#Derivatives are Getting a Makeover but are Still Financial WMDs

Posted: August 14, 2014 in Excess and Algorithms
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by @anarchyroll
8/14/2014

Can a nuclear bomb be repackaged and sold as anything other than a weapon of mass destruction?

Countries that have the bomb, like the United States, claim they can be used as weapons of peace. Peace via the threat of destroying the world hanging over the head of anyone who dares to cross the boss.

Derivatives were at the core of the financial collapse of the global economy in 2008. Warren Buffet; America’s greatest living investor, has publicly stated he stays far away from them. With those two unremovable stains, it is no wonder why JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs are trying to rebrand derivatives.

Derivatives are the tool or instrument most used by big banks and hedge funds that turns Wall Street and the finance sector of the American economy into a casino on steroids. Until derivatives are regulated (they are completely unregulated presently) then Wall Street will, like a degenerate gambler, continue rolling the dice as often as possible, at the highest stakes possible.

Using money to make money has been described as The American Way by many CEO’s who have taken their respective companies public. If that is an acceptable definition of The American Way, then there is nothing more patriotic than using derivatives to make money.

One of the many problems with derivatives is that it uses nothing real, tangible that can be held and felt in the real world. The only thing a derivative is used for, is to make money in the finance sector. The finance sector of any economy is meant to help build wealth for the masses. Derivatives are a tool used by finance sector insiders, for finance sector insiders. Derivatives are purposefully complex and confusing, in many cases beyond any verbal explanation.

Attempting to rebrand derivatives under the umbrella of Alternative Mutual Funds, shows exactly why the finance sector of America’s economy needs to be strictly and tightly regulated this side of the 2008 collapse. They know how dangerous and damaging derivatives have been in the past, and rather than allow transparency and regulation, Wall Street is trying to sweep them under a rug, and try to tell people that the rug is a self-sustaining money tree.

 

The Pink Slime Factory is Back in Business

Posted: August 13, 2014 in Anarchy Journal Constitutional
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by @anarchyroll
8/13/2014

Before 2012, the only pink slime I was aware of was in Ghostbusters 2.

Then the ground beef byproduct controversy erupted.

Essentially, the public got wind of a filler in ground beef that contained ammonia hydroxide and was in the majority of mass-produced ground beef in major grocery stores and fast food chains. This led directly to the public flipping out, the (pink slime) filler to be removed, pulled from shelves, burger patties, etc…

But, America’s attention span is measured in 140 character online text messages and six second looping video clips. The media attention has gone away, the consumer outrage has gone away, and with that, the pink slime is coming back.

Why? The price of beef is going up, and putting pink slime into beef helps keeps costs down for manufacturers. So pink slime processing plants are reopening and pink slime will soon be back in our burgers and on our grocery shelves.

Will the public object again? Will mainstream media stoke the fires of public outrage again? Or do the majority of consumers and producers just want cheap beef?

 

#GuardiansoftheGalaxy Keeps #Marvel Moving Forward

Posted: August 11, 2014 in Anarchy Journal Constitutional
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by @anarchyroll
8/11/2014

Holy Howard the Duck was Guardians of Galaxy a good comic book movie!

The first time I heard of Guardians of the Galaxy was when the trailer debuted online earlier this year.

 

 

This film is yet another example that Marvel Studios does way more right than wrong and that all Marvel intellectual properties should be developed for the silver screen by Marvel and NOT third-party like Sony (Spiderman) or 2oth Century Fox (X-Men).

I saw the movie with a friend who owns all but two issues of Guardians ever printed. He informed me that the film was as true to the source material as any comic book movie that has come before it. That is another reason why Marvel Studios needs to make all Marvel movies. It is important that comic book movies be very close to their source material, more so than novels. Why?

My friend @TheFantom says it all the time and it’s truer each time I hear it; comic books are colorized, fully fleshed out, movie storyboards.

That doesn’t mean each comic book movie needs to be a shot for shot live action version of a comic. Hollywood needs to be able to do its thing and take creative license with the source material. But maybe let’s have one comic book movie that is a live action storyboard and see how it does in the theaters. It can’t do any worse than Ryan Reynolds’ Green Lantern disaster.

Guardians of the Galaxy is the opposite of disappointing. It was everything I want out of a summer blockbuster movie in general, and out of a comic book movie specifically. It had awesome action, great comedy, and intense drama all in the right places of a film that was neither too short or too long.

The opening scene of the movie is intense human drama, the very next scene is a comedic, musical, action scene. That sentence basically sums up Guardians of the Galaxy. The film does a good job at touching upon the full range of human emotions. I think that many women who don’t like comic book movies or big budget action movies would like this film for that very reason; the full range of emotions get their buttons pressed.

So whether you’re a casual movie fan or the human version of Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons, Guardians of the Galaxy will find a way to suck you into the screen and entertain you, regardless of whether you paid the extra fee for 3D. And these days, at these prices, that is all I ask of a movie.

The #Information Superhighway is More Potholes than Roads

Posted: August 10, 2014 in Anarchy Journal Constitutional
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by @anarchyroll
8/9/2014

Have you noticed more news on data breaches, password stealing, and hacking as a tool for war in the news recently? It’s not just you, and it’s not just sensationalism.

It turns out the internet being referred to as the information superhighway is an apt metaphor. As it has been recently revealed that the highway is more potholes than road.

