What is the surprise?

Folks talk past each other continuously.  Platitudes, trite sayings, overgeneralisations, dogmatic statements all abound.   As a person with an opinion, perhaps El Gringo Viejo is guilty at least as much as the worst among us.  And so, the solution for the body politic in dealing with me is to simply say, "He is too opinionated", or "He is too extreme".

 

     That solves the problem.  Relegate the Old Fool off to the attic, or to the shed out back that has a bed and a bit of a shower room, and tell him that supper will be brought to him in a little while.

 

     But, in the ephemeral swirl of ideas and notions, theories and theorem, thesis and antithesis and synthesis....what is known to be true because it is true, cannot be denied.   One who challenges what is demonstrably the truth cannot be accommodated solely for the purpose of being "reasonable" or "willing to compromise" or "finding common ground".

 

 

These truths are certainly self-evident:

     It might be inappropriate to say, but immigration is not necessarily a good thing.   If people arrive here to complain that things aren't to the liking here, because in Lower South Garbagia the government gave people two hundred quarts of borscht every three days, free, then there is a problem.
 
     Folks should not be surprised that the two Marathon bombers were on welfare.  Most people arriving to the United States at this time expect to have free everything.  Things have changed.   With the 1986 Amnesty, which directly reinforced the entitlement notions induced by the "War on Poverty", it was one of the main objectives, especially of the collaterals who were permitted to come in once the Amnestied relative was legalised, to obtain free goodies.
     We owned a very nice Laundromat for many years here on the border.   There were three girls who were collaterals to another, slightly older, girl who were talking.
      The older girl was giving the others a philosophical orientation about their new digs.  They were unaware that El Gringo Viejo could understand them.  She stated, and I shall remember this forever, "It's a lot better here.   Here the government takes care of you when you get tired.  If you learn how to apply, you can get almost  anything for free.  The only thing wrong is the damned gringos that live here."

     The time of the people sailing past the Statue of Liberty with nervous anticipation and joy for the smell of liberty and opportunity is dimming.    They still come, but in an ever decreasing percentage of the whole.   One must consider that one-third of all Muslim men in London are living with four wives, and all four wives are on the dole.   It is a typical form of benefit harvesting.   The Brits permit it and it might be their final blow as a place with even a residual of majesty.   Perhaps they might learn early enough that if Muslim move into a non-Sharia nation that they must abide by the laws of that nation, but that is not the view to-day, either of their immigrants nor substantial numbers of ours.

     Barak Obama's aunt Zietuni Obama and uncle Omar Onyango Obama have lived in that same area of Massachusetts....Boston and surroundings....for a combined 40 years...completely on the public dole.  And they feel offended that they have not had better treatment and consideration.  Uncle Omar has made fame as a repeat DWI.  And, he does not use a public defender.   He has upper-drawer Philadelphia lawyers.  He blatantly threatens that if anything happens to him, he has the President's private number....it might be the bottle talking....it might not.  But he does have 1,000 dollar/hour attorney intervention.   His only work is off the record at ..... a liquor store.    Auntie Zietuni and Uncle Omar were and are both illegal aliens and have been ordered deported on occasion...but they still here.
     Auntie Zietuni has complained loud and long, a la Maxine Waters  and Shirley Jackson Lee about the deplorable treatment she has had, while dressed up like a something or another and with her nails glittering and her hair extenders glistening.  It is too much to be believed.

     And now we learn, further, that although participation in public assistance, certainly, is a matter of public record,  the governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has sealed the Boston Bombers' participation in the various and sundry public assistance programs that were advantaged by them.   Auntie Zeituni and Uncle Omar cost the taxpayers a combined 120,000 per year at this time with the housing, food, recreation, walking around money, Medicaid, etc.   You just gotta love it.....

There come times when being reasonable is like drinking poison.   If I continue to drink this hemlock juice it is going to kill me.  If I continue to answer the questions, "Do you think a child should go hungry?  Don't you think someone should feed him?"    The time has long past for mobile spaying and neutering clinics, and the outright abolition of public assistance.   The grocery chains and the Farm Bureau and the Banks be damned!

