LOTTERY MADNESS

 

When  the payoff for the interstate lotteries reach more than a billion  dollars, people who can least afford it, bet large sums of money. The prize grows to such totals only because the vast amount being wagered and the creators are  increasing the odds of winning. 

At a time when credit card debt is a more than one trillion dollars and growing at the rate of more than  ten billion dollars a month, there are people financing ongoing expenses, food and utilities, that should be paid out of  present earnings.  

This cannot end well.

Almost a hundred years ago, in worst conditions, there was a song that offered some sage advice:

___________________________________________________

Song of the Lottery Agent / AKA The Money Lender's Song

OR

Lied Des Lotterieagenten/Song of the Lottery Agent [ AKA The Money Landers's Song]

From the Kabrett Jazz Opera:  Der Silbersee / The Silver Sea [Germany 1933]

Book and Lyrics: George Kaiser

Music: Kurt Weill

___________________

What will you pay for advice

on how to use your money wisely?

If you’ve got money, don’t leave it in your pocket.

Go to the people and sow it.

They are a field, fertilized with blood,

Something grows there, something’s coming up.

That produces the cream of your profit:

Interest

and compound interest.

One thing comes first, nothing comes second.

Close your picture book on life.

Just open your calender punctually,

read the “due dates” and you have read enough.

That’s how you calculate the cream of your profit:

Interest

and compound interest.

If you’ve got a human heart, harden it into stone

and don’t be surprised if it’s not successful straight off.

Just once be firm when faced with great need:

Soon you’ll be able to watch them leap to their deaths.

That guarantees the cream of your profit:

Interest 

and compound interest.

Build a tower of stone around yourself,

You won’t hear the agonizing screams outside.

Be blind, be deaf, forego no debt,

Or you’ll forfeit money and money’s benefit:

Interest

and compound interest.

Learn by this how one can make

Compound interest and the joy of interest to smile.

[Coda – spoken: menacingly]

You are now a rich man.

You have vast sums of money 

You are a millionaire.

Now you can do ----ANYTHING----YOU—WANT!

___________________________________________________

My translation from the German. I have followed, where possible,  the available singing translation – only making alterations that more accurately convey the original German. ( Singing translations must make the words fit the notes.)

“The Silver Sea,”  following  the incredible success of Die Dreigrosschenoper / The Three Penny Opera, and Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagoney / The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagoney opened in the three cities of  Leipzig,  Magdeburg,  and Erfurt, on the same night, in spite of attempts at disruption  by the SS. Ten days later Hitler declared a “state of emergency” following the Reichstag fire and suspended all civil rights. All three productions closed, and within a month cast and crew members surfaced in Paris.  Since then, the play has seldom been performed.

________________

When the iconoclastic playwright Bertolt Brecht teamed up with the classical composer Kurt Weill a new dimension was created. The lyrics were bloodthirsty and the music beautiful. This soon came to be  referred to as  Brechtian Dissonance

You  can listen to the original German to understand the flavor here from the leading interpreter present day Ute Lempe

Weill: Der Silbersee - Lied des Lotteriagenten (Was zahlen Sie?)

https://youtu.be/y4LCtZhrlyM_

Illiterate Man Memorises the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica

Walter Simpson amazed even himself when he discovered that he could recite the entire encyclopaedia from A to Z. Not only that, but he could call up any article in the work and recite it word for word. "If I had known that learning is so easy, I would never have dropped out of school in  the third grade," Walter confessed. 

Experts had suspected that such rapid learning was underway, but they  confessed that Mr Simpson was the first verified example of the new technique. It has been labelled "Digital Osmosis." It seems that if the material is available in digital form, all that is necessary is for the student to view the heading of the material and click the "Like" button and the entire document enters the brain. It doesn't seem to matter what  the length or complexity of the material is.

Documents ranging up to tens of thousands  of pages, involving the most complex material, along with complex mathematical exposition seems to pose no hurdle to the new type of learning. However, it is absolutely necessary is to click the "Like" button. This activates the mechanism that transfers the text into  the recipient's brain.

When the electrons of digital material leap the spacial distance between the computer screen and the human brain; not only does the brain absorb the material, but anything peripheral is included– page numbers, footnotes, etc,

Mr Simpson offered assurance that he intended to continue his education to the Ph D level. He is taking his time to decide what area he should study. He seems to be undecided among several subjects, including law, medicine, and several areas of advanced physics and biology. He said that he has plenty of time to decide since it should not take a more than a month or so to complete his studies.

