fnord

If your response is “helping, of course!”, I have to ask: Are you sure? I was, but it turns out I was wrong. And evidence suggests I’m not alone.

Anyone who thinks the USSA gov—and govs the world around—don’t massage their statistics in some way must have a photo of themselves in the dictionary under “naïve”. Of late, some knowledgeable folks have been looking with suspicion at the unemployment figures, and with very good reason.

But for those of us who aren’t interested in the intricacies of the birth–death model, a video has been made to help sort out how our beneficent state currently defines “unemployed”:

(Or, watch it at YouTube if you prefer)

This is quite accurate, including the statistic cited at the end. At least as far as gov numbers go ...

That’s the claim of a recent Economist article, titled The Ungovernable State. While I agree with the author(s) somewhat (not knowing the details of California’s constitution nor governance systems, I’m trusting that the information in the article is at least nominally accurate), at a fundamental level California is not alone.

It can be very tempting—especially for those just testing the waters of political resistance in support of freedom—after considering the tangle of laws and regulations, the penalties for violating them, and those who serve the state in administering and enforcing them, to rethink one’s course. I can understand the urge to back down, to some degree: trying to conceptualize all of that sprawling power is daunting; and between steady streams of bad news [thanks, Joel] and stories of thug brutality both neophytes and seasoned activists might find it hard to draw a deep breath, and summon the will for another round. I don’t mean to play Pollyanna here, nor to pretend that such treatment only happens in other places, and to other people—but it is vitally important to understand that when we adopt this perspective of the state and its agents, we are too often falling right into their hands.

Oh, this just cracks me up.

I dunno if he meant it as such, but that’s what came to mind when I began reading an essay brought to my attention by The Endervidual. Let It Die seems a worthy counterpoint to at least some of NonEntity’s Synthesis.

Sorry, Peter ... I admire your stance and have tried to adopt it myself, but I do not have sufficient discipline for it. However, I offer this ramble within his “practicalities” context, because the implications of those statistics and their rippling effects are not often deeply considered.

The Washington Post has oh-so-helpfully laid out how the stimulus bill—now waiting for the thief-in-chief’s signature—divvies up the spoils, in a five-page article How Will the Government Stimulus Plan Affect You?. Five pages sounds like a lot, but each page is fairly short. Personally, I like David Gross’ take on it: “Congress has decided to play double-or-nothing with our money in an attempt to get the economy reinflated ...”

At the risk of offending more friends via quibbles over words, I must confess that the carelessness with which the word “all” is used, or implied, wearies me. Seeing many freedom-oriented individuals—who, it seems logical to think, really should know better—do so therefore calls into question for me their willingness to think deeply before writing, and/or to write precisely.

Brought to you by Peter, whose post Santa the Spy reminded me of yet another Ray Stevens classic:

(direct link to the vid on YouTube)

O’course, Lobo and I never filled the snolfs’ heads with the Santa myth ... and now that they’re old enough, they see the snooping, nannying connection between “Santa” and the state. They don’t care much for either one. :-D

Just sat down to enjoy my coffee—a little late this morning after a very pleasant, but long day with family yesterday, but I figure I’ll say more about that at some point, preferably with pictures as well—and made the misnake of perusing the Reuters headlines. So ... I’m gonna vent a little so that the chocolates I’ll be starting in just a few minutes don’t have a bitter taste to them.

I think pretty much everybody who’s given any attention to recent economic news knows where Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson worked before climbing into the govcart; similarly, they also know that his bail– financial fascism tsar is also from that company. The ties between Goldman Sachs and the Treasury go deeper than that, however. Keeping the cozy relationship in mind, and heralding the Brave New World unfolding before us, I humbly submit a more fitting name for the currency: the Sachson.

It seems fitting, in more ways than the obvious one.

