Pim Fortuyn

Financial Transaction Tax

Financial Transaction Tax

What is a Financial Transaction Tax?

It is simply a very small percentage of the total amount of your everyday purchases.

Why am I even promoting the idea? Don't we already have enough taxes draining our slowly dwindling weekly wages?

Yes we do, but there is some light at the end of the tunnel - if the powers that be would simply get their head out of where the sun will never shine.

According to the Reserve Bank of Australia...

http://www.rba.gov.au/publications/bulletin/2004/jul/pdf/bu-0704-3.pdf

Page 15 states, in a table entitled Cash Withdrawals Year to March 2004 (no mention of the start, but presumably, March 2003?) there was, wait for it, $142,534,000,000 - yes, $142 billion dollars withdrawn from ATM's (your own, and 'foreign' ones), EFTPOS cash-out and cash-out + purchases, and credit card cash advances.

$142 billion dollars. The report obviously is slanted to the types of outlets that we all get our cash from, but eventually, that cash will be spent within the economy.

But if we look at the spreadsheet, kindly also provided by the RBA (they really hang themselves don't they - or should I say, they really hang the government, don't they?) at:

http://www.rba.gov.au/statistics/tables/xls/c07hist.xls

it shows that the total of interbank settlements for November 2012 stood at:

$150 billion dollars.

That's right - just for the month of November 2012.

That includes all financial transactions being cleared through various systems such as SWIFT, RITS, Austraclear etc, each and every month.

Check it out - $158 billion for Sep 2012, $151 billion for Oct 2012, and $150 billion during Nov 2012.

Now, imagine a financial transaction tax on those amounts - lets pick a number - a third of one percent or 0.33% .

Lets do the math.

$158,000,000,000 is $158 billion dollars, the same amount cleared through the various financial clearing houses as described by the Reserve Banks' own spreadsheet for September 2012.

(158,000,000,000 / 100) * .33 = $521,400,000 or $521 million dollars per month, directly into the Australian government coffers (for the month of Sep 2012)

Lets total the 2011-2012 financial year (from the spreadsheet above)

July 2011 - $164 billion

August 2011 - $164 billion

September 2011 - $168 billion

October 2011 - $173 billion

November 2011 - $164 billion

December 2011 - $181 billion (Xmas time!)

January 2012 - $148 billion

February 2012 - $149 billion

March 2012 - $157 billion

April 2012 - $167 billion

May 2012 - $152 billion

June 2012 - $168 billion

Lets total up the entire 2011-2012 financial year in settled payments throughout the banking system in Australia. (I don't even think my calculator is up to the task, but I'm sure Google can tell me what sort of number I'm looking at...)

It turns out to be:

1 961 753 000 000

one trillion, nine hundred and sixty-one billion, and seven hundred and fifty-three million dollars.

That's a lot of dosh!

So I wonder what 0.33% of that is?

6,473,784,900

6 billion dollars

And that's at just one third of one percent.

How about we ask for ten percent of that, just like the GST (don't worry, the GST will be history after we look at the result!)

Ooooh! Now that's nice:

196,175,300,000

$196 billion

$196 billion dollars

Seems almost as much as what the present government has borrowed and what we'll have to pay back someday.

So, they could recoup $196 billion dollars out of the Australian economy in a year - and that's without the GST, without payroll tax, without the MRRT, without the carbon "price" - just by simply creaming off the top of what normal Australians, and Australian businesses, pay each and every month, to one another!

Am I mad?

Why hasn't this been implemented?

9/11 Conspiracy Solved: Names, Connections, & Details Exposed (Apparently)

This video goes for 44 minutes.

The following, video, text and posts are attributed to AlienScientist
==========================================================================

Published on 31 Oct 2012

Was 9/11 really an Inside Job? After reviewing this documentary, and checking the evidence, I think the answer will be clear to you.
http://www.alienscientist.com/911/911%20two%20sides.jpg

Special thanks to Michael C. Ruppert, Mark H. Gaffney, and Kevin Ryan for solving the crimes of 9/11 with their amazing research. This video is a compilation of evidence they have uncovered.

"Crossing the Rubicon" - The Decline of American Empire at the end of the age of oil
http://www.fromthewilderness.com

"Black 911" by Mark H. Gaffney:
http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2011/05/25/black-911-a-walk-on-the-dark-s...