A few sceptics commented that no one using this method of learning could write even a simple three word declarative sentence.

Copyright 2023 Roger G McCorkle

TRUMP ORDERS MOON INTO POLAR ORBIT

 

President  Trump has issued an executive order that will require the moon to be in a polar orbit by Labor Day of this year. The moon would normally be at full on September the second. However, to make the most spectacular display the full moon has been rescheduled to the night of Monday, September 7, 2020. The full moon rising in the north following the holiday fireworks is expected to be extraordinary.

President Trump said that under Article II of the Constitution,  he has the unconditional authority to change the moon's orbit by executive order. Many scientists say that this is absurd,  but this has been disregard by most sources as a minority view. 

The people of Alaska expressed great excitement of the prospect of watching a moon rise over the North Pole. Many people living at the southern tip of South America, in Chile and especially in the  Argentina area of Terra del Fuego, were amazed to realize that they will now have moon light almost 365 days of the year. One authority said that a full moon reflecting off the Antarctic snow and ice would  light up the region like the tropics.

The PBS News hour's Judy Woodruff interviewed Kellyanne Conway for more than twenty minutes. She first asked Conway to "Remind us which is the moon and which is the orbit." In a follow-up she raised serious concerns about how this would affect international trade in the Pacific rim countries. 

 Meanwhile, Mike Pence waxed enthusiastic on Fox News. He said that the polar orbit was long overdue and that this was just one of the remarkable achievements of the new Space Force.

Mitch McConnell, over on the hill, said that the Senate was prepared to vote for the 783 Billion dollar appropriation bill that is necessary to achieve this great American Triumph.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party's  organizations and many Democratic office holders and candidates  have sent out emails pleading for donations of $25 dollars or more to stop Trump's plan to change the moon's orbit.

____________

For an in-depth look at topics of more than passing interest, see my website at Patreon.com

Comments welcomed; subscriptions encouraged.

One of the three free articles on my website:  Art v Entertainment

https://www.patreon.com/RGMc

HOW TO DIE FROM CORONOAVIRUS

[Numbers as of 11:49:49 AM ‎Monday, ‎March ‎9, ‎2020]

First nation to develop and distribute a Coronavirus test: Germany.             
Best Coronavirus test in the in the world: Germany. 

Slowest nation in the developed world to distribute a coronavirus test: U. S. A. 
Accuracy value of U. S. A. coronavirus test: Unknown

The total population of Germany was slightly above 82.9 million.
The estimated 2019 United States is 329.45 million

Number of coronavirus cases in Germany Exceeds 1,150.                                                                 
Number of coronavirus cases in US climbed above 545

US coronavirus death toll rises to 21.
Germany coronavirus death toll 0.

But Germany has socialized medicine

American: "Social Medicine? Over my dead body!"

Coronavirus: "No problem. Will do."

________

Free Article -- please leave a comment.

Art v Entertainment https://www.patreon.com/posts/art-v-29916873

Know-It-All Society

                                                                Know-It-All Society

                 

Martin Patrick Lynch. 2019. Know-It-All Society: Truth and Arrogance in Political Culture, Liveright Publishing Corporation, A Division of W. W. Norton & Company, New York - London.

                                               

An interesting new book from a Board of Trustees Distinguished Philosophy Professor at the University of Connecticut, Martin Patrick Lynch. The author of The Internet of Us Knowing More and Understanding Less in the Age of Big Data.

This is a complex book that requires a careful and attentive reading. It is not to be skimmed, the principal sources referenced are: Michel de Montaigne, Socrates, David Hume, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Friedric Nietzsche, Hannah Arendt, John Dewey, and John Rawls, among others. Unfortunately the people who need it most probably would not be able to understand it.       

"Current research estimates that at least 60 percent of news stories shared online have not even been read by the person sharing them." ... per research at Columbia University -- Study conclusion:  "People are more willing to share an article than read it. (p 41-42)*

*[Dewey, Catlin 2016. "6 in 10 of You Will Share This Article without Reading It, a Depressing New Study Says." Washington Post, June 16, 2016] The research used such tools as Google analytics to discover that the hits on the sites were a fraction of the number of social postings. With only the raw numbers used it might be worse that 6 in 10.

