willing to embellish their side and optionally lie on what they feel, all sides that goes straight into social media and often several times over.

Official misconduct.
Basically is is seen on both sides and always will be, I used the government staff leaking lists, but the opposite side is also there (like Amazon staff greasing personal (family) needs. Several options and these things happen and time is the only way to get there, yet the issues mentioned earlier drains close to all resources.

Use of informants.
That is the larger problem, who is a real informant, and who is there to play some political game? The data will not reveal either but it also constitute a wrongful case.  A seemingly small but growing issue on a stage where size is the least visible element of all.

Inadequate defense.
The largest problem issue. It overlaps with technical abilities, privacy abilities and false confessions, they all impact the defence that is offered and as such is the easiest overrun in court or in a hearing. This also is a stage with documentation and as we see with some players at the ICIJ (Pandora papers) as well as the NSO group. There is no adequate defence as the presented attacks are too often absent of evidence, yet still there is a conviction against the players and the media became part of that problem. A stage where defense was not possible because some players were allegedly tainting the field. 

Six elements and they are out in the open, so when we see “Britain’s Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries, who was appointed to the job in September, said she wanted the powers brought forward” I personally wonder whether she is clueless on what is involved, or is this a mere ruse to get fines so the governmental Credit Card is not cut into pieces by too many banks? And if the UK is in that stage, how deep is the EU and the US at present?

Before we leap to rush to the small minded people, lets make sure that they do not end up driving business to players like WeChat. A site that will not adhere to anything that is seemingly non-Chinese.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Media, Politics, Science