jpbikerfreak's Blog

Well well well... just this morning I said the US was on the short list of governments to go broke. Well it appears as usual, the left coast is leading the way. I've often joked we should just give California [back] to Mexico, but this is serious.

In a matter of day or weeks, the state will no longer be able to pay its bills. The article below discusses options such as issuing "IOUs" instead of money to creditors, and withholding tax refunds.

http://www.sacbee.com/capitolandcalifornia/story/157131
6.html

Obama and his socialist friends had better get to work... we're going to have to borrow quite a bit to get ourselves out of debt. Wait a minute...

Who's next?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,482828,00.html

Iceland's government has collapsed.

The entire country is now in political turmoil. What exactly does it mean when a country goes bankrupt, and/or has a government collapse? Well we saw it with the soviet union. And now in a different form we're seeing it in Iceland.

Many other developed countries are teetering. Even England and Scotland are flirting with disaster.

And don't fool yourself, the U.S. is on the short list also.

A few years ago I decided to move in the direction of becoming a minimalist. Recently I have stepped up my efforts to realize minimalization.

Like many Americans, I spent the first 16 years of my adult life trying to acquire "stuff". I've spent the last 4 trying to get rid of it. How much junk does a person need? How much junk can a person maintain? When a person decides he needs to get rid of his junk, who will take it?

The answers: Not much, not much, and pretty much nobody. Your plastic bargains from the discount chain are worth nearly squat when you leave the parking lot. Sure you can get stuff at garage sales dirt cheap, but then it accumulates. Then you go to use it and it doesn't work. Or you get it home and are completely disappointed in it, or you can't figure out how to use it.

In my war on junk, I have made many trips to the dump, had several garage sales, and am STILL trying to get rid of all this junk. Today we cleaned out even MORE JUNK to sell and haul to the dump. It's endless.

In raising my 3 kids in the midst of the "disposable age" I estimate we've bought, sold and or trashed 100 tons of junk. And I doubt that's an exaggeration. Recently the moving company we're using estimated the total weight of all our junk to be 13,000 lbs. And we have a small house.

So, with only a few exceptions, I've decided not to keep stuff.  If I don't use it within 6 months to a year, it goes. I don't care if there is sentimental value, take a picture and toss it to the curb. Get a gym membership not exercise equipment. Get a kindle instead of buying books (OK I'm a hypocrite on both those examples LOL). 

I've decided that a man only needs 1 rifle, 2 pistols, 1 shotgun, and 1 bow. But wait.... different occasions call for different types of tools... LOL

I also think that a man only needs 2 motorcycles. Well really I could see 4. 1 cruiser, 1 dirt bike, 1 crotch rocket, and 1 commuter.

Maybe I'm not doing quite as well as I'd like...

What are your suggestions for going minimal?

We're going to be putting our house on the market in a couple of weeks (DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME). Based on realtor feedback, I've come up with this ad for it. What do you all think? Am I asking too much?

Overland Park:

3 bdrm 2 full bath ranch with full basement, great location, great school system, new siding, new windows, new roof, new plumbing, new attic fan, re-modeled kitchen, hardwood floors, huge fenced in back yard...

We'll take 3 easy installments of $19.99. But wait, the first 10 to show up will also get new toasters. And if you call RIGHT NOW, we'll DOUBLE the value of this offer by throwing in a used waffle iron.

You get all that, the house, the toaster, and the waffle iron for just 3 easy installments of $19.99.

Have your credit card ready and call now. If you don't have a credit card, owner will bargain. He could use a family of chia pets or a case of beer.

http://clusterstock.alleyinsider.com/2009/1/75-of-late
st-bank-of-america-bailout-paid-merrill-lynch-bonuses-b
ac\

The bailout insults and madness continue. Now we find out that 75% of the latest bank of america bailout has gone to pay executive bonuses.

The board and/or share holders have yet to demand CEO Ken Lewis' resignation. Sooner or later the people are going to burn wall street down if this continues.Let 30% of the population get laid off and not be able to put food on the table.... they will surround the financial titans' ivory towers with pitchforks and torches.

Sorry we rolled off the edge of the world.

OK here's the stupidest disclaimer I've seen yet anywhere.

On a bag of fish we bought the other day:

"Keep frozen until ready to thaw".

Think about that one for a minute....

Full story here

Leading economist says US Banks are "effectively insolvent". As I write this, Bank of America's stock (BAC) is racing toward $0. It has lost well over 80% of its value in the last year, and now it appears the shotgun wedding between it and Merril was a HUGE mistake.

Meanwhile, Henry Paulsen and Ben Bernanke continue to pump cash through a fire hose the size of the outlet at the hoover dam at the banking system. What has this done? NOTHING. Trillions of dollars have been loaned, handed out, or committed to this systemic implosion of our fractional reserve banking system. How much farther will it go? Roubini now says $3.6 trillion, and I don't know if that counts the enormous handout Obaman and Co. are working on.

Grab a chair and a bowl of popcorn and let's watch the implosion...

Calling all bloggers....

I've been on f4 for just over a year now on a daily basis. I've enjoyed chatting with you all. Well everyone except open eyed liberal LOL j/k.

The reason I've been able to spend so much time on this blog is my work has not challenged me. That is changing. I put in my 2 weeks notice and took another job in another state. I have a strong feeling this new job will expect results and will not tolerate me blogging all day.

Therefore a week from Friday will be likely my last day - at least on any regular basis.

Happy blogging to all!