"We think we are sharing news stories in order to transfer knowledge, but much of the time we aren't really trying to do that at all -- whatever we may consciously think. If we were, we would presumably have read the piece that we are sharing. But most of us don't. So, what are we doing?

"A plausible hypothesis is that the primary function of our practice of sharing content online is to express our emotional attitude....As Crockett has noted, expression of attitudes like moral outrage is one way that tribes are built...Social media is an outrage machine." [Emphasis added]  (p 43- 44)

Lynch adds:

"And it may go even further than that, as I once heard a senior Facebook representative (off the record) acknowledge that the company's own data showed that the problem was actually much greater: as much as 90 percent of the stories shared on that platform may not be clicked through by those sharing them."

                (Author's footnote # 13 on Chapter 2)

At 174 pages, this is a brief book that is densely reasoned, but decidedly worth the trouble that the reader may invest.

________

Free Article -- please leave a comment.

Art v Entertainment https://www.patreon.com/posts/art-v-29916873

INDIFFERENCE

L. A. subway Singer

 Emily Zamourka was homeless for a couple of years singing in the L A subway. How many people walked by? A few may have handed her a little money. But tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions -- in over two years -- walked by without a second glance.

Emily Zamourka recently came to fame with her haunting solo captured in the Los Angeles subway. Zamourka is a classically trained violinist, originally from Russia. She became homeless and started playing on the street after getting hit with massive medical bills

Finally, a policeman, a cell phone, and twitter caused people to take the time to actual listen. The video drew massive amounts of attention online, changing the course of Zamourka's life

When her $10,000 violin was stolen, she was left with only one instrument: her voice. Several GoFundMe pages have been set up to help her, and one violinist offered to give her an instrument.



Joshua Bell
[quoted story]

A man stood at a Metro station in Washington, D.C. and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried on to meet his schedule. 

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping, continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In he[sic] 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition
.
No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.

 Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats averaged $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the Metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people.          https://www.imamother.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=69716

Darcey Bussell 

Darcey Bussell was one of the youngest ballerinas ever to dance the lead in a world premiere - Princess Rose in "The Prince of the Pagodas." While Bussell was still at school, the choreographer Kenneth MacMillan had noticed her exceptional technique, and in 1988 at age 19, he decided to use her to create the leading role in his ballet The Prince of the Pagodas to Benjamin Britten's music, which led to her moving to the Royal Ballet.

A year later, in December 1989 on the opening night of the show, she was promoted to principal dancer at just 20 years old
.
Nothing can compare with a live performance, but a Blu-ray can at least offer some enlightening extras. In the Blu-ray video of the ballet "Sylvia." We get to see behind the curtain before each act and at the curtain call. For the curtain call Darcey says; for two hours we have danced our hearts out. When the final curtain falls, it is only down for less than a minute -- just long enough to turn on the house lights.We have been on a brightly lit stage for the better part of two hours. When the curtain goes back up we get to see the audience for the first time and see their reaction. It is always a heart stopping moment. If the audience is leaving or just sits silently, it would be devastating. I’m not certain that I would ever have the courage to go back on stage after such reception.

This from one of the world's great ballerinas.

Indifferent does have the power to kill.

The Audience / Viewer and Indifference

When you see a street performer, money is nice. A word of appreciation is great. A little applause? When you read a blog, think about a "like," maybe leave a comment, or even re-post or tweet.
---------------
For more and to  see detained original essays go this site -- 3 free. Leave a comment?

    https://www.patreon.com/RGMc

Writing on Arts, Letters, and Social Issues

I am now doing major essays on Art, Society, and related topics at

https://www.patreon.com/RGMc

There are three free articles plus more for paying patrons @ $5 a month. Take a look.

BUT IS IT ART? AND WHO CARES?

The Kennedy Center Honors, awarded at the beginning of December are being televised on Tuesday, December 29, 2015 by CBS at 9 PM eastern time. The list of winners for 2015 are: Carole King, George Lucas, Rita Moreno, Seiji Ozawa, and Cicely Tyson.

The stated qualification of the Kennedy Center Honors is that it is: “Awarded for Lifetime Contributions to American Culture through the Performing Arts.’  Not entertainment but arts. There are many awards for entertainment, The Academy Awards, The Grammy , The Emmy, The People’s Choice, and the list seems to go on forever.  There are very few awards for lifetime achievement in the arts, which should make the Kennedy Center Honors a special occasion.

