It was an email so I don't have an online link.  Here it is in its entirety.


Dear WBAI Supporter –

 

I am not ungrateful, but my first reaction to someone wishing me a Happy New is, “Jeez ... Snap out of it! Who could possibly entertain the faintest hope of a Happy New Year after listening to the ongoing litany of doomsday scenarios presented every day on the airwaves of WBAI?

 

n  Rising sea levels caused by global warming will soon flood the subways and electrical sub-structures of New York (and most other port cities such as London, Tokyo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Rotterdam, Buenos Aires, etc.), shutting off electricity to homes, businesses, hospitals, factories, schools, banks, stores; also access to fresh water (it is pumped by electricity); and gasoline (ditto); and food supplies (delivered trucks that can’t cross inoperable toll bridges and tunnels or navigate streets impossibly grid-locked by lack of traffic lights); not to mention no elevator service, no heating or air conditioning  in residential and commercial buildings; inability to access your checking or savings account, get cash or make credit card purchases to buy food, water, medicine, clothing or other necessities; or access your computer or the internet; or switch on the radio or TV to find out what’s going on; or call anyone on your home phone or cell phone in case of emergency.

 

n  According to privately circulated estimates among city administrative officials and police and fire department personnel, the result of such an event would be citywide panic and the breakdown of law and order, precipitating widespread rioting by armed gangs of looters, thieves, rapists, and ravishers from the Hamptons to Glen Cove, and from Battery Park to the Upper West Side.

 

n  And while they are looting and thieving and raping and ravishing, we might want to consider Fukishima. Another moderate earthquake and/or typhoon (a frequent occurrence) could precipitate the world’s largest nuclear meltdown, and the world’s largest single-event death toll in history. At the moment, however (thank Heaven for small favors), the Fukishima facility is “only” pouring millions of gallons a day of radioactive waste water into the Pacifica Ocean, resulting in massive and irreversible poisoning of air, water, and fish, which has already produced a notable spike in cancers, birth defects and general health debilitation – not only in Japan – but also in America’s Pacifica Northwest, soon to be repeated in Los Angeles and elsewhere across the U.S.

 

n  But why look to Japan for nuclear nastiness? Much closer to home we have the frighteningly imminent possibility of nuclear meltdown at the Indian Point Nuclear Plant, only 28 miles from New York City. Operating way past its certified end-of-life, tottering along like an arthritis-afflicted ancient, badly maintained, recipient of numerous non-compliance citations from nuclear regulatory agencies, subject to frequent malfunctions, and criminally vulnerable even to “mild” earthquakes (or inept sabotage), an Indian Point meltdown could kill 40 million people in 40 minutes, and doom untold millions more to excruciating slow deaths in the months to come, while making the entire New York Metropolitan area an uninhabitable radioactive wasteland for thousands of years.

 

n  But even sooner than a nuclear disaster, we may be facing an even more critical economic disaster -- the catastrophic loss of the dollar’s unique position as the international reserve currency. This is imminent, according to leading economic and political analysts, and would trigger a total collapse of the U.S. banking system, generating explosive financial panic as we are subjected – not only to massive inflation – but also the immediate seizure by failing banks of all our deposits: checking accounts, savings accounts, Certificates of Deposit (CDs), money market funds, pensions, and any other liquid assets. Can failing banks really seize our money “just like that”? Yep, just like that. It is perfectly legal; the enabling “bail-in” laws have already been put on the books in the U.S. and Europe (did you sleep through that?).

 

And don’t think the FDIC  will protect your deposits up to the $250,000 limit promised by this agency. For when the failing banks seize your deposits, they will convert your money into stock in their failed institutions, rendering you “legally compensated” for your loss, and therefore not entitled to reimbursement  by the FDIC. Not that it will matter because, by that time, the FDIC will be bankrupt, since it has reserves of only $25 billion, whereas the seized deposits requiring compensation would likely exceed $25 trillion. And even if the FDIC could lay its hands on $25 trillion (fat chance, since this is nearly twice the entire Gross Domestic Product of the United States), another statute now  on the books, namely the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2005, which was arm-twisted into law by Citigroup, JP Morgan, Chase,  Wells Fargo and the rest of the usual suspects (bet you slept through that, too), compels the FDIC to give preference to derivatives counter-parties over mere depositors like yourself, whose claims for reimbursement could exceed $600 trillion – or more than the GDP of the entire world economy.

 

n  But that’s not all. About a minute before the above-described financial collapse, the Government will suddenly announce the immediate devaluation of the U.S. dollar. (Of course, former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner officially denied that the Treasury would ever do this. But on the other hand, as British journalist Claude Cockburn, once warned, “Never believe anything until it is officially denied.”) This devaluation would wipe out (if anything was left) the last vestige of the savings and buying power of virtually everyone in the country, except the 1% who own it.

