A grumpy old bathplug raves

[masalai]

Bamby, That is what I was trying to say, Thanks... Most of my angst is directed to those you identify, but I feel that the "average Joe" can do lots by getting petitions going and delivering to those who hold elected office "vote for that bad bill and don't get our vote next election"... Several essayists have expressed amazement, that greater political activism has not happened, with the excuse comment that, maybe the pain level is not sufficient yet??? United and bold NON-VIOLENT activism may get the attention of the media and get things rolling???? You need leaders to rise from within the grass-roots...

OK lets agree to a definition I am happy to call the bad guys - "bankers" or "wankers" , which mostly they seem to have those affiliations, Politicians their pawns, are "*******" (Australian rhyming slang for Yanks = septic tanks or "*******" in a friendly but derogatory way... and all you good citizens / good folk are usanians, as people from europe are europeans, australians or ozzies are from Australia - Other examples would require detailed history and explanation... - - - Are you happy to accept usanians for yourselves, and "*******" and "wankers for the bad guys in banks and parliament?

[masalai]

Where else does one post this piece of abject dumbness?.....NZ shop robber leaves contact details - http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...section=justin
A man vying for the title of New Zealand's most incompetent criminal left his name and contact details with a shop before robbing it and fleeing.

The man - a regular customer of the music shop in the southern city of Christchurch - grabbed handfuls of notes from the till with four surveillance cameras trained on him on Friday, the shop's manager told a local newspaper.

Just minutes before the robbery, the man had approached the assistant saying he wanted a copy of Pink Floyd's album The Wall held for him and giving his details.

Manager Garry Knight says although the shop assistant was distracted with helping another customer, two other people in the store witnessed the theft.

"It's comical," he said. - He also had other long-standing requests for albums at the shop, also accompanied by his name and contact details.

[Bamby]

What's your opinion on this Mas? After all we wouldn't want the actual people responsible for this mess actually paying taxes would we.

Republicans are using the T-word - taxes - to attack the Obama healthcare program. It's a strategy based in a lie.

A very small niche of America's uber-wealthy have pulled off what may well be the biggest con job in the history of our republic, and they did it in a startlingly brief 30 or so years. True, they spent over three billion dollars to make it happen, but the reward to them was in the hundreds of billions - and will continue to be.

As my friend and colleague Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks pointed out in a Daily Kos blog recently, billionaire Rupert Murdoch loses $50 million a year on the NY Post, billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife loses $2 to $3 million a year on the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, billionaire Philip Anschutz loses around $5 million a year on The Weekly Standard, and billionaire Sun Myung Moon has lost $2 to $3 billion on The Washington Times.

Why are these guys willing to lose so much money funding "conservative" media? Why do they bulk-buy every right-wing book that comes out to throw it to the top of the NY Times Bestseller list and then give away the copies to "subscribers" to their websites and publications? Why do they fund to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars a year money-hole "think tanks" like Heritage and Cato?

The answer is pretty straightforward. They do it because it buys them respectability, and gets their con job out there. Even though William Kristol's publication is a money-losing joke (with only 85,000 subscribers!), his association with the Standard was enough to get him on TV talk shows whenever he wants, and a column with The New York Times. The Washington Times catapulted Tony Blankley to stardom.

"Fellowships" and other forms of indirect sponsorship of right-wing talk show hosts have made otherwise-marginal shows and their hosts ubiquitous, and such sponsorships of groups like Norquist's anti-tax "Americans for Tax Reform" regularly get people like him front-and-center in any debate on taxation in the United States.

All so they could run a tax con on the American people, thus keeping Moon and Murdoch and Scaife and Anschutz (and others) richer than you or I could ever even imagine.

All of this money was spent - invested, really, since it's been more than saved back in low income tax rates on millionaires and billionaires - to convince Americans that up is down and black is white when it comes to income taxes. Here's how it works:

Rich Person's Tax Effect

If a person earns so much money that he doesn't or can't spend it all each year, then when his taxes go down your income after taxes goes up. This is largely because there's little to no relationship between what he "needs to live on" and what he's "earning."

Somebody living on a million dollars a year but earning five million after taxes, can sock away four million in a Swiss bank. If his taxes go up enough to drop his after-tax income to only three million a year, he's still living on a million a year, and only socks away two million in the Swiss bank. His "disposable" income goes down when his taxes go up, and vice-versa. (Technically, the word is "discretionary" income for after-tax, after-living-expenses income, but "disposable" income has become so widely used as a phrase to describe discretionary income I'll use it here.)

