Buster Stronghart

2012-01-23T21:25:00.001-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Final Moments

Sitting with you
Watching you, helpless;
Sleep is engulfing you
What more can I do, helpless?

Mum and you did everything for me
When I was helpless;
You always gave the right words
When everyone else gave the wrong.

Here with you, in fear for you
Whatever can I do for you.
You did so much for me
Now I'm helpless.

I really should have brought you cheer
Instead my gift for you is tears;
Al least your closed eyes cannot see
That I am helpless.

It used to be you tucking me up in bed
Now nurses tuck you up instead;
White hospital pillows beneath your head..
Try to sleep peacefully.

I hope that happy memories
Are filling your dreams
Then surely things won't be quite
As bad as they seem.

Still you are cut from me
By those locked eyelids.
Please wake and smile at me!

Let's pretend that things are
Just as they used to be,
Before that stealthy coma captured you
And your shuttered lids kept us parted.

Sylvia Lukeman Knut Hamsun's eulogy by Marie Hamsun, his wife.

The wanderer has reached

The end of his journey.

It wasn't always easy

To keep up with you, my love.

Sometimes you had to wait for me.

And sometimes

I had to wait for you.

At times we even lost track

Of each other on the way.

But somehow,

We always found each other again.

Good bye, my Knut.

And thank you

For keeping me company.

Marie Hamsun 1952

2012-01-23T18:17:00.001-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young.

Oscar Wilde

2012-01-21T21:58:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

The smart person accepts. The idiot insists.
Take whatever is thrown at you--and build on it. " Yes...and; not "No...but."

The idiot is bound by his pride. It must always be his way. This is also true of the person who is deceptive or doing things wrong, he always tries to justify himself.
A person who is bright is humble accepts what others tell him--criticism or ideas--and he works with them.

Father Arsenios of the Vatopaidi Monastery, Greece

2012-01-12T15:19:00.003-05:00

BusterSI’m beginning to think that maybe it’s not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you’re with them.
-->The Accidental Tourist, Anne Tylertronghart@Gmail.com

"Don't Bother with History it's All in the Past." Geoff Dyer,

"When I was very young I had very little patience; now that I am older I have none at all." D.H Lawrence

"It's not how much you love someone, it's who you become when you're with them." Anne Tyler, "Accidental Tourist."

2012-01-04T19:33:00.001-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A pineapple rolled off the pile
Seemingly dangerous to touch
The grocer's boy, white apron tied
Around his waist bent to grasp it

Shoppers gasped in horror
But with an experienced touch
The boy placed it back in place
And everyone smiled in relief.

mek Jan 3, 2012

2012-01-03T07:57:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Things That Make You Go Hmmm ... – December, 2012

This is a look back on 2012 written in December 2011.

By Grant Williams

"...it reflects a peculiarly American trend of burying-in-the-sand Ostrich Think, so prevalent among mainstream publications: An unwillingness – bordering on inability – to look at financial news in a cold light, and see what it actually means, rather than what we hope and pray it might be."

December 20, 2012

Well what a year that was.

It's hard to believe that, after a tumultuous year like 2011, the stakes could have been raised yet further in 2012, but raised they were.

So many momentous moves took place in the past twelve months it was hard to keep pace with everything. Fortunately, way back in December 2011, I didn't put together my own list of 'Black Swan Possibilities For 2012' that so many people choose to publish at the end of a year, so history will be unable to judge the success or failure of my own thoughts which I diligently kept to myself – after all, who in their right mind would want to listen to a list of potentially unexpected events that I predicted could possibly happen in 2012?

Predicting is, to use the vernacular, a mug's game and, if you ever find yourself being foolish enough to share your thoughts about what MAY happen with others, then take the advice of Marc Faber:

"...when you make a prediction, never make a prediction about timing"

Unfortunately for them, the Mayans were unaware of the thoughts of Dr. Faber - a situation that is probably even more unfortunate for Dr. Doom himself, as he would doubtless have been revered amongst a group of people not only fixated by the end of the world, but willing to put an actual date against it. For those of you concerned about it, that date is tomorrow, December 21st, 2012, hence my desire to write my review of the past year BEFORE the world ends. In case you're interested in reading it, I'd suggest you get a move on – just on the off-chance.....

We begin the review of 2012 with arguably the biggest story (though in this particular year, that is a tougher call than one would normally imagine) and that was the final implosion of Europe after decades of political process and, latterly, hundreds of billions of Euros thrown into a bottomless pit in an ill-fated attempt to placate Germany.

Ultimately, with the Germans having to finally capitulate and allow the ECB to backstop European sovereign debt in March after a series of disastrous bond auctions, it was clear that the position of Greece was one that couldn't continue the way it had.

Faced with yet more enforced austerity and a population on the verge of Civil War, Greece finally had no choice but to leave the Euro (shown happily to the door by her Northern neighbours), return to the Drachma and devalue its currency dramatically in order to address the crippling deficits it had accumulated in the futile attempt to be accepted into a 'club' it had no more than a geographical right to be part of from the beginning.

