The Iron Lady passes away

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

Hi,

Margareth Thatcher - RIP

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22067155

For those with a hankering now for a Falkland War game, this one is
generally considered the best strategic/operational level treatment of
the war :

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/35614/where-there-is-discord-war-in-the-south-atlantic

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <de168062-8a39-4ba9-b811-e565a0202a98
@a14g2000vbm.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> Margareth Thatcher - RIP
>
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22067155

The USA never had a better friend. Godspeed, Mrs. Thatcher.

--
Giftzwerg
***
"What makes an assault weapon an assault weapon? Randomly selected
cosmetic features that look scary to ignorant liberals, but have nothing
material to do with the function of the firearm. If liberals had more
sense, they would be embarrassed."
- Senator Ted Cruz

[smr]

In article <MPG.2bccb69cf...@news-east.giganews.com>,
giftzw...@hotmail.com says...

>
> In article <de168062-8a39-4ba9-b811-e565a0202a98
> @a14g2000vbm.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
>
> > Margareth Thatcher - RIP
> >
> > http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22067155
>
> The USA never had a better friend. Godspeed, Mrs. Thatcher.

Have fun burning in hell with Ronnie, bitch.

--
smr

[Holdit]

In article <MPG.2bccb93ab...@news.ftupet.com>,
m...@shawnritchie.com says...

I bet Satan's handing out the ear plugs...

As someone who lived under her reign, I won't be mourning her passing.
Some of what she did was good, and needed doing, but she went much too
far.

Holdit



--
--
"I have described nothing but what I saw myself, or learned from others
of whom I made the most careful and particular enquiry."
- Thucydides (Peloponnesian War)

"I've just jazzed mine up a little."
- Spike Milligan (World War 2)

[dougb]

I suppose that's one pit she couldn't close...

Doug

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 9 apr, 02:46, dougb <douglasbrun...@rogers.com> wrote:

> I suppose that's one pit she couldn't close...

Tsssk - all this negativity towards the author of my favourite quote,
a quote which always manages to sting my intended targets into a
frenzy

"I want my money back"

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <99d118ef-bc67-4473-a191-
36d397...@h1g2000vbx.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com
says...

> > I suppose that's one pit she couldn't close...
>
> Tsssk - all this negativity towards the author of my favourite quote,
> a quote which always manages to sting my intended targets into a
> frenzy
>
> "I want my money back"

"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other
people's money."

"No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he'd only had good
intentions; he had money as well."

And I found this jewel:

"Consensus: 'The process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values,
and policies in search of something in which no one believes, but to
which no one objects; the process of avoiding the very issues that have
to be solved, merely because you cannot get agreement on the way ahead.
What great cause would have been fought and won under the banner: I
stand for consensus'?

[Frank E]

Speaking of Ronnie, watching the news last night it occured to me that
now, nobody is bitching about Star Wars and (hopefully) the ability to
shoot down a NK missile. Add that one to the list of things he was
right about.

Rgds, Frank

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 9 apr, 14:13, Frank E <fakeaddr...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 8 Apr 2013 12:24:14 -0500, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:

> >In article <MPG.2bccb69cfe75d281989...@news-east.giganews.com>,
> >giftzwerg...@hotmail.com says...
>
> >> In article <de168062-8a39-4ba9-b811-e565a0202a98
> >> @a14g2000vbm.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...

>
> >> > Margareth Thatcher - RIP
>
> >> >http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22067155
>
> >> The USA never had a better friend.  Godspeed, Mrs. Thatcher.
>
> >Have fun burning in hell with Ronnie, bitch.
>
> Speaking of Ronnie, watching the news last night it occured to me that
> now, nobody is bitching about Star Wars and (hopefully) the ability to
> shoot down a NK missile. Add that one to the list of things he was
> right about.

It's funny how one remembers specific things from that period. Among
mine is a 1985 news item about a ticker tape parade held for Vietnam
veterans. More than anything else this signaled to me that the US was
back and Reagan was the representation of it.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

Our current NMD platform does not derive from Reagan's SDI program. The
latter was supposed to defend us, based in space, from an all-out Soviet
over the artic missile surge. Ie, a threat that really just doesn't exist
anymore.

Our current missile defense is all ground and sea-based and started with
programs begun in the 90's, post-Reagan.

Star Wars was and remains a colossal, useless white elephant.

--
smr

[Frank E]

I disagree. It got people thinking about (and testing) how to shoot
down ballistic missiles. The fact that what you ended up with is
different from the original proposals isn't that big of a deal as long
as it does the same job.

It happens to me all the time that a final design doesn't look
anything like what I originally envisioned. As long as it gets the job
done, it doesn't matter much and there's always a direct path between
the original proposal and the final product.

Rgds, Frank

[Giftzwerg]

In article <6U1kUTCFZQoYqO...@4ax.com>,
fakea...@hotmail.com says...

> >Star Wars was and remains a colossal, useless white elephant.
>
> I disagree. It got people thinking about (and testing) how to shoot
> down ballistic missiles. The fact that what you ended up with is
> different from the original proposals isn't that big of a deal as long
> as it does the same job.

The real difference between the original SDI and the scaled-down
programs during the 90s (and continuing today) is, uh, *scale*. The
threat in the 1980s was the USSR firing 15,000 nuclear weapons at us.
The threat today is some NoKo looney-tune firing *one* missile in the
general direction of Hawaii.

But you're exactly right; the primary benefit of SDI was to toss out the
silly notion that ballistic missile defense was Magically Impossible,
and start exploring the possibilities.

[Giftzwerg]

In article <2f22aebd-674b-406b-b569-e7732f2d20a4
@y2g2000vbe.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> > Speaking of Ronnie, watching the news last night it occured to me that
> > now, nobody is bitching about Star Wars and (hopefully) the ability to
> > shoot down a NK missile. Add that one to the list of things he was
> > right about.
>
> It's funny how one remembers specific things from that period. Among
> mine is a 1985 news item about a ticker tape parade held for Vietnam
> veterans. More than anything else this signaled to me that the US was
> back and Reagan was the representation of it.

Which is why the usual asshats hate him - even today - with such teeth-
grinding fury.

[Vincenzo Beretta]

> "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
> of other people's money."

So, according to Mrs. Thatcher, the American financial system in 2008 was socialist. Interesting.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton IIRC to ensure
that people with low means of income could become house-owners too.
Banks didn't like that at all, and the end result was the real-estate
bubble.

The above was already explained to you at length, so what is
interesting here is that you fail to see the cause as a typical case
of failed social engineering i.e. socialist measures, and somehow
attribute it to wild capitalism.

What is also funny here is that the ultimate downfall of Thatcher was
also real-estate related - the infamous poll-tax - she should have
known better.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Frank E]

On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 00:21:05 -0700 (PDT), "eddys...@hotmail.com"
<eddys...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On 11 apr, 07:01, Vincenzo Beretta <reck...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> > "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
>> > of other people's money."
>>
>> So, according to Mrs. Thatcher, the American financial system in 2008 was socialist. Interesting.
>
>It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton IIRC to ensure
>that people with low means of income could become house-owners too.
>Banks didn't like that at all, and the end result was the real-estate
>bubble.

Banks didn't like that at all?

Lets all have a moment of silence for those poor bankers, forced by
the socialists to make gimmick loans to people who couldn't afford it
and then flip those loans into derivatives that nobody understood so
they wouldn't get caught holding the paper.

>The above was already explained to you at length, so what is
>interesting here is that you fail to see the cause as a typical case
>of failed social engineering i.e. socialist measures, and somehow
>attribute it to wild capitalism.

With the laws in place before the Clinton era, that whole mess
couldn't have happened. Damn those socialists for deregulating the
banking industry!

Rgds, Frank

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 13:31, Frank E <fakeaddr...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 00:21:05 -0700 (PDT), "eddyster...@hotmail.com"

>
> <eddyster...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >On 11 apr, 07:01, Vincenzo Beretta <reck...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >> > "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
> >> > of other people's money."
>
> >> So, according to Mrs. Thatcher, the American financial system in 2008 was socialist. Interesting.
>
> >It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton IIRC to ensure
> >that people with low means of income could become house-owners too.
> >Banks didn't like that at all, and the end result was the real-estate
> >bubble.
>
> Banks didn't like that at all?

No they don't. There is a reason banks ask for collateral if you want
a loan. Here the collateral was the government creating a mechanism
whereby banks could hedge themselves against the risks, the carrot
that came with the stick that *required* banks to give home loans to
persons with bad credit and low income. Social engineering.