The Rich Person's Tax Effect is the one that virtually all Americans understand - and, oddly, most working class people think applies to them, too (this is the truly amazing part of the con job referred to earlier).

But it doesn't.

Working Person's Tax Effect - version one

Most working people spend pretty much all of what they earn - their "disposable/discretionary" income is close to zero. Savings rates in the US among working people typically are small - one to five percent - and during the last few years of the W. Bush administration actually went negative. So the take-home pay that people have after taxes - regardless of what the taxes may be - is pretty much what they live on.

As economist David Ricardo pointed out in 1817 in the "On Wages" chapter of his book "On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation," take home pay is also generally "what a person will work for." Employers know this: Ricardo's "Iron Law of Wages" is rooted in the notion that there is a "market" for labor, driven in part by supply and demand. So if a worker is earning, for example, a gross salary of $75,000, his 2008 federal income tax would be about $15,000 ($802.50 on first $8,025 of income; $3,687.75 on income from $8,025 to $32,550; $10,612.50 on income from $32,550 to $75,000), leaving him a take-home pay of $60,000.

Both he and his employer know that he'll do the job he's doing for around $60,000 a year in take-home pay.

So what happens if his taxes go up, cutting his take-home pay to $55,000 a year (even though his gross is still $75,000)? Over time (typically one to three years) his wages will rise enough to compensate for the lost income.

Alan Greenspan used to be hysterical about this effect - he called it "wage inflation" - and The Wall Street Journal and other publications would often reference it, although the average working person has no idea that if his taxes go up, his wages will eventually go up. Similarly, when working-class people's taxes go down, their gross wages will, over time, go down so their inflation-adjusted take-home pay remains the same. We've seen both happen over the past eighty years, over and over again.

When I was in Denmark last year doing my radio show from the Danish Radio offices for a week and interviewing many of that nation's leading politicians, economists, energy experts, and newspaper publishers, one of my guests made a comment that dropped the scales from my own eyes.

We'd been discussing taxes on the air, what the Danes get for their average 52% tax rate (free college education, free health care, 4 weeks of vacation, being the world's "happiest" country according to research reported on CBS's "60 Minutes" TV show, etc.). I asked him why people didn't revolt at such high tax rates, and he smiled and just pointed out to me that the average Dane is very well paid with a minimum wage that equals about $18 US (depending on the exchange rate from day to day).

Off the air, he made the comment to me that was so enlightening. "You Americans are such suckers," he said, as I recall. "You think that the rules for taxes that apply to rich people also apply to working people. But they don't. When working peoples' taxes go up, their pay goes up. When their taxes go down, their pay goes down. It may take a year or two or three to all even out, but it always works this way - look at any country in Europe. And it's the opposite of how it works for rich people!"

Working Person's Tax Effect - Version Two

The other point about taxes - which Obama leveraged with his "no tax increases on people earning under $250,000 a year" pledge - has to do with the fact that our tax structure in the US is progressive.

Here's how it breaks out for a single person from the 2008 federal tax tables:

10% on income between $0 and $8,025

15% on the income between $8,025 and $32,550;

25% on the income between $32,550 and $78,850;

28% on the income between $78,850 and $164,550;

33% on the income between $164,550 and $357,700;

35% on the income over $357,700.

Note that our $75,000/year worker has two full tax brackets above him, which, if they go up, will not affect him at all. (This is also true, of course, for the median-wage and average-wage American workers who earn in the low to mid-$40,000/year range.)

The top tax rate that a person pays is referred to as their "marginal tax rate" (in our worker's case 28%). So what happens if the top marginal tax rate on people making over $357,700 goes up from its current 35% to, for example, the Eisenhower-era 91%?

For over 120 million American workers who don't earn over $357,700/year, it won't mean a thing. But for the tiny handful of millionaires and billionaires who have promoted The Great Tax Con, it will bite hard. And that's why they spend millions to make average working people freak out about increases in the top tax rates.

Income taxes as the "Great Stabilizer"

Beyond fairness and holding back the Landed Gentry the Founders worried about (America had no billionaires in today's money until after the Civil War, with John D. Rockefeller being our first), there's an important reason to increase to top marginal tax rate, and to do so now.

