(Tom Toles via GoComics.com)
.
The NYTimes gives Adrian Chen space for a victory amble (cuz hipsters don’t lap):
FOR the obsessive followers of the volatile virtual currency bitcoin, the price of a single bitcoin at the time their fixation began holds undue significance. I know one bitcoin cost around $9 when I first stumbled on it in the summer of 2011. That was before I single-handedly sent the price of bitcoin soaring.
I wasn’t trying to manipulate an underground economy. I was just doing my job as a blogger for the website Gawker when I broke the story of the online underground illegal drug market Silk Road, on which bitcoin was the only accepted currency because of its relative anonymity. The article went viral and introduced hundreds of thousands to bitcoin…
…[A]s of this writing, one bitcoin is worth around $880. Senate hearings held to discuss regulating bitcoin earlier this month were “lovefests,” according to The Washington Post. Abroad, Chinese investors are flocking. Bitcoin seems on the brink of respectability.
Still, there’s a zaniness about the currency. Bitcoin is built on a weird mix of the most old-fashioned kind of speculative greed, bolstered by a contemporary utopian cyberlibertarian ideology. Boosters say that bitcoin is the currency of the future. I’d argue that the phenomenon is a digital gold rush perfectly emblematic of the present…
Apart from mocking cyberlibertarian ideology, what’s on the agenda as we steel ourselves for another week?
polyorchnid octopunch
I have to say, given that bitcoins are in fact even more arbitrary than fiat currencies, watching the libertarian goldbug types flocking to it is pretty damned amusing.
Fred
But mocking cyberlibertarian ideology sounds like fun. Can’t we mock it just a little? Please?
lamh36
Afternoon BJ.
Alright. Finally back at home in Baton Rouge, catching up on some DVR viewing (love Dracula BTW) after spending all but one of the last 4 days home in NOLA with the fam. Had to thank to my sister for putting me up at her house and my other sister for bascially letting me “rent” her car for the majority of that time.
Love my sisters!
Getting ready for a 7 day straight stretch of work though, so trying to enjoy my last off day until then.
lamh36
Um…no shit Sherlock!!!
Poll: Majority of Americans Are Racist
wmd
The comic could actually be on to something – NSA has lots of compute capacity that could mine bitcoins.
satby
Spent the day making soup (Cajun kale and sausage, broccoli cheese, and of course turkey) to clean up leftovers after the big feast. Tomorrow starts the rest of my life as a free-range human, having been laid off officially as of 12/1/2013.
I should be worried about finances; but I’m so happy to be out of that pressure cooker that I feel better than I have in years. And now I’ll still have health care!
The Sailor
Bitcoins!? At least when you bought tulip bulbs you got tulips.
Keith P
Trying to learn how to make bread. I’ve never been good at it (the only great loaf I’ve ever made was a no-knead version I baked in a pot), and I don’t even have a steaming oven. But I want to start making really great subs, and it’s too far of a drive to find a really good bakery.
Belafon
@lamh36: The article was written right before the election, and yet Obama still managed to win by 3% if I remember correctly.
I suspect a lot of those who have racist attitudes are like my mom. Her worldview tends to be that blacks in general are lazy people on welfare, except for every black she knows, and that percentage is more like the whites she knows. As for Obama, he’s been good for the country and he’s a good family man. She had no problem voting for him.
I haven’t yet been able to get her to recognize this contradiction, and it’s kind of the same fight I have with her on gays and lesbians. She’s 63, from West Texas (where I grew up as well), and spent the last 20 years working in the county jail. I’m still working at it.
Belafon
@wmd: Wait until Goldman Sachs starts trading in bitcoins. Every transaction will be coopted by them.
aimai
@Keith P: I think I recommended the Sullivan Street Bakery Book to you a while ago–he does a no knead bread that bakes in a cast iron pot. I’ve loved the breads and we make the walnut bread all the time and the pane integral but his light italian sub style bread is killer. It rises slowly and you stretch it out, dot it with herbs or garlic, and cook it fast on a sheet pan. Split it and it makes the best sandwhiches ever. They don’t really keep so you have to do it again but mixing and baking are a snap. I cover mine with a mix of cumin/fennel/poppy/sesame and rosemary/garlic/ and thyme.
Here’s the recipe:
oops:
Cut the dough into 4 equal quarters, and gently stretch each piece evenly into a stick shape the length of the pan. Place on pan, leaving 1 inch between sticks. Brush with olive oil, and sprinkle each stick with a pinch of coarse salt.
