Intellectually Stimulating

Getting AHCI to work with an IDE installation of windows

2010-01-04T22:22:00.004-06:00

If anybody has tried to install windows XP (with SP3 or the 64-bit version) with SATA drives, they'll quickly find out the challenge of installing with AHCI enabled in BIOS. I was one of many who gave up trying, and simply set IDE compatibility mode in the BIOS, which ensures that your new SATA drive will work with older operating systems. For the longest time I had simply assumed that I was stuck with the slower IDE drivers, and would forgo the double data transfer rate of SATAII, as well as the lower wear-and-tear on my hard drive from the use of NCQ. Or I would have to spring the cash for a brand new install of Windows Vista or Windows 7. However, I came across a somewhat painless method for enabling AHCI in BIOS, using the following tutorial. (Since this link appears down at the moment, I will reproduce the text below)

Posted by Giulio in Computers

This is a topic I often googled for to have the definitive solution, but I never found a complete one.

Sometimes you install Windows on your PC while the disk controller is in IDE (compatible) mode, and you later realize you would like to switch to the newer AHCI mode.

Doing this after the install procedure is tricky, because Windows needs the disk driver to boot, and if it doesn’t have it, well, it will blue screen forever because it’s not able to mount the system volume.

I found a lot of articles regarding this topic, but often they were specific to some SATA controller, incomplete, and didn’t explain *why* this happens and how to define a generic solution.

So, here is my best effort to explain this.

In Windows, drivers are installed as services. You can find a pretty list of them in the registry, using the well known regedit.

Fire regedit up, and browse to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services key.

Every key here represents a service, which could be a driver or a service as you see them in the Services console.

CurrentControlSet is the current system configuration. Actually, this a link to one of those ControlSetXXXX keys you can see at the same level of CurrentControlSet.

Windows does this to keep track of different system configurations, so you can have a “last good configuration”, and so on.

You can tell which control set is the current one by having a look at the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\Select key. Here you can see four values : Current, Default, Failed, LastKnownGood. The value of each of these indicates which ControlSetXXXX is the corresponding one. Value names are pretty self explanatory, so I won’t detail them. Since you need to modify the current one, anyway, let’s stick to CurrentControlSet.

Now, before switching to AHCI (which can be done in the BIOS of your computer, and if you’re reading this you probably know how to do that), the proper driver must be manually installed.

Since the most common vendor for AHCI controllers is Intel, I will cover how to install the iaStor driver, which is the generic driver for all recent Intel SATA controllers.

First, download the drivers. A quick google search will point where to get them. The installer won’t work, because the controller now is in IDE mode, and has a different hardware ID. So, they must be manually installed.

The quickest way to have the actual driver files is to download the plain ZIP package from Intel’s website. The only file needed from the archive is iaStor.sys.

Throw this file in C:\Windows\System32\Drivers. Of course, if “Windows” is not where Windows is installed, replace with the correct folder name.

Now, a registry key for the driver must be created.

To speed things up, a .reg file can be created to quickly import new keys and values in the registry. Copy and paste the following in a text file and save it as ‘iastor.reg’, or whatever .reg name. Double click on the .reg file to import it.
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\iaStor] "Type"=dword:00000001 "Start"=dword:00000000 "Group"="SCSI miniport" "ErrorControl"=dword:00000001 "ImagePath"="system32\\drivers\\iaStor.sys" "tag"=dword:00000019 "DisplayName"="Intel AHCI Controller" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\iaStor\Parameters] "queuePriorityEnable"=dword:00000000 "BusType"=dword:00000003
Now, Windows knows of the iaStor driver. Windows also needs to know that your AHCI controller is a critical device, and the driver must be loaded early, before painfully crash with a bluescreen.

Another key in the registry must be created, in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase. Here a key exists for each device which is critical for boot time. A new key with the hardware PCI ID of your specific AHCI controller. This PCI ID can be retrieved by having a look at the ‘iaStor.inf’ (for SATA RAID) or ‘iaAhci.inf’ (for plain AHCI) files which come with the drivers. Doing some text search (and of course knowing the name of your controller, like ICH8, ICH9, etc) will uncover some lines which match the controller name with its PCI ID. Here is an extract of iaAhci.inf.
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2653&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 82801FBM SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_27C1&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 82801GR/GH SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_27C5&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 82801GBM SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2681&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 631xESB/632xESB SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2821&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 82801HR/HH/HO SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2829&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) 82801HEM/HBM SATA AHCI Controller" PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2922&CC_0106.DeviceDesc = "Intel(R) ICH9 SATA AHCI Controller"
As for the iaStor key, the following text can be copied and pasted in a .reg text file for quick import, but be careful to substitute my PCI ID (the red string) with yours. You should change only the DEV_ value, since VEN and CC are the same for all controllers. Double click the file, just as for the previous one, to import it.
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\pci#ven_8086&dev_2829&cc_0106] "Service"="iaStor" "ClassGUID"="{4D36E96A-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}" "Security"=hex:01,00,04,90,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,14,00,00,00,02,\ 00,4c,00,03,00,00,00,00,00,14,00,ff,01,1f,00,01,01,00,00,00,00,00,05,12,00,\ 00,00,00,00,18,00,ff,01,1f,00,01,02,00,00,00,00,00,05,20,00,00,00,20,02,00,\ 00,00,00,18,00,9f,01,12,00,01,02,00,00,00,00,00,05,20,00,00,00,21,02,00,00
OK. Now, you can reboot, change the controller from IDE to AHCI in the BIOS, and hopefully everything will work. At least, it worked for me

If something went wrong, just switch back to IDE mode and verify that all steps have been done correctly.

These steps should be quite similar for other vendors/drivers, so feel free to improvise

Have fun!

I tried this method, and wasn't successful at enabling AHCI, but I *was* successful in enabling RAID in my BIOS. Don't worry, you don't need to mount a RAID volume, it will use your existing volumes without you needing to do anything, but if you want to use RAID in the future. Also, the RAID option encapsulates the ACHI option, so you'll benefit from the same features such as SATAII and NCQ. You can then install Intel's Matrix Storage Manager if you'd like. I recommend using a utility such as HD Tune to confirm that you're getting the faster transfer rates and features present with your SATA drive--the free version is sufficient in reporting this information.

Protester Envy

2009-04-17T23:36:00.003-05:00

What happens when a political class ceases to have the monopoly of starting protests?

They sputter with rage, denigrate the protesters, and claim that the protest is a product of astroturfing.

Ladies and Gentlemen, let me present you world-class comedienne and left-wing pundit, Jeanine Garofalo:

OLBERMANN: Congratulations, Pensacola teabaggers. You got spunked. And despite the hatred on display, a few of you actually violated the penal code. But teabagging is now petered out, taint what it used to be. And when you co-opt the next holiday, Fourth of July, try to adopt a holiday food that does not invite the double entendres like, you know, franks and beans. On a more serious note, we're now joined by actor, activist Janeane Garofalo. Good to see you.

JANEANE GAROFALO: Thank you. You know, there's nothing more interesting than seeing a bunch of racists become confused and angry at a speech they're not quite certain what he's saying. It sounds right and then it doesn't make sense. Which, let's be very honest about what this is about. It's not about bashing Democrats, it's not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don't know their history at all. This is about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up. That is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks. And there is no way around that. And you know, you can tell these type of right wingers anything and they'll believe it, except the truth. You tell them the truth and they become -- it's like showing Frankenstein's monster fire. They become confused, and angry and highly volatile. That guy, causing them feelings they don't know, because their limbic brain, we've discussed this before, the limbic brain inside a right-winger or Republican or conservative or your average white power activist, the limbic brain is much larger in their head space than in a reasonable person, and it's pushing against the frontal lobe. So their synapses are misfiring. Is Bernie Goldberg listening?

OLBERMANN: Russ.

GAROFALO: Because Bernie might not have heard this when I said this the first time. So, Bernie, this is for you. It is a neurological problem we're dealing with.

OLBERMAN: Well, what do we do about it, though? I mean, our friend in Pensacola there who played them like a $3 fiddle and led them right down the garden path with nothing but facts and then they went, wait a minute, that doesn't sound like Rush Limbaugh. If you can't get them to make that last leap to what are we all doing here, Howard Johnson is wrong, how do you break through that?

GAROFALO: I don't think you do, for most of them. This is a -- it's almost pathological or elevated to a philosophy or lifestyle. And again, this is about racism. It could be any issue, any port in the storm. These guys hate that a black guy is in the White House. But they immigrant bash, they pretend taxes and tea bags, and like I said, most of them probably couldn't tell you thing one about taxation without representation, the Boston tea party, the British imperialism, whatever the history lesson has to be. But these people, all white for the most part, unless there's some people with Stockholm syndrome there.

OLBERMANN: And, I didn't see them, the fact that they weren't near the cameras which is bad strategy on the part of the people that were staging this at Fox.

GAROFALO: True, and Fox News loves to foment this anti-intellectualism because that's their bread and butter. If you have a cerebral electorate, Fox news goes down the toilet, very, very fast. But it is sick and sad to see Neil Cavuto doing that. They've been doing it for years, that's why Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch started this venture, is to disinform and to coarsen and dumb down a certain segment of the electorate. But what is really, I didn't know there were so many racists left. I didn't know that. I -- you know, because as I've said, the Republican hype and the conservative movement has now crystallized into the white power movement.

OLBERMANN: Is that not a bad, long-term political strategy because even though your point is terrifying that there are that many racists left, the flip side of it is there aren't that many racists left.

GAROFALO: They're the minority, but literally tens of people showed up to this thing across the country.

OLBERMANN: But if you spear your television network or your political party towards a bunch of guys looking who are just looking for a reason to yell at the black president, eventually you will marginalize yourself out of business, won't you?

GAROFALO: Here's what the right-wing has in, there's no shortage of the natural resources of ignorance, apathy, hate, fear. As long as those things are in the collective conscious and unconscious, the Republicans will have some votes. Fox News will have some viewers. But what else have they got? If they didn't do that, who is going to watch -- you know what I mean? They have tackled that elusive clam -- you know, the clam, the 18 to 35 clam -- klan. Klan. With a k demo. But, you know, who else is Fox talking to? I mean, what is it urban older white guys? And the girlfriend, and, you know, the women who suffer from Stockholm syndrome gain. There's a lot of Stockholm syndrome, is what I'm saying ultimately. What else do you want to know?

OLBERMANN: What happens if somebody who's at one of these things hurt somebody?

GAROFALO: That is an unfortunate byproduct since the dawn of time of a volatile group like this of the limbic brain. Violence unfortunately may or may not ensue. It always, it's like a, the Republican Party now depends upon immigrant bashing and hating the black guy in the White House. Will people act on that? It's not new. But, you know, Fox doesn't mind fomenting it. Michelle Bachmann doesn't mine fomenting it. Glenn Beck doesn't mind fomenting it.

The claims that the Tea Party protests were somehow orchestrated by corporations went unchallenged and without fact-checking. I've actually been to political protests, and it's typically made very obvious who runs them. In the case of the afore-linked Iraq War Protest I went to, it was made clear that the show was run by communists--literal, self-identified communists.

The Tea Party protests were different. They were spontaneous, and weren't linked by any single political party, PAC, or corporation. Glenn Beck wasn't in the shadows orchestrating the whole thing. I would love to claim that the Champaign-Urbana Tea Party was organized by the Libertarian Party, but the truth is that it just appeared out of nowhere, and aggregated supporters on its own. Most signs were hand-made. Nobody was turned away or made unwelcome. Given, nationally speaking, Glenn Beck, and a few Republican Politicians hopped onto the bandwagon pretty early, mugging for the camera, but why is this considered to be somehow surprising or underhanded? Leftist celibrities show up at political rallies all the time.

Then there's the accusation that the protesters had "no right" to complain on tax day, since Bush started the bailouts. Yes it's true that Bush started them, but it caught many conservatives by surprise--those that I've talked to were very upset by it. There was a sense of betrayal and of helplessness. I think it took the second round of stimulus to get them agitated enough to protest--I believe the word "trillion" was the tipping point. Culturally, since it's mostly the left who protest, some on the right view it with disdain. I think also leave-me-alone limited-government types typically would rather not draw attention to themselves.

I'm not sure where the accusation of racism came from, but it's easy to refute by simply looking at pictures of the protesters' signs--they seem uniformly of the anti-government variety. I thought dissent was patriotic?

I think it's really jealousy, and maybe fear of competition, that drives the former champions of protest to such lengths to smear the opposition.

Public Entrepreneurship

2009-04-11T10:58:00.004-05:00

Just recently the Champaign County Libertarian Party had the opportunity to have a discussion with Joseph T. Mahoney on his collaborative paper (written with Peter Klein, Anita McGahan, Christos Pitelis) about “The Economic Organization of Public Entreprenership”.

I created a podcast of the discussion in AAC format that is available here (6.2 megs, one and a half hours), as well as a google video version which is viewable below:

Among topics discussed were Arrow's Impossibility Theorem, Coase's Theorem, and how the government's role can be to enhance the wealth of nations as opposed to destroying it through the harnessing of entrepreneurship in the public sphere. Some specific examples are thrown in, as well as how the topic related to local politics in Champaign-Urbana.

Some of the arguments were new to me, some of them being more from a utilitarian-libertarian point of view than a deontological-libertarian view. Also, the paper is based upon a minarchist view of the world--that is to say, it assumes that a government will exist. It is a pragmatist idea of how to improve government that could appeal to both conservatives and liberals I think.

For instance, the typical small-government view is that government inaction is better than government action. However, imagine the following hypothetical. A community is under imminent danger from an objectively demonstrable threat (a natural disaster, the collapse of a bridge, etc.). The private parties that make up this community cannot all agree on a plan to remedy the situation. In this case, the government stepping in doing something would be preferable to doing nothing, as a haphazard solution would be better than total disaster. If the government solution is unpleasant enough, or would take too long to implement, this would stimulate entrepreneurs to come together with a plan for the public good. More often then not this plan is more effective, faster, and more efficient than the government plan, and more appreciated by the public as it doesn't involve increased taxes or regulation.

There are surprisingly many instances of this happening, in light of the bungling done with the bridge collapse in Minnesota and Hurricane Katrina at the hands of the government. Just recently I was forwarded an email on how citizens and businesses built a bridge in Hawaii because the government was unable or unwilling to do it. Not only did it get done faster, but much cheaper than the projected cost. Not only that, the cost did not result in increased taxes or government debt--it was absorbed by the businesses who would benefit from the repaired bridge. The "free rider problem" in this case was averted. There are other examples of course, such as citizens volunteering to sandbag an overflowing river. Their efforts not only save their own property, but help save the property of their neighbors as well.

The only downside I can think of, is that while public entrepreneurship is better than a government solution due to government's use of force, is that it sometimes requires the threat of force. In other words, action is only taken because the government bureaucracy's solution is more feared. This of course is tied into legitimacy of the government's force (see: Arrow's Impossibility Theorem), which may be called into question if the democratic process is absent or easy to manipulate--the paper discusses this issue in some detail.

Overall it was a fascinating topic that I think will gain more traction as people realize that the government isn't very good at creating value or solving things--and we may have to rely on ourselves and our neighbors.

Inflation, manias, and gold, oh my!