Costa Rica:
Arenal Kayaks – kayaking tours and more; trusted individual with whom I have done business and been highly satisfied

USSA:
Cat’s Curiosities – Cat Farmer, Las Vegas; online bookstore and physical shop in NV; trusted individual whom I have met in person; have not done business with yet
Jill of Many Trades – Mama Liberty [email to myeft_coach at yahoo.com], Wyoming; offers EFT and other energy therapy coaching, either in person or via email and/or telephone; teaches several levels of handgun classes & is NRA certified instructor; retired nurse and knowledgeable herbalist; trusted individual whom I have met in person many times, and have done business with and been highly satisfied
Mailable Art – “A. Subset”, mobile; individual I have met in person, briefly; have not yet done business with
The Marksman’s Box – Gene McCarron, Wyoming; individual I have met in person, briefly; also vouched for by Mama Liberty; have not done business with yet
Restored Spirit Arts – jewelry, including custom made jewelry; trusted individual with whom I have done business and been very satisfied
Richardson and Bluhm – Warren Bluhm and B. W. Richardson; I have met both, and satisfactorily done business with both; highly trusted individuals
Navigating In the New World – book by Australian Shaun Saunders; individual whom I have known well for years but not yet met in person; highly trusted
J. Smith books – Jon [email to j-wyant at austin.rr.com], Fredericksburg, Texas; he’s also near completion of massage therapy training and will accept clients for cash, gold, silver, or barter, fees dependent upon session length and distance to come to you; trusted individual with whom I have successfully bartered
Sunni’s Caramels – me, WA (north of Seattle, south of Bellingham); homemade caramels, truffles, and other treats; special orders welcome; can make gluten-free chocolate cakes, cheesecakes, and regular cakes, pies, etc. for local pickup or delivery
Sunni’s Salon – Tom Ender and me; Amazon and other bookseller’s affiliate sales; Salon Payola guarantees a review; I will review books, music, movies for other sites for a fee [barter welcome]; I am also available as a ghostwriter or copy editor
Vera Verba – Sean Hastings and Paul Rosenberg; book publisher and seller (print and online, although the entire catalog is not currently available online); t-shirts also available; I have met Paul in person multiple times and have a great deal of trust in him; have not yet done business with VV

If you want to be included on this list, please send me an email [either my first name at this domain or sunni.snake at Gmail; sending to both is a good hedge against the email demons that have been intermittently bothering me] with “Agora” somewhere in the subject line. Please include a link to your web site, if you have one, or an eddress; your business(es), general location, especially if important to your work; payment form(s) accepted; and if I do not know you, two pro-freedom references I can contact to vouch for you.

That’s what I consider a more reality-oriented headline for the New York Times article, Congressional Leaders Stunned by Warnings. Some excerpts from throughout the article [links omitted, all emphasis mine]:

It was a room full of people who rarely hold their tongues. But as the Fed chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, laid out the potentially devastating ramifications of the financial crisis before congressional leaders on Thursday night, there was a stunned silence at first. ....

As Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and chairman of the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, put it Friday morning on the ABC program “Good Morning America,” the congressional leaders were told “that we’re literally maybe days away from a complete meltdown of our financial system, with all the implications here at home and globally.” ....

“What you heard last evening,” he added, “is one of those rare moments, certainly rare in my experience here, is Democrats and Republicans deciding we need to work together quickly.”

Although Mr. Schumer, Mr. Dodd and other participants declined to repeat precisely what they were told by Mr. Bernanke and Mr. Paulson, they said the two men described the financial system as effectively bound in a knot that was being pulled tighter and tighter by the day.

“You have the credit lines in America, which are the lifeblood of the economy, frozen.” Mr. Schumer said. “That hasn’t happened before. It’s a brave new world. You are in uncharted territory, but the one thing you do know is you can’t leave them frozen or the economy will just head south at a rapid rate.” ....

Lawmakers in both parties described the meeting in Ms. Pelosi’s office on Thursday night with Mr. Paulson and Mr. Bernanke as collaborative, and that they were prepared to put politics aside to address the needs of the American people. ....