Takes 15 to 20 minutes.
muricafukyea
If Bitcoin manages to stay dominant then it’s a viable currency like the USD is compared to other less viable currencies like the Mexican Peso or Russian ruble or whatever. Whether it is able to maintain dominance over alternatives being created almost daily remains to be seen.
Also, I am waiting to see what people like always wrong libertarian curious Cole thinks about it at which point I will assume the opposite will happen.
Josie
@Keith P: My youngest son, who was not interested in cooking until a few years ago, learned how to make bread from a recipe and video by the blogger Chef John:
http://foodwishes.blogspot.com/
I could have taught him, but he was determined to do it on his own. He took his iphone in the kitchen with him and actually made bread. And it was really good. I recommend Chef John as a teacher. He is thorough, detailed and funny – very entertaining.
Cassidy
@lamh36: I have yet to run into a coworker, other than POC, who haven’t expressed some sort of anti-black sentiment at some point. I shouldn’t be disappointed, South Georgia, but I am.
Keith P
@aimai: Thanks for the recipe! My first set of loaves just came out, and they look the part and have a good crumb, but not the crust I wanted. It’s a standard oven crust – about 2mm and very crisp, where I am trying to get the sandwich crust, where it’s soft and slightly chewy rather than crisp. I think I might try it at a lower oven temp (I did 425F for 1/2 hour)
On the other hand, I am devouring the hell out of it as medallions topped with white truffle butter.
Warren Terra
Bitcoins are Beanie Babies for the 21st century, with an added aura of technological mystique. That they’re especially susceptible to wild, hype-driven and possibly engineered swings in value is just the sauce on the nonsense meal.
Little Boots
i thought wingnuts only believe in gold.
Comrade Dread
Starting my new job tomorrow, one month after being laid off.
Little Boots
@Comrade Dread:
congratulations.
seriously, I like hearing that.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
Knitting with double pointed needles is like knitting with a live hedgehog. But the items for the craft fair are coming along.
I may have caught a cold from G, but I’m not sure.
lamh36
@Belafon: yeah. the South is a funny beast. There is the history, but the makeup of many of it’s largest cities is such that there is nearly no way you can NOT know someone who isn’t Black. And yet the whole, “he’s one of the good one” mentality just can’t be shaken.
But the hope is that as the country get more “multicultural” and diverse and as the old guard die off then these attitudes will also fade.
Maybe once Obama is no longer in office and they aren’t confronted by all this “change” maybe it’ll get better, but I bet we’ll be back to people having their bigotry simmering under the surface.
Still until then, all we can do it work on those who we can .
The Sanity Inspector
That’s a clever cartoon! I’ve enjoyed Toles since the 80s.
Litlebritdiftrnt
@Keith P:
I am not trying to take away your commitment to make bread but may I suggest that you visit all the thrift stores in your area and pick up a bread machine or two? They are the kind of item that are given as presents, used once or twice, and then donated to the thrift stores. I have been using them for almost a decade since they started showing up in thrift stores and when one wears out due to over use I just go and replace it. You can bake almost anything in them and using the “dough only” cycle I make great French Bread, sub rolls, dinner rolls, you name it.
I began a tradition several years ago where on Christmas Morning I give a gift of breakfast to my next door neighbor by delivering baskets of freshly made doughnuts, cinnamon rolls, muffins, and cinnamon raisin bread all made with my bread maker the night before and baked that morning. They love it.
I have found that you can find all of the recipes and instructions on line in case they are not contained in the machine (and they usually are). I bake at least three loaves a week with my machine.
Little Boots
@lamh36:
if it’s hillary, will they just do a search and replace, black for woman.
Little Boots
i mean, it’s just tempting to hate the south. it’s a stupid temptation, and we all should resist it, but damn, they do not make it easy sometimes.
Litlebritdiftrnt
@Keith P:
For a soft chewy crust brush it with butter as soon as it comes out of the oven.
Amir Khalid
Bitcoin sounds just too good to be true. Its rise in value over the past few years is obviously unsustainable, as Adrian Chen points out; you just have to expect a sharp slowdown at some point and hope that not too many speculators bail on it. The supply is strictly regulated; are there enough Bitcoins to do business with? And just how good is the technology that protects the anonymity of Bitcoin transactions? What if Bitrcoin bugs start worrying that Glenn Greenwald is sitting on a report that NSA has already cracked it?