2008-12-19T18:41:00.005-06:00

On a rare hard money post on the Reason blog, a pointed question was asked of the commentariat, by domoarrigato:

I've never gotten a decent answer from Austrians on this site as to why they prefer the arbitrary inflations and deflations which would inevitably caused by fluctuations in the supply and industrial demand for soft yellow metal over those tied to the state of the economy. Or, how a metallic standard would cure the primary cause of bubbles and crashes (human psychology and extension of credit to dubious actors for uneconomic means.)

This latter isn't impacted one whit by being able to convert currency into specie.

I decided to man up to the task and offer my own response:

I think you're just setting up a straw man. It doesn't have to be gold, gold is merely a good candidate. The whole point is that one should be free to choose whatever means of exchange one desires.

Also, manias and panics cannot be solved other than through a totalitarian state which tells you what to buy and sell. People are sheep and will plow into retrospectively dumb "investments" like beanie babies. Reducing the scope of government will prevent many manias by taking away the easy credit punch bowl, and by removing fool-hardy government schemes and mandates. If you research manias throughout history, the worst ones initiated by the government sticking its phallus in the middle of private contracts (Tulips, Mississippi River Valley, Railroads, and finally, Real Estate). Government *could* quell some manias by pursuing cases of fraud, but since governments were making money hand over fist through real estate taxes, nothing happened.

...inflation and deflation aren't intrinsically bad (in moderation), they just benefit debtors in the former and savers in the latter. *Both* extreme deflation and inflation are bad because they distort people's rational expectations as to what their money is worth and aggravate herd like behavior ("Never put your money in banks, they can't be trusted!" or "Houses always go up in value!")

Well, apparently my reply was somewhat satisfactory as domoarrigato riposted:

If I've been effective enough in pointing out the difficulties of a gold standard that it is viewed as a strawman on a libertarian website, then I have been sucessful indeed. I put it out there, because I generally get a lot of flack for busting on the gold crowd. I see I've attracted the attention of the free banking crew instead today. I actually have a lot less of a problem with that concept than you might think. Free banking is a concept that I like a lot - in fact I support efforts like e-gold etc. I do take issue with the idea that USD are somehow a monopoly currency in this country. There are many counter examples that argue otherwise - mostly local barter arrangements. The big more visible ones tend to run afoul of the laws (like money laundering statues) but that doesn't stop people from saying it's because of "legal tender laws" - which it's not. In fact, we have free banking in the US, and these currencies exist peacably beside the dollar. It's just that money - like telephones - has a lot of network effects that determine it's success. You can only use wildcat currencies where they are accepted voluntarily.

Well put. I would only add that moderate deflation can much more easily turn into extreme deflation, and is always accompanied by much worse economic outcomes than moderate inflation. Which is why every mainstream economist that I am aware of views a couple of percents of inflation as "price stability"

Then he offered a concrete example of how a gold/silver standard is just as inflation prone as fiat currency. And soon we were off on another tangent:

I did an interesting calculation on the oft cited roman debasement and inflation example. Very good records exist, and I was able to compare the value of silver denari(common unit of money that were debased from being solid silver to solid bronze with just a silver wash) to that of solid gold aureus (corrected for weight and purity) which were commonly used as stores of wealth. Over the 200 odd year time period that I looked at, inflation averaged a remarkably un-remarkable 6%.

Also during this time period, the roman empire expanded enormously in size and citizenry and wealth/capita. The money supply increased many times faster than the 6% would indicate because of this. The romans inflated their currency through debasement because of the raw demand for more currency in an expanding economy.

Another poster name HAL-9000 offered his analysis of Rome's inflationary period, which put things into perspective:

What was the 200-year period you looked at? Most of what the Roman Empire was built during the Republic...at least the big-money "acquisitions" if you will. Your time-frame sounds more like the late Republic than the Empire.

You know, sitting here thinking about it, there's another big caveat in looking at money and collective social behavior with ancient societies - especially the Roman transition from Republic to Empire - and that's slavery.

In the late Republic and especially the Empire, most people's participation in money transactions was as the commodity the monies were being exchanged for. That also would have a significant impact on "assets" in a society that practiced a high form of ledger accounting like the Romans did.

I wonder, what was inflation like when Rome was still a Republic, before rampant slavery set in, and a permanent underclass became dependent on socialism bread and circuses in Rome? Was there a monopoly on metallic currency, and was it subject to inflation?

Much ink has been spilled on the matter. Even if a government chooses gold over fiat currency, it could still debase it, though with much more difficulty. A recently written book attempts to analyze the use of money in that time period. It seems one problem the authors had, was trying to measure the amount of money floating around. Apparently, Roman coins were valued, but many other means of exchange were used during the Republic. Rural farmers used wheat and cattle, some used foreign coins, and still others just used unminted bullion. It becomes ambiguous as to what money is--and how does one measure the other means of exchange used? It seems the number of coins used simply met the demand for coin. It wasn't until the Roman empire spanned the whole mediterranean, and the grain shipments converged on the gargantuan city of Rome, that the emperors achieved a de facto monopoly on money. The larger the government, the more official coin it needed to pay its functionaries and military. Also, it's more convenient for the government to request payment for taxes in its own coin. Eventally everybody had to use coin, as governments needed to buy grain for the proletarians and the army--even though traders and farmers initially preferred not to use the official coinage. It seems Gresham's Law was already in effect.

ZOMG: Wall Street Is War Street!

2008-11-18T18:04:00.004-06:00

Those were the friendly words greeting me at my mailbox today, as apparently I was delivered the full catalogue of the AK Press. Two goons with black balaclavas, black gloves, and black slacks were pictured in stark black and white, carrying a minimalist placard with the pithy phrase "WALL ST. IS WAR ST."

"For me? You're too kind!" I thought to myself, but was much disappointed after I flipped over. It was addressed to the former tenant, a raging anarchist apparently. So started my trip down irony street for the evening.

First was the bold declaration on the back touting AK Press as a premier source of anarchist literature. "Oh really?" I wondered. "Surely they must have works by Murray Rothbard, or a little bit of Hans-Hermann Hoppe!". Alas, no. But they *did* have a full back-catalogue of Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Bill Ayers.

Of course, I knew better. The little red and black flag in the corner signifies that this publication was of the anarcho-syndicalist brand of anarchy. This is important because the publication touts itself as just plain anarchism, and it's only if you bother to read a dozen pages into their brochure that they mention "syndicalism". In other words, they arrogantly co-opt a whole entire movement of a wide variety of thinkers--such as, for example, Christian anarchists, or agorists. It is intellectual dishonesty. This isn't unexpected however: those on the left of the statist variety, the modern day liberals, did something similar when they co-opted the term "liberal", and warped to the point where it no longer resembles classical liberalism.

If you forgive the foray into deconstructionism, it's interesting to analyse the materials themselves. It is more or less a combination marketing brochure with full media catalogue: movies, music, books, and merchandise. The cover is simple, intriguing, and accurately summarizes the subject matter. Everything in this book is categorized, summarized, organized to benefit the consumer in the purchase collective-anarchist material. At the same time, it's printed with newsprint to cut costs. What I'm trying to say here is that AK Press has created an excellent market-based product. Whoever is working in their marketing department is no slouch. I would say that it's even a fine example of capitalism! It's also quite aware of its own hypocrisy. From the section entitled "Isn't an 'anarchist business' an oxymoron?":

There's definitely something strange and contradictory about the concept of an anarchist business. AK Press works hard to destroy and move beyond capitalism, toward a non-exploitative, sustainable, and just economy. However, like it or not, capitalism is the only game in town at the moment.

I couldn't agree more! It's the only game in town because well... it's the only game that works. The market has been in existence ever since Ogg traded a hunk of flint for Zugzug's dried fish. Eventually, Lothar of the Hill People discovered cowry shells were a good store of value when flint and fish were unavailable. Though I have to admit, Cave Clan's Collective Coop makes some wicked magic brownies.

Fortunately, the newsprint of AK Press makes good tinder for my fireplace. Reduce, re-use and recycle, I say! Though I think you can guess as to whether I'll be pulling off the shelf "A People's History of the United States" or "Road to Serfdom" to read next to a roaring fire.

Obama: More Clinton than Carter

2008-11-08T21:19:00.005-06:00

There has been much ink spilled that Obama's upcoming presidency would be a repeat of Jimmy Carter's mediocre four years. The punditry notes several similarities. For instance, a presidency that starts with a crushing budget deficit and a stagnant economy. This would be accompanied by a weak foreign policy, and economic mismanagement that would prevent business from recovering. This comes from the assumption that Obama would stay true to his leftist roots, and his comments about wealth redistribution and fairness at any cost.

However, it starting to become clear that Obama is no Jimmy Carter, but more like his Democrat predecessor, Bill Clinton. This is because it appears that Obama associated with far left characters such as Bill Ayers and Rev. Jeremiah Wright for political expediency. In order to rise up quickly in Chicago politics, one cannot play to the center. He needed to ally himself with both the liberal, white, elite as well as stay true to the black community. It seems that to become a credible presidential candidate, he not only had to play to the center, he must stay firmly planted there.

I do not think this will be an easy-going libertarian type of centrism. This will be an authoritarian father-knows-best status quo kind of centrism.

The ideological left will be disappointed that he does not represent a true change in Washington. A number of libertarians decided to punt for Obama instead of McCain because of his anti-war views and increased support for civil liberties. They will soon have buyer's remorse.

My proof of this is his choice of Rahm Emanuel as Chief of Staff. He is a former Clinton staffer and political insider. He was a Wall Street financier. Some of his policy views are chilling, such as a mandatory three month civil service program (this is a newspeak, politically correct version of a draft). Due to his ties to banking lobby, he won't recommend roll back the horrendously expensive bailout of big business. Other cabinet positions are unconfirmed, but they appear to be from across the political spectrum.

The far left will be sorely dissapointed in his promised redistributionist schemes, for two reasons. First, due to the fact that our economy is slowing, and we're stuck with 2 trillion for the bailout (which Obama supports), there will be no money available for social projects. Second, since Obama at least pays lip service to the free market, his economic advisors will likely warn him that any further deficit spending will result in massive inflation. Also, any increase in tax rates beyond Clinton levels would merely accelerate the flight of industry and business to other countries, which would cause ever decreasing returns in tax revenue.

Libertarians who sought to punish the Republican party for the failures of the past 8 years by pulling the lever for Obama will soon discover that Obama is no civil libertarian. Not only did he vote for the USA PATRIOT Act, but he also voted for the retroactive telecom immunity. I expect Obama to close Guantanamo eventually because of its symbolic value, but he will no doubt simply expand on Bush's presidential powers. In terms of freedom of speech, Reason Magazine summarized Obama's willingness to violate it:

...the folks at places such as the Parents Television Council will continue thundering on about indecency on the public airwaves (and why the Federal Communications Commission ought to be regulating content on satellite and cable too). In this sort of jeremiad, they will find an ally in Obama and his puritanical friends on the left, who similarly like to run down market-based culture, especially video games. "Turn off the television," Obama is fond of saying, "turn off the video games." Like Bill Clinton, who along with First Lady Hillary Clinton hosted a seemingly endless series of White House events decrying vulgar culture, Obama hasn't been shy about pulling a Janet Reno when it comes to threatening industry to undertake "self-regulation": "Broadcasters and video game producers should take it upon themselves to improve this [rating] system to include easier to find and easier to understand descriptions of exactly what kind of content is included," Obama said in 2007. "But if the industry fails to act, then my administration would."

What I find amusing that there were still many anti-war activists shilling for Obama as the "anti-war" candidate. Obama will phase out troops merely in accordance to the timetable already proposed to the Bush administration, which will probably be hammered out before Obama is even sworn in. These troops will probably be transferred to Afghanistan, and possibly to peacekeeping missions in Darfur. I could make other idle predictions, but it seems that most foreign policy will remain unchanged between Obama and Bush.

While Obama will initially see some mandate for leftist policies, I foresee Republicans regaining majorities in either the House or the Senate, similar to what happened with Bill Clinton. This will be mostly due to what happens in the economy. Government intervention in the economy in the past year has not solved anything, and it will solve nothing in the next two years. The market will eventually recover on its own. Once the Republicans regain a foothold, like Bill Clinton, Obama will have to play towards the center.

Naomi Klein called me an insane fundamentalist

2008-10-29T22:34:00.007-05:00

Naomi Klein spoke tonight at UIUC to promote her book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Though philosophically she strikes as an anarcho-syndicalist rather than a full-blown Marxist, she seems to be an expert at promoting her book and book tour. I'm not familiar with which worker's cooperative she's sharing profits in, but she seems to be doing well: Smith Memorial Hall, one of the concert halls on campus, was filled to the gills.

Unlike many students there on a late-night homework assignment, I actually took notes and had prepared a couple questions. She focused on on her new book The Shock Doctrine, though she did talk about her older book No Logo and current events. She posits that her book is a different "telling" of the story of Milton Friedman. It's in opposition to the commonly held story that market reforms tend to stimulate economic progress, and through prosperity, increased civil liberties. In this alternate history, the Chicago School uses "shock and awe" to force market reforms on an unwilling populace. She also attempts to twist his philosophy (Friedman was anti-war, and anti-coercive government) to making him sound like a militarist, corporatist douche, who wants nothing more than to send goons with guns to force you to shop at Walmart. In reality, these are not Friedmanite policies, but corporatist ones. Authoritarians tend to cherry-pick which ideologies keep them in power, regardless of their political origins. Is it Friedman's fault if a dictator acknowledges that the market is the most efficient way to run an economy? Naomi Klein brushes such critiques aside by comparing them to communist apologists who said that Marxism was never implemented the "correct way".

So why the name for my post?

I had originally prepared the following question:

Your book presents the thesis that the right uses catastrophes to advance their policies. What stop the left from using the same underhanded tactics to further their own agenda?

I decided against it because I thought that this kind of "gotcha" question it would falsely mark me as a Republican plant from the McCain campaign. I'm sure Naomi Klein would find an appropriate response. My guess is something like: the people would express their common will and spontaneously form worker cooperatives if the evil elites would have their wealth redistributed, so there would be no need for underhandedness! Depending on the electorate, this might in fact be the case, though there would still be shock and awe of a different kind.

Instead I tapped the microphone, cleared my throat, and asked her this:

As there are different brands of socialism, there are different brands of liberalism. You have already expressed disdain for the Chicago School. What is your opinion on the Austrian School?

As the words "Austrian School" began to echo in the hall, the other lone libertarian in the audience clapped his hands excitedly, then stopped quickly as the room was starkly silent. I paraphrase Naomi Klein's response through my notes:

They're even crazier than Chicago School! Though Hayek had some influence on Milton Friedman, they are true Market Fundamentalists. They paint a beautiful tableau of free markets, but they are extremely dangerous! You cannot win arguments with fundamentalists like them. Just like the communists on the left, they retreat to their sacred texts whenever there is a criticism the failure of free markets. With the current shadow banking system of derivatives, which were deregulated under Robert Rubin, this ugly mess is what a true free market would look like!

I was a bit taken aback that she implied that I'm an insane fundamentalist, as who else but an Austrian Economist would ask what she thought of Austrian Economics? On the other hand, I have to give her credit for knowing who the Austrians are, and for giving me an honest answer.

I was bit surprised at her ire for other reasons. There was no mention of the commonality between Naomi Klein and many of the Austrian School's positions. The opposition towards both corporate bailouts and state owned companies. The opposition to war and government coercion. The doctrine of political and economic decentralisation. The acceptance of voluntary cooperatives in the market. The opposition to central banks.

