annaliisa’s Neighborhood

Here's the Story.

So, why do you think they'll allow cold blooded premeditated murder in Texas?

I'm not an Anti-Gun Nut. I'm not suggesting we set up support groups for burglars. But, shooting an unarmed man in the back? What justifies that?

If we don't care, why not? Because the people shot were illegal immigrants? Because they were theives? Because it's Texas?

Quite Frankly, I think it's because we really are monsters. We just have a thin veneer of civility, but underneath that, we like killing. Because how many that think that this man should be killed for what he did? You don't have to say, but uh huh, I thought so.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not above it, but that's why I think the law should be above us. Because we can't be trusted, but the law should be trusted because it should be more noble than any of us are.

I don’t think I believe anything too strange or weird. I believe that JFK was shot by more than one man, but I don’t think Aliens were involved, or that the CIA was doing it as an attempted Coup, or what have you. I believe that there are life forms not based on Earth, but I don’t think that little green or grey men are abducting cattle. I believe that it’s entirely possible that there are animals we haven’t yet verified, but I don’t believe that Sasquatch is my brother, or that chupacabra is infecting goats across the land. I believe that it’s possible to see, and experience strange phenomena, but I don’t believe that my grandfather is haunting a nursing home.
By and large, I think I’m a rational person. I basically believe that there are systems and rules to the workings of the universe, and that there are reasons for things. I might have some religious beliefs, but none that interfere with my ability to interact with the world. I might have some superstitions, but none that keep me bound. I think I’m mostly tuned into the here and now.
Maybe that makes me dull, and uninspired. Maybe, in order to be some kind of groovy artist, I need to have some conspiracy theory driving me. Maybe, in order to be interesting, I’ve got to have some kind of religious belief that tests the boundaries of modern society. Maybe superstitions add spice to life. I don’t think so, but I’ll take being rational over being interesting, anyway.
My Father talked about the intersection of faith and science once, and I liked his notion. In a nutshell, he thought that it was good to see the poetry in things, but to still accept the facts. It’s good to see the “angel in the sun” all the while recognizing that it’s a bunch of mega hot gases floating in space. So, it’s not that I’m a purely rational being, who can only see the material universe, it’s that I believe that the material universe is more real than my half-understood mental processes.
So, I never quite understood why it was that it appears that, in order to be “alternative” or “countercultural” or whatever they’re calling “not quite mainstream” these days, it’s necessary to believe absolutely irrational delusions, like that the founding fathers were Alien worshippers who were Masonic believers in Illuminati Vangaurdism, or that chanting Hare KRSNA is any better than counting beads in a rosary, or that a secret cadre of Jewish Lizard people control the world bank. Maybe I never did enough of the right kind of drugs, and maybe I kept the wrong brain cells but it still confuses me. I thought that all it took was disagreeing with the majority, and all my disagreements with the majority are fairly rational. I believe in both social and economic democracy. I believe that the world is explainable. I believe that there is no one born more or less noble than another person. I believe in maintaining a sustainable environment. I believe that loud music with an exciting beat is more enjoyable than quiet music with a sedate beat. I believe that recognizable people are more interesting than fanciful caricatures. I believe that people are neither inherently good nor evil, but are capable of both. See what I mean? All rational, yet all outside of the mainstream, when you rephrase it by label as Socialist, scientific, populist, environmentalist, Rocker, humanist, and moral relativist. Stated by label, I sound like a flaming leftie, don’t I? But, my beliefs are compatible with everyone, if you ask me.
That’s why I always liked a theory a friend of mine had: he believed there weren’t “alternative” and “straight” people. He believed there were “Squareheads’ and “Screwheads”. Squareheads are the quiet folks who behave as they should, while screwheads are the wild ones who cannot get along. The funny thing is that an awful lot of squareheads think they’re screwheads, and a lot of screwheads think they’re squareheads. I think I’m a screwhead who’s trying his level best to be a squarehead. How about you?