That last one was a Carter thing, the Community Reinvestment Act
(CRA) . Under Clinton, the CRA was expanded and he set targets for low-
income home ownership at the Department of Housing and Urban
Development, and at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well.

In other words : banks were *forced* by the federal government to
provide bad loans to unqualified people – plain and simple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Mac

"The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC), known as Freddie
Mac, is a public government-sponsored enterprise (GSE), headquartered
in the Tyson's Corner CDP in unincorporated Fairfax County, Virginia.
[2][3]

The FHLMC was created in 1970 to expand the secondary market for
mortgages in the US. Along with other GSEs, Freddie Mac buys mortgages
on the secondary market, pools them, and sells them as a mortgage-
backed security to investors on the open market. This secondary
mortgage market increases the supply of money available for mortgage
lending and increases the money available for new home purchases. "

As to who's responsible :

"President Bush recommended a significant regulatory overhaul of the
housing finance industry in 2003, but many Democrats opposed his plan,
fearing that tighter regulation could greatly reduce financing for low-
income housing, both low- and high-risk."

Translated : their voters wouldn't be able to get home-loans anymore,
as they shouldn't have in the first place and wouldn't get in an
unregulated market.

So, yeah, socialist measures fubar'ed things up again - what's new ?

But I guess it's easier to blame Bush and Big Evil Banks

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 13:52, "eddyster...@hotmail.com"

> So, yeah, socialist measures fubar'ed things up again - what's new ?

I want to add a few words here : I am in favour of social engineering
where the measures taken level the playing field, the entry level, not
the outcome level.

What I mean is that in my opinion things like education should be
free, in other words : I'm in favour of giving everyone an equal
chance to start out and make something of his life. Why ? Because
*everyone* in society benefits in the long run if talent gets a
chance. Input/starting equality.

But what pisses me off is that particular parties are striving for
outcome equality whereby it doesn't matter anymore how hard you
studied and worked because if you do well, you're going to get taxed
heavily, with the money going to the lazy.

I know this may sound harsh but providing cheap mortgage loans for the
poor is a Bad Idea as it removes part of their incentive to do
something about their situation themselves. And as we've now
experienced : social engineering that goes against the grain of how
societies really work will come back and bite us in the lower behind
in the long run.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Frank E]

On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 04:52:37 -0700 (PDT), "eddys...@hotmail.com"
<eddys...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On 11 apr, 13:31, Frank E <fakeaddr...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 00:21:05 -0700 (PDT), "eddyster...@hotmail.com"
>>
>> <eddyster...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> >On 11 apr, 07:01, Vincenzo Beretta <reck...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> >> > "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
>> >> > of other people's money."
>>
>> >> So, according to Mrs. Thatcher, the American financial system in 2008 was socialist. Interesting.
>>
>> >It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton IIRC to ensure
>> >that people with low means of income could become house-owners too.
>> >Banks didn't like that at all, and the end result was the real-estate
>> >bubble.
>>
>> Banks didn't like that at all?
>
>No they don't. There is a reason banks ask for collateral if you want
>a loan. Here the collateral was the government creating a mechanism
>whereby banks could hedge themselves against the risks, the carrot
>that came with the stick that *required* banks to give home loans to
>persons with bad credit and low income. Social engineering.

It was free money for the banks, do you really think they were
fighting against it at the time, pushed into it by the US government?

The reason that Clinton Era 'reforms' managed to pass so quitely was
because everyone got what they wanted. The liberals got easier housing
loans for poor people, the banks got rid of regulations that they'd
been trying to get out of since the great depression.

>In other words : banks were *forced* by the federal government to
>provide bad loans to unqualified people – plain and simple.
>
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Mac
>
>"The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC), known as Freddie
>Mac, is a public government-sponsored enterprise (GSE), headquartered
>in the Tyson's Corner CDP in unincorporated Fairfax County, Virginia.
>[2][3]
>
>The FHLMC was created in 1970 to expand the secondary market for
>mortgages in the US. Along with other GSEs, Freddie Mac buys mortgages
>on the secondary market, pools them, and sells them as a mortgage-
>backed security to investors on the open market. This secondary
>mortgage market increases the supply of money available for mortgage
>lending and increases the money available for new home purchases. "
>
>As to who's responsible :
>
>"President Bush recommended a significant regulatory overhaul of the
>housing finance industry in 2003, but many Democrats opposed his plan,
>fearing that tighter regulation could greatly reduce financing for low-
>income housing, both low- and high-risk."
>
>Translated : their voters wouldn't be able to get home-loans anymore,
>as they shouldn't have in the first place and wouldn't get in an
>unregulated market.
>
>So, yeah, socialist measures fubar'ed things up again - what's new ?
>
>But I guess it's easier to blame Bush and Big Evil Banks
>

Here's the problem with that theory. The housing bubble wasn't caused
because we gave loans to poor people. Was that part of it? Sure, but
it was a minor part. If you were right you'd only see the bubble
affecting low cost housing.

Back then, I oculd have easily gotten a house loan for $500k even
though there's no way I could have made payments on that. The bank
offers me a loan that's 'interest only' for 5 years and after 5 years
I can sell it for 30-40% more than I paid for it and make a killing.
That's the pitch I was getting from the banks at the time and it had
nothing ot do with government loans.

The flaw is obvious, what happens if housing prices don't go up by 6+%
a year but most people are bad at math and never ask that question.
And the banks didn't care because they only had to hold on to that
loan for a couple of days.

Rgds, Frank

[Giftzwerg]

In article <cba6addf-4a20-436e-889e-79836be77b80
@a34g2000vbt.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> But I guess it's easier to blame Bush and Big Evil Banks

The other component in the disaster was that homebuyers themselves - mad
with EZ credit which could be obtained virtually by whim - bid up the
price of houses to astronomical levels ... a classic bubble.

Ultimately, every mortgage is secured by the property itself; if the
holder defaults, the bank sells the property. But the skyrocketing of
home "values" led to situations where banks were issuing %500,000
mortgages on a home whose real value was about $200,000.

Where did the EZ credit come from? Yep.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 15:34, Frank E <fakeaddr...@hotmail.com> wrote:

> It was free money for the banks, do you really think they were
> fighting against it at the time, pushed into it by the US government?
>
> The reason that Clinton Era 'reforms' managed to pass so quitely was
> because everyone got what they wanted. The liberals got easier housing
> loans for poor people, the banks got rid of regulations that they'd
> been trying to get out of since the great depression.

I'm not seeing where you write where this was beneficial for the likes
of me or the economy in general so I'm happy you agree it was a Bad
Idea to start with.

I think it was a politically motivated deal, and the banks got bribed/
cajoled into playing along.

I guess it all depends on who you think was the driving force behind
it all. I've worked for a bank for close to a decade and you won't
often hear me defending their practices but I've seen enough of these
stinkin' social engineering efforts in my life to put the blame
squarely where it belongs in this particular case : Carter and Clinton
- the buck stops there.

> Here's the problem with that theory. The housing bubble wasn't caused
> because we gave loans to poor people. Was that part of it? Sure, but
> it was a minor part. If you were right you'd only see the bubble
> affecting low cost housing.

Once you create a system where the banks can minimize the risks they
take on a mortgage - any kind of mortgage - you're setting yourself up
for the inevitable.

> The flaw is obvious, what happens if housing prices don't go up by 6+%
> a year but most people are bad at math and never ask that question.
> And the banks didn't care because they only had to hold on to that
> loan for a couple of days.

.... because ? Check again who created those 2nd line mortgage
underwriters and who wanted to reform it, but couldn't because the
Democrats objected as it would hit their electorate hard.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <87c20ff1-ec56-465b-9000-e7df8e1622e0
@r7g2000vbw.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton IIRC to ensure
> that people with low means of income could become house-owners too.
> Banks didn't like that at all, and the end result was the real-estate
> bubble.

Are you retarded? Banks fucking tripped over themselves to abuse the
legislation to give loans to anyone they could, often without any
verification of income, robo-signing away, in order to fatten their
balance sheets and, with the full connivance of their owned assets in the
ratings agencies, bundled all of what they goddamned well knew were
horrible loans with a bunch of other toxic crap and got it labeled AAA so
they could make their money pushing those mortgages around, not off of
being repaid for them.

The only thing the legislation was designed to prevent was redlining; ie,
denying a loan to a black guy making 40k/yr. while giving a loan to a
white guy making 40k/yr and having the same credit rating as the black
guy. The legislation specifically states that the only criteria for
granting a loan a bank should adhere to is the ability to pay it back.

There's nothing in the legislation that would require a bank to give a
$500k mortgage to a McDonald's manager making $35k/yr, which certainly has
happened.

