Married for 61 Years

Let me tell you about a local jazz musician and his parents.  Aaron Keith Stewart.

Aaron is a local jazz vocalist in town.  If you like jazz, then you'll like Aaron's singing.  However, I could not pass this up as he posted this on his facebook page.  And when I say, "posted this on his facebook page" i do not want you to roll your eyes and dismiss, but rather look and appreciate.  His parents just recently celebrated their 61 wedding anniversary.  That shit doesn't happen frequently.

He also posted a picture of his old man back in Kansas City when his dad was one of the first black police officers in town.  And I want you to look at this picture and tell me pride and handsomeness just isn't oozing from this picture.

There is no moral story or economic lesson.  I'm merely just posting this up here because it's pretty damn cool and you wouldn't see this unless we all started posting it.

Welcome the Newest Member to the Captain's Family

Never Donate Sperm, Period

Boys, you are handing women and the state your wallet when you do.  NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER donate sperm.

Never.

Get that through your heads, boys.

JimKKKins Jimmy Moore Meme

I didn't link to the source of the following meme because I "swiped" it from a friend on a private FB page.  However.  Jimmy Moore is digging in his heels with his latest and repeating his deceitful behavior that began when he posted a bunch of screenshots of correspondence he claimed was directly with him.  His intent is clear.  To try and attach to people such as myself, nasty comments and/or play the martyr for suffering such supposed abuse.   The only screenshot with any connection to me or this blog was one of a comment Dr. Kurt Harris left here, he presented it as a comment he'd received, and did not link to the source.  Bad form, but nothing new for JimmyKKKins.  

If he wants to link to where I have called him a neo-Nazi, I want to see it.  Near as I can tell, ItstheWooo is the only blogger saying that.  

Now here is my challenge to Jimmy Moore.  Post a link or divulge the source of the following meme or remove the insinuation on your blog that someone such as myself created it. He is playing victim with:

"I didn’t even know what a neo-Nazi was before all of this drama unfolded online over the past few days with the really disgusting and unwarranted memes being created with my photo on them that you see in this blog post."

I say Jimmy probably created that meme.  It gets no hits on tineye.com.  Shame on you Jimmy!  I didn't really think you had it in you to stoop this low to save your ass.

In other hilarious news, according to Jimmy, his critics need to get out more in the real world and stop spending so much time on the internet.   This from a man who claims to have never heard of David Duke, apparently is incapable of a 5 second Google Search, and now claims he didn't know what a neo-Nazi was before all of this happened.  Too sad and sickening to even be funny.   Need to get out more Jimmy.  Ha!

Children, Without the Yucky, Gross Sex

Hallelujah feminist brothers and sisters!  The day is upon us we can have children without all that icky, yucky gross sex!

I like how the author considers a sexless life "liberating."

My god you people are miserable.

Mainstream Media, Here We Come

We are not a fad or a fashionable movement.  We are not a "faux-crusader" hobby for people too lazy to work at anything (going green, PETA, veganism, etc.)  We are a backlash against the biggest psycho-social atrocity foisted upon a people.  You destroyed our lives, our country, our economy and our people.  And without those things in our lives, we have nothing else to do but exact our toll of revenge.

Lisa Kirbie

If I ever got the genie in the bottle to grant me three wishes, one would be to have all the spoiled western women who are ignorant of history and think communism was "cool" disappear and be replaced with women who actually did suffer under communism.  I find their former soviet counterparts to be better educated, less spoiled, more grounded, more reliable, and more responsible.

I'm going to say it again for the cheap seats - feminism = communism.

Something tells me Clarissa will be very upset with this.

The Productionless Human Bubble

No matter how complicated economists try to make economics, it really is a simple study.  If you can understand core concepts like why you can't print off more money, what is "wealth," etc, you are about 90% there, heck, you're probably better than most economists who've been brainwashed to look at "production surplus charts" and are addicted to Black Swan econometric models.  And so while economists on cable TV are citing macro and global economic figures and concepts, I want to introduce a simple, micro-concept.

If people don't produce, they will die.

Yes, we can make it more complicated.  We can take overly productive people and have them support unproductive ones.  We can borrow money from productive people overseas to support unproductive people here today.  We can even borrow from productive people of the future who don't exist yet to support unproductive people today.

But in the end, if there are too many parasites and not enough producers, the system will fail.

What's funny though is if you look at the resources we spend on the unproductive people it has all the markings of a financial bubble.

We currently spend nearly 70% of our governmental budgets of wealth redistribution, supporting the unproductive people.

We are borrowing from other productive people in foreign countries to support our unproductive ones.

And we are borrowing from the future to support our current unproductive classes.

If you add it all up, the trillions of dollars we spend every year (whether we have it or not) on unproductive people dwarfs the Dotcom Bubble, the Housing Bubble, the Education Bubble, and the Retirement Bubble.

And like all bubbles, this one will pop as well.

The problem is this bubble is not a financial one, it's a human one.  And when I say "pop" I mean impoverishment and death.

I do not wish to sound Malthusian about this, but there have been other "human bubbles" that have popped. Most notably when countries went full blown communism.  China's great leap forward and Stalin's brilliant starvation schemes put the Nazi's to shame in their ability to kill.  And it was all done in a very simple way - starvation.  In short, the economic environment changed to the point the production or earnings (in the form of food) tanked and was not adequate enough to support the price (in the form of human lives). 

Of course, these were a bit more rapid conversions from one economy to another, but the same thing is happening here in the US, albeit much more slowly.  The government is growing and crowding out the private sector to the point it accounts for 40% of our economy.  More and more people are dependent upon government for their survival to the point 1 in 2 people in the US now collect a government check.  Our economic growth rate has slowed to about half of what it used to be.  And the unproductive people tend to have more children than the productive ones, ensuring the ratio of parasites to producers will continue to increase.

The question is when will the bubble burst.

It's impossible to say, but like all bubbles it will come when lenders no longer extend credit.  China will have had enough.  The Arabs will have had enough.  Even US bond holders will have had enough.  They will realize the US does not have the economic productive capacity (desire, actually) to produce the wealth necessary to pay back its debts.  At that point in time they will cut us off and the US will take on the mantle of a charity case, desperate of "foreign aid" much like Haiti or sub-Saharan African countries.  There may be some debt forgiveness, but all the debt forgiveness in the world will not solve the problem of a lack of production.  We will become a welfare state and get to enjoy the death rates, poverty rates, starvation rates, and infant mortality rates of our third world sister countries.

And we will all blame Bush and Big Oil.

Oh, I know, I know, this is harsh and how dare I talk about death, but ignoring it won't stop it from happening.  Besides, this is how I enjoy the decline.

Enjoy the decline!

Men Asking Women for Their Credit Score

Yes ladies, it's happening.  And since HR likes to do those things, we figured we'd just follow their lead and do the same!

Besides, you ladies always hate it when we're so shallow, looking at only the outside.  You should be happy we take an interest in your personal financial management acumen and intelligence!  Now is your chance to shine!

You go girl!

New Information

It happens quite often around here.  I post something about what Gerald or Geraldine Guru says about fill in nutrition topic du jour, and more often than not I get at least one comment notifying me that Gerry has changed his/her stance on said topic.  I'm then told that it is the mark of a thoughtful and serious person, as they have changed their position based on new information.  If this were the case, I would agree.  But more often than not, this is not new information ... outside of their world.  