The subsequent rioting in Portugal, when a referendum on membership of the Eurozone was denied, and the consequential emergence from the shadows of the Socialist Party, whose cries of "quebrar as correntes" (break the chains) became a rallying cry that swept them into power and Portugal out of Europe, threw the continent into a tailspin and now looks like causing Spain to become the third country to walk away from a Unified Europe in protest at the draconian concessions being demanded by Germany in order that the Spanish government's debt receive the same backstop granted the more austere governments in Dublin and Rome.

The announcement by the Prime Minister that, like Greece before it, Spain's budget deficit was actually of a far greater magnitude than had been previously admitted was the final nail in Spain's coffin.

Much of the strife in 2012 was centred around The Middle East as the trouble in Iraq that began last year immediately after the withdrawal of US troops continued to escalate into a full-scale civil war and the simultaneous eruption of violence in Syria allied with the attempts by Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia to influence the outcome of the sectarian violence that ravaged Iraq combined to send the oil price spiking to $150 as attacks on pipelines in the south (widely assumed to be backed by the government in Tehran) became commonplace, disrupting supply and sending gas prices soaring across the globe. The unrest culminated in the ill-fated US attack on Iran's Bushehr reactor which caused another spike in oil prices to the previously-inconceivable level of $188. The resultant surge above $5.00 for gas prices in the US proved a step too far for the creaking US economy.

President-elect Hillary Clinton's narrow win over Michael Bloomberg in last month's US election put the seal on an extraordinary year in American politics after Barack Obama's shock decision in June not to seek re-election. Bloomberg's late emergence put paid to the hopes of Ron Paul, whose remarkable showing in the early Primaries and caucuses had made the chances of him finally moving into the White House (and bringing some much-needed fiscal sanity with him) look anything but remote.

Paul's surge in the opinion polls was as much a tribute to the sheer consistency of his message over several Presidential campaigns as it was to the vagaries of the other candidates in the race for the Republican nomination. Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry and even Michele Bachmann came and went, but ultimately, it looked like Paul and Mitt Romney would be left battling it out for the GOP nomination - until Bloomberg finally threw his hat into the ring.

Obama's withdrawal from the race had echoes of Lyndon B. Johnson's famous speech in 1968 during which he had cited the division in the American House:

"There is division in the American house now. There is divisiveness among us all tonight. And holding the trust that is mine, as President of all the people, I cannot disregard the peril to the progress of the American people... Believing this as I do, I have concluded that I should not permit the Presidency to become involved in the partisan divisions that are developing in this political year... Accordingly, I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President."

In an eerily similar scene, Obama's withdrawal address to a nation that had grown tired of the petty politicking by Speaker John Boehner's Republicans and Harry Reid's Democrats was as dramatic as it was unexpected - although the low-visibility of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the months leading up to the announcement that the former golden child of American politics was withdrawing had many on the Hill speculating aloud about what was perhaps going on behind the scenes.

Obama's star, so long in the ascendancy, had burned out amidst a drastically worsening employment landscape and the false dawn of a string of better-than-expected economic figures around the end of 2011. The unprecedented collapse in retail spending early in 2012, public weariness with the bending of statistical inputs to produce the desired results, the Congressional insider-trading scandal that just wouldn't die and the disastrous attack on Bushehr all combined to make Obama's position untenable in the end.

His standing down "for the good of the Democratic Party, so we can unite and finish the journey to a better America", whilst a shock, was enough to catapult Hillary (and, importantly, her husband Bill) Clinton to a nail-biting victory that ultimately snatched the White House from Bloomberg's seemingly unshakable grasp.

Meredith Whitney's late-2010 prediction about a Municipal bond meltdown in 2011 turned out to be a year too early, unfortunately for her, but it came true in spades in 2012 as, with the partial disintegration of the Eurozone, the realisation dawned on the world that the likes of California, Illinois and New Jersey were no better off than Greece, Portugal and Spain.

Whitney's original report "The Tragedy Of The Commons" attracted thousands of words of commentary when it was issued way back in 2010:

(Fortune): Whitney claims that the study is the most comprehensive, in-depth analysis of the states' murky patterns of spending, revenues and benefits programs ever assembled by the government, foundations, or another research firm.

What Whitney found reminds her of the poor disclosure and arcane accounting rules that hid the fragile condition of the banks and monoline insurers that she unmasked. "The states represent the new systemic risk to financial markets," says Whitney. "I see a lack of transparency and an abundance of complacency on the part of investors and politicians, just as we saw before the banks imploded."... "It's not that my clients requested it," says Whitney. "I was just so shocked by what I was seeing that I couldn't stop. Any long-term strategic plan needs to take account of the dangerous, mostly overlooked problems in the state finances."

In the report, Whitney rates the fifteen states on four criteria, their economy, fiscal health, housing, and taxes. For each category, she assigns a rating of one, two or three for best, neutral or negative. Only two states get positive overall ratings: Texas and Virginia. Eight are either negative, or rated neutral, with a negative bias. The rub is that those are typically the states with the biggest economies: California, Ohio, New Jersey, Michigan, and Illinois (all negative) and Florida, Georgia, and New York (neutral, negative bias).

