The San Francisco quake was around 8.0. Kyoto in '95 was around 7.0. Ricter, the man who gave his name to the earthquake scale, died a few years ago. He was 84.6. http://www.seismo.unr.edu/ftp/pub/louie/class/100/magnitude.html

HighRise: Sounds like an endangered species. I don't recall hearing about spotted alligators before. Any genetic engineering factories nearby?

Sorry -- couldn't resist! G'Nite!

I throughly enjoyed our philosophical interchange. But first things first: in deference to Bart- go gold. Analytical thinking is the common denominator that brought us to this site and this holds true whether the subject is money, gold or mans future.

Our scientific knowledge has raced ahead in the last few thousand years but our spiritual advance is zero. Just fifty years ago we killed millions and even today the slaughter continues, in the name of nationalistic or religious beliefs. But we cry big tears if a few fetuses

are sacrificed because of personal preference or biological defects.

As a species we are overrunning the world but the evangilists would have us heal all the ill and feed all the starving children so they can grow up healthy enough to have more children. When will man wake up to reality? ( remember the oldie - two cannibals are peering out of the jungle watching one of the great battles and one cannibal turns to the other and says "white man crazy - he kills more than he can eat" )

Meanwhile back at home base - go gold and you too silver/

That's Kobe earthquake in '95, not Kyoto.

I believe the New Madrid event of 1811 ( actually several
shcoks between, I believe 1811-1813 ) in the mid north
american continent was an 8.5

You have a lot of these prophecy sites at hand eh! Modest interest perhaps? I posted the Hopi site, because Hopi prophecy had been mentioned here the other day.

Your last post at 23:48, sure has a lot of "TRIBALISM" in that group of organizations.

Thanks...Take Care

My parents read to us an account of that New Madrid quake when I was about 10. It was a real Heller. It changed the course of mighty rivers.

silverplate: My graphs suggest that silver has bottomed, like RJ said. We may be entering the second wave of silver, similar to what happened in 1993, when gold was driving silver. Now silver will drive a limp gold. I don't have a clue what RJ was referring to in regard to being bearish long term on silver. Unless -- he was predicting a fall after a three month or so second wave in silver.

Most of my assets are in cash, simply because I am worried about a massive inventory pileup in the US, with subsequent effects on the markets. All depends on whether US buyers can pick up the slack due to reduced foreign demand for our goods. My graphs also suggest oil and commodities bottoming in the next six months. All depend on what the El Nino or La Nina have in store for us in the fall.

My guess is that the US markets will rally for a while -- they will need something really bad to tank. Almost unstoppable -- but to rich for my blood. Will be interesting to see if Brazil tanks soon.

Gollum @23:56: Fascinating stuff. Much appreciated.

Being a mid continental quake it wasn't so intense locally
as one of equivalent magnitude would be, say, out on the
west coast. More of it's energy went into shaking the
entire continet up and down so it was pretty strong at
great distances from canada to mexico. Even so it was
still one hellacious shaking goin on.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. I learned something new. But I need to ponder on it. Can those velocities be QUANTIFIED? I mean, can you do the math and get meaningful, REAL numbers? Or are we just dealing with generalized concepts. Because if we can quantify, surely we can perform experiments and VERIFY. I haven't read of any such experiments.

Someone needs to feed that cat. He's been in that box for so long. But then, you don't NEED to feed a DEAD cat, do you? Should we, or should we not buy cat food?

.

Oh it gets even weirder than that. It can be shown that
if one can go even the least bit faster than the speed
of light, then it is possible to be able to get back
to where you started before you started from there.
Because truth propagates instantaneously, at the moment
the star wnet supernova it was true not only everywhere
that it had but also at every point in the past that it
would.

Up untill it happened in your uninverse of all possible
universes your past was such that it might or might not
happen. Once it did, your past was such that it would.

In fact it is the dichotomy between truth an reality that
gives the universe the property that it can be a universe
that allows for free will and consciosness rather than
a universe of pre destined automatons.

Two base hits. Extra bases, both. Silver $5.35 Monday.

Once velocities exceed light speed measurements are
irelevant. Photon #2's measurement outcome is predetermined
as soon as photon#1's measurement is made no matter how
far apart or how quickly the measurement is made according
to theory. Lab experiments have verified the connection
is there, but now how "fast" it travels. Fast just
does not apply.

Here is a good written summary, including eyewitness account. It affected 1 million square miles. 5 towns were destroyed in three states. The San Francisco quake affected 60,000 square miles. http://www.system.missouri.edu/upress/spring1996/bagnall.htm

Maybe it's an asteroid.

You got some bad sh!t here.

.

The Balkans is kind of a funny place for a big quake
like that. It is a monster. Not impossible though.
Too big for nuclear too, I think.
The "signature" of an asteroid strike would look much
like nuclear except potentially much larger.
News wires are pretty quiet. Maybe everyone is still
looking at their monitors saying, "What the hell was THAT"

Last I checked, USGS had still not reported this. Will try to relocate the USGS link and update.

http://www.drudgereport.com

Or...out in the balkans some cow kicked over a seismometer.

Camping Alert

If you are considering doing some camping this summer, please note the following public service announcement:

In Alaska, tourists are warned to wear tiny bells on their clothing when hiking in bear country. The bells warn away MOST bears. Tourists are also cautioned to watch the ground on the trail, paying particular attention to bear droppings to be alert for the presence of Grizzly Bears.

One can tell a Grizzly dropping because it has tiny bells in it.

-EJ

OK. I think. The movie screen thingie is new to me. The spin stuff I've run across before, but didn't fully grasp HOW the two photons were interrelated. The thing I remember most was that the effect was INSTANTANEOUS, which is what you are really saying, I guess. Instantaneous action at a distance. That REALLY blows my mind.

Did you feed the cat? Art Bell time. Go gold. Go silver. Go earthquakes. Too many people. Can't feed em all. Away.

Your truth is as good as any i have seen, i will report back after my visit to the black-hole.
G-nite JTF thanks.

Instantaneous at a distance, yes. But I don't think I
would call it instantaneous action at a distance. More
like instantaneous-predestination-of-how-measurement-
will-turn out. No action involved. No energy transfer.

Sorry about the repost, but I am way busy packing and youse guys have been having a high old time bantering about my favorite subject. Gollum, you seem to have a very clear understanding of some of the more arcane aspects of quantum theory but you still speak in terms of absolute time which, of course, must be discarded. Argent, I did not know this was an interest of yours. By the time I get back, this thread will be long over, so I take the liberty to repost the only thing I've ever really written on physics:

From July 1997

A paper clip spontaneously changes into a coat hanger due to the non-zero probability that it will happen. It is said that anything not forbidden by quantum theory, is required. Ive often suspected paper clips of this duality, but Hiesenburg also showed us all that the paper clip can just as easily, as an infant coat hanger created from the ether, change back into a paper clip. The only evidence we have of this behavior is that we just know it has to happen, much like many just know that gold will go to $500.

Feynman diagrams often resembled Rorschach tests, but the diagrams themselves depicted the "sum over histories", in which any particle takes not one path in a journey, but all possible paths. This paradox has been demonstrated in the experiment of the box with two slits. This experiment proved that a single particle - a photon, lets say - travels trough two slits in a barrier at the same time, and upon reaching a detector is shown to interfere with itself as if it were a wave and not a particle. This has been widely understood to be proof, written into the fabric of space time, that even particles masturbate. Whether or not they feel guilt about this behavior is still unknown.

The aforementioned box with two slits should not be confused with the famous box in which Schroedingers unfortunate cat waits for his fate. Of course in this thought experiment, the cat is less alive or dead than both alive and dead. This holds true until an observer collapses the wave form and a particular history is chosen. Nowhere in discussions of this sad cat has any mention been made that the cat is also an observer and would thus seal its own fate.

Had this cat lived through the diabolical machinations of physicists, with far too much space-time on their hands, it would undoubtedly give birth to Schroedingers kittens. Yes, the cat in the box is a female, actually it used to be a paper clip but thats all in the sum over histories now.

Schroedingers kittens are treated with much the same disrespect as their wiry mother, far beyond the assistance or rescue of Bob Barker. These unfortunates are each placed in there own death/life duality box. Each box is rigged to kill these poor cats should a particle measure a certain spin. The reason for two kitties is that, rather than a single particle, a pair of particles, created from a single event, will cause the ax to fall onto one of our fluffy friends.

When two particles a created from a single event, the sum of their "spin" properties must always add to zero. We know the any particle does not "choose" a past until observed, thus, if we observed one particle to have a certain spin, the other particle must then assume a history of the offsetting spin, always obeying Newtons law of conservation of energy, creating a net sum of zero.

We now place these two kitties in separate space crafts, connected by a tubular umbilical. The event transpires to create two particles which promptly speed toward their respective kittens. The umbilical is now severed, using a chain saw which spontaneously sprang into being as a side effect of the improbable event of a paper clip choosing the coat hanger lifestyle. These craft speed apart at a significant fraction of the speed of light until, several years later, they are now 1 light year apart. The kittens have survived on strict rations of Meow Mix of which these precocious little kitties have asked for by name.

We know that if a particle has X spin, it will break a vile of poison in the box and a kitten will die. We also know that should the particle be measured to have Y spin, the vial will not break, and the kittens will grow to become cats and therefore graduate to the even more frightening experiments of the type visited on their poor mother. We also know that if we measure one of these related particles to have a certain spin, this will collapse the wave form of both particles, which will then assume the only histories available to them, that of an opposite of the other particle and thus obeying the law of conservation of energy.

When we then open the spacecraft of kitty one, we will observe if the fearless feline is alive or dead, always remembering that until the act of observation, the observed particle will not assume any history, preferring its own "sum over histories" until it actually has to choose one. This phenomenon is much like the Clinton administration, which will not take a position on any issue until the latest polls are in.

Let us say that we have opened the space craft and observed the particle to have a spin of Y. Like flipping a coin, the chances that the particle will assume a spin of Y is exactly 50%. We now find a live, fluffy kitty vehemently asking for more Meow Mix by name. We know that the particle did not assume the Y spin until observed and, thus, the kittens fate was not decided until the actual observation, exactly the same as its hapless mother.

Remembering the law of conservation of energy, as soon as we observe the particle of kitty one, the particle of kitty two must then, immediately, assume the history of a particle of spin X. The crucial distinction here is the each particle assumes a particular history only after the act of observation. Kitty one, was always alive, as kitty two was always dead, but until the observation, neither kitten was alive or dead. They existed in a juxtaposed position of life and death. If we could travel back in time and repeat this observation, again and again, for a hundred times, we would find 50 live kittens and 50 dead as a doornail kitties.

When we discover kitty one to be alive, and knowing that the second particle must assume an opposite history, we can only conclude that K2 was immediately killed only upon the observation of K1. How can this be? The kitties are now 1 light year apart! Relativity tells us that nothing travels faster that the speed of light and that for a photon of light, time stands still and has no meaning. Yet as soon as we observe our kitten to be alive or dead, K2 must immediately, without the slightest pause, assume the opposite. The important thing to keep in mind, is that once a history is assumed, it has always been that way. If K1 is alive, K2 has always been dead although this history was not chosen until we observed the results.

Einstein called this instantaneous transfer of information "spooky action at a distance" and was one of the primary reasons that he rejected quantum theory for most of his life, even thought he was instrumental in its discovery. The accepted term today is "non locality" or, as some prefer, poppycock.

This very oversimplified explanation of the "sum over histories" has been made to offer consolation to all those despairing to gold market today. Content yourselves to know that, while gold is in the doldrums here, in another history, gold is soaring.

For those of you bored to tears by this post, realize, that in another history, I spent the last several hundred words extolling the virtues and imminent rise of gold

As a Canadian who observes the actions of the Democrats and the Republicans I have often been curious as to why so much time is spent on Cinton'S sex life and other seemingly trivial matters such as political contributions received from the Chinese while everyone knows that the American lobbyists are doing exactly the same thing.

No mention is ever made of the Republicans protecting the tobacco industry, nor is there any pursuit of the tobacco company heads stating obvious lies that tobacco does not harm people or that nicotine is not addictive or deliberately added to tobacco. I DO NOT SEE ANY OF THESE CEO'S BEING CHARGED OR GOING TO JAIL FOR LYING TO CONGRESS, they aren't even being investigated. The enormous contributions from business to the both parties, the majority to the Republicans is never examined, why not?

Yours is the most influential nation on earth and it is becoming the laughing stock of the world for political gain. If every world leader was held to the same standard as Clinton we would have no world leaders. We may not even have any followers.

The rest of the world looks to the United States for guidance in these troubled times and what do we get? Did the president lie about having sex!

I hope that you in your position would be able to help bring the focus of Congress and the nation to important affairs of state and not just affairs.

AMERICANS ARE GOOD PEOPLE AND THEY DESERVE BETTER

Absolute time is a local paramaterization of the non spatial
odering of the occurrance of events. It has it's uses.
Different observers will see a different spacing of these
events depending upon their inertial frame of reference,
but the sequence will retain it's monotonic ordering.
It is understood that space and time make up a continium.
In the case of undiferentiated events, that is to say
events wherin the necessary wave collapse has not yet occurred
in is meaningless to think in terms of either space or
time but only in probabilities and probability space.

If your 21:36 is correct, then why does a radio signal travel demonstrably faster from NY to LA than from LA to NY ?
& don't give me any crap abouut boucing off the left coast !
Perhaps there are stranger things than are dreampt of in relativist
phylosophy.


Y.O.S.


TAR BABY

Absolutely

OK

The earth rotates. While the radio wave is in flight
LA is coming to meet it. While anything from LA is
coming NY tries to get away. The radio wave, though
always traveling at the speed of light has diferent
distances to travel in absolute ( sorry, RJ ) space.

This is better than Art Bell. RJ: Outstanding. Very lucid.

Gollum: No ENERGY transfer? Are we talking metaphysics here, or physics? Just kidding. Sorta. Would like to continue this at another time.