The sad reality in this greater community is that the demographic most influenced by Gary Taubes was not scientists (thankfully) or the medical community (sadly, some have been), but the guru community.  They picked up and ran (and boy did they run!) with TWICHOO.  And make no mistake, many in the paleo/primal community were heavily influenced by this and seemingly did not engage in any independent, critical thinking, let alone research of their own prior to writing their own various books.

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Kids "Want a Dad" for Christmas

Never mind those kids though.  They don't know what they're talking about.  Kids don't need no STIIIIINKINNNNNG fathers!  They have the state!  That's all they need!

Hey, I Watch the History Channel!

I even remember how to do molar conversions and still understand valence electron configuration!

Ketosis and Burning Body Fat

Alternate Title:  Picture Worth More Than 1000 Words.  In speeches and interviews lately, Jimmy Moore has become fond of mentioning a few things (well, in addition to name dropping Robb Wolf)

• Nutritional Ketosis as being somehow unique from run-of-the-mill, what, biochemical ketosis.  NK requires blood ketone testing as this is more accurate.  And,
• Ketosis is evidence of burning body fat which he wasn't doing prior to this experiment.
• Ketones and blood glucose being reciprocal

Tis true that measuring blood ketone levels is more accurate than urine ketones.  For one thing, urine levels vary widely with fluid intake, frequency of urination, etc.  Urine ketones are also "spill-over".  This is why nobody is ever busted for DUI on the basis of a urine test.  But just because urine levels are not necessarily representative of one's ketogenic production doesn't mean a person is, or is not, in NuttyK.  But let's presume that to be truly NuttyK one must also be a prick-er.  

On the right sidebar are Jimmy's NuttyK experiment results from Days 180-209.  Top to bottom we have AM glucose, AM ketones, PM ketones,  and body weight.  Do YOU notice any correlation?   Here's what I see:

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Girls Will Pay the Price for the Games They Play

The games that started in middle school, for whatever sick and twisted reason, will initially take a toll on the young boys they were deployed against. 

But over the long term, they will cost girls more.

Boys will adapt.

Boys will learn.

Boys will read, compare notes, theorize and inevitably figure it out as their genetics are programmed to do.

They will then become men.

And once that happens, they will have been so forged by fire and tribulation not only will your games not work, your sincerity will be dismissed as a tactic.

And when your sincerity is refused or just not trusted, you will then realize the full price you'll have to pay for your foolish games.

Hyperinsulinemia, Insulin-Suppressive Drugs & Obesity (and Lustig)

The recent buzz about hyperinsulinemia being at the root of obesity (whatever the mechanism) has had me thinking again about the insulin lowering drugs.   Studies in this regard were referenced in the recent article in Cell from Dr. James Johnson's research group at UBC.   If this is really all there is to it, why not just treat obesity with such drugs?  Or at least give them to the reduced-obese so they won't regain the weight, and/or the so-called pre-obese who start gaining at some point in life before they become obese.  This is really the bottom line of studies like the recent one from UBC.  Because if all we need to do is suppress the hyperinsulinemia (however it is caused) to prevent obesity it would be done.  There is a relatively rare condition, called by many names, but most descriptively neo-natal or infant hyperinsulinism.  These children must be treated ASAP to avoid the consequences of hypoglycemic episodes.  I surmise the drugs octreotide and diazoxide were developed at least in part for treating this condition, though often partial removal of the pancreas is required.

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Insulin Secretion and the Corrected Insulin Response (CIR)

I'm working on a post about hyperinsulinemia and obesity in humans.  It may well turn into several posts.  But in one study I will be discussing they identified hypersecreters according to something called the corrected insulin response, CIR.  Sometimes this is further "standardized" as the CIRgp which is evaluated at the peak glucose reading.  The CIR is value calculated following a standard OGTT.  If you have data from your OGTT, you can calculate your own and determine how you rank.

The CIR was developed by Sluiter and colleagues as outlined in:  Glucose Tolerance and Insulin Release, A Mathematical Approach I. Assay of the Beta-cell Response After Oral Glucose Loading.  

From the dose-response relations between glucose and insulin after oral glucose loading, a reproducible parameter for beta-cell response was deduced. The main advantage of this parameter lies in its independence from the initial or reached glucose level.

Units:  glucose in mg/dL , insulin in μU/mL

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When a Girl Flakes

Roosh provides you young boys with some valuable advice about dealing with a girl when she flakes out or stands you up.

I called it 505025, but the lesson is the same - always have stuff to do, and NEVER assume you're going out.

Girls flaking had gotten so bad at one point, and I so accustomed to it, I had forgotten I had a date one time because I just assumed she was going to flake.  I was at the bar with some friends when I received the call.

Regardless, you always assume the girl is going to flake.  Matter of fact, you may want to flake on the girl and cancel at the last minute.  That technique is one of the few that has ALWAYS worked for me (meaning the girl was sure to go out with me when I "rescheduled" the date).

It's for the Chilllllddrennnnnnn

Will the Soccer Moms Please Shut Up?

I'm so sick of soccer moms.

Diet Plan Programs

Hey all, just your friendly "community" consumer advocate here letting you know a few things about Jimmy Moore's latest venture.   A little while back he announced three new things coming to LLVLC. Jimmy wrote:

It’s one thing to read a book about low-carb and I highly encourage you to do that. But sometimes people have difficulty interpreting what they read on the pages of a book into what that should look like on their plate. That’s why I’ve created the “Livin’ Low Carb Meal Plan” set to release to the public on Monday, December 17, 2012. You’ll get meal plans, shopping lists, recipes and so much more to help you stay on the straight and narrow on your low-carb diet. Many people get into a rut with their low-carb meals, so I hope you take advantage of this new service designed to help you keep this from happening. {emphasis mine}

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She Threw the Spear the Furthest

Why I can't get into the Olympics (mentally, not actually participating in the Olympics) is because

so what?

You threw the spear the furthest.

You jumped over the most sand.

You dove the most pristine.

Did you solve cancer?  Did you produce a really cool video game?  What the hell did you do other than a physical feat that has no real world ramifications for...well...the real world?

This is not to besmirch the actual atheletes who participate, but I always had the question,

"Precisely what does the gold medal winner in gymnastic's flippy flip division at the age of 17 do with her life thereafter?"

Well, I guess we have the answer.

In the end no matter how much fanfare and hubaloo we put on the Olympics or sports for that matter, these atheletes have to answer to the real world of economics.  They really don't produce anything of value, and I often wonder how many of the Olympiads regret dedicating their entire youths to being the best "flipper" or being the best "jumpy person."

Makes all those days playing Dragon Warrior or the Final Fantasy series seem not so wasted.

Robb Wolf: On the Role of Calories vs. Carbs/Insulin

... but it was my new-found energy and activity level that drove my leanness, not an inability to store fat in the absence of significant insulin. I think this is one of the most damaging messages that comes out of the LC camp to this day, I was duped by this, so I’m not going to do what a lot of other recovered LC writers do and make folks out to be idiots for still believing this…but, it is time to face facts. In every damn study it is clear that for fat loss we’d like adequate protein, and a calorie restriction scenario.

Robb Wolf, Dec. 2012

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Why Youth Should Not Save for Retirement

I wrote about it before, but in case you missed it or need to send a youth some wisdom:

We're Only Trying to Help Ladies

We care.

I See Cartel, Not Competition

Usually, it is said that women are very competitive with each other.  Women would prefer NOT to have women bosses in that there is competition.  Women are always competing with each other for men.  Heck, if you ask why women dress the way they do, it's not even for men - it's to compete against other women. 

But while i'm sure there are strains of competition among the fairer sex, I unfortunately see more cartel-like behavior than competition.