But for every word of commentary on Whitney's prediction, there were a dozen (written with barely-disguised glee) devoted to pointing out just how wrong she had been (with Bloomberg conspicuously leading from the front):

*Meredith Whitney Loses Credibility as Muni Defaults Fall 60% - Bloomberg

*Meredith Whitney Doubles Down AND Cops Out On Her Muni Doom Prediction - Business Insider

*Whitney's Armageddon Belied by '11 Returns - Bloomberg

*Muni Bonds: A Disaster That Wasn't - WSJ

*The Worst Prediction of 2011 - Wall Street Daily

As all eyes moved from the crumbling Eurozone to the US, the Municipal Bond meltdown that Whitney foresaw in late 2010 became the next big thing.

The debt of California and Illinois in particular attracted the ire of investors as Illinois' terrible fundamentals were laid bare by, of all people, Former State Senator and Republican Cook County Board President candidate Roger Keats and his wife Tina late in 2011 as they left Illinois for the wide open spaces of Texas.

In a letter published in the Wilmette Beacon, they pulled no punches:

(Godfather Politics): As we leave Illinois for good, I wanted to say goodbye to my friends and wish all of you well. I am a lifelong son of the heartland and proud of it. After 60 years, I leave Illinois with a heavy heart. BUT enough is enough! The leaders of Illinois refuse to see we can't continue going in the direction we are and expect people who have options to stay here. I remember when Illinois had 25 congressmen. In 2012 we will have 18. Compared to the rest of the country we have lost 1/4th of our population. Don't blame the weather, because I love 4 seasons.

Illinois just sold still more bonds and our credit rating is so bad we pay higher interest rates than junk bonds! Junk Bonds!

Illinois is ranked

• 50th for fiscal policy

• 47th in job creation

• 1st in unfunded pension liabilities

• 2nd largest budget deficit

• 1st in failing schools.

• 1st in bonded indebtedness

• Highest sales tax in the nation

• Most judges indicted (Operations Greylord and Gambat)

• 5 of our last 9 elected governors have been indicted. That is more than the other 49 states added together!

Then add 32 Chicago Aldermen and (according to the Chicago Tribune) over 1000 state and municipal employees indicted. The corruption tax is a real cost of doing business. We are the butt of jokes for stand up comics.

We live in the most corrupt big city, in the most corrupt big county in the most corrupt state in America. I am sick and tired of subsidizing crooks. A day rarely passes without an article about the corruption and incompetence. Chicago even got caught rigging the tests to hire police and fire!

Our Crook County CORPORATE property tax system is intentionally corrupt. The Democrat State Chairman who is also the Speaker of the Illinois House (Spkr. Mike Madigan) and the most senior alderman in Chicago each make well over a million dollars a year putting the fix in for their clients' tax assessments...

The letter continued, but the point was made.

California was little better

(Sacramento Bee): California became the first state in the nation to completely eliminate transportation funding for public schools. Gov. Jerry Brown cut $248 million in state funding that helps put school buses on the road and reduced student attendance funding by $79.6 million. Those cuts take effect the second half of the academic year.

(Huffington Post): a myriad of California state employees are taking home big salaries. The five highest paid government employees all work in the prison system, according to LA Weekly, including the head parole psychiatrist for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation who made $838,706 -- the most of any public employee in the state.

The crown of highest paid public employee in California may be up for debate. A prison surgeon was actually the highest paid public employee, netting $777,423 in 2010 while not working because he was taking home two years of back pay while appealing a termination, according to the Los Angeles Times.

But prison employees aren't the only California state employees making the big bucks. Most of the full-time lifeguards in Newport Beach, California get more than $100,000 in pay, benefits and overtime.

Of course, as the US economy began to sink, the Fed - unlike the ECB - proved once again that it had no hang-ups about turning on the printing presses and so it was that we not only saw QE3 this year as the Fed announced their intention to buy an additional $800 billion of MBS in February after the strengthening dollar - floating proudly atop a sea of global monetization by the BoE, the SNB and (at that stage covertly) the ECB - threatened to put paid to the US' export-led recovery, but QE4 too as the Fed finally slashed the rates it paid on the $1.7 trillion in excess deposits held at the Federal reserve by banks in an attempt to finally get that capital deployed where it was needed most.

Unfortunately, the fears of a great many Fed-watchers were realised when the effects of QE3 and the sudden surge of money out of the Federal Reserve's digital vault and into the wild after QE4 (euphemistically called 'Reserve Realignment' by an increasingly-ridiculous Board of Governors) caused the kind of inflation spike that had been strangely absent since the Fed's balance sheet went into overdrive in 2008.

U.S. CPI hit 5.3% in October and, with regular gas settling comfortably above $5 as premium gas soared above $7 in the wake of the conflict across the Middle East, the inflation genie was finally - and conclusively - out of the bottle and the deflationists (who had looked like winning the day) were left licking their wounds.

Naturally, this showed up in the prices of the precious metals as gold made a mockery of its late-2011 swoon to charge through $2,400 as, not only the renewed moneyprinting by Central Banks the world over, but the Middle East conflict and, perhaps most importantly, the emergence of the MF Global 'whistleblower' who, amongst other things, had testified to the CME behind closed doors that there was a dramatic shortage of physical gold backing the paper claims being traded on the COMEX - confirming what many had been speculating about for years - and explained to bemused regulators that the collapse in gold prices from $1,900 to $1,600 had been pure manipulation designed to shake loose physical gold and move it into the hands of large investment banks whose short positions had begun to get out of hand as their regular suppliers - the world's central banks - had turned aggressive buyers in 2011.

