Good news. Heard from her and her family. They are safe, as they live about 40 km away from the port. They said the death toll is in the low to mid hundreds right now.

Jesus Christ was apparently quite a tolerant bloke. He hung out with the whores, the beggars, the undesirables etc, he told parables about "good" people turning a blind eye to the hurting of their brother while a Samaritan turned out to be the truly good person. He said "Judge not lest ye be judged".

I don't even believe the guy was anything other than an altruistic nutter (if he existed at all) and I know his message better than you, or the douchebag in the video...

Persecution is being tossed in an arena with lions. It's being nailed to a cross. It isn't "co-existing with others and not getting the privilege of being able to make rules on how they live their lives". That's called equality, respect, common decency. You and you're ilk don't know true suffering mate.

Perhaps if you actually emulated the person you claim to worship (you know, the one that is waiting for you in the afterlife with a big fucking stick and an accounting of your years of intolerance) rather than made up your own interpretation, you'd actually be a christian worthy of the name...

And if you want to witness suffering, go minister in Africa for a few years, then get back to us about just how bad it is to be "persecuted"...

Works with sunglasses too - *related=http://videosift.com/video/They-Live-Nada-Learns-the-Truth

They Live - Nada Learns the Truth has been added as a related post - related requested by Zawash.

8:18 – "Germany is very financially responsible".

The clip makes a few good points, twists others and omits some central issues. But I want to comment on the quote above most of all, because it forms the basis for all kinds of arguments and recommendations.

The claim that Germany is financially responsible stems from what has been paraded around domestically as the "schwarze Null" (black zero), meaning a balanced budget. Given how focused most economic debates are around the national debt or the current budget deficit, it shouldn't come as a surprise that not running a deficit evokes positive responses in the public. If there has ever been an easy sell, politically, it's this.

However, it's not that simple.

For instance, the sectoral balance rule dictates, by pure accounting identity, that the sum of public balance, private balance and external balance is 0 at all times. In case of Germany, this means that the balanced public budget (no surplus, just a fat zero) requires a current account surplus of the same size as private savings – or an accumulation of private debt. For someone to run a surplus, someone else has to run a deficit. In this case, foreign economies have to run a deficit vis-á-vis Germany, so that neither the German government nor the German private sector have to run a deficit.

The composition of each sector is another topic entirely, but the point remains: no surplus in Germany without a deficit in the periphery. If everyone is to be like Germany, Klingons have to run the respective deficit.

My question: is it financially responsible to depend on other economies' deficits to keep your own house in order? Is it responsible to engage in this kind of behaviour after having locked yourself into a monetary union with less competitive economies who have no way of defending themselves through currency devaluation?

Second point: capital accounts and current accounts are two sides of the same coin. If Germany runs a current account surplus of X%, it also runs a capital account deficit of X%. Doesn't explain anything, but it's the same for the countries at the other side of these trade imbalances. Spain's current account deficit with Germany meant a capital inflow of the same size.

Let's look at EuroStat's dataset for current accounts. Germany had run a minor current account deficit during the late '90s and a small surplus up to 2003. From then on, it went up, up, up. Given the size of Germany's economy within Europe, that jump from 2% to 7.5% is enormous. Pre-GFC, the majority of this surplus went to... yap, PIIGS. Their deficits multiplied.

Subsequently, capital of equals size flowed into these countries, looking for investments. No nation, none, can absorb this amount of capital without it resulting in a massive misallocation, be it stock bubbles, housing bubbles, highways to nowhere or lavish consumption. Michael Pettis wrote a magnificent account (Syriza and the French indemnity of 1871-73) of this and explains how Germany handled a similar inflow of capital after the Franco-Prussian war: it crashed their economy.

As Pettis correctly points out, the question of causality remains. Was the capital flow a pull or a push?

The dataset linked above says it all happened at just about the same time, in all countries. It also happened at the same time as Germany's parliament signed of on "Agenda 2010", which is the cause of massive wage suppression in Germany. Germany intentionally lowered its unit labour costs and undercut the agreed upon inflation target (2%). German employees and retirees were forced to live below their means, so the export sector could gain competitiveness against all the other nations, including those in the same currency union. Beggar-thy-neighbour on steroids.

Greece overshot the inflation target. They lived beyond their means. But due to their size, it's economically negligable. France stayed on point the entire time, has higher productivity than Germany and still gets defamed as the lame duck of Europe. Yet Germany, after more than a decade of financial warfare against its fellow members of the EU/EZ, is hailed as the beacon of financial responsibility.