I’m not Kramer, and I’m not Bennett, nor am I even Sustern, but I am watching the market. I don’t think you’re getting an accurate picture from the evening news. Now, I know this is hardly a revelation, but let me clarify a little bit:

First of all, Housing is not in some kind of death spiral. The market I see is flattening out. By that I mean, the top 20% in price are finding themselves losing value, while the bottom 20% in price are gaining value- just as sharply as the top is losing value. So, what that means is that investors, people who make money in real estate speculation, are losing their shirts, but the middle class homeowners are fairly stable. The real news in housing is that the exotic mortgages that were all the rage from 2001-2005 are falling apart. It’s not the general housing market, and it’s not even the whole sub-prime market. The bottom line, here, is that there was a big push in 2001 to get people into mortgages, so that they could turn these mortgages into securities, therefore, investment brokers pushed the limits past anything reasonable, and in so doing created a class mortgages that were doomed to fail, and everyone who knew anything about it, knew they would fail. That’s what’s happening, and everything else is window dressing. It really doesn’t matter if the homeowners getting forced out are black, white or Latino (For the record, the majority I’m seeing are Latino)  what matters is that if you don’t have a mortgage that is either a fixed rate or a traditional ARM (Adjustable rate mortgage: the traditional version adjusts with the prime lending rate, plus 3% or less) you are in grave trouble, because your mortgage is simply not a good idea. You may not be qualified to refinance either, so like it or not, I really would suggest you think about selling, depressed market, or not. That’s the hard truth. Another matter is consumer credit. As all the analysts say, consumers are carrying way, way too much debt. I think that’s a sign of a weak economy, and more certain than mortgage rates as a barometer of how things really are for the general public. What’s really scary is that, because investors are running scared due to the investment market being down, the credit crunch has translated to seemingly arbitrary changes in your interest rate on your Credit card. You can make all your payments on time, for the full amount, and they’ll still adjust your interest rate based upon what you purchased. If you bought too many necessities, or otherwise made it look like you might possibly be strapped for cash, they’ll adjust up, figuring that you are potentially a greater risk for repayment. So, while too much consumer credit debt is never a good idea, now I would say that even using a credit card for convenience might not be such a great idea. That’s something that should be on the ticker.

Second, Gas prices are adjusting up but still are wonky. On the one hand, crude prices are going up not only because of demand. There are, in fact, Oil speculators who are jacking the price up. America is, in fact, hording the strategic reserves to artificially keep up profits for big Oil. Retail vendors are, in fact cashing in. But, on the other hand, that’s because Oil is not a renewable resource, and we really have hit peak (where we’ve used up more than half of all the oil there will ever be). Burning oil really does harm the environment in quantifiable ways. We really are not using oil efficiently. So, in other words, we probably should be seeing closer to European prices, around 8-10 dollars a gallon, but less of that price should be going to profits for Oil companies. If we were even halfway smart, gas taxes would double, and subsidies would be cut in half. The money thus generated would go to research and development of non-carbon fuel. But, related to that, transportation costs should be going up. The days of 100 dollar cross country flights should never have been (don’t get me wrong, I took advantage of them, as well) and we will have to pay for them, now. Expect prices to go up at your local Wal-Mart. But the real story is this: there are coming food shortages. The oil shortages are really a non-issue. We used far too much fossil fuel, and we simply cannot live that way any more, and we will have to adjust our lifestyles. There’s no debate, no story, no excuse. But we are mishandling food, we have been mishandling food, and, unless we change course IMMEDIATELY, the consequences will eclipse what we’re dealing with on Oil. That’s a story.

 Is Starbucks going under? Ab-so-freaking-lutely NOT! By now, we’ve all heard that they’re closing 600 stores. They’re also opening 200 new ones. This is just a change in strategy. I thought their “overkill” method of franchising was doomed, but as long as they were doing good, I was happy to be wrong. Now, it looks like I was right to think they were barking up the wrong tree. See, their business model was to allow franchisees to build their new starbucks wherever they wanted, even if there was another starbucks across the road. The idea was to let the individual franchise holders take the risk of location. The issue that has come to bear is that such risk cannot be deferred from the parent company, forever. Sooner or later, you have to actually own your brands. That’s the story, here.

