Voice

Internet privacy is a fiction.

2012-01-29T07:56:00.000-08:00

Here is the latest use of my name to attract searches to a commercial site that Google will not BlOCK.
Google will however BLOCK my files if I don't make an effort to UNBLOCK them.
peterderemigis

Books and Docs - Search - ANCA ROZOREA
www.booksanddocs.com/.../ANCA-R... - United StatesCached - Translate this page
You +1'd this publicly. Undo
sf n velimirovici proloagele2, google adsense, marketing google, peterderemigis, Fluid Mechanics Lecture Notes (II), maitreyi, gregg braden trezirea la punctul ...
Books and Docs - Search - buratino
www.booksanddocs.com/.../buratino-... - United StatesCached - Translate this page
You +1'd this publicly. Undo
google adsense, marketing google, peterderemigis, Fluid Mechanics Lecture Notes (II), maitreyi, gregg braden trezirea la punctul zero, gregg braden trezirea, ...
Books and Docs - Search - ericson dezvoltarea socio afectiva
www.booksanddocs.com/.../ericson-d... - United StatesCached - Translate this page
You +1'd this publicly. Undo
5+ items – ericson dezvoltarea socio afectiva The Books and Documents ...
cerinte_psiVARSTELORAA http://www.scribd.com/doc/73118108/cerinte ...
sint psiho 267 http://www.scribd.com/doc/3497894/sint-psiho-267

Notice: They call this file "hacking".
Books and Docs - Search - hacking
www.booksanddocs.com/.../hacking-... - United StatesCached - Translate this page
You +1'd this publicly. Undo
cuore, photography, end, sf n velimirovici proloagele2, google adsense, marketing google, peterderemigis, Fluid Mechanics Lecture Notes (II), maitreyi, gregg ...

Here's the latest file that comes up in peterderemigis searches. As you can see it appeared some time after the "Internet privacy is a fiction." file was posted.

"peterderemigis.blogspot.com/2012/01/internet-privacy-is-fiction.html

3 hours ago – sf n velimirovici proloagele2, google adsense, marketing google, peterderemigis, Fluid Mechanics Lecture Notes (II), maitreyi, gregg braden ..."

I must not forget that "No one owns the Internet". At least that's what some of the sites I complained to about their using my name told me.

The Unintended/Sorry

2012-01-26T15:28:00.000-08:00

A man of experience in finance and business at the U.S. Treasury making decisions for the expenditures of government funds knows that exceptional profits made selling mortgage loans to the unfortunate poor were never intended; but these profits now must be insured by the U.S. Treasury and funded by taxing everybody to maintain the stability of the U.S.-world economy, though government insuring the profits of private business had never been intended.

The Economy and Me

2012-01-16T05:00:00.000-08:00

Last spring I was on my front lawn bent over picking weeds. A voice from behind caught my attention; I stood up to face a man selling interlocking brick walks. When I told him I could not afford this rather unnecessary upgrade to my prefabricated concrete walk and porch stairs neither this year nor next, the man asked me if it was because of "the economy". he seemed surprised when I responded without thinking that "the economy" means nothing to me personally: I think only of how I can financially support myself from day-to-day. When I thought about my response it seemed rather inane, and was likely a retort meant to dismiss the salesman who had imposed his thoughts on my private weed pulling. But when I thought further, I recalled all of the attention given to "the economy" in news stories in print and electronically that assume universal understanding of the term "economy" in phrases such as the nation's, Canada's, Europe's, America's "economy" I came to realize that those who seem effectively concerned about and best equipped to adapt to "the economy" are investors and their advisers who understand which aspects of the economy: trade, GDP, GNP, corporate profits, labour agreements, employment, CPI, inflation, deflation, disinflation, the stock markets, interest rates etc. might affect their investments. The man selling interlocking brick walks and stairs, on the other hand, was simply a sales contractor, not an investor but an individual like the rest of us trying to match his day to day income and expenses.

Iran or the Republican primaries

2012-01-15T13:27:00.000-08:00

"Iran warns of consequences if Arabs back oil sanctions"

(Sun Jan 15, 2012 3:24pm EST)

This morning I viewed much of 2 separate U.S. news interview shows; PBS News and several Toronto Star articles through the previous week and most were about the fortunes of Republican presidential primary candidates. I can't recall mention of the Iran crisis, most of which I learned online. I wonder if talk of boycotting Iranian oil and getting Europe and China onside is as important as the above Reuters headline implies?

Oil Embargo

2012-01-13T13:30:00.000-08:00

"OIL EMBARGO
U.S. and European efforts to cripple Iran’s finances by discouraging or banning countries and firms from importing its oil have been proceeding, though China, Iran’s biggest customer, is reluctant to oblige and other countries too fear that to stop purchasing Iranian crude could badly hurt their own economies.
Japan’s policy on Iranian oil was left in doubt Friday after the prime minister distanced himself from his finance minister’s pledge to reduce oil imports in support of the U.S. push to prevent Iran from making nuclear weapons."

Canada's National Post's January 13 words quoted above should make it clearer that only Canada, Britain and the U.S.A. are committed to an oil embargo. Europe seems so far a kind of doubtful spouse in wanting to keep using Iranian oil for another 6 months before committing to the embargo.

Iran and Russia

2012-01-13T10:02:00.000-08:00

'Another senior Russian official, the hawkish outgoing envoy to NATO Dmitry Rogozin, cautioned further that Moscow would view an attack on its southern neighbour Iran as a threat to Russia:

"Iran is our neighbour," Rogozin said. "And if Iran is involved in any military action, it's a direct threat to our security ... We are definitely interested in the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction ... But at the same time, we believe that any country has the right to have what it needs to feel comfortable, including Iran." '

The Iran Sanctions Saga

2012-01-05T07:53:00.001-08:00

"UPDATE 1-China extends Iran oil import cut as sanctions mount"

The above quoted headline is from a January 5, 2012 article by Chen Aizhu located in a

Reuters Online file.

The headline quoted above and the article that follows seem conflicting. The headline implies(or is easily misread to mean) that oil cutbacks by China are part of the sanctions imposed on Iran for its nuclear ambitions. But the article seems to indicate that China has recently halved its imports of oil from Iran because of a credit dispute over payment for these imports.

For more confusion in comprehending various nations' involvement in sanctions/embargoes of Iranian oil, read

And today January 10, 2012 another complication in the Iran sanction story is described in the following Reuters article.
"Geithner seeks support on Iran sanctions"

What side are they on anyway?

2012-01-01T06:51:00.000-08:00

Yesterday evening, December 31, 2011, an announcer on CBC television referred to the late NDP leader Jack Layton as both a "game changer" because his party, the NDP, attracted 59 Quebec federal seats in the May 2011 election to make his (left leaning) party the official opposition in the federal parliament - and "Taliban Jack " apparently because he had wanted to stop Canada's (the former peace keeping nation's) military from fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The following morning on Fox News Sunday, Ron Paul conservative Republican(right leaning) presidential nominee wanting the U.S. out of Afghanistan supported the validity of this part of his foreign policy by stating his belief that 70% of Americans want the U.S. out of Afghanistan.

An Interesting Article

2011-12-31T06:53:00.001-08:00

Egypt assures U.S. no more raids on democracy groups

The Consuls recording in 1959

2011-12-28T15:34:00.000-08:00

The recording studio at New York City's Bell Sound in 1959 appeared a lot more basic than I had expected considering this was where Dion and the Belmonts, Elvis Presley and other big pop names were said to be recording, and because our Buffalo New York recording was considered to be inferior in sound and possible record sales to what could be produced at the Bell Sound studio.

I recall how difficult it was in those days to record a proper balance of my drums. We had to cover my bass drum so that it would not dominate the other instruments. I have a feeling that the reason I can't make out my drum beat on "I'm Happy" is that they hadn't at that point in the session been able to figure out how to get a balanced drum sound without completely muffling the drums. The drumming in "Runaway", however, is much more precise and musically satisfying: I can hear the rhythm and blues snare drum off-beat with the triplet cymbal feel which is reminiscent of the way I thought I had learned to play some 20 months after I had purchased my first drum set in April or May of 1957, and learned my first drum rhythms by copying Bill Doggett's "Honky Tonk part one" off-beat by striking the cymbal and snare drum on only the 2 and 4 beats without playing the 1 and 3 cymbal rhythm, sort of a pause bang(cymbal&snare)pause bang(cymbal&snare).( back to the Consuls)

Egypt's Military Study Proposal

2011-12-26T06:17:00.000-08:00

What follows is quoted from the opening of an Online Reuters article

By Marwa Awad CAIRO

| Mon Dec 26, 2011 9:30am IST

(Reuters) - Egypt's military rulers are studying a proposal from their own advisers to bring forward parliamentary elections by two weeks after demands from protesters and politicians to speed up transition to civilian rule, an advisory council member said on Sunday.