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@lamh36:
When I was visiting my mom last month, she was complaining because all of the commercials for a show we were watching (I think it was “Undercover Boss”) were for AA shows — a sitcom, Iyanla’s show, etc. And I wanted to say, “The reason you’re seeing commercials for shows for black people is because the show you’re watching is popular with black people! It’s Marketing 101!” But she just doesn’t get it. Sigh.
Litlebritdiftrnt
@Amir Khalid:
I read a story somewhere last week of a guy in Ireland (I think) that lost millions of dollars in bitcoins when he replaced his computer and forgot to take them off his hard drive. He had bought them when they were worth pennies and at today’s price would be worth said millions. Too lazy to go and find a link.
Little Boots
@Litlebritdiftrnt:
millions of what?
Keith P
@Keith P: The other thing about the loaves I made is they’re heavier than I was expecting/hoping for. The insides look fine (not too dense), but sub rolls that I’ve bought are quite a bit lighter. I did 3 cups flour to 1 cup water/milk mixture, and the dough seemed good. Maybe for my next batch, I’ll use more yeast and/or let it rest longer (1.5 + .5 hours for the first batch). That’s one of the main things about Lahey’s bread – extremely long rising time, although I don’t want my bread tasting like beer.
Little Boots
@Keith P:
throw in some fish, and you’re jesus.
WereBear
@Comrade Dread: Yay!
We are very far along on our T-bird break project, rearranging the living room to be an oil painting/podcast studio instead of… a living room.
Well, when our friends visit we will still have places to sit.
My Spatial Consultant, Mr Werebear, tried to make the existing furniture work, but we wound up getting a very inexpensive L-shaped computer desk and chair, and it worked out well, with everything fitting in that funny place under the eaves.
Very Space: 1999!
Botsplainer
I was just contemplating my local economy and how localized gentrification is creating a neighborhood where local property owners, local landlords and local business owners are doing well. I juxtaposed that with the “compete for the bottom” Galtian business ethics that characterize the GOP, particularly in those places where they go spastic for dragging in chain retail, chain restaurants and relocated manufacturing plants.
There’s probably a book or two in that one.
Amir Khalid
@Litlebritdiftrnt:
And what happens to those Bitcoins? Can Mr Hapless Irishman somehow reclaim them? Can someone else find them and use them? Or do they disappear from the Bitcoin supply because no one can use them?
GregB
@Litlebritdiftrnt:
Man loses bitcoin fortune by tossing his laptop.
WereBear
@Keith P: Modern bakeries, much like modern ice cream makers, have big machines that can put a lot of air into the product. Might not be utterly duplicable at home.
Little Boots
@WereBear:
bakeries? or congress?
see what I did there?
Bill E Pilgrim
I tried to generate bitcoins on my home computer. I must have done it wrong though because now my hard drive is all gummed up with cheese.
srv
Years back, I decided that BC was created by the NSA or in league with other foreign intelligence agencies. Given the governments’ lack of interest in going after the currency as opposed to users like Silk Road, I think that is still the case.
So, IMO BC is not really speculative in the sense that it is endangered by governments, but just to market craziness. Given there are so many fucking crazies and libertarian geeks, it would be a great investment until 27% of the public held them.
MomSense
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
Have you tried magic loop?
Gypsy Howell
@Keith P:
Keith, try the Tartine bakery cookbook by Chad Robertson. (Look it up on Amazon) This is really spectacular bread. It’s a bit more complicated than Jim Lahey’s Sullivan St. bakery bread- you make a sourdough starter over a period of a couple of weeks and then have to tend it on an on-going basis, but if you are serious about bread making, this is really really great stuff. So worth the time, and once you get the starter made, and get the hang of his technique, it only takes a few minutes of prep each day (plus the 50 mins of baking time, which I do in a cast iron Dutch oven)
We have a good “foodie” friend who’s French, and he swore this was as good as anything he’s eaten in France.
If nothing else, the photos alone in the Tartine book will make you drool. IIRC, there’s a YouTube video about Tartine too that’s worth watching.
There is just nothing better in this life than a great loaf of bread. Good luck!
El Caganer
@lamh36: 51% of Americans express anti-black prejudice? Does anybody else find this statement a bit odd? It sounds like the author is implying that “American” = “white,” which is a bridge I’d really rather not cross.
Anoniminous
Somewhere around here I have a 5,000,000,000 Papiermark bill. Wonder what that’s worth in bitcoins.
Villago Delenda Est
These things are one in the same.
Exterminate the Ferengi.
Gypsy Howell
@Gypsy Howell:
ETA: Tartine uses a no-commericial-yeast method, (you only use your starter as leaven) which gives a beautiful texture and subtle flavor. Plus it keeps longer than commercial yeast bread.
lamh36
On December 1st, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus and her courageous act sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Civil Rights Movement that changed the course of history. We are forever grateful.
