91热爆

'DIFFERENCISM' - IS IT AMGYDALA DEEP?

Cultural overlay of visceral prejudices can decrease tensions, while the good times role.

But when 'multiculture' is stressed, the lid blows off - 'phase separation' occurs.

Put PC man in a scanner, and show him pictures of 'ethnics' in scenes of threat. Only then might the multicultural idyll be properly confirmed - or denied.

Currency Wars...

I don't suppose there is any chance whatsoever that you will take an historical look of the role of currency wars and the start of major economic Depressions? Please think about it?

We are in a Depression like that of the 1870s and it will take decades for us and the world to recover - mainly because the terribly ignorant economists are so very badly educated that they think that we are in a recession and a little time will fix it. This is NOT the case as the debt bubble is still with us and so long as it is with us the Depression will continue - Read the history books.

We have to actively deflate the debt, re-establish prudential monetary pricing and then and only them can be start to recover. (And house prices MUST fall substantially to re-establish our international competitiveness - then we can effectively deploy our workers.) This is the imperative of the arithmetic deny it all you like!

A SUBJECT ON WHCH I KNOW I KNOW NOTHING (#2)

As Devil's Advocate John: surely we are soooo much more 'global' (not to say nano-second digital) than 1870, History is now bunk?

@2 We should get Max Keiser in and let him loose to explain his work and ideas without interruption by so called presenters.But NN don`t do uninterrupted speech. It might be too informative. Try Max Keiser`s blog or RT.The 91热爆 is too conservative on economics.

Last night's review of the High St - and the govt expert was interesting but I found it all a bit superficial & a bit shallow i.e. having not covered:-

Issues like the role of Banks & their immense influence on the increasingly expensive High St in terms of property & business lending - How banks fund the same national multiple retailers & provide the same boring large corporate shop names from Lands End to John O Groats.

How Ma and Pa small business operations and Jones Bros butchers are priced out of every High Street so that most of our meat now comes in from e.g. The Netherlands while British farms stand idle & derelict

Sounds and looks to me like no one anywhere is covering what has & is still really happening to the British High Street

4. barriesingleton wrote:

"As Devil's Advocate John: surely we are soooo much more 'global' (not to say nano-second digital) than 1870, History is now bunk?"

If only secured debt could vanish that quickly! In the late 20's debt vanished and bankruptcy was fairly instant when the stock market bubble burst. Today (and in the 1870s) the debt that has to vanish is secured on property so the bubble bursts very very slowly. Debt in the 29 crash vanished instantly like a balloon bursting, however today (and in the 1870s) the deflation is like a small tack in a tyre (tire US), a slow puncture, hence the problem and the length of the Depression. The reality is the same the financial institutions holding this debt are dead, but because the corpses are still slowly rotting new ones can't be set up for the finance of the new businesses which will employ the new employees and get us out of the present Depression. This dead weight of debt crushes everything - because it is secured on assets that have residual price (unlike the 1929 crash).

I have more complex explanations, but I hope this one suffices!

..China and its trade partners have fundamentally divergent ideas on the function of exchange rates. The United States and other major developed economies, as well as the IMF, view an exchange rate simply as a price. Consistent intervention by China to keep its exchange rate substantially below the level the market would set is, in this view, a distortion that prevents international markets from functioning.

Chinese officials take a very different view. They see the exchange rate -- and prices and market mechanisms in general -- as tools in a broader development strategy. The goal of this development strategy is not to create a market economy, but to make China .. rich and powerful...



the left in the uk see the impoverishment of the uk as a good thing because its 'redistributing wealth'. what they don't say this is 'wealth' we borrow at interest which means we are funding their dreams with our poverty and indebtedness. So while china is building modern skyscapers we are turning off the street lights because we can't afford them.

As Merv said the world is a zero sum game. For some to get rich others must get poorer [one way or another].

so next time politicians say 'globalisation' is 'merely' market forces and so must be 'good' tell them china don't think so. They see it as a preplanned strategic victory. They don't share our view of free markets. China isn't going to allow free trade and thus the repatriation of jobs and wealth back to the uk or anywhere else.

the current exchange rate is 10 yuan = 拢1. this is not because of market forces but strategic policy designed to make us poor.