So far Schroedinger's Cat has been shot, poisoned and maybe gassed. My cat's name is Merlin, after King Arthur's magician buddy. I think I will go check on him to see how he is doing . All this talk of action at a distance may have made him uneasy. Art Bell awaits.

No confirmation yet. I'd be happy if this turned out to be a false alarm. http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/cgi-bin/quake/gldfs.cr.usgs.gov

came to lose its place as the world's reserve currency and how the dollar took its place? I presume it had to do with their going broke in WWII while the USA was left the only sizable wealthy and undamaged industrial power. Thx.
-EJ

It's a night. I'm going to go ponder why all vertebrates
( and others ) need to dream.

Apparantly they've run out of the currency paper & have started keeping accounts like they do in a game of Hearts, on a sheet of typing paper !
My guess is that the standstill agreement must come with an IaManFer gurantee or otherwise the Western Banks would have to book these non-performing loans as a liability.
This explains R. Rubins agitation for Congressional approval for the latest $18 billion tranch of bailout funds.
There's still not enough to cover the default debacle across the globe.
They're reduced to merely "threatening" to make more loans in Russia.
They don't have the dough to lend, even if the Ailing Tigers were dumb enough to take the bate & switch to nationalization.
Every one is just whistling past the graveyard of insolvency.
How long will the markets pretend that the Money Center Banks are
solvent. Perhaps if the Conservatives & radicals in Congress hold this drab of funding up, the house will come down.

A moratorium is the last ditch effort. I can hear the quiet before the storm of realization. How about one of those Klinton Mexican Bridge loans out of the Currency stableization fund ? Nope, at least the Mexicans had an oil industry to pledge @ $18 oil. Don't the IaManFers have "special borrowing rights" up to about $50 Billion ? What are the conditions ? Let's see $78 Billion for indonesia, how much forb the bulk of the Korean short term debt ? Malaysia ? China ?
Won't they need some credit to start picking up some of the pieces after all the current credits are sucked down the black hole of default.
Don't they ( IMF ) also have 2600 Tons of AU that they could threaten to sell like they hung over the market for most of 96 & 97 ? What a pity that they would be lucky to raise $20 TO 40 BILLION AT THE PRICE THEY HAVE DRIVEN Au TO, TOO MUCH OF A TURNIP THERE !
Let's see, there's still the US Tax Payer. Yeah, that's the ticket !

Y.O.S.


TAR BABY

P.S.
OOPPS, My last post ( Grasshopper Mechanics ) was meant to be respectfully addressed to Gollum.

For Little Gritty Bum
Seems like the harder you study .. the less you
learn .. Nasty Problem you got there .. Dont mean
to offend .. Try saloosa 45.

The distance traveled by LA in the time it takes the signal from NY to reach it because of the earth's rotation does not account for the difference. The difference is more likly the result of the velocity imparted to the signal by thr rotation & the counter phenomenon encountered by a signal overcoming this force.

Heresy ? You betcha !


Y.O.S.


TAR BABY

This is odd. Have heard no confirmation by anyone else. Either the group reporting this F*ed up big time, or our government is sleeping through another Big Boom.

Salads .. are delicious BUT they must be made properly.
1. Check you fridge for "iceberg" lettuce. Also the fridges
of your close friends/relatives. If you find any pitch
it out and tell whoever bought it NEVER to do that again.
2. Find a place where you can buy real lettuce and proper
greens for salad.. red oak .. butter lettuce.. watercress
chicory.. whatever. Use these things to make salads.
3. If you MUST put tomatoes in a lettuce salad use the
whole small cocktail type. Chopping tomato into a salad
is criminal, as the juice dilutes the dressing. Only
fools do this. If you wish for tomatoes .. serve them
sliced on a side dish drizzeled with french dressing
amd cracked pepper.
4. A salad should be PRIMARILY about lettuce. Add
those small tomatoes or sliced fresh mushrooms or even
sliced chives .. But nothing else please .. and these
are not in any way necessary.
5. Use this salad dressing .. In a small jar .. clearly
designated for this specific use. Pour in roughly one
inch of Good Olive Oil ( italian preferably from spoletto )
.. some balsamic vinegar ( about 10-15 % of the amount
of oil ) .. 2 crushed galic cloves.. about a heaping
teaspoon of mustard .. any type .. a pinch of cumin
seed .. salt / pepper .. maybe some fresh dill or
fennel IF availble.
Shake this till emulsified and pour on salad. Mix with
two forks. The idea is for the leaves to be covered
with dressing but with no surplus in the bowl.
6. Serve with bruscetta .. Make Toast .. drizzle with
olive oil .. crush one garlic clove on each piece and
spread it around
7. Healthy and delicious .. serve with icy cold beer.

Well, I just rechecked the time and date of that 8.4 seismic event. 21:53 of June 5. More than 30 hours ago. This looks more and more like a false report. As Emily Letellier would say--never mind.

Indeed, most of us seem to have a hard time disregarding distance, or "space", or what ever it's called. "Time", we've learned to "mess with" in our minds, but the idea, that space is irrelevant is beyond the beyond for most. No faster than light communication - NO DISTANCE!

What's so hard about that?

NO DISTANCE
NO DISTANCE
NO DISTANCE

Yes, you calculated wrong. 40% silver equates to 40 parts
per 100. 4/9 is not right. That would mean 40% OF 90%.
There is a hefty premium on the 40% silver coins.

How many five gallon buckets to contain a ton of winter wheat please?

Yes. At last, and alas, I figured out the flaw too. Still, $1600 for 295 ounces of Silver is not bad. Works out to about $5.35 per ounce. Spot Silver is 5.28.

http://home.worldnet.fr/scdut/default.shtml

Do you still believe Soviet Migs are surperrior to those of USA?

Notice, I gave you a misspelled word to pick on?

Anglais, s'il vous plait!!

G'day Kitco mates.
Many of you have expressed your concerns about how to hold your 'precious' in a form that is unavailable to your government. I spent the afternoon ( Aussie time ) browsing the net and had a good look at the Perth Mint's updated URL. It occurred to me that some of you may wish to hold precious in a stable democracy out of the clutches of your government. Check out the Perth Mint's depositary services. It would be up to you to figure out how to pay for your precious in Perth with complete privacy.Use your imagination!!

Think of it.
Things get untenable wherever you happen to live.
You hop on the next plane to the land of Oz.
Not only do you arrive at the most wonderful country on the earth, BUT-- you have the means to support yourself for an indefinite period.
You will probably never want to leave ( the REAL battle begins when your tourist visa runs out ) .

http://www.perthmint.com.au/index.shtml

The IMF has about $50 billion on deposit. About $35 billion are member country deposits. Those countries can reclaim those funds on demand so they only have about $15 billion that is lendable. The IMF can not print money. That must be done by the member countries who would then contribute it to the IMF. A slow and complicated process.

http://www.perthmint.com.au/depository/about/location.shtml

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/world/story.html?s=z/reuters/980605/international/stories/indonesia_39.html

http://nt.excite.com/news/u/980607/04/news-bankruptcy

http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19980605/V000890-060598-idx.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/980605/russia_fit_1.html

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/technology/story.html?s=z/reuters/980604/tech/stories/insurance_1.html

I dont know much about American
Migs .. Didnt even know they made
them.
Regarding your spelling .. That
was close enough to a real word ..
but "nieve" .. blooper .. really now.

6pack@0033--

the prophecies bookmarks are 'all they can be', and some more.

i guard and protect my bookmarks as if they were precious....
knowledge is power......and more than precious.....wait for
chaos and flux to run amux us.......everyone will want power...
only a smattering will possess it.

don't be afraid of the lawnmower blade......the next ice-age approaches,
even as the pundits in high places toll the bell of global warming...
co2 and the weather......we are heading for the coldest winter on record..after this record breaking heat wave finishes its' run.

cherokee!:..riding.the.ether...looking-back-to-see-forward.....

Most Elliott wave devotees ( and all realists ) would regard the price action in gold from 12 January to 6 April as a contra-trend rally in typical ABC form, a 5-3-5 pattern. After 6 April can be counted as a five wave decline in a new larger degree bear pattern. Just to keep goldbugs all hoping it isn't true,this latest five wave decline stopped short of new lows ( meaning lower than 12 January ) . A rally would--under this scenario--be followed by a decline at least to $269.40. $240 would be quite reasonable.

Given that one may turn Elliott on his head and see him as equally correct, the fact that new lows were not made on 1 June could also be seen as supporting the idea that 12 Janury to 29 January was a new impulse wave up and that 29 January to 1 June is a corrective wave of the irregular type wherein wave B's extremity exceeded the 29 Janary end of wave 1.

The Carolan Spiral Calendar f19 ( =1910 calendar days ) tie from the important 11 March 1993 low to 3 June would at least support the notion that a

The Carolan Spiral Calendar f19 ( =1910 calendar days ) tie from the important 11 March 1993 low to 3 June would at least support the notion that a low of some significant degree is confirmed. I have learned NOT to assume that a important cycle length from an important past date means that the new date is of equal importance to the initial date, 11 March 1993 in this case. Nevertheless there are also very important stock market cycle ties to this time frame--including a remarkable one to the 1942 low ( and the end of the bear market from 1929 ) --just as there were on 12 January. Of course the stock market rallied strongly after 12 January while the gold market rallied only weakly.

Since the stock market is in a very long term bull market and gold in a very long term bear market the probabilities favor continuation of these trends. Nevertheless since the stock market and gold often turn together ( see 1992-94 ) , one shoud look for a rally here ( as also on Elliott grounds ) and carefully gauge its strength versus the stock market. My impression, however, based upon all of this,is that stocks will ( again! ) do better than gold, and that is where my money is going.

Wow! I missed all the discussion about similtaneity and the Schroedinger cat paradox. Yes -- some kinds of information do seem to travel instantly throughout the Universe.

LGB: I think we have your Loral 'fall guy'. The following is an except of another article today by Jeff Gerth in the New York Times -- probably front page news. Text not yet on Matt Drudge, or I missed it.

The fall guy is physicist Wah Lim, a Chinese-born American citizen, and former senior vice president of Loral. Apparently, the China Aerospace missle crash in question occurred on hill 22 on Feb 1996. China Aerospace launches military and civilian missles -- which Loral obviously knew. Liu Jiyuan , chairman of China Aerospace, asked Loral to put Lim in charge of a review panel to get a second opinion regarding the cause of the crash. Lim sent a very cooperative letter to Liu, copy apparently now available to the Dept of Justice criminal investigation. Loral had to know about the letter, but information on senior executives briefed not available.

Loral's mandate from the US government expressly forbode 'launch vehicle/satellite detail design', or 'information that will enhance the launch site facilities or launch vehicle/mission capabilities' of the Peoples Republic of China. However, it is clear to me that the panel of Loral's Lim, and others from Hughes, British Aerospace, and Daimler-Benz Aerospace did indeed send a report of som ekind ( fax ) to Liu, which lead to China Aerospace improving their civilian ( and military ) launch capability. An Air Force Agency, the National Air Intelligence Center, thought so to, and sent a review to DTSA, which sent the review to the State Department, which sent it to the dept of Justice for criminal investigation. The State Department is probably still seething from the day WJC took their regularatory contol of foreign US satellite lauches, and gave it to the Ron Brown, Commerce crowd. And for good reason -- big time security breach.

The CIA report, released on Friday ( still secret ) after a brief delay by Janet Reno, apparently conficts with the NAIC report. That CIA report, by the way, was released before George Tenet was director of the CIA. I still don't know what G. Tenet actually said.

What is puzzling is that Loral must have made alot of money by fixing the Chinese missle problem. The Loral higherups almost certainly knew how much money they would make if the Chinese missle problem could be fixed. The official postion of Loral now is that it was a mistake, not a security breach. It seems that 'Lim acted without the support of Loral', according to Loral's outside attorneys. I wonder -- why did they retain outside attorneys. Most large corporations have an army of them. Unless ... we are talking about criminal investigation. Also -- as I know learning from friends about how you cover your rear end in corporate circles, the official Loral denial could have come after they discovered the Justice investigation. 'They just didn't know about what happened until much later' Interesting.

LGB: I'd suggest you steer clear of Lim. He is 'expendable', as well as any others associated with him. Former senior vice president of Loral .. wonder where he is now. My intuitive guess is that he has been generously rewarded, even if he has been demoted. Perhaps by both Loral and the Communist Chinese Government. He would make a perfect Wener Von Braun lookalike for that secret military site in the Gobi desert. Now -- the people that worked for him -- that may be another story. Beware those corporate politics -- anything of this magnitude can suck in alot of innocents.

All: Incidentally, you should all know that the director of the NSA is not a military type, but a political type who will say anything that the WJC crowd tells him to. Fortunately our FBI director and CIA director seem to be made of stronger stuff, thank God.

http://www.dtic.mil/cendi/naic.html

gollum: Looks like you know your physics! I am impressed. Perhaps whe should set up a dialogue some time from now when my debt to Bart Kitner has been neutralized. I am now short at least a dozen precious metals related posts!

SM Lee warns of yuan
devaluation

[TOKYO]

ingapore Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew warned yesterday
that China may be forced to devalue the yuan if its Asian
neighbours failed to pull themselves out of their economic
crisis.

Beijing, with its US$140 billion ( S$237 billion ) in
foreign reserves, would face little pressure for
"one year . . . or maybe 18 months", Mr Lee told
a seminar here.

"The question is, does it make sense beyond a
certain point?" he asked.

The spectre of a Chinese devaluation has haunted
financial markets across Asia for months as the
economic crisis has dragged down currencies
across the region.

Many fear a yuan devaluation would trigger
another, even more painful round of currency
turmoil, as investors flee the region.

Beijing has repeatedly pledged not to devalue its currency. The yuan
was last cut in value in 1994.

Mr Lee said: "If the worst happens, like the Japanese yen goes down
to 150, 160 or 170 ( against the US dollar ) then the renminbi ( or
yuan ) is in some difficulties as exports will become overpriced,
investments and the economy will slow down."