Moreover, the Austrians didn't invent the free market as some idealistic fantasy, but acknowledge that the market simply exists. Yes, markets sometimes fail (like any human activity), but it's the failures that regulate the excesses of the market. If you do not allow markets to fail, and keep bailing them out, people will irrationally plow more money into them because of moral hazard, until they eventually become "too big to fail". The whole economy soon becomes dependent on this gargantuan market. Today this happened with real-estate, a government policy fueled mania (everyone should own a home!) fifty years in the making that spawned the derivatives beast we're stuck with today. Derivatives regulation would simply have been a band-aid on a botched amputation. Yes, we should not have convinced everybody to move into a home using government policy (Fannie Mae, low Federal Reserve interest rates, government regulation requiring easy mortgages), but at this point we should just let the banks take a black eye for their gamble on derivatives and simply fail. I think this last point is something Naomi Klein and I can agree on.

August Chicago Bob Barr Fundraiser

2008-08-30T09:52:00.007-05:00

I've been sitting on these for a while, but I took some pictures and video of the Bob Barr fundraiser in Chicago on August 15th, 2008. It was an opportunity to meet the man behind the 'stache, and mingle with other freedom-minded individuals.

Pictures

Videos

CATO Fuel Study: Giving Libertarians a Bad Name

2008-08-12T10:16:00.008-05:00

I was browsing Drudge Report today and came across a new study today claiming that gas is as affordable today as the 1960's. A priori, the claim sounds ridiculous, as it seems completely out of touch with reality (my doubts were confirmed when going over the study's methodology). However, amusement quickly turned to dismay as it was apparently produced by the CATO institute, probably the publicly well-known libertarian think tank.

I was bothered by two reasons. First, that while CATO thinks that it may be making a reasoned argument (an argument that I'll deconstruct later), common experience by most people rejects the idea that gas prices are affordable. This disconnect caused a fury of comments to the article, claiming that CATO is out of touch with reality. Of course, what the commentariat does not know is that even many libertarians think that CATO is out of touch with reality, as a quick search of CATO on another popular libertarian site will reveal. CATO is merely reinforcing the stereotype that libertarians are out-of-touch moneyed elites (a false claim; if you drew a Venn diagram those two groups would hardly intersect).

This leads me to the second point, and that is that this CATO publication doesn't do anything to bring to light the core tenets of libertarianism: individualism and personal liberty. It almost seems like they are being polyannas for the current economic system (which isn't a free market, despite what the socialists claim). In fact, CATO's argument that standards of living have improved runs counter to an argument made on the Libertarian Party's website. Namely, that government intervention has caused standards of living to decline for a typical family:

Let's take a look at a median income family of four in the 1950s. At that time, the Federal income tax amounted to only 2% of the family budget. Americans enjoyed the highest standard of living in the world.

By contrast, in the 1990s, the Federal income tax takes 25% of income for the same family of four. Taxes at all levels -- federal, state, and local; hidden and visible -- take about 50% of a family's income. We must work from January to June just to pay taxes.

It now requires two paychecks to keep many families from going bankrupt. Typically, a working mother brings home 32% of a family's income.

So, whether she chooses to work -- or must work to make ends meet -- taxes have stolen her contribution to the family budget. In other words, one spouse now works all year just to pay taxes.

Admittedly, CATO is only specifically looking at gasoline prices as an element of income. However, what's defined as "income" here is very suspect. The statistician who created this report is playing fancy shell game with the numbers. Namely, the "income" being used in the study is "average disposable income". There is an important difference in the definition between median and average (arithmetic mean). The average value can be easily distorted by outliers in the data (for example: Bill Gates), who has literally billions of dollars of disposable income. Median is more meaningful in economic data. Another problem is the meaning of "disposable". What costs are subtracted that are not considered "disposable"? What was a necessity in 1960 may not be a necessity in 2008, and vice versa. A personal computer, car, and cell phone, are considered indispensable today. In 1960, a stay-at-home-wife was considered indispensable. What amount of income is disposable is subjective, and cannot possibly be objectively measured. Even the definition of "income" is suspect. For example, there was a unique occurrence in the past decade where people cashed out the equity in their homes, and this shows up as "disposable income" as people bought SUVs, family vacations, and other fancy toys. However, while some view equity as "untapped wealth", taking out money in your home is merely assuming more debt. Money that has to be paid back later is not income.

My proposal to this study is to simply use median household income, minus income taxes, without adjusting for inflation. This information is relatively easy to obtain. Same goes for gas prices. In estimating how much pain people are feeling at the pump, find the median number of miles driven per household and the median fuel economy each year (a more difficult task). Following this methodology you'll probably find a much different result than CATO, and probably more in line with a typical person's experience. What conclusions will you be able to formulate on libertarianism though? Probably none.

Recharge any battery: save the environment by saving money

2008-07-04T08:16:00.005-05:00

People are skeptical when I say economic efficiency means environmental efficiency. They often point out externalities as a counter argument, though if you defend property and individual rights, this problem can be mediated: pollute my land, and I sue you. Outside of the tort system, here's a way you, as an individual and as a consumer, can both save a lot of money and save the environment.

Don't throw away your batteries when they're dead! Any student of chemistry knows that a battery is a reversible chemical reaction. The truth is, many alkaline batteries can be recharged. Now the reason why I use the qualifier most is that some batteries are purposely designed to malfunction when you recharge them, to get you to buy more of course.

What I use is a discontinued Rayovak Recharger, which is a scaled down version of this one. I don't know why they stopped making these, but perhaps they did when people found out they could recharge any alkaline battery, as opposed to just rayovak brand rechargeables. Recently, Rayovak launched a new line of rechargeables, but I have not tested these out to see if these still work.

Ideally, any automatic recharger works (the kind that shut themselves off when they detect a full charge), but be careful testing. You can even do it yourself if you're adventurous. One thing I must point out though is that the chemicals inside the battery can irritate your skin, so if you see any sign of leakage, remove the battery with a thick paper towel and wash your hands. You'll notice a distinctive sour odor when batteries burst, which is another way of telling if they've malfunctioned. If the leakage got onto the charger or electronics, you can either wipe it down immediately or wait until it dries and dust it off. Also, if the battery stays warm a while after you've charged it, that means that the battery shorted and can no longer be used. Also, most batteries have some kind of expiration date on them, and this is a good rule of thumb as to your success in recharging the battery.

Ideally you should be able to recharge the batteries as often as you want until the battery can no longer be recharged. If you want, you can use a permanent marker and add a tally mark each time you recharge your batteries.

Good luck, have fun, and remember, safety first!

The Benefits of Global Warming

2008-04-21T21:28:00.005-05:00

Much ink has been spilled over all the potential dangers of global warming (or as has been recently rebranded--climate change). Hurricanes, rising sea levels, encroaching deserts--things these things have been happening to the planet since the end of the last ice age--are predicted to get progressively worse due to the warming of the planet. On the other hand, there are benefits to a warming planet. These include longer growing seasons, a net increase in habitable areas of the planet, and higher biodiversity. How do we know this? From both the fossil record and historical record from warm ages.

For instance, the first known explosion of biodiversity, the Cambrian explosion, happened only after the greatest ice age the planet has ever experienced had ended, also known as "Snowball Earth". Typically, other time periods where the Earth was warmer, also resulted in increased flora and fauna. For example, in the Early Carboniferous, which was warmer than today, plant growth was extensive and thick (due to higher CO2 and higher temperatures) and bacteria that break down plant matter did not yet exist; it resulted in the coal seams we have today. There is also the Mesozoic Era--the time of the dinosaurs--which was far warmer than it is today and there was a great diversity of animals. The first mammals and birds developed alongside the dinosaurs during this time. Even during one the most massive global warming events scientists have on record, also known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum 56 million years ago, terrestrial animals thrived even though marine species died out. In fact, this was the time when our ancestors, primates, first appeared on the scene.

There are also human recorded events of times warmer than today. During the Medieval Warm Period, temperatures were so warm in the Northern Hemisphere, that wine grapes were grown in England. Greenland was warm enough to support a sedentary population, and Vikings even led excursions into North America long before Columbus. The High Middle Ages were in fact a time of relative plenty and cultural development. Our stereotype of the "Dark Ages" comes from the prejudice of the generations following the end of the warming period which resulted in famine, and the Black Plague probably didn't generate warm fuzzy feelings either. While the West eventually recovered, life during the little ice age was no picnic. Sure there were scientific and cultural advancements, but life for the common man really didn't improve that much over the medieval era. The shorter growing seasons resulted in crop failures, even to the point of having a devastating year without a summer.

One counterpoint I will address is what happens if the worst climate predictions of the next 100 years are true? Will any benefits be outweighed by the negative consequences? I'm convinced that even the worst warming will open up more land to human utility than is lost, as during warming periods tend to warm up the poles to a greater degree than the equator. Compare the vast frozen interiors of Siberia, Canada (and possibly Greenland and Antarctica) that will become warmer and more habitable, to arid areas near the equator that face desertification. Of course there will also be land lost due to rising sea levels, but even the greatest modeled sea level rise between 1990 and 2100 would be only 770 millimeters. Compare this to the late stone age when sea levels were three meters higher! The sea level change will be so gradual that any affected populations could easily move out of the way, probably a cost much cheaper than climate mitigation (can we just call it terraforming?), but that will be the topic of my proceeding post.

Wayne Allyn Root Speech in Chicago

2008-04-08T21:05:00.004-05:00

Taking a small break from my Anthropogenic Global Warming skepticism here to post my video of Wayne Allen Root speaking last week, April 3rd 2008. For those that don't know, he's currently the front runner Libertarian Party presidential candidate.

You can download a high-res version of the film from bittorrent, or watch the lower-res youtube segments below:

You can also view Mr. Root debate the other candidates at the Heartland Libertarian Conference on April 5th.

The Climate Data Is Off or Contradictory

2008-03-31T21:30:00.006-05:00

When climate models are wrong, it doesn't help at all to have bad data. Of obvious importance to climate data is of course, temperature measurements. Countless stations around the country monitor all kinds of statistics, which ideally should be completely free of interference so that objective conclusions can be made.

These stations were originally placed at rural locations throughout the country, but due to our gorging on cheap sources of fossil fuels, suburbia has expanded far into the countryside, often engulfing weather stations in their wake. There is a common weather phenomenon associated with cities, known as the urban heat island. Because of the vast amounts of concrete, asphalt, pavement in cities, and the relative lack of greenery, cities tend to much hotter in sunshine than the country. The heat island effect is noticeable to the point where even a child can scientifically measure its existence. So one would think that having stations that go from being in a green zone to being in an urban zone would be problematic. The IPCC assures us that this does not matter: if a sensor has been in a heat zone for very long amount of time, it should display a consistently higher temperature, but not constant increase. I'm not certain if I buy this explanation. To see how massively urban areas have expanded, compare this map of Chicago around when temperatures began to be recorded, to this today:

View Larger Map

This is not to say that global warming isn't happening, it's that doubt shouldn't be cast on the extremity of predictions. Normally when a scientist conducts an experiment, and their data proves to be corrupted, they meet massive ridicule. Instead the IPCC has become indignant, saying the heat islands don't matter, as long as their measurements for ground temperatures match their data on oceans temperatures. However, independent sources say that conclusions based on oceanic data are ambiguous at best.

Lesson learned? If a set of data is unreliable, it's better to use data that's unambiguous and hard to fool--statistics can only repair data up to a point. This is why satellite data should be used as often as possible. Data can be recorded from anywhere on the globe, and it samples temperature form the atmosphere and is therefore prone to less variability than surface temperatures. Unfortunately, satellite data only goes as far back as mankind has had satellites. Weather balloon measurements serve as a good proxy, but even then those go back about fifty years. However, proponents of using surface temperatures don't like satellite measurements (which record temperatures in the atmosphere), because--surprise--they record less severe warming trends than for surface temperatures. Could this be the urban heat island effect in play? You be the judge.

Addendum 4/21/2008:In this post I neglected the man who is behind the verification of the climate data station--making sure that they are a minimum distance away from potential sources of the urban heat island effect--so that they give a more reliable measure of the temperature record. His name is Anthony Watts, a meteorologist who runs a blog that describes his research as well as SurfaceStations.org which keeps track of information about each station.

The Climate Models Are Wrong

2008-03-29T10:24:00.010-05:00

It wasn't so long ago, that there was a quite different campaign warning of the dangers of climate change. In the 1970's, the climate crisis du jour was global cooling. This is because temperatures had been declining for several decades, from the 1940's through the 1970's. It was predicted at the time that we were headed towards a global cooling catastrophe (loss of farmland, severe storms, etc) if the trends were to continue according to the best models science had to offer. The prevailing theory at the time was that aerosols given off by factories, automobiles, deforestation, farming, etc. was reflecting sunlight back into space from the atmosphere, causing cooling throughout the planet.

It turns out those models were wrong. In the 1980's the trend reversed, and we had global warming throughout the 1990's. In particular, 1998 was the warmest year on record. What were climate scientists to do? The new paradigm was that the cooling effect of aerosols was counteracted by the effect of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, which has been increasing consistently since the Industrial Revolution. So the new mantra has become that our consumption of fossil fuels is gumming up the global climate system, causing it to warm up like a car with its windows up on a hot summer day. When reconstructing temperatures from the past and projecting them into the future, we had the hockey stick model, where due to accelerating carbon dioxide levels, we would have accelerating temperatures, until the planet turned into a smoldering cauldron, much like Venus.

However, it just so happens that if you take the hot, steamy year of 1998 as a reference point, we've had global cooling₁:

Which Leads us to Dr. Miklós Zágoni, a climate specialist who worked for NASA. Since the climate predictions of massive global warming turned out to be wrong as of late, he tasked himself to refine the climate models. It turned out that the carbon dioxide model for global warming made a flawed assumption in its equation. Namely, to simplify one of the thermodynamics equations, an assumption was made that the atmosphere has infinite height. Since I have an engineering degree, it's not unusual to see equations simplified using assumptions--with the understanding that the results would be identical when the assumptions are made. In this case though, Dr. Zágoni discovered that accelerating heating would not happen, that there would be a ceiling to the amount of global warming due to carbon dioxide. This sounds like good news! We won't all die, and we won't need complex and onerous carbon legislation! Dr. Zágoni's reward? He was summarily defrocked and excommunicated by NASA.

Is this really about science, or is it as much about orthodoxy, bureaucratic inertia, and grant money? Perhaps if we have problems predicting weather into the news ten days, maybe we should be wary of making temperature predictions for the next 100 years.

Update 2008/3/31: I think the best model that explains global warming (as opposed to the prevailing anthropogenic CO2-based theory of global warming) is the one which ties global temperatures directly to solar activity. The increased presence of CO2 in the atmosphere would be explained mostly that it would be released from the oceans as they warmed; as opposed to being a cause of the warming they would be a symptom.

₁ It was actually a challenge to find temperature data for the past 10 years. A little too convenient, if you ask me.

