The rate of change we are seeing around us is massive. There are threats of automation or artificial intelligence even eating into what is called the white-collar world.
Here’s a suggestion on how you might cope with this overwhelming change: Take on full responsibility for keeping your skills and abilities current.
Article provides a brief summary of our education system. I will expand that with what I have learned elsewhere. Then I’ll mention a plan to dealing with this turmoil.
An unofficial plebiscite was held to oppose the end of democracy. The vote for a constitutional convention to re-write overthrow the current constitution has been held, with uncertainty as to the actual turnout.
7/15/17 – Reuters – Venezuela opposition hold unofficial plebiscite to defy Maduro– The opposition holds an unofficial vote on 7/16 as a protest against the upcoming official vote which many consider to be the last votes ever in Venezuela as a new constitution will essentially put the legislature under the thumb of the president.
From previous reading I’ve done, massive subsidies to the poor successfully bought their allegiance. The collapse of services including water outages, random outages of electricity, and empty store shelves are rapidly undermining support from the poor. Protests has spread to many of the poor communities in Caracas. There have been nightly protests in a number of communities for several weeks.
How is it that services are available on the interstate highway system when and where I need them? Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.
I took a road trip from the Los Angeles area to Williston last week. My wife and I drove there with our son and his family.
A few questions came to mind on the trip
Questions
1. What economic system provides a gas station within a few miles of the point that we decided we wanted to fill up the tank?
With four drivers in the car, we were planning to drive on through the night. We were too tired to do that so we decided to stop for the night.
2. What economic system provides multiple hotels and motels half an hour down the road from where we changed our mind?
3. Furthermore, when we wanted to stop, what economic system provided motels at multiple price points so we could pick the one that fit our price range and taste?
4. Why is it that the motel we choose included a full breakfast for all of us in the price?
5. Why did the motel even have two upgraded lamps on the night stands each with 2 USB charging points and two electrical outlets on the base of each lamp?
Flaring of natural gas. A common site in 2012 and 2013, but is rare today. Photo by James Ulvog.
There has been a lot more interest in my posts on “The Overnighters” documentary recently. This is the third and final part of this series of followup on the documentary. Previous discussions include my disclosures, and reporting with agendas.
This post will close with some lessons we can learn from this disaster.
Other articles
As I was looking for some source of the increased interest lately, I also came across some older articles I’ve not noticed before. Keeping in mind my extended discussion in part 2 about writing with agendas, these additional articles have a minimal agenda visible.
Two hundred forty-one years ago today marked the start of this wonderful, fantastic, heaven-blessed, messy, delightful, powerful, flawed, and glorious experiment called the United States of America which has delivered unimaginable levels of freedom to hundreds of millions of people here in the US of A and contributed massively to the freedom of hundreds and hundreds of millions more around the world.
If you want a really short description of this day, consider a photo of a sign on a store’s door I saw while browsing the ‘net:
Closed on July 4
in observance of
Brexit 1776
If you are looking for a brief description of the string of events which led to signing the Declaration of Independence and the follow-on events leading to full independence, Continue reading “Happy Birthday America!”
A New York investment bank bought bonds from the Venezuelan central bank at a steep discount and got a lot of heat for doing so. The military is applying more violence to protesters as support from the rank and file appears to be shrinking.
5/30 – Wall Street Journal – Goldman Sachs Under Fire for Venezuela Bond Deal– Goldman bought $2.8B of bonds issued by the government-owned oil company for $865M. That is 31% of face. If, and this is a big if, the bonds were to be paid in full, on-time, at face value that would produce a 40% return.
Goldman is in a PR mess because the bonds were held by the Venezuelan central bank, meaning Goldman essentially put almost a billion dollars into the government’s hand.
Article says Goldman has been increasing their holdings of Venezuelan debt over the last few months. Their play is that if government gets its finances in order, the bonds will soar in value and Goldman will make a huge profit.
Those of us living in the United States are blessed with religious freedom, political freedom, and economic freedom because those who went before us fought for freedom.
Many of those fighting offered up their life for freedom and the offer was accepted.
I am humbled and grateful to God that some of my ancestors are included in the long list of those who fought. I am especially humbled that a great, great grand-uncle is in the list of those who died in the defense of freedom.
