Gangster State? US?

Two / three more witnesses to reality? Will we finally listen? Is it worth our time to get informed? You decide.

Caravan To Midnight - Episode 535 Dr. Paul Craig Roberts & Joel Richardson (Time: 3:14:13) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFGE77h3QB4&t=5547s

If this was the state of things two years ago (particularly as described by Dr. Roberts), what is the current state? Is it not all to obvious that drama upon drama is constructed to distract us from the cascading destruction of law and liberty?

Connecting the Dots ~ Exposing the Cons?

When media is in the ownership and control of those pursuing and protecting power and gain, what is the likelihood of truth being disseminated to the masses?

Does it matter whether the pursuer / protector is black or white? brown or beige? young or old? able or disabled? politically right or left? human or AI?

If your raison d'être were to increase power and gain, would you allow your owned and controlled media empire to spread the truth about your hidden agendas? your secret deals? your moral failings? Would you want anyone connecting the dots of your cons as you competed for the resources of the world? for the supreme position of all positions — #1?

Or maybe you fell for a “honey-pot” / “brown-stone” op and found yourself compromised such that your power and gain status was at risk of exposure and collapse? What would you not do to keep the truth under wraps? to keep the income coming in? Would you lie? steal? cheat? oppress? kill? Would you seek to compromise and blackmail others so they, too, would be “in control”? Would you falsely accuse whistle-blowers of the very crimes they seek to expose? Would you come to take pleasure in the success of your duplicities? Would you become addicted to the highs of deceiving the “low brows”? Would you revel in the deliberate, increasing incongruities you were able to get away with? in the fabrications that you were able to force others to advance for the sake of their paychecks and pensions?

So if media is owned and controlled by power- and gain-brokers, what is the chance for truth? What is the historical, déjà vu “pattern and practice”? to accuse upstart, non-conforming investigative journalists of fictional sins and crimes? — just like whistle-blowers? Is the pattern to deflect? disparage? destroy the true news? to swear by all that is high and mighty, low and despicable that “False News” is everywhere but where you are?

So to those who get their news and views from corporate-controlled media, the déjà vu truth is: Whether the anchor or reporter is Fox-, CNN-, MSNBC-, ETC.-affiliated, your diet is fat-cat-saturated and truth deficient.

Time to move on, folks. Unplug from the fat-cat MSM. Move on to the new news paradigm — those upstart alternates who risk reputation, life, and limb to uncover the cover-ups of power and gain agendas with facts, evidence, and accountability. As always, use one's head and discernment, but perhaps begin with some of these:

▪ The Corbett Report at https://www.youtube.com/user/corbettreport
▪ George Webb at https://www.youtube.com/user/georgwebb
▪ Crowdsource the Truth at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8Cl9QaRtuW9CNjP7pP4BBQ
▪ SGT Report at https://www.youtube.com/user/SGTbull07
▪ Trello Bd at https://trello.com/b/RMx1r5dG/hillarys-hamlettruth-leaks-hcs-leakershackers-henchmenseries-54-350-awan-spy-ring
▪ Trello Bd at https://trello.com/b/4jnnJKaR
▪ NewsBud at https://www.youtube.com/user/boilingfrogspost
▪ Our Hidden History at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbfzszfxZr4qmeZjZ_3R_Pw
▪ The Outer Light at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnrE7PkiyVPP5ZTMqo3QW-Q
▪ Judicial Watch at https://www.youtube.com/user/JudicialWatch
▪ The Solari Report at https://www.youtube.com/user/thesolarireport
▪ End Times News Report at https://www.youtube.com/user/prepare333

And remember, the fat-cat "pattern and practice" is to malign, mock, and accuse all who threaten their standing and glory; and to reward willing, shilling others for doing the same.

Imagine?

If one were a psychopath/sociopath¹—i.e., a PWOC²—whose raison d’être was to pursue power and gain, what would one be predisposed to do:

▪ lie?
▪ steal?
▪ cheat?
▪ distort?
▪ falsely accuse?
▪ malign?
▪ short change?
▪ manipulate mankind and markets?
▪ create profit-generating catastrophes?
▪ foment wars?
▪ externalize costs?
▪ convert (corrupt) a good into an evil?
▪ hire shills and trolls to front for one?
▪ etc., etc., etc.

But let us consider: corrupting a good into an evil.

A recent exposé of unconscionable corruption and fraud is profiled in Vaxxed³—a documentary that everyone should watch (as Robert De Niro encourages) so we can make up our own mind as to its credibility. Despite shills, trolls, and dupes maligning this film, it is NOT anti-vaccine. It presents as anti-corruption, anti-fraud, anti-abuse, anti-tyranny, anti-PWOCs; its concern: pro-health, pro-child, pro-family, pro-transparency, pro-choice, pro-safety, pro-uncorrupted science. It is a voice crying in the profit-driven wilderness against vaccine protocols that are:

▪ untested and unproven respecting the safety of vaccine mixtures;
▪ decades past due for review and exposure of timing and effectiveness;
▪ insufficiently and corruptly assessed by oversight bodies;
▪ in critical need of open, honest discussion;
▪ in dire need of punitive accountability.

So, how long till we clue in that mega-corps and their HyPEs⁴ who swim in psychopathic waters (who stand to lose massive amounts of “power and gain” if truth be told) cannot be trusted in any degree?

Can we not see the déjà vu?—that vaccine “science” has become a latter-day, oppressive tyranny like unto the days of Galileo?—blindly committed to its own preservation, gain, and status quo, whatever the cost to others?

---------------------/
1. http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/05/a-plague-of-psychopaths.html
2. PWOC = a Person WithOut Conscience, which includes corporate (faux-)“persons” by so-called court decision. See also http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/02/econ-005-person.html ; http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2014/12/without-conscience.html
3. Vaxxed: From Cover-up to Catastrophe (Time: 1hr. 35 min.) at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5562652/
4. HyPEs = Highly Paid Employees

ADDITIONAL VIEWS AND COMMENTARIES: As always, watch, listen, and learn with discernment.
● VAXXED Documentary Explored with Filmmakers on Antidote (Time: 50:58 min.) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KrpK0rbl9w
● VAXXED DIRECTOR ANDREW WAKEFIELD BREAKS SILENCE ON VACCINE VIOLENCE AGAINST CHILDREN AND CDC COVERUP (Time 12:49 min.) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=titN2bZYlUU
● Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe (Time: 1:31:43) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gepyvumlS-8
● FULL Vaxxed Coast to Coast AM Interview Bigtree, Wakefield & Hooker (Time 1:18:39) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG6ZHT0L8rs
● Robert De Niro on Pulling 'Vaxxed' From Tribeca Film Festival (Time:5:01) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eHZVqDbdEc
● Robert De Niro, Tribeca and the censorship of the VAXXED documentary (Time: 26:35 at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFAGViYJ_VI
● UN VAXXED A Docu Commentary for Robert De Niro (Time 1:26:04) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM_rTjKdegw

Inevitable?