The yen has been sliding badly for the past two months and was
yesterday close to the 140 yen level against the dollar, a seven-year
low.

Economists in Japan warn it could tumble to 160 yen by the
year-end, dragged down by the country's deep slump.

If Asia's currencies stabilised within the next year at a level 30 to 40
per cent below their rate before the crisis broke, then "the ideal
outcome would be for China to do a one off ( devaluation ) of 10 to
15 per cent to become more competitive", Mr Lee said.

"The advantage of devaluing the renminbi by 30 per cent in 1994 has
already been wiped out."

Inevitably any devaluation would have a serious impact on
Hongkong, which has aggressively defended its currency peg to the
US dollar.

'If China devalues, Hongkong will have to do a one-off devaluation,"
said the former Singapore prime minister.

But Hongkong "cannot do it now because confidence is a critical
factor".

"Hongkong's economy would be worse off with devaluation and they
have to keep the peg," he said. "But when the right moment comes
they should get out of their shackles."

Mr Lee was speaking at an international conference here on "The
Future of Asia", which gathered government and business leaders
from across the region.

Anson Chan, Hongkong's chief secretary, dismissed any chance of a
Chinese devaluation.

The Hongkong government has been strongly committed to
maintaining its dollar peg, particularly in the months after the handover
of the former British colony to Chinese rule.

"It is neither in China's national interest nor is it politically or socially
beneficial for the renminbi to be devalued," she told the conference.

China was already running a trade surplus with the US, she noted. "If
it chose to devalue its currency, it would only tend to exacerbate the
trade gap and add to the trade conflict."

"China still has to rely on imports so if the renminbi is devalued the
imports will clearly be more expensive and China will be importing
inflation." -- AFP

All: These days, alot of security can be bypassed instantly with a fax machine. Secret information can be removed from a secure area on a zerox, and carried to a non-secure location. Across the street from Commerce, in the case of John Huang. I think our information collecting/security agencies had better get on the ball, as it seems the most serious breach of security in the last five years or so came from the highest echelons of government, not from some computer hackers. Same for the Loral episode. I wonder what else we will discover -- I suspect we only have the tip of the iceberg.

Makes my WWII spycatcher book look dull by comparison. Or even those great George Smiley stories by John LeCarre. Just wait till he writes about this one! This one could be a blockbuster at the box office. Commerce mole gives away satellite security secrets wholesale, funded by Democratic Campaign contributions from the Communist Chinese Government. I do not blaim the Chinese, if we were this dumb. Come to thing of it, how about Jim Carey as the director of the NSA? Someone was really dumb, especially if they knew about what happened, and did nothing.

So - this time they are saying that it may happen -- a Yuan devaluation. That will be bearish for gold ( Hong Kong gold sales? ) , and probably bearish for silver. Silver seems to follow a different drum, so it may survive relatively unscathed.

Jin -- please take care. I am amazed how peaceful Indonesia is, given what happened. I'll bet that the price of gold where you are is still rising, but that noone is buying. I guess you will have to wait until the economy recovers. Until then -- I hope you have it safely hidden from prying eyes. My reasoning is that is when precious metals reserves should show up to jump start an economy. Before that time, you are just feeding a voracious dying monster, and the gold will leave the country anyway. That will be a lesson for us westerners to learn when it is our turn in the deflationary cycle.

.the question is why? Drudge broke the story....maybe main stream press are still upset with his talk at the press club..very strange

http://www.drudgereport.com/n.htm I still don't know. An 8.4 should have caused some real commotion. What I posted gives time and location.

sub bases.....Drudge did call this a mystery quake but it sure got a lot of net coverage....good example of people power on the net,main stream has not touched this...as I said could of been a hoax...it was sure a lot of fun while it was going on.....but then again I live for conspiracy stuff

Off to attend my hometown church with my dear Mother, as of today, 75 years young, along with her older son ( flying in from Scotland, and her two daughters flying in from Dallas and Nashville ) . Yes, what a proud day for us all. A party in the country afterwards, should be 200 fine folks gathering from these here parts. You are all greatly invited to celebrate with us....smell the wind...is that bbq beef I smell....uh huh. Do come on down! yes, sir....

All: This is not going to go away -- this time.

hxtp://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19980606/V000685-060698-idx.

html

Please convert hxtp to http, and splice together for latest Jesse Helms comments.

All: It appears that Lim now works for Hughes. He is a physicist, with expertise in missl guidance. It is not surprise to me that Loral would have people that were expert in missle guidance system, right, LGB? In your defense, Loral is really not to blame, though their people should have known better. Guess they didn't think about those Chinese missles aimed at LA. It is this entire crazy political climate where everything is for sale, even our most precious encryptation algorithms ( sp? ) . Let us hope that this time the massive leak in Commerce is plugged. Makes Aldrich Ames look like a kindergarden kid. We don't need spymasters these days. We do it to ourselves.

hxtp://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19980528/V000058-052898-idx.

html

Just paste together, and change hxtp to http.

All: Out to enjoy the weather.

http://www.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/1998/dom/980427/cover1.html

So, why have the Gnomes of Zurich announced the sale of their gold -
which has been the stabilizing keel of the Swiss Franc for nearly two centuries?

It will be necessary to delete the extra letters "en" in the word "golden" before pasting the URL to your Internet locator:

http://www.golden-eagle.com/editorials_98/vronsky060898.html

Evil forces undermining Australian confidence-govt

CANBERRA, June 7 ( Reuters ) - Australian Deputy Prime Minister Tim Fischer said on Sunday "evil economic forces" were undermining Australian economic confidence.

12-year lows of just under US$0.60 on Friday.

"I think it's a sharp reminder that there are forces, evil economic forces including the negative aspects of pure economic rationalism which I reject, abounding at this time," Fischer said when asked about such a rate hike.

"We are not going to walk into the coliseum to be slaughtered at this next election," Fischer told the Ten Network.

"Yes, there's a lot of fragility with regard to economic confidence, a lot of scaredness about job security at this time. Well, we are going to answer that with a package of policies which stack up, particularly on job sustainability,"

The latest Reuters Poll Trend, a smoothed average of the three major published opinion polls, showed the government currently trails the Labor opposition by about two points.
http://www.freecartoons.com/ReutersNews/AUSTRALIA-POLITICS.html

these sites are where the cyber people discuss all sorts of money, encryption, gold and privacy issues. It's pretty hard core. The Time article was nothing compared to this stuff.

http://www.infoseek.com/Titles?qt=cyphernomicon&col=WW&sv=N3
http://www.oberlin.edu/~brchkind/cyphernomicon/chapter7/7.7.html

http://www.oberlin.edu/~brchkind/cyphernomicon/cyphernomicon.contents.html

Small point, but you mention the UK as a "gold rich" central banker and Japan as a gold poor one, and don't mention Italy at all. In fact Japan's CB holds more gold than the BOE, and Italy's nearly three times as much as either of the other two.

3 hours long. Should be interesting.

I noticed that the agency from which Drudge got the info was one that reports nuke explosions. What other agencies track them? Surely more than one would have reported it. Else it's a computer glitch, or someone playing games with Drudge. Please elaborate if you have any info.

Where's chas when we need him?

IMO, the final conclusion of my statement about the US's "gold standard" is that the dollar bills issued by banks and the gov't were and are derivitives. Even the ones that had "Gold certificate" printed on them.

Remember roosevelt and his executive order?

I stand in awe of your mother, and salute her! Happy birthday, Studio.mom.

Nick@C, I'd take an excuse to visit Australia, always wanted to and have been putting it off for too long.

aurophile: You're right about the stock market, it's likely to keep going up as long as all the news the market gets is intepreted as good news. a few years ago, if Pakistan blew up a nuke the market would go down for fear of the impact of political instability on the world economy. Now the market would go up in anticipation of more Asian flight capital. Hat's off to you if got the cajones to ride the last 3% - 5% of of the bubble to the top. Good luck!
-EJ

Does anyone here know if the USGS reported the Pakistani and Indian nuclear tests in their earthquake reports? The 8.4 isn't there.

No longer have your email address.pls email me. Thx amigo

This is a rebroadcast. My wife and I watched it before. The show consists to the usual suspects all telling it like it is in a somewhat disorganized panel presentation and discussion. If this show were my introduction to Y2K, I'd be baffled. I'd ask myself: why is this group of high-level guys talking about this problem like it's the end of the world yet I hardly hear anyone else talking about it in these dire terms, such as the mainstream press? They also come off as vaguely delighted with the bad news they have to offer, as if it gives them some unusual importance because they have special knowledge not generally shared. This undermines their credibility. People who are prone to expect the worst will get the impression from the show that Y2K is some kind of disaster waiting to happen, but they will not be able to explain exactly why to anyone else and they will not see follow-up stories in the mainstream press, so in time the feeling is likely to pass. Optimistic types will simply dismiss the show as the prognostications of alarmists.
-EJ

stuff if you want a blow by blow account go to Free Republic go to the forum section you will have to scroll down a bit the last post was early this morning,

grant;I caught the C-Span show its indeed very good Ed Yardin cuts no slack,I'll watch it again

http://www.freerepublic.com

President Roosevelt's "New Deal" which, in addition to continuing the RFC ( President Hoover's "trickle-down" theory expressed in the Reconstruction Finance Corporation [RFC] ) , introduced reforms designed to help directly those below.

However, by failing to do away with the basic causes of depression and mass unemployment inherent in capitalism, ( adam smith 1776 - Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, "It espouses free-market competition, with limited government intervention, it regards unemployment as a necessary "EVIL", to keep costs-and therefore prices-in check," ) , Keynesism, in the form of both "trickle-down" and "trickle-up" failed to work; in 1937-38 there was a sharp economic breakdown and only the advent of World War II pulled the country out of the crisis.

After World War II Keynesism was revived and became accepted government policy in Western Europe as well as in the United States. The initiation of the COLD WAR resulted in government subsidization of industry through the purchase of gigantic armaments at public expense.

In line with big business policies to dominate the world the Keynesian theory well fitted the needs of American Corporations. Under the impetus of war scares and red scares, the huge armaments program with its "trickle-down" theory of prosperity superseded any "FAIR DEAL" or "WELFARE STATE" approach to the problem of depression and mass unemployment as LIBERAL and LABOR LEADERS with few exceptions went along with the program.

But again Keynesism failed to prevent the economic breakdown of 1949-50. Only the HOT WAR in Korea temporarily pulled the country out of the depression and when that "POLICE ACTION" was over the nation was faced by the so-called ROLLING RECESSION of 1953-54 with its millions of unemployed and its millions of young men siphoned off into military service.

Profits in the postwar period of the cold and hot wars dwarfed the bumper profits of the World War II years. From 1947 to 1952 profits before taxes totaled 213.6 Billions of dollars as against 116.7 Billions from 1940 to 1945, while profits after taxes came to 113.3 Billions of dollars as compared with 55.1 Billions.

Profits per production worker in manufacturing rose from $957 in 1944 to $1,756 in 1952, an illustration of how monopoly was able to squeeze ever greater profits out of workers through increased speed-up, skyrocketing prices, and JUICY WAR CONTRACTS.

The "Wall Street Journal" in its issue of April 9, 1952, declared "...Green, Murray ( AFL ) and others such piously anti-Communist leaders are actually playing unintentionally we hope, Russia's game by striking or threatening to strike..."

The Chamber of Commerce in its fifth report on Communism said that the real danger came from non-Communists, ( fellow traveller? ) , "those who engage in pro-Communist activities" such as fighting for higher wages, housing, or the repeal of the thought-control Smith Act. "The danger," said the Chamber in its report, comes from "ostensibly non-Communist individuals and organizations"

FWIW ....Take Care

Randgold having interest in both. Continued consolidation in the industry with major restructuring in RSA.

Some experimental subjects were hooked up with an array of
electroencephlogragph ( EEG ) electrodes and given a simple
decision making task to perform. When a light went on they
had to decide whether or not to push a button.

By analysing the time of arrival of electrical impulses at the
various electrodes, a computer generated three dimensional map of
the location of the origin of the activity could be produced.

It was found that the activity woukd begin at some point, spread
to various areas of the brain, eventually reach the motor control
areas for the muscles that control the hand, and the finger would
move.

The intersting thing is that at the time of decision, the activity
would originate at some very small discrete point or another.
Decisions are made as very localized events, perhaps as localized
as a single electron jump from one orbital to another on a single
atom.

It would appear then, that the mind may be able to influence the
transitions of electron states. One is left to theorize that the
brain/mind interface incorporates a kind of quantuum computer. That
perhaps the brain exists in the "reality" space of collapsed
wave functions, the mind exists in the "truth" space of events
yet to be, and consciousness and free will arise out of the
workings of the interface between the two.

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a302825.htm

Today I taught a 13 year old to do low temperature casting and they in turn taught 2 others who'd never done it. It is an easy introduction to the love of jewelry and principles of art. The steps were as follows.

We obtained cuttlefish bone. This is sold in the pet department of a grocery store for an outrageous 2 or 3 dollars but is about 25 cents a bird shows or pet shows. The ends were cut off, then the bone cut in half and ground square by rubbing on a concrete driveway. We then cut the bone in half to make 2 rectangles. These were ground together lightly until they fitted well. Then with a pencil we carved out on one side a button hole, a sprue groove and the form for metal. With our 4 molds we made a flower, a model spear point, a fish and a ring, the largest being about 1.5 inches long. We heated the pewter ( I told them to NEVER HEAT LEAD as lead produces toxic fumes which could hurt them ) in an old pan over a propane stove outside, set up the molds in an old tin can and poured with an old spoon ( using gloves, aprons, eye protection, shoes et cetera ) . The whole process including the teaching and cleanup took about an hour. Files and nippers were used in trimming the finished forms. IMHO

approach the speed of light, or what?

As you can see, I had a window seat in physics class.

Ever play pool at Flat Top Jonny's?

-EJ

Thanks for the link. Yep, looks like a hoax. Wonder if MD is tweaking us or someone tweaked him?

