Bad Year on TASE

I am worth 20% less on the TASE than on January 1st. The sheqel devaluated from 3.4 to 3.7 per dollar, and the portfolio itself lost about 10%. My worst investment was Nvidia and Tower. I should have avoided the NASDAQ and areas I am not familiar with. I was seduced by the hi tech bubble and lost, and it is not the first time.

Rosa Schwartzburg: Occupy Hungary

Article in the New York Times front page: "Occupy Hungary", written by a Jewish sounding student of the CEU (Soros) University in Budapest. The idea follows the "Occupy Wall Street" protest movement, that failed miserably. Rosa's intention is to protest the Hungarian Government's deadline to close down Soros's private liberal institution.

But to write Occupy Hungary is not the same as Occupy Wall Street, specially not for the paranoid, anti-Semitic, nationalist Hungarians, that have experienced bitter foreign occupations in their lifetime. It is not joke for them. They are taking it literally.  No good.

Central European University - Master of Laws in Human Rights (LL.M)

Central European University (CEU) is a graduate-level, English-language University accredited both in the U.S. and Hungary. The Department of Legal Studies provides high quality advanced legal education and education in human rights, comparative constitutional law, and international business law. Its programmes are among the finest in Europe, enabling students to obtain a solid grounding in fundamental legal concepts in civil law and common law systems and to develop unique skills in comparative analysis.

Does music impede studying and thinking?

Studies conclude that it does, and the best working condition is silence. 

Was the Flint Water Contamination a National Disaster?

President Obama declared the incident a National Disaster and channeled very large funds to the City of Flint. For all the scandal and accusations of systematic racism, and the jailing of eight EPA professionals, I am still wondering what was the real damage if any of the whole media carnival. From a professional magazine's comments column:


Dear Ms Jerome, It is not true that hundreds of children had high blood levels/ Please stop repeating that myth and falsehood. Read the CDC and other reports of thousands of blood leads taken before during and after the switch back. About 2 % were temporally raised by about 2 ug/dl. There were no "brain damaged "children! 

The magazine refers to a study that found 5 ug/dl - I am not qualified to evaluate the difference, but seems to me that the differential damage must have been minimal as no follow up studies have been published. According to the Wiki, one in forty American children have more than 5 ug/dl, which makes me think that Flint's lead levels were "normal" in the American context. The fact is that I am not alone in suspecting that the whole thing was made up for political reasons. May be I am wrong. 

Meeting my neighbors

My little daughter has to write an essay on visual messages and sent me out to take pics of her elementary school. In the last ten years, school children became scarce in our neighborhood while the population of lunatics increased. So the school was closed and the building became a Psychological Clinic. I dutifully took pics of the graffiti and sign posts but when trying to enter though the front door with my camera, I was attacked by a Moorish receptionist shouting it was forbidden to enter with cameras and loudly called security. The lobby was full of sad, depressed women looking at the floor. Thanks to my fast reflexes, my camera escaped unharmed.  

Merhavia Investments enters the Marijuana Business

This note is to register my astonishment how things evolve. Having lived long, I can compare the past with the present. The changes - physical and ideological, are incredible.

 Kibutz Merhavia, founded in 1910 or so, in the malaria infested swamps of the Yezre'el Valley, not only did not fail as all utopic initiatives and communist revolutions, but it is prospering and mutating into a Stock Exchange capitalist business that invests in the profitable field of medical marijuana.

The pic is from their website, from the early years when they lived in tents. Merhavia itself is on the Le Fave Cruzader Fort and its surrounding fields, abandoned following the Arab conquest. The only durable stone structures in this country are Cruzader (European) buildings. Since then, nothing. The Arab pastoralists built nothing in 900 years since then. 