@9 "the left in the uk see the impoverishment of the uk as a good thing because its 'redistributing wealth'. "

Jaunty - you talk so much sense, and then spoil it when your old prejudices reassert themselves. If terms like "left" and "right" have any meaning at all, they certainly to not refer to monolithic bodies of people with identical, or even similar views. Even if you were to say "some on the left", you should justify it with a source. Don't put words into an imaginary opponents mouth. Mind you, reading many of your posts, one might imagine you were of the left yourself - God forbid eh? ;-D

As far as the rest of your arguments are concerned, I'm sure you are right. For years, China has adopted a modern version of the mercantilist strategy which laid the foundations of the 19th century triumph of the British Empire. Then in the 1840s, the Corn Laws were repealed and Britain embraced free trade - which was the logical thing to do as the dominant economic power. Unfortunately, Free Trade went from being a trading strategy to a theology, as history was rewritten. The Liberal tradition represented by, say, Vince Cable sees trade as the answer to all problems, and forgets that no country has developed without protecting fledgeling industries.

Economic and political mismanagement have wrecked many UK industries. I can't see a way out of this for the UK without a new mercantilism. In my view this would need exchange controls and an end to the free convertability of sterling.

this is the last/best blog on the bbc

its character limit will be its demise

Switzerland: 鈥淲elcome to the eurozone鈥�

11

maybe i have been around them longer than others and i know when i hit the mark the response is personal attacks. Yes there are as a many different lefties as types of crisps.

globalisation is a jedi mind trick word and is nothing but the policy of currency manipulation of china. since when are socialists opposed to policies of the chinese planned economy?

..a socialist planned economy can only be possible after first establishing the necessary comprehensive commodity market economy, letting it fully develop until it exhausts its historical stage and gradually transforms itself into a planned economy....

..The Socialist Republic of Vietnam has pursued similar economic reforms, though less extensive, which have resulted in what is officially called a Socialist-oriented market economy, a mixed economy where the state plays a dominant role intended to be a transitional phase in establishment of a socialist economy....



globalisation is supported as a jedi mind trick word by 'the' right because of false belief and the pursuit of profit through moving factories out there and 'the' left because of its effect in bringing down capitalism and piggy backing their pet solutions that don't address the cause either. Its akin to using the theory of crowds to generate revolution. Go to big rallies and try to subvert it into some catalyst of revolution by providing leadership, structure and organisation to the masses. So now they piggyback the credit crunch saying its the 'failure of capitalism' when actually its the reassertion of economic laws after a massive fraud.

Where did the lefties go after the soviet fall? Into climate activism and so we have barmy ideas like climate 'justice' and the carbon tax as redistribution. Maurice Strong is a big fan of china.

neither left nor right wish to address the currency issue because it serves both their purposes. One to generate profit another because it provides instability as the backdrop to selling their snake oil.

lets see if the ex workers power member will start to address the strategy of the yuan exchange rate.

i agree if the aim is not to become effectively colonised and marginalised through poverty that tariffs should be put on chinese goods among other measures. Then the dragon will start to hiss and show its true imperialist face.

:p Oh come on! Can anyone seriously tell me they wouldn't be in fits of laughter like the House of Commons when David Cameron called Nadine Dorries "frustrated"? I somehow suspect it really was a "came down dear" moment :D
I have to say I was completely enthralled by Jeremy's interview with the guy from Syria and his film and his experiences. Excellent stuff. Gillian Tett is always fantastic on the show.

i'm tired

Jeri, seek help if u need it. I think we all need it.

When extreme left starts aligning with extreme right....big trouble will ensue.

#17 museV

" Corporate Nazi's " !

@17 Muse. If you examine the history of politics "extreme" just means alienated from the mainstream,and the deceit has been to suggest that you cannot be a centre ground extremist or social democrat extremist, when I have been one for years.

