The British Film Institute (BFI) has restored footage taken during Ernest Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition, including the poignant moment the ship’s mast collapses as Endurance is crushed by sea ice. Despite the sailors’ perilous predicament, Shackleton insisted the nitrate film was salvaged. The remastered work is part of a collection depicting early 20th century Antarctic exploration.

Sleepy Joe has already destroyed the Russian economy in just one week. Stocks down 40% and market closed. Foreign banking closed. Interest rates doubled, Oil exports stopped. Rubel in total collapse.

Even Russians are protesting against Putin.

Joe creating an international coalition to give Russia a unified front opposing him has done more damage to their country than 4 years of Trump’s “leadership” did to ours, and that’s quite a lot.

Imagine if someone gave him caffeine…he’s already doing exponentially better asleep than Dumb Donald when he was awake. Poling agrees.

If the dollar has no actual value…you’re sunk from the start.

Improving gdp is the only way to add value today….much easier said than done, and possible to go backwards at light speed.

Are you calling the US a developing country? Deflation isn’t a concern for most. It’s pretty rare.

If you improve the economy artificially, the bill will come due someday inconvenient and likely cause depression, not just recession.

Restarting countries didn’t all borrow, some tried to take over the world and ignore all their debts. Just saying.

If you have gold backing your dollar, even if your dollar somehow collapsed you’ve still got all the gold. That’s just one reason it’s smart. If you don’t issue dollars for every ounce of gold in reserve, you can add dollars without the risk of inflation, then remove them when possible.

You keep saying it has no advantages, I’ve listed many.

Outrageous idiotic bullshit. Gold is a commodity universally valued. Bitcoin is worse than nothing, it costs money just by existing and has absolutely no value besides what idiots will pay, that’s like basing your economy on beanie babies and saying it’s the same as physical gold. WTF man?

If youre a normal country you are always living on credit, if for no other reason, then because it is super easy and cheap to borrow. Also you have to, to make it to the next pay check (tax collection). First your subjects have to produce and sell, then you can collect taxes.

You dont base the value of the dollar on anything. You offer it as a commodity to the market. If your economy sucks or you print too much money the dollar goes down, which can help the economy. Printing money doesnt automatically help the economy though, it just creates space and time to make it possible for the economy to improve.

Improving the economy means creating more or better products and services that are in demand at a competitive cost. Governments in non-dictatorial countries cant really do that directly, they can only create the conditions for this to happen.

Moderate inflation hardly plays a part, except as a moderator (is that a pun?) of shocks. Deflation (and a strong gold standard in a developing economy IS deflation) is deadly, it makes the economy less flexible, less able to adjust.

If you never improve your ecomomy, all you will have left will be to bitch about inflation.

What is too much debt, too much inflation, too much intervention? I wish economics was a science.

Theoretically the economy can get to be so bad that the structure collapses, there are countries which have notoriously bad historical records, and yet every time they restart they have to borrow money to get things going again. Reserves in general are useless. Production, services and a functioning market, recursive production of valuable goods and services which freely and easily find customers is the only thing you can consider a reliable pillar of civilization. Currency is one of those goods and services.

If for any reason yor currency cant freely circulate (see China or the USSR errr... Russia) you can hardly be a superpower, at least not in the economic sense.

Adopting a gold standard so strong that it would destroy the international dollar standard has no advantage for the USofA or for any developed first world country. Even just having the Euro wreaks havoc in weaker European countries economies, but that is another can of worms.

A lot of what is wrong about the gold standard would apply if a country decided to adopt bitcoin as its sole currency btw.

LMFAHS!!
Sydney Powell, Trump’s ex lawyer, is defending herself from disbarment for filing numerous frivilous lawsuits….her defense? “Maybe my claims are true”…her evidence? “Many people believe it (after I spent months convincing them, even after I admitted it was just hyperbole not fact), and “many Republican legislatures are creating biased election laws to fight against the frauds I claimed…..so maybe it’s true.”
That’s not a defense, it’s not even a debate point, and it’s so ridiculous it might lead to her defense lawyer being disbarred!
Oh my god, your team really relied on stealing power then ignoring your own criminal acts that put you there, didn’t you? Trump’s promise to pardon the insurectionists if they return him to power is just more proof of that. With the records Trump tried to hide, steal, burn, shred, etc mostly being recovered, things are looking pretty shitty for your “destroy democracy and blame anyone else” “murderous violent sedition is legitimate political discourse” “wasn’t me” team.
What steaming pieces of feculence the right has become, top to bottom.