El Gringo Viejo

Revisions, extensions, and other ramblings

First, a glorb of bilge that would truly puke a buzzard off'n a gut wagon.

 

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An anthropologist proposed a game to the kids in an African tribe. He put a basket full of fruit near a tree and told the kids that who ever got there first won the sweet fruits. When he told them to run they all took each others hands and ran together, then sat together enjoying their treats. When he asked them why they had run like that as one could have had all the fruits for himself they said: ''UBUNTU, how can one of us be happy if all the other ones are sad?''

'UBUNTU' in the Xhosa culture means: "I am because we are"

More photos from Tom Hughes

 

 

This is the thinking that is being taught in universities, feeling groups, new improved relevant churches, and the Girl Scouts of America (new and modern, meaningful, tolerant, relevant, diverse Girl Scouts).   It speaks to a certain understanding that communism is the highest form of human achievement and development.  If we would only yield to an over-arching reality and controlling force, and give up any sense of self, then we would be materially happy.

    They draw the obvious parallels with Judeo-Christian instructions about charity, giving, thinking of others, caring for the poor, feeding the hungry, caring for the imprisoned, etc.  But the utopians always forget basic things.   They forget that Christianity is about redemption and salvation.  The progressives are about lining people up to eat, to go to the doctor, to go to the unisex restroom, and other forms of fairness and social democracy.   They are not about feeding the poor.   They are about telling everybody what to eat, when to eat it, and that they must like it.  The only exemption will be a certain elite who know better than the other 85% of the population that must follow orders.

 

     The story about Little Black Sambo is ridiculed by leftists in their hypocritical attempt to show their disdain for racism.  (For an illustration of what really good commies think about Negroes, we refer you to the writings of Ernesto Guevara ).  We are told that the use of the word "Sambo" is racist.  We are told to disregard Sambo's cunning, work, and effort that, in the end, proves to be victorious over the tiger.  The whole story is just an attempt to ridicule and diminish the value of Negroes and traditional life.    We are also instructed that Sambo is not a good representative of the collective.  Sambo must not exist.  Children sitting in a circle, who all love each other and who practice the sacrament of  .....from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs...then they will have Nirvana, Happiness, Contentment.

 

     Sambo?  Well, he is in another place....called a Gulag.

 

We are sure that Tom Hughes is a nice guy.  He went to State University of New York and he works for the Unity Employment Services.  He also really must believe that the Xhosas are practitioners of their perfected philosophy....and devoid of the frailties that affect white males who own guns and who never do anything good for anyone all the time....and who hate....and are not inclusive....or good....and everything.

     Tom is surely aware of how communists have elevated tribal civilisations .  Georgia in the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics comes to mind.  Pol Pot in Cambodia comes to mind.  Fidel and Raul and Che, in Cuba come to mind.   Mao Tse Tung comes to mind.  Adolf comes to mind.   We're talking about a veritable Hell of Fame of socialist bastards who have created Workers' Paradises in every corner of Planet Earth.

 

Sheesh!

 

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Now, a bit of an explanation about El Zorro's and Lee's submissions and my comments about them. 

 

    El Zorro's observations and lamentations about the notion that children are part of a circle of possession of a communal greater reality are spot on in the culture war.

 

     AND......The War is on.

   Bestiality, polygamy, homosexuality, Sado-Masochist Marriage Labour Unions and Adoption Services and Baseball Churches, NAMBLA adoption liberty,  Temporary Adoption and Escort Service Clubs, Community Sexual Investigation and Experimentation Clubs all seem reasonable.....normal....regular....you know....like .... freedom....NO?

