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48 comments:
I'm still a novice when it comes to this whole economics malarkey, but I'm interested to see what happens if a whole raft of these struggling European countries move towards governments that favour debt default over austerity.
Interested to see what happens if this "BRICS bank" comes to fruition, too.
Last night I spoke to a customer of mine in Iceland, who is the Icelandic distributor for Audi. He's doing OK.
Only because the Icelandic people told the IMF and the ECB to go fuck themselves.
I hope other EU countries follow their example.
World economics 101:
Somewhere around about 1971, US Pres Richard Nixon bankrupted America. The gold bullion reserves that had up until then backed by the value of the US dollar were placed on the open market, the majority of the US physical gold reserve was snapped up by India and China. The fact that the United States no longer had sufficient physical gold reserves to validate the amount of paper money in circulation meant United States was in fact bankrupt.
Luckily, about the same time, the US reached an agreement with OPEC that were ever in the world one country would trade with another for the supply of oil, that transaction could only occur in US dollars. This meant that regardless of nationality, all foreign banks were required to hold significant reserves of US dollar currency in order to facilitate Energy Transfers in the form of oil from country to country without exception.
It is through this mechanism and only through this mechanism that the US dollar has retained any viability as the leading currency for international transactions.
This arrangement meant that all foreign banks needed to maintain a high reserve of US dollars at all times in order to meet the country's needs for energy in the form of petroleum products.
This mechanism allowed the United States to maintain an artificially high value for the US dollar for many decades. In effect, it allowed them to unilaterally set the price of oil on a worldwide basis.
Moammar Gaddafi got up one morning and had a really good idea, given that the chairmanship of OPEC would fall to him that year, he found himself in a position to challenge the supremacy of the US dollar in relation to international energy purchases, and proposed that a new currency, based on gold, Called the Gold Dinnar be adopted as the new International Exchange Currency.[Thereby becoming Axis of Evil member number one]. This proposal did not go down particularly well with the US government, if the international banking system were to place their US currency reserves on the open market in order to purchase a new currency backed by hard metal, the value of the US dollar would Plummet.
Saddam Hussein [Axis of Evil Number Two] got up one morning with a great idea. He decided to take the idea a step further, why not sell oil to anyone who asks, in any currency they like. Euros, Rubles, Dollars, Yen. It's all money after all. His major downfall was his decision to transfer all the countries foreign oil exchange accounts on US dollar denominated accounts to Euro denominated accounts. The rest, as they say, is history.
Meanwhile Axis of Evil Member Number Three, North Korea, decided that not only would they change their foreign energy exchange accounts from US dollars to Euros, but would cease trading in US dollars altogether. But unlike the other protagonists in this saga, North Korea has the distinct advantage of being in possession of Nuclear Weapons. The Kim Jong succession lives on.
Having successfully bombed the other major contenders for the US dollars supremacy in international energy trades out of existence, America faces a bit of a PR problem. The only viable threat to the supremacy of the US petrodollar is the euro. But given the fact that Europe is largely populated by white people, bombing them out of existence is really not an option.
Plan B: What if we were to create a bunch of bogus triple A rated Secure Financial instruments and con the Europeans into trading their gold and silver backed currencies into worthless paper US dollars. By the time they worked out what that actually happened, their currencies would be virtually worthless and is not a dammed thing they can do about it. The US dollar reigns supreme.
Fuck me, Mr E. How have they kept this quiet, and how has no one retaliated and how have countries kept being sucked in? Why does everyone scrabble to be America's friend OR worry about saying no to them or both? Surely it's just a case of a few (non-Arab, cause you know, they 'can't be trusted) countries getting together and ganging back up on the US? Is this what Europe tried to do with the EC and if not, why not?
And PS would you fancy joining our tandem read over at my blog? We(me and Alex thus far) are looking at a book called The Trecherous Alliance, we haven't gotten very far mainly because I'm being lazy about it.
Oh! Oh! Mr E! Mr E!