So anti democratic, so un-American, but that’s all your party is now, anti American obstructionism and election frauds to cling to the power you have left after Trump squandered 100% control of government with nothing to show for it but failures, economic collapse, and mass death.

BTW, can you tell me what the Republican plan is to solve these 3 issues?
(three of your complaints were the same issue, oil, and at least 3/5 are not factual or omit the reason inflation was down and oil was cheaper last year is 2020’s disastrous leadership exacerbating the pandemic, and causing economic collapse….inflation was about 4.2% sept-sept. Time to raise rates from zero and stop handing corporations free loans.)

…because McConnell has announced that, once again, the Republicans will have absolutely no party platform in 2022, no goals they’ll admit publicly beyond “stop the president”, no plans at all for how to fix anything you claim Biden broke. Obstructionism is the entirety of what Republicans stand for in the next election….obstructionism and clinically insane conspiracy theories….but they wear your jersey so you’ll vote for them and chant the slogans like a good little rube.

Edit: Because you clearly don’t know, Trump is by far the best at dumping gdp into the septic tank….-3.5% q1 2020. -33%q2. Biggest drop by far in living history including the Republican led recessions of the 80’s and 2000’s. His last year total is a negative 3.5%…and you’re complaining about single digit inflation!!! Ha!
Just like the debt and deficit, the economy only matters to the right when Democrats are in power, and is completely out of their control and not their problem when Republicans are. Trump in 4 years spent more than Obama in 8 without starting deep in a recession he ended (but instead ending by starting one) and without creating a national health care system or anything beneficial…instead of tax and spend he tried refund and spend double on monuments to divisiveness, on credit if possible.

Yes, duh Bob.
Trump polling at 36% was worse, so you just claimed fake polls. He inherited a strong robust economy, a system to protect from epidemics, far less debt and deficit, and no pandemic…no crisis. I don’t argue Biden’s popular, like you do Trump despite reality, I only argue he’s a vast improvement, the best that could be hoped for under the disastrous circumstances one Trump term put the nation in.

The people coming, largely Haitians, almost all say they’re coming because they saw American politicians say the American borders are open and accepting everyone. Those are Republicans saying that, lying to get their base riled up, but the Haitians living in South America don’t know that, they think they are being invited by the Republicans. Look into it, you’ll see that’s true if you do. Biden sent many back to Haiti, Trump liked to dump them back in Guatemala to try again.
This energy independence myth, just quit. We were not. There was a world wide oil glut in 2020 because the pandemic lowered demand so much suppliers actually gave it away at one point….that was not some genius Trump energy plan bearing fruit, it was the economy and industry collapsing thanks to an avoidable pandemic. As the economy recovers, so does demand but not production. You seem to want to blame Biden for basic economics.
My gas is the same as 2019+-$.25….you want to compare to 2020 because gas was cheap thanks to Covid. Yours might be more for some political reasons, like your unprotected pipeline got hacked by Russians, but you need to prove it, then prove Biden’s failure caused it, not just say it, and not by cutting and pasting some talking head’s opinion. My assessment is he’s improved security on infrastructure but I’m open to evidence to the contrary.

Lowering corporate tax rates didn’t lower unemployment significantly, it raised upper management compensation and corporate profits. Investing in infrastructure will.

That’s good you don’t want to debate more Covid deaths, because there’s more than enough blame for both sides even if you don’t look at 2020 that was all Republican stoked (anti mask, anti social distance, anti contact tracing). Keep in mind, since Jan, >90% of all cases are in the intentionally unvaccinated population, almost 100% of deaths, and remember who they are and who they follow…not Biden. Covid deaths this year are nearly 100% caused by political division and misinformation created and spread by one political side. Guess which. That’s not to say Biden’s perfect, he should have implemented vaccine mandates Jan 21, no exemptions without permanent quarantine, what was needed to stop more deaths by stupidity, but he doesn’t have the balls for dictating. You should be so grateful for that.

Blaming the Chinese without proof, or even evidence they are to blame, just supposition, is outrageously dangerous and provocative. Accusing them of creating and releasing it on purpose….against themselves….is simply asinine and proof you aren’t thinking for yourself or at all.

Mid terms always go to those not in power, so yes, 2022 will likely return congress to partial Republican control, which you will call a massive mandate against Biden unlike when it happened in 2018 and you just whined that it’s unfair.