What happens when an economy (national or global) is based on a system that promotes psychopathic behaviors? If one doesn't believe that corporate capitalism favors psychopathy, one has not been reading headlines of late or one has a very short and selective memory.

Review:

▪  A Plague of Psychopaths? at http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/05/a-plague-of-psychopaths.html
▪  Capital Punishment at http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2015/10/capital-punishment.html
▪  Mayday? Mayday? Mayday! at http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2015/05/mayday-mayday-mayday.html
▪  TransAlta Culpa (Again)? at http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/08/transalta-culpa-again.html
▪  How Long Till We Get It??! at http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2009/08/how-long-till-we-get-it.html

But there may be hope.

Read:

Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future by Paul Mason

Listen to:

The End of Capitalism a “CBC Ideas” podcast at http://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-end-of-capitalism-1.3334355 (Time 53:56 min.)

So, indeed—how long till we finally acknowledge that:

▪  capitalism's highest rewards go to people without conscience (PWOCs)?
▪  if we keep doing what we have been doing—pursuing power and gain at the expense of each other—we will not survive?
▪  what goes around, will come around?

So for those puzzling about how a corporate tyrant like Donald Trump* could rise politically as far as he has, perhaps we need only look at the system DT has used, abused, and profited from for decades.

Perhaps our love affair with corporatism has brought us to this inevitable, political choice! and the inevitable “impending doom” (whether right or left), unless we awake to the realities of our competitive, psychopathic system.

PS: Do not assume that Socialism^† is the only alternative. It is equally corrupt and bankrupt. There are other options that have been explored in other posts.^‡

--------------------/
* The pure face of corporate capitalism?
† http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/search/label/Socialism
‡ http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2009/12/economics-of-jesus.html
-- http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2013/12/gods-economy-christmas-perspective.html
-- http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2014/06/gods-economy-is-it-possible.html
-- http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2015/08/course-correction.html
or peruse the labels:
-- http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/search/label/EconomicsOfJesus
-- http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/search/label/God%27sEconomy
or Google: “gift economy”

Perfect Patsies ?

(the SHARE-side of shareholding?)

pat•sy
Noun [plural pat•sies. slang.]
1. a person who is easily swindled, deceived, coerced, persuaded, etc.; sucker.
2. a person upon whom the blame for something falls; scapegoat; fall guy.
3. a person who is the object of a joke, ridicule, or the like.
    (Source: Dictionary.com)

In follow up to the Déjà Vu Times post of October 5, 2015 entitled, “Capital Punishment,” I recommend a CBC News Post of October 19th:

From Bell to VW, shareholders pay for executive sins: Don Pittis
Why do innocent shareholders pay fines when company executives go scott-free?
By Don Pittis, CBC News Posted: Oct 19, 2015 5:00 AM ET Last Updated: Oct 20, 2015 10:57 AM ET^[1]

Mr. Pittis’ first two paragraphs inform us thus:

Martin Winterkorn stepped down from his job as CEO following the Volkswagen emissions scandal last month and will get a golden goodbye worth as much as $90 million. The figure was calculated by the Wall Street Journal from information in the company's annual report.

While Winterkorn and other departing executives enjoy their perks, shareholders face up to $18 billion US in fines in the United States alone after VW cheated the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, plus the cost of lawsuits and fixing millions of affected cars.

We are even informed that the North American Volkswagen CEO Michael Horn admits knowing of the “emissions rigging” in 2014.

So patsies of the world unite! Begin with Winterkorn and Horn. Hit this rhyming duo with the Capital Punishment² decreed by Moses; and thence onward to those “Bell Boys (& Girls),” and to the myriad other “profit-loss” schemers that hang to the [g]rafters of the corporate structure.

Why indeed do shareholders tolerate crimes against themselves by their HyPEs?³ How long before “patsy” definitions 1, 2, & 3 are added verbatim as ”shareholder” definitions 2, 3, & 4 at Dictionary.com?

How long before we admit the great con, corruption, and connivance of the shareholding system? The whole game is supposedly “gain,” but it seems that most shareholders are so far removed from influence, knowledge, oversight, or conscience they have become the perfect patsies.

--------------/
1. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/corporate-legal-responsibility-volkwagen-and-others-1.3272750?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning
2. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2015/10/capital-punishment.html
“If the theft be certainly found in his hand alive, whether it be ox, or ass, or sheep; he shall restore double. ... If a man shall deliver unto his neighbour money or stuff to keep, and it be stolen out of the man's house; if the thief be found, let him pay double. … For all manner of trespass, whether it be for ox, for ass, for sheep, for raiment, or for any manner of lost thing, which another challengeth to be his, the cause of both parties shall come before the judges; and whom the judges shall condemn, he shall pay double unto his neighbour.” (Old Testament | Exodus 22:4, 7, 9; bold emphasis added.)
3. Highly-Paid Employees = HyPEs

Capital Punishment ?