'scuse me, Sir; in World Economics 102, will we be covering the roles, relationships and motivations of the main players of "Plan B"? 'cause, like, I think that'd be really cool 'cause, like, up 'til now I thought it was, like, just a big mess caused by a bunch of unscrupulous pricks with little or no agenda outside of their own enrichment operating within a system of structured chaos.
C'mon, sir, please?
Although I only worked for the Victorian education Department for a very short time, I did learn one thing, why bother actually doing what you are paid for, when you can just to put on a video.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5267640865741878159
Mr E, that video predates the financial collapse and doesn't even mention a US plot to debase European currencies (although it suggest a pattern of behaviour). That's the specific bit I really wanted more info on. Do you know of anything decent that's been written about it? Or any good performance pieces on the subject?
Oh, and here's a blurb on that book that Melbs and I are reading, if you're interested.
Part1
Alex,
The important room thing to remember in all of this, is that unless the hegemony of the US petrodollar is maintained, the United States as a viable nation and a global economic power is totally fucked beyond repair.
The entirely fictional casus belli for the removal of the Saddam Hussein regime, pretty much worked. The country that purports to be a standardbearer of democracy and the rule of law throughout the world, was able through intense media manipulation, was able to decimate a sovereign nation, that posed no threat to the United States in either Economic or Security terms, with total impunity. The fact that their actions caused the death of perhaps 400,000 innocent Iraqi citizens, the creation of roughly 1,000,000 internally displaced persons, with another 1 million persons displaced outside the country and the total destruction of the country's economic infrastructure and even the act of handing over the leader of the country in the middle of the night for extrajudicial and quite brutal execution by his political rivals in direct contravention of numerous international treaties to which the United States is a signatory, was until recently never questioned.
The sole purpose of this action was to send a message to the rest of the world of don't fuck with The Petrodollar. It is worth noting that the United States could not have achieved this outcome without the assistance of NATO allies.
Another major threat to the petrodollar scam was Libya, but in this case America got lucky. The grassroots popular uprising against the until then American supported brutal regime in Egypt was a gift to the furthering of the American agenda in the Middle East. All the United States had to do was betray an ally whose regime that they had supported for many years, and portrayed in the media as a victory for democracy, describing it in prosaic terms like is "Arab Spring".
With the success of the so-called "Arab Spring" in Egypt, the way was clear for a similar "uprising of democracy" in Libya.
Moammar Gadaffi's crimes were manifold, he had sought to challenge the hegemony Of the US Petrodollar and had had the unmitigated gall to create a situation where the income from Libya's Domestic Oil Reserves would be used for the benefit of the Libyan people. Once again, the military wing of the Global Oil Industry, NATO swiftly dealt with the situation. In a freakish coincidence, the sovereign leader of that country also was extrajudicially despatched again in direct contravention of international treaties to which the United States was a signatory.
So at this point, the only remaining major threat to US petrodollar hegemony Is the Euro.
The situation, from the United States perspective is a little tricky.
Part2
While United States was able to convince its NATO allies to obliterate a couple of pesky little countries in the Middle East, populated by a bunch of brown people, who they really didn't care for in any case, the US foreign policy analysts were at a bit of a loss as to how explain to their NATO allies, how, in the interests of democracy worldwide, it would be in their best interests to bomb themselves out of existence. The majority of NATO treaty signatories being European countries and all.
The threat to US petrodollar hegemony only exists while the Euro exists. The Euro is the basis of the European Monetary Union, so to achieve its objective the United States has not had to destroy Europe. All they need to do Is Destroy the Euro, and the dissolution of the European Economic Community as a trading bloc, must naturally follow.
I personally believe that the United States has deliberately engineered the bankruptcy of the EU as a matter of foreign policy.
Imagine the surprise of the German people when they woke up one morning and learned that 85% of their national gold bullion reserves, which underwrite the paper currency of Europe's only remaining industrial powerhouse, are not physically located on German territory but are instead held in a bank in New York, have not been physically audited in 18 months and at the present time nobody seems able to state exactly where the sovereign wealth of one of Europe's richest countries is actually located.