I want to live in a real social democracy where there is fair and honestly run private and public sector and where there is genuine democracy.
Yet I am an extremist because it has been plain to me that nothing in our political system offers me anything remotely like what I want.

Yet all I want is to live in a democracy,and it seems so sad to me to know that democracy will be impossible while the 91热爆 exists and reigns over us on behalf of the criminal capitalists who have wrecked the global economy and enslaved us with debt.

Strange times folks. I hope you survive them!Unless you work as a social police person at the 91热爆!

I've noticed that some of Bb91热爆's posts have been RETROSPECTIVELY censored.

please take note everyone.

'20. At 00:01 8th Sep 2011, museV wrote:
I've noticed that some of Bb91热爆's posts have been RETROSPECTIVELY censored.'

'First they came...'

They also seemed to come (explaining how some days old referrals now are advised as 'rule breaks' at long last. Seems a heck of a time to ponder something like a rule, or not, so I am unconvinced) for my replies to Bb91热爆's, and so (don't do counter purges - and actually enjoying our civilised sparring, when it makes it through. Voltaire's paraphraser might see hope in that, at least) I merely asked how a polite reply to a still published post could be 'off topic'.

Hope that didn't lead to their 'solution', finally, which is often to send the kapos in behind to 'tidy up' so things look neat for the box tickers. Mutually assured modding, and the heck with collateral dommage. Certainly it makes making sense near impossible. Sure it will get 'better' @ 400 chars. Must be, as we have been told it will be/is/has been.

Notes may be taken. Possibly not printed. And hence seen.

History redux. Not in a good way.

'20. At 00:01 8th Sep 2011, museV'

A lot seems to depend on who is 'in charge', or up in the 'thumbs down' box above them, daily. We are currently blessed.

Other times... not so much...

/news/business-14579710

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Ironically.

@22 Paul Mason has been shortlisted for the Orwell Prize in the past - but this little gem should be shortlisted for an "Orwellian" prize methinks. :-)

THE APE CONFUSED BY LANGUAGE (#23)

Modern man is full of 'given goods' that are unsustainable. There can be no HomSap without the 'ape-vehicle', and the ape-vehicle is the reproduction department. In the Age of Perversity, in which, ironically, many have 'talked themselves' out of procreation, many others are multiplying prodigiously - courtesy of CLEVER medical interventions. Worse, the mad, sad and bad do far more impregnating than the nice-but-dim - hence: the trend toward barking-mad movers and shakers (aka oilers and snakers). Clearly a FUNDAMENTAL UNSUSTAINABILITY.

Against the above, double dips and monetary fine points, however elegantly dissected, equate to 'angels on a pin'.

euro

haha no mention of china [again]. why deal with the symptoms when you can deal with the cause?
how can the world rebalance with china's mercantilism? how can the uk compete when
10 yuan = 拢1

china and the world have a fundamental divergence on the role of fx markets. theirs is prevailing.

Terror-fied

so when the bbc going to show the little mosque show?

or have hijab newsreaders/presenters?

"... how is popular culture being used to alter perceptions of Muslims?"

This sounds like "white" propaganda social engineering, and it won't work, or certainly not without a backlash. You only have to look at the way the word "gay" is used as a general derogatory adjective by children and adolescents, eg "how gay is THAT?" Thus used, the word has nothing to do with either the original meaning of the word, or homosexuality. It is a reaction against being told how to think and speak.

Why should society promote a good perception of any religious adherents? Accepting that most believers just want to get on with their lives and be left alone, the history of most religions is nonetheless pretty ugly. In fact, as a human activity, religion is probably even more perverse than politics: and the mixture of the two is usually absolutely poisonous.

If we allow religions to proselytise, we must allow them to be criticised. If they're offended, tough! What is more offensive than teaching that a loving God would torture those of a different persuasion for eternity in Hell? If religion is to be protected from criticism, let it be be confined to consenting adults in private.

:o) Jeremy's written a brand new article in today's Guardian!