Dr. Zágoni or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Global Warming

2008-03-27T19:49:00.006-05:00

This post isn't about global warming denialism. In fact I accept that the climate changes all the time. At one time glaciers covered much of the Earth, and during another period, Antarctica and Greenland were verdant and covered in forests. I propose the following: that the moderate global warming that has happened in the past 100 years is a boon to human development and prosperity, with overall greater benefits than detriments. Extreme runaway global warming will not happen, and the more data that comes out, the clearer that becomes. One prediction is clear though: by attempting to drastically reduce carbon dioxide emissions, it will require more oppressive use of government to enforce regulations, and cause a massive disruption of the economy. I will be publishing a series covering these points, including who is Dr. Miklós Zágoni, and link them back below.

The Climate Models Are Wrong
The Climate Data Is Off or Contradictory
The Benefits of Global Warming
How Climate Mitigation Is Cheaper than Climate Prevention
Consensus Science and Rent-Seeking
How The War on Carbon Will Wreck the Economy and Take Away Your Liberties

Anti-War Movement Hijacked by Communists and Islamist Apologists

2008-03-19T21:18:00.008-05:00

Since today was the 5 year anniversary of the start of the Iraq War, I decided to check out the anti-war rally in downtown Chicago, which happened to start just down the street from where I work. As the above link will attest, I was aware of the some of the socialist intentions of the event, but decided to give the organizers the benefit of the doubt that it was going to be a straight-up focus on the war and give a rational presentation of arguments to back up our side of the issue. It turns out I was dead wrong.

At first I was entertained by some of the more creative and individual protesters that weren't affiliated with the leftist organizers of the event. These included Jesus Christ with the Cross, Patriotic Puppets, a Revolutionary in a tri-corner hat, St. Gertrude Parish, and few "billionaires for Democrats":

Though as soon as the speeches started, the whole thing left a sour taste in my mouth as the anti-war issue was used as a linchpin to forward all sorts of political ideologies only marginally related to war. There were anti-corporate socialists who wanted to use the war money to fund socialized projects. Hey, I happen to like the corporate overlords who pay my salary. As far as the cost of the war is concerned I'd rather get my money BACK through lower taxes and lower inflation, and not have it spend on more big-government boondoggles, thank you very much. There was a Mexican nationalist who tried to link the illegal immigration issue to the fact that non-citizens are "coerced" into the army. Last time I checked our army consisted entirely of volunteers, and immigrant veterans tend to be rewarded handsomely with citizenship. There was a person ranting against Israel and for the Palestinian Intifada. I'll get more into that insanity later. There was no end to the grandstanding on people's pet issues, and relatively little time left to take a principled stance against the war.

After the speech we started marching, and this is when the madness truly began. If you click on the image below, you'll see that these are members of the International Socialist Organization, or put another way, Revolutionary Marxists:

An organization that should have died with the fall of the Berlin Wall when communism collapsed under it's own crushing weight of oppression, and should have been buried along with the millions of deaths it caused throughout the 20th century. Yes, the very people who would love nothing better than to reproduce the hell on Earth that is North Korea and Cuba on our soil. But wait, there's more! I managed to scribble down one of the chants that they started up on the march, reproduced here:

Long live the Intifada!
Intifada, Intifada!
Free free Palestine,
Long live Palestine!

Repeated ad infinitum, all while holding "Stop Racism, Stop The War" signs in Arabic. Of course, the irony is that the Intifada is a fucking war, that antisemitism is rampant in the Intifada, and that the Islamists would be more than willing to throw the commies under the bus in the quest to re-instate the Caliphate and Sharia Law in Palestine. Pure madness.

Another interesting aspect of the march was how shockingly civil it was (given the rampant communist and black-flag-and-mask anarchist presence). There was a sizable police presence (as taken in pictures below), but there was absolutely no conflict. There were exactly two intersections that featured riot police and policemen on horseback, but they seemed positively bored out of their skulls, and seemed to be more of a curiosity than the protesters, who were photographed almost relentlessly. At other places, the march was flanked by ordinary beat cops who looked like their couldn't wait to end their shift. Onlookers and protesters alike crossed the police "lines" without so much as a sneer. I took a picture of what I thought looked like a police version of an Active Denial System, but it turned out to be an ordinary TracStar satellite dish.

Naturally, the media was there to gawk at the scene:

Here are some random pictures of the protest:

To end on a positive note, the march was worth it purely as an opportunity to take pictures of a city with world-class architecture--at night:

Update 2008/3/20: One thing I forgot to mention was that there was a "United Nations" contingent there flying a large UN flag. The irony, of course, is that one of the pretenses for going to war was over non-compliance with UN resolutions.

Getting Windows Vista NOT to screw up networking

2008-03-04T20:47:00.005-06:00

I recently bought a low-end laptop, and much to my surprise, it came Windows Vista instead of Windows XP. It sure looks pretty, and, in fact, I'm using to write this blog write now. However, Windows Vista has an infuriating flaw.

It won't network with Windows.

First a little background on my network topography. I run Windows 2003 Server as a router, file server, and print server. I've gotten everything, and I mean everything to read file shares on this network. I've gotten almost every Windows OS (save Vista) to work: Windows 95, Windows 98 SE, Windows 2000, Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Professional 64-bit. I've even gotten openSUSE (a flavor of Linux) to read network shares using Samba, with the small exception of folders on NTFS drives.

And Windows Vista? Absolutely nothing. Yes, I can connect to the internet, but I see nothing on the network. Microsoft Help pointed me in the direction of installing the LLTD (Link-Layer Topology Discovery) protocol. Of course, it can only install in Windows XP. I forced it to install using compatibility mode on Windows 2003, and added the protocol to my network card, and rebooted the server.

Four hours of a wasted evening later, I can now not only finally see the shared files on the network, but I can also see the position of my 2003 server in my network. If it had taken one hour longer, I would have torched my laptop. Let's just say I don't expect the average home user to figure out this problem on their own, and may cause a small amount of chaos in IT departments across the country. Thanks, Microsoft.

Shuttering the Chicago Ron Paul Office

2008-02-10T08:24:00.000-06:00

Since Mitt Romney's "suspension" of his campaign, the chance of a brokered Republican Convention this year is close to zero. Because of this, the need for a national campaign through November is over, though Ron Paul will still compete in remaining states. Since Illinois' primary was this past week, the campaign has decided to shutter all the offices here and transfer remaining campaign materiel elsewhere. So, I went over to the Chicago office to pick up some stuff and help with "striking the set". It was a somber affair mostly, akin to packing up all your things for a permanent move, where you know you'll leave behind friends and memories. Overall the office suited its purpose, sharing the ideas of liberty, and I met all kinds of interesting free-minded folks. It's good to know that independent yet generous people (all the equipment in the office was donated) are still around, and will be around for along time to come. I took some final photographs of the Chicago Ron Paul office, before it passed into history:

The Ron Paul Portrait Is Unveiled in Chicago

2008-02-02T09:14:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, I was at an event at the Chicago Ron Paul Office, where they unveiled a new portrait of Ron Paul by the artist Caleb O'Connor. I got a chance to interview him, and ask him about his work and what inspired him.
View Larger Map

Breaching the Great Firewall of China

2008-02-02T08:03:00.000-06:00

China, though it has gone through an extended period of modernization and economic liberalization, is still nonetheless tightly controlled by the Communist Party. The the plan is that their educated classes will too busy to think about politics when they are playing with cars, digital gadgets, and voting for the next Chinese Pop Idol. There is, however, the problem of the Internet. It is the ultimate beacon of freedom: a decentralized, hard-to-control, morass of ideas and commerce. Thus was born the Golden Shield Project, though it's more commonly known as the "Great Firewall of China".

It's aim is straightforward: to control the information passing through and circulating within the Chinese Internet. Filtering technologies allow the blocking of websites (imagine a Chinese version of Prison Planet), and search terms such as "Democracy". Personal emails can be opened and email traffic can be disrupted. But more importantly, the internet is used as a surveillance tool - if there are repeated attempts to subvert authority, IP addresses can be traced to real-world addresses. The fear of being sent to prison is usually enough for most common folk to avoid discussion of politics online.

Of course, there are ways of circumventing the Chinese Firewall. The biggest weaknesses are encrypted traffic and anonymous traffic. Two technologies that I know can exploit these weaknesses with ease, and allow the Chinese people to exercise freedoms in ways they never even thought possible.

Tor - an anonymity network

What Tor does is somewhat complicated, but the end results are fairly easily explained. The user's IP address is hidden - making the user invisible. However, the internet traffic itself can still be examined, so by looking at patterns in the data coming out of Tor's "exit nodes", a person's identity can be ascertained through the information itself. All cloaking devices have their weaknesses, just like that episode of Star Trek. The user must still take certain other precautions, such as using data encryption.

Freenet - a censorship-resistant distributed data store

Achieving complete anonymity and encryption of data might require abandonment of the traditional way internet works, such as using Freenet. Very simply put, Freenet piggybacks on the regular internet, allowing content to be distributed all over the world anonymously. Moreover, if one node is knocked out, the content remains as all the pieces are distributed everywhere. While this prevents dynamic content such as interactive websites using databases, "static" content such as text, music, movies can be stored. This would allow Chinese citizens to read books, watch movies, and listen to music otherwise banned on the mainland. It more resembles a filesharing network that way, though it is completely anonymous, distributed, and allows complete freedom of speech.

One question remains: if the Chinese Government blocks access to certain websites (including the ones that supply the above-mentioned software), how do the Chinese get their hands on these technologies? Unfortunately, the only way is to do it the "old-fashioned way" - distributing copies by CD. In that sense, you must also breach the old Great Wall of China.

Rob Blagojavich Holds CTA Riders Hostage

2008-01-10T20:09:00.000-06:00

I got the following email forward today:

It's been a long ride. Today, the Senate and House have finally approved a long-term plan to fund transit.

This bill will help CTA, Metra, and Pace avoid coming fare increases and service cuts, and help to stabilize the three agencies for years to come. After 25 years of waiting, this is it!

However, the Governor must still sign the bill.

Governor Blagojevich has said that, while supportive of transit funding, he will rewrite or "improve" the bill sent to him by the legislature. The Governor does not have the power to just rewrite legislation--what he's talking about is using an "amendatory veto."

An Amendatory Veto suggests changes to the bill. The bill would go back to the House and Senate. The legislature can either vote to accept the Governor's changes, vote to override the changes (with a 3/5 majority), or let the bill die.

An Amendatory Veto would (at least) delay a solution to the transit crisis or (at worst) endanger the solution altogether.

Please call the Governor's office today to tell him to sign HB 656, without an amendatory veto, immediately. Tell him that an amendatory veto is still a veto, not a signature.

Governor Rod Blagojevich
(217) 782-6830

(courtesy of SaveChicagolandTransit.com)

I've had my grievances with Save Chicagoland Transit. I'm not a fan of taxpayer bailouts of corporate monopolies either. However, I agree with the advocacy group for this reason: Governor Blagojevich is violating the separation of powers in government. The executive branch of the government is there to execute the law. While it does have veto powers, it does not have legislative powers. As of this writing, the governor issued this statement:

While the Governor has been clear in his opposition to increasing the sales tax to fund mass transit, he said today he will accept the approach passed by the General Assembly in House Bill 656 in order to avert devastating service cuts and fare increases, but will use his amendatory veto authority to make sure seniors citizens can use public transportation for free.

Translation: the Governor vetoed the bill. But to somehow claim moral authority over the legislative branch, he won't sign it until senior citizens ride for free. In this case, he isn't saying "do it for the children", but "do it for the old folks". This puts the legislative branch in quite a bind. They could accept the governor rewriting the law (something beyond the governors supposed powers), but be stuck with the task of finding extra funds, or cut other programs that help old folks. Or they could override the veto with a supermajority and be smeared as being "insensitive" to seniors, and be set up for defeat by governor-sponsored opponents in the next election.

The governor knows that this veto will take up precious time. He is probably aware that pay cuts, fare increases, and service cuts will begin by January 20th. As a consumer of RTA services (I ride the Metra now instead of the CTA, but they fall under the same budget), I'm incensed that the Governor would use me and fellow riders as a weapon to bully the legislature to get his version of a bill through.

Let him known that you won't fall for his doublespeak, a veto truly is a veto, and he holds both the legislature and RTA ridership in contempt.

Ron Paul's showing in Iowa decent, but there is a silver lining

2008-01-04T18:40:00.000-06:00

Though Ron Paul's fifth place showing in Iowa was lower than some had hoped, there is actually some good news to be gleaned from his vote total for his future performance in New Hampshire and elsewhere.

Average polling data indicated that Ron Paul had risen to 7.6% in polls by January 2nd. With his 10% showing at the Iowa caucus, he showed that he could bring out at least a third more voters to the booths than polls indicated. Common sense says that polling will never be perfect, but on the other hand it may be true that polling really does exclude Ron Paul support because they're young, never voted before, or do not use land lines. If this pattern holds, Ron Paul will always do better than what's reported by traditional polling methods.

There are also certain elements of the Iowa population where Ron Paul trounced the competition. According to MSNBC's exit polling, Dr. Paul dominated among independents who voted Republican with 29% of the vote, and with voters who described themselves as angry with the Bush administration he scored a whopping 54%. Since New Hampshire expresses both of those demographics strongly, and plays host to the libertarian-oriented Free State Project, he stands a good chance of placing highly and even winning that state.

Another interesting fact is that Ron Paul was one of only three candidates to place first in an Iowa County (the other two being Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney of course). This happened to be Jefferson County, Iowa. If anybody knows what makes Jefferson County special, please let me know. This is definitely good news that the campaign is able to target locations where he's popular and draw out the voters. You can view how Republicans placed by county, here.

Update: here are some more predictions on Ron Paul and other Republican candidates, as well as the number of delegates assigned per candidate.

Ron Paul on Mad Money

2007-12-18T16:28:00.001-06:00

The cognitive dissonance on this video is amazing. I saw Jim Cramer's explosion on the air about the Federal Reserve a while ago, and while I appreciate the fact that both of them oppose the Fed, they probably oppose it for differing reasons. Cramer was upset that Ben Bernanke didn't act quickly enough to save the markets (and therefore bail out Cramer and his stock market, banking, and hedge fund buddies). Ron Paul hates central banking in general, because inflation created by central banking tends to hurt the lower and middle classes, and central banks are an enabler of government deficit spending. Jim Cramer seems to be in it for extracting revenge, as Ben Bernanke isn't "Easy Al" with the "Greenspan Put" on hand (though my prediction was wrong--Ben Bernanke has relented and dropped rates recently). Also amusing is their disparity in arguing their points. Cramer is his typical insane self, hopping in fury, while Ron Paul, the elder statesman, speaks about the matter calmly and rationally.

To be fair to Cramer, he is an entertainer, and people should view him as such: take his antics and advice with a grain of salt. I must give him mad props on having Dr. Paul on his show, and advocating Federal Reserve transparency.

More Gloom and Doom from the CTA

2007-10-12T20:53:00.000-05:00

As Chicago's CTA falls further into decay, gridlock, permanent construction projects, the ominous threat of fare hikes and service cuts persists. The president of the CTA is reduced to panhandling as this just-received email attests:

Letter from CTA President Ron Huberman

Dear CTA Customer:

Today, I unveiled the CTA's proposed 2008 budget that lays out a series of painful service cuts, fare increases and lay-offs that will happen on January 6, 2008. These actions are required to meet our legal obligation to submit a balanced budget and are in addition to those service cuts and fare increases that will take effect on November 4th.