Silver followed gold higher with the price reclaiming the $50 level and holding it despite the continued failure of the CFTC to publish the findings of their now three-year investigation into manipulation of the silver market which led to the sudden resignation of Bart Chilton in protest at what he claimed were 'unacceptable delays in the face of overwhelming evidence of consistent and coordinated manipulation'.

The death of Kim Jong-il in December of 2011 had led to fears of increased tensions on the Korean peninsula but instead, what the world (and South Korea) found themselves dealing with was unexpected engagement of an altogether friendlier nature as Kim's successor, his third son, Kim Jong-un, used the 100th anniversary in April of the birth of North Korea's Kim Il-sung to attempt to build bridges by moving towards reunification with the South. The potential cost of any reunification between South Korea's 48 million citizens and their 24 million 'cousins' across the demilitarized zone will dwarf that borne by West Germany back in 1989 when they tore down the Berlin Wall.

Goldman Sachs estimated in 2000 that it would cost W1.7 trillion (US$1=W1,188) to raise North Korea's labor productivity to 50 percent of the South's in 10 years after reunification, and W3.55 trillion to increase it to South Korea's level. It was based on an assumption that Korea would be reunified in 2005.

The North's per capita income of $1,000 is a world away from the $20,000 enjoyed in the South and bridging that gap will no doubt cost far in excess of the estimated €2 trillion cost of reuniting Germany between 1990 and 2009.

Whatever happens, Germany's economic conditions at the time of their reunification were far better than those 'enjoyed' in Korea. The East German population was far smaller in comparison to the differential between North and South Korea and the difference between the health of the two economies - while large - was nowhere near the gulf between the two Koreas. The process of reunification will take years - maybe decades - and along the way, the political implications of a unified Korea, under the influence of the West, right on China's borders is guaranteed to be a bumpy road indeed.

Lastly, but by no means least, the astonishing collapse of China's housing market after the cracks that began to show in 2011 was both swift and brutal in 2012.

The first signs of any real weakness came in November of 2011 as official data showed a modest 0.15% month-on-month decline in the 70 cities monitored by the National Statistics Bureau, but beneath the friendly figure, lay a more worrying truth:

(FT): ...the trend was clear with housing prices falling in 34 of the cities in October, twice as many as in September.

China has used a battery of policies to cool its real estate market, trying to rein in the runaway prices that had become a risk to the economy and a bitter frustration for ordinary citizens unable to afford property... On the surface, the official data suggest that China's property market is holding up reasonably well. In Shanghai, prices for new homes dipped 0.3 per cent from a month earlier. In Beijing, they were down just 0.1 per cent.

But the numbers published by the statistics bureau are notorious for understating the true volatility in the market. When prices were soaring in late 2009, the official data showed annual gains of 10 per cent when private companies estimated that prices in top-tier cities had doubled.

One key concern now for both policymakers and investors is whether the official data will fail to capture the full extent of the stress in the housing market as prices fall.

A series of reports in official media have said that many smaller real estate developers are on the brink of collapse, blocked from bank financing and unable to generate cash flow as transactions plummet. In Wenzhou, the weakest housing market in the country, one developer offered free BMWs in the hopes of enticing buyers.

To support the economy even as it heaps the pressure on real estate developers, the government has launched a programme to build 36m affordable homes over five years. But in a rare setback for such a high-profile policy target, the housing ministry has admitted that progress has been slow, raising doubts about whether the public investment in property construction can adequately compensate for the decline in private investment.

Shanghai's housing market had already fallen some 40% from its 2009 peak by the end of 2011 and this retrenchment continued into 2012 despite China's best efforts to loosen the grip of their earlier efforts to cool the raging property market.

In any other year, the long-anticipated bursting of the Australian housing bubble which finally happened following an epic decline in consumer spending in the first half of 2012 and the triumph of David Cameron's Conservative Party in a snap election called when the coalition with the Liberal Democrats broke apart in the wake of Cameron's decision to abandon Europe would have been major stories.

Cameron's landslide victory proved that the British had little desire to be part of the European experiment any longer and justified the decision he made in December of 2011 to follow a different path and, in its own way, set the stage for the continent-wide calls for referendums that threatened to engulf the whole of Europe in civil strife.

In Australia, the collapse of housing prices in Sydney and Melbourne - long-predicted by many - was swift and deep and, despite Glenn Stevens' rapid response through a series of rate cuts, the pain reverberated through an already creaking retail sector as overindebted households cut back their discretionary spending in historic fashion. The mining sector, for so long the backbone of Australia's prosperity, struggled to take up the slack in the second half of the year as China's problems intensified.

Lastly, the gradual creep higher in US interest rates after QE3 and QE4 resulted in several near-failed auctions looks as though it could signal the beginning of a fundamental shift that may potentially, in 2013, bring about the final unraveling of the global government bond ponzi scheme.

We shall see.

To get Grant's work you can link at http://ethreemail.com/subscribe?g=bdc736be

2012-01-03T07:53:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

"...Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment"

– BUDDHA

"The future is purchased by the present."

