While All Eyes Are on Europe, Japan Circles a Black Hole

While all eyes are on the absurdist tragicomedy playing out in Europe, Japan is quietly circling a financial black hole as its export economy is destroyed by its strong currency and the global recession.

There is a terrible irony in export-dependent nations being viewed as "safe havens." Their safe haven status pushes their currencies higher, which then crushes their export sector, which then weakens their entire economy and stability, undermining the very factors that created their safe haven status.

As long as Germany stays within the Eurozone, Japan is the primary example of this dynamic. Should Germany leave the euro and return to its own currency, it too will begin orbiting the financial black hole of declining exports driven by a strengthening currency in a global recession.

Economies that are less reliant on exports are much less exposed to the consequences of a strengthening currency.

We can lay out the dynamic of Japan's currency and export-dependent economy thusly:

1. Export-dependent economies such as Japan, China and Germany rely on strong exports to sustain their employment and growth.

2. This means they must maintain positive current accounts (trade surpluses).

3. As their currencies strengthen, their exports become less competitive globally.

4. Export-dependent economies must pursue strategies to keep their currencies aligned with their buyers, the importing nations.

5. Germany has done so via the eurozone, which aligned its largest import market, Europe, with its own currency.

6. China has done so by pegging the renminbi (yuan) to the U.S. dollar and restricting foreign exchange (i.e. not allowing a free-floating renminbi).

7. Japan has neither of these advantages, and must intervene in the FX markets by buying and selling yen and dollars.

8. Despite its well-known debt problems (see chart below), Japan retains a massive and diverse industrial base, a current-account surplus (or modest deficit with its nuclear power plants largely offline) and large overseas assets.

9. These assets, plus its homogeneous culture, makes Japan an island of stability in an increasingly unstable global economy.

10. For these reasons, the yen is considered a "safe haven" currency and yen-denominated bonds as "safe haven" liquid investments.

11. As demand for yen rises, the currency strengthens, weakening the competitiveness of Japanese exports.

12. The "safe haven" status of the yen ends up hurting the Japanese economy's primary engine, exports.

13. The stronger yen ends up weakening the very attributes that make the yen and Japanese bonds "safe havens."

14. As the global economy slides into recession, exports decline sharply under the double-whammy of falling demand and a rising currency.

15. Ironic, to say the least.

Entries and email may be sporadic this week due to other commitments.

---

Resistance, Revolution, Liberation: A Model for Positive Change (print $25)
(Kindle eBook $9.95)

Read the Introduction (2,600 words) and Chapter One (7,600 words) for free.

We are like passengers on the Titanic ten minutes after its fatal encounter with the iceberg: though our financial system seems unsinkable, its reliance on debt and financialization has already doomed it.We cannot know when the Central State and financial system will destabilize, we only know they will destabilize. We cannot know which of the State’s fast-rising debts and obligations will be renounced; we only know they will be renounced in one fashion or another.
The process of the unsustainable collapsing and a new, more sustainable model emerging is called revolution.Rather than being powerless, we hold the fundamental building blocks of power. We need neither permission nor political change to liberate ourselves. A powerless individual becomes powerful when he renounces the lies and complicity that enable the doomed Status Quo’s dominance.

Read more...

A Little Perspective on What Lies Ahead

Eliminating Elites won't eliminate our structural problems or the reduction in phantom wealth we've all been relying on.

Many finance-oriented critiques start from the position that our problems largely stem from the financial/political dominance of Elitist cartels and cabals. Clearly, the malinvestment, exploitation, predation and disregard for the law that characterizes the rule of political-financial Elites in both developed and developing nations have wreaked havoc on societies and economies around the globe.

Implicit in this critique is a dangerously naive assumption: if all our problems can be traced back to Elitist cabals such as the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank, then it follows that the subjugation or eradication of these concentrations of self-serving power would remove the cause of our problems.

Alas, that would be a welcome step in the right direction, but that alone would not resolve the structural causes of our devolution. Freeing ourselves of self-serving Elites would certainly create an opening for structural transformation that is currently impossible, but the transformation will require changing much of what the average citizen takes for granted as a "given" or even "right."

For a little perspective on what lies ahead, let's consider the structural problems that remain even if we were fortunate enough to throw off the yoke of the Fed, the corporate cartels, and the entire system of Elitist dominance.

1. We would still have mountains of debt that will never be paid and enormous losses to write off. It would be nice is we could place all the inevitable losses as phantom assets are exposed to price discovery on bankers and Elites, but the reality is that these assets are distributed throughout the economy: as these phantom assets vanish, pension funds, insurance companies and other bulwarks of non-Elite wealth/security will have to write off significant portions of their assets.