All of us at the CTA understand that these service cuts and fare increases will cause you a tremendous hardship. We know that you will face fewer travel options, less frequent service and more crowded buses and trains. To make matters worse, the drastic measures described in the 2008 budget are in addition to the service cuts, fare increases and lay-offs that will take place on November 4th if the Illinois Legislature does not enact fundamental funding reforms.

It is important for our customers to know that all of us at the CTA do not want to see this budget become reality. We remain hopeful that the Illinois General Assembly will pass a long-term funding solution.

Please know that we sought to minimize the impact of our budget deficit wherever we could. For example, we reduced our costs by over $38 million this year alone - without impacting service. The CTA and its unions have also agreed to an unprecedented five-year contract, contingent on legislative action, which would enable the CTA to reduce costs and manage itself more like a business. The Illinois Legislature, however, has yet to pass the bill that would give the CTA authority to put these reforms in place. This inaction is costing the CTA more than $11 million each month.

So, while the CTA continues to look for every opportunity to cut costs, there is simply no way we can manage our way out of a $158 million deficit in 2008.

The CTA continues to fight for sufficient transit funding and we need your help. Please contact the Governor and your state legislators and tell them how important mass transit funding is to you. In addition to calling or writing your legislators, you can go to www.transitchicago.com where a link will allow you to easily send a message.

With your support, we are hopeful that we will finally get a long-term solution to the CTA's funding shortfalls and put future "doomsdays" to rest. If the State enacts pending legislation before November 4th, these service cuts and fare increases will not go into effect.

Sincerely yours,

Ron Huberman
President

Where is the outrage? This is what happens when you have half-assed neither-free-market-nor-socialist crony corporatism. If the CTA were a public company, even as a monopoly there would be a shareholder revolt. I'm not exactly a fan of socialism, but if the people of Cook County were the actual owners of the CTA (since the taxpayers ultimately pay for it anyway), this never would have happened. Instead the people of Chicago are at the mercy of a political elite, who use the CTA as a way of rewarding their minions with easy jobs, and simply milk the populace for more money when the patronage jobs run out. To paraphrase James Howard Kunstler, this transportation system would be the envy of a third world nation like Bolivia. I see only a few options for the average citizen:

Vote with your feet. Do not reward piss poor performance with more fares. Use alternate transportation like the Metra, bicycling, walking, driving, and cabs. I got to work downtown faster on my bicycle than I ever would on the Brown Line.
Demand that the monopoly be broken up. The most basic study of economics would reveal that competition reduces prices and improves quality.
Demand that the monopoly be bought out by the government. This would be the least desirable solution, but a government funded monopoly is far worse than a government agency. At least this would put the CTA's decision making process into the hands of the people and make it easier to monitor. No taxation without representation!

Please read my previous rant on this subject.

Collation of Ron Paul's answers all the All-American Presidential Forum

2007-10-07T22:45:00.001-05:00

This is somewhat old news, but here is a video consisting of all of Ron Paul's answers at the All-American Presidential Forum. In the latter link, You can watch the show in its entirety, as well as see full transcripts. The show was hosted by Tavis Smiley at Morgan State University, a prominent Black college. The debate dealt primarily with minority issues. What was shocking was that the four Republican "front runners" (Giuliani, McCain, Romney, Thompson) decided to snub potential minority voters to squeeze more money out of the 3rd quarter. Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee seemed to have come out the winners in that debate. Tom Tancredo looked absolutely terrified (of the audience perhaps?), and Alan Keyes' theatrics were thoroughly entertaining.

The Longest Ferry Ride Rudy Giuliani Ever Took

2007-09-24T19:58:00.000-05:00

The World Student Press Agency reports that Rudy Giuliani took the "longest ferry ride in his life". Apparently he was forced to share the ride back from Mackinac Island (Michigan) with 100 boisterous Ron Paul supporters. From the article:

It was the last ferry back from the island to Mackinac city. Nearly 100 Ron Paul supporters were waiting on the dock when they were surprised to see Mayor Giuliani appear with his bodyguards walking toward the ferryboat. The crowd started cheering Ron Paul’s name and Mayor Giuliani’s smiling face suddenly turned thunderstruck.

. . .

Giuliani was “hiding” beneath the window in the captain’s cabinet, with bodyguards standing around him to block the sight. The crowd kept cheering Ron Paul’s name again and again all the way, for almost 20 minutes, many of them were calling their friends and family to give them the play-by-play.

You can watch some of the footage yourself below:

Ron Paul Speech at Johns Hopkins University

2007-09-16T11:20:00.000-05:00

Ron Paul recently spoke at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, on September 11th 2007. "A Traditional Non-Intervention Foreign Policy" was the name of his speech. The speech and discussion period were moderated by Robert Guttman (CPFR director) and Andrew Ward (Financial Times White House correspondent). He spoke of how non-interventionism is not isolationism, how an overly aggressive foreign policy can actually encourage worldwide terrorism, and how the Federal Reserve indirectly plays a part in military misadventures. The countries he focused on were Iraq and Iran, though he did speak of Korea and Vietnam as well. One of the methods of combating terrorism that he brought up was the old school concept of Letters of Mark and Reprisal. Ron Paul faced some tough questions from the audience, but was able to defend his views eloquently. Venues that Allow Dr. Paul more time to speak with fewer interruptions such as Johns Hopkins demonstrate that he is a true statesman who is not reliant on talking points to support his positions. The JHU SAIS should be commended for allowing him to speak, particularly since Ron Paul's positions probably differ from many of the academics there. His full speech is available below:

You can also download this speech for offline listening. You can also view detailed information about this event.

Saving the CTA - No Magic Bullet

2007-09-13T18:50:00.000-05:00

As most citizens of Chicago and its outlying suburbs are already aware, service on CTA, and to some extent, Metra has been worsening as of late. Nearly as many have heard that due to Governor Rob Blagojevich's politicking and refusal to play ball with both Democrats and Republicans in Illinois, there has been a budget shortfall, and the CTA will lose funding, forcing a corresponding hike in fares and a reduction of service.

On my way home using Metra (as I refuse to use the CTA unless absolutely necessary), I was handed a flyer entitled "Are slow zones in you [sic] future?". It was a proclamation of dire warning that the CTA, Pace, and yes, even Metra, would be facing fare hikes and drastically reduced service, and I should contact my government representatives immediately to correct the situation. At the bottom was a url to a website, savechicagolandtransit.com.

Thinking this was a grassroots campaign started by a concerned local citizen to restore some kind of dignity and either resurrect or terminate our regional transit currently on life support, I dutifully visited the website. However, the fact that is's not .org and .com, that it's linked to from the CTA page, and it advocates massive bailouts at the taxpayer's expense, I suspect that it may be astroturf.

I agree in principle with the aims of the website: public transportation for Chicago. Economies of scale make it cheaper, faster (at least in theory: Metra is fast but CTA is slower than biking), better for the environment, and more comfortable than driving. Also, I agree with the website that Chicago transit needs a massive overhaul. While I'm satisfied with Metra, the CTA is an embarrassment. When riding it I feel like I'm in a third world country, compared to the experiences I've had with other systems: Le Métro, The Tube, Metrorail, and the Las Vegas Monorail.

Is is the proposed solutions proposed by this "grassroots" effort that I find, quite frankly, disturbing. Those are found here. Here are some of their ideas that I take issue with:

We must prevent service cuts and fare hikes, and bring our existing system into a good state of repair. Yes, we need to bring the system into a good state of repair, but, I think rate hikes are in order and are actually a good idea. When fares are too low, you have the free rider problem. Increasing fares will eliminate the use of the CTA as a homeless shelter, as at the moment, a $2.25 fare can allow you to ride the trains almost indefinitely with free transfers. In fact, I think Metra-style zoning should be instituted, and transfers between trains treated just like transfers between buses and trains. Since fare cards are used instead of tokens, the need for a universal fare for all kinds of rides is obsolete. Raising fares also has a psychological factor; if you think people are complaining now, as fairs increase, citizens will demand better service, and as they say, "it is the squeaky wheel that gets the oil." Of course, we should continue to have reduced fares for children, seniors, students, and the disabled.
The last state capital bill, Illinois FIRST, expired in 2004. A statewide capital bill—which would typically cover transit as well as road and school construction—is desperately needed. In particular, a new capital bill is essential for securing federal transportation funds and bringing our transit system into a state of good repair. I vehemently disagree with this. Under no circumstances should people of other states, nay people of other counties be paying for our transportation network. It is the responsibility of the citizens of Chicagoland to pay for the RTA, be it using fares, gas tax, sales tax, or whatever. People of Cook County should pay for the CTA, and people of surrounding counties pitch in to help Metra, but that's it. The vast majority of users are local commuters.
A dedicated, reliable source of operating funds to support the current operations and growth of CTA, Metra, and Pace. The way we fund public transit operations in the Chicago region is ripe for change. The 1983 RTA funding formula was a last-minute political solution that was never meant to last. The revenues it has supplied to each service board have grown more slowly than the costs of providing service. A new means of funding area transit that addresses today’s realities—such as reverse commuting, suburb-to-suburban commuting, and urban revitalization—is needed. This is going to sound like a radical proposition, but if the 1983 was intended as a temporary solution, then we should let it expire. CTA started as a corporate monopoly in 1952, and it was bailed out multiple times by the government. I don't think taxpayers should be bailing out corporations, therefore if the system is ready to collapse, we should let it collapse. Put the assets up for auction. I'm sure there are many entrepreneurs or even neighborhoods who would love to take over a piece of the CTA (such as a bus route). You could have Pete's Clark Street Bus Line compete with the Lakeview Bus Circuit. Let's see raw capitalism compete with raw socialism, instead of the half-assed corporatism we have right now.
Measures to eliminate the paratransit deficit. Chicagoland’s disabled residents deserve quality door-to-door transit service. But we need to find a funding source to support this costly service, while increasing its efficiency and encouraging its users to try accessible fixed-route services. I agree with the second half of this proposition, but not the first. We should reduce the fares for the disabled, and encourage them to move closer to accessible stations, but door-to-door service should be left up to charity (yes, they do exist) or up to private services.
Support for CTA’s pension fund. CTA’s pensions, which cover retirement benefits and healthcare for retirees, are severely under-funded. Additional funds must be found to help bridge the funding gap. In addition, laws concerning CTA’s collective bargaining agreements process must be changed to allow the agency to negotiate pension benefits with its unions more fairly. I sympathize with people's needs for benefits, but this should remain an issue between the workers and management, and not become a politicized issue for taxpayers. In fact, focusing on this might alienate some potential supporters. For instance, in my industry, there is no union, no pension (though a possibility for 401k usually), and all employment is "at will" - employee or employer may terminate the job at any point. Personally, I think things are great: I negotiate directly with my employer without a union boss breathing down my neck, and I fund my own retirement as I please. The fact that this group wants taxpayer money to become a bargaining chip in a labor dispute really annoys me. The only reason why there's a union is because the RTA is a monopoly - there is no other employer for these workers except for perhaps Amtrak. This creates a very dangerous situation: the union, management, or the government can stop the trains to force citizens to do their bidding.

In short, these are my summarized suggestions:

Increase fares (as noted above)
Eliminate waste, such as politically connected jobs, excessive cigarette breaks, strict labor contracts - though waste is more easily removed using competition (see below)
Open up competition with different transportation. Allow competing bus lines or tram lines. Allow revenue-losing train lines to be bought out. Legalize rickshaws.
Clean up the CTA trains! There's no reason that CTA can't be as clean as Metra
Give us express service on the CTA rail lines. Delays notwithstanding, it takes an hour and a half to get from downtown Chicago to downtown Evanston when not at rush hour.
Automate electric rail cars. This is the 21st century for chrissakes! This would mean cheaper, safer, and more reliable service.
Another controversial point: outsource construction and maintenance (not to be confused with offshoring). There's no excuse for having only a couple guys working at once on a station upgrade while the rest watch, and they only work on a daily shift.
Example of a FREE CAPITALIST RAIL STSTEM that fulfills most of the suggestions above, costs no taxpayer money, and charges no fares! We can do better than that!

Jim Cramer: Wake Up Bernanke!

2007-08-06T20:04:00.000-05:00

It looks like Ron Paul isn't the only one who's choosing to stand up to the Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke. Jim Cramer goes ballistic on the air, demanding that Ben Bernanke "Wake up" to the carnage happening in the economy, and lower interest rates. Cramer cites the collapse of the stock market, and the millions of people soon to be facing foreclosure due to tightening credit:

I hate to disappoint Jim Cramer, but I highly doubt the Fed Chairman is going to lower rates. This is because there is one major concern that trumps all for the Federal Reserve: protect the currency at all costs. Ben Bernanke doesn't care for the troubles of condo flippers and day traders. Nay, even if it meant bankrupting every businessman and homeowner, the dollar must be preserved. You see, if we drop rates at this critical juncture, every single foreign government that is holding our debt, as denominated in dollars, will dump dollars so fast the what happened to the Weimar Republic will look like a picnic. Ben Bernanke will do two things: raise rates to keep people buying up our debt, then perform a massive helicopter drop.

Does anyone still support the war?

2007-07-30T19:40:00.000-05:00

I have to admit, I initially supported the Iraq War back in 2003. I listened to the war propaganda, and while I didn't believe the whole uranium bit, I was hopeful that we would finally prove the UN wrong and get all the WMD. I chose to ignore the fact that we gave him the WMD in the first place, but it wouldn't be hard for an evil genius like Saddam to make some more.

So the war dragged on, and we didn't find the WMD. Well, at the very least, I thought, we were liberating them, correct? Unfortunately, Rumsfeld ignored the advice of senior commanders to use the number of troops required to pacify a nation the size of Iraq. "Shock and Awe" would be enough to bring down Saddam Hussein, and the people would rise up and spontaneously create a new, peaceful, democratic, multicultural government. Then I watched in horror as these newly "liberated" people proceeded to pillage their own museum without nary a US soldier in sight. Since the Iraqi army disbanded, it was up to Iraqi Citizens to take up arms and patrol their own neighborhoods, and soon an insurgency set in.

Well, I thought, if we just ship some more troops over there, drastically lower the unemployment, and provide basic security, the country will right itself. Unfortunately, all the sweet sweet contracts assigned to Iraq go towards hiring Americans at over 100 grand apiece. Some of these hires were going towards outsourcing duties the army ordinarily performed, at much lower costs than private contractors. Of course, we COULD have hired a dozen Iraqi's for the same price to do a lot of the reconstruction and truck driving. Perhaps the administration cynically never trusted the Iraqis to rebuild their country? Regardless, massive unemployment likely fueled the insurgency, as pissed off young men tend to want to break things when unemployed.

Allright, fine. So we screwed up on the reconstruction front. And we don't nearly have enough people patrolling the country. Well, at least from an imperial standpoint, we have their oil right? Well, instead of nationalizing their oil industry and selling off the crude to the highest bidder to repay for the war and reconstruction effort (as promised) we simply let foreign corporations come in and do the drilling operations as they please. I'm not being anti-capitalist, I'm just pointing out that we gave away their oil reserves without conditions for paying back the American Taxpayer or the Iraqi Government. Also, due to the aforementioned lack of policing, the pipelines are constantly bombed. The end result is that to fill a tank of gas where I live it costs $3.50 per gallon (I live in Chicago), so the Iraq War didn't put a dent in my gas bill as promised. Also, the American Taxpayer is stuck with the 10 billion monthly tab. As a comparison, the experimental fusion reactor in France, which will lead us to true energy independence, costs just 12 billion US dollars.

