What is the Cheddar at the End of the Rat Race?

'The use of money does not disestablish the normal process of creating credit. Money, it is true, is always being paid into the banks by the retailers and others who receive it in the course of business, and they of course receive bank credits in return for the money thus deposited. But for the manufacturers and others who have to pay money out, credits are still created by the exchange of obligations, the banker's immediate obligation being given to his customer in exchange for the customer's obligation to repay at a future date. We shall still describe this dual operation as the creation of credit. By its means the banker creates the means of payment out of nothing, whereas when he receives a bag of money from his customer, one means of payment, a bank credit, is merely substituted for another, an equal amount of cash.'

 Economist Ralph George Hawtrey, Currency and Credit (1919)

Christmas

Whenever you talk about putting the Christ back in Christmas, I can't help but think I would rather put Saturn back in Saturnalia.

What would Machiavelli Do?

The first order of business is some sort of treaty with Russia. That within itself is a deeper issue than can be discussed here. The Ukrainians need to be abandoned in favor of allies who did not support Hitler during WW2. The military balance with Russia has inverted from the Cold War days, and their conventional capability is not strong but their nuclear one is. American nuclear development was initially a response to Russian conventional superiority, now Russia lacks this and retains nuclear weapons as a trump card against the U.S. But we would have to settle accounts. Of all the things we learned post-Cold War with the opening of the archives, this much is clear- there never was a missile gap or a serious threat of the Iron Curtain extending westward. But McCarthy may have been correct in many of assertions regarding communist influence but then its a question of how much respect one pays to freedom of speech.

On the 'Yellow Peril' Version 2: The Chinese do not have a navy to match ours. It appears they are trying to build one, yet America required a half-century cold war of military spending to build its forces. China will not catch up for a long time. It’s a major head-start. In any armed conflict, China lacks a nuclear force of any size to threaten the U.S., and the PLAN/PLA Air Force would not doubt be destroyed without offering much resistance.

All major nations: Europe, Israel, India, Russia are under threat from terrorism so cooperation between them all would go a long way. You fight terrorism effectively in the international arena and with small precise forces.

The United States would then pursue a peaceful settlement of the Syrian Civil War, with Bashar signing away his alliances with Iran and Hizbullah in exchange for the U.S. To cease supporting the anti-government forces in his country and the carrot to offer him would be intelligence cooperation on cutting the jihadists out of his country. US forces could operate in a limited fashion in North Iraq with an eye to keep the Kurds safe while diminishing ISIS.

Ever wondered why Middle East or Afghanistan has exceptionally retarded borders? The Sykes-Picot Agreement. America is attempting to enforce borders drawn by the same red-coated idiots our forefathers fought a long and bloody war to over-throw. History is ironic in the extreme. People arguing for the partition of Iraq seem to think that the current constitution ignored regional autonomy or that a division would magically end the existing tensions. Neither is the case, and either way you slice the pie, you will end up with a very messy desert to the Second Iraq Conflict. Keep this in mind: the Sunnis and Shias are killing each other over a disagreement about who should be Caliph. The Caliph ceased to exist during the break-up of the Ottoman Empire. The ultimate question dividing Sunni/Shia has existed since the 7^th Century. The Ethnic divisions in Iraq date to Ottoman-Safavid Wars.

Iran has had much time to prepare for war with the U.S and any military confrontation with them has to have this in mind. Operations from northern Iraq could threaten Tehran. Mutual defense agreements with bordering states are a plus. The Iranian military could easily fall back its own hinterland, but any attempt to cut the straits of Hormuz would require large numbers of men and expose them south of the Zagros Range. Destroying these forces in a potential war would be necessary. The Iranian response would mean terrorism across the region. But with ISIS pushing to Baghdad the Shiites there will be distracted. Kurdistan should be supported, even at the cost of Turkey. Kuzestan is ripe with Sunni tension and there has to be a better use for some of the Gitmo inmates somewhere. Israel could be told to deal with Hezbullah, which it could do, thus rending the Iranian response useless. Iranian terrorism is not a threat and neither are nukes. The biggest worry in regards to Iran developing such weapons would be a nuclear arms race in the region with Saudi Arabia developing nuclear weapons to combat the Iranians, and what you then have is the most religiously extreme Salafist supporting state in the area with nuclear weapons and only a slight grip on power to prevent these weapons from going to the same people that carried out 9/11 itself.

Of course, Machiavelli would probably be confused as to why a country that was recently discovered across the Atlantic was in the middle of Mesopotamia.

Of course, Machiavelli would probably be confused as to why a country that was recently discovered across the Atlantic was in the middle of Mesopotamia.

With leadership like William 'I sure Ain't Jefferson' Clinton, Vice Commander in Chief George 'Constitution Burning Bush' and Dick Cheney, we are sure to bungle every conflict. With people like these running the show, such wars are inevitable, and the blow-back from each of these administrations would be enough to challenge any president, let alone the national joke currently in office.