 

     After all, women should be allowed more liberty. No?  To-day's artificial Mormons are so....out of date.  The Bible says that everybody should have 500 concubines and 200 wives and then take Uriah's wife if you wish.  Right?   So...we are going to set up more and more and more clubs of thugs who gently force women into the Church of the Latter Day Aid to Families with Dependent Children and the Latter Night Saints....so that the Obamites can spread the wealth of the Millionaires and Billionaires.   Right?

 

     And if one thinks that these things are impossible....remember this.   They all....all...already exist in various places throughout the Planet Earth....throughout the First World...throughout the Third World....and in the United States of America.

 

     With each step towards being "reasonable"  and "fair" we step closer to turning the entire human race into something like a porno-movie / municipal zoo factory.    Could anybody believe how AFDC has produced Detroit in less than three generations?  Could anybody believe 20 years ago that Detroit would become something so gross, that if any normal person mentions the word "Detroit", he is immediately called a racist?    It is proof perfect that the anti-religionist and the progressive rationalists provide the certain path to perdition.

 

     And....it is all designed to destroy the one place where the greatest true liberty and greatest improvement of the human condition ever existed.     Remember to replace anything that is previously thought to be disgusting with words that sound pleasant and repeat those pleasant sounding words frequently.  Before long...evil become goodness....hideousness becomes beauty.....death becomes life.....darkness becomes light.....slavery becomes freedom and poverty becomes wealth.   And, en route, always aim for control of The Children.

 

Chalk up a BIG 10 - 4 for El Zorro. 

 

 

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THEN....the note from Lee.  One or two folks may have reasonably thought that Lee or El Gringo Viejo were saying that the professor from yesterday's posting was spot on.  Such is not the case.

 

     The Professor is spot-near.   His calculations are excellent, and his data is excellent, and his interpretations are very good.   He errs, however, when he says that trepidation on the part of anti-Keynesians and central government manipulation of the money supply of any given country about Zimbabwe-like inflation is "nonsense". 

 

     The fact is that to achieve hyper-inflation...using a baseball analogy...one must cross first base if he ever intends to reach home base.

 

     Plus, using the good professor's examples, he was a bit too dismissive of other realities that occur when governments  go on a pre-emptive "let them eat Pizza a la mode" strike to feed the masses free vacations to Danish massage parlours  and Mercedes Benzes.  Once again, gong to Mexico, it took Mexico 20 years to recover from the profligacy of Echeverria's and Lopez Portillo's contiguous 12 years of profligate madness.   And....that was never quite hyper-inflation, but, since Mexico was a relatively large country, with a relatively large and complex economy, wounds were very difficult from which to recover.

 

     The analogy would be like hitting a roach with a grain of sand thrown by mosquito.   That would be Cyprus.   Mexico from 1977 through nearly the turn of the century was more like a moderately large bull-elephant being shot by 3 rounds from 50 caliber elephant gun.   That patient goes in to the hospital with  an evaluation of "extremely grave".   The recovery finally happened, but there are still scars.  And there was no "real hyperinflation". 

 

     We understand that there is scale in things.  Mexico's GNP is the equivalent of all of Africa's.   It is twice the amount of Sub-Saharan Africa. 

 

      Texas's GNP is almost the exact same amount of  Mexico's.

 

      Right now, the United States of America, with fools like Bernanke, Geithner, Obama, and their cohorts and minions in charge...."You didn't build it!!   You didn't do that by yourself!!" are the ones in charge.   These are people who want revenge and control.   They want to give the oppressed  their just reparations.  They are madmen.  They are to economics what the "Reverend" Mr. Wright is to religion.   These are the commanders on the bridge of the Ship of Fools.   So, one of the main ingredients required for the Professor's perfect storm to arrive at a hyper-inflation is very much in place.   Just think of the ridiculous, demagogic manipulation and purposeful destruction of the housing market.

 

     So Dr. Steve Hanke is one of the Good Guys, but this time he only hit a triple with two men on base.   No Grand Slam....but a good hit.

 

 

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 THEN, about the Quinta Tesoro de la Sierra Madre.