When the awards were first announced, CBS signed up to carry the event.

CBS vice president for specials Bernie Sofronski stated: "George [Stevens] came to us with this. What turned us on is that this is the only show of its kind ....We see this as a national honoring of people who have contributed to society, not someone who happens to have a pop record hit at the moment...[emphasis added]  Our intention is not to do just another award show. 

A general poll asking people chosen at random to identify each of the winners might reveal some interesting results.  I suspect that few would identify Cicely Tyson and almost no one would be able to identify Seiji Ozawa.

For the record, Ozawa was the distinguished conductor of the Boston  Symphony Orchestra for 20 years and in 1994  had the new Tanglewood concert hall "Seiji Ozawa Hall" named in honor of his 20th season with the orchestra.  He was music director of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra from 1965 to 1969 and of the San Francisco Symphony from 1970 to 1977.  In fact, there isn’t a significant orchestra in the world he hasn’t conducted.  In addition, he has championed and introduced to the world many younger composers. The list is too long; check the Wikipedia article for the full Monty. That is Art with a capital “A.”

If he has achieved all of these things, why is he not better known?  Why are The United States’ leading artists, performing and otherwise, completely unknown?

It starts with leadership.  And what better place to look than the White House?  In fact, the President and the first family will be seated in box with the honorees.  Watch the award ceremony and something rather amazing happens. When the award is to a popular entertainer and the people performing are pop icons, President Obama cannot contain himself. He is jumping around in his seat, snapping his fingers, and mouthing the words. When it comes time for the one honoree from the real arts, he complete disappears. The camera pans across the honorees and the first family.  President Obama is seated to our far right. The camera always stops short of the President’s seat.

Always: In 2012 when the token artist was the international [Russia > England > USA] American citizen ballerina Natalia Markarova, in 2013 the African-American and international opera diva Martina Arroyo, in 2014 the world famous American ballerina Patricia McBride who spent nearly 30 years dancing with the New York City Ballet and had roles and original  ballets created for her by George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins’-- where was the President of the USA? AWOL!  It couldn’t be a coincidence.  Not year after year. Actually he is just doing the “Meurkan Thang.” He is not unique in this.

Of interest in this matter, CBS television has been running promotions for the Tuesday evening program for several days in advance. They picture and name all the honorees  and picture many of the guest performers along with the evening’s host Steven Colbert. Absent from this promotion is Seiji Qzawa. Why? They know their audience. Nobody in the U.S.A. knows or cares about  a symphony conductor.

A few months ago PBS ran a program from their “American Masters” series titled “American Ballet Theater: A history.”  The narrator for the program was Jennifer Homans, author of the ground breaking and award winning book: “Apollo’s Angels: A History of Ballet.”  She said that ballet is sophistication, style, eloquence, and beauty – in short, everything that America hates. So there is the bitter truth.

It has not always been this way.  In the wake of World War II many young Americans discovered Europe and were amazed.  When the fighting was finished,  there were museums, opera, plays, ballet, tons and tons of books, and a attitude that didn’t take the received wisdom of the smallest village for some universal truth.  Eyes were opened. The GI Bill opened some of the best colleges and universities in the land to a generation who had never seen or thought of college.

The roots were already there. In the 1930's and 40's there radio programs: The NBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Arturo Toscanni was considered by many to be the best in the world. [Imagine a television network today creating and underwriting such an organization.] The Orchestra performed on radio and gave concerts on Sunday afternoon in Carnegie Hall with admission prices comparable to a movie ticket. There were also broadcasts of the Chicago, Philadelphia, and other orchestra – national wide in prime time.

With the advent of television we soon had The Bell Telephone Hour, The Voice of Firestone, Producer's Showcase ( Ford & Magnavox as sponsors), and CBS televised the first live performances from the Metropolitan Opera.

For drama television gave us Westinghouse Studio One,  Kraft Television Theater, and Playhouse 90. The last gave us a first look at plays that were to go to Broadway and movie screens:  Paddy Chayefsky’s “Marty,” J.P. Miller’s “Days Of Wine And Roses” [ TV title: "The Lost Weekend"], “Requiem," "The Miracle Worker” and “Judgment At Nuremberg.”  All became Academy Award winning films.