A Park

2011-12-14T09:54:00.000-08:00

At dusk scarcely audible, crickets twitter invisibly.
At dawn above scattered wrappings, a squad of Monarch Butterflies flutters menacingly.

Clinton helps promote Obama's energy strategy.

2011-12-04T08:55:00.001-08:00

On Thursday December 1, 2011 I reviewed an old article of mine suggesting that President Obama's policies owed much to the Clintons. I decided that my suspicions were still valid, and to my surprise on the evening of Friday, December 2 President Clinton appeared in an interview on the PBS News hour in which the interviewer referred to his and President Obama's visit to a company earlier that day to promote the Obama job creation retrofit program. This visit by the two presidents was reported as unusual by Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent guardian.co.uk :

Bill Clinton came out with an assist for Barack Obama on his economic strategy on Friday, as the two men teamed up to launch an energy saving retrofit of government buildings and commercial properties.

The unusual joint appearance marked the second time in a month that Clinton, who presided over the boom times of the 1990s, has endorsed Obama's management of the economy.

On Friday, the former president went even further saying that his Clinton Global Initiative had been pursuing the same strategy as Obama, betting that investment in a green economy would help haul America out of the recession.
http://peterderemigis.net/news/events.htm

Pakistan and America

2011-11-28T04:10:00.001-08:00

So I guess you heard of the incident in Pakistan this past weekend. Why do you think Pakistan has been allying itself with America and Nato for more than ten years?

(a) terrorism
(b) money
(c) A natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to India and Pakistan

Canada, Britain, and USA sanction Iran further

2011-11-21T14:40:00.001-08:00

While

Russia, China, India and other nations maintain larger-scale trade with Iran, whose energy exports have helped it shrug off serious harm from the U.N. sanctions and other penalties applied by individual countries or the European Union.

Out of Iraq and into the Asia - Pacific region?

2011-11-16T04:36:00.001-08:00

CANBERRA

"(Reuters) - President Barack Obama and Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard on Wednesday unveiled plans for a deepening of the U.S. military presence in the Asia-Pacific, starting with thousands of U.S. Marines operating out of a defacto military base in the Australian port of Darwin"

"Heart Break Hotel/Misery Pavilion" (lyrics/reality)

2011-11-15T03:56:00.001-08:00

The point of the article "Heart Break Hotel/Misery Pavilion" was my realization that the lyrics of Elvis' song and and the words of Li Bai's poem although separated by centuries and civilizations have more in common than one might expect. Whether the realities behind the two works are different or similar, Heart Break Hotel and Misery Pavilion express a common human emotion associated with travel and loneliness bordering on despair which was expressed in China of the ninth century and in America of the nineteen fifties.

Cutbacks

2011-11-09T04:59:00.000-08:00

What we possess, we take for granted, believing that since we have become accustomed to receiving it we have a right to it: it is a reward for our job, our age, our social status, our generosity, our fine character and talent, our importance to society. If cutbacks are necessary cut overall expenditures and programs trickling to the less talented, faceless less privileged not accustomed to the perks and pleasures of a better society. Here there is little room for objective judging of value or worth. Here there is only fear of losing what we already have.

Now Who'd believe this?

2011-11-04T18:11:00.000-07:00

A major reason for the U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Afghanistan was the building of a pipeline through the country that would take natural gas from Turkmenistan to India and Pakistan. Canada and the other 44 Western countries occupying Afghanistan are supporting this U.S. objective by bolstering Washington’s military position in the country

No one I'd know.

New Libyan PM taught at University of Alabama

2011-11-01T17:16:00.000-07:00

TUSCALOOSA, ALa.- — For 20 years, Abdurrahim el-Keib taught electrical engineering at the University of Alabama, helped lead the area’s Muslim community and talked little about his home country of Libya. With Moammar Gadhafi’s regime deposed, the professor now has a new role as prime minister of his homeland.

2011-10-23T10:18:00.001-07:00

A reasonably thorough and respectful depiction of the end of the Libyan war

2011-10-21T17:10:00.000-07:00

Oct 21 (Reuters) - A popular Egyptian talk show host said on Friday he would suspend his programme until further notice due to increasing censorship pressure after an episode discussing the army's handling of a protest that left at least 25 dead failed to air.

NATO in Libya

2011-10-20T11:52:00.000-07:00

"One possible description, pieced together from various sources, suggests that Gaddafi may have tried to break out of his final redoubt at dawn in a convoy of vehicles after weeks of dogged resistance. However, he was stopped by a NATO air strike and captured, possibly three or four hours later, after gun battles with NTC fighters who found him hiding in a drainage culvert.

NATO said its warplanes fired on a convoy near Sirte about 8:30 a.m. (0630 GMT), striking two military vehicles in the group, but could not confirm that Gaddafi had been a passenger."

How Poverty is Kept Invisible

2011-10-16T05:21:00.000-07:00

I have watched much of the TV coverage of the so called Bay Street protests/meetings. The impression I have gained from observing commentators' analyses of these Wall Street protest inspired get-togethers is that they are not terribly effective. For all commentators agree, as if they had gotten into a huddle before making their assessments public, that because the protesters are leaderless and guided by a variety of personal motives the demonstrators may not know how to achieve goals.

Interviews of demonstrators seem to put individuals on the spot with the most typical question being: did you vote in the recent elections; isn't it a bit late late to be demonstrating for change?

Today news commentators seem still to be attempting to make sense of the protester's multiplicity of purposes and are able to come up with only one unifying factor : social inequality; little is said about adult poverty.

Not All that Important

2011-10-15T06:54:00.000-07:00

This morning the occupy Bay Street protesters inspired by the US. occupy Wall Street groups who've been objecting to large CEO payouts and financial industry bailouts, are appearing in TV clips with Toronto charity marathoners and Tokyo anti nuclear protests.

But later today Bob Rae, interim Liberal party leader cautioned that we should take protesters concerns seriously.

"The Best of Possible Worlds"

2011-10-14T18:23:00.000-07:00

Canadians this evening are being told by speakers on TVO and CBC that they have little reason to take the U.S. Wall Street protests to Bay Street, for Canadians they say are politically and financially protected against the ills endured by the Wall street protesters. Indeed the Wall Street crowds are themselves a disparate lot without common cause or discernable purpose who will lose their support in time as the Tea Party has lost many of its followers since their march on Washington some time ago.

Libya

2011-10-05T12:11:00.000-07:00

"Libya's economy is almost entirely reliant on oil and gas revenue.
......................................................................................................

Libya has Africa's largest oil reserves"

2011-10-05T05:00:00.000-07:00

" 'If NATO attacks Syria,we'll fire missles at Tel Aviv'By JPOST.COM STAFF AND REUTERS
10/04/2011 18:53"

Heritage Oil in Libya

2011-10-04T16:46:00.000-07:00

"LONDON, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Heritage Oil has bought control of a Benghazi-based oil services firm, striking the first upstream deal in Libya since the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi and building on the British explorer's reputation as a first mover into political hot-spots."

African Oil Reserves

2011-10-02T09:30:00.000-07:00

Anyone wishing to discover possible reasons for participation in the Libyan civil war may want to peruse this graph:

Courting The Elderly ?

2011-10-02T04:46:00.000-07:00

This morning on CBC television I saw an image of Alberta's new Conservative premier, a former Stalmach cabinet minister, sitting among people celebrating her victory as Alberta's first female premier . The people with whom she sat had pure white hair likely in an old people's home, reinforcing a typical media image of Canadian politicians, male or female, canvasing the elderly.

The following opinions are quoted from an April 2011 Wordpress Blog.

At election time senior citizens are worth more than the rest of us. They vote.

And that’s why Canadians will go to the polls for the third time in five years

over the Conservatives’ failure in [the 2011] budget to satisfy an NDP

demand to enrich benefits for the elderly…. Conservative Seniors Minister

Julian Fantino believes the opposition parties are using seniors as “pawns in a

political arena.”

