A most excellent post today at Naked Capitalism
Especially this good thinking by Tom Crowl:
Money is a very difficult concept for most people to understand… and I believe that adds to the confusion.
To the extent that the condition of human society is controllable by humans (in other words barring meteor strikes, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc…
That condition is ENTIRELY dependent on decisions… ENTIRELY!
Individual and group decision operating within the constrainsts of natural law. (literally ALL decisions but like flapping butterfly wings most have negligible effects)
MONEY is a TECHNOLOGY!
That’s the first thing people don’t quite get… and it doesn’t stand in for ’stuff’ though it may seem so…
What it actually does at its root… is impel decision.
Money is a decision technology… and that’s true whether fiat or commodity based… Its roots are SOCIAL. (A hammer you can use by yourself… with money you need at least one other and a whole body of shared belief behind it.
And that’s also why trying to separate economics from politics is not only wrong but very dangerous… it leads to very, very bad social science open to tremendous bias.
Recognizing its root in decision has implications… certainly including. but well beyond the issue of campaign finance… Its also inherently and eternally incapable of functioning perfectly which doesn’t mean we don’t need it… but it needs a wiser approach for repairing the damage when it breaks.
Decision Technologies: Currencies and the Social Contract
BTW, on a slightly different topic… when economic purists talk about ‘markets’ as some perfect mechanism for deciding values…
I’d like to suggest this:
Those that assume that markets establish ‘rational prices’ have to concede that the rationality is bounded by human perceptions of time and its relationship to those values.
Anyone but a complete idiot will realize that EVENTUALLY… oil will be orders of magnitude more expensive. Now that could be in 2 years or 200… but it’ll come.
SO a hypothetical investor with a 1000 year lifespan would likely be buying oil (and helium along with a few other things) and know that he was making a pretty safe bet that somewhere along that line he’d be way, way in the black on his investment…
My only point is to recognize that markets are inadequate mechanisms which cannot be reliably depended on to do the kind of pricing necessary to promote the best human condition longterm.
And until the common political wisdom confronts and will deal with that… we’re essentially screwed.
(This has nothing to do with Left/Right ideological fantasies… it arises out of a seemingly discredited way of looking at things…. PRAGMATISM.)
There are all too many economic arguments made that are ridiculous and should have long ago been over and have no place in honest political discourse (ridiculous things like the Laffer curve, or that the FED is a neutral body w/o a pro bank/financial services bias).
I’ve only been looking at this economics world in any serious way for a couple of years and I know I don’t know a lot… but really… this field is clearly messed-up…
And we’re stuck with an establishment not much interested in looking for real answers.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Saturday, February 26, 2011
The Banking Fractional Reserve Requirement is Zero
Simon Johnson seems to know something about money. He has an something of huge impact to say recently: Geithner's Gamble
"It is a deeply disturbing vision, one that amounts to a huge, uninformed gamble with the future of the American economy – and that suggests that Geithner remains the senior public official worldwide who is most in thrall to the self-serving ideology of big banks."
Disturbing indeed! Geithner is a dangerous man. Karl Denninger, who seems to know something about money and is not hesitant to say it, has much more, less kinder comments about Geithner. That link is just a sample.
I recall recently that Geithner said that the banking reserve ratio should be zero. I don't know much and thought it was 10 percent. It is Zero and has been zero for some time. If he is calling for it to be zero now, what negative number below zero does he really want? A bank's reserve is a hedge against a potential need to pay out to depositors. Banks do not have to do that anymore. The government will do it. To Geithner it makes sense that the banks can therefore have a negative reserve ratio.
Fractional Reserve Banking is a cornerstone of the banking system. Wikipedia is a source knowledge for the unsophisticated. A real economist would scoff at anything it said but it usually gets the basics right.
Wikipedia: Fractional-reserve banking is the banking practice in which only a fraction of a bank's deposits are kept as reserves (cash and other highly liquid assets) available for withdrawal.[1][2][3][4]
Many call fractional reserve banking a fraud. More cautious observers ask if it is a fraud but conclude it is. I think only bankers would defend it.
If a cornerstone of the banking system is not there then it seems to be on shaky ground.
Zero Hedge seems to have its ear to the ground and is good at telling what it hears from other sources. Today it has an article from Tipping Points. Gordon T. Long makes a first and last statement that sandwiches excellent tipping point indicators related in between.
Beginning Statement:
Throughout my 2010 article series "Extend & Pretend" and "Sultans of Swap" I stressed that we were rapidly moving from the Financial Crisis of 2008, through the Economic Fallout of 2009 -2010, towards a Political Crisis in 2011 -2012. We are now clearly beginning to see the early emergence of the final part of this continuum. From North Africa to Wisconsin all are fundamentally based on the single insidious underlying problem - excessive global debt and credit levels.
Ending Statement:
The public will soon wake up to the magnitude of money printing that is going on to support the economic recovery fallacy. When the public does become aware, “Money Velocity” will accelerate. When this happens, the likelihood is that the markets will dramatically rise, not because economic conditions are improving, but rather because of a depreciating US dollar. We believe this expectation is presently being priced into the market. We are truly exposed to the potential of a “Minsky Melt-Up” or more correctly from an Austrian perspective, a Von Mises “Crack-up Boom”.
The risks are presently towards a SHORT TERM corrective consolidation. The Intermediate Term calls for higher market highs into June 2011 - then it gets ugly - fast!
"It is a deeply disturbing vision, one that amounts to a huge, uninformed gamble with the future of the American economy – and that suggests that Geithner remains the senior public official worldwide who is most in thrall to the self-serving ideology of big banks."
Disturbing indeed! Geithner is a dangerous man. Karl Denninger, who seems to know something about money and is not hesitant to say it, has much more, less kinder comments about Geithner. That link is just a sample.
I recall recently that Geithner said that the banking reserve ratio should be zero. I don't know much and thought it was 10 percent. It is Zero and has been zero for some time. If he is calling for it to be zero now, what negative number below zero does he really want? A bank's reserve is a hedge against a potential need to pay out to depositors. Banks do not have to do that anymore. The government will do it. To Geithner it makes sense that the banks can therefore have a negative reserve ratio.
Fractional Reserve Banking is a cornerstone of the banking system. Wikipedia is a source knowledge for the unsophisticated. A real economist would scoff at anything it said but it usually gets the basics right.
Wikipedia: Fractional-reserve banking is the banking practice in which only a fraction of a bank's deposits are kept as reserves (cash and other highly liquid assets) available for withdrawal.[1][2][3][4]
Many call fractional reserve banking a fraud. More cautious observers ask if it is a fraud but conclude it is. I think only bankers would defend it.
If a cornerstone of the banking system is not there then it seems to be on shaky ground.
Zero Hedge seems to have its ear to the ground and is good at telling what it hears from other sources. Today it has an article from Tipping Points. Gordon T. Long makes a first and last statement that sandwiches excellent tipping point indicators related in between.
Beginning Statement:
Throughout my 2010 article series "Extend & Pretend" and "Sultans of Swap" I stressed that we were rapidly moving from the Financial Crisis of 2008, through the Economic Fallout of 2009 -2010, towards a Political Crisis in 2011 -2012. We are now clearly beginning to see the early emergence of the final part of this continuum. From North Africa to Wisconsin all are fundamentally based on the single insidious underlying problem - excessive global debt and credit levels.
Ending Statement:
The public will soon wake up to the magnitude of money printing that is going on to support the economic recovery fallacy. When the public does become aware, “Money Velocity” will accelerate. When this happens, the likelihood is that the markets will dramatically rise, not because economic conditions are improving, but rather because of a depreciating US dollar. We believe this expectation is presently being priced into the market. We are truly exposed to the potential of a “Minsky Melt-Up” or more correctly from an Austrian perspective, a Von Mises “Crack-up Boom”.
The risks are presently towards a SHORT TERM corrective consolidation. The Intermediate Term calls for higher market highs into June 2011 - then it gets ugly - fast!
Friday, February 25, 2011
Where Money Lives
After getting some idea of what money is and should be what system does it live in once it is born. That is the core Fedwire system for the USA and its related interfacing network systems. For China it is the core National Advanced Payment System and its related interfacing network systems
Regardless of what money does as a medium of exchange, this is where money lives to do its exchange thing. The system where money lives is not going to change much in any event, even a crises in what money does (or fails to do).
People interface with this system, if they have money or not is another matter. A significant change like going from debt money to asset money and abolishing frational reserve banking is not going to significantly change how people view their interface with the money system even if the internals of the the money system operation change substantially.
Ylink is the core system provider to China. Clear2pay is apparently a main provider of interface to the core system.
The fed owns its own Fedwire system. I have no idea yet who the contracting system provider is. The core system has its interfacing providers in the USA.
Regardless of what money does as a medium of exchange, this is where money lives to do its exchange thing. The system where money lives is not going to change much in any event, even a crises in what money does (or fails to do).
People interface with this system, if they have money or not is another matter. A significant change like going from debt money to asset money and abolishing frational reserve banking is not going to significantly change how people view their interface with the money system even if the internals of the the money system operation change substantially.
Ylink is the core system provider to China. Clear2pay is apparently a main provider of interface to the core system.
The fed owns its own Fedwire system. I have no idea yet who the contracting system provider is. The core system has its interfacing providers in the USA.
Real Time Gross Settlement
After all this stumbling around on the internet trying to find out what money is and how is managed as an object I finally found what exists that demonstrates my idea that money (big money at least) ought to be a permanent record on which only the owner changes. That system is called Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) Its basic record is the account holder and money changes between holders. My idea is to make money the basic record (denominated in large amounts like thousands, millions and serialized) and change owners on the X amount denomination record. Seems so obvious just to let money sit in one place and let ownership change among accounts or account change among denominated, serialized chunks of money.
This should have been obvious to me in the beginning. However, I did not know then what I know now.
This is the explanation of RTGS at Wikipedia:
This "electronic" payment system is normally maintained or controlled by the Central Bank of a country. There is no physical exchange of money; the Central Bank makes adjustments in the electronic accounts of Bank A and Bank B, reducing the amount in Bank A's account by $1000 and increasing the amount of Bank B's account by the same.
The RTGS system is suited for low-volume, high-value transactions. It lowers settlement risk, besides giving an accurate picture of an institution's account at any point of time.
Such systems are an alternative to systems of settling transactions at the end of the day, also known as the net settlement system such as BACS. In the net settlement system, all the inter-institution transactions during the day are accumulated. At the end of the day, the accounts of the institutions are adjusted. Extending the example above, say another person deposits a check drawn on Bank B in Bank A for $500. At the end of the day, Bank A will have to "electronically" pay Bank B only $500 ($1000 - $500).
The implementation of RTGS systems by Central Banks throughout the world is driven by the goal to minimize risk in high-value electronic payment settlement systems.
In an RTGS system, transactions are settled across accounts held at a Central Bank on a continuous gross basis. Settlement is immediate, final and irrevocable. Credit risks due to settlement lags are eliminated.
RTGS does not require core banking to be implemented across participating banks, since transactions are direct, with no central processing or clearing operations. Any RTGS employs two sets of queues: one for testing outgoing funds availability on a chronological FIFO basis with the option of prioritizing specific inquiries, while the other queue is for processing debit/credit requests received from the central bank's Integrated Accounting System.
This should have been obvious to me in the beginning. However, I did not know then what I know now.
This is the explanation of RTGS at Wikipedia:
This "electronic" payment system is normally maintained or controlled by the Central Bank of a country. There is no physical exchange of money; the Central Bank makes adjustments in the electronic accounts of Bank A and Bank B, reducing the amount in Bank A's account by $1000 and increasing the amount of Bank B's account by the same.
The RTGS system is suited for low-volume, high-value transactions. It lowers settlement risk, besides giving an accurate picture of an institution's account at any point of time.
Such systems are an alternative to systems of settling transactions at the end of the day, also known as the net settlement system such as BACS. In the net settlement system, all the inter-institution transactions during the day are accumulated. At the end of the day, the accounts of the institutions are adjusted. Extending the example above, say another person deposits a check drawn on Bank B in Bank A for $500. At the end of the day, Bank A will have to "electronically" pay Bank B only $500 ($1000 - $500).
The implementation of RTGS systems by Central Banks throughout the world is driven by the goal to minimize risk in high-value electronic payment settlement systems.
In an RTGS system, transactions are settled across accounts held at a Central Bank on a continuous gross basis. Settlement is immediate, final and irrevocable. Credit risks due to settlement lags are eliminated.
RTGS does not require core banking to be implemented across participating banks, since transactions are direct, with no central processing or clearing operations. Any RTGS employs two sets of queues: one for testing outgoing funds availability on a chronological FIFO basis with the option of prioritizing specific inquiries, while the other queue is for processing debit/credit requests received from the central bank's Integrated Accounting System.
FedComplete
A new suite of services was announced by the Fed called FedComplete.
It is interesting to note that all these money management systems are own by the Fed and users are charged for the services. This is a sideline business for the Fed but I wonder if it is a growing line of business within the Fed. It is essentially a monopoly business although down at the bottom levels there are companies that produce software to integrate with it.
Dealing in a monopoly system to own it and rule it seems to be business model of the Fed.