The Great American Baby Bust

I am commenting a note by Lyman Stone. He writes about the yet unnoticed baby bust in America: "The important thing to understand here is these are big changes in your friends’ lives, and they happened really fast. This is not some gradual easing into lower fertility, but a pretty speedy change." American population is changing its reproductive behavior to resemble other Western nations. He debates the absurd notion of overpopulation and untypically, he understands the implications of subreplacement and is emotional about his people dying off. 

Bravo!

Social Anthropoids vs University of Ariel

The European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) has ratified a motion to boycott Israeli academic institutions in the West Bank. This decision follows a letter from the Israeli Anthropological Association (IAA), Prof. Nir Avieli, urging to boycott three institutions in the settlements: Ariel University, Orot College in Elkana, and Herzog College in Alon Shvut. The motion was overwhelmingly ratified this month by the organization’s members, passing by a vote of 830 in favor, 21 opposed and 37 abstentions. 

Disgraceful! 

Dulcinea del Toboso

Y diciendo esto, se adelantó a recebir a las tres aldeanas, y apeándose del rucio, tuvo del cabestro al jumento de una de las tres labradoras, y hincando ambas rodillas en el suelo, dijo:
—Reina y princesa y duquesa de la hermosura, vuestra altivez y grandeza sea servida de recebir en su gracia y buen talente al cautivo caballero vuestro, que allí está hecho piedra mármol, todo turbado y sin pulsos de verse ante vuestra magnífica presencia..."

I am hearing through Librivox the reading of Don Quixote in Spanish. Fifty years ago I had a copy in the Sopena edition, in the original medieval Spanish, and it was quite frustrating. Now they are reading a contemporary Spanish edition, perfectly comprehensible and clear. The second part is very different from the first part, in this sequel the fact of lineage is present in every second sentence, like Sancho's "I am Cristiano Viejo, Catolico Romano and hate the Jews to death". And "my Father Panza and all the Panzas were Old Christians, labradores (peasants), etc." Cervantes, obviously, needs the Church's permission to print this work, but it is surprising that in 1600 (the last Jew left Spain a hundred years before) he feels the need of a constant emphasis in not having Jewish blood and being good old Catholics. In addition to the references to Jews, in every occasion the rank and the wealth of the personages is clearly defined. Those were times of ethnic cleansing in Spain, and Cervantes is sympathetic to the Moor expulsees. When Don Quixote is hosted by the Duke, he sends a servant girl to his bedroom "to help him undress", which puritanical Quixote rejects - he wants to be faithful to his Dulcinea. Anyway, it is very entertaining. 

Bad day at the Stock Exchange

There have been imperceptible changes in the world, which are starting to exert pressures and stresses. The EU is in chaos, Merkel is weak and Britain is rudderless. The hostility between the USA and China is deepening, Japan is re-arming, Australia is prospering and becoming a regional power. The government in Israel is unstable and rivalries are hardening. My NASDAQ portfolio lost weight in the last week, and today TASE has followed downwards. Bank Hapoalim lost 5% and other heavy stocks are crumbling. The diamond companies of Lev Levaiev are paralyzed and the employees interrogated by the police (pic). A female executive jumped from the TASE building and instantly solved her difficulties. The police asked to jail the Minister of Interior, Arieh Dery, for something related to the financing of his new palace in Jerusalem. 

Bad day at work

Pic: New project, a gym in Kanion Azrieli, Ramla. The planning team visited the place with the managers of the center. I started to develop my ideas of how the gym will solve various difficulties (the building lies on a concrete platform) and while I was talking full of enthusiasm, creativity, momentum - our Arschloch leader told me to shut up. Later this Chernozhopyi explained that in the first meeting we should just hear and not talk.

I am rejecting projects: I am overscheduled and tired. 

The Basra Project

The Jewish Brigade served with the British Army during WWII guarding the oil fields. After the war they returned to Palestine and founded an agricultural settlement in the Sharon region. Near Raanana. They called it Basra. It prospered mightily. The pic shows the monument to the fallen - leaves in a graveled Japanese garden.

We are building a coffee shop. The sight is beautiful.  