So where does that lead us now? I say just give up, and bring the boys home. Sure, that does sound like cowardice, but at this point, it's the most rational thing to do. Yes, people will die, but people will die regardless if we stay there or not. Eventually one of the three ethnic groups in the country will assert dominance over the other two, and stability will be restored. If and when they are ready for a democracy, they will have one, because at this point, we can't afford to force it down their throats.

I would also like to point out how this war has eroded our civil liberties, and how the Abu Ghraib Scandal helped to tarnish our reputation, and made us lose the moral high ground when it comes to things such as torture and the Geneva Convention.

The knee-jerk reaction in this election cycle will be to elect Hillary Clinton to pull us out of this mess, but don't be fooled. Hillary Clinton is not anti-war. The three truly anti-war and anti-Patriot Act candidates are Dennis Kucinich (Democrat), Mike Gravel (Democrat), and Ron Paul (Republican).

Why the recent stock market high wasn't that high to begin with

2007-07-29T08:26:00.000-05:00

The pollyannas rejoiced recently when the Dow Jones Industrial Average at last broke 14000 on July 19th 2007. "See!" they thought to themselves, "The economy is doing great! Who are these fools who constantly warn about doom and gloom?". These are also the same permabulls who tend to believe every statistic the government publishes. Here I will show that this new "high" was never high to begin with, and any profits made by tracking the DJI are more akin to a statement issued by the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland fame:

"Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"

Here I will compare the two previous peaks, the aforementioned from this month (14000), and the peak of the internet bubble: on Jan 14th 2000, the Dow Jones reached 11,723. The reasons why I compare peaks, and don't measure from trough to peak are because of hindsight bias and because I want to compare apples to apples (peak to peak, trough to trough).

I'm not going to use inflation to measure the change in the stock market in real terms, as it would involved a longer discussion about what the "true" inflation is. Instead I will compare the purchasing power of the dollar compared to other currencies. The currencies I have chosen roughly correspond to the G8. I chose gold and silver as traditional currencies and stores of value.

Data from Onanda.com	2000/1/14	2007/7/19	purchasing power drop
British Pound	0.60750	0.48770	19.7%
Canadian Dollar	1.45080	1.04360	28.1%
Euro	0.97530	0.72470	25.7%
Gold	0.0035210	0.0014870	57.8%
Japanese Yen	106.150	121.9560	-14.9%
Russian Ruble	28.670	25.44230	11.3%
Silver	0.19610	0.075990	61.2%

The change in the purchasing power of the dollar compared to other currencies is absolutely astounding. The only currency that the dollar has actually increased its purchasing power against is the Yen, but this is mostly due to the fact that the Japanese have been pusruing a Zero Interest Rate Policy for many years now. For those not familiar with it, basically the Japanese have been "running the printing presses" like crazy to stop deflation, but it hasn't been working quite the way they expected (see Carry Trade).

Get ready for the big surprise: the peak-to-peak increase in the stock market was only 19.4%! As an intellectual exercise, if you had bought Euros or Pounds and put them in a regular savings account, and not invested in anything you would have made more money. If, like presidential candidate Ron Paul, you had put all your money into Gold and gold mining stocks, you would be making out like a bandit.

This is why I'm voting for Ron Paul for this presidential election. The Federal Reserve has been devaluing the currency so much, it's no wonder that the stock market seems to be shooting through the roof! Ron Paul will tame the federal reserve at the very least, and eliminate it entirely if he can.

International support for Ron Paul

2007-07-27T07:51:00.001-05:00

It seems as if the message of liberty, peace, and prosperity is loved not only in the United States, but throughout the world. People in other countries have spontaneously picked up the message of Ron Paul. Witnesseth:

Ron Paul France (France, in French)
Bavaria for Ron Paul (Germany, in German)
This group celebrated the Fourth of July, when the local branch of the American Embassy would not.
Belgians for Ron Paul (Belgium, in Flemish)
Ron Paul Brazil (Brazil, in Portuguese)

And then there is, of course, The Austrian School of Economics (English) who is behind Ron Paul.

Ron Paul Cures Video Game Addiction

2007-07-24T19:37:00.000-05:00

Put down that controller, boys and girls, Ron Paul may just cure you of video game and television addiction! Witness this young man attest to this fact:

Ron Paul noticed this effect early on:

"Remember the complaints that kids were addicted to TV and video games, and ignored the world around them? There are plenty who don't fit that bill. And the tool in their hands and ours is the internet. With it, we can circumvent the biased media."

The Low Unemployment Myth

2007-07-24T08:55:00.000-05:00

There is a fairly simple law in economics. If unemployment is low, in means that there are more jobs available for the unemployed to choose from, and employers must make better offers. Wages must also rise for current workers, because it is harder to retain employees: many be tempted to find better work due to less competition from the unemployed. Low unemployment = wage growth.

Unemployment is on the decline, but wages have not increased significantly. I refer you to this chart: "Ah," one may ask "But this shows that wages have been increasing at about 4% per year!". These increases have not been corrected for inflation. According to the government, inflation has been running at around 3.3% for 2007. In real terms, the average wage increase has been 0.7%. This is a low number, considering the fact that it is constantly trumpeted that we are in a "job recovery".

The point is that the government isn't giving you an accurate picture of actual unemployment. The unemployment percentages are low, because unemployment pretty much just tells you the total percentage of people receiving unemployment compensation, not the percentage of unemployed in this country. Barry Ritholtz gives a simple summary of how the numbers are fiddled with.

So, unemployment is worse than it should be: maybe it's a few percentage points more. So 0.7% real wage growth doesn't seem that bad. But hold on a moment: what if the government not only fiddled with unemployment numbers, but also fiddled with inflation numbers? When I first looked at how inflation was calculated--by measuring price increases--the amount of tinkering to make the number look lower was astounding. Shadow Government Statistics attempts to reconstruct the number as it was calculated before the Clinton administration. The number he comes up with is actually around 6%. So now we're looking at -2% real wage appreciation. The average working American is therefore getting poorer.

However, measuring inflation using price increases is simply measuring the effects of inflation, not inflation as defined in the dictionary: "Expansion in the money supply beyond the increase in available goods and services. Often misunderstood to mean a rise in prices, which generally accompanies such an expansion." So to look at inflation, one must also look at the rate of increase in the money supply. There are three major "categories" of money supply: M1, M2, and M3. M1 measures "hard" currency like dollar bills and coins and checking accounts. M3 reflects savings accounts and other US money sloshing around the planet. The Federal Reserve in its infinite wisdom has decided to mysteriously stop publishing the M3. Shadow Government Statistics once again has picked up the pieces and recalculated it, and it's at a frightening 13% yearly increase. So, some simple arithmetic here: 4% - 13% is -9%. The average American is falling behind by nine percent a year.

Ron Paul wants the Federal Reserve to start publishing the M3 again. Will you vote for him?

Why I will no longer work on Mursatron 5000

2007-07-21T08:19:00.000-05:00

As some of you have seen in a previous post, I had already started creating artwork for the game Mursatron 5000: A Casey Serin Simulator. But whenever I sat down a done research on using a third party game engine or created my own, I got the sensation that I was doing work not having fun. "Nonsense!" I'd tell myself, "This will be awesome! This is for Casey Serin fans and haters everywhere!". Then I thought about it some more. All I was doing was fan service. Casey Serin is going to shut down his blog in August anyway, and after the hatred simmers, he will eventually fall into obscurity. That is, until the day the IRS, FBI, CashCall, and LossMitPro catch up to him and wring him dry. My three book covers I think are enough entertainment.

I have come to the conclusion that I have more useful things to do than to slave away on a video game for several weeks that is likely to turn out pretty mediocre, or worse yet, would be as incomplete as any task that Casey Serin puts his mind to. But, more importantly, I have discovered a more important purpose to my free time: supporting the Ron Paul political campaign. I had actually been following him for a while, as I discovered him to be the lone, sane, honest politician in Congress. He isn't tied down by lobbyists. He holds the "quaint" notion that the Constitution limits the power of government and should maximize the freedoms of individuals as well as the states to make their own decisions. He's for sound money, as opposed to having our money controlled by unaccountable private institutions (the Constitution says only our government can control money... and there was never an amendment to change that). He wants to stop our country from engaging in nation building, as we don't have the moral authority to bully countries into doing our bidding. Why the hell are our troops still in Germany after the Berlin Wall fell? Nation building should only be the result of beating another country in a just war, not en end to itself. Also, continuous warfare on non-entities (War on Terror, War on Drugs) drains the economy and erodes our civil liberties. I digress; my point is that my skills are better served than making a silly game about some naive, amateur, fraudster.

Operation Afternoon Rush a Complete Success!

2007-07-19T18:48:00.000-05:00

Chicago Ron Paul supporters recently banded together to spread the message of freedom in Chicago, in an event called Operation Afternoon Rush. We simultaneously canvassed both Union Station and Ogilvie Station. Hundreds of leaflets were passed out, and many who had already heard of Ron Paul gave us the thumbs up. A sweet older lady came up and said "You know, I've heard a lot about Ron Paul from my son!" so the message is spreading.

Recently, Barry Manilow has contributed to the Ron Paul campaign, and is the top candidate of the United States military. If the troops are supporting Ron Paul, which candidate do you think really supports the troops?

Oh and if you don't vote for Ron Paul, Sweet Betsy is going to get you:

To join events similar to this one in Chicago, please join the Greater Chicago Ron Paul 2008 Meetup Group

Immigration Post on Blue Collar Republican

2007-07-17T20:58:00.001-05:00

I was invited to write for bluecollarrepublican.com after I bravely mixed things up by defending some unfair accusations towards Ron Paul and his supporters. I tested the waters by writing an extensive opinion on immigration, which mostly reflects a libertarian position, and I look forward to its reception.

Europa Barbarorum for Barbarian Invasion

2007-07-08T19:44:00.003-05:00

EB for BI is no longer hosted here. It has been moved to my web store, freeformatics.

From Zero To Hero: Ron Paul Is Now a Top-Tier Candidate

2007-07-08T08:06:00.000-05:00

Just a few months ago, Ron Paul barely recognized in polling statistics. Before the election race started however, he was a favorite among libertarians and admired on a few economics blogs. Due to more people hearing his message on the internet, ABC news reports that Ron Paul has topped McCain in campaign financing with 2.4 million dollars. This is heartening, because this financing consists almost entirely of personal donations instead of the usual special interest or corporate donations. This also omits "in kind" financing due to the fact that donations of time and money aren't calculated until later. In terms of financing, the makes Ron Paul a top-tier candidate. This is a sign that his campaign has momentum, and his poll numbers should undoubtedly go up. He is already the top republican candidate on youtube and a top search in Technorati, but due to this surge in financing, the mainstream media will find him hard to ignore.

Mursatron 5000: A Casey Serin Simulator - The Planning

2007-06-30T10:00:00.000-05:00

I've been batting around a Casey Serin video game idea in my brain for a while. I decided to finally put my ideas on paper (or HTML of you prefer). Mursatron 5000: A Casey Serin Simulator will be a 2D top-down view action game. The purpose would be to get cashback at close from houses for sale, and other little loans such as from cash call, as quickly as possible. Obviously, no money will be spent on debt repayment or living expenses, save for trips to Jamba Juice and Starbucks which will speed up Casey. After a while, houses purchased will fall into foreclosure and random haterz and collectors will come after you. Haterz will simply slow you down, while having a collector catch you will make you lose the game. Eventually, I will think about putting in other powerups that will make you temporary invincible to detractors, in the vein of Packman.
The Platform:
Originally I was going to use the XNA system developed by microsoft. I ran into several technical difficulties, namely, that not only are you limited to windows, but your graphics card MUST support Directx 9! My development machine doesn't have a decent graphics card, so I couldn't even compile a test project! So I might just do it in OpenGL, so it it will run on any system. But since I'm kinda lazy, and making a multi-platform game would take forever, I might just hack into the windows drawing routines since I plan on only making a 2D game anyway.
Artwork:
I don't have much artwork at the moment, but I have some stuff in the works and will be updating this post as graphics become available.

Akubi	Nacho	Calico Koi	Golden Koi	Ruddy Koi

Silver into Gold

2007-06-28T19:40:00.001-05:00

In the good old days when money was actually backed by something real like gold and silver, the exchange rate from silver to gold was set to 16:1. As much as I grow a rubbery one at the thought of a gold-backed currency, such goverment tinkering resulted in some serious imbalances. To make an instant profit from arbitrage between gold and silver, one had to simply accumulate a large amount of silver money and exchange it for gold money. For a long explanation on how this worked, I refer you to this article. Now that silver, gold, and cash have been decoupled from each other, the rate of exchange between the two metals can float freely.

I have a small amount of bullion hidden away that I fondly call my "apocalypse fund", just in case really bad things happen. Now, hopefully these things will not happen, but my investment will not be in vain since bullion has beaten inflation in the past few years. What is the reason for this title? Well, I don't want to hold silver anymore for one simple reason: outside of the United States the sale of silver is subject to a VAT tax. The fact that gold is easy to carry than silver is offset by the fact that it's harder to make small purchases with gold than silver.

Now, since the silver and gold ratio vary wildly lately, and it's hard to time the market, when taking fees into consideration, the conversion ratio was about 45:1! Which means that this much silver:

converts into this much gold, plus a small hit to my credit card:

Kinda sucks, doesn't it?

EDIT 2007/6/29: My fiancée is understandably concerned that I'm revealing sensitive financial information on the internet. For those willing to come looking for my pot of gold (and a disappointingly small pot it would be), rest assured that it lays in a securely locked chest an the bottom of a well in an undisclosed location while guarded 24-7 by sharks with laser beams on their foreheads. And koi.

Casey Serin writes volume 4 of his book

2007-06-27T21:58:00.000-05:00

Casey has done the impossible and released the fourth and hopefully last in his collection of print. May God have mercy on the soul of the poor fellow who has to read this one. (Okay guys, this was fun, but I'm seriously burnt out now, lol)

Casey Serin launches volume 3!

2007-06-26T19:32:00.000-05:00

Casey serin has just released the third book of his chef d'oeuvre, titled "A Million Little Leases", all in the space of 24 hours! Talk about a massive focused action of late-nite business mettings!

Casey Serin releases a new book!

2007-06-25T22:28:00.001-05:00

Casey Serin has released a new book... and it's not "The Foreclosure Code"! His new epic is entitled "House Crash": (All apologies to Neal Stephenson, author of Snow Crash)

Haterzcast on 06/22/07 cancelled: backup talkcast held instead

2007-06-23T11:55:00.000-05:00

Poor CHJTS got into a car accident yesterday, so that night's Haterzcast was aborted. A few of use gathered together to hold a Backup Talkcast, hosted by gordonsanders. There was some Casey Serin hating there, but it was mostly about Annie discussing legal options available to Galina, in case of divorce or separation. Here it is, below:

(if the player above doesn't load, click the image below)

Players: gordonsanders, Annie[?], Egosumabbas. Other players, please leave a comment so I can add you.

David Crisp: Can I have $1.8 billion too?

2007-06-20T19:15:00.001-05:00

This may be old news to some of you, but real-estate scammer David Crisp got a $1.8 billion line of credit to start the "University Towers" project in Bakersfield, Kaleeforrneea. Astonished, I sent in a prank email to his newfound financiers Neuflithz Wisenthall & Schlumberger:

To whom it may concern:

Thank for the time in reading my email. I was wondering if my corporation could get 1.8 billion dollars in financing for a commercial project of ours. It consists of multi-pronged business campaign aimed at several markets. Real Estate does this all the time in high-rise construction: offices, condos, and retail are often located in the same building. I was considering doing the same, but on rural property. Consider the following possible uses of formerly country farmland:

1) Llama farm - llama wool sells at a premium. The llamas could also be featured in a petting zoo. Possible advertising revenue could be done with state and country fairs.
2) Wind farm - wind turbines could be installed along ridgelines on the property to maximize power generating efficiency. Some of the debt being taken on could be easily paid in the long term thanks to government subsidies.
3) Hydroelectric - small hydroelectric turbines could be installed on small streams on the property. It is a myth that only large rivers produce abundant hydroelectric power.
4) Ethanol distillation - extra switchgrass not consumed by llamas could be processed into clean-burning ethanol technology. It's been proved that switchgrass is a far more effective ethanol crop than corn, and can also be consumed readily by llamas and other grazing animals. It is also a perennial plant that does not need fertilization.

I'm sure you'll agree that this would be a wise investment. I look forward to hearing your reply. Best regards,
[Signature]

Any rational investment firm would promptly relegate my email to the spam folder and block my IP address. However, I actually got a polite reply from these fine gentlemen. I thought to myself "I think I smell a scam here". First, Mr. Crisp claims that these are "high-level financiers from Europe", and when further pressed said "Do I feel confident about this as a funding source? Yes, I do, 110 percent [...] I'm confident with people that are working on it, I'm confident that it will get done." Their reply to my email as follows:

NWS-MANAGEMENT CONSULTANTS
For International Investment & Financial Services
Tel.: +971-4-2236322 / Fax: +971-4-2279800 / Mob: +971-50-5443571
E-mail: nws@emirates.net.ae P.O. Box: 42556 Dubai, U.A.E. License No.: 530866
Website: http://www.neuflithzwisenthallschlumberger.com

C.C. : Credit Analysis
Pages : 6 (including this page)

RE: YOUR REQUEST FOR THE LEASING / ENHANCING OF LINES OF CREDIT UP TO € 1,800,000,000.00 (ONE BILLION EIGHT HUNDRED MILLION EURO)

Dear Mr. Nadolski,

As per Dr. Dias' instructions, annexed please find relevant documentation relating to the above mentioned subject.

Please inform us for our records how you came to know about our organisation, i.e. , personal references, Time Magazine or International Herald Tribune advertisements, Financial Press, Internet, etc.

Best regards,

NWS - Dubai Office

C.C.: NWS - London Office
[Personal information and credit request form omitted]

If they are "high-level European financiers", then why is their headquarters in Dubai? And why are they so eager so lend me money? Maybe they actually liked my business proposal. Should I take them up on their offer?

You can read more about David "It's all about image" Crisp at the Bakersfield Bubble Blog.

Casey Serin Limericks

2007-06-19T19:02:00.000-05:00

Since IAFF has been getting a tad dull lately, with Casey Serin once again begging from his Haterz™ to help dig out of the superfund waste dump he created for himself, I have decided to repost some hilarious limericks I've come across on iamfacingforeclosure. These were all written by the poster known as "Wishful Thinker".

When he filled out the loan forms he knew
That the words he filled in were not true
Checking numbers was rare
and the banks didn't care
Now their loans have turned into poo poo

KC is today's Peter Pan
And Caseyworld is like Neverland
When reality intrudes
And darkens his mood
He says" I'll never grow up" life is grand

To read more Casey Serin limericks by "Wishful Thinker", Google can lend a hand.

Why does radioshack continue to exist?

2007-06-12T19:07:00.000-05:00

A recent failed purchase at a nearby Radioshack store made me wonder at how much life imitates art. The onion published a hilarious article entitled Even CEO Can't Figure Out How RadioShack Still In Business. Read it for a good laugh, because unfortunately, the funniest material they write is firmly grounded in reality.

Here is a shining example as to why Radioshack's business model is fatally flawed. I have a computer hooked up to my HDTV that I use to play DVD's and recorded movies off my network. I wanted to improve the picture by switching from a VGA cable to DVI cable. These aren't obscure parts, even though Radioshack traditionally has been known to carry a motley assortment of electronic parts. Many of you probably recognize the cables easily from the pictures shown in the links.

There is a Radioshack close to home that is within walking distance. But just to be safe, I went on their website to verify that they have a number of DVI cables to choose from. It seemed like they had a wide variety, from the useless, overpriced Monster brand to a less overpriced in-house brand. I figured the extra expense of buying the cable in person would be made up by the convenience and speed compared to the shipping costs and waiting time of buying online.

When I went to the store one evening, the first rack near the door contained an army of overpriced monster cables. This was expected, since the markup on those monsters is monstrous, and probably reel in a hefty profit. You see, since the DVI specification is a digital signal, there is absolutely no benefit to having the higher priced monster cable. Unless there is a fundamental flaw in the cable you buy, you're better off getting the cheapest cable you can find, though I'll get more into that later. Thankfully, they had some in-house generic brand cables there too. However, not one single cable of these was a simple DVI cable. They had lots of HDMI cables, and they even had a DVI-to-HDMI converter. I could have cobbled together some kind of hack to get the DVI signal to go to an HDMI plug in my TeeVee, but the total cost would have been over $100! Frustrated, I asked the sales clerks (who were by now hovering around me like flies gravitating to a freshly laid turd) for some aid. Naturally, they guided me right back to the rack full of Monstrosity Cables, and didn't find a DVI-to-DVI cable either (no shit sherlock). I told them that they had lots of these kinds of cables online, but assured me that I was probably looking at internet only products. They then suggested I cobble together that same DVI-to-HDMI hack that I mentioned earlier. I promptly told them not to waste any more of their time and bid them adieu.

This is a picture of the clever hack I would have had to buy at Radioshack. The product on the left is the Monster DVI to HDMI adapter. That costs 34.99. The shortest Monster HDMI cable they had was 79.99. Total cost (before tax) is roughly $115.

So feeling a bit disgruntled, I decided to surf over to amazon.com, among many choices of web vendors. I searched for DVI cables, ordered it by cheapest, and found found 6 FT. DVI SINGLE LINK CABLE for the shockingly low price of $1.50 new from one of the independent sellers (Amazon's price was $7.99). Even with 4 bucks of shipping it and using the Amazon price, it was still massively affordable. Figuring there was a catch as to why it was so cheap, I did a little research. According to wikipedia's DVI article, there are two flavors of DVI: single and dual. Single supports 1920×1200 resolution compared to dual's 2560×1600. Single is therefore the cheaper of the two. Since my HDTV is 1336×768, a single link DVI cable is more than enough to satisfy my needs.

I received the product in plain packaging a few days later, and the picture on my TeeVee is crystal clear, since it's a "perfect" digital signal, far superior to the original VGA cable. All this from a product that cost less than 10 dollars.

This goes to show that the success of Radioshack is based on the ignorance of the general public to its price-gouging activities by pushing Monster products above all else. Buying Monster only makes sense when the best performance is needed: wiring expensive high-fidelity and high-wattage audio equipment over 40 feet, such as at a club or at a rock concert, using analog cables. For digital video and digital audio, the cheapest quality cable will be more than sufficent. Even if you feel compelled the highest quality goods to simply show off to your friends, you'll be better off buying your monster cable online. As more an more people are drawn to the internet, Radioshack will increasingly find fewer and fewer reasons to exist.

Best Ben Bernanke Parody Ever

2007-05-31T20:13:00.001-05:00

This has to be the most hilarious Helicopter Ben picture I've ever seen: Lost all your money flipping Las Vegas condos or daytrading sub-penny gold stocks? Maxed out 100 grand on your credit cards? NO PROBLEM! Helicopter Ben to the rescue! Thanks Bull (Not Bull) for the graphic.

The Chicago Spire Is a Pipe Dream

2007-05-09T20:10:00.000-05:00

The buzz in Chicagoland has been about the newly redesigned Chicago Spire. The Chicago Plan Commission recently approved this new design. Architecture fans are gushing over its sleek, winding, glass superstructure, politicians are fawning over how it will add to the sky line and the city's marketability for the Olympics, and your average citizen is wondering why the silhouette of the building resembles a popular sex toy. More importantly, the people of Streeterville living in the immediate vicinity of the future 150 storey structure worry about the building's impact on traffic and public space.

However, I think the biggest roadblock to the project is simple economics. I'm going to assume the popular estimate of the project costing $2.2 billion to be accurate, though I'm sure cost overruns are going to push it higher. The biggest folly is the fact that it's going to be mostly residential with some retail shopping on the ground floor. No mixed-use, with partial office space: it's pure condo.

Since I work downtown, I've witnessed many new condo and hotel constructions planned and under construction. Also, more than a few office buildings have been converted to condo as well. The market is clearly saturated. If you don't believe me about the Chicago housing market having too much supply, these numbers on housing inventory back me up. All these condos are going up downtown, but the amount of office space is proportionally going down. You need high paid workers to live in all these fancy luxury condos.

So what do these other condos have to do with the Chicago Spire? The Chicago Spire will be competing against all these other condo developments. Given, the Chicago Spire will be the tallest building in North America when completed, I'll give it that much. However, a simple calculation based on the projected costs of the project ($2.2 billion) against the number of units for sale (1200), reveals a very disturbing statistic. In order for the project to break even, the average price of each condo will have to be $1,830,000. A quick search on ziprealty shows that you can get yourself a mammoth greystone rowhouse from the 1880's for that price fairly close to the city center. To each his own.

Let's take a different approach to that condo price though. Traditional methods of calculating housing affordability suggest that one should not spend more than 30% of one's income on housing payments. Another way is to multiply your household income by 2.5-3.0 to determine how much house you can afford. Let's be generous and assume a multiple of 3. This means to be able to afford living in this glass and steel phallus you must make about 610,000 a year. How many people make that kind of money? According to the latest US census data (2005) only 31,506 households make more than 200K a year in Chicago proper. The number making more than 600K a year is probably a fraction of that. That's not a lot of high-rollers go to around. My educated guess is that they will try to find more value for their money, like an all-stone Victorian mansion.

But never fear, the mainstream-media says all is well! National Public Radio interviewed some economic experts for us and broke it all down. The first person, a Realtor®, stated "if we're able to get a totally different and new group of buyers into the marketplace they're going to create more demand... it will help push up pricing especially in the premium buildings in the city". He thinks the key is to sucker foreigners who don't know any better to buy up our overpriced property. Expert number 2 from the Trump International Hotel and Tower says that Chicago can definitely handle the higher prices, because we have more luxury projects in the works (i.e., more supply of expensive condos will mean more demand for expensive condos). And of course, the baby boomers will swoop in and save the day! The pulverizing logic of faith-based economics has won me over. It's all good, build away.

Funniest Casey Serin Comment Ever

2007-05-03T08:50:00.000-05:00

This has to be the funniest (and truest) comment by far that I've ever seen posted on iamfacingforeclosure. Thanks for the laugh Scott:

We’re not haterz, we’re just watching the train roll by, yelling at you to pull the brake:

I started out just surprised that someone managed to get so badly in debt without a plan, then became engrossed in watching the trainwreck. Not just any ordinary train wreck, mind you. No, Casey has managed to set up conditions that are well beyond a normal train wreck. It’s all in the details, too, and that’s how I became a Haterz(tm).

Going through his blog week by week I found that Casey has managed to assemble a frightening collection of rolling stock. What’s in this freight car? Oh, a bunch of cases of dynamite. And in this one? Some kegs of gunpowder. Another is full of matches. We find the latest is now filled with tons of rotten, spoiled food because, D’oh! Snowflake forgot to turn on power to the refrigeration car.

Robert Kiyosaki watches the train roll by, gathering speed, since it’s on a downhill. How steep? Oh anywhere from 8% to 14% slope, it seems. RK points and laughs. “Kid, you are *so* screwed” he yells.

Casey’s in the engineer’s cabin, staring at a big lever labelled “BRAKE”. Does he pull it? No. He pulls some other lever that’s unlabeled. He thinks about pulling the brake lever, but PrLinkBiz flashes her thong. Casey’s distracted and forgets about the brake lever.

Tim from MBA calls on the radio, trying to coach Casey into at least slowing the train down. Tim describes to Casey what a brake lever looks like and how to use it. Casey smiles and nods in that way people do when they don’t speak the language, hangs up, and decides to eat some vegetarian shrimp.

Casey thinks again about trying to find the brake lever. Nobody flashes their thong. Casey’s distracted and forgets the brake lever.

Casey pulls on some things that don’t even remotely look like levers, becomes distracted, sets the alarm for 5:30, and goes to sleep so he can be well-rested for pulling on everything but that brake lever the next day.

Casey sees Homeless Bob hop on his train. Homeless Bob starts throwing sticks of dynamite out the door. Casey notices, thinks about shaking his fist in rage at Homeless Bob, then decides taking a nap is a wiser course of action.

People lined up along the route are yelling at Casey to pull the brake lever. “It’s the one with B-R-A-K-E written above it!”. “Spelling’s for loosers, I’m an ideas man”, Casey yells back.

Casey watches the couplings pop and the freight cars behind him go lose(tm). All Casey can think of is how sweet it would be to add 200 more freight cars to his train.

Casey puts out a sign advertising “Become a Locomotive Engineer! $39 Training Course”.

Nigel flashes his thong (leopard print, did someone say?). Casey’s distracted and forgets that he’s on a train.

Finally, the train approaches a curve. The locomotive is going too fast and jumps the rails, with Casey merely holding onto his blue ball in the hope that it will cushion the blow. Before the locomotive and Casey have a chance to slide to a stop, the freight cars that had all popped lose(tm) come flying around the corner, each jumping the rails and hitting Casey from behind (I’m too lazy to work in any jail metaphors here - y’all can think them on your own). All these hits have pushed Casey towards a cliff.

One final freight car is jumping the rails. It’s full of about 15 million pennies. They’re heavier than ordinary pennies because they’re dirty. Lots o’ momentum here, enough to push Casey over the cliff.

Down below? A river. Is this the end? Naaah, this trainwreck has so much more to play out. There’s a barge that Casey might land on. Not any ordinary barge, though. This one’s engulfed in flames. Steering wheel’s broken. A few hundred yards downstream? A waterfall. Sharp pointy rocks below, piranha in heat swimming around. There’s also a plane with CashCall written on the side that hovering around. Seems the engine’s stalled and it’s starting to plummet, aimed right at our “hero”. It just goes on and on.

Come all you Haterz(tm) if you want to hear
A story ’bout a flipper with no fear,
Casey Serin was the investor’s name
“Twas in the Central Valley that he won his fame.

Casey Serin, he wanted passive income.
Casey Serin, chugging wheatgrass shots with glee.
Casey Serin, how can he be so dumb?
Thinking that no work will bring him money for free.