Was 9/11 an Inside Job?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20521.htm

A guide to 9/11 Whistleblowers
http://www.corbettreport.com/articles/20100305_911_whistleblowers.htm

Project Hammer
http://decryptedmatrix.com/live/bushs-project-hammer/

WTC 6
http://www.whale.to/b/wtc_6_h.html

SEC Act Section 12(k)2:
http://www.sec.gov/rules/other/34-44791.htm

Richard Grove's testimony (complete transcript)
http://www.freewebs.com/abigsecret/grove.html

"Collateral Damage" by E.P. Heidner
http://www.wanttoknow.info/911/Collateral-Damage-911-black_eagle_fund_trust.pdf

The CIA's forty-year complicity in the narcotics trade by Alfred W. McCOY
http://www.cob.sjsu.edu/facstaff/davis_r/fallout.htm

Executive Order 12333 created an agreement between the CIA and Justice Department (DEA) to look the other way on Government Drug Trafficking: http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo/eo-12333-2008.pdf

AIG and Drug Money
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ciadrugs/part_2.html

Maurice Greenberg's report for the CFR
http://www.fas.org/irp/cfr.html

Richard Armitage, Frank Carlucci, Herbert Winokur, and company
http://digwithin.net/2012/04/08/911-as-a-sequel-to-iran-contra/

Post 9/11 Promotions:
http://arabesque911.blogspot.com/2007/11/911-incompetence-sabotage-and.html#_...

9/11 Gold Theft and other smoking guns:
http://911review.org/Wget/Killtown/9_11-Smoking-Guns.html
http://killtown.911review.org/oddities.html#February26,1993-WTC_gold

Kevin Ryan's landmark article on who had "Demolition access to the WTC Towers":
Tenants:
http://www.911review.com/articles/ryan/demolition_access_p1.html
Security:
http://www.911review.com/articles/ryan/demolition_access_p2.html
Convergence:
http://www.911review.com/articles/ryan/carlyle_kissinger_saic_halliburton.html
Clean Up:
http://www.911review.com/articles/ryan/demolition_access_p4.html

Kevin R. Ryan, et al, Environmental anomalies at the World Trade Center: evidence for energetic materials, The Environmentalist, Volume 29, Number 1 / March, 2009,http://www.springerlink.com/content/f67q6272583h86n4/

Kevin R. Ryan, The Top Ten Connections Between NIST and Nanothermites, Journal of 9/11 Studies, July 2008,http://www.journalof911studies.com/volume/2008/Ryan_NIST_and_Nano-1.pdf

Website for In-Q-Tel, http://www.iqt.org/technology-portfolio/index-by-practice-area.html

Wikipedia page for Jerome Hauer,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerome_Hauer

Peter Jennings interview with Jerome Hauer, ABC, on 9/11, 14:53, available on You Tube, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj0Rz9ZsDAg

Taku Murakami, US Patent 5532449 - Using plasma ARC and thermite to demolish concrete,http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/5532449/description.html

Albert Gibson et al, Integral low-energy thermite igniter, US Patent number: 4464989, http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=rKl1AAAAEBAJ&dq=US+4464989

Michael C. Ruppert, Suppressed Details of Criminal Insider Trading Lead Directly into the CIA's Highest Ranks, October 9, 2001,http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/10_09_01_krongard.html

Kevin R. Ryan, Mahmud Ahmed's itinerary from his Washington DC visit the week of 9/11, 911blogger.com, 11/27/2009,http://www.911blogger.com/node/21978

The agreement between LLNL and Savannah River can be found here - https://www.llnl.gov/str/News597.html

Savannah's reference to developing sol-gels can be found here -http://srnl.doe.gov/mat_sci.htm

SEC document for Washington pre-payments -http://www.secinfo.com/dRqWm.4G1Vx.c.htm

The Ties That Bind, Descended from family business empires, six huge business groups dominate the Japanese economy, Multinational Monitor, October 1983 -http://multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/issues/1983/10/ties.html

Securacomm Consulting Inc. v. Securacom Incorporated, United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, January 20, 1999, 49 U.S.P.Q.2d 1444; 166 F.3d 182, http://altlaw.org/v1/cases/1099498

Wikipedia page for Stratesec, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratesec

SEC filing for Stratesec, May 2, 1997,http://www.secinfo.com/dS7kv.82.htm

Kroll Inc website, http://www.kroll.com/about/

==========================================================================

Decide for yourself.

Julia Gillard, and her sojourn to India

No, I'm not going to comment on her fall.

You can read more about that on lots of the other gutter press sites.

No-one else seemed to ask the question of why she was there in the first place.

Here's what I posted in response to a comment on Andrew Bolt's blog:

@Chris
I posted my original reply yesterday, but it wasn't accepted by the moderators, apparently.
I said then, that the only reason she's there is to talk to India about uranium sales.
And I'm vindicated by tonight's news, that Labor has back-flipped once again, and is considering  uranium sales to India.
Why is this a back-flip? Because Labor always said they would not sell uranium to anyone who has not signed the non-proliferation agreement.
Guess who didn't sign? Yes, India.
And now, in order to balance the budget, Gillard flies off to India and has talks about "economic ties"
Can anyone say "budget surplus" ????
Please.
Can no-one else see through this governments' lies and spin?
Wake up people.

