The Winter of Our Discontent

Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums chang'd to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
. . . .

Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun,
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore,--since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,--
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.

-Richard III, William Shakespeare

"The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane and intolerable, and so, if he is romantic, he tries to change it. And even if he is not romantic personally he is very apt to spread discontent among those who are."

-H. L. Mencken

Don't tread on an ant, when he's done nothing to you,
There may come a day, when an ant is treading on you.

-Antmusic, Adam Ant

It is a bright, cold day in December.  The traffic on the freeways is noticeably lighter.  People on the elevator look drawn, haggard.  They talk about wanting to put 2010 behind them.  Christmas presents fill the back seats of Japanese-manufactured, cheap sedans.  And walking though the office reveals an assortment of plates of Christmas cookies and goodies with plastic wrap and ribbons strewn beside.  Another year over, a new one begun.

Meanwhile, the municipal bond market is in collapse.  The next domino falls.  States and local municipalities will have to pay more and more of a premium to get money needed to run necessary services, and go deeper and deeper into debt, and those who least need any such services grin at new census numbers that ensure yet even more and better control on this strange, internecine and internal House divided against itself.  It is the drowning of "government" in the bathtub.  Someone ran off with the money in the deregulation frenzy, and they continue doing so.  They are bilking the national coffers, the money supply, and, most of all, nobodies like you.

But nowhere in the brightly illuminated telepersons on Faux News is any of this evident.  Next up, how "liberals" are spending too much of "your" money.  The "government" that they are bilking is taking too much of "your" money.  The enemy within is the intelligentsia.  Ah, the enslaved nod and obey.  From between teeth that are bleached too white, and makeup that is smeared on deceptively smoothe, through eyes that reflect the television lighting's glare, the lies are being told.  Ignorance is Strength.

But which is it, this government?  Is it the old and dilapidated buildings huddled around a quiet and cold marsh on the shores of the Potomac?  No, not any longer.  Now, it is elsewhere.  It speaks to you from the media of screamfests on cable television shows and chainsaw voices on AM radio peddling gold and free, misguided and sideways anger.  Those who govern you are not the fools scurrying around the chambers in Washington.  Those are just shills who have managed to cut a better deal than you.  And, ironically, they serve as the scapegoats of those who truly govern you, manage the information your given about your own society, and direct your emotions to pervert your reason, an amygdala-hijack of your own ability to think for yourself.  And they choose as scapegoats the fools in Washington, and almost anyone who can think and feel.

So Merry Christmas.  And Happy New Year.  If you are reading this, then you are already one breath of freedom better than the cars that run endlessly along freeways, going nowhere.  You have taken the pill and are seeing how deep the rabbit hole goes. 

An Englishman bedecked in woman's makeup once quipped decades ago about these and other ants.  Just as an Englishman a millenia before him quipped about this winter, and our discontent.

Distress Call From the Year 2010

[begin transmission] . . . S.O.S. . . yes, whoever you are, whatever you are, whenever you are -- you should be warned.  Don't let what happened to us happen to you.

The last three decades of the 20th century seemed like such halcyon days.  We never knew what was really going on.  The decade of freedom and free love slowly morphed into the greatest disparity of wealth in U.S. history, the economic enslavement of labor, the destruction of journalism, the press, free speech, the degradation of the government and community services, and the evisceration of civil liberty after civil liberty, all in the name of "security."  And all of it was by design, all along.

It started with the media.  We never thought that so many could be so misled by so few so much of the time.  But it happened.  The most outrageous lies were broadcast incessantly, to the point that truth and fact became malleable, fashionable, and deviant.  It didn't even matter what was the truth and fact, it was somehow more important to vilify whoever it was that was saying it.  The truth became suddenly either a state secret or treason.  Victor Hugo's post mortem spoke eloquently, "in a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act . . ."