Relationship 101

Common Decency Is No Longer Common

-Don't bear dead weight. That is the job of casket bearers. If its dead, Let it be. Every demon inhabits their own hell.
-If someone treats you as a mistake, let reality do the heavy lifting when you know you are in the right. Only a sociopath feels no remorse or regret.
-Hate is the easy road, and carrying grudges indicative of a weaker nature unfit for survival.
-Passive abuse is still abuse. People who excuse their own actions via situations really believe in a sort of ethics that is not worthy of the term. Anyone playing the victim card is a few aces short of a full deck. Pity is a dangerous emotion in either direction
-Sometimes forgiving is the only route for a mature person. If you can't do this, good luck in life because life itself can be far harsher than anything one person can do to you
-Heuristics are useful. If someone does not fit what you know to be a rationally and healthy reaction, hit the road and refer them to a professional.
-Sharing your body with someone and then never speaking to them is generally a sick setup. Death is final. Cutting people off right and left is a great way to lock yourself in the very negative states of mind that produce personal and interpersonal problems. Self-fulfilling prophecy is a sad truth. If you talk to no one you have dated, this usually means there are two sides to the coin and perhaps you are part of the problem.
-If you throw someone away, do not be surprised when they move on. Only children at the pre-operational stage are incapable of realizing actions do not have consequences. If someone gives you their best and you give them your worst, don be surprised when they figure out they might deserve something better.
-Take care when you have someone's heart. If you lack the ability to pick up on emotional ques from someone you are sleeping with, take steps to increase emotional intellect.
-Don't mess with someone's ego or money. People are not means to an end, and if you treat someone like something that has expended its value, you will likely get a bad reaction.
- A fight is a nice dance in which two angry people prove just how bad that state of mind is
-Get an animal before you expect unconditional love
-Apologies, when issued, should be given a chance. There is no interaction between two people that will not include hurdles.
-If someone is hurt when a break up happens, it means they cared. For all you know, you were a peak experience. Be careful who you seek advice from in these situations because it could be that those you rely upon were never able to form the attachment you are severing. Do not treat an uncommonly good partner like something common.
-Time will put everything in perspective. It may take a lot of time, but if you are a functioning person with a conscience you will not forget the wrongs you have done another person. Honor promotes good sleep. Only death is final and if you seek this kind of end with someone who loves you, you will likely end up dying alone or relying on your own children to care for you when they themselves should be living which you never learned to do.
-Pulling away from another person in stress means that you are only capable of being a good person during fair weather times. People are supposed to grow together, and anyone using variations of the 'its not you, its me' approach are still stuck in the teenage years mentally. Don't be surprised when you end up with more of the same when you demolish that which was different.
-If you have been single for a long time, take care to re-develop those skills with the person you are with. Real love is a learned thing especially in regards to romance, and what one sees as a child from one's parents will set the course for what one thinks is healthy.
-feelings change. All things have impermanence. But don't expect anything genuine to go away on a whim. Common dating advice is only fit for common people.
-If genuine emotion scares someone away, or you think it might, that should scare you away from them. Fantasy and reality are very different in this regard. If you seek an endless platonic ideal in a partner you will miss out on many genuine people along the way.
-Love is different in each interaction. Do not waste time on romantic notions of the past.
-Break ups are isolating times, but only a malicious person does so in a manner which is disrespectful and takes none of the other person's needs into account. 

Historical Amnesia

How did we get here? Bad philosophy. Someone said that a long time ago (Rand). Her solution was a belief in a mythic capitalism. But why can’t America find the way out of this edge we have crossed over?

On Being Civilized

Generally speaking the first cultures who settled along river valleys did so after many generations of subsisting in a horticulture environment. Settled life gradually adopted intensive agriculture and developed a government, some say in order to enable people to do this. There is a loss of health which is apparent in a comparison between hunter-gathers and their counterparts living in cities. Historically speaking, there was always a large mass of non-settled peoples who chose not to live in this sort of arrangement: Germanic tribes to the north of Rome, Laplanders in Scandinavia, or peoples from the Central Asian Steppe. Recently, this has changed with the last hunter-gather non-settled peoples being pushed to the absolute margins.

Benefits to living in society depend on the specific nature of the society in question. But generally, they are easy access to food which you do not have to kill or grow yourself. On the other side of this coin there is a loss of agricultural and hunting knowledge which makes on dependent on the supply chain, and in the case of the modern West, Just in Time delivery. This could cause problems in a crisis, for example most Americans do not even have the relatively simple skills involved in growing a vegetable garden which got their grandfathers or great grandparents through the depression or that allowed people to supplement their diet during rationing imposed in the Second World War.

If the medieval age of faith was overthrown, it has been replaced in turn by a level of trust unknown in non-first world countries. The belief in the goodness of man has enabled some to gain absolute power over the use of force, and has led the rest to simply trust that this will be done in a just and even handed way. Justice here is meant as a sort of impartiality and respect for the rule of law which should be the guiding principle of any social contract.

The question of the sacrifice of freedoms is an old question. Thomas Hobbes viewed stateless society as that of a war of all against all. That is, every person was thought to be so self interested that he would simply do what he wanted unless held down by an authority so vast and terrorizing that he could do nothing but submit to it. Hunter-gatherers appear to have a vast amount of free time; the sort of back breaking labor that the peasant is subjected to in the first societies was unknown, as well as class distinctions. The Peasants after all only existed because there was enough food to allow them to be born and fed; the life of hunting and gathering is one that exists on the margin of starvation. Civilization gives humans the power over environment, and in a time-obsessed modern society in a post Ford/Taylor world it gives the illusion of power of the fifth dimension. Or at least, gives us the pressing sense that the time between waking and sleeping must be accounted for by socially acceptable behaviors such as work, school, approved hobbies or avocations.