WereBear
@GregB: Hmmm. I speculate that if I had something worth a MILLION DOLLARS (pinkie held to face like Dr. Evil) I would, like, take care of it. Keep track of it. Not just throw it out.
I guess I’m silly that way.
Villago Delenda Est
@Little Boots:
Only wingnuts think that gold has an intrinsic value that is unaffected by anything else.
These dipshits, like all wingnut dipshits, have never read, let alone comprehended, The Wealth of Nations.
WereBear
@lamh36: We are all very grateful.
gwangung
@El Caganer: Only if there were no Hispanics or Asian Americans in the sample. Given there are strains of anti-black sentiment in the Asian American community that I know exists, it doesn’t trigger anythings on first glance.
ruemara
planning for the next flea market and I’ve settled on a blend of toys, jewelry and baked goods. I really need to make money on the the next one. Plus the roomie cat is getting on my last nerve. she pissed on something and now my bedroom has a faint under odor of piss.grrrr. digitizing my record collection and today’s blast from the past is Le Mystere du Voix Bulgares. I had strange, yet good, taste in music as a kid.
Oh yeah, started off my month with a passel of job rejections, so status quo is maintained.
@El Caganer: That is rather the default view of American within the majority.
Bill E Pilgrim
So far I understand that bitcoins are made of an old-fashioned mix of speculative greed and sourdough starter.
It’s possible I read the thread too fast.
shelly
“online underground illegal drug market Silk Road,”
*********
‘online underground’ Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?
Villago Delenda Est
@gwangung:
Yeah, their is a great deal of anti-black sentiment there, and back in the old countries of said Asians.
KithKanan
@Amir Khalid: They disappear from the bitcoin supply, same as if you had a pile of cash in your closet and your house burned down.
That said, your supply concerns are probably less of an issue because Bitcoins are divisible to 0.00000001 — it’s kind of the inverse of hyperinflation where you start seeing bills in million and billion denominations — instead normal transactions will be carried out in tiny fractions of a bitcoin and few people will actually see or own whole undivided bitcoins.
MomSense
Helping some friends enroll on healthcare.gov
Site worked really well. After going through the verification process, we received a notice saying they had to call though to verify immigration status. The notice told them that they were eligible for subsidies and the monthly amount which is great because it gives incentive to call right away.
Phone wait was only about 3 minutes and the person has been great. She just put me on hold for a minute. She said they are really busy so I will be sure to tell her that we do appreciate what they are doing.
The site is really much better now. They are excited because they don’t have insurance and have some chronic health issues. They are self employed so the cost of insurance on the individual market was just too much for them.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@MomSense
I’ve tried it, but I’m not a big fan. Usually I’ll use two circulars, but this was only 16 stitches, so DPNs made more sense.
At least I was able to find the 4″ and 5″ DPNs — the 7″ ones were way too awkward to use on a small number of stitches.
MikeJ
@Bill E Pilgrim:
Shine your coins until they have a high poolish on them.
Bill E Pilgrim
@shelly: The “Deep Web”
Or Star Trek Deep Space Web, if you prefer.
shelly
Now that it does seem to be up and running well, what will be the FOX/CNN whine-du-jour? The site is supposed to handle 50,000 visits at a time. Will they bitch that it should be more?
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@El Caganer:
We’re all swimming in the same sludge. Here in So Cal, we have a big problem with black and Latino gangs targeting innocent people of the “wrong” group as part of their gang wars.
From some studies I’ve seen, some of that 51% may themselves be African-American, at least on the unconscious bias tests. That’s how all-pervasive it is.
shelly
ot, but any word on the BJ pet catalog of 2014?
NotMax
@KeithP
Not for sandwiches, but the easiest, nearly foolproof bread to make to build confidence in baking the stuff is Irish Soda Bread. (Plus it is yummilicious.)
Probably several thousand recipes on the ‘net; perusing 2 or 3 will give you an idea of the basic mix.
Or perhaps someone here has a favorite variation (I did, but lost that particular version decades ago).
PsiFighter37
Bitcoin was trading around $1200 last time I checked on Friday. When the whole system inevitably gets hacked and everyone loses everything (and then has no legal recourse because glibertarians don’t believe in that kind of shit), I will be laughing my ass off at the Winklevii and everyone else who was stupid enough to believe in this kind of shit.