It depends on what you mean by shorten. If you were a
passenger on board such an object enerything would seem
fine. Plenty of legroom. If you were an observer watching
if fly away or toward you, it would appear to be shortened
but on closer inspection you would conclude that the space
it was in was what was shortened. If it was flying past you
so that you viewed it from the side, it would look
rotated.

Oh, no I have never played at FTJ. Ever play at Johnson
City?

There will eventually be another 8.4 event when someone
goes out there and sets back that seismometer the cow
kicked over.

amazed at the info that came out of cyber sleuths all nite,guys were all over the net searching for stuff,just goes to show the why the MEDIA is trying to trash MD at any cost....

it sucked me right in.......and I saved myself a roll of silver eagles

I agree. It's always fun tracking and determining if
an apparent event is a real event or a non-event

Hello Missing...re your post of yesterday , I'm happy to admit to you that
I'm far from being privvy to all things going on at Loral...I daresay plenty of VP's are even "unprivy"...however, the gist of that article confuses me since the Chinese "Loral scientist" identified does not work for Space Systems Loral, nor did he at the time of the launch failure. I know all the "Scinetists" at Loral Space and he is NOT one of them. I suspect once again, the media are confusing the facts. ( What a shock! )

Didn't someone say he worked at Hughes?

Re your admonishment about my violating DISCO security Spud, relax. There's no prohibition that I know of in divulging that you have worked on a past program. Naturally I don't currently hold a clearance, as the company I work for now doesn't do any classified or defense related work. And interestingly, you are quite aware of the industry title of "Aviation Leak" in regards to that periodical.....which only re-inforces a point I made eariler that publically published periodicals have freely dessiminated far more information of a sensitive or "classified" nature, than any supposed "technology transfer" from a Satellite manufacturer could have ( In areas in which that satellite manufacturer has no knowledge or expertise, specifically, launch vehicles )

Almost forgot....Silver has seen it's low for 1998! Buy silver!!!!!!!

Seems pretty quir around here right now, I guess
I'll go looking for Flat Top Jonny's. Be back
later.

A GIANT HAPPY BIRTHDAY GULP TO YOUR MOM...GULP...NAMASTE'

Big title, but I have been trying to gather informative URL's for this and they are not ALL readily available. I'll try it this way- 1 ) Recent US quakes; 2 ) same world; 3 ) potentials 4 ) mechanics 5 ) results. 5 will be devided into evidence and prognostications. Can't get it all at once. I'll do 1-3 URL's and when the rest comes in, I'll do it. My own personal minute experience will be in 5 Hang on, I'll do the best I can

All Interested: I have flown the F-4 and F-16 in an operational role. I have many friends that have flown the F-15. I worked on the original Statement of Need for the ATF/F-22 "way back" in the early/mid eighties. I have studied the performance parameters of most of the world's fighter a/c and flown against many. No single country has cornered the market on fighter superiority. If U.S. fighters/fighter pilots have a edge it is because the combination of avionics/aerodynamics/propulsion/maintenance/training is superb. Throw in others systems such as AWACS along with a philosophy of disciplined empowerment and you have an awesome potential. But the bottomline: It is not the size of the dog in the fight, it is the fight in the dog.

will be the single biggest cluster screw-up in the history of mankind. One thing for sure, it will show the world that politicians can't get out of their own way. I wonder how many forests will need to be chopped down to supply the mountains of paper these individuals are creating.

Smaller community systems will surely be the wave of the future. Central anything after this will be dead for sure...

to find Flat Top Jonny's. But it's worth it if you like to drink great beer while you shoot pool. I learned to play pool in bars. State-dependent learning requires that I have at least one beer but no more than three in a few hours to play at peak performance. I am fairly constantly on the road around the USA. Maybe we can hook up for a game sometime.
-EJ

How many five gallon buckets to contain a ton of winter wheat please?

There has been an intense debate on this forum regarding the issue of deflation or inflation. I have been wanting to post the following for a long time. Finally ,here it is. A forecast of deflation is provocative and controversial. It means falling stock prices, falling commodities prices, falling wage rates, falling real estate values and rising unemployment. In deflation the dollar will rise against foreign currencies and surprisingly gold will rise. Why ?
Please think of the entire money system as an upside down debt pyramid. I think of a pyramid as having a flat top so it does not sit on a point but on a square top that sit in turn on a block of gold, the gold in the vaults of central banks.It could be called a credit pyramid, but the word debt stresses the more important debtor side of the problem. The pyramid includes all debtors and creditors in the entire world, not just in dollars but in all currencies. Please arrange the debtors according to their liquidity, with most liquid down near the gold base. As you go up the pyramid the debtors get less and less liquid, so the less liquid are at the very top.This means there are far more illiquid than liquid debtors, particularly in the dollar. The debt pyramid was big in 1929, but today's dwarfts it. As the years went by , debts world wide increased to an astronomical levels. Liquidation can occur in either of two ways. In one accelerating inflation can wipe off the debts. In the other, market forces take over from the authorities and debts get liquidated through deflation. Debt liquidation will occur the first way in some currencies like the South American,Russian and S.E Asia in which there is no longer term lending at all at fixed interest rates or even in a fixd amount. The Dollar and Yen will surely go the second way because far more has been borrowed short and lent long than in any other currency. Deflation and debt liquidation mean defaults and bankruptcies. The Euro Dollar market looks like the most vulnerable
part of the system. Eurodollar banks have virtually no liquid assets like the United States government treasury bills. They have borrowed short and lent long on a scale unprecedented in commercial banking history. Moreover, only the branches of American banks in the market have direct
access to the federal reserve as lender of last resort. Foreign banks are not members of the system and have access only indirectly through their own central banks . Also, the depositors are for the most part big and sophisticated , like foreign central banks and multinational companies, and may want to move large amount fast. Yet, many of their deposits have been put into relatively long terms loans, many to developing countries, that can't be called if the depositors should demand their money. For instance, Indonesia just concluded a rescheduling agreement with its foreign banks for $80 B in private debt. This is a reneg
and it means the banks will never see their money again. This is deflation. You may be wondering how can we go into deflation when our
government will try to inflate via deficit spending and low interst rates. The answer is the market will start destroying purchasing power faster than the budget deficits can create it. After all, the US government debt is only 1/3 of the total private debt. When the dollar price of anything, whether a foreign currency, a commodity, a stock or piece of real estate falls in terms of dollars, the dollars purchasing power of the holders falls, too. The destruction of the purchasing power by the market will dwarf the creation through government budget deficits. Most important of all, remember that the paper part of the pyramid sits on a block of gold, the ultimate liquidity on the entire systemIf the dollar goes into deflation many other currencies will go into deflation, too. Central banks and governments will be desperate to restore liquidity of the system and get the debt pyramid growing again. An obvious and relatively painless way to do so will be through a rise in the price of gold on their books, a massive one. Even the US treasury will yield to that temptation. It will forget all of its talk about demonetizing gold, phasing it out of the sytem. You may be wondering why gold will go up in deflation when other prices are going down. The best answer I can think of lies with the central banks. Like you and me they are witnessing the breakdown of the fiat paper money system. Just as you and I have been urged by government to accept dollars and eschew gold, the central banks have been oblighed ever since Nixon closed the gold window to buy dollars rather than gold as a reserve asset. As a matter of fact many CB sold gold in recent years. The consequences have been devastating for them. I predict that CB will begin to buy gold soon to restore their reserves and liquidity. After all they own more than half of the gold above ground. A RISE IN THE PRICE OF GOLD ONLY HELPS THOSE WHO OWN IT. Remember , inflation erodes the confidence in fiat paper money for as prices rise paper money will buy less. Deflation erodes confidence because many paper IOUs don't pay at all. Gold is not a promise to pay. As the ultimate monetary asset, it has scarcity value in and ot itself.
Have a good day.

Thanks to Squirrel for the salad address.
Thanks to J. Disney for the wonderful delicious salad.
Thanks to George for the winter wheat.
Thanks to Sharfin for the beautiful words.

Thanks to ALL for the Kitco Weekend!!

From June 17 onward, it appears that you will need to pay to access the site at its new location. It will have a new name of "$CD CON$EILS" ( SCD Advi$e ) .

Mondex, the smart chip "money card, could easily accommodate Electronics Benefits as one of its "currencies".
"The Bank's" perception that Microsoft is a competitor to their "consolidated financial platform" seems to have more to do with the anti-Trust suit against Microsoft than anything else I've read.

When FDR reflated, he devalued the greenback against gold. Is there any other alternative if the greenback turns turtle from liquidations and bankruptcies ?

Johnson City? Just north of Carterville where Minnesota Fats sat on his front porch and watched the world go by?

Read some of the discussion on the Commerce Dept., Loral, and the Chinese Commies. Must have missed the references to the dead bodies ( so far ) due to plane crash and natural causes; e.g., Ron Brown ( Sec. of Commerce ) with .45 accidental hole in head and Barbara Wise ( who reported to John Huang who reported to Ron Brown ) found in her office in Commerce Dept., nude, bruised and dead of some natural cause. Apparently, the theories of probability no longer apply.

I was wondering if the nice folks in London knew something about the Euro gold backing that might prompt them to raise rates...

Time running out for Senate to change banking laws

WASHINGTON ( Reuters ) - Legislation to overhaul the nation's Depression-era banking laws has sparked interest in the U.S. Senate, but time is running out for enacting the sweeping reforms, experts say.

The bill that would allow banks, securities and insurance firms to get into each other's lines of work barely passed in the House last month, clearing the chamber by just a one-vote margin. It must now be approved by the Senate before it can be signed into law.

U.S. regulators remain split over the bill. Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan supports the legislation. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin opposes it -- threatening President Clinton's veto -- because it shifts regulatory powers from Treasury to the Fed.


The New York Republican has been focusing on more popular issues critical to his political race, including his legislation to restrict banks from charging customers bigger automated teller machine fees and efforts to recover the funds of Jewish Holocaust victims from Swiss Banks.

Financial industry experts say that acting on the banking reform legislation could jeopardize D'Amato's campaign since much of his funding has come from the financial services industry, including groups opposed to the bill.
http://www.freecartoons.com/ReutersNews/BANKING-CONGRESS.html

Some previously active Marines are financial Godzillas.
The page on small local banks states:
"Community banks have become a sanctuary for small businesses and customers who can't afford the big banks."
On Friday, while making a deposit {personal with a live cute teller} the President of the bank {actually the husband & wife own the bank but I bet the wife calls many of the shots - she wears pants too} anyway, this President of my little community bank comes over and asks if I have time to sit and visit with her. Of course I do.
She and the cashier I was just doing business with are not happy with present credit card outfit that manages our merchant accounts. Low-volume merchants like me are getting screwed with high monthly minimums, etc. She wanted to keep me up to date with what they were working on and she wanted to know my perspective on the issue, etc.
BANKING WITH A SMALL LOCALLY OWNED BANK IS GREAT!!
When was the last time a small businessman with $100,000/year gross sales could sit down with his bank President and talk about his service needs, how the business is going {mine and the community in general} and then branch off to talk about Y2K and runs on currency, etc.?

Transition to low inflation not always smooth

NEW YORK ( AP ) -- Along with much joy and delight, the arrival of a new low-inflation era has brought a few moments of uneasiness to investors in stocks and stock mutual funds. Now seems to be one of those times.

"Lower earnings expectations will push stock prices lower even while declining bond yields provide support. It is uncertain which effect will be stronger, but the net result will be churning markets, a potential minefield for equity investors."

The decline of inflation has certainly rewritten the traditional investment-cycle script followed by many money-managers and advisers.

For instance, no longer can investors find safe havens in gold or other inflation hedges every time the going gets tough.

http://www.freecartoons.com/BizTicker/CANOE-wire.Low-Inflation.html

Toronto-Dominion Bank CEO says merger approval likely

TORONTO ( Reuters ) - The head of Toronto-Dominion Bank said he thinks the bank's proposed C$19 billion ( $13 billion U.S. ) merger with Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce will likely win approval from regulators and the Canadian government.

At the same time, he declined to specify how many of the two banks' 74,000 employees would be cut. He said he didn't expect major reductions and thought most of the losses would be handled through attrition.
http://www.freecartoons.com/ReutersNews/CANADA-BANKS.html

Following is partial copy of recent B. Rosen comments:

AUGUST GOLD

WEEKLY CHART TREND: Lower toward 270-280. DAILY CHART TREND: Lower.

TODAY'S EXPECTED RANGE AND DIRECTION: Sideways to lower.

NEXT HOURLY CHART NEXT DAILY CHART NEXT WEEKLY CHART

TURN: 6/5 L; 6/8 H TURN: 6/10 L TURN: 6/98 L

SWING-TRADE TRADING STRATEGY: Cover shorts at 292.90.

( 6/4 ) The pattern on gold is fairly clear and it would appear to be headed toward the 299.50 region into early Monday before new lows manifest. First resistance is at the 296.70 and support is at the 292.60 region. If we get a pullback, we would exit with a small loss and look to reenter; however, if we cannot exit, we are willing to hold with a 301 stop as we do expect the downside to manifest toward 270 an 277.

JULY SILVER

WEEKLY CHART TREND: Bottoming and higher into June and July.

DAILY CHART TREND: Lower.

TODAY'S EXPECTED RANGE AND DIRECTION: Topping and lower.

NEXT HOURLY CHART NEXT DAILY CHART NEXT WEEKLY CHART

TURN: 6/5 L TURN: 6/9 L TURN: 7/98 H

SWING-TRADE TRADING STRATEGY: Cover shorts 491.

( 6/4 ) We are close to a bottom but it is still not confirmed even though

daily stochastics are pointing higher. Minor cycles are weak enough into Thursday that we can stay short. Resistance is at 520 and 527 and we will not stick around if we go higher. Minimum downside is the 490 region, although new lows are possible toward 483. Once we hit the 480-483 region, look for a recovery to 540 before new lows to 450 manifest.

BIGGER PICTURE: ( 5/8 ) Downside patterns project a cycle low here with major support at 490 with an eventual goal of 450. Linear cycles still seem on the defensive for a secondary low into June 9.

