Quote :

I feel regular people are in dire straits here but this has not shown in political anger yet

Why not, youngdan? Is it pride, denial, distraction, a sense that energies are better spent in getting by than in agitating?

Is it much of an issue for the candidates - or are they operating on a different plane? I haven't really been following the election in the last while.

youngdan wrote:

I paid 8 dollars for a pound of turkey breast the other day but to
explain that to someone would be likely to have ended me in a mental
hospital. Things like food and petrol that were always very cheap here
are now rising. Petrol is 3.25 a gal but today I saw diesel at over 4
dollars. That is a outlandish price here. The economy here is about 6
month ahead of Ireland.

What do you mean when you say the economy is 6 months ahead of Ireland?


Do you think the American government created the war money in the hope that there would be major Iraqi oil dividends? I really haven't thought it out how they decided they'd pay for a unilateral war like that - will this end in a fate worse than Vietnam I wonder ? The iraq war crashes the US economy?


And what are people intimating the price of petrol diesel gas will reach? And is there a general atmosphere of proaction to this at all e.g. driving less, getting smaller vehicles or are people frozen in the glare of the headlights?

It is non of those at all. They have being dumbed down to an extent hard for us to believe. Jay Leno does a segment every now and then called Jaywalking where he goes out onto the street asking passerbys on this that or the other. He brings photos of famous political persons say and the whole laugh is how clueless most people are. He might be talking about Rush Limbaugh but he is showing the person a picture of Cheney. Most people here have no idea what the Supreme Court does not to mind who is on it. 6% vote in the republican primaries for example and in November 35% will vote for each party regardless of the candidate because working class should vote democrat and middle class should vote republican. They will believe anything here. It is all trivialities here. I tend bar occasionally here and was working the night the Patriots lost the superbowl. I could barely keep a straight face as I saw the dismay when the Giants snaged a victory. These dorks were more upset than if their mother died. They are so programmed that you would think they owned part of the team. When the Patriots won the superbowl and also when Red Sox won the world series a million of these suckers skipped work and school to go to the parade in Boston.

Kind of puts the comment "it's the economy, stupid" in a whole new light...

Dan that looks like the most incredible failure of Democracy from the world's biggest Democracy ...

Is it not just that they prefer football to politics?

Cactus. It has been a long time since I thought about the fishery industry but you bring up a great point. In hindsight the 200 mile limit was probably a very valuable national asset that was not recognised. Like our 7 tons of gold it was given away with little protest. I would like to see every foreign trawler confiscated and a chance given to the fish and the Irish fisherman to make a comback. If other countries did not want to pay well for our fish then I would have a fish and chip dinner delivered to every Irish house that is having trouble putting a bit of grub on the table. How is that for a modest proposal.

Auditor. I mean that if the the present downturn is to be blamed on the real estate bubble bursting then the burst is 6 to 9 months further advanced here than in Ireland. I feel the top here was reached about spring of 2006 when agents were getting it hard to make sales but median prices continued to rise on fewer sales. I sold my bar business on June 30 2006 because I could see that the spending of my customers was falling off. I was waiting for the Irish property market to follow suit and I think what really burst the bubble there which had to burst was the sales halt resulting from the stamp duty uncertainty. The property decline there is just beginning in my opinion. The Iraq war has postponed the recession I think because the money was created out of nothing and spent into the economy. The resulting fall in the value of the dollar is only making headlines recently. The Euro is falling as well but not as fast. The Euro gold price has gone from 300 to 650 approx over the last 5 years. People here will drive the same as always. What will happen is that the car will be repossessed abruptly out from under them or else towed for no insurance or unpaid tickets when they are pulled over by the cops who type the license plate into their incar computers

Getting back to what might happen in Ireland. In a big downturn just maybe there would be 166 replacements in the Dail. This would take a sea change in thought but sudden poverty might do it. Irish politicians feed at the publics expense not just for their own lives but it is assumed that the next generation is entitled by birthright. Are there not 3rd generation parasites now. This carryon has lead to some dimwit TDs far in excess to what any form of natural selection would produce. The day might come when a return of an Irish currency will be discussed. The most important thing to understand is what a central bank does. It allows a government to spend money it does not have and it allows the owners of the central bank to create money out of thin air. It is a I'll scratch your back if you scratch my back and hugely beneficial to both parties. This con job sounds too good to be true so we will look at what actually happened when the Bank of England was set up in 1694. The King at the time was faced with the age old problem of how he was going to get money for war and domestic spending. He ruled out taxation as being unhealthy. The other method of old was increasing the money supply. Since there was more or less a staple supply of silver and gold this meant less metal in each coin so some metal was clipped from the edges of each coin and the clippings were melted to produce new coins. To be caught clipping on a private basis was a capital offence. This is the reason for grooves on the edges of coins. People could see their coin getting smaller as they were repeatedly clipped. Some rich bankers offered the King a sweat deal.They would assume his debts if he would grant them a charter is issue the currency for the kingdom backed by gold held in their vaults. They were clear that they would lend the king whatever funds he needed in the future. The people then were not as doopy as they are today so the problem was how to make them accept the banknotes. That is where the legal tender laws came in which made it illegal not to accept banknotes and mandated thart taxes could only be paid with banknotes. This created a demand for the banknotes. In time the central bank realised that the chances of more than a few demanding gold for the banknote were slim so they were able to issue more banknotes than gold on deposit and eventually they dropped the link intirely and could create any amount they wished. The government could borrow all the money they wished and they were happy. There is no intention of these government loans being repaid,they are just rolled over. In 1946 the Bank of England was nationalised because by that time the bankers owned The Federal Reserve. The Fed issues the US currency and the US treasury borrows from the Fed and elsewhere and pays interest on this money. Now if the Treasury were to issue the currency itself it would save about 400 billion dollars a year juice. The public does not grasp that the Fed is not owned by the government. IF the Fed did not exist the relationship between deficit spending and inflation would be clearer to see. So if Ireland in the future brings back it's own currency it is important that people understand how things work but don't expect rte to explain it