Because of their sacrifice, I get to enjoy this kind of freedom:
Consequence of intentional government policies in Venezuela. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.
A one-year old child who weighs 11 pounds.
Eleven.
In what used to be the regions’s richest country, the average weight loss in the last year is 19 pounds.
That’s an average weight loss according to a survey by social scientists measuring the impact Venezuelan government policies are having on the citizens of the country.
It is called the ‘Maduro diet’ in dishonor of the president who is gladly continuing the polices that have broken the once rich nation.
It is a common site to see people picking through trash hoping to find something that is edible.
When will those of us who don’t have to decide which of our children get to eat today start calling the expected results of intentional policies a crime against humanity?
Let’s take a quick look at health care in Venezuela before returning to the starvation issue.
In Venezuela, that sign is needed at hospital pharmacies, bakeries, and now at gasoline stations. Image Courtesy of Adobe Stock.
The shortages and suffering in Venezuela continues. Your homework for the day: what economic system provides this level of suffering?
Foreign reserves are shrinking
Bakeries threatened if they bake too many sweets and not enough price-controlled bread
Pregnant women are leaving the country to deliver their babies
Gasoline shortages appear
3/1/17 – CNN Money – Venezuela is down to its last $10 billion – The country’s foreign reserves are down to $10.5B, from $20B in 2015, and $30B in 2011. That info in sourced to the Central Bank of Venezuela.
Article says inflation is expected to hit 1660% this year and 2880% in 2018.
3/13 – PanamPost – Venezuelan Regime Threatens to Expropriate Bakeries, Jeopardizing Bread– In addition to price controls and currency controls, the government is going to impose output requirements on bakeries. If they don’t produce bread all day at the government limited price, they are subject to take over by the government. Left out of their miscalculation is that the government has stopped importing wheat flour.
If bakeries don’t bake enough bread, the government will close the shops.
That little ol’ thing, along with 500 similar contraptions, is changing the world of oil production. Photo by James Ulvog.
Looks like we are in the midst of radical change in regional and world politics caused by the technological revolution in oil and gas production. I keep trying to wrap my little brain around what is going on. Here are a few articles that may stretch your brain too.
Brain stretcher on the shift in geopolitics due to increased US oil production
Speculation why the Saudi government’s plan to re-engineer their country’s economy isn’t going to work
Three articles on the rapidly increased US shale production undercutting the OPEC production cut
3/12/17 – PJ Media – The Problem of Success– Article raises the unsettling idea that nobody has figured out the impact of dramatically increased production in the US.
Neither the previous US administration, the current US administration, leadership in Saudi Arabia, leadership elsewhere in the Middle East, nor even pundits for that matter, have figured out how geopolitics will change as Saudi Arabia loses its role as dominant oil producer and the decentralized American drillers gain the swing producer role.
It stretches my brain even to understand there is an issue.
American frackers used the dramatic run up in oil prices to $100 as an opportunity to figure out how to frack oil where it could never have been touched before. They then used the collapse in prices as an opportunity to figure out how to frack far more efficiently, far more effectively, with far higher production output from every well. As a result, the break-even price for U.S. shale has shrunk.
The vast network of independent producers are responding to price changes far faster than OPEC could handle or the majors could ever dream of. Prices go up somewhat and in about three months US production is surging.
Several intriguing articles on military forces using technology:
ISIS using larger drones with larger payloads
Marine Corps wants to experiment with giving an entire battalion suppressors for all their weapons
Pakistan developing second strike capability by putting nuke loaded cruise missiles on diesel subs
Lots of jobs in the US military will be replaced by robots
2/21 – Washington Post – Use of weaponized drones by ISIS spurs terrorism fears– In Iraq, Islamic State is working with drones above the quadcopter size. With wingspans of about 6 feet, the drone can carry a mortar round at about three pounds instead of a hand grenade.
IS has posted videos of multiple uses of the drones to drop explosives. The frequency of offensive use of the drones is high enough that Iraqi troops must scan the scansky for drones and take cover when one is spotted.
Captured documents indicate IS is doing research to develop new drones and modify off-the-shelf versions.
This is a significant step up from my previous discussion of ISIS’ drone usage. On January 30, I mentioned:
