Tag Archives: CNBC

October 31, 2016 · 16:54

As messages pass by

There has been a lot of throwing regarding e-mails in the 11th hour of the campaign. As elections are officially about to start, the need to get them out in favour of the Republican side seems to be clear. Yet, in all this there is an equal worry why the Democrats have let this get so out of hand.

For those who do not keep up to date with the daily need of any Clinton e-mail, let’s mull this over, so that the sequential parts will be a lot easier to understand. For the most, part of the history (at http://www.cnbc.com/2016/10/29/the-history-of-the-clinton-email-controversy.html) will give you part of the goods, but it is still a little short.

You see, this all goes back to 2012, when the Islamic militant group Ansar al-Sharia started a coordinated attack against two US government facilities in Benghazi, Libya. It resulted in the deaths of U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens and U.S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith. It was the New York Daily News that reported on State Department officials who were criticized for denying requests for additional security at the consulate prior to the attack. In her role as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton subsequently took responsibility for the security lapses. So, that should have been the end of it, should it not? The basic premise is that mistakes will happen, it is really not great when lives are lost, but it is a danger many foreign dignitaries in conflict places face.

Although, at this point, one valid question becomes debatable: ‘Should any elected official making such a lapse of security be regarded as a possible president of the United States?’

I am merely phrasing the question, it is not an answer pushing you into the direction of the Yes or No answer. What followed was a media rush towards the semantics of ‘Act of Terror‘ versus ‘Act of Terrorism‘. I am calling this an issue of semantics as in the end Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens ended up being equally dead, so in that regard there was no impact. Just as many have seen, but perhaps not realised that syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer claimed that a State Department e-mail, which passed along a report from Embassy Tripoli that Ansar al-Sharia had claimed responsibility for the attack on Facebook and Twitter was evidence that the White House knew of terrorist connections to the attack almost immediately. Charles Krauthammer stated, “This is really a journalistic scandal. I mean, the fact there was not a word about any of this in the New York Times or the Washington Post today.” This comes from the 23rd October 2012. The issue now is that there are layers of issues not dealt with. Consider this part and also consider the Senate Hearing Response by Hillary Clinton “With all due respect, the fact is, we had four dead Americans! Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they’d go kill some Americans?! What difference, at this point, does it make?!“, which is only part of the response, yet the response in the hours before the attack would have been important, especially as the movie linked to all this ‘Innocence of Muslims‘, a movie by an Egyptian born Coptic Christian, an anti-Islamic movie with the intent to denigrate Islam’s prophet, Muhammad. Was there really no clue that this would have repercussions? In addition, Anti-Islamic content had been added in post-production by dubbing, without the actors’ knowledge (source: Christian Science Monitor). What is interesting is that Sarah Abdurrahman states “If you watch closely, you can see that when the actors are reading parts of the script that do not contain Islam-specific language, the audio from the sound stage is used (the audio that was recorded as the actors were simultaneously being filmed). But anytime the actors are referring to something specific to the religion (the Prophet Muhammed, the Quran, etc.) the audio recorded during filming is replaced with a poorly executed post-production dub. And if you look EVEN closer, you can see that the actors’ mouths are saying something other than what the dub is saying.“, this is important because it clearly implies an attack on religious values, one that the Muslim community values above all others. Now we cannot expect that the internet is policed to a certain extent, yet in light of the trailer, was there really no one who asked ‘could this get out of hand?‘, whilst in the other direction, the fact that the trailer had been online for almost 50 days, were there no danger flags at all? So on a September 11th day, was there no perception at all that there could be a dangerous situation? In addition there was a PDF (at http://permanent.access.gpo.gov/gpo33519/Flashing%20Red-HSGAC%20Special%20Report%20final.pdf), where the Regional Security Officer in Libya compiled a list of 234 security incidents in Libya between June 2011 and July 2012, 50 of which took place in Benghazi.

  1. America and American interests were (regardless of reason) under direct terrorist attack.
  2. The State Department should have increased security on several levels
  3. It gives another view to the Senate hearing in light of certain facts (January 23rd 2013)
  4. The United States Senate Committee On Homeland Security And Governmental Affairs paper from December 2012 shows that additional security would have been essential.

Now, why is this so important during an election? For the most, we could call trivialise all this in regards to ‘administrative failure‘, which will happen, even as we all realise that lives were lost, it gives weight to the response that Hillary Clinton gave. As she stated “It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again” as well as “The Intelligence Community has a process, I understand, going with the other committees to explain how these talking points came out”, which now makes the second one a killer to say the least.

This is now part of the problem!

You see, the email controversy is not just that mails were missing, it became publicly known that Hillary Clinton, as she served as the United States Secretary of State, had used her family’s private email server for official communications, instead of the State Department email accounts maintained on federal servers. So certain triggers could have been missed and an issue of reporting now exists. In addition, the mere notion that thousands of emails that would later be marked classified by the State Department retroactively had been on other servers is also a clear case for response. This now gets us to Bill O’Reilly (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCYma3zZf7U), who now informs us on two sides that matter. At 2:11 we see the ‘accountability of people in power‘, which is an issue at any given day, yet there might be a clear explanation, yet the implied issues as seen gives us that there has been a level of miscommunication going all the way to the Oval Office, which is now a really big issue. In that regard, the Clinton campaign is getting cut all over the place, in addition, at 4:16, there is now the implied issue that FBI director James Comey was either not aware or covered up the private email issues as they were missing from the summation of the case.

Now, after all the grief that FBI director James Comey is now receiving. In addition, Nevada Democrat Senator Harry Reid gives us ‘James Comey may have broken law‘, is that so Harry? The trouble with Harry is that he doesn’t seem to mention on how private email servers and not the State.gov servers were used. Can we all agree that this might be the bigger issue, for more than one reason? The fact that impeachment could be due to all or any crime that abuses office powers, we could surmise that there is an optional case of perjury. If proven, we can avoid the entire election. That is not, as Harry Reid states ‘interference in an election‘, but the investigation of possible criminal acts. On one side, if this goes up after the elections and should Hillary Clinton win, than it is a first in history that both members of a family, both in a position of presidential powers gets impeached for ‘Perjury and obstruction of justice’, which is at his mere age of 76 still an interesting event to personally witness. Harry gets enthusiastic in his speech as given on the Huffington Post. You see he states “letting her GOP opponent get away with breaking the law“, which is interesting as the system does not seem to make a criminal ineligible for running for office. It mentions that you need to be an American and once elected you cannot run a second time for president (re-election does not apply), so a one term president cannot be a president again. When we look at the Constitution, Article 2, we get an interesting side. Section 4 gives us: “The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanours“, this implies that a felon can legally become president of the United States, practically that is a lot less certain.

So here we get the trouble with Harry. You see, until the election it is the premise of conviction, if Hillary Clinton gets prosecuted and convicted regarding the Benghazi mails after a successful election, she would be impeached. It is a possible and practical solution, but it isn’t likely and in addition initially James Comey made a notification of events. In light of the Washington Post (as well as the Guardian) we see “Their decision partly reflected the institutional power of the FBI director, Comey’s personality and the political realities they were facing, according to current and former Justice Officials. In this case, officials said Comey put the department in an untenable position by informing them that he was sending a letter to Congress because he had an obligation to lawmakers or they would feel misled“, is this separation of powers at its finest, or is this a mere loophole? We need to see this in contrast to another quote in the same article. Here we see: “At the July news conference, Comey announced that the FBI had completed its investigation of Clinton’s private email server while she was secretary of state. Comey said he was recommending to the Justice Department that Clinton not be charged, but he added that Clinton and her colleagues had been “extremely careless” in their handling of classified information.”” So it was after July that things escalated. The part that we see ‘when Harry met Hillary’ is that the path that is taken is odd to say the least. The mention by James Comey ‘in an unrelated case‘ as well as the fact that when this all happened Hillary Clinton should have had a cleaning pass on a very high level. That never happened, for the most it is an actual consideration exactly HOW Anthony Weiner got these mails to say the least. Consider that he left congress in June 2011, a little more than two months before it all happened. So how and exactly why was he kept in the loop? If the facts are correct, we are now facing a case where Hillary Clinton mailed classified materials to an outsider. A part that leads to even more questions when we see “FBI director James Comey revealed the existence of the emails, which law-enforcement sources said were linked to Weiner’s estranged wife, top Clinton aide Huma Abedin“, which now gets the Clintons in even more hot water. It came from a private server, it went to the top aide and she was using the laptop of resigned congressman Anthony Weiner, now it seems that the mails were meant for his wife, did she not have her own laptop (at http://www.cnbc.com/2016/10/30/fbi-obtains-warrant-for-newly-discovered-emails-in-clinton-probe–as-reid-accuses-comey-of-hatch-act-violation.html)?

From my view, the fact that classified materials went via unqualified sources to a device owned by a person who’s is no longer in office. It seems that Harry is spinning his way through legal mentions whilst ignoring transgressions of classified communications. So, Harry needs to be careful on whacking the paint brush around. In the end, there is of course a chance that it will influence the election, but we could in equal margins consider that the Clintons, due to careless ignoring mails in the field, the entire mess ended up hurting themselves again.

It is because the clarity of what actually happened is out there is missing, is exactly why this is now coming to blows now. As for the mention of ‘Reid Accuses Comey of Hatch Act Violation‘, we should in equal measure consider that this is not an act where we see ‘political activity’, this is an FBI director who is now looking into possible criminal negligence and the fact that classified materials were on a laptop not owned for the person who the intended mail was, in addition, it belonged to a person no longer in office, so those conditions could well spell more mess as former Hillary Clinton chief of staff Cheryl Mills and another top aide had “some” classified material on laptops they turned over to the bureau in its probe of Clinton’s private server use as secretary of state. Through her own statements, we saw that she was unaware what classified meant, she did not use the proper protocols on sending classified, secret and more than 20 top secret emails. So as we see Senator Harry Reid go all up in arms, we need to consider one additional quote from the Washington Post (at https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/comey-gives-in-to-shameful-partisanship/2016/10/30/c31c714a-9ed8-11e6-8d63-3e0a660f1f04_story.html). “The evidence suggests that FBI Director James B. Comey is a decent man. The evidence also suggests that he has been intimidated by pressure from Republicans in Congress whose interest is not in justice but in destroying Hillary Clinton“, that seems to be the driving force here. It is my personal belief that this is what happened and this is why the initial mail was so vague. If I resort to calling a spade a spade then I would state: “Yo Harry, we know that you are stupid, but you are not stupid. You know what I am saying?” Instead of lashing out to the Republicans in congress, instead of looking why the massive level of ignorance from a former Secretary of State wasn’t properly cleaned up the moment it was a clear visibility issue, we will get to the direct consequence of dropping the ball on the bottom of the 9th when you are down 4 points and this is the last play. It could cost you the game and that is exactly what could happen at this point. When you trace all this information back you get to the clear understanding that WikiLeaks doesn’t need to find whistle-blowers, with the cyber negligence we see at present, Congress could in theory be supplying WikiLeaks with Top Secret information for decades to come (dramatically over-sized speculation). Perhaps Congress could take a moment to send an unclassified email to Maj Gen William T. Lord (you know the dude in charge of the Air Force Cyber Units) requesting a highly needed presentation on ‘Common Cyber Sense‘, it seems that a sizeable population on Capitol Hill is in dire need of one. #JustSaying

 

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September 3, 2016 · 13:32

Jack’s Place

Sometimes we wonder, what the long term effect would be if a baby is dropped on its head. At least, we should wonder about that! When we see that politicians are bending over backward to get their own way after elections, we have to wonder what we should do with politicians who have been dropped on their heads. In this case, when we see Tony Blair have a go in French (amazing quality French I tell you) on how ‘We have the right to change our minds on Brexit’ (at http://www.theguardian.com/politics/video/2016/sep/01/tony-blair-we-have-the-right-to-change-our-minds-on-brexit-eu-referendum-video). He is going on ‘on how people may change their minds’. How the people decided to move house whilst they had no idea on where they were going to. In my view, the house they are in now had rot, the house had termites and the landlord was an idiot skimming its tenants. How is whatever we move to not a better place? Labour is still at it, still trying to undo the change the people in Britain moved to as political parties were flaccid, the politicians of the EC in general were incapable and bending over for the desperate need of the USA and Wall street, the people at large have lost 60%-75% of their quality of living. All because nobody showed any backbone against the greed of Wall Street.