For those of you who don't know a "cartel" is a group of companies that act like a monopoly.  For example OPEC is a cartel of different countries that produce oil.  Their intention in forming the cartel is to maximize profits.  They do this by acting as a team, and not competing against each other.  You can also see this when Lucky Luciano formed "organized crime."  Beforehand the various crime families were fighting each other for territory.  Luciano realized working together the different crime families would not only have lower deaths, but increased profits. 

Regardless, cartels are deemed "bad" because they invariably result in higher prices for the consumer.  This is why we have trust-busting and anti-trust legislation and usually break up monopolies - so many companies are competing against each other constantly improving quality and lowering prices.

I don't see that however in the "highly competitive" arena of women.

One chart if you will:

Admittedly both sexes are just as guilty, but what this chart shows me is that there is definitely no competition going on between women in the pursuit of men.  If there was the pink line would be trending downward, not upwards. Further cementing my case women are cartelling and not competing is when you combine this with their prohibitive attitudes towards dating, courtship, and marriage, not to mention their insanely long and unattainable "requirement lists" of men. Women, unconsciously or not, are keeping the supply artificially low in order to command the highest price.  No man is good enough for them, despite clamoring for "why can't I find a good man" and "where have all the good men gone?"

However, there's a funny little thing about cartels.

Sometimes a member of the cartel will "cheat."  Meaning they will break away from the group and act in their own best interests.  An example would be the oil embargoes of the 70's.  OPEC managed to drive gas prices sky high in severely limiting the supply of oil.  Prices got so high, however, members of the cartel were VERY tempted to produce a "little more" oil than they were supposed to, thus netting them significantly increased profits.

I ask the question, "why aren't some women doing the same thing?"

The reason I ask was I was discussing with a friend of mine about how simple it would be for women to snatch a man today.  All they have to do is:

1.  Be in shape.
2.  Be nice
3.  Be kind
4.  Be reasonably intelligent
5.  Be responsible/adult/mature

That's it.  That's how low of a quality product the cartel has made.  All an individual girl has to do is these five basic things and she will pretty much blow away all of her cartel sisters.  She can snatch a man, just like that.  It would be like being asking an adult to compete against 1st graders in a 2 mile run and the prize would be $5,000.  HOW CAN'T YOU COMPETE???

This is not a question about, "how come you don't want super awesome guys like us?"  It's more of a question of why, with it being so easy to compete, don't you?  If "finding a man" means that much, how hard is it to hit the treadmill, lose 10 pounds, show up on time, not play mind games, and just follow those five commonsensical rules?

Alas, I'm an economist.  Not a social-pscyhologist.  And thus, I'll just sit here bemused wondering why OPEC isn't selling more oil at $450 a barrel.

Patenting Pharmaceutical Protocols and Dietary Interventions?

Around a month ago, I was alerted to Jeff Volek's involvement with a company called UCAN that markets sports drinks containing SuperStarch.    I blogged on this here.  The SS is touted as being made by a "patent pending" heat/moisture process.  So a little digging was done by Lerner and then I followed the trail, and lo and behold, Volek himself is not on the patent app for SS -- that is the Scottish company that developed it.  No, Volek's patent is (links in comments on that post):  

 "The present invention is directed to a method of controlling serum insulin levels in an individual, the method comprising the step of administering to the individual a food composition comprising heat and moisture treated starch (HMT starch)."

Now I questioned this in the comments.  What would the meaning be of such a permit?  Nobody else could administer UCAN to fat-adapted ultra-marathon runners?  It makes no sense.

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Grouchy Morning Linkage

I thought they only went after wiener dogs.

The hot girl will always have the advantage over the unhot girl.

Motorcycles and the Alpha Omega Spectrum. (and not a language warning, I have to read these more carefully when i link)

Liberal talk radio station shuts down, blames lack of revenue on Obama.

You WILL embrace the fat.  EMBRACE THE FAT DAMN YOU!!!!

Girl Game

When just "looking pretty" doesn't seem to cut it, learn "Girl Game!"

Warning, "Girl Game" or "GG" is full of truth and factual data.  GG is not for the weak at heart or people who prefer to be lied to even though it hurts their actual real world success.  You should not read GG if you are on antibiotics or blood pressure medicine.  Side effects include:

• having a rude awakening
• realizing you only consulted women about men, but not men themselves
• changes on your part
• acknowledgement you're not perfect
• acceptance of competitors better looking and younger than you
• having to cut your "must have" list in half
• listening to what other men say

Consult your doctor before using Girl Game.

(language warning)

Does Hyperinsulinemia Drive Diet-Induced Obesity?

Unless you've been living under the internet equivalent of a rock in this community, no doubt you've heard there was a paper published in Cell and Metabolism entitled Hyperinsulinemia Drives Diet-Induced Obesity Independently of Brain Insulin Production.  It's a TWICHOOB's dream title ... until you actually read the paper, or even the abstract and freely available charts and diagrams.  Too bad most did not.  My link is to the full text I'm sharing with my readers through Google docs.   But you actually don't need to read this whole paper get the basic gist of what the study entailed and the results.  However, before we even do that, consider this.  How do you induce obesity in a C57Bl6/J mouse?  You feed it a high fat diet, HFD.    And as the graphic clearly shows, the researchers believe the results of their study warrant a change in the chain of

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It's official. Jimmy Moore & Co. aren't interested in solving metabolic mysteries after all

UPDATE 9/14/13:  I am in the process of deciding exactly how to deal with one Dr. William L. Wilson, discoverer of the imaginary CARB Syndrome.    This appears to have been the only post of mine he links to in his unsolicited diagnosis of yours truly with this made up mental illness.   Further he offered treatment in the the form of his Carb-22 supplement.  

My purpose for this update is that some have -- rightfully, IMO -- taken him to task for making this bizarre diagnosis on the internet, of someone he has not only not met in person, but apparently knows very little accurate information about based on skimming a few blog posts.  After the fact he emailed me a link to the post, and posted one on another post on this blog.  He is busy answering many challenges to his post on his FB page at the moment.  

Rather than re-evaluate the prudence of his actions, he seems to be digging a hole.  One way he is doing that is claiming I am some public figure and it's fair game for everyone to diagnose me ... oh, and because in this post I essentially did the same thing with Jimmy Moore.  Now, this would not justify his actions, especially since as a licensed and practicing physician he is clearly subject to laws that I, a mere blogger, am not.   But let's clear a few things up anyway.

In his post he wrote:  

You might wonder how can I possibly diagnose someone with a disease who I have never personally met? Yes, to some extent I am speculating, but in medicine we often speculate about possible diseases in patients we have never seen when discussing cases with our colleagues in “curb side” consults. CarbSane even does this herself when she speculates that Jimmy Moore has Klinefelter’s syndrome and she doesn’t even have an MD behind her name. Over the years I have successfully treated thousands of patients who fit the CARB syndrome pattern and in my opinion CarbSane clearly falls into this category. After 35 years of clinical experience, my diagnostic skills are very sharp.

On FB he's written:

Out in the world physicians and every Tom, Dick and Harry speculate what might be wrong with public figures like CarbSane. Physicians do this all the time on TV and in the media. Even CarbSane does this when she speculates whether Jimmy Moore has a genetic condition.

You call my analysis of CarbSane “mean spirited”, yet she suggests that Jimmy Moore has Kleinfelter’s syndrome. Perhaps she was trying to give Jimmy information that would help him but I doubt it. Klinefelter’s syndrome is a genetic disorder you really can’t treat. If CarbSane really does have CARB syndrome, it is a reversible disorder that is quite easy to treat. If she doesn’t want to deal with it, that’s her choice and it’s fine with me. If she is interested in checking out, I have information that might be helpful to her.

