What a lame duck Gordon Brown is...........

Well its been a while since I blogged about the world and seems I am talking mainly to myself but I just got so mad I had to say something............... Gordon Brown has all his spin doctors and all his comments about blame for the UK situation on the world.... Just like any lame politician it is important to lay the blame clearly with someone else, preferably to a ficticious enemy and completely out of any possible way it could have been avoided by his government. The facts are clear now, blatently clear that this crisis has been caused by two things. Greedy bankers, yuppy derivatives traders and senior directors of banks and mortgage houses, the list of banks is endless and for mortgages primarily Fannie Mai and her friend Mac and secondly women pushing their husbands to buy houses as well as spend money they simply did not have or could not afford to spend. We could add, of course, property developers encouraged also by the banks to continually push the fantasy wealth of property ownership over leasehold....So you might say what has Gordon Brown to do with all this...... well firstly he will not say openly that Labour has encouraged people to feel rich in homes they will never own and can not afford to pay for in the UK. He will not admit that the UK banks and bankers have been amongst the most irresponsible in the world and possibly could have been forseen in the 90's when all the "old" fashioned responsible building societies clambered to become banks ! Giving crumbs as payout to their members in order to fill the directors pockets with BILLIONS afterwards ! Who's to blame blogspot now seems to hit the spot. Gordon Brown was the chancellor of the exchequer surrounded with some of the highest paid economists and advisors in the world all self serving and filling their pockets from the same Gravy train that has gone bust. Gordon Brown tries to avoid the responsibility and puts it on the rest of the world when the proverbial stuff should stick to him like it does to a blanket. He tries now to claim some credit to put accountability back into banks...............it will take decenies to stop the idea of getting rich quick in the financial trade. He should start at home and resign because as top management in the country game he has to be responsible for the catastrophic mess the UK is in now simply because it had no mangement at the top. So where is all the pleasure in the pain, where is the silver lining that will allow everyone to lift their heads and get on with cleaning up the mess. I look optimistically on everything and I sincerely hope there is not the planned riots in the street. Someone will come along and be brave enough to make real changes in the institutions and in the education of people so this crazy event never happens again. I am very happy that people have cut back consumption of everything a consuming society is a poor society. I hope we can bring back the idea that savings and real assets are fundamental to a prosperous nation. I hope leverage becomes a very dirty word in all circles and especially women leveraging their husbands earning outside acceptable limits. There you go......thoughts for the day

People power................ the beauty of it !

I have been once again trying to digest the reams of information and rubbish talked about the "credit crunch" and have got to saturation point............. finally I have to ask myself what has it changed............ who is suffering and who is to blame for the pain..... or is it just one big smoke ball for politicians to show they are managing and governing. I seriously get the impression that there is total panic and political knee jerking going on and that finally all the action will in fact, if anything make things worse for the most vulnerable.
I read with interest a quarter of a million people pushing and shoving to buy 4GB flash chips over the weekend and wide screen TV sets and monitors..... this is something like 3% of the population of HK. I picked up early on that this whole mortgage crisis in the USA is because around 5% of the mortgage paying population is defaulting on their obligations. I am guessing that in the whole world slump in demand real oil consumption is down about 5 or 6% ! This is enough for the oil price to go down from 140$ to 40$ a barrel ! It is true that demand for autos big ticket items is down maybe a staggering 50% right now..... but this is possibly since it is such a big ticket item it is postponeable.... although can be that all peoples credit worthyness has declined enormously.
This whole thing seems to have been because of trying to get consumption growth from a relatively small part of the total population....the whole world is volatile on average to a very small change in total consumption. This means that the whole leverage game to inflate asset values pushed the system to be vulnerable to a relatively small downturn in actual consumption...then the thing spirals downwards. Pushed expansion of factories and companies to operate at close to break even on high volume output at low margins. So can it not be that we have all decided enough is enough to be continually pushed to consume..... and the population at large has decided to cut it off ! This is real people power and is a slap in the face of growth at any price. Seems to me we are in a survival mode and the politicians would be best to stay out of it !!
The market will tell us how to correct the aberation by simply turning back to value for money !
I feel comfortable that a surviving strategy for people , communities and enterprise will be found quickly as long as politicians stop playing politics ....................... a happy thought and nothing has changed.

Epicurus where is your garden now..........?

It occurred to me that the pursuit of pleasure and satisfaction is still inseperable from pain since without one we will not feel the other. The idea of the balance between positive and negatives is in itself pleasing ..order to disorder and vice versa is a universal concept. Equilibria and balance is harmonious and therefor not neutral. Perhaps pleasure itself is not the opposite of pain as an extreme it is that point at which the balance of extremes is pleasing.... stability, harmony, tranquility. So then what is the oppositive of pain in the extreme? Perhaps pleasure itself and equilbrium is in fact another paradigm a different state, a shift...........hmmm.
I had an awful feeling I was close to knowledge and then got lost......... I once thought that when you know everything there was this dreadful irony that you died instantly before you could pass this knowledge on. So here is to living another day still in the paradigm where pain exists so that I can have a lot more pleasure.......before nothing? ...thought for the day.