Add to this the fact that as of today, nobody connected with the scam that managed to make a goodly proportion of the world's total wealth disappear as yet to be called to account for their actions. Foreign policy.
I don't usually go for conspiracy theories but you make a compelling case, Mr E.
Ramon, what say you? Are the Americans really THAT clever?
Are the Americans really THAT clever?
No.
The idea that deeply complex social movements dating back decades and involving millions of people that resulted in the Arab Spring is somehow the product of the US is a form of perverse Western narcissism that reduces the Arab people to the role of hapless dupes and puppets.
in this case America got lucky. The grassroots popular uprising against the until then American supported brutal regime in Egypt was a gift to the furthering of the American agenda in the Middle East.
Ramon, I can't see anyplace where Mr E is suggesting the Arab Spring was masterminded by the West.
If he's making anyone out to be dupes, it's the Europeans. And that's still the bit I can't get my head around (thanks for sticking it out, Mr E). I get the stuff about Iraq and Libya and I can see the motivation for dissolving the Euro; but who in the US government, and by what mechanism could they have orchestrate that kind of targeted financial collapse? And more importantly, assuming everything else is true, how could the Europeans have been so badly blind-sided by it?
Alex,
In the wake of the great depression of the 1920s and 30s in the United States, Congress passed a law which became known as the Glass Steagall Act, I think in 1931. In effect of the law created a clear demarcation point between the activities of Savings Banks and those of Investment Banks, preventing Savings Banks from using depositors funds to finance speculative investments or from sharing information regarding the financial affairs of their depositors which would provide the Investment Bankers with privileged information which they can use to their advantage in their investment decisions, most importantly it set a limit on the percentage allowable under fractional reserve lending.
The Glass Steagall Act did a fantastic job of protecting US Private and institutional investors from the more rapacious instincts of the banks. So much so, that over time US stocks and bonds carrying the Triple A rating was seen in the worldwide market as one of the more secure long-term investments available, second only to hard metal bullion.
Things went along pretty smoothly until 1991, when President Clinton as a negotiating concession to his Republican rivals signed into law a Republican sponsored bill repealing the Glass Steagall act of 1931. This was the seminal act in the current global financial crisis. The banks were now free to merge commercial and investment banks, and pretty much do whatever the hell they liked with their depositors funds, including making substantial cash donations to ensure that the "right people" were elected to Congress.
The US Banking Industry now had the two things that it needed most, an obscenely relaxed regulatory environment and the best government money can buy.
Barack Obama spent $760 million on his campaign to be elected President. The greater proportion of that money was donated by guess who? The Banking Industry. Current estimates would suggest that by November this year the cost of getting Obama re-elected will be somewhere in the vicinity of US$1.2 billion. The disastrous ruling by the US Supreme Court in the Citizens United case which gave US corporations the same first Amendment free speech entitlements as flesh and blood American citizens, not only allows US corporations to make donations of unlimited funds to their chosen candidate, they can now do so without any legal requirement to declare their interest publicly.
So as a result, the real power in the United States is not held by either the executive branch or by Congress, it is held by Exxon, Citibank, Haliburton, JP Morgan, Bank of America, Lockheed Martin and the list goes on. With no one in Washington willing to risk upsetting their paymasters, it's party time!
Give mortgages to anyone with a pulse. No need to worry about their ability to repay the loan because in the end that will be somebody else's problem. Goldman Sachs bundles a bunch of worthless mortgage-backed securities, throws in a couple of genuine Triple-A rated securities, then pays their friends over at Moody's or Standard and Poor's a healthy commission to rate the entire bundle as Triple-A, sells the whole package to the first sucker that comes along, could be anybody, maybe it's a union pension fund or maybe if they're really lucky its the fucking Greek Treasury or the Bank of England. Who cares?
We got their Euros, they got a wad of worthless paper. All good. The only thing left to do is to buy a 70 to 1 leveraged put option on the transaction so that when the deal goes bad, we make another billion on the side.