—

The Globe and Mail, “Three parties, one strategy: Capture the senior vote,”

Joe Friesen and John Ibbitson, March 23, 2011

Change

2011-09-30T17:02:00.000-07:00

Yesterday and today, most Canadian news TV shows kept reminding viewers that the U.S. President's wife was seen shopping at a Target discount store dressed like a typical downscale Target shopper. Today this image of her as the frugal Target shopper seems to contrast with her in August, 2010 as the rather spend thrift tourist in Spain.

2011-09-27T13:43:00.000-07:00

"Analysis:Egypt's army draws anger as transition drags"

Bailouts and Political Donations

2011-09-27T05:37:00.000-07:00

The article that follows first published on Tuesday, January 20, 2009 comes to mind every time someone refers to bailouts of financial institutions. Recent reports of demonstrations on Wall Street have inspired republication of that 2009 article based on a Toronto Star newspaper report.

President Obama's inauguration is the most expensive in American history. President Washington "kept it short and sweet when he was sworn in as president April 30, 1789,in New York City." (Mitch Potter: Toronto Star,Jan.16 2009) And on Jan. 19, 2009 Scott Mayerowitz of ABC News, Business Unit writes "Obama's Inauguration Has Been Financed Partially by Bailed-Out Wall Street Executives."

Strange that when America is facing the worst financial crisis since the great depression, and Wall Street bankers receiving $700 billion bailouts that Wall Street executives should fund the most expensive presidential inauguration of all time.

A few days ago a British TV commentator said that he thought bankers were not very good at banking but excellent at coning politicians

Egypt's army says emergency law in place till June

2011-09-22T15:14:00.000-07:00

Egypt's army says emergency law in place till June

Libya won't secure borders for "long time": envoy

2011-09-20T14:47:00.000-07:00

An ''Open Door" to West Africa?

By their friends ..........

2011-09-20T14:32:00.000-07:00

Today, September 20, 2011, I received a flier among my September 20 mail from SaveTO.ca entitled "WILL ROB FORD'S CUTS INCLUDE YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD?" urging me to "make a presentation at City Hall on September 19 to discuss the Mayor's cuts to services."

When I visited the SaveTO.ca website I was encouraged to join Twitter.

Sorry but I cancelled my Twitter account some time ago because I was embarrassed by the pointless blather that I no longer wished to continue being associated with.

Work and Taxes

2011-09-20T04:49:00.000-07:00

On a Sunday morning last year Democrat and Republican speakers on the Fox Network and Face the Nation debated how to increase employment in the U.S.; as expected Republicans wanted to extend tax cuts to the wealthy past their expiry date at the end of December 2010 while the Democrats wanted to ensure that those earning up to $ 250,000. a year also got tax cuts.

Recently the U.S President produced a new fiscal plan which would produce jobs by rescinding tax cuts for the rich which he had extended beyond the expiry date set by Republican President George Bush before leaving office in 2008, and by diminishing employers' payroll taxes and cutting government spending to lessen the need for increased revenue.

But despite mentioning infrastructure work which he had originally planned to base his job creation strategies on when he came to office in 2009 his plans for increasing employment were mostly about money shuffling through tax reform, and diminishing spending and not about the jobs that people could do to get more of them working, perhaps even making some of the things they are encouraged to consume.

CAIRO | Mon Sep 19, 2011 8:37pm BST

2011-09-19T15:08:00.000-07:00

"CAIRO (Reuters) -Egyptian rights groups have accused Egyptian authorities of carrying out random arrests after this month's attack on the Israeli embassy in Cairo, citing it as another example of a return to the ways of ousted President Hosni Mubarak."

Egypt Elections

2011-09-18T08:37:00.000-07:00

"The military council will issue a decree on September 26 fixing a final date for the election for the People's Assembly and the Shura Council," MENA quoted the official as saying, adding that the military council was the appropriate authority to make such decisions.

"Canada to extend Libya mission by three months"

2011-09-14T06:31:00.000-07:00

.....................................................................................................................................................
"Canada's commitment will not go unrewarded , Karmos said, suggesting numerous construction contracts will be up for grabs." ...................................................................................................

"African migrants take deadly gamble in Libya"

2011-09-13T16:51:00.000-07:00

.....................................................................................................................................................................
"Refugee camps within Libya and sprouting along its land borders contain thousands of fleeing Africans telling tales of horror at the hands of rebel fighters suspicious they are pro-Gaddafi mercenaries. "
....................................................................................................................................................................

British Officials and The Libyan Transitional Council

2011-08-24T12:30:00.000-07:00

"as British officials meet members of the Libyan National Transitional Council in London to help prepare a smooth transfer of power"
"William Hague calls on Gadaffi to accept defeat"

Egyptian Revolution in February 2011

Is this how media popularize politicians?

2011-08-14T16:35:00.000-07:00

Today I saw Republican Michelle Bachman interviewed on two Sunday morning political programs. On Fox news Sunday reaction to her winning the Iowa straw pole as a champion of the get Washington out of your life movement seemed mostly favourable until one journalist blurted out that as a tax lawyer she'd worked for the IRS, the Washington taxing agency. And a report that Texas Governor Perry had formally announced his entry into the Republican primaries, also vowing to get Washington out of your life, and championing his state's contributing one third of America's job growth was met with such enthusiasm that he was placed among the top three candidates with Bachman and Romney until one journalist sarcastically remarked that many of the jobs Perry's state has been accredited with were in some way associated with Burger King.

Jobs and Wealth

2011-08-14T08:33:00.000-07:00

When we hear of the need for jobs we are in effect hearing a cry for the sharing of wealth.
Responses to this cry for income are met by one side demanding more tax money, while the opposing side insists that greater taxation absorbs funds that could be used to create jobs. Although we are told that the size of government is enormous we are also warned that because of its enormity it has been encouraged to burden itself with an enormous debt which has paradoxically diminished its economic power and the ability to promote job creation and the sharing of wealth. On the other hand we hear of non government organizations being flush with cash, but unwilling to invest because of the uncertain regulatory environment created by government.

Curiously no one mentions the kind of work that either the government or private businesses flush with cash might create to replace the jobs lost over the past 30 years as a small percentage of North Americans have been increasing their share of their nation's wealth.

What we do hear in addition to calls for less and more taxation depending on your politics are the age old pleas by both sides of the political spectrum for more education because those with jobs are better educated while the unskilled and less educated have had their work making things shipped to places where labour is cheapest.

Egypt's Army

2011-07-25T05:37:00.000-07:00

Egypt Army Moves To Secure Key Role In Countries Future

"Meaningless Words"

2011-07-18T07:47:00.000-07:00

I first published the little ditty that follows on Thursday, 12 June, 2008, and since then apologies seem to have been spoken with increasing frequency by those accused of offences large and small.

Has anyone noticed that "I'm sorry" no longer means: "I made a mistake and won't do it anymore".

Too often "Sorry" now means " I know you don't like it but with your permission I'll continue doing it anyway."

A Cause of Fear/Depression?

2011-07-05T05:19:00.000-07:00

In Canada weather seems to be the most important news item. There is the weather channel devoted to 24-hour-a day weather predictions. Next is CBC( Canada's public broadcaster) which too makes regular predictions about the weather throughout the day that are sometimes interspersed with repeated video clips about natural disasters that have occurred throughout Canada, the USA, and the world. Of the three private stations available on basic cable in Canada all from the early morning seem to compete with scenes or predictions about the weather

And the weather predictions repeated throughout the day are mostly rather dire, reminding me of an old satirical impression of such forecasts as in "cold today and hot tomorrow", for almost all weather predictions regardless of present experiencable conditions are either about possible snow, freezing temperatures, rain, lightening, tornadoes, or excruciating heat, and in the case of one channel an ad repeats a historical report about terrible weather. We are rarely allowed to experience weather as it actually is without the foreboding predictions of weather forecasts.

McCain and Kerry visit North Africa with other senators and business leaders.

2011-06-28T17:22:00.000-07:00

Senator McCain leading a group of senators and business leaders to North Africa said "Egypt army wants swift power transfer"

The senators were accompanied by Jeffrey Immelt, chief executive of General Electric, as well as other business leaders from some of the world's biggest corporations, including Coca Cola, ExxonMobil and Boeing.

The Zanzibar Tavern Toronto

2011-06-24T06:49:00.000-07:00

My first impression of the Zanzibar Tavern was formed on an evening in the summer of 1959 when Robbie and I were walking up and down Yonge Street. Then it seemed a kind of formal place that you could hardly see the inside of through a kind blue haze wafting up to the front entrance. Its windows as did most bars in the 1950's displayed rather conservative posters announcing the presence of performers of stage screen and television. In those days bars stopped serving Liquor at 11.00 p.m., and could continue serving alcohol only if customers entered a part of the club where food service was available. In about 1961 when I first played drums in the Zanzibar everyone moved upstairs where food was available after 11. Then the only attraction was the musicians on stage performing in rather warm stage lights often interrupted by howling feed back from an old field microphone echoing through the house PA system's mysteriously placed speakers.

