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Slope of Hope Blog Posts
Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.
‘Tis But A Scratch
I read a few days ago that John Cleese was saying that politics in the US nowadays seems like an endless Monty Python sketch, and he has a point. Before I look at the US equity markets today I just want to reflect on the bizarre nature of the news we are watching nowadays.
In the ‘special military operation’ in Iran it is now clear that there were never any negotiations with Iran since the war started, and it isn’t even clear that the US wanted any talks, as the person preparing to negotiate on the Iranian side, former Iranian foreign minister Kamal Kharazi, was seriously wounded in a US/Israeli attack on his Tehran home three days ago. If he survives, his enthusiasm for future negotiations might be somewhat dampened by his wife’s death in that failed assassination attempt.
Trump declared on Saturday on Truth Social that there were only 48 hours left of the ten day pause he gave to the Iranians, and if there is no ‘deal’ in that time, which frankly seems doubtful, then he would rain down hell on the civilians of Iran. Since then he has said in another ‘Truth’ that he will now not start bombing Iran ‘back to the Stone Age’ until Tuesday (tomorrow).
(more…)Liars and Fools
The majority of the pop from yesterday’s completely-made-up story by Trump that they were having “strong talks” (seriously, is English this guy’s second language?) with Iran have already disappeared. The fact that 100% of the pop isn’t gone is just ridiculous, but also a testament that there’s always some chunk of people so brain-dead they’ll actually believe the beast.
Still, it’s heartening to see the lie has been largely unwound.
Set Em Up/Knock Em Down!
After the market closed today, once he got all his short-dated call positions in place, Trump sent out his 57th “War is Over!!” declaration of the past three weeks:
Recycling Corruption
It's probably quite obvious that I put my best posts in the "prime time" just after the close and leave the silly infographics for the middle of the night. I made the mistake of putting up a good post at 1 in the morning, so it received precious little attention or discussion, so I just going to re-publish it now.
Long-time readers know of my disposition toward government, and by government, I mean any government, be it federal, state, or local. I consider them to be a magnet for waste, fraud, and laziness, and I daresay if every single government employee on the planet vanished instantly into thin air, almost all of us would be vastly better off (to say nothing of demonstrably wealthier).
The frustrating thing about government waste is that you can’t do a damn thing about it. you just have to live with the fact that your assets are going to the worst of humanity. Here in my fair city of Palo Alto I have read about countless instances of the kind of crap that makes me despise government more by the day. First, there’s this gem:
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