Novelist Larry Beinhart was the first to bring this to my attention. He looked over the history of tax cuts and economic bubbles, and found a clear relationship between the two. High top marginal tax rates (generally well above 60%) on rich people actually stabilize the economy, prevent economic bubbles from forming, prevent economic crashes, and lead to steady and sustained economic growth (and steady and sustained wage growth for working people).

On the other hand, when top marginal rates drop below 50 percent, the opposite happens. As Beinhart noted in a November 17, 2008 post on the Huffington Post, the massive Republican tax cuts of the 1920s (from 73% to 25%) led directly to the Roaring '20s stock market bubble, temporary boom, and then the crash and Republican Great Depression of 1929.

Rates on the very rich went back up into the 70-90% range from the 1930s to the 1980s. As a result, the economy grew steadily; for the first time in the history of our nation we went 50 years without a crash or major bank failure; and working people's wages increased enough to produce the strongest middle class this nation has ever seen.

Then came Reaganomics.

Reagan cut top marginal rates on millionaires and billionaires from 74% down to 38% and there was an immediate surge in the markets - followed by the worst crash since the Great Depression and the failure of virtually the entire nation's savings and loan banking system.

Bush I cut taxes, and the nation fell into a severe recession while debt soared and wages for working people fell.

Things stabilized somewhat when Clinton slightly raised taxes on the very rich, but W. Bush dropped them again - including taking taxes on unearned income (interest and dividends - the "income" that people like W. born with a trust fund "earn" as they sit around the pool waiting for the dividend check to arrive in the mail) down to a top rate of 15%. (That's right - trust fund babies like Bush and Scaife pay a MAXIMUM 15% federal income tax on their dividend and interest income, thanks to the second Bush tax cut.) The result of this surge in easy money for the wealthy, combined with deregulation in the financial markets, was the "froth" Greenspan worried about and led us straight into the Second Republican Great Depression, ongoing today.

The math is really pretty simple. When the uber-rich are heavily taxed, economies prosper and wages for working people steadily rise. When taxes are cut for the rich, working people suffer and economies turn into casinos.

Roll Back The Reagan Tax Cuts

While there's much discussion about letting the Bush tax cuts expire, if we really want our country to recover its financial footing we must do something altogether different. We need to roll back the Reagan tax cuts that took the top marginal rate from above 70% down into the 30% range.

First, though, we have to help Americans realize that "no new taxes" is a mantra that is meaningful to the very rich, but largely irrelevant to average working people.

Only when the current generation re-learns the economic and tax lessons well known by the generation (now dying off) that came of age in the 30s through the 60s, will this become politically possible. Americans need to learn what Europeans know about taxes - they only matter to the rich.

Thus today the uber-rich are spending hundreds of millions to make sure words like "burden" are always associated with the word "tax," and to convince average working people that they should throw out of office any politicians who are willing to raise taxes on the rich.

We have a lot of education to do...and as long as the Right Wing Machine of the uber-rich continues to "lose" (e.g. "invest") millions of dollars a year in their ongoing disinformation campaign, it's going to require all of us reciting the mantra, "Roll back the Reagan tax cuts!"

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/07/21

[masalai]

I am too far away to work at the microeconomic analysis, and you seem to have a good grasp on the numbers there... Your detail helps to confirm the plight all will find themselves firmly held in and trapped, unless action is taken to counter the control of the masses... - The big picture is the one that needs to be understood.... Murdock et-al refer to "MONEY" as respectability and respectability as "POWER" and power corrupts... The shareholders may be loosing out, but I bet the "heads" have a firm grasp of the game and the money they want, to comply and support the bankers and FED in the grand plan... USA and world dominance if the stunt works... Remember . . . . . . He who controls the supply of money controls the government and when the FED was created by the major Bankers to stop "this boom and bust economic cycle" (********, but all the US politicians fell in line) - . . . . they pulled the biggest heist known . . . . (control of USA) . . .... is just the first step in what could be the lead to the biblical Armageddon, and America may well be the home of the Antichrist (fiat MONEY) - if you want to take the biblical explanation...

Don't get confused and distracted, there is NO DIFFERENCE between the Republicans and the Democrats in what they do, Just some minor differences in what they say about the other side.... All bipartisan governments around the world work the same play.... Americans seem to have an affection for the "homespun 'forest Gump'", and despise the "slick sounding operator" - just actors doing what seems to be in vogue at the time....

[Frosty]

5 years on this forum and I have never seen such a bunch of wankers as there is now.

