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+--- Thread: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? (/showthread.php?tid=2315)
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - Bullwinkle - 03-19-2009
"I should food self sufficient at some standard of living in 4 months, food and fuel self sufficient in 9--food fuel and revenue self sufficient in 16."
JWFITZ: I appreciate your topics insight and input, I’m a bit behind and peddling as fast as I can … thanks for the roadmap(s).
Aloha
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - JWFITZ - 03-19-2009
Thanks, I appreciate that. If we're going to work towards a sustainable future, well, some of us actually need to start working towards a sustainable future. We're running out of time, and anyone getting started today is going to be about 2 years behind the curve--meaning they won't really be able to get on-line before price pressures hit us. These things take time. They are completely do-able, but they require a sincere commitment to a different way of living and a robust acknowledgment of responsibility. That's a pretty stiff drink for a lot of people, and I understand that. Being able to see and follow a workable example--even if it isn't the model one chooses to follow--still demonstrates viability and can offer a lot of encouragement and help.
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - mgeary - 03-19-2009
quote:Yes, it does, Jay. I watched all 34 minutes of the Charlie Rose interview, and I watched Fed Chairman Bernanke on 60 Minutes last Sunday. I'm reading the links, and, like Bullwinkle, I'm peddling as fast as I can. I also re-read this whole thread, all 15 pages of it. The very first post starting this thread is a masterpiece. Kudos.
Originally posted by JWFITZ
...If you're still wondering how a market can exist(derivatives) that expresses a decade of global GDP, and exist, well--it smells like a massive, massive scam.
Does this help?
I'm very much impressed with your sentiments about increasing community involvement, and also with your push for sustainable living. These are both worthy goals, IMHO, regardless of what the economy is doing. I agree with and support your bringing these topics to the forefront of PunaWeb.
I have to say that it is with some of the language, or perhaps the tone, of your thesis that I struggle with. Perhaps you are right, but I get a "sky-is-falling" message from you, whereas Bernanke, President Obama, et. al present a "the sky nearly fell, and we're still not out of the woods, but we seem to be headed in the right direction" message. Not that a President and Fed. chairman are infallible, but at least they're well-informed. Or should be.
I'm not an economist, so I wouldn't presume to enter this debate on the merits. I have to defer to people a whole lot smarter than I am, which puts me in the sheep category, I guess. After all this, I still haven't a clue whether your "$500 trillion in bad debt" comment is valid or not, but I do know that $500 trillion dollars makes our whole economy, much less Obama's stimulus plan, our national debt, and the annual deficit, look trivial. The fuss (righteous indignation) over the $165 million paid in retention bonuses to the AIG managers is laughable, in comparison.
Thanks for your continued effort to keep us moving in a productive direction. I'll keep reading this thread, because I'm learning.
Optimist? Pessimist? I would hope I'm a realist with a sunny disposition.[8D]
Aloha! ;-)
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - JWFITZ - 03-19-2009
Sure, and I appreciate the comments. I adopt a forceful tone on purpose because(that's how I am) and that it is important to provide counterpoint to the very ill-informed commentary one often hears from the popular media, which is often very misleading. I believe the current environment possesses grave and very present dangers. We'll do a lot to keep ourselves--and our community--safer with a little forethought. Planning ahead requires looking squarely at real issues in real time, and few have done that.
As for the 500 trillion dollar deal. First, the 500 trillion dollars refers to the whole total of the world derivatives market as of the last couple years. It's well over that now, I'm sure in excess of 700 trillion--and it is indeed a staggering amount of money. This is more or less a decade of world GDP. While some have suggested that it's erroneous to suggest that the whole of the market is potentially based on false valuations(hence bad debt--uncollateralized) and there may be some point to that, the fact remains that there exists an unimaginably vast market, more or less invisible, more or less unregulated, more or less un-valuable, and apparently wholly fractured by lack of transparency and institutional mistrust. How much of that huge sum is bad is anyone's guess. No one is really 'fessing up. If you don't know, you must suspect it all. And this is the core of the issue.
