The man who helps "little minds" understand the "big ideas" in the news.... But are they even worth understanding?
It's happened again, boys and girls! Another Monday came rolling around after Sunday! And "Uncle Jay", a Brooklyn boy with a white beard and not a whole lot of hair, a fellow who has worked in movie sound production and movie editing, started making his three-minute video "explaining the news."…
Article comments
76 - Clavos
Thus, the need for a society that doesn't require becoming a commodity to satisfy material needs.
With respect, I don't think anything, not even your concept of the ideal, Utopian society, will ever eliminate that phenomenon, because sex is used by both genders to achieve ends having nothing to do with material needs.
77 - Cindy
But then how would sex be being used as a commodity (or to commoditize a person)? I'm not against any consentual relationships.
Put another way: If a woman's material needs are met and she doesn't need to become a prostitute to meet those needs--then there's nothing I imagine I am opposed to.
78 - roger nowosielski
#76,
Like self-validation? Or fuller, more meaningful life? Just asking.
79 - Cindy
Hey, even if it is some kinky ideas. Who am I to decide what people should want?
Meet the material needs through an egalitarian society that values community is basically my position. I think many of these things that are destructive to healthy sexuality self-view and other-view would diminish and disappear.
80 - Clavos
Meet the material needs through an egalitarian society that values community is basically my position. I think many of these things that are destructive to healthy sexuality self-view and other-view would diminish and disappear.
I'm not sure of that, Cindy. Sex, as you know, is one of the most powerful forces driving humans, and often manifests itself in dehumanizing and bizarre ways that have nothing to do with other wants, material or otherwise.
81 - Cindy
You're right that it's my guess. Maybe it won't ever be eliminated. But, one thing for sure is, there isn't much chance to find out by keeping a system that turns sex into passive spectacle rather than an active relationship of experience with another--and people into commodities in pursuit of, not real relationship, but that same spectacle.
82 - Clavos
BTW, I forgot to mention that Broward Medical Center in Ft. Lauderdale is also building a solid rep as a cardiac center, though I don't think that it reaches the levels of Emory or Methodist DeBakey yet. That said, my father had a very successful aortic valve replacement there almost thirty years ago, in 1982.
83 - Cindy
Thanks Clav. It's harder than one thinks to get info without asking real people.
84 - Ruvy
zing,
When I was talking about my dead roommate's vices, I was talking primarily about smoking, alcohol and drugs, and the negative effects that flowed therefrom. I wasn't thinking about sex. When I was talking about my own vices, I was thinking primarily of things like procrastination, not doing things when I need to, These things diminish me.
But since you raised the issue, in my own eyes, sex that exploits is wrong. That's a tricky call, but it is the standard that I use. So prostitution, in my eyes, is wrong - because either the john or the prostitute - or both - are being exploited.
And you are making assumptions about what religion does or doesn't do - and more to the point, being a believer is different from being "religious"; and I'm a believer more than I am religious.
The rules found in the Torah (vayikrá/Leviticus, Chapter 18), apply to the Children of Israel within the Land of Israel and have nothing to do with you guys. So far as I'm concerned, the rule that applies to you all forbids sexual immorality in a general sense - with details still to be worked out by Noahide judges. Since I am not a Noahide judge, I cannot tell you what sexual immorality means for you. And assuming would only make and ass out of you and me.
85 - roger nowosielski
Another word you're looking for, Ruvy, old-fashioned as it is, is promiscuity.
86 - roger nowosielski
And for all my many relationships, I never really was guilty of it.
87 - Cindy
I am with Ruvy on the exploitation thing.
But, that is what it is, it's all about exploitation of something or someone. Sex, weakness, identity...
And that's somehow supposed to have something to do with individual liberty. When one's individual liberty is reduced to the chance to exploit someone else, it makes me wonder how dizzy one must get giving all those twists to the meaning of the word.
88 - Ruvy
Getting back on topic, I watched Uncle Jay's latest on 9 March. And he was having trouble keeping a smile on the face of what is shaping up to be an economic disaster.
And he hadn't even read this from Global Research! If he had, he might have thrown in the towel altogether....
Happy Purim, boys and girls!
And speaking of Purim, here is a recipe that Rabbi RaHamim Pauli received for a great Purim meal.
You'll need the following: a cup of flour, four large brown eggs, two cups of dried fruit, a half teaspoon of salt, a cup of brown sugar, a cup of water, 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1/2 cup walnuts and a bottle of whiskey.
Sample the whiskey to check for quality.
Take a large bowl. Check the whiskey again.