JULY CRUDE and PRODUCTS

DAILY CHART TREND: Sideways to higher.

TODAY'S EXPECTED RANGE AND DIRECTION: Higher.

NEXT HOURLY CHART NEXT DAILY CHART NEXT WEEKLY CHART

TURN: Research in progress TURN: 6/10 H TURN: 7/98 L

SWING-TRADE TRADING STRATEGY: Sell 1546 mit with a 1563 stop.

( 6/4 ) Crude continues to trade nebulously, and now that support at 1450 has been reached and we are at oversold conditions, we have to look for a bounce. First resistance is at 1514 and then 1530 and 1557. We still see a good sale at the 1547 region with support at 1435. While patterns suggest a breakdown toward 1339, we are inclined to see congestion and poor trading until the June 24 OPEC meeting. We will stand aside until we get a better signal or hit a better risk/reward. Linear cycle lows still dominate into next week.

BIGGER PICTURE: The fact that we fell to 1250 this early does not bode well for the June low. Our continuation chart target has been 945-1000, and at this point we are inclined to think that it has a chance if OPEC fails to agree on additional production cutbacks in late June.

Have a great trading day! Barry Rosen

Check out www.un.org and see who's going to be enforcing international drug investigations, arrests, seizures and incarcerations. They'l be wearing blue helmets if Newt and his drug war cronnies have their way.

UN secretary General claims UN is in Unique position to carry out drug war agenda of destroying crops and SEIZING ASSETS from money laundering.

Disney experiencing executive exodus

BURBANK, Calif. ( AP ) -- By all appearances, The Walt Disney Co. is riding high, with record profits, strong stock performance and an ambitious list of new ventures likely to boost earnings even higher.

So why is Disney chairman Michael Eisner losing so many of his top lieutenants?

In recent weeks, four key executives -- mostly aggressive, up-and-coming managers in their mid-to-late 30s -- have given notice.

The departures have resurrected questions about Eisner's ability to share power and cultivate a successor to run the $11-billion-a-year US company.
Its holdings include theme parks, movie studios, the ABC television network, ESPN and professional sports teams.

"People try to paint Eisner as a dictatorial autocrat, and I think to myself that's true to some extent, but he also is a brilliant executive," said Arthur Rockwell,

Not all exits from Disney have been graceful.
http://www.freecartoons.com/BizTicker/CANOE-wire.Disney-Exodus.html

Sorta north east of carterville. In between
West Frankfort anf Herrin.

I would like to share an article with you on the debate between Enstein's relativity & it's relavance to real world applications & classical Newtonian physics for your review & comment.
Please be so kind as to email me with your Snail mail or fax address.
Thanks.

Y.O.S,

TAR BABY
tnewtron@aol.com

"Aviation Leak" refers more to it's use as an organ of prole-feed than anything "really" going on. When the big mega-corporate MICs need funding, political persuasion, etc. it shows up in AvWeek.

Old, old saw: Those who know don't advertise.

'Nother point - yes, there are plenty of programs you say *nothing* about. Do you REALLY work in the defense industry? As I said, you need a chat with DISCO.

On the otherhand, the whole security/classification system strikes me as unconstitutional: I've seen enough crap, fraud and waste hidden behind the pretense of "security" to make me sick for a lifetime. If the American taxpayer knew what as going on, we'd really be in trouble. Perhaps we BOTH need to visit DISCO.

On the other, otherhand, since I expect the Federal Gov. to manufacture a national emergency in late 1999, with martial law & suspension of the Consitution, why bother.

Buy gold! Reject the fraudulent Federal Reserve Note! Salvery based paper-money indeed!


Spud

I didn't mean Herrin. I meant Marion. I guess I'm just
blind in one eye and can't see out of the other. Can't
think straight and my rhuematism's bothering me again.

Sure. I won't be at my email until Monday though. I'll
send it then.

Wheat:

Don't have wheat in my database of food densities, but brown rice is 6.4 Lb/ US Gallon. I would think that wheat ( hard red winter ) might be a *bit* more dense, but not too far off. If you assumed 6 Lb per gal, that would equate to 30 Lb/ bucket. Most of the "commodity" buckets that you receive food in, are 5 gal to "the line", and a full extra gallon to the

tippy-top. So, depending on how you packed them, I'd assume 60 to 70 buckets to the short ton.

P.S. using a less dense 6.0 vs 6.4 is just my contrarian nature. :- )

If you have any wheat handy, measure one cup. The weight in ounces will be the same as the number of pounds per gallon. Nifty home density shortcut, since the number of ounces per pound is 16, and the number of cups per gallon is 16 also.

@mozel:

I'm going back to school. :- ) . Thanks for your postings. I need to understand the situation I'm in first ( lack of freedom ) to formulate my next question. I'm treading water in the deep end. :- )

@gollum ( @mozel others )

I'm awed by the depth here. And appreciative. It's like discovering the .9 of the iceberg you *can't* see, through the newsgroup posting ( the .1 ) . Thanks all. Back to lurk.

makes plain that the quid pro quo for the $80 billion moatorium on "Corporate" debt is nationalization of the debts, i.e., government guarantee.
In the words of that great Indonesian, "I have only begun to riot for my country !"
This won't hold & the debt game won't flow.
Gee, what will it be like on Wallstreet when the Money Center Banks have to write down these loans that will never be repaid ? As noted in the article the ability to even service interest is in serious doubt.
Let's see how this backfires or unfolds.

Y.O.S.


TAR BABY

Blaming the media for being innacurate is like O.J. Simpson claiming EVERYONE else is lying and only HE is telling the truth. Kinda like Clinton arguing against six or seven women who claim he came on to them or had sex with them. Did Bruce Lindsey call Mr. Schwartz to tell him Whitehouse spin secrets?

"Loral officials insist that the unauthorized and perhaps illegal disclosure to the Chinese was just a mistake."
Chicago Tribune 6-7-98

Could the next elitist hat trick be the massive infrastructure projects being talked about for the likes of China and other countries?
If so it will as always, be financed partially with debt, but China can use its dollar reserves to buy western equiptment, continue to export for balanced reserves and still pay its people with its own printed paper.

You or anyone else see the late Fri. Reuters story on Spain's contribution to the ECB of 4.9B U.S. of 71B domestic reserves, to be 11.4% of total ECB reserves.Concerning Spain's share, article goes on to state: "The majority of that total is likely to be denominated in U.S. dollars, with a small proportion held in gold, analysts said."
What's to happen with the vast amount of excess reserves? If they pledge not to sell, how can they lend L/T when producers are closing out hedge books...to shorts? Australia and Argentina are not directly part of this Euro equation although they went ahead and bailed out too. As one of the bankers said, bonds offer a better return on reserves. Any thoughts on this, and I don't mean ( THOUGHTS! ) like "another"

I enjoy your history posts so much that I was disappointed to see you buy into the notion that it was US re-armament which called an end to the 1930's deflation.

I can do no better than quote from Antal Fekete's "Deflation: Retrospect and Prospect" CMRE Monograph

45, April 1986:

"Folklore has it that the deflation of the 1930's came to an end at the outbreak of hostilities in WW II, when defense speding at home and abroad finally put the country back to work. Neither the facts nor the theory

support this naive view. The end of delation came in late 1941, when the war in Europe was alrady two years old. Goverment spending as an anti-deflationary device had been tried by Pres. Herbert Hoover and, on a

truly grand scale, by Franklin D. Roosevelt--and it did not work. It only prolonged deflation. In the absence of such a huge supply of new government paper, the bond market boom would have come to a quick end.

Specculators would have bid up the price of government bonds to such high

cont:

Speculators would have bid up the price of government bonds to such high levels that the yield would have fallen below the productivity of labor and capital available in this country. At that point, factories would
have started humming again. The stock market would have recovered quickly, together with commodity markets. Deflation would have been a fleeting moment, a shock therapy, to be sure, but one of short
duration, unable to do permanemt harm.
It did not happen that way. The boom in the bond market, spread out to a period of more than tne years, was due entirely to the so-called anti-deflationary fiscal policy, the deficit spending, and the pump-priming invented by Keynes........."

Your theory of EU gold-backing might have something to do with UK rate rise was something that I hadn't thought about. I don't think there has been any disclosure of central bank thoughts behind the action. So, you might think that they are raising rates so as to better compete with a gold-backed Euro.

Let's face it, global central bank rates have been low in the past several years. I think this was collusion ( most CB's are owned by the same people, with perhaps a local mix ) to help Euro nations lower their borrowing costs ( interest on debt ) in order to meet Maastricht requirements on budget deficits at or below 3% of GDP. Now the Euro nations are IN, so there might be some sort of jockeying rates up to compete with other currencies as deflation is starting to wreak havoc on liquidity IMO.

Also, it could be that "the powers that be" want the UK into Euroland, but National pride and fear of losing sovereignty is preventing it (  la Jimmy Goldsmith's Referendum Party ) . If Britain raises rates to the point where the Pound becomes much stronger vis--vis the Euro, it will drive the UK economy into the ground, and the Brits may just clamour to join Euroland after all.

Do the small rate hikes we have seen recently in Scandanavia, Canada, and the UK have something in common with the massive rate hikes we have seen in Russia, Brasil? Confidence in paper currencies seems to be slowly slipping away. And when the confidence is gone, don't expect the Rothschilds, Warburgs, Rockefellers etc to use any of THEIR cetral bank gold to defend a nation's currency. They are too greedy for that. So don't be surprised to see more CB sales. Irrational they seem, rational they are.

Probably what saved the economy this time around ( post 1980 ) was that since the economy is now largely based upon services and technology, the interest rate did not need to fall to 3% in order for "industry" to revive. It just needed to be seen to be falling, as it has been doing ever since 1981. Nevertheless the same grotesque growth of the government bond market has surely prolonged the disinflation and wrecked the commodity markets.

Gold/Silver-bimetallism
A fixed exchange rate between Gold and Siver coin is a price control,
hence bound to fail, viz., preferences, discovery, innovation; can change
the market exchange rate and the undervalued coin per the fixed exchange rate ends up as bullion.

16:1? 55:1? : Static data from particular instances of time in a dynamic world.

Let's see how the game is played.
I owe you $80 billion I can't repay, so I'll repay the interest while you load me down with $50 billion more in debt.
When do I start amortizing the $50 billion ?
The debts are shifted from private obligations to public.
Oy, such a deal !

I found an article on the Quakes of the New Madrid fault. The first started on Dec 16, 1811. I put that date into a solar system display program on this site http://www.fourmilab.ch/cgi-bin/uncgi/Solar and it was quite interesting. The Earth, Sun, Saturn, and Jupiter were all aligned.

Someone mentioned the significance of Sep 9, 1999 by Nostradamus, the Earth is aligned with Jupiter and Saturn then as well. And May 5, 2000 the Earth will be opposite a host of planets ( inc. Jup & Sat ) all lined up on the other side of the Sun.

BTW, Harry Schultz ( newsletter editor ) has for years run a series of articles called Earth Changes. In it, he has said that most earthquakes are not covered by the press for some reason. Any suggestions to why?

S&P 500 JUNE FUTURES. I wrote, "The S&P futures will have what will be a two week, or likely more, slide in prices which will take it down to the 1050 area, or lower, perhaps much lower." EVALUATION Grade "F". I still think that the S&P will do as I projected, but I failed to project last Friday's 10.1 point up gap, and total increase of 31.8 points. PRICE PROJECTION The trend will be up much of the week, and flat to down at the end of the week.

T-BOND FUTURES I wrote, "T-Bonds will stop their price increase this week, and turn lower late this week, or early next week." EVALUATION Grade "B".
The close on Friday 5-29 was 121-23, the close on Friday 6-5 was 121-22, with the low of the week being 120-29. Despite Friday's outside day with an up close, the trend for the week was down. PRICE PROJECTION This small move down is about over with prices starting up again by the end of the week.

GOLD and SILVER FUTURES I wrote, "Gold and silver are near their lows for this move and will turn up for a nice trading move before heading lower than today's prices." EVALUATION Grade "B" for each. Both gold and silver made a small move up this week, but the events of the week lead me to believe that the "trading move" up will be delayed for a week or so. PRICE PROJECTION GOLD will move down this week, likely going below the recent low of 287 on the June contract. PRICE PROJECTION SILVER down, with perhaps a significant drop in prices.

CANADIAN DOLLAR FUTURES I wrote, "The Canadian Dollar has likely reached it's low for this move, and will move upward for a nice trading move before turning down and going lower than it's recent lows." EVALUATION
Grade "D". Prices increased Monday and Tuesday, reaching a peak on Wednesday, before falling Thursday and Friday. The close Friday 5-29 was 6868, and the close Friday 6-5 was 6873. A new low for this move was registered Friday at 6858. PRICE PROJECTION I stick with my original projection of an increase in prices, but was at least a week early.

If others on this site are traders, be it in futures, options, stocks, mutual funds, or whatever, you are making projections, perhaps not as specific as mine, but projections nevertheless. Why not stick your neck out also and post a projection occasionally.

Nice site. Many thanks.

http://www.canoe.ca/TopStories/jun7_iraq.html

I'm still processing. He makes a compelling gold up on deflation case.
-EJ

Following the lead of Trader Ed, let's take a look at some charts. For some perspective, here is the monthly chart for silver going back to 1993. Note that we have had two bottoms around 440 with no clear shift to a bull mode. Arguments may ensue over the previous sentence but I don't fell comfortable seeing most of the 97 advance being retraced and continue to maintain a bullish posture.

For those who follow candlestick charts, the top reversal in Jan 98 is a classic pattern. A shooting star followed by a long legged doji. ... The shooting star should have been warning enough. Together, they provided ample time to clear a long position. The next two months are only anticlimax.

Note that 440 is providing good support and because of the nature of this failed rally, my OPINION is that silver will see the 440 area again but probably not before APH's near term outlook comes to pass. That is a run to 570 before another correction. Unless there is a fundamental change to the position of all PMs, silver will likely revisit 440 again later this year.