–Samuel Johnson

"When did the future switch from being a promise to a threat?"

– Chuck Pahalniuk

"Study the past, if you would divine the future."

–Confucius

"The future ain't what it used to be."

– Yogi Berra

2011-12-15T01:03:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com UP THE UNION !

Prescriptions for one month supply:



Androgel 1%	300 gm	$ 742.99
Simvastin 20 mg	30	$ 35.99
Zetia 10 mg	30	$ 144.99
Allopurinal 300 mg	45	$ 23.99
HCZT 25 mg	30	$ 12.99
Micardis 80 mg	30	$ 125.99

		$ 1,086.94

vagifem 10 mcg	8	70.99
Omeprazole 20 mg	30	64.99
Venaflxine 37.5 mg	30	120.99

		256.97

One month total for husband & wife		$ 1,343.91
	This family has a union plan that pays for prescriptions in full. What if they had to pay themselves?

2011-12-01T16:57:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Make a note;
The Ninth Day.

A film about commitment to belief. Knowing one's self. Honoring one's self.

Spirituality. Resistance, Cooperation, Collaboration.

2011-11-22T01:07:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A mystic is an hysteric who visited a cleric before a physician.

Umberto Eco, The Prague Cemetery

2011-11-19T14:41:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A personal note that may dismay sensitive people of a certain disposition. If you are one of these please do not read on.

Every time I complete a bowel movement I am grateful. Every time.

2011-11-18T19:38:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A friend from Columbia offers these words of wisdom.

“Las mujeres y las reglas se hicieron para ser violadas”

(Rules and women were meant to be violated.)

Disclaimer:

This is not necessarily the opinion of the editor.

2011-11-15T23:32:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

"Glory warms us in the grave."
Nonsense. That's a silly stave.
There's a better warmth than this
Found in cow-girl's kiss,
Though she be a thick-lipped flirt,
Though she reek of dung and dirt.
And a better warmth, I'm thinking,
Every man has found in drinking;
Lapping wine, the lucky dog,
Punch or even common grog;
Sprawling over filthly benches
With the vilest thieves and wenches
That have yet deserved a hanging;
Yes, but -- living and haranguing--
Worth more envy, every one,
Than fair Thetis' noble son.

Old Pelides spoke the truth:
Who's alive, than lords and ladies
And the greatest kings in Hades,
Praised in many a classic tome, or
All the heroes sung by Homer!
Richer is the poorest youth

2011-11-14T00:56:00.001-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Well, the pool heaters have been down for several weeks.

You see, about two months ago the new Board President proposed a new installation based on the specs provided by the engineer who had recently done a million dollar HVAC job for us. I stood up and asked (1) whether he had any pool experience, and (2) whether the heater company that he recommended had built any pool heaters in the past. Due to my careful observation of Rumpole of the Bailey, I knew that I should never ask questions unless I knew the answers—and I did know the answers – and they were “No” and “No.” The room went quiet while people thought about the implications.

I immediately mounted my high horse, named Self-Righteous, and demanded that no contract be let until we heard from some experienced pool companies. I pointed out that it would be irresponsible for the Board to take action without looking at alternatives, and a motion was made that passed 6-3. We would look for alternatives.

The process has taken about seven weeks during which time the heaters have continued to dysfunction, and the weather has cooled resulting in water that is ‘cool’ according to me, ‘cold’ according to a some, but 'ass-freezing' according to the vast majority of owners, most of whom have left their sense of humor up North.

At a meeting on Thursday, a few fingers were pointed at me, so I mounted my other high horse, Sanctimonious, and pointed out that I was interested only in the long term good of our condominium, and the others on the Board should try to keep that in mind, and resist their impulse to join the noisy mob. We had obtained several proposals on the table, we were ready to vote. The original proposal from the HVAC engineer was passed, 7-1 one Board member being absent.

Last night I received an email, from an owner, not on the Board, but very skinny, and thus more susceptible than most of us to the cold, who, apparently having had his crayons confiscated, writes in CAPITAL letters:

“NOW ITS TIME TO CONSIDER ALL THE SOUTHPOINT OWNERS WHO WILL SUFFER FROM A SEVEN WEEK DELAY OF THE INSTALLATION OF THE NEW POOL HEATERS THAT COULD HAVE BEEN AVOIDED THE SEASONAL OWNERS EXPECT TO USE A HEATED POOL REMEMBER THEY PAY THERE MAINTENANCE ALL YEAR LONG BECAUSE OF THE IGNORENCE OF ONE BOARD MEMBER NOT KNOWING A LICK ABOUT ANYTHING I’LL TELL THE SEASONAL OWNERS TO THANK HIM PERSONAL.” (SIC for all errors-- this is cut & paste.)

Even Maria, who needs to get in the pool for her special knee exercises has refrained from blaming me. (Diamond-like earrings will do wonders.)

2011-11-12T00:57:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

The N Word

So here we are in the year 2010, and I've been thinking of some things that have been missing. Shouldn't we already have flying cars? Better infrastructure? More telecommuting? We live in a digital age and we still can't get things right such as dog food free of fertilizers or E.coli in your burgers.