Banks fucking LOVED this legislation, particularly as it was bundled when
reinforced in '99 with the repeal of Glass-Steagal, which now allowed
banks to fully exploit their granting of these "we know goddamned well
this mortgage ain't getting paid back" toxic loans via the investment arms
of themselves that they were no longer required to keep asset separation
with.

--
smr

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 15:54, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> Are you retarded?

I dunno - I didn't lose a dime in the housing bubble crash, how about
you ?

> Banks fucking tripped over themselves to abuse the
> legislation to give loans to anyone they could, often without any
> verification of income,

... because ? I'll answer it for you : because the Federal Government
created a system, institutions for safe underwriting of mortgage loans
to people a bank would *never* have loaned money to without said
institutions.

> Banks fucking LOVED this legislation, particularly as it was bundled when
> reinforced in '99 with the repeal of Glass-Steagal,

http://www.american.com/archive/2012/august/five-myths-about-glass-steagall

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Frank E]

On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 09:44:22 -0400, Giftzwerg
<giftzw...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>In article <cba6addf-4a20-436e-889e-79836be77b80
>@a34g2000vbt.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
>
>> But I guess it's easier to blame Bush and Big Evil Banks
>
>The other component in the disaster was that homebuyers themselves - mad
>with EZ credit which could be obtained virtually by whim - bid up the
>price of houses to astronomical levels ... a classic bubble.
>
>Ultimately, every mortgage is secured by the property itself; if the
>holder defaults, the bank sells the property. But the skyrocketing of
>home "values" led to situations where banks were issuing %500,000
>mortgages on a home whose real value was about $200,000.
>

60 minutes had an interview with one of the guys who made a killing
off of the housing collapse. The guy wasn't doing fancy math,
analyzing derivatives or doing anything complicated. His reasoning
basically boiled down to the fact that over the last 10 years housing
prices had been going up by over 6% a year and wages had been going up
by about 1% a year. SInce there's a limit to how much of their income
people can spend on housing, there's no way that was sustainable so
the bubble had to burst.

Such a simple concept, wish I'd thought of that at the time. Then I'd
be typing this from my private island in the caribbean! <g>

Rgds, Frank

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 16:56, Frank E <fakeaddr...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Such a simple concept, wish I'd thought of that at the time. Then I'd
> be typing this from my private island in the caribbean! <g>

I dunno about you, but I'd go nuts on such an island inside a week

I'm a city kid, I need a bustling crowd around me in a cinema watching
the latest action movie, I need to reach a snooker table in 15 minutes
if I get a hankering, I need Thai junk food, a vet for the dogs, my
gaming buddies, a hobby shop selling me Valejo paint *now*, freshly
baked baguettes on Sunday morning, short : all the creature comforts
that a decently sized town has on offer.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <35d6ab3c-64bc-4938-8f21-691430a07651
@y2g2000vbe.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

>
> On 11 apr, 15:54, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> >
> > Are you retarded?
>
> I dunno - I didn't lose a dime in the housing bubble crash, how about
> you ?

Didn't lose a red cent; housing, to me, is something you pay to live in
either via rent or mortgage, not an investment vehicle unless you're a
dedicated real estate player, which I am not. My money goes into the
family business, not some bubble that's grossly abusable by TBTF banks I
can't even begin to think of fighting against.

> ... because ? I'll answer it for you : because the Federal Government
> created a system, institutions for safe underwriting of mortgage loans
> to people a bank would *never* have loaned money to without said
> institutions.

So the Feds are to blame for trying to maybe make sure that _valid_
candidates for loans weren't denied by these fuckhead bankers simply due
to the color of their skin, but the banks aren't to blame at all for
coming up with 1000 creative ways to immorally, unethically, and basically
illegally (not that we bother prosecuting financial misconduct by banking
executives in this dumb fucking country; have .01 gram of coke on you and
be black and you're going away for a double-digit term; launder EIGHT
FIGURES worth of money for the cartels and be white? Eh, pay a laughable
fine) abuse those guidelines to finance what was basically a ponzi scheme
of such proportions that it helped crater the entire global economy in
'08.

I know which party I think is the bigger pack of shitheads here.

> > Banks fucking LOVED this legislation, particularly as it was bundled when
> > reinforced in '99 with the repeal of Glass-Steagal,
>
> http://www.american.com/archive/2012/august/five-myths-about-glass-steagall

Ah, yes, the AEI. Nope, they _never_ have any agenda that would to make
deregulation look just peachy-keen, nosirree.

--
smr

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

On 11-04-2013 15:58, eddys...@hotmail.com wrote:

> I guess it all depends on who you think was the driving force behind
> it all. I've worked for a bank for close to a decade and you won't

To me its obvious that it was everybodys dance around the golden calf.
Greedy poor people wanting more than they could afford, greedy bankers
wanting short sigted gains at high risk, populist politicians being more
concerned with reelecion than anything else etc.

> often hear me defending their practices but I've seen enough of these
> stinkin' social engineering efforts in my life to put the blame
> squarely where it belongs in this particular case : Carter and Clinton
> - the buck stops there.

Well neither Reagan nor the two Bushes changed it - 20 years of
Republican rule cannot overcome the might of 12 years of Democrat rule -
How can that bee if the president has so much to say?.
I guess congress had something to do with it also

The President does'nt make the laws, so why give him all the blame or
praise? He is just the head administrator doing what congress tell him
to do,

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 17:15, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> So the Feds are to blame for trying to maybe make sure that _valid_
> candidates for loans weren't denied by these fuckhead bankers simply due
> to the color of their skin,

There's a funny thing about businesses in general : they don't give a
hoot about what color you are, as long as you've got money. Because if
they do care about such things, a smart competitor will come along and
take all that good business away from them.

It's kinda funny that on the one hand you're claiming banks will do
*anything* for money and on the other hand you say they somehow care
about the melanine content of your skin ? Pull the other one.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 17:25, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:
>
> Well neither Reagan nor the two Bushes changed it - 20 years of
> Republican rule cannot overcome the might of 12 years of Democrat rule -

Well, Bush tried to change it and failed due to Democratic opposition
so I guess that after all it's still Bush's fault as everyone knew all
along <rolls eyes>

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <99d6b16b-554d-42e2-a57b-8cbce45bc222
@n4g2000vbv.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

What group from, say, the 50's through the 80's, had more money for banks
to get their paws at and play with? Blacks or whites? Now ask yourself if
a bank in, say, Chicago circa 1960 wanted to be known as the "Nigger
Bank" that lent money to niggers that allowed the niggers, assuming they
were willing to assume the very real physical risks of doing it, to buy a
nice house in a nice white neighborhood? Does that sound like the sort of
sound financial risk a big bank would want to take? It doesn't to me.

Maybe look up the very real history of redlining in America?

You're being a naive child about this, Eddy. Banks of course want to make
money. There was a LOT more money to be made in keeping racist whites
happy in the middle decades of the 20th than there was in bravely lending
to the few blacks that were able to rise above their station and want to
be treated like white folk of similar circumstance.

--
smr

[Frank E]

On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 06:58:57 -0700 (PDT), "eddys...@hotmail.com"
<eddys...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>I'm not seeing where you write where this was beneficial for the likes
>of me or the economy in general so I'm happy you agree it was a Bad
>Idea to start with.
>
>I think it was a politically motivated deal, and the banks got bribed/
>cajoled into playing along.

I don't disagree that the government carried a large part of the blame
for the collapse. But that blame lies mostly with the way they
deregulated the banking sector, not with subsidizing low income home
owners. They made it easy and convenient for the banks to write bad
loans so of course the banks jumped all over it.

Rgds, Frank

[Giftzwerg]

In article <4RtnUUBxoG48VP...@4ax.com>,
fakea...@hotmail.com says...

> >I think it was a politically motivated deal, and the banks got bribed/
> >cajoled into playing along.
>
> I don't disagree that the government carried a large part of the blame
> for the collapse. But that blame lies mostly with the way they
> deregulated the banking sector, not with subsidizing low income home
> owners. They made it easy and convenient for the banks to write bad
> loans so of course the banks jumped all over it.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac *are* the government. If anyone is
responsible for the 2008 crisis, it's the guys who wildly asserted that
they were solvent.

I'm looking at you, Chris Dodd. And that other fatfuck, Barney Frank.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 11 apr, 18:27, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> You're being a naive child about this, Eddy. Banks of course want to make
> money. There was a LOT more money to be made in keeping racist whites
> happy in the middle decades of the 20th than there was in bravely lending
> to the few blacks that were able to rise above their station and want to
> be treated like white folk of similar circumstance.