Making money not only on money but on the system in which it flows.
If the Fed was abolished (not sure exactly what would be abolished except changing debt money to asset money spent into the economy by the government and abolishing fractional reserve) then the money handling system that they own, nationally as well as world wide, is a big line of business that the owners would still hold.
It is interesting to note that all these money management systems are own by the Fed and users are charged for the services. This is a sideline business for the Fed but I wonder if it is a growing line of business within the Fed. It is essentially a monopoly business although down at the bottom levels there are companies that produce software to integrate with it.
Dealing in a monopoly system to own it and rule it seems to be business model of the Fed.
Making money not only on money but on the system in which it flows.
If the Fed was abolished (not sure exactly what would be abolished except changing debt money to asset money spent into the economy by the government and abolishing fractional reserve) then the money handling system that they own, nationally as well as world wide, is a big line of business that the owners would still hold.
Fedwire
I think this is where money is born: Money is created with an entry on a keyboard at the Federal Reserve Bank and given existence as a data entity with a push of the enter button. Where it is conceived, in whose head the amount is determined and the logic process behind the decision is something to think about later.
The purpose here is to explore where the newly created money goes the instant after it is created.
While the Fed gives tours of its gold, paper cash and museum to visitors from Peoria, what I want to do is take the geek tour of where the real action is: The computer system that processes all the digital money.
The computer system that handles money is called Fedwire. Fedwire is only one of a package of system services owned and operated by the Fed and offered on a fee basis to users. Since this a privately owned system of a private bank there is probably little or no detailed documentation describing its total structure, relationships and operation as a computer information system other than reverse engineering from whatever can be found that is generally written about it in various places.
I conclude that at the very instant that money is created at the Fed it is born into the Fedwire system. Where it goes or could go from there would fascinate a geek. The fed has all the documentation describing the sytem from high level view down to programming implementation. It would be a very interesting thing to see. I am sure that it is locked up tighter than the gold or cash they hold.
Fedwire is the Real Time Gross Settlement system of the United States. The systems of other countries are listed at the same link.
The Peoples Bank of China System called China National Advanced Payment System (CNAPS) is their Real Time Gross Settlement system like ours is the Fedwire system.
The purpose here is to explore where the newly created money goes the instant after it is created.
While the Fed gives tours of its gold, paper cash and museum to visitors from Peoria, what I want to do is take the geek tour of where the real action is: The computer system that processes all the digital money.
The computer system that handles money is called Fedwire. Fedwire is only one of a package of system services owned and operated by the Fed and offered on a fee basis to users. Since this a privately owned system of a private bank there is probably little or no detailed documentation describing its total structure, relationships and operation as a computer information system other than reverse engineering from whatever can be found that is generally written about it in various places.
I conclude that at the very instant that money is created at the Fed it is born into the Fedwire system. Where it goes or could go from there would fascinate a geek. The fed has all the documentation describing the sytem from high level view down to programming implementation. It would be a very interesting thing to see. I am sure that it is locked up tighter than the gold or cash they hold.
Fedwire is the Real Time Gross Settlement system of the United States. The systems of other countries are listed at the same link.
The Peoples Bank of China System called China National Advanced Payment System (CNAPS) is their Real Time Gross Settlement system like ours is the Fedwire system.
Creating Money
Printing Money is a confusing term. It is often used in news reports with a picture of dollar bills in the background or dollar bills rolling off a printing press. The public is confused enough about the nature of money to reinforce their confusion by equating dollars with dollar bills. Only about 3 percent of money in circulation is paper dollar bills. Everything else is an electronic record expressed in quantities of money.
Create Money is a much better term. However, the media has confused that term also. It is often connected to the phrase "out of thin air". The Federal Reserve Bank, a private bank, creates money out of thin air to loan through the fractional reserve banking system and loan to the US Government.
Out of thin air causes problems for people that want the gold standard to have some under laying value relationship to money.
Creating money is really creating information. We are in an information society. Some is worthless like spam some is very valuable like patented information or medical records.
Money (dollars) used as a medium of exchange was created as a piece of valuable information. It was born as an entry on a keyboard and with a press of the enter key it existed in a secure domain of computer system communication and data storage infrastructure.
Dollar bill paper currency rolling off the printing presses is a popular tourist attraction. This is funny: the website for that link is called moneyfactory.gov! "You'll see millions of dollars being printed during a tour of the BEP" How exciting! No free samples!
This is how the Wall Street Journal contributes to the confusion of creating money:
If the Fed is going to create boatloads of depreciating, non-yielding dollar bills, who will absorb them?
Within the same article the WSJ uses this grapic to illustrate their story:
Deceptive! That picture is not what the Fed creates! They only create numbers on a computer not actual bills.
Then the WSJ further confuses the issue by saying: " ... news was the Federal Reserve's announcement last Tuesday that it intends to debase its own paper money." True if by "paper money they mean all that digital computer money that the Fed creates but paper money is popularly conceived of as paper dollar bills.
What the BEP prints as the creation of paper currency is peanuts. Where the big money is created is the Federal Reserve. It is created there in the trillions of dollars! That is exciting! Maybe the most exciting thing in the money world and nobody sees it. It could be the biggest tourist attraction in NYC after Times Square. Watch trillions of dollars being created! There should be a web cam so anybody could watch it on the internet. At the Federal Reserve Bank website there should be a total in big numbers on the first page stating how much money was created as a running daily total. Maybe with instant replays of someone entering a number on a keyboard and pressing a button. Who is that person? People? How many are authorized to do that? They should be made famous. Nobody in the world has ever made so much money! Can they telecommute to work?
Federal Reserve Bank tour info is here. The tour includes cash and gold. Peanuts for the public. The real (digital push button money) is created on a computer behind the curtain. That is what I would like to see.
It seems like there might be some interest in exactly who gets to push the button to create trillions of dollars. Does Bernanke do it on his coffee break? I googled "who creates money at the Fed" An obvious question. Nobody has ever asked it as far as google is concerned. No hits at all. Maybe I need to get more creative in my search. Is it a good paying job? How would they advertise to hire for that position? Could be an amusing job offer. The fed could make money if they auctioned off or had a lottery on pushing the enter key that creates trillions of dollars. What a thrill! Maybe the next reward on Survivor?
What they really did when they pushed the enter key was to create a piece of information. Highly protected information. But where is its value in association to anything? It has potential value that it can be used to create a debt when it is loaned to someone or somehow used in conjunction with supporting a loan process but that value of the newly created information, other than the fact that it exists is not realized until it is connected somehow to a loan. When some amount of the created money is associated with a loan in exchange for something, that amount becomes a debit on the banks asset record associated to a credit on the bank record of the entity it was loaned to and whatever document the person receiving the loan used as a promise to pay in exchange for the loaned money.
There is a benefit to the Fed to confuse the money issue in the mind of the American public and they are doing a good job of that. The worse the situation becomes, the more they have to confuse the public. That is easy to do.
Money is: A piece of created information. It is a highly protected piece of information existing primarily (97%) in a computer information system.
Create Money is a much better term. However, the media has confused that term also. It is often connected to the phrase "out of thin air". The Federal Reserve Bank, a private bank, creates money out of thin air to loan through the fractional reserve banking system and loan to the US Government.
Out of thin air causes problems for people that want the gold standard to have some under laying value relationship to money.
Creating money is really creating information. We are in an information society. Some is worthless like spam some is very valuable like patented information or medical records.
Money (dollars) used as a medium of exchange was created as a piece of valuable information. It was born as an entry on a keyboard and with a press of the enter key it existed in a secure domain of computer system communication and data storage infrastructure.
Dollar bill paper currency rolling off the printing presses is a popular tourist attraction. This is funny: the website for that link is called moneyfactory.gov! "You'll see millions of dollars being printed during a tour of the BEP" How exciting! No free samples!
This is how the Wall Street Journal contributes to the confusion of creating money:
If the Fed is going to create boatloads of depreciating, non-yielding dollar bills, who will absorb them?
Within the same article the WSJ uses this grapic to illustrate their story:
Deceptive! That picture is not what the Fed creates! They only create numbers on a computer not actual bills.
Then the WSJ further confuses the issue by saying: " ... news was the Federal Reserve's announcement last Tuesday that it intends to debase its own paper money." True if by "paper money they mean all that digital computer money that the Fed creates but paper money is popularly conceived of as paper dollar bills.
What the BEP prints as the creation of paper currency is peanuts. Where the big money is created is the Federal Reserve. It is created there in the trillions of dollars! That is exciting! Maybe the most exciting thing in the money world and nobody sees it. It could be the biggest tourist attraction in NYC after Times Square. Watch trillions of dollars being created! There should be a web cam so anybody could watch it on the internet. At the Federal Reserve Bank website there should be a total in big numbers on the first page stating how much money was created as a running daily total. Maybe with instant replays of someone entering a number on a keyboard and pressing a button. Who is that person? People? How many are authorized to do that? They should be made famous. Nobody in the world has ever made so much money! Can they telecommute to work?
Federal Reserve Bank tour info is here. The tour includes cash and gold. Peanuts for the public. The real (digital push button money) is created on a computer behind the curtain. That is what I would like to see.
It seems like there might be some interest in exactly who gets to push the button to create trillions of dollars. Does Bernanke do it on his coffee break? I googled "who creates money at the Fed" An obvious question. Nobody has ever asked it as far as google is concerned. No hits at all. Maybe I need to get more creative in my search. Is it a good paying job? How would they advertise to hire for that position? Could be an amusing job offer. The fed could make money if they auctioned off or had a lottery on pushing the enter key that creates trillions of dollars. What a thrill! Maybe the next reward on Survivor?
What they really did when they pushed the enter key was to create a piece of information. Highly protected information. But where is its value in association to anything? It has potential value that it can be used to create a debt when it is loaned to someone or somehow used in conjunction with supporting a loan process but that value of the newly created information, other than the fact that it exists is not realized until it is connected somehow to a loan. When some amount of the created money is associated with a loan in exchange for something, that amount becomes a debit on the banks asset record associated to a credit on the bank record of the entity it was loaned to and whatever document the person receiving the loan used as a promise to pay in exchange for the loaned money.
There is a benefit to the Fed to confuse the money issue in the mind of the American public and they are doing a good job of that. The worse the situation becomes, the more they have to confuse the public. That is easy to do.
Money is: A piece of created information. It is a highly protected piece of information existing primarily (97%) in a computer information system.
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Sage Thinking
Sage made this comment on American Thinker.
I think it is an excellent observation:
America must retreat with its current fiscal and monetary policy. Fiscal policy is what the government chooses in terms of taxes, tariffs and investments. Monetary policy is the structure of the money system. In our case, we have horizontal banking which creates debt money when you take out a loan. We have vertical money, or money that is injected into the money supply, when the Treasury deficit spends. In both cases the money is based on debt, which is in turn is based on (hypothecated) real wealth. For example, you buy a house then the house is collateral for the loan.
China vertical spends debt free from their four big state banks. They also have private banks that create horizontal debt money. But, China forces their private banks to hold large reserves, thus helping prevent bubbles. In other words, China’s money system is a strategic advantage as their vertical money is not debt based. They spend Yuan’s debt free, like Lincoln did with Greenbacks. By contrast, we are enslaving our population to create money, where that new debt money is often mal-invested.
Since the private banking empire has hosted our Government, then don’t expect any policy changes. Criminal activities by Goldman Sachs and others will be overlooked, because money power is now fully insinuated into the body politic. China is actually playing rope a dope with Western private bankers. They are trading out Yuans for dollars, and then locking up dollars into Treasury bonds. This keeps the game going, and forces the U.S. to deficit spend (more debt enslavement) to offset the import imbalance. Each time Western bankers ask China to revalue the Yuan, China talks about doing it in a basket of currencies. This means that they intend to diminish the role of the dollar. They can definitely do it as long as we continue to create new money based on debt, while they do not have that ball-and-chain hobbling them. Fiscal and Monetary policy leads to wealth and to funding for military.
Well said Sage! You seem to be the best or perhaps the only thinker on the conservative site! Others are listening to you so they must have some clue. Keep talking.
Further down the same page Sage made another good comment and then he said this:
The fix is actually pretty simple. The problem is breaking the stranglehold of special interests. To us conservatives everlasting shame it took a liberal (Dennis Kucinich) to propose a real fix: Emergency Employment Defense Act of 2010, abbreviated NEED. The bill number is HR6550.
This bill makes all private banks 100 percent reserve. Private banks can no longer create credit money, which is credit that stands for money, but drags debt with it in every transaction. This debt load amounts to about ½ of your life energy. The Federal Reserve is absorbed into the Treasury. The Treasury is then locked down with new laws that have teeth, and allow only congressionally approved spending levels. The new money is U.S. dollars that are debt free.
Private banks would only match up people that have money to give to people that want money. They would get a fee for doing this operation. In effect, private banks would work like most people think they do now. Most people think private banks actually loan out their savings. Under this new system money becomes money and not credit/debt. New money that enters into the supply is then controlled by law. Historically, Congress has never exceeded its authorization levels when it had this power (during Lincoln’s greenback era). Going back further in time, the Continentals of the Revolutionary War authorization was never exceeded.
