Zecc Architects Utrecht managed to transform a 1931 water tower in Soest, The Netherlands, into a nine-level modern home.
A designer, Max Lamb, decided to return to his favourite beach on the south coast of Cornwall, UK, to make stools utilizing a primitive form of sand-casting. A childhood spent building sandcastles inspired Lamb to design stools by pouring molten pewter into a sand mould and hand sculpt it into the beach.
The diary entry of Theodore Roosevelt, the U.S’s 26th President, on Valentine’s Day in 1884. The day both his wife and mother died.
Transcript:
$15 TRILLION is equivalent to the the federal debt of the U.S. Treasury Department. Lord James of Blackheath has spoken in the House of Lords holding evidence of three transactions of 5 Trillion each and a transaction of 750,000 metric tonnes of gold and has called for an investigation.
I think there are three possible conclusions that may come from it. I think there may have been a massive piece of money laundering committed by a major government which ought to know better and that it has effectively undermined the integrity of the British bank the Royal Bank of Scotland, in doing so. The second alternative is that a major American department has an agency that has gone rogue on it because it has been wound up and has created a structure out of which they are seeking to get at least 50 billion Euros as a payoff. And the third possibility is that this is an extraordinarily elaborate fraud which has not been carried out but which has been prepared in order to provide a threat to one government or more if they don’t pay them off. So there are three possibilities and this all needs a very urgent review.
My Lords, it starts in April and May of 2009, with the alleged transfer to the United Kingdom, to HSBC of a sum of 5 trillion dollars and seven days later, in comes another 5 trillion dollars to HSBC, and then 3 weeks later another 5 trillion. 5 trillion in each case. Sorry. A total of 15 trillion dollars is alleged to have been passed into the hands of HSBC for onward transit to the Royal Bank of Scotland and we need to look at where this came from and what the history of this money is. And I have been trying to sort out the sequence by which this money has been created and from where it has come from for a long time.
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is secretly negotiated, instead of debated by elected politicians. More people need to be informed about this process – pass it on.
Hitchens describes the state of fear he witnessed during a visit to North Korea.
An American marine in Afghanistan does an outstanding impression of Herbert the Pervert from Family Guy while sharing some candy with the local kids. Appalling satire aside, it’s truly touching to see unedited interaction between soldiers and locals. Extra points for the accidental lightsaber effects.
[via LiveLeak]
Recently the American «Big Food» Industry successfully lobbied to define pizza sauce as a vegetable under school lunch rules. Most nutritional changes that doctors have been advocating for years have also been blocked by the industry, essentially forcing impoverished schools to continue serving unhealthy, processed food to children.
As these collective meals seem to be a burden, both directly and indirectly, for public budgets, how about a encouraging more parents to prepare healthy meals their children can bring to school? This is no thorough solution, of course. Just a passing thought on this specific matter, corresponding with the individualistic American philosophy. The problems are obviously deeper rooted, closely intervened with other sectors, and prompts a greater systemic change.
Frugal Dad made this amusing visualization on what they claim is «a shocking consolidation of the American Big Food Industry». I hope we see a substantial reorganization of sector subsidies and laws – preferrably not solely written by big business this time around.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Source: Frugal Dad [I thank Kirsten for the pointer]
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Back: A. Piccard, E. Henriot, P. Ehrenfest, E. Herzen, Th. De Donder, E. Schrödinger, J.E. Verschaffelt, W. Pauli, W. Heisenberg, R.H. Fowler, L. Brillouin;
Middle: P. Debye, M. Knudsen, W.L. Bragg, H.A. Kramers, P.A.M. Dirac, A.H. Compton, L. de Broglie, M. Born, N. Bohr;
Front: I. Langmuir, M. Planck, M. Curie, H.A. Lorentz, A. Einstein, P. Langevin, Ch. E. Guye, C.T.R. Wilson, O.W. Richardson
From Left To Right:
I bet they had some brilliant drunken conversations after these gatherings!
// via Amazon.
«In my opinion it is a grand book. We all have the greatest reason to be grateful to you for saying so well what needs so much to be said. You will not expect me to accept quite all the economic dicta in it. But morally and philosophically I find myself in agreement with virtually the whole of it; and not only in agreement with it, but in a deeply moved agreement.»
John Maynard Keynes On Hayek’s Road To Serfdom.
[Ground Footage: Second Collapse Occurs At Around 18min]
The poor infrastructure of the American educational system has created a shortage of Americans who can perform high skilled technology jobs, according to Dr. Michio Kaku. The H-1B Genius visa is therefore used to attract immigrants who are qualified and willing to adapt to the demanding U.S. corporate lifestyle.
S&P’s credit ratings of the 50 U.S. states shows that 13 areas have the top AAA rating, and the worst region, California, was awarded an A- rating.
Source: The Tax Foundation.
Via @TheArmoTrader:
Corporations will pay a total of $247.2 billion in state, local and federal income tax this year.
Via @douglas_blake:
Apple is worth more than all the homes in Detroit, MI ($153.1 billion) and Tampa, FL ($146.3 billion) combined.