The Kennedy Center itself was first proposed in the U. S. Congress in 1958 and signified championed by John F Kennedy.  At  his  inauguration, he invited Robert Frost to read a poem at the ceremony.  It served as notice that the Arts were now an official part of the country.  Once in the White House he had a formal dinner for all the American winners of the Noble prize – arts and science.  He persuaded Pablo Casals to play a recital at the White House.  Never in his life, had Casals ever played to a private audience.  He agreed because of his admiration for the new President and the tone that he was setting for the nation.

President Kennedy was chagrined that Washington D. C. stood alone as the only capital city of a major nation without a performing arts center.  All modern nations have capitals with great performing arts centers as well as great museums.  He made it a goal to change that.  His actions were heralded as a great step forward for the nation. Andre Malraux, author of Man's Fate (La Condition Humaine) and France’s Culture Minister agreed to loan the Mona Lisa for display in Washington and New York. France is not in the habit of loaning out the Mona Lisa.

What happened? Well. President Kennedy was killed, television discovered that people would watch just about anything – including the people next door or across town, if they were called Reality Stars. Actually it’s a long story. But we now have no serious arts leadership in the nation.

As someone remarked; “In the ‘70's we thought the idea of popular culture was really cool. We didn’t realize that all too soon it would be the only culture that remained.”
 
The immediate question: Will President Obama ‘take a powder’ again when Seiji Ozawa is honored or will he show some leadership for the arts?

REPUBLICANS SUFFER NERVOUS BREAKDOWN

Republican National Committee Chairman, Reince Priebus has issued an emergency call for all Republican psychiatrists to come to Washington to aid many Republicans members of the House and Senate, who have suffered  nervous breakdowns after realizing that minority control of the U S Senate might be a thing of the past.  Mitch McConnell has been stricken with such a bad case of stuttering after hearing that Harry Reid had plans to return to the requirement that filibusters would actually require senators to take to the floor and talk around the clock as seen in the movie  “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” that he has been unable to utter an understandable sentence in more than twelve hours.

House majority leader  John Boehner fearing that the whole weight of obstructing the government would be on his shoulders was taken with such a crying jag that he was unable even to walk. An aide said that Mr. Boehner had finally cried himself to sleep but that he was fearful of what might happen if he awakens and realizes that Harry Reid is serious about a move permitting  a Senate  majority to pass legislation without allowing the minority to rewrite everything to their satisfaction.

Chairman Priebus was so desperate that he has called Newt Gingrich for assistance. He believes that Newt who once held vast power before finding himself shut out of Washington, will be able to administer some serious grief counseling to distraught Republicans.

Dr. Sigmund Sigmund, the little known descendant of the great Viennese shrink said that the Republicans were in extremely serious perils, having suffered two dire set backs in less than a month. They still have not recovered from the shatteringly unexpected lost of the Presidential contest at the beginning of November and now they have to realize that they are faced with the trauma of not being in absolute control of the government.

 Dr. SS suggested that the Republicans might be faced with overcoming the infantile omnipotency complex described by his illustrious ancestor. He explained that Freud had described the world of the new born as a place that catered to its  every need. When the baby is hungry or soiled, he simply has to cry and someone rushes to attend to his needs. When the infant finally begins to realize that he is only one of many persons with a multitude of needs, it can be a difficult period for the little tyke.

Sources said that Paul Ryan has run into the gym and has been exercising nonstop for most of the day. Several aides have tried to talk him into taking a rest, but he insists that he must train to run a three minute mile. Dr. SS said that it was one of the worst cases of denial that he had ever seen.

Chairman Priebus has cancelled all press appearances for the next couple of days for all  elected Republicans.  When asked if he would call on the services of Carl Rove,  Priebus said that Carl Rove had best attend to Carl Rove.

© Roger G McCorkle

KOCH BROTHERS ANNOUNCE MAJOR CHARITABLE GIFT

In an expression of their extreme disappointment at the outcome of the 2012 election, the Koch brothers vowed to do every thing possible to avoid a repeat of another Obama-style presidency. Jim Dandy, a Koch spokesman, said that plans are being laid for the creation of a research center that will undertake to clone angry old white men. The Kochs plan to seed the center with an initial $100 million grant. He added that even if it cost several hundred million more that it would be more effective that all the money that was wasted with  “Turd Blossom” Rove.