We need to go back to fundamentals in trying to understand the current financial crisis - to try and understand the fundamental contradiction at the heart of the free market system and why we need to do something about it.

Imagine a single country and its people - they work for themselves and sell goods and services to each other either by bartering or receive a scarce commodity like gold or silver in return which they use to buy goods & services that others produce in their locality - the gold/silver based "money" came into being as convenient sized lumps to exchange, which then go around and around in a closed loop.

Now add in employers who make a profit out of their workers - i.e. they pay out less in wages than the value of what is being produced. This means that every time the money and production of goods & services goes around the system, a slice is taken off it, so unless the economy grows and the profit is spent on capital goods, e.g. machines etc which require people to make them, then in the end the purchasing power of the workforce will be less than the value of what they produced, so less and less will be sold with each economic cycle until all the money is in the hands of the employers.

Now add in banks, which are able to effectively create money by lending more than they actually hold. They lend to employers to invest and to individuals to enable them to buy expensive items, e.g. houses.

Over time this additional money enables the economy to grow, but it also creates debt, whilst the owners of private business keep on depositing more and more money from their profits in the banks, from which they expect interest payments too.

This situation can continue so long as the economy keeps on growing, but there is only so much planet out there to expand into, and for the countries that started their economies earlier and now pay higher wages, they reach the point where they cannot compete with the newer low wage economies, so production is done in the new economies and consumption takes place in the older ones: now whole nations run massive trade deficits too.

The debt mountain is mirrored by a capital mountain which is formed from the profit taken out of the real economy and lent back to countries, businesses and individuals which must be paid for at all levels of the economy.

Eventually the real economy cannot bear the weight of paying ongoing profit and carry the cost of the massive level of debt as well, and the whole edifice comes to a grinding halt because the%2

'26. At 12:05 8th Sep 2011, Sasha Clarkson - a reaction against being told how to think and speak.'

A lot of it about. And likely to be more, where permitted.

Even those a smidge over n,n,n-nineteen can get.... awkward when some decide thoughts and words are their sole domain to issue and control.

Continued..

Eventually the real economy cannot bear the weight of paying ongoing profit and carry the cost of the massive level of debt as well, and the whole edifice comes to a grinding halt because the debt cannot be serviced or repaid - this is where we were when the credit crisis hit, although you need to add in the complexity of trading/investing in financial futures, derivatives, speculation etc. which magnified the crunch.

Governments then decided not to let the lenders - i.e. the banks - collapse because that would end the entire financial system, so they then added massively to the overall debt by "socialising" private debt - in the UK that was 拢40,000+ for EVERY INDIVIDUAL PERSON in the UK.

Where will this end? Well clearly a lot of companies, banks, communities and individuals are in effect "economic zombies" - they cannot continue to be "live" economic entities because they are irretrievably broke - i.e. cannot to pay off their debts, or in many cases even continue to service the debt with interest payments, but are being propped up by central banks pumping yet more debt into the system.

The sheer scale of the accumulated capital and the rate at which it is being formed is the REAL problem - there are a number of places you can see this happening - the vast revenues going into the oil producing states, the huge balance of payments surplus being run by China and the enormous bonuses being paid to bankers - and underneath all this is the mountain of private wealth which continues to grow rapidly.

As each country's currency is tradeable, it used to be the case that a heavily indebted country's exchange rate would fall, so making their imports more expensive and their exports more competitive, but there is a limit to how far any country can devalue relative to other currencies, particularly if many countries are all in trouble at once and there is extensive manipulation of exchange rates too.

So what could solve the problem? Well clearly we are between a rock & a hard place - the "rock" is our debt and the "hard place" is our GDP - if we push too hard against the rock by putting pressure on those who hold our debt, they will go a "Greece" on us and jack up our borrowing rates, whilst if we bear down on our economy through too much austerity, we'll do an "Eire" and shrink the economy so much that it can't bear the cost of debt servicing.