Capital punishment … is punishment by death. The sentence is referred to as a death sentence. Crimes that can result in a death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. The term capital originates from the Latin capitalis, literally "regarding the head" (referring to execution by beheading).¹

In light of recent corporate crimes committed in pursuit of greater capital (aka: mammon, moola, lucre, bottom-line, etc.) as in

▪  «Bristol-Myers Squibb to Pay $14 Million: Neither Admits Nor Denies SEC Charges in China Bribery Case»  (filed in News, October 5th, 2015)²

▪  «Consumers blindsided by Volkswagen's emissions test rigging: 'There's no way for a customer to know if something like this is going on': automotive researcher»  (CBC News Posted: Sep 22, 2015 5:00 AM ET) ³

▪  «TransAlta could pay $56M settlement for inflating Alberta energy prices» (CBC News Posted: Sep 30, 2015 3:58 PM MT)⁴

▪  «KPMG tax 'sham' used by at least 25 wealthy Canadians; Document says Case against KPMG to proceed as out-of-court talks break down» (CBC News Posted: Sep 30, 2015 5:00 AM ET)⁵

▪  «Toshiba CEO Hisao Tanaka resigns over doctored accounts that inflated profits: Toshiba acknowledges systematic coverup that began in 2008» (CBC News Posted: Jul 21, 2015 5:25 AM ET)⁶

▪ (etc., etc., as in the déjà vus of “things as they are, and as they were, and as they are to come”);⁷

perhaps we should return to the early days before corporations joined the immortals (as in: too-big-to-fail). And since our “fine-system” does not seem to carry sufficient deterrence, perhaps we could take a lesson from Moses:

If the theft be certainly found in his hand alive, whether it be ox, or ass, or sheep; he shall restore double. ... If a man shall deliver unto his neighbour money or stuff to keep, and it be stolen out of the man's house; if the thief be found, let him pay double. … For all manner of trespass, whether it be for ox, for ass, for sheep, for raiment, or for any manner of lost thing, which another challengeth to be his, the cause of both parties shall come before the judges; and whom the judges shall condemn, he shall pay double unto his neighbour. (Old Testament | Exodus 22:4, 7, 9; bold emphasis added.)

If the entirety of criminal, corporate profits automatically became a doubled loss, could that improve our situation? As it now is, the gains so far exceed any potential loss that the so-called “fiduciary duty” to shareholders (combined with the ego of most corporate HyPEs⁸) almost mandates adventures in crime.

Additional “capital punishments” could be: first, to automatically fine ALL corporate HyPEs in-the-know (or who should have known) the sum of their yearly salary, benefits, bonuses, and gains for every year of infraction—thus decapitalizing them; second, decapitate them (without severance) from their head positions; and thirdly, ban them for at least ten years from heading any other corporation of moderate to behemoth size.

If our punishments were consistent, capital, and catastrophic, perhaps we could get a grip on this (en)raging epidemic of mammon-mongering, psychopathy, and PWOCs.⁹

------------------------------/
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment
2. See more at: http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/#sthash.lODcFrey.dpuf ; http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/
3. http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/consumers-blindsided-by-volkswagen-s-emissions-test-rigging-1.3237589?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning ; see also VW's personal betrayal a sad lesson in business morality: Volkswagen reminds us why profit-motivated companies need tight regulation by Don Pittis, CBC News Posted: Sep 23, 2015 5:00 AM ET at http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/vw-tdi-diesel-morality-1.3238590?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning
4. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/transalta-could-pay-56m-settlement-for-inflating-alberta-energy-prices-1.3251225?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-calgary ; see also: http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/08/transalta-culpa-again.html
5. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/kpmg-tax-sham-used-by-at-least-25-wealthy-canadians-document-says-1.3249468?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning
6. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/toshiba-ceo-hisao-tanaka-resigns-over-doctored-accounts-that-inflated-profits-1.3161364?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning
7. Doctrine and Covenants | Section 93:24 ~ And truth is knowledge of things as they are, and as they were, and as they are to come;
8. HyPEs = Highly-Paid Employees (which is what most CEOs, CAOs, CFOs, etc. are since most business has shifted from an owner’s, hands-on paradigm to one of hired managers).
9. PWOC = person without conscience. See: http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2014/12/without-conscience.html ; http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/05/a-plague-of-psychopaths.html

Mayday? Mayday? Mayday!*

Perhaps on this historic May Day,^† we could profit from mourning these words of Thomas Jefferson:

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government in a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country. (Thomas Jefferson ~ 1816¹)

Have we not observed how the noose of hypocrisy has tightened as we have “globalized”?—

▪ how wages & benefits have plummeted as “profits” (and CEO compensations) rise;
▪ how loyalty to the corp has no reciprocation by the corp;
▪ how international sister corps protect each other’s profit turf, despite “free-trade” and law;²
▪ how big corps are into control, tyranny, bullying, spellbinding, etc., etc., despite human rights and freedoms (speech, association, a free press, religion, etc.) (Read a recent manifestation of control as Netflix, HBO, and their content providers try to control the viewing options of “foreign” paying subscribers. (Yes, PAYING, but masking their “foreignness”³);
▪ how the pursuit of big profits is poisoning our climate, deforming our weather, killing competing innovations, suppressing unprofitable truths, corrupting and/or homogenizing diverse cultures, damaging our food (& well-being), etc., etc. (Just read the Déjà Vu ~ Times posts labelled “corporatism”⁴ to get a broader notion of how prescient Mr. Jefferson and others were); and
▪ how the list goes on and on.

So what is the remedy to this call of distress? Since the majority of governments seem to have taken a luxury berth on the doomed ship Babylon,⁵ it seems we shall have to look elsewhere for help. Could it be—at ourselves?—at “We the People”? OR maybe even God?!! Could much of this be but déjà vu?—a semblance of nigh 240 years ago in America? (Have we forgotten already, the Brits and their globe-trotting tea partner?!⁶)

-------------------------/
* Mayday^x3: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayday
† May Day: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_Day

1. This is a verifiable quote. See the transcribed copy of Jefferson’s letter to George Logan, Nov. 12, 1816 (p. 68-69) at Hathi Trust Digital Library: http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t3pv6bn68;view=1up;seq=92 . The original letter is at The Library of Congress, The Thomas Jefferson Papers Series 1. General Correspondence. 1651-1827, and their digital copy of the original is at http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=mtj1&fileName=mtj1page049.db&recNum=641 (Digital Images 641 and 642: see the second page—image 642—for the quote.)
2. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/04/has-anyone-noticed.html
3. Cross-border “watching”: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/netflix-and-hbo-border-hopping-is-anyone-getting-caught-1.3050460?cmp=rss&cid=news-digests-canada-and-world-morning
4. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/search/label/Corporatism
5. “They seek not the Lord to establish his righteousness, but every man walketh in his own way, and after the image of his own god, whose image is in the likeness of the world, and whose substance is that of an idol, which waxeth old and shall perish in Babylon, even Babylon the great, which shall fall.” (Doctrine and Covenants | Section 1:16)
6. Then & Now; Tea Party 1 & Tea Party 2: http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/04/econ-010-then-now.html

A Better World ?