There are more, perhaps I edit them in, perhaps not.  In any case, I can see how he thought that ... my wording is not always crystal clear, this is a blog after all, and I don't proof, edit and consolidate nearly as much as I would like to if I had infinite time.  But as it turns out, I did not.  Here are the exact words:

It has come up in comments here of late that Jimmy might have Klinefelter's syndrome which is one cause of hypogonadism.

Klinefelter's was raised by someone in comments  here (no I do not have the time nor desire to track a link down).  I also recall that I said at least once that I do not believe this to be the case.  A chromosomal condition like that is usually diagnosed early on.   However, there are many other causes of hypogonadism and he displays enough symptoms that if he were getting proper comprehensive care, this would at least have been addressed.    So let's be clear, I did *speculate* that this may be an issue for him, I did not diagnose him.

I did not wish to get Regina any more sneers aimed at her at the time so I didn't quote her post I linked to, but I will now.   Not to bring her any belated headaches, but because folks like Wilson are apparently too lazy to click through links and read the content that has stirred me to write what I do here.  I don't write this blog in a vacuum.  In this post, Regina wrote:

Since it is the endocrine system which largely controls our weight and hunger, it needs to function well for weight loss and maintenance. Yet, there are some endocrine issues which a diet alone cannot resolve - they are genetic - and Jimmy has, we've learned through his posts, hypogonadism.

Simply understood, that's where you, if male, have low testosterone, elevated LH and/or FSH, and often it leads to high serum ferritin (iron).

Jimmy has shared with readers that he has this condition - and it's something, that after reading up on it last night, one cannot change with diet alone. Now this isn't an excuse - but a reason that helps explain why Jimmy's appetite is such that he's driven to eat more than he requires. Those with hypogonadism are often insulin resistant, suffer abdominal obesity and gain weight easily.

Frankly, Regina stated this in far more definitive terms than I would have chosen.     Does he have hypogonadism?  I do not know.  But the point of the title of this post is that on some level, apparently, he does not care.   He is seemingly in a constant search for answers with blinders and very deep shades on in a darkened room.  He does not want to see.   For the time being the NuttyK was working for weight loss -- nevermind the worsening lipids, the stubborn UTI he had early on, the protein and crystals in his urine or anything else.  Mr. Healthy LC Diet was losing weight again.   

She also wrote:  

If nothing else, Jimmy is a prolific blogger - he's got websites, podcasts, YouTube videos, a forum, twitter and facebook - and this leaves us with a lot of information to ponder about his weight maintenance, gains and losses.

Yes he is.  And for those that don't know, I have a freakish memory and I remember a lot.  Especially numbers, images, dates, phrases, etc.etc.etc.  I see, hear and write a lot.  This reinforces it.  This may come off as obsession when it is not.  Jimmy used to blog daily about what he ate along with notes.  Routinely discuss struggles and ask for advice.  As he became more dogmatic and those offering advice kept giving him advice he didn't want to hear, he got mighty testy at times.  I vividly recall him asking for thoughts on a topic and when someone responded with their thoughts they were rudely shot down with a "nobody asked you".   I used to be one of those people who tried to help him.   Others remember me.  I remember them.  Eventually, Jimmy just started censoring any "advice" he didn't like ... and the pot shot posts at his "nasty" critics started insinuating all manner of bad behavior.  NEVER. HAPPENED.   

Regina, one last time (in response to Jimmy's comment in a post to which she was responding to:  "Was it the keto-adaptation or the calorie-cutting that has worked in producing the weight loss success I’ve seen? If you ask me, I say WHO CARES?!"):

Well, I care - not only about Jimmy as a person and friend, but also for those within the low-carb community, who despite doing everything seemingly right, fail to lose weight or gain and will do anything - even something extreme - to lose the weight.

So then, what has been going on?

What context might explain Jimmy's weight gains and losses?

And more importantly, why are those important considerations for anyone ready to jump on board the nutritional ketosis bandwagon and do what Jimmy's doing?

When Jimmy embarked on this extreme nutritional ketosis experiment seemingly everyone jumped on board.  I know not everyone, but enough.  Even a 100 lb perfectly healthy woman did.  Thankfully she had the common sense to stop before she harmed herself.   Three years ago now Jimmy went on an eggfast.  The following year on his lead a woman engaged in one.  Face went tingly, passed out.  Stuff like that.  I have highlighted here how SO many are stuck or weigh more than they ever did.   How so many see their insulin sensitivity worsen, their body composition and fat distribution change unfavorably.  For crying out loud one low carber had to cut her hair because too much was falling out  -- and still she advocates for the "healthy" diet.  There's more at stake than just money, but wasting money is enough of a bad thing, no?

I do NOT mock their looks or weight.  I do NOT attack them personally.  I DO think it is pertinent information that an advocate for a diet be honest in their delivery.  If a diet is not working for you, you really have a lot of nerve promoting it to anyone.  Period.  That Jimmy Moore is too mired in dogma to alter his diet ... Well, many have tried.  I may not have the friends Regina has in the LC community, but I do not want to see people potentially harm their health taking advice from charlatans ... even if many of those people don't particularly like me.

I provide my readers with the science here.  I'll occasionally share *my opinion* and clearly state it as such for people to consider as they see fit.   I think that on the whole Cholesterol Clarity will do far more harm than good and that it deserved at least one honest appraisal on its merits.   Jimmy Moore can't even be honest with himself any more what is going on with his health and it is evident throughout the book and the quotes he chose so selectively to entwine with his biased narrative.  

---

Original Publish Date:  12/18/12

I would like to give props and offer my support, though she probably doesn't really want it, to Regina Wilshire of Weight of the Evidence blog.  By the time I had found the LC community in 2009, her blogging had apparently tapered off and I had not really come across much bearing her name other than the occasional picture.  Oh ... and the post on Jimmy's now defunct and deleted menus blog identifying her as a "heavy low carber".  It was that post that caused me to mention her in a post of my own (2011) addressing the topic, hence due to Jimmy's inclusion of her in his post, her name got included in mine.   I also named a few of her low carbing friends, and the rest, as they say, is history.  I hope in retrospect, some of these folks are able to see that I meant no harm or ill will in merely highlighting what I did.  It's pretty obvious, to everyone except the low carbers it seems, that on the whole advocates of the lifestyle are more overweight or obese than advocates of other lifestyles.

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The Negative Externalities of Skinny Jeans

Captain Capitalism's Super Awesome Political Analysis on the Shooting

• Broken family
• Kid obviously never had dad give him the asswhoppin' he needed to make him a young man and not the social outcast he was
• On psycho drugs
• Shooting only stopped when armed people arrived on the scene
• Executions were carried out with pistols, not the AR 15 (last i checked) (it was the AR 15 according to more recent reports) OK, now the third update has it being the pistols.
• Good thing guns were banned at the school
• Good thing Norway banned guns too
• Somebody remind me of my "Nerf" theory of gun control one of these days
• Start buying guns now while you can.  Here's my dealer.

Another Case Against Having Children

He puts it more succinctly than I do (language warning)

Real Men vs. Corporate Drones

From Rev. Aurini:

From the Book of St. Frost

This goes in line with Ludwig Von Mises observation Marx's hatred of the division of labor was out of envy for specializing in a skill would result in different levels of status.  Say an engineer vs. a social worker.  It also explains fat acceptance.