Likewise, the weak dollar, I’m not really all that worried… On the one hand, like mortgages, this hurts the big guys who cashed out on our backs, and will be corrected by genuine market forces, as opposed to the artificial forces that we have confused for the market. Look, Europe needs American dollars; they need us to buy goods. They’re doing ok with the Chinese and Indians, but China is fairly closed and self-contained, and India is really unstable. America, and therefore the Dollar is still necessary to the European, Asian, and world economy. So, this is largely a correction. What is it correcting? The “air” economy that got over-extended. When the dot-coms crashed in the late 1990’s, people talked about an “air” economy, of people over-valuing things that really had no value. Well, post 9/11, there was a different reason for it, but the economy was still pumped up on nothing more than talk, and promises. We delayed the crash that could have come, and should have come in 1997, all the way out for 10 years, with things like exotic mortgages, stimulus packages, tax cuts and subsidies, all created to make the economy look strong, but we’re basing all this on what? A service sector economy. Well, what good is a service sector economy to the world market? Nothing is exported from that, and we won’t learn their languages, so we can even provide those services to them. That’s what’s getting corrected. Hopefully, it’ll get bad enough to mean the death of NAFTA and outsourcing, but I have a feeling that’ll we’ll get screwed by ourselves long before those really necessary measures of actually rebuilding a manufacturing base to our economy happen.

But, on the other hand, the weak dollar is covering up the real story, again. It’s covering up how weak our job market is. It’s covering up how much skilled labor we’ve let slip away. It’s misdirecting us from recognizing that we’ve gone on far too long believing that we’re all rockstars and celebrities while we contribute nothing to the market. We’re selling each other big macs and haircuts and that will not sustain an economy. Farm, factory, and firmament sustain an economy (meaning you need a larger sector of job making food, manufacturing goods, or exploiting natural resources) So, a sustainable economy, ultimately, is one in which a real value has been produced. What’s a real value? Something that’s useful, no matter what. For an example, a doctor, even though he’s performing a service, is producing real value in that by keeping people alive and healthy, they can continue to work and consume. Meanwhile, there’s no real value to a Barber. Don’t get me wrong. I like Barbers, and I think short hair is preferable to long hair, but ultimately you can cut Barbers out of the economy, and you’ve still got the same strength or weakness to the economy. If I’m still not clear, I’ll explain later, if anybody asks. But, that’s my point in a nutshell. We’ve become the kind of country where things of real value, like the information in a doctor’s head, become confused with things of much, much lesser value, like the information in a Barber’s head. That’s really the news story of the generation. We’re a bunch of idiots, filled up with useless information, and so obfuscated from anything real, and sustainable that we wouldn’t know it, if it hits us. No, I don’t mean that in the metaphorical sense. Whether you’ve got a religion or not, and whether you think that fathers should be equal partners to mothers is immaterial. I’m talking about value in a purely material sense. I’ll let the poets argue about whether America has lost its “values”. I’m saying we’re not able to discern Air from pollution, food from poison, and water from waste. I’m saying we’re illiterate. What’s worse is that we don’t seem to care. I don’t care if you pay attention to me, or not. Seriously, I have no desire to be admired, no claim for fame, and no need for notoriety. But it’s disheartening to me that the information I’m talking about is so easily ignored. So, when I say that I find it discouraging that the very, very few who might read this will still find it unclear, I don’t mean that I’m throwing out pearls before swine. I mean that this should be such commonplace thought that even if I articulate it poorly, it should be as clear as when a rockstar sings “If you know what I mean”.

Opinion is nice, and entertaining, but it’s not as valuable as fact. So, even if I’m ranting, the thing that should be outraging you is that our economy is so service based, not that you disagree with one bit or another about how I present this.

To illustrate this: the Election would be all but over if word got out that McCain once had a gay lover in Viet Nam, and yet, the election continues even though neither candidate has a plan to balance the budget.

If anybody was just looking at my blog, i probably confused them. Yeah, i was trying to find a good, grey theme...

It's not your imagination: it really is getting harder to eat:

From Cattlenetwork