Citizens will ultimately find their wealth/financial security has been degraded, perhaps severely. It's tempting to think that a "debt jubiliee" on (for example) student loans would "solve the problem," but this is not a pain-free solution: the $1 trillion in student loans are someone's assets, and the "someone" is not necessarily a banker or billionaire: it might be the pension fund that is paying Mom or Dad's pension.

The unpayable debts are only symptoms of a deeply flawed system. To see the debt as the problem is to ignore the system which created the "need" for that debt: in the education cartel, that is the entire system of "higher education," which is fundamentally a "skimming operation" not unlike its partner in crime, the financial industry and central State that creates and enforces the debt.

In other words, simply writing off debt does not address the structural causes of the debt. That will require a massive revolution in our understanding and delivery of education, and a wholesale elimination of tens of thousands of "skimming" positions within the education complex.

That means tens of thousands of people will lose their high-paying jobs.

You see the point being made here: living within our means requires a massive structural downsizing of assets, employment and expectations. An economy that has lived on the creation of debt (phantom assets) cannot be transformed by the mere writedown of debt: the entire structure that created and enforced that debt must be torn down, and everyone who skimmed off a profit or livelihood from that reliance on the machinery of debt will experience a decline in their standard of living.

2. We would still have a global economy facing the constraints of higher-cost energy and commodities. As we all know, it's easier to create phantom wealth than it is to create real goods such as grain, energy, gold, etc. Phantom assets are ultimately claims on A) income streams or B) real-world assets, and so all phantom assets are ultimately claims on a limited resource, either a commodity or an enterprise.

You can "grow" phantom assets to near-infinity, but that near-infinite sum of money will still distill down to a claim on limited resources and income streams.

As I have often noted here (thanks to correspondents Bart D. and Harun I.), energy may well be abundant at a certain price; what will be scarce is the cash/income to pay for that "abundant" energy. Abundance of a commodity that has a high cost-basis due to real-world constraints does not lead to lower prices: if it takes one barrel of oil to extract and refine three barrels of shale oil, the cost of those barrels cannot drop below the cost of extraction, refining, return on the capital invested, labor costs, etc.

Sellers of oil below cost will rapidly deplete their capital and go bust.

Eliminating Elites is a first good step, but it does not magically eliminate the constraints imposed on a phantom-asset based system. Living within our means will require a massive reduction not just in phantom assets but in the income that has been generated by those phantom assets. It won't just be bankers and billionaires who will be poorer; everyone with exposure to the financial system and the real-world costs of the FEW essentials (food, energy, water) will be poorer in terms of purchasing power.

3. As Status Quo policies fail, replacement policies will become less predictable in their implementation and unintended consequences. Recognizing that a policy has failed is only a first step; understanding the structural causes and designing a policy that won't alienate all the vested interests while addressing the problem is politically impossible until the crisis has left the Status Quo no other choice.

But there is very little history that informs the confluence of crises we now face; the more replacement policies diverge from the mainstream, the more unpredictable their comsequences become. As the saying has it, the road to Heck is paved with good intentions, and policy choices that seem common-sense in crisis could issue disastrous results.

Political expediency is a powerful force for unintended consequences. Even if we got rid of the Fed and various financial Elites, the losses trickling down to the Main Street economy would still be large enough to cause powerful vested interests (union and municipal pension plans, for example) to support Status Quo "saves" of phantom assets and the machinery of debt-creation.

Political expediency will not vanish along with the Fed; vested interests will still seek to impose self-serving policies that have not been thought out or tested in the real world on smaller scales. They will attempt to conserve their own wealth and power at the expense of the general citizenry or politically weaker rivals.

Entries and email may be sporadic this week due to other commitments.

---

Resistance, Revolution, Liberation: A Model for Positive Change (print $25)
(Kindle eBook $9.95)

Read the Introduction (2,600 words) and Chapter One (7,600 words) for free.

We are like passengers on the Titanic ten minutes after its fatal encounter with the iceberg: though our financial system seems unsinkable, its reliance on debt and financialization has already doomed it.We cannot know when the Central State and financial system will destabilize, we only know they will destabilize. We cannot know which of the State’s fast-rising debts and obligations will be renounced; we only know they will be renounced in one fashion or another.
The process of the unsustainable collapsing and a new, more sustainable model emerging is called revolution.Rather than being powerless, we hold the fundamental building blocks of power. We need neither permission nor political change to liberate ourselves. A powerless individual becomes powerful when he renounces the lies and complicity that enable the doomed Status Quo’s dominance.