About those smart apes

The idea of taming apes to perform human work has been tried many times and never succeeded. Simply, there is no way to convince an ape to do anything for us: no feeding handicapped persons, no guiding blind persons,  no pushing coal carts in mines, no fighting as heroic soldiers in our battles. That's not all. Many tried to measure the muscular force of a chimp, since it is estimated that they are three or four times stronger than us, but they totally refuse to lift heavy weights or pull the handles of dynamometers. Of course they understand what is required from them, to pull forcefully a handle, and they understand they will be paid handsomely for the exercise, but they refuse to co-operate.

Only Homo sapiens and mules can be trained to slave for others. 

Cutting the trees to increase water resources

The catchment of the Amandel River, which feeds Theewaterskloof Dam from the north east, contains little other than water-hungry alien trees. Photo: Big Oak Adventures 

Cape Town will clear foreign/invasive species from catchment areas. The concept is contrary to the Israeli ecological "green" doctrine that deforestation and desertification reduce water availability. Here each tree has been catalogued and killing trees (including foreign, water consuming species like Eucaliptus) is a crime. I think our regulation is crazy.

"The Nature Conservancy study found that R372 million could fund a 30-year programme to clear invasive trees and prevent them from returning in the seven priority sub-catchments that supply three-quarters of Cape Town’s water. As well as being cheaper, this ‘green’ option would deliver more new water than each of the other options."

They thought this was the Berlin Wall

During the last month the Palestinians of Gaza organized mass demonstrations facing the border fence with Israel, occasionally trying to break through and enter in their thousands to Israel. They calculated that resistance would meet international condemnation, and if some Palestinian boy may get hurt - killed while filmed by the CNN would be the best - the will to resist would collapse. The shade of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, where Serbia and Laos leaders are waiting their death sentences, would intimate our leaders. The European Union had been financing for years "human rights" campaigns to demoralize Tzahal, the Israeli Defense Forces, documenting any infraction of their super-humanist theology. A blond Arab (Yugoslavian in fact) girl spitting on an impassive soldier was feasted all over Europe as a heroine, daring to stand up to an armed Israeli occupation soldier. The prognosis was that Israel would be unable to stop the unarmed invasion by innocent Arab youth.

What happened? Small teams of Israeli snipers took aim at the legs of those approaching the fence. A routine developed where the advance ranks of the invaders were followed by medics and ambulances. A thousand were wounded and a hundred killed. No one hurt in our side. Universal condemnation of Israel. Then the campaign then petered out and died.

Conclusion: If we had fallen victims to the sophisticated demoralization campaign of the EU, and let ourselves be convinced by their suicidal propaganda of absolute human rights, our soldiers would have refrained of shooting live fire on unarmed underage demonstrators while being filmed by the CNN. Our military and political leaders, already frightened to travel to certain European countries, would not be courageous enough to give the order to shoot.

The EU is a hidden enemy of Israel, very dangerous. 

How effective are missile attacks?

Yesterday the HAMAS government in Gaza fired 200 missiles to Israeli targets. The results were fires and one slow Arab boy asphyxiated by a fire. Today we are informed of 50 missiles on Ashkelon, and the death of one illegal Arab building contractor,  Mr Mahmood Abu Asmah, 48 y.o., from Hebron. May his innocent soul be admitted to Mohammed's paradise. There are physical damages to the upper stores of buildings, with no casualties.

Israel operates an effective system of compensation for worktime lost because of the emergency, and a fast and generous system of rebuilding the houses affected. No schools, to the joy a students and teachers. The kibbutzim in the North are offering hospitality to those who want to evacuate themselves and enjoy a quiet holiday in the nature.

Missile attacks are ineffective against a disciplined population. Hizballah's leader in Lebanon says that they have 10,000 missiles prepared for Israel, should we be seized by panic? If its killing effectiveness is similar to what we are suffering today, he is talking of 40 victims, mostly Arabs, aged folks that hurt themselves running for cover, and so. Israeli vengeance is never proportional. What says the Bible? Seven for one?

