Bear Pit: now the sole domicile of politics at LuLa

[Robert Roaldi]

Maybe the opening act would be trial by combat between AOC and Ted Cruz.

Do we know if Rudy's idea for trial by combat allowed for "champions" or would the principals have to fight their own battle? Do you think Cruz could take AOC? He's bigger but probably slower.

I had read an article about how Reddit members had caused trouble for some big money investment short sellers, and I have to admit I laughed out loud at that. Never having bought a single video game, I had never even heard of that retail chain. Then again, they may not have outlets in Canada, I simply don't know.

I hadn't heard of Robinhood either, the trading company I mean. I read the article, didn't really follow what they did or why, but I'll try again tomorrow when I'll be more awake. But from the few sentences in that article, it sounded like they sided with the big players in this skirmish. It it's that simple and if it's true, I can't say I'd be surprised. I hope this doesn't lead to another crisis like in 2008. I know about free markets and all, but at some point if the market traders start causing people more harm that good, someone might want to rethink things.

I used to work in IT for an investment bank in the late 1980s / early 1990s and got to know a lot of the people there. They do what they do and some of them are good at it, but if the rules of the game don't prevent them from doing harm to the wider society, they will do that harm if there is a buck to be made. A good friend of mine was chief economist at another investment bank. He told me this story one day. At a senior management meeting, he made the suggestion that their fund managers' compensation should be tied to the performance of their clients' portfolios. The CEO response was, "We are a transaction-based business."

[faberryman]

For most people watching GameStop, it is the market acting irrationally, but there will be winners and losers. For the winners, it will be a brilliant strategy; for the losers, it will be either bad luck or the winners cheated. At the hearings, you will hear questions from the senators like: "So you are telling me you can do all that on a phone?" For me, I look at it and say: "Holy cow, those guys sure do have a lot of money and not a risk adverse bone in their bodies. This is going to be spectacular. Sort of like playing chicken out on Highway 41: someone's going to get killed and someone's going to get the girl. And then the police are going to arrive."

[Robert Roaldi]

For most people watching GameStop, it is the market acting irrationally, but there will be winners and losers. For the winners, it will be a brilliant strategy; for the losers, it will be either bad luck or the winners cheated. At the hearings, you will hear questions from the senators like: "So you are telling me you can do all that on a phone?" For me, I look at it and say: "Holy cow, those guys sure do have a lot of money and not a risk adverse bone in their bodies. This is going to be spectacular. Sort of like playing chicken out on Highway 41: someone's going to get killed and someone's going to get the girl. And then the police are going to arrive."

You're probably right. The idea of Wall Street speculators (and my impression was that this play was speculation, not commodity hedging) being beaten at their own game was just too much fun. Their reaction will probably be to change the rules so that this can't happen again, or not so easily anyway.

[faberryman]

You're probably right. The idea of Wall Street speculators (and my impression was that this play was speculation, not commodity hedging) being beaten at their own game was just too much fun. Their reaction will probably be to change the rules so that this can't happen again, or not so easily anyway.

I might mention that there used to be a GameStop store around where I live. I went in a couple of times to see if they had any games for whatever kind of game machine we had because the kids were always beating me at Mario Cart and I was looking for something simpler that I might actually have a chance at. Well, there was never anyone in the store. It was like I was sneaking in in the middle of the night, and the checkout guy looked like he was sleeping with his eyes open. And of course they never had any games for my game machine, easy or hard. Anyway, GameStop left and an eBay store opened up. You could take your unwanted stuff over there and they would take pictures of it and post your listings on eBay, and in addition to a fee, they would take a commission if your stuff sold. There were two flies in the ointment: first, it was more trouble to take your stuff over there for them to do it than to just do it yourself, and second, the fees and commissions were such that it was cheaper to throw your stuff away. So the eBay store disappeared. The space has been used for several other businesses that failed, and now I think it is a mattress store. At least that is what was there the last time I drove over to the post office. It will probably be going out of business soon, if it hasn't already. Who is going to go in a store and lie down on a bunch of mattresses that other people have been lying down on in a COVID pandemic, mask or no mask. Anyway, when I heard about this GameStop thing, I thought it was a scam and people were shorting the stock and whatnot when there wasn't really any stock because GameStop went out of business fifteen or twenty years ago. Now that I think about it, I'm not really sure you need stock in a business that actually exists anyway. When the music stops, some people are going to have the money and some people are going to have worthless stock. Does it matter if the worthless stock is in a real or imaginary company?

Update:

I just read that Robinhood has raised another billion dollars from investors to keep things going. Sort of like going over to the cage to get more chips.