Sovereign Risk

What exactly is Sovereign Risk?

Here's some fairly high-brow talk from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_risk#Sovereign_risk

The probability of rescheduling is an increasing function of debt service ratio, import ratio, variance of export revenue and domestic money supply growth. Frenkel, Karmann and Scholtens also argue that the likelihood of rescheduling is a decreasing function of investment ratio due to future economic productivity gains. Saunders argues that rescheduling can become more likely if the investment ratio rises as the foreign country could become less dependent on its external creditors and so be less concerned about receiving credit from these countries/investors.^[12]

From reading that, do you even understand it?

No, neither do I.

My main question is this:

"What would actually happen should a sovereign nation default on its loans?"

For example, given the troubles with Greece and Italy 2012, what if the government of either of these two countries simply said, nope - we default! We can't pay. ??????

What would be the ramification? Who would tell that sovereign nation to hand over all its resources? Its gold, its silver, its coal, its wheat, its cotton, its bananas, its sheep, its iron ore, in effect to repay what the sovereign nation owed to its creditors?

I can't find anywhere online that answers that question.

Maybe no-one has ever considered the question - after all, there seems to be a lot of money to be made from people who bet on the currency exchange markets - they wouldn't want to see a sovereign nation go under - they'd lose too much money.

So the norm keeps on and on - all we ever hear is how the stock market is doing - the result of the stock market drives the rest of the economy, completely disregarding the fact that the majority of businesses in a country aren't even listed on the "all important" "stock exchange".

Its a manufactured market, people - from those who have the greatest to gain from the manipulation of markets - and to hell with the rest of the population who struggle day to day to gain employment, and even then, are subjected to ever increasing prices.

I ask again - what would happen should a sovereign nation default on its loans? What I'd like to see is these countries who are doing it bad saying "fuck you" - what would the creditors do? Are they going to send in an army to take over the business sector of the nation, or remove current members of parliament?

I'd think that was an act of war.

If nothing else, we need to remove this world wide scam of fractional reserve banking, because lets face it, it isn't working, and the level of worldwide debt can NOT ever been repaid, so I ask:

Why not just say "I DEFAULT"

For a home-owner, that's really bad - they have to give up their home to the bank (who will sell it at auction), and if they don't receive enough money to pay off the outstanding debt, they're still in debt.

Read that again - a family can still be in debt even after losing their home in a mortgagee sale.....and in many circumstances, through no fault of their own.

Why no fault? Maybe.... rising interest rates, rising electricity prices, rising food prices, and with the carbon tax yet to hit.... its no wonder people are losing their homes.

Now, the more important thing (sorry homeowners who are doing it tough....) is that no matter what you do in your daily life, you're always subject to the policies of the government of the day.

You know that - you've experienced it.

I ask again - what would happen if Greece were to default on their loans?

Who would come in (the bank) and try to sell the resources (your home) to try and repay what they owed (your mortgage) ?????

I'm sure you can see that there are really big issues at stake here in the world at the moment - this is not a good time to be living under a fractional reserve banking system.

One way to help our respective governments survive this ever increasing debt to foreign interests may be to implement something like a "financial transactions tax" - this would see a change in the payments *everyone* makes whenever they buy or sell something.

Remove the GST. This would help small business no end. After all, at the moment, they are unpaid tax collectors for the government - as if they didn't have enough work to do.

So no GST - what's next? No income tax - everyone would have an immediate increase in disposable income - that they can then spend in their local marketplace to increase the money supply within an economy- but wait on, that is against the bankers creed - they are the only ones who can increase the money supply through fractional reserve banking! No my friends, it'll never happen because the masters of banking WILL NOT LET THAT HAPPEN.

To come to back to the sovereign risk angle, (which is no different to the risk you face with your debt) I really wonder what would happen should a sovereign nation simply say:

"FUCK OFF - WE'RE NOT PAYING"

Its a very simplistic question - but all of this needs a very simple answer.

I wish someone had the balls (like the creators of the film "Network", and Peter Finch for elucidating what so many of use REALLY want to say:)

MY LIFE HAS VALUE!

Watch that film over and over again - sometime, it'll sink in, and I hope you get as mad as hell as to what's going on today.

YOUR LIFE HAS MEANING.

And that was a film - here's a real person who has some things to say:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yi6XV8yBFoU&feature=related

I'll get no comments on this, because you are all asleep.

You don't think.

You don't question.

Yet you ask why your life is going down the toilet.