The only problem is the language warning that the like of Mises never had to provide.  But if you get to the later half of the article, Frost delves into the sad world of the marxist mind.

A MiG 15 to Freedom

So I'm watching The Military Channel on youtube, specifically the history of MiG's.  I learn about this Soviet pilot who defected to the US by piloting his MiG 25 to Japan.  In the Wiki entry I read about this other guy, No Kum-Sok aka Kenneth Rowe.  The guy flies his MiG 15 from North Korea to an air force base in South Korea during the Korean War.  I'm just wondering how gutsy was that defecting from North Korea, and flying an enemy plane to an enemy air force base hoping they let you land instead of shoot you down.  Thankfully he has written a book about it.  "A MiG 15 to Freedom."  I just have one question:

Why the hell hasn't a movie been made about this guy?

Post Post - Kenneth Rowe talking about his landing:

Ass hat LC Doctors

I'm hoping to get to my analysis/comments of the hyperinsulinemia paper in Cell , that's causing all the buzz on the internet lately, published up by tomorrow.  Such posts require more attention to detail and seriousness than posts such as this one.  But it's a nice little break from my real life grind at the moment to bring you a little commentary such as this post.

The LC position on insulin is getting to be downright ridiculous.  But the title of the paper, "Hyperinsulinemia Drives Diet-Induced Obesity Independently of Brain Insulin Production" can be quickly read as "Insulin causes obesity", which led two LC docs to jump right in.  First, Eades tweeted:

 DecMichael Eades, M.D. ‏@DrEades

Hilarious. Researchers @ UBC stumble onto the fact that insulin stores fat. As if they're the 1st to notice this. http://bit.ly/121FvTM 

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Confessions of an Ex-Crusader

So the co-founder of Greenpeace, as some of you know, has come out against Greenpeace citing it is no longer the organization it once was.  He has since wrote a book:

"Confessions of a Greenpeace Drop Out"

But this highlights another issue I've brought up before.

"What can you do when you've spent your youth ignorantly advocating and voting for socialism?"

Famous conservatives today were liberals.  Michael Medved, Joe Soucheray, and now Patrick Moore.  Thankfully, they've at least done something.  But what irks me is the "JOhnny Come Lately's" who in their 50's and 60's realized the crap they swallowed back in the 70's was nothing more than leftist garbage.  Oooo!  Great!  You get 3 more election cycles before you die of old age!  Good thing you only wasted the first 15 election cycles of your life voting to make my future hell!

Sorry, in a particularly foul mood.

Out of the Park

Language warning, but hilarious:



more here.

Proof Positive Feminists Are Psychotic

I want you to follow me in a little experiment.  And I'm being serious, I need to know if I'm missing something.

Victor Pride wrote a self-improvement piece for men.  You may not agree with all of his methods, but if you read it, I think the majority of men and women would agree the majority (though, not all) of his recommendations are good things men should pursue.

So riddle me this, riddle me that, Batman.  Why the hell would anybody ridicule his recommendations?

"Physically build something."  Mock it, ridicule it?

"Start a Business."  Mock it, ridicule it?

"Own your car outright/avoid debt."  Mock it, ridicule it?

WTF?!

I mean, if you want positive proof just how batshit insane feminists have become you needn't look any further than this "Jezebel" piece.  The fact they mock and ridicule fiscal responsibility, self-improvement, and production is only proof that the feminist movement is not only delusional, but they're destructive.  So people should do the OPPOSITE of what Victor is recommending?

DON'T START A BUSINESS?

DON'T BUILD SOMETHING?

GO INTO DEBT???

Precisely what kind of world do modern day feminists believe in???  I'm just curious, where does the money come from?  Where does the production come from?  Who produces the things you need and innovates new products and methods that lowers their prices??  Or does mocking and ridiculing things like "production" and "independence" qualify as genuine economic production in the feminist interpretation of economics?

I expect no sane, adult reaction from the little girls at Jezebel, but rather am using them as an example for everybody else to learn from.

If feminism has been able to convince women (little girls, actually) that things like fiscal discipline, spending within your means, production, innovation, and independence are worthy of mockery and ridicule, then the whole movement is not just invalid, but evil and insane.  It is destructive and it is unfounded.

The question is whether people (especially women) are going to realize this and start to reject feminism for the co-opted evil political vehicle it has become, or just to continually subscribe to it for politically correct purposes, granting them the political capital they need to continue their evil agenda.

Regardless, enjoy the decline.

King Leonidas vs. General Maximus

Let it henceforth be resolved,

Which is the better body to build for the true man?

King Leonidas - Ripped, low fat, constant reps, but mayhaps no actual increase in strength

or

General Maximus - Powerful, brute, low reps, high strength, but no definition and prone to fatness later?

I have done both, but know not which is better.

Glorious New Sponsor! - Ranger Self Defense

Is There Anything Good About Men?

I had meant to finish my book and then read Roy Baumeister's book, "Is There Anything Good About Men."

Unfortunately, time gets away from you and I did want to plug this because he was kind enough to have an e-mail conversation with me about some of his research.

 

I will put together a more thorough review once i read it.  And I am also going to be reading  a book called "Hookernomics."  But that is for a later time.

Quotations: Taubes on Pathological Science

INTERVIEWER Marc Hellerstein thought that the obesity epidemic was caused by people being sedentary?

TAUBES He believed that the key is whether you’re sedentary compared to how you used to be. When I told him about the Pima and the Sioux Indians and this 1981 study of obesity in oil field workers, he had an excuse for everything. So the Pima and the Sioux Indians, they lived on reservations, so they could be obese because they were relatively sedentary, at least more sedentary than they used to be. And the oil field workers, well, they're Mexican-American, so they have some kind of "thrifty" gene going. You know this is what pathological science is: a field in which you can find a reason to explain away all negative evidence. In pathological science, it’s no longer possible to refute the hypothesis. Remember, science is about trying to test your hypothesis and refute it, but in a field like this, if you test it and come up with a counter-example, the counter-example is just explained away with whatever comes to mind. Negative evidence never means anything. So you have an obese person who's sedentary, that's proof of my hypothesis. If you have an obese person who's very active — at least, compared to most people today — the Sioux Indians, for instance, who were so poor they had to walk down to the river to get their drinking water; who had no televisions, no cars; they had to walk outside to evacuate their bowels — those people are obese because they used to be more active than they are now.

~ Gary Taubes, January 2008

Interview with Seth Roberts 

Leaving aside Gary's example here, and focusing on his discussion of science, I contend that low carb "science" has long since passed into the realm of the pathological.

53% of All Infants on WIC

Honest to freaking Christ.

Do not tell me to bring children into this world when over half of them are being brought up and trained to be the parasites their parents are.

53% OF ALL INFANTS????  ON WIC?????

Cripes.  Enjoy the decline.

A Dangerous Combination

From a reader who is obviously enjoying the decline...

Glorious hat AND Rumpie!

To quote Jose, "in communist Minnesota, Rumpie drink you!"

Sarah Kavanagh - High School Vegan Kid

Too young and unpopular to hang out with the normal kids?

Check

Too lazy to do something constructive like the physics team or a high school sport?

Check.

Needs something easy to do in life so becomes a vegan not because she cares about the animals but because it takes no effort, but gives her otherwise worthless life some meaning?

Check.

I introduce to you Ms. Sarah Kavanagh.

Something tells me she'll become a lawyer, or an activist, or some person in general who is going to tell other people what to do with their lives, like, oh I don't know....

