Rhamaland: 63 People Shot Since Wednesday

Heading into Saturday night, 63 people have been shot in Chicago since Wednesday.

The latest shootings occurred Saturday afternoon. The Chicago Tribune reports:

Seven people were shot -- one fatally -- near Flournoy Street and Francisco Avenue in the Lawndale neighborhood on Chicago's West Side this evening, authorities said.

At least 63 people have been shot across the city since Wednesday this holiday weekend, 11 fatally.

In this evening's shooting, four people in serious-to-critical condition and one person in fair-to-serious condition were taken to Stroger Hospital, while one person in serious-to-critical and one person in fair-to-serious condition were taken to Mt. Sinai Hospital, according to the Chicago Fire Department's media office.

One of those victims, a 48-year-old man, was pronounced dead, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

This Week in TSA Drama

Baghdad Bob reports in:

A starter pistol loaded with six blanks was discovered in a carry-on bag at Baltimore (BWI).
---
 An empty M60 igniter was discovered on a key ring at San Diego (SAN)
----
While checking his bag at Philadelphia (PHL) a passenger stated: “Take care of my bag, it might blow up.”

Happy July Police State

(Via Mark Perry>

Was Andrew Galambos Really Nuts?

There are a few insider tales that circulate about the libertarian Andrew Galambos (1924-1997). They give the impression that he was a bit, shall we say, off. The most often told tale is that when Galambos gave a lecture, he would set down a bowl and toss a nickel in the bowl every time he said the word "liberty," as a royalty payment to Thomas Paine, who he claimed invented the word liberty.

As best as I can trace back, this tale was first told by libertarian humorist Jerome Tuccille. I think Tuccille was trying to be humorous when he told the tale. I believe others may not have caught the humor, as I have seen the tale repeated many times as fact.

 I recently linked to a recorded Galambos lecture series. The lectures are hours long and Galambos mentions Paine and uses the word liberty many times, yet, not once do I hear Galambos tossing a coin into any bowl.

A tale about Galambos was told in a more serious manner by Harry Browne. He wrote:

[Galambos] required every student entering one of his courses to sign a contract agreeing not to divulge any of the course ideas without permission from Galambos — and not even to use the ideas, in business or elsewhere, without permission. In effect, the course tuition bought you the right to become aware of the ideas, but not to use them or even to talk about them to outsiders.

This certainly makes Galambos look nuts. But Galambosian Charles Terry has emailed me and writes:

The reason Galambos required his students to sign a non-disclosure agreement is because he didn't want information from his courses given out of sequence. You can't explain V50 in a short few minutes. If you take V50 in its correct sequence and entirety you will understand why. If you have just a little information you will make yourself look like a fool [...] to those of us who have taken and understand the course.

So there you have it, a tale from a jokester, and someone who clearly had a love-hate relationship with Galambos, paint Galambos as a very odd character.  Yet, he seems pretty sane during the recorded lecture.

Walter Block is right, you really don't own your reputation. Galambos might agree with the thought.

The Developing Super-Steroid Surveillance State

A friend, who travels in certain circles, has just outlined for me the direction the surveillance state is taking. I am absolutely shocked. And you are hearing this from a guy who has not been impressed to date with the Edward Snowden leaks.

I don't want to end up running my life from the transit zone at Sheremetyevo airport, so I won't say more about this (for now), other than that in the very near future just about the only place to hold a private meeting will be in a Turkish bathhouse.

What Really Happened: The Coup in Egypt.

By Eric Margolis

The real story behind the military coup in Cairo led by General al-Sissi is much more complex than the western media is reporting. Far from a spontaneous uprising by Egyptians, – aka “a people’s revolution” – what really happened was a putsch orchestrated by Egypt’s “deep government” and outside powers – the latest phase of the counter-revolution against the so-called Arab Spring.

A year ago, Egyptians elected Mohammed Morsi president in their first fair democratic election. Morsi came from the ranks of the Muslim Brotherhood, an eight-decade old conservative movement of professionals dedicated to bringing Islamic principals of public welfare, politics, education, justice, piety and fighting corruption.

But the deck was stacked against Morsi and the Brotherhood from day one. The brutal US-backed Mubarak had fallen, but the organs of his 30-year dictatorship, Egypt’s pampered 440,000-man military, judiciary, academia, media, police, intelligence services and bureaucrats, remained in place. Even Morsi’s presidential guard remained under control of the Mubarak forces.

