A (formerly) Far East located, politically focused, Blog with attention also paid to the finer things in life: Women, Beer, Women, Travel, Women, Adventure, Golf, and did I mention women?
Or why the place that Skippy works is on the express train to hell-no local stops. To understand why-lets review some ancient mythological history:
The old satyr had been drinking wine and had wandered away drunk, later to be found by some Phrygian peasants, who carried him to their king, Midas (alternatively, he passed out in Midas’ rose garden). Midas recognized him and treated him hospitably, entertaining him for ten days and nights with politeness, while Silenus delighted Midas and his friends with stories and songs.
On the eleventh day, he brought Silenus back to Dionysus in Lydia. Dionysus offered Midas his choice of whatever reward he wished for. Midas asked that whatever he might touch should be changed into gold.
Midas rejoiced in his new power, which he hastened to put to the test. He touched an oak twig and a stone; both turned to gold. Overjoyed, as soon as he got home, he ordered the servants to set a feast on the table. “So Midas, king of Lydia, swelled at first with pride when he found he could transform everything he touched to gold; but when he beheld his food grow rigid and his drink harden into golden ice then he understood that this gift was a bane and in his loathing for gold, cursed his prayer” (Claudian, In Rufinem). In a version told by Nathaniel Hawthorne in A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys (1852), Midas found that when he touched his daughter, she turned into a statue as well.
Now, Midas hated the gift he had coveted. He prayed to Dionysus, begging to be delivered from starvation. Bacchus heard, and consented; he told Midas to wash in the river Pactolus.
Midas did so, and when he touched the waters, the power flowed into the river, and the river sands turned into gold. This explained why the river Pactolus was so rich in gold, and the wealth of the dynasty claiming Midas as its forefather no doubt the impetus for this aetiological myth. Gold was perhaps not the only metallic source of Midas’ riches: “King Midas, a Phrygian, son of Cybele, first discovered black and white lead”.
Midas, now hating wealth and splendor, moved to the country and became a worshipper of Pan, the god of the fields and satyrRoman mythographers asserted that his tutor in music was Orpheus.
In other words be careful what you wish for-for you may surely get it. And so, my friends, the great and powerful General, being of the same age as many of the people he commanded-decided that his work force was too old, and too overpaid-decided then and there to take a system that was not broken and offered his agency a wealth of experience and changed it. This began his organization’s transformation down the road to mediocrity.
Which Scott Adams has chronicled nicely:
And that, my dear friends, is the world I have to look forward to. ( For the short term at least).
Well, silly me-I thought I was done with that proposal I worked on last month. As it turns out-not really. The government came back with what they call-requests for information. Which in essence means I have to do the whole thing all over again-by Monday.
Those who know-say this is a good thing. I sure don’t see how. Except it means they did not dismiss it out of hand so I must have gotten something right.
It should be no surprise to any regular readers here, that when it comes to sex-I am very open minded and take a pretty liberal view point when it comes to the age old question of “How much is enough?” ( Answer: There is no such thing as ‘enough sex’). So it should come as no surprise that I have pretty ambivalent feelings about the supposed misdeeds of Representative Lee-who, it would appear, seems to have a thankless wife at home not performing her wifely duties, in near sufficient quantities it would seem. That’s hardly surprising since Congressmen are in the end also human beings-and subject to the same afflictions and peculiarly American hang-ups concerning sex. Unlike other great nations on the planet-America with its warped view of sexuality provides no useful alternatives, thus forcing men like the good Rep Lee to resort to eminently traceable means such as Craigslist-which proved to be his undoing.
Imagine if we actually faced up to the problem and took a more practical view of sex and sexuality, and actually moved forward from our cramped and confining views of marriage and partnership? Think of the talent that could be harnessed-given that the it appears the Congressman seemed how to know how to do his day job. For people who complain about getting the government off our our backs, they seem to turn a blind eye to telling people how to live their personal lives. Which makes them complete hypocrites IMHO. Before anyone goes high and right-live through the hell that is a sexless marriage, and then maybe, just maybe, you might have some frame of reference.