Yes, indeed! It’s getting better and better—isn’t it? If you don’t believe, or you find yourself asking, “For whom?” take a listen to the Ira Basen documentary, “In The Valley of the Kings”¹ [Silicon Valley, that is] (42.06 min.) at

http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/sundayedition_20150220_88670.mp3

The world is certainly an over-regulated, mixed-up mess, but do we really think that monetizing / capitalizing, the new “sharing economy” via BIG corporations with clever apps and no regulation is the nirvana we seek? The myth of corporate beneficence² is almost as true as touting that a “sharing economy” is sharing when everything is for rent.

We have to admit though that there is financial genius in app-controlled, independent little guys doing all the work while the BIG guys skim off the top for providing an automated connection. Except it seems more like “back to the future”—like back to a serfing³ paradigm. Seems like the little guy always gets the squeeze in pursuit of the bottom line.

We should also admit that it does present as a profitable step-up from the Nike, et al. model. Those old-style companies divested themselves of factories, workers, permits, licenses, properties, etc., etc., etc, and claimed ownership only in third-party, third-world  manufactured product. But with the new “sharing” apps, these new companies (like Uber and Airbnb) don’t even have product to warehouse or sell—no cars, no driver costs, no repairs, no houses, no towels or bedding or breakfasts—nothing, niente, nada. All that detail-stuff hangs to the little guy. And yes, sometimes it is good for the little guy and the consumer, but where there is an opening for power and gain, as night follows day, the “sharing-app” execs will find a way to control and exploit with no one to control them.

Besides, in the déjà vus of history, when did the bottom-line make anything safer? (Ask Nader.) When did it bring out the best in integrity? (Observe the tobacco, auto, banker, Wall Street, etc. boys.) When did it foster fundamental human rights? (Read a BIG corp. employment contract.) When did it truly serve the little guy with equity? (Ask the little guy.)

We keep looking to technology to solve our escalating problems and shortcomings, but what if the best solution is not in tech at all—even with all its best advances? What if a better world is in consciousness of spirit and love for our fellow human beings? Yes, let tech be a valuable resource—but please, can’t we keep it free from the prison of corporatism?⁴

---------------/
1. See the CBC Sunday Edition program ad and cartoon at http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thesundayedition/the-niqab-and-citizenship-the-bystander-effect-train-love-in-the-valley-of-the-kings-1.2963290/in-the-valley-of-the-kings-an-ira-basen-documentary-1.2963565 . Documentary aired Sunday morning, February 22, 2015.
2. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2010/05/free-agents-one-and-all.html
3. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/01/are-we-serfing-yet.html
4. This label with 30+ posts details many of this writer’s views about corporatism at http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/search/label/Corporatism

Washout ?

(Re-viewing psychotropic drugs)

Washout

4. (informal)

1. a total failure or disaster

2. an incompetent person

(http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/wash-out)

3. dose tapering of medication to more safely discontinue

its use or to (ostensibly) eliminate its effects

before commencing a different treatment regime

(source: industry idiom¹)

But perhaps we should expand the meaning of “washout” as we consider:

▪  the effects of profit motive on integrity and compassion;
▪  the psychopathology² of most profit-driven corporations;
▪  the psychopathology of many HyPEs;³
▪  the massive, addictive profits in PR and propaganda;⁴
▪  the practice of off-label drug marketing;⁵
▪  too many slap-on-the-wrist fines (relative to profits); “do NOT go to jail” standards;
▪  the myopia of permitting industry-funded efficacy studies and of FDA revolving doors;
▪  the pervasive “cancer” of publication bias and research misconduct;⁶
▪  the “accountable to shareholders” con;⁷
▪  the “rapid increase in the use of polypharmacy in psychiatry”;⁸
▪  the number of (ignored) witnesses coming forward,⁹ as in


» Gwen Olsen, former Rx Drug Rep.
at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIm8fHxqUAM (Time: 7:18)
see also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4bYng7X7Kk (Time: 5:51)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIASdSFV8fI (Time: 8:52)



» Documentary: Making a Killing: The Untold Story of Psychotropic Drugging at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tse5TtcNZ8U (Time: 1.34.42)



» Dr. John Abramson (UCTV) at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_o8CIDuxCC0 (Time: 29:40);
author of Overdosed America

» Podcast: Robert Whitaker on Psychiatric Drugs at http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/features/2014/06/08/robert-whitaker-on-psychiatric-drugs/ (Time: 29.50); and author of Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America

» Website: http://www.drugawareness.org/ 

Of course, some(?) percentage of patients may benefit (or believe they benefit) from chemical intervention, but the broad picture established by independent studies is that other non-prescription treatments achieve results (without the severe or dangerous side-effects) that psychotropic drugs do not and cannot achieve by the very nature of how they work and what they, in reality, do.

So, if we consider all the above (and more), perhaps we should add to the washout definitions:

Washout

5. (observed)

1. loss of life, hopes, and dreams of millions of mis-medicated

2. impunity for many drug companies for false and misleading

speech; for frauds and depraved indifference

3. mis-education (and/or apathy) of the prescribed and their

prescribers because of PR / propaganda, (& Rx perks)

4. loss of life, hopes, and dreams of many family, friends, and

victims¹⁰ of the mis-medicated

Interesting, is it not, how washout and whitewash seem twin strategies for this profit-driven Hydra?

So here are three questions:

•  How long this culture of denial?
•  How long, with the knowledge and unbiased studies that are out there, before the first question of every marriage & family therapist is: “What are the medications in this family?”¹¹ (Please read the footnote.)
•  How long before we utterly refuse to participate any more in WASHOUT and WHITEWASH?

