The arising ‘anti-terror’ industry, of course, deserves a lot of attention as an area where returns have been most excellent since 9/11. Now, with the latest move of troops into Afghanistan (for reasons fuzzy to me except it has something to do with oil and drug money) it’ll be more important than ever to watch.
So, when headlines cross that “Homeland Security forecasts 5-year terror threats” I study them closely to see which category leaders in the ‘new industry’ are lining up to get how much dough. Not that I would invest in them.
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The global ‘terror’ situation is no different than local street crime, except for size. Just as a general rule of thumb, you don’t see many $85,000/year family income spouses out pulling holdups and robberies, do you? Hell no. It’s income disparity that leads to street crime. Daddy Warbucks going for a hike in the wrong part of town meets local crack head with a .22. No assault gun needed, contrary to the do-gooder/groupthink/MSM mantras.
“Hand over the wallet!” follows sure as day follows night. A .22, kitchen knife, it all works about the same and I can’t think of a single back alley hold-up I’ve ever read about pulled off with an assault rifle; maybe I just not well read, though.
International crime is a huge business. Why, it keeps Homeland Security, Metropole, the Mossad, and US alphabet agencies plus enough police agencies and suppliers to employ millions of people employed.
Why, spending money to level income-disparities, global opportunity disparities and a few bucks in the direction of emotional education so people won’t be so inclined to bury their feelings in illegal drugs, why that’d be crazy, right?
Why, if people had a little food, a little sense on birth control, and a little more evenly distributed resources, those ‘terrorist’ movements wouldn’t have such fertile soil from which to grow.
I hope you saw, and read the story that the “Former British Foreign Secretary: Al Qaeda is not read group, just a U.S. Propaganda Campaign“?
Bu, that’s how the world works, I suppose. Drugs, money, power and above all disparity – the root of power.
Make it impossible for ‘common folks’ to opt out so everyone in the world has to play the crooked game and you’ll quite naturally see a rise in the ‘global revolution’ context that we’re seeing in linguistics now. People-watching, spending-addicted drama addicts can only be financially hose-whipped for the benefit of the PTB just so long before they ‘get it’.
Don’t need no five-year terror threat report from Homeland Security. A mirror will do just fine.
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Parallel thoughts: “Pope decries selfishness in economic crisis” says one headline while another offers “‘If people look only to their own interests, our world will certainly fall apart.‘
Sorry, but you might pass on to His Holiness – that ship’s done sailed…
There Be Pirates
Speaking of which: The fact that “China’s Navy to join pirate patrols” of Somalia is disconcerting. The Jamaica Gleaner headlines it as “Pirates, poverty mark failure of American policy”.
Meantime, the new US military command in Africa is not getting involved... so the new Barbary Coast seems destined to eat up newsprint for much of 2009…
Name Game
I love it: “Kosovo names street after US president Bush.“ Me? I think his dad did better with the airport naming in Houston…but who knows what else will follow.
GPS Retort
Seems not everyone thinks like me on the consumer madness over GPS:
“Dude, You are soooo full of yourself on the GPS thing. I lOVE my car GPS. It gives my freedom from maps on trips. It is not that I can’t do it, it is why should I have to do it.
When we went to France, our friends from Holland picked us up for a 2 week adventure in the french country side. We had 4 places to stay in various parts of the south, Once we got out of paris, our friend (a truck driver) programmed his TomTom navigator to avoid major roads. We saw the most wonderful scenery. It took us down farm roads, left here, right there. The amount of effort to get that route would have been over whelming. Someone would have to have kept their nose in the map constantly and miss out on the great adventure. One day day we left “Tom” in the window of the car and it totally overheated, we were so depressed because it meant that we would have to drive on only main roads. We decided to go out of the way to a large city to buy a new one. But after holding “Tom” in front of the airconditioner for a half hour, it arose from the dead. We didn’t take “Tom” for granted before that and we sure didn’t afterwards.
Enjoy your main road (mainstream) map trips!”
Wonder if I gave more than the reader had any dough left over after the trip to send to his local food bank…Oh well, his money, not mine.
Reader Quips
Folks wanna know department:
“Why the flock is Madoff not in jail getting his Chrismas bonus from Bubba?
I WANT TO KNOW!”
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“German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who grew up in Communist East Germany, was quoted in Focus magazine telling her Cabinet the following joke: “What’s the difference between Communism and Capitalism? Answer: The Communists nationalised all the companies first — and then ruined them.”
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“George, The “working family’s czar” is an interesting phrase as it does describe the direction we are heading, but much more important is the irony of Biden being any sort of advocate for the middle class. As a member of the CFR and having much responsibility for NAFTA type Middle- class assault treaties as well as major responsibility for the Bankruptcy Middle-class assault bill he is no better than a fox in a hen house. This is right out of the NeoCON playbook. WTF? Gimme a break!”
Well, of course! There’s only one party in America – the one we weren’t invited to!
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Send snip and save items to george@ure.net
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Ham Radio Question
Say, I spent a fair amount of time Thursday trying to get my Tigertronics SignaLink to pull down the PTT line on either my Icom 746 or the Icom 735 – tried two different computers – using Ham Radio Deluxe. Any clues? Using a factory Tigertronic Icom cable, too… Won’t read frequency of the CI-V line either…
The Annual Forecast Issue
Every year about this time, at least since 2000, I’ve made it a practice to issue an ‘annual forecast’ in order that to have a set of expectations against which investment decisions can be benchmarked. To accomplish this, I’ve used numerous methods in the past include nonlinear trend projection, basic econometric modeling, and even to some extent predictive linguistics. But this year, due to the special nature of the times just ahead I’ve worked up a new ‘graphic modeling’ approach that avoids the heavy-duty math and is quite intuitive. Hopefully, you’ll enjoy the approach but as we get into it, you’ll discover, as I did while doing the research, that the results give a nearly dire outlook for 2009. Not unsurvivable, at least for most, but at the same time it’s clear in this modeling exercise that the Depression of the 1930′s could look like a ‘walk in the park’ compared to what’s coming.
More For Subscribers Subscription Information
What is better than a Christmas New Years Card?
Why, sending an email to everyone in your ‘contact’ file and tell them about www.urbansurvival.com of course!
“Live on $10,000″ Updated
What? You haven’t ordered the ebook “How to Live on $10,000 a year — or less”? Suit yourself. We’re all going to live it shortly, anyway. I just thought you might like a heads up by reading about how to do it before you get pink-slipped. But, suit yourself OR visit www.liveontenthousand.com or, click one of the following button:
Yep – still possible. I also took a bit of additional material that was pertinent from recent issues of Peoplenomics and included them. The whole thing runs about 65 pages, but it gives you a vision of how to not only live on the aforementioned dollar amount, but also how to migrate up the economic foodchain if you make a little more than that and do some active savings… Click here for the page with more details on it.
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Last week’s report is here. For back issues of this site, click here. (Goes back to 1997!)