Maybe now you'll start asking questions, and start reading some material other than the latest TV "reality show", or the latest magazine stand "celebs today!"

I don't know why I even bother writing this stuff - it might seem crazy and weird, but I'm allowed to since I have a free blogger account, and hell, even if I get shut down, I still have my own "self-hosted" site (on my own server, on my own internet connection) so you might see it there too.

But lastly:

SHOUT OUT AND ASK WHY YOU ARE WHERE YOU ARE?

You've put in the hours, the work, the heartache, the headache, and the rest.

So why aren't you further ahead?

Its not your fault.

But then again, it might be.

The Live Music Scene, Venues and Other Stuff

Wow.

Listening to DJ Psychopomp on www.thefuzz.com.au and checking out the chatroom, I was reminded of an idea I had so many years ago.

Here's what I said in the chatroom:

Sorry to hijack or whatever. circa 1998: I spoke to the drummer from The Choirboys about a "venue" that incorporated a performance stage, rehearsal rooms, retail displays (need a new set of strings / sticks) - he liked the idea but "sponsorship" was the nail in the coffin.

That was my idea in a nutshell.

But even more.

Imagine this:

A band gets to this venue. They have rehearsal rooms, they gain access to retail displays (just in case they need to buy new strings, new drumsticks, maybe a cymbal or two), but this next idea was the biggest one.

Each and every rehearsal room had a complete recording facility built-in, so that the drums could be miked, the guitars, the vocals, the piano, the violin - each could be individually recorded - during rehearsal.

That's the thing - during rehearsal.

As Tori Amos once said - "getting a moment on tape" - I've never forgotten that comment.

Imagine coming into a rehearsal space, and giving it the best, but NOT recording it?

Oh NO!

Anyway, that was my idea - each and every rehearsal or practice session could be recorded - obviously these need to be paid for, but ...... but that's the first sticking point.

The next was that the drummer from The Choirboys liked my idea, but artists who have "made it" have sponsorship, so they wouldn't be buying from the retail spaces in this "venue"

So if we remove the sponsorship aspect, what's left?

A space that offers:

* Rehearsal rooms (with complete recording capabilties off the bat) - pay for a DAT on your way out.

* A performance space - a venue, that can be booked for a concert.

* Retail or other spaces that sell goods and services.

Lets expand on that last point - remember the "sponsorship" aspect of "known" artists. They won't be buying products and services from these retail points - but for the unknowns, or just starting out artists, this could be very useful.

Secondly, think of people coming to the venue to experience an artist - they will want food and drinks - there's an opportunity ( a licensed venue certainly ) but one to think about.

So that's a really short precis of my idea. I haven't gone into the ultimate detail here, because I really don't know whether it'll actually fly.

The artists are the ones who will drive this - if they want to.

What are the issues with your current rehearsal spaces?

What is missing?

What do you want?

How can someone deliver on what you need?

Osama

I've been watching video, and listening to audio, and given that I have some pre-conceived ideas, I have to say that I just don't believe what we're being told.

For instance, there have been many references to the "twin towers" during the recent commentary - one of the reasons why the USA has been on a decade long search for bin Laden.

However, the more I hear about all this, the less I hear references to Building 7 - another building that "fell down" on September 11, 2001.

Do you know about Building 7? Forget the twin towers - Building 7 is where, I think, that people need to focus their questions.

So, please convince me that Osama bin Laden was the cause of the destruction of Building 7 - given that it wasn't hit by an aircraft, nor was it completely destroyed by fire.

"9/11" is all that is ever referenced in the commentary. As though that day, that phrase - is all that is needed to reinforce the story we've been told for the last 10 years.

I also ask the following question:

Who bank-rolled Osama bin Laden during the Russian invasion of Afghanistan? I think you'd be surprised.

The 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan galvanized bin Laden. He supported the Afghan resistance, which became a jihad, or holy war. Ironically, the U.S. became a major supporter of the Afghan resistance, or mujahideen, working with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to set up Islamic schools in Pakistan for Afghan refugees. These schools later evolved into virtual training centers for Islamic radicals.

By the mid-1980s, bin Laden had moved to Afghanistan, where he established an organization, Maktab al-Khidimat (MAK), to recruit Islamic soldiers from around the world who later form the basis of an international network. The MAK maintained recruiting offices in Detroit and Brooklyn in the 1980s.

The Taliban, the former rulers of Afghanistan, arose from the religious schools set up during the mujahideen's war against the Soviet invasion. After the Soviet army withdrew in 1989, fighting erupted among mujahideen factions. In response to the chaos, the fundamentalist Taliban was formed and within two years it captured most of the country. The Taliban gave bin Laden sanctuary in 1996

Read more: Osama bin Laden http://www.infoplease.com/spot/osamabinladen.html#ixzz1LArFYXDb

So, the USA helped the mujahideen resist the Russian invasion - effectively giving bin Laden money and resources. http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=3556

But I don't even believe the last paragraph.