Here are a couple of beginning answers:

•  Coming Off Psychiatric Drugs: A Harm Reduction Approach to Medication Withdrawal | Will Hall at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4bdG601k4k (Time 39:15)

•  Website: http://beyondmeds.com/

-------------/
1. Derived from various online readings & videos, plus “Washout” article at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3215520/
2. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/05/a-plague-of-psychopaths.html ; The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power by Joel Bakan, et al. at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6zQO7JytzQ (Time: 2.25.18)
3. (Highly Paid Employees); http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2014/10/public-enemy-1.html ; http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2014/12/without-conscience.html
4. University of California TV:
•  Overview of Pharma Industry Marketing Practices (1) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHHC5AYAUVI (Time: 23:47)
•  Industry Sponsored Research and Marketing (Pt. 2) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoDdQ6foEtc (Time 27:46)
•  Industry Sponsored Education and Marketing (Pt. 3) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrcdKB6_I4w (Time: 27:40)
•  Direct-to-Consumer Pharma Marketing (Pt. 4) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrSoTvhIPzc (Time: 28:56)
•  Effects of Marketing on Prescribing: Does It Matter? (Pt.5) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AjwPZuivBY (Time: 28:49)
5. Off-Label Marketing & Free Speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_3wrbuwum0
6. Ben Goldacre: What doctors don't know about the drugs they prescribe ~ TED talk (Time 13:29) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKmxL8VYy0M
7. The Great Con: http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2012/03/great-con.html
8. “’Polypharmacy’ refers to the concurrent use of multiple medications in a single patient.” Quoted from a DovePress abstract titled, “Polypharmacy or medication washout: an old tool revisited” at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3215520/
9. Numerous additional witnesses can be found by searching “Big Pharma,” “SSRI,” “Prescription Suicide,” etc. Here are a few extras:
•  Risky Business: Reporting on Research in the Media (UCTV) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it5yyn_lIKg (Time 57:26)
•  The Truth About the Drug Companies - Dr. Marcia Angell at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDbQNBla6aU (Time 1:17:36)
•  Manipulation of Data: http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/18775/do-washout-periods-in-drug-studies-lead-to-underestimates-of-side-effects
10. See http://www.drugawareness.org/ for the expanding list of tragic victims of the mis-medicated.
11. Please understand: This is not to say that all family problems arise from medication, but with the known problems, the listed (and expanding) side-effects, and massive over-prescribing, why do we not comprehend that medicines play a key role in understanding behaviors and solutions?

Remembering George ?

On this date—December 14—215 years ago, General George Washington died under the watchful eye of three physicians. They were using the then standard-of-practice of bloodletting,¹ but after four bouts of it, Washington’s fate was assured. Perhaps we could say, he was bled to death.

And perhaps we are in the midst of a latter déjà vu at this very hour as Uncle Sam bleeds toward the same fate—except there are no attendees allowed about the bed. Those trying to enter and save the patient are mocked and defamed while most everyone else is:

▪  at the stock exchange,
▪  “treasure hunting” with their devices,
▪  too busy trying to staunch their own bleeding, or
▪  crying against the offenses of socialism and communism.

However, despite the real offenses of communism / socialism, the more vital, critical health question is: What is the difference between excessive bloodletting and corporate capitalism? No, that’s not quite right. It’s not the difference that concerns us—‘tis the similarity!

See, whichever you choose, the patient dies.

Too bad, we’ve forgotten, not just George, but Thomas:

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government in a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.  (Thomas Jefferson ~ 1816²)

---------------------------/
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloodletting
2. This is a verifiable quote. See the transcribed copy of Jefferson’s letter to George Logan, Nov. 12, 1816 (p. 68-69) at Hathi Trust Digital Library: http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t3pv6bn68;view=1up;seq=92 .
The original letter is at The Library of Congress, The Thomas Jefferson Papers Series 1. General Correspondence. 1651-1827, and their digital copy of the original is at http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=mtj1&fileName=mtj1page049.db&recNum=641 (Digital Images 641 and 642: see the second page—image 642—for the quote.)

Blinding Paradigms?

At some future day, say even 100 years hence, will observers look back upon the age of baby-boomers and their offspring as a bizarre time of dizzying technology AND stupefying intransigence? Will someone begin to quote Charles Dickens,¹ lamenting:

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of [staggering stupidity hubris]”?

And will someone observe that great crimes were orchestrated by “tight-lipped authorities” who believed that their “superlative truisms” governed the cosmos and all therein and thereout?

▪ Will we even be here in 100 years (yea, even 50) if geoengineering² and HAARP³ (et ilk) continue their secret combinations (chemical and otherwise)?

▪ Will corporate capitalism⁴ have lost its gloss in the wake of cause, effect, consequence and destruction; and will it finally be observed that the “capital system” damned more creativity and innovation than it ever encouraged?

▪ Will the nuclear energy industry have finally drowned in its own indestructible, toxic waste?

▪ Will militant scientists atheists finally be recognized for what they are: dogma-driven tyrants—as déjà vu the Inquisition as every other militant bully of past and present?

▪ Will the lies of GMO and industry-sponsored “studies” finally be acknowledged as profit-driven frauds?⁵

▪ Will the Big Business of fast-food & health chronic sickness finally admit that what is ingested makes a difference?

▪ Will the medical and psychiatric professions have finally accepted evidence-based  (i.e., mostly non-profit and non-pharmaceutical) solutions to the recurring / enduring pain epidemics?⁶

▪ Will the Electric Universe⁷ (and other theories that challenge the standard model) have been given a fair and open hearing?

▪ Will “cultural superiority” have given way to the observation that ancient civilizations knew and achieved things we haven’t begun to match?⁸ that progress has not been linear and gradual? that civilizations, equal or superior, have fallen into dust in obsessive pursuit of excess, disparity, power, and gain? (Oh, déjà vu—again!)

▪ Will the predilection to conspiracy by those pursuing power and gain (and their desperation to deny it) finally be openly acknowledged as a ubiquitous, historical déjà vu?

▪ Will citizens of the “great superpower” ever admit the pivotal role their nation played in the destruction of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, worldwide?⁹

▪ Will the CAO’s of geoengineering and HAARP be tried and condemned for acts of supreme conceit and criminality (before it’s too late)?

The list could go on and on.

And for those who think that God (plus all the above) is just another blinding paradigm, I suppose we shall all know, sooner or later.