So as the former British politician of some renown is chatting up the French in French about the dangers of Frexit (in very good French I must admit), he seems to have forgotten historic events. It comes in the form of a little cumulative tale. As such I will go to the last verse of it all as not to iterate it all in this article. A song based on the principle of Chad Gadya, published in 1590, I move to a 17th century edition which came with the approval of Nurse Truelove.

This is the horse and the hound and the horn
That belonged to the farmer sowing his corn

This is about farmer who is sowing his fields, the farmer in the UK is being presented as the one now suffering ‘UK farmers wonder who’ll get the harvest in’ (at http://www.politico.eu/article/uk-farmers-wonder-wholl-get-the-harvest-in-agriculture-migration-brexit-labor/). The letter is not in question, there is no opposition that certain changes will have certain issues that need to be dealt with. “Richard Hirst, who farms 790 acres close to Norfolk’s blustery east coast. “They provide a fantastic service and potentially that’s all going to stop.”” the quote is fair enough, yet in that one player decided to remain quiet. I will get to that person later. What is also shown and raises questions is “Hirst relies on around 200 seasonal workers, most from Romania and Bulgaria, to plant and harvest the salad crop. Polish construction workers repair farm buildings. Polish truck drivers cart produce to market. That pattern is repeated across rural England“, how come that UK people aren’t coming to the sound of the horn of labour? Is it beneath them or is it not possible to get it done for normal UK wages? I am not stating that Richard Hirst is exploiting cheap labour, I am asking how come no one in the UK is willing to do it. We know that the farmers are hurting. When large corporations with governmental pressure options is milking the milk industry. Consider the average 2 litre milk bottle at £1.90. Whilst we see at http://dairy.ahdb.org.uk/market-information/milk-prices-contracts/farmgate-prices/uk,-gb-and-ni-farmgate-prices#.V8jC4vl96Uk that farmer gets 18.14 pence per litre, down from 20.77, which means that the dairy marketing engine gets 80%. There is something not right here! We know that there are costs, yet when the main ingredient is only 20% of the price, something is not right. I suggest that we increase milk minimum to £2.20 per 2 litre, meaning that a 1 litre bottle can only cost £1.10 and the increase is shipped 100% to the farmers. How long until the dairy industry tries to get their fingers on part of that increase? I am willing to bet that they make their first attempt before the ink dries on this agreement if it ever becomes a reality. Will it hurt some? A little, I cannot deny that some are in worst places than me, yet I am willing to pay that little extra to defend a milk legacy. Milk is essential, it is for some people essential to learn that the imbalance we see here is a massive imbalance that the EU brought. Here we see (at http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/milk/policy-instruments/index_en.htm), here we see that Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013 establishing a common organisation of the markets in agricultural products and repealing Council Regulations, is pretty much the initial death stroke to the farmers. Now, there is partially soundness and reasoning here. Consider that we see “establishing a common organisation of the markets in agricultural products) where the main market tools are set into 3 parts”

  1. Market intervention
  2. Rules concerning marketing and production
  3. Trade with third countries

It is rules concerning marketing and production that is at hand. It was the introduction of quota’s that was some figment of someone’s imagination approach to fair trade. In actuality, it was truly an attempt to give an equal push for the small farmers and fishermen, but it ‘evolved’ into something quite differently. The larger supermarkets Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, Morrisons, The Co-Op, Aldi, Waitrose and Lidl had no limits on quotas as they did not produce the dairy. You see, even as the fishermen were ‘obeying’ fish quotas, Japan, China and Russia went on a fishing spree (read: are still) so that people get their cheap fish, yet in milk there is another iteration. We see this in the Guardian of July 2012 (at https://www.theguardian.com/money/2012/jul/27/dairy-farmers-milk) the following “Tesco, Sainsbury, Waitrose and Marks & Spencer are all paying 30p a litre or more to dairy farmers, says the RABDF, which it says is the minimum survival threshold for farmers: ‘They are not so much the good guys, but they are at least paying 30p’“, which now gives us the issue that this year the price went down to 18.14 pence per litre. So if that is the average, how come the average price is currently 38% below the minimum survival threshold? How is that possible? If we accept that pricing is done on fairness and survivability, how come that this Economic Union is allowing for a supermarket situation where they squeeze the farmers out of a livelihood, all set to the allowance for a market, which they set is claiming to be for the fairness of all. Yet when we saw the Tesco debacle, not the PwC side, but the Tesco Executive side requires scrutiny too. Consider The Tesco Remuneration report (at https://www.tescoplc.com/media/1926/tescoar15_gov_remunerationreport.pdf). Consider that the CEO and CFO get CEO – £1,250,000, and the CFO gets £750,000. Also consider that the bonuses are CEO – maximum opportunity of 250% of base salary and for the local bookkeeper we see CFO – maximum opportunity of 225% of base salary. Consider that only 50% is set to sales and 30% is set to profit, how much money does Tesco need to make for these two people to have a really merry Christmas with family (or booze and hookers)? Now, even as the Guardian is stating that Tesco is not evil, yet they are matching the survival rate “all paying 30p a litre or more to dairy farmers“, so who is kidding who here?

That kept the rooster that crowed in the morn
That woke the priest all shaven and shorn
That married the man all tattered and torn
That kissed the maiden all forlorn

We get to the upcoming Bill of Rights. The Human Rights Act (HRA) will be dumped (read: scrapped enthusiastically). The Week published the following quote: “Scrapping the act will break the formal link between British courts and the European Court of Human Rights and stop the act being “misinterpreted”, say the Conservatives. They argue foreign nationals who have committed serious crimes are able to use the freedoms guaranteed under the Human Rights Act to justify remaining in the UK“, the right to self-govern is here in jeopardy. We seem to be all over Strasbourg to guarantee the rights of criminals, yet there is too little for their victims. Whilst the quote from the Tories is “aim is to “restore common sense and tackle the misuse of the rights contained in the Convention”“, this actually makes sense. There have been one too many stories on how a Rapist was given leave to stay in the UK, now he is imprisoned for life Rapist Dahir Ibrahim decided to retry his penetrating event. His defending lawyer stated “No long term physical injury was sustained by the victims“, so why not send his daughters to Pakistan? There is every chance that the culprits will be acquitted. Even more so, the Lawyers daughter could become famous as in one case the transgressor filmed 280 events. So his daughter could become a Bollywood star. Wouldn’t that be great?

There is the danger that events get uplifted because of emotional factors. That is not a good thing, which is why I voiced it in this way, we need to try to keep as much emotion out of legal issues, yet this does not mean to be soft on hardened criminals. It is the right of the UK to allow people in, yet in equal measure, if these visitors resort to serious crimes, should the victims not be allowed to voice for them to be evicted (through a court of law of course)? Even more so, why should any government allow for those deciding to go for ‘serious criminal solutions’ to be allowed within their nation? It is my view that Strasbourg has been too academic, too focused on finding a ‘compromise’ that this path seems to highly favour the path of the criminal and less so on the victim. It is my personal believe that the Bill of Rights might be a solution, especially if the 15 freedoms are kept.

So before we go into the last part. We looked at the economy (well, sort of), we see that Laws in general have failed the people of the nation, we see that large corporations are given too much leeway and too much options, whilst the press reflects this as ‘but they pay more than average’, which holds no water when the fee paid is 38% below the survivability threshold. By trying to please a few hundred at the expense of millions of non-receiving victims of society. Consider the next part. If I, for the most a dedicated Conservative see this, when I noticed the victims that the EC has been creating, how come Tony Blair and Jeremy Corbyn cannot see this? They should be squarely on the side of the Dairy farmer and the milkman, a side they both neglected (read: ignored). There is a constitutional failing in play and the fact that the hardships of some are mere plays for politics is just sad.

That milked the cow with the crumpled horn
That tossed the dog that worried the cat
That killed the rat that ate the malt
That lay in the house that Jack built.

Well, we just dealt with the milk. Yet, what has been ignored is the play of Rat and Cat and Dog. The cat chases the rat, but who is rat and who is cat? It can be argued that the EC and the USA are either, the issue with an exploitative symbioses is that it becomes increasingly hard to differ between the parasite and the body he feeds of, the better the parasite, the harder it becomes to find the parasite in the body. The dog becomes the UK, on one side it howls against the moon waking us all up (read: for naught). At times it chases the wrong party (read: mailman), yet the dog has its shiny moments. It howls, barks and bites the burglar in your house, it alerts to the dangers coming to the door and it can scare off dangers. Any dog has good and bad moments. The fact that some laws have still not been updated is a concern and the Bill of Rights wasn’t the first one that needed to come. However, for the benefit of the European segregation it does make sense. My biggest issue is that the EU decided on too little and far too late that makes Brexit a fact not to ignore, the fact that people like Tony Blair are now making speeches in France, winking to the UK that people can change their minds is a larger issue. Especially as the events leading towards Brexit has never been dealt with.

Yet we are not done, you see, Mario Draghi is still having a go at it, his latest quote states: “The figures won’t come as a shock to ECB President Mario Draghi, who warned in July that inflation rates were likely to remain “very low” over coming months, before picking up toward the end of the year” (source: Wall Street Journal), you see, there is a truth there, especially as he is relying on the Christmas shopping spree to save him. Yet, in this, is that number corrected (for end of year uplift)? If not than the European economy is in an even less inspiring state than most are willing to admit to. This in light of conflicting numbers coming from America when we see positivity one day, negativity the next. We know on a global scale economies are in a slump and because there was a dire need to keep the Status Quo and move it from virtual to fictional. We can no longer afford that game, which is why Brexit made sense.