     During my last stay, on the second day, El Gringo Viejo went to the nearby village and made his rounds.  At the little seafood "hole in the wall" place where El Gringo Viejo maintains an "office" we met with the dismaying news that a man, wife, and child had been gunned  down only a few blocks from the little seafood place.   They had been accused of calling authority and the military with information about the left-over remnants of the people who had been running amuck in the area for the last two years.   Their information had resulted in set of major arrests, detentions, deportations to American courts, long sentences into the really deep prisons meant for really bad people in central Mexico.
     The perpetrators had been arrested shortly afterwards, others of their small group were dealt with finality about forty miles away.  Other people, neighbours and friends of the three victims, had been quick to give information to the Army about the guilty parties.   For the next three weeks El Gringo Viejo and other "stand out"  people actually hung around, in order to demonstrate solidarity...simply by being out in the open....going about our business.


This is a Powder Puff bush that has just gone into full
bloom.  It is an attractor of very docile bees and small
wasps that are critical in citrus pollination, and also
 attacking bugs that are actually dangerous to plants.

     All the big harvest trucks carrying the crews of young men out to the orchards early each morning....all the regular people....did a remarkable thing.   We all just stayed in place, doing the things normal people do.   Some of it was because the thudding and thumping of Apache attack helicopters and the companies of infantry moving around in force....and some of it was because we knew that the war had been won in our area and we were not going to retreat from victory.
 

     And  that is the way that was.  And for three weeks....nothing more happened.   And the harvest goes on.  And we kept moving around...day or night.

Then, we had a small victory with the finishing of our little carport.  It is, like the Quinta, a rustic addition to a rustic place.   But, we really needed finally to put in a place where the sun did not punish a vehicle during the day.  And now we have it.   It took about four months of planning and impromptu modifications and changes in direction.  We first had thought about putting on a thatched roof.   But then, since our place has no thatching anywhere, we decided to keep the same "look" with the carport.   It cost too much, took too long, and was worth it.

   Alvaro essentially designed and built it by himself.    He then went on to salvage the 

gatepost of the entrance of the Hacienda de La Vega (our neighbours) due to his architectural and engineering ability.  It was all, in truth, one of his finest hours.   This picture to the right shows Alvaro with BeBe, from our "famous" front entrance, standing in front of his carport construction project.

     Now, concerning these pictures, they have been a bit difficult for me to tame, so if you need to reduce them, feel free to.    Some people want to know sometimes what we mean about our little mud hut....they may have seem some of the older pictures on the web-site, and want to know if the place is holding up at all.  So this is just a bit of a refresher to remind people that much of what El Gringo Viejo says is true.

  
   And, finally, this is Alvaro's other project, about 50 yards away from the carport.   He is shown here with his assistant "Lirio", performing artificial life-extension on the "muro" or "Castillo" which anchors the gates of the entrance of the Hacienda de La Vega.
     The muros were put in back in 1936.  This one gradually has floated, until it became known at "La Torre de Piza".  It weighs about 11 tons.  It is anchored 9 feet below the surface, and its foundation stones are about the sizes of peck and bushel baskets.
     Alvaro excavated, flooded, and winched with block and tackle (improvised) the monster leaning tower back away from its four inch list during a four day war with an enemy that resisted removal from his comfortable bed.  It had moved to the point however that citrus harvesting trucks could no longer move through.   So, while many of the old trees have been removed and replanted, there is still about 13 acres of Valencia that can be harvested, so it was necessary for the light crop this season.  In about the second season from now, it will be shown to have been very necessary to have had made this maneuver.

     So we have begun the beguine.    Please accept my appreciation for your being here.   Please forgive the somewhat peculiar advertisements that have appeared due to Google's notion about the nature of our clientele.   Although we are not paranoid, it seems as though it was an intentional act to embarrass this blogsite due to the fact that we are ''un-preferred" political commentators.   We brought our opinion to their attention is somewhat definite and finite terms and things did, we have to admit, change back so a more normal set of presentations.
El Gringo Viejo

Take Our Choice: Zimbabwe or Weimar Republic? Argentina or Brazil?