Sometime toward the mid-60's about when the British pop influences and the folk music style were developing, rock and folk performers began replacing progressive jazz players, and "beat" poets in the old coffee houses of the Yorkville area, the Zanzibar atmosphere changed abruptly as the rather staid old Zanzibar became the "with it" multi-media Zanzibar Circus. Television sets and screens were placed around the room where patrons could watch television and slide shows wherever they sat. And into this multi-media morass came the Go-Go dancer. Now the band on stage was not the only attraction; the slides, the television, the pulsating strobe lights and the dancers all became part of a circus-like extravaganza.

June 2011, Vancouver Stanley Cup Rioters Not Anarchists?

2011-06-23T10:01:00.000-07:00

Pardon me if I'm wrong, but I think I've been hearing that the June 2011 rioters were not led by anarchists as in the June 2010 Toronto G20 riots or in the February 2010 Olympic protest, but by youngsters around 14 years of age, young offenders for whose actions only their parents are legally responsible.

Objectivity and Justice

2011-06-22T04:51:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, 29 July, 2009 I wrote "The senate Judiciary Committee's voting to recommend Sotomayor's candidacy for a position on the Supreme Court of the United States seemed partisan with only one Republican voting in favour of her candidacy. One might have expected that opinions in such matters might appear more objective than the 13 - 6 vote (12 Democrats versus 6 Republicans) suggests. What did Sotomayor say or do to convince 12 Democrats and 1 Republican that she has and would judge according to the US constitution and not race as many Republicans seemed to fear."

On June 20, 2011 it was reported that a class action law suit by female retail workers was rejected 5 to 4 by the Supreme Court of the United States"along ideological lines".

A Hairbrain Opinion?

2011-06-19T13:38:00.000-07:00

The topic most discussed by television reporters in their reviews of the NDP convention is the term socialism and how it should apply to the NDP platform. The next most discussed item by these reporters reviewing the convention is whether or not the NDP should merge with the Liberals.

Highlighting the term "socialism" as they do suggests that the NDP are uncomfortable being labelled socialists, and reminding viewers of Liberal interim leader and former NDP Premier's, Mr. Rae's suggestion that the Liberals' and NDP's merging makes sense without the term socialism - making the NDP seem to be essentially Liberals.

2011-06-18T11:40:00.000-07:00

It's funny how the social advances diminishing the restraints of morality seem to have inspired some of the "connected" and famous to destroy themselves.

Political Centre versus Poverty

2011-06-17T15:40:00.000-07:00

When they say his NDP won 103 federal seats to become the official opposition in place of Mr. Rae's Liberals because of Mr Layton's personality and his party's move to the political centre, they are "reiterating" their own beliefs in political personality and the political centre ("them that's got") at the expense of the growing numbers of poor Canadians.

Debtors

2011-06-15T08:28:00.000-07:00

Warning debtors that low interest rates will inevitably begin to rise, they ignore the fact that most debtors owe on credit cards at rates that have never approached the 0 to 1% rates that central banks have been charging financial institutions since 2008.

Left, Right or Just Reality?

2011-06-04T04:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday,a bright warm day here in Toronto as I walked south along the West side of Yonge street just south of St Clair I passed between two young women holding signs under their chins that read " Because I am ..." who I thought might be collecting donations, but who said nothing as I passed. As I returned north along the way I had come some 30 minutes earlier both women still holding their placards said nothing neither to solicit donations, nor to promote a cause or political message.

Although I was puzzled as to the purpose of these two placarded young women standing silently on either side of the sidewalk, I forgot about them until I boarded the Yonge Street subway and faced a sign that completed the part of their placard statement with the word "girl" not visible on the street blocked by their arms and reading "Because I am a girl" followed by a list of the rights which according to this statement "girls" do not have.

When I arrived home, I saw a television image of another young woman displaying a placard under her chin; this sign read "Stop Harper".

"The hand is quicker than the eye."

2011-05-28T08:17:00.000-07:00

Since I first became aware of the term transparency when it was used in the autumn of 2008 to describe how the U.S. treasury would distribute some $800 billion to worthy banking institutions, I have begun to think of the old magician's line:"The hand is quicker than the eye" as media and political types continue to use that abstract term to communicate a sense of honesty and up rightness in describing certain economic and political intentions.

"The Consuls" versus "Little Caesar and the Consuls"

2011-05-28T04:13:00.000-07:00

On my website "peterderemigis.net" the term "consuls" has for months been at the top of the list of Internet searches listed for my site. I assume that this persistently high position indicates that there are still many online interested in that now ancient Toronto group of rock and roll musicians originally called the "Consuls". Although the term, consuls, was originally used to denote two leaders of the Roman senate more than 2000 years ago, some time between political rule by the early Roman kings, and the rule of the emperors often called Caesar, I think I recall that our group's labelling itself "The Consuls" was actually inspired by a British automobile,the Consul.

Obviously I had nothing to do with applying that name to our band, and have always believed that Bruce Morshead had originated it. Some time after Robbie, Gene,and I left the "Consuls" the new group that formed around the two remaining "Consuls" became known as "Little Caesar and the Consuls". The new name inspiring a kind of imperialist air, surprised me because I rightly or wrongly had always believed that the original name had more mechanical/commercial or even democratic associations than the more recent one evoking the image of the autocratic rulers of the Roman empire.

But what interests me about the change of name from "The Consuls" (whether derived from the Roman Consuls or a British auto) to "Little Caesar and the Consuls" is that it reminds me that in the early days of rock and roll the name "Consuls" seemed to fit an era in which differences between performers and audience were blurred compared to ensuing years of popular rock entertainment when the distance between the deified "rock star" seemed to grow as wide as between the Roman emperor and his subjects in the latter days of the Roman empire.

Official Opposition

2011-05-22T15:42:00.000-07:00

Watching TV news you'd think the NDP'd
Stopped existing on May 2,
Hiding, shamed perhaps as the Liberals' rightful place fell into the laps
Of youthful upstarts, too green for democracy
Void of connections, stature or opinions.

The U.S. Currency

2011-05-14T04:19:00.000-07:00

For some years now I have been hearing about the decline and eventual worthlessness of the U.S. currency and its eventual replacement by some more universal currency to be named later; yet as talk of its decline continues financial experts keep calling it the "safe haven" currency as U.S. bonds are purchased for only nominal rates of return whenever investors fear a new weakness in the world economy. And every time commodity prices rise economists say their increase is a result of the decline in the value of the U.S. dollar,the international currency. Rarely does anyone say commodities rise in cost because too many people purchase them.

Petroleum of course is the commodity most frequently talked about because its price affects all other commodities through rising transportation costs, and the cost of components used in manufacturing throughout the "global economy".

Today I am reading of the possible end of the Euro and the European union as European countries such as Greece struggle to pay off their sovereign debt. Recently an economic commentator believing in the eventual worthlessness of the U.S. dollar said he would bet on the survivability of the Euro over the U.S. currency.

But scarcely anyone predicting the decline of the U.S. and its currency ever tells us that a currency value is determined by the worth of the goods and services that a currency represents and that the U.S. currency represents the value of most of the world's goods because the U.S. controls most of these goods, especially petroleum and that the indebted European countries control very few of these goods, especially petroleum.

2011-04-29T15:31:00.001-07:00

CAIRO | Fri Apr 29, 2011 6:12am EDT

CAIRO (Reuters) - When President Hosni Mubarak was driven from power in February, millions of Egyptians believed the graft and stagnation that blighted his 30-year rule would go too. Two months later, some people are having second thoughts.

Impoverishment not an Election Issue

2011-04-23T07:15:00.000-07:00

Coverage of the Federal election campaign in Canada emphasizes the national economy: the conservatives say that they must be be elected as a majority government in order to continue Canada's economic recovery, and both the Liberals and NDP insist that the Conservatives should not be given a majority because their approach to economic recovery won't work. For the Liberals and NDP state that they unlike the Conservatives would not give corporations tax breaks, or privatize health care, nor would they lead Canada off the world stage by cutting back on foreign aid contributions. They unlike the Conservatives would tax corporations more, improve government health care, and support "a woman's right to choose".