At least when you have gold backing the currency, you have something worthwhile. Bitcoin is a modern-day Galtian fantasy that will eventually have people come in for a rude awakening. Why on earth would anyone give value to something that exists solely because of math problem-solving?
Idiotic beyond shit.
fuckwit
Mock if you like, but I’m bullish on bitcoins. They’re basically a digital gold. Gold is nice, but having to fucking deal with physical coins/bars/etc are a PITA. Trading physical gold is also a PITA. I think the bitcoin technology is cool too, very clever.
Sure they’re sketchy and filled with bullshit– but so are US dollars, and every other currency, and even gold! Currencies these days are all just digital blips to begin with too, so I see nothing wrong with a new kind of digital blip, with some clever geekery, some convenience and decentralization features that I like.
The only thing I do NOT like about bitcoins is that they’re deflationary– but then so is gold. They’d make a terrible actual day-to-day currency. But as a store of value, they’ll be damn near ideal once they get enough traction that the price stabilizes. The fact that it was designed by and is actively fanboi’ed by eminently mockable libertarians and teabagger goldbug types is merely added entertainment for me, and isn’t (at this time) of sufficient significance to turn me off on the currency.
I’m very glad to hear that The Powers That Be are more interested in helping bitcoins than destroying them. Bummer that BJ’ers choose to mock them, but then, mocking is what we do best here anyway, so that’s to be expected.
BillinGlendaleCA
@shelly:
Yes.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
@Villago Delenda Est: indeed.
? Martin
@PsiFighter37:
Well, the utility value of gold is far below its market price, so it’s somewhat better, but only slightly.
No, the problem with Bitcoin right now is that the Chinese gave it the thumbs up a week ago or so, and they are notorious for changing their mind. The value of Bitcoin is right now tied directly to the political winds of the Chinese Commerce Ministry. I’m not sure I would want my money dependent on them…
Bill E Pilgrim
@fuckwit: It’s certainly not just people at this blog. For whatever that’s worth.
It’s a big tangled argument that’s probably not worth getting into but I’d just say that claiming that they’re a better place to park money than gold isn’t really much of a recommendation, IMO.
Edit: I read yours again and realized that you’re not calling for a Bitcoin standard, so edited this. Others are definitely calling for it though, see Krugman’s piece.
PsiFighter37
@fuckwit:
Therein lies the eventual downfall of this experiment. It’s basically just a bunch of nerds who think they are the smartest thing ever and have devised their own currency to live in Galtian paradise.
Little Boots
well this place came alive.
Little Boots
@fuckwit:
told ya.
Tripod
@PsiFighter37:
It’s a fad. Like the aforementioned beanie babies or custom choppers or World of Warcraft. Just don’t get left holding the bag when the market implodes. I’m pitching a reality show around a colorful redneck family and their bitcoin mining.
the Conster
Bitcoin involves the Winklevii, also too.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
@fuckwit:
Worst submission to Hershey ever.
Little Boots
@the Conster:
dammit, fine, we’ll give them facebook.
Soapdish
Bitcoins = Libertarian Edition Beanie Babies
? Martin
@fuckwit:
Conceptually, I think Bitcoin is fine. The problem I have with it is twofold:
1) There’s no way to inflate the currency. This is, of course, the defining characteristic for why people like it, but it also means that supply/demand becomes highly inelastic due to the overall scarcity of them, which means that their valuation is going to be all over the map. An unstable currency isn’t an effective currency – particularly as a store for value.
2) It’s too easy to be overwhelmed by the agendas of whoever wants to trade it. Want to crash the currency? Easy. Want to drive it up? Also easy. The only people who have any notion of stability are those with enough wealth to control it, and there are plenty of people with enough wealth to control it – and you and I aren’t among them.
The fact that there will never be more than 21M Bitcoin is a real problem. Libertarians love the absolute nature of it, but they’ve never understood how scarcity pricing works. They assume every market is perfectly elastic, even one that is by definition inelastic.
Tripod
@Villago Delenda Est:
I’m hording Confederate currency.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@lamh36:
I have lots of anti-human feelings. They are not limited to black people.
People are asses, and collectively, we are worse.
jonas
So let me get this straight. The problem with fiat currencies — according to my Ron Paul newsletter — is that they’re not backed by any “real” asset, i.e. gold, so that governments and speculators just use them as so much Monopoly money, rendering them so risky as to be essentially useless in the long term. So the alternative to this is now a completely virtual online currency attached to absolutely no underlying asset whose value is based purely on speculation.
Oooookay.