El Gringo Viejo has not been on the run or in jail. We had a busy stay of it down at our place. A little bad news and a lot of good news. He returns to kind messages to both him and to the OROG community, thereby proving that Earth actually does require his humbly noble existence in order to remain in orbit around some distant sun.

   Folks who have a conservative and rational understanding of economics know that any kind of socialist, progressive, or Keynesian approach to financing the buying of cake or vodka for the masses, paid for with government free money results in the ruin of the country  under concern.   The inflation of the money supply....not rising prices....is the cause of the ruin.
     Simple cases of prices rising due to free market conditions ....(such as eggs for 5.00 dollars each in Anchorage in 1900 was due to an oversupply of miners and a shortage of chickens)...is different from Luis Echeverria Alvarez, as a socialist, deciding that the way to give Mexicans lots of money and make them rich was to force the Bank of Mexico to borrow shiploads of money and give it away, essentially in helicopter drops over populated areas.
      LEA's Obama-like spread-the-wealth notion, expressed on steroids worked fine....and please do not worry....Luis Echeverria Alvarez made sure to get his spread of the wealth.   And Mexicans were soon paying 20 pesos for a hamburger that had cost one peso the year before.

     So...we watch here and wait....but the shoes will fall, sooner rather than later.    The explanation forwarded by Lee is presented  by Professor Steve Hanke, a very solid thinker, and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute.    The work is somewhat dry....but it reads well.  It is also pleasantly short enough to read twice.

     In a way, it points out that the reason that we have as little "inflation" as we do is because of our shirts being the cleanest of all the shirts in the dirty clothes basket.   European unemployment and social welfare obligations remain at grotesque levels, and their governmental budget deficits are ghastly.    Mexico and Canada have had several years of balanced (or some semblance of balanced) budgets and fairly steady rightward governance.  That is why the American dollar is losing against the other two nations' currencies.

 

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David,

    This may be an explanation why the dollar has not declined in value as fast as I had expected.

