It has been a slow year of turmoil. When I look back over the past twelve months I view a year I’m glad to see come to an end.
It started with a Funeral of a friend and ended with a funeral of a family member. The events of the year seem to be a mishmash of tragedies, at least this year. Some years are a flow of victory and joy, some a combination of both.
In reality our lives are no different we move from the time of our birth to our death flowing through our time punctuated by events happy and sad. Those events combined with our families and our luck shape who we are. We as a group are luckier than most because we have all chosen to share our views of the daily events of the world with each other. We are a minority that has reached out to find others to talk about things that most of our friends never even give a second thought to. Whether we fight or get along is just the color of the paint we use on the Canvas of ATW.
I am grateful for all of you ally and adversary, we all add color to this canvas. This year comes to an end, a new one begins. I have no idea what this year will hold for me let alone any of you. I do know that some of us will share the events of our lives some won’t. The only thing that can be counted on is that we will argue about world events that will effect our lives, but that we our powerless to do anything about.
The next two years my country will be in extreme political battle with itself. Factions of every type will be vying for power while we also try to hold the damage being caused by those in power now to minimum. We live in the curse of Interesting times.
I bid farewell to 2014, and welcome 2015 with both fear and joy. All I know for sure is each of us will grab the Tiger by the tail and be dragged along for good or ill, and we will each share our perspectives with each other. Each of us will be better than most because of our interaction here, remember that as we trade punches and share trenches.
and remember the threat in the background that is coming for us all.
45 thoughts on “2014 comes to an end”
Comments are closed.
Interesting take on the UK economy in 2014:
“UK gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to total $2.828 trillion (£1.816 trillion) this year, compared with French GDP of $2.827 trillion, as The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said Britain’s acceleration was boosted by the inclusion of sex and drugs to UK growth (as part of new pan-European accounting standards). Official estimates show prostitution added about £5.7bn to the UK economy in 2013, while illegal drugs were worth about £6.62bn. One question – how did they estimate it?”
Link here
Greece may be about to blow up the Eurozone, and in the process derail the EU federalist project, if its parliament fails to elect a president on Monday. Here’s hoping, and here’s a great tale from David Stockman:
“On the old continent, this December 29th, a succinct political showdown is scheduled to take place which may well become a defining moment for our entirely unsettled new millenium. What is at stake is none other than the prosperity of the common man pitted against the privilege of concentrated power. Lamentably, this deliberate dogmatic divide has relentlessly defined human civilization for the ages.
What is at hand isn’t so much about lofty ideals. It’s not about Socialism. It’s not about Capitalism. It’s not about Communism. It’s not about being a progressive, or a conservative or a liberal. It’s not about left vs right. Forget all those dumbed down dichotomies. It’s much more fundamental than all of that. Quite simply, it’s about People vs. Power, that’s it, nothing more. Those that have and wield institutional power, and those that do not. It’s as elementary and base as that I’m afraid.”
Peter – whenever I state the above in blunter terms, you wail ‘conspiracy theory ha-ha-ha’. Why is that? Let’s look specifically at what Stockman wrote:
I’ve stated that clearly on here, adjectives and nouns – yet each time to meet opposition and attempted ridicule from you. Why is that?
Allan
Peter ridicules the specific claims you make regarding corporate or individual power and greed not the fact that such a culture exists at all. There is a difference.
ATW is a part of the British press, Allan
A small part, but a part nonetheless
Allan what have you been prevented from saying here, on a site that has worldwide distribution for anyone wishing to read it?
Colm – if the culture of corporate powerand greed exists then so too do the manifestations of it. How can it be otherwise?
Allan
You are being vague. What do you mean by ‘manifestations’ ?
What business is this Stockman what athletes entertainers and others are paid?
He is jealous?
Where do I claim to have been prevented from stating my opinion on ATW? I’m asking why it is that Peter can link to “rapacious Banking Sector, our completely captured Regulators, our entitled Multinational Corporations, our entrenched Governmental Agencies, our marauding Military Industrial Complex, our fleecing Healthcare Providers, our muzzled Free Press, our hijacked Justice System” yet when I do exactly the same and with specific examples (which are not debunked), Peter is the first to wail ‘conspiracy theory’.
I disagree. I think you fail to understand what I have written, and it’s not particularly challenging:
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/manifestation
Colm – here is manifestation of the culture of banking power and greed:
http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/anglo/
I suggest that you open the link, read it and understand it.
Jamie Dimon is a personification of the culture of banking power and greed.
You and whathisname are saying that the press has been muzzled.
Yet you say that you have not been muzzled, so I think that you are arguing with yourself
Where have the British press been muzzled, and what have your reporters been prevented from reporting?.