 

n  Simultaneously, the Government would also issue a proclamation officially seizing -- and harshly criminalizing the holding of -- gold and/or silver by private citizens, so that those who had been trying to hedge against collapse of the dollar by hoarding gold and silver, could not benefit. Few analysts mention this scenario, but it is inevitable. In fact, it has already been done in America -- with “fines of $10,000, or imprisonment, or both” for violators. See FDR’s Executive Order 6102, which I have attached in all its ominous glory. [The same text in more readable form is at http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=14611&st=&st1=]

 

n  At the same time, restrictive international monetary laws will be in force (many countries have already enacted them) forbidding citizens, non-citizens, or foreigners to transfer more than a token value of assets (cash, precious metals, jewelry, ownership of real property) from one country another, on pain of imprisonment and fine; so that those who sought to shield their assets by stashing them overseas may still own them, but will never get to enjoy them – sort of like being the proud owner of a magnificent swimming pool ... on the Moon.

 

n  But hey, what’s money? Food is more important. Unfortunately, a large portion -- perhaps even most -- of the crops now being grown in the U.S. are either already Genetically Modified or on the way to being “infected” and “mingled” with GM seeds. (No one really knows for sure the actual extent, and those able to find out, don’t want to know). Every day, Monsanto’s vigilant army of “crop detectives” discovers allegedly “stolen” GMO seeds on another non-GMO farmer’s land (blown by wind or dropped by birds), which gives Monsanto grounds to sue for “seed theft,” as it has successfully been doing for the last 10 years, winning huge settlements that bankrupt non-GMO farmers, and accelerate the ultimate takeover of our entire U.S. food supply by GM agriculture, dairy production, meat, and fish.

 

n  But why bother to pay attention to what’s going on around you? The Government will pay attention for you, the same way it is already paying attention to you. Unlimited NSA surveillance now allows the Government to track you wherever you are, in case they want to arrest you; or to discover and blackmail you about private and potentially embarrassing events or issues, if they merely want to ruin your life. Either way, if you pose a threat, they can crush you.

 

n  Can you resist that kind of Government pressure? Sure, if you want a broken arm or a rubber bullet in your head. That’s because the growing militarization (and brutalization) of local state and city police forces -- along with the shredding of posse comitatus – is the Government’s way of preparing for the “pacification” and detainment of large numbers of citizens by using overwhelming armed force, when (not “if”) the loss of their savings, jobs, income, food, water, and homes precipitates the anger, rioting, looting, and clamor for revolution that will follow the playing out of the various scenarios described above.

 

n  As a minor distraction, given present technology, there is also the real possibility (Dick Cheney is just waiting to say I told you so) of small nuclear devices being brought into this country piecemeal (and therefore undetectably), then assembled and sited in various locations, to be detonated randomly and terrifying by those who have nothing to lose because they believe (no doubt correctly) that they have already lost everything as a result of military, economic, or cultural predation by the U.S. or one of its proxies.

 

n  By the way, did you notice that fracking is on the rise everywhere? So huge are the profits to be derived from its ability to access and recover hitherto unusable energy deposits, that the practice will be almost impossible to restrict, let alone stop. Therefore, expect even more earthquakes and contamination of water supplies in the future, not only throughout New York State (if Governor Cuomo caves on the issue, as he expected to do) but in virtually every state of the union. But it’s not all bad – hopefully, sometime in the future, fracking will enable you to save 3 to 4 cents a gallon when you gas up (if you can still afford to own a car).

 

n  Are you ready for the solar flares? NASA predicts them to hit in force within the next 10-14 months, though with as yet unknown severity. But according to some knowledgeable analysts, they may hit with enough force to knock out electricity, transportation, and computer capability on a global basis, dragging the world back to the 15th century. That might not be so bad, if at least humanity survived. But it may not, because the international energy grid transformers, which supply the world’s electrical power, were never hardened against solar flares. So they could all be fried. Which means -- if worldwide electric power ceases even for only 48-72 hours (and some predict it could cease for months or even years) -- the 435 or so nuclear reactors around the globe will (after their 48-72 hours of backup generator fuel is expended) be unable to circulate cold water over their nuclear cores, and melt down.

 

So even if you have bought or built a looter-proof home, surrounded by barbed wire, on arable farmland, with years of canned food stored in an underground bunker, and your own private spring-fed well – all located hundreds of miles away from the nearest nuclear reactor (say, in Florida or Texas) – what good will it do? When the world’s 435 nuclear reactors all melt down at once, and start spewing radioactive fallout into every global wind current and waterway in the world, will there truly be any place to hide for anyone -- except perhaps those who are willing and able to live underground for the next 25,000 years?