From the point of view of the European institutional investor, what could possibly go wrong? These are US backed, collateralised mortgage securities that have been independently rated triple-A by Standard and Poor's for God's sake! What could possibly go wrong?
Welcome to the wonderful world of weaponised debt!
Again, thanks for your patience Mr E. So, most of what you said in your last comment I've heard before and think I grasp reasonably well -- banks paying politicians to remove regulations so they can operate like crooked casinos -- that's what I meant by unscrupulous pricks operating within a system of structured chaos. But how, where, and when does this intersect America's agenda of keeping oil trading in greenbacks to become a pre-meditated strike on the Euro? Is this what Clinton was looking to when he repealed Glass Steagall? Was JP Morgan planning on bombing Europe on behest of the government from the very beginning? What am I missing?
Hi Alex,
In a lot of ways I suspect that this didn't start out as a premeditated strike on the Euro. The United States regulators have known about the criminal practices of the major banks for years and have done nothing about for the reasons stated above. The individuals in effective control really couldn't care less if a couple of million peoples pension fund disappeared in the smoke or if they bankrupted whole cities. Somebody else's problem.
Sure, the US economy would take a hit, but it would recover quickly, just fire up the printing presses for another round of quantitative easing, and everything will be fine for them, it's only the actual people will suffer, but they will manage somehow. Or not.
I think at some point a decision was taken somewhere by somebody to ramp this scam up to a new level, why mess around ripping off pension funds and municipal treasuries, when it would work equally well with sovereign nations?
Get their colleagues in the "City" of London to join the scam, there are not part of the euro zone and can print currency at will to cover any possible domestic complications. Then just let it play out.
Publicly express your concern, but do nothing.
It's going to be really interesting to see what comes out of the meetings being held in Chicago at the moment. If they allow Greece to exit the euro zone then what about Spain, Italy Portugal. Belgium is financially rooted, France is not far behind it and we're not at all sure about Germany. Perhaps Poland or Romania will step in and save the day. My guess would be that the United States will not come to the aid of the Greeks, particularly given the size of the oil reserves that they just discovered in Greek territorial waters.
Keep your eye on the JP Morgan stock price if anybody has the cash and the balls to short sell Morgan stock, financially, it's the end of the world.
A few points:
1) The US has the advantage that other countries are forced to trade in Greenbacks; but doesn't the UK run the risk of hyper-inflation if it gets into a situation where it needs to print a lot of money? If not, why not?
2) I have heard it said that the viability of Germany (and to some degree France) depends largely on whether or not Greece, Spain, Portugal et al follow the path of austerity or decide to pull an Iceland. Thoughts?
3) I hear Max Keiser ranting perpetually about destroying JP Morgan and the US dollar by buying precious metals. Is there any validity to his ramblings or is he merely a counter-cultural reflection of Andrew Bolt?
1) The US has the advantage that other countries are forced to trade in Greenbacks; but doesn't the UK run the risk of hyper-inflation if it gets into a situation where it needs to print a lot of money? If not, why not?
Because as a result of their arrangement with OPEC the United States is able to externalise the impact of its fiscal policy.
The UK can't.
Compare price at the pump of Petrol in Australia, the UK and the United States. Every gallon of gasoline that is pumped in the United States is being subsidised by the rest of the world. The rest of the world pays for its energy in hard cash, the United States pays with debt.
2) I have heard it said that the viability of Germany (and to some degree France) depends largely on whether or not Greece, Spain, Portugal et al follow the path of austerity or decide to pull an Iceland. Thoughts?
All the proposals offered by the ECB and the German government are aimed at bailing out the banking system of the stricken nations. Nothing has been proposed thus far that would actually help the people of the country. Why the hell would the people except harsh austerity measures that affect their day to day life in order to secure the profitability of an now indisputably corrupt banking system, the occupy Wall Street Movement is just the start. Think French Revolution.
3) I hear Max Keiser ranting perpetually about destroying JP Morgan and the US dollar by buying precious metals. Is there any validity to his ramblings or is he merely a counter-cultural reflection of Andrew Bolt?