To make this conversation a bit more intellectual, I'd like to discuss nuclear power. Yes, the "n" word of 2010. Many countries are scared by the potential dangers of nuclear power. I'm not talking in the form of weapons, but more so the use of energy. Honestly, they should be given the hazards of towns melting down and radioactive waste that has to be stored.

Yet one particular country is in a unique bind - France. Since the oil shocks in the mid 1970's, the nation built a network of reactors (59 to be exact as of 2008) that now produce roughly four-fifths of the country's electricity. That is pretty amazing, but why? France has no oil, no coal and thus no choice! Secondly, a majority of their political leaders are trained scientists and brilliant in various disciplines. And last but not least, they choose nuclear because quite frankly the decision-making process has been centralized. So while they might be energy independent, is it perhaps at too high of a cost or risk? Are we overlooking that the byproduct is simply radioactive and where do we store it?

Source Stats: National Geographic, 2009

2011-11-12T00:50:00.000-05:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Flannery O'Conner

2011-11-05T09:29:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

2011-10-20T06:44:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Physicist Richard Feynman: “Here's to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes, the ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules and they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them... about the only thing you can't do is ignore them, because they change things, they push the human race forward; and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do."

2011-10-19T23:17:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

October 19, 2011

Yesterday, while at Barnes & Noble, I was horrified to see a young girl, maybe sixteen, very pretty, and very intelligent looking, pick up a thick copy of Ayn Rand’s works. I felt that I should warn her of the dangers of reading Ayn Rand at such a tender age. (You know, of course, that it is to the adolescent in each of us that Ayn Rand appeals, no matter how old we may be at the time of reading.) I knew that she should be alerted. It was my duty.

But I feared being accused of untoward behavior and so suppressed my need to save her from the shameful ignominy of a lifetime of conservatism, so I set aside my desire.

Later she and her family, two brothers and a sister, as well as their father sat near me in the coffee area of the store. I thought that as she was now with her father that it might be a better time to approach. I devised a plan: I would write a note to her father explaining the perilous situation into which his lovely daughter was placing herself.

So I composed a note to her Dad:

Dad:

Your daughter is at an impressionable age. She is about to read a book of writings by a powerful, persuasive author with extreme views. The writings will give your beautiful, idealistic daughter ideas that may not be rational, sensible or correct. She does not have the life experience to deal with these radical ideas.

If I cannot persuade you to tear that book from her hands, then, at the very least, insist that she read a counter-balance to Ayn Rand. Suggest that she read a biography of an American Hero, E.V. Debs. There are several, but in particular, for your young daughter, I would recommend “Adversary in the House,” by Irving Stone.

If your daughter reads both books, she will better be able to make up her mind by comparing the life value of pure selfishness as compared to a life filled with compassion for others.

I signed my name and passed him the note.

The incident did not end well. The father read my note, and handed it back to me. He had nothing to say to me. No words were exchanged.

Later, I saw the family pile into a large black BMW 745L.

mek

2011-10-18T02:35:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

When two people fight the third one wins.

Edgar Weinstock -- Brooklyn Edgar.

2011-10-16T22:51:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Thursday, November 27, 2003

Martinis

I like to have a martini,
Two at the very most.
After three I'm under the table,
After four I'm under my host.
..........Dorothy Parker

Martinis son como las tetas de una mujer
Una no es bastante
Tres son demasiado
Pero dos? -- es sufficiente!
..............Jose Espino, my friend and employee

2011-10-16T22:49:00.002-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

ResumÃ©

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

Dorothy Parker

2011-10-15T11:20:00.002-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Knut Hamsun was a Nobel Prize winning Norwegian Novelist whose major books were written from about 1888 thru the thirties and forties. He had a tempestuous relationship with his wife that included lengthy separations and infidelities, but at the end they returned to each other. He lived until 1952; but before and during the war years, strangely, he and his wife favored what they incorrectly believed was Hitler’s plan for a pan-Europe that would include Norway as an independent country. Hamsun, was old and deaf, and read nothing but the Nazi approved papers in Norway.

After the war when he was shown film of what the Nazis had done he renounced the Nazis, but not Hitler, declared that anti-Semitism was morally wrong. He insisted that he should be tried for his wartime activities. During the war he did try to save resistance fighters who had been captured from torture and death but was always rebuffed. These failures did not dissuade his support for Hitler. He was asked by Hitler to meet at the Wolf’s Lair in Austria. At that meeting, at which he was old, exhausted and befuddled, he repeatedly brought up the question of torture and execution and was thrown out by Hitler. He returned to Norway but remained silent. He wrote the only obituary of Hitler written in Norway.

Knut Hamsun's eulogy by Marie Hamsun, his wife.

The wanderer has reached

The end of his journey.

It wasn't always easy

To keep up with you, my love.

Sometimes you had to wait for me.

And sometimes

I had to wait for you.

At times we even lost track

Of each other on the way.

But somehow,

We always found each other again.

Good bye, my Knut.

And thank you

For keeping me company.