 

There are (sigh) many other very probable disaster scenarios I could list,  but my fingers are getting tired. And listing more would be overkill – like trying to frighten you by threatening to slit your throat after I have already shot you through the heart. So I will stop, and thank all my friends for their Happy New Year’s wishes, some of which could – who knows? -- actually come true. 

 

But I won’t hold my breath – although, given the increasing levels of pollution, holding one’s breath might be one of the few positive actions available in the months ahead.

 

Sweet dreams, all.

 



Stephen M Brown

sbrown13@nyc.rr.com

news.lists.stevebrownonboard.org

I agree.  My father was a staunch conservative, a senior account agent with a national insurance company.  Insurance companies are little more than banks that gamble but their gambles are backed by studies that qualify and quantify everything and when they bet it's like having Vegas house odds or better.  He use to say 'don't worry about the national debt, after all we only owe it to ourselves' but of course in the 21st Century that is no longer the case.  Post WWI when Germany had vast reparations to shell out they drastically devalued their currency and so major US financial entities used the devalued German money to buy up German industry.   So, maybe the Chinese will buy Century21 Inc and buy up American homes.  Who knows, maybe one day a good portion of Americans will be renting from the Chinese.  Heck, I do believe organized crime finds apartment buildings and rental homes excellent investments so why not overseas American debt holders doing the same thing.

You might have a small matza ball soup shop, a few tables and bar and popular.  You get approached and told you will launder money.  From then on every year you're saving $50k.  You start buying up real estate in the town.  By the time you retire you own a good part of the town.

Here's a blatant divergence from the thread.  What the author describes should be good for Bitcoin however.  He get annoyed at Happy New Years wishes and decries disasters that might befall the world and the US in the coming year.  When he gets to the US economy he postulates:

"  But even sooner than a nuclear disaster, we may be facing an even more critical economic disaster -- the catastrophic loss of the dollar’s unique position as the international reserve currency. This is imminent, according to leading economic and political analysts, and would trigger a total collapse of the U.S. banking system, generating explosive financial panic as we are subjected – not only to massive inflation – but also the immediate seizure by failing banks of all our deposits: checking accounts, savings accounts, Certificates of Deposit (CDs), money market funds, pensions, and any other liquid assets. Can failing banks really seize our money “just like that”? Yep, just like that. It is perfectly legal; the enabling “bail-in” laws have already been put on the books in the U.S. and Europe (did you sleep through that?).

 

And don’t think the FDIC  will protect your deposits up to the $250,000 limit promised by this agency. For when the failing banks seize your deposits, they will convert your money into stock in their failed institutions, rendering you “legally compensated” for your loss, and therefore not entitled to reimbursement  by the FDIC. Not that it will matter because, by that time, the FDIC will be bankrupt, since it has reserves of only $25 billion, whereas the seized deposits requiring compensation would likely exceed $25 trillion. And even if the FDIC could lay its hands on $25 trillion (fat chance, since this is nearly twice the entire Gross Domestic Product of the United States), another statute now  on the books, namely the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2005, which was arm-twisted into law by Citigroup, JP Morgan, Chase,  Wells Fargo and the rest of the usual suspects (bet you slept through that, too), compels the FDIC to give preference to derivatives counter-parties over mere depositors like yourself, whose claims for reimbursement could exceed $600 trillion – or more than the GDP of the entire world economy. "

Down here in the rural south whoever wired the local mobile homes likely was selling driveway rejuvination with black paint instead of tar when not wiring.  Lots of mobile homes put in about the same time all have shallow wells as the choice to accept municipal water only came about a decade or so ago.  To keep the wells from tripping the 100 amp service they put in a multiple breaker box next to the main 100 amp breaker box on the pole but wired it to the main input rather than the output so the well box goes directly to the power meter as it were - that way the 100amp main won't trip from the well.  Looking inside you see slots for 10 or more breakers and only the one double for the well occupied but if you go to add a breaker for a shed you find you can't kill the power to the box without the power company pulling the meter and shutting down the home completely.

And to get it fixed you don't bribe the inspector you have whoever is doing the electrical repair describe in detail to the inspector where in their family trees they are related.

I have to disagree.  100 amp service was typical of post-WWII homes of a smaller nature.  I'm pretty sure that split levels built in the late 1950's onward were 200 amp service with two phases between which one would see 230VAC for the oven and clothes dryer.  100 amp service is still put in things like mobile homes but mobile homes aren't houses.  What goes into a small ranch now-a-days is probably 200 amp since electric stoves and clothes dryers are the norm.

