Archive for November, 2008
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act 101
America, just found the FISA 101 Act on your Justice Department Website. Now I know you have a war on, and I know that you need the ability to identify threats to yourselves. Probably do ourselves.
Just in case you may have forgotten, the Australians (thats us mate), the British, the Canadians, The New Zealanders, the Germans, the Poles and a whole lot more are all on the same side, many are taking casualties both military and civilian, all are facing the same threats. So why do you want to spy on us?
By the way we wouldn’t have a situation where the British spy on you, and you on the British and you swap information would we?
Imagine if you found one of your oldest and best buddies setting up a web cam in his backyard, or worse in your backyard that would let him perv on your wife, even if he swore he was just doing some bird watching.
So take some advice from an old mate, take your whiz bang electronic snoopery gadgetry, some of which is in our backyard and as a hint, bugger off.
In other words I understand your needs, we all have these urges, but find a better way to do it.
November 29 2008 | Opinion | No Comments »
The Law Is An Ass.
In the West the concept of Justice and Law are so inexonerably intertwined that they are deemed inseparable. Law is managed by Justice Departments, Statues of Justice proudly grace courts of Law the world over. How is it then that there can be unjust Laws?
To understand this you need to grasp the concept that “The Law” and “Justice” are two separate concepts. The Law refers to the will of the state. Justice is an abstract concept that everyone uses, but which most people would have a hard time defining.
Before we delve into the concept of Justice and move towards the inevitable albeit rhetorical conclusion we need to have a brief look at Law to try and understand what Law is.
As a note to those amongst the legal community that are sharpening their quills in retaliation, I will state here that I have zero, zilch, nada, nichts legal training. I simply have the fortune to live in a state in which there are Laws, and there appears to be a concept of Justice, but the statement the “Law is an Ass” is so entrenched in our collective consciousness that it is considered a normal state of affairs.
But first to Laws. continue reading »
November 29 2008 | Philosophy | No Comments »
Darryl Guppy: A Must Read
I said I would stay away from market related discussion for a while which is easier said than done. Particularly when you come across an article like this one from Darryl Guppy that I consider a must read.
It was written back in on about the 12th of October in which he discusses what happens as a market moves towards a bottom.
Following on from his discussion we are not there yet. So if you are in the market, or contemplating a re-entry, please have a read of this article.
The important thing to note is that markets do not fall straight down and then bounce straight back up. They go down and then trend sideways for a while. It is this sideways trend that you need to look for.
When the lows are no longer lower than the previous lows and the market seems to be bouncing along sideways, that is when you reenter. Choose an entry at or near the floor and perhaps exit at or near the recent highs and simply trade the bollinger bands as the market trends sideways.
November 27 2008 | Market | No Comments »
Barbarians At The Gate
Background: What Is Civilization
Before delving into this I need to bring out the abstract concept of “civilization” as it is a term that is often used but seems to lack adequate definition. For now in the absence of the more formal definition of Justice and its relation to Civilization that I will write about at a later time, assume that the concept of being civilized is a relative term that enables you to compare two peoples in such a way that you can compare the damage that you are at risk of sustaining if you lived amongst them.
As such you can say that “such and such a people are civilized”, or “that was a civilized place”. When you say this, you are in fact saying that when you are amongst those peoples, or in that place that the threat to your own security is less. Conversely when you are amongst uncivilized people, or in an uncivilized place you are exposed to risks that you probably would not desire.
Whether these threats be the obvious threat of violence and warfare, the threat of disease and starvation or the more subtle threats of government incompetence and corruption it is easy to see what a civilization is, by comparing it to what it is not.
Note here I am not necessarily talking about nations or cultures, I could be talking about suburbs in the city you live in. Interestingly I find that public amenities are an interesting measure of how civilized a place and the local people are. Clean and maintained or broken doors, flooded stalls and graffiti everywhere?
The key advantage about civilized versus uncivilized to my mind is that in regions of civilization there is less damage which in practical terms means infrastructure builds up rather than torn apart. The build up of infrastructure then provides survival advantages to the people that built it. Quite simply the civilized spend less of their resources repairing damage and are able to spend more on their own development.
Consider again the public amenities and the costs of cleaning graffiti. Could that money be spent on schools or public parks?
With the concept be being “Civilized” behind us, a good way to define a “Civilization” seems to be that a Civilization is a collection of people with more or less the same standards of Civilized behavior, who all contribute in one way or another to the collection itself. In simple terms a “Principal of Fair Exchange” holds. Note the key word contribute here as this is important.