Thus I am passing along this post from John Coles place that examines this dichotomy in more detail:
Like Humans Do
by mistermix
Chris Lee is a skeezy cheater, and a hypocrite, but he’s also another reminder of the waste and pain caused by our contradictory, one-sided and archaic views of marital fidelity.(emphasis mine-SS).
Any regular Dan Savage reader/listener knows that one of his most common caller/writer is one part of a married couple who’s sexually frustrated. Usually there are children involved. Often, this person knew that they were sexually incompatible when they married, but was hoping things would change. Usually, their marriage is under a sexual death penalty: if there’s an affair, there’s a divorce.
This kind of call or letter is pretty boring because there’s really no solution accepted by mainstream society. Most of these marriages would be a hell of a lot better if the sexually unsatisfied partner had a discreet affair, but that puts the other partner in a socially untenable situation. “Open marriage” is something for dirty hippies or sleazy swingers, not an upstanding member of society. And, since the first stop for marital therapy is often a pastor or priest, it’s very unlikely that the open option will even be broached.
So, instead of negotiating an outlet, these marriages move on to a badly executed affair, tears, recriminations and, usually, divorce. The cheated-on member of the pair has the moral and legal high ground, they’re under intense social pressure to make the cheater pay, and by the time the cheating happens, the cheater’s resentment over their lack of satisfaction has probably already poisoned the well.
If we want to do something about the high divorce rate, we might want to get real about making sexual satisfaction a precursor to marriage, and also about the role of a discreet, mutually agreed-upon affair as a safety valve. Of course, religion and social norms rule that out-of-bounds. That’s too bad, because the only person more miserable that Mr. and Mrs. Chris Lee this morning is their little boy, a kid who’s in a world of hurt that might have been avoided if mom and dad had been able to negotiate a piece on the side.
Maybe there is a business opportunity here for me-opening the US franchises of well known freelancer bars!
James Webb announced his retirement from the Senate today. It is hardly surprising, and probably not unexpected.
Phib and the others tend to view Webb as not having accomplished anything. They are wrong-about that and about Webb.
Let’s look at what Webb did accomplish. First he got passed, something George W. Bush’s hack defense Secretary and his deputy for Personnel could not get done-a fair and revamped GI bill for the generation that is stuck fighting the mistaken wars that Bush and Rumsfeld created. Did Dr Chu think about that-or for that matter about doing anything else that supported the serving Soldier, Airman, Sailor or Marine? Nope. Could not be bothered.
Furthermore-unlike some of the tough talking members of the tri-corner hat wearing brigade, Webb actually endorsed positions that supported military people. He defended Tricare and he’s advocated a restructing of our criminal justice system. He sponsored an amendment to give troops adequate turnaround time between deployments-which would have put a nice hole in the Army’s warped 15 month deployment schedule or the Navy’s stupid FRP program. Webb defended it on the Senate floor:
Unlike many of his Democratic compatriots-he came out against the war in Iraq, even before the invasion, writing in 2002, that “In Japan, American occupation forces quickly became 50,000 friends. In Iraq, they would quickly become 50,000 terrorist targets. “
The next seven years proved him right about that.
Some of Phib’s more ardent commenters are fixated on a relatively minor incident in 2006 where Webb supposedly “snubbed” George Bush regarding the war in Iraq. Some, say that Webb was “disrespectful”-I’m damned if I know how, especially when he said quite correctly, that he wanted his sons home from Iraq. At the time I wrote differently-but I agreed with Webb’s sentiments. And that he was dealing with a buffoon. He simply did not want to have a conversation with the man who created a mistake that could very well kill his son-that’s a very understandable sentiment. As he said, Webb later remarked in an interview, “I’m not particularly interested in having a picture of me and George W. Bush on my wall”.