We can use the quote by CNBC we saw on September 2nd (at http://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/02/jobs-report-proves-janet-yellen-is-wrong-about-the-economy-commentary.html) where we see “The reported August job gains were also considerably below the gains in June and July. The unemployment rate was forecast to fall to 4.8 percent, but held steady at 4.9 percent. Both numbers are disappointing and make a September rate hike less likely“. We could agree that it means that the US is in a slow upwards momentum, which would be really good for the US government. Yet it is only half the picture. The other side we see quoted in the Business insider (at http://www.businessinsider.com.au/albert-edwards-consumer-crutch-holding-up-us-economy-kicked-away-2016-9). Here Edward claims what I have stated in other ways several times before. The quote “Albert Edwards doesn’t think that the consumer can keep the US economy afloat for very long” was only the start, but it boils down to the fact that the US consumer is stopping its spending’s on many levels. The US has a massive issue at that point, because it has relied on consumer spending for far too long (instead of corporate taxation). Even if spending goes up the smallest amount in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, the elections are on November 8th, 2016 which means that the successor might enjoy those results, but the Democratic Party will only be able to rely on half-baked speculations at that point. Even if they would dare to go that distance, there is enough ‘evidence’ to see that their predictions would end up being overly optimistic. What is the issue is that the US now desperately requires a solution, which those in power, who require the status quo to continue will not allow for. In that light we see the remarks by Tony Blair. Trying to sway the people that they can change their minds and more important on downgrading the new house at any cost. You see, when the UK sees that the move was harsh, but slowly people are starting to see their new living room, different, likely a little smaller, but soon it will feel comfortable and it will come with the feel of comfort the people in the UK have not known for decades. It will not come in the wake of laziness as many will need to work really hard, but that money will now benefit the UK, which is why we need to pull together as a Commonwealth, we need to pull together a lot more than most of our politicians are comfortable with. Soon thereafter it will no longer be Jack’s place, it will be your home. One that is interconnected in many ways, some good, some bad and someone is always chasing you, just as you are always chasing something or someone. A lesson in coexistence that does not require the parasite approach, something they still don’t get on Wall Street. You see as we see in the Australian Financial Review quotes like “Richard Fontaine, a leading US foreign policy expert” on how Australia is so vulnerable on Chinese demands, he seems to forget that his government did whatever they could to ram the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) down our throats. And now that the US is realising that with Brexit the game is truly ending, in addition we see that President Hollande feels the coffin nail that the TTIP carries as well as the vision on how it seems to only propel the need for big business, whilst Google’s option to drive commerce is not yet ready, it could be the true new innovation for small corporations, where the corporations keep the power on a global scale. Three elements that show that not only will the US face an economic slump (read: I find the statement ‘recession’ too speculative). Yet, the playing parties in the final moments on a lame duck president on the way to the morgue is not a moment to put political weight to final acts of despair whilst the new president is not set and that agenda could unwind everything, so the players have too much to lose as the dealer is about to change, possible with new decks of cards.

In that regard the economic players are currently realising that until January: ‘The safest way to double your money is to fold it over once and put it in your pocket‘.

Not good news for President Barack Obama, Tony Blair or Strasbourg for that matter. Perhaps Mario Draghi will get it at some point, but I am not holding my breath on that achievement to happen any day soon.

 

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October 2, 2015 · 22:33

How to blame an inanimate object.

Something happened in Oregon. For many it will be horrific, to some it has no impact, to others it has an emotional impact. The news at CNN (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrYkblNgs_U) is all about the breaking news. For Umpqua Community College it will be a dark page in their history. The news is giving all levels of speculation, they are not doing it in an irresponsible way, because they are factors to be considered, but the news diverts on several occasions towards ‘other speculated’ events and dangers. It stopped being news after 20 seconds. It was all about (as I see it) on prolonging the event. Moving from breaking news snippet to breaking news snippet. We can argue on the value here, but there is no issue with that approach, it is a choice. In the case of John F. Kennedy Jr, when on July 16, 1999 his plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts the issue was different. For 45 minutes we saw a sailor on the back of a deck. Nearly every newscast (CNN, Fox, CNBC et al) were all zooming in on that same sailor whilst I was at Dulles Airport waiting for my flight. Now that constitutes the pinnacle of bad newscasts, this is not, but there is an issue. You see, as emotions rise in that instance, we all were confronted with 10 dead, 20 wounded and the initial shooter has been apprehended. Something I could have stated in under a minute. Yet, it is not about this newscast, what happened afterwards becomes the issue. An interesting side is shown at EpicTimes.com by Jon Justice (at http://www.epictimes.com/jonjustice/2015/10/ucc-mass-shooting-blaming-the-gun-has-begun/).

This is not the first event and it will not be the last event either. The quote ‘Jon was frustrated to see so many people on social networks blame the NRA and call for more gun control‘ starts it of nicely. You see, guns do not kill people. People kill people. In addition we see the quote: “We need to get over this idea that you can put up a “Gun Free Zone” sign and it will stop the violence”, which is more than just bringing it to a point.

His podcast (also in the webpage) is emotional and seems to strike out to people trying to score political points towards gun at the expense of 13 cadavers. Yes, this sounds extremely crude, which it is. People ignore again and again that the gun culture is not the killing factor, the killing comes from criminals and monsters who seem to score names by going after children. Changes are needed and gun control has never and will never be the solution. You see, when guns fall away, we get blunt objects, knives and other devices that can end lives. Jon Justice starts to blame social media and 20 hours news a day. Jon Justice brings up a very interesting side. Social media and the option of notoriety is a growing concern, in all this guns are not even close to the largest dangers. Should we globally ban Facebook? In 2013 32,719 people died in a car accident. So, why is there no car control, you see nearly all the involved players had a driver’s license? Why are people not banned from cars FOR LIFE? In addition Jon brings up the discipline required for guns. Weirdly enough is that those who legally obtained a gun, some of these what people tend to call Gun Nuts, they tend to revere their gun. They take as many precautions towards gun safety and their weapon as a mother would towards their child. His speech takes a turn that people should observe. His consideration regarding 14 kills in Chicago, which has one of the strongest control laws. How many people spoke out in that regard? Those people taking a chance on political points thanks to the deceased from Umpqua Community College is appalling. Jon Justice clearly has a point.

Yet I started with the amendments. There was reasoning here. You see, the US constitution starts with the three amendments that safeguard liberties. To appease the anti-federalists personal freedoms were guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, whilst in addition limiting the government’s power. Yet, people forget that changing one is lowering the defence of all. I will go one step further, if the people lose the rights to bear arms, we should also change the first amendment where we state that the freedom of speech exists, yet after the editing the people can hold anyone liable for that what they print or speak. This should be great for Hollywood and their residents. Many people will rejoice that glamour press could be held accountable for their innuendo. They are connect because the first three rights were about the people. The first is: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances”

You see, people seem to attack the second amendment, which was one of three set towards the safeguards of liberty.

The American second Amendment states: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a Free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed“. This links to the Heritage guide to the Constitution (at http://www.heritage.org/constitution#!/amendments/1/essays/140/freedom-of-speech-and-of-the-press). The interesting quote is “The debates in the First Congress, which proposed the Bill of Rights, are brief and unilluminating. Early state constitutions generally included similar provisions, but there is no record of detailed debate about what those state provisions meant“, is that not interesting? Is the meaning and the debate regarding not one of the highest importance? The 1st Continental Congress in 1774 showed the following: “The last right we shall mention regards the freedom of the press. The importance of this consists, besides the advancement of truth, science, morality, and arts in general, in its diffusion of liberal sentiments on the administration of Government, its ready communication of thoughts between subjects, and its consequential promotion of union among them, whereby oppressive officers are shamed or intimidated into more honourable and just modes of conducting affairs” In this light, why do we not hold the press accountable? ‘The advancement of morality‘, is that not part that must be addressed? When we consider the Hacking scandal in the UK that involved the Murdoch Business, on June 3rd 2015 (at http://www.theage.com.au/comment/hacking-scandal-has-not-changed-murdoch-20150601-ghekss.html), we see the following two quotes: “New evidence … has led the Metropolitan Police to believe that this was unlikely to have been correct … the newspaper is unlikely to have been responsible for the deletion of a set of voicemails from the phone that caused her parents to have false hopes that she was alive“, which was regarding the deleted messages from Milly Dowler, which gave the parents the false hope that she was still alive. The next one was “I was taken aback when Davies told me, in a roomful of students and media buffs, that the premise of my question was wrong (and by implication, therefore, his story wasn’t). The Metropolitan Police, he said, had provided Lord Justice Leveson with a detailed report shortly after The Guardian’s correction was published. It showed there was a great deal of uncertainty about who had deleted what, and when. Naturally, Davies added, no one had reported this“, yet this remains linked to the issue that the press had been ignoring personal freedoms and blatantly hack the device of a person without consent. Yet in the end, the press did a double take on false ‘humility’ by promising to do better, an approach that was never met and blatant false allegations returned to be the norm less than 4 weeks after the end of the Leveson report considerations. So in all this, if people want control of something that is not to blame, in equal measure to ‘nurture’ a communion that seems to live on the needed premise of ‘Flight MH370 was crashed into the Indian Ocean in an apparent suicide mission‘, a statement that had no bearing as no evidence existed not at that point and no evidence existed a long time after that, even today 18 months later there still is no evidence of any kind that this was a suicide mission.

Marlin1881Now the second amendment: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a Free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed“, this is the kicker! The fact that it is not infringed is nothing more than the ability to bear arms. Considered the image to the left.

 

Do you think that this is the weapon made by or owned by anyone who is about killing people? This is a work of art, plain and simple. The issue in Umpqua Community College is not plain and simple. The news gives us that the shooter was targeting Christians.

 

 

So is this person Chris Harper Mercer a mental health case or an anti-Christian extremist. You see, the speech from President Obama seems wrong on two counts. He stated ‘we do not have sufficient common sense gun safety laws‘, how wrong was he? You see, in the first case we can claim his speech should have been ‘Obamacare failed this young man, this young man who did not get the proper care and as a result people at Umpqua Community College paid for this failing with their life‘. In the other case the speech should have been ‘America is under attack, an extremist, under the guise of religious terminal segregation decided to attack Americans and the American way of life by killing future moulders of this great nation where freedom reigns‘. No, another speech was made and the gun, ‘the inanimate object’ got blamed.

The third one has no bearing on these events, yet this one is the last one that safeguards liberties in the US. The text: “No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law“, which basically gives a new view to the British expression ‘my home is my castle‘ in the US. The first is over protected, the second is shunned and prosecuted, and the third gets ignored. All facts that brought forth what was once the greatest nation on earth as well as the champion of freedom. That last part America seems to think it still is, yet when we consider the victims of Umpqua Community College. Was freedom of speech guaranteed so that one person could kill many (an act that was done not through voicing a thought or opinion) or has the right to free speech been taken away from the victims, who had a Christian and legal right to speak out regarding what they thought would be right in their lives and in their community? We will never know, because the dead do not talk.

How can we get past this?

First of all, the following part comes from the Seattle Times, which has an interesting side (at http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/roseburg-attack-latest-in-growing-list-of-horrific-killings/), it states: “Oregon is one of seven states, either from state legislation or court rulings, with provisions allowing the carrying of concealed weapons on public post-secondary campuses, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The other states are Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Utah and Wisconsin.” So, there is a small side which does score points for President Obama, ‘common sense gun safety laws‘ is the issue in my view. You see, as I see it (oversimplifying issues as per usual), concealed weapons should not be allowed to anyone that is not part of the police, the military, governmental officials (members of the alphabet group) and cleared private security. It would not have made any difference today. But this fact should still be stated.

There is every option to stop the military from dropping the people who stood by them and let those getting close to retirement to become part of an education location security team, a group of people that is armed and is there to keep the students safe. They remain semi-military staff and are as such accountable for events, but I feel certain that whatever person, for whatever reason thinks that he will become famous, that person is a lot more likely to be the diminished towards a mere by-line ‘today an individual entered a campus armed with concealed weapons. Military protection was on site and none of the students became victim of this attack. The carcass of the transgressor will be disposed of shortly; his identity no longer matters‘. How long until these people regard a school not to be a target? How long until we acknowledge that anyone with a mental condition should not be allowed a firearm license? Will that stop the transgressor? No, that is extremely unlikely, but the presence of trained personnel on educational grounds will make it extremely certain that the loss of innocent victims will remain as low as possible. Consider the Columbine Massacre. April 20, 1999 from 11:19 a.m. until 12:08 p.m. An event where for almost an hour two people had access to a ‘shooting gallery’ causing the death of 12 people and wounding 21. Now consider another event. On 15 April 1912 a British Dinghy was lost at sea. It was called the Titanic (you may have heard of it). In 1914 the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) became in effect, a convention that is still in effect today. So, if sailors can get something this lasting done, how come that proper security in US schools is still not achieved 186 months after Columbine? The combined wars of the American Revolutionary War and the Northwest Indian War took less time to settle. The two costed the lives of 8044 in battle, since 1980 it is rumoured that only 297 people were killed, so perhaps if we get a few more casualties (like 8044 minus 297) things will actually change, as long as those pushing for change realise that blaming guns and trying to force gun control will never ever be a solution. The Titanic lost 1500 lives a number that outside a war would never have been fathomable in those days, so perhaps more deaths will push the American administration into action. I am however reluctant to consider that they show any wisdom in that regard. Guns and politicians react like a bull and a bright coloured blanket, with no option for any amount of fence. What people might forget is that the US military is cutting 40,000 troops (not of their own accord I imagine). Many of those now need to find jobs, which means that new pressures are about to hit the US job market, did no one consider the fact that many of these are exquisitely trained in keeping people safe? Is it such a jump to enlist these people within the Justice department as educational security (to avoid issues with the 1978 Posse Comitatus Act)?