Personification:
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/personification?showCookiePolicy=true
Phantom – the internet is not part of the press. Why do you claim it as so?
Phantom
To be fair to Allan he wasn’t claiming his views were being muzzled, only that they were being dismissed by Peter and others despite Allan’s claims that they prove the very thing Peter is complaining about.
The internet is absolutely part of the press. It is the fastest growing part if it, per the ongoing transition from paper.
Some good local and other original reporting has come from blogs.
It is all the press., the free exchange of ( good and bad ) ideas.
Colm
I want to hear what stories have been muzzled.
I don’t think that Allan knows of any such stories
Phantom – reporting of crime is deliberately not accurate in the MSM:
http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=10509
Let’s look more closely:
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-06-10/news/chi-when-race-is-mentioned-in-the-chicago-tribune-20110610_1_racial-descriptions-race-coverage
Hmmm… whites are being mugged by blacks and race is crucial to the narrative. Put another way, if whites were mugging blacks, one can be absolutely sure that race would be at the forefront of a huge national furore.
We’ve all heard of Trayvon (aspiring fizzissist), Stephen Lawrence (aspiring architect) et al. How many have heard of Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian? How about the Wichita massacre?
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/08/13/the-gruesome-story-of-a-murdered-tennessee-couple-you-may-have-never-heard-about-but-that-you-will-never-forget/
Had this happened to a black couple at the hands of a white gang, one would never have heard the end of it.
Allan
You actually raise valid points there.
Blacks do commit a hugely disproportionate share of violent crime, and it is true that major media, starting with the 1970s have largely stopped using race in descriptions of perpetrators
This isn’t because the press has been muzzled though. This is because editors have made atrocious decisions in efforts at political correctness.
In the US and also in the UK, you can say what you like, the only real problem being bad libel law in the case of Britain.
Phantom – the presence of political corectness and ‘muzzled’ (more accurate would be ‘skewed’ – not my word as selected) press is not accidental: the former begets the latter. In the US and UK, one cannot say as one likes. A ‘wrong’ word and one can be thrown out of work.
Allan
I have never argued that the banks are not corrupt parasites. Goldmans is known as the great sucking squid for a reason.
But I dispute conspiracies in general for the simple reason that if they existed they would be exposed eventually. The best example is the assassination of JFK in 1963. The conspiracy theories were many and varied, but all have now been discredited and the banal truth of a lone assassin is accepted by all but the wilder loons. The Warren Commission made mistakes, but it got the basic verdict right, as I’m sure you agree?
“2014 is set to be England’s hottest year in over 350 years, according to the world’s longest continuous record, with climate change at least partly to blame. The whole world has had a warm year and global data, released later on Wednesday, is likely to indicate a new record.”
Link here
I certainly would not agree but I don’t intend to develop the JFK assassination today.
Understood, perhaps you can enlighten us when it suits.
Peter – I shall be very happy to enlighten you. Let me know when you have the mistakes of the Warren Commission. Usually, when ‘mistakes’ are made in any report, it affects the result adversely.
Troll
I wish you continued success with your Freddie Mercury tribute act.
I notice nobody here has addressed the shooting dead of a gun toting mother by her 2 year old child. Are you still a gun advocate?
This makes light oif a very serious issue… http://newsthump.com/2014/12/31/toddler-shooting-tragedies-could-be-prevented-by-arming-2-year-olds-insist-nra-2/
//Are you still a gun advocate? //
Daithi, OK, this toddler shot a woman dead in a supermarket.
But shit happens. You ignore the fact that many muggers and murderers had been scared off attacking this group because they knew the 2-yr-old might be armed.
Daithio happy new year
Peter just for you sweetheart
Satellite Temperatures Reveal the ‘Global Warming Pause’ Lengthens to 18 years 2 months – (218 Months)
Noel, D
This is the point that the Gun Fondlers cannot considerr.
Widespread availability of guns, including among the untrained ( most states have no requirement that a gun owner knows which end of the gun the bullet is fired from ) can only lead to more ” accidents “, shootings in family / neighbor rows, or suicides.
This incident was not an accident. A decision was made to allow a curious, restless two year old to be in very close proximity to a loaded handgun. Everything that came after flowed directly from that decision, and from the diseased gun culture of the US.
Say a prayer for that poor child.
Oh and the NRA wants blind people to have the right to have guns also.
They’ve said so openly this year.
Not a joke.
Perhaps they could use guide dogs to help them aim.
Here is a New Year’s present
An actual NRA video advocating funs for the blind. They removed the video after intense criticism, but the internet never forgets.