Adam Gadahn
Jessica Assaf
Haley Koch/Chloe Camilla


"Crusaderism," people, look it up.

Always the Eco-Bridesmaid, Never the Bride

Enough time has passed I can tell this story without fear of people being identified or finding out.

This summer I went to a buddy of mine's wedding.  He's a eclectic character, doing his own thing, so it was only natural he would get married later in life.  His wife was from San Francisco, was a teacher, as were all of her friends.  It was inevitable it was a hippie wedding, most people were liberal, but since it wasn't my wedding I knew enough just to be quiet and shut up.

However in being quiet and shutting up, it was interesting to see the wedding unfold, especially the bridesmaids.

The majority of the bridesmaids and female friends of the bride we in their 30's and not married.  They all had very important careers (assistant art director, teacher, teacher, teacher, teacher, special ed teacher, teacher, teacher, drama director, etc.) and they were all noticeably vocal about "finding a man."  But there was another thing I noticed.

They were RABIDLY econ-friendly.

Not a la "environmental terrorist" or "ELF" sort of rabid, but the first thing you picked up on was when you walked up to the facility there was one of these 30 something girls telling you how everything was laid out, where all the food was, but (most importantly) this was a "green wedding" and nobody would "have to worry" because everything was going to be recycled or composted.  I remember the look in the girl's eyes when she hurriedly rushed to the part about it being a green wedding.  A little blank, but this spark in her eye showed when she showed us the labelled bins (trash, compost, plastic recycle, paper recycle).

As the wedding progressed and the wedding party had to be herded from one function or room to another, sure enough there was always some 30 something friend of the bride highlighting the green aspects of the wedding.  The confetti was biodegradable.  Compost over here, oh "here, here is the recycle bin!"  You can eat your chairs.  And finally, when we all had dinner and it was apparent people would be disposing of their trash, a cadre of women got up and started orchestrating the disposal of the food.  "Plastic recyclables go here, food for composting goes here!"  They JUMPED from their seats and were eager to do this.

While this show within a show was going on, there was a guy I got to know a little bit.  Foreign guy from a very poor country.  We'll leave it at that.  He started his own company here in the US and was very much a capitalist.  He was also a very handsome fellow and knew it.  He was alpha.  And in sitting at our table I silently watched him just run circles around the plethora of 30 something single ladies.  He talked about his little boy which melted their hearts (though he never produced a photo).  He said all the right things.  And smiling, constantly smiling.  Sure enough when it came time to make sure people disposed of their waste properly, all the women at our table left, and I looked over to him and said,

"You know precisely what you're doing."

He responded, "they're all the same."

It was true.  They were all the same.  But in more ways than one.

Sure, they were women.  They liked good looking confident men.  They were also the same in their professions (liberal arts, touchy feely, no real economic production type jobs).  They were also all single. But what really united them was how zealously religious they were about the whole green thing.  Because with nothing else in their lives, flashing their "green credentials" was about the only thing they had left in life.

With no husbands, no boyfriends, no family, boring hobbies (oh, wow, organic wine tasting, who saw that coming!?), and jobs nobody really cared about (because they weren't interesting), these girls unconsciously knew on some level they weren't interesting people and didn't lead interesting lives.  Teachers?  A dime a dozen.  Single?  All people have been that before.  You like to travel?  Well who in the Patron's Saint Name of Frick doesn't?  The foreign man was the most interesting fellow at the table, and thus he took up most of the attention.  No one asked anything buy the basic courtesy questions about them.  But once an opportunity for these girls to "do their thing" and show everybody just how good greenies they were popped up, blamo!  They were performing like caffeinated monkeys in a circus.

NOw I don't know if they did that because they had nothing else in their lives.  I don't know if they did that to impress the 2 or 3 alpha males in the wedding party.  I don't know if they did it because they actually believe it.  But whatever reason they did it, it was sad.  For it was proof that K-16 (18 for some) education system merely indoctrinated them about "going green" and other leftist claptrap to the point they were damaged goods.  30 something, yearning to find a man, and instead of being an interesting person, or having an interesting career, or having a skill (say, ballroom dancing, or playing chess well), ALL they could do was puff their chests with their ability to compost and recycle. 

Sadly, it's like hipsters or your average college liberal.  They try so hard to "rebel" but lack the intellect to genuinely do so, all they merely achieve in the end is conformity and commonness.  And there is no value in commonness and conformity.  Alas, there's no shortage of 30 something liberal art-educated-and-employed-women who lack what men want, but hey, at least they can tell you where to get some mean organic wine from the Napa Valley!

Enjoy the decline!

Defend the Blazing Fur

There are costs to bloggers speaking the truth and fighting socialism.

Drama! Vegan v. LC

I can't help but weigh in on this this morning.  It seems a vegan  has come out with a new one:  Low Carb Guru of the Month.   

Yes, I'm aware that posting about this here puts me at risk for promoting such activity, but I'm going to take that risk.  Why?  Because Jimmy Moore has sought fit to respond and there are several things about this response that are worthy of being "called out".

Read more »

Tickity Tock, Ladies

How's that lefty "perception is reality" working for ya?

Enjoy that freaking decline!

When Government Replaces Husbands and Fathers

From our Spanish Agent in the Field.

Though, I have a question.  Does it fall under,

"government replacing fathers and husbands"

or is it

"other women forced to work to pay for the day care and the taxes to pay other women to take care of their children while they take care of the other women's children and in reality all we've managed to do is take non-taxable labor of child-rearing and outsource it to government employees who now earn a tangible salary which can be taxed, so all we did is tax motherhood, disconnect children from their parents, and (despite claims of how good women are at multitasking) done a craptastic job at outsourcing the rearing of children?"

Just wondering.

Ex Soviet Speaks About the Left Eliminating Individualism

From our Ex Soviet Agent in the Field.

Clarissa was kind enough to speak to my original post about why the left wants to eliminate individuality.  Nearly all of my (Mises') hunches were correct, especially my belief the family was targeted.

She also strongly recommends reading this book about Stalin and just what a sick twisted and evil man he was.

New "Well Hello 2nd Armored Award" Winner

Happy day economists!

In writing "Enjoy the Decline" I was doing research as to what drugs your local pharmacy would have with exceptional value in terms of a SHTF scenario.  So I called the local Walgreens (yeah, I'll mention the company!) and the pharmacist there was quite rude.  So off to the internet I went and in came...

"THE PATRIOT NURSE!" who kindly and promptly answered my question.

For this rapid response and kindness I hereby present The Patriot Nurse with the Captain Capitalism's "Well Hello 2nd Armored Award"  (again, the 6:00 minute mark and 6:25 mark)



And no, I won't tell you what drugs they were.  You'll have to buy the book!

From a reader.  it seems the good nurse has unfortunatley suffered the loss of her fiancee recently.  I cannot surmise what that is like, but I think we all better visit the good Patriot Nurse as a show of support.  No woman deserves to have her fiancee lost before marriage.  Please do visit the Patriot Nurse for all of your needs:

 

New Strain of the "Shaming Language" Virus

Shaming language, if you don't already know, is a response you get from somebody when you tell them something factual, that they don't like, but since it is factual, they can't refute it, and so they call you names.

That's about as simple as it is.

It's childish.
It's immature.
And simple minds use it.

Normally "shaming language" is used in the context when men speak candidly and bluntly about courting, women, dating, sex, etc.  Because it is candid it offends the fragile sensibilities of most women.  But since it is true said offended women have no legitimate retort.  So the shaming language begins, typically mocking the size of a man's manlihood or questioning their sexual orientation.