Ash Can
@fuckwit:
Don’t kid yourself. Gold is tangible. National currencies are backed by the national governments that issue them. Bitcoins are backed by nothing.
They’re like the subprime mortgages that fueled the housing boom of the aughts. It’s fine to play around with them — with money you can afford to lose — and make a few bucks off of them while the bubble is still inflated. But to consider them as safe as an investment that’s actually regulated and backed by something of demonstrable value is delusional, and to invest anything in them other than money you can afford to lose is insane.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@shelly:
Given that they were recently busted, dismembered, and confiscated by the government? Hoocoodanode?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
Eric Decker played for the Gophers. Our offense still sucked.
Cassidy
@? Martin: Isn’t our money already dependent on them?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Comrade Dread: Congrats! Always good news!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Child’s play for the NSA to crack bit coin – all they have to do is bride bribe the IT people at Bit Coin with their own fake money.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@Cassidy: No. The thing people need to remember is this: if someone owes you $10 billion in a currency you control, that’s their problem; if someone owes you $2 trillion in a currency they control, that;s your problem.
China is in the second situation.
Tripod
@srv:
The framing story is everything. The same idiots that freaked out over the Amero are now furiously masturbating over bitcoins. We came up with this at a secret meeting chaired by Bill Clinton and involving Bilderbergers, the Rothchild family, Freemasons, the Mob and the CIA.
ericblair
@? Martin:
I think this is the real main problem with them. There’s no monetary policy possible. You’ve got an automatic deflationary trap: since they will likely keep increasing in value, people will hoard them. Eventually the market ceases to operate because everyone is just sitting on their bitcoin pile waiting for the market price to increase. They cease to be a medium of exchange, and then everyone gets to climb the wall of worry until the crash starts. Then there’s no floor, because there’s no other practical use for these particular sequences of bits and there’s no government ready to back them up.
Origuy
Anyone want to buy my Magic the Gathering cards? I have quite a bit invested in them.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
Everything I needed to know about Bitcoins was when their value skyrocketed during the lead up to the Cypriot bank bailout, and promptly crashed shortly after said bailout. Nothing like investing in the Russian Mob’s favored money laundering scheme.
j
Isn’t it odd that the RNC logo uses the same “K” look as Koch Industries?
RNC: https://twitter.com/GOP/status/407161769069924352/photo/1 … (look at the right side of their logo).
Koch Pollution Inc. : http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.shiftboard.com/images/logos/logo_koch.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.shiftboard.com/casestudies/koch.html&h=100&w=150&sz=7&tbnid=Q7O5DmJCB3eeiM:&tbnh=80&tbnw=120&zoom=1&usg=__FTx4mYkQBmWpLNFWeyFGtbiUBSM=&docid=kGA-h5542X7o4M&sa=X&ei=2s2bUtO6Gs_3oATlqoGwAQ&ved=0CDoQ9QEwAw
Hmmmm?, Hmmmmmmm??!!
BillinGlendaleCA
@ericblair:
You are correct. However for a: Paulite, Goldbug, Bitbug and a good number of libertarians, that’s a feature not a bug. They don’t like monetary police at all and don’t like fiscal policy either.
Joel
Speculation is definitely the way to get rich: that’s why Vanderbilt, Carnegie, and Morgan all got rich as gold prospectors.
Splitting Image
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Gracias. That is the best summary of the situation that I have seen in a long time. As a bonus, it explains why certain factions are really stupid to risk damaging the U.S. dollar’s status as the world reserve currency.
As for bitcoins, there isn’t much to say about them other than it is smart to put money in them when the price is low and dumb to put money in them when the price is high. Just like any other investment. The problem is that certain types of investment seem to attract crowds of people looking for the sure thing: that one investment that is guaranteed to go up and up and up in value. Gold is one; real estate is another. Bitcoins seem to be headed down the same track. Those things are always great to have gotten in on before the idiots got involved and started inflating the price, but really risky to get involved with later on. I’ll pass on them.
? Martin
@Cassidy:
Hardly. They can influence it a bit this way or that, but if they dumped all of their dollars tomorrow, most people wouldn’t notice. Hell, they’re only holding about 10x-20x as many dollars as Apple. But I know 3 people that could buy every Bitcoin in existence at the current price, and China or Goldman could do it without bothering any upper management.
The Tragically Flip
@ericblair: Yes, my thoughts exactly, bitcoin’s success as a speculative investment is actually counterproductive to any aim to make it an everyday currency used for non-illegal transactions. If the value keeps going up because the currency is designed to inflate in value the more it is used, who would spend bitcoins? Wait until tomorrow, they’ll be worth more. When tomorrow comes, wait until the day after that.
