World stock indexes rebounded strongly last week. The Dow and the Hang Seng were up nearly 10%, the FTSE and DAX were up 13% and the Brazilian Bovespa was up a whopping 17%. Gold pushed passed $800.
In the U.S. retailers reported a better than feared "Black Friday," with sales rising 3% compared to the previous year, although discounts were deep and profit margins low. Black Friday refers to the Friday after the Thanksgiving holiday. It is both the traditional start of the Christmas shopping season and the day that retailers start to make their profits for the year. In recent years it has become a bigger and bigger thing, with families waiting in line outside big box stores and malls the night before waiting to get let in at five in the morning, lured by steep discounts on a few big ticket items. This year with the bad economy it got completely out of hand as a Walmart employee was trampled to death in Long Island when the crowds were let in.
© unknown
What a week; world stock indexes took another serious beating while J P Morgan fired 3,000 amid speculation that total Wall Street job losses will reach 225,000 and Citibank was bailed out to the tune of $27 billion of new equity and in excess of $300 billion blanket guarantee of some of its toxic assets.
Remember back in 2005 when Ariel Sharon decided to make a "historical sacrifice" by withdrawing some 9,000 illegal Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip? Remember the drama whipped up by the world's media and the tears on the faces of those who were leaving behind their ill begotten houses and farms? Remember the debates about civil and human rights - the rights of the settlers, that is because as we all know, the Palestinians have no rights. Remember as well how Sharon - the same man who years before was responsible for the massacre of the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila in southern Lebanon - was applauded for his restraint and sensibility.
Well, all of that was nothing but the theatrics that came with a calculated step in a long-term war strategy and which is now reaching a climax with the siege of Gaza.
Well, all of that was nothing but the theatrics that came with a calculated step in a long-term war strategy and which is now reaching a climax with the siege of Gaza.
The events of November 18, 1978 in Jonestown, Guyana were a tragedy that few can come to grips with even today, 30 years later. But that was not a singular event. As a sign posted at Jonestown read, "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
I'm Warren Olney in Los Angeles. Ninety minutes ago came word from Guyana, making this bizarre story more bizarre than ever. Troops from Guyana have found between three and four hundred bodies at the People's Temple commune at Jonestown. No marks of violence on any of the bodies. No marks of anyone alive, despite reports that as many as 1,200 people lived in Jonestown. There had been predictions that a mass suicide would occur from several defectors. We don't know that that's what happened. We don't know what happened to the rest of the people who lived at the commune. We don't know what's happened to attorneys Mark Lane or Charles Garry, or to the Reverend Jim Jones. And we don't know how much longer this awful story will take to unfold. For Edwin Newman and for all of us at NBC, I'm Warren Olney in Los Angeles.
"The few who can understand the System (Cheque Money and Credits) will either be so interested in its profits, or so dependent on its favours, that there will be no opposition from that class. While on the other hand, the great body of people mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous advantage that capital derives from the system, will bear its burdens without complaint and perhaps without even suspecting that the system is inimical* to their interests." - Extract from a letter written by Rothschild Bros of London to a New York firm of bankers on 25 June 1863
* (hostile, hurtful)
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* (hostile, hurtful)
********
Almost human.
However, I wonder if Fersch really "gets it". While he talks about the importance of psychopathy quite eloquently and identifies the problems inherent in the conflation of psychopathy with antisocial personality disorder, there is a question and answer in the first chapter that is puzzling. (It is possible one of his colleagues answered this question, as the individual author is not listed for each section.)
In this question on the debate between psychopathy as either categorical (i.e. you either have it or you don't, like Turner's syndrome) or continuous (the extreme end of traits shared by everyone, as in someone with very high intelligence), he firmly takes the "continuous" side. However, I get the impression that he does so without understanding the crux of the matter, or the implications of such a position.
Last week, Barack Obama was (we presume) elected president of the United States as the country fell deeper into recession. Nearly 300,000 jobs were lost in October in the United States as the official unemployment rate rose almost a half percent since September to 6.5%. The Dow fell 4% last week despite all the good feelings. When he takes office in January 2009 the new president will surely face an economic situation as dire as Franklin Roosevelt faced in 1933 Not only the United States, but the rest of the world, is looking to him to find a way out of economic disaster. Will he deliver?
On both sides of the Atlantic there is incredulity at the gall of bankers. Goldman Sachs is reported to have set aside $7 billion for bonuses having received $6 billion from the federal government in bailout funds; while The Royal Bank of Scotland is scheduled to pay out a much more modest $2.9 billion equivalent.
The age old argument that bonuses have to be paid to keep people from walking has of course been trotted out. In the current atmosphere, it might be said that bankers are lucky not to be walking the plank let alone getting a bonus. Indeed, in any just society many of them would be in jail already.
The age old argument that bonuses have to be paid to keep people from walking has of course been trotted out. In the current atmosphere, it might be said that bankers are lucky not to be walking the plank let alone getting a bonus. Indeed, in any just society many of them would be in jail already.
© Alex/Peattie & Taylor
Meanwhile, the sun is still taking some time off, more fireballs are lighting the sky, and we were surprised by an early arrival of extreme cold weather. Flu pandemic scares came with it, but we believe they are not really related to the weather. There is also an increase of reports of UFO sightings and cold-blooded acts by pathological individuals.
But hang on, because there is always hope!
Comment: This is a story about a freak cold weather incident that is rather astonishing and at the end, to stave off reasonable doubt about global warming, which would creep into the mind of anyone who has been paying attention to the actual data regarding the state of our planet, someone decides to throw in some of the most ridiculous propaganda we have ever read considering the story that includes it.
Read and weep with despair at the lies being delivered to the public without a blush, and the public that doesn't immediately boycott all mainstream media in protest!
Hailstorm swamps one small town in 6ft drifts - and it's still only October
© Daily Mail
Hailstones pelted down burying cars in a sea of ice in Ottery St Mary, Devon
Hailstones pelted down burying cars in a sea of ice in Ottery St Mary, Devon
© Apex News and Pictures
Cars buried under three feet of hail stones in the town of Ottery St Mary
Cars buried under three feet of hail stones in the town of Ottery St Mary
Ottery St Mary, in Devon, was plunged into chaos by the storm in the early hours yesterday.
First, the area was battered by an astonishing 12in of hail in just two hours. This blocked drains, which led to widespread flooding as the rain began to fall.
More than 100 people had to be evacuated from their homes and 25 were airlifted to safety or rescued by firefighters.
