When King James I had the Christian Holy Scriptures translated into English (primarily from existing Greek texts), a penny was what you paid for a day's labor. Shakespeare paid a penny for a cheap supper (which included an even cheaper fortified wine) and a night's rough lodging at one of the Olde Towne's lesser inns - a price which still provided that inn a small profit.

Europe's économie est dans le WC or Die Wirtschaft ist in der Toilette, so to speak. China's economy is also shì zài cèsuô based on false renminbi (yuan) evaluation. And the price of wheat has been limit up for the past week-and-a-half. END OF THE WORLD?

Maybe not. But since the US Dollar has no real value, the real value is in commodities - including metals - which would be a sure buy, if various unnamed governments (which I have named many times here) would quit trying to manipulate the money markets. Of course, if countries would quit trying to manipulate the currency markets, we wouldn't need to invest in commodities.

The result is a compounding of inflationary causes. And there a lot more than these. Yet our government basically sidesteps the entire issue by ignoring the real economic markers. God, I hate economic fascism.. I really do.

Don't Feel Sad For Cocky
USC did not win the College World Series this year. But they are definitely one of the top four teams in the nation. And be sure of one, very important thing: Gamecock Baseball will be back in Omaha, next Summer..

1. 15 bowl games which rotate, in order, from regional to super regional to semi-final, to the College Football Championship (CFC.)
2. The first four years, the CFC will be played at the Rose Bowl (1^styr), Orange Bowl (2^ndyr), Cotton Bowl (3^rdyr), and Fiesta Bowl (4^thyr).
3. After each turn at being the CFC, the bowl will move to the back of the line, joining the overall rotation.
4. The first year, there will be a lottery, in which the remaining 11 bowls will receive a number from 5 to 15, which will be their order.
5. Each team will rotate upward, with the bottom eight bowls hosting the 16 competing college teams, the next four hosting the 8 winners of the 16 team competition, the next two hosting the winners of those competitions, and the top one will host the remaining two teams, becoming the bowl for the CFC.
6. The first three rounds of bowls are played the first, second, and third Saturday of December.
7. The CFC is played New Year's Day.

I know, there is probably NO way in heck that this simple, honest system will be put in place - too many egos, too much money in the wrong hands. But it would work, if they Chose to use it.

And another Eurojoker country to worry about is La Fou France, which has become Socialiste, encore une fois, n'est-ce pas..? The last time the French government got this bad, Napoleon came to power. But they're not the only ones. As smart Brit, Danial Hannan, says, "Europe is becoming infantalised. Spain is the one to watch, now."

In any case, if the IMF DOES throw more money at Greece and France and Spain and..., that cheapens everybody's currency except the Chi-coms and the Russkis (but they have their own economic problems). That also means that your precious metals will be worth more, soon, which sucks because we were all hoping we'd have more time to buy it for a while, at lower prices.

But who knows, these days - the metals markets are run by people who don't always think clearly.

My sources around the state tell me that there are two forces at work here and maybe three. The first thing to look at is the poor reporting, prior to the election. When people are confused, they often will not vote, not as a conscious action - although that could be a factor - but as an unconscious force which postpones and obfuscates the will to vote. At the end of the day, it becomes "too much trouble."

The other force at work is the positive belief that other people will vote for their candidate, and so there is no need to vote, this time, but the intention to vote in the general election is still strong.

Yes, there are some people who are "as mad as hell" about their candidate being excluded, and are "not gonna take it anymore," but this number is surprisingly small - smaller than I expected it to be, but if you like, you can count this as reason number three.

There is no "rah-rah," half-time speech, here. If you're not organized to WIN a political campaign, then you're not going to get your way, either now or later. It's one thing to criticize politicians who don't do what you want. It's quite another thing to get organize to the point that you get what you want. And, if your political adviser is saying ANYTHING ELSE, you're a fool for listening to her.. or him.

I am always interested in the perspective of First Nation People - the most accurate name for the second group of people to live in North America, the people we call Indians. I say second, because Laplanders may have been the first in North America (ca 32,000 BCE to 14,000 BCE) and they are considered Caucasian, even though many of their descendants live in the mountains of Northern Japan. Naturally, their tale of woe is told from their point of view which, not to put too fine a point on it, boils down to, "We got screwed!" And indeed they did - by the Brits.

The FNP were totally P.O.'d with the new nation of the United States. They had thrown in with the French during the French and Indian War and the Brits during the Revolution. When you lose a war, you have to pay. And in many places such as Western South and North Carolina, the Tsalagi - Cherokee - (the real nickname for the Ohn-weh-wah) paid a terrible price. So for that, and other payments and actions against the FNP, they decide to back the Canadians in the War of 1812, helping the Cannucks basically beat the crap out of the invading Yanks.

When the Treaty of Ghent was signed, the British withdrew most of their troops from Canada and all of their troops from the territories of The United States. For the FNP, this was disastrous, and as they say, they lost their land, their culture, and their soul.

But before you get all teary, remember that there had been more than a hundred years of enmity between the "Civilized Nations" and the lower American colonies that eventually became the U.S. The FNP made tactical errors and bad political choices. And they were betrayed by the withdrawal of the Brits. As the Grail Knight says in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, "They chose poorly." And the Tsalagi would choose poorly again by siding with the Confederates during the Second American Revolution. They owned slaves, too.

So yes, it's a shame that they got a bad rep, but the First Nations People should have chosen their friends, better.

When it seemed as if the union thugs were going to outraise the Governor's in-state effort, thousands of small-dollar contributions poured in from around the country. People with great fortunes and no fortunes at all gave money to Walker's campaign, not to send a message to America, but to make sure that his conservative experiment - which is working - could continue to its successful end.

Walker is proving that you don't need to raise taxes in order to reign in budgets and get them in the black. People who believe in the Tea Party ideas knew that and gave accordingly.

The Tea Party is NOT dead. The Republican Party needs to take a good, long look at the Wisconsin giving campaign and learn.

Eric the Un-Dead
Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that Eric Holder is acting in a way consistent with high crimes and high misdemeanors. Even if they had hard evidence in the "fast and furious" debacle, which they almost do, a sense of the congress or contempt of congress is meaningless. The administration is already used to flouting the law. It would, also, take months, because of delaying tactics by people like Sheila Jackson Lee, to bring articles of impeachment. By the time it would go to the Senate, Obama and Holder would be gone, if the polls are right. And even if they did bring articles of impeachment against the standing Attorney General, with the Senate being a Democrat majority, there would be no conviction. Except, maybe, for Dianne Feinstein and Carl Levin, they're ALL crooks.

Whose fault is this? Ours. Americans voted FOR Democrats to be a majority for the Senate.

How do we change things? Vote out anybody calling himself or herself a Democrat. That includes the clown in the Whitehouse.