Marie Hamsun 1952

2011-10-13T00:04:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com
Something about the historical context of a school birching drawing that I just looked at reminded me of a notion that’s always puzzled me. In the real world (I’m not talking about our kinky fun times now) why do authoritarians talk about imposing “discipline” on people when the trait you actually get from consistent punishment for infractions of rule sets is “compliance” or “obedience”? Discipline, rightly understood, is a virtue of self-control and individual initiative; by contrast, obedience is a survival skill of the powerless.

(The difference: discipline is useful for accomplishing a person’s own goals, while obedience is entirely about what other people want.)

When the Victorians (to pick just one bad example) claimed that school punishment or military floggings instilled discipline, were they knowingly telling a euphemistic lie to pretty up the fact that they were just beating obedience into powerless people? Or were they actually confused about what they were doing and accomplishing?

2011-10-02T22:39:00.003-04:00

Written by a friend, Arnold Lewis -- He plans his own Blog --Leading from the Bottom---

For the Birds

You know, some females are really demanding. They seem to lack patience, want what they want right now! Some even get pushy, shoving another out of the way. What is more, instead of wanting equality, they want dominance, total control even in public places, not hidden away somewhere with whips and slings.

I have seen unbridled pain inflicted over something very simple, that quite probably, had they been more pleasant, they might have had with no such seeming difficulty required.

And, when two such females of two different couples interact, either, or both, may push spouses or even the other's spouse or partner. How or why any of this group would have another as a spouse is beyond me. Unless there seems no escape. Maybe they are partners awaiting the proper moment to be spouses, but I’d think that mastering one’s own behavior might lead to better, or possibly far worse, decisions and involvements stemming from spousing.

Is it possible that with recognizing no escape, the males simply back down in order to avoid more and more overt pushiness?

What is even more concerning is that these spurts of behavior arrive seemingly irrationally. Sometimes, one might find some reasoning, but even that takes a major stretch of imagination, since simple observation shows that with kindness, all may be satisfied, may find that sharing works just fine. It truly is a strange phenomenon, and not unheard of in any circle or in any level of society.

It seems so uncalled for and surprising, especially when the females are all decked out in their beautiful finery. The more bitchy seems to be the one in gray, and why wearing that color might indicate anything untoward, I have no idea. Her cheeks are more lightly rouged than her partner in misbehavior. Her hat is similar in color and design. She waddles the same way, too.

The one in white may be learning bad habits. Maybe this gray lady is teaching her tricks that alone she might have not learned. Perhaps the gray lady has even shoved the beautiful lady dressed in white and lovely shade of yellow just once too often, and the latter may have developed a short fuse after having been abused in such an unseemly manner.

What makes the entire situation even more pathetic is that they live in the same house, share the same food, drink from the same wells. Perhaps this sharing issue is the root cause. With delivery of food and water, for instance, they stand quietly to observe without any concern. And, they eat and drink with no problems, they even at this time seem to share easily, the lady in grey walking behind and entering the stage with no concern and no concern shown. What happens next? It is impossibly to understand why she’d get so upset. And, even more impossible to understand why Ms. Grey’s behavior seems to set of the beautiful young lady in white and gold.

Perhaps, this is an age issue. But, it would seem that age will exacerbate the problems rather than resolve them. What appears even more influential is that these ladies’ partners do not seem to be overly insulted. They react with not much concern, give room politely, share with little seeming selfishness and make sure the lovely ladies have what they want.

I believe they are spoiling them. Or, perhaps there is a devious motive from the males, thinking about teenage affairs or long-term involvements. If so, then it becomes difficult to decide which approach to take, which to condemn or acknowledge as good.

What is happening, for sure, is that the society has changed somewhat within that house. And so, we’ll observe them as they observe us as we go about our days.

These little birdies offer much more than I ever expected. They are becoming a part of me as they had already become a part of the other adults living here. I am slow on the uptake, sometimes.

Arnold

2011-10-01T11:21:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

“I was no clerk nor had any capacity to be one. The only place I ever found in my life to put a piece of paper as to find it again was either a side coat-pocket or the hands of a clerk or secretary more careful than myself.” U.S. Grant in his memoirs—which are far more interesting than anyone might guess.

When I was in business, there was one worker, a woman in the Rx department who was a technician, but who was known as “finder of lost articles.” She was a Seventh Day Adventist from Tegucigalpa, very dark, and ravishingly beautiful. Although she was sincerely religious she wore very tight jeans, the kind that take an assistant to help you get them on, and very tight sweaters or open blouses. She constantly attempted to get me to join or at least attend a service at her church. For a time, I wondered whether the Seventh Day Adventists accepted this kind of dress, but she was with me so many years that I forgot about the disconnect.

In any event, when something was lost or unable to be found, say an invoice from the previous year’s Chanel Christmas order, the bookkeeper would call Ana B. F. to come to the office and help her find it.

PRESTO! It would be found in no time. She had mysterious and primitive powers, but carried with her a quality of innocence. These peculiar powers are similar to those of the woman who lives with me.

.mek

2011-09-29T22:52:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Important Life Advice -- unless you think you are the Conductor

2011-09-24T00:05:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-09-24T00:00:00.000-04:00

ca.1972 with Max

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-09-23T23:57:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Maria about 1972

2011-09-11T08:25:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-09-04T11:29:00.001-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

A letter from a friend, September 2011

Leading from the Bottom Up! Arnold Lewis

For the Birds
We have newadditions to the family, two cockatoos, golden white with really yellow plumes.They are young, and when they arrived were naturally scared and stayed closetogether on one of their perches. They didn’t eat, and watched every move byother member of the household.