But never at least in my limited witnessing of media coverage of Canada's Federal campaign have I seen anything about poverty as a condition experienced by all classes, ages and nationalities. I have seen some attention given to environmental concerns but the rising prices of fossil fuel, and food does not seem to be treated as an election issue. The improvement of the plight of the aged and their families,and better child care are issues that Liberals and the NDP say they stand for. But no one mentions the needs of those who are young and without pensions, or connections for finding profitable work. Nor does anyone say anything about whether or not there is a real need for importing workers from abroad too many of whom inevitably and almost invisibly join the ranks of the underemployed/unemployed and impoverished regardless of "the economy".

Which is the real-est characterization of them all?

2011-04-21T04:23:00.000-07:00

On April 12, 2011 I was reading an article in the Toronto Star about President Obama's appearing to be celebrating government spending cuts that might some day diminish the US's government debt, and saw a reference to an April 10 article in the New York Times :

"The President Is Missing"By PAUL KRUGMAN Published: April 10, 2011

What have they done with President Obama? What happened to the inspirational figure his supporters thought they elected? Who is this bland, timid guy who doesn't seem to stand for anything in particular?

So after reading these two articles of April 10 & 12 assessing President Obama's deficit reducing stature I was surprised on Friday April 15,2011 to hear on PBS the following appraisal of Mr. Obama's deficit cutting actions by two other journalists:

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree the president did an effective job?

MARK SHIELDS: I think the president did a remarkable job. I mean, understand this, Jim.
..................................................................................

DAVID BROOKS: Yes. Well, I mean, he did rally the left.

Food Prices(April 2011)

2011-04-21T03:40:00.000-07:00

On April 21, 2011 the following words appeared in the Nairobi Star

"Kenya: Countrywide Protests Over Food, Fuel Prices"

Here are some

subjective comments about media coverage of inflation and food pricing.

Egypt, April 9, 2011

2011-04-09T04:37:00.000-07:00

By Patrick Werr and Marwa Awad

CAIRO | Sat Apr 9, 2011 7:19am EDT

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian protesters who defied an army bid to clear them from Cairo's central Tahrir Square demanded on Saturday that the military pass power to civilians and put former President Hosni Mubarak on trial...

Consuming, Fear, Anxiety

2011-03-30T03:24:00.000-07:00

And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handfull of dust.

The Wasteland,canto I; T.S.Eliot,1922

As I was growing up fear was a constant media message. Then we were encouraged to fear communism especially Russian communists who we heard wanted to enslave the world, just like the Germans and Japanese whom we eventually defeated with the help of the US and the UK in the second world war. Eventually communist China assumed the frightening aspects of Russia especially after China on the side of communist North Korea helped create the stalemate that concluded the Korean War.

Since Richard Nixon's trip to communist China in the 1970's, the fear of communist China subsided as a vast variety of consumer goods made in China were exported for sale to North American consumers. And since the decline of its Soviet Union, Russia has become a sort of friendly bear joining the US in space exploration but not in Afghanistan, perhaps, where some believe that Nato is fighting to diminish Russian influence from Turkmenistan along the future gas pipeline rout to Europe.

Today the object of fear has shifted from fear of communists to a fear of Islamists, bad weather, incomplete insurance coverage,bad credit scores, inadequate diet, anxiety over sports losses,global warming and bullying.

Recently I heard that fear and greed are useful to marketers in attracting consumers to their products. I used to think that the fear valued by marketers was the fear a consumer might have of not obtaining the marketer's product and the greed or desire was simply the desire to obtain the advantages that the product might provide. But I eventually learned in studying my own fears and desires that when experiencing fear/anxiety the desire to purchase something appeared to create a sense of momentary power over this fear which at times seemed so powerful that it increased the desirability of the sale item.

The term consumer, closely associated with the term purchaser, is metaphorically derived from the idea of eating, which I have known for years was inspired by anxiety, for I have been aware as many others have that much of my appetite is inspired by anxiety, an overwhelming urge to fill a psychological emptiness which too often is mistaken for real physical need.

Toronto's Early Rock and Roll Society

2011-03-28T05:19:00.000-07:00

After watching the Bravo TV presentation of "Rock and Roll Stories" about Toronto's Rock and Roll musicians on Yonge Street from 1957 to the 1970's I could not resist recalling an old 1960's photo of Boyd Sarney and the Silouhettes. This photo is unique in that it represents the social world that has all but disappeared with the early Toronto bands, and the age of the teenager, for it shows that those early bands, and musicians were part of a community of friends, girl friends, and local well wishers and not simply the heroic and sometimes rebellious Rock Stars that inevitably came to represent performers of popular music.

When will Egypt's military relinquish power?

2011-03-21T07:10:00.000-07:00

The following is quoted from a Reuters March 21,2011 news report.

MILITARY RELINQUISHES POWER

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces will assume presidential powers until the new head of state is elected.At that point, it is expected to relinquish power

The Green Dolphin Restaurant Toronto

2011-03-19T09:30:00.001-07:00

The Green Dolphin restaurant on the south side of Queen Street West facing north up Landsdowne Avenue was to Parkdale/Toronto West, what the Brown Derby and later the Zanzibar was to downtown Toronto. It was a kind of hub where people from surrounding areas would meet to find out what was "going on". This was the place where New Brunswick boxer Gerry Durret's meeting Robbie Robertson from Toronto's east end, and eventually Arkansa's Ronnie Hawkins inspired Gerry to become an entertainer playing harmonica and singing.

Here too the dapper and trimly attired Norm Robichaud would stop for a coffee or conversation during his walks from Sunnyside and the five corners to Dufferin and Queen. And there he'd run into Eddy Billick standing wearing his latest suit in front of the Dolphin at the Queen Landsdowne intersection. They'd talk of where they'd been recently: the Elm Grove near Dufferin, the Pool Hall near Sunnyside, and sometimes even the downtown bars.

But their favourite topics were Hollywood movies and movie stars. They wanted to be actors, not on stage but on location in movies. And they seemed always dressed for the part, wearing suits and ties at any time of day or night: in those days(1950's to 1960's)our minds were filled with Hollywood movies and movie stars. In a way these images were patterns for our dress and behaviour until the end of the 1960's when "rock & roll"became "ROCK", and musicians' black mohair suits were replaced with colourful shirts and hats, and even jeans.

Neither Ed, nor Norm were musicians, but both, especially Ed, eagerly participated in discussions about the groups and musicians I was working with. I don't recall what Norm's talents were, but as time went on I learned that Edy was a rather accomplished visual artist.

There were of course numerous other visitors to the Dolphin: most were friendly with the restaurant's proprietor, Louis(looeey) who when it got busy would hustle us coffee sippers out of the more lucrative booths.

Most of us lived a short walk from the Dolphin: none of us drove. Edy lived in a house up Landsdowne, Gerry Durette in a modern apartment on Jameson Avenue south toward King Street. In those days I was living on Close Avenue. I don't think I ever knew where Norm resided.

What is invisible poverty?

2011-03-10T03:24:00.000-08:00

...Fama di loro il mondo esser non lassa,
misericordia e giustizia gli sdegna:
non ragionian di lor, ma guarda e passa."Inferno, Canto III

Most of what people know about society arrives through the various news vehicles such as TV, free newspapers and to a diminishing extent radio. All of these media seem to repeat the same features all day long and sometimes all week long, and most of these feature facts seem to be based on reports of other journalists or expert studies.

Consequently information about poverty is conveyed in references to abstract studies or in feature stories based on information of experts or interviews of those considered to be disadvantaged. Scarcely does this information about poverty seem to arise from any one's immediate experience. No one seems to have witnessed the life of the poor in the places where the poor seem most real: on Toronto's downtown streets where the poor have been sleeping since the late 1970's, or standing in rush hour crowds that struggle onto the subway, buses and streetcars. And no one reporting about the poor seems to live among the poor in apartment towers or houses in not so desirable real estate areas where even public schools seem underfunded compared to schools in more affluent districts. And of course one might assume that the poor do not comprise the intellectual milieu of those who now and then publicise information about poverty.

Rising Prices of Oil, and Other Commodities

2011-03-06T03:28:00.000-08:00

I first published "Food Costs and Wages" quoted below on Tuesday, 17 June, 2008 a few months before the stock market crash in the late summer of 2008 as oil prices rose to $147.00 a barrel, and food riots were breaking out in some parts of the developing world. During the recession that followed oil prices fell to some $30.00 a barrel, though food prices did not appear to decline, and the media forgot about the rising cost of food and oil, and warned only about the severe risks of deflation(falling prices)until the winter of 2010 when most commodity prices rose to such heights that talk of deflation dissipated and increasing numbers of media experts began speaking of possible inflation as the United States loaned billions of dollars to banks and investors.