I may be naive, but throughout my life whenever someone played the
"racist" card it turned out upon closer inspection that it really
wasn't the case.

Now I do not deny that individual people sure can be racist, but in my
experience businesses / corporations never are - money talks.

A lot of people over here absolutely detest Moroccans, but a rich one
stepping into a bank is going to get the VIP treatment no poor white
trash guy would ever get - and that has nothing to do with what the
law says, it's what his wallet is saying.

On a more philosophical note : I've noted that certain types of
discrimination are generally frowned upon - color, gender, sexual
orientation ; but that others are widely accepted as being normal :
religion (if it's a small and/or unpopular one), weight and general
looks, age, intelligence and the number of dollars in your bank
account. It's a funny world.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <683b64b6-e19a-43cc-bc6e-e36645e55744
@z4g2000vbz.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

>
> On 11 apr, 18:27, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> >
> > You're being a naive child about this, Eddy. Banks of course want to make
> > money. There was a LOT more money to be made in keeping racist whites
> > happy in the middle decades of the 20th than there was in bravely lending
> > to the few blacks that were able to rise above their station and want to
> > be treated like white folk of similar circumstance.
>
> I may be naive, but throughout my life whenever someone played the
> "racist" card it turned out upon closer inspection that it really
> wasn't the case.
>
> Now I do not deny that individual people sure can be racist, but in my
> experience businesses / corporations never are - money talks.
>
> A lot of people over here absolutely detest Moroccans, but a rich one
> stepping into a bank is going to get the VIP treatment no poor white
> trash guy would ever get - and that has nothing to do with what the
> law says, it's what his wallet is saying.

The point you're just not getting is that the American racism (which is
much deeper, and different, thing than you're used to in Belgium with
what, your piddling ten-twenty years of having to actually see noticeable
groups of not-Belgians in your cities?) was of the stripe that, until a
point in time that's in the past but still well within living memory, any
bank that welcomed a wealthy negro's money _WOULD HAVE LOST ACCESS TO THE
MUCH BIGGER PILE OF MONEY CONTROLLED BY WHITES_. A modern Belgian, no
matter how much he hates Moroccans, probably isn't going to pull his money
from a bank just because the bank is willing to hold a wealthy Moroccan's
account. This was emphatically NOT TRUE in the United States until very
recently. White businesses willing to treat coloreds the same as white
needed to be taught a lesson about their role in keeping the whites
superior to the negro; that lesson would involve their white business
going bye-bye.

This is why legislation was eventually needed to force the country's
banks, the vast majority of which were white-owned and managed, to treat a
black person the same as a white person if their income, credit rating and
collateral were equal when it comes to lending them money.

--
smr

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 12 apr, 16:27, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> The point you're just not getting is that the American racism (which is
> much deeper, and different, thing than you're used to in Belgium with
> what, your piddling ten-twenty years of having to actually see noticeable
> groups of not-Belgians in your cities?) was of the stripe that, until a
> point in time that's in the past but still well within living memory, any
> bank that welcomed a wealthy negro's money _WOULD HAVE LOST ACCESS TO THE
> MUCH BIGGER PILE OF MONEY CONTROLLED BY WHITES_. A modern Belgian, no
> matter how much he hates Moroccans, probably isn't going to pull his money
> from a bank just because the bank is willing to hold a wealthy Moroccan's
> account. This was emphatically NOT TRUE in the United States until very
> recently. White businesses willing to treat coloreds the same as white
> needed to be taught a lesson about their role in keeping the whites
> superior to the negro; that lesson would involve their white business
> going bye-bye.

Ok - I readily admit I didn't know it ran that deep, but I must also
remark that we do have a sizeable number of black people living here -
even when I was a kid every village had a black family or two - this
never posed any problems as they usually integrated very well and
today black people are waaaaaay down on everyone's shitlist which is
topped by Moroccans and other assorted Maghrebs, closely followed by
all manner of Balkanoids - all of them Caucasian might I add.

I guess we're a bit like the Romans : color-blind culturalists - adopt
our culture and we'll get along fine, despise our values and watch it
go both ways.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <307d0072-900d-4c7f-807a-0378754fdc14
@q2g2000vbb.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

>
> On 12 apr, 16:27, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> >
> > The point you're just not getting is that the American racism (which is
> > much deeper, and different, thing than you're used to in Belgium with
> > what, your piddling ten-twenty years of having to actually see noticeable
> > groups of not-Belgians in your cities?) was of the stripe that, until a
> > point in time that's in the past but still well within living memory, any
> > bank that welcomed a wealthy negro's money _WOULD HAVE LOST ACCESS TO THE
> > MUCH BIGGER PILE OF MONEY CONTROLLED BY WHITES_. A modern Belgian, no
> > matter how much he hates Moroccans, probably isn't going to pull his money
> > from a bank just because the bank is willing to hold a wealthy Moroccan's
> > account. This was emphatically NOT TRUE in the United States until very
> > recently. White businesses willing to treat coloreds the same as white
> > needed to be taught a lesson about their role in keeping the whites
> > superior to the negro; that lesson would involve their white business
> > going bye-bye.
>
> Ok - I readily admit I didn't know it ran that deep, but I must also
> remark that we do have a sizeable number of black people living here -
> even when I was a kid every village had a black family or two - this
> never posed any problems as they usually integrated very well and
> today black people are waaaaaay down on everyone's shitlist which is
> topped by Moroccans and other assorted Maghrebs,

It's easy to get along when every village tops out at "a black family or
two". They're not, and can't be, a threat. It's not like that here; we
have many entire counties and cities where blacks are the majority. Up to
1860, states like South Carolina and Mississippi had more slaves than
white people, period. The rest of the southern states were anywhere from a
full quarter to a full half slave vs. white. That leads to a much differnt
dynamic than you're going to get in some Belgian village where six people
out of 1600 are black.

Basically, there's no racism like the racism that descends from knowing
that, in many circumstances, you are outnumbered and, if you ever take the
foot off of the oppression brake and let them get their shit together,
you're dead.

> closely followed by
> all manner of Balkanoids - all of them Caucasian might I add.

Oddly, the only groups I kind of hate unreservedly are Armenians and
Azerbaijaniis. I've met a fair number of each, and they have been, to a
person, absolute pieces of human shit. Just terrible.

> I guess we're a bit like the Romans : color-blind culturalists - adopt
> our culture and we'll get along fine, despise our values and watch it
> go both ways.

That's giving yourselves a bit too much credit. I'm guessing incidents of
outright Belgian racism (well, forgetting the whole Congo thing, which was
Hitlerian in its awfulness, really) didn't start cropping up until there
were parts of Belgian where what white Belgians consider _true_ Belgians
could be outnumbered and felt the fear that comes with not being easily,
lazily, automatically dominant.

--
smr

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 12 apr, 17:24, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> In article <307d0072-900d-4c7f-807a-0378754fdc14

> @q2g2000vbb.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...

>
> > I guess we're a bit like the Romans : color-blind culturalists - adopt
> > our culture and we'll get along fine, despise our values and watch it
> > go both ways.
>
> That's giving yourselves a bit too much credit. I'm guessing incidents of
> outright Belgian racism (well, forgetting the whole Congo thing, which was
> Hitlerian in its awfulness, really) didn't start cropping up until there
> were parts of Belgian where what white Belgians consider _true_ Belgians
> could be outnumbered and felt the fear that comes with not being easily,
> lazily, automatically dominant.

For starters there's no such thing as "Belgian" - that's like saying
"North American" where USA-nians and Mexicans may have some things in
common, but in essence are two different nations sharing a geographic
space.

Our sensitivities are different - I refered to Rome because Romans
also differentiated between "us" and "them" not based on color, but on
whether or not you spoke Latin and were part of their culture. We do
that as well - a purple-spotted green Martian who tries to learn the
local lingo will be readily accepted, whereas a lily-white 10th
generation Walloon moving north and not bothering to integrate will be
despised.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Frank E]

On Fri, 12 Apr 2013 00:18:32 -0700 (PDT), "eddys...@hotmail.com"
<eddys...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On 11 apr, 18:27, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>>
>> You're being a naive child about this, Eddy. Banks of course want to make
>> money. There was a LOT more money to be made in keeping racist whites
>> happy in the middle decades of the 20th than there was in bravely lending
>> to the few blacks that were able to rise above their station and want to
>> be treated like white folk of similar circumstance.
>
>I may be naive, but throughout my life whenever someone played the
>"racist" card it turned out upon closer inspection that it really
>wasn't the case.