What’s not to like about that? I have the same sentiment. And he is still right about Iraq:
Five months before the invasion, I was trying to warn that if you weren’t careful, you were going to (1) empower Iran; and (2) get us stuck in Iraq for the next 30 years. There are always going to be sectarian difficulties in Iraq. My view is that we do not belong as an occupying power in that part of the world and that 50,000 troops won’t hack it. We really need to reach the point where we have withdrawn our military from Iraq. The difficulty of course is that you can’t withdraw in a way that would further destabilize the region. But we need to withdraw, and we need to signal that is our clear objective.
Was he a straight party line Democrat? No. No more than he was a straight party line Republican.
Webb’s critics, Phib included, just can’t forgive him for being right about Iraq. His term is about average for a freshman Senator-and as the beneficary of one of his signature pieces of legistlation- I have a generally favorable opinion of him. The country needs a lot more Jim Webb’s and a lot less Rand Paul’s.
My cell phone was stolen tonight-out of a locked locker at the gym. I know because I have torn the house apart and retraced my steps and I know I locked all my stuff away and was careful to make sure the lock was locked and spun.
So now I am just getting done filing reports and such canceling my cell phone and otherwise doing things I was not planning on doing tonight. GRRRRRR!!!
So listen to Nina-a girl from Japan who, besides being cute, also has a good command of the news and English:
The S.O. and I went to see this movie this past weekend. Believe it or not we had a hard time getting two seats together-so crowded was the theater.
We both loved the movie-even if it did take more than a couple of liberties with history. Me, because I like any movie that talks about that time when the world was as its should be- with the British Empire ruling 25% of the world’s population. ( India of course, being as it should be with the Union Jack flying over Dehli and Gandhi just an annoying fakir). I sometimes wonder if that was the age I was meant to live in. Of course it would have been a dicey thing-in that I would have to be coming of age in 1919 so as to be old enough not to get sucked into World War II downstream. ( Impossible-no matter how many times I think it out, since being in the Royal Navy is always a part of these scenarios-I would have been in the thick of the second conflict. ) And of course, then there’s the need to be rich enough to be of the right class……….
But I digress.
Nonetheless, the movie is good story telling-and very well done. Edward VIII comes out like a real louse and Wallis Simpson gets a thorough going over , being portrayed as a real shrew. Afterwards I went back and researched a bit-it would seem they may have gotten this bit right. I’ve often wondered if later on in life, Edward did not sit out on the veranda in France and wonder what might have been…………….
In Japan lately there have been a lot of commercials for this movie:
The movie’s title is : Taiheiyo no kiseki –fokksu to yobareta otoko ( or, Miracle of the Pacific: The Man Called Fox).
Story highlight here:
On 7 July, Captain Oba and his men participated in the largest banzai charge of the war in the Pacific. After 15 hours of intense and unrelenting hand to hand combat, almost 4,300 Japanese soldiers were dead. Allied forces declared the island secured on 9 July 1944. By 30 September 1944, the Japanese Army made an official presumption of death for all personnel of unknown status and they were declared killed in action. That included Captain ?ba, and he was awarded a “posthumous” promotion to Major.
In reality, Captain ?ba survived the battle and took command of 46 other soldiers. ?ba then led over 200 Japanese civilians deeper into the jungles to evade capture. He and his men organized the civilians and placed them in mountain caves and hidden jungle villages. When the soldiers were not assisting the civilians with survival tasks, Captain Oba and his men continued their battle against the garrison of U.S. Marines. ?ba used Mount Tapochau as their primary base; at 473 meters (1,552 ft), the peak offered an unobstructed 360-degree view of the island. From their base camp on the western slope of the mountain, ?ba and his men occasionally conducted guerilla-style raids on American positions. Due to the speed and stealth of these operations, and the frustrated attempts to find him, the Marines on Saipan eventually referred to ?ba as “The Fox”.