Lee

Nothing “Hyper” About US Inflation By Steve Hanke

While inflation seems to be on everyone’s mind these days, misconceptions abound. Indeed, few concepts in economics are as misunderstood as inflation. This month I take a look at some common questions about inflation, and a few that I wish more people were asking. Is hyperinflation coming to the U.S.? No. Hyperinflation arises only under the most extreme conditions, such as war, political mismanagement, or the transition from a command economy to a market-based economy. If you compare the U.S. to countries that have experienced hyperinflation — think Iran, North Korea, Zimbabwe, and the former Yugoslavia, for example — the U.S. doesn’t even come close. Hyperinflation begins when a country experiences an inflation rate of greater than 50% percent per month — which comes out to about 13,000% per year. Although it experienced elevated inflation around the time of the Revolution and the Civil War, the United States has never passed this magic mark. At present, the U.S. inflation rate, measured by the consumer price index (CPI), is less than 2% per year. So, to say that the U.S. is on its way to hyperinflation is just nonsense. But what about Quantitative Easing? Won’t that cause high inflation? No, at least not under the current QE program. What many people fail to understand is that the money created by the Fed, through programs like Quantitative Easing, is what’s known as “state money” (monetary base). In the U.S., this makes up only 15% of the money supply, broadly measured. The remainder is made up of “bank money” — the allimportant portion of the money supply produced by banks, through deposit creation. So, while the Fed has more than tripled the supply of state money since the collapse of Lehman Brothers, in September 2008, this component of the money supply is still paltry compared to the total money supply. In fact, when measured broadly, using a Divisia M4 metric, the U.S. money supply is actually 6% below trend (see the accompanying chart). There are a number of factors that affect the growth of money, but there are two main factors that have hampered broad money growth in the United States since the financial crisis. Not surprisingly, they are both government created. The first is the squeeze that has been put on the banks, as a result of Dodd-Frank and Basel III capital- asset ratio hikes. By requiring banks to hold more capital per dollar of assets (read: loans), the regulators have put a constraint on bank’s balance sheets, which limits their ability to lend. In consequence, money supply growth has been slower than it would have otherwise been. The other factor is the credit crunch created by the Fed’s zero- interest-rate policy. This has dried up the interbank lending market, because banks have little financial incentive to lend to each other. Without a well-functioning interbank lending market to ensure balance sheet liquidity, banks have been unwilling to scale up or even retain their forward loan commitments. The end result is a loose state money/tight bank money monetary mix. And since bank money makes up 85% of the total, the money supply in the U.S. is still, on balance, tight and below trend. That said, the broad Divisia M4 measure of the money supply has started to show signs of life in recent months. How Can The Fed Avoid Inflation Going Forward? The Fed should start paying attention to the dollar. While operating under a regime of inflation targeting and a floating U.S. dollar exchange rate, Chairman Bernanke has seen fit to ignore fluctuations in the value of the dollar. Indeed, changes in the dollar’s exchange value do not appear as one of the six metrics on “Bernanke’s Dashboard” — the one the chairman uses to gauge the appropriateness of monetary policy. Perhaps this explains why Bernanke has been dismissive of questions suggesting that changes in the dollar’s exchange value influence either commodity prices or more broad gauges of inflation. The relationship between the dollar’s value and inflation has been abundantly clear for the last decade. As Nobelist Robert Mundell has convincingly argued, changes in exchange rates transmit inflation (or deflation) into economies, and they can do so rapidly. This relationship was particularly pronounced during the financial crisis (see the accompanying chart). Indeed, from 2007-09, the monthly year-over-year percent changes in the consumer price index and in the USD/EUR exchange rate have a correlation of 0.75. As can be seen in the chart, there is a roughly two-month lag between changes in the USD/EUR exchange rate and in the CPI; when we factor in this lag, the correlation strengthens to 0.94. By ignoring this, Bernanke was “flying blind” in the initial months of the crisis. In consequence, the Fed failed to stabilize the USD/EUR exchange rate, which swung dramatically in the months surrounding the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Accordingly, the Fed acted too slowly in cutting the federal funds rate to stabilize inflation, which swung from an alarming rate of over 5% (year-over-year), to a negative (deflationary) rate in a matter of a few short months. If Bernanke had been monitoring the USD/EUR exchange rate, he would have realized that he was engaging in an ultra-tight monetary policy in the early months of the financial crisis. He would have known then to act much sooner than December 2008 — almost two months after the Lehman bankruptcy. Perhaps if he had tried to stabilize the value of the greenback, the bankruptcy may never have occurred in the first place. Regards, Steve Hanke for The Daily Reckoning Ed. Note: Steve H. Hanke is a Professor of Applied Economics at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. You can follow Prof. Hanke on Twitter: @Steve_Hanke1

We'll take your baby for a few years and raise him correctly...and we promise to give him back!

EL ZORRO WRIDES AGAIN!!

 

 

 

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James Hathorn	Apr 9
to me

THEY  AREN'T YOUR CHILDREN!!

     A far left TV host, Melissa Harris-Perry, has a program on MSNBC.  She is a professor of African-American studies at Tulane University.  She, recently, made comments on her TV show that openly displays the absurd misplacement of values regarding our children.  Ms. HarrishyphenatedPerry says that we as parents do not own our children, they belong to the state.  (See Melissa Harris-Perry)

     This is the same bilge Hillary RodhamhypenatedClinton spewed in her rag, “It Takes a Village”.  It is the same terrifying ideology that spawned the Hitlerjunge at the rise of the Third Reich. Their ayran children were physically taken from their parents and put in camps for indoctrination and education.