It is clear to me that the zombies must be allowed to die, we must drastically reduce the amount of profit tak

Continued AGAIN

It is clear to me that the zombies must be allowed to die, we must drastically reduce the amount of profit taken out of the real economy and become much more self-sufficient in terms of what we produce and consume.

The financial services industry in general and banks in particular are a dysfunctional vampire draining the blood of those who do productive work and should be heavily pruned back to being the tail rather then the dog and the economy should have control of the wagging, not the other way round.

Globalisation is not the answer - we need to end our dependence on imports and work to make sure that value stays within the communities that created it and is not being syphoned off elsewhere. Sustainability is the key - in energy, food, manufacturing and employment - an end to the tidal wave of imports and a big expansion in jobs and production in the UK instead.

@28.30, 31. Well said again Richard. It was worth reading as usual.

@29 I'm not against trying to improve understanding of other cultures, or sections of society, by means of documentaries etc, far from it. However, understanding means "warts and all", and not having the threat of murder if one expresses a critical opinion.

I would conflate and augment couple of bits of Shakespeare to promote common humanity. "The King is but a man as I am: the violet smells to him as it doth to me. Prick him, do he not bleed? And he goeth to the toilet like the rest of us." This applies to all religious leaders, past and present too!

'32. At 14:39 8th Sep 2011, Sasha Clarkson -

@29 I'm not against trying to improve understanding of other cultures, or sections of society, by means of documentaries etc, far from it. However, understanding means "warts and all", and not having the threat of murder if one expresses a critical opinion.

No argument. But it's when 'educate and inform' gets mutated into 'edit and opine' rails get jumped.

And with twin teen boys, especially in this internet age, I can appreciate what happens when one aspect gets more favoured than another. Bad enough when simply leaning casually, but a disaster in the making when unsubtle manipulation is working in the background.

Seems an awful lot of historical, comedic and discussional oil being dumped around at the moment... to calm waters that may been seen... feared to get stirred by memories of more recent events?

Fair enough, if the intent is benign. But the possibility is that things can be ladled on too thick, unconvincingly, and simply make matters worse.

One is, however, sure there will be much of simple substantive interest to be gained from... '...popular culture being used to alter perceptions of Muslims? We have an interview with Dr Naif al-Mutawa, creator of The 99 - comic book superheroes based on Islamic culture and society. And Catrin Nye speaks to the creators of Canadian TV sitcom Little Mosque on the Prairie - described as The Cosby Show for Muslims.'

'33 Junkk "it's when 'educate and inform' gets mutated into 'edit and opine' rails get jumped."

Quite. You don't achieve understanding by clumsy attempts to suppress the whole truth.

As a rose-tinted sitcom, 'Little Mosque on the Prairie' may be benign enough, but as one critic said "There鈥檚 deep confusion and racism about the place of Islam in the Western world and it鈥檚 the thing that鈥檚 broiling up under everything in the world, and the show presents this world where everything is happy."



I didn't see last night's Newsnight, but the official preview above seemed somewhat one-sided. The phrase "alter the perceptions of Muslims" smacked of manipulation rather than education.

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Greek 1-Year Bond Yield Hits 88.48%, 2-Year Bond Yield Hits 50%!

It just serves to show Westminster is still a gentlemen`s club. Nadine Dorris made a sensible proposal on abortion counselling. Unfortunately, politics is often not what it is, but what it looks like. The minute I saw Newsnight`s report on a private counselling provider talking nonsense about grieving god`s heart, I knew the policy was destined to be chucked in the bin. The problem with sexist jokes at work is that if women join in, they look foolish and perhaps disloyal to their own team; if they ignore it, they look isolated. It is a classic lose-lose situation. Ms Dorris was right to blush it off as a non-incident. Mr Cameron however showed excellent politician`s instinct by laughing with the boys to uphold his head boy status in the HoC, and apologising afterwards to Ms Dorris in private.

P.S. NN/documentary/book/article - Paxman is superman! ^_^ Although it is not the conference season yet, he is on 3 nights a week and he has also presented intermittently over the summer holiday. Is Peter Rippon slave trading Paxo?! -__-||