Today in the first week of March 2011, media are now reporting rising commodity prices which include the rise of oil to just over $104.00 a barrel and grocery costs increasing by 5%. And now there is talk of how economies would not be adversely affected by the increased cost of fuel until the price of oil reaches $110.00 per barrel. But now the 2008 $147.00 a barrel oil shock is increasingly recalled as the point at which people and economies stopped spending and the world fell into a recession which President Obama and his economic advisers called the worst economic decline since the depression of the 1930's which they attributed to America's speculative financial investments and not the great oil shock of 2008.

"Food Costs and Wages"
Tuesday, 17 June, 2008
For years now media business commentators have spoken of fears of deflation while most of us who grocery shop have worried about the rising price of food and our deflationary wages.

Recently a common grocery check out scenario has included credit card rejection and the cry "the price of groceries keeps rising but my wages stay the same."

2011-02-28T04:19:00.000-08:00

The following headline in a Press TV transcript of a February 28 interview with Syed Wasif, a professor of international law in Washington, reads

In Egypt, protests continue against the military interim government, demanding a civilian transitional government until the presidential election in September.

The transcript continues with a discussion of the significance of two American senators recently visiting Egypt, and the US-Egypt relationship.

McCain & Lieberman in Tahir Square

2011-02-27T16:42:00.000-08:00

Two senior U.S. senators toured Tahrir Square, the hub of the protests that toppled Mubarak, a long-time ally of the United States. Democratic Senator Joseph Lieberman and Republican Senator John McCain shook hands with passersby.

"We're very happy to be here, it's very exciting new era for a great country, great history, great future," Lieberman said.

(Reuters Feb. 27, 2011. Additional reporting by Yasmine Saleh, Patrick Werr, Shaimaa Fayed and Ashraf Fahim; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)

I remember them travelling together way back in March 2008.

"Egypt's protest dispersed by force ...

2011-02-27T04:17:00.000-08:00

Army uses batons to break up demonstrations in Cairo demanding purging of Mubarak loyalists from government."

The Egyptian military has now apologized for its attacking and imprisoning protesters this Friday, February 25, 2011.

Appearance

2011-02-17T03:48:00.000-08:00

In the autumn of 2008 when Mr. H. Polson was the U.S. Secretary of the treasury the word "transparency" became a popular expression used by media and politicians often implying a kind of moral forthrightness. Now the term is sounded so often that it is beginning to mean "goodness" so that "transparency's' opposite, "opaqueness" seems to imply a kind of hiddeness, behind which fraudulent actions may be committed.

But to me "transparent" means only something that one can "see through", a gauze curtain perhaps, or an X-ray image which I see but may or may not be able to understand. So for me the word opaque never implies a quality of less worth than its opposite transparency; whether an image or an action appears through a transparent glaze oris immediately visible depends only on one's ability to understand what one sees.

In keeping with my opinion that opaque images are as revealing as transparent ones I have chosen some images of photographs and paintings whose subjects are real people whose faces, actions and surroundings have a typical humanity conveyed by a kind of opaque immediacy.

Wael Ghonin & William Hague

2011-02-15T03:32:00.000-08:00

According to Reuters, a Google executive's and Britain's Foreign Secretary's comments have been the basis for promises by Egypt's military to hold elections that could lead to civilian control of the military some time in the future.

Wael Ghonim, a Google executive who had been detained for his part in the uprising, said members of the military council had told him a plebiscite would be held on constitutional amendments in two months.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague also said Prime Minister Ahmed Shafik had let him know that he would reshuffle his cabinet in the coming week to bring in opposition opinion.(Reuters February 14, 2011)

And again on February 15 Reuters confirms that of those involved in the Egyptian protests that the Google executive is the only person named as being directly involved in negotians with Egypt's military.

Wael Ghonim, a Google executive who had been detained for his part in the uprising, said members of the military council had told him a plebiscite would be held on constitutional amendments in two months, a prelude to holding elections. (Reuters February 15, 2011)

Mr. Mubarak's February 10, 2011 Speech (an opinion)

2011-02-13T03:41:00.000-08:00

This morning of February 13, 2011, I read the CBC transcript of Mr. Mubarak's Thursday, February 10 speech. What I read on Feb.13 was technically more confusing than what I thought I had heard on Feb.10, but whether the speech was expected to contain Mubarak's resignation or not, what I heard and what I read seemed full of his real human sorrow upon his having to make the speech in response to the preceding 2 weeks of protest organized against his presidency.

If one were to take seriously his devotion to Egypt, Mr. Mubarak may seem a tragic figure, arriving out of the military, to replace the slain former military man President Sadat to save Egypt from the political chaos that seemed about to follow upon Sadat's assassination scarcely 30 years since Egypt's 1952 independence.

In the nearly 30 years since he replaced Mr. Sadat, to save Egypt, he perhaps lost sight of his goal, the independence of the people who are Egypt, forgotten as a result of a blinding hubris that had engulfed him until his sad speech on February 10,2011.

Armies

2011-02-12T15:55:00.000-08:00

They used to say it would end all wars
That world-wide calamity;
Then with just a glimpse of history
Prize in hand for peace he planned his war.

And the army, Oh the army
Hushed
Guns behind them,
Motionless, scarcely breathing
Waiting, watching for the moment
Like a house cat waiting
To be a leopard
Leaping.

Consumerism and Democracy

2011-02-12T04:25:00.000-08:00

"itunes" and unwanted viagra emails keep invading my junk email box no matter how many blocks I program to stop them.

Six Exoplanets

2011-02-07T03:32:00.000-08:00

Sky and Telescope emails some recent articles about astronomy discoveries for free. A recent article about the physical characteristics,and orbits of six exoplanets( planets outside our solar system) and the star they orbit is informative,

Xenophobia and Globalism

2011-02-05T09:54:00.000-08:00

Xenophobia is a word often hurled at people objecting to having local industries and jobs replaced by people from outside one's locale or country. The word is derived from a Greek term meaning fear of strangers and is used to mock those wishing to resist being replaced by less expensive labour as though fearing job loss or lower wages is motivated by prejudice toward foreigners, a dislike of immigrants and not simply fear of personal and family economic destruction.

Contrasting with the term xenophobia is the idea of globalism which seems more complementary to those to whom it is applied as it connotes a kind of worldly generosity, a willingness to sacrifice one's self, family and country to a greater worldly good.

The conflict between the globalists and xenophobes has heightened since the early 1970's. During that time to the present the champions of globalism seemed not so much foreign countries seeking to acquire the wealth of other nations but by international companies often using the political and military strengths of their countries of origin to further the welfare of their own businesses. During this time the wages of most workers, the non knowledge based workers, have stagnated while the wages of executives and professionals have soared.

" food stamp beneficiaries aren't them - they're us,"

2011-01-31T04:54:00.000-08:00

Here is another old article about poverty first published on November 3, 2009.

Tuesday, 3 November, 2009

Talk of child poverty is endless. Few talk of poverty without implying that only children are poor and that general poverty may not exist.

To reinforce the view that only children are poor researchers for the study, " Half of U.S. Kids on Food Stamps", talk of pediatricians, doctors expert in childhood ailments as those in the know about child poverty, when the fact is poverty has to do with injustice, not medicine or diseases caused by poverty.

For as 'James Weill, president of Food Research and Action Center, a Washington-based advocacy group, said ... that "there are just very large numbers of people who rely on this[food stamp] program for a month, six months, a year."

"What I hope comes out of this study is an understanding that food stamp beneficiaries aren't them - they're us,"

Canada's March food price increase "largest since November 1986"

2011-01-31T04:43:00.000-08:00

What follows is a quotation based on a Statistics Canada April, 2009 report about rising food prices.

Sunday, 19 April, 2009

Food prices, the largest factor, rose 7.9% during the 12-month period to March, on the heels of a 7.4% rise in February. March's increase was the largest since November 1986.

Shelter costs, the second largest factor, advanced at a 12-month rate of growth of 2.1% in March, after increasing 3.0% in February. While still a major contributor to consumer price growth, the 12-month change in the shelter price index has slowed since reaching a peak of 5.4% in July 2008. (Statistics Canada,April 17,2009)

Food, Energy, and Credit

2011-01-31T04:23:00.000-08:00

What follows is an article I published in November, 2008 amidst media', politicians' and economists' concerns about the so-called "credit crunch".

