Friday, January 31, 2014

New Argentina Economic Collapse?

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Consumer prices are soaring, the treasury is running low on foreign currency and the peso has had its sharpest slide in 12 years. Instead of rioting, though, Argentines are falling back on tried and true survival skills to cope with the turmoil.

Inflation is at about 30 percent...

So some Argentines are hoarding dollars, while others stockpile goods or plow their savings into real estate.

More people ride bikes now following recent increases in public transportation fares. They eat less at restaurants and cook at home. They buy cheap, pirated DVD copies of the latest films rather than go to the cinema.
Is this where the US is heading?
Many Argentines note that the current economic woes are not as bad as Argentina's financial collapse in 2001-2002. Unemployment remains relatively low, and many people benefit from government handouts. Yet they worry the country may be at a tipping point.
That does sound familiar.
The presidential couple negotiated or paid off most of Argentina's defaulted debt, nationalized the pension system, and retook control of the national airline and oil company. They also kept energy cheap through subsidies and dug deep into the treasury to redirect revenue to the poor through handouts.
Quite familiar. The government robbed people's private pension plans to pay it's own debts: They robbed the savers at the point of the government's guns, and now wonder why people don't save money or invest.

Read the whole thing. I think it is where we are going.

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Thursday, January 30, 2014

The House Leaders Don't Deserve It

Drudge Report headline:
HOUSE LEADERS CAMPAIGN FOR AMNESTY

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Tuesday, January 28, 2014

How To Use A Signal Mirror

Just the thing to have when I am next lost at sea.

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Monday, January 27, 2014

Some New Zealand Schools End Playground Rules

Apparently with good results.
Chaos may reign at Swanson Primary School with children climbing trees, riding skateboards and playing bullrush during playtime, but surprisingly the students don't cause bedlam, the principal says.

The school is actually seeing a drop in bullying, serious injuries and vandalism, while concentration levels in class are increasing.

Principal Bruce McLachlan rid the school of playtime rules as part of a successful university experiment.

"We want kids to be safe and to look after them, but we end up wrapping them in cotton wool when in fact they should be able to fall over."...

"When you look at our playground it looks chaotic. From an adult's perspective, it looks like kids might get hurt, but they don't."
Fancy that. I wish this idea would run amok here.

And let's abolish zero-tolerance policies while at it. They are anti-American at their very core. Unless, of course, you think America is all about training children to become docile drones in a police state.

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Is Bob Schieffer A Democratic Party Operative With A Byline?

He certainly deleted some inconvenient statements from an interview with Senator Ted Cruz.

That, of course, is the downside for Republicans in not having an interview go out live.

And Democrats in the same position can probably rely on the "news" media to edit out their inconvenient statements.

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Sunday, January 26, 2014

Caught Without A Corkscrew?

How to open a bottle of fine wine with a shoe and a wall.



You probably should not try this if your wall is made of drywall, though.

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