Via @JosephMosby:
3.873 billion bricks in the Great Wall of China * $.52 per brick = Apple is worth more than the Great Wall of China.
Via @csilvers416:
The economic cost of obesity in America is $300 billion.
Via @hassankhan:
Apple is worth more than 45 days of worldwide oil consumption – Roughly $7 billion per day assuming 86 million barrels a day at $83 per barrel (Nymex Crude).
Via Reuters:
The DJ STOXX euro zone banks index is valuing its 32 members at $340 billion.
In contrast, Apple’s market capitalization has soared to $340 billion on the back of the success of innovative technology products like iPods, iPhones and iPads.
// Wikipedia
40 years ago, following the advice of Milton Friedman, President Richard Nixon ends the Gold Standard and terminates the Bretton Woods system.
Source: The Economist.
Al Jazeera On American Inequality.
The richest 1% of US Americans earn nearly a quarter of the country’s income and control an astonishing 40% of its wealth. Inequality in the US is more extreme than it’s been in almost a century — and the gap between the super rich and the poor and middle class people has widened drastically over the last 30 years.
Meanwhile, in Washington, a bitter partisan debate over how to cut deficit spending and reduce the US’ 14.3 trillion dollar debt is underway. As low and middle class wages stagnate and unemployment remains above 9%, Republicans and Democrats are tussling over whether to slash funding for the medical and retirement programs that are the backbone of the US’s social safety net, and whether to raise taxes — or to cut them further.
The budget debate and the economy are the battleground on which the 2012 presidential election race will be fought. And the United States has never seemed so divided — both politically and economically.
How did the gap grow so wide, and so quickly? And how are the convictions, campaign contributions and charitable donations of the top 1% impacting the other 99% of Americans? Fault Lines investigates the gap between the rich and the rest.
This episode of Fault Lines first aired on Al Jazeera English on August 2, 2011 at 0930 GMT.
Source: Al Jazeera Fault Lines.
See All Episodes Of Fault Lines >> Here.
Click for interactive feature
Banks are complicated, and especially in this age of too-big-to-fail, they often house a number of thorny practices under one roof – practices that, as we learned the hard way in the fall of 2008, can be difficult to regulate.
When the Dodd-Frank Act was passed a year ago, lawmakers and citizens hoped it would usher in a more robust and effective system of oversight. The law created several new regulatory agencies to deal with the challenges of keeping the most complex financial industry in the world in check. These intricately named agencies include the Financial Stability Oversight Council and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and join a lineup that already boasts the Office of Thrift Supervision and Bureau of Competition.
The convoluted system was made more so, and today it can be nearly impossible to keep track of who exactly is overseeing what.
To help decode this web of oversight, The Fiscal Times created this infographic, “Who’s Watching the Banks,” to illustrate which agencies – and which agencies within agencies – keep an eye on which aspects of the financial industry.
Source: The Fiscal Times [via The Business Insider & The Big Picture]
Click to transfer
The New Yorker Interview >> Here.
More Of Cassidy’s Business Persona Writing: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Finance: Why Crashes Are So Common, What Value Wall St. Bring & The Volcker Rule.
Ray Dalio’s «Principles» In All Their 123 Page Glory >> Here [PDF].
The Soda King Mission:
John Nese is the proprietor of Galcos Soda Pop Stop in LA. His father ran it as a grocery store, and when the time came for John to take charge, he decided to convert it into the ultimate soda-lovers destination. About 500 pops line the shelves, sourced lovingly by John from around the world. John has made it his mission to keep small soda-makers afloat and help them find their consumers. Galcos also acts as a distributor for restaurants and bars along the West Coast, spreading the gospel of soda made with cane sugar (no high-fructose corn syrup if John can avoid it).
Source: YouTube.
«Reason Magazine Editor in Chief Matt Welch and Reason.tv’s Nick Gillespie appeared on Freedom Watch With Judge Napolitano to talk about their new book The Declaration of Independence and how the rise of independents means the two-party system is in decline.»
Source: ReasonTV.
// The U.S. National Archives via Flickr.
Monday, July 4th:
Independence Day: All U.S. markets are closed.
Tuesday, July 5th:
10:00 AM ET: Manufacturers’ Shipments, Inventories and Orders for May.
Wednesday, July 6th:
7:00 AM: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the mortgage purchase applications index.
10:00 AM: ISM non-Manufacturing Index for June.
Thursday, July 7th:
8:15 AM: The ADP Employment Report for June.
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.
Friday, July 8th:
8:30 AM: Employment Report for June.
10:00 AM: Monthly Wholesale Trade: Sales and Inventories for May.
3:00 PM: Consumer Credit for May.
Transfer To The Calculated Risk Blog For Charts, Estimates And Details On The Schedule For Week Of July 3rd.
«By this reckoning, over 28% of all the history made since the birth of Christ was made in the 20th century. Measured in years lived, the present century, which is only ten years old, is already “longer” than the whole of the 17th century. This century has made an even bigger contribution to economic history. Over 23% of all the goods and services made since 1AD were produced from 2001 to 2010.»
The Economist Has More Here.
HT: Mark J. Perry.
WSJ Markets
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