Personally, the major point I wanted to get across with this now very long thread was this: we are facing a very difficult future, which in large measure has not been well anticipated, especially by policy makers, and in many situations most of us are very unprepared for. We need to get jamming on getting ahead here. This is going to be pretty hard stuff for a lot of people, as most have a tremendous vested interest in a way of life that simply will not ever return. Never. I'd like to get away from the doom predictions as it's becoming less interesting all the time--it's getting to be as tiresome as explaining that the sky is blue to the blind who want to believe elsewise--AND, we've got bigger fish to fry, like trying to keep as much quality of life, security, and humanity in our community as we can. The sooner we admit the path that we are on, the sooner we can get to work on real solutions.
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - Hotzcatz - 03-19-2009
quote:And most excellent sweet potatoes they are! Glowing jewel toned garnet on the outside, creamy sweet white insides! If Jay had a "Sweet Potatoes For Sale" sign up in front of his house, I'd stop in there every time I drove by! (Hint! Hint!) He did kindly give me some of those beauteous 'taters as well as some vine starts while we were there dropping off his new baby chickens so hopefully we will be able to provide our own soon, but they are most excellent sweet potatoes and well worth driving on those rocky roads to get them.
Originally posted by JWFITZ<SNIP>
Where's my investment today? In sweet potatoes. That's where I think things are going.<SNIP>
Kurt Wilson
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - punafish - 03-19-2009
Happy to say the sweet potato starts that Jay gave me are thriving. Can't wait to sample them now...
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - Guest - 03-19-2009
There was a reason early Hawaiians did so well off without money.[
]Damon Tucker's Weblog
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - Guest - 03-19-2009
Damon.
The reason may have been that almost every commodity and 95% of the population was the property of the 5% that was the ruling class.
In a system where there is no individual property ownership, money is not essential.
Money & ind. property enables a person to save the fruits of their labor.
Our society is doubly taxed. We are half slave to the state by paying 1/2 of our corn to the state. Most of the remaining portion of our wealth in our society is wasted on debt service, frivolity, sloth, false pride, our ignorance, etc.
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - JWFITZ - 03-20-2009
I agree.
And even without money, there was still taxation. And if you were unfortunate enough to be one of the aboriginal pre-Hawaiian migration Awena people stuck on the scorched earth reservation in Ka'u, taxation generally meant death.
It is interesting to note however that in even in Hawaiian culture the greatest threat to personal sustainability was the need to produce extra resources in order to subsidize a dead beat consumer class that contributed nothing but controlled the laws.
Anything to learn from that?
RE: Hello Mr. Wolf, won't you please sit down? - JWFITZ - 03-20-2009
How about we steer the conversation away from the bad stuff that is all too self-evident and move towards the constructive? This requires:
1) Understanding that sustainability is a quantity, not an ideology, that reflects basic and measurable relationships of input/output. There are lifestyles that are sustainable, and those that aren't, and we need to define and recognize the difference. I firmly believe that false demonstrations of sustainability are every bit as damaging as people who live lives of wanton consumerism, if for no other reason as to perpetrate the myth that sustainability can be had without radical reductions in consumption. It can't. Until we figure that out en masse we only get ourselves deeper in the hole, more depleted, and once we're finally compelled to buckle down we'll need to live sustainable(survival) lives with even less than we would right now. And that would be stupid indeed, but where we are heading. If you think sustainability is hard to pull off now--try thinking about what it will be like in 10 years with another 25 percent of farm land gone and another billion people on the planet, in a world 1 degree F warmer. And, with higher property taxes, income taxes, regulation and compliance burdens to boot, all asking for a fee. And you're trying to make a living off of sweet potatoes. . .
2) Community is made possible by mutual support and trust. Trust requires maturity, honesty, and integrity. I see the "sustainability" issue here as well, for while we have people who demand to consume more than their fair share at the detriment of the society as a whole, we have an inherently anti-social society. I don't think we need to get all ideological or weird about this whole issue either. In a world where Homeowners Associations feel it's within their rights to tell others what colors they can paint their houses, or that you've got to build a house of at least 1000 square feet--surely I'm within my rights to tell you to keep your god-damned CO2 out of my atmosphere. It's hardly a stretch. Community is working of for the common good--unless we have a community that recognizes that as a basic first principle our attempts at trying to create it are going to look pretty silly.