Last night incident in Gaza and continuation

The Government imposed censure on the incident so I can't say much. An Israeli commando camouflaged as Arabs (some of them were really Arabs) entered Gaza and destroyed some advanced electronic equipment. They were discovered and the leader, a Lt. Colonel, was killed in the fight. They all got out of Gaza. The identity of the dead commander cannot be revealed because he was an Arab living in an Arab town, and if known, his family would suffer. There is a growing Arab sector - apart from the Druzes that are not Muslims - that are silent Israeli patriots and even Zionists.

All the day there were exchange of missiles between Gaza and Israel. The army is asking people to download an application to inform about incoming missiles. The emergency zone has been extended to the Dead Sea, as the missiles are having longer range than in the past. In other words, the terrorists have the capability of bombing the outskirts of Tel Aviv.

People is stressed but in terms of material damage and human victims, the Arab attack is insignificant. I think there is one dead, a boy (a luckless innocent Arab) was too slow to escape a burning bus. People in the South are passing the night in the bunkers (a propaganda pic above. They are drinking Smirnoff vodka.) or expecting any minute an SMS that they have 50 seconds to find a refuge.

Up! Up from Depression

Saturday night worked hard to finish the chicken factory of D. in the Shaarey Benjamin Industrial Area, distant one kilometer from Ramallah. The factory is owned by an Israeli Arab, and like the supermarkets and other shops in that "illegal" settlement, is built on Palestinian clients. I feel that Israeli Arabs are super-aware of the opportunities opened up also for them, as part of the dominant nation, in the  territories. They have no fear and they speak perfect Arabic. 

The work was difficult, then I could not sleep and woke up angry with a vivid nightmare: it was the ceremony of presenting the diplomas of the course, everybody was receiving back approved their project papers and their diplomas, and I received a fat file with my many projects and no diploma. The old lady in charge indicated the three page handwritten letter explaining that they had examined carefully but decided to not graduate me.  

How to pull up myself from anger and depression? Start working. I am not in the mood, answered to myself. We  know that you cannot work now, but at least you can move your legs and get out of the bed and open the next plan? I could do that. Up then and start doing, the rest will come by itself. 

So I put myself in motion and worked till now. May be the issue is dehydration, I mean, I have not tasted wine for weeks, I am dry, I need vinegary smelly Rioja wine! Now that I have a clear goal, this night I am going to drink red wine as I recommended by the doctors. "Moderately" - whatever that translates for an old fat Jew. I am enjoying it in advance. Up from depression.    

Kabalat Shabbat

Welcoming the Shabbat in the kinder. The big-headed boy is Geffen. First grandson. He is watching his enemy across the table, that biting bully in blue shirt. 

Light sails

The discovery of the enormous light sail tumbling across the solar system, the oumuamua object, led me to the Planetary Society's light sail project and then to the IKARUS project of JAXA, the Japanese space agency. They have demonstrated the feasibility of the concept and created a technology that seems to me quite advanced, opening up the possibility of managing the sail by controlling its reflectivity, its angle to the sun, and even the way to generate much electricity. Like a sailboat, it can move against the direction the wind, meaning that it can be used to go everywhere. 

Replacing...and Ruling Americans

The refugees are not only replacing "them" American European folks, they are starting to rule them. A clitoris-less Somali Muslim woman, married to her own brother, was elected to the Congress by Minnesota. No friend of Israel at all. Muslims are a big success in America. Not so much in Somalia. 

First Credible Contact with an Alien Space Civilization

The space object we call ‘Oumuamua entered our solar system a year ago, turned and quickly left again. It was represented as a solid cigarlike object but it was not. Now we know it was a thin sheet of 0.3 mm thickness and 16000 sq meter surface. A Harvard paper proposed that it was a light sail from an alien ship. It is the first plausible encounter. 