[Robert Roaldi]

I might mention that there used to be a GameStop store around where I live. I went in a couple of times to see if they had any games for whatever kind of game machine we had because the kids were always beating me at Mario Cart and I was looking for something simpler that I might actually have a chance at. Well, there was never anyone in the store. It was like I was sneaking in in the middle of the night, and the checkout guy looked like he was sleeping with his eyes open. And of course they never had any games for my game machine, easy or hard. Anyway, GameStop left and an eBay store opened up. You could take your unwanted stuff over there and they would take pictures of it and post your listings, and in addition to a fee, they would take a commission if your stuff sold. There were two flies in the ointment: first, it was more trouble to take your stuff over there for them to do it than to just do it yourself, and second, the fees and commissions were such that it was cheaper to throw your stuff away. So the eBay store disappeared. The space has been used for several other businesses that failed, and now I think it is a mattress store. So, when I heard about this GameStop scheme, I was surprised because I thought GameStop went out of business fifteen or twenty years ago.

Weird concept that, an eBay store. I wouldn't have thought that there was a big enough market.

Over the years, I have bought/sold some photo equipment using eBay. One time I sold something, I thought to myself, "Whoah, those fees seem kind of high these days". So high in fact, that the last time I made a major change in photo equipment (from 4/3s body + 2 lenses to m4/3s equiv) I traded in at a bricks and mortar retail store. Their low trade-in wasn't much worse that any eBay sale + fees and a lot less aggravating. I don't know what I'll do in future, eBay seems to have a near monopoly. I found out that they own kijiji, I may have been the last person to realize that.

All the malls local to me, both traditional and Big Box, have a lot of empty shops and For Lease signs. But they keep building more strip malls. Oddly enough, from what people tell me, the rents haven't dropped much. Supply and demand is a tricky thing, I guess.

Could it be that people don't actually need to shop so much to be happy?

[Robert Roaldi]

This is an article about Liz Cheney to do with a political rally in Wyoming, https://www.politico.com/newsletters/playbook/2021/01/29/scenes-from-a-wild-day-witnessing-the-gop-civil-war-491569.

I don't care at all about the main point of the article, in fact I didn't finish reading it, but the part that interested me was the author's side note early on that many people would refuse to talk to her unless she removed her mask.

If that isn't a demented cult, then what is?

[jeremyrh]

This is gonna wind up His Orangeness

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/black-lives-matter-nobel-peace-prize-petter-eide-norweigan-mp?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

[faberryman]

This is gonna wind up His Orangeness

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/black-lives-matter-nobel-peace-prize-petter-eide-norweigan-mp?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

I read about Trump getting nominated before. Turns out just about anyone in government or academia can nominate anyone else. I think there were something like 200-300 nominations for 2020. So getting nominated isn't that big deal but actually winning is.

Of course, if Trump starts bragging about getting nominated, being able to point out that Black Lives Matter got nominated too is kind of fun.

[faberryman]

This Ex-SNL Star Is Giving MyPillow Guy the Floor for His Conspiracy Rants

https://www.thedailybeast.com/ex-snl-star-joe-piscopo-is-giving-mypillow-guy-the-floor-for-his-conspiracy-rants

So Joe Piscopo is letting the MyPillow guy go on and on about how the election was rigged six ways to Sunday and there were fraudulent votes and fraudulent no votes, and how Giuliani doesn't know if the Biden votes were from Mars, and the Kraken this, that, and the other, and all the rest, and then Joe Piscopo gets down to brass tacks:

“I cannot believe they did this, and I’m telling everybody to go out and get as many MyPillows as they possibly can.”

Anyway, I am reading this article and thinking it over, and I have an epiphany. instead of bringing the loonies into the studio to do your radio show, why not go remote? You could have a touring radio show where you crisscross the country going from loony bin to loony bin setting up your mikes in treatment rooms and having the loonies come in one by one to discuss whatever is on their mind. Think of the variety. People get tired of listening to the same old conspiracy theories from the loonies on the outside. I mean if you are not loony enough to be in a loony bin, what's the point of having you on the show?

Oh, and take a look at that photo of Joe Piscopo. He and Trump are in a dead heat for who can use the most suntan cream. I can't understand why anyone would use suntan cream to do a radio show. Think about it.

[Robert Roaldi]

Speaking of loonies, I got a laugh out of the first paragraph in this opinion piece, https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/01/29/marjorie-taylor-greene-crazy-censure-463862.

I didn't read the whole thing in detail, not something that interests me that much. I get it that you don't necessarily want "credentialism" to creep into a set of minimum requirements for public office, since in theory they are supposed to represent everyone, not just deep pocket lobbyists, but maybe being insane should disqualify you from some jobs, even political ones. Leaving aside the whole rigged election con, which has now been done to death by now, surprised that still has legs, when a public official starts questioning whether school shootings actually took place, isn't that a just little over the line? Sometimes we are obligated to put crazy people in care, if only for their own mental health. This lady needs help.

[Peter McLennan]

This Ex-SNL Star Is Giving MyPillow Guy the Floor for His Conspiracy Rants


Anyway I am reading this article and thinking it over, and I have an epiphany. instead of bringing the loonies into the studio to do your radio show, why not go remote? You could have a touring radio show where you crisscross the country going from loony bin to loony bin setting up your mikes in a treatment room and having the loonies come in one by one to discuss whatever is on their mind.