Echoing Peter Morrison, the Hardin County Texas Republican treasurer, who said that the people who voted for Obama are maggots, Mr. Dandy said that the bothers had realized that it would never be possible to educate such irredeemably shiftless moochers to the benefits of laissez faire, the devil take the hindmost, free enterprise, capitalism. If you can’t sell ‘em, or disenfranchise ‘em, the only choice is to out vote ‘em.”

The distributed Koch press release, said that the goal was not only to create millions of angry old white men to vote, but to create as many clones as possible of the right kinds of politicians.  “Imagine the nation with fifty or one hundred thousand John Boehners and Mitch McConnells. This has the potential to turn the nation back to the path of small government, no rules, and no taxes for anyone making more than a million dollars a year.”

Spokesman Jim Dandy conceded that the project probably wouldn’t be complete in time for the 2016 election. He said that it was a long term goal that would probably take at least 8-10 years to be fully underway, but that he thought that there might be enough angry old white men clones by 2020 to move several of the most important swing states into the solid red column. He hinted that many of the first clones would be located in Florida, where they could easily pass unnoticed in the general population.
©Roger G McCorkle

cross post from open salon

MITT NEEDS MONEY

 Cross post from Open Salon of  Sept 12, 2012

Dear Patriotic Job Creator™,

Greeting from Return to Yesteryear®, the organization making the world safe for those who can say: "Yes, we built it!"

I had hoped that I would never have to write you this letter, but our nation is in peril. Our beloved Mitt Romney and his brilliant choice for veep, Paul Ryan, were beaten in fund raising in August by $114 million to $111 million. Even worse, Obama did this by appealing to a rag-tag crew of retirees and students for donations of as little as $3-5. Are we going to allow this motley bunch to decide who sits in the Oval Office? I should think not!

You may be thinking that it is only three million dollars difference. But that difference could see the job-killing, tax-raising Kenyan socialist return to the White House for four more years. Just think, if Obama is reelected and allows the Bush tax cuts to expire, that could cost you a lot more than three million dollars. Now is the time to act.

The good news is that we have an anonymous benefactor who is willing to match dollar for dollar your donations of $1 million or more during the next three days. In addition you will be able to donate anonymously to one of our special charities and take a tax deduction.

If you need help in transferring funds from an off-shore account, you may contact our campaign legal advisors, Wee Hyde Ewe and Howe, at their campaign email address:

Fun_raiser@www.entre_nous.ch

Swiss bank email is ever-so-private. Thanks to the Citizens United ruling, your funds will be discreetly transferred into one of our special numbered accounts. The hour is late and the need is pressing. I urge you to take advantage of a very special friend’s matching-funds offer right now. Delay could be expensive – very expensive. The last thing that any of us need is regret on November the 7^th. If we wake up on that day and Obama and his union buddies have won it will be too late. Your moment to make a difference is now.

It goes without saying that Mitt is one loyal chap. I can assure you that he never forgets a friend – not that I am implying any quid pro quo, of course.

With your generous support, I am sure that the Wealth Creators™ of our nation will do even better in the future.

Your ever so discreet friend,

Max

　

©Roger G McCorkle



　

UMG/ UNIVERAL FRANCE ET AL

                Or, how bizarre!

In spite of the fact that UMG/Universal France blocks my viewing of all French videos on You Tube, they send to me the following promotional for Madonna's new CD at my YouTube account on Monday, February 06, 2012 @ 5:00 PM EST [ie 11:00 PM Paris or European Central Time!]

Découvrez le nouveau single de MADONNA "Give me all your luvin" ainsi que son album MDNA disponible en version exclusive en pré-commande à durée limitée à 9.99€ jusqu'au 6 Février !
Disponible en téléchargement légal : http://bit.ly/A6qWwx" -- February 3, 2012

Or in English:
[Discover the new single from MADONNA "Give me all your luvin" and her album MDNA available in exclusive pre-order time-limited to € 9.99 until February 6th!
Available for download: http://bit.ly/A6qWwx "- February 3, 2012]
　
As if they hadn't already committed the absurdity of sending me a questionnaire in regard to my experience with a BluRay that I had ordered in January 2011 and received 6+ weeks later -- in March of 2011. The questionnaire was sent on January 27th and offered a €5 discount on a future purchases for taking the survey. After completing the survey, I was rewarded with a discount code good on any purchase of €35 or more good until January 10!

Why they didn't just date the discount code good till the Ides of March of 63 BC I don't know.