In addition to have more holes than concrete, stretches of solid road that exist are seemingly ruled by Mad Max/Road Warrior style gangs in the form of international hacker mafias. No information on the open internet is secure. That was one of the lessons that should have come from the Edward Snowden NSA Leaks last year. But that fact took a distant second to the US government having a full-fledged Orwellian domestic spying program active, in place, and recording everyone’s emails, text messages, phone calls, and data placed on social media.

Not only is our personal, private information not safe from our government but our stock markets aren’t safe from international hackers either. The NASDAQ got straight up hacked into by Russian hackers in 2010. The hack and investigation into it were recently declassified and chronicled in a great article by Bloomberg Businessweek. After the FBI, CIA, NSA, and Secret Service each took turns looking into the matter, it is still unknown exactly how the hackers got in, what they took, and/or what they left behind. Essentially the only thing they know is that the hackers were Russian.

In related news, Russian hackers just this week stole more than 1 billion passwords and half a billion emails in the largest data theft in the history of the internet.

In the spirit of a stock market being hacked, it turns out professional hackers have their own exchange market. A recent article in TIME magazine revealed that hackers sell software bugs to the highest bidder to both governments and private companies.

The last year and a half will be remembered as the golden age for conspiracy theorists. Before you know it there’ll be a video released showing big foot, shooting Kennedy, from the studio where it staged the moon landing.

Learning that the information super highway is more potholes than roads in the long run, is good for us. We must be less trusting of faceless corporations. I know we’d all like to think Mark Zuckerberg is our friend, but he’s just another CEO trying to make money off of his customers. Not only are social media companies selling our information first hand through data brokers, but the information is so unsecure that all social media services are serving as enablers for identity thieves.

I can only imagine how much of my personal information is being packaged and sold on the black market. I’ve signed up and signed away my identity to a plethora of social media providers. But I’m a lower risk target. When I check my bank account online moths fly out of my monitor. But there are plenty more people who have plenty more to lose who have plenty more valuable information floating around online. And what we have definitively learned is that the information is NOT secure, it is floating around, waiting to be snatched by any hacker collective willing to put in the time and money.

There is no going back from the digital revolution. We’re not going back to analog and paper. So what is the solution? I don’t know, I just hope a solution is found before I have enough money to invest online.

The #Habit of Fear is the Hidden Obstacle to Overcoming #Fear Itself

Posted: August 7, 2014 in Stimulus Space Response
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by @anarchyroll
8/6/2014

Overcoming fear is part of life. They say fear is only in the mind, so is the idea that overcoming fear is a single act or moment that lasts forever.

Conquering fear is a process. If you want to master a skill, it will be a process of growth. Like exercising, if the muscle(s) aren’t continuously worked, they will regress.

Fear is bad enough, and gets written about quite a bit. A concept/aspect of fear that I am yet to encounter literature on is the habit of fear. The habit(s) of thinking, perceiving, and/or acting in fear based ways can remain long after the fear itself has been conquered.

These habits of thought, perception, and action can cause the illusion of regression, which can then cause a regression in the model of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I have noticed within myself that even when I don’t feel any physical fear or anxiety when attempting to do something that once terrified me, I will sometimes still not follow through with the right action that is in line with my goals. Why would I not take action if I’m not feeling afraid or thinking fearful thoughts?

Because there is a vacuum of space in my mind and spirit where fear used to be. The habits of fear based thoughts, perceptions, and actions are so cemented into my being after so many years, that it isn’t enough to blow up the concrete, I have to build something new as well.

It is both frustrating and humbling, because it exposes the progress I have made as well as the lack thereof. It lets me know I have much work still left to do after what feels like two lifetimes worth of an odyssey of the mind, heart, and spirit.

It is also something I was/am unprepared for. I thought once I stopped having such frequent, intense panic attacks when pressed up against the edge of my comfort zone that I would just naturally move forward by larger and larger increments. I falsely assumed once I reached a certain point of progress I would only take steps forward as opposed to continuing to take steps backwards.

I thought conquering fear was a destination, not an ongoing process.

But there is no aspect of personal development that is a final destination. Constant growth, evolution, improvement, change is required to achieve any and all goals. Whether the goal is material or immaterial, internal or external, physical or metaphysical.

I just wish I would have known that there would be a vacuum of space that existed where the fear used to be. The habit of fear in addition to the fear itself. That getting to the top of the mountain doesn’t mean much unless there is infrastructure below me to get back down and move on to the next challenge life has to offer.

I know what I have to do and should do which is choosing to do courage and taking right action. But I have fallen into holes in the ground of not doing what I know I should/need to do, then getting caught in the paralysis of analysis. Getting trapped in a cycle of going to sleep determined and waking up with progress amnesia. So many bad habits formed and cemented during all of my formative years. I go to sleep having made progress getting out of a ditch only to wake up in the morning to find I sleep-walked my way back to where I was yesterday, last week, last month, etc.

Habits, not the fear itself, but the residual effects of living a fear based existence for 3/4 of my life. I don’t feel afraid but I act afraid. I don’t take action when I want to because I am so used to being to afraid to act that stagnation is the status quo.

The habit of fear. Another obstacle to get to self-mastery. Though this concept feels more like black ice than a brick wall.

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