In the end there is a case to be made that 40,000 departures are arranged because the US is so broke that it has exhausted all options and hiring these people in other capacities is no longer an option. Which is the consideration one gets at minus 18 trillion, so how has this administration as well as the previous Republican one done anything to keep places of education truly safe?

I’ll let you ponder these facts, but when you do, consider the words of Bill O’Reilly (at http://video.foxnews.com/v/4524976308001/the-mass-murder-in-oregon-/?intcmp=hpvid1#sp=show-clips), the fact that again there is a link to social media and the fact that the ‘claim’ was placed before the event took place. In my personal view an anti-Christian extremist would not have given ‘warning’, making this a ‘some form of mental health case’. There are unknowns and there are speculations. The statement that people were killed based on religion was made by someone who was in the classroom where it happened seems to be acceptable enough as quality reporters have gone with that fact.

So where is any solution to be found? Gun control will not lead to any solution (in the US) and amending the laws and regulations are equally pointless against transgressors like this.

 

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September 22, 2015 · 22:11

In Greed we trust

In greed we trust, all others are expected to die! That is the basic setting which is now ruling the internet and it all started when the CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals AG bought the rights to generic drug Daraprim and he subsequently raised the price by 5500%. This now creates two parts. They are:

  1. How is this legal?
  2. How to prevent such dangerous situations?

The initial part is not found. You see, when we look at the definition of Financial Exploitation, we get: “Financial exploitation occurs when a person misuses or takes the assets of a vulnerable adult for his/her own personal benefit. This frequently occurs without the explicit knowledge or consent of a senior or disabled adult, depriving him/her of vital financial resources for his/her personal needs” (source:  National Adult Protective Services Association (NAPSA)). Most forms of protection against exploitation is against what people own. One of the most famous cases in Australia is Commercial Bank of Australia v Amadio (1983) 151 CLR 447; [1983] HCA 14. Yet, the law regarding exploitation of something that is not owned is not clear, in certain places we see that in the Generics and Biosimilars Initiative Journal (GaBI Journal). 2012;1(3-4):146-9. The title of the PPRI conference reports gives us this with ‘The potential of generics policies: more room for exploitation’. The tactic is quite sound, if the price of normal medication cannot be lowered, than raising the price of generics is a sound strategy from the view of the greedy. The paper also gives us “Mr Richard Bergstrom, President of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations stated that ‘once patents expire, prices should fall to a low, but sustainable, level’. In this panel discussion but also throughout the conference there appeared to be a common understanding that generics competition works well”. This was a view stated almost 3 years ago, which is true. However, the solutions that are addressed to a 2% or even 1% market does not seem to have too many alternatives, this is where the solutions like Daraprim and Cycloserine seem to come into play. The older small solutions that have no equal because the need is too small, now a massive option for larger profits.

When we look at Bloomberg on August 6th, we get: “Allergan Plc’s Actavis unit got a subpoena from the U.S. Justice Department seeking information on the marketing and prices of its generic drugs, becoming the biggest company yet to draw scrutiny in the government’s widening antitrust probe of the industry. The June 25 subpoena also sought information about communications with competitors regarding the products, Allergan said Thursday in a filing. While the company didn’t supply further information and didn’t specify the competitors, rivals including Lannett Co., Endo International Plc, Par Pharmaceutical Holdings Inc. and Impax Laboratories Inc. have made similar disclosures in the past several months“, as well as “Some 10 percent of generic drugs doubled in price between July 2013 and June 2014, and half of all generic drugs rose in price, according to an analysis earlier this year of Centres for Medicare and Medicaid data cited by Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont who’s running for president, and Representative Elijah Cummings, a Democrat from Maryland”

So as we see these events, why did Martin Shkreli make this move? An entrepreneur of his achievements does not play around. What is his game?

The ‘defence’ we see from the other side is “Shkreli said: “We need to turn a profit on the drug.” He defended the decision by telling Bloomberg News that newer versions of the drug needed to be developed and his was the first company “to really focus on this product” for decades and that such research was extremely expensive“. This goes against the statement he later makes, which was “He also promised that: “If you cannot afford the drug we will give it away for free.” Shkreli also said the drug was currently under priced” (source: http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/21/entrepreneur-defends-raise-price-daraprim-drug).

Now we have an issue with all this. Is this about the medication, or is this a first step to bleed dry health systems?

For this we must show one additional quote. It is “Shkreli’s start-up company, Turing Pharmaceuticals, acquired Daraprim in August. The drug was first developed in the 1940s and is used to treat toxoplasmosis, an infection that is not common but is particularly dangerous and can be fatal“. The question in my mind is how this existing drug is any form of treatment against the complications of AIDS? A drug that is over 60 years old, which is suddenly the foundation towards a cure? What are we not seeing? Well, that part is shown by CNBC (at http://www.cnbc.com/2015/09/21/drug-prices-big-price-increase-for-daraprim-rescinded.html). Here we see that this is the second act. The first one was “Cycloserine was acquired last month by Rodelis Therapeutics, which promptly raised the price to $10,800 for 30 capsules, from $500. But the company agreed to return the drug to its former owner, a non-profit organization affiliated with Purdue University, the organization said on Monday“, after which the price ‘stabilised’ at twice the original price. So is this about a changing approach to the increase of generic medication by 100%-300% in the end? In addition, the other CNBC quote is “However, outrage over a gigantic price increase for another drug spread into the political sphere on Monday, causing biotechnology stocks to fall broadly as investors worried about possible government action to control pharmaceutical prices. The Nasdaq Biotechnology Index fell more than 4 percent“, now this is all starting to make sense. A hedge funds manager playing the market and playing the waves of market exploitation. This is not unheard of, more important, for the most, we could argue that no illegal acts were undertaken. The Guardian stated “It is not uncommon for companies to use inventive interpretations of government regulations and loopholes in the law to corner the market for certain drugs, especially ones that were developed a long time ago and have only a limited market“, which is true, but when we considered the additional event that the Guardian ignored, give us cause for concern. I am not stating that the Guardian is trying to misinform its readers, their conclusion on one case is sound. Yet, when we see the addition that came from CNBC regarding Rodelis Therapeutics, we see another side. Here we see a side of market exploitation and Market manipulation, as far as I can tell at present in a very legal way. That we see from “Mr. Hasler said the new price was needed to stem losses”. Really? So is this about feigned losses, or is this one of many steps where drugs that treat smaller populations to grow 100%-300% in price to assure a market niche that most NHS systems (US, EEC and Commonwealth nations) are unable to fight. In this way on an international level the respected NHS versions will be placed under additional pressure. As I see it, Martin Shkreli has started Turing Pharmaceuticals AG to dig into this very profitable branch. In addition, for something this expensive, how come those rights transferred for only 55 million?

It seems to me that parts in all this remains unstated. Why?

Now in this part I am not having a go at journalists as in the past. For one, this is an evolving story, in the second part there are a few sides to all this. For one, I am speculating in what the game is here (speculating is not now, nor should it ever be regarded as factual). In addition there are sides that have not played yet. One of these sides is the law. As I personally see it, certain entrepreneurs, wealthy or not are now trying to corner the 2% treatment solutions, perhaps even the one percent group. Consider how this affects the UK. Let’s use the UK statistics. When we consider 240 million patients a year. If 2.4 million people require a drug and if that price suddenly goes up from $500 to $1000 (the Cycloserine example). This is only in the UK. Which gives them an additional 1.2 billion and this is only ONE nation, now consider the effect on the EEC as well as the US and the other Commonwealth nations, now the money becomes really handsome. Even at 0.1% it is a massive influx of money and for now all very legal. I have full faith that the law will be adjusted, yet we will see that it will be adjusted too late and some of these fast moving rascals will have made a massive additional amount of money, which is not an illegal act by the way.

This whilst I am still slaving over my issues of Infringement. That and a massive student loan will not propel me whilst some dubious hedge funds individual walks away with billions. A clever mind is half the battle!

So as this event escalates, the UK will have a new problem, because as is, the prospect stated ‘Planned NHS expenditure for 2015/16 is £116.574bn‘ is possible off by no less than 10%, the generic pharma side is only one side. I wonder what happens when these ‘entrepreneurs’ acquire the service contracts of hospitals at large, what happens when the MRI contracts are sold off to third parties? What happens when those prices go up? This is a path that Stadium Group CEO Charlie Peppiatt seems to be walking towards in a very successful way. As one third of the planet goes into ‘one foot in the grave mode’ that population will require a massive amount of support in medical terms (until they move towards their respective casket or urn). There is one side that is an issue for the other players. As I see it Martin Shkreli might be the most visible one but as I see it not the brightest (massively richer than me though), in one bash he has given visibility to a move that many wanted to keep under wraps, because out of sight, out of mind and that would have resulted in profits (loads of it). The visibility forced on the eyes of many might now result in NHS safety valves that could stop the forced squandering of funds. I wonder if my view is correct and more important will proper steps be taken sooner rather than later.

I’ll let you decide.

 

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April 21, 2015 · 02:36

The Defiant Possum!

Yes, Greece is all over the news today, in many ways the people are now expecting a Grexit, the Greek exodus from the Euro. The people are reading more and more about the Greek way and no one is playing nice anymore. Even though readers might disagree with my view, which remains forever valid, let me show you the evidence that brought me to this!

The Centre Party, led by telecoms millionaire Juha Sipilä, must now put together a coalition. And if he invites the Finns into office too (Timo Soini, leader of Finns, who has already vowed to change’s Finland’s approach to Greece), we will see the complication regarding the chances of agreeing a third bailout for Greece. (Source: the Guardian). You see, Finland’s economy not in a great shape and they are now facing austerity. Sipilä had pledged a wage freeze and spending cuts to make it competitive again, which are issues that Tsipras is not addressing, which means that the Finns are no longer playing nice, one less vote that might have been in favour of any third bailout, now lost, the trip from Tsipras playing nice with the Russians did not help either. We now see a direct consequence on inaction where the observing it all are going more extreme, less positive towards the Euro. The Finnish Centrist Party is only a smaller step in the path that UKIP, National Front and the PVV are proclaiming. So, those who were rightfully sceptical of my predictions can now personally see the first of 6 steps fulfilling, the Pro-EU part in Finland lost and the Centrist party now has a staggering 49 seats, they are now in the centre of any coalition, gaining 14 seats. This is the danger I foresaw all along, even if many other parties were blind to this danger.

The second part was seen today when Fabrizio Goria (@FGoria) published the Barclays list on the payments that Greece has to make, these are only repayments and payments on maturity of bonds, the repayments are €1B by May 15th, €1.7B by June 17th, €4.7B by July 20th and €3.6B by August 20th. This brings the total repayments €10.7B before September 1st. Can anyone tell me how they expect to pull this off? Let us not forget that the days of the Onassis shipping fortunes are gone, the nation has a population of 11 million. We could state that it boils down to 970 Euros from every Greek (including the minors and babies), in addition to the taxation they are mostly not paying at present anyway. Add to that that many Greeks are living way below the poverty line.