To be sure it's highest quality, pour one level cup and drink. Repeat.
Turn on the electric mixer, beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.
Add one teaspoon of sugar and beat again. Make sure the whiskey is still fresh.
Cry another tup. Turn off the mixer.
Beat two leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.
If the fired druit gets stuck in the beaters, pry it loose with a drewscriver.
Sample the whiskey to check for tonsisticity.
Next, sift two cups of salt. Or something. Who cares? Try the whiskey.
Now sift the iemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table spoon of beer or something.
Whatever you can find.
Grease the oven. Turn the cake tin to 350 degrees.
Throw the bowl out of the window. Try the whiskey again - and go to bed.
Hag purím saméaH....
89 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy, I don't think this recession is all that. They said on a news report yesterday that it is not yet as bad as the one that happened in the 80s - and I never even noticed that one, or the previous one in the 70s, until they had already happened.
Just as with previous economic adjustments, life will go on. The kind of revelling in these undoubtedly painful adjustments that some people seem to go in for is just hysterical...
Maybe you should make an adjustment to the news sources you refer to, unless it suits you to proclaim these events, as you have been doing for so long now, because you have such a different agenda.
90 - Ruvy
I can't fault you for a sense of humor, Chris. GM is on life support, banks are failing all over the place, the American government is spending all sorts of money it doesn't have, and never will - and you seem to be willing to believe a sweet candy report patting you on the head and telling you that everything is alright. Have another piece of candy, Chris....
Either that or you are joking altogether - but in your case I don't think you are.
Cattle going to the slaughterhouse seem more perturbed than you are, pal. I keep an eye on stuff from Global Research because they have the annoying habit of being right when it comes to the economy - even though their views on Israel disgust me.
91 - roger nowosielski
I'm not certain I'd go along with you, Chris, on the tenor of your general remarks (not those directed at Ruvy). Perhaps you're less affected by what's happening here - you're somewhere in Spain, no? No question that the press and the media contribute here to everyone's perception, but still . . . Layoffs and the free-falling market, people losing their savings - these are everyday occurrences.
Of course life will go on. It always does. But what I see, it won't be quite the same.
92 - Clavos
But what I see, it won't be quite the same.
Probably true. We'll be rid of a lot of dead wood (GM, Citi, e.g.)
Now, if we could only figure out how to get rid of about 3/4 of the Federal gummint...
93 - Christopher Rose
You're both exaggerating, presumably from too much media exposure?
Ruvy, actually GM might fail but so what? Car manufacturers have failed before. Some banks have gone in the USA and a few more might go here and there, but most banks are still there and there is money available. I've been granted three mortgages in the last two weeks and I don't even have a credit history in the UK anymore as I was in Spain for over 6 years.
As to debt, it can be a funny thing. I've never been in more debt but I'm getting richer not poorer, despite the lack of
a hugeany disposable income! What seems like an impressively large sum to owe is usually reduced to more manageable proportions by the twin effects of time and inflation, so there is no reason to think that nations like the USA won't get through this.I've no idea at all what you're on about with your sweet candy thing report, so unless you start to make sense, I'll assume that is just another of your "special" moments...
Roger, I don't really care about falling share prices. Investing in shares is - and always has been - nothing more nor less than gambling. Actually gambling is more honest as you don't get insider trading in a casino. Better Vegas than Wall Street!
If people are rash enough to gamble blindly based on the opinions of others, it is hard to feel much sympathy when they lose. However, if gamble one must, when better than when share prices are back to where they were a few years back?
There have always been lay-offs and there always will be but, for every car company that dies, there are literally dozens of new, more hi-tech companies starting up all over the world.
Yeah, it ain't the greatest of times economically, but we've been there before and we will be again. We'll get through it - unless it actually is going to be the end of the world somewhere between 2012 (Mayans) or 2030 (Ruvy) - and then it won't matter anyhow, so lighten up!
94 - roger nowosielski
I'm all for a major cleanup, Clav, and restoring integrity to corporate culture. And I should hope the present efforts are remedial, that once the mission is accomplished (a big if), the government will be less intrusive (another big if).
One disturbing news had come out overnight: prohibiting companies from pleading their case with the employees in the matter of unionizing. I'm not very happy about it, because it perpetuates the adversarial model in times when all Americans should coming together and work on solutions.
95 - Cindy
Scientist reveals what men REALLY think of when they look at a girlie calendar
Here is an interesting article, that might say something about objectification.
When men are shown images of women in bikinis, the part of the brain they use when thinking about DIY tools and other objects lights up.
