Rio 2016: What to Expect

The Olimpycs (once again) sponsored by Coke and McDonald's:

Simple Jack - Newly elected President of the IOC
I'm Lovin' It !!!

As was strictly enforced in London, Coke and McDonald's are the only brands allowed.  Security will be provided by the TSA who are the "Official Gropers of 2016".  According to the IOC, the TSA was automatically selected due to their unparalleled efficiency at throwing away things we need.  So anyone caught with real food will have it ripped out of their hands by a TSA agent.  

The Official Condom: "Usain's Bolt"

Also as in London, only official condoms will be allowed.  The official condom of 2016 will be the new brand "Usain's Bolt" part of a line of products that includes boner pills (Warning: If you experience an erection lasting more than 17 days, it may just mean that you are in fact Usain Bolt - #1, The Best, The World's Greatest, The Fastest, The Hardest etc. etc...). 

All condoms will be inspected by the TSA before, during and after use.

New Sport: Nude Women's Beach Volleyball

Yes, the sport we (men) have all been waiting for.  First it was real volleyball, then it was scantily clad women on a beach volleyball, now finally, the real deal.  Many fans had complained in London that the women were overdressed in the beach volleyball events, so the IOC came up with a solution.  This of course, will be an exhibition-only event and only men and bearded lesbians will be permitted in the stands.  The only permitted competitors will be large-breasted Swedish women.

Other new sports being considered:

1) Handball:  No, not the sport seen in London that no one has ever seen before, the real hand ball we played as kids hitting a ball against the wall

2) Leap Frog: This will be borrowed from the gay Olympics.  IOC officials are confident there will be fewer delay of game penalties as in the GO

3) Drinking booze while running cross-country: Borrowed from the Hash House Harriers

4) Synchronized Walking

5) Standing on One Leg 

6) Synchronized standing on one leg

7) Basket Weaving

8) Watching TV

9) My Kids' Favourite: Playing 'Call of Duty' for 16 hours straight

Trump for President

A *Real* American (Accept No Substitutes)

Dispatches from the Idiocracy

Anyone assimilating the facts from this blog or any other source of reality has to find some way to reconcile society's pervasive complacency in the face of economic annihilation.  The only way this is possible is to dissect and understand the zeitgeist of the time - or what I call The Idiocracy.

Stock Market Con Game

The stock market is the biggest con game on the planet.

As of this week, the stock market (S&P 500) is at the same level it was 10 years ago. That means even cash bank deposits yielding 1% have outperformed the market.

They call it the "secondary market" for a reason, the stock market exists to allow company insiders to sell their shares to the general public. That money you've been plowing into your 401k these past 10 years? That was used to buy shares from insiders who have taken hundreds of billions of dollars out of the market in the past 10 years, while your money has gone nowhere. The common man has been brain washed into a "buy and hold" strategy by Wall Street who need a steady supply of suckers to buy out the insiders. And when I say "insiders" I include those in "buy side" firms such as Hedge Funds who get their information from investment banks long before the public ever hears about it. Reg. FD (Full Disclosure) is a total joke that only washed out a handful of the really bad traders. The fact that hedge funds routinely pay commissions well above what I pay as a measly retail "Active Trader" is all you need to know that the insider trading game is alive and well i.e. inflated commissions are "payment in kind" - thank you very much.

Meet the Country Club
The stock market is just another Ponzi scheme based on cheap and easy growth at all cost. The CEOs of major companies are vastly overpaid and have little or no accountability. After Enron, we were told things would get better, but things have only gotten much worse as Bush & Co. basically neutered the SEC the day they (Bush & Co) took office. Just look at examples such as Charles Prince whose company (Citigroup) lost ~$18 billion which got him fired with a "modest" $42m in severance (see this article from USA Hooray) - poor fella. Similarly at Merrill Lynch, writedowns there have totalled some $19+ billion dollars (to date), as Merrill Lynch just took down another $5 billion in losses this week. Yet last fall, CEO Stan O'Neal was "let go" and given a "mere" $160m in severance for doing such a bad job. These guys are all part of the global country club - this is a cohort of Poser CEOs who made their way to the top not through entrepreneurship or innovation, but strictly through their country club and frat boy connections. George W. is the quintessential example of a guy with zero talent who just bullshitted his way to the top. Every major company in America is now riddled with these pretenders, and this past 8 years has given them the perfect venue in which to succeed at their con game. Their methods are largely all the same, take an existing business and leverage it up to the maximum extent possible, temporarily manipulate the stock price higher based on ephemeral and inflated earnings, cash out, and then walk away, leaving the general public as the bag holder.

If you still have money in the stock market, then I highly recommend you make an honest assessment as to YOUR role in this cash out scheme, and adjust accordingly. Those who would tell you that the stock market outperforms less risky asset classes over the long-term, left out some important details. For example, after the 1929 market peak, the Dow lost 90% of its value in 3 years and then took 25 years to get back to the 1929 peak. If you are planning to retire sometime in the next 10-20 years, ask yourself if you can take that kind of pain. I know I can't. And don't kid yourself that it can't happen again. The current lineup of morons running this show (economy) are the least competent group of policymakers since the founding of the Republic. They are the Country Club Idiocracy and you are their meal ticket.

No ROI (Return on Intelligence)

One of the most difficult aspects of living in this current era is the debasement of intelligent thinking. As I have indicated, below, we are deeply entrenched in the DISINFORMATION age, which brings with it all manner of deception, dishonesty, and anti-intellectualism. As the financial crisis unfolds, the public's desire for "simple" answers will only increase, and intelligent "grey area" debate will give way to "black or white" George Bush-style uninformed posturing. Further exacerbating the problem will be the mass media's relentless decline into the abyss of ignorance e.g. "Reality TV", "Fox (Faux) News"; a race for the bottom with the ever-descending lowest common denominator. As people's optimism for the future fades, they will "tune in" and "tune out" in ever-increasing numbers.

Due to the triumph of the marketing-based pseudo-economy over the engineering-based economy, the premium on intelligence has basically disappeared. Not too long ago being intelligent and increasing one's knowledge was an edge in work and in private life. Reading books other than those written by Danielle Steele and Michael (pseudo-scientist) Crichton, was considered a worthwhile use of time. Under the "marketing based" economy however, those rules have changed, and intelligence is now deeply discounted to the point of having a negative return on investment. What edge can intelligence have, when there is no one around to understand what the hell you are saying? Actually, I think there are plenty of smart people still around, but how can meaningful discourse compete with Britney Spears' latest escapades? I may sound like a snob to say all of these things, but I for one miss the kind of straight talking, critical thinking that made the United States a strong nation in the first place.

It begs the critical question: What will come back first - a strong economy based on sustainable fundamentals OR the premium on intelligence that promotes R&D, and enables competition with the rest of the world? I submit that it will be impossible to achieve the former, without the latter.

Return on Intelligence (ROI), Rest in Peace...