Next up will be a weekly chart of silver followed by the daily.

As an aerodynamicist working outside and inside these birds ( F-111A, FB-111,F-111C, F-111K, F-111B ( reborn as F-14 Tomcat ) , F-15, F16, B-1, Shuttle and other not-to-be-mentioned craft ) I can categorically say that the Russians and others copied us at every possible turn to create "also rans". Also, no craft now made can exceed the 60's technology found in the F-15 at design point Angels 60. Why do the filthy-rich Saudies prefer the Eagle over all others? Because they want to beat the pants off any Russian or French contender. Put an American pilot in the seat of an F-15 with support from Awacs and nobody can touch him.

http://www.theage.com.au/daily/980608/bus/bus17.html

On the weekly chart the bears have had the field 12 weeks out of the last 18. The rally here around 5 is not exactly scaring the hell out of them.

Note the pattern at the top. The first dark bar engulfed over 50% of the final rise to the top. This is known as Dark Cloud Cover and universally bearish in its interpretation.

Near term, if silver does not clear the 540 area decisively ... and soon like this week, I fear it will retrace short term to support at 480.

When considering future prognostications for PMs it really isn't possible to separate the TA from the fundamentals and the fundamentals remaain: " No one gives a damn about PMs". Of any flavor. ...... Except the shorts that is.

According to my source ( poket reference ) wheat has a S.G. of .77, rice .75, rye .71. Wheat is 48 lbs. per cubic foot. 6.248 dry gallons per cubic foot which means a 5 gallon pail would hold .8 cubic foot or 38 lbs. of wheat. So it would take mathamatically 53 pails to hold a short ton. But in fact it would take a few more, after it sits a while it iggles down and cozys up and you lose about a inch or two of space. You can open them up and add more after a week or so. These numbers agree O.K. with my experience. Pails are very convient, but plastic drums or and other contrainer that provided water and mouse protection would of course work as well. Don't forget a hand grinder ( Corona ) and a power one too. I just finished lunch, homemade bread made out of fresh ground wheat yesterday. Best for active people, a bnit fatting for me but I'm addicted.

http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSFeatures/jun7_viagra.html

-EJ

Note again the dark cloud cover at the top. The dark candlestick engulfed over half of the previous day's rise. A clear indication that the advance is about to end.

Also notice the small "hammer" in mid March which signaled the beginning of the small counter trend rally.

There was lengthy battle for control in area around 630 and the bears prevailed as the price fell out of the upward channel.

Now we have a rounding bottom which seems to stimulate some folks to put their money on the LONG line. But there doesn't appear to be real rush to own silver at these prices. Volume is not exactly rising with the trend. Last Fri the low was about 505 and it recovered to upper 20's. Helluva day trade.

On the dailies, 570 looks doable short term. I think APH has the handle on it. ....... 540-545 still looks critical. Failure their will not be good.

What would the world currency speculators do for a pastime
if the world should go to a single currency standard?
They wouldn't be able to play off one basis against another
as in bimetalism or one currency against another as they do
today. Bummer.

Suggest you relook at $c. Friday close was 68.62 - a new weekly low for this move indicating $c down next week.

If the next world depression is seen as having been set off by currency speculation, maybe a single currency is what we'll go to after the fiasco has ended. More likely there will be three? One for each for Asia, Europe, and the Americas?

I got a question for you: what events might lead to a run on the US dollar? It has been speculated that the Euro might provide a sufficient alternative to provoke such an event. Maybe it's my Americentricism but somehow I doubt that there will be enough confidence in the Euro for that to happen, at least initially.
-EJ

Dollar strong against the major currencies as trading in the far east commences. Yen at 140.26, thus, breaking an important pyschological barrier. Gold will have an uphill battle to move up.

Thanks for your interests in the history posts. I consider your statements have merit, unfortunately, neither you or Antal Fekete's will ever know, if the 1930's would have been considered "fleeting moment"

As a Canadian, from 1929 to 1939 were considered 10 lost years. I suggest the deflation of 10 years is not "fleeting moment", unless of course, the measurement is against the total history, since time began.

Also, I consider the views expressed by Antal Fekete, are likely stated for other opportunistic purposes, certainly, were not written for the good people, that were forced to endure the hardship of a depression.

And the father's and mother's that were expected to approve having to send their son's off to war, and risk the expected result, never to see their son's again. Yes, Germany and Europe, and also the allies.

"[Deflation would have been a fleeting moment, a shock therapy, to be sure, but one of short duration, unable to do permanemt harm.] "

World War I - In 1915 - Thus in the end, the Morgan lack of neutrality overcame President Wilson's announced neutrality as if the Morgans were at the center of power and reality, the government an unrealistic appendage which they were forced to bring into line. "Our firm," ( House of Morgan ) said Thomas W. Lamont, the Morgan partner, "Had never for one moment been neutral. We didn't know how" And how could they, when billions of dollars were invoved?

( WW I start July 1914 - USofA declared war April 1917 )

By 1917 the Allies had borrowed one billion, nine hundred million dollars through the House of Morgan; We went overseas for democracy and the flag; and by the end of the Peace Conference the phrase J.P. Morgan suggests had compulsion over a power of seventy-four billion dollars.

Concerning the power of these investment bankers, the future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis had this to say in his book "Other People's Money and How the Bankers Use It" ( New York 1913 ) , p.4:"...these bankers bestride as masters America's business world, so that practically no large enterprise can be undertaken successfully without their participation or approval. The key to their power is Combination-concentration intensive and comprehensive."

( WW II Started August 1939 - USofA declared war December 1941 )

Antal Fekete's "Deflation Retrospect and Prospect" sure can not turn me on. But, many have their views, I can not buy the program.

Thanks....Take Care.

test only

THE BANK OF JAMAICA, established by the Bank of Jamaica Law ( 1960 ) , began operations in May 1961, terminating the Currency Board System which had been in existence from 1939. The establishment of the Central Bank was in recognition of the need for an appropriately regulated financial structure to encourage the development process, particularly as Jamaica was about to embark on the road to political independence.

The main objectives of the Central Bank were defined by the Bank of Jamaica Act to be:

a.To issue and redeem notes and coins.
b.To keep and administer the reserves of Jamaica.
c.To influence the volume and conditions of supply of credit so as to promote the fullest expansion in production, trade and employment, consistent with the maintenance of monetary stability in Jamaica and the external value of the currency.
d.To foster the development of money and capital markets in Jamaica.
e.To act as banker to the Government.

All of which is well and good; however, one does wonder WHY the BOJ is the Central Bank of Jamaica! What interesting games do we have here? Oh! Remember the Jamaica Accords? Interrrresting yes?

It would appear the BOJ is the Bank of Jamaica! WHAT! BOJ is the central bank of Jamaica?
http://www.boj.org.jm/boj-offc.htm

============================================
Date: Sat Jun 06 1998 22:15
HighRise ( henryd__A ) ID#401460:

He measured up, others didn't.

HighRise
==============================================

I know... I was being mordant.

HenryD

http://www.boj.org.jm/index.htm

Thanks for your posting. John Disney was giving me a hard time, saying Russian fighters best. I knew he was totally full of it. Otherwise a great guy tho.

You got my grey matter working and its Sunday. The part about the EURO sure throws a big wrench in my theory. Good job stimulating minds!!

My data service, Dial Data, says that the Canadian Dollar closed on 6-5 at 6868, up from a low of 6858. This is a higher close, again according to Dial Data, than the previous week's close. I am dependant on the accuracy of their data. Thanks for the warning.

This is official...

"XFO: GOLD-FRANC ( SPECIAL SETTLEMENT CURRENCY )

EDITEX Europe - Annex B ( Currency Codes )
3. ANNEX B List of alpha-three Currency Codes ( ISO 4217 ) sorted by codes. ( Data Element 6345 ) CODE. CURRENCY. COUNTRY. ADP. ANDORRAN PESETA. ANDORRA. AED"
http://www.nyconsultant.fr/editexeurope/annex-b.html

Now, logic suggests that, having selected a settlement currency, one is well advised to have a prudent stash of selected settlement currency at
hand...

Of course, whilst one is bringing in the sheaves, one makes sure the sheaves are VERY reasonably priced! {:- )

Short term, a failure of some major US bank ( s ) ( perhaps due to
speculation in the drivatives areana ) might do it. Sudden death
of a significant figure like Greenspan or Rubin might, but
just ad easliy take move more flight money into cash.

Long term, the economies going down now will start to recover
first pulling liquidity back out of US.

Have just finished reading the posts of the last 48 hours. Talk about jet fighters, earthquakes, gossip.

Hey remember gold? Would love to read some posts on that.

Live Long and Propser.

or is Yahoo not working?

From Japan's past...


"the primary unit was the gold yen...
The mint having achieved full operation, the old coinage had to be removed from circulation to provide specie.

Rather then buy it with more inconvertible notes, the government asked the well-known and wealthy Mitsui Company to issue notes bearing the names of both Mitsui and the Imperial Treasury. Mitsui bore all the
expenses of the issue and was responsible for redemption, but retained 20% of the issue as compensation.
http://www.money.org/bolingexhibit.html

i liked your post, are you suggesting humans have factual ( truth ) insight to future events ? very interesting stuff, please forgive any spellling mis.

The crashing of the Australian dollar over the past few months has strongly re-inforced my opinion that the floating currency system is a sham.

The fact that profit hungry speculators can deliberately drive down the value of your currency just to make a profit is immoral. In the process they destroy confidence, put thousands out of work, and contribute to the perhaps fatal undermining of financial confidence through out the world. All in the name of greed.

My friends, socialism is not the problem. Feral capitalism is.

I agree with Malysia's Dr. Mahathir. There needs to be a new global currency system where the value of your curreency is determined by economic fundamentals etc. Speculators can still speculate but their activities should not determine the value of your currency.

It's a question of political fortitude. The government's of the world need to gather a declare such a system into existance. The markets need to be collared. They are out of control. Asia is proof of that. The well being of us all depends on a system of managed capitalim coming into being.

Otherwise, get used to the Asia thing. It is going to happen a lot more often.

Live Long and Prosper.

P.S. For those of you who want to blame the government's of Asia for the problem, I suggest you look at Mexico. It did all the 'right' things; privatised, deregulated, cut tariffs, you know all the neo-liberal freemarket stuff, and for their trouble they too had their economy trashed in 1994.

http://www.isei.or.jp/books/63/image/chart/chart4.gif

GM

torture, The paper is winning over metal for many years now, The funds in US mutual funds now is over $ 5 Trillion and inflows are increasing every month, money is flowing out of Gold and no one in power is interested to stop this constant bleeding, If Euro doesnt boost Gold, it may be end of Gold and all PM's.

The state of affairs are extremely depressing..

goodby all,here comes the res,,

XFO is the step in that direction! It is the quintessential "A" is "A"; nothing more, nor less, than a specific measure of a very specific element. That it has been successfully used in international agreements says a great deal about its stability and acceptability.

Over the transom: from a list of trading acronyms used by one of the major houses one gleaned the following tidbit...the GF ( and the DEM ) were labeled "dead currencies", which in the jargon of this house meant, "You
can't play with these..." ( This about the DMark because it is not available for forward operations )

Yeah. I bit my tongue during those posts, choosing discretion over valor in not posting a rebuttal...but enough is enough. Hopefully, we won't have to test the hypothesis here, but it's my hunch that so-called non-existent Russian war machine will be used to test Mr. C's metal in the Med very soon. They tried to stick in a bayonet just to help out their good ol' buddy Saddam recently, saying that we were about to cause a nuclear incident. We don't have time to rebuild the arsenal destroyed by Mr. Clean if a confrontation arises, but air superiority is our game and the Russians know it. I look for a Russian buildup before Christmas.

My shirt's missin' buttons ( pride ) and my belt's on the last notch ( bbq ) ...and I'm one grey-haired-lady-kissin' dude...oh yes I am. Wow! Thank you so much for your well wishes. happiness.

Agreed. Gold's position is indeed precarious. Am hoping for a positive ( 20% plus ) gold reserve figure.

Live Long and Prosper.

I book marked that post for finer study, but have now gone back & reread.
JP makes a string of valid observations without nonsequitors, yet IMO, fails to build a cohesive argument for his conclusion that AU will rise as deflation takes hold.
Vronsky takes a stab at the same position on his editorial web site.

I am unconvinced. I have been intending to do some basic research of his review of the perfomance of AU stocks leading up to & during the Great Depression. My recollection is that contrary to his view, Au stocks nose dived prior to the DOW, i.e., had their crash early & generally languished until FDR legalized the devaluation of the USD by 75% ( following Britian's lead ) . This devaluation was the single greatest blessing that any industry ever recieved from government action up to that time. The depression/deflation caused by debt default also lowered the cost of production so that AU stocks were more profitable.
These things all appear to be in the process of repeating, but took almost 5 years to unfold from crash to devaluation & required the 2nd revolution of our system & constitution.
I do not disagree that Au will do better than any other asset class in a deflation. Perhaps POG has already anticipated this move in the way that a down turn in the stock market is said to presage a recession. I agree that POG & AU stocks have already had their nose dive & are poised at the bottom ( even a move to $250 would only be a 20% correction off a dead cat bounce @ $315, if that's what is in the cards & still only represent a 37.5% correction from it's 1996 trading range. Au stocks have basicly been cut in half.

I agree that this deflation is driven by massive overcapacity, malinvestment & avaricious loan activity, resulting in massive worldwide defaults & exacerbated by hugh losses in speculative derivitives & soon to be included US & Euro stock market losses.
Defaults erase credits & therefor diminish the money supply which is the definition of deflation. Like JP says, they also remind creditors that the securities they're holding are only as good as the credit of the obligors & there will certainly be a paradigm shift to quality. A stock market crash would impoverish ( wipe out personal balance sheets ) & deleverage the entire US economy, deflate the USD & rapidly introduce a prolonged period of stagflation, an environment that has been good for the price of AU. I believe any general deflation would be short lived. The key to any real bull move in POG is dependant on a curency crisis in the USD.
Massive revaluation of the USD to AU a la FDR or as a surreptitious move back to an international AU standard is beyond the range of my crystal ball ( as suggested by Oracle @ Vronsky ) , except when the problem is terminal & the solution is simple
& fair, it generally will come to pass with vindication for all AU bugs.
Perhaps instead of going for confiscation they are squeezing all AU out of weak hands into strong by driving the price down for some kind of global redistribution as the predicate of a sane international monetary system.