The dictatorship’s old guard – better known as the “deep government” – sought to thwart every move of the Brotherhood. In fact, the stolid, plodding Morsi only became president after more capable colleagues were vetoed by the hard-line Mubarakist courts.

Morsi should have purged the “deep government,” notably the police, secret police, judges, and media who were sabotaging the democratic government. But Morsi was too soft, and the entrenched powers arrayed against him too strong. He never managed to grasp the levers of state. Ironically, after all the media hysteria in North America over the alleged dangers of the Muslim Brotherhood, it turned out to be a dud.

The Brotherhood stumbled from one crisis to the next as Egypt’s economy, already in terrible shape before the 2011 revolution, sank like a rock. Tourism, that provided 17% of national income, evaporated. Unemployment soared over 13%, and over 50% among angry urban young. We have recently seen this same phenomena in Turkey, Tunisia, Algeria, Pakistan, and Western Europe. Severe shortages of fuel and electricity sparked outrage.

Egypt’s curse is that it cannot feed its surging population of over 90 million. So Cairo imports huge quantities of wheat and subsidizes retail prices for bread. The US sustained the Sadat and Mubarak regimes with boatloads of wheat discounted 50%. This vital aid tapered off when Morsi took power. Food prices in Egypt rose 10%.

Equally important, ever since Anwar Sadat invited in the US to rearm his outdated military, Egypt’s armed forces have become joined at the hip with the Pentagon. Just as Turkey’s 500,000-man armed forces were, until eleven years ago, and Pakistan’s so remain today.

Armies of many Muslim states are designed to control their populations, not defeat foreign enemies.

Read the rest here.

The Economist on Marc Rich

A NEW employee once asked Marc Rich for advice on trading. He expected, perhaps, “Buy low, sell high”, or “Think long-term”. Or perhaps, given Mr Rich’s habit of going to the office at daybreak, “Up with the lark”. Instead, Mr Rich picked up a knife and ran a finger across the edge. “As a trader you often walk on the blade,” he said softly. “Be careful and don’t step off.”

Few walked it more skilfully than Mr Rich. Obsessively, he scanned the globe to see crises coming, wars brewing, shortages looming. He bought before anyone else did, and was first there when countries began to look round for oil or zinc or nickel. On the eve of the Korean war, as a mere junior trader at Philipp Brothers in New York, he created a market in mercury, which the army needed for batteries. The price soared. From the late 1960s, somehow anticipating the Arab oil-export embargo, he began to create a spot market for oil. Previously, all crude was tied up by the big companies in inelastic long-term contracts. Starting in Tunisia, Mr Rich began to buy and sell it for immediate delivery, like any other commodity. When the embargo bit after 1973 he was swimming in oil when the majors were struggling, and was able to sell it at a mark-up of as much as $14 a barrel. Some called that profiteering. Mr Rich called it a service charge. He could have demanded more, but that would have been “like taking candy from a baby”.

A free agent in this exhilarating new market, he went from strength to strength. Turning on his insistent, feline charm, he sought out buyers and sellers while his partner Pinky Green arranged shipping. It was a winning combination, forged at Philipp Brothers but soon outgrowing it. In 1974 the two of them, peeved that their bonuses were still so small, left to form Marc Rich + Co. The main office was in Zug in safe, secret Switzerland, no questions asked.

From there, with cat-like tread, Mr Rich found his way round any political or moral obstacle. He sold Soviet oil to apartheid South Africa, despite a UN embargo, and between 1979 and 1994 made profits of around $2 billion there. He sent Soviet and Venezuelan oil to Cuba in exchange for sugar, ignoring America’s ban on trade. He sold on the global market surplus Iranian oil that had flowed to Israel down a secret pipeline, and kept the arrangement going seamlessly despite the Iranian revolution of 1979, another embargo, and the American hostage crisis. The Iranians respected their contracts, he explained. They could not sell their oil, so he bought and sold it for them, using shell companies wherever necessary. Keeping well below the radar, as he always did, he was soon the world’s largest independent oil-trader, with a turnover in 1980 of $15 billion.

Read the rest here.

