Confused

Hours I am sitting here and following US news, and cannot make sense of them. It is all a distraction, I need to do some work too! The American elections as shown in the media is unanimous: the Democrats won because the Trump avalanche was stopped. I see that the Republicans won more positions, so the media is biased or just lying? It is something of a mystery to me. The cryptocurrencies collapsed, losing 70-80% of their market value, why? NASDAQ is up 7%, something I never experienced nor expected. Maybe people are selling crypto and buying stock. Here we are going to have a new government, and people are afraid. There is talk of Dery (a convicted thief) taking the Treasure, and Ben Gvir (a Kahanist rabble-rouser) getting the Police ministry. It is difficult for me to concentrate and work. I am feeling old and tired. 

Ill: Confucius. 

Peres' Dream Coming Along

 

There was some kind of regional climate conference and Israel's President Herzog attended and talked to other leaders. Big deal, we are starting t be accepted here.

Jordan and Israel signed a letter of intent to exchange electricity for desalted water. The solar field in Jordan is an Israeli project. We are investing in Jordan. Slowly they are coming along. 

The small colored man at the left seems to be al-Sisi, Egypt's ruler. I am not sure, because in other pics he appears almost white. They may have forgotten to filter this picture.  

The Truth about Humans

Our twin variety, the Neanderthals, lived on meat alone. Like jackals and wolves. The human stomach has a pH of 2 and can digest rotting meat like other scavengers, say vultures. Even the sapiens variety prefers meat to vegetables.

Everywhere humans moved, game and large-bodied animals on land or in the sea worth hunting,  soon disappeared. They were exterminated. Nothing can survive where there are humans. They are everywhere. 

Humans are naked and defenseless and have no big teeth or strong paws. Cannot outrun or overpower any animal. Humans hunt in groups like wolves, but they are less disciplined. It was this absolute inferiority that forced famished humans to develop artificial weapons, and about ten thousand years ago, when they had finished all game, to eat undigestible grasses like teosinte and Triticum and then cultivate them. But humans did not turn into peaceful ruminants. The latest development is the settling of Mars. Already two tribes are exploring and mapping it. Anything out there must see itself as doomed.   

Potash market mystery

 

The graph shows Nutrien's 14% loss today. It is worrying why a very stable product - fixed production potential and fixed demand - can suffer such variations. It never goes under the minimum but a less-than-expected quarter profit (still enormous) can decrease its price by 14% or maybe 30%. I don't understand, have to think why a temporary disappointment can do this. 

Netaniyahu and three Orthodox parties

 
The papers talk about the victory of the Right-wing in yesterday's elections, but that is wrong. Netanyahu is liberal in his economic outlook, strongly capitalist, and free-marketist. He will govern with three smaller parties that hate Lapid's anti-religious, secular liberalism. The largest is the Religious Zionist party, which focused on Jewish settlement and integration of the West Bank territory in Israel. The Shas party is led by Orthodox Rabbis of the Moroccan and North African communities, interested in maintaining a large educational network and in stopping the immigration of European Jews. Their rabbinical judges are questioning the racial purity of Russian and Ukrainian Jews and rejecting their visas. The logic is absurd because North African Jews - themselves - are indifferentiable from Palestinian Arabs, while European Ashkenazi Jews are genetically unique. The Torah Party are Orthodox Jews that do not identify with Israel and refuse to serve in the army. Many are lifelong biblical scholars and as such, are subsidized by the state. They are violently anti-woke modernism. They have no political or economic agendas, except to maintain their status and subsidies. In conclusion, it is false to characterize Bibi and his partners as right-wing, they are not paid by large monopolies (there are none in Israel) and they are not representing the interests of the wealthy. The Communist arguments that they are representing the plutocrats are so absurd that no one voted for them. 

Would you trust your savings to a Nigerian prince?

S&P cut Credit Suisse's rating one notch to BBB- meaning its credit is trash, worthless. Only fabulously rich Arabs are eyeing buying it. A bank lives on the confidence of the public. Those hardheaded Calvinist Swiss bankers imagined that the moneyed will trust a diverse Senegalese? Wokeness killed the bank. 

China closes down

Lei Ge, a senior media person, said in an interview with this station: "It is an integral part of Xi Jinping's vision of China's development strategy. Xi Jinping is determined to take the so-called socialist road with Chinese characteristics and fight against the mainstream of modern Western civilization in the United States. This is surrounded and blocked by European and American societies. This is the harsh reality China has faced in the past five years.”

 Immediately after the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, things start happening in China. 50,000 supply and marketing cooperatives in rural China have been re-activated. The purchase and sale of agricultural products will be completed by the supply and marketing cooperatives. Details: https://reurl.cc/oZLqVg 

The old Supply and Marketing Cooperatives were created during Mao's famine in 1959-60, to supply the cities. Internet commenters remember them as a government instrument and fear the end of free agricultural marketing and the return to mass scarcity. Although cooperatives are logical and successful in many parts, Xi's decision reminds me of Soviet collectivization and the Holodomor.