Back to the future.



Y.O.S.


TAR BABY

As a central bank of issue, the Federal Reserve System had behind it all the enormous wealth of the American people. When it began operations in 1913, it created a serious threat to the central banks of the impoverished countries of Europe. Because it represented this great wealth, it attracted far more GOLD than was desirable in the 1920s, and it was apparent that soon all of the world's GOLD would be piled up in this country.

This would make the GOLD standard a joke in Europe, because they would have no GOLD over there to back their issue of money and credit. It was the Federal Reserve's avowed aim in 1927, after the secret meeting with the heads of the foreign central banks, to get large quantities of that GOLD sent back to Europe, and its methods of doing so, the low interest rate and heavy purchases of Government securities, which created vast sums of new money, intensified the stock market speculation and made the stock market crash and result6ant depression a national disaster.

Since the Federal Reserve System was guilty of causing this disaster, we might suppose that they would have tried to alleviate it. However, through the dark years of 1931 and 1932, the Governors of the Federal Reserve Board saw the plight of the American people steadily worsening and did nothing to help them. At any time during those years the Federal Reserve Board could have acted to relieve this situation.

Therefore, the American people had to starve and suffer until March of 1933, when the White Knight ( Franklin D. Roosevelt ) came riding in with his crew of Wall Street bribers and put some money into circulation. That was all there was to it. As soon as Roosevelt took office, the Federal Reserve began to buy Government securities at the rate of ten million dollars a week for ten weeks, and created a hundred million dollars in new money, which alleviated the critical famine of money and credit, and the factories started hiring people again.

1932 - U.S. unemployment reaches between 15 and 17 million by year's end 34 million Americans have no income of any kind, and Americans who do work average little more than $16 per week.

1933 - Adolf Hitler begins 12 years as dictator of German Reich.

1933 - AFL "REVERSES" its long-standing position against unemployment insurance and urges that work be spread through a 30-hour week with some "economic planning" by the federal government.

FWIW........Take Care

Someone ( I wonder who? ) just swept the overnight silver market. Some 300 contracts ( guessing here ) were sold in a flash to drive the price from 5.25 down to 5.12; it has since crept back up to 5.21. I find it breathtaking that well-known shorts publicly accuse longs of manipulating this market.

YO

As was posted here before:

"Chase Manhattan's derivatives exposure is now equal to U.S. GDP. The U.S. banking system as a whole has $62 in off-balance sheet derivatives for every dollar of equity capital and five dollars for every dollar of assets on the banks' balance sheets."

The euro may also have an impact. From this month's Economist:
"Given the widening current-account deficit in the U.S., the fact that the new currency area will start out with a large surplus indicates that the euro may well be strong against the dollar during the initial phase after its introduction."

There are a million ways to lose in the big city. You have to make your luck. As a result of the world buying debt denominated in dollars in exchange for open access to US markets for export for the past 30 years, the U.S. has become the world's debtor. More than 40% of the US debt is held by foreign nations. Nations make their bad luck, too

-EJ

YO

How is the real estate market in OZ? When I was there earlier this year, it was showing healthy inflation in price levels. The All Ords is not far off its highs. Considering the fall out of the SE Asian crisis and Australia's trade deficit, I see contagion, and I expect Real Estate & Shares to drop off.

EJ, as to when the USD will weaken, it could be when it gets to the point where the values that can be found in other parts of the world, like in OZ & NZ, that would lead those who have investments in the US to sell their 'merikan holdings and buy foreign holdings.

( 1/12*2 ) 10*4 = 69 years of history. A wave of magnitude 10.

So a major money center bank goes down, what does gold do? Thanks.

HB

Gold will tank. It seems nothing is bullish for gold at the moment.

the numbers say it is good, and if you believe bullsh@t it will stay that way.

Loved your 14:11 analysis. History bears your thoughts out. Gold has risen in price during catastrophic deflationary debt liquidations. You mentioned that central banks will re-accumulate gold once this liquidatuion is underway, and history bears that out too.

Just one addition to your analysis. When you talked about CBs accumulating gold, you only talked about them buying it. Remember that in our century several countries, including the USA, have decided to confiscate gold rather than purchase it.

Either scenario drives up the price of gold, just makes realizing your gains more risky when a confiscation happens.

- Steve

is just another reason for Gold to go down ( again ) . It seems that the entire world is totally subservient to the might of US Paper after WWII.
17% of World's population of the West consume more than 70% of all global resources and what is going to happen when 100% of the World tries to emulate this model of gross consumerism as it seems to moving to this model in earnest everywhere, without realizing that this type of insatiable greed for material is eroding family and moral values rapidly, where the parents measure of sucess is how much they can make and consume. The Mother's prefer to leave their offspring in an alien lap all day, year after year, in order to make some more dollars, it is no surprise that you see School shootings and other forms of evil permeating into society due to an overwhelming importance given by us to material wealth.

If money was cure all and basis for happiness, then how come many of the rich and famous have lived in depression and took their lives, Elvis 'The King of Rock & Roll' having everything, died at 40 due to his need for pharmaceuticals for everything, others examples like Marilyn Monroe, Howard Hughes, Cristina Onassis, J.P. Getty's family, Patricia Hearst etc. etc.

Euro Will Rival Dollar as Top World Currency, Bergsten Says



Geneva, June 6 ( Bloomberg ) -- Europe's single currency,

the euro, will command equal status with the U.S. dollar five

years from its 1999 introduction, said Fred Bergsten, director

of the Institute for International Economics in Washington.





Bergsten said the combined gross domestic product of the

11 countries joining the European economic and monetary union

is roughly the same as that of the U.S., making the two

currencies equals in world markets.

``There will be a shift from a dollar-dominant system to

a bipolar system of co-equals sharing market leadership,''

Bergsten said at a foreign exchange conference in Geneva.

``Obviously the euro will not replace the dollar, but we

should expect rough equality between the two.''





The dollar and the euro will each account for 40 percent

of world financial transactions, Bergsten said. He estimates

the dollar has a 60 percent share of the market currently and

European currencies 20 percent.





The speed at which the euro gains equal footing with the

dollar will depend on how quickly the European Central Bank

can establish credibility, Bergsten said. He expects the

process to take three to five years.





The single currency will also strengthen over the next

few years, driven by ``the largest portfolio diversification

in history'' as investors shift $500 billion and $1 trillion

out of dollars and into euros. Three quarters of the amount

will be in private investments, and the rest will be in public

reserve holdings, he said.





The euro will start life undervalued by 15 to 20 percent

and will strengthen from there as European growth accelerates,

he said.





The dollar is likely to lose ground, meantime, as the

U.S. economy slows, prompting the U.S. Federal Reserve to

lower its benchmark lending rate. A reduction in U.S. rates

would lessen the appeal of dollar-denominated deposits and

bonds.





The yield on the benchmark 30-year U.S. treasury bond

will be at 5.0 percent at the end of the year, Bergsten said,

compared with 5.79 percent late Friday.





He also said the U.S. merchandise trade deficit will

widen to a record $300 billion this year. That too will drag

down the dollar.

``Given that, plus a pick-up in growth in Europe, I

anticipate a decline in the dollar, a rise in the euro and, if

( Japanese officials ) can ever get their act together, a rise

in the yen as well,'' he said.





The euro's rise will be unchecked by the ECB, which

Bergsten said will adopt a ``benign neglect of the euro, much

like the U.S. does.''

Good stuff. I think we have to accept the fact that no one but the shorts care about this 'stuff'... At least tech stocks have trading volume going for them.... :- ) )

GM

"Well yes, Ms. Pennington.....Wall Street looks like this to me http://www.mpt.org/mpt/wsw/bio.html "

A List of International Events Having a Bearing on Exchange Rates
1947 March-- Establishment of IMF
1949 April--Yen is fixed at 360 yen to the dollar
1967 November--November UK pound crisis
1968 March-- The US dollar crisis. A system of two prices for gold is established.
1969 August to October--French franc is devalued against the German mark
1971 August-- To protect the dollar, the US government imposes non-convertibility between gold and the US dollar. European countries and Japan adopt a flexible-rate exchange system.
1971 December-- The Smithsonian Agreement. The yen is revised 16.88% upwards against the dollar, and the dollar is devaluated 7.89 against gold. Yen is fixed at 308 yen to the dollar.
1972 June--UK pound crisis. A flexible-rate exchange system is adopted.
1973 February-- US dollar is devalued by 10%
1973 March--Reintroduction of the flexible-rate exchange system in most advanced countries.
1983--Due to US high interest rate policy, the Japanese yen falls to low level ( 240 yen to the dollar )
1985 September--September G5 meeting adopts a low-dollar high-yen policy.

Source: Koukou Jiyu-Jizai,Gendai Shakai ( Social Studies ) , Juken-Kenkyu-sha, l988, p.98, 99

Vested interests in the status quo also own the means of opinion production. Their continued success depends on defeating the enemies of the status quo. With so much staked on debt, gold is their enemy. The million megaton media machine of paper billionaires tells all in a thousand ways that gold is dead. Paper rules! The new era of digital media money is here to stay! And it is, as a method of transaction.

You have been beating your head against a wall of paper. Tell your broker you own gold and he rolls his eyes. But remember that the most significant investment opportunities in history are those that appear at the time ludicrous in the public eye. Keep YOUR eye on the fundamentals. In time, the Black Debt will give way Gold. Go long and prosper.

-EJ

Future events have no real existence other than in the quantuum
mechanical probabilty "space" until they happen. Thus the mind
can have no insight into future events, but only into possible
future events.

There is a good article in, I believe, the current Scientific
American concerning liquid Quantuum computers which would be
some good background for our discussion.

GM

If a major bank, particularly a US bank were to go down it would bring
a certain amount of mistrust into the idea currency accounts as a safe
place to store wealth. It could only be bullish for gold.

Spock:

How did it come about that in all the countries where the currency speculators did their terrible deeds, that there were massive quantities of dollar denominated loans? Why was it that all those businesses with close ties to the government chose to denominate their loans in dollars instead of Rupiah, Baht, Won, Ringett or whatever?

Could it have been that the political class gave the nod to the bankers who gave the nod to the businessmen, that it would be 'safe' to take out lower priced dollar loans because in the event of a currency problem, the government would bail them out?

Speculators can push the boulder over the edge of the cliff. If the boulder is sitting on flat land there is nothing at all that can be done. Speculators are not a single monolithic force unless the game is a slam dunk. If some group tried to push against a sound currency, another group would take the otherside.

As for the 'morality' of currency traders, are they any more or less moral than those that trades stocks, bonds, cattle, goats, or gold? All are trying to buy in hopes of higher prices and sell in hopes of lower. As a class, traders and speculators add value in terms of discovering price. If they are not good price discoverers, they are soon led to another line of work. You can't b***s*** your P&L.

Yours is the third cogent explanation here that the net effect of a stock market crash will be inflationary with respect to gold in dollars. There seems to be general agreement that relative to all other investments, gold has the greatest likelihood of preserving wealth. The wild card, of course, is confiscation. Seems to me that if the Fed were looking ahead that the Fed will want to ensure that the top 5% currently holding 37% of the wealth in the US does not put any significant holdings into gold, as that will make the future option of confiscation a political impossibility.
-EJ

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Y2K is gonna change everything.

thank you, i with little knowledge and education, would not attempt to discuss quantum theory with you,i try simply to exist in this reality in search of the rational.

back to where they came from? Nowhere.

...but what do you say a position like this pays? And does one have a moment ever to enjoy the financial rewards?
-EJ

I don't think it's the day to day currency traders who
are the problem. It seem that some really big guns like
Mr. Sorros for one can command sums larger than the total
reserves of many countrys. Like the guy at the poker table
with more money than any other player they can use their
weight to advantage. Using thier own an leveraged funds
they can short the currency driving it down. Sure enough
the CB and others take the other side, but since their
reserves are not high enough and are forced to capitulate.
The positons are then covered at great profit and the
big guys have that much more in the way of funds for
the next raid.

I have hundreds of coin cases from the U.S. mint that store much of my silver ,,,, in addition, I had several thousand coins minted that commemorate my family history that I've been storing in various ways ,,, are the U.S. Mint containers good for long term storage ,,,, if so, how do I get some more at a reasonable prices ,,,,,, I need the 20 coin holders ( as a minimum ) due to the large quantity I have ,,,,,
,,,,,
Any other suggestions ,,,,,,

TIA

dollar be "worth more"? So if gold stays at 300 or even goes a bit lower, won't we still have won?

robnoel@primenet.com

Speculators perform a vital service: like the garbage man they clean up the mess made by governments ( and other imbeciles ) , for a fee, clearing the market of stupidity.

Spoke tonight with my oldest childhood buddy in the world tonight, who has grown up to be a editor at the Washington Post, top of the heap. Proud of him. I asked him about Y2K, since the Post is one of few mainstream press orgs covering the issue. He said the story is covered by the Financial desk, not his. He claims to know little but says the Financial disk is, "obsessed with it." He explained his personal reluctance to accept the implications of Y2K as he understood them as follows:

1 ) Too preoccupied with other matter -- in my experience, he works nearly 16 hours a day, 7 days a week

2 ) If there were even a remote chance that the effect might be catastrophic, then the government would be at war against it

I believe that these are the two primary reasons most do not deal with the Y2K issue directly. They are too busy keeping body and soul together and logic informs them that no government is going to allow such a calamity to take place with so much opportunity to prevent it.