Washington's approach came to an especially calamitous end in September 2001 when the Taliban regime was linked to bin Laden's terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that killed some 3,000 people. Moreover, evidence quickly emerged that the Taliban all along had been collecting millions of dollars in profits from the illicit drug trade, with much of that money going into the coffers of the terrorists. Rarely is there such graphic evidence of the bankruptcy of U.S. drug policy.

Its always about money and power - and all that money goes into the coffers of the terrorists - and it isn't al-Qaeda.

And lastly, just keep watching the main stream media for vision of Osama bin Laden's dead body - you simply will never, ever, ever see it - except under a white sheet - but that could be anyone under there.......

Gruesome I know, but "the proof is in the pudding" apparently.

So if you never see it, what is the truth?

There is no truth - you've been lied to yet again.

Update:

Pakistan TV claims to broadcast images of Bin Laden's body

Pakistani television stations on Monday broadcast what they described as unconfirmed images of Osama bin Laden's bloodied face after the United States said he had been killed.

"The picture of Osama bin Laden's dead body has been released. It is unverified," said the commentator on Pakistan's largest TV network, Geo.

Other channels also showed the image of a face, which sported a bushy and black beard without any visible traces of the white or grey detected in the most recent video footage of bin Laden when he was alive.

http://gulfnews.com/news/world/usa/pakistan-tv-claims-to-broadcast-images-of-bin-laden-s-body-1.802087

But still, there's no video or even pictures.

UPDATE:

My local TV station made a big expose of an image of a dead bin Laden.

Which really made me upset given what I said above....

UPDATE:

Well, the very last thing that my local TV station said was that the image they showed right at the top of the news was a fake.

Make of that what you will.

So I'm still waiting to see pictures of bin Laden's actual dead body. Sorry to his family - but this goes deeper and more political that you can possibly imagine.

WTC Building 7

I've been wanting to write something succinct about 9/11 for a very long time.

I had a brain-flash the other day, so I went and researched "building demolition companies" on the web, because lots of people said that the towers were the result of a controlled demolition - others have said that they fell because of the fierceness of the fires weakened the supports, and the buildings just pancaked to the ground.

Lets leave out the issue for the moment that they fell in near free-fall speed.

Another issue about researching building demolition companies has to do with the fact that Larry Silverstein, the owner of the World Trade Center complex, was interviewed sometime in 2002 (for a documentary by PBS called "America Rebuilds") about Building 7, and he said "they made that decision to pull"

"I remember getting a call from the...er...fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.' And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse."

Watch him below:

Perhaps I should let Mr Silverstein recant that statement however:

"The Commander told Mr. Silverstein that there were several firefighters in the building working to contain the fires. Mr. Silverstein expressed his view that the most important thing was to protect the safety of those firefighters, including, if necessary, to have them withdraw from the building."

So perhaps he meant "pull the firefighters out" - the trouble is:

NIST and FEMA and Frank Fellini, Assistant Chief at the time for WTC 7, said:

"...We were concerned that the fires on several floors and the missing steel would result in the building collapsing. So for the next five or six hours we kept firefighters from working anywhere near that building, which included the whole north side of the World Trade Center complex. Eventually around 5:00 or a little after, building number seven came down."

So, given that Building 7 was "pulled' (from Larry Silverstein's own mouth) just how long does it take to place all the explosives in a building in order for it to fall into its own footprint, and minimise damage to surrounding buildings?

Here's where my research comes in - according to http://www.controlled-demolition.com,

they demolished the J.L. Hudson Department Store in Detroit in 1998. Here's what they had to say about how they went about it:

CDI’s 12 person loading crew took twenty four days to place 4,118 separate charges in 1,100 locations on columns on nine levels of the complex. Over 36,000 ft of detonating cord and 4,512 non-electric delay elements were installed in CDI’s implosion initiation system, some to create the 36 primary implosion sequence and another 216 micro-delays to keep down the detonation overpressure from the 2,728 lb of explosives which would be detonated during the demolition.

Read that again. 24 days to place 4,118 separate charges in 1,100 locations.

So how was Building 7 prepared for demolition, on the same day? If CDI's 12 people took 24 days to place 4,118 separate charges in 1,100 locations, then to do it in one afternoon would have taken, what, 288 people? Yet, during the day, there was smoke and dust and debris all over the WTC complex. How could 288 people get so organised, research the design of the building, bring in all the explosives, get inside the building (and why didn't they put the fires out while they were in there?), place the charges, rig up the detonators...