Monday, 24 November, 2008

In October and in early November of this year I wrote asking why this summer's world-wide food riots had disappeared from media reports. I was concerned because the shortage of basic foodstuffs: rice, wheat, and corn around the world affected food prices in Canada so that when I noticed reports of the shortage of bank capital drowning out reports of food shortages, I expected the prices of bread and pasta to suddenly go back to 2007 levels, about half what they are today. Indeed not only are the prices of basic foodstuffs twice what they were about a year ago, but fees for insurance, and most services are still rising substantially.

Last evening in a CBC interview I learned from a World Food Program official that one billion people world wide go to bed hungry as they did before this past autumn while the cost of food rose, and the shortages of food increased. All those media stories about food shortages have simply been replaced by stories about the credit crunch. The value of food and energy, and world population continue rising.

And food shortages and energy depletion, the most fundamental occurences in world economies continue affecting every aspect of economic and social life, while everyone gives their attention to the business and credit practises used to distribute the profits from selling and maintaing food supplies.

Food Prices Still Rising

2011-01-31T04:06:00.000-08:00

The following piece first published on Saturday, 29 March, 2008 maintains its relevance today, January 31,2011.

Several years ago I thought I noticed food prices at the supermarket increasing. But every time I heard economists and other experts on the Canadian business news talking about prices their major concern was deflation, not rising food prices which they excluded as not part of the core prices which were actually trending low.

Although I accepted the experts findings, I still could not dismiss the nagging feeling that I had been paying more and more for food, and that someone in the media should warn us of the implication of rising food prices even if food prices were not calculated in their so called, core, price trend analyses.

One day at least 2 years ago a conversation about food prices developed at the supermarket checkout. I recall that the conversation began when a customer complained to the check out clerk that she had found herself having to estimate increasingly larger sums to pay for her groceries. The clerk seemed to agree that he'd experienced this price rise as he found himself spending $25 a day for his groceries.

In the week of March 23, 2008, I read of food riots throughout the world, and a headline on the front page of Saturday's Globe and Mail that decried food inflation throughout the world. Yesterday, I saw and read reports of food riots in Haiti.

When will economic and media financial experts begin talking about food price rises, (non core inflation) to the degree that they warned about core deflation several years ago?

Truth

2011-01-30T09:36:00.000-08:00

What is truth?

What's been said.

What's been heard.

What's repeated, oft quoted.

What's not worth the bother?

Perceiving.

Remembering

Thinking.

What is thinking?

Despotism, Democracy/Communism/Socialism

2011-01-30T03:01:00.000-08:00

Television reports of demonstrations against Egypt's current rulers frequently introduce the notion that these demonstrations if successful will lead to democracy. Indeed a number of spokes people have excitedly stated that the desire for democracy in the Middle East has become contagious and is spreading uncontrollably from Tunisia to Egypt and beyond, a kind of fever that President George W. Bush believed would develop from America's 2003 invasion of Iraq.

In keeping with this notion that equates the desire for freedom with a desire for democracy, one CTV commentator repeated the notion without challenge that the possible fall of the current Egyptian government might be analogous with the fall of communism. None of the experts to whom this commentator introduced this notion paralleling the possible fall of Egypt's rulers with the fall of communism said anything about her apparent analogy as though it were an undeniable fact against which no one tuned into CTV would want to argue. But despite the lack of discussion of this parallel there remains another view about the relation between recent revolutionary events in Egypt and more distant ones in Russia, and that is that both the communist revolution in Russia and demonstrations in Egypt represent an attack against despotism. In Russia communists rebelled against an autocratic Czar and an hereditary and oppressive political system; in Egypt the despot may be a president who has remained in power for a generation and appears to be preparing to hand power to his son to perhaps establish a kind of dynasty to ensure against unknown forces who might obtain power in a way that could be destructive to Egypt.

But as in Czarist Russia in Egypt a successful dismantling of the current regime may not necessarily lead to a Western style democracy though both the Russian revolutionaries and Egyptian demonstrators seem challenged by a despotic regime.

Media Speak

2011-01-29T11:34:00.000-08:00

Media = social media;

Fall of communism = Fall of north African governments

Democracy, the international community triumph

Through media

So says media.

Staying on the Right Side

2011-01-29T03:36:00.000-08:00

Media accounts of the turmoil in Egypt show that most journalists and politicians seem sympathetic with the protesters believing that they represent democracy overcoming tyranny. News reports condemn the Egyptian regime for turning the Egyptian army against the people demonstrating in the streets, and cutting off their Internet communications. But no one ever explains why these same reporters and politicians in 29 years scarcely said anything to discourage the anti democratic government actions that are said to be the reasons for the current protests; and why today it is assumed that this turmoil in North Africa is motivated by the inevitable striving for global democracy as practised in Europe, Israel and North America, and not the more socialist kind championed in Asia and Africa between 1945 and 1960 against the colonial influence of Europe and North America.

Torontonians

2011-01-27T11:28:00.000-08:00

When people ask me where I'm from, assuming I'm from somewhere else, and I tell them I'm from Toronto, they respond incredulously as though they had never met anyone actually from Toronto, "Yeah' but where are you from?" They ask again. I repeat; I was born in the city of Toronto but moved to Scarborough to avoid the unpleasant changes in Toronto of the 1990's.

For most people Toronto is what Toronto's become, a place where people migrate to, not a place to be born, and raised.

A place passed through, but never a home.

But before 1970 Toronto was somewhere to be, not because of its simple architecture, but because of its stability,its cleanliness, and its citizens.

Young and Dundas for instance obtained its character from the Torontonians who congregated there from the east and west ends of the city. Some had originated in small towns up north in Ontario or Quebec. Some were native Canadians but regardless of their origins everyone seemed to be a Torontonian. And the proof was that if any of us wanted to confirm our status all we needed to do was go down to Yonge and Dundas, stand on the corner, have a drink at the Derby, a shoe shine or pressed pants at United Deforest, a hot dog surprise or smaltz herring at Tops.

We would see young & old acquaintances of various backgrounds and notoriety, and talk about the recent exploits of fellow Torontonians without ever looking up at the signs on the hodge podge of buildings that surrounded us to remind us where we were, or to confirm that we were all Torontonians.

Food Prices(January 2011)

2011-01-26T04:50:00.001-08:00

Today, Jan. 26, 2011 after following months of reports of rising food prices I read the following United Nations' warning that reminded me that in November 4, 2008 most media commentators so concerned about deflation and global warming seemed to have forgotten food riots the previous summer as oil prices were reaching close to 150 dollars a barrel.

The FAO has warned that prices of wheat and other staples rose alarmingly in 2010 and that some poor countries may be headed for a repeat of the 2007/2008 food crisis that led to deadly riots

..............................................................................

Tuesday, 4 November, 2008
"Who remembers world wide food riots this summer?"
There has been a world-wide shortage of rice and other basic grain foodstuffs since 2007. Canadians have been paying double the price for bread and pasta since 2007.

On November 4, 2008 Archer Daniels Midland world's largest grain processor announced record profits for the quarter ending September 30, 2008:

"DECATUR, Ill., Nov. 4 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Archer Daniels Midland Company ADM today announced record quarterly net earnings of $ 1.05 billion for the quarter ended September 30, 2008, up 138 % from the period a year ago. Net sales increased 65 % to $ 21.16 billion."

A Canadian Offshore Oil Moratorium

2011-01-23T05:15:00.000-08:00

Tuesday, 15 June, 2010

On May 4, 2010 British Columbia's Liberal Environment Minister said he's prepared to review a 37 year old moratorium on offshore oil exploration.

It is puzzling that this review was announced after the BP oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico, though the spill has been given as a reason for no action being taken on lifting the ban.

An interesting element in talk about reviewing the ban is that there is no evidence that the ban was ever based on law.

... it seems clear that the federal ban on oil and gas tanker traffic cannot be found in any statute or other binding legal instrument. Moreover, there is no federal instrument that establishes a ban on offshore exploration and development. The provincial government has periodically complained but has acquiesced in these arrangements...