Fking egotistical wankers that call themselves fking astronauts engineers or what ever ,--hey no one will ever know. I can say i am a designer --what the fuk does that mean, Oh so your the prick that designs the **** we see in the boat shows of today ,---get him boys --hang him high by the testicles and dont let him down till his pen falls out of his pocket forever.

His mum may be impressed with is certificates but this is the real world.
Theres a few guys on here thats actually seen a fking boat before and been on one.

( hey I was on a speed boat once when I was a child now I build them because I can add up and take away)

Some of these pricks work upstairs in the office ,--occasionally bring a **** load of papers down to the shop floor , give it to the foreman and run back upstairs as fast a they can and hide. But the lads have seen it all before and just get on with it and cover the mistakes.

We get waves of wankers --hope they move on soon.

[Fanie]

We have the same crap here. Bunch of idiots making rules and laws for others which they have no idea about until someone gets injured or killed then they quickly change to something else.

See my post #2563 here http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/ope...14472-171.html

[Frosty]

Thanks for the points fanie.

Here have a few yurslef

[Bamby]

This is a excellent example of WHY America is going to **** in a hand basket. I can't believe even Obamha would honor this P.O.S. unbelievable.

A presidential medal based on a sex life
Posted: August 12, 2009
1:00 am Eastern

By Peter Sprigg
© 2009

When President Obama today awards a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom to Harvey Milk, it may mark the first time in history that the nation's highest civilian award has been granted primarily on the basis of someone's sex life.



As the White House announcement explained, "Harvey Milk became the first openly gay elected official from a major city in the United States when he was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977." Yet Milk served in that office for less than a year, so that hardly qualifies him for the Medal of Freedom. Milk was also assassinated in November of 1978. But that cannot qualify him for this award, either – San Francisco Mayor George Moscone was killed by the same assassin the same day, but he will receive no Medal of Freedom. At least lesbian Billie Jean King, who will also be honored by Obama, was a genuine tennis star.


But Milk is famous only for winning one election, being murdered – and having sex with men. In his "gay rights" stump speech, Milk once said, "Like every other group, we must be judged by our leaders and by those who are themselves gay." What can we conclude about the homosexual movement in America based on the life of Harvey Milk? I recently decided to find out by reading "gay journalist" Randy Shilts' 1982 biography of Milk, "The Mayor of Castro Street."



Don't miss David Kupelian's culture-war classic, "The Marketing of Evil: How Radicals, Elitists, and Pseudo-Experts Sell Us Corruption Disguised as Freedom"


According to Shilts, Milk's "first sexual experiences were in the standing room section of the Metropolitan Opera [in New York], a gathering place for homosexual men. ... Random groping led to brief trysts after the performances." Milk, "by his own account, was leading an active homosexual life by the age of 14."



He continued to engage in homosexual conduct while serving in the U. S. Navy. Shilts reports that Milk, who had his own apartment off base, would pick up hitchhiking sailors by offering them a bed to sleep in. "The guests often would not know that Milk's apartment had only one bed until they walked in the door."



Milk later exploited his time in the Navy during his political career – by lying about it, claiming falsely that he had received a dishonorable discharge for his homosexuality. Milk "knew the story would make good copy," according to Shilts. "Maybe people will read it, feel sorry for me and then vote for me," Milk told one campaign manager.



The information Shilts provides about Milk's sexual partners is revealing about the nature of male homosexual life in America. Milk's first long-term lover, Joe, had his "introduction to gay life" when he performed sex acts upon men in a movie theatre for money – at age 9. Milk's next lover, Craig, had been arrested after having sex with a 40-year-old man – when Craig was 14. He met Milk when he was 17 – "it would be to such boyish-looking men in their late teens and early 20s that Milk would be attracted for the rest of his life," Shilts reports. Another lover, Jack, moved in with Milk when he was 16 and Milk was 33. Jack attempted suicide several times, and once when he physically attacked Milk, "Harvey literally tied him up and threw him in a closet."



Milk showed a casual attitude toward the use of illegal recreational drugs as well as toward sex. Besides homosexuals, Milk had another key constituency – "potheads," according to Shilts. One key supporter ran "a marijuana supermarket from his bustling apartment." Shilts reports that Milk arranged several jobs for his partner Jack L. – including one manufacturing "poppers," an illegal street drug. When a doctor asked what he could do for gay people, Milk replied, "Write more prescriptions for Quaaludes."