Replacing them

Bloomberg, a business magazine, is ecstatic with the Democratic Party's probable victory and control of the American Congress. Demography is destiny, they say, and American demography votes for the Democrats.  Obama was not a success, Hillary was corrupt, so there must something I don't understand here, because the stock exchange is … rising.

P.S.: Remember the lead pollution of Flint's water? Flint operators forgot to add buffer to the water or may be it was stolen, but facts are irrelevant, whole America is convinced that Governor Schuette tried to poison the Flint Blacks and that Obama and Hillary saved their lives. The system works: Democrat Gretchen Whitmer today defeats Republican Bill Schuette. 

The Rebbe explains the mystery of kangurus in Noah's Ark

Yeshive Bochers (Jewish divinity students) love to formulate difficult questions to their teachers. For example: How did an Australian marsupial like the kanguru travel to Mount Ararat and take his reserved seat in the Ark? Flying Quantas? Rabbi, how was that?

Rabbi Moshe Leib the Cohen Halberstadt has the answer.  It goes like that: You know that there is a process called evolution in nature. Yes, Darwinian evolution. There are "initial", antediluvian animals that were in the Ark and survived the flood. There are other animals that were not in the Ark but evolved from the survivors. Now, is the kanguru an antediluvian, initial, root animal, or it evolved after the flood? The distinction is unimportant, the fact is that Australia is full of jumping kangurus, so it definitely must have been one or the other.

BTW, the kanguru meat is not kosher. 

Where is the gold?

Venezuela demanded from the Bank of England to repatriate 14 tons golf of its reserves worth more than $500 million. 

Comments:

(Anon 1): Bet the Bank of England no longer has it. Gold delivery obligations on the fraudulent COMEX have been shunted over to London for months now via an instrument called Exchange for Physical (EFP). You can read Harvey Organ or the GATA website to learn more. Less than five tons of physical gold on the COMEX now. Not enough registered (deliverable) gold to meet demand.

(Anon 2): Good luck with that. Germany tried to get their gold back from the U.S. a few years back, they were told to wait. Then the U.S. set up a deal to show Germany the gold that was actually borrowed from JPM.The growing concern about the gold sitting under Manhattan has become a touchy subject ever since Germany announced earlier this year plans to repatriate its gold from Fed vaults. Some have said the move signifies German mistrust of the Fed. Others argue the Bundesbank is just one of many central banks keen on rebalancing its own gold reserves.

So where does JP Morgan fit in? Months ago ZeroHedge drudged up the fact that JPM-owned 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza has, on its fifth sub-basement, the world's largest bank vault.

You know who else has five sub-basements? The New York Fed. You know what building is across the street from 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza? You guessed it:

Yup. JPM's vault, the largest in the world, is possibly inches away from the Fed's gold vault. Across the street, on the same level underground

J: Years ago I was tempted to speculate in gold but I suspected that COMEX is fake. It looks that I was not the only one. 

Water Cutoff in America

“Water service was cut off to an estimated 1.4 million people living in more than a half-million American households. "  Most did not pay their water bills for more than two years. The data is incomplete and refers to Detroit; New Orleans; Springdale, Arkansas; and Oklahoma's two largest cities, Oklahoma City and Tulsa. Private operators did not report the data, so it can be assumed it is widespread.

This is from the wealthiest country in the world, in GNP and in water resources. Must be a social / educational / racial discrimination problem, not a water supply problem.

You can solve the problem taking dance - salsa - classes (see ad).

End of the World

There is a biblical oracle or prophesy that the birth of a perfectly red calf will signal the end of the world. Well, some say it has happened in Israel. Make your preparations.

Horses in Rishon LeZion

Starting another project: a horse ranch in the middle of the city of Rishon LeZion. It is hidden near a farm, still there are those anachronic things in a highly urbanized site in the center of Israel. They will have horses for sport but no races (forbidden). Each horse will have de luxe residence, water and sprinklers. Once more, I asked for too low fees. When asked for an advance cheque, they ran to bring me it before I repent. Imbecile (moi!).