"Men, stop crying in public" (Toronto StarJan.22)

2011-01-22T09:48:00.000-08:00

Juvenal Satire XV(an older,less witty view of the significance of tears)

... When Nature gave tears to man, she proclaimed that he was tender-hearted; and tenderness is the best feeling in man. She therefore bids us weep for a friend who pleads his case as a defendant in squalor, or when a ward whose streaming face and girlish locks raise a doubt as to his sex brings a defrauder into court. It is at Nature's command that we moan when we come across the funeral of a mature maiden, or when the earth closes over a babe too young for the funeral pyre. For what good man, what man worthy of the mystic torch,
and such as the priest of Ceres would wish him to
be, believes that any human woes concern him not?
It is this that divides us from the speechless herd;
and it is for this that we alone have had allotted to
us a nature worthy of reverence, capable of divine
things, fit to create and practise the arts, and that we
have drawn from on high that gift of feeling which
separates us from the lowly [beasts], who are lacking
and who lean forward with eyes on the ground...

the Bank of Canada's Economic Perspective

2011-01-20T03:40:00.000-08:00

According to a report in the Business section of today's Toronto Star Mr Carney, Canada's central banker said yesterday that

Canada has recouped all the jobs lost during the recession, while the U.S. has only recovered about one-seventh of the over 8 million jobs that vanished in the slump. Canada is also the only country in the G7 whose economic output has returned to pre-recession levels."
Yet he also says “Canada’s lack of competitiveness is acting as a bit of a brake on the recovery at this point and that’s become a real concern to the Bank of Canada.”

But this report also says

Canadian firms have been outpaced by rivals when it comes to improving productivity......................................................................
“The divergence in productivity growth between Canada and the United States has become even more pronounced in recent years. This underlines the risk that a combination of disappointing productivity performance and persistent strength in the Canadian dollar could dampen the expected recovery in net exports"...

This allusion to the strength of the Canadian dollar dapening recovery in exports is puzzling considering that the Canadian dollar was rising when Canada was recouping "all the jobs lost during the recession" and the U.S. recovering only "about one-seventh of the over 8 million jobs that vanished in the slump." and becoming the "only country in the G7 whose economic output has returned to pre-recession levels."

The reference to Canada's poor productivity compared to the U.S. also needs a full explanation to be fully appreciated, for with Canadian jobs returning to pre-recession levels while the U.S. struggles to regain its pre recession employmemt levels as its productivity(decreasing the cost of labor) surpasses Canada's suggests that the U.S. has sacrificed jobs to improve productivity as though productivity and exports ought to be of greater value to Canadians than employment and "economic output".

"Family Ties"

2011-01-18T05:30:00.000-08:00

A report in today's Toronto Star tells that Mr.& Mrs. McCain of McCain Foods are donating one million dollars to a gay-rights church in Toronto's gentrified Riverdale district whose pastor has "family ties" with the McCains.

A Toronto Star business report on February 3, 2011 extends the "ties" theme into the secular realm.

Maple Leaf Foods Inc. has agreed to bring the CEO of West Face Capital onto its board of directors in a move to satisfy complaints about some of the directors’ independence from the McCain family.(The Canadian Press)

' "whose ass to kick" '

2011-01-17T15:05:00.000-08:00

There has recently been much media commentary about a lack of civility in political discourse. This concern about civility seems ironic when one considers that the media appear to encourage those they interview to tell about the various emotions such people feel when they are involved in news making events, not their thoughts and objective analyses or interpretations. Since expressions of emotion when habituated sometimes provoke thoughtless and sometimes vulgar outbursts one might imagine that encouraging emotion may in fact encourage in politicians the subjective feeling that one is always right and that one's opponent is always wrong. A case in point is the media's complaint that President Obama had at first shown little emotion in his reaction to BP's involvement in the April, 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

What follows is my previously published description of the media's attempts to get more emotion out of the president who complies with his rather uncivil emotional outburst about ass kicking.

Friday, June 11, 2010

It's funny how media television and newspaper reports, and interviews about President Obama's handling of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico seem to suggest that Americans believe that Mr. Obama's rhetoric about BP's responsibility for the spill lacks emotion. So in the last few days Mr. Obama talks about America's getting "through this crisis"(the oil spill that began on April 22,2010 in the Gulf of Mexico)as Americans have always done; and on the Good Morning America interview his emotional outbursts about his knowing "whose ass to kick," and in his hypothetically firing the CEO of BP, Mr. Hayward if he had been Mr. Hayward's boss, Mr. Obama seems to be trying to give Americans the emotion that media say Americans want, instead of his administration's rational management of offshore drilling in environmentally sensitive waters.

Mr. Obama partially ends a 20+ year moratorium

2011-01-16T12:49:00.000-08:00

Thursday, 1 April, 2010

President Obama appeared on the "Newshour" this March 31, 2010 evening giving his reasons for having "partially ended a moratorium that's lasted more than 20 years."

JIM LEHRER: 'There could be more drilling for oil along major expanses of the U.S. coastline. President Obama today partially ended a moratorium that's lasted more than 20 years.'
...................................................................................
U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: 'This is not a decision that I have made lightly. But the bottom line is this: Given our energy needs, in order to sustain economic growth, produce jobs, and keep our businesses competitive, we're going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel, even as we ramp up production of new sources of renewable, homegrown energy.'

BP Inquiry Report

2011-01-16T05:43:00.000-08:00

Here is the 306 page 16.7 Megabit, Bp inquiry report complete with colourful photographs.

An Iranian Invitation

2011-01-15T05:28:00.000-08:00

Just above the tiny report in the Jan. 15 Toronto Star about a military advisory commission recommending that the Pentagon stop banning "women from serving in combat units" I read that only Egypt, Cuba, Syria, Algeria and Venezuela accepted Iran's invitation to tour Iranian nuclear sites and that the US China and Russia had refused. What common factor united Egypt, Cuba, Syria, Algeria and Venezuela in their acceptance of this invitation, and conversely what is the basis for China's, Russia's and the US's rejecting this invitation? Why were European countries not even invited?

cerinte_psiVARSTELORAA	http://www.scribd.com/doc/73118108/cerinte ...
sint psiho 267	http://www.scribd.com/doc/3497894/sint-psiho-267

Voice

Internet privacy is a fiction.

Books and Docs - Search - ANCA ROZOREA

Books and Docs - Search - buratino

Books and Docs - Search - ericson dezvoltarea socio afectiva

Books and Docs - Search - hacking

The Unintended/Sorry

The Economy and Me

Iran or the Republican primaries

"Iran warns of consequences if Arabs back oil sanctions"

(Sun Jan 15, 2012 3:24pm EST)

Oil Embargo

Iran and Russia

The Iran Sanctions Saga

What side are they on anyway?

An Interesting Article

The Consuls recording in 1959

Egypt's Military Study Proposal

A Park

Clinton helps promote Obama's energy strategy.

Pakistan and America

Canada, Britain, and USA sanction Iran further

Out of Iraq and into the Asia - Pacific region?

"Heart Break Hotel/Misery Pavilion" (lyrics/reality)

Cutbacks

Now Who'd believe this?

New Libyan PM taught at University of Alabama

NATO in Libya

How Poverty is Kept Invisible

Not All that Important

"The Best of Possible Worlds"

Libya

Heritage Oil in Libya

African Oil Reserves

Courting The Elderly ?

Change

Bailouts and Political Donations

Egypt's army says emergency law in place till June

Libya won't secure borders for "long time": envoy

By their friends ..........

Work and Taxes

CAIRO | Mon Sep 19, 2011 8:37pm BST

Egypt Elections

"Canada to extend Libya mission by three months"

"African migrants take deadly gamble in Libya"

British Officials and The Libyan Transitional Council

Is this how media popularize politicians?

Jobs and Wealth

Egypt's Army

"Meaningless Words"

A Cause of Fear/Depression?

McCain and Kerry visit North Africa with other senators and business leaders.

The Zanzibar Tavern Toronto

June 2011, Vancouver Stanley Cup Rioters Not Anarchists?

Objectivity and Justice

A Hairbrain Opinion?

Political Centre versus Poverty

Debtors

Left, Right or Just Reality?

"The hand is quicker than the eye."

"The Consuls" versus "Little Caesar and the Consuls"

Official Opposition

The U.S. Currency

Impoverishment not an Election Issue

Which is the real-est characterization of them all?

Food Prices(April 2011)

Egypt, April 9, 2011

Consuming, Fear, Anxiety

Toronto's Early Rock and Roll Society

When will Egypt's military relinquish power?

The Green Dolphin Restaurant Toronto

What is invisible poverty?

Rising Prices of Oil, and Other Commodities

McCain & Lieberman in Tahir Square

"Egypt's protest dispersed by force ...

Appearance

Wael Ghonin & William Hague

Mr. Mubarak's February 10, 2011 Speech (an opinion)

Armies

Consumerism and Democracy