But it was clear they continued to examine ways to make clear that the government was stepping up not just to help the major financial firms but also to protect the interests of American taxpayers and families by safeguarding their pensions and college savings, and by preventing any further drying up of consumer credit.

I would have hoped that part of that “stunned silence” included these bozos realizing—finally—that no group of individuals, no matter how bright nor how many degrees and pedigrees they bring to the table, can manage all the vast markets that comprise an economy. And really, can we even separate out “economies” that correspond to the imaginary lines on our maps in a meaningful way? With individuals and groups from all over the globe buying property and corporations in the USSA, and of course the importing and exporting that goes on constantly, and foreign investment/support in Treasury instruments and the FRN itself, where does the USSA economy end and another entity’s begin? But such a hope is always in vain, and thus it was revealed yet again that the hubris of the ruling class knows no bounds: more intervention will save us all!

The question is, how? How does one save the taxpayers by stealing even more of their wealth and redistributing it? How does it help them when that process props up the very companies that misrepresented their goods, allowed applicants to lie about assets and then didn’t even bother to check out the lies in approving mortgage loans far beyond their ability to repay? Since when do such crappy businesses deserve to even stay in business, let alone to receive even more corporate welfare? Oh, right: since crony capitalism became synonymous with “free markets” and passed off as what underpins the USSA economy.

I have never claimed to be an economics whiz, but I know enough to realize that shuffling paper around does not inherently add value—yet that was precisely what drove much of the last growth cycle. I also understand that one cannot indefinitely create credit out of thin air; there will be a reckoning when the “assets” that back it are found to be insufficient. And thus, I think that a Mr. Wolfgang Münchau was spot on when he pegged the current crisis as one of solvency, not liquidity—way back in March, no less. People all around the world understand the basics of budgeting and running a household, and successfully resist the temptation to overextend themselves. It is not terribly complicated, except in the heads of central bankers who cannot resist pushing the buttons and pulling the levers; nor in the minds of the politicians who make contradictory promises out of both sides of their mouth without a thought as to who will bear the costs (or how they will be borne).

No matter what action they take, it hurts, because it limits the freedom that markets must have to operate properly. Letting companies that were imprudent and/or unethical fail is the swiftest course out of the mess that’s coming, but we can already see that is not the course the central bankers and politicians will choose. It will be more intervention, more pain, and a very protracted correction that will be far worse than marking everything to market now and clearing the debris. Ma and Pa Main Street do not have lobbyists on the Hill, you know; but the investment bankers, real estate brokers, and other “market sectors” all do.

To all the commentators and “analysts” who are now bemoaning the end of the free market in this country, I can only ask: Where the fuck have you been? There has been no systemic free market here, ever. Even whatever black markets exist are pressured by rules and regulations and their promised punishments in the mainstream marketplace.

What can we do to minimize the coming pain? Being in this country, that’s a very tough question, as we will not be able to avoid the dollar crash that is gathering momentum already. But we can minimize the damage by finding and creating agorist networks, and using them to step outside of the crashing mainstream economic system as much as possible. I’ve been meaning, for far too long now, to create a list of pro-freedom businesses and entrepreneurs; I’ll do my best to get something up before the weekend is out, even if it’s very rudimentary. If you have an agorist business and want to be included on the list, let me know. Other ideas are of course welcome in the comments.

Systems rise, and systems fall. Through it all, enterprising individuals can be amazingly resilient, in part because they stay outside the system and can see and act on trends more nimbly. That kind of activity is what’s needed now, both for enhanced survival and for teaching others what a true, freed market is. The faster we escape from the dog–chasing–its–own–tail pseudo-solutions offered by the federal government, banksters, and others of that ilk, the better.

Many smart people look at the current turmoil in the investment/financial sphere and wrongly conclude, “That won’t affect my savings and investments. My bank is FDIC insured.” It may be; but it turns out, despite all the headlines about the FDIC fund drying up, that the truth is far, far worse: like Social Security, it doesn’t exist.