Captain Oba and his men held out on the island for 512 days, or about 16 months. On 27 November 1945, former Major General Umahachi Am?, commander of the 9th Independent Mixed Brigade during the Battle of Saipan, was able to draw out some of the Japanese in hiding by singing the anthem of the Japanese infantry branch. Am? was then able present documents from the defunct Imperial General Headquarters to Captain ?ba ordering him and his men to surrender themselves to the Americans. On 1 December 1945, three months after the official surrender of Japan, the Japanese soldiers gathered once more on Mt. Tapochau and sang a song of departure to the spirits of the war dead. ?ba then led his people out of the jungle and they presented themselves to the Marines of the 18th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Company. With great formality and commensurate dignity, Captain ?ba surrendered his sword to Lieutenant Colonel Howard G. Kurgis, and his men surrendered their arms and colors. They were the last organized resistance of Japanese forces on Saipan.
According to Japan Probe-the movie makes Oba out to be something of a hero: “placing emphasis on how Oba saved the lives of civilians by helping them hide in the jungles. Considering the fact that many other Japanese civilians died in the battle and thousands committed suicide rather than face capture, Oba’s actions probably did save some from such a fate.“.
Also from Japan Probe-One of the trailers:
The film hits theaters across Japan on February 11th.
Players and owners are clashing over a new labor agreement that could result in a lockout for the 2011 season, dealing a devastating blow to the NFL’s $8 billion business.
UPDATE! Well, it was a close game-but still a loss. Simple truth is Green Bay out played the Steelers and Ben R. is kidding himself if he thinks he can get lucky over and over again.
Stumbled on this over at John Cole’s place. It’s from a comment thread from a post about the latest bat shit crazy idea proposal from our Galtian Overlords. I thought it was so clever, I had to post it here.
More truth than you realize-especially if you spend a weekend here in a place like Shopping Mall.
In putting up a link to this new blog. Spike-who lives where I wish I could live, is a fine photographer among his many talents. And he now has a nice collection of those over at his new photo blog-Spike’s Photos. Go on over and check them out!
You can tell a Tea Partier-but you can’t tell him (or her) much.
I have a friend on Facebook who loves to post trite quotes from the Founding Fathers-most often taken out of context-in an effort to show his derision for those of us who do not share the ugly vision for this country, that they pretend to love. Like the impetous soul that I am and when fueled by a beer or four, I often rise and take the bait. Especially when it comes to hackneyed District Court judges from Pensacola.
Well, as Facebook works, this leads, to his friends coming back, and talking about how all liberals are “hateful”-simply because I had the effontery to use a mild, but quite accurate term of: ”teabagger”.
Jesus H. Christ.
When you can’t show make fun of people who absolutely deserve it-what is the world coming to?
There was one quote of one of his female friends that got my attention:
So you think Japan is the only country out there who has “fixed costs” they cannot lightly dismiss? Do ya maybe think that the US has fixed costs? Do ya think that maybe the US has saddled itself with entitlement costs that it has NO hope… of ever repaying? THAT is precisely the entire point. ALL of the “entitlement states” are going BANKRUPT, starting with JAPAN. They have debt of 200% of their GDP, second only to Zimbabwe. Public entitlements are crushing economies of ALL sizes, ALL over the world. From cities, to states like California, to countries like Spain, Ireland, Greece, and yes, Japan. Creating a new TRILLION dollar entitlement, that uses the worst possible fiscal gimmicks (like double counting Medicare savings, counting 200 Billion dollars in cuts to payments to doctors-then passing a SEPERATE bill to “refund” the “doctor fix”, using 10 years of taxes to “pay” for six years of benefits, etc.) is a disaster. The bill has now been declared unconstitutional in its ENTIRETY because Democrats were too stupid to include a “severability clause”, a mistake that a first year law student wouldn’t have made.
This was a bad bill, rammed onto the American taxpayer literally in the middle of the night. Written in secret (“We have to pass the bill to see what’s in it”-Nancy Pelosi), unread by ANYONE who voted for it, supported by the most rediculous of fiscal gimmicks, and now found Unconstitutional by TWO Federal Judges.
Now most of this is just the standard Fox News line-presented also as fact without context, but the “Social Network” does not allow you enough space to drive such drivel back into the cave.
So yes its true-and it is also irrelevant.