It just seems implausible at best.

If you think that 9/11 was the result of terrorists, you're completely correct.

Thanks to http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/node/2210 for details.

Finally, Do It Yourself Web Server / Hosting...

... has a new look.

I was going to use XSitePro2 to develop the new site, and it would have been mega.

However, Google had me indexed. That would have meant a whole bunch of changes, and really, I wasn't completely happy with XSitePro2. It was great and all, but for SEO stuff, IMHO, you just can't go past WordPress. There were just some issues that I didn't feel comfortable with using XSitePro2 to publish the new site.

There are so many plugins and stuff though for WordPress..... its hard to know what not to install! (That's a topic for a whole other post!)

So if you want to get your own website up and running, head on over to Do It Yourself Webserver / Hosting, do the lessons, and let me know how you go.

New DIYWS site to be released soon

Hey everyone

Been working on a new site for DIY Web Server - was hand coding everything, but came across XSitePro - brilliant.

A few minor tweaks needed, but generally, a great "replacement" for NVU et al.

Talk soon

:)

DIYWS

Hey everyone

After months in the interwebs wasteland (read, no Internet at home!) I've finally got everything up and running again.

Do you want to host your own website AT HOME?

You do! Well, now you can.

Free lessons are available at the Do-It-Yourself Web Server site.

Learn all there is to know about hosting your own web site at home. It really is quite simple - you get shown how every step of the way.

Visit now and start serving your own content to the world tomorrow!

See you there!

A testimonial from a happy vendor...

I thought I'd post this testimonial from a happy vendor whose home I sold.

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN

It's with pleasure and gratitude that I supply this testimonial about Bradley Thomas, at this time employed as a sales person for Ray White Real Estate Maryborough QLD.

I was impressed from the outset with Brad's positive attitude when he inspected and listed my property.

I was even more impressed with his advertising skills and the unique "spin" he used to portray my property on the Internet. The interest and action was immediate, resulting in several inspections followed by a successful sale.

My property had been listed with several other agents for over a year.

Brad goes the "extra mile" to give customer service, and he kept me "in the picture" throughout the term of that contract. I've observed that he is regularly involved in courses and study to further his skills and career.

With his serious work commitment and his quiet confident manner Bradley Thomas would be a valuable asset to any employer of his choosing.

Yours sincerely

Trevor Knowles

Trevor Knowles

Vendor

Bauple

So if you want to sell your home, give me a call!

:)

2nd hand computers

Hi gang

612 ABC Brisbane (@612brisbane) retweeted a message from 4ZZZ (@4ZZZ) today about donating old computers etc.

I saw an advertisement in a local computer shop:
Celeron Dual Core 2.2ghz
1gb RAM
160GB hard disk
Windows Vista Home
$880

That's just the computer - no monitor etc.

There is a certain supplier of good quality parts etc: here's a breakdown on how to build a completely new PC from scratch!

Motherboard: ASUS P5KPL-CM $78
CPU: Celeron E2200 $108
RAM: DDR2 800 $18
HDD: WD SATA 160GB $57
Case with PSU: Shaw Bach-720 $49
LCD Monitor: 19" LCD Acer V193WB $172 ($143 after $29 cash rebate)
Keyboard & Mouse: ASUS Vento KM-63 $24
OS: Windows XP Pro OEM: $199

Total: $705 (including monitor and operating system - the 2 most expensive items)

PC's are so cheap nowadays it really does pay to chuck the old ones out!

I use a 667mhz with 128mb ram at work - as slow as a wet week especially when you load all the latest software onto it - I'm champing at the bit to get my good laptop back! :)

My current desktop (the one I'm typing this on at home) cost me a whole $175 - brand new - case, motherboard, cpu and ram (I had hard drive, monitor and keyboard/mouse etc)

If you have a few monitors, keyboards and mice floating around, you can save yourself a fortune (not to mention a lot of grief) by chucking out the old motherboard, cpu and ram and reusing everything else!

I did, and this PC works like a dream.

PS - I'm available for building new PC's from scratch with parts - case with power supply, motherboard, cpu and ram - you supply all the rest - save yourself a fortune, not to mention your sanity!

Cheers!

"Tuppence a bag"

Hi gang

Amazing how things work....

Just watched "Mary Poppins" - well, just the TV on in the background actually.. wasn't actually watching.... :)

BUT!