Read more...

Part 13: Robin Meets Kylie: Love AFS

Here is this week's chapter of my serialized comic novel "Four Bidding For Love."(Those who find absurdist humor and adult situations offensive, please read no further.)

     Robin withdrew his handkerchief for the third time and wiped his tearing eyes. The appointed rendezvous point—the craft fair's coffee stand—was unfortunately adjacent to a vendor of scented candles whose heavily-perfumed wares had instantly triggered Robin's allergies. It seemed as if an entire containerload of vanilla bean extract had been poured into the wizened seller's white candles, with another cargo of chemical-musk thrown into the array of squat purple candles for good measure.
     Surrendering to whatever petrochemical had launched a frenzied immune response in his suffering eyes, Robin shifted out of whiff range and reckoned he could watch for the pony-tailed negotiator from a safe distance. The din of hundreds of conversations filled the cavernous space, and Robin's innate dislike of crowds added to his discomfort. All this for a stupid toaster and an equally stupid poster, he sighed; this is the cost of being too nice for my own good.
     Amazing that someone can make a living at this in a depressed economy, Robin mused, for he'd paused in front of a booth of rustic bird houses. Taking in the steep price being asked for each avian abode, Robin thought, maybe I'm just naive, and this guy drives a Mercedes.
     A glance at his watch stirred Robin's annoyance, for his counterpart was late. As he scanned the coffee stand once again—no females with dark ponytails—he fumed, I've already wasted far too much time on this foolishness.
     The next booth featured a selection of handcast gargoyles, "suitable for lawn placement or hardscape decorations" according to the hand-lettered sign. Robin reckoned the hunched little monsters with exaggerated expressions of evil intent were hideously inappropriate for anyone's yard save the Addams Family; yet the proprietor, a hearty man with red suspenders and a jovial countenance, acted as if he were selling beatific cherubs rather than figurines guaranteed to etch nightmares in the minds of anyone deranged enough to purchase one.
     His curiosity was quickly rewarded—or perhaps punished would be a more accurate description— by the potbellied craftsman himself, who approached, thumbs crooked theatrically behind suspenders, to describe his purposefully hideous wares. In a booming voice designed to carry over the surrounding din, the man stated that the gargoyles were cast from originals that graced Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. Robin nodded in feigned interest and twisted round to survey the coffee stand once again.
     His need for deliverance at fever pitch, he saw a slim chestnut-haired young woman in blue jeans and form-fitting blouse walk hurriedly up to the coffee booth and then slip off her sunglasses in a nervous scan of the patrons. Her dark hair was bound into a glossy ponytail, but he immediately dismissed her as a potential Kylie. It couldn't be her, he told himself; she's gorgeous. As the gargoyle maker droned on, Robin watched the young woman glance about in the fidgety fluster of someone late for an appointment. It couldn't be her, Robin repeated to himself, but then clearly she was late and looking for someone.
     Robin had never fallen in love at first sight, and so he could not know that angels voices don't well up in Heavenly chorus to announce the glad tidings; they whisper. What happens is precisely what he experienced, which is that everything and everyone but this young woman fell away from his perception, and he could not pry his gaze from her.
     Though it seemed more likely that the menacing gargoyle on the tabletop beside him would spring to life than this comely young woman would be the negotiator for the ursine axe-thrower, Robin was so desperate to escape the enthusiastic purveyor of gargoyles that he resolved to approach the young woman.
     Excusing himself, Robin walked unsteadily toward the anxious dark-haired beauty and inwardly prepared for cool rejection. Smoothing the front of his black turtleneck, he took a calming breath and then approached the young woman. "Excuse me, but are you Kylie?"
     The young woman gazed at him and stammered, "Why, yes. Are you Robin?"
     "That's me," he replied, and his relief was mirrored by Kylie's approving appraisal of him. Though Robin was pleased she did not seem disappointed, he could not hear the angels of love at first sight which murmured so enchantingly in Kylie's ear. For it seemed to Kylie that a Bollywood movie star had just introduced himself, and everything around her but his tentative smile and earnest dark eyes fell away from her view.
     Kylie too had never experienced love at first sight, she did feel aflutter with a new kind of nervousness. Though Robin’s black turtleneck and worn khaki trousers were ordinary, his symmetrical features, large soft eyes, easy grin and casually combed black locks worked like magnets on her gaze.
     In a voice which reminded her of an avuncular FM radio host he asked, "May I get you a cup of coffee?" and she nodded a bit too eagerly.
     "I must look like I just left the saddest movie ever made," he said lightly. "Those scented candles fired up my allergies most wickedly."
     Glancing about, Kylie said, "There's no place to sit in here anyway. Maybe we can find a bench outside."
     Robin affably agreed, and once the two had cardboard coffee cups in hand, they worked their way through the craft enthusiasts to the open doorway and the crisp San Francisco air beyond. Once beyond the odoriferous reach of the candles, the faint scent of Kylie's hair, or perfume, he couldn't tell which, reached Robin, and the thought that she smelled good registered brightly in his mind, alongside the observation that her blue jeans clung quite attractively to her firm derriere.
     Two pair of eyes followed the youthful couple with hawklike intensity: a matronly and not terribly attractive woman in a long purple skirt and square sunglasses wearing a kitschy straw hat wreathed with pink flowers, and a top-heavy man in a crumpled fedora and baggy coat trousers similarly masked by oversized round sunglasses.
     In their single-minded pursuit of the love-struck young couple, the ungainly set of spies collided in front of the cuckoo clock booth, and each issued a curt apology before advancing through the doorway.
     Though it was cruel to even think it, Alexia reckoned the rude woman who'd just bumped into her was ugly enough to pass for a man, and a damned plain one at that. This town is a magnet for batty old ladies in castoff clothes, she thought, while the rest of us are scrimping just to avoid ending up on the streets.
     For his part, Ross took one look at the bulging chest, grotesquely ill-fitting trousers and mashed fedora of the high-voiced man who'd jostled him and thought, Jeez, even the bums have pretensions; this poor devil thinks he looks like Sam Spade. He probably also thinks he's Emperor of Atlantis, too; what a nutty town.
     With these first reactions firmly in mind, each gave the other wide berth; Ross took up position beside the entrance registration booth, while Alexia joined the fair attendees who were enjoying the afternoon sun on the pier.