>26% of Americans are Republicans. The rest are what you call socialist communists because you don’t know what those words mean. Your party does not represent your (alleged) country….and is shrinking. Democrats aren’t even my party, they are just the only achievable adversaries to the madness of the right at this point in time. Given a better option, I would jump….you can’t say the same. You’re deep in the death cult of personality the Right has become…a true believer.

Biden got money no president in my lifetime has to invest in America. Bridges, Roads, Airports, New water systems, Digital communication improvements, Overall improvements and long deferred maintenance of rail, New funding to fight increasing wildfires (Brandon)…all the things absolutely necessary for the nation to function as a first world nation. He’s already a big winner, and if we aren’t speaking Mandarin in 3 years he still will be. The fruits of his legacy will be enjoyed for decades to come, Trump’s legacy is economic failure, failure to protect from a preventable epidemic, massive unemployment, an administration so corrupt that the convictions of people in his administration or campaign almost certainly outnumber the prosecutions of members of all previous administrations combined while the severity of their crimes outweighs the combined national injury caused by all previous political crimes, and a division so strong one party actually tried to destroy democracy and install a dictator.

History is the judge of any administration, not the midterm, and history will look kindly on Biden, no so for Trump, mired in constant criminal scandal and failures to this day. The only president in our history to not peacefully transfer power, to be impeached twice, who clearly put his own interests above those of the nation at every opportunity. Death and division are his legacy.

Merry Mithra’s season.

Congratulations! Your video, China/Shaky building/Collapsing, has reached the #1 spot in the current Top 15 New Videos listing. This is a very difficult thing to accomplish but you managed to pull it off. For your contribution you have been awarded 2 Power Points.

This achievement has earned you your "Golden One" Level 26 Badge!

Your video, China/Shaky building/Collapsing, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

To be fair, I often Upvote videos later deemed to be snuff. You can't use my Upvote to assume my position on this being snuff, I won't speak for others.
This one is on the line for me since there was no death on camera. It's kind of up to the community as I see it. If you get complaints (not just questions) taking it down is the respectful thing to do.
Technically IMO, the recent building collapse video is snuff more than this one since, although you can't see them, those deaths were on camera. I Upvoted it too. 🤦‍♂️

Well, it isn't looking good for the building management.

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/miami-florida-building-collapse-06-26-21-intl/h_d9466fb68e097da81c660ed6a197417c

They do have codes, Florida actually has some of the strictest building codes in the country. The building was actually being worked on and updated to meet additional local hurricane codes at the time of the collapse.

Every state has to meet the codes established by the ICC or one of the organizations that existed separately before they merged. The only city to ignore these codes and go completely by their own code is Chicago.


At the municipal level, the city can add more building codes to meet specific local hazards or weather. Miami/Dade has very strict hurricane codes that need to be met.

I suspect that we will find that the fault in this lies with the building owner failing to meet code or maintenance updates in a timely manner, as well as the fact that the building experienced subsidence in the amount of 12 cm between 1993 and 1999. This is not that unusual in structures built on barrier islands and it ceased sinking in 1999.

Video from another angle and a related article.
https://www.freightwaves.com/news/oocl-vessel-blamed-for-crane-collapse-at-taiwan-port

Bob, as much as this'll surprise you, I totally agree with what you're saying. The distribution of the stimulus money to couples making up to $150,000 is friggen ridiculous -- and I'm in that category. I will do what I did with the last two checks: give to local charities helping the homeless and communities of color (as much as I hate that term).

The worst part of this is that it sets up a liquidity trap. The Fed can't reduce buying crap debt (that BBB dogshit is at 4% should terrify anyone who understands how debt and the rating agencies work), nor can they allow rates to rise (thus totally screwing responsible savers). This is the cusp of a financial disaster that blew past 1929 on 9/17/19 and is now approaching the cataclysm of the South Seas Company collapsing. As far as I can see, this is a total melt-up in the markets because there's no stable returns and everyone is now in speculation mode.

Were it my call, I would scale the money along income (or non-income) lines: $10k for the lowest incomes, sliding scale from there. I'd also set up government-backed savings accounts that pay 10% for those people and only those people. I'd also pay off/down student debt along the same income scales.

I do not begrudge the wealthy for their wealth. But capitalism can't be a winner-take-all system. We live in a society, and society will always have winners and losers. The least we can do is ease the burden for those at the bottom by taking some from the top. I'm tired of the homeless camps and mentally-ill people wandering the streets of Seattle. They are the least of us and thus should be the ones who get the most help.