So when we hear on French TV (iTele) the fact that Moscovici added that “Plan A is for Greece to remain in the Eurozone, and there is no Plan B. But there’s also no time for prevarication“, so in this story of ‘Moscovici the Possum’, playing dead to the realities of finance, where the next bailout of €7.2 billion, does not even cover the bills due before September 1st, which add up to a lot more than the bailout money that might not even come in. When we saw that the last payment was almost not made, when the Greeks pulled it off we saw the some triumphant pose of ‘we did it!‘, whilst we also saw that it cleaned out Greece for the most and that the payment made is only 10% of what is due over the next 18 weeks. This is the future I foresaw, one that could be done by nearly all using Excel or an abacus.

But this is not just about my view, others see it in the same way. Although, there is (as will be) an opposition view too and I do not ignore it. Foremost there is the eminent view of Simon Nixon from the Wall Street Journal. He stated: “One option is that Greece fails to get a deal with its creditors (quite plausible), runs out of cash (ditto) and then defaults on a debt repayment payment. But that wouldn’t immediately trigger Grexit“, which is where I am to some extent. Yet, he adds to that “How things play out after [a default] that will depend on who Greece decides to default on and the reaction of bank depositors. If Athens defaults on a government bond or loan, then the ECB will have to raise the price that banks pay to access emergency liquidity from the Bank of Greece, effectively depriving them of access to fresh supplies of euros. If Athens decides instead to default to its own citizens, perhaps by issuing IOUs to pay pensions and salaries, bank customers may start emptying euros from their accounts. Again, banks would quickly run out of collateral for emergency liquidity. In both cases, Athens would have to introduce capital controls and bank holidays to stop the financial system imploding. Some officials believe Greece could carry on for several weeks if not months in this state of limbo while still technically remaining part of the Eurozone“, I am not denying his view, he has a good grasp of things so he is probably a lot more correct then I am. Yet, my issue now is not whether they remain in the Euro, but the ramifications of Greece remaining in the Euro, regardless of the consequences and through the wheeling and dealing of several players who feel profitable if Greece remains in the Euro. Finland is only the first of 6.

Second is the UK with UKIP, that party is still growing and the Varoufakis rock star tour, as we saw it over the last two months, only agitated people all over Europe, the entire German slamming thing as well as the political statements around the refugee issues did not help either. So as UKIP grows, so will the option (and future) of the Euro diminishing in equal measure, the nightmare that Moscovici will like even less.

Third on the list is France with National Front. They will go on growing and the momentum UIKIP gets will massively benefit National Front, the party that was ignored for way too long has become a voice of power in France. Marine Le Penn has become a global player, another member against the softness for Greece and even less in favour of the Euro power as it diminished the force of France will take a steep change for the worse of the health of the Euro as they gain more momentum.

Fourth is the Dutch PVV, by themselves not that powerful or too influential, but with the like minded views they have to some degree to both UKIP and National Front, PVV will be invited to several tables they were not invited to earlier, even though their favour is falling (especially against the Dutch VVD), they remain a higher placed party (higher than they were before) and should the VVD be unable to create a working dialogue with UKIP and National Front, we will see more growth towards PVV, making them another voice that asks to end the Euro.

Fifth is Germany. Their power is actually twofold, first there is the growing opposition from Bernd Lucke, with his AfD (Alternative for Germany), remains on a forward momentum. And as they are anti-Euro, that ship needs to be closely watched, in addition, some German magazines state that one in two Germans are now in favour of Grexit. And here we get the first major Crux. Should some player overextend their reach by forcing some ‘deal’ keeping Greece in the Euro with a last minute ‘miracle’ solution (with ‘some’ hidden costs down the track of course), then the move towards AfD could be a lot more massive than before, the German player is the biggest one at the moment (in economic regard to the other 5 parties) and they have had enough (especially after the WW2 debacle Tsipras reignited).

Sixth in all this is the wildcard Italy. Here we have several unknowns, yet there is also a glooming danger. You see, the party here is Lega Nord, normally, this party is the one that is not the biggest contender it never was. However, Matteo Salvini is making headway, slowly but surely. Now we get the other side of the Greek issue. Matteo could grow in Italy with Lega Nord, the same way Syriza got Greece under Tsipras. Now we have ourselves a different fight, because Lega Nord is the opposite of Syriza and they are anti-Euro, as well as Anti-immigrant. So the issues pushed on us by Greece that are nagging us, are also growing the powers of Lega Nord. Normally it would not be such a big deal, but with National Front and UKIP being similar minded, Lega Nord will now get a more powerful European voice, together they will also push growth for AfD, or through AfD. I feel that they could grow a ‘symbiotic’ relationship.

If you are scared now, then do not be (unless you are a banker). These issues have been clearly in play and the vocally uttered path from Moscovici is helping these six entities and his speeches might help Moscovici a little less over the coming weeks. By trying to hold onto ‘Status Quo’, Moscovici might be achieving the opposite, who is the nice cuddly Possum now? Actually Possums are regarded as pests in New Zealand, so even as the possum is protected in Australia, is gets shot on sight in New Zealand. So as Moscovici contemplates his value as an asset by some, several nations are regarding the steps of Moscovici to be like a pest. Even though most of these politicians are not into the fair wildlife ‘game’, they will regard his policies and the need for them to be shot down at their earliest convenience. Not by the six I mentioned mind you, but as these issues are reason for growth for the six players mentioned, the other parties in those nations will now slowly more and more accept sacrificing Greece (by holding them to account), for them it is about governing and their chance to do so diminishes with every iteration where Greece remains unaccountable.

So here is as I see it the opposition I see to Simon Nixon from the wall Street Journal. Not because he is wrong (he is not wrong), but because the correct path seems to elevate some political parties to the degree that several political opponents do not want to see, which exasperates the Greek position even further.

This all escalates even further when we consider the news from NBC less than an hour ago. The title ‘Greece requires public sector entities to transfer cash balances to central bank’ should worry many, as it could be the first signal for the population of Greece to make a bank run (at http://www.cnbc.com/id/102601803). The quote “Greece issued a legislative act on Monday requiring public sector entities to transfer idle cash reserves to the country’s central bank, as part of efforts to deal with a cash squeeze” gives a fair view that Greece is trying to collect all the ‘idle’ cash there is. Is that not addressing the very last option? The second quote is “Monday’s act excludes pension funds and some state-owned firms. Cash reserves that are needed by these bodies for their immediate payment needs are also excluded from the regulation”, here we get the part ‘excludes immediate payment needed for pension funds’, yet what is ‘immediate’ here? 4 weeks, 8 weeks? This could possibly imply that those on a pension might not receive anything from June 1st onwards. Perhaps this is just to make headspace (or is it fund space) until May 12th? I do not presume to know the answer, but the Greek acts only confirms how right I was all along (as I see it).

So as Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras seems to continue to try to convince sceptical foreign creditors to extend new financial aid, we must ask how successful does Alexis Tsipras consider his chances when the state is collecting all ‘idle’ coins. If it takes all coins just to make the next €1 billion, whilst 9.7 is still required soon thereafter, how much faith will the creditors have? So, the earlier statement that Yanis Varoufakis made (three days ago), when he stated “On the 24th [April] there will not be a solution, there will be progress”, he’ll better wake up now and realise that he finds a decent solution before Saturday, because progress might not be enough and when the creditors state ‘no!’, then the Greek default could be regarded as the next reality. By the way, the quote from Bloomberg (regarding the legislative act of Greece) is: “Central government entities are obliged to deposit their cash reserves and transfer their term deposit funds to their accounts at the Bank of Greece,” the presidential decree issued Monday said on the government gazette website. The “regulation is submitted due to extremely urgent and unforeseen need”, I wonder what unforeseen need they might imply, because there was very little un-foreseeability regarding the strapped cash issue, that part was almost crystal clear when the previous payment was barely made.

The only thing remaining is to keep an eye out on the quotes from Pierre Moscovici for the next 48 hours, it might be interesting to see the ‘swing’ it holds (if it swings).

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March 31, 2015 · 21:56

Just before the joke

 

That is how I feel at this time, after a week of hospital, the first thing I did (actually the first thing I did was to get a bacon and egg roll, which I missed beyond life), was to take a look whether that Greek (Tsipras) had gotten a clue and a few vowels. So as I look at the Guardian (at http://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2015/mar/31/euro-falls-greek-progress-unemployment-inflation-live-updates), one of the initial views I get is: “Samaras says Tsipras imagined he’d get money without terms but ended up getting terms without money“, which is very apt. It was a statement by @MacroPolis_gr (Twitter id). It is interesting that I made similar views 10 days ago, just slightly less poetic. Just above that we get: “He pledged to end the ‘pillaging’ of the middle classes, and revealed that a new clampdown on unpaid taxes had already delivered €100m. But his speech lacked clear details about the reform plan that Greece is putting together in negotiations with its creditors over the last few days“, moreover, 100 Million is just a joke in the sight of what is required and it seems clear that many parties are not willing to give a single Drachma to help Greece out at present. Theatrics and fake images are no longer enough, in addition, the 10 days of absence shows that not only is there a lack of progress, the words of Jeremy Cook take us one step further: “On every agenda item of what the austerity and bailout program needs, Greece disagrees. The program calls for a VAT increase on the tourism sector, the Greek government has said no. Pension reform has been shot down and public sector wages will remain protected“, so there is no decrease in spending, no increase in taxation and the cost remain untouched. There is a clear need that something has to give, and Tsipras as the spokesperson seems to be steering towards the Euro collapse, whilst he could be suddenly play ‘possum’ in the last 5 minutes of the deal stating: ‘what would you like?‘, at that part, is he relying on the initial ‘too big to fail‘ part as I had predicted it, or is he willing to be the first one to collapse it all? At that point, when 85% of the 8 million retirement funds dwindle down below 70% of value, who will be blamed? The Germans (as they seem to do), the troika group, or are the Greeks willing to consider that electing Tsipras was a massive mistake in a long line of huge mistakes? So as we see more razzle dazzle misrepresentation from Tsipras as he claims to remain within 1.5% shortage of GDP, the question becomes…. how?

That answer is not given in any way shape or form.

When we see the quote from Mark Mobius “Templeton’s #MarkMobius tells the Greek press ‘Greece will stay in the euro zone. The stock market is cheap and we are buyers.’“, in my view this means ‘As long as I am making profit in other markets seeing Greece leave the Eurozone will be detrimental to my bottom line, which is profit‘. Is my view wrong? Am I not seeing right, or are we facing iterations of cadaver devouring? You see, the bond of a place that will not pay back is a worthless bond, so why give such a place billions. You see, in my view if these ‘moguls’ are so iteratively happy on Greece remaining in the Eurozone, let them pay Greece from their profits. They only need 5 billion for now, but guess what, it seems that those ‘investors’ are just like all other investors, unwilling to pay for the bag of potatoes, which is no longer worth the potatoes. That gives us the issue, Greece willing to play, but not pay, investors very willing to pay, but not play. You see investors (they call themselves grown-ups) have no sense of humour, especially when their profit is in danger. So here we are looking into the mouth of the claimants, Tsipras and Mobius, all just playing the tune to their needs and the Greeks are just about to get marginalised in the scheme of things.