-----------------/
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Tale_of_Two_Cities
2. http://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/ ; See also YouTube on geoengineering: e.g., David Lim, March 2013.at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h57c3WtSiM8 (1:23:55 min.) ; Dane Wigington at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZ-tph5s_GM (48:05 min.), etc.
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Frequency_Active_Auroral_Research_Program ; see also http://www.earthpulse.com/src/category.asp?catid=1 ; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74b-gA9qq3o ; Book: Angels Don't Play This HAARP by Nick Begich and Jeane Manning; Word-Picture; http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/09/p-con-002-not-to-worry.html
4. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/search/label/Corporatism
5. GMO, etc.: http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2012/10/some-choice.html
6. The Mindbody Prescription: Healing the Body, Healing the Pain by John E. Sarno, M.D.; Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America by Robert Whitaker; podcast: Robert Whitaker on Psychiatric Drugs at http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/features/2014/06/08/robert-whitaker-on-psychiatric-drugs/
7. Electric Universe: https://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/ ; http://www.holoscience.com/wp/
8. This is not to say that modern scientific and mechanistic man has not achieved incredible things (a current example being the Rosetta mission: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(spacecraft)), but it is to say: It is highly unlikely that our mechanical and energy systems are the only or even most efficient systems possible in making great discoveries or advancements. Much has been lost from the past, even as our advancements will be lost in time if we do not learn the philosophic and moral lessons of history.
9. Whether one agrees with their politics or not, there is much to learn from the facts and warning voices of Chris Hedges, Chalmers Johnson, Jeremy Scahill, Naomi Klein, Stephen Kinzer, Noam Chomsky, etc., etc., etc. Take time to read their books or "YouTube" them. It’s time! Perhaps past time.

Free for All Some

If you were a writer and wanted to hype your income (and had the means), a sure-fire way to do it would be to buy tons of your own books and store them in some warehouse. Then after a short period of time, you could put them back on the market—with a price increase, of course, because sales had been so phenomenal. (Supply! Interest! Demand! you know!) Then after a time, you could buy your unsold books back again. The cycle could repeat itself several times before things began to wear thin (like the cover perhaps; or the disparity between income and cost).

So far, this buyback strategy seems to be working for many of our HyPEs (Highly Paid Employees) in the corporate world. For them, it works to have the corp buy back its shares. The share price goes up; the bright HyPE looks great; s/he collects the contracted "performance" bonus; and thereafter spends more time at work trying to figure out how to make it happen again; and where to spend or invest the income bump.

 Buyback is becoming a super duper¹ profitable strategy (at least for some).

Here is the take by financial writer Don Pittis²:

If someone handed you a bundle of free cash, would you stop working?

Perhaps that's what has happened to our economy. As governments create more and more free money ^[3]— in the form of no-interest loans — and inject it into the financial system, companies have stopped investing in the future.

Instead, as Edward Luce noted the other day in the Financial Times, companies are pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into share buybacks that produce nothing. Except higher share prices, and therefore higher executive bonuses.

"If you need an explanation for why the top 0.1 per cent is doing so well," says Luce,^[4] that is where to look. Luce's solution is to change the rules so that executive earnings are based on something other than short-term share prices.

The proposed solutions may need a second look, but here again, we see (déjà vu!) one more case of the “Growth Fund” syndrome.⁵

How long do we keep duping ourselves?

-----------------------------/
1. http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/11/confession-of-dupe-dealer.html or http://dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/search/label/Dupers
2. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/free-money-for-all-could-jumpstart-the-economy-don-pittis-1.2775647?cmp=rss  (cbcnews Business: Don Pittis, Sep 24, 2014)
3. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/desperately-seeking-economic-health-in-the-era-of-free-money-don-pittis-1.2756004 (cbcnews Business: Don Pittis, Sep 05, 2014)
4. The article in the Financial Times, dated September 21, 2014, and written by Edward Luce is titled: “The short-sighted US buyback boom.” It can be found, if you have an FT subscription, at: http://www.ft.com/home/us
5. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/04/growth-funds.html ; http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/03/vast-fund-of-stupidity-recycling.html

TransAlta Culpa (Again) ?

A bottomless pit of contrivance?
(from office.microsoft.com)

A few days ago in Alberta, a heat spike was forecast. The power-generating giant TransAlta seems to have anticipated its own spike as two of its large coal-fired electricity generating plants were shut down for “unscheduled maintenance” creating a classic supply and demand divergence—huge demand with limited supply, with the resultant classic free-market spike.

Are we surprised? Why shouldn’t this be the rational, transnational strategy for all corporations that “live and breathe” the bottom line? Makes perfect cents (by the trillions).

Oh, and yes! We have seen this before. As recently as February of this year at:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/transalta-accused-of-manipulating-energy-prices-in-alberta-1.2554508?cmp=rss (*) Quote:

“Alberta's power-generating giant TransAlta has been accused of market manipulation again.
“The power company is in trouble with the province's electricity watchdog — the Market Surveillance Administrator (MSA).
“It says the company shut down some of its power plants on four occasions during peak periods in 2010 and 2011, driving up prices.
“TransAlta rejects the allegations, but the case is already prompting calls for tougher regulation of the electricity market. …
“… this isn't the first time TransAlta has faced allegations like this.
“The company was fined $370,000 in 2012 for market manipulation.”

So what does free market really mean? Free to manipulate supply and demand for profit? Free to get off almost scot-free when caught? Free to repeat in endless déjà vu?

And what power-generating corporation has not clued into this “spike and spin-dry” strategy? When weighing gains and losses, who can resist?

So, in years to come, will our current free-marketeer defenders be judged as blind and deaf to “realities” (as passionately unobserving) as those we have judged from the so-called “dark ages”?

Is dummkoph-ish the word that springs to mind for our day (and for all of us who sit back and let this happen time and again)?

-----------------------------/
* See also: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/transalta-admits-to-manipulating-electricity-prices-1.976969

High-Frequency Déjà Vu

If you are a believer in “free-markets” and laissez-faire, perhaps an excursion beyond Milton Friedman (& company) might prove useful.