Then it was politics.  Suddenly, the political machinery became simply a function of economics.  The more money there was to spend, the more influence could be had.  This stratified the wealthy class, which received anything it requested, bought and paid for, while the once-American ideals and principals that had been the foundation of protecting the middle and lower class were discarded, lost in the media deluge of hypernationalism, jingoism, and fundamentalist Christianity. 

The Middle Class was last.  The bulwark of U.S. society, the ballast and the anchor, the center and counterweight to profligacy and excess, was starved out of existence.  Those few who saw the Middle Class emaciated by loss of governmental services and declining real income for decades were attacked by those whom they sought to inform and save.  The anger and ire of class warfare was perverted into a hatred of a caricature of elite intellectuals.  Roosevelt's Brain Trust could no longer save those whom it was intended to save, as it was declared to be an internal enemy.

Finally, without this steadying presence, civil liberties were eroded and eradicated.  The prison system became one of the leading industries, as more and more money was funnelled out of the people's taxes and the people's wealth to imprison them.  The criminal justice system became based on retaliation and contrapasso, rather than rehabilitation and the hope of a better society.  But it was the money that flowed to this system, this Military-Industrial-Media-Prison Complex that resulted in more surveillance, more monitoring, more checkpoints, more warrantless searches, more walls to keep people out and to keep people in.

Do you read me?  Come in.  S.O.S.  Mayday . . . are you getting this message . . .

[end transmission]

Exile on Main Street

Normal Americans once used to Escalades and McMansions now live in exile from the American Dream. Asslickers who once scored $250k/yr are self-pirahnaizing their 401ks and savings, beleiving that redemption is but one Joel Osteen sermon away. Because their thinking is boxed by the Previous American Experience (PAM), they sit in their hollowed out castles completely unaware of the global labor arbitrage that is in the process of rotisserie-roasting them to death. Huddled around the fire are global elitists and hungry ChIndians who long not to have a Christmas home in Santa Fe, but an indoor shitter and some tp to give them and their assholes a new standard of living. Americans can't compete with that. First and foremost, because we aren't willing to. Johnny Walker Blue used to be in Human Resources shuffling papers and hiring hot assistants with tramp stamps that almost made him think he could trash the Cialis prescription. But now that the wife is looking for a Bigger Better Deal (BBE) and the tennis pro at her former country club just gave her 6 orgasms in one night, Johnny changes his tune. Suddenly Wendy's and McDonalds aren't just places for late-night drive thrus, but maybe for early-morning career revival. As a friend once pointed out, Indians and Chinese are plentiful enough and cheap enough to satisfy global demand for just about every good and service. That makes the rest of us nothing but delusional burrito-eating shit factories.

Top 10 Signs Your Hedge Fund is Toast

10. You see an open Bible on your boss' desk.
9. You see certain office equipment like monitors and chairs for sale on ebay.
8. The bloomberg subscription aint getting renewed.
7. You hear the word 'gate' come up alot as it relates to limits on redemptions.
6. A star partner suddenly takes a hiatus.
5. All the traders leave.
4. Even hot secretaries are getting fired.
3. Compliance people cry for no apparent reason.
2. The guy who was gonna allocate $50 million fell off a ladder and wont be able to send the money until he recovers.
1. You hear some subcontractors talking about a wall thats gonna cut thru the office (ie for new tenants).

Markets and Society

When I was in 4th grade, I was cut from the basketball team. I was devastated and cried after school as I watched my friends walking to the gym for practice. One reason I was so upset: I was pretty damn good. I kept practicing and within a few weeks, some scumbag was off the team and I was in. A couple of games in, I scored 27 points in a 24 minute game. Looking back, I would have to say that incident built my character.

By the 1990s, there were no more team tryouts. For anything. All grade-schoolers made the team. All cheerleaders made the squad. And everyone got trophies. Benchwarmer on the last place team? No problem. At the pizza party, the coach would still find some kind words about your athletic prowess as you walked up to collect your Hustle trophy. No one could fail.