Keep in mind that the concept of being “Civilized” is a relative rather than absolute term, you may think you are “Civilized”, others perhaps do not.
This by the way does not include the concept of “civilized” as used by the the chardonnay liberals who will call the people they visited on their latest overseas jaunt “civilized” because the people are “nice” and smile lots, while the tourist is reliant upon the medical, legal, military, educational and social support infrastructure of their home country. Nice place to visit, but wouldn’t want to live there? Think about why.
With these concepts in mind what are the Paradoxes of Civilization?
continue reading »
November 25 2008 | Culture and Philosophy | No Comments »
The World Best Pasta.
This one is a good one, but not for the delicate. It is a massive hit of strong flavours. The perfect food for blokes. Given it’s rumoured history as being a Pasta Sauce that was used by Italian working girls to entice in the men I can well understand why it worked. The combination of a hot blooded woman and this sauce is a lethal weapon.
You will need Good Olive Oil, Garlic (lots of), Chilli Flakes (lots of), Capers (lots of), Anchovies (lots of), Kalamata Olives (lots of), some Basil , Balsamic Vinegar optional. See what I mean about robust flavours. To hold this massive hit on your senses together you will need some tomato’s, I find a tin of those Italian Roma Tomato’s (without herbs) is fine. If you use fresh three or four will do. As a guide to the garlic about a whole bulb will do it.
To start, fire up a small pot on the stove on a medium heat, pour in some olive oil say a third of a cup, enough to form a layer we can fry the Anchovies and Garlic in. When the Olive oil is hot enough to fry, throw in about a dozen Anchovies and give half a dozen cloves of Garlic a whack with the flat of a knife to partially crush them and throw them in. Stir this until the Garlic and Anchovies fall apart.
Right about now your kitchen will be emitting enticing smells that is probably luring randy Italian males from miles around. These girls new their stuff. If like me you are not of the shoe fixated gender and don’t want a kitchen full of horny males attempting to grope the cook – bolt the door.
Having secured the premises, or thrown out the red light and welcome mat as the case may be, throw in about a half a teaspoon of Chilli flakes – more is good, give it a bit of a stir for a couple of seconds, lower the heat and add a tin of Tomato’s or a few fresh ones halved or quartered, doesn’t matter as it will all break down anyway.
Add about a dozen Kalamata Olives, whole works fine (mind the pits) or you could tear them up and discard the pits, finally add a couple of teaspoons of Capers, perhaps a splash of water if you need it and optionally a splash of Balsamic Vinegar. Simmer this down until you have a rich sauce. Probably about 30 minutes – needless to say don’t burn it!! I normally start the pasta and find by the time the pasta is cooked, the sauce is ready. I use a pot big enough for the pasta to swim in which takes a bit to heat up.
Just before you are ready to serve, add a few more cloves of chopped Garlic, tear up a couple of Basil leaves and add them and simmer for a couple more minutes.
For the pasta I run with a normal size spaghetti, this is a good sauce and in this case it is all about the sauce, the Pasta is just there to give the sauce something to stick to. But if you are going do it, may as well do it with style, I toss the pasta in some butter before serving. Normally I would toss the pasta in butter and garlic and perhaps some herbs, but in this case we have enough garlic to guarantee you will get to sit alone on the 8:45 North Shore line out of Town Hall for the next week or so. You could serve with some parmesan if you like. I like some crusty bread to soak up any sauce that is left.
Oh yes this will serve two with perhaps a bit left for Ron. Later Ron that is.
Enjoy.
P.S Variations On A Theme
Ok so you liked that sauce. As a variation you could drop the tomato’s altogether. What you would have is the Anchovy and Garlic base into which you would throw in the Capers, Chilli and Olives without worrying about simmering down the passata, which of course you would not have not having any tomato’s. Pretty much just heat the water for the Pasta, make the Anchovy and Garlic base, bring the the heat down and toss in the rest while you cook the Pasta. In fact you could do this one with butter and olive oil – just be careful not to burn the butter.
If you do this use a thin pasta and perhaps toss some parsley in for colour. You could also use those tiny Red Italian Chilli’s finely sliced, which with some Parsley and hunks of Olive and Capers hanging off the Pasta would look pretty good imho.
Late Edit: Just tried the latter without the tomato’s and it’s a lick the bowl clean ripper. In the end I added a quarter of a cup of water to cool off the oil before adding the butter and simmered it down with a little oregano – no basil, but did add a splash of balsamic vinegar. Now I have a huge satiated grin on my face, have broken out in a chilli sweat, stink like a garlic farmers goat and have merrily managed to get sauce from arsehole to breakfast time.