AMERICAN CORPORATIONS ARE DOING GREAT. YOU ARE IRRELEVANT: THEY NEITHER CARE FOR NOR NEED YOU.

The reports of 2^nd quarter profits of American corporations were nothing short of amazing. In the decades following World War II any corporation that realized an increase in profits of 3-5% was consider a sure fire winner. Investors lined up and the stock price climbed. Then by the ‘80s and Ronald Reagan, such returns were no longer acceptable and 5-10% growth became the new baseline. Now in our Brave New Globalized World profits must grow by geometric proportions to be acceptable. Three fourth of companies reporting 2nd-quarter results show unprecedented jumps in profit:

>>GE Capital profit jumps 123%
>>MasterCard profit up 33%
>>Mattel net income jumps 56 %
>>Citigroup up 24% [$3.3 billion]
>> Caterpillar up 44% [$1 Billion]
>> Dow Chemical Profit up 74%
>>Visa up 40%
>>Exxon Earning up 41%
>>Starbuck's profit up 33%
>>Chevron profit jumps 43%
>>GM profits jump 89%
>>Dell Posts Flat Sales --Profits rise 63%

The figures for Dell computer are typical. Corporations with no gain in sales and in many cases with even lower sales figures are reporting vastly increased profits. The oblivious question is: What is the source of these sudden corporate gains?

The AP wire carried a brief story in a recent late Friday release [see my previous post for more on the "Friday Follies."] that revealed the extent of the share of the pie that corporations are taking. It summarised finding of the Center for Labour Market Studies at Northeastrn University, according to the director Andrew Sum:

                         Boom in Corporate Profits, A Bust in Jobs, Wages
Paul Wiseman, AP Economics Writer, On Friday July 22, 2011, 6:36 pm EDT http://finance.yahoo.com/news/A-boom-in-corporate-profits-a-apf-3135711604.html?x=0
[note: Yahoo news links tend to go dead after 1-3 days]

"I've never seen labor markets this weak in 35 years of research," says Andrew Sum....Wages and salaries accounted for just 1 percent of economic growth in the first 18 months after economists declared that the recession had ended in June 2009...Corporate profits, by contrast, accounted for an unprecedented 88 percent of economic growth during [the same time period]...

Director Sum cited several factors at work in this unprecedented disparity. The two most important being the expansion of American corporations to over seas market; and second, the surplus work force created by the army of unemployed Americans. As Sum noted: "...companies are squeezing more productivity out of staffs thinned by layoffs during the Great Recession. They don't need to hire. And they don't need to be generous with pay raises; they know their employees have nowhere else to go."

How extensive is this problem? Steve Davidoff in his "Deal Professor" column in the New York Times Dealbook on August 16,2011,section gives some amazing answers.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/category/main-topics/legal/http://dealbook.nytimes.com/category/columnists/deal-professor/
 [The link is to Dealbook, which is not behind the NYT paywall.]

A recent Standard & Poor’s study found that 50 percent of sales by companies in the S.&P. 500-stock index are outside the United States. [Emphais added] Interestingly, the report also found that these companies paid more in foreign taxes than to the United States government....

In 2004, Congress enacted the American Jobs Creation Act, a tax holiday for companies to repatriate cash. The dividend tax was reduced to 5.25 percent from 35 percent. In exchange for this reduction, Congress required that any cash repatriated be invested in the United States. The cash could not be used for dividends or stock repurchases.

Alas, cash is fungible...[A study:]The Unintended Consequences of the Homeland Investment Act," found that in the year following the act, repatriations increased by $230 billion from the previous year, to $299 But the repatriation did not result in increased investment. Instead, companies largely repatriated the money and used their current United States holdings to pay out dividends or engage in share repurchases. This was contrary to what Congress had intended.

For those who can’t understand the nature of the war being waged on the majority of American citizens, it is only necessary to look to the professional financial advisory services. On October 8, 2009 the market advisor Rakesh Saxena writing on the site "Quote Platform" spelled out the facts of the Globalized economy.

Noting that India with a population of over one billion persons had hundreds of millions living on the edge of starvation, he said that those numbers do not matter. All that is important is the realization that India has over 350 million people with upper middle class incomes, who are in the market for new cars and flat-screen TVs,  and that that is a group larger than many other nations.  In other words, only those with money count. Those who have fallen off the apple cart can be safely forgotten. He concludes his market analysis:

At the same time, equity prices should face no risks from negative unemployment data. The thousands of desperate, unemployed workers who lined up in downtown Detroit [in Oct 2009]for housing assistance bitterly complained about the Obama Administration’s inability to generate jobs despite the promises made during, and immediately after, the last presidential elections. But, as a Wall Street hedge fund manager asked, "Who cares?"