Do this and we would be out of debt in a few years and the economy would be roaring. We have a continental country with huge advantages and a highly intelligent motivated workforce. To be in debt with these advantages is the height of idiocy. We have been duped by a cabal of very clever bankers which can be traced to the Bank of England in 1694. Money does not have to be debt based. The money supply can be controlled with a system as outlined above. One thing I would add though is a bank clearing house instead of floating exchange rates. This allows real dollars to circulate only in our economy. www.monetary.org
Sage makes sense. Doesn't matter that he is a conservative. Sage consistently beats the debt free money drum with every post on the site.
Well done Sage!
I think it is an excellent observation:
America must retreat with its current fiscal and monetary policy. Fiscal policy is what the government chooses in terms of taxes, tariffs and investments. Monetary policy is the structure of the money system. In our case, we have horizontal banking which creates debt money when you take out a loan. We have vertical money, or money that is injected into the money supply, when the Treasury deficit spends. In both cases the money is based on debt, which is in turn is based on (hypothecated) real wealth. For example, you buy a house then the house is collateral for the loan.
China vertical spends debt free from their four big state banks. They also have private banks that create horizontal debt money. But, China forces their private banks to hold large reserves, thus helping prevent bubbles. In other words, China’s money system is a strategic advantage as their vertical money is not debt based. They spend Yuan’s debt free, like Lincoln did with Greenbacks. By contrast, we are enslaving our population to create money, where that new debt money is often mal-invested.
Since the private banking empire has hosted our Government, then don’t expect any policy changes. Criminal activities by Goldman Sachs and others will be overlooked, because money power is now fully insinuated into the body politic. China is actually playing rope a dope with Western private bankers. They are trading out Yuans for dollars, and then locking up dollars into Treasury bonds. This keeps the game going, and forces the U.S. to deficit spend (more debt enslavement) to offset the import imbalance. Each time Western bankers ask China to revalue the Yuan, China talks about doing it in a basket of currencies. This means that they intend to diminish the role of the dollar. They can definitely do it as long as we continue to create new money based on debt, while they do not have that ball-and-chain hobbling them. Fiscal and Monetary policy leads to wealth and to funding for military.
Well said Sage! You seem to be the best or perhaps the only thinker on the conservative site! Others are listening to you so they must have some clue. Keep talking.
Further down the same page Sage made another good comment and then he said this:
The fix is actually pretty simple. The problem is breaking the stranglehold of special interests. To us conservatives everlasting shame it took a liberal (Dennis Kucinich) to propose a real fix: Emergency Employment Defense Act of 2010, abbreviated NEED. The bill number is HR6550.
This bill makes all private banks 100 percent reserve. Private banks can no longer create credit money, which is credit that stands for money, but drags debt with it in every transaction. This debt load amounts to about ½ of your life energy. The Federal Reserve is absorbed into the Treasury. The Treasury is then locked down with new laws that have teeth, and allow only congressionally approved spending levels. The new money is U.S. dollars that are debt free.
Private banks would only match up people that have money to give to people that want money. They would get a fee for doing this operation. In effect, private banks would work like most people think they do now. Most people think private banks actually loan out their savings. Under this new system money becomes money and not credit/debt. New money that enters into the supply is then controlled by law. Historically, Congress has never exceeded its authorization levels when it had this power (during Lincoln’s greenback era). Going back further in time, the Continentals of the Revolutionary War authorization was never exceeded.
Do this and we would be out of debt in a few years and the economy would be roaring. We have a continental country with huge advantages and a highly intelligent motivated workforce. To be in debt with these advantages is the height of idiocy. We have been duped by a cabal of very clever bankers which can be traced to the Bank of England in 1694. Money does not have to be debt based. The money supply can be controlled with a system as outlined above. One thing I would add though is a bank clearing house instead of floating exchange rates. This allows real dollars to circulate only in our economy. www.monetary.org
Sage makes sense. Doesn't matter that he is a conservative. Sage consistently beats the debt free money drum with every post on the site.
Well done Sage!
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Electronic Piggy Bank
Mansoor Kahn presents some interesting basic thoughts about money at his blog called Aquinam's Razor.
In this blog post he discusses a method to migrate from debt money to asset money (he calls it 100% money).
I agree with all his method steps but would like to comment on #6:
6) The new government bank will act as an electronic "piggy bank" only. All deposits will be 100% reserve and it will not make any loans. Loan making will be left to the private banking system (with no deposit insurance or a possibility of a future bailout). The new government owned bank exists only as a "safe" money storage and a payment clearing system so the public does not have to carry around physical paper cash to make purchases and pay bills.
I have been thinking about this. So I will write about it with a bit of humor. Do not take any of the ideas too literally but grasp the concepts
The electronic "piggy bank" of the new government bank will hold all the 100% money of the USA. It would really be a huge server farm located at Ft. Knox near the depository. The facade would an artistic rendition of a pig in honor of who used to own all the money. The building would be painted pink. It would be located near the gold vaults in compromise with the gold folks to give the digital money value by proximity. Ron Paul said this was close enough and was the deciding factor in legislation to be introduced jointly with Dennis Kucinich that will abolish the Fed and established the Piggy Bank.
The United States Bullion Depository is called Ft. Knox for short. The United States Piggy Bank could just be called the Pig like we call the Federal Reserve Bank the Fed.
All the money in the United States is securely stored in the pig. The money itself is fiat money but it is as good as the gold that it sits next to. It belongs to the people of the United States and all financial entities other than people that do business in the USA.
US currency called Digital Dollars, or just dollar bills for short exist as a computer record consisting of these data elements:
Denomination Amount. The denomination may be a value as determined necessary serve as a medium of exchange with face values in an appropriate distribution from 1 thousand dollar bill to a billion dollar bill. Perhaps much like we have paper bills in denominations from $1 to $100.
Serial Number. A unique sequential serial number is given the denominated bill at birth. Once born, the bill exists forever. Data regarding the bill is included in the serial number. No two numbers are alike.
Owner ID: An identity number of a financial entity registered in the money system of the USA. Every number is unique. The government has its own number system range. ID numbers may be concatenated to denote ownership as well a rights to use the money. All money records have an owner ID.
Transaction History A record of all transactions for each denominated bill in the Pig system would be retained. This is a separate record related to its parent by serial number.
Digital Dollars are used as a medium of exchange simply by changing the owner associated with denomination. This method of handling transactions is transparent to the owner. The owner authorizes a payment transaction to a new owner through a secure system. The Pig receives this transaction request in the form of a total amount. The Pig then changes ownership on whatever is the least number of denominations necessary to equal the total. The Digital Dollar Bill Unit remains a fixed record in the computer. Ownership changes with transactions.
Ooops! What about the amount less than $1,000? That is the subject of a Small Money System called Small Change that would interface with the Pig. It would be a private money system and act as the Small Change Purse of the owner. The two would interface. Rules of the Small Change system would be established as well as protocols and security. Anyone could be authorized to operate a small change money system subject to registration and rules. The money in each Small Change system would be serialized. When the small change account of an owner was greater than $1,000 dollars it would migrate to the Pig. When Small Change needed replenishment, money would be transferred to the owner's Small Change account. A method would be established to replenish the Small Change owner account as required. I have no idea what that method might be but given enough time I could dream one up.
The Small Change sector is to be established as a free private enterprise vehicle to introduce market place efficiencies to money management at the bulk of transaction level. It will also serve to give employment to unemployed banksters. They are limited to handling accounts of less than $1,000 dollars in this system. However, they no longer have a monopoly and must compete with anyone in this free and open money system sector. Probably one that will be dominated by Apple, Google or Facebook.
Money in the Pig would serve as a store of value savings account at the choice of the owner. The owner would have control of the account to allow others to use money the owner was not using and it would therefore be reserved for their use depending on whatever arrangements were made with the user. This opens the possibility for mandatory reservation of some amount, depending on wage transactions levels and employer contributions that would to be reserved for the future use of the owner. This could handle Social Security if the owner is an individual subject to withholding.
Maybe some more ideas to add to this as i get them.
In this blog post he discusses a method to migrate from debt money to asset money (he calls it 100% money).
I agree with all his method steps but would like to comment on #6:
6) The new government bank will act as an electronic "piggy bank" only. All deposits will be 100% reserve and it will not make any loans. Loan making will be left to the private banking system (with no deposit insurance or a possibility of a future bailout). The new government owned bank exists only as a "safe" money storage and a payment clearing system so the public does not have to carry around physical paper cash to make purchases and pay bills.
I have been thinking about this. So I will write about it with a bit of humor. Do not take any of the ideas too literally but grasp the concepts
The electronic "piggy bank" of the new government bank will hold all the 100% money of the USA. It would really be a huge server farm located at Ft. Knox near the depository. The facade would an artistic rendition of a pig in honor of who used to own all the money. The building would be painted pink. It would be located near the gold vaults in compromise with the gold folks to give the digital money value by proximity. Ron Paul said this was close enough and was the deciding factor in legislation to be introduced jointly with Dennis Kucinich that will abolish the Fed and established the Piggy Bank.
The United States Bullion Depository is called Ft. Knox for short. The United States Piggy Bank could just be called the Pig like we call the Federal Reserve Bank the Fed.
All the money in the United States is securely stored in the pig. The money itself is fiat money but it is as good as the gold that it sits next to. It belongs to the people of the United States and all financial entities other than people that do business in the USA.
US currency called Digital Dollars, or just dollar bills for short exist as a computer record consisting of these data elements:
Denomination Amount. The denomination may be a value as determined necessary serve as a medium of exchange with face values in an appropriate distribution from 1 thousand dollar bill to a billion dollar bill. Perhaps much like we have paper bills in denominations from $1 to $100.
Serial Number. A unique sequential serial number is given the denominated bill at birth. Once born, the bill exists forever. Data regarding the bill is included in the serial number. No two numbers are alike.
Owner ID: An identity number of a financial entity registered in the money system of the USA. Every number is unique. The government has its own number system range. ID numbers may be concatenated to denote ownership as well a rights to use the money. All money records have an owner ID.
Transaction History A record of all transactions for each denominated bill in the Pig system would be retained. This is a separate record related to its parent by serial number.
Digital Dollars are used as a medium of exchange simply by changing the owner associated with denomination. This method of handling transactions is transparent to the owner. The owner authorizes a payment transaction to a new owner through a secure system. The Pig receives this transaction request in the form of a total amount. The Pig then changes ownership on whatever is the least number of denominations necessary to equal the total. The Digital Dollar Bill Unit remains a fixed record in the computer. Ownership changes with transactions.
Ooops! What about the amount less than $1,000? That is the subject of a Small Money System called Small Change that would interface with the Pig. It would be a private money system and act as the Small Change Purse of the owner. The two would interface. Rules of the Small Change system would be established as well as protocols and security. Anyone could be authorized to operate a small change money system subject to registration and rules. The money in each Small Change system would be serialized. When the small change account of an owner was greater than $1,000 dollars it would migrate to the Pig. When Small Change needed replenishment, money would be transferred to the owner's Small Change account. A method would be established to replenish the Small Change owner account as required. I have no idea what that method might be but given enough time I could dream one up.
The Small Change sector is to be established as a free private enterprise vehicle to introduce market place efficiencies to money management at the bulk of transaction level. It will also serve to give employment to unemployed banksters. They are limited to handling accounts of less than $1,000 dollars in this system. However, they no longer have a monopoly and must compete with anyone in this free and open money system sector. Probably one that will be dominated by Apple, Google or Facebook.
Money in the Pig would serve as a store of value savings account at the choice of the owner. The owner would have control of the account to allow others to use money the owner was not using and it would therefore be reserved for their use depending on whatever arrangements were made with the user. This opens the possibility for mandatory reservation of some amount, depending on wage transactions levels and employer contributions that would to be reserved for the future use of the owner. This could handle Social Security if the owner is an individual subject to withholding.
Maybe some more ideas to add to this as i get them.
What To Do With All This Money?
Having to much money is a problem when it is not going anywhere!
Big players with big money have a big problem!
Big problems present big opportunities for solution!
Slick solutions make even more money, get more power.
Banks created the mortgage crises. They set up a situation that passed the risk from them to someone else. Bets were taken that the mortgages designed to fail by giving them to people that could not pay. Of course, to get the mortgages they could not pay, the house buyers had to pay fees that were pocketed by all those making up front money on the sale. The brokers of the deal. The greedy brokers cut out others that would have also benefited from the sale so they could make more. They avoided local government recording fees by registering the mortgages with MERS. That is just a sideline on the the problem.
The result was that there was a ton on money made on the front end of the sale of houses in the boom. Much went to the sellers due to inflated prices. They bought low, sold high to a bigger sucker that thought it would go on forever.
Ah, but for people clever with money there is much more to be made on the back end of the crises they created. There is no end to playing with Other People's Money. After the houses were sold, The debt created by the bank was sold, quickly. It was a hot potato. Maybe more like a stick of dynamite with the fuse lit.