Now, you might want to conclude that I am just imagining things and that would as always be fair (never just accept the word of anyone), yet in my view as stated before things do not add up, in the last light as Greece is under so much pressure, we see a Prime Minister showing close to zero effort in obtaining that what is essential for the current continuation of Greece, yet he does not seem to take any clear effort to truly fight for his nation (as I see it). Yet, consider the other information when we look at the data as I presented it roughly 10 days ago, we saw the Australian Financial review reporting: “The country’s cash shortfall is projected to hit 3.5 billion euros in March, according to Bloomberg calculations based on 2015 budget figures“. If that is true the the shortfall is already a fact and the news on the BBC (at http://www.bbc.com/news/business-32113699), quoting: “The reforms are needed to unlock a new tranche of bailout cash for Greece, which could run out of money in weeks“, is that so? In addition, when we look at Reuters (at http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/24/us-eurozone-greece-cash-exclusive-idUSKBN0MK1PT20150324), which is a week old, states in the title ‘Greece to run out of cash by April 20 without fresh aid – source‘, the quote “Greece will run out of money by April 20 unless it receives fresh aid from creditors, a source familiar with the familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday” is fair enough and the article is a week old, yet it seems that one states shortfall as per today, out of cash within 3 weeks. It seems to me that several parties are already dragging their feet and dragging the point of no return as far forward as possible, yet the ones needing to get things done are dragging their heels too, so how is any of it a good idea?

This dragging thing is all the rage amongst economic players. The BBC gives us “Mr Varoufakis said that tensions between the two countries ‘must stop’, adding: ‘Only then can Greece, with support of its partners, focus on implementing effective reforms and growth-orientated policy strategies’“, no no no! The tension does not need to stop, Greece only needs to stop blaming Germany and get on with it. There was no debilitating ‘tension’ there is only a group of debilitated Greek officials who are not doing what they are supposed to do. The additional quote: “However, the reforms as initially proposed do not appear to have been specific enough to win the approval of the lenders, formerly known as the ‘troika’“, shows that Greece has been dragging its heels, as specific plans were clearly required, so what game are the players Tsipras and Varoufakis playing?

Is that such a weird question to have?

When we see ‘To Vima’ (at http://www.tovima.gr/en/article/?aid=690574), we see the following: “Mr. Tsipras called for the opposition parties to support the government’s efforts in the current negotiations with the country’s creditors and partners. The Prime Minister outlined his government’s “red lines” and argued that he would not accept any further pension and wage cut, or the implementation of any recessionary measures. Mr. Tsipras further stated that he would not accept the deregulation of collective dismissals, any increase of the VAT in food or medicine, nor would he agree to the further “selling off” of public assets“. I personally agree with selling off public assets, that makes sense, if Greece is to move forward at any stage, selling of its assets will only mean that thy will make money for the new owners. The no recessionary measures is a boast that cannot be continued, either they do it now, to a strong extent, or the Drachma will force it onto the entire population beyond its debilitating extent.

Yet what could be done?

That is the question when we see the Financial Times from two days ago (at http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a45d78e2-d627-11e4-b3e7-00144feab7de.html), here we see: “Without fresh funding, Athens risks running out of cash before meeting a €450m loan payment due to the International Monetary Fund next week. The credit rating agency Fitch downgraded Greece late on Friday to a “substantial credit risk”, citing “uncertain prospects of timely disbursement from official institutions”“, now we have ourselves a ball game.

So, this gives the clear insight that Greece is already short by half a billion long before the 20th April deadline. The article shows a few more gems and you should definitely read it. I especially like the Greek officials and their ‘hope’ for a partial disbursement off the $7.2 Billion which could tide Athens over until they would be able to reach what they call ‘a full deal’. Is it not nice on how they make no steps in any direction and still they want cash?

So as we look at the Greek expressions we see the old time favourite “I’ve lost my eggs and baskets”, meaning in this case, I have no money and I cannot fathom why not. You see, the situation turned into “a whore’s fencepost“, which implies that things only get out of hand when it is more than a brothel’s walk away.

But we must not forget that there are other players on the horizon too. That part seems to be a lot clearer when we see the response from Mark Mobius. When we look at some other quotes like from CNBC, we see “Amid the turmoil, hedge fund managers are again eyeing Greece for bargain shopping, but the political uncertainty has kept them from aggressively investing there“, so hedge funds are all about the stability, yet these ‘stable funds’ require clarity of profit, that much can be ascertained from Paulson and Co. So as we see the quote “Paulson, which manages $17.8 billion overall, still holds longstanding equity positions in two major Greek banks, Piraeus Bank and Alpha, according to recent investor materials“, we can only guess on how large the ACTUAL amounts are. All that at what percentage? 6%, 7% or even more percent? That interest needs to come from somewhere, so as the Greeks think that they move forward by 2019, the truth seems to be that they are taking care of interest and principle of whatever is out there right now. So as we question the claim by Mark Mobius, my questioning his statement comes in part from this “Alden’s main fund fell 9.6 percent in January thanks in part to losing Greek positions, according to the person“, so if shares are so cheap, why did Alden still lost close to what amounts to well over 150 million? 9.6% of 1.7 billion is a lot more then I will ever make in my life, so why was Mark Mobius so blasé? What is he fishing for and what are the current Greek officials not telling the people that voted them in?

 

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March 21, 2015 · 12:27

This is not Sparta!

You might not realise it, but many of us have a Greek side in us. The gamers are all about ‘This is Sparta!’ as they slay their opponents Gerard Butler style (a Scotsman no less) in Diablo 3, more than a few of them would also consider becoming the consort of Lena Headey (Queen Gorgo), a woman who might be twice their age, but still looks better than the average 25 year old photo model. Some with a more academic approach will be confronted with the Socratic Method as they get through another Uni class. Some will love it, some will hate it. It seems there are no people in the middle ground here. Doctors still recite the Hippocratic Oath and we could argue that Prudence which comes from Phronesis, a Greek word, which got introduced by some old Greek with a beard. I remember the speech, this old guy suddenly making a speech, roughly 334BC, I was watching the Panathenaic Games and suddenly he starts deliberating (at himself) in a most bombastic voice. The man starts ‘ranting’ about something called Nicomachean Ethics, nice, but not while ‘I am watching a game!’ Someone told me his name was Aristotle. I reckon the fab never caught on. Let’s face it, public speakers and the virtue of practical thought, it will never catch on, I reckon. Guess what! It has been 2345 years and I was right! Take this Tsipras fellow, as I see it, he continues a long line of public speakers void of practical wisdom.

That we see in ‘Greece financial crisis: EU offers funds in return for urgent reforms‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/mar/20/greece-financial-crisis-eu-offers-funds-in-return-for-urgent-reforms). You see, this Alexis Tsipras has been in office almost 2 months now and as we can read in the article, he has nothing to show for it. He was supposed to show reform, he now has 10 days and the photo as printed shows away hiding his mouth behind his first. Is it agony, frustration, defiance? Is it all just theatre? The BBC with ‘Greece to draft new reform plan within days – EU leaders‘ (at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-31963952), which shows a ‘smiling’ Tsipras with the quote “Greece has agreed to come up with a new reform plan within days to secure the additional bailout funds required to prevent bankruptcy“, read those words carefully. It does not state, ‘will finalise’, or ‘will complete the current draft’, it states ‘to come up with a new reform plan’. So when we see the quote “I think that all the sides confirmed their intention to try to do their best to overcome the difficulties of the Greek economy as soon as possible“, I feel slightly miffed. You see Tsipras is all about the blame game. In one part, he has every right to be so, because the mess was not initially of his making. He did get into the elections as he saw he could ‘play’ the voters and now it is crunch time, he cannot deliver, because whatever defiant act he will attempt will cost the people of Greece dearly. As I see it, he’ll end up doing exactly what Antonis Samaras was doing, I wonder if that constitutes election fraud? Promising something, not doing it and doing what the opposition was doing all along. As I saw it (yes, a personal view), Antonis Samaras was a fine politician trying to decently play a really crappy hand that he got dealt. You see, in this regard, none of them have done anything  about holding to response the previous administrations that tailored the deal, that spend money an entire next generation did not have, not to mention the artful tax dodgers, none of that was as I see it done! I reckon that Tsipras would only have to arrest Kostas Vaxevanis to show that he is no better than any of the other previously elected politicians.

You see my emotion here is because I love Greece (Specifically Crete), I feel pain as I see that it is driven into the ground by elected officials, it is largely done so through inactions, which makes it even worse. It is sloth in its most profound form, not just spiritual and emotional apathy, it is done through additional decisive inaction. A form of treason of the worst kind. Almost like the captain of a ship who now INTENTIONALLY goes towards an iceberg expecting the iceberg to get out of the way. It reminds me of an advertisement where the captain of a cruiser (USS Montana) who decided to play chicken with a lighthouse (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYsdUgEgJrY), yet in this case it is not a person being handed ‘incomplete’ or ‘incorrect’ information. In this case we all know the object in front of the good ship Hellenic Republic and its captain(s) have not taken the measures they should have. This is how the news is reading to me. What should have been done is a list of continuing meetings non-stop with all parties. The Greeks were given a play, theatre of a mediocre level and soon they will not be left with any options. As I personally see it, politics of its very worst kind.

All this now reflects in a bad way, especially if we take the word of the NOS (Dutch News). Here we see “‘De verwachting was dat het goed zou komen’, zegt de Rabobank-econoom. ‘Maar het probleem is dat de Grieken steeds hun beloftes breken. Ze proberen steeds opnieuw over de voorwaarden te onderhandelen’” “‘The expectations were that everything would be fine’ said the Rabobank economist, ‘but the problem is that the Greeks break their promises and then try to renegotiate their deal again and again’{translated}” as well as “We zijn wel gewend van de Europese politiek dat oplossingen pas gevonden worden als we bijna in de afgrond stappen” “We are used that European politics will find a solution as we are about to step into the abyss {translated}”.

This all directly reflects back to the days of the SNS-bank debacle ‘too big to fail‘. It seems that Tsipras is taking the ‘let’s take this over the abyss, so I can blame someone else‘ approach. Not the most subtle path of the blame game, but a blame game tactic none the less. When did we see any serious step to address reform from Greece? It seems to me that the ‘let’s be nice one more time to Greece‘ is counted upon, yet no clear and decisive act from the Greek elected officials is coming. So as the possible mark of bankrupt is looming no more than 2 weeks away, did the Greek population consider that if the government is out of money, how much money is actually available at a bank? When the run on the bank starts, how quickly are those coffers empty and where will the people get cash to pay for the average need like food, water and electricity?

That part seems not addressed in any way!

Actually it is (at http://www.afr.com/news/world/greek-coffers-running-on-empty-bring-accident-threat-closer-20150320-1m3nym), the Australian Financial Review is not the only Financial Review paper, so there will be more, but for the most, we see little about this little part: “While Mr Tsipras isn’t saying what’s left in the bank, he acknowledges Greece is facing ‘liquidity pressure’. The country’s cash shortfall is projected to hit 3.5 billion euros in March“. So even if that part might be ‘virtual’ to some extent, how much money is actually available to banks? That part might be seen when we consider “The Bank of Greece has plugged cash shortfalls by tapping the reserves of other public sector entities, including pension funds, hospitals, and universities“, as well as “The Bank of Greece and the European Central Bank won’t report official cash outflows for January until the end of the month. But sources in the Greek banking sector have told Greek newspapers that as much as 25 billion euros (US $28.4 billion) have left Greek banks since the end of December“, which comes from http://www.cnbc.com/id/102439432. So in two weeks, how will things get paid for?

That is a question Greeks (the population at large) should be asking, because when the money is gone, how will they address the bills with the cash of their savings whilst the banks had pushed them in possible other none profit making endeavours? At least, if things really collapse, we can always opt ‘at least it was due to a radical left vision’, in the past (read 70’s), the radical left visions gave way in Italy to Brigate Rosse and in Germany to the Rote Armee Fraktion. Their economy was never this desperate, so I wonder what the Greeks will come up with, I am however sure that it will be blamed on the Germans (again).