So we small miners might be mining bitcoins looking like toy sales in the small neighborhood candy store while a Toy-R-Us and a Walmart are under construction on the same block.

Well the return produced by Jupiters has been nice.  Nicer still if you have the Cloud Hashing facility.

Network protection doesn't protect the small miner but KnC customers in general which would include Cloud Hashing.  KnC is a business.  Like any business the larger customers get favored.  But the whole question of protecting KnC customers is muddied not only by large block sales but immediate resale of miners, tho the latter I feel  to a lesser extent.  It's difficult to be clear as it's a complex issue.

Could the question of Jupiter sales if and when have anything to do with some customer trying to buy up as many as possible?  We see photos of major hashing facilities where were they, in Hong Kong and Iceland?  Those big facilities can operate on a thin margin and make a good profit while that same rate of return for small miners would be a big disappointment. But how would that lack of information limit sales to a buyer with the money, it wouldn't.

Personally I took a schellacking on the Bitpay, waiting until btc was over a grand on MtGox then later that day buying but getting a $984 or so price on the btc while the slope was up the entire time, and that for the $13,200.20.  But still the ~$984 was a good btc value compared to $700 or $800/btc.  So, I'm not feeling upset.

That drop back to $9995 makes me wonder if KnC, their ear to the ground and having access to info at the chip manufacturer level which might include gossip between chip manufacturers, could possibly think there's a lot more coming down the pipeline a month after batch 1 has shipped, much more than they had earlier figured.

Remember back when we were waiting for production testing to begin.  There was a delay with KnC but the network hashrate showed a sharp increase that would have been hidden by KnC's hash.  Like someone tried to slip some major hashing by.  So, nobody knows everything that's going on out there.

Could also mean that parts are in stock to build a good many Jupiters.  Ambiguous, could mean either, complete Jupiters in stock or all the parts necessary to build Jupiters on hand in stock inventory.

They seem good to their word with minor exceptions so far and that's way ahead of others so I'm not going to give the 'just a marketing tactic' any weight.

wrong if fulfilling most customer's expectations, right if plan was to get pre-paid orders to finance first ASIC development and implementation then sell first to employees and self, then waiting customers and backdoor deals slowly while hashing while the hashing was best for ASICs; then when ROI was almost break even on the miners, really start to ship pre-orders.

1st week 2014, 1/1-1/4 probability of Jupiter sales opening, 20%
2nd week 2014, 1/5-1/11 probability of Jupiter sales opening, 45%

these are my guesses.

heh heh

No information to make decisions may be the point.  A group sales figure here on bitcointalk has gear to sell.  It's not KnC gear, it's not too efficient, price isn't great, but the stuff is available and he was an early provider of ASICs to us in this country at the home user level.  He personally put ASICs in miners homes  here while BFL was blowing smoke our way.  If KnC were to say 'We've been working full work weeks producing Jupiters for release in January.' sales of comrade ASIC miners might be damaged.  KnC knows it has the Lexus of Bitcoin Miners at present.  KnC can sell at will all it offers.

Isn't the first week in January their New Year.  Big event there I think where everything stops except parades and party for what a week or two?

Has the factory floor been idle since the last shipment of upgrade modules?  I suspect not.  And I doubt they'd lay off the factory workers between that period of upgrade cards and the eventual production run of Neptunes.  Their proto lab would be working full time of course.  So one would think the floor workers have been building what we call November Jupiters and stockpiling.

Wonder what the failure rate will be over time.   Liquid cooling of the ASIC true but the rest of the card?  The Jalapeno has filter caps near a chip that was getting quite hot and speculation was those caps would fail long before their due date.  They may have corrected that in later Jalapenos, I don't know.  So, the Monarch ASIC will be well cooled but the rest of the card?

I trust your guess.

I had done some calculations this morning that turn out to be wrong.  Someone was speculating on a $3000 price tag for January Jupiters.  I think that is a lowball figure if one considers the $13200 figure for late batch 1 Neptunes, of course the $205 shipping is non-refundable as is the Bitpay take.  That $12,995 is $4.33/GHs after a few months waiting while if January Jupiters go off at $3000 it's $5.45/GHs at a nominal 550GHs tho at a power penalty.

So, either the $12,995 was a blunder or the January Jupiters are going to come with a price tag well above $3000.

But then my calcs might be all wrong today - running treadmill watching Bering Sea Gold and next episode highlights show one of the miners being carried into hospital after opening a door to someone, spinning the cylinder of a revolver, putting it to his head and it discharging.  They were not rushing thru the hospital door.