The mortgage debt was sold to middle men. It was sliced, diced and lipstick was put on the pig by credit rating companies. The pig in the poke was sold as a good investment. The sellers that held on to them insured them against failure. That is called hedging a bet. When they failed, the insurance company like AIG could not pay. The banks could not pay. There was not enough money to pay. Money had to come from somewhere to pay. The government made up the money to pay by borrowing money from the banks and then loaning the money back to banks and AIG so they could pay off the bets they had made to those that had bet that what they had designed to fail would fail.
All of this was not a break even game. Money was made by some sector. Money was lost by another. In addition, there was more money created as money supply overall.
Additional money in the money supply is inflationary if it exceeds an equal growth in productivity. It is inflationary only if it gets spent. Banks have money but they are not loaning it. Business has money but they are not investing it to increase production and hire workers to do that.
But somehow we believed that small business is the bedrock of commerce. Get small business back in business. The solution seemed to be all in the hands of small business. Give small business a tax break. They will invest in expansion, hire workers. Put money directly in the hands of workers to spend at small business creating demand for small business to sell. The economy gets back on its feet.
So, the economy is still laying on the ground gasping.
Making money on this whole scheme, is not over yet.
While attention was being directed at what one hand was doing by shouting look at small business. The other hand of big business was stealthily moving. Don't forget, there was a lot more money in its hand as a result of the mortgage scam.
What to do, what to do?? Money does not sit idle. What can it buy cheap and sell dear? With an immense amount of money what is big enough to buy??
Food.
Food is big. Everybody eats. The problem is that all the food for sale today to eat today is for sale only to the consumer or in the chain of supply close to the consumer. Food is perishable. The only thing to buy is future food. All future food could be bought. It can be bought in terms of food commodities to be delivered at a purchase price in a future time frame. All of the world's food could be bought on those terms. It would cost a lot of money. On the other hand it would be an investment that could make a lot of money if future food bought today became much more valuable when the time comes to sell it.
If I could buy food futures cheap today, then sell them in a short time frame like tomorrow, next week or next month as the price for the value of that future food rises then I make money. Climate crises is making that future food more valuable. There is a natural climate constraint on production. If I can add more factors to make that food more valuable in the future it means more money to me. Simply speculating on the future value of food today increases the competition in speculation by driving future prices up and thereby increasing what is paid today. It does this only if there is a lot of money around with which to speculate with. There is a lot of money around and believe it or not, a lot of money on hand that is not doing anything is a problem to the holder. The money is not making any money. For the speculator, the business is making money on money. Or, making money by betting on money in terms of prices. This is justified by the social value of stabilizing future prices.
How can futures be manipulated for great reward and leave someone else holding a bag of nothing but risk and loss?
So tell me: How did that work for ya on your mortgage?
Can you say manipulation?
Speculation is a big business sector.
Ponzi schemes to make money on money purely on loans and speculation and the added money that makes through manipulation.
What are they to do with all that money?
Set the situation up by leveraging the existing money crises past the tipping point by granting tax benefits to new industry in the state. All this does is rob another state in a zero sum game that benefits big business. What else can you do then Governor Scott Walker?
Ah but there is more!
The governor might aggravate the crises to his advantage and agenda by giving tax breaks to business and reduce income. Business gets him in the end. The state is going broke and it has to privatize its public assets. Sell cheap today something the public owns that will cost them more in the future when it has to buy the services from the new private owner. The Koch brothers? If not them then someone else with money looking for a profitable home.
Look at this:
Chicago Scores! What a deal! Chicago sold the revenue from its parking meters for 75 years. For that they got more than a billion dollars! Sold to A Sub LP and Morgan Stanley. City gets to solve its money crises! A report issued by Chicago's Office of the Inspector General said the city could have gotten almost $1 billion more for the meters. It was later learned that a substantial amount of money behind the buy was from the middle east.
More here on Chiago's great "Score".
Wisconsin: It is always in the fine print! Koch Brothers! They must have a lot of money and want to buy cheap with it! It their end game to be a buyer of Wisconsin public utilities without any competition? Check it out here. Which was taken from a comment here made by Amanda Terkel. What do you think?
16.896 Sale or contractual operation of state−owned heating, cooling, and power plants. (1) Notwithstanding ss. 13.48 (14) (am) and 16.705 (1), the department may sell any state−owned heating, cooling, and power plant or may contract with a private entity for the operation of any such plant, with or without solicitation of bids, for any amount that the department determines to be in the best interest of the state. Notwithstanding ss. 196.49 and 196.80, no approval or certification of the public service commission is necessary for a public utility to purchase, or contract for the operation of, such a plant, and any such purchase is considered to be in the public interest and to comply with the criteria for certification of a project under s. 196.49 (3) (b).
Amanda writes:
It's unclear what "the best interest of the state" is.
But if this deal goes through, one of the companies that could stand to benefit significantly is Koch Industries. Koch already has several companies in the state, including a coal subsidiary, timber plants and a large network of pipelines.
During the 2010 election cycle, Walker received $43,000 from the Koch Industries PAC, his second-largest contribution. The PAC also gave significantly to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn helped out Walker considerably in his race. Koch also contributed $6,500 to support 16 Republican legislative candidates in the state.
The Koch-funded group Americans for Prosperity has also been standing with Walker throughout his budget battles, busing in Tea Party activists and launching the site, Stand With Walker. After the election, Walker and other Republican governors received guidance from the American Legislative Exchange Council, a group that is also funded by Koch dollars and has pushed anti-union measures.
In the bigger picture there is so much money sloshing around in the system that needs somewhere to go that will not be inflationary. If it is taken out of the system through long term investment purchases it is not inflationary. What to buy that has a big price tag now that will reap rewards far into the future as a sure thing cash cow once it is controlled?
Wow! Might we be seeing here an example of the Total Business Strategy at work?
Food.
Public Owned Infrastructure.
The new gold? The new gold rush to mine it?
Public Owned Infrastructure is now like a fixer upper house. Neglected by someone that could not or would not maintain it. Cheap at the price considering its under laying value. Worth much more in the future than it is now. Worth even more if its ownership is a monopoly.
This explains the giveaway of public assets to private business. "This is tantamount to selling the family china only to have to rent it back in order to eat dinner"
Big business has probably always admired bankers for capturing control of money and owning the printing press that creates the money. That is the biggest privatization of a public utility that was ever done. It was done almost a hundred years ago by the Federal Reserve Act. Debt Money set the stage for everything to follow in business. Now big business will follow the same model to capture a new license to print money. They will own what we once did. We once owned the money system. Our Constitution says that Congress has the power to create money. We once owned that power. It was ours.
We will someday say we once owned the public assets we created. We owned them until we could not longer pay to maintain and keep what we owned. Then we sold it and rented it back.
We only rent bankers money today that used to be owned as a our power to create and serve ourselves.
We will only rent the public assets that were in our power to control when we owned what we had invested in to serve ourselves.
Big business is only 100 years to late to the feast on the public enjoyed at first by the banks. The banks have opened the door to a partnership through the mortgage scam. It was a marriage of necessity because the banks could not have lasted much longer in the ponzi scheme of the Federal reserve.
Paupers in the land that our forefathers conquered.
We can get back from the Federal Reserve the power to create money that rightfully belongs to us in accordance with the Constitution as exercised by Congress.
We will not get back the public asset infrastructure that we sell to Big Business unless we nationalize it.
We will not have to sell what we own as public assets if we take back our power to create money and establish an asset money system in place of a debt money system. The window of opportunity to do this is closing as banks partner with big business to avoid collapse and perpetuate their fraud and they both feast upon us and make our serfdom permanent.
The most basic and fundamental thing we have is our freedom. What we own and benefit from and use to create our wealth, the wealth of our nation, is the productivity of our labor. Banks own money. Business owns the means of production. Labor is not one of those means, it is an external component owned by the workers and employed by business. Business can never own workers, trample on workers rights because workers own the government because that is our freedom. Government regulates business to keep the balance.
Government is not working as it should. Business is assuming ownership of it.
The people of Wisconsin are fighting our battle with the government and big business for ownership. The government there being a front for business interests.
Business wants to own labor and use forces at its disposal to do it. Business once sent in its supervisor goons, weak minded unpaid lackeys that were no more than workers themselves who were not smart enough to understand the situation and act in their own greater self interest, workers "owned" to work for less money and the paid thugs that do anything for money. It used to be that the government sent in police to enforce ownership power. It sent in troops when the big guns and more of them were needed.
Our own Egypt?
Business found a thing to do with all that money to make more money.
At this time president Obama is talking to a Small Business Conference. Hey mister president, keep your eye on what the other hand called big business is doing while your attention is being diverted to focus on Small Business!
Listening to a debate on TV with one ear I hear some jerk talking about all the excessive benefits that the public workers in Wisconsin get. The woman presenting the workers position says Walker gave tax breaks to business to cause this need to cut elsewhere, then they play the clip where Walker says he will not raise taxes to offset the loss of revenue resulting from the tax breaks given to new business. New business is a benefit to the state. Then the woman says, if belt tightening and sacrifice is needed then let all the taxpayers undertake it. The jerk says they get excessive benefits. She says that their pay and benefits are equal to the public sector based on a survey done by somebody. He says they get more benefits and therefore reduce them to what everybody else gets.
The basic logic of the entire situation is on the side of the public employees. More than that it is on the side of the public versus the government and big business control. Governor Walker can dictate to all the taxpayers if he wants to share the load just as much as he is dictating to public employees. Of course, business has been loading the game by pushing the meme in the media that public employees don't deserve what they get. Besides, we can't afford it at this time (due to the crises created by the banks).
Walker logic: Take the money from those that are getting more than they should. I am all for that. However, don't get it from those that have more than they should. Get it from those that just have more. It is called a regressive tax. It is a progressive idea. If he can identify all those workers that are getting more than they should as he sees it in terms of pay an benefits then take it from them. A waitress getting excessive tips. A banker getting an excessive bonus. In both cases it is getting it from a class that is making more than others in the same class. The other way to get more is to tax a single class that just gets more. Those with more income or property to tax. I am not sure which Wisconsin uses but by definition, whatever it uses is de factor fair. Use that system. Raise taxes to pay for government operations, or take cuts on a rational prioritized basis as a function of zero based budgeting.
Walkers objective is not governance. He has other agenda, which is the same as big business or its owned means of production called the Republican Party.
Big players with big money have a big problem!
Big problems present big opportunities for solution!
Slick solutions make even more money, get more power.
Banks created the mortgage crises. They set up a situation that passed the risk from them to someone else. Bets were taken that the mortgages designed to fail by giving them to people that could not pay. Of course, to get the mortgages they could not pay, the house buyers had to pay fees that were pocketed by all those making up front money on the sale. The brokers of the deal. The greedy brokers cut out others that would have also benefited from the sale so they could make more. They avoided local government recording fees by registering the mortgages with MERS. That is just a sideline on the the problem.
The result was that there was a ton on money made on the front end of the sale of houses in the boom. Much went to the sellers due to inflated prices. They bought low, sold high to a bigger sucker that thought it would go on forever.
Ah, but for people clever with money there is much more to be made on the back end of the crises they created. There is no end to playing with Other People's Money. After the houses were sold, The debt created by the bank was sold, quickly. It was a hot potato. Maybe more like a stick of dynamite with the fuse lit.
The mortgage debt was sold to middle men. It was sliced, diced and lipstick was put on the pig by credit rating companies. The pig in the poke was sold as a good investment. The sellers that held on to them insured them against failure. That is called hedging a bet. When they failed, the insurance company like AIG could not pay. The banks could not pay. There was not enough money to pay. Money had to come from somewhere to pay. The government made up the money to pay by borrowing money from the banks and then loaning the money back to banks and AIG so they could pay off the bets they had made to those that had bet that what they had designed to fail would fail.
All of this was not a break even game. Money was made by some sector. Money was lost by another. In addition, there was more money created as money supply overall.
Additional money in the money supply is inflationary if it exceeds an equal growth in productivity. It is inflationary only if it gets spent. Banks have money but they are not loaning it. Business has money but they are not investing it to increase production and hire workers to do that.
But somehow we believed that small business is the bedrock of commerce. Get small business back in business. The solution seemed to be all in the hands of small business. Give small business a tax break. They will invest in expansion, hire workers. Put money directly in the hands of workers to spend at small business creating demand for small business to sell. The economy gets back on its feet.
So, the economy is still laying on the ground gasping.
Making money on this whole scheme, is not over yet.
While attention was being directed at what one hand was doing by shouting look at small business. The other hand of big business was stealthily moving. Don't forget, there was a lot more money in its hand as a result of the mortgage scam.
What to do, what to do?? Money does not sit idle. What can it buy cheap and sell dear? With an immense amount of money what is big enough to buy??
Food.
Food is big. Everybody eats. The problem is that all the food for sale today to eat today is for sale only to the consumer or in the chain of supply close to the consumer. Food is perishable. The only thing to buy is future food. All future food could be bought. It can be bought in terms of food commodities to be delivered at a purchase price in a future time frame. All of the world's food could be bought on those terms. It would cost a lot of money. On the other hand it would be an investment that could make a lot of money if future food bought today became much more valuable when the time comes to sell it.