Here is one suggestion:

Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt by Michael Lewis © 2014

In trying to unravel a Wall Street mystery, several people, hired and headed by Brad Katsuyama of RBC (Royal Bank of Canada), pursued the threads of evidence and history. One of those pursuers was John Schwall who went “digging around the Staten Island library” looking at other Wall Street scandals. Here is how Lewis describes it:

Several days later [John Schwall had] worked his way back to the late 1800s. The entire history of Wall Street was the story of scandals, it now seemed to him, linked together tail to trunk like circus elephants. Every systemic market injustice arose from some loophole in a regulation created to correct some prior injustice. “No matter what the regulators did, some other intermediary found a way to react, so there would be another form of front-running,”^[1] he said. … He’d learned several important things, he told his colleagues. First, there was nothing new about the behavior they were at war with. The U.S. financial markets had always been either corrupt or about to be corrupted. Second, there was zero chance that the problem would be solved by financial regulators; or, rather, the regulators might solve the narrow problem of front-running in the stock market by high-frequency traders, but whatever they did to solve the problem would create yet another opportunity for financial intermediaries to make money at the expense of investors. ... (p. 103)

So, here is a suggestion for those who “worship at the altar of the free-market”² (like conservative Gerry Nicholls²). Please: open your eyes and ears to the high-frequency déjà vu of the faux-free, faux-efficiency, faux-self-correction, faux-hype, etc., etc., surrounding corporate capitalism.

from office.microsoft.com

------------/
1. “Front running is the illegal practice of a stockbroker [or high-frequency trader, et al.] executing orders on a security [or buying/selling] for its own account while taking advantage of advance knowledge of pending orders from its customers [or other investors, buyers, sellers, or brokers.]. …” quoted from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_running
2. Quote from conservative Gerry Nicholls at minute 9:50 on CBC “The Current”: episode titled, “What is the Future of Public Broadcasting in Canada?” broadcast May 14, 2014.) http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/current_20140514_13102.mp3

A Plague of Psychopaths ?

In the 1970s, Robert D. Hare developed a Psychopathy Checklist-Revised [1985 / 2003] (PCL-R),¹ setting out the following character traits and behaviors:

glib and superficial charm	denial
grandiosity	parasitic lifestyle
need for stimulation	sexual promiscuity
pathological lying	early behavior problems
cunning and manipulating	lack of realistic long-term goals
lack of remorse	failure to accept responsibility for own actions
callousness	many short-term marital relationships
poor behavioral controls	juvenile delinquency
impulsiveness	revocation of conditional release
irresponsibility	criminal versatility

In the first century A.D., the Apostle Paul wrote: “THIS know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be

lovers of their own selves	false accusers
covetous	incontinent
boasters	fierce
proud	despisers of those that are good
blasphemers	traitors
disobedient to parents	heady
unthankful	highminded
unholy	lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God
without natural affection	having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof
trucebreakers

from such turn away.” (New Testament 2 Timothy 3:1-5)

Do we see the commonalities? Not only are we encountering more and more of these personality disorders in real persons, but within the business world, we seem to have created a surfeit of psychopathic faux-persons, as well:

The Pathology of Commerce

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5hEiANG4Uk&list=PLFA50FBC214A6CE87

For the full documentary, entitled “The Corporation,” see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y888wVY5hzw OR https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6zQO7JytzQ

Not every person (or faux-person) manifests all behaviors, but maybe it is time we began to see and name such behaviors for what they are. And to remember that psychopaths also manifest strongly as bullies and narcissists, (though not all bullies and narcissists are psychopaths).

The latter-day proliferation of psychopathic behaviors is causing incredible pain, suffering, loss, and waste, exacerbated by uninformed (and often overworked) court officials and church pastors. When will our courts and churches become venues for relief from the glib, superficial charm, grandiosity, pathological lying, cunning, and manipulation (etc., etc., etc.) of psychopathic bullies?

----------------------/
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare_Psychopathy_Checklist

Bawdy Politics ?

(OR, Alas! Alas! Wo is US!)

In remembrance of the 120th year of the death of

Joseph Ferdinand Keppler (1 February 1838 Vienna – 19 February 1894 New York) … an Austrian-born American cartoonist and caricaturist, who greatly influenced the growth of satirical cartooning in the United States;^[*]

and the 125th year of the publication of his The Bosses of the Senate^[†], I repost his sadly enduring look at puppetry, power, and “bawdy politics”:

The Bosses of the Senate by
Joseph Keppler [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
First published in Puck 1889.
page URL: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AThe_Bosses_of_the_Senate_by_Joseph_Keppler.jpg
file URL: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e5/The_Bosses_of_the_Senate_by_Joseph_Keppler.jpg

How many déjà vus before we actually VU? and then DO something about this?! And that includes especially you: SCOTUS, POTUS, SOTUS, and HOROTUS!

PS: If “bawdy politics” can describe the (past and current) Senate, what might we call the House^‡?!

------------------------------/
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Ferdinand_Keppler
† http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Bosses_of_the_Senate_by_Joseph_Keppler.jpg
‡ (being the House of Representatives, which, in this age of abbreviation and economy, may be shortened to HOR, which surprisingly!! may be a synonym!)

Has Anyone Noticed ?

AWAKE !!
to the price-tag of
delusion.

Once upon a time, Adam Smith said:

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. (The Wealth of Nations, p. 148—I.X.I)

Once upon a (more recent) time, foreigners (in this instance, meaning non-residents of the USA) could surf the commercial web for best price and most current product and actually order it from a US company without having a US billing address for their credit card.

Now, one is beginning to encounter online merchants, even ones as big as HomeDepot and Walmart, who refuse to sell online, if the purchaser cannot provide a US billing address. As recent as ten months ago, this was not so. So what is the deal?

Are these companies colluding with their international sister companies to protect turf and prices? Just try to checkout online without a US billing and shipping address if your preferred seller is a US company. Let’s take Walmart.com and Walmart.ca for example:

▪ Check out the 13 bath toys available online at Walmart.ca
http://www.walmart.ca/en/baby/bath-supplies-toys/bath-toys/N-2437
against the 130 available online at Walmart.com
http://www.walmart.com/browse/baby-toddler-toys/bath-toys/5427_491351_976819?tab_value=all&catNavId=%3Cc%3aout+value%3d%27491351%27%2f%3E&ss=false&ic=32_32&
(If these web addresses change or become defunct, just try your own product comparison.)

▪ Check out the $13.87 CDN and $9.68 USD price differential for the very same “Summer Infant Tub Time Tea Party Set.”*

▪ Check out the increasing inability to purchase what you want from the online store you prefer if you are deemed "foreign."

Sometimes, it may be the reverse when savvy US shoppers encounter a unique product and price in another country and are locked out by drop-down-box address exclusions. Is it because companies are “sacrificing” sales to non-competition covenants with sister companies? Just try to buy a great online deal from HomeDepot.ca if you live in the US.