In my view, I wonder, was I correct two years ago? Could an independent Crete have created at least a partial economic growth? Would Crete have been better off in a state of independence? I do not proclaim to have the evidence, but I feel that my feeling back then was spot on. Now the rest of Greece could drag down this island against their will.

It seems very unfair, but then in the politics of Tsipras (and that of politicians at large), fairness never had anything to do with it.

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December 12, 2014 · 11:44

Is it all Greek to you?

Let’s take a look at the issues!

First there is Bloomberg who on April 11th headlined ‘Greek Bond Sale Tops $4 Billion in Return to Markets’ (at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-04-10/greece-readies-bond-sale-as-athens-car-bomb-reminds-of-upheaval.html), a nation with 11 million have notched up their debt by hundreds of billions, no options at present to repay it and again they are allowed to push new bonds into the market.

My first issue: I want to see a list of names of people that allowed for this. There will be no excuse, no non-clarity; they are to be presented by a panel of economists explaining the rationale for this and it should be presented live! (I wonder how long it will be until we hear ‘carefully phrased denials on lack of clarity‘ in regards to who drove this).

I already gave my view on May 18th on my article ‘Are we getting played?‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/05/18/are-we-getting-played/), where I stated: “The investor relies on information like credit ratings (from places like S&P and Moody for example) to make an assessment on how realistic the investment is. The fact that almost a month later the quote ‘Greek lenders are likely to face large losses over the next two years’ is seen, gives rise to the question whether any upgrade to the credit rating was valid“.

It seems clear to me that Greece is unable to manage its economy, its debts and its options to repay the debts. Can we please have a vote whether Greek economic affairs should as per January 1st 2015 be managed by either Germany or Turkey (Turkey is not that great an idea, that’s just me being mean)? It seems clear to me, for a long time now, that pouring money into a hole, whilst people keep digging themselves deeper will not result in any resolution. There has been clear evidence of gross negligence for over a decade; as such other measures will be required.

The Bloomberg article states: “Greece today took one more decisive step toward exiting the crisis,” Samaras said. “International markets are now expressing in the most undoubted way possible their confidence in the Greek economy”, I state that this is not the case, Greece is nothing more than an upgraded vulture option, todays information clearly sees this, let’s just be clear, this is just a little over 6 months AFTER that so called vote of confidence.

The second part we see with “The government and European Union predict that the Greek economy will expand 0.6 percent in 2014 after six consecutive years of contraction that has cost about a quarter of the nation’s economic output and sent the unemployment rate surging” I believe we are being intentionally misinformed here. If we look at http://www.tradingeconomics.com/greece/gdp-growth-annual, we see that this year Greece’s GDP annual growth rate is growing by 1.9%, a growth of 1.5% in a year, whilst this nation is in such disarray, such debts and such levels of unemployment, there is, what I see to be an intentional attempt to misinform people. The standards used are no longer applicable. With a little over 1 out of 4 without a job, this nation is a mess; numbers are withheld, or misrepresented, not unlike the entire Goldman Sachs issue in 2010. If you doubt my word against that of those economic ‘boffins’, then look at today’s news.

 

We see ‘Grexit fears send Greek bonds and shares sliding‘, which the Guardian stated 10 hours ago. The quote “The Greek stock market is plunging to new depths, after the prime minister issued dire warnings of chaos ahead if his party were ejected from power“, as well as “Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras on Thursday accused opposition SYRIZA of bringing back Grexit fears and sending a message to the markets not to lend to the country by declaring its sovereign debt unsustainable“. By the way, in my view, the debt was never sustainable. When we consider 300 billion, over 11 million, we see that every Greek needs to bring 27,300 to the table, one out of four has no job, so that costs extra, as well as bring the cost per working Greek now to a little over 33,000. If the average Greek brings home a little less than 10,000, you can see that they come up short by a lot. By the way at 5%, the interest to be brought in would be 20% of a Greek income, whilst at present Greece cannot even properly budget its nations. So, as we look at these numbers, can anyone explain how Greece considers its debt to be sustainable?

Those who allowed Greece to fall in this deep hole should be made public and named, and we are talking Greek names here. Someone signed up for unrealistic debts, misrepresented presentations and the Greek government presented it. The Greek people have a right to know who were behind this titanic blunder. The fact that Austerity measures are not kept and the system is not cleaned up only helps to make a case that Greece should not be allowed to continue to be part of the EEC, because at present they are not in a small measure, the risk, which they could now enable the Euro to collapse completely.

If we consider the reasoning of a quickened election by PM Samaras and the message “Athens exchange has now tumbled by 7%, meaning it has shed 20% of its value since Samaras decided to accelerate the presidential election to next week“, we should wonder why this change is now being made. There are conjectures in play too (partially by me at this point). When we consider another (non proven source, at http://www.zerohedge.com/category/tags/greece), we see ‘Greece Suffers Biggest 3-Day Crash In 27 Years‘, here we see the quote “Did we just get a glimpse of the ugly reality hiding behind the veil of status-quo-maintaining central-bank-sponsored manipulation?“, I have written similar thoughts, but mine were not founded on economic knowledge, just on the data I looked at. One response there was “Central bankers have lied to a false prosperity and zero interest rates as if there is no risk remaining“, which is in line of what I have noticed with economies all over the EEC, I call it ‘managed bad news‘, which seems more apt, but when we see a 20% crater in what is laughingly called ‘Greek valued bonds’, my euphemism of carefully cautious labelling can be thrown out of the front door and perhaps it should be called ‘intentional manipulation for the profit of a few‘. Proving that part takes a little more time, yet those behind the curtain will not be held to account in any way, shape or form and legislating these events seems to be a large ‘No No!’ as well.

So where to look?

Well, if we look at the news CNBC gave us on November 19th, we see “Yields this week have not reached the 9 percent level hit in mid-October when negative sentiment surrounding Greece spread to global markets. However, rising debt yields do highlight that the country’s economic woes are far from over, with a crucial deadline in early December looming large on the horizon” (at http://www.cnbc.com/id/102198319), we also see the following quote “The country managed to exit recession this year and post a positive gross domestic product (GDP) figure last week, but political wrangling has continued nonetheless“, so ‘manage to post a positive…‘, positive by what standards, as well as the part ‘managed’, managed how? Through manufacturing or through manufacturing the books (aka cooking them) with possible assistance from Goldman Sachs or a like-minded institution? The lack of clarity as well as the lack of clear numbers give pause to consider how bad an idea it was to let them back onto the bond market last April.

The final part we get from the Guardian (at http://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2014/dec/11/russia-central-bank-interest-rate-hike-ecb-loans-live#block-54899bc7e4b09dc257b7f1fe), where we see “The 10-year Greek bond is now yielding over 9%, up from 8.7% last night. And the three year bond is now yielding more than 10%, as nervous investors demand a bigger premium for holding debt that matures sooner“, so from a mere 5% to almost 11%, doubling the dividends, is ‘sponsored manipulation‘ THAT far-fetched? I want to see names of those behind the curtains, they are no Wizard of Oz, they are what used to be called the ‘Gnomes of Zurich‘, yet in this day and age, they are virtual, and none of them reside in Zurich, that’s just too old school.

In the end where it their (and our) money, in the form of dividend going to?

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August 12, 2014 · 11:24

No Press, No Facebook!

So, another day in the life of you, the reader, me the blogger and us, the victims of big business in a way that neither of us expected.

Why are we in a stage of No Press? Well, I cannot confirm this for the UK, Canada or Europe at large, yet in Australia it started last year, the second week of November.

Most did not ever bother to look at this, but one I found (at http://www.cinemablend.com/games/PS4-Doesn-t-Block-Used-Games-Game-Rentals-60480.html) wrote the following: “A new last minute reputation management troll-rumor has surfaced online in an attempt to curb Sony’s momentum leading up to their big launch later this week“.

This is a hilarious ‘sucking-up-to-Sony’ response! So what actually happened?

In the two weeks before the launch of the PS4, Sony decided to change the terms of service (at https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/legal/software-usage-terms). I gave the information to Channel 7, Channel 9, Channel 10 and the Sydney Morning Herald.

NONE!
I say again NONE of them did anything about it. There was a flaccid message (to follow shortly).

So what is so important?

Sony wanted to start putting in place several issues to enforce DRM and to end certain practices. As the PS4 had not launched yet, they could not be too vocal about it, which meant that those claiming to be journalists had a duty to look into it, especially as these changes affected well over 80 million consumers globally. So either journalists only care about the boobs of Rihanna and on how people prefer fake boobs (of course, the possible silicone in a chest is always more newsworthy then the silicon chip that holds an economy).

So what is the exact issue?

Two points from the terms of agreement

  1. 3. You must not lease, rent, sublicense, publish, modify, adapt, or translate any portion of the Software.
  2. 1. You must not resell either Disc-based Software or Software Downloads, unless expressly authorised by us and, if the publisher is another company, additionally by the publisher.

I will admit that 6.3 is badly phrased (a big no-no in any term of service agreement), but in this form it specifically targets one area of usage, which where at blockbusters one could rent a game for a week. An interesting try before you buy approach (not debating the validity or invalidity of this).

It is 7.1 that is the big issue, by agreeing to this (if you do not you lose your PSN account and online abilities) you confirm that you will not resell your games or buy second hand games. This was the big killer for Microsoft in the beginning in addition to the fact that this issue hits 80 million consumers. How is this not in EVERY newspaper? Perhaps their bosses where in the act of ‘hustle for advertisement coin’ (whoring seems like such a harsh word here).

When we look at Eurogamer (at http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-11-12-sony-reiterates-you-can-sell-and-share-your-ps4-games), we see the following: “Sony Worldwide Studios boss Shuhei Yoshida added on Twitter: ‘If you are concerned about our new European TOS, we confirm that you are able to sell or share your disc PS4 products, including in EU.’” This is the flaccid response I referred to. If this is the case, then WHY make it part of the terms of agreement? Because Sony lawyers are perhaps cheap? (They really are not!)

We do not doubt the words of the Sony CEO, yet his word can be changed in a simple board meeting, the terms of service is a legally binding document between the consumer and the corporation offering the device and the service. Why am I the one person explaining this ‘oversight’ to the press?

This is a massive issue! The impact on the software industry would be felt in several countries. The fact is that many shops are in business only because they make a few extra dollars of second hand games. If not, new games would have to rise in price. Also, there is, especially in these economic times a large group depending on cheaper game solutions. A pre-owned game, which is at times at least 50% cheaper than the new alternative is one way for some to play a few games. The simple truth is that many cannot afford a $120 game, more often; their parents also are not in possession of such spending sprees, which makes the pre-owned game market an essential part to cater for a sizeable chunk of these consumers.

The second issue is the one that we see evolving now.

I was confronted with this almost two weeks ago, but something about the list of changes seemed so horrifying that I decided not to upgrade. This is still evolving and there are genuine concerns. Yet, what is the actual truth?

If we look at the Bull (at http://thebull.cbslocal.com/2014/08/07/facebook-crosses-the-line-with-new-facebook-messenger-app/) we see the following:

  • Facebook can change or alter your connection to the Internet or cell service without telling you.
  • Facebook can send text messages to your contacts on your behalf.
  • Facebook can record audio, and take pictures and videos, at any time
  • Facebook can read your phone’s call log, including info about incoming and outgoing calls
  • Facebook can read your contact data, including who you call and email and how often
  • Facebook can read personal profile information stored on your device
  • Facebook can get a list of accounts known by the phone, or other apps you use, it can connect all your accounts and Intel together.