Read the lyrics to the next song very, very, very carefully... and keep an open mind while you look back on what happened in 2008:

Mr. Dawes Sr, Mr. Banks and Bankers:
If you invest your tuppence
Wisely in the bank
Safe and sound
Soon that tuppence,
Safely invested in the bank,
Will compound
And you'll achieve that sense of conquest
As your affluence expands
In the hands of the directors
Who invest as propriety demands
You see, Michael, you'll be part of
Railways through Africa
Dams across the Nile
Fleets of ocean greyhounds
Majestic, self-amortizing canals
Plantations of ripening tea
All from tuppence, prudently
Fruitfully, frugally invested
In the, to be specific,
In the Dawes, Tomes
Mousely, Grubbs
Fidelity Fiduciary Bank!


Now, Michael,
When you deposit tuppence in a bank account
Soon you'll see
That it blooms into credit of a generous amount
Semiannually
And you'll achieve that sense of stature
As your influence expands
To the high financial strata
That established credit now commands
You can purchase first and second trust deeds
Think of the foreclosures!
Bonds! Chattels! Dividends! Shares!
Bankruptcies! Debtor sales!
Opportunities!
All manner of private enterprise!
Shipyards! The mercantile!
Collieries! Tanneries!
Incorporations! Amalgamations! Banks!
You see, Michael
Tuppence, patiently, cautiously trustingly invested
In the, to be specific,
In the Dawes, Tomes
Mousely, Grubbs
Fidelity Fiduciary Bank!


After reading that, can you apportion that idealism to any major bank nowadays?
I think you can - if you are an intelligent person that is.

(Upset at that last sentence? - go educate yourself! - then come and leave a comment)

Can you believe those lyrics? They were written (or at least, the film was released) in 1964.

1964.

Now, while I don't apportion any blame to the lyricists or songwriters (the Sherman brothers), they seem to have been way ahead of their time in understanding the banking industry.

Lets forward to 2008:

So many banks went under:

Why? Perhaps it was exactly as the Sherman Brothers wrote about it Mary Poppins:

Lets review some lines from the lyrics:

"In the hands of the directors "

Well, sure - we know that they were the ones who held the fortunes of the bank - obviously, they are the ones to be held accountable. No?

"You see, Michael, you'll be part of
Railways through Africa
Dams across the Nile
Fleets of ocean greyhounds
Majestic, self-amortizing canals
Plantations of ripening tea"

Hmmm - odd investments to be sure.

So your money has gone toward investing in these so-called "hair-brained schemes" (well, hair-brained as far as you're concerned - even if you knew where your money was invested!) but according to the bank - "as safe as houses!" - and that has to be the most ridiculous statement ever.

Back on topic.

Lets take each of those investments at face value:

"Railways through Africa"

and lets see if we can make any money from that.
OK - according to Railways Africa, you might have made some money with that.... :)

What about:

"Dams across the Nile" ?

Ok, so perhaps the Aswan Dam was a good investment too (at the time)

Next! What about...

"Fleets of ocean greyhounds"

Can anyone say "Titanic" (even though it sank before the brothers Sherman wrote Mary Poppins...)

Next! (ok, ok)

"Majestic, self-amortizing canals"

Oh, ok - Suez Canal..... but! Read this:

“

"One thing is sure... our local merchant community doesn't pay practical attention at all to this grand work, and it is legitimate to doubt that the canal's receipts... could ever be sufficient to recover its maintenance fee. It will never become a large ships accessible way in any case." (reported by German historian Uwe A. Oster)

”

(Bold in the above is mine)

"There's your first clue, Sherlock!"
(The above line used without permission from the 1997 film "Titanic")

So lets go back a bit. All the investments that these big banks have made, on your behalf, (remembering that they are using your money) in the hope that they'll make more money (and pay you what they promised they'd pay you, in terms of interest payments) have essentially crashed and burned.

During this period however, they paid themselves huge bonuses on the expectation that their investments would pay off - remember the lyrics: "In the hands of the directors"

So.

Isn't it the responsibility of the directors of these banks to guarantee the investments of their customers?

Apparently not.

And now, taxpayers money is now used to bail-out these "directors".

Does this seem right to you?

Make a noise. Do it now. Right now.

After all, they are using your money!

And they're the ones who have made you lose money!

Are you angry yet?

2009 - will this be your year?

Hi gang

Ok - lets cut the bullshit.

I don't have a job. I have a crap-load of debt to pay off.
I can just manage to pay my Internet access before the end of the month.

Don't feel sorry for me - I'm an idiot. I have been, for a farking long time (just ask my kids)

Well, today, it was so damn hot here, that I went for a swim in our pool. I sincerely apologise to everyone who has gone off to work today - that I can find time to go for a swim. Crap, yes I know.

I am one of those who try to work for myself, and its not always easy, and most of the time, its a pain in the ass, and there's not a lot of money attached to it, but its something I need to do.

But I just wanted to let you know that my first thought was: "I want to do this everyday for the rest of my life"

What do you want to do everyday for the rest of your life?