　
　

THE FRIDAY FIVE O'CLOCK FOLLIES

The Federal Government as well as most major corporations long ago discovered a wonderfully easy way to bury unpleasant news that they hope never comes to the attention of most people: the Friday evening press conference.

By three P.M. on Friday almost everyone is packing up to get out of the office and onto the pleasures of the week end. Rather than conceal the really bad news, the "Powers that Be" choose to send an underling to announce the bad news. After all, with the name reporters from both the print and electronic media gone, the briefing by the Fourth Under Secretary of The Treasury will only be attended by cub reporters and interns.  The story is then buried under all the human interest stories and puff pieces that were prepared earlier in the week to fill in for the lack of hard news. By the following week the story is old news and will be forgotten in the hurly-burly of the ongoing circus.

If someone manages to dig out the story later and attempts to bring it into the spotlight, it will be dismissed as old news and not worthy of attention. It is truly amazing how many really important stories managed to get buried in the weekend follies.

WHEN PROTESTS ARE IGNORED

Get beyond the idea of the media. Do something they can't ignore.

In the Miami/Ft lauderdale market there have been MoveOn and other protests where hundreds of people showed up and no media coverage. At one large protest a local station [The locals are Network owned] sent a team that did over an hour's worth of taping with inteviews. It ended up as a 20 second piece just before the commercal break leading into the sports roundup on the 11 PM News.

As Boss Tweed said: "In politices the first thing is money; I forget what the second is."

I have been campaigning for a "NO SHOPPING DAY" on the 1st Saturday of each month. This will work. On Tuesday Aug 2nd the Consumer Spending report showed a decline of 00.2%. The Dow fell over 265 points! YEAH! It does get attention.

If even 20% of the public quit spending money -- in malls, on line, and paying bills --on the 1st Saturday of each month, things would begin to change. The reasons for the 1st Saturday are twofold: [1] It is easy to remember, and [2] there are more complex economic reasons that would give this act maximum impact, but would be beyond the scope of this post.

THINK!! ACT!!!

The secret of getting things done is to act!
Dante Alighieri

　
ALLEN WEST, TEAPARTER’S TEAPARTER WANTS TO GIVE AWAY MILLIONS OF TAXPAYERS DOLLARS
 It’s ironic that Tea Party Icon Congressman Allen West (Rep) Fl 22 District [Boca Raton and northern Broward County / Ft Lauderdale] who was on the CBS Evening News on this past Friday July 15^th proudly proclaiming that he would never agree to raise the US debt ceiling –ever–not even a penny, is trying to gives away Florida taxpayers’ dollars to private enterprise.


For a print version of his comments on the debt ceiling:
　
Rep. Allen West on McConnell debt plan: It's dead on arrival
http://www.thestatecolumn.com/articles/rep-allen-west-on-mcconnell-debt-plan-its-dead-on-arrival/

But there was no mention that only a couple of weeks ago he approached the Mayor of Broward County, Sue Gunzburger, with a request to pony up $14 million for new Super Sky Boxes at the Bank Atlantic Center [home to the NHL Florida Panthers and concerts by Lady Gaga, the Rolling Stones, and others]. Apparently he thinks that the county has money to burn.

In fact, the county budget has a shortfall of $20 million dollars and the school board has given pink slips to 700 teachers. Municipalities in the county seeking grants to make up budget short falls have been turned down. One example: the city of Hollywood planned to pink-slip a number of police officers to make ends meet, and the officers agreed to take a 12% pay cut so that no one would loose his or her job.

West’s excuse for the $14 million dollar give away is that: "It would create jobs." Never mind that of the original construction cost of $212 million, the county put up $184.7 million and was promised a share of the profits. Since the opening of the arena thirteen years ago in 1998 the county has received one check for $200,000. The county is not allowed to see the books! Even more damning financial details are on the arena website:   http://hockey.ballparks.com/NHL/FloridaPanthers/newindex.htm

 None of this bothers the last of the Red Hot Spenders, as long as a few people in the Holy Private Sector (genuflect, please) are able to pocket the money.

©Roger G McCorkle