And it does not mean a damn thing about the United States debt situation-its apple and oranges. Not that my Facebook acquaintance would know that-because that would require doing more than a little research. As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, ” If Japanese government bonds were widely held by non-Japanese investors, the S&P action could have caused severe damage to the economy. But because the assets are held largely by domestic players, analysts say it has had no negative effect.”
Now twenty years down stream-yea there are probably some problems in store if Japanese women don’t get on their backs, knees, or stomachs and start conceiving some babies-so as to increase the Japanese revenue base.
A mega Tsunami wiping out Shanghai wouldn’t hurt either.
The authors at the link are right-Facebook started as a young peoples medium, designed to share information that might get you drunk, high or laid-or some combination thereof. Blogs were made to talk about politics. When you are younger , you don’t care about politics so much. However when you become older, politics becomes more personal, especially when there is a herd of people who are literally out screw you over keep you from getting the things you need to make your life better. Which is one reason for me why the health care debate is so personal and I have little patience for those who can’t understand the obvious.
Plus, like blogs-Facebook has all the worst parts of the internet with not so many of the good things. People become one dimensional. Its a lot easier to dislike them-especially if they are only the friend of someone you knew 20 years ago and have absolutely nothing in common with now. And the availability of the Facebook apps on all types of computing devices makes it just to easy to lash out and correct people when they spout stupidity.
Now that is something I knew already-but its good to get a reminder from time to time. And I’ll still post on Facebook-but I’ll try to avoid it when drunk or pissed off.
But it won’t be as much fun. Wish all I had to do was worry about getting drunk, high, and or laid. But those days are long gone.
Which brings me back to one other things my Facebook acquaintance probably didn’t know about Japan and why they have it over us-they, don’t particularly like Facebook.
Well, I must be getting over my jet lag because I find myself able to marshall rage at obvious stupidity again. And judging by the news today there is plenty of it. The difference between now and yesteryear though is that I find myself wishing to drive the point home more forcefully:
I’ve got more than a few people I could use that on now.
<—————————————————————->
Very well then, lets begin-I’ll start with Egypt. The ignorance the bulk of the news media has shown about the country is really appalling-more importantly I think people are really misjudging the Egyptian people. Will they screw up the revolution they are fomenting? Absolutely. But will Egypt become the next Iran? Not a chance.
Lets start with the hypocrisy that is present on both sides and the obsession of with tangential issues. Here is the voice of right wing America today:
Hey, look, folks, if the industry of talk radio was responsible for Tucson, how about blaming Obama’s Cairo speech for this? Yeah, have you seen, folks, the liberals, the Democrats, the media seem to be more embracing of the Muslim Brotherhood than the Tea Party movement. Have you noticed that? I have… “The Obama administration has aligned itself with Egypt for calls for orderly transition.” Orderly transition? What if this bunch turns out to be led by Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or what have you? It’s the Muslim Brotherhood. For crying out loud, Obama “embraces,” “aligns itself with protests in Egypt”? Uhhhh.
That really caught me, because we don’t know who or what is behind this movement. We do know Obama has been focused on changing America. We do know that Obama has spent his time abroad apologizing for our past and he’s been lauded for doing this by our media, the left, the likes of Colin Powell. If he were a traditional American president, Obama would have been using our authority — our moral authority — and experience to ensure our best interests remain intact.
Now those who are long time readers know I really don’t care about any Arab’s opinion on anything-but to ignore what appears to be a genuine popular uprising is to act in our own disinterest. We just have to step back and watch this play out-we have no more ability to influence events than I have to influence the repeal of the USFSPA. ( Interestingly for people who are opposed to government intrusion in one’s life- NOT ONE TEA BAGGER has come out in opposition to that. Guess they can all afford three ex wives like Gingrich).