For example, I made a video about how women do earn the majority of degrees, but that is only because the vast majority of those degrees are laughably easy degrees.  I even went so far as to explain to women why this is for their own benefit because going $75,000 into debt for a Masters in English would only serve to harm them later.

Truthful?  Yes.
Honest?  Yes.
Even helpful to women?  Yes.

But the inevitable shaming language of course came in:

Now shaming language is nothing new to real men who have refused to be politically correct and insist on speaking truthfully, candidly and unrepentantly about men, women, and so on.  We don't care who it offends.  We're sick of little spoiled children who think they're deserve 80+ years of un-offended life.  And we're sick of the political and power structure that kowtows to it.  Our lives are too short to be pissing away walking on eggshells.  But I have stumbled on another hornets nest that has caused enough umbrage it's attracting a whole new variant of shaming language all on its own.

I call it "Going Galt Shaming Language."

Not to brag, but I'm waaaaaay head of the curve on this enjoy the decline thing.  I've psychologically adapted myself to accept and benefit from the decline.  I've given up all my previous dreams in life (simply because they're not feasible in this economy) replacing them with feasible ones.  I am more grounded in reality and prepared than most people are.  So when people ask me what I do for a living and I say, "as little as I possibly can" it triggers a conversation about minimalism and enjoying the decline.

Now most conservatives and men are intrigued and reluctantly have to admit I might be right.  They are intellectually curious and the furthest thing away from being offended.  But there are two groups that actually take umbrage and get pissed off when I say, "I'm not working any more.  I'm doing as little as I can.  I'm not going to let society live off of me anymore."

Liberals
Religious conservative types

Liberal women in particular take most offense.  They can't believe somebody would check out and go Galt.  Liberal men just dismiss me and think I'm immature.  And the religious types go on about "who is going to keep the population going" or "we need more children to fight this war."  But the language, oh, the shaming language.

"You're greedy!"
"You're selfish!"
"Why, you just don't care about other people!"
"Oh, you have it so good in this country!  You're a white male!  Stop you're bitching!"
"What if everybody did what you did!?  You owe it to society!"

In short the new shaming language is to accuse anybody who has half a sense to live life and avoid work as a pouting child who's decided to pick up my toys and go home.  That (once again) you're not a "real man/woman" if you don't "man up" and work hard and pay taxes.  You're just a whiner, a complainer, a cry baby.  Oooo!  Boo hoo hooo!  Da wittle boy doesn't wanna grow up and be a real man.

In reality it is very much like the shaming language when you voice an opinion about the sexes.  It's about control.  If you say you refuse to date fat girls, then the shaming language begins as a means to make you  feel bad for wanting to sleep with skinny chicks.  "Get back in line!  How dare you have such thoughts!"  But instead of losing power of what men should find/should not find attractive, it's losing power over the production and wealth transfer of a slave.  So if the slave decides to leave the plantation (which we all can), the only way they can get us back is by shaming us for not wanting to stay.

I don't believe any advice is needed to explain why you should not feel shame for not trying your best.  The generations of politically correct brainwashing and shaming language tactics are starting to show for what they truly are and people are not swallowing it anymore.  Besides, anybody with 6 months work experience in this glorious economy knows just what a bunch of rubbish "working hard and having a successful career" means - 40% taxes, crappy benefits, a sadistic, power hungry employer, and incompetent/easily offended/compliant-filing co-workers.  Oh, and you get to be loathed in public for being successful or "rich."

So pour yourselves a double.  Break out that lazyboy.  Fire up the old XBox and just make do with less.  In the end all that shaming language is, is a bunch of nagging liberals scared to death you won't slave away to pay for their crap anymore and that their precious little government programs may go away.

Enjoy the decline!

You Girls Are Making It Very Hard For Me....

to defend your right to vote.

Why the Left Hates the Division of Labor

One of the things I could not explain until recently was how the left not only wants financial equality, but also seems hell bent on social equality.  In other words, I can understand where they want other people's money (that's just human nature).  What I don't understand is how they also wage war against social or even biological differences.  For example feminists trying desperately to claim "gender" is not biological, but socially driven.  Swedes eliminating the words "him" and "her" from their language.  Parents bringing up their children with no specific sex.  Mothers need to be fathers and fathers need to be mothers.  Or, all these leftist groups posing as atheist groups banning one religious symbol or another from public grounds.  Or all the women (and some men) pushing for "fat acceptance."  Whatever it is, the left wants no differences.  Everything, money, status, social networks, physique, even your gender should be the same. 

So I was reading "Freedom, Inequality, Primitivism and the Division of Labor"and it was one of those moments where you discovered a link that made you go "AHA!  THAT'S IT!"  (of course it was also one of those moments where you saw somebody had gone down this path before and that you are  not unique or special and even if you had come up with your own epiphany, Mr. Fuller would be there in half a second citing the originator of that epiphany).  And that link or observation was...

Marx hated the division of labor.

The ramifications and consequences of this are many, shocking and just outright scary.

Right off the bat this should tell you the man was an idiot, if not, outright insane.  He wanted to abolish the division of labor.  He wanted people to excel at everything and not be defined or anchored to any one job.  Even the most rookie, fresh off the assembly line economist can see the flaws in being against the division of labor.  But what scares me is how this miserable failure of a human (and he was) was able to get nearly half the globe to believe his claptrap.  How can you take this man seriously, let alone when he purports to be an economist BUT IS AGAINST THE DIVISION OF LABOR???? 

It not only explains why every communist experiement has failed, but it also testifies to the intellectual weakness of people who swallow this poppycock.

But take the economic consequences of ignoring or "not liking" the division of labor, and look at why he was against it.  It defined humans.  It applied characteristics and traits to humans.  UNIQUE characteristics and traits.  And some of these traits are better than others, resulting in inequality.  Not FINANCIAL inequality.  Inequality in terms of strength, respect, admiration, and status.

It is here I cannot claim to make the link, as Ludwig von Mises did that already for me, but Marx and leftists in general are not just against economic inequality, they are against ALL inequality.  It is why Marx and many leftists are against differences PERIOD.

Even if you were in a communist country, as a doctor earning the same as everybody else (0), you would still be deemed "superior" which would be unacceptable.  So various measures would have to be taken to "humble" you or ensure you didn't enjoy a higher status.

What's really frightening though is what this psychology leads to and implies.  Forget having more money than somebody else.  Forget having a bigger house than somebody else.  Worry about being just plain DIFFERENT from somebody else.  In other words individuality should be punished.  It is the group, or the state, or the commune that is more important, the individual does not matter, it is the borg.

This is why you have the left pushing such idiotic things as eliminating "he" and "she" from language.  this is why you have such a monolithic push on academia for poltically correct speech. (the 4:40 mark I see the man thinking "how sad these kids don't see the bigger picture")  This is why there are things such as the "fat acceptance" movement.  This is why you can't keep score at a kid's baseball game.  This is why we eliminate the honor roll.

But what's truly pathetic, and it shows you just what a sad, pathetic, worthless lot these people are, is to ask why they insist on destroying the individual.

The answer - hurt feelings.

That's it.

The whole entirety of communism and all of its ramifications and all the lives it's destroyed and hundreds of millions its killed is because weak, pathetic, sad, worthless humans don't want their feelings hurt.

Don't tell me I can't define evil.