The problem with Max is that he is in his heart, a conspiracy theorist.
I watch his show on RT most days, but feel that the quality of journalism on the show would be greatly improved if he were to maybe go easy on the Crystal Meth for a day or so. In a lot of ways, he is an important voice in the world of finance, purely because he is willing to go on record highlighting the criminal fraud taking place within the banking industry.
I think his thoughts on buying precious-metals rather than having cash in a bank account, at near enough to zero interest rates is spot on. I purchased 26 ounces of gold and 14 ounces of Silver a couple of years back, and financially, I have no regrets.
Questions cont'd:
1) Earlier, you said: "Get their colleagues in the "City" of London to join the scam, there are not part of the euro zone and can print currency at will to cover any possible domestic complications. Then just let it play out." My question was, if the UK is operating without the safety net that America enjoys, why would they be so blase about the possibility of having to print money?
2) Does a European revolution necessarily mean the end of the Euro and if so, doesn't that play into the hands of the US as previously discussed?
3) No, actually I think that pretty much covers it. Even though trying to imagine Max without the meth seems kind of like trying to imagine G rated porn or something.
Even though trying to imagine Max without the meth seems kind of like trying to imagine G rated porn or something.
Alex,
The biggest problem in all of this is that the broadcast media are not telling us the truth.
Max Keiser, for all his faults, at least presents what he believes to be the truth. He is completely off his tits most of the time but at the least he is trying. Unfortunately, this program only screens on RT. Nobody in the all-important over 65 gullible old Conservative cunt demographic in the United States would ever see his program. And they are the people who vote. The United States holds its elections on Tuesday when most people are at work, the only people that can spare the time to queue up to vote are a bunch of geriatric old fucks with absolutely zero information about the real issues and too much time on their hands to not think about them.
The level of political discourse and journalism in the United States is aimed at people with the intellectual capacity of an 8 to 12-year-old and the attention span of a goldfish. These people are Murdoch's Fox News audience and are in a very big way responsible for the chaos in the world today.
Below are three links to what in a perfect or even near perfect world would pass for financial journalism. What a shame they come from a comedy program rather than a serious news outlet.
Part1
Part2
Part3
It seems to be the great irony of the American TV news industry -- that a show designed to poke fun at TV news is often the most credible source of news on TV.
But I think there's also something quite interesting about what you say in regards to the voting public. In the kind of democratic/consumer-based country like we have here and the US, the dire state of the media/politics/etc becomes a pretty pitiful reflection of us as a free populace.
Society is hard, I suppose. Or maybe it's just that people are crap?
Mr E, I think it's a bit of a shame that you deleted that last comment. To a fair degree, I share those sentiments and even mentioned it to Melba a week or two ago. People get busy, get involved in other things, lose interest, move on and whatnot -- it happens everywhere, I guess; but yeah, I've noticed. It's a pity we don't have the big Perseus/Boogeyman battles anymore, but I'm hopeful that things will pick up again at some point. After all, what's life without hope, 'ey.
Oh, and if it helps at all, I can call you a cunt any time you like. Just putting the offer on the table, y'know.
Hey, are you much of a Eurovision fan, Mr E? What's your take on the brouhaha over the preparation for this year's big technophonic tugfest and related human-rights violations?
Alex,
I'm an atheist and therefore don't believe in hell, but if I did, my ultimate vision of hell would be a large empty room apart from a large number of comfy settees surrounded on all sides by huge plasma screens running the Eurovision song contest over and over and over and over and over again. On arrival in said room, the guests would be presented with a large glass of just slightly too warm Budweiser Light, the glass would have magical properties in that each time you took a sip, it would instantly refill itself. And so it would go, for all eternity, Eurovision and warm Budweiser Light . Except of course a Sunday night, which is movie night when such cinematic giants as Ishtar and Waterworld would be screened on a continuous basis accompanied by yet more slightly too warm Budweiser Light.