It tends to be different here in the US, at least in the deep south. I
grew up in an all-white neighborhood, went to an all-white school, was
a member of an all-white counry club. At one point not long after
moving here from Europe (early 70s), my parents were even warned
against having a black person over for dinner at the house; 'it simply
wasn't proper'. Talk about some serious culture shock for an 8 year.
<g>

Even up to the mid 90s, the last time I bought a house, there were
still all white neighborhoods.

>Now I do not deny that individual people sure can be racist, but in my
>experience businesses / corporations never are - money talks.

Businesses are run by people. Imagine that you're a realtor selling
houses. You know that if you try to sell a house to a black or
hispanic couple then a lot of the white people in the neighborhood
will never do business with your company again and you might be
ostracized by your neighbors. You also know that even if you did, the
people would never be able to get a loan from the local bank to buy
that house. Are there ways around all of that, sure, but for most
people it isn't worth the hassle.

Rgds, Frank

[Holdit]

In article <35d6ab3c-64bc-4938-8f21-691430a07651
@y2g2000vbe.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> On 11 apr, 15:54, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> >
> > Are you retarded?
>
> I dunno - I didn't lose a dime in the housing bubble crash, how about
> you ?
>
> > Banks fucking tripped over themselves to abuse the
> > legislation to give loans to anyone they could, often without any
> > verification of income,
>
> ... because ? I'll answer it for you : because the Federal Government
> created a system, institutions for safe underwriting of mortgage loans
> to people a bank would *never* have loaned money to without said
> institutions.
>

Eddy, it all happened here without any government intervention. The
banks just couldn't lend out the money fast enough.

Holdit

--
"In economy no frills; in business class it'll all be free - including
the blowjobs."
- Michael O'Leary

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 15 apr, 13:57, Holdit <holditREM...@indigoTHE.ieCAPS> wrote:
> In article <35d6ab3c-64bc-4938-8f21-691430a07651

> @y2g2000vbe.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...

>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > On 11 apr, 15:54, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> > > Are you retarded?
>
> > I dunno - I didn't lose a dime in the housing bubble crash, how about
> > you ?
>
> > > Banks fucking tripped over themselves to abuse the
> > > legislation to give loans to anyone they could, often without any
> > > verification of income,
>
> > ... because ? I'll answer it for you : because the Federal Government
> > created a system, institutions for safe underwriting of mortgage loans
> > to people a bank would *never* have loaned money to without said
> > institutions.
>
> Eddy, it all happened here without any government intervention. The
> banks just couldn't lend out the money fast enough.

Different country, different reasons. Banks over here never lend out
money like crazy, yet were hit by the US housing bubble implosion
nonetheless.

And despite what they're trying to tell you, the euro crisis is not
over yet - how could it, as the underlying fundamentals are still
there : different economies cannot share a common currency without
massive jiggery and duck tape. This won't last. What every financial
advisor should tell you is to get your money out of banks yesterday.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <HuVrUYf6SgoL1L...@4ax.com>,
fakea...@hotmail.com says...

> >Now I do not deny that individual people sure can be racist, but in my
> >experience businesses / corporations never are - money talks.
>
> Businesses are run by people. Imagine that you're a realtor selling
> houses. You know that if you try to sell a house to a black or
> hispanic couple then a lot of the white people in the neighborhood
> will never do business with your company again and you might be
> ostracized by your neighbors. You also know that even if you did, the
> people would never be able to get a loan from the local bank to buy
> that house. Are there ways around all of that, sure, but for most
> people it isn't worth the hassle.
>

I dunno. The last time I sold a house was in the mid 1990s, and all I
cared about was getting the $$$ I wanted. If the realtor had turned
down a prospective buyer because he was <insert ethnic group here>, I'd
have boiled her in oil. Actually, my attorney would have boiled her in
oil.

In other words, the *realtor* wasn't in charge of who the house went to.

I was, and the only color I cared about was "green."

[Vincenzo Beretta]

> It was - legislation was pushed through under Clinton

The criminal act by Clinton was signing the repeal of the Glass-Steagal act,
one of the most important safeguards put in place after the Great Depression
to avoid an encore. Guess what happened.

> IIRC to ensure that people with low means of income could
> become house-owners too.

The starry-eyed idiocy ""America is a stronger country every single time a
family moves into a home of their own" followed by practical idiocies like
the "zero-down-payment initiative" came from Bush - starting from October
2004.

> Banks didn't like that at all

Financial institutions at large jumped like 14-years old into an harem of
supermodels in the new "creative finance models" where they could take
high-risk gambles with ***pension and saving deposits*** AKA "money not
belonging to them".

> The above was already explained to you at length

And I listened, with amused attention :0)

> so what is interesting here is that you fail to see the
> cause as a typical case of failed social engineering
> i.e. socialist measures, and somehow attribute it to
> wild capitalism.

Bush never had a clear mind. After all he had just invaded probably the
single country in the whole wide world that had nothing to do with 9/11.

BTW, when the big-asses needed a bailout via taxpayers' money, then the word
"socialism" was temporarily suspended from the USAnian vocabulary. It was
reinstated as soon as the first sick Average Joe noted how UHC for
***people*** could be a good idea too.

[Vincenzo Beretta]

>> http://www.american.com/archive/2012/august/five-myths-about-glass-steagall

> Ah, yes, the AEI. Nope, they _never_ have any agenda that would to
> make deregulation look just peachy-keen, nosirree.

The funny thing is how the EVIL PLAGUE-SPREADING ALL-AROUND DEMON
WORSHIPPERS socialists *tried* to warn the UZ that repealing the
Glass-Steagal act would have have *very dire* consequences:

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/1999/11/bank-n01.html

"...And there is a much more recent experience than 1929 to serve as a
cautionary tale. A financial deregulation bill was passed in the early 1980s
under the Reagan administration, lifting many restrictions on the activities
of savings and loan associations, which had previously been limited
primarily to the home-loan market. The result was an orgy of speculation,
profiteering and outright plundering of assets, culminating in collapse and
the biggest financial bailout in US history, costing the federal government
more than $500 billion. The repetition of such events in the much larger
banking and securities markets would be beyond the scope of any federal
bailout."

This piece was written in 1999. I wornder how much the guy's crystal ball
would be worth on e-bay. Not much, I guess: anyone could reach the same
conclusions.

The CRUEL ANTI-AMERICAN USA-HATING SAURIAN ALIENS WORHIPPERS socialists
actually tried to... warn the Americans that they had just built a time-bomb
under their assess! The other DESPECABLE TRAITORS SURRENDING MOKEYS. AKA the
French tried to do the same with Iraq. It was a given that for the UZ it was
not going to end well...

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 15 apr, 23:36, "Vincenzo Beretta" <vincenzo.bere...@fastwebnet.it>
wrote:

>
> > so what is interesting here is that you fail to see the
> > cause as a typical case of failed social engineering
> > i.e. socialist measures, and somehow attribute it to
> > wild capitalism.
>
> Bush never had a clear mind.

Oh, dear - Bush again <rolls eyes> - my point is and remains that
social engineering is the #1 party trick of leftist governments, a
party trick that *always* blows up in the face of those attempting it
and always ends up costing more than ever intended.

> BTW, when the big-asses needed a bailout via taxpayers' money, then the word
> "socialism" was temporarily suspended from the USAnian vocabulary.

It might have also escaped your notice that Big Money always is a
little more equal than others - no matter what system you live in.

> It was
> reinstated as soon as the first sick Average Joe noted how UHC for
> ***people*** could be a good idea too.

One of the most expensive things in the world is "free" health care -
as the Spanish are now finding out and correcting with haste. You guys
will be next.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Vincenzo Beretta]

>> Bush never had a clear mind.

> Oh, dear - Bush again <rolls eyes>

Ah, sorry. True. The US government was led by Otto von Bismarck at the time.

> - my point is and remains that
social engineering is the #1 party trick of leftist governments

Substitute "leftist" with "stupid" and you tie up nicely Bush, his starry
eyes idea that "owning houses makes countries stronger" (??), and the
2000-2008 fiasco.

> It might have also escaped your notice that Big Money always
> is a little more equal than others - no matter what system you
> live in.

Actually it *never* escapes my notice - neither in debates about bailouts,
nor in ones about UHC, nor in ones about global warming ^^

> One of the most expensive things in the world is "free" health
> care

Health care is never free. It is paid by tax-payers' money. Saying that it
is free is like saying that it is "socialist": a good way to convince people
that public money is best used for bailouts.

> as the Spanish are now finding out

The Spanish debacle was due to... the burst of the housing bubble! Amazing,
uh?