Next: The Smitten Negotiators 


To read the previous chapters, visit the "Four Bidding For Love" home page.

---

A note of thanks to those who buy the book: As an independent writer, book sales are a substantial part of my income. I receive no funding from a university, trust fund, hedge fund, think-tank or government agency. I self-publish my books as a financial necessity, as the small royalties (5% to 7.5% of the retail price) paid by publishers cannot support me during the long months it takes to write a book. Your purchase makes it possible for me to continue sharing ideas on the blog and in my books. Thank you.

Buy the Kindle ebook for $4.95

Four Bidding For Love (print, $16.99) 

Read more...

Health is Wealth Part 2: Expert Advice on Improving Fitness

In Part 2 of our "health is wealth" series, Dr. Don Jewett of global medical leader UCSF offers expert advice on improving fitness.

Dr. Don Jewett of the University of California-San Francisco (UCSF), a medical school/hospital that's on many "best in the world" lists, was kind enough to share some expert fitness advice in response to yesterday's entry Health Is Wealth: Prevention, Fitness and Strength.

"I'm a retired Orthopaedic Surgeon who was Director of Physical Therapy for 10 years at Univ. of Calif. Medical School, San Francisco. I was on the full-time faculty for 27 years. 

1. Your muscles have both "fast" fibers and "slow" fibers. Each is specialized for the named action, and the proportion changes, depending upon what your persistent activities are. Long Distance runners have almost all slow fibers. You can exercise the slow fibers with Tai Chi. 

2. However, you will not get stronger unless the muscle is "tired". Body builders and those with equipment go to the point of exhaustion. That works. But another way is to hold a given position such that the muscle trembles. Hold it that way as long as possible. In this way you can reach the "tired" state quickly. 

3. If you don't have weights, then save plastic gallon jugs that have a big handle (for most of your fingers). Fill them with the amount of water that you can lift and hold, say with the elbow bent to 90 degrees, with the muscle trembling. As you get stronger, increase the water. You may need different pairs with different amounts of water, for strengthening different positions and/or muscles. 

4. You can do push-ups, and hold the position. If you aren't strong enough to do a full push up, then make it easier: a) put your knees down on the floor, instead of your feet. b) lean against a wall. Again, you don't need to "do" push-ups, just get your arms bent at the point where your muscles tremble. 

5. Strengthen leg muscles by a partial squat to the point of trembling. If you aren't strong enough, then lean your back against a wall after putting a dining-room chair on either side of you. Put your feet away from the wall, and descend slowly to the point that your leg muscles tremble. As they tire, you may have to put your hands on the chairs to get up again. As you get stronger, move your feet closer to the wall and/or bend the knees more. 