At the same time, the region they use to try to tune into another person's thoughts and feelings tunes down, brain scans showed.
96 - Clavos
We're such animals!!
Thankfully.
97 - Cindy
Nothing wrong with an animal nature.
Somehow, I doubt it's an animal nature that puts a partner in a category with a do it yourself tool.
98 - Clavos
"images of women in bikinis" are not "partners," Cindy.
99 - bliffle
It's those darn Ridgid Tool calendars:
Ridgid tools
Us guys owe a debt of gratitude to pinup artists because as Art Buchwald put it "they show us that there's a lot more to women than just brains!"
100 - Cindy
Clav,
Are the pictures of the men wallets & security? Apparently that is what the female brains in the study saw them as.
101 - Ruvy
Chris,
I've no idea at all what you're on about with your sweet candy thing report, so unless you start to make sense, I'll assume that is just another of your "special" moments....
I don't see the world through rose colored glasses. With a name like Rose, I'm not surprised that you do. As for GM or Ford, they deserve to go out of business for all the shit they have stuck on the market for decades - but who is going to feed all those kids of the parents who will be laid off? Who is going to feed all the kids of the parents working for the satellite firms who supply the parts, etc? You with your three mortgages? Maybe cars should be like computers with all the parts interchangeable so you can get them off the shelf - but at this point they aren't. Loads of banks deserve to go out of business too, for all the stupid things they have done. But again, who is going to feed the kids of the poor workers there who are laid off? And with what money?
Where are the people who have had their mortgages foreclosed going to live? Under what bridge? In which cave? Having been homeless for a good year or so, I know what homelessness and hopelessness feels like. While strong adults can handle it, the weak ones can't, and it really works a number on the kids.
This is serious shit, Chris. That is why I was warning about it two years ago. Go back and look. I didn't write articles on the coming decline, but whenever someone else did, I latched on and threw my two shekels in. That is why I do not view this as just another "spot of hard times". A huge nation's money system has just collapsed, and you can see chunks of its economy drifting away like ice from a melting glacier.
How or when this will hit you, I cannot say. I am no economist. G-d knows I'm no prophet. Visibility, as the businessmen call it, is real poor in all this, and the world is not used to America collapsing. But I can see the Coracle moving in History's stream, and the American Coracle is moving towards rocks upon which it may well collapse.
102 - Christopher Rose
I can only assume that it is your determination to ignore anything that doesn't fit your predictions of doom on account of your mystical "insight" which caused you to ignore my point about how new businesses are forming as the old ones shrink.
It wasn't that long ago that the East India Company was one of the most powerful corporations on the planet. Now it's just an odd footnote in history. Thirty years ago Microsoft didn't exist, now it is arguably on the wane.
You don't really know what is happening in the West, Ruvy, just as we can't know what it is really like to be living the precarious life you do. You of all people should know better than to believe what you see on TV news or read in the papers.
It's not a question of me being an optimist, although I am, it is a question of accepting the reality of the situation, rather than part of it, which is what you do.
If you look back at the recession of the 30s, it is statistically just a tiny blip now, practically indetectable, just like other, more recent falls. However, somehow economies have managed to get over these terrible disasters and carry on. Why should we think it is apocalyptic this time? On the evidence so far, it isn't, so maybe it would be a better tactic to lay off the doom-monging. There are enough manic street and web preachers all around the world doing that already. So far, nobody's predictions of doom have ever come to pass, that is a fact you can be sure of.
America or, more correctly, the USA, is not collapsing, it is changing and evolving, just as it should do and just as other countries are too. Nothing could or should try to prevent that.
103 - roger nowosielski
You may be right, Chris. But if you were an American, you'd bemoan the loss.
I can't blame you, of course, for subscribing to a larger view. Still, it's a downer because we set the trend. Now, it looks like it was all for naught.
Think of the good times that America had once meant and signified - the hope and the portent. It's all gone or about to disappear.
I bet you won't enjoy it as much once the dust settles. Life will be drab.
104 - Christopher Rose
Roger, what loss? If you mean GM, they deserve to go to the wall for producing shit cars for years. With the partial exception of Ford, your entire car industry sucks massively and deserves to suffer.
If you mean the US, as I noted above, it's a change, that's all. So we live in interesting times, it ain't so bad and way better than being bored.
The best of us is yet to come, mate. Enjoy the ride.
105 - roger nowosielski
Yes, we're up for a ride. I was just thinking of the good ole' times when everyone was happy-go- lucky and carefree. The good old American clunkers, and Saturday nights on the Main Street, pick-ups and movies. The whole shebang.