It is in part the worry I had when I was looking through the rights I had to agree to when installing the Facebook Messenger app, which I decided against. If I lose my messenger history, so be it!

If we consider the Sydney Morning Herald (at http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/smartphone-apps/facebook-is-forcing-messenger-app-on-users-and-they-arent-happy-about-it-20140729-zycfb.html), we see the following quote “CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed during last week’s earnings call that the company eventually wants to monetise Messenger and the app will eventually ‘overlap’ with payments, though, as TechCrunch notes, he acknowledged the company still has a lot of work to do before users will see payments cropping up in the app“. It is fair enough that people will get to pay at some point. At that point people can return to the old Yahoo Messenger, which has forever been free!

My issue here is that there is a lot more visibility here, yet why this is not the lead with every news channel as this affects BILLIONS of people is also a little beyond me.

There is of course the other side. Is what ‘the Bull’ stated true? I am not stating that they were lying, but the android permissions are at times a little out there. This view is actually reinforced by CNBC (at http://www.cnbc.com/id/101911170).

The confusion seems to have stemmed from Android. “The app when you install it, it explains in a list what it needs permission to do, and this is the list that frightened a lot people initially,’ Simons said. ‘That doesn’t mean it sort of willy nilly goes about contacting friends or recording you as you go about your day using your phone camera,’ he added.”

I cannot disagree with this view, yet the truth is that just like with Sony, we agreed on something, we made a binding pact and that what is and that what could be are now intertwined and as such it is not about handholding, it is about clarity! When Big Business forces you the consumer, they will be precise (example: ‘we hereby charge you $11,732.34 to be deposited within the next 10 days‘). Yet when they would like something from you, they hide in ambiguity (example: ‘we can change all your savings into a fortune, deposit all today and the larger returns could be yours quite soon’). So, how large a deposit, how much larger, how soon? These answers would not be forthcoming until AFTER the deposit I reckon.

So where do we stand?

When we consider the issues that have plagued the tech savvy population, like the TPP, Sony, even government spending seems to be missing on the glasses of those ‘considering’ themselves to be Journalists. Another bash of that seems to have missed the larger view in news (at http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2014/08/05/federal-spending-transparency-money-missing/13485581/).

The first quote is “the data that does exist is wildly inaccurate, according to the Government Accountability Office, which looked at 2012 spending data. Only 2% to 7% of spending data on USASpending.gov is ‘fully consistent with agencies records,’ according to the report“, which makes me wonder who is keeping track of the deficit and how much larger could it be?

The second one is “The Department of Health and Human Services failed to report nearly $544 billion, mostly in direct assistance programs like Medicare. The department admitted that it should have reported aggregate numbers of spending on those programs“, which reads like, if we aggregate numbers, you are less likely to find anything and we can hide it under a total header. Failing to report on half a trillion is a big thing, it is well over $1000 for every resident in America.

So, does that mean that the deficit of the US is a lot larger? That would indeed be news as it would put the US in a peculiar financial position, or better a position they no longer hold. I am not stating that I am right or that I am wrong (both are an option). It seems that the papers and newscasts we get bombarded with every day seem to become more and more selective on what they consider important. One article affecting 80 million (the combined population of Australia and the UK) as well as the new issue which hits over a billion people does not seems to be important. The last news of last week is one that does bear scrutiny, yet to get something from USA Today and not the Guardian or any of the Australian news bringers does pose questions.

The Facebook issue will hit us for some time and it might result in something different. The issue linked to this is whether Android has a registration system that bears scrutiny. Android has its own faults (also not too overly reported on by journalists) and just pointing the finger at Facebook is also not entirely the right thing to do.

There is also the difference on what some will do and what some could do. It is the ambiguity that is slowly getting to more and more people.

So what should the journalists be doing and what should Facebook not be doing?

 

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October 22, 2013 · 22:28

Patrons of Al-Qaeda

Many people have some form of religion, which is fine. To have a personal believe in something that is bigger than yourself or bigger then that what you see is not a bad thing. Many Christians have their father, their son and their holy ghost. Some go the other way and give credence to Satan, the anti-Christ and the false prophet. I cannot vouch for any of that. I agree that there is more than this in the universe, but what?

No matter how that part falls, it is likely that Al-Qaeda believes in their personal ‘information’ trinity.

They would be Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning and Julian Assange. These three people have done more to support Al-Qaeda then Osama Bin Laden ever could.

Assange, who is still hiding in an embassy, is the lowest transgressor of the three. First of all, as an Australian he did not really break any laws (although some debate should be had over hindering the actions of an ally under war time conditions). The public view is that on one side he should be nailed to a cross and on the other side he should be heralded. Information is often a lot more complex than many consider. If you want an example, you only need to look at this week’s situation where Assad is now blocking peace talks. Should there be any surprise?

I still am not completely convinced he was directly involved with the Sarin attacks; the issue here is that too much intelligence is questionable. If the USA had shown ALL OF IT publicly, the doubt might not have been there. Yet, the reality is whether they actually had hard evidence on who did it. Let us not forget that the evidence collected in the investigation was all about whether it had happened, not who did it. And guess what, Al-Qaeda was an element in Syria too, so what exactly did happen? Watching Secretary of State John Kerry go on a plane with his briefcase, shown on the news like he is some kind of rock star is not helping anyone either. It seemed as empty to me as a PowerPoint on some concept that no one wants to spend money on.

It shows two possible sides, either they have actual evidence that needs to remain a secret (which no one seemed to be accepting), or they actually didn’t have any and we were watching some version of the Punch and Judy show!

The other side is one that Assange was not into, the acts of terrorism by Al-Qaeda and the Taliban were not shown, we saw through WikiLeaks just one side of it and it changed the overall balance.

Then WikiLeaks released thousands of diplomatic cables, which I consider to be an act of utter stupidity, the information was one-sided, so the US opposition (all of them) get several free punches into play and as such, US recovery is still being hindered. This is the ‘bad’ side of Julian Assange. Their one sided act destabilised many events. Yes, there is a case to be made, but by not exposing the other side, we get a one-sided situation. In the end, the damage is done and even as there might not be any criminal activity by Julian Assange, we should ask questions.

In case the reader thinks that ‘actions’ against Julian Assange should be made, then consider that many in the financial industry did nothing ‘criminals’ either, even though thousands became homeless because of their ‘non-criminal’ actions.

By the way, remember the quote by CNBC (and many others), somewhere in 2010: “WikiLeaks honcho Julian Assange told Andy Greenberg at Forbes that he was in possession of a trove of documents that ‘could take down a bank or two.’ The documents wouldn’t necessarily show illegality but they would reveal an ‘ecosystem of corruption’ at one of the biggest banks in the United States. WikiLeaks would release it ‘early next year.’”

They never came! So was this about intelligence, or about positioning banks in an even stronger place? Is it not interesting that Al-Qaeda’s patron number three and number one patron are all about neutering governments, whilst the banks stay out of play? Is it such a far fetching thought that these two idealists get played by those who believe greed is all?

In the middle we see Bradley Manning. This is not some ‘foreigner’; this was a member of the US military. In my view, he is a traitor plain and simple. A private, without any in depth education thought he had it all figured out, decides on US military policy. Which is interesting as many military members above the rank of Colonel are still trying to figure out what the best course of action is, even those with Ivy League degrees. The only positive thing from all this is that the military needs to seriously start to address its mental health issues, but beyond that small sparkle of recognition, this person was more than a small danger.

That part is not addressed even as the news still discusses the winner of this unholy threesome. Three days ago USA today published information on the fact that anti-leak software had still not been installed. I think it is even worse than many think it is. Some of these applications have (as any good application would) powerful log files. Even when we look at non-military solutions we see the following:

“The client’s log file is located at <user_directory>/Palantir/<version>/logs/client.log”

We can see at Palantir’s wiki what it logs, and depending on the settings it can give a lot (at https://wiki.palantir.com/pgkb/does-the-palantir-product-do-any-logging.html)

By the way, one needed only to change three settings to really log a lot:

# log4j.logger.com.palantir.services=error # package level
# log4j.logger.com.palantir.serveres.Nexus=warn # class level
# log4j.logger.MyLabeledLogger=info # specific logger

Removing ‘# ‘ on each line was all it would take.

This one warning gives a final view “Note that we do NOT recommend enabling logging below the warn level for production scenarios.” which means that all logging is possible mapping out the active military network in real time as the user muddles along.

This is not about Palantir, or even anti-Palantir. It is a software solution that part of the Intelligence community is currently using. IBM Modeler and SAS Miner are both data mining tools with similar abilities (and there are more). They all have these options as it is needed to make their products go smoothly. So when Bradley Manning gave it all away, he really gave it all away! The consequence might have (or could be resulting) in deep targeted attacks against a military server system. The question becomes how good is the anti-leak software? As many logging is set at higher levels (read administrator), many of them would be able to log events unhindered by many prying eyes (it is not realistic to monitor all logs on even 1 server). Even if it is all covered, who else has access to just read these log files? It is not uncommon to negate log files, as their users are usually vetted for use of the application. LOG files can however show more than many bargain for.

Unless the server architecture has been re-arranged, there is plenty of worry whether these servers are safe at this time, because log files are inherently their and needed, they are not linked to a password change and often, they do not get reconfigured away from their standard configuration as the case has been with plenty of application that it would hinder smooth operations.

Last on the list of the Patron Threesome is Edward Snowden. I have mentioned him often enough, so I will not go through it all again. He is in my view a traitor and not some ‘holier than thou’ protector. He is not some idealist, too much pointed to him making a getaway with the eye on some quick bucks (and many of them), I might be wrong, but that is how I see him. As he showed us how ‘naughty’ the NSA was, did he show us how unscrupulous Microsoft seems to be?

That view can be seen through an article in Techbeat just 4 days ago. The first quote is “Microsoft is developing a new technology to replace cookies. This work is similar to projects being undertaken by Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google. Tracking cookies have come under scrutiny recently from regulators by many concerned about privacy; certain types of cookies (Third party tracking cookies) are now easily blocked through built-in functions and extensions/add-ons within main web browsers.”

The second one from the same article is “This technology should also include Microsoft services including their search engine Bing. Tracking in mobile devices remains a key point. The big advantage of Microsoft’s emerging technology is that it could track a user across a platform.”

So basically, this reads like: ‘we the consumer used to have a little privacy, but soon, thanks to Microsoft, that privacy might be gone forever, allowing for non-stop online harassment wherever we are‘ So, That Snowden fellow never gave us anything on that, did he? Even though the NSA should have been aware of such plans long before Techbeat had a clue. Does the reader still think he is such an idealist?

Yet, on the other side, he has shown one important weakness. The US intelligence branch is on that same low level as the organisation that in the 50’s used to be laughingly referred to as ‘British Intelligence’. The question is not just how weak is the NSA seems to be; it links to questions regarding the weakness that GCHQ and its current Commonwealth peers might have. There are in addition issues with the personal digital safety of people on a global scale. Not because the NSA is scanning to identify terrorist networks, but if one person (Snowden) could get away, is there anyone else who just wanted money and gave their data download to cyber criminals? There is absolute 0% guarantee that this did not happen, so in how much danger are our details?

So, why this blog today? Many do this at the start, but in certain light this had to be done at the very end. It is not just about their acts, but also about the acts you and I undertake. We willingly give out our details to Facebook (including a beheading, but excluding exposed breasts), LinkedIn and Google+, yet many scream about ‘some government‘ seeing what we are doing and who we are doing it with (or without).

The twisted world we allowed to be created is likely to throw us at least two more curve balls before Christmas. Enjoy!

 

 

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