      The left’s persistence in the education of our youth is a viral infection which our immune system seems unable to suppress.  We (some of us) remember the “days of rage”, the weather underground and the SDS – students for a democratic society.  Bernadette Dohrn’s socialist manifesto, “Prairie Fire”, documented the movement and strategy to indoctrinate young people to join.

Back on point, Ms. Perry has outed the left’s agenda to destroy the nuclear family.

We send our young people to war to defend the country with guns.  When they come home they now find out the government they fought for does not want them to have a gun to protect their family.  The government can have guns but the citizens cannot.

The picture is clear.  We are (becoming) a commune where there is only one family the parents being the government.  Healthcare is not provided by the biological parents, it is provided by the government.  Education is not provided by the parents, it is provided by the government.  Protection of the nuclear family is the responsibility of the government, they want your guns. 

A commune as in “communism”.  We are getting there very quickly. 

As El Gringo Viejo and yours truly believe, the time is coming for the Republic of Texas to secede from the socialist union.  Texas is the last port from the perfect storm.

 

El Zorro

 

Remember the Equal Rights Amendment

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We should remember the Equal Rights Amendment that the Margaret Sanger Sapper Battalion foisted upon the unsuspecting American public some time back.   Its ghost rests withing the vacant halls of the Dustbin Museum, along with the Berlin Wall and most of Havana de Cuba.

 

     The Equal Rights Amendment was another of those things that float out of Washington, D.C.  with the total approval of all the right people, the marxist press, and  Mother (Sir Edmund) Hillary in her day, as well, as I recall.

 

      It passed both houses of the Congress with the required two-thirds vote, it had the approval of the "moderate" Republicans who believe in nothing and everything at the same time, very strongly but not in any extreme way...unless it is absolutely necessary, or not...maybe.

 

      The Constitutional Amendment to ban segregated restrooms was just fixing to be ratified by the last three or four states for the three-quarters necessary, when all of sudden, on the Johnny Carson show one night, some liberal Hollywood type girl....a very young actress of some currency....we forget her name....said to a slightly older and much more famous actress that she wasn't all that hot for the Equal Rights Amendment.  She allowed that she had a real problem using the same restroom as men...especially when she did not know the men.

    The older and wiser and much more important actress just exploded at the new bimbette who waited for the more important actress to finish her tirade.  Johnny Carson looked on with that nervously quizzical look that he had mastered, as if he were waiting for a real mud-wrestling, hair-puller.

 

    The younger girl simply responded that she still did not like having to use a restroom where there a bunch of strange men hanging around.   Johnny intoned that he understood, because sharing hairspray and eye liner would be out of the question.   The applause - 0 - metre  gave the younger girl about a 15 to 1 approval edge, and then they broke for commercials.

 

     Something caught fire that night.  Within the week several States were in the process of rescinding their ratifications of the ERA.....while the Democrats were telling those States that they could not rescind, and that the Congress was going to amend the length of time for the other States to get on the bandwagon and ratify the amendment.   Kind of like New Jersey Rules...don't you know....Corzine style...Torricelli style...

 

     The Equal Rights Amendment failed and failed miserably.  Just like (Sir Edmund) Hillary's Free Medical Initiative in 1993 - 1994.    Both were thought to have been automatic slam-dunks.   Perhaps the reasonable, calmer heads among the homosexuals will recognise that contractual is more to their benefit than Sacramental.

 

     S0 we shall see if the winds change across the desert while El Gringo Viejo is gone.  To-morrow finds us on the road south to our little adobe hide-away.   We are going to try to make it to the little chat room in the Estacion de Santa Engracia with more frequency this time, and thereby have a few more contributions.  We shall see.

 

El Gringo Viejo

 

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Tick Tock...Tick Tock....

    Folks, this is really becoming more apparent by the day.  Mexico and Canada are doing a better job of running a budget than the Americans.   Their central governments' are running something remotely akin to a balanced budget of sorts.  The centre-right of the old centrist party (the famous PRI -  privilege, redundancy, and insipidness) along with the National Action Party and the new President have been somewhat effective in keeping some sense of reality about spending by the central government.