It’s a great lesson in deflation economics for libertarians and why a little inflation is always preferable to permanent deflation.
gene108
While driving through VA, on my way back to NJ from NC, I saw a sign outside Richmond on I-95 that read something like “Highway Safe Zone Ending”.
It’s just that when I first saw the sign this morning, I thought “safe zone ended” Death Race 2000 begin…pew pew pew all you mofo’s merging…I’m gonna be zoomin’ on my way now….10,000 fuckin’ points…because really, when the state ends the “safe zone” on its stretch of interstate what else could it mean?*….
*I’m not exactly sure what the “Highway Safe Zone” is about, though from other signage on the interstate I think it has to do with higher ticket prices, if you get one in the area…sort of like a government sponsored Ticketmaster :-)
The Tragically Flip
The dream of having any “permanent” zero risk store of value should always be understood to be a fantasy. We live in a universe of entropy. Everything falls apart. Why shouldn’t unused wealth rot too?
Aside from the comparison to physics, on the economic policy front unused wealth is actually a form of economic (and real world waste) – it means resources not employed productively, sitting idle. It should never be encouraged.
? Martin
@gene108: It’s a zone to protect road workers. Lower speed limits, usually triple fines for speeding, etc.
You’re right about the death race 2000 bit, but they’re the targets, not you.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@The Tragically Flip: It’s not that simple. Unused monetary wealth represents absolutely nothing in and of itself other than that the holder has a claim on economic resources at some point. It is perfectly possible for all real assets to be in productive use while huge piles of money sit on the sideline. In which case, all that spending the money would accomplish is to produce inflation.
And it’s perfectly possible for all monetary resources to be in use while real assets lay idle, though this is less common in practice.
? Martin
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
But that’s still a form of economic waste. It means that we’re compensating people unnecessarily. That compensation could be better used elsewhere.
Sure, inside some arbitrary local sub-economy that’s true, but it’s only true because our economic knowledge and activity itself is imperfect. If your sub-economy cannot find a use for that capital, then that sub-economy should not be rewarded with additional capital – it should instead go to some other economy that can put it to use, and there are always economies that can use the money.
mawado
Inspection of Flour
One of the worst schemes ever adopted for taxing the consumer, is the system of inspection which has often obtained in other Slates. The practical result has always been that the public were forced to sustain a host of officials by paying an enhanced price for such articles as happened to pass under the ban of these judges, while not a particle of security was obtained that the article so inspected was of the proper or necessary quality.
In the older States the theory of inspection has fallen into disrepute. Experience has convinced the public that the system was simply a maintenance of an army of political warriors at the general expense, and whole regiments of inspectors of flour, beef, pork, leather, whiskey, lumber, etc., etc., have been overthrown and dispersed, to earn their livelihood by some more active and beneficial employment. Of coarse, there were those who raised their voices against these sweeping changes — who prognosticate the most deplorable consequences to public health from the destruction of such excellent sanitary regulations: but as usual in such cases, it was found that trade was most productive of good aud legitimate results when left entirely untrammelled, aud when tbe buyer and the seiler were placed ou an equal footing and called upon to exercise their judgments in matters most pertinent to them.
The plan of inspecting articles of food is so nearly obsolete, and has been so often demonstrated to be an extensive fallacy, that it is with no litile surprise we observe that the subject of appointing inspectors of flour is perseveringly pressed upon the attention of the legislature. It may be true, as charged, that the market often contains large quantities of sour and damaged flour, and there is not the slightest doubt that the consumption of such deleterious food is tbe cause of disease aud death. But the remedy proposed is quite useless and inefficient. The only consequence would be, that those who consumed the flour would pay an additional price for it, amounting to at least the fees of the inspector, and then after a!!, they would be obliged to take the flour at their own risk. It is folly to suppose that the inspection of flour will make it better, and it is equally absurd to presume that in a market so peculiarly circumstauced as is ours, damaged flour will be kept out of the market Such things never have been accomplished in communities more setlled in their character than ours, and they could not consistently be supposed possible of accomplishment here. Besides, the citizens of this State have become so accustomed to judge for themselves in all the bargains they make, that they would not regard the brand of any inspector as of the slightest value. They buy what suits them, upon the fairest terms they can get, and if they choose to buy sour flour they will do so. It they buy flour for a good article which afterward turns out to be unfit for consumption, they will have their action against the seller if he have deceived them; but if they have made a bad purchase through their own want of care or judgment they certainly ought to contentedly to abide the consequences.