Some seem to be using “fraud management filters” (such as that offered by PayPal) to exclude orders from foreign-based IP addresses—not for the sake of fraud protection, but solely to justify refusal to sell. For example:

“PayPal gateway has rejected request. The transaction was refused because the country was prohibited as a result of your Country Monitor Risk Control Setting.”

Yes, fraud can be an issue, but when the billing and shipping addresses have been in PayPal’s database for years and have been used innumerable times without problem or complaint, surely fraud technology is smart enough to know that!? So, can there be some other reason to exclude willing buyers from certain markets?!

Thus, if one is travelling or temporarily outside the US, their US PayPal account with its US-issued credit card and its US verified billing and shipping addresses can be rejected because the online purchase was attempted from a foreign IP address.

So much for free trade with certain merchants, unless you are free to travel to the US (or other country of choice) and present your credit card in person and carry the item away. And so much for being able to buy certain US items and have them shipped to family or friends in the US (or elsewhere).

A work-around suggested by a customer service rep at HomeDepot.com was to travel to our local (foreign) HomeDepot (3-hr round trip) and purchase a gift card in order to complete our desired transaction online with HomeDepot.com.

So, how do these definitions jive with current and evolving realities?

A free-trade area is a trade bloc whose member countries have signed a free-trade agreement (FTA), which eliminates tariffs, import quotas, and preferences on most (if not all) goods and services traded between them. If people are also free to move between the countries, in addition to FTA, it would also be considered an open border.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_trade_agreements#Lists_of_free_trade_areas

United States antitrust law is a collection of federal and state government laws, which regulates the conduct and organization of business corporations, generally to promote fair competition for the benefit of consumers. The main statutes are the Sherman Act 1890, the Clayton Act 1914 and the Federal Trade Commission Act 1914. These Acts, first, restrict the formation of cartels and prohibit other collusive practices regarded as being in restraint of trade. Second, they restrict the mergers and acquisitions of organizations which could substantially lessen competition. Third, they prohibit the creation of a monopoly and the abuse of monopoly power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_antitrust_law

Competition law is law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies.
Competition law is known as antitrust law in the United States and anti-monopoly law in China and Russia. In previous years it has been known as trade practices law in the United Kingdom and Australia.
The history of competition law reaches back to the Roman Empire. The business practices of market traders, guilds and governments have always been subject to scrutiny, and sometimes severe sanctions. Since the 20th century, competition law has become global. The two largest and most influential systems of competition regulation are United States antitrust law and European Union competition law. National and regional competition authorities across the world have formed international support and enforcement networks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competition_law

Isn’t it time we consumers and citizens awoke to the fraud of “free markets”? ’Tis a complaint as old as capital itself!

--------------------------/
* http://www.walmart.ca/en/ip/summer-infant-tub-time-tea-party-set/6000039572745
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Summer-Infant-Tub-Time-Tea-Party-Set-4pc/20525944

A Plea to the Bully Pulpit

Would the powers that be please schedule an open, global convention to discuss the despicability of bullying? Of course, we are beginning to name (and condemn) it for what it is, though we have a long way to go, particularly when it happens in families, or when the bully is especially powerful, wealthy, or famous.

SO, if you are part of a family, or if you are especially powerful, wealthy, or famous—or want, or plan to be—you might be well-advised to watch a re-run of Touched by an Angel, Season 7, CD-1, Episode 2, entitled “Legacy.” There you can observe in brutal detail the way of the bully—a powerful, wealthy father.

Considering the past and present ubiquity of bullying (from the micro- to the macrocosm), we suggest an international screening of “Legacy” (with requisite permissions) for all elected and non-elected government officials, all employees of governments, all CEOs and other HyPEs* of big business, all lawyers and lobbyists, all so-called conservatives and liberals, all fathers and mothers, all gang members, and all other persons and faux-persons (as in Goldman Sachs, et al.) who may or may not fit into one of the above categories.

After the global screening, here is the plea:

▪ If you are the bully: Admit it! STOP IT! (That means even, and especially, you, Uncle Sam! And you, too, IMF.)
▪ If you are the bullied, STOP IT! Get help. NAME IT for what it is—ten thousand times ten thousand, if necessary. Don’t give loyalty to anything that violates integrity. Stand for truth and justice.

-----------------------/
* (being Highly Paid Employees)

The Spruce Budworm Syndrome?

"The eastern version of the Spruce Budworm is Choristoneura fumiferana, which is one of the most destructive native insects in the northern spruce and fir forests of the Eastern United States and Canada. ... The catastrophe theory of budworm outbreaks holds that particularly major infestations occur every 40–60 years, as the result of a cusp-catastrophe event, whereby populations jump suddenly from endemic to epidemic levels."¹ (Bold emphasis added.)

Wall Street ~ 1907 Panic
By Soerfm (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],
 via Wikimedia Commons

If one takes a stroll down Wall Street (and Memory Lane²) one can perhaps see the syndrome in epidemic action, at this very hour, in the budworm nursery of downtown New York City.

Budworms do not seem to cogitate that at some point all the trees that sustain them will be destroyed, especially when the infestation cycle becomes a spiral instead of a cycle, which is precisely where we are at, is it not? (And does it help that the NY nursery has a brisk export business in this era of globalization?)

So, if you are a budworm or a budding-worm, there was some drastic / radical / offensive advice given about 2,000 years ago (in prescience and déjà vu of our day?) that may help if you are sick and tired of being caught up in the down-spiraling syndrome:

And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched:
Where their worm dieth not,^[*] and the fire is not quenched.
And if thy foot offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter halt into life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched:
Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.
And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out: it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire:
Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. (New Testament Mark 9:43-48)

[*] Yes, a kind of immortality! but why, in blazes, choose that kind?!

---------------------------/
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spruce_Budworm (Section titled “Eastern Spruce Budworm”
2. http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/04/growth-funds.html ; http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2011/03/vast-fund-of-stupidity-recycling.html

ECON 013 ~ Aptly Named?

The Gods must have an infinite sense of irony to have inspired the naming of this modern behemoth.

Is this not the latest, perfect symbol of ten-thousand déjà vus since the days of Cain?

Is this what we champion with our capital addictions?

Isn’t this the inevitable legacy of the Randians?

Isn’t there a better option? like maybe a third way? not right or left, but UP?

Just asking.

Econ 013 ~Clip art from MS Office 2000