6. Holding onto the back of a dining-room chair, then balance for some minutes on one foot. Move the leg your not standing on to different places around you. This helps keep the body feedback sensors "tuned up" (as you lose some when you age). Bend the leg you are standing on to the point where the leg muscles tremble. YOU CAN SAVE TIME BY DOING THIS EXERCISE WHILE WAITING IN LINE AT THE STORE--- holding on to the shopping cart! 

7. The abdomen strengthens by partial sit-ups, held part-way up--- it takes longer to make these muscles tremble--- they are all slow fibers. It may help to bend your knees a bit--- this flattens your back so that it doesn't hurt. 

8. The back can be strengthened by lying on your stomach and arching your back. If it is too easy when lying on a bed, then move your head and shoulders off the bed, into space. You can rest with your hands on the floor, and then exercise by lifting your hands and keeping your back straight. Again, the back muscles are completely slow fibers, and may not tremble. 

9. Know the difference between good pain and bad pain. Bad pain comes on immediately when you hurt yourself, or reach a certain position, and it feels "sharp". Good pain comes on gradually, often several hours after you exercise. It is "dull" and "aching". If you have $10 worth of good pain when you go to bed, then good pain the next night (24 hrs later) will be clearly less-- say $7, and in another 24 hrs it will be $4. 

GOOD PAIN IS A SIGN THAT YOUR BODY IS GETTING STRONGER. YOU MUST WELCOME IT. DON'T TAKE Aspirin, Steroids, Tylenol, Motrin, or any other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug BECAUSE THESE DRUGS ACT TO SLOW HEALING! Good pain can be in muscle, tendons, ligaments, joint capsule. Welcome it, you WILL be stronger soon. 

10. Make your exercises varied and interesting--- so that you will keep it up. Walking, swimming, bicycling are all "low impact" exercise that you can do with others, or go to some new, interesting places."

Thank you, Dr. Jewett, for sharing your hard-earned knowledge and experience.

In related news, Otis Brawley, M.D. recently laid bare the ill health of our healthcare system in his book How We Do Harm: A Doctor Breaks Ranks About Being Sick in America(Kindle) (print)

"I blame patients, I blame doctors, I blame hospitals, I blame drug companies, I blame insurance companies. Our health care system is messed up because the system is designed to fail, and everybody is responsible for health care failing as it is now." Dr. Otis Brawley

This entry was drawn from Musings Report #17. Subscribers and contributors of $50 or more receive the Musings Report each weekend. Subscription links can be found below.

Entries and email may be sporadic this week due to other commitments.

---

Resistance, Revolution, Liberation: A Model for Positive Change (print $25)
(Kindle eBook $9.95)

Read the Introduction (2,600 words) and Chapter One (7,600 words) for free.

We are like passengers on the Titanic ten minutes after its fatal encounter with the iceberg: though our financial system seems unsinkable, its reliance on debt and financialization has already doomed it.We cannot know when the Central State and financial system will destabilize, we only know they will destabilize. We cannot know which of the State’s fast-rising debts and obligations will be renounced; we only know they will be renounced in one fashion or another.
The process of the unsustainable collapsing and a new, more sustainable model emerging is called revolution.Rather than being powerless, we hold the fundamental building blocks of power. We need neither permission nor political change to liberate ourselves. A powerless individual becomes powerful when he renounces the lies and complicity that enable the doomed Status Quo’s dominance.

Read more...

Health is Wealth Part 2: Expert Advice on Improving Fitness

In Part 2 of our "health is wealth" series, Dr. Don Jewett of global medical leader UCSF offers expert advice on improving fitness.

Dr. Don Jewett of the University of California-San Francisco (UCSF), a medical school/hospital that's on many "best in the world" lists, was kind enough to share some expert fitness advice in response to yesterday's entry Health Is Wealth: Prevention, Fitness and Strength.

"I'm a retired Orthopaedic Surgeon who was Director of Physical Therapy for 10 years at Univ. of Calif. Medical School, San Francisco. I was on the full-time faculty for 27 years. 

1. Your muscles have both "fast" fibers and "slow" fibers. Each is specialized for the named action, and the proportion changes, depending upon what your persistent activities are. Long Distance runners have almost all slow fibers. You can exercise the slow fibers with Tai Chi. 