If I could buy food futures cheap today, then sell them in a short time frame like tomorrow, next week or next month as the price for the value of that future food rises then I make money. Climate crises is making that future food more valuable. There is a natural climate constraint on production. If I can add more factors to make that food more valuable in the future it means more money to me. Simply speculating on the future value of food today increases the competition in speculation by driving future prices up and thereby increasing what is paid today. It does this only if there is a lot of money around with which to speculate with. There is a lot of money around and believe it or not, a lot of money on hand that is not doing anything is a problem to the holder. The money is not making any money. For the speculator, the business is making money on money. Or, making money by betting on money in terms of prices. This is justified by the social value of stabilizing future prices.
How can futures be manipulated for great reward and leave someone else holding a bag of nothing but risk and loss?
So tell me: How did that work for ya on your mortgage?
Can you say manipulation?
Speculation is a big business sector.
Ponzi schemes to make money on money purely on loans and speculation and the added money that makes through manipulation.
What are they to do with all that money?
Set the situation up by leveraging the existing money crises past the tipping point by granting tax benefits to new industry in the state. All this does is rob another state in a zero sum game that benefits big business. What else can you do then Governor Scott Walker?
Ah but there is more!
The governor might aggravate the crises to his advantage and agenda by giving tax breaks to business and reduce income. Business gets him in the end. The state is going broke and it has to privatize its public assets. Sell cheap today something the public owns that will cost them more in the future when it has to buy the services from the new private owner. The Koch brothers? If not them then someone else with money looking for a profitable home.
Look at this:
Chicago Scores! What a deal! Chicago sold the revenue from its parking meters for 75 years. For that they got more than a billion dollars! Sold to A Sub LP and Morgan Stanley. City gets to solve its money crises! A report issued by Chicago's Office of the Inspector General said the city could have gotten almost $1 billion more for the meters. It was later learned that a substantial amount of money behind the buy was from the middle east.
More here on Chiago's great "Score".
Wisconsin: It is always in the fine print! Koch Brothers! They must have a lot of money and want to buy cheap with it! It their end game to be a buyer of Wisconsin public utilities without any competition? Check it out here. Which was taken from a comment here made by Amanda Terkel. What do you think?
16.896 Sale or contractual operation of state−owned heating, cooling, and power plants. (1) Notwithstanding ss. 13.48 (14) (am) and 16.705 (1), the department may sell any state−owned heating, cooling, and power plant or may contract with a private entity for the operation of any such plant, with or without solicitation of bids, for any amount that the department determines to be in the best interest of the state. Notwithstanding ss. 196.49 and 196.80, no approval or certification of the public service commission is necessary for a public utility to purchase, or contract for the operation of, such a plant, and any such purchase is considered to be in the public interest and to comply with the criteria for certification of a project under s. 196.49 (3) (b).
Amanda writes:
It's unclear what "the best interest of the state" is.
But if this deal goes through, one of the companies that could stand to benefit significantly is Koch Industries. Koch already has several companies in the state, including a coal subsidiary, timber plants and a large network of pipelines.
During the 2010 election cycle, Walker received $43,000 from the Koch Industries PAC, his second-largest contribution. The PAC also gave significantly to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn helped out Walker considerably in his race. Koch also contributed $6,500 to support 16 Republican legislative candidates in the state.
The Koch-funded group Americans for Prosperity has also been standing with Walker throughout his budget battles, busing in Tea Party activists and launching the site, Stand With Walker. After the election, Walker and other Republican governors received guidance from the American Legislative Exchange Council, a group that is also funded by Koch dollars and has pushed anti-union measures.
In the bigger picture there is so much money sloshing around in the system that needs somewhere to go that will not be inflationary. If it is taken out of the system through long term investment purchases it is not inflationary. What to buy that has a big price tag now that will reap rewards far into the future as a sure thing cash cow once it is controlled?
Wow! Might we be seeing here an example of the Total Business Strategy at work?
Food.
Public Owned Infrastructure.
The new gold? The new gold rush to mine it?
Public Owned Infrastructure is now like a fixer upper house. Neglected by someone that could not or would not maintain it. Cheap at the price considering its under laying value. Worth much more in the future than it is now. Worth even more if its ownership is a monopoly.
This explains the giveaway of public assets to private business. "This is tantamount to selling the family china only to have to rent it back in order to eat dinner"
Big business has probably always admired bankers for capturing control of money and owning the printing press that creates the money. That is the biggest privatization of a public utility that was ever done. It was done almost a hundred years ago by the Federal Reserve Act. Debt Money set the stage for everything to follow in business. Now big business will follow the same model to capture a new license to print money. They will own what we once did. We once owned the money system. Our Constitution says that Congress has the power to create money. We once owned that power. It was ours.
We will someday say we once owned the public assets we created. We owned them until we could not longer pay to maintain and keep what we owned. Then we sold it and rented it back.
We only rent bankers money today that used to be owned as a our power to create and serve ourselves.
We will only rent the public assets that were in our power to control when we owned what we had invested in to serve ourselves.
Big business is only 100 years to late to the feast on the public enjoyed at first by the banks. The banks have opened the door to a partnership through the mortgage scam. It was a marriage of necessity because the banks could not have lasted much longer in the ponzi scheme of the Federal reserve.
Paupers in the land that our forefathers conquered.
We can get back from the Federal Reserve the power to create money that rightfully belongs to us in accordance with the Constitution as exercised by Congress.
We will not get back the public asset infrastructure that we sell to Big Business unless we nationalize it.
We will not have to sell what we own as public assets if we take back our power to create money and establish an asset money system in place of a debt money system. The window of opportunity to do this is closing as banks partner with big business to avoid collapse and perpetuate their fraud and they both feast upon us and make our serfdom permanent.
The most basic and fundamental thing we have is our freedom. What we own and benefit from and use to create our wealth, the wealth of our nation, is the productivity of our labor. Banks own money. Business owns the means of production. Labor is not one of those means, it is an external component owned by the workers and employed by business. Business can never own workers, trample on workers rights because workers own the government because that is our freedom. Government regulates business to keep the balance.
Government is not working as it should. Business is assuming ownership of it.
The people of Wisconsin are fighting our battle with the government and big business for ownership. The government there being a front for business interests.
Business wants to own labor and use forces at its disposal to do it. Business once sent in its supervisor goons, weak minded unpaid lackeys that were no more than workers themselves who were not smart enough to understand the situation and act in their own greater self interest, workers "owned" to work for less money and the paid thugs that do anything for money. It used to be that the government sent in police to enforce ownership power. It sent in troops when the big guns and more of them were needed.
Our own Egypt?
Business found a thing to do with all that money to make more money.
At this time president Obama is talking to a Small Business Conference. Hey mister president, keep your eye on what the other hand called big business is doing while your attention is being diverted to focus on Small Business!
Listening to a debate on TV with one ear I hear some jerk talking about all the excessive benefits that the public workers in Wisconsin get. The woman presenting the workers position says Walker gave tax breaks to business to cause this need to cut elsewhere, then they play the clip where Walker says he will not raise taxes to offset the loss of revenue resulting from the tax breaks given to new business. New business is a benefit to the state. Then the woman says, if belt tightening and sacrifice is needed then let all the taxpayers undertake it. The jerk says they get excessive benefits. She says that their pay and benefits are equal to the public sector based on a survey done by somebody. He says they get more benefits and therefore reduce them to what everybody else gets.
The basic logic of the entire situation is on the side of the public employees. More than that it is on the side of the public versus the government and big business control. Governor Walker can dictate to all the taxpayers if he wants to share the load just as much as he is dictating to public employees. Of course, business has been loading the game by pushing the meme in the media that public employees don't deserve what they get. Besides, we can't afford it at this time (due to the crises created by the banks).
Walker logic: Take the money from those that are getting more than they should. I am all for that. However, don't get it from those that have more than they should. Get it from those that just have more. It is called a regressive tax. It is a progressive idea. If he can identify all those workers that are getting more than they should as he sees it in terms of pay an benefits then take it from them. A waitress getting excessive tips. A banker getting an excessive bonus. In both cases it is getting it from a class that is making more than others in the same class. The other way to get more is to tax a single class that just gets more. Those with more income or property to tax. I am not sure which Wisconsin uses but by definition, whatever it uses is de factor fair. Use that system. Raise taxes to pay for government operations, or take cuts on a rational prioritized basis as a function of zero based budgeting.
Walkers objective is not governance. He has other agenda, which is the same as big business or its owned means of production called the Republican Party.
Monday, February 21, 2011
President's Day
Clinton had a simple focus on a crucial issue. The Economy is what money does.
Obama must focus on an even more fundamental thing: What Money is.
For example:
If we look at what people do in the world it is anything and everything they do. The range of that is immense and only limited by human imagination. Even if the focus is confined to a major broad category like what people do in the economy.
If we look at what a person is rather than they do then we deal with the fundamental issue. In this situation a person as a citizen of our country is defined by the Constitution. With a solid grip on what a thing is, or what a thing was designed to be, what the thing can do naturally follows. People were designed to be something by a Higher Power. We then then just called that truth self evident and implemented the design of what a person as citizen is. After defining what a citizen is, what it does, individually or collectively does not have to be designed, simply permitted and regulated to maintain compliance with the design standard defining what a citizen is.
Let me design, create and put into operation what a thing is and I will basically determine what it does. If do that in my own self interest to benefit me then I own it, I control it, I determine what it does.
That is what Jefferson said about money. When banks create it, control it, it does not matter what governments do. Governments meaning an institution of the people, for the people to serve the people. Banks control the government and serve themselves. They control the people, in serving themselves, the banks do not serve the people. The Constitution embodies a moral foundation. There is no moral foundation to a banking system. It is just business. One of the goals of business is market share and total market dominance is the objective.
Banks own all the money. All our money is debt money. Our government gave banks the total money system and the only solution is to take it back. The only way to take it back is a change in definition of what money is: An asset, not a debt. An asset created by We The People to serve us all, like our government was created by us to serve us. Money must not be an asset created by a bank to serve a bank at the expense of our ideals of freedom, justice and rights.
It is the Money, stupid.
Who owns the power to dictate to people was settled by our first Revolution. President Obama is standing in President Washington's shoes. It is ironic that his race and its dictator was the crux of another revolution. If the current president cannot fill the shoes of our first president or our 16th president and make another pivotal declaration of freedom then freedom is doomed as Jefferson said it would be when the power to control money is given to the banks.
This is a tipping point in history where people are defying their oppressors and making the statement of who they are and freeing themselves from the self serving control of those in governmental power have defined them to be. That is Freedom Version 1.0 Basic freedom. We have had revisions and refinements to this version throughout our history. We must again establish world leadership with the design and implementation of Freedom 2.0. The updated version takes the control of money and our nation's destiny, as well as the destiny of the world from the dictatorial power of the banks. Version 2.0 is a paradigm shift, the second great one in our history.
What a sad state of affairs here: Respondents in a new Gallup Poll this President Day's (today) have tapped Ronald Regan as the nation's greatest chief executive, ahead of Abraham Lincoln.
Obama must focus on an even more fundamental thing: What Money is.
For example:
If we look at what people do in the world it is anything and everything they do. The range of that is immense and only limited by human imagination. Even if the focus is confined to a major broad category like what people do in the economy.
If we look at what a person is rather than they do then we deal with the fundamental issue. In this situation a person as a citizen of our country is defined by the Constitution. With a solid grip on what a thing is, or what a thing was designed to be, what the thing can do naturally follows. People were designed to be something by a Higher Power. We then then just called that truth self evident and implemented the design of what a person as citizen is. After defining what a citizen is, what it does, individually or collectively does not have to be designed, simply permitted and regulated to maintain compliance with the design standard defining what a citizen is.
Let me design, create and put into operation what a thing is and I will basically determine what it does. If do that in my own self interest to benefit me then I own it, I control it, I determine what it does.
That is what Jefferson said about money. When banks create it, control it, it does not matter what governments do. Governments meaning an institution of the people, for the people to serve the people. Banks control the government and serve themselves. They control the people, in serving themselves, the banks do not serve the people. The Constitution embodies a moral foundation. There is no moral foundation to a banking system. It is just business. One of the goals of business is market share and total market dominance is the objective.
Banks own all the money. All our money is debt money. Our government gave banks the total money system and the only solution is to take it back. The only way to take it back is a change in definition of what money is: An asset, not a debt. An asset created by We The People to serve us all, like our government was created by us to serve us. Money must not be an asset created by a bank to serve a bank at the expense of our ideals of freedom, justice and rights.
It is the Money, stupid.
Who owns the power to dictate to people was settled by our first Revolution. President Obama is standing in President Washington's shoes. It is ironic that his race and its dictator was the crux of another revolution. If the current president cannot fill the shoes of our first president or our 16th president and make another pivotal declaration of freedom then freedom is doomed as Jefferson said it would be when the power to control money is given to the banks.
This is a tipping point in history where people are defying their oppressors and making the statement of who they are and freeing themselves from the self serving control of those in governmental power have defined them to be. That is Freedom Version 1.0 Basic freedom. We have had revisions and refinements to this version throughout our history. We must again establish world leadership with the design and implementation of Freedom 2.0. The updated version takes the control of money and our nation's destiny, as well as the destiny of the world from the dictatorial power of the banks. Version 2.0 is a paradigm shift, the second great one in our history.