-EJ

It is not quantuum theory that interests me. It is the nature of
what is. Nor do I require that what is be rational. I take it the
way it comes. To the extent that you ad well as I exist in this same
boat you are just as qualified as I to discuss it. Perhaps more so.
The last time I checked there was no requirement to be well educated
in order either to exist or to hold a discussion. Sometimes it is
the naive eyes that see the emperor's lack of clothing.

What is is.

For the last couple of year I have seen at least certain portions if
not most going to great pains to assure Y2K compliance with their
software and hardware. I have seen no concern on their part toward
the preparedness of either private industry or non US sectors.

me thinks the first serious manifestations of the bug will be financial turmoil, and I believe it will come much sooner than later, you'll see it start in a month or so. Go gold

My thanks and appreciation for a very thoughtful post. This concept of gold

rising during a deflation is most intriguing. It is certainly at odds with

recent years in which gold has led and predicted the global disinflation - as

clearly witnessed by Yardini gold charts. Studies that I have read evidence

that gold tends to lead a change in inflationary or disinflationary trends, as

measured by the CPI, in about a year in advance. Now what may have

happened in the past as a major contributor in gold's paradoxical rise during

deflation, and what I expect will happen now if deflation does manifest

itself, is that gold having made its bottom in anticipation of the deflation

rose during deflation in anticipation of a recovery due to steps taken to

stimulate the economy or due to corrective forces owing to the very act of

deflation.

the search gos on, there may be light at the end of the dark tunnel.

Ooops. Portions of the government ( agencies ) .

I'm not sure the tunnel ever ends. One see a light up ahead,
comes to it and is momentarily illuminated. Then one becomes
aware of new darkness, and yet another light up ahead...

The currency speculators are not the primary cause of monetary crises, they're simply the final blow. They prey on the weak and the foolish financial policies of corrupt governments who try to blame them for their own personal greed and shortsightedness. Unfortunately it's the ordinary people who pay ( again! ) for their leaders mistakes. Then some people in an entirely different country get to pay to bail out the b****rds who made the bad loans in the first place! The only solution to all of this nonsense is to return to tangible money like gold and silver that isn't subject to the whims of politicians. As far as "managed" capitalism goes, the problem with that is the managers have the force of law and the police and military backing them. So instead of a few people getting obscenely wealthy providing goods and services that others want ( and they only wield economic power primarily as the political arena in a free market economy has little to interest them ) you have politicians doling out favorable legislation to the biggest campaign contributers. Now you're in a world of hurt because both political AND economic power is consolidated into the hands of very few people. :-0 The more that government tries to regulate and manage and control the worse it gets for the common man. We need governments to provide for the common defense, imprison violent criminals, and maybe even maintain the infrastructure like roads, utilities, etc. Anything more is just the dead weight of taxation and control hung around the citizens' necks. Oh, btw, notice I didn't post anything on "US vs Russian fighters-Part II" like I did last time. See, Bart, I'm reformed! Really! ;- )

Gollum:

Just like in poker, if the country and central bank hold the cards in the form of a sound balanced economy, they can not be forced out. In addition, there must be someone willing to sell currency back to the spec's in order for them to liquidate their positions. Otherwise, the repurchase of their short will send the market right back up.

Central banks have much more power than their reserve balances. They can boost short term rates to levels that make it very uncomfortable for specs. This obviously can slow an economy, but if the fundamentals are ok, then the specs will run for cover a long time before the economy capitulates.

The fact that Soros manages some $20 billion, does not mean he will bet the whole load on a single play. This is just too great a risk. Governments can always do things like capital controls and other nasty things so that there is a real incentive for the specs, no matter how large, not to get carried away.

The real reason that currency speculators are able to consistently make money is that currency markets trend. Almost all successful currency traders are trend followers of one sort or another. While I have no way of proving this, the single largest factor causing currency trends is likely to be the fact that there are central banks, and politicians that influence them. If central banks never intervened in the currency markets it would probably be a lot harder for specs to make a living. I am grateful for their never ending foolishness.

As for time to enjoy? One suspects THAT would be a function of the psychological profile. Personally, it is not the kind of pressure that brings forward the best in moi! {:- )

after the Jan. 1, 2000. It's a hopeless muddle.

When shall I expect the Y2K demon, whatever he really is, to come to my door? As my history professor used to say ( he had adopted the 18th century view of time as a relativistic rather than absolute measure of the time of occurrence of events ) : "Expect me when you see me."

-EJ

certainly indicates that most gov. agencies are not where they shold be in their remediation efforts. Sen. Bennet also speaks very alarmingly about U.S. progress ( both public and private ) Presidential Y2K czar Koskinen is issueing warnings almost daily. The next step is a Presidential speech on the issue. What effect do you think that'll have on the markets?

is 5 Star! {:- ) )

You are probably right, but I'm not altogether sure that even a
sound economy couldn't be pulled down. These guys go after the
weakest prey first so it's hard to find a test case.

Poor management of a country's resources makes them into a target,
to be sure, but I think the root of the problem is also that
there is more than one currency rather than a single global standard.

CBS International Markets
Shanghai Composite Index
45.10
-1268.62
-96.6%
45.90
44.69
Is this of any interest?

HighRise

What will be will be. I rather think the Y2K thing will turn
out not to be bad as some have feared nor as painless as others
have said. There will be surprises.

They may begin to fear that Christmas 98 will be a stinker.
That the entirety of 99 will be worse - except for survival supplies.
They will start slashing inventories with storewide sales.
They will be buying less and less. Suppliers will have to cut back too.
The spiral will accelerate. Especially when consumers catch the flu too.
Manufacturers will cut back and lay off - the unemployed will not be buying much and neither will those who fear for their jobs.
What does this portend for Gold and Silver?
Demand may increase among those who have the cash to buy.
But for those battening down the hatches for a major blow...
Why bother buying anything if it will all be for nought anyway.
When the consumers and the retailers crawl in the cave with the bear...
prices of everything will drop. And still we won't buy - because we have nothing to buy with and no one to sell it to. For the lower half of the population Gold & Silver will be a luxury compared to food, shelter and defense. Bootstrapping only works if you can reach the bootstraps.

Gollum:

I'm with you there. If there was a currency backed by a basket of commodities, then one could draw the line between debt and currency. This would make it clear that purchasing debt was not a risk free operation. Then there would be no tears to be shed when a debt was not repaid, as this was part of the deal in the first place.

As the system currently exists, disaster is always lurking. When and if problems surface in the US dollar, the result ain't going to be pretty.

The mainstream press always see the usual suspects prognosticating on Y2K: Rep. Hyde, Sen. Bennet, Koskinen, etc. Each begins to sound like a child running his tongue over and over the same sore spots, "Ouch, the government's not ready!" and "Ouch, the banks are behind!" Without authority escalation, the introduction of higher level representatives, Y2K has taken on the character of a cultist issue. I do hope Clinton or at least Gore gets publically involved. In the current envirnoment the stock market will probably rise if they do, the justification perhaps being that the issue is now being taken seriously so we'll be ok. If nukes in India can't do it, nothing can bum out this bull.
-EJ

Well, I'm going to retire early so I can get up early
and be surprised by how high the market came overnight.

the unreachable goal,would the donky walk without the carrot.

"Gold Franc-Several gold francs are minted. The Swiss gold franc is used in BIS's balance sheet. The value of these Francs is now expressed in terms of SDRs."

Please note the FIRST sentence, "several gold francs ARE minted." Mmmmmm
http://www.fxfxnet.com/members/fx/g.htm

bbl

Ok, here it is ! GOZEERAH goes down town !
The events that will unglue this Mongolian Cluster Bunch
assembled by the minions of Wallstreet & the USG PPT are continued unrest in the Ailing Tigers making further force fed debt consumption unpalatable & the revelation that as a result of the failure of the IaManFers to socialize the Western Money Center Bank Debts of say $750 Billion, that they are insolvent. Japanese losses alone will be recognized at in excess of one Trillion. Most of Japanese household savings have already been wizzed away & the rest will be wiped out by Japanese Bank failures & the stock & bond market crash.
This market epiphiny will coincide with the recognition that these same banks have massive losses wiping out their equity, either from direct gambling losses or the inability to collect from their derivitive
debtors !
This crises will parcipitate a crises of confidence at the knees, causing the banks to raise all available capital & everything will contract & buckle from there. All fiat currencies will fall, but the premium of the USD will evaporate @ 12 Ft. per second per second !
NOSTRADUUMBASS flatly predicts these events to hit by September 8, 1998, ( Market may wobble into October before final denial dawns ) with dead cat bounce to be annihilated by the Y2K Tsunmami, a la 1932.
POG has been punished enough & will not fall below 10 % of Cost of Production ( for a short period ) & will rise to an exalted level between $1200 &n $68,000 within two years. POG of $850 within one year or my name ain't NOSTRADUUMBASS & you can place me in the pantheon of greats with S. Puetz !

Love On Ya,


BOWIE NOSTRADUUMBASS

I'm going to hit the hay too. If the NIKKEI is below 15000 when I wake, the DOW will ROCK tomorrow, is my guess.

G'Nite.
-EJ

y2k

I cant find any fault in the doom that seems in store due to the y2k problem. However, it was Jesse Livermore that said about speculation, "beware of insailable arguments presented by a brilliant mind." I hope y2k is such an argument.

I don't think that the price of gold is going down below the 287.00 mark again. And as far as deflation goes or inflation goes, the price of gold is going to rise in either case because gold is a cyclical commodity and
there are an awful lot of indicators that are saying we have hit a bottom. It seems that supply and demand ( demand for industrial production, jewelry,and demand as a investment tool ) are infavor of prices rising. So if any of you want to buy gold stocks or physical you will have to go elsewhere . I'm not selling right now!!! If some central banks want to sell now, let them. I run my own bank and I am not selling
any until$340.00

SINGAPORE considered one of best in ASIA!Today,badly hit in stocks and currencies market!
Think that after G7 tomorrow,the region markets will slip further.The topic about "DEVALUEATION of reminbi"seem getting hotter each day.So as Aussie dollars...broke 0.60!The demand of the local gold dropped.Shops closing one by one by one...
briefly..

SDRer-Thanks!
Highrise-I think that's a bad quote. Yahoo has them up a couple of points.
Moon-hi! ( Thought we'd all forgotten about you, didn't you? Thought you could lurk in peace, didn't you? Well, listen here Mr. Moon, if that's your REAL name, we'll be watching...oops, kinda lapsed into goonspeak for a minute there. Sorry about that. ) ;- )
Sub $300 gold? BUY! BUY! BUY!
BBL

willingly give up their metal assets, so what is the net effect? Does confiscation valueless gold?

I caught part of a report on CNN this evening. I missed most of it so details are sketchy. The report was that people had come forward from the U.S. military to state that the U.S. used nerve gas during the Vietnam war, and get this, we used it on our own personnel. The personnel were defectors from our military. Approval for use of Seron, the nerve gas, had to have come from the White House. Nobody else would have had the authority.

http://home.worldnet.fr/scdut/ANALYSE.HTM
Stephane's gold analysis from France
I have translated to the best of my knowledge but the translation is not
guaranteed. ANALYZE OUNCE Of GOLD IT WILL BE VERY IMPORTANT TO WATCH LEVEL 287,5$ AND 300$ POG confirmed this week the rupture of its strong level of support located at 298-300$. Gold established a lower level at 288$ before
moving up again a few dollars. Gold could even return to test from the
bottom level 298-300$ before having a new weakness. The two very important levels to watch will be: 1 ) Level- 287,50$: it is indeed on this level which passes the lower weekly band of Bollinger . A move beyond the bottom
of this band would be in my opinion rather negative because we would have again a strong volatility with a downward move It could find its new
support at level 278-280$ ( low of the year ) but could just have a
sufficient powerful downward move to break this ultimate support ( with
downward objectives to 250$ ) . SCENARIO II would be then possible 2 ) Level- 300$: an upward crossing of this level ( becoming now a strong resistance to the rise ) would validate according to my opinion SCENARIO I, this would be in my opinion very bullish. POG could move up again with upward resistance at levels 306$, 314$, 325$, 340$. Now neutral opinion, I advise you to intervene via the gold shares only if one of the two levels is crossed. Be careful and do not seek to guess a possible low, wait until the graphic configuration improves to return to do some purchases . I think that always the two following scenarios of Elliot waves should be privileged ( to facilitate the comprehension of these analyses, look at the second graph below ) : SCENARIO I: SHORT-TERM BEARISH, MID- TERM BULLISH, BUT LONG-TERM BEARISH the ounce of gold is going through an upward technical correction of a downward movement in five times ( 415$-278$ ) which took place between the beginning of 1996 and the beginning of 1998. This technical correction should last between 9 months and 2 years. It will take the form of WAVE A, B, C ( see graph-color of identical waves on the graph to facilitate the location ) . WAVE A should be finished and should have broken up into three sub-waves a1, b1, c1 ( 278$-314$ ) . WAVE B is presently going and sub-wave a2
( 314$-295$ ) should be finished, and so wave b2 ( 298-303$ ) . Sub-wave c2 is presently going with downward objectives located between 280-290$. The end of this sub-wave will bring an end to WAVE B. WAVE C will have to break up into three sub-waves a3, b3, c3 ( even in five ) ( not shown on the graph ) . The upward trend of this wave will be at least 315$ and could reach a level up to 340$ if this wave have an extension. After gold could move again in a bearish movement in five times with objectives of fall on 280$ or even lower. SCENARIO II: VERY BEARISH MID- TERM gold should have carried out a technical upward correction of the downward movement in five times ( 415$-278$ ) which took place between the beginning of 1996 and the beginning of 1998, limited only to sub-waves a1 , b1, c1. This upward correction of 1/4 of the great downward movement should be finished. A new fall in five times should take place with aims quite lower than 280$. This wave in five times breaks up like this: Wave 1: 314$-298$ is 16$ Wave 2: 298$-303$ is 5$ ( 1/3 of correction ) Wave 3: 303$-280$ ( if downward extension of 1.618 ( of wave 1 ) or 303$-260$ ( if downward extension of 2.68 ( of wave 1 ) Wave 4: to come Wave 5: to come
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