     The Board of Governors of the Banco de Mexico (their Fed) is not printing money as is Bernacke and the cabal of anti-American ghosts who seem to be controlling him from some Ouija Board in Hell.    The Mexican and Canadian currencies have gained substantially during the past few months, and to-day, El Gringo Viejo went and bought his pesos for the coming month's administration at our little hideaway.

 

     It was an eye openner.   So far this year, the number of pesos that one dollar can buy has decreased  from 13.00 pesos to...as of mid-morning to-day...11.90 .    That is a loss of about 8.5%, which is one of the steepest, if not the steepest drops in the free market value of the American dollar against the Mexican peso since the implied parity at 12.50/1.00 was abandoned in 1976.

 

     To put all in perspective, the leftists Luis Echeverria Alvarez and Jose Lopez Portillo ran their two six year terms into a twelve year Dante's Inferno of economic morass that literally destroyed the Banco de Mexico and the stability that had been carefully crafted by very moderate left, centre, and rightwing policies from about 1945 through 1970.   Echeverria began to flood money into the reach of the populace with unbalanced budgets on the premise that Mexico's new industrial might and success with the Olympic Summer Games in 1968 would result in forcing Mexico into the ranks of Great Nations as Japan had done almost overnight.   His notion of threatening increased nationalisation of "laggard industries" and enforcement of draconian labour union rules, along with absurdly out of balanced budgets,  caused the first major devaluation since after World War II's readjustments. 

    By the time he left office the peso had lost 50% of its value against the dollar.   (Liberal reporters, who are stupid by nature, would report that it had lost over 100% of its value, but obviously they had majored in new math).   But as the new Presidente took office, the peso continued its wobble by half-lifes....finally ending around 600 pesos / 1 dollar.    Miquel de la Madrid came in and began a slow, meticulous return to some kind of normalcy.   He allowed two tiered "official rate" and "market rate" policy to die and returned the peso to full free floating, free market rules.  By the end of his term...the people were glad to report that the peso was worth about 3,000 / 1 .....and a happy hour bill for a table of four at a decent saloon would have been paid with 0ne 50,000 peso bank note.   The people had a lot of money but a lot of money might not have even paid the parking metre.

     So Carlos Salinas de Gortari was elected and he tricked everybody...because it was thought that he would be a lefty...but Dr. Jekyll came out and Mr. Hyde was sent to the showers. Carlos began to extend and strengthen Miquel de la Madrid's conservative economic measures.  Among other things he and the Heroic Congress of the Federation decided to take off three zeros from the currency and its public appearance.   One thousand peso coins, made of pot metal, were suddenly one peso coins that were  almost pretty.  All currency lost three zeros....as well as the  bank accounts, CDs, deposits, bonds, etc.

 

     Another little shock at the end of Salinas de Gortari's  term left the peso pushed around a bit....and various issues, primarily straying at times from the balanced central government budget rule and the decision to pay off most of the foreign public debt, allowed to the peso to seek an equilibrium, about 5 years ago of between 12 and 13 to one American dollar.  Remember, that by the measurement of 1950, that peso was actually valued at 12,000 to one or 13,000 to one.   That is the price of socialist policies and over-borrowing.

 

     That is the path upon which the United States of America HAD ENTERED.    It is not the future.   It is the here and now.    So instead of picking up 13,000 pesos for my exchange to-day as I would have a year ago....the envelope contained on 11,900 and that was with the "preferred customer" bonus of 10 centavos per dollars.  The rate for the common dumboes changing lesser amounts was 11.77  per dollar.

 

    So there we are.   I believe that it takes 1.07 American now to buy 1.oo dollar Canadian.  It is well that the other countries away from us are, in the main, having worse buzzards coming home to roost.    Precious little time remains for us to either correct the problem with massive, radical entitlements reforms....or to just turn out the lights and accepting the implosion of the Republic.

 

El Gringo Viejo

 

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