Ben Bernanke has taken the stock and bond markets and basically said all assets get Hustle trophies. MBS worth 10 cents on the dollar? No problem, we'll print and take them off banks' hands at 90 cents on the dollar. And for the stuff the banks want to hold on to, we'll give a Federal guarantee. No one can ever lose. Ever. Unless you bet against Ben, which would imperil the existence of numerous small hedge funds trying to make a name for themselves. So get long. Take risk. And don't worry. The end of the year Pizza Party is right around the corner. And everyone is getting a trophy.

Of Anthills and Christmas Parties

"Every ant  knows the  formula of its ant-hill,
every  bee knows  the formula  of its  beehive.
They know it  in their own way, not in our way.
Only humankind does not know its own formula."
-Fyodor Dostoyevsky

So there I was at the annual Chrismas party, bumping elbows with probably one hundred other eager little small business people, the much-heralded and admired American "small business owner," each one armed with a fistful of free vistaprint business cards, a nametag, and some even having a shirt advertising the name of their little niche in the free market.  It's called a "Chamber of Commerce," and it is the means by which the monied class herds the non-monied class out of the source of capital, keeps them in line, and somehow, astonishingly, keeps them voting against their own economic and political interests. 

So many people with so little in common and so little business to do with one another.  You see, the problem isn't that each of these desperate little fools was unwilling or unable to carry out their little contribution to society.  The problem was that their pathetic little contribution really wasn't needed.  And it certainly isn't needed in the volume and the degree to which they seek customers to purchase it.

But these little people, each one probably formerly an engineer, an information technology professional, or a mid-level manager of some sort, was no longer useful in the world economy.  The labor that they used to provide to the owners of capital could now be obtained somewhere far away for far, far cheaper.  So these people were ordered out of the cubicles, and left to find little small "businesses" to occupy their time.  That is really all that they do.  There are far more real estate agents, real estate brokers, salespeople of various worthless goods, insurance agents, lawyers, business consultants and accountants than would ever be needed in the U.S.

Yet there they are, the "Chamber of Commerce," clinging to their little business cards and crawling constantly around in circles, over one another, under one another, trying to get from other ants in the anthill what none of them really have.  Each one, now a jettisoned, individual unit of labor with some worthless license, striving to get some piece of capital.  Only the real capital left the antill a long time ago.  It went overseas.  And the ants are left to mortgaging their homes, cars, and land to feed themselves.  When all of that goes South, the Capital will move overseas, the place to which the wealth is flowing, assets are appreciating, and capital is needed.

Who is left there to explain to them that only they do not know their own formula?

We All Have a Friend Like Obama

C'mon dudes. You know what I'm talking about, and if you don't, you are that friend. You know, the guy who cant go to titty bars. The one who has to take a whole day to find out if he can have a couple of beers with the fellas. The one who gets a call in the middle of a good time and suddenly has to split. The one who laughs a little less hard than normal with the fellas because the wifey is around. Sometimes, they even look at the wife to see if they can laugh at a joke at all. TOTAL FUCKING PUSSIES. They drink water with lemon while everyone else is downing brewskies. They pass on shots. They have no opinion on an incredible ass that just shook a tail in front of your table. Sports? Fuck that, the only time they watch football is the Super Bowl halftime show so the wife can watch Aerosmith. Concerts? Weed? Nope. Totally foreign to him. Yes, we all have that friend.

Today, the House Dems realized NoSlama Bama Obama is that friend. I dont even care whether the tax cuts get extended or not. It just pisses me off watching Obama take it up the wazoo by a bunch of dudes who will pull out and make him taste his own ass juice. Yes, the Dems called him out on his lack of balls. They know its hopeless, but they got sick and fucking tired of watching it play out. This changes nothing..for anyone. After the Dems get it out of their system, ObangMe can puss out again a few more dozen times. Then it will be time for the dems to forcefully remove the duct tape from his crotch and remind him: THESE ARE YOUR BALLS. THEY ARE ATTACHED TO YOUR DICK. THIS IS WHAT THEY ARE CAPABLE OF!