Let’s look at the facts: 1) The Army is in control-and if this goes over the edge there will be a lot of dead Egyptians in the streets, and most of them know that. 2) Egyptians understand the need to have tourists coming to their country and ships going through the Suez Canal. (Even though they don’t deserve it (it was never theirs) and in my perfect world the French and British would still run it). I believe we should give them some credit. They don’t want an Islamic Republic like Iran-they just want a new President. And they are jealous of their sovereignty-so people who say America “should be telling” Egypt what to do are ignorant. Thus in my opinion, we should just be sitting on the sidelines watching this play out.
Imagine if history had turned out differently and we had Islamic commentators “tisk tisk”ing over the Christianist “tea party brotherhood” uprising in South Carolina. Not every nation will act in US self interest and we are not the rulers of the world. We will be fine-no matter what happens. As for the Egyptian people? Well their needs are never going to be high on my list of concerns-they are still Arabs after all. But they are not Iraqis either- and not stupid enough to go back to 1966.
<—————————————————————->
Then there is the health care ruling. To read the columns on Facebook and Memeorandum it is the end of the world as we know it. Which is pretty amazing, given the fact that the douchebag Tea Party beholden judge had pretty much telegraphed what he was going to do long before the issuance of the ruling. What’s really amazing is that he took 78 pages to show how stupid he is :
Got that? The uninsured can only have a “substantial effect on interstate commerce” — and thus be regulated by Congress – if they are subject to the precise conditions which exist today all over the country, and which prompted the Act in the first place. The judge acknowledges this point, to his credit, saying that the Congress would of course have the power to regulate the millions of people who meet his five criteria above. But he then concludes: “But, to cast the net wide enough to reach everyone in the present, with the expectation that they will (or could) take those steps in the future, goes beyond the existing ‘outer limits’ of the Commerce Clause” (emphasis in original).
I suspect there will be a million words of legal and political analysis over the logic and viability of that conclusion.
Unsolicited and simplistic recommendations for the legislative branch? Also check. Judge Vinson wrote: “If Congress intends to implement health care reform — and there would appear to be widespread agreement across the political spectrum that reform is needed — it should do a comprehensive examination of the Act and make a legislative determination as to which of its hundreds of provisions and sections will work as intended without the individual mandate, and which will not.” In other words: Try again, Congress, and good luck with that!
Painfully half-hearted expression of regret for kicking the entire Affordable Care Act to the curb? Check. Judge Vinson wrote: “I must reluctantly conclude that Congress exceeded the bounds of its authority in passing the Act with the individual mandate. That is not to say, of course, that Congress is without power to address the problems and inequities in our health care system. The health care market is more than one sixth of the national economy, and without doubt Congress has the power to reform and regulate this market. That has not been disputed in this case. The principal dispute has been about how Congress chose to exercise that power here” (emphasis added).
I am sure that others, including some of my colleagues here at the Atlantic, will be spending time in the coming hours and days further parsing the ruling. For me, for now, it’s enough to say that Judge Vinson delivered for opponents of the Act precisely what he had promised them one month ago in open court in the motion hearing; a epic, hero-to-a-cause ruling that somehow makes U.S. District Judge Henry Hudson’s ruling last month in Virginia, which also struck down the “individual mandate,” seem like a relative exercise in judicial restraint. And that’s saying something.
What is particularly interesting about this, to me, is the fact that the news media has just rolled and printed every word of this ONE opinion-yet scant attention is given to an equal level opinion that points out how nice it would be if Judge Vinson walked in front a bus had actually interpreted the law correctly.
The district court rejected this claim and upheld the minimum coverage provision as a valid exercise of Congress’s Commerce Clause power. The court rejected the premise of that argument, explaining that the “decision whether to purchase insurance or to attempt to pay for health care out of pocket, is plainly economic.” The court explained that these decisions, “viewed in the aggregate, have clear and direct impacts on health care providers, taxpayers, and the insured population who ultimately pay for the care provided to those who go without insurance.