Mercantilism always comes at the cost of others. And the EU is living proof.

Yep. One of the keys for me too. What good is He if the only thing He provides is salvation from the Hell He created to punish us for not loving Him to His satisfaction? What else have You done for me, or anyone else I know, in this present day life on Earth God? Nada, and sure some would say God saved so and so from an accident... then but then millions of good Christians die every year from accidents... it's almost like it's random who He helps or not... In fact, He indeed doesn't help any more than any other god does... He at one point had a better army, which allowed Him to spread around to Europe and force them to convert or integrate their holidays into His to make it seem better to those forced to convert.

Okay He created Hell for Lucifer and the angels who chose not to praise Him for a moment... which proves that angels do have free will... which goes against the teaching He created us to love Him of our own free will as the angels had no choice... so either He forced Lucifer and the third of all the angels to rebel, or they have free will. Then we get all those people in Asia, Africa and the Americas and all over the glove who are going to Hell before they heard about the gospel of Jesus as they never had a chance... but wait many Christians say, they won't go to Hell because they didn't know, they'll be judged on if they lived morally... which begs the question, if you are basically fully guaranteed of life in Heaven without the knowledge of Jesus, then why spread the message? Oh, the Great Commission... that command they apparently listen to, while the people like this ignore His command to Love and treat others as you'd have them treat you. How He hung around sinners and tax collectors and talked badly about those who were showing off how holy they were and prayed openly, trying to shame those who didn't do as they did. How He told the crowd who was about to stone a woman at the well "let those without sin toss the first stone" and then importantly doesn't toss any stones Himself, not because He's sinned, but because He's operating on a new covenant. Yet they love to toss stones of discrimination and hate towards those who sin differently than them. He commands us to heal the sick, and yet it is the Christians of this Nation that oppose guaranteeing everyone a minimum degree of universal health insurance, preferring only people with good jobs have affordable health care. And on and on...

And the Jesus is coming soon folks... Seriously I've head from family that even if Climate Change is real, the real damage doesn't come for hundred years or more, and Jesus will have come by then. Just look at the world, gay people can get married now. Clearly Jesus is coming soon. I had another family member note how after the election of Obama the first time that just means Jesus will come sooner now... as if the Bible doesn't say there's an appointed time, let alone that He appoints the leaders...

And then the whole help help we're being repressed attitude... when basically they are being denied special rights and privileges and just coming to equal legal ground with others. Basically they are coming into the situation that forced the Pilgrims to leave a Christian Nation to move to what would become America because they couldn't persecute others as they wanted to, as the theocracy that ruled that Nation didn't agree to go that far.

I could go on for ages. I covered the topic a billion times though... well not a billion...

Hey @lantern53

You're oddly silent.

What's your opinion on this one?

Good police work here?

I wonder why they only tackled and handcuffed the black kids tho.

Clearly they aren't racial bias or anything. Cops can't ever be racist.

They probably just knew exactly ever kid that did or didn't "belong" there
You know, like they personally know each and every kid and where they live.

So of course they only tackled the ones that were "trespassing" and "fighting".. right? o_O?

Either way, lawful or clearly morally unlawfully wrong.
ALWAYS obey the police, amirite?!

Maybe they just wish they lived in Australia?

I feel like both of you likely made mistaken 'assumptions' in your arguments.
I can't understand how a survey can say 'consumer prices are 36.9% higher there' yet 'local purchasing power is 14.29% higher in the US'...Those numbers don't seem to jibe, or really mean anything without more info. Is that per dollar, per capita, average salary, mean salary, what? If things really cost 36.9% higher there, we SHOULD have near 25% more 'purchasing power' per dollar here, not 14....but you also have to ignore that they have far more dollars per person (even after paying higher taxes) to make your point...and you must also count 'national oil revenue' as 'personal tax' to come up with your numbers...if you did the same for the US, I would accept that, but you don't...as if the fed only gets money from personal taxes.

EDIT: Also, are your numbers AFTER tax income? I note they are AVERAGE incomes, and in the US, most people make far less than the average, because the top 5% takes 50%GDP (+-). Remove the top 5% and the bottom 5% and you'll see the numbers change drastically, and it will give you a much more realistic picture of the average person's income. I seriously doubt the wage disparity is nearly as pronounced in Norway, but I don't really KNOW.

