Snowden is US’s Worst Nightmare
There has been a lot of talk on how Snowden is the NSA’s biggest nightmare. At the core of the issue is the right to privacy and this is what people forget. There is nobody who would argue against international intelligence gathering. However, despite what people are led to believe, just like the IRS scandal is revealing the abuse of tax law to target political groups, the same corruption has infested everything. The NSA does not need to seize every phone call and then store it forever. Microsoft has screwed itself royally by cooperating with this paranoia so that Windows 8 now phones home and reports on any non-Microsoft software you install. That is why NASA has abandoned Microsoft. They have totally destroyed Skype. There is nothing these people have not screwed up because they have to know everything and that will be used not for terrorism but for taxes.
It was Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965), where the right to privacy was established. That was a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Constitution protected a right to privacy. Some right-wingers think that should be overturned. I think they should volunteer for euthanasia since they do not respect human rights and would obviously regard Jefferson and Franklin as either liberals or terrorists.
The Griswold v. Connecticut case involved a Connecticut law that prohibited the use of contraceptives. The question was not just should people be allowed to use condoms to prevent children from being born against the design of nature, but exactly how do you enforce that law? Do government agents then have a camera in every bedroom? Or perhaps they must enter to inspect before insertion? This was the right to privacy and that was a 7-2 vote. I cannot imagine living in a world the other 2 saw nothing wrong with government inspections before sex. Call me old fashion. Call me a romantic where I think such an invasion would dampen the mood. But do not call me a mindless drone willing to give up everything so sick paranoid people can sleep at night knowing what everyone is doing has been approved by them.
The Puritans were chased out of England and became the American “pilgrims” who were religious nutjobs. They massacred a tribe of 600 Indians because the women were bare-breasted and they determined that offended God. Of course, that somehow did not offend the Thou Shalt Not Kill doctrine. These people made it a felony to kiss you wife in public, outlawed all sports because it led to cursing, outlawed plays because acting was lying, and outlawed Christmas celebrations actually having people go around and peek in your windows to see what you were doing. Sounds similar to the NSA. International security is one thing – then exonerate all other non-terrorist crimes if the NSA ever used any info for non terrorists acts – complete 100% immunity from all other laws. Then they will not abuse what they have taken illegally.
Wall Street is Trying to Remodel – Again
Believe it or not, the most sophisticated computer “models” running Wall Street are simply Excel spreadsheets. Even the very top firms using more proprietary software cannot cope with the global economy. They lack the depth of models as well a databases. This has always been the specialty of Princeton. Firms have been unwilling to spend the multi-millions it costs to do the real job. We will be fully functioning before year end. This is no small accomplishment. We do not use Excel Spreadsheets. Might as well use stone wheels. It takes a lot more than flat model formulas.
New York Lost The Financial Capital of the World – It’s London
QUESTION: Did New York follow the 224 year cycle peaking as the financial capital of the world?
First Bank of the United States – Third Street, Philadelphia
ANSWER: No. The first financial capital of the USA was Philadelphia, which is where both banking and the first stock exchange began. The Philadelphia Stock Exchange is the first securities exchange in the USA founded in 1790. The First Bank of the USA is located on Third Street and the Second Bank of the USA is on Chestnut Street, which is adorned with numerous bank buildings that are now restaurants or museums. The Philadelphia cycle was 112 years. It fell with the fall of Jay Cooke with the Panic of 1873 that began the first Great Depression that was renamed the Long Depression that lasted 26 years.
It was J.P. Morgan who became a partner with the man who really created the financial system, Anthony Joseph Drexel (1826-1893), forming Drexel, Morgan & Co. This is the same man who began Drexel University and whose name was on the firm New York destroyed with the so called Michael Milken insider trading that threatened NYC – Drexel Burnham. It was Morgan who moved the capital to NYC and thus NYC began to rise from about 1895 and peaked in 2007. The financial capital of the world was London until World War I, shifting to NYC, and now its back to London thanks to the corruption of NYC investment banks and the inability to obtain a fair trial in NYC Federal Court on any suit against the NY bankers.