What a sad state of affairs here: Respondents in a new Gallup Poll this President Day's (today) have tapped Ronald Regan as the nation's greatest chief executive, ahead of Abraham Lincoln.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Progress
I have to know that I am getting somewhere in my journey when I look at the things I neglect to get there.
I neglect shoveling the snow on my driveway.
I neglect my car, the battery is dieing
I neglect my house.
I neglect my personal relationships
There is more below the pictures
I am getting somewhere, the price is worth it but it is only a price deferred, ironically a debt come due.
So I start with my driveway. All things in due course. When they are taken care of, I will take care of myself when I declare this journey finished.
Driveway first. The car did start so there is a point in doing the driveway.
Shoveling the driveway is not to clear it. It is only doing the heavy lifting to expose the icy surface beneath, which is really just snow in its hardest form. I do 99 percent to expose the hardest part to the sun and let it do what would be so hard for me. I had to wear golf shoes to shovel the snow this morning.
It is Sunday and perhaps there is a lesson here that will apply to the other things I have neglected after I get the car down the driveway.
I am making progress. I am getting somewhere.
I don't have to do the steps. I know a quicker, better way to get where I want to go. I have neglected those closest to me. I gave them this blog address so they might understand why. Show them what I am doing, focusing my attention. Hope that they will understand. Few have looked at it but I hope they will understand anyhow. One person I gave the site address to shares a common cause. To widen out to a core of those that share a common cause and contribute once I get my ideas together if where I am going.
I neglect shoveling the snow on my driveway.
I neglect my car, the battery is dieing
I neglect my house.
I neglect my personal relationships
There is more below the pictures
I am getting somewhere, the price is worth it but it is only a price deferred, ironically a debt come due.
So I start with my driveway. All things in due course. When they are taken care of, I will take care of myself when I declare this journey finished.
Driveway first. The car did start so there is a point in doing the driveway.
Shoveling the driveway is not to clear it. It is only doing the heavy lifting to expose the icy surface beneath, which is really just snow in its hardest form. I do 99 percent to expose the hardest part to the sun and let it do what would be so hard for me. I had to wear golf shoes to shovel the snow this morning.
It is Sunday and perhaps there is a lesson here that will apply to the other things I have neglected after I get the car down the driveway.
I am making progress. I am getting somewhere.
I don't have to do the steps. I know a quicker, better way to get where I want to go. I have neglected those closest to me. I gave them this blog address so they might understand why. Show them what I am doing, focusing my attention. Hope that they will understand. Few have looked at it but I hope they will understand anyhow. One person I gave the site address to shares a common cause. To widen out to a core of those that share a common cause and contribute once I get my ideas together if where I am going.
Its All About the MONEY, Stupid!
Someone political adviser whispered to Clinton: Its all about the economy, stupid. Base your campaign on that.
Someone needs to whisper to Obama: Its all about the MONEY, stupid.
Jefferson said the same thing.
In my post about memes I asked what meme tweet the founding fathers would have given us upon which base our freedom.
Its the Money, stupid!!
Someone needs to whisper to Obama: Its all about the MONEY, stupid.
Jefferson said the same thing.
In my post about memes I asked what meme tweet the founding fathers would have given us upon which base our freedom.
Its the Money, stupid!!
The Wheels are Coming Off
On CBS Sunday Morning there was a story about Pritchard, Alabama. The city can no longer retirement benefits to its retirees. The city does not have the money. It is in violation of state direction to pay the money. It does not have the money. Its plea for bankruptcy has been denied. The city must pay. The city says that it cannot.
Later on the same program there was a story about the IBM computer called Watson. A comment was made that it only does what a computer does best. It uses logic. Another comment was that it will never be able to duplicate what we can do with the human heart. That was a segue to what came next: Human emotional attachment to what essentially a computer, even if it is dressed up as a baby seal.
We are manipulated into attachment to other things that do not have a human heart. Recently there is a commercial with the punch line "I love my bank". The delivery is saying it over and over again. A human says it to her dog. This is the ultimate in your face joke of the marketing industry. If you can get someone to love a bank, you deserve an oscar in the advertising business!
Later in the same program was an ad for a credit card. The focus was on having a baby, the guy fainted when he learned they were going to have triplets. The Chase credit card saved the day!
What if we asked Watson what kind of Monetary System we should have. It would certainly tell us the we must create money, not the banks. Jefferson said that long ago.
Manipulators are manipulators regardless of the medium of manipulation. Logic is hard to manipulate, emotion is easy. Watson is the ultimate, at least up to now, thing that cannot be manipulated by anything but logic. Logic at a low level can conflict but it can be resolved at higher more fundamental levels. In the end I guess the logic that wins is the logic of its contextual system. All that is necessary to resolve a logic conflict is to take it to its ultimate frame of reference contextual level.
Is that contextual level bounded by not going beyond the separation of church and state? Not if one is conflated with the other. It ends, as far as Americans are concerned at the Authoritarian Level. That is where we draw the line between the opration of exterior authoritarian control versus organic democratic freedom of choice.
Then Ben Stein made his appearance. I always have to supress the immediate urge to barf when I see him. He talked about money. Demand, inflation, stagflation. The world situation. Banks holding money. He said "The feelings are ominous". He cerainly got the right!! Feelings are emotions. We are in a crises.
What is the fundamental nature of the crises. Is it feelings or logic. It is a combination of both. The current money system is not logical, not reasonable. The current controllers of money must fight the those that want to control it with the manipulation of emotion and when that fails the direct use of force.
The current controllers of money power send in the goons loaded with emotion to intimidate and outshout those that seek control. At first they are identifiable goons of the system. The top level agents of the Federal Reserve Bank inserted into government positions. Then when things heat up they send in the plain clothes goons. The ones that go hand to hand with the people desiring freedom. The Power Holders then fight a delaying game, make promises that are empty and nothing more than more of the same old stuff. In the end, the only question is will they go peacefully or be forced.
Have we seen that same scenario play out recently?
Later on the same program there was a story about the IBM computer called Watson. A comment was made that it only does what a computer does best. It uses logic. Another comment was that it will never be able to duplicate what we can do with the human heart. That was a segue to what came next: Human emotional attachment to what essentially a computer, even if it is dressed up as a baby seal.
We are manipulated into attachment to other things that do not have a human heart. Recently there is a commercial with the punch line "I love my bank". The delivery is saying it over and over again. A human says it to her dog. This is the ultimate in your face joke of the marketing industry. If you can get someone to love a bank, you deserve an oscar in the advertising business!
Later in the same program was an ad for a credit card. The focus was on having a baby, the guy fainted when he learned they were going to have triplets. The Chase credit card saved the day!
What if we asked Watson what kind of Monetary System we should have. It would certainly tell us the we must create money, not the banks. Jefferson said that long ago.
Manipulators are manipulators regardless of the medium of manipulation. Logic is hard to manipulate, emotion is easy. Watson is the ultimate, at least up to now, thing that cannot be manipulated by anything but logic. Logic at a low level can conflict but it can be resolved at higher more fundamental levels. In the end I guess the logic that wins is the logic of its contextual system. All that is necessary to resolve a logic conflict is to take it to its ultimate frame of reference contextual level.
Is that contextual level bounded by not going beyond the separation of church and state? Not if one is conflated with the other. It ends, as far as Americans are concerned at the Authoritarian Level. That is where we draw the line between the opration of exterior authoritarian control versus organic democratic freedom of choice.
Then Ben Stein made his appearance. I always have to supress the immediate urge to barf when I see him. He talked about money. Demand, inflation, stagflation. The world situation. Banks holding money. He said "The feelings are ominous". He cerainly got the right!! Feelings are emotions. We are in a crises.
What is the fundamental nature of the crises. Is it feelings or logic. It is a combination of both. The current money system is not logical, not reasonable. The current controllers of money must fight the those that want to control it with the manipulation of emotion and when that fails the direct use of force.
The current controllers of money power send in the goons loaded with emotion to intimidate and outshout those that seek control. At first they are identifiable goons of the system. The top level agents of the Federal Reserve Bank inserted into government positions. Then when things heat up they send in the plain clothes goons. The ones that go hand to hand with the people desiring freedom. The Power Holders then fight a delaying game, make promises that are empty and nothing more than more of the same old stuff. In the end, the only question is will they go peacefully or be forced.
Have we seen that same scenario play out recently?
Saturday, February 19, 2011
CRISES
Crises Demands Clarity
There is no debt crises in Sovereign Nations
This post is a place holder. An empty space yet to be filled. The beauty in a bowl is its emptiness.
This is a very important place holder established to anchor my focus on the solution by establishing clarity of crises.
It is an empty bowl now but work is in progress to fill it.
Define the crises clearly.
A clearly defined and understood crises is the key to its solution.
The core of the crises is the core of the solution.
Both demand clarity.
The fog of war tells us that it there can't be a solution as long as there is no clarity.
Clearly war is not the solution in this case.
Clarity of war? Now that leads to a clarity of solution.
There is no debt crises in Sovereign Nations
This post is a place holder. An empty space yet to be filled. The beauty in a bowl is its emptiness.
This is a very important place holder established to anchor my focus on the solution by establishing clarity of crises.
It is an empty bowl now but work is in progress to fill it.
Define the crises clearly.
A clearly defined and understood crises is the key to its solution.
The core of the crises is the core of the solution.
Both demand clarity.
The fog of war tells us that it there can't be a solution as long as there is no clarity.
Clearly war is not the solution in this case.
Clarity of war? Now that leads to a clarity of solution.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Words Like Money
Words, like money, are a medium of exchange. In that context my post on Euphemism is not out of line with the rest of the posts that relate to money in some fashion. I am, after all, looking at what money really is. Perhaps to understand what it is there is benefit in exploring how we use other things in a communication interchange as a medium.
In the post Memes, a meme is a unit of cultural expression. It passes from one person to another, it becomes the means to convey a cultural value from one to another. So what is the payback in passing a meme like money to convey a value? Perhaps reinforcement that it was a value. That is done by not questioning it by accepting it as a given. Repudiation would reject the value the words as a medium of exchange were intended to convey. In other words: (is there a pun here?) your words are not accepted as legal tender. Your money has no value. Leads to interesting thoughts. Ralph Nader is saying here, I don't buy your memes that you intend to convey to me with your words. The words themselves are not legal tender because they do not represent a thought with single grain of conceptual value. That conceptual value being anything that is anywhere near the truth
Velocity of money is an interesting thing. How quickly it goes from hand to hand. There are formulas to express it. How fast is goes from hand to hand has implications in a bigger scheme of things.
Speed of turnover from one holder to another is a measure of what money is rather than what money does. Like money, it is an medium of exchange in a transaction of value. Buy that idea and then maybe the basis of money was in language. In an organic sense then looking at money in terms of language might give a new view to how the concept of money developed before barter, which is where most money historians start.
I should go google linguistics with some added keyword that might get me to somebody who has this view of how money really got started.
Ha! My first hit: "Linguistics - That Is Where The Big Money Is" A bumper sticker! Maybe a double meaning here along the lines of linguistics being money as well as how to make Big Money.
Money Talks. That is an interesting linguistic phrase! Money is an example of Frame Semantics (Linguistics). Interesting that it uses the example of money. Maybe this was the context in which the fundamental concept of linguistics that provided a means to establish a different perspective from which a frame is viewed, such a buyer and seller and a means of bringing the two together.
Language as Currency. Googling that gives and interesting return. Mostly hitting on the question: What is a country's Language and Currency. Probably the two most important things we need to know to communicate there! There is a closely binding analogy. Possessing what each is we can participate in the economies of what they do.
The "Economics of Language" is described here as at the fringes of economic study. Two different languages regarding economics are now being used in Washington. Maybe the study of the economics of language should be hauled in from the fringes. When it gets down to such fundamental "starting all over by speaking the same language" things have certainly gotten out of hand.
Haven't they?
If one side has manipulated the language itself to press its advantage, they will not agree to sit down and go over the basics of what the language to be used is. They own the language, they can make up its meaning and value out of thin air and employ it to further they own agenda to accrue wealth and power....................
Hey, am I talking about Banksters and money or Politicians and Words.
What we have here..... is a failure...... to communicate.... (with a medium of exchange.... by which to trade value. I own the medium of exchange.) Whack! I am communicating with you. You want to compromise by agreement on the neutrality of the medium of exchange that means I can't load the medium with my own message? You want me to give up my power to do that? You mean we each depend on our own ability to formulate and present positions not manipulating the medium of exchange itself in our favor to present them?
"What we have here is a failure to communicate." Those were the unspoken words but spoken meaning of the end of the film that was the result of the failure.
Digressed enough for one day. I think that I got somewhere in all of this.
The idea of money and linguistics is a worthy one and may have more than just academic interest. People don't understand money. If there is a close analogy between money and language, which most can understand, perhaps there is a path to better understanding. The creation and use of the political language in economy of politics by politicians gets us no more than the creation and use of money by Banksters in our financial economy. Both are heading for geometric growth and devaluation of the underlaying value of their units.
Unit of Words = Unit of Money.
Who owns the words and their meaning value as a medium of exchange?
Who owns the money and its meaning value as a medium of exchange?
Are we going bankrupt, to put it in economic terms in something more important than finance?
Noam Chomsky....Help us! Tell it like it is!
In the post Memes, a meme is a unit of cultural expression. It passes from one person to another, it becomes the means to convey a cultural value from one to another. So what is the payback in passing a meme like money to convey a value? Perhaps reinforcement that it was a value. That is done by not questioning it by accepting it as a given. Repudiation would reject the value the words as a medium of exchange were intended to convey. In other words: (is there a pun here?) your words are not accepted as legal tender. Your money has no value. Leads to interesting thoughts. Ralph Nader is saying here, I don't buy your memes that you intend to convey to me with your words. The words themselves are not legal tender because they do not represent a thought with single grain of conceptual value. That conceptual value being anything that is anywhere near the truth
Velocity of money is an interesting thing. How quickly it goes from hand to hand. There are formulas to express it. How fast is goes from hand to hand has implications in a bigger scheme of things.
Speed of turnover from one holder to another is a measure of what money is rather than what money does. Like money, it is an medium of exchange in a transaction of value. Buy that idea and then maybe the basis of money was in language. In an organic sense then looking at money in terms of language might give a new view to how the concept of money developed before barter, which is where most money historians start.
I should go google linguistics with some added keyword that might get me to somebody who has this view of how money really got started.
Ha! My first hit: "Linguistics - That Is Where The Big Money Is" A bumper sticker! Maybe a double meaning here along the lines of linguistics being money as well as how to make Big Money.
Money Talks. That is an interesting linguistic phrase! Money is an example of Frame Semantics (Linguistics). Interesting that it uses the example of money. Maybe this was the context in which the fundamental concept of linguistics that provided a means to establish a different perspective from which a frame is viewed, such a buyer and seller and a means of bringing the two together.
Language as Currency. Googling that gives and interesting return. Mostly hitting on the question: What is a country's Language and Currency. Probably the two most important things we need to know to communicate there! There is a closely binding analogy. Possessing what each is we can participate in the economies of what they do.
The "Economics of Language" is described here as at the fringes of economic study. Two different languages regarding economics are now being used in Washington. Maybe the study of the economics of language should be hauled in from the fringes. When it gets down to such fundamental "starting all over by speaking the same language" things have certainly gotten out of hand.
Haven't they?
If one side has manipulated the language itself to press its advantage, they will not agree to sit down and go over the basics of what the language to be used is. They own the language, they can make up its meaning and value out of thin air and employ it to further they own agenda to accrue wealth and power....................
Hey, am I talking about Banksters and money or Politicians and Words.
What we have here..... is a failure...... to communicate.... (with a medium of exchange.... by which to trade value. I own the medium of exchange.) Whack! I am communicating with you. You want to compromise by agreement on the neutrality of the medium of exchange that means I can't load the medium with my own message? You want me to give up my power to do that? You mean we each depend on our own ability to formulate and present positions not manipulating the medium of exchange itself in our favor to present them?
"What we have here is a failure to communicate." Those were the unspoken words but spoken meaning of the end of the film that was the result of the failure.
Digressed enough for one day. I think that I got somewhere in all of this.
The idea of money and linguistics is a worthy one and may have more than just academic interest. People don't understand money. If there is a close analogy between money and language, which most can understand, perhaps there is a path to better understanding. The creation and use of the political language in economy of politics by politicians gets us no more than the creation and use of money by Banksters in our financial economy. Both are heading for geometric growth and devaluation of the underlaying value of their units.
Unit of Words = Unit of Money.
Who owns the words and their meaning value as a medium of exchange?
Who owns the money and its meaning value as a medium of exchange?
Are we going bankrupt, to put it in economic terms in something more important than finance?
Noam Chomsky....Help us! Tell it like it is!
Funny Money
To my Radical Friend:
Considering what I am doing, the Max video you sent me this morning is the most amazing thing I have ever seen.
What am I doing: Thinking about money. I have been doing it for months. I have hundreds of organized bookmarks that are my footsteps in this journey.
Finally, I decided that after all this input to my thought I had to start making some output. I established This blog. Nobody knows about it except my sister, two others and anyone that might find it by search, which appears to be one person so far. I could hide it completely until I wanted to go public. Those that I told about it don't look at it so it is still really non-existent except to me. No heed to hide it. Who knows, if it is open I might get some feedback but that is not what I am looking for now. It is raw material that has to be refined, boiled down, shaped, processed and distilled into some 200 proof stuff. So much on the internet is not. Maybe my objective should be to put it all in a single tweet.
Not a bad idea; A single tweet. If our Founding Fathers had to put their thoughts into a single tweet and tell us: Take this tweet and run with it to build a free country. Maybe it would be: One person, one vote? Just a fun thought like my Euphemism post! Really that is more or less the level of simplicity that I have to reduce a complex situation to and it has to be more direct than a euphemism. I like linguistics.
So, I will give you this post and you can see what I am working on. You are the fourth person to have it. All the rest of the entries in the blog are on the right hand side. All these ideas are going somewhere. I am not ready to discuss them with anyone yet. You are good at defending your ideas against a mob with one hand behind your back and I am sure you gave as good as you got last night or even better but talking to some mobs is a zero sum game. All that is accomplished is that you irritate them but that is all they want. As a result of the irritation they find the opportunity to express how they feel, not how they think, because they don't. To many are led by those that don't and thrive on feelings like fear/hate. Segue here to Egypt and what happened and feelings and thinking.
It was 5:20 by the time I realized that I had intended to be there last night.
So, here is the key to the door of my thoughts on the right hand side of this blog.
Please go to this blog post first. It is germane to the Max video. It dances around it but connects at the end. All the rest are too. This is the video about China at the end of that post. Then meander at will among the posts. Keep in mind I only wrote them for myself at this point.
What Jefferson said about those having the money ruling is a truth. China is going to rule. Perhaps they are sending us a two part euphemism. We just don't get it. They are very clever or we are very dumb. Down the center of the beginning of this link are more good things that wise men said about money. The rest of the link I am still struggling to understand and filed it as "return to" when I know more.
Max was laughing through his entire comment. He knew about some of the ridiculous parts of what he was talking about. He did not know about the others.
Somebody over in China is watching Max and laughing all the way to the Noodle Factory. If his video goes viral in China we will know the writing on the wall. They get euphemisms, the beauty of this one is that Max does not even know that he expressed one.
What Max's video says in in so many words that is really bottom line words that are taboo for us to say (but he does not know he said it.)
"We are so stupid".
And
"We do not even know it!"
We will be the last ones in the world to get it when everyone in the world is laughing at us after the dollar falls.
Just desserts? The end of our feasting on the rest of the world. We get eaten. So sweet for them.
Truly justice for what we have done. Justice is what love looks like when it takes social form? Interesting idea. Mike has a fascinating mind and an equally interesting way of expressing himself.
And we thought we owned the world with our military.
The Chinese guy that saw Max with be the center of attention at the Noodle Factory water cooler today.
“First they ignored us
Then they laughed at us
Then they attacked us
Then we won”
Funny money. That is all we will be left with. It will not even be ours. It all belongs to the banksters! Like Mubark the banksters will bail out. Where to? China. They will be greeted as liberators of the world that caused the downfall of the USA.
Banksters wear a beret and a t-shirt underneath those suits? The people who start a revolution are called revolutionaries. The Banksters started this one. Perhaps they are our enemies more than we even know?
Inside job!!!
Chinese plot?
Max was laughing through his entire comment. He knew about some of the ridiculous parts of what he was talking about. He did not know about the others.
Somebody over in China is watching Max and laughing all the way to the Noodle Factory. If his video goes viral in China we will know the writing on the wall. They get euphemisms, the beauty of this one is that Max does not even know that he expressed one.
What Max's video says in in so many words that is really bottom line words that are taboo for us to say (but he does not know he said it.)
"We are so stupid".
And
"We do not even know it!"
We will be the last ones in the world to get it when everyone in the world is laughing at us after the dollar falls.
Just desserts? The end of our feasting on the rest of the world. We get eaten. So sweet for them.
Truly justice for what we have done. Justice is what love looks like when it takes social form? Interesting idea. Mike has a fascinating mind and an equally interesting way of expressing himself.
And we thought we owned the world with our military.
The Chinese guy that saw Max with be the center of attention at the Noodle Factory water cooler today.
“First they ignored us
Then they laughed at us
Then they attacked us
Then we won”
Funny money. That is all we will be left with. It will not even be ours. It all belongs to the banksters! Like Mubark the banksters will bail out. Where to? China. They will be greeted as liberators of the world that caused the downfall of the USA.
Banksters wear a beret and a t-shirt underneath those suits? The people who start a revolution are called revolutionaries. The Banksters started this one. Perhaps they are our enemies more than we even know?
Inside job!!!
Chinese plot?
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Things Don't Change
Things don't change, their functions do.. More accurately: Things do change over time but slowly. Functions change more quickly over time. A thing can perform multiple functions. Changes in a thing's numerous functions over an extended time can change what a thing is. Fundamental things change very slowly over time. Absolute things don't change. There are very few absolute things in the world. There is only one absolute Thing beyond the world. It has only one Function in this world. Our view of the Function of that Thing in the world changes. The Thing and its Function does not.
That is the way I see things.
That is the way I see things.
Mises Money
Mises presents his Theory of Money and Credit here.
It begins:
Part 1: The Nature of Money
Chapter 1: The Function of Money
1. The General Economic Conditions for the Use of Money.
Extracting some of his key statements presents fundamental views of money:
The position of the state in the market differs in no way from that of any other parties to commercial transactions........Kings and republics have repeatedly refused to recognize this.... The concept of money as a creature of law and the state is clearly untenable.
Mises likesd gold:
Sound money still means today what it meant in the nineteenth century: the gold standard. The eminence of the gold standard consists in the fact that it makes the determination of the monetary unit's purchasing power independent of the measures of governments. It wrests from the hands of the "economic tsars" their most redoubtable instrument. It makes it impossible for them to inflate. This is why the gold standard is furiously attacked by all those who expect that they will be benefited by bounties from the seemingly inexhaustible government purse.
Mises likes it because:
The eminence of the gold standard consists in the fact that it makes the determination of the monetary unit's purchasing power independent of the measures of governments. It wrests from the hands of the "economic tsars" their most redoubtable instrument. It makes it impossible for them to inflate. This is why the gold standard is furiously attacked by all those who expect that they will be benefited by bounties from the seemingly inexhaustible government purse.............
It begins:
Part 1: The Nature of Money
Chapter 1: The Function of Money
1. The General Economic Conditions for the Use of Money.
Extracting some of his key statements presents fundamental views of money:
The position of the state in the market differs in no way from that of any other parties to commercial transactions........Kings and republics have repeatedly refused to recognize this.... The concept of money as a creature of law and the state is clearly untenable.
Mises likesd gold:
Sound money still means today what it meant in the nineteenth century: the gold standard. The eminence of the gold standard consists in the fact that it makes the determination of the monetary unit's purchasing power independent of the measures of governments. It wrests from the hands of the "economic tsars" their most redoubtable instrument. It makes it impossible for them to inflate. This is why the gold standard is furiously attacked by all those who expect that they will be benefited by bounties from the seemingly inexhaustible government purse.
Mises likes it because:
The eminence of the gold standard consists in the fact that it makes the determination of the monetary unit's purchasing power independent of the measures of governments. It wrests from the hands of the "economic tsars" their most redoubtable instrument. It makes it impossible for them to inflate. This is why the gold standard is furiously attacked by all those who expect that they will be benefited by bounties from the seemingly inexhaustible government purse.............
The classical or orthodox gold standard alone is a truly effective check on the power of the government to inflate the currency. Without such a check all other constitutional safeguards can be rendered vain.
This is how Mises would apply his theory:
One of the main aims of a return to gold is precisely to do away with this system (deficit spending) of waste, corruption, and arbitrary government...........
The first step must be a radical and unconditional abandonment of any further inflation. The total amount of dollar bills, whatever their name or legal characteristic may be, must not be increased by further issuance. No bank must be permitted to expand the total amount of its deposits subject to check or the balance of such deposits of any individual customer, be he a private citizen or the U.S. Treasury, otherwise than by receiving cash deposits in legal-tender banknotes from the public or by receiving a check payable by another domestic bank subject to the same limitations. This means a rigid 100 percent reserve for all future deposits; that is, all deposits not already in existence on the first day of the reform.
The ideas of dead guys live on. Mises ideas are living here.
His ideas are still making the case for gold. We live in a different time. The function of gold then in a money system is historic fact. It no longer applies to the current world where there are better ways to perform the function of this thing called money.
The gold standard crusaders of today are focused on the function of gold as money. Mises was absolutely correct in his statement about the functional failings of the money system and the need for a solid standard. The failings are still the failings. Mises solution of 100% reserve money was right. His solution of a fixed amount of Solid Money that could not be manipulated was right.