I have a few things up my sleeve, and will continue to work on them.

But my primary thought was, "Gee, if I could just work at home, without all the stress and strife, and not battle the daily commute, but be able to give something back to the world-wide community.... and earn a dollar at the same time - wouldn't that be something?"

Life isn't all about earning as much money as possible.

Some folks will say it is - but really, can the CEO of the Macquarie Bank really spend all the money he is paid? I doubt it. How many things can you buy, and the bigger question is, even if you can afford to buy all those things, how many things can you use?

It might be nice to have an apartment in the Maldives, a chalet in the Swiss Alps, a hideaway in some remote corner of some forgotten continent. Does having those things make you happy?

Does eating in a fancy restaurant make you a better person than me?

No.

I don't know how these people think, but if I had those things / opportunities? Would that make me happy? No.

My wife and I were given vouchers to dine at a posh French restaurant a few months ago. Our verdict? Posh, smosh. Rubbish! Food was passable at best, service was rubbish, seating arrangements were ridiculous, the list goes on. I have no idea what the total cost was, but whatever it was, it was too much. And for goodness sake, this was in Brisbane of all places, not London, not Paris, not even Sydney for goodness sake. We will not be going back there.

So, even given insane amounts of money to spend, it seems that just being seen is more important than anything else, regardless of venue, food, service.

The ones who earn obscene amounts of money for their day job - I don't know how they feel about themselves, but given our experience with our posh night out, I'd rather stay at home.

All I know is this:

for me, to be happy, is to have enough money to:

1. pay the bills (we all want that)

2. be able to go to the local bottle shop and buy a couple of bottles of wine without worrying about that dreaded "transaction declined" message

3. to be able to leave/give something to my children, so they can have a quality of life that is somewhat shielded from this apparent "global financial crisis".

With all due respect, and whatever you read in the media, I firmly believe this GFC has been "manufactured". It has happened before, and it will happen again. Do the names "Morgan" and "Rothschild" and "Rockefeller" mean anything to you? Perhaps a trip to the library might be in order..... :)

Anyway, from one perspective, this has been an inward looking post.

From another, its a wake-up call to you all.

To hell with all the nay-sayers, the doubters, the dream-stealers who constantly bring you down. To hell with them.

If you want to do something, you just go and do it, regardless.

I applaud you, and wish you all the very best!

And to my children - kids, I love you more than words can express. Take life by the horns, shake it and say "I am the king/queen of my destiny. I may fall down, but I will get up again. I will never be defeated by those who think otherwise."

Say "I am who I am - my life has purpose and meaning - do not detract that from me."

If you do this, you will win - every, single, time.

I love you.

Dad

@Lisa_Nova - "Twitter Whore"...

I don't know what it is about this, but I just laugh my head off every time.

---

"Twitter Whore" Part 1

---

"Twitter Whore" Part 2

---

Hope you enjoyed!

Interesting Twitter Stats...

from twittercounter.com

BarackObama (153,171)
kevinrose (83,353)
leolaporte (70,439)
cnnbrk (70,095)
scobleizer (47,321)
JasonCalacanis (47,296)
alexalbrecht (46,276)
twitter (45,517)
guykawasaki (42,801)
Veronica (41,380)
bradzo (72) ..... :(

Hey Robert, at least you're above JasonCalacanis! :)

Windows XP and "invalid boot disk" message

This happened to the partner of a work colleague on his main computer.

Absolute bummer!

"Oh crap", I thought, "this might need a repair install..... *groan*"

But all is not lost!

Reboot the PC with the original XP cdrom.
Move through the screens till you get to the point of installing Windows XP, or using the "Recovery Console"

DO NOT choose the 'R' option to use the Recovery Console.
Just press Enter to install XP. (Don't worry - this is what this post is all about....)

Eventually, after accepting the license agreement and such, you'll be presented with a screen that shows you the current XP installation.

Here's where it all went wrong for my work colleague's partner.

There were no options to select the current XP installation. Bad news I thought. His disk is crapped out - looks like a new disk at worst, a re-installation at best.

But NO!

Somewhere in that series of screens will be something that shows what the current Setup thinks is the current disk configuration, and the current XP installation.

In the case of my work colleague's machine, his *external* USB drive was showing up as Drive C:
His recently bootable internal hard drive was showing up as Drive D:, and there was no identifiable XP installation.

"This is not right", I thought.

SO! What to do?

....
....
...
....
....
....
....
....
....

Yes. Unplug the external USB hard drive and reboot.

Lo and behold and thanks to whatever diety you worship!

His Windows XP PC booted just fine and dandy.

Plugged the USB hard drive back in, and everything was back to normal.

Good stuff.