LIRKO vs. TWICHOO X.0

from this study, image from this post

It occurred to me as I was thinking again about LIRKO, that this little mouse not only countered TWICHOO 1.0, but it pretty much puts the lid on TWICHOO X.0.  This profoundly hyperglycemic and hyperinsulinemic liver insulin-receptor knockout mouse, is not fat.  Though not statistically significant, the trend is to eat a tad less, be a tad smaller, and pack on fewer fat grams  than controls.  But let's just call it a wash.

For any newer readers, TWICHOO stands for Taubes Wrong Insulin-Carbohydrate Hypothesis Of Obesity.  Version 1.0 was that which was put forth in Good Calories Bad Calories.  In this version, Taubes put forth four ways by which the carbohydrate could promote obesity:

1.  Carbohydrates stimulate insulin which stimulates fat storage and/or traps fats in our fat cells so fat accumulates.

This was pretty much the "lead singer" of his Barbershop Quartet singing the TWICHOO jingle.  Carbs stimulating insulin basically led to chronically elevated insulin levels.  The other three are:

Read more »

Nice Job Saving the Planet

I was doing some research to see what energy consumption in the country looks like in that I don't know if I trust official government economic figures anymore and would prefer instead to look at energy consumption as a proxy for economic growth.  The results were inconclusive (plus I think I had the wrong data set).

But then I found this gem:

Americans spent more calories of energy worrying and talking about renewable energy than calories burned using actual renewable resources!

How Women Deny Women the Market Price Mechanism

When you hear the phrase "market price mechanism" your mind instantly conjures up sad, nerdy academian economists with too much time on their hands and a desire to sound intelligent.  So they come with some hoity toity sounding phrase and then banter it about much like rubric, paradigm and dynamic, mocking those who've never heard of the phrase, even though the phrase was created all of 10 seconds ago.  However the "Market Price Mechanism" is not one of those phrases and is actually a VITAL part of any economy.

Specifically what it is, is the information a market conveys about the value of certain goods via prices.  Say, for example housing.  If you were like many Americans during the bubble, you were completely ignorant about all the underdealings and going-ons that led up to the bursting of it.  Technically you needn't have been informed about these things because the market, inevitably, told you housing was too pricey when housing prices started to tank.  The market was telling you "Hey, there's too much housing" or "hey, housing is not worth as much as you think it should be."

While this is one example, the information the market pricing mechanism conveys is even more important than that.  Prices provide information about EVERYTHING in the economy.  Is milk over priced?  What's going on with gas prices?  OBama got elected - well maybe silver is more valuable than it was before.  Is that Furby really worth $400?

More commonly you see this play out in real time at lightning fast speed anytime you watch a stock market trade up or down.  As information is released about corporate earnings, economic data, even things like weather ("Trading Places" anyone?), the vast amount of information is digested by the market and translated into second to second changes in prices.  In other words the market pricing mechanism constantly reassesses the value of every item in the economy by taking in all the information that is relevant to the value of those items and conveniently translates that into a numerical dollar price for your brain to understand.  You can then decide whether it is worth the price to pay for such an item or not.

Market pricing mechanisms, however, do not just apply to financial markets or commodity markets.  You could contest that any time any information is conveyed to a human, that human's perception of whatever that information is about changes.  So for example say I'm going tornado chasing and time after time again I see tornadoes have a tendency to show up in the afternoon as opposed to morning.  I incorporate this information and then sleep in till 10AM instead of going out chasing in the morning.  The problem is sometimes the information you get is wrong.  And if you act on wrong information it can cost you.

Say a jealous tornado chaser doesn't like some noob in his neck of Kansas.  He purposely lies to me and says, "Yeah, all the tornado chasing happens at night.  It's great!"  Then I will see no tornadoes.
Or David Lareah tells me during 2005 that housing is a great deal.  I buy and lose my shirt on a McMansion.  Such information can be considered "wrong" but it can also be "noise" in that it drowns out the real data resulting in bad pricing.

Now fast forward to today when (once again, I have no idea why) the memory of a girl giving me gift certificates to Sebastian Joe's (an ice cream parlor in town I like) popped into my head. It was long ago, she was a dance student of mine and she learned I liked Sebastian Joe's ice cream.  At the end of class she brought me a gift certificate.  In hindsight I see that the girl really liked me and probably wanted me to ask her out.  But I never went out with the girl.  That seemed odd to me today because she was cute and I would have gone out with her.  Why didn't I pick up on that Sebastian Joe's ice cream certificate?  Why didn't I act upon that obvious piece of information the market pricing mechanism was sending me?

Because other girls previous to her ruined the market pricing mechanism.

What I mean by this is previous to this girl I had suffered a torrent of instances where information I would have thought was giving me a green light, ended up being nothing more that false alarms or outright ruses.  There was the one girl who invited me back to her place after a date, took me upstairs, took off her shirt, wanted a back rub and when I went in for the kiss she jumped back, shocked saying, "what are you doing???"

There was the other girl, only in her skivvies, in my bed.  So sure was I of this one I turned her around, went in for a kiss, thinking nothing of it, and again, "Wait!  What are you doing!?  I can't kiss a man until I'm engaged!"

And let us not forget the countless times of married women who take their rings off, show up at bars or clubs, flirt with you and when it comes for a phone number or going back to a hotel, "Oh no!  I can't do that, I'm married!"  Alas, they were merely using you to test their market value. 

With such erroneous information or "noise" flooding the market, the problem is nobody listens anymore to the market pricing mechanism.  So when a SINCERE and legitimate piece of information hits the market (nice, sweet girl getting you ice cream certificates), you treat it with suspicion, don't believe it, and don't act on it because now all information is considered corrupt and unreliable.

The effects this has on the "dating market" is identical to the effects a dysfunctional market pricing mechanism would have on a financial market.  With no market pricing mechanism, liquidity dries up.  With no liquidity, there is no volume.  And with no volume, there is no value.  In other words, no trades are made, nobody buys anything, the market shuts down. 

Now, this was happening in my 20's when it was fun and fashionable for young girls to play games.  But 10 years later the women are "serious" and they're "done playing games."  They've "had their fun and are ready to settle down."  Why, you'll forgive them for their immaturities, won't you?  They were just having fun, you understand.  Tee hee!

Sadly, it's too late.  Not in the sense they're in the 30's and "where have all the good men gone?"  But the destruction of the market pricing mechanism explains another little phrase you commonly hear.

"He's not picking up on my clues!  How can't he tell I'm flirting with him!  Why hasn't he asked me out yet?!  I've given him all the signals!!!!" 

In short, men have become inured to the information the market pricing mechanism sends out.  And while girls may be done "playing their games" and are NOW sending out serious and legitimate information, unfortunately nobody is listening, or, let alone dares to let themselves believe it.

What is the cost?

Well, consider my friend from yesterday.

He's in his 40's, has excellent game, is accomplished and is in good shape.  He's conversing with a 25 year old thing who has a hipster boyfriend.  The girl has dropped every imaginable hint about those two going out.  "Let's go for drinks."  "Let's get drunk."  "I'm bored by myself." etc. etc.

Though accomplished, my 40 something colleague is nothing but skeptical.  Would it be great to go out with a 25 year old thing and steal her from her hipster DB boyfriend?  You bet.  But if history is any indication, it is more likely she would just use him for drinks, OR, should he ask her out, she has the immediate shame-card, "why, GASP!  I have a boyfriend! (you dirty, amoral person you - implied)"

The result?

We'll never know.  He's opted to do nothing.

Financially that means a market price of zero, volume traded of zero, and a value of zero.  Romantically, that means no dates, no courting, no romance, no nothing.

Enjoy the decline!