2. However, you will not get stronger unless the muscle is "tired". Body builders and those with equipment go to the point of exhaustion. That works. But another way is to hold a given position such that the muscle trembles. Hold it that way as long as possible. In this way you can reach the "tired" state quickly. 

3. If you don't have weights, then save plastic gallon jugs that have a big handle (for most of your fingers). Fill them with the amount of water that you can lift and hold, say with the elbow bent to 90 degrees, with the muscle trembling. As you get stronger, increase the water. You may need different pairs with different amounts of water, for strengthening different positions and/or muscles. 

4. You can do push-ups, and hold the position. If you aren't strong enough to do a full push up, then make it easier: a) put your knees down on the floor, instead of your feet. b) lean against a wall. Again, you don't need to "do" push-ups, just get your arms bent at the point where your muscles tremble. 

5. Strengthen leg muscles by a partial squat to the point of trembling. If you aren't strong enough, then lean your back against a wall after putting a dining-room chair on either side of you. Put your feet away from the wall, and descend slowly to the point that your leg muscles tremble. As they tire, you may have to put your hands on the chairs to get up again. As you get stronger, move your feet closer to the wall and/or bend the knees more. 

6. Holding onto the back of a dining-room chair, then balance for some minutes on one foot. Move the leg your not standing on to different places around you. This helps keep the body feedback sensors "tuned up" (as you lose some when you age). Bend the leg you are standing on to the point where the leg muscles tremble. YOU CAN SAVE TIME BY DOING THIS EXERCISE WHILE WAITING IN LINE AT THE STORE--- holding on to the shopping cart! 

7. The abdomen strengthens by partial sit-ups, held part-way up--- it takes longer to make these muscles tremble--- they are all slow fibers. It may help to bend your knees a bit--- this flattens your back so that it doesn't hurt. 

8. The back can be strengthened by lying on your stomach and arching your back. If it is too easy when lying on a bed, then move your head and shoulders off the bed, into space. You can rest with your hands on the floor, and then exercise by lifting your hands and keeping your back straight. Again, the back muscles are completely slow fibers, and may not tremble. 

9. Know the difference between good pain and bad pain. Bad pain comes on immediately when you hurt yourself, or reach a certain position, and it feels "sharp". Good pain comes on gradually, often several hours after you exercise. It is "dull" and "aching". If you have $10 worth of good pain when you go to bed, then good pain the next night (24 hrs later) will be clearly less-- say $7, and in another 24 hrs it will be $4. 

GOOD PAIN IS A SIGN THAT YOUR BODY IS GETTING STRONGER. YOU MUST WELCOME IT. DON'T TAKE Aspirin, Steroids, Tylenol, Motrin, or any other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug BECAUSE THESE DRUGS ACT TO SLOW HEALING! Good pain can be in muscle, tendons, ligaments, joint capsule. Welcome it, you WILL be stronger soon. 

10. Make your exercises varied and interesting--- so that you will keep it up. Walking, swimming, bicycling are all "low impact" exercise that you can do with others, or go to some new, interesting places."

Thank you, Dr. Jewett, for sharing your hard-earned knowledge and experience.

In related news, Otis Brawley, M.D. recently laid bare the ill health of our healthcare system in his book How We Do Harm: A Doctor Breaks Ranks About Being Sick in America(Kindle) (print)

"I blame patients, I blame doctors, I blame hospitals, I blame drug companies, I blame insurance companies. Our health care system is messed up because the system is designed to fail, and everybody is responsible for health care failing as it is now." Dr. Otis Brawley

This entry was drawn from Musings Report #17. Subscribers and contributors of $50 or more receive the Musings Report each weekend. Subscription links can be found below.

Entries and email may be sporadic this week due to other commitments.

---

Resistance, Revolution, Liberation: A Model for Positive Change (print $25)
(Kindle eBook $9.95)

Read the Introduction (2,600 words) and Chapter One (7,600 words) for free.

We are like passengers on the Titanic ten minutes after its fatal encounter with the iceberg: though our financial system seems unsinkable, its reliance on debt and financialization has already doomed it.We cannot know when the Central State and financial system will destabilize, we only know they will destabilize. We cannot know which of the State’s fast-rising debts and obligations will be renounced; we only know they will be renounced in one fashion or another.
The process of the unsustainable collapsing and a new, more sustainable model emerging is called revolution.Rather than being powerless, we hold the fundamental building blocks of power. We need neither permission nor political change to liberate ourselves. A powerless individual becomes powerful when he renounces the lies and complicity that enable the doomed Status Quo’s dominance.

Read more...