Granting that there is a peculiar fitness in gaurding the public against imposition in matters which affect the general health, yet, if the principle of inspection be a true one, it ought to be applied to most other articles of food. Pork, beef, mutton and veal are sometimes found ia the market of such a character as to be unfit for consumption, and so it might be said of numerous other articles of food. But no one proposes to have these articles inspected; and for the simple reason that it ia well understood that such an attempt would completely fail to effect the desired object. And so it will be with flour inspection. You may establish a corps of officials, give them large fees, extorted from our already tax-ridden community a princely income of $50,000 or $60,000 for some lazy wight, who probably would not be able to tell rye flour from wheat, and that is all the good that will come of it. There will not be a bag the more ol good flour brought into the market, nor a pound less of bad flour sold.
We are opposed to this scheme. Opposed to it as tax-payers aud consumers, and opposed to it from principle — opposed to it because it will take dollars and cents out of tbe pocket of every inhabitant of the State, for the sustainment of a lot of useless officials, without the remotest possibility that the public interests will be subverted thereby. The public voice should be raised against the passage of the bill. Our statute book should be kept free from the errors and fallacies which the experience of older communities has made palpable; and our financial burdens warn us that every species of indirect taxation should be avoided, especially where no good ends can be promoted by an opposite course.
— Daily Alta California, Volume 3, Number 44, 14 Febraury 1852
I had no idea the koch bros where that old.
lol chikinburd
It’s cold and lonely here in moderation. All you’re missing is, fuck CBS.
polyorchnid octopunch
@El Caganer: It may be that around 51% of Americans are white.
fuckwit
@The Tragically Flip: There’s a great concept in some alternative currencies called “demurrage”. Basically, a demurrage makes it impossible to use the money as a passive, hoarded store of value; you have to make the money WORK for you, by reinvesting it, otherwise you gradually lose it until you have nothing. It’s a nice way to enforce some inflation on an otherwise deflationary currency. I think not having a demurrage is one of the major social flaws of Bitcoin, which, as others upthread have noted, the anti-social Goldbugs/Paulites/Glibertarians view as a feature not a bug. A few lefty types have tried forking Bitcoins and adding a demurrage, but the majority of alt currency users don’t seem to want that, so they’ve died on the vine while Bitcoin has gotten all the oxygen.
Also, lest anyone think Bitcoins are only for right-wing Glibertarians, some lefty/350/Occupy/Seattle types have found things to like about it too:
http://suitpossum.blogspot.co.uk/p/the-heretics-guide.html
Lurking Canadian
Your average libertarian thinks inflation is just about the worst possible thing. The “magic” of bit coins is precisely that they are finite in number. Even *gold* loses value when somebody digs more of it out of the ground. Once the last bitcoin has been dug, that’s that.
As ericblair points out, this makes it perfectly useless as a currency, which means the only reason to hold it is as an inflation proof investment. However, that requires a constant supply of new suckers willing to pay ever higher prices for your invisible magic bean–traditionally, that kind of thing doesn’t end well, although if you time it right, it’s not so bad.
Now, the utility of bitcoin as an untraceable means of paying your favorite hitman after he finalizes your enemy…well, sure, as long as you can convince the assassin to take it.
BTW, my autocorrect wants to replace “bitcoin” with “bitching”. This probably says something meaningful about apple’s view of gilbertarianism.
Omnes Omnibus
@polyorchnid octopunch: Per the 2010 census, 72.4% of Americans are white, 63.7% are non-Hispanic white or European-American. How is Canada doing with racism and such?
Villago Delenda Est
@jonas:
This is the point where I reach for my clue by four and start swinging it at Ron Paul’s head.
He should discuss just how “real” gold was with the fuckin’ Spanish Hapsburgs.
Tripod
The currency is irrelevant. It’s all about the hording.
keestadoll
@Keith P: I happened upon the Breadman Ultimate on sale at a little hardware store here about a year ago. There is nothing that can possibly go wrong when you use it and follow the directions and AMPLE recipes supplied with it. Haven’t bought bread in a year!
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/breadman-convection-ultimate-bread-maker-stainless-steel/8617231.p?id=1192835518339&skuId=8617231&ref=06&loc=01&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=8617231&extensionType={adtype}:{network}&s_kwcid=PTC!pla!{keyword}!{matchtype}!{adwords_producttargetid}!{network}!{ifmobile:M}!{creative}&kpid=8617231&k_clickid=53937104-4fb1-44a9-3a5f-0000091da677