Did you know..................Abba film Mama Mia was watched by more people in UK than Harry Potter

It is incredible how some people can make comparisons that at first seem to be quite senseless but can mean so much if you think about it.... both these films have great stories and life experiences behind them... the amazing popularity of both and the human stories told behind them. So full of very lovely emotions and memories of the past. I think mention of the gorgeous wonderful life story of Joanne Rowling and how she started from such a humble single mother in a coffee shop to a mega rich but still great natural personality is so wonderful. The Abba group was a mega phenomena in the greatest pop era and while it didn't seem to bring all happy stories for them personally has left its trace so deeply in the minds that it can be rejuvinated 50 years later....what enormous pleasure that must be for them as it is for us.
This is the pleasure power of the mind and can bring a smile to the face and great feelings of satisfaction and contentment. As the great philosopher Gwen used to say "be thankful for small mercys" Your mind is so powerful that if you want to you can have beautiful thoughts about almost anything...... such enormous pleasure...thought for the day

Well it has to be pleasure to see traditions carried on for 400 years plus

I couldn't let the November 5th go by for many reasons without blogging a little.....but apart from the sweep to power of Barack Obama as President of the world's greatest nation we must remember remember the 5th of November , gunpowder treason and plot ...
1605 the dear old king of England James 1st and all his lords were about to be the subject of a terrorist aggression when luckily the local london bobbies (policemen) were alerted by the strange dress (long cloak and spurs) on someone who was meant to be visiting the House ! The subsequent discovery of a big load of gunpowder under the house was then made. This was all about religion too with the Spanish Catholics not happy at all about the English regime and its politics.
Can anyone see any parallels or as my dear philospher Gwen used to say "what goes around comes around" ..."nothing new under the sun my boy". What is mankind all about really when religion can have such devastating effects on mankind in the name of God. Shouldn't we be having a good look at the power of politics and making sure the power is channeled towards purposeful ends....religion has this strange power over people that allows them to kill and mame people in HIS name. Equally politicians have powers to send armed forces in the defence of nations and to fight aggression. Power is to blame and the thirst for power in both religion and politics. Maybe some time to look again at a school of diplomacy and common sense and why not for thinking.................. education and the sharing of knowledge and thought through philosophy was always the subject of persecution by leaders and politicians........... thought and debate was just far to powerful for them to tolerate. I will always be convinced in the gentle forces overcoming the violent ones................... we will get there one day. In the meantime we still encourage our children to hoist a dummy on top of the fire, let of a bunch of fireworks but never tell them the true history of what happened and why it happened so that it might not happen again.

Well its big election day and guess I should try to have some thought for the day......am I interested who is president of the USA I guess I have to say no.....do I have some thoughts on either of them about what might happen after the result is announced ...I say yes. Will either of them make it a more pleasurable world I think possibly yes. So thats why I go for Obama. Already the city of Obama will celebrate in Japan. Already Kenyans and Nigerians will feel that someone is close to them at the top of the world's house. I do feel Obama will change things as far as the outside world is concerned and will possibly attempt to relate more to other cultures and civilisations. Let's hope he is a good listener and can somehow repair a lot of the damage caused by the war mongering and now proven damaging free market greed caused by the radical and self serving right wing politicians and socialites of the USA. Socialism of a kind may finally come to the USA by way of the biggest money campaign there has ever been......so full of irony. This is the real power of the Obama camp to mobilise the masses to pay up and mount the essential impressive campagn for change. So where is my essential feeling of pleasure.........................have to wait and see. Do I care ..yes I do ..because I sincerely hope we can have a lot less aggression and hatred in the world and somehow I believe Obama may be the right signal to start the process..... thought for the day

epicaricacy-shadenfreude

It is said the weak person with low self esteem will find pleasure in other's misfortune...... seems I have morose delectation a dreadful sin ! However, the more I think about it I am possibly getting pleasure out of my own bad luck ! Anyway, thanks to a good buddy I found two new words to add to my pleasure of finding out more about myself..... Humor is just Schadenfreude with a clear conscience 幸災樂禍 enjoying (other's) calamity (and) laughing at (other's) misfortune" 他人の不幸は蜜の味 (tanin no fukō wa mitsu no aji, 他人の不幸は蜜の味^?), translates literally as "others' misfortunes are the taste of honey." Well going back to the great philosopher Gwen would say "you got what you deserved" "you got your comeupence".................and why not our great English word to gloat !
Thank you Wikipedea ...as I said before I have no original thinking just try to put the jigsaw puzzle together from any sources I can.....In any case gloating is a sort of superieur state of knowledge or experience and is often quickly replaced by compassion and care for those that are really in pain !
So today I find that being a person of low self esteem can still transform into one of superiour knowldege gaining pleasure from both humour and care ! Probably the two most important elements of happiness in life !
Thought for the day