> and correcting with haste. You guys will be next.

Finding that you don't have anymore the money to pay for health-care is
different than saying that health-care was responsible. Money can go away
for other reasons too: incompetence, fraud and robbery - just to name a few
we lived with in the merry 2000s.

And most Italians own their houses (me among them) so our country is STRONG.
Bush said so, so you can take it to the bank. Hmmm... On a second thought, I
just said two stupid things :0)

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 16 apr, 09:44, "Vincenzo Beretta" <vincenzo.bere...@fastwebnet.it>
wrote:

> Finding that you don't have anymore the money to pay for health-care is
> different than saying that health-care was responsible.

I suggest you Google a bit about the Spanish "free" health care crisis
and how they suddenly found out how much this "free" thing is actually
costing them.

> Money can go away
> for other reasons too: incompetence, fraud and robbery -

Sure - but I'm blaming social engineering.

A little example : in a nearby town the ruling socialists and green
got it into their head that what the city needed was more parking
space ... for bicycles. All those recalcitrant people wanting to drive
into town with their car were either misguided creatures or pure evil
CO2 spewers who just have to be corrected in their behaviour.

So they tore up the center square and made a free underground parking
area for bicycles.

Today the numbers are in : on average 18 (eighteen) bicycles get
parked there every day for a piffling sum of just over 2000 Euro per
month per bicycle just on operating costs.

Here's a small prediction : that underground white elephant complex is
going to stay open right until those socialists run out of other
people's money.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Frank E]

On Mon, 15 Apr 2013 16:17:32 -0400, Giftzwerg
<giftzw...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>In article <HuVrUYf6SgoL1L...@4ax.com>,
>fakea...@hotmail.com says...
>
>> >Now I do not deny that individual people sure can be racist, but in my
>> >experience businesses / corporations never are - money talks.
>>
>> Businesses are run by people. Imagine that you're a realtor selling
>> houses. You know that if you try to sell a house to a black or
>> hispanic couple then a lot of the white people in the neighborhood
>> will never do business with your company again and you might be
>> ostracized by your neighbors. You also know that even if you did, the
>> people would never be able to get a loan from the local bank to buy
>> that house. Are there ways around all of that, sure, but for most
>> people it isn't worth the hassle.
>>
>I dunno. The last time I sold a house was in the mid 1990s, and all I
>cared about was getting the $$$ I wanted. If the realtor had turned
>down a prospective buyer because he was <insert ethnic group here>, I'd
>have boiled her in oil. Actually, my attorney would have boiled her in
>oil.
>In other words, the *realtor* wasn't in charge of who the house went to.

It wouldn't be anything as blatant as that. Odds are that if you're of
the wrong background, you wouldn't be shown the house to begin with
since the buyer's realtor doesn't have much incentive to show that
house to their client. Why try to push your client into a house where
you know they might have have problems getting a loan and they'd
definitely have problems after they move in.

If you're the realtor selling the house, I imagine that there are a
lot of things to slow down the process. Maybe the house just isn't
available for showing when the buyer has time.

I couldn't tell you how exactly it worked but I certainly saw the
results.

Rgds, Frank

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

On 16-04-2013 10:08, eddys...@hotmail.com wrote:

> Here's a small prediction : that underground white elephant complex is
> going to stay open right until those socialists run out of other
> people's money.

Well, the one we have at the train station is full beyond capacity
during the day while the commuters are away.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 16 apr, 14:44, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:

Here's the difference

In your case there's a real demand for something - public money spend
on infrastructure investments for that purpose get my full support

In my case there was no demand - nobody wanted that a bicycle parking,
on the contrary, businesses in that town are crying out for *car*
parks in order for them to be able to compete with the big malls
outside the city centers. But leftist ideologists don't care about
real needs, they want to force the proletariat into cycling - even
openly saying that they want to steer society in a particular way.

How well that works we can observe in North Korea.

Another example : in my wallet right now there's 31 euro worth of "eco
cheques" - that's right - by government decree part of my wage is not
payed in real money, but in paper cheques so leftie loonies can
determine what I can spend my money on that's already taxed 50%.

Last year I got rid of them - basically by fraud - but the
restrictions have been tightened and right now I'm staring at 31 euros
of *my* money and nothing I can think of to spend it on as I don't
need any of the limited items of eco crap I could spend it on.

This sort of thing makes my blood boil. If I could buy rotten eggs
with them I'd do so and then hurl them at every green politician in
sight. What's next ? part of my wages payed in food stamps for soy
based products because meat is murder ?

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

On 16-04-2013 15:16, eddys...@hotmail.com wrote:

> Another example : in my wallet right now there's 31 euro worth of "eco
> cheques" - that's right - by government decree part of my wage is not
> payed in real money, but in paper cheques so leftie loonies can
> determine what I can spend my money on that's already taxed 50%.

What?

You Belgians are crazy ! - why do you elect governments enacting such laws?

Perhpas you Flems and Waloons should stop fighting over who the riches
of Bruxelles belong to and just desolve that failed state of yours.

Perhaps the EU court could help you? cant you claim paying part of your
wage in that way somehow hinders the free exchange of services and goods
between EU member states? A great many national laws have been
invalidated due to that. If you cannot spend those "special money"
outside Belgium its a clear violation of the Lisbon Treaty.
How and what can you spend them on?

[mite...@hotmail.com]

Hi Eddy, things quiet at work?

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 16 apr, 17:33, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:

> On 16-04-2013 15:16, eddyster...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> > Another example : in my wallet right now there's 31 euro worth of "eco
> > cheques" - that's right - by government decree part of my wage is not
> > payed in real money, but in paper cheques so leftie loonies can
> > determine what I can spend my money on that's already taxed 50%.
>
> What?
>
> You Belgians are crazy ! - why do you elect governments enacting such laws?

Have you got an hour or two ?

It's a combination of almost total media control by the government, a
cultural "elite" that's bought and paid for and a voting system
favouring the status quo.

Note also that the current Belgian government, aka "the orchestra on
the Titanic" took 18 months to put together after the last election
and does *not* have a majority in Flanders, the part of the country
which produces 80% of the GNP.

> Perhpas you Flems and Waloons should stop fighting over who the riches
> of Bruxelles belong to

LOL - have you been in Brussels lately ? - it's a social dump, full of
no-go areas. Anybody who wants it can get it for all I care.

> and just desolve that failed state of yours.

Belgium is already dead. What you see is the children fighting over
the inheritance.

> Perhaps the EU court could help you? cant you claim paying part of your
> wage in that way somehow hinders the free exchange of services and goods
> between EU member states?

Here's how it works : before EU courts can step in you need to have
exhausted every national appeal level which works incredibly slow. So
if you take this to court you're going to lose a lot of money on
lawyers and have to wait 10-15 years. Short : you cannot win a legal
fight against a government which appoints judges and can slow down the
judicial process at will.

> How and what can you spend them on?

Bio-food, bicycles, electric appliances that work on solar energy,
train & bus tickets, courses in car-eco-driving, compost-vats, 100%
recycled paper - like I said : crap I don't need nor want.

Last year the restrictions weren't so tight yet, so I managed to get a
warm & fuzzy feeling when I bought total weed killer with them :)

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 17 apr, 01:58, mitet...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> Hi Eddy, things quiet at work?

Don't worry - if you work & study hard, one day you might get a job
like mine too

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Holdit]

In article <021c07ad-e754-4f13-a0b9-e7223dbccdc1
@c15g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
> courses in car-eco-driving,
>

What?

1. Keep an eye on your fuel economy reading.

2. Try to keep it high.

3. Um...

4. ...that's it.

That'll be € 1,000, please. All major credit cards accepted.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 18 apr, 11:08, Holdit <holditREM...@indigoTHE.ieCAPS> wrote:
> In article <021c07ad-e754-4f13-a0b9-e7223dbccdc1

> @c15g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...
>
> > courses in car-eco-driving,
>
> What?

I wish I was joking, but I'm not. This is Absurdistan.

> 1. Keep an eye on your fuel economy reading.
>
> 2. Try to keep it high.
>
> 3. Um...
>
> 4. ...that's it.
>
> That'll be ¤ 1,000, please. All major credit cards accepted.

The rules around the use of those eco-cheques are totally nuts as
well. I can buy a train ticket with them, but not for a train that
crosses the border. I can buy a bus ticket with them, but only in
Brussels and Wallonia, not in Flanders where I live.

The day I encounter one of them green "social engineers" I'm going to
make him eat these paper eco-cheques, which incidentally are printed
on non-eco bleached paper. Oh, the irony.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

In article <021c07ad-e754-4f13-a0b9-e7223dbccdc1
@c15g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> Belgium is already dead. What you see is the children fighting over
> the inheritance.