106 - Clavos
@#104,
It ain't often I so totally agree with you, mate.
Just wish it weren't costing me so much of my personal treasure (41% so far); I don't suck massively, and at least IMO, don't deserve to suffer.
107 - Ruvy
Clavos,
Just wish it weren't costing me so much of my personal treasure (41% so far); I don't suck massively, and at least IMO, don't deserve to suffer.
That's the point, Clavos. I don't think you deserve to suffer - but suffer you do. So, what's happening in the States is not "a change, that's all". Unless I'm wrong, you may not be in the position to replace that 41% of your wealth.
Think of my father-in-law, who was 82 last October. He is a damned decent fellow and he doesn't deserve to suffer either. But suffer he does. And he cannot replace the wealth he has lost in the market.
We're not talking about irresponsible people here, not you nor my wife's father, nor Joanne Huspek, nor a whole host of people who are suffering what is more than just "a rough patch".
My own neighbors talk of how business seems to have dried up altogether. My neighbor the publisher can't get any business, my neighbor the photographer talks about "being more flexible" (a sure sign of trouble), my neighbor the tour guide is grateful not to have his own business, and to be working for someone else, etc. etc. But the kids' mouths still have to be fed.
108 - roger nowosielski
Well, that's an awfully selfish attitude, Clav, to judge the situation from your own singular perspective. What about the greater whole?
109 - Clavos
What about the greater whole Roger?
Isn't that what I'm paying taxes for?
And isn't it the entity to whom I'm paying the taxes that is the source of most of the problems?
And finally, isn't that what you liberals are for?
110 - Clavos
One final note, Roger:
Read Ayn Rand's The Virtue of Selfishness.
111 - roger nowosielski
Clavos - I've read that, and I've read Plato, too, about what we commonly consider to be in our best self-interest.
Sorry, but I'd rather side with Plato.
112 - Clavos
Of course you would -- brilliant intellectual that you are.
113 - Dan(Miller)
Re #112
Censors! Quick! Personal attack! Bring the fire hoses!
Whoops, my bad. I need new glasses. The second grouping of ll looked like ff.
Dan(Miller)
114 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy, people who invested in shares ARE irresponsible because it is gambling, pure and simple.
Clavos, invest in real goods not stocks. Pork bellies, corn, houses or boats maybe.
115 - Cindy
Re#99
bliffle,
That is pretty funny, now that I think of it.
116 - Clavos
The time is getting very ripe for buying houses, Chris -- at least here in South Florida...
117 - Ruvy
Ruvy, people who invested in shares ARE irresponsible because it is gambling, pure and simple.
For once, Chris, we actually agree on something. I gambled in the market, and won, getting out with all my chips and more. We lived on those chips here in Israel for quite some time. I gambled in real estate and also won (though when I did, I wasn't intent on gambling at all, just buying a house to live in) and with the winnings from that we were able to move to Israel.
I'm not a riverboat gambler, though. Quite the opposite.
I tried to get my father-in-law to get out of the market in 1987 when it crashed. He said he had seen worse (meaning the shitty markets in the 1930's when most folks stayed away out of sheer fear of losing everything. He got me to go in the market, and I was a conservative gambler, very rarely losing anything. But, if you want to play the market, you have to be willing (and able) to lose like a Christian. If you can't you're screwed - badly.
My father-in-law started with nothing in the market, doing very careful research and investing conservatively with such free funds as came available as my wife and her siblings were growing up. He eventually came up with a very large portfolio, and he had a lot of faith in the market, something I never had.
I don't think I have to tell you how he feels these days. He can't ever replace what he lost. He's just too old.
118 - Christopher Rose
Ruvy, I think you'll find that we agree on more than just one thing. Indeed, the only thing I can think of that we substantially disagree about is that you think it is okay to base your life around a belief system based on the unproven existence of a deity, which I consider reckless and a folly.
As to your father-in-law, those shares are inheritable so, as long as they aren't sold at a market low point, they can still deliver value to people in the future. Not perfect admittedly, but there is still the potential for a winning run in the Wall Street Casino.
I'm not against investing in shares, but it absolutely has to be approached as either a very long term investment that you forget about or you have to go in having previously accepted that you are gambling and shouldn't invest more than you can afford to lose.
I did some day trading in the mid 90s and both won and lost fairly large amounts of money. Now I see that there are much smarter ways to invest, where the odds are more in my favour.
119 - HeddaCabbage
Does this guy makes ignorance or wisdom more blissful? Whichever, thanks for introducing us to Uncle Jay, Ruvy.