Phase Two Gender Wars: Two Males Reproduce

Here we use pluripotent stem cells derived from somatic cells to combine the haploid genomes from two males to produce viable sons and daughters. Male (XY) mouse induced pluripotent stem cells (Father #1) were used to isolate subclones that had spontaneously lost the Y chromosome to become genetically female (XO). These male-derived XO stem cells were used to generate female chimeras that were bred with genetically distinct males (Father #2), yielding progeny possessing genetic information that was equally derived from both fathers. Thus, functional oocytes can be generated from male somatic cells after reprogramming and spontaneous sex reversal. These findings have novel implications for mammalian reproduction and assisted reproductive technology.

In the experiment above, two males's cells were manipulated to produce viable male and female babies. It was done in the lab, so it can be done everywhere. What are the philosophical and social implications of this new technology? That all the noise about gender (such as separate praying areas at the Wailing Wall) are obsolete like leper islands and blue blood dynasties. The experiment completely transforms the meaning of male and female in mammalian society.

As Nietzsche's Zoroaster said, humans are a bridge towards something different. Increasingly, we have outgrown ourselves. Human, too human, yes:  but at my age I am a bridge to nothing. 

The Red-Dead Seas Desalination Project

The fall of 450 meter between the Red Sea (and the Mediterranean Sea) spontaneously offers the possibility of a large hydro-electric project. During the last 150 years many designs have been published but nothing was done. Shimon Peres linked the generation of electricity with desalination and half-promised that Israel will build it and supply free drinking water to Amman. The "vision" was written into the Jordan-Israel peace accord, mediated by Clinton. The World Bank (aka USA) was to finance the project.

Now the King of Transjordan demands the water. The population of Transjordan has exploded from half a million in 1948 to more than twelve millions. Water is scarce as well as mismanaged. The current configuration of the project takes place entirely on Jordanian territory. What do they need us for? For completing the poker table? No. They are enviously watching as Israel has solved the water supply problem of the "territories", that being our legal obligation as so-called "occupying power", so they wonder, what about us? Are we not Palestinians? Why can't we enjoy the privileges of the "occupied"? Why, why, why?

What if Israel ignores the whole thing as it has been doing lately? We shall have a raving hysterical fit, we shall roll on the floor, we shall shame you in public! No peace! No peace!

Only half of the richest Americans are Jews

Forbes published its list of the richest Americans and it appears that only five of the richest ten are Jews.

The much maligned Soros - who is a Jew only by birth - is relatively poor in this company.

But yes, we Jews have advanced in the last two centuries. In those times, the large majority of the Jews in Western Europe were dirt-poor peddlers/beggars without residence permits. Actually, illegals. Pic. A Jewish peddler in Hungary. 

Golden Cookies

Yesterday went to the Industrial Area of Holon for the ampliation of a bakery - confectionary factory. I had designed the old factory about six years ago, and it was a nightmare. The raw materials are sugar in large quantities, margarine and oil, and flour. All considered highly pollutant by the local environmental agency. The workforce is the typical proletariat: Arabs (the supervisors), Sudanese refugees, ethnically uncertain Russians from the Far East, etc. The place is clean, the work is organized and the products are attractive and sickeningly sweet. They must be exactly what the Israeli public likes, because they are adding more equipment and personnel.

One of the problems is drainage. Although it is a dry factory, not much use of water, the Ministry of Health demands a drain in each room. The new addition is on the second floor of an old industrial building, and I cannot bore holes in the pre-cast concrete plates (pic) resting on the slabs, in order to hang the pipework from the ceiling of the lower stage. I'll have to try to pass the 110 mm pipes inside the floor plates. If possible. It is not. The pic right shows the plates over the parking - here I can bore holes and hang the pipework, the problem is inside the building itself, where the owner does not agree to have pipes hanging above his head and his machines.