As an American member of our sloppy-assed, centuries-old melting pot over
here, I'm mesmerized by the idea that a tiny state that has a population
that basically matches that of the _county_ I live in, with a mere two
main population groups to haggle with, thinks disintegrating into even
smaller micro-states is the right answer. It strikes me like Chicago
having a pissing match with Milwaukee.

So, can I ask, honestly (the Belgian Civil War doesn't really make the
news over here for some reason):

a) what are the key issues that make Belgium undoable? Sounds like some
grumping over the wealthy part of the country not being able to keep
enough of its wealth and not wishing the share it with the poorer parts
(which I can sympathize with, as a member of a liberal Blue State that
pays more in Fed taxes than it gets back by far, essentially subsidizing
unproductive assholes like Mississippi and Arkansas).

Are there other issues going on? Seems like a nice language barrier and a
host of asinine laws to get around it might be an issue, too?

b) what are the most common proposed solutions to dividing the place up?
And of those, which do you favor?

I hope I'm not coming off too snarkily here, I'm genuinely curious. As a
member of a giant, polyglot mess of a country with some seriously
diametrically opposed constituencies that do not like each other at all,
yet we still manage to make a go of it reasonably well, I can't quite
understand shit like tiny Ireland ripping itself apart for a century due
to not being able to figure out a peacful merger, or various Balkan states
where the only differences are possibly an alphabet and which god you
don't worship anymore, and now Belgium falling apart (tho' I'd favor a
return to y'all beloning to the Netherlands; it looked cool on a map).

--
smr

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 18 apr, 15:37, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> a) what are the key issues that make Belgium undoable? Sounds like some
> grumping over the wealthy part of the country not being able to keep
> enough of its wealth and not wishing the share it with the poorer parts

Yup - money - and not a piffling amount - the average Flemish family
of 4 pays around 9K a year in taxes that go straight to the south
(2012 data). That's a small second hand car - every year - with no end
in sight.

It also doesn't help that Flanders is also the biggest net payer to
the EU with 268 Euro per person/year (2012 data)

I don't know about you, but I prefer spending my own money on stuff I
like instead of giving it to a bunch of freeloaders under the guise of
"solidarity" - 9K a year is not solidarity, that's theft, and even a
rich region like our's is startng to feel the effects of this
bloodletting.

> (which I can sympathize with, as a member of a liberal Blue State that
> pays more in Fed taxes than it gets back by far, essentially subsidizing
> unproductive assholes like Mississippi and Arkansas).

What also doesn't help in our case is that Belgium never was a country
- it's an artificial construct of 2 entirely different populations,
each with their own language, culture and traditions. We literally
have nothing in common, except a national soccer team and a forced
marriage lasting 180 years. Incidentally a study was done on it :
there wasn't a single year in our shared history where the money did
*not* flow from the north to the south.

> Are there other issues going on?

Today ? Not really - there was in the past when French was culturally
dominant, but that got mostly smoothed out. And it's not like there's
any hatred or vendettas or such - we just have so few things in common
that we pretty much treat the other half as just another foreign
country. I know about as much about Wallonia as I do about other
neighbouring countries.

> b) what are the most common proposed solutions to dividing the place up?

Flanders independent or re-joining The Netherlands, Brussels +
Wallonia in a federation, Brussels as a Euro territory, Wallonia
rejoining France.

Most likely : independent Flanders, Wallonia to France, Brussels as a
kind of Euro DC

> And of those, which do you favor?

Independence or rejoining The Netherlands is both ok for me and I
personally don't give a crap what Wallonia and Brussels decide to do,
that's up to them, their decision on their own nickel.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

Wow. Thanks for the info, had no idea about most of this. I did find this:

http://blog.katania.be/2010/10/the-breakup-of-belgium/

Which goes through an EXHAUSTIVE review of every possible breakup option,
it seems (I particularly like the variant title "United British
Nightmare").

I'm amazed at this, really. But it truly seems that you guys are two
completely separate people jammed into a state together, and have somehow
managed to not mix one goddamned iota in almost two centuries. I don't know
if I'm impressed or appalled at that.

--
smr

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 19 apr, 19:49, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> I'm amazed at this, really. But it truly seems that you guys are two
> completely separate people jammed into a state together, and have somehow
> managed to not mix one goddamned iota in almost two centuries. I don't know
> if I'm impressed or appalled at that.

Well, look at it from this perspective : in 2 centuries we haven't
started cutting each other's throat, which must also be a European
record :)

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[smr]

True, true, there is that. I guess I'm just surprised that being invaded
(and putting up a decent fight for its size) twice in a generation didn't
kickstart some kind of national consciousness.

--
smr

[Holdit]

In article <daffcef8-e614-4688-8e48-aef4843a93fc@
16g2000vbx.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> Another example : in my wallet right now there's 31 euro worth of "eco
> cheques" - that's right - by government decree part of my wage is not
> payed in real money, but in paper cheques so leftie loonies can
> determine what I can spend my money on that's already taxed 50%.
>

I backtracked to see if I'd understood this correctly, that part of your
pay is effectively deducted and replaced with these things?

Am I right?

Holdit



--
--
"I have described nothing but what I saw myself, or learned from others
of whom I made the most careful and particular enquiry."
- Thucydides (Peloponnesian War)

"I've just jazzed mine up a little."
- Spike Milligan (World War 2)

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 20 apr, 09:18, Holdit <holditREM...@indigoTHE.ieCAPS> wrote:
> In article <daffcef8-e614-4688-8e48-aef4843a93fc@

> 16g2000vbx.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...

>
> > Another example : in my wallet right now there's 31 euro worth of "eco
> > cheques" - that's right - by government decree part of my wage is not
> > payed in real money, but in paper cheques so leftie loonies can
> > determine what I can spend my money on that's already taxed 50%.
>
> I backtracked to see if I'd understood this correctly, that part of your
> pay is effectively deducted and replaced with these things?
>
> Am I right?

Yes.

Can't make it any simpler :)

Though it's against the law and all that, you can find people who'll
buy those eco-cheques from you at 80% of their value - that's the
going rate right now going by what I hear. It's a bit the same as with
DRM : it forces basically honest people to break the law and deal with
shady websites and characters to get (a part) of their money back.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

I guess you had something in common since you agreed to revolt and
seccede from the Protestant Netherlands - the Waloons must have been
part of that too.

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

I meant the Fleemish.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 21 apr, 14:53, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:
> On 21-04-2013 14:50, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen wrote:
>

> > On 20-04-2013 01:42, eddyster...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >> On 19 apr, 19:49, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>
> >> Well, look at it from this perspective : in 2 centuries we haven't
> >> started cutting each other's throat, which must also be a European
> >> record :)
>
> > I guess you had something in common since you agreed to revolt and
> > seccede from the Protestant Netherlands - the Waloons must have been
> > part of that too.
>
> I meant the Fleemish.

Those stupid peasants weren't exactly consulted. In fact nobody local
had any say in what eventually happened.

This is the real history : back in those days (1830) countries were
very protective of their own economy and industry and it wasn't really
easy or cheap to export stuff. This posed a problem because before
1815 we had been part of the large French empire and could export at
will within it. Economically those were the good times.

In 1815, after Waterloo, the victorious allies saw a win/win situation
by removing a large chunk of French industrial power and creating a
large buffer-state and sito presto the enlarged Netherlands was born.
This did create some religious and language tensions, but especially
Big Business wasn't too happy with getting restricted to a much
smaller market.

The French didn't like losing this part of "their" territory either,
so in 1830 French secret agents and paid for agitators, also endorsed
and sponsored by local Big Business used those language and religious
grievances and instigated a rebellion with as ultimate purpose a
return to the French Fatherland. The flag flown during the revolution
was the French one.

That's when the big powers intervened because there was no way they
were going to allow France to reclaim such a large chunk of territory.
So in a conference a compromise was reached that nobody local here was
really prepared for or demanded : a new buffer state, a kingdom that
was so unlikely to survive contact with reality that the first few
princes and nobles who were offered the kingship declined. Eventually
a poor German princeling raised at the British court accepted and this
ensured that both Prussia and Britain felt secure enouh, resulting in
a new country getting born.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

On 19-04-2013 08:58, eddys...@hotmail.com wrote:

> Yup - money - and not a piffling amount - the average Flemish family
> of 4 pays around 9K a year in taxes that go straight to the south
> (2012 data). That's a small second hand car - every year - with no end
> in sight.