Article on countries which have recently dropped the dollar



Just stuck it here for now - back later

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8021

This was well worth reading, thanks

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8021

I will be back later. I read global research frequently to get a different perspective like I do with a lot of sourses and I keep intending to get some of these videos. I want to comment on the former assistant treasury secretary of the Treasury under Reagan Paul Craig Roberts. My opinion of him is that he is one of the greatest heros on the scene in this country at the moment. He is one of a few that I hope may step forward as a 3rd party candidate. I urge everyone to check some of his articles and interviews.

http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts03182008.html This is Robert's latest article. I think I have figured this linking

According to your man Craig Roberts you are in debt to the tune of 53,000 billion dan. .. and apparently you have been living off credit for twenty years or more...

Now I've had the theory before that what we are seeing at present with the decline of the dollar like this is the very final end of WWII - more exactly the proper end of the Cold War. Now that China is a trusted entrant into the world markets via the WTO, there is little need to see her as a mysterious Red Entity which could any minute rape Australia and overrun SE Asia etc...

Wars cost, even Cold ones. Now America is getting the bill...

It is never intended for government debts to be paid off. The money supply is to be expanded indefinately. The bankers clean up. Everything depends on the expanding continueing. This is why inflation is a given and never explained. The only danger to the system is an end to the inflating or worse a reversal. The defaults are causing a reversal and deflating. The system can not survive if this is not prevented. This is the struggle that is taking place at the moment. The leveraging which was great at expanding is now working against them. This is the moment of truth. The market could crash within hours from here.

Auditor #9 wrote:

The internet doesn't break if there's a nuclear war, right?

(sorry, this is way off-topic - I should moderate myself)

No it doesn't and remember to keep on topic. We need focussed discussion at all times.

Look here for even more evidence of the collapse of the dollar:

Dollars tough to sell on streets of Amsterdam

First crack of the whip

youngdan wrote:

First crack of the whip

It's more of a gentle reminder imo.

I want to keep a very good discussion going on the topic upon which it is based.

This discussion can be nourished by the below linked:

BMW Outsourcing Production to the U.S.

I am more guilty than anyone for straying. The numbers here are few so for some of these economic threads I will add other stuff that would merit their own thread on pie

Darryl Schoon
The Die is Cast This is worth a read if it links.

youngdan wrote:

Darryl Schoon
The Die is Cast This is worth a read if it links.

Would like to read this youngdan, but link didnt work for me - I will try googling later. Thanks for all your good stuff.

I am worrying about the potential instability of a US kind of broke, without the will or cash to send armies, but tooled up with nuclear missiles. Tell me anything you think would help me sleep better.

I am sticking in this link here
http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/schoon/2008/0324.html

and there's a lot more on google.

I haven't read it either but I'll halve/share your worries cactus - what kind of world would it be with a broke US?

The US of all western developed nations is the one to watch which is why we are watching it like hawks. Americans will have to adopt a massive paradigm shift pretty soon or we could be in for a catastrophic war with no real value. They are threatening Iran again which is cuckoo - Iran is not an internationally bellicose country and you'd sincerely doubt if it will ever be. They'll go in there because they think that the price of oil will be kept stable or even go down - who cares? it's time America was weened off it's dependency and it could be time that blocs like Europe encouraged that.

I don't think it's possibly to seperate the fall of the dollar with the rise in world oil usage. The world will eventually have to get together on this if it hasn't already with the global warming ticket and try to get America to change. There are already enough 2.3 Litre cars in the world let's stop making them/buying them and start going for smaller, less hungry vehicles - a Nissan Micra will still get you across Wyoming..

ECONOMY: More U.S. Banks Agree to Stall Home Repossessions
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41258

Found this article about American banks banding together in order to stem the tide of home repossessions

What does that have to do with out discussion about the dollar? A currency is only as strong as the psychological and spiritual health of the citizens of any bloc. Financial problems will be dealt with in time, the fundamentals are what make money and one of those fundamentals in human capital in decent shape. Economies are being based to a lesser and lesser extent on production and more and more on this human capital, I hope. (It's inevitable anyway - we can't keep producing forever)

Many ordinary Americans should be squeezed enough financially without having to pay off a mortgage too (rising oil prices I was referring to) so this type of thing should come as a welcome reprieve while they are gathering themselves for bigger adjustments, concerning energy and food. It might go further than being a reprieve and turn into a sort of an amnesty for some people. In effect the 'sub' is beginning to be taken out of the 'sub-prime'.

Auditor #9 wrote:

Found this article about American banks banding together in order to stem the tide of home repossessions

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41258

I'd like to see how many houses will actually not be repossessed by this grandiose iniative.

heh. I'd reckon they are throwing tidbits to the birds at first but soon enough they will be giving them whole sliced pans. The mortgage defaulters have 30 days to try to renegotiate their loans - so the terms will be changed at least for some people.

Given the weirdness of the sub-prime market where your loan is thrown up on PaddyPower Investment International in order to raise the capital from droves of investment gamblers all over the planet, who is going to take it when the defaulters begin to challenge their loans in courts? Those sub-prime debts may not be covered by any real laws .. Who do you go to to help you recover the money you lost in the Grand National?

One massive class-action and the whole house of cards could come tumbling down. Before that you will see more leniency if not cuts from the banks.