The court emphasized that “[t]he health care market is unlike other markets. No one can guarantee his or her health, or ensure that he or she will never participate in the health care market. Thus, [t]he question is how participants in the health care market pay for medical expenses — through insurance, or through an attempt to pay out of pocket with a backstop of uncompensated care funded by third parties. Far from ‘inactivity,’ by choosing to forgo insurance plaintiffs are making an economic decision to try to pay for health care services later, out of pocket, rather than now through the purchase of insurance. [P]laintiffs in this case are participants in the health care services market, and they have made a choice regarding the method of payment for the services they expect to receive. How participants in the health care services market pay for such services has a documented impact on interstate commerce, and this market reality forms the rational basis for Congressional action designed to reduce the number of uninsureds.
This part is interesting. I haven’ t seen it before, anywhere:
The uninsured, like plaintiffs, benefit from the ‘guaranteed issue’ provision in the Act, which enables them to become insured even when they are already sick. Without the minimum coverage provision, there would be an incentive for some individuals to wait to purchase health insurance until they needed care, knowing that insurance would be available at all times. As a result, the most costly individuals would be in the insurance system and the least costly would be outside it. In turn, this would aggravate current problems with cost-shifting and lead to even higher premiums.
But Vinson, most of our Tri corner hat wearing idiot friends, and the rest of the callously uncaring have no problems sleeping at night-while this happens:
For example, Hillary St. Pierre, a 28-year-old former registered nurse who has Hodgkin’s lymphoma, had expected to reach her insurance plan’s $2 million limit this year. Under the new law, the cap was eliminated when the policy she gets through her husband’s employer was renewed this year.
Ms. St. Pierre, who has already come close once before to losing her coverage because she had reached the plan’s maximum, says she does not know what she will do if the cap is reinstated. “I will be forced to stop treatment or to alter my treatment,” Ms. St. Pierre, who lives in Charlestown, N.H., with her husband and son, said in an e-mail. “I will find a way to continue and survive, but who is going to pay?”
Exactly what will happen to the law’s specific provisions that prevent insurers from imposing lifetime limits and require them to phase out the annual limits now in place is unclear.
But a certain segment of America does not really care about anything- but preserving wealth for people that will never share it with them-much less allow them to become like them. That’s the part of the American psyche that has always eluded me-that Americans want so badly to be rich that they will let the people who are rich literally get away with murder, only because they hope someday to be like them. Even though the people they are assisting, have stacked the deck against them, on purpose.
Well played morons.
<——————————————————————————————>
And so, when you realize that this is what we are dealing with, sometimes you want to lie back, rest, smile, and imagine what you wish you could say:
I’m more than a little pissed off tonight-for a bunch of reasons, not worth going into. So following dinner, I decided to hunker down and browse.
And when I went to Big Lychee-from my second favorite city on the planet-I discovered all the mistakes I have made that will keep me from being a millionaire. ( Where the hell is the Tequila in the pantry?) Parts that apply to me are in italics:
How to Be (or at least Have Become) a Millionaire Without Being an Entrepreneur and Without Really Trying
1. Don’t get married; don’t have kids. Bang goes millionaire status for most people. Some say marriage improves a woman’s ability to accumulate wealth, but it has wiped out many men I know: ex-wife got the house, and by then it was too late to build another nest egg from nothing. Even a successful marriage usually comes with those horrendous money-sinks known as kids; in the UK, each one eliminatesGBP200,000 of investable funds, and you can’t even hire them out at age six to clean chimneys. Why else can’t that Orthodontist save five years’ salary any faster? You want the glorious blessing, fulfillment and pleasure of children? Fine, but be prepared to sacrifice much hope of millionaire-hood. (Note, by the way, that this list is not titled ‘How to be Happy’.)
2. Make sure you bought somewhere to live in ages ago before prices became stupid, and you paid it all off soon after, even if it left you with zero at the time. That means somewhere pretty cheap. Remember the self-made American mentioned in the Economist: why waste money you can invest? You want a sea view and room for a Jacuzzi? Fine, but don’t complain when you’re not a millionaire.