Late Late Edit: Have tried the latter a couple of times now, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. I am tending towards toning down the quantities to simply end up with a Pasta coated with all sorts, so make the pasta and in the mean time simply fry up some garlic (not as much) in butter, slice up some red chillis (need the colour), dice some olives, tear up some anchovies, throw in some capers and some herbs. Toss the pasta in the concoction.
Definitely in the experimental basket.
Happiness is a clean plate.
November 22 2008 | Food | No Comments »
World War 2 – What Was That?
I kid you not. I was in a cab yesterday on the way to work and as is common in this day and age talk turned to the economy. As could be predicted when asked what I thought was happening I got on my “baby boomers are just getting old” soap box.
The wierd thing was that this guy didn’t know what baby boomers were. OK so his English was not good, so I thought perhaps in his culture they use a different word. Nope still not understand. You know “soldiers all come home at the same time? happy to see the wife”. Nope no comprehension.
The problem when I got to the bottom of it amazed me
It turned out that the guy – in his thirties I would guess – had never heard of World War 2. He understood the “happy to see wife” bit alright, just had no idea why so many men came home at once. Now I was sure that India was involved in WW2 and on checking surely enough there are about thirty Victoria Cross recipients listed – which is a lot, Australians earned about 20 – so it could not be a case of the world seen from Anglo eyes and me being at fault assuming things are important that other nations consider irrelevant.
How can that be? How can someone not know what World War 2 was. Particularly in this ANZAC infatuated country with War memorials in every town square?
Perhaps from an Indian view partition and independence are more relevant. He probably could have talked all day on that if I had asked.
Just don’t know, wierd in fact.
November 21 2008 | Culture | No Comments »
Warning Warning Will Robinson
Another statement of the bleeding obvious perhaps, but I just had a gander at the VIX Volatility Index from Stockcharts and technically it is also not pretty. The cross on the Price Percentage Oscillator (PPO) indicates an increase in volatility is extremely likely and will continue upward for a few more weeks. So putting that together with this mornings post and again I get a very bad feeling.
Post Script
I might chill on the share market posts for a while unless there is a noticeable change in market conditions, we find a floor, or something else occurs worth reporting. I think we all know where it is headed and perhaps even why.
It was never my intent for this blog to become a share market forum, although I must admit that historically these are “Interesting Times” and as such happenings in the market are worthy of comment even if only for me or someone else with an interest in history as it occurred to be able to look back one day and wonder “WTF was I thinking”.
Captains Log: Star Date 16.6.63
November 20 2008 | Market | No Comments »
Something to cheer up a lousy day
If you have anything left after the events here, are fool enough to be long or even have “Balls of Steel” now is a good time to take note of these kids (and take your money out) to the tune of this.
The Stock Market Hokey Pokey
You put all your money in,
You pull all your money out;
You put all your money in,
And you move it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That’s what it’s all about!
You put your margin loan in,
You pull your margin loan out;
You put your margin loan in,
And you move it all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That’s what it’s all about!
You put your stops in,
You pull your stops out;
You put your stops in,
And you move em all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That’s what it’s all about!
You put your shorts in,
You close your shorts out;
You put your shorts in,
And you move em all about.
You do the Hokey-Pokey,
And you turn yourself around.
That’s what it’s all about!
Just another twit of wit.
November 20 2008 | Humour and Market | No Comments »
Thats It Guys, Everybody Out!!!
The bad news is I am seeing a downward indicating Pennon/Flag forming on the Dow. And that is without last nights fall to 8000 thereabouts that is occurring as I write. Late update, it’s now 7991 and falling
Best of Luck All.
November 20 2008 | Market | No Comments »
Still Doubt It
Well my less than optimistic prediction of a fall to 7500 in the last couple of weeks of last month didn’t occur. But I am still seeing 7500 as the mark to start thinking about whether we have a floor or a ceiling to the current market. As mentioned in the ASX200 post we have the looming bankruptcy of GM and/or Ford to worry about. Until that issue and all the related uncertainty is resolved I can’t see buyers coming back.
Layoffs, capital equipment belt tightening and companies here in Australia such as Allco, ABC Learning, not to mention numerous tiddlers going into liquidation has only just started.
I am starting to agree with the longer term fall to around the 5500 mark.
Come on governments, we need ambitious, growth developing, exciting, enlightening capital spending plans. Someone needs to fire the imagination of the markets and the world. We need direction. Lets do something great, lets go to Mars, lets mine Titan for methane, lets spend lots of money in such a way that it will build a better world. And lets do it today!
Sic ‘Em Rex
November 19 2008 | Market | No Comments »
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