I bet the people in the Antwerp region could say the same for the rest
of Flanders - what would Flanders be without Antwerp? The BASF plant in
Antwerp alone stands for about 2% of Belgium exports for crying out loud.

> It also doesn't help that Flanders is also the biggest net payer to
> the EU with 268 Euro per person/year (2012 data)
>
> I don't know about you, but I prefer spending my own money on stuff I
> like instead of giving it to a bunch of freeloaders under the guise of

What do you mean freeloaders? Do you claim that the economic differnces
are due to the Walloons being lazy rather than matters of geography and
what industries were promoted in which region.

Besides unless I am much mistaken Wallonia was a very rich region before
WW2 being one of the most important centers of induistrialization.
I dont think its entirely true that Flanders was the rich part of
Belgium back in the 19th and early 20th century.
Wasnt it more lkike the poor Flemings leaving their undevolped Agrarian
society to seek better lives elsewhere like eg. rich industrialized
Wallonia?

> What also doesn't help in our case is that Belgium never was a country
> - it's an artificial construct of 2 entirely different populations,
> each with their own language, culture and traditions. We literally

Then why the fuck did you rebel against the rest of the Netherlands?
Or do you claim those piss poor good for nothing Walloons could drag you
out of the Netherlands against your will.

And if the state is to be dissolved, then why should the regional
borders established in the late 20th century take precedence over the
much older borders? Or do you expect the Walloons just to give up
Brabrant without a fight?

[Carl Alex Friis Nielsen]

On 20-04-2013 11:10, eddys...@hotmail.com wrote:

> Though it's against the law and all that, you can find people who'll
> buy those eco-cheques from you at 80% of their value - that's the

Why dont you take them to court over it?

Its clearly hindering the free exchange of goods and services between EU
memeber states and therefore illegal.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 21 apr, 17:31, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:

> On 19-04-2013 08:58, eddyster...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> > Yup - money - and not a piffling amount - the average Flemish family
> > of 4 pays around 9K a year in taxes that go straight to the south
> > (2012 data). That's a small second hand car - every year - with no end
> > in sight.
>
> I bet the people in the Antwerp region could say the same for the rest
> of Flanders - what would Flanders be without Antwerp? The BASF plant in
> Antwerp alone stands for about 2% of Belgium exports for crying out loud.

All the Antwerp harbour activity together is 8% the Belgian GDP. This
leaves 72% of the Belgian GDP that's created in Flemish areas outside
Antwerp.

> > It also doesn't help that Flanders is also the biggest net payer to
> > the EU with 268 Euro per person/year (2012 data)
>
> > I don't know about you, but I prefer spending my own money on stuff I
> > like instead of giving it to a bunch of freeloaders under the guise of
>
> What do you mean freeloaders? Do you claim that the economic differnces
> are due to the Walloons being lazy rather than matters of geography and
> what industries were promoted in which region.

Yup - lazy - the number don't lie. Flanders : 60% of the population,
80% of the GDP.

In 2012 less than 2000 Walloons found a job in Flanders. The situation
is so dire that we've start importing workers from *France* - one my
wife's French nieces is even working over here.

Of course unemployment benefits in France run out after 3 years ,
while over here they're in perpetuity. Why get up in the morning, if
you can get money for free - right ?

> Besides unless I am much mistaken Wallonia was a very rich region before
> WW2 being one of the most important centers of induistrialization.

True - guess what the tax laws were back then : based on the land area
your enterprise occupied, so a medium sized farm in Flanders paid more
taxes than a 2000 worker ironworks plant.

> I dont think its entirely true that Flanders was the rich part of
> Belgium back in the 19th and early 20th century.

Of course it wasn't, but even in the famine years of the 1870's
Flanders *still* paid more in taxes than it got back - so much for
solidarity ...

> Wasnt it more lkike the poor Flemings leaving their undevolped Agrarian
> society to seek better lives elsewhere like eg. rich industrialized
> Wallonia?

The difference being - and I'm sure you noticed - that the Flemish
didn't sit on their butt and got unemployment benefits, but moved and
picked up jobs elsewhere. A lot of them migrated to the US and Canada
as well.

> > What also doesn't help in our case is that Belgium never was a country
> > - it's an artificial construct of 2 entirely different populations,
> > each with their own language, culture and traditions. We literally
>
> Then why the fuck did you rebel against the rest of the Netherlands?

I've typed up the history in another post - I suggest you read it.

> And if the state is to be dissolved, then why should the regional
> borders established in the late 20th century take precedence over the
> much older borders?

Who the hell cares about borders from 300 years ago ? The current
borders were established in common agreement with the Walloons

> Or do you expect the Walloons just to give up
> Brabrant without a fight?

How come you're so uninformed ? There's no fight about Brabant. The
northern portion is Flemish, as it always was, the southern portion is
Walloon, again, like it always was.

The "fight" - if you can call it that way - is about Brussels. A
small, but vocal part of the Flemish independence movement still think
they'll be able to reclaim that old Flemish city, but they're
delusional. That city is lost, in more than one way.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 21 apr, 17:33, Carl Alex Friis Nielsen <c...@mail.dk> wrote:

Oh, that's a smart move - pay 5,000 in lawyer bills and wait 10 years
to finally be able to convert my 31 euro in eco-cheques to real
money ...

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 20 apr, 07:00, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:

> On Fri, 19 Apr 2013 16:42:51 -0700 (PDT), eddyster...@hotmail.com wrote:
> > On 19 apr, 19:49, smr <m...@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
> >> I'm amazed at this, really. But it truly seems that you guys are two
> >> completely separate people jammed into a state together, and have somehow
> >> managed to not mix one goddamned iota in almost two centuries. I don't know
> >> if I'm impressed or appalled at that.
>
> > Well, look at it from this perspective : in 2 centuries we haven't
> > started cutting each other's throat, which must also be a European
> > record :)
>
>

> True, true, there is that. I guess I'm just surprised that being invaded
> (and putting up a decent fight for its size) twice in a generation didn't
> kickstart some kind of national consciousness.

World War 1 did - but not as you'd think - it kickstarted Flemish
consciousness

The Germans are a logical people - they noticed that 90% of the
soldiers fighting them on the Yser line were Flemish and that Belgium
up to then hadn't been really kind to them. So they took some measures
to get the population in occupied Flanders on their side. One of those
measures was the founding of the first Dutch speaking university,
appointing Dutch speaking mayors and a instituting a Dutch speaking
civil administration.

Luckily for Belgium there was no internet back then so the soldiers
didn't find out the local population wasn't too unhappy with German
rule compared to Belgian.

After 1918 the Powers That Be didn't dare to turn the clock back, but
kept both of their feet on the breaks so all in all it took 50
additional years for something basic like the Constitution to get a
Dutch translation, but things accelerated in the seventies and
eighties so today we're no longer second-class citizens.

But even today this ancient history still stings a lot of people and
motivates them to strive for independence, no matter what.

I'm of the new generation, a generation that's simply tired of footing
the bill. I don't care about what happened 40 years ago, I care about
them stealing money from my wallet from the day I started working up
until today and if I don't do something about it for the next couple
of decades as well.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Graham Thurlwell]

On the 18 Apr 2013, "eddys...@hotmail.com"
<eddys...@hotmail.com> wrote:

<snip>

> Bio-food, bicycles, electric appliances that work on solar energy,
> train & bus tickets, courses in car-eco-driving, compost-vats, 100%
> recycled paper - like I said : crap I don't need nor want.

AA and AAA rechargeable batteries and chargers included? They at least
would be useful.

--
Jades' First Encounters Site - http://www.jades.org/ffe.htm
The best Frontier: First Encounters site on the Web.

nos...@jades.org /is/ a real email address!

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 23 apr, 19:56, Graham Thurlwell <nos...@jades.org> wrote:
> On the 18 Apr 2013, "eddyster...@hotmail.com"

>
> <eddyster...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> > Bio-food, bicycles, electric appliances that work on solar energy,
> > train & bus tickets, courses in car-eco-driving, compost-vats, 100%
> > recycled paper - like I said : crap I don't need nor want.
>
> AA and AAA rechargeable batteries and chargers included? They at least
> would be useful.

Yeah, back in 2005 - today they're completely useless as all
electrical equipment has their own specialty battery. The only thing
in the house that still uses AA batteries is the tv remote control.
And it already has rechargeable batteries.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[.sergio.]

Il giorno lunedì 8 aprile 2013 18:06:59 UTC+2, eddys...@hotmail.com ha scritto:
> Hi,
>
>
>
> Margareth Thatcher - RIP

Rust in peace