The last time I actually watched the Eurovision song contest, I was staying at a moderately priced hotel in Basel Switzerland, having just spent two weeks as a guest artist at Electronic Arts Festival in Austria followed by a week at the Wagner Festival in Bayreuth Germany, by which time I was so desperate to hear spoken English, I would have watched anything. I would happily cheer lead the collapse Of the Euro as a currency, all the EU as an entity, on the condition that the Eurovision song contest went with it.
Just out of curiosity, what year was that?
Actually, apart from the Bud, your description of hell sounds about like what I usually do to relax (only with the ratio of Eurovsion to movies reversed by a factor of fifty).
So anyway, no thoughts on the western media's sudden and no doubt fleeting interest in the forcible displacement of Azerbaijani citizenry in order to accommodate the tenth level of Discharge's inferno? I thought I might learn something, since you're obviously far more familiar with that part of the world than I.
Hell is the (enclosed) Fremantle Leisure Centre in summer. 50 C and one million shrieking kids whose parents obviously do not care if they want to somersault backwards 1mm from edge of pool. I try and read during lessons and other people's kids actually drip on The Iliad. Unbelievable!
Hell is the (enclosed) Fremantle Leisure Centre in summer.
Can you at least get a beer there, Squib?
If you can, I guess it'd explain why none of the parents are concerned with what their kids are doing.
I'm not sure what my personal vision of hell involves but I'm fairly certain that at some point Scott Morrison would show up in a frilly torsolette and perform a four hour cabaret rendition of Mambo #5.
Alex,
I'm really glad that the Azeri people have had their day in the sun and were able to use the opportunity of the song contest to focus, albeit briefly the world's attention on the ongoing civil rights cluster fuck in their country. But as with all these kind major international events where the government does everything in its power to present a shiny, sanitised image to the world, whether it be a song contest, Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games or whatever, in the greater scheme of things nothing will change.
We are dealing here with a totally corrupt police state ruled over by a brutal dictatorial regime who in itself are ruled by yet another even more brutal dictatorial regime namely British Petroleum. I had dubious honour of having both the Azeri Government and British Petroleum Caspian Sea Division as clients a couple of years ago, total unmitigated cunts to a man.
I'd like to hope that the publicity gained during the song contest would produce some lasting benefit to the Azeri people, but I know it won't.
Despite what Mr E claims, hell cannot, by definition, have any beer
Squib.
I can only assume, giving your most recent post, that you are totally unfamiliar with Budweiser Light. If you would care to provide me with a mailing address for your good self to my e-mail, I will happily purchase and send you a sixpack of Budweiser Light and the thermometer. On receipt of the above, you should serve it to a select group of sorta friends, i.e. people who you wouldn't give a flying fuck if you never see again, at the optimum slightly too warm temperature of between eight and twelve degrees centigrade.
After which you can send me a formal apology by return e-mail and publish a post retracting your previous post.
Where's Melbs?
Hi Mr E I'm here. Trying to work out what hell for me would be.
Still thinking. Maybe being blind? I can't come up with anything funny. Or being trapped at an endless dinner party with boring people. No wine?
Warm beer is grouse. I have not tried Budweiser Light. My fave beer is Redback with two little wedges of lemon. They have to be little because I have to get them back out and eat them when I've finished. Mr E. would you like to send me 6 Redback?
Any type of light beer is ridiculous. What's the point. Just don't drink. I'd rather be stone cold sober than drink a fucking light beer.
Happy Friday night all, and go Cats.
So why are the west so interested in Syria now? I mean, they're not a major oil producing nation and, after Afghanistan, they can't be expecting to plop a democracy into place there. So what then?
Any type of light beer is ridiculous. What's the point. Just don't drink. I'd rather be stone cold sober than drink a fucking light beer.
I used to feel this way; but, believe it or not, after actually being stone cold sober for a few years, I really started to miss the taste of beer (and whiskey). For New Year's, I got some of that I-can't-believe-it's-not-beer stuff that Coopers sells in the lolly-water aisle of the supermarket now. It didn't taste like really good beer, but it was close enough. And considering how the rest of the night went, it was pretty much the highlight.