Milk may even have faked a "hate crime" to advance his political ambitions. The windows of Milk's camera shop were "blown out by ... M-80 mega-firecrackers." Shilts says, "Years later friends hinted broadly that Harvey had more than a little foreknowledge that the explosions would happen. '... The campaign was sort of going slow, and, well ...'"
Even homosexuals were divided about Milk during his lifetime. According to Shilts, "Lesbian leaders had long ago spread the word that Harvey was anti-woman, partially for his close alliances with drag queens, and few ever backed Harvey."



Shilts' book (like last year's film "Milk") makes it clear that Milk was a tireless campaigner who formed unique political alliances – for example, between San Francisco's homosexuals and labor unions. And he had courage – Milk actually anticipated that he would be assassinated.
But in the few months that Milk actually held elective office, "Harvey left little doubt that his term would be marked more by his unique brand of political theater than by the substantive tasks of the board," according to Shilts. And that "political theater" had mostly to do with advancing the homosexual movement – in his "political will," Milk declared, "Almost everything that was done was done with an eye on the gay movement."
In other word, it was all about sex. Pro-homosexual activists will describe the issue as one of identity – "who they are." But the real issue is one of behavior – what they do. And what Harvey Milk (like other homosexual activists) wanted was not only the freedom to engage in homosexual sex, but the right to do so without ever being criticized. Milk told one audience that "it is madness to ... be ashamed of the sexual act, the act that conceived you. ..." Yet homosexual acts never conceived anyone, which is what separates them, undeniably, from heterosexual acts.



Since Harvey Milk died from an assassin's bullet, over a quarter million American men have died of AIDS, which they contracted because they had sex with other men. What's truly "madness" is that someone whose only claim to fame is that they promoted such deadly behavior should be honored with a Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Source: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=106598

[masalai]

If that is a common example? then you all is in deeeeeep doooodo.... but WTF there is a bright side, that is 2 less males interested in the remaining females so more available for the 'hetro' guy?..

Don't ignore the signature area of my posts - the second one is a record of my build progress since 23 April 2009 - Thanks for your appreciation, who-ever you are

[masalai]

Bugger grumpy this is beautiful http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/quee...0825-extr.html This event is very rare and can be seen in August / September in the SE corner of the Gulf of Carpentaria, N Queensland.... I will sit there for the whole 2 months in anticipation of seeing just this....

[Frosty]

Bamby,--great movie I hate being in a public Cinima, look I cant even spell Cinima, is that right ?

I havnt been much since my poor mum took me n me sister to see it in ohhh what errrrmm,---must have been errr1958 ? I was 6


I fking hate cinemas full of other people rattling crisp packets and eating popcorn that seems to get down your back of you neck , What up with these idiots.

Oh and then some dork behind says to his girl friend " Oh Oh my mate used to have a car like that" or "I can drive like that" and she says eeer stopiiit

I cant stand it,-- god I went to see Titanic and sat next to a bloke with a colestomy bag ----oh for fks sake.

Im glad I can buy fking copies and watch at home on my plasma.

[Frosty]

And another thing why do all nutters drive out of the Cinema car park like bloody idiots after watching Steve Mc queen in Bullet fks sake.

[Fanie]

You mean you went to see the Thai Thanic there eh Frosty ? My mother also insisted we must see it in a cinema. My butt went dead in the first 5 minutes and a bunch of idiots were talking the whole time in front of us.

Mind you, it was such a soppy movie if I didn't crap them talkers out to shut up I was going to join them

[masalai]

You can find stupid idiots everywhere, I think they interbreed... Just try to ignore them? but sometimes they need a good tongue lashing - if only to vent ones' own spleen, just be careful not to piss on them, as they may then show their psychotic side

And whilst on the topic of insanity, TV programming? the temerity to call it (a list of what one can watch on that box?) anything other than rubbish that could not be disposed of elsewhere? - with age (maturity?) one (me, I presume as so many others seem quite contented to let themselves be overwhelmed by it), must develop significantly reduced tolerance of mind numbing crap - I now seem to be full of invective within 30 seconds and walk out within 3 minutes - No interest in cinematic presentations either? the special effects in the preview promotional stuff is enough.... I think I need to go on an extended cruise somewhere - Roll on April 2010...... or sooner if I win a bit in a lottery.......