Bitcoin Foundation to the State of California: You Have No Clue

The Bitcoin Foundation, the Bitcoin trade group, has sent a lengthy letter addressed to Tara Murphy, an assistant attorney general in the California Department of Financial Institutions saying it doesn’t sell or exchange the virtual currency, reports WSJ.

The State of California recently sent the foundation a cease and desist order, preventing it from selling bitcoins---which it doesn't do,

Thank You Obamacare

Is the what is spooking the Obama Administration into delaying the health insurance mandate for businesses until after the 2014 mid-term elections?

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, the number of people working part-time increased by 322,000 people to 8.2 million between May and June.

Many businesses are increasing the number of part-time employees rather than full-time employees to escape from the clutches of some of the Obamacare regulations.

As the Economy Moves From One Crisis to Another...

...keep in mind who the Wall Street Journal has determined are the top 3 most influential business thinkers:

1.Paul Krugman
2. Joseph Stiglitz
3. Bill Gates

According to WSJ, the findings were based on Google hits, media mentions and academic citations.

How You Can Quickly Make It into the World's 1% Richest

You might  already be there. If not, get a job at McDonald's and work overtime.

It only takes $34,000 a year, after taxes, to be among the richest 1% in the world, according to  World Bank economist Branko Milanovic in his book The Haves and the Have-Nots.

CNN reports on Milanovic data:

The true global middle class, falls far short of owning a home, having a car in a driveway, saving for retirement and sending their kids to college. In fact, people at the world's true middle -- as defined by median income -- live on just $1,225 a year. (And, yes, Milanovic's numbers are adjusted to account for different costs of living across the globe.)

Textbook Publisher Files for Bankruptcy Protection; Owes Harvard Economics Professor $1.6 Million in Royaties

Cengage Learning Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection more than five years after a buyout led by Apax Partners LLP left the textbook publisher with about $5.8 billion in debt,  reports Bloomberg.

According to the bankruptcy filing, Greg Mankiw, chairman of the Harvard economics department, is owed $1.6 million in royalties, according to the bankruptcy filing.

(Via Paul Krugman)

This Week in TSA Drama

Baghdad TSA Bob reports in:

A 2½-inch knife was discovered concealed in a Denver (DEN) passenger’s thermos that contained ice and medication

After a passenger’s cooler alarmed at Memphis, he stated that the bag contained explosives. It didn’t. It contained toiletry items, a freezer pack, and foam.

After asking a Denver (DEN) passenger if he had any other items that needed to be removed from his bag, he stated, "I have a bomb in my bag."

Why Telling a Story is the Most Powerful Way to Activate Our Brains

By Leo Widrich

In 1748, the British politician and aristocrat John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich, spent a lot of his free time playing cards. He greatly enjoyed eating a snack while still keeping one hand free for the cards. So he came up with the idea to eat beef between slices of toast, which would allow him to finally eat and play cards at the same time. Eating his newly invented "sandwich," the name for two slices of bread with meat in between, became one of the most popular meal inventions in the western world.

What's interesting about this is that you are very likely to never forget the story of who invented the sandwich ever again. Or at least, much less likely to do so, if it would have been presented to us in bullet points or other purely information-based form.

For over 27,000 years, since the first cave paintings were discovered, telling stories has been one of our most fundamental communication methods. Recently a good friend of mine gave me an introduction to the power of storytelling, and I wanted to learn more.

Here is the science around storytelling and how we can use it to make better decisions every day:

Our brain on stories: How our brains become more active when we tell stories

We all enjoy a good story, whether it's a novel, a movie, or simply something one of our friends is explaining to us. But why do we feel so much more engaged when we hear a narrative about events?

Read the rest here.

TRAILER: Steve Jobs Movie

Steve Wozniak hates the movie. From CNN:

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak hasn't seen "jOBS," the biopic of his founding partner that premiered Friday at the Sundance Film Festival.

But in terms of how well the movie tells the story of Apple's heady early days, his review is already in.
"It's so awful and atrocious," said Wozniak, who said he got access to a copy of the movie's script. "Unlike the way Steve and I really dealt with each other.

"I didn't want to have much to do with that movie."