Again, the video is not a parody. These guys really believe this.
http://gawker.com/the-nra-tried-to-get-rid-of-this-video-advocating-guns-1617727951
That video is just nuts. Apart from the lunacy of the point he’s trying to prove, a person who speaks like he does should simply be never allowed near weapons.
“The fact is it has been proven that people that lack vision have an increased awareness of their hearing and spatial surroundings. The biggest concern I hear is having blind people carrying in public. Are you envisioning the person waving the gun around and pointing at anybody for no reason? For that’s what it sounds like.”
there are people that shouldn’t have access to guns, knives, cars and especially children.
Accidents happen irresponsibility happens more often. Eliminating guns from Law Abiding people has proven to be more dangerous than allowing the majority to have them.
But to people like Phantom facts on the issue of firearms mean nothing.
People are the problem not the things we have access to.
I use the following story as my example. Read it and understand that these are the type of people that are the problem, that no matter what you ban or wish didn’t exist babies would still die.
http://www.cleveland.com/nation/index.ssf/2014/12/maryland_baby_found_dead_in_ba.html
You don’t like guns, you don’t know how to use or handle a gun. In any analysis you are ignorant on the topic. Ignorance breeds fear.
I can find 1000 stories like the one I link to for every ONE about a gun misuse that you can find.
Worry about the children born to people like the ones in the story I link to. There regretfully you’ll find pain and suffering 1000 fold over any problem caused by a firearm.
but as I said reality means nothing to you both on several subjects.
Eliminating guns from Law Abiding people has proven to be more dangerous than allowing the majority to have them
Who told you that, and give precise information backing it up please.
Keep in mind the gun death rate per 100,000 population in the following northeast / mid atlantic states ( figures from 2010, but they have not changed much over the decades ) Why the huge difference between NY and NJ and the other states?
The gun fondlers here try to say that the difference is because of the presence of blacks in certain states but the ultra high gun death rates in Alaska 20.4 and Wyoming 15.6 where there are virtually no blacks kind of give the lie to that one too
New Jersey 5.2
New York 5.1
Pennsylvania 10.1
Virginia 10.8
West Virginia 14.1
//I can find 1000 stories like the one I link to for every ONE about a gun misuse that you can find.//
Can anyone explain how the fact that many children die through neglect has any relevance to the story of a 2-year-old shooting dead a woman?
I means, hundreds of thousands of children die from famine; does that mean terrorist murders of a few children are OK?
Troll, you might have a point if you link to a story of a 2-year-old shooting dead a potential murderer.
The gun fanatics, including the specimen here, who are not to be confused with responsible gun owners, can never and will never address this issue rationally.
They’ll always come back to a few anecdotes and will never address the statistics of populations within the US or which compare the US and much safer countries such as the UK or Canada.
The fanatics oppose all regulations, except maybe those which would not allow felons to have guns. Theirs is an angry and emotional response at all times.
The NRA is a disgusting organization but there are gun nuts more extreme than they are.
I looked at a gun nut chat room and saw many of them strongly endorsing the ” rights ” of blind persons to be armed. I swear.
One may talk about ‘gun fanatics’ but what about anti-gun fanatics, many of whom are in power and break the law in their quest:
http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/alberta/Hell+Residents+angry+RCMP+seize+guns+from+High+River+homes+with+video/8588851/story.html
Basically, police seized legally-owned firearms from homes evacuated during a flood in Alberta. Several of the guns were taken from houses which were broken into by police who then subsequently broke into the locked cabinets where the guns were secured.
Read John Lott and get back to me on where he is wrong.
Phantom it isn’t me who has no facts on their side it’s you buddy boy….
Troll – your link mentions
Who is John Lott? Have you heard of him before? If not, why do you link to him now? Did you just ‘google’ him to back your pre-conceived views? Does he have a degree in Gun Studies?
Hey – I’m just kidding. The inane questions above are what Phantom asks when he’s been rumbled.
that’s quite all right Allan, Phantom knows who Lott is.
The thing is there are topics which each of us will never be swayed by reason or fact.
Guns is one of his.
Troll
What level of gun control do you support?
None ?
Should the following class of people be allowed to own guns –
People with a criminal record? Alcoholics? Drug addicts? Illegal aliens? Tourists?Those with a record of domestic violence?
Those on psychotropic medication?
The blind?
Should any safety or marksmanship training be required, as it is in many places?
Should records be kept of all gun sales or transfers?
I don’t expect answers, as they’ve not been addressed over the years here.
Allan actually has spoken about the need to deny guns to those on psychiatric meds, so I give him credit for that
I’m fine with guns – I only want them controlled in a sensible way. Like autos or airplanes, these are powerful machines that should be respected and which require knowledge to use properly.