All you complain about them paying for (whether they use the service or not) is the same in the US, yet the (underfunded) services provided in the US for the money are almost useless, so a near TOTAL waste. Do you not understand that? We have decided that, in a society, it benefits YOU if your neighbors children get educated, and also if your neighbors don't go bankrupt over medical bills, and it benefits you to not throw destitute elderly out on the streets, and even if you don't drive, it benefits you to have roads in your area...etc.

I find it hilarious that YOU are outraged and indignant FOR THEM, while they are apparently MUCH happier with the system they live in than you are with yours. You might think about that a minute.

I'm guessing purely from a forces standpoint that if you were stood up, you'd be a lot more likely to survive than if you were lying down, like the video says. Mainly because your internal organs and brain are about to be decelerating, and you want to minimise the deceleration as much as possible. Your extremities might get pulverised, but without the organs they're not much use anyway.

There's some historic example about a 1945 bomber crashing into the Empire State Building, severing the ropes and inducing free-fall, but the lift's ropes coiled up and cushioned the occupant's fall and they lived. I just looked it up, and apparently only several times has free fall ever happened, only killing one person. But apparently people die from falling in the shafts, mechanics caught in machinery and strangulation from scarves caught in doors.

@GaussZ

I've not been to Brick Lane but there are similar areas in Chicago. Chinatown has endless Chinese restaurants on the south side. Devon Avenue on the north has curry place after curry place.

These exist for a few reasons.

First, immigrants often naturally group together in certain areas of a city. This is very true of Chicago if you study the demographic profiles. It is not surprising that people want to open a business in the community they live in and eat food they are familiar with.

Second, these streets become destinations in and of themselves. "Let's go get some curry up on Devon Ave (Chicago) or Brick Lane (London)." You may not even have a particular restaurant in mind - you just go there and see what you find.

I would guess that those restaurants are able to survive because they exist in a community where there is high demand for their goods.

Those businesses are competing with each other but there is enough demand for their product in one area that they can all stay open.

Going back to the beach analogy it is like everyone on the beach wanting a LOT of ice cream AND people travelling to the beach because it is known for its great ice cream (presumably they know how to make the best ice cream, curry etc).

Back to my earlier comment, restaurants do like being next to one another and they would prefer if the product is different. Why?

Imagine there are two retail spaces available in a town that has no restaurants. You want to open a curry restaurant in one of the spaces and sign a lease with the landlord to do so. Ideally you are the ONLY restaurant in town. If people want to eat out they have to come to you. Now the landlord wants to lease out the other space - what would you like to see there most? Another Curry Restaurant, a pizza place, or an ice cream shop?

I can tell you for a fact that fast casual restaurants in the USA love being next to a Starbucks because people got to Starbucks everyday. That means if you sell sandwiches people know exactly where you are. They see you everyday and you are right next door to one of their favorite establishments etc.

I have never understood why people would be satisfied with staying where they are. If they lived their entire lives in a forest and told to stay in the clearing, they'd wander out before long.

Why do people NOT want to wander out? What do we stand to gain from staying here? In 400 years time, should we still be worrying about car insurance and celebrity gossip, or would we rather be taking strides into the universe? Which one signifies progress?

What would some of the greek philosophers have said about us, i wonder? I think people have become too familiar with this reality we find ourselves in.. you put someone in the GTA universe, or Saints Row, and they will experiment and enjoy themselves for hours. There's a real world out there with tangible things that we can experiment with.. but people just want to watch TV or drink themselves stupid. Or maybe they're too exhausted to play and be inquisitive because they've been at work all day.

well done on that physicists video.
political arguments dressed up as science is such a cynical and disrespectful approach to such a complicated,and possible species ending,situation.

the movie "they live" was a documentary.

i promoted the video if only to further the discussion and expose a political argument that has NOTHING to do with the science,but rather EVERYTHING to do with the singular,monied interest of powerful influential players who care nothing but their own self-interest.

and at what cost?
possibly everything and everybody.

this physicist sold his soul for money.
he is a whore.
no..worse than a whore,because at least a whore has more integrity.

Yep. Maybe, helping him clear his inventory without a loss will let him re-stock in a way that works out better for him in the future.

The weak social ties that connect us---the storekeeper, the barista, the guy at the corner stand you say hello to---they have a lot to do with the sense of neighborhood that people have when they live in a place.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpersonal_ties