View the original post here

Casey Serin No Stranger to Pyramid Schemes

2007-03-30T22:04:00.000-05:00

At long last, I've finally stumbled across Casey Serin's original Chain Letter, written when he was just 14 (it's from February 8th 1997, he was born September 10th, 1982). When he says he has "business experience", he's not joking! Ten years of creating pyramid schemes, apparently. This is why the "cash out at close" "fix 'n' flip" scam was a no brainer. He takes out a zero-down stated income loan, ignores the interest rate since he has no intention of paying back every dirty penny, gets cash back greater than the legal limit. The cash back is used to fund real estate seminars (undoubtedly to discover better ways to game the system and extract cash, also known to him as "standard industry practices"), jamba juice, a hawaiian vacation, and trips to see his various properties (with as little "fix" of the flip as possible). Like a man buying more chips at a craps table, the cashback is inevitably not enough (as he quit his potentially lucrative job as a PHP programmer), and this is where he commits his critical mistake. A true con man would realize that foreclosure is an inevitability and would take the next plane to Mexico or Uzbekistan. However, like the famous Charles Ponzi, he believed in his own scam, and like a moth to the flame, clings to the limelight as much as possible. So he starts grabbing money from "private lenders" (read: loan sharks) like CashCall. The mistake is that you can't "return the keys to the bank" with this company. They will get a Writ of Execution and take all his stuff, and if he's not careful, all his wife's and sister-in-law's stuff as well. In short, Casey Serin is nothing but a pyramid schemer, and a bad one at that, who got bitten by the narcissism bug of 21st century internet celebrity. A Con Artist knows when to move on, but he fell into the seduction of YouTube and blogging somehow thinking that exposing his own gross incompetence was a way to cash in. Whether or not he can make money off his notoriety like Monica Lewinsky or OJ Simpson by writing a book remains to be seen.

Casey Serin Techno Remix

2007-03-29T17:57:00.000-05:00

Just recently I came across a techno remix of Casey Serin's webcast/podcast/talkshow. It perfectly crystalizes the whole 2 hour ordeal into a few minutes. In fact, I would say it perfectly summarizes Casey Serin and the entire contents of iamfacingforeclosure.com:

You can also download the CASH-IN CASEY by The Fannnnnnnnnn remix to put on your favorite mp3 player. If you have 2 hours to kill, The original podcast itself is available here, and you may also read the transcript of the first hour, and the transcript of the second hour. If you're listening to the full podcast, beware the 15 minute "intermission" between the two hours. The last 20 minutes of the podcast are by far the most entertaining.

As far as the music goes, it's your typical mid-90's club-head eurotrash techno. However, there are some amusing musical references to The Girl from Ipanema, and Brahm's Hungarian Dance No. 5.

EDIT: After a number of google searches, I could not find the original author of "Call-in Casey"! If the original artist comes forward, I will buy him or her a jamba juice of their choice along with a free wheatgrass shot.

EDIT on 6/12/2007: It seems that the author is none other than Casey Fannnnn (the number of n's is variable), who often posts to Exurban Nation. The original mp3 link is here. The original post that it appears in is here. He even has his own entry on caseypedia Dude, Casey Fannnnn, give me a shout out and I'll order you some Jamba Juice next time you're in Chicago!

EDIT on 9/16/2007: It appears that the original source for the MP3 has disappeared, so I've redirected it to a mirror.

Loudness War and Replay Gain Follow Up

2007-03-24T07:13:00.000-05:00

In my Prevous Post I discussed the loudness war, and how to correct some of the distortion present in your music files, and how to bring them to the same loudness as the rest of your collect. However, I only showed how to do this with Ogg Vorbis files (*.ogg). You can also do this with your MP3's using MP3Gain.

This program, fortunately, has a GUI for those averse to the command prompt. Most of it is straight forward. You click add folder, and it automatically scans it and adds all the MP3's contained in all its sub directories. To use it, you may optionally do a track analysis first to see the varying amounts of loudness of all your files. This may take a while though, so be sure to do this before lunch or going to bed. You will only have to do this once however, so it doesn't matter if you do it now yourself, or if you let the program do it for you later. You have several options when applying the gain to your tracks. The default is track gain, which makes all your MP3's the same volume relative to each other. The other popular option is album gain, which normalizes all tracks by album, that is, all the tracks from one CD will be at the same volume relative to each other from the original recording, but the whole album will be set to a loudness relative to other albums. This is for audiophiles who want to preserve the difference in volume between tracks on a classical album for instance, where one movement might be piano, and the other forte. I'm not sure what the "constant gain" option does, so you may want to research it yourself later.

Before you go click happy and hit the "Track Gain" button, there is an important feature for you to consider. Some tracks may be marked as "clipped", due to a sound engineer pushing the loudness of a track way beyond its limits, and causing a jarring distortion known as "clipping". By default, MP3Gain may not always correct this clipping problem, or may accidentally introduce its own clipping when amplifying a track that was originally very quiet. To fix this, go under options and check "Don't clip when doing track gain". Other options to note are under Options->Tags. This allow you to optionally skip already-calculated tags or to force them to be recalculated.

How the Suits Stole the Life out of Music, and How You Can Steal It Back

2007-03-21T18:22:00.000-05:00

While recently browsing wikipedia I looked up Depeche Mode's Playing the Angel, and discovered something odd in the footnotes:

The album is considered by numerous fans to be poorly mastered, relying on heavy compression to intentionally and artificially boost the output. Due to the format's inherent characteristics, vinyl versions are unaffected by the poor mastering of the CD versions.

This led me to a blog post about how the audio mastering on Playing the Angel is yet another victim of the Loudness War. What this means is that many new albums (including remasters I afraid) are purposely mastered to be as loud as possible at the expense of dynamic range, audio fidelity, and possibly introducing errors like clipping. Sure enough I listened to "Precious", and heard the telltale "popping" of clipping during beats. Sure enough, the waveform of the song looks like a wall of noise:

What does this picture mean? In layman's terms, in most recorded sound, the "green blob" should look like a fuzzy sausage, not a solid rectangle. It should be lumped mostly in the middle, with little spikes hitting near the top on bottom throughout. Sometimes (during the softer parts of the song), the sausage shape should get skinny. The spikes repesent things like beats and cymbal crashes. In the case of "Precious" every single possible microsecond has been "normalized" (cranked to 11 if you will).

Why would the suits do such a thing? Well, two reasons, really. First, louder albums make more sales. Given two heavy metal albums, would you pick the louder or quieter one? Second, "audio compression" (different from mp3 compression) makes the music consistently loud in a noisy environment or public environment (your car or the dance floor). When listening with headphones though, the distortions can become noticeable, such as every part of a song being at the same volume, the music sounding "muddy", and the clipping I mentioned earlier.

So, how can you correct this travesty? Well, fortunately, there are tools that can fix the clipping errors and alleviate some of the muddiness. The dynamic range problem can't be fixed though. The only way to fix that problem is to find a vinyl copy of your album, record it on your computer to a lossless format such was FLAC, then record it back to CD.

Here's what you can do if you have your music on CD, MP3, or Ogg Vorbis. There is a standard called Replay Gain. The wikipedia link has a number of implementations, but I will explain here how to quickly bring all your Ogg Vorbis music files back up to par. Coincidentally, this tool will also help your classical music albums sound almost as loud as your rock albums on your player, so you don't need to fiddle with your volume dial as often. It is called VorbisGain and is available on Rareware's list of ogg utilities. It's a command line utility, but don't let that scare you! Click on the download link under "VorbisGain v.0.37". Open up the zipfile. You'll see a bunch of code files, ignore those and go into the "Release" folder. There will be a single exe file. Save the exe to your windows directory (usually c:\windows). Then click Start->Run... and enter "cmd" into the box (without quotes) and hit enter. A DOS prompt will show up. Type in the following:

VorbisGain.exe -r "YourMusicDirectoryGoesHere\*.ogg"

The -r means it scan all your folders and files recursively for Ogg Vorbis. YourMusicDirectoryGoesHere is the location of your music. In my case it is g:\Music, yours will be elsewhere. Some may be thinking "Woah buddy, I'm not going to just run some dos command to garble my music!" This program will not modify the actual audio data. It will simply mark your file with a "loudness value" that will be used by your music player. Now for the last step. Most music players have a plugin to use Replay Gain. I happen to use WinAmp, and all you have to do to turn it on is to go to Options->Preferences->General Preferences->Playback, turn on "Use Replay Gain" and select "Apply Gain / Prevent Clipping" for the Amplification Mode. Other programs will differ. If your player does not have a Replay Gain feature, your files will simply play as they did before. If you don't think Replay Gain sounds good or screws something up, you can always undo your work with the -c switch:

VorbisGain.exe -r -c "YourMusicDirectoryGoesHere\*.ogg"

Problems Installing Linux

2007-03-08T21:41:00.000-06:00

Since Windows Vista makes me sick, I decided to to give Linux a spin, as I remember the KDE interface to be quite tasty. I'm now on my FIFTH flavor of Linux trying to get it installed. My system is neither bleeding edge, nor obscure, but it is rather new. It is made with off-the-shelf parts and assembled myself. Windows XP 64-bit installed perfectly and runs amazingly well. The specs are as follows:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 @ 2.13GHz
Intel 965 family motherboard
Seagate Barracuda SATA drive
An old generic DVD Rom
NVidia Geforce 7950
1 Gig RAM

So I fire up Kubuntu 6.06 Dapper 64-bit edition, the latest stable release of that flavor of Linux. A half-minute through the standard install selection, and I get this un-userfriendly obscure error:

PCI: Failed to allocate mem resource #6: 20000@50000000 for 0000: 01:00.0

Even with a Computer Engineering Degree from a Big 10 University and 2.5 years experience in software development, this doesn't mean squat to me. Some googling later reveals that this release of Kubuntu/Ubuntu doesn't have the latest kernel of Linux, and therefore doesn't support the Intel Core 2 Duo. Why Windows XP-64 with SP1, an operating system that dates from April 25 2005 (according to wikipedia), doesn't have any problems is a mystery to me.

Thinking that the kernel is the problem, I download instead Kubuntu 6.10 Edgy. I got the following problems with this installer:

/bin/sh: can't access tty; job control turned off

Some searching for this problem revealed that my SATA drive might be to blame (really?). I tried some command line switches that people suggested in some forums, and got the same result. Another post recommended I use the Alternative installation CD. So, I download this one, burn it, run it, and choose the text installer. After choosing some initial options, I get this lovely error:

No common CD-ROM drive was detected

No CD-ROM? Are you joking? How the hell did this installer run in the first place? I tried manually selecting one, but nothing was detected this way. It kindly suggested that I abort the installation. Later on I discovered this happened on machines who happened to have windows installed on the primary partition of a SATA drive.

Having exhausted most flavors of Kubuntu, and not wishing to download the absolutely-bleeding-edge developer's nightmare edition, I opted out, and browsed the other breeds of Linux on distrowatch.com. I was disappointed in not being able to install Ubuntu/Kubuntu, since it is the most popular one on there. I opted next for SimplyMEPIS 6.5 RC1, another Debian based Linux, and reportedly similar to Kubuntu. Two episodes of Babylon 5 later, it's downloaded and ready to go. Things looked promising at first until in unexpectedly left the install GUI and went into an infinite loop of printing out the following line of text:

/etc/init: 5 /linuxrc: not found

Apparently this is caused by the fact that I have an Intel 965 motherboard. So much for off-the-shelf parts, eh?

Despairingly, I decided to simply pick at random from the list of the top linuxes on DistroWatch. OpenSUSE 10.2 seemed promising for one particular reason: it had an optional "mini-install" that downloads packages directly from the internet. Sick of downloading large ISO files, I opted for this one. I popped in the CD and started the installer. At first it seemed to have the same problems as Kubuntu in not liking my SATA and DVD-ROM combination, but eventually the prompt for an internet installer. I followed the instructions verbatim from SUSE's website, and eureka! it started downloading without a hitch.

The installer is quite pretty and intuitive. It intelligently set up extra partitions on my hard drive, detecting my windows partitions and leaving them alone. It automatically set up a pagefile partition, which is something I have to do manually for Windows using a special partitioning boot CD. The defaults were nice, but gave you the option of specifying your own partitions, so either a novice or an expert would be happy. The default software packages were intelligently picked as well, assuming that I wanted a standard selection of desktop applications. The only thing I had to add in "expert" mode was an optional 32-bit environment (for WINE to run windows applications). Optionally there were server and developer packages advanced users could install. I could also pick which GUI I wanted to download: Gnome, KDE, or "other". It gave me a nice summary of my choices at the end, allowing me to go back and fix any choices. It then started downloading, giving me the estimated size remaining of the download, number of packages, and time remaining.

Looks like it will continue downloading during the night, so my user experience will have to wait for another post. Hopefully, I will be able to figure out how to get it to interact on my Windows network. Though I was frustrated with the install process at first, I reminded myself that at least I didn't pay for this operating system. All it cost me was some internet bandwidth, a couple evenings, and a few blank CD's. This is more than I can say for people's experiences installing windows vista.

Casey Serin: An elaborate hoax?

2007-02-28T21:34:00.000-06:00

Everybody loves a good conspiracy theory. Take the Flat Earth Society's opinion on the Apollo Moon Landings. I propose here that one should consider that Casey Serin's story on iamfacingforeclosure.com is an elaborate internet hoax, like Primate Programming Inc. Here are a few reasons:

Nobody could get in 2.2 million dollars in debt so quickly at such a young age with no employment history. It's true that 0% down no-doc neg-amortization loans have been out of a while, but 8 properties? Didn't the subprime mortgage market start to collapse in 2006? Then again, Casey Serin wonders aloud why is my credit score so high, since it takes a few months for one's credit rating to be affected.
Despite Casey's loathing of "haters", Casey is willing to put up a collection of satire on himself. This is an indication to me that the whole site itself is satire.
Even though Casey Serin is constantly mocked and parodied in comments and in other blogs for abuse of the word "sweet", Jamba Juice product placements, and obsession with wheatgrass shots, he continues to do so. Even today, he has a whole post dedicated to juice.
Deliberate irony in several posts. The foremost on my mind is the post entitled Homess Dude Trespassing on my Property, despite the fact that he himself is homless (he lives with in-laws) and soon will not own the property either. Another is the post with the foreclosure auction, where the auctioneer is wearing a hat that says "flop", and uses a trashcan as a podium. There is also the above-mentioned posting of satire pictures.
Despite comitting mortgage fraud on a massive scale, among other scams, the State and Federal governments have not yet used him as a posterboy for mortgage fraud, despite his high profile public image.
Nobody posting on Casey Serin's blog has yet met him in person, as far as I've read in the comments (can somebody prove me wrong?).

Despite all of that, there are a number of things that are not in my favor:

Numerous photographs of properties that would be time consuming to steal from other pages, and pictures of events that require paying for entry.
Pictures of legal and financial notices that might be tough to fake.
Appearances in the media and with Robert Kiyosaki (Rich Dad, Poor Dad) that would make it difficult to fake one's story.
The fact that many real estate purchases were timed to have a minimal impact on credit score (though this may not have been intentional), and they were done in multiple states to allow for easier committal of fraud.

First Post

2007-02-27T09:40:00.000-06:00

Setting up a blog has become almost painless these days, so I decided to join the foray. I'll be looking forward to making posts on various topics in the near term. A few topics that have been rattling around in my brain have been: posthumanism (or transhumanism), Casey Serin, forthcoming deflationary collapse, peak oil, programming, and so forth. Stay tuned.