The first day, Ney, a black Pug, went over to see them. He wasinterested, maybe a bit jealous. He put his hands on the trunk lid wherethey were living, and looked, interested. He figured out, possibly, thatthey were in a cage and posed no additional threat to his reign.

We, or I, kept, our cat, Sir Thomas, away, not because I was afraid of what he’d do,but I didn’t want to stress the birds. After a few days, he went to look,with moderate supervision. One of the newbies squawked before he got close, andhe went tearing back to his rooms. So much for bravery or protecting therealm. Both Ney and Thomas have adjusted to sharing this kingdom,somewhat at least, with a wary eye from Thomas. But, any change is suspectto many of us.

Ney now ignores them. Tommy is only moderately interested and preferswatching the outside birds as they land in the apartment window boxes. Hebecomes more interested in the inside birds after they are covered for thenight. He doesn’t like things hidden. Closed doors and coverings oftenprevent our knowing what we need to know.

After a couple of days, the new guys – really a guy and gal – areadjusted, enjoy being on the balcony swinging and watching the city from theirlittle protected world. They are eating well, and aren’t bothered by thehand bringing their food. They have learned that the bowls of food aregood things and eat while keeping an eye on any major movement by the othersliving here. Or, they ignore any movements because they were happilyeating breakfast or snacking during the day.

They now choose what to eat from the bowls containing different foods. They share with each other. One is more hesitant, the other a bitbraver, ignoring the people around. They have little personalities, and arelearning quickly. They are much smarter than I thought birds to be. How stupid of me. Instinct perhaps, but I see some thoughtprocesses, from their perspective, of course. Why would they choose fromwhich bowl to eat? Why do they pull on the green seed plants to get theseeds that are inside? There are other choices, and choices is the rightword. Why do they now not fear the bowls being put into the cage and thengo to those bowls, seemingly happily, one bowl or another, not in given order,but as they seem to want things from each bowl containing different foods? They are safe and can do other things like play with their toys. Yes, of course, they have some built in basics from which they choose. But, don’t we all? And, don’t we all do better when we feel secure?

I look at the animals in our world of apartments and airplanes and see themchoose to do things that have purpose to them– but they choose to do what isbest at the time. I can’t figure out how far ahead they plan, but they doplan ahead. Tommy, in particular, as he’ll do some fake moves andpatiently wait – sometimes a long time, until he can accomplish his goals. I suppose there is some applicable truth for all of us in theiractions. Long-term vision vs. short-term gain, for instance.

How people cannot gain insight into other creatures living with us I have noidea – except they either do not watch and think, or they do not think at all.

Sometimes human arrogance toward the rest of the world is unbelievable. Itseems very sad to me that this arrogance is so common among most so-calledleaders and elected officials. However, we get whom we elect and hire. And, the elected are hired for the job of helping the majority of thepeople hiring, aren’t they? I think we need to improve the educationsystems by teaching people actually to think instead of regurgitating inanitiesand unproven belief systems based upon other belief systems. I thinkbeliefs ought to be validated by observation and personal proof rather thanbeing based upon ignorance foisted upon us by those with particular interestsof serving themselves first. I think we ought to teach thinking. Itseems so rare to me.

Arnold Lewis

2011-09-03T02:10:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-08-31T23:28:00.002-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

"Can you not believe without proof?"

Marlene Dietrich as Shanghai Lil

2011-08-28T00:10:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-08-28T00:00:00.002-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begin upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his ruin from some murder or other that perhaps he thought little of at the time.

Source: Thomas De Quincey, "Second Paper on Murder

2011-08-27T00:40:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-08-21T20:31:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

The best portion of a good man's life is his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.

William Wordsworth

2011-08-17T22:46:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-08-17T22:22:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

2011-08-15T07:41:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

"I think how little we can hold in mind, how everything is constantly lapsing into oblivion, with every extinguished life, how the world is, as it were, draining itself, in that the history of countless places and objects which themselves have no power of memory is never heard, never described or passed on."

W.G.Sebald

2011-08-13T07:00:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

There are two sides to every question until you take one.

2011-07-04T13:04:00.003-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Ernest Hemingway:

"An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with fools."

"To drink is nothing," Hemingway proclaimed in "For Whom the Bell Tolls." "It is to be drunk that is important."

F. Scott Fitzgerald said, "First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you."

Alcohol takes years off your life, but "it "always makes you happy. Hemingway.

Martinis will make you "feel civilized," and will make the people you hate seem tolerable.

Drinking means lying to your sugar mama, but if you feel guilty for deceiving a female -- or if you feel guilty for anything -- you are definitely not drinking enough.

"To drink is nothing," "It is to be drunk that is important."

Whining is for women; whiskey is for men.

2011-07-01T17:19:00.000-04:00

BusterStronghart@Gmail.com

Referring to radicals and Marxists, Terry Eagleton says:

Their task is to get to the point where they are no longer needed.

from: Why Marx was Right.