Sounds like Jobswas  much more a hardcore entrepreneur than the "social do gooder" that the movie portrays:

Speaking Wednesday at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Wozniak said he's also watched a scene from the movie that was released online. In it, Wozniak says "nobody wants to buy a computer" as Jobs tries to convince him of the potential.

"Never happened," Wozniak said.

He elaborated last week in an e-mail to Gizmodo:

"Totally wrong. Personalities and ... the ideas of computers affecting society did not come from Jobs ... . His idea was to make a $20 PC board and sell it for $40 to help people... build the computer I'd given away ... . [H]e always saw a way to make a quick buck off my designs (this was the 5th time). The lofty talk came much further down the line."

Excerpt from Michael Hastings’ “The Operators” Re: Death Threats

At Leaksource.

Want to Know What Is Going On In Syria, Follow the Money?

by Taki Theodoracopulos

When a draft-dodging con man such as Bill Clinton begins to sound like General George Patton, most intelligent people realize that the fix is in.

Clinton recently remonstrated with Obama over the latter’s inaction in Syria. Like a true politician, Barack obliged and ordered small arms to be delivered to the rebels three days after the draft dodger had read him the riot act. Clinton is a sleazeball who has never done a thing except beat his own drum. His close friends are sleazy, his Hollywood buddies are shabby, and even his daughter’s father-in-law has done hard time for big-time fraud. Clinton lowered the bar as president and was extremely lucky to be followed in the White House by a man who although well-meaning will go down in history for having committed one of the greatest foreign-policy mistakes of any American president. Nevertheless, the prisoner of the neocons has had the decency to stay out of the fray and inside his Texas farm. Not our Bill. He wants to live in the White House again and is busy preparing his wife’s triumphal entry to it in three years. Hence his aggressive remarks about Syria.

But here’s the scoop: Look for the money. The Saudis and Qataris have a hell of a lot of it. Bill Clinton, a man who never let a scruple get in his way, is their perfect secret agent.

Read the rest here.

Billy Joel Plays 'New York State of Mind' With College Freshman

Vanderbilt University freshman Michael Pollack managed to get onstage with Billy Joel during a Q&A and perform "New York State of Mind" with the singer.



 (Via Rolling Stone)

The Men Who Fired Men's Wearhouse Founder George Zimmer

By Douglas A. McIntyre

The board of Men’s Wearhouse Inc. (NYSE: WM) is made up of people who should not be on any public board. The irony is that all were added on the watch of fired chairman George Zimmer. He thus sowed the seeds of his own demise. However, that does not change the fact that the board has no qualifications to make the critical decision it made to oust Zimmer, or how it should restructure management for the future.

The least likely man to be on any board of any kind is new age doctor Deepak Chopra, M.D. He has written a number of books, but his primary qualification, according to the company is that he “listens well and brings wisdom.” If that is the marker, the board would be better adding His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.

Another board member without a single qualification is Michael L. Ray, Ph.D. Ray, is the John G. McCoy — Banc One Corporation Professor of Creativity and Innovation and of Marketing. Among his main qualification, according to Men’s Wearhouse, is that he is a “mediator and consensus builder” and ”listens well and fosters dialogue.” That must have included the dialogue around the ouster of Zimmer.

Another board member who appears out of place is Rinaldo S. Brutoco, who is president and chief executive officer of ShangriLa Consulting. The firm does not seem to have a mission per se. He is also the head of the The World Business Academy, an odd nonprofit think-tank.

Finally, there is the former CFO of Men’s Wearhouse, David H. Edwab, who is currently the board’s vice chairman. He made the brilliant decision to leave the retailer to work at Bear Stearns, but then came back to the retailer. The best Men’s Wearhouse can say of him is that he is an “inactive” Certified Public Accountant.

Read more here.

Price Inflation Watch: Starbucks to Raise Some Drink Prices

File: Price Inflation
File: Friday Night News Dump

Starbucks Corp will increase the price of some of its beverages in U.S. company-operated cafes by as much as 10 cents, the first price change in up to two years, a spokeswoman said on Friday, according to Reuters.

The price hike will be effective June 25, Starbucks spokeswoman Lisa Passe said. "Less than a third of beverages will be affected by the price increases," Passe said.

Increasing rent, labor and non-coffee commodity costs in various markets are the reasons behind the price increase, Starbucks spokesman Jim Olson said.