3. Make sure you have a fairly well-paying job. It doesn’t have to be a stratospheric, investment-banker income, though it needs to be comfortably into middle-class territory. Just as important: your monthly salary should be at least double, preferably more, than your monthly outgoings. Which means…
4. DON’T WASTE MONEY. Make sure your monthly outgoings are no more than 50% (better still, 40% or 30%) of your monthly income. If you ‘like’ expensive clothing, luxury brand watches, every new electronic gizmo that plummets in price a year later, the trendiest nightspot/resort, the laziest/priciest transport, stop ‘liking’ them, or don’t come whining when you don’t end up a millionaire. Women in particular need to sort out their financially debilitating cosmetics/shoes disorders.It helps to have been brought up by parents who thought it was still 1943. If you need to spend to make other people think you are rich, see a therapist.
OK, now we’re halfway there, hopefully by age 35 or so: no encumbrances to feed, no landlord/mortgage sucking your blood, and significantly more cashflow coming in than going out. This brings us to the interesting bit where miracles happen.
5. Invest. According to a story, someone once asked Albert Einstein what was the most powerful force in the universe, and he replied “compound interest.” Compounding is why the orthodontist mentioned above would have had no problem saving US$1 million in a decade if he hadn’t blown so much on family and mortgage interest. It is why you need to have your home fully paid off fairly early in your working life: your mortgage payments are compounding someone else’s stash.
5. a) Invest in equities. Quick and cheap to trade, flexible, diversifiable, income-producing, low-maintenance investments that mostly grow. It takes some study and thought, but no more than following football or movie stars. If you need to be told to re-invest dividends, you aren’t getting it. (If you prefer real estate, and get a kick out of leverage, stamp duty, lawyers, repairs etc, you’re an entrepreneur, committing the unpardonable sin of putting effort into it.)
5. b) Invest at a time and in a place that in retrospect enjoyed major one-off boosts from historic shifts in global economic patterns. The 1990-2010 period in Hong Kong was pretty hard to beat, with globalization, new technology and the rise of China.
5. c) Follow the usual rules. Invest in a blend of boring and mildly adventurous equities. (On average, if you put $10,000 into each of five reasonably considered stocks, maybe one will be a dud, three will perform OK and one will boom. The dud can’t fall more than $10,000; the one that booms can go to $50,000, $70,000 or more. Maybe 70% of returns come from 30% of the portfolio.) Prefer good managements. Prefer companies in industries with high entry barriers. Most of all, let time do the work. And so on.
5. d) Understand timing and psychology. Example 1: Make the most of mayhem. Events like 9/11, SARS and the 2008 crash were singular buying opportunities when the herd was rushing to sell. Buy heavily at such times, and everything else just falls into place. A strong stomach and cold blood help. Example 2: Distinguish trends, fads and bubbles. Emerging markets might fade as flavour of the month, but the strategic long-term case is simple. A stupid investment can be a good one (for a while) if enough idiots are deluding themselves into thinking it’s a good one, as the recent gold price shows.
And there you have it. Your housing is paid for, there’s no screaming family to grab-grab-grab, the Hong Kong government is happy with its annual 15%, you earn decently, you save and you invest. Oh, and it’s the 1990s and 2000s. It could be $100,000, $1 million or $10 million, depending on your circumstances: the point is, if you haven’t accumulated at least 10 years’ salary from zero in (say) a decade and a half, you haven’t tried.
Looking back, it was almost impossible to fail. But how to do it from 2011 onwards, I have no idea.
All prices are in HKD. But even with the sarcasm aside-its still some pretty good advice. Follow it and you could be living at 61 Barker Road.
Middle of the road kind of guy. Love living in Asia and will be back there as soon as I can. I lived 8 and a half grand and glorious years in Asia traveling from one end to the other and generally having a really good time. Despite my best efforts to stay, I was "Quantum Leaped" to a 3 and 1/2 year exile in the USA to pay for my sins - suffering through the lunacy that is life in the American South. I am now back overseas, living the expat life again, working my way around the world- taking the long way home to Asia via the path of living in Germany. Like Dr. Samuel Beckett, I am hoping my next leap will be the leap that brings me home to Asia. Always on the lookout for my next ex-wife.