His main political proponent today is Ron Paul. If Mises was alive today and he would probably say to Ron Paul:
This is not the same world I lived in. Things don't change but functions do. Inflation is still the problem. Debt money is still the problem. We need Sound Money. A gold standard might have been a good idea at my time but in the modern world you have much better ways to perform a function aimed at solving the same old things. Don't do it with gold. Functions change, things don't. Do it with your modern technology that manages things and functions in ways that I never could have imagined. When I lived, the things and its function were the same. Gold was money. Now you can separate concepts from the constrains of their physical objects. Money does not have to be tied to gold anymore. Use your technology to make money as good as gold, the only thing it would lack is the glitter. Your marketing people could even figure out a way to give it that.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Blessed are the Young
“Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt”
-Herbert Hoover
-Herbert Hoover
Memes
Wikipedia describes a meme. Go to here for the explanation. It is an interesting concept.
Or just grasp this: A unit for carrying cultural ideas.
Short and sweet. That is the extent to which ideas are developed today. While Twitter has a limit on words in a tweet, most are short. Matching our short attention span. That is not entirely bad. In that short period of time that it captures our attention span it just might give us pause to think. While attention is short, once inspired most of us can still think. Some that cannot are sheep. They have short attention spans too but don't think. We will be hearing more money memes from those that fire up theirbase sheep. Beck is not a thought leader. He is a meme bleater.
Money Memes:
Here are some common money memes that we hear often today.
Its our money.
Its my money.
Its your money.
Government money.
Some sheep bleat the memes, other sheep repeat them.
I think that the president might say the meme and then so something that the bleat leaders don't ask their sheep to do: Think about it. At least those that can. Reasonably, rationally as responsible citizens. That might seriously happen. Is he a sheep leader or a shepperd?
Thinking is difficult for a sheep. That is why they get fleeced.
The meme is the key to either controlling thoughtless people or igniting the fire of thinking people.
Fired up?
I am not sure. I want to believe.
Or just grasp this: A unit for carrying cultural ideas.
Short and sweet. That is the extent to which ideas are developed today. While Twitter has a limit on words in a tweet, most are short. Matching our short attention span. That is not entirely bad. In that short period of time that it captures our attention span it just might give us pause to think. While attention is short, once inspired most of us can still think. Some that cannot are sheep. They have short attention spans too but don't think. We will be hearing more money memes from those that fire up their
Money Memes:
Here are some common money memes that we hear often today.
Its our money.
Its my money.
Its your money.
Government money.
Some sheep bleat the memes, other sheep repeat them.
I think that the president might say the meme and then so something that the bleat leaders don't ask their sheep to do: Think about it. At least those that can. Reasonably, rationally as responsible citizens. That might seriously happen. Is he a sheep leader or a shepperd?
Thinking is difficult for a sheep. That is why they get fleeced.
The meme is the key to either controlling thoughtless people or igniting the fire of thinking people.
Fired up?
I am not sure. I want to believe.
Household Economics
President Obama is talking about his budget. A couple times he likened the budget problems to a household budget and a credit card.
When questioned he acknowledged the difference between balancing the annual budget (income = expenditure) and the total level of debt owed (National Debt). Apparently although the budget is balanced the level national debt goes up by trillions.
When questioned about the National Debt level the president said that first we need to get the budget deficit balance corrected first and then deal with the total level of debt. He indicated that would be dealt with in a couple years.
The president may explain the situation to the public in terms of a household budget but that is where the analogy ends. Our government can do something a household economy can't.
A government can change its Debt Money system to an Asset Money system. That is the solution. Perhaps what he intends to do is kick the debt solution down the road to his second term. It will be a crises then.
Perhaps he will take the Roosevelt approach:
The country needs and, unless I mistake its temper, the country demands bold, persistent experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.
Go Ahead, Make Me
I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it.
Maybe he already has a plan to change from Debt Money to Asset Money and abolish fractional reserve banking?
Somewhere near the end of his speech he appealed to us asking what it is that we want to do with our money? Do we want it to do this or that. Think about the benefit. Make some rational reasonable decisions.
Our money? Doesn't that set the stage for the implementation of an asset money, debt free money system? The real question is what we want to do with our money system? Someday he may ask that question. That is what would make him our greatest president if it became our money, not the bank's money.
When questioned he acknowledged the difference between balancing the annual budget (income = expenditure) and the total level of debt owed (National Debt). Apparently although the budget is balanced the level national debt goes up by trillions.
When questioned about the National Debt level the president said that first we need to get the budget deficit balance corrected first and then deal with the total level of debt. He indicated that would be dealt with in a couple years.
The president may explain the situation to the public in terms of a household budget but that is where the analogy ends. Our government can do something a household economy can't.
A government can change its Debt Money system to an Asset Money system. That is the solution. Perhaps what he intends to do is kick the debt solution down the road to his second term. It will be a crises then.
Perhaps he will take the Roosevelt approach:
The country needs and, unless I mistake its temper, the country demands bold, persistent experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
1932
Go Ahead, Make Me
I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Comment to a group of reformers. His point: Until they lead the way, they shouldn't expect leaders to follow.
Maybe he already has a plan to change from Debt Money to Asset Money and abolish fractional reserve banking?
Somewhere near the end of his speech he appealed to us asking what it is that we want to do with our money? Do we want it to do this or that. Think about the benefit. Make some rational reasonable decisions.
Our money? Doesn't that set the stage for the implementation of an asset money, debt free money system? The real question is what we want to do with our money system? Someday he may ask that question. That is what would make him our greatest president if it became our money, not the bank's money.
Euphemistic Discourse
Rather than chasing an idea this morning I stilled my mind and let the idea come to me. I never know what it might be.
Euphemistic Discourse. At first I felt it settle softly. Then I felt it grab me. I could spend the rest of the day with this idea.
All my journeys on the internet seem to start with Google.
How often I found where I should be going only by setting out for somewhere else. (Buckminster Fuller)
The first google hit took me here. All the way to China! I did not set out to go there!
Chen Liwen presents A Cognitive Contrast Study of Euphemistic Discourse Between Chinese and English. I didn't know there was one. Discovery is the joy of the journey.
There is a contrast. "Euphemisms are abundant in both Chinese and English. Although there are surprising similarities between corresponding expressions in two languages, differences between them are obvious, especially in euphemistic discourse."
That got me hooked. Tell me more Liwen.
"Chinese euphemisms tend to employ two presentation spaces to map onto one reference space, whereas in English often there is only one presentation space."
That is an interesting view. I can only guess that in English the single presentation space is a direct mapping of the euphemistic expression to the direct explicit statement or word that it represents. Apparently, Chinese expression of the euphemism is a two part thing relating to the explicit statement or word.
Thinking about that, this is what I thought:
The explicit statement or word that a euphemism leads to is an obvious but subjective interpretation on the part of the person hearing the euphemism: I heard you say this but in raw simple terms I know that you really said this. Maybe what Liwen is going to talk about is that in Chinese there are two parts to the euphemistic statement and it is up to the person to put the two parts together and produce the simple explicit conclusion of what is being said. How much more interesting and perhaps challenging. The constructor of the euphemism has to think about how to present part one and part two of the euphemism then convey it to the listener so that the listener gets the explicit meaning by putting 1 and 2 together to get part 3. Just my guess.
The Chinese euphemism might then be more teacher/student oriented in that it requires the student to think rather than just translate. The challenge in an English euphemism is the listener either getting it or not. There is simple direct connection or not. In Chinese the maker says in effect: This is part 1, this is part 2 in words not only removed from their explicit meaning but another step removed from their explicit meaning. Stating 1 and 2 that way is my signal to you that if you want to get the part 3 explicit conclusion you have to figure it out by yourself.
That is an interesting and perhaps more elegant way to communicate. It can also lead to ambiguity in meaning but only if the speaker and listener do not know the rules of the method by which Chinese euphemisms are formed but how they are passed as a message. If both are masters of this art then the conversation would be a very interesting display of communication skill on an elegant level of chess.
Moving the Chinese conversation from the master/student relationship to the master/master relationship makes it even more interesting. I would conclude a euphemistic discourse between two masters to go like this: One master constructs the euphemism as 1 and 2 and expresses it with the intention that it would be received and put together to turn on the light of insight to an explicit meaning 3 in the mind of the receiver. The receiving master gets the euphemism and responds as follows:
a. I got your part 3 intended explicit meaning. I know what you intended to say and confirm that to you. You put it together so well in expressing the 2 parts to me that there is nothing more to say. I grant you a point.
b. Your 1 and your 2 may also explicitly mean 4. That is so because within either 1 or 2 or both is a sub part 1 and 2. Something that you did not see but that I perceived as a higher level thought that you did not have when you formed 1 and 2 thinking that they are obviously 3. If you agree, grant me a point.
How inscrutable to an outsider that does not know the rules of the game nor its elegance!
The Chinese are clever people.
So, I am thinking all this after reading Liwen's brief summary of what might obviously follow in an expanded explanation with example that I was already looking forward to examining to learn if what I was thinking about the nature of Chinese euphemisms in comparison to English euphemisms was correct.
Ah, the link at the bottom that opens the door to the adventure of discovery to be found in Liwen's Contrastive Study! I click on the following link with great expectation of learning more:
Download(PDF format)
Bummer!
It is one of our most exciting discoveries that local discovery leads to a complex of further discoveries. (Buckminster Fuller)
For further discoveries here I will have to learn Chinese!
How do euphemisms in French compare to those in Chinese. Maybe some guy in France is as disappointed as me that we will never know....................
Euphemistic Discourse. At first I felt it settle softly. Then I felt it grab me. I could spend the rest of the day with this idea.
All my journeys on the internet seem to start with Google.
How often I found where I should be going only by setting out for somewhere else. (Buckminster Fuller)
The first google hit took me here. All the way to China! I did not set out to go there!
Chen Liwen presents A Cognitive Contrast Study of Euphemistic Discourse Between Chinese and English. I didn't know there was one. Discovery is the joy of the journey.
There is a contrast. "Euphemisms are abundant in both Chinese and English. Although there are surprising similarities between corresponding expressions in two languages, differences between them are obvious, especially in euphemistic discourse."
That got me hooked. Tell me more Liwen.
"Chinese euphemisms tend to employ two presentation spaces to map onto one reference space, whereas in English often there is only one presentation space."
That is an interesting view. I can only guess that in English the single presentation space is a direct mapping of the euphemistic expression to the direct explicit statement or word that it represents. Apparently, Chinese expression of the euphemism is a two part thing relating to the explicit statement or word.
Thinking about that, this is what I thought:
The explicit statement or word that a euphemism leads to is an obvious but subjective interpretation on the part of the person hearing the euphemism: I heard you say this but in raw simple terms I know that you really said this. Maybe what Liwen is going to talk about is that in Chinese there are two parts to the euphemistic statement and it is up to the person to put the two parts together and produce the simple explicit conclusion of what is being said. How much more interesting and perhaps challenging. The constructor of the euphemism has to think about how to present part one and part two of the euphemism then convey it to the listener so that the listener gets the explicit meaning by putting 1 and 2 together to get part 3. Just my guess.
The Chinese euphemism might then be more teacher/student oriented in that it requires the student to think rather than just translate. The challenge in an English euphemism is the listener either getting it or not. There is simple direct connection or not. In Chinese the maker says in effect: This is part 1, this is part 2 in words not only removed from their explicit meaning but another step removed from their explicit meaning. Stating 1 and 2 that way is my signal to you that if you want to get the part 3 explicit conclusion you have to figure it out by yourself.
That is an interesting and perhaps more elegant way to communicate. It can also lead to ambiguity in meaning but only if the speaker and listener do not know the rules of the method by which Chinese euphemisms are formed but how they are passed as a message. If both are masters of this art then the conversation would be a very interesting display of communication skill on an elegant level of chess.
Moving the Chinese conversation from the master/student relationship to the master/master relationship makes it even more interesting. I would conclude a euphemistic discourse between two masters to go like this: One master constructs the euphemism as 1 and 2 and expresses it with the intention that it would be received and put together to turn on the light of insight to an explicit meaning 3 in the mind of the receiver. The receiving master gets the euphemism and responds as follows:
a. I got your part 3 intended explicit meaning. I know what you intended to say and confirm that to you. You put it together so well in expressing the 2 parts to me that there is nothing more to say. I grant you a point.
b. Your 1 and your 2 may also explicitly mean 4. That is so because within either 1 or 2 or both is a sub part 1 and 2. Something that you did not see but that I perceived as a higher level thought that you did not have when you formed 1 and 2 thinking that they are obviously 3. If you agree, grant me a point.
How inscrutable to an outsider that does not know the rules of the game nor its elegance!
The Chinese are clever people.
So, I am thinking all this after reading Liwen's brief summary of what might obviously follow in an expanded explanation with example that I was already looking forward to examining to learn if what I was thinking about the nature of Chinese euphemisms in comparison to English euphemisms was correct.
Ah, the link at the bottom that opens the door to the adventure of discovery to be found in Liwen's Contrastive Study! I click on the following link with great expectation of learning more:
Download(PDF format)
Bummer!
It is one of our most exciting discoveries that local discovery leads to a complex of further discoveries. (Buckminster Fuller)
For further discoveries here I will have to learn Chinese!
How do euphemisms in French compare to those in Chinese. Maybe some guy in France is as disappointed as me that we will never know....................
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