Too late.  No need to travel, either. The idea has already been used.  Right here.

[faberryman]

Too late.  No need to travel, either. The idea has already been used.  Right here.

Did I ever tell you about my friend Harvey?

For those of you who have better things to do than watch old movies and might not be familiar with the reference:

"Harvey is a 1950 American comedy-drama film based on Mary Chase's 1944 play of the same name, directed by Henry Koster, and starring James Stewart and Josephine Hull. The story centers on a man whose best friend is a pooka named Harvey, a 6 foot 3.5 inch tall invisible rabbit, and the ensuing debacle when the man's sister tries to have him committed to a sanatorium."

[faberryman]

I guess things are getting back to normal.

Putin signs law extending nuclear arms treaty between US and Russia

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/29/europe/russia-new-start-treaty-extension-intl/index.html

"The treaty limits each side to no more than 700 deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and heavy bombers; no more than 1,550 warheads on deployed ICBMs, deployed SLBMs and heavy bombers for nuclear armaments; and a total of 800 deployed and non-deployed ICBM launchers, SLBM launchers, and heavy bombers."

That sounds like a fair number of nuclear bombs and delivery systems for each side.

I might have to watch Dr. Strangelove again this afternoon.

"I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion, and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.”

[Peter McLennan]

Reminds me of a cartoon I saw back in the day.  It was Brezhnev and Reagan standing waist deep in a basement flooded with gasoline.  Brezzie has fifteen matches in his shirt pocket and Reagan has twenty.  Reagan's saying, "Heck, if we both had thirty matches, then we'd really be safe.

[faberryman]

So it is cold and rainy outside, and I am watching the news, and they are interviewing this NYT reporter who has spent the last three weeks knee deep in alt-right chat rooms, and they are showing on screen some of the alt-right online comments, and up pops this quote from some woman who said she heard that Biden had lowered the age of consent for girls to eight years old. Just let that sink in for a minute.

[jeremyrh]

It’s not just in the US that police target journalists, it also happens in China, err, I mean Britain

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/jan/30/arrest-of-photographer-at-kent-protest-raises-press-freedom-fears?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

[Robert Roaldi]

The baby-eating thing never seems to disappear, https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/anderson-cooper-qanon-conspiracy-theorist_n_601531ebc5b6bde2f5bfb487.

We were watching the first of a multi-part BBC series hosted by Lucy Worsley about myths and lies during various periods in British history. Part One was about the Reformation, and she mentioned some baby-eating propaganda in vogue at the time. Of course those poor saps didn't have internet fact-checkers to set the record straight.

Ms Worsley has a three-part series out about myths and lies in American history that's worth watching if you can find it. She covers the Revolution, the Civil War and the Nuclear Arms race. She didn't mention baby-eating in that series.

[faberryman]

Part One was about the Reformation, and she mentioned some baby-eating propaganda in vogue at the time. Of course those poor saps didn't have internet fact-checkers to set the record straight.

I don't think fact checkers have much sway over the people who believe that kind of stuff. I have read a couple of articles recently about trying to talk people out of conspiracy theories and such, and apparently doing so with facts is not that all that effective. What is needed is more akin to deprogramming. Before the internet, conspiracy theorists were often loners; now they can reinforce their beliefs online 24/7 with millions of others.

[Robert Roaldi]

Some are still proud of being backed by Trump, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/30/marjorie-taylor-greene-trump-support-463996.

My advice to Ms. Greene is to keep her eyes open for an oncoming bus. She must be pretty dim to still expect loyalty from the Trumpster.

It is very difficult not to have some human pity for her though. In a few years time during an introspective moment she will be sitting at home thinking about her past and remember these days. Maybe a niece or someone will be doing a civics project and do some research about her and ask some questions. Or maybe if she's single at that time she'll meet a guy on Tinder who will google her past before their first date. I wouldn't want to live with that.

[Robert Roaldi]

I don't think fact checkers have much sway over the people who believe that kind of stuff. I have read a couple of articles recently about trying to talk people out of conspiracy theories and such, and doing so with facts is not that effective. Doesn't work all that well around here either.

Cults are like that, I'm told.

Many years ago, I knew a guy who married a woman much younger than himself after his first wife left him for another guy (who later rejected her anyway, so not a great move there). His new younger wife was hit hard by her father's death and started paying these cultists (forget their affiliation) to get in touch with her dead dad. This group claimed to have access to a group of aliens, who in turn claimed to be able to communicate with dead humans. She coughed up a couple of thousand on 2 or 3 occasions but unfortunately, the group reported that the aliens told them that her father was busy at the time and couldn't come to the seance. They suggested trying again later. The guy that I knew tried to reason with her but she rebelled and his second marriage broke up, which I would characterize as a lucky escape. I met her once and she was very attractive, proving once again that looks aren't everything.

(I am not making any of this up, I feel I need to add that.)