-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.11/pageone.html <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.11/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - Volume 3 Issue 11</A> ----- Laissez Faire City Times March 15, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 11 Editor & Chief: Emile Zola ----- Silk Purses by Zola Al Gore created the Internet. Hillary Clinton hurt her back skiing. Bill Clinton gave Juanita Broaddrick mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is near 10,000 and all is well. Well, maybe not. Al Gore has delusions of grandeur. He was too busy hoeing tobacco to become even marginally computer literate. He promoted the "information superhighway" with only one purpose in mind: government control and regulation of the Internet. Remember the Clipper Chip�the government�s plan to put a communication backdoor into every personal computer, fax, phone, and set-top TV converter? Al Gore went out to sell the Clipper Chip to the American public. Remember ITAR restrictions on encryption exports? These restrictions have the effect of "dumbing down" computer security, and hence the security of the Internet. But Al Gore nevertheless invited industry executives into his office to urge them to support encryption export controls. Al Gore said, "Let�s make the Internet available to every school child." And then he promptly introduced the idea of censorship: "We must protect the children. We must keep them from seeing pornography on the Internet. We must keep them from reading Matt Drudge. We must make sure they visit the White House web site and receive daily doses of government propaganda." Hillary Clinton has long bent over backward to cover her husband�s criminal behavior. But she is not the "injured woman." Rather, she is Bill�s facilitator, covering for him when there is excess publicity. Even so, she didn�t go with Bill on his trip to Central America. She had already viewed the hurricane damage, thank you. Instead she went to New York to see about running for senator and to discuss damages with her divorce lawyer. She wants half of everything Bill has�including the codes necessary to launch nuclear missiles. She doesn�t worry about the money�that�s already in her name. As for Bill, he�ll find someone else to pay the bills, as he always has. Juanita Broaddrick? Who cares? She scarcely made the news. After heroically saving her life (what else could have possibly happened?), Bill thought about buying her a new pair of panty hose. "The crotchless kind last longer," he would have explained. I was watching one of the guest stock commentators on CNBC. He was relating why he interpreted Alan Greenspan�s congressional testimony as bullish: "I understood him as saying he will be adding more liquidity, and that money will go into the stock market, and drive stock prices higher." What a wonderful world! This bozo thinks it�s great that (as he assumes) Greenspan will create more pieces of Federal Reserve paper, and these pieces of paper will be exchanged for stock market paper, and stock prices will go up. That way the American public will feel even wealthier, and the savings rate�which has already fallen to zero�may even become negative! With no savings, there is no capital formation. So where are those future corporate profits going to come from that will pay the dividends implied by the high level of stock prices? Who knows�and who cares! Many Internet companies have never made a profit, and look how their stocks have taken off! Profits were the old paradigm! It�s the new digital economy, turning sand into computer chips! If we need more capital, we�ll go to the beach! If we need more savings, we�ll rape and plunder the Social Security Trust Fund surplus! If we need more savings, we�ll borrow it from the rest of the world through a massive current account ("trade") deficit! Whatsa matter with you, girl? You got a run in your stockings? Recently it has become increasingly clear that the whole stock market boom is based on leveraged finance, and it has been going on for years. With the right lever, Archimedes could move the world. With the right money leverage, you can jack up stock prices. Households have become increasingly indebted, especially through home equity loans, and have increasingly plowed money into the stock market. Corporate takeovers and leveraged buyouts have bid up stock prices using the vehicles of bond and bank financing. Corporations have used portions of their cash flow to buy back their own stock. But who can argue with it? We�re prosperous, aren�t we? The Dow is near 10,000, isn�t it? The rest of the world is going to hell in a hand basket, and we�re grabbing and consumi ng all their savings, ha, ha! It�s Lincoln Bedroom living on a beer budget! All is well and only the foolish think about insurance. Like me and my put with a Dow 9500 strike. The market will almost surely close above this level before the option expires on March 18th. It is now clear that the option was a waste of money. Come to think of it, I want the money back from my car insurance payments of the last 20 years also. Whatever was I thinking of? There have been no accidents�not one. Yet . . . somehow I have a much greater fear of getting clobbered by the stock market than being run into by another car. But that fear must be irrational. I mean, Bill Clinton�s president, isn�t he? And Geraldo Rivera is protecting us from the terrorists down in Little Rock. I guess one thing that worries me is the government keeps worrying about things while telling us not to. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself (not to mention the Internet), they say. We�re living in the middle of the greatest prosperity in history. Social Security is sound. The federal budget is in surplus. We�re the greatest superpower there ever was. There are no foreign missiles pointed at America�s children�not a single one! But why, in the middle of our great prosperity, do we have to borrow so much from the rest of the world? If Social Security is sound, why do we keep having to "save" it? If the federal budget is in surplus, why is federal government debt growing at $100 billion a year? If we are such a superpower, why is the U.S. military out conducting simulated responses to anthrax and sarin gas attacks on urban areas simulations in which the local citizens are terrorized by helicopters and special forces? And if there are no missiles pointed at America�s children, what�s all this talk about Chinese spies? What�s there to worry about? I mean, Bill Clinton�s president. And Geraldo Rivera is down in Little Rock, protecting us from the terrorists. That ought to provide some comfort. But somehow, somewhere, the thought keeps reoccurring: No matter how hard you try, you just can�t make a silk purse out of a sow�s ear. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 11, March 15, 1999 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Published by Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc. Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar All Rights Reserved ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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