I was lying in bed last night, thinking about what's going on in the financial markets at the moment; and this thought came to me:
The BRICS countries have been talking about starting their own world bank that doesn't use the US dollar; the other day China and Japan announced that they're no longer going to be using the US dollar for their trade; and Mr E, you were saying that a number of oil producing countries have been (attempting) moving away from the US dollar as well. Now, assuming that everything else you said is correct, and the world does steadily move away from the US dollar, and the value of the US dollar and, subsequently, the US economy collapses; you're going to have a very large country, with a very large sense of entitlement, a very very large military, and a corrupt government that (on one side, at least) seems to have found its niche peddling a message of fear and outrage to a constituency of uneducated religious fundamentalist.
Am I right about this? I hope not, because that all seems a bit scary, doesn't it?
Hi Alex,
Basically, the situation on I see it, and I have to say at this point that I am not in any way an expert in this field, but all of the assertions that I have made in this thread, are based on what I truly believe based on the evidence.
All the evidence points to the fact that American dollar created out of thin air, without the backing of hard metal beit either gold or silver is no longer sustainable. At the present time there is not enough gold bullion on the planet to pay off the international debt the United States of America has been clocking up in 1972, let alone the interest accruing.
At some point the rest of the world has to say to the people of America, "No More", the United States has been living way beyond its means for over three decades, and I'm afraid the time has come where they have to face the reality of the situation. At the highest levels they know this, but in order to preserve their power, the people have to be kept in the dark about this. Everything is fine, nothing to see here, move along.
I firmly believe that what we are witnessing now is the beginning of the end of the US empire. It is simply not possible to sustain the facade of the US dollars value as a currency worthy of its position as the default currency for international exchange.
All of the efforts going on at the present time, are simply an attempt to postpone the inevitable. At some point the dollar must crash. It won't be pleasant for anybody, but it has to happen, sooner rather than later, in order for the world's financial markets to get back to something approaching reality.
Sleep well, E.
I shall try, Mr E. Thank you kindly.
Hey Alex,
Wow, forty posts without involving a discussion of Perseus' sexlife.
Wanna do Palestine next?
Maybe some of the regular members here might have an opinion on that.
There's always hope....
Sounds real good to me Mr E. I actually wanted to ask you for a history lesson on Syria and Lebanon, but was worried that you might've been finding the conversation a little tiresome.
Oh, and Jordan too. I know so little about Jordan that I didn't even think to mention it.
Also, what do you know about the African continent? A discussion for a later time, perhaps?
Wanna do Palestine next?
For the love of God, no!!
Mr E Palestine has been done, as you might know, over at mine in oh around 2009. If you go here http://melbgirltakeonthings.blogspot.com.au/2009_01_01_archive.html and scroll down to Jan 14 and Jan 13 and read the comments, you will find a treasure trove of old commenters' gold. Or should that be commenters' old gold?
God my blog used to be good.
The US Banking Industry now had the two things that it needed most, an obscenely relaxed regulatory environment and the best government money can buy.
Lo and behold, if old Jon wasn't talking about exactly this last week; after Jamie Dimon faced a full-forced arse-licking from a senate comity upon annoncing some very large losses.
Doesn't seem to be too much discussion from Bloomberg & Co about it though.
Doesn't seem to be too much discussion from Bloomberg & Co about it though
Alex,
Why would Bloomberg have anything to say about Jamie Dimons all-star Washington bidet.
Michael Bloomberg is an ex-Wall Street multi-billionaire whose company is in the business of selling information to the Wall Street traders. It was as a result of their financial backing and influence that he got to be Mayor of New York. This is the guy who a few years back financed the scandal that removed Elliott Spitzer from the New York Governors mansion, when Spitzer started publicly expressing concerns about the shenanigans going on 0n Wall Street even then.
Thom Hartmann did a really good show on this here.
I saw that, Mr E; and I've noticed that just about all of RT's programs have had it as a major point of discussion.
I would have thought that a major financial news channel would have at least considered it a minor point of discussion.
Obviously I still have a lot to learn about just how small the world really is.
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