[Bamby]

> He emerged from the vapors with a message that had no meaning; but He
>
> hypnotized the people telling them, "I am sent to save you." My lack
>
> of experience, my questionable ethics, my monstrous ego, and my
>
> association with evil doers are of no consequence. I shall save you
>
> with hope and Change. Go, therefore, and proclaim throughout the
>
> land that he who proceeded me is evil, that he has defiled the nation,
>
> and that all he has built must be destroyed. And the people rejoiced,
>
> for even though they knew not what "The One" would do, he had promised
>
> that it was good; and they believed. And "The One" said " We live in
>
> the greatest country in the world. Help me change everything about it!"
>
> And the people said, "Hallelujah! Change is good!"
>
>
>
> Then He said, "We are going to tax the rich fat-cats." And the
>
> people said "Sock it to them!" "And redistribute their wealth." And
>
> the people said, "Show us the money!" And the he said, "
>
> redistribution of wealth is good for everybody."
>
>
>
> And Joe the plumber asked, " Are you kidding me? You're going to
>
> steal my money and give it to the deadbeats??" And "The One"
>
> ridiculed and taunted him, and Joe's personal records were hacked and
> publicized.
>
> One lone reporter asked, "Isn't that Marxist policy?" And she was
>
> banished from the kingdom!
>
>
>
> Then a citizen asked, "With no foreign relations experience and
>
> having zero military experience or knowledge, how will deal with
>
> radical terrorists?" And "The One" said, "Simple. I shall sit with
>
> them and talk with them and show them how nice we really are; and they
>
> will forget that they ever wanted to kill us all!" And the people
>
> said, "Hallelujah!! We are safe at last, and we can beat our weapons
>
> into free cars for the people!"
>
>
>
> Then "The One" said "I shall give 95% of you lower taxes." And one,
>
> lone voice said, "But 40% of us don't pay ANY taxes." So "The One"
>
> said, "Then I shall give you some of the taxes the fat-cats pay!"
>
> And the people said, "Hallelujah! Show us the money!"
>
> Then "The One" said, "I shall tax your Capital Gains when you sell
>
> your homes!" And the people yawned and the slumping housing market
>
> collapsed. And He said.. "I shall mandate employer-funded health care
>
> for every worker and raise the minimum wage. And I shall give every
>
> person unlimited healthcare and medicine and transportation to the
>
> clinics." And the people said, "Give me some of that!"
>
> Then he said, "I shall penalize employers who ship jobs overseas."
>
> And the people said, "Where's my rebate check?"
>
>
>
> Then "The One" said, "I shall bankrupt the coal industry and
>
> electricity rates will skyrocket!" And the people said, "Coal is
>
> dirty, coal is evil, no more coal! But we don't care for that part
>
> about higher electric rates." So "The One" said, Not to worry. If
>
> your rebate isn't enough to cover your expenses, we shall bail you out.
>
> Just sign up with the ACORN and you troubles are over!"
>
>
>
> Then He said, "Illegal immigrants feel scorned and slighted. Let's
>
> grant them amnesty, Social Security, free education, free lunches,
>
> free medical care, bi-lingual signs and guaranteed housing..." And
>
> the people said, "Hallelujah!" and they made him king!
>
>
>
> And so it came to pass that employers, facing spiraling costs and
>
> ever-higher taxes, raised their prices and laid off workers. Others
>
> simply gave up and went out of business and the economy sank like unto
>
> a rock dropped from a cliff.
>
> The bank banking industry was destroyed. Manufacturing slowed to a
>
> crawl. And more of the people were without a means of support.
>
>
>
> Then "The One" said, "I am the "the One"- The Messiah - and I'm here
>
> to save you! We shall just print more money so everyone will have
>
> enough!" But our foreign trading partners said unto Him. "Wait a
>
> minute. Your dollar is not worth a pile of camel dung! You will have
>
> to pay more... And "The One" said, "Wait a minute. That is
>
> unfair!!" And the world said, "Neither are these other idiotic
>
> programs you have embraced. Lo, you have become a Socialist state and
>
> a second-rate power. Now you shall play by our rules!"
>
>
>
> And the people cried out, "Alas, alas!! What have we done?" But yea
>
> verily, it was too late. The people set upon The One and spat upon
>
> him and stoned him, and his name was dung. And the once mighty nation
>
> was no more; and the once proud people were without sustenance or
>
> shelter or hope. And the Change "The One" had given them was as like
>
> unto a poison that had destroyed then and like a whirlwind that
>
> consumed all that they had built.
>
>
>
> And the people beat their chests in despair and cried out in anguish,
>
> "give us back our nation and our pride and our hope!!" But it was too
>
> late, and their homeland was no more.
>