If you follow the patriot or libertarian movement at all, you know who Lt. Col. James "Bo" Gritz (USA-ret) is. He is the real deal, a living legend. He is a highly decorated Vietnam veteran, a former delta force commander, a POW rescuer and general all around bad-BLEEP. He also placed the FBI under citizens arrest at the siege of Randy Weaver's household at Ruby Ridge, as well as carried out the weavers' dead infant child, wife, and dog, who all died from FBI bullets fired from primarily from a man named Lon Horiouchi , who later received a medal for his actions. (I have met Randy, he's a very down to earth guy). Gritz also served as a negotiator in the Waco church massacre (is your church ATF approved?) and has served his country in many other ways, but I digress.

I have personally met Col Gritz (see my pic in my photo album).  This is a man who has made his living in the special forces, testified before congress many times, burned the UN flag on countless occasions (a real crowd pleaser) AND who said something that has always stuck in my memory. "Rules are for the undisciplined".

Why do we need rules? We need them for the 2% of the population who has no self-discipline. If you pull your own weight, and you take care of your own, who cares if you have 21 items in the 20 item checkout? If you're not an idiot, why do you need disclaimers telling you that the firearm you just purchased may cause death or injury (I HOPE so, or I just wasted my money).

We live in a society that has lost its self discipline, and as a result, requires more and more rules.

Think about that next time you see some ridiculous disclaimer. And then remember that abundance leads to dependance, and dependance leads to servitude, aka slavery. We're on that path right now folks.

"Sign, sign, everywhere a sign... blockin' out the scenery breakin' my mind, do this, don't do that, can't you read the siiiiign"?

http://blacklistednews.com/news-2906-0-14-14--.html

This is a story about the NSA's spying program, which scans all your e-mails and almost certainly all your phone calls.

4th Amendment? What's that? After all, GW did say "the constitution is just a piece of paper".

The feds no longer have any respect for your privacy, the constitution, or anything else that gets in their way in their quest to continue our imperialist empire.

After long and careful thought, I've come up with the following solutions to all of our problems. I'm going to take a few suggestions from you all before I make this final, and send them to His Holiness, Barak H. Obama.

1. Energy: This one is difficult; but the technology is there. First, we clone the dinosaurs. We can do this with fossils of course. When adequate numbers are reached, we begin to kill them, bury them and drive over them with heavy machines. Then use the machines to dig up the coal, oil, gas and diamonds we created.

2. The economy: This one is really pretty easy. Pass a law saying we can all write ourselves a check for $100,000.00 and the banks must allow them to clear. That way we cut out the middleman (the government) and stimulate the economy.

3. Illegal immigration: all US citizens will conspire to pick up and move to Mexico on an agreed upon date. We will take everything with us and leave the land to the illegals. Since there is probably nobody left in Mexico, we'd then have our entire country there and they'd be up here. THEN we build the wall.

4. Global warming: after we have unlimited coal and oil from #1, we can build huge air conditioners to counter the effects of global warming (assuming global warming is even a reality).

5. Bad hair cuts: develop a helmet that has a small hole for each hair on your head. After you get the perfect hair cut, you place the helmet on and by use of a vacuum, it pulls each hair into a hole and measures it with a laser. Blades can then follow the measurements to cut the hair the exact same way next time. And in the not too distant future, RFID tags could be embedded in each hair. Their locations in relation to each other could be transmitted, and the machine could manipulate them to any style you select.

6. Office security: I have decided that a considerable amount of time could be saved if we combined our paper shredder with our printer. The printer would feed the paper directly into the shredder, thereby guaranteeing no chance of compromising company secrets. You don't REALLY need those TPS reports, do you?

7. High prices of health care and gasoline: As with #2, pass a law saying gas is $1.00 per gallon and health care is free. I'm really not sure why this hasn't been done yet, it seems obvious.

8. PETA: Yes I have a plan to get rid of PETA. First infiltrate them, then convince them that leather is a much more insidious abuse of animals than fur or meat. Then set up a rally for them. At the same time, infiltrate the outlaws, hells angels, mongols (what's left of them anyway), booze fighters, galloping gooses and any other MC you can think of and convince them that PETA wants their leather. Arrange a meeting.

OK throw some more problems at me so I can come up with solutions to them as well.

http://www.facesoflawsuitabuse.org/stories/story.asp?s
=48913

This is the perfect example of a litigious society gone mad.

A coach is hitting pop flies to the kids to teach them to catch (I guess) and one gets hit in the head.

SO THE FAMILY SUES THE COACH because he was negligent. The sun was in the kid's eyes. See the coach should have turned the dimmer switch on the sun I guess.

http://www.kunstler.com/Mags_Forecast2009.html

It's a long read, but worth it if you have any interest in how severe great depression II is going to get. Months ago I said we are headed for it, a few months ago I called the beginning of it. I'm just an arm chair economist, this guy is the real deal.

He recently dumped ALL his shares of Ford Motor Company. This is huge. At one point he had over a billion invested in Ford (ticker: F, NYSE).

Among his predictions:

The value of the dollar will drop 60% within a year due to hyper inflation.

The dow will drop to 4,000 next year

The car culture / urban sprawl way of life will be dead very soon - the middle class will no longer be able to afford to drive.

Hyper consumption is over, and credit will be nearly impossible for anyone to get in the forseeable future. "The days of using your house as an ATM are OVER".

Infrastructure collapsing due to lack of money.

And many many more....

As a card carrying ACLU member, I have collected these 10 commandments from one of their videos. I'm not a lawyer, and this is all written to the best of my memory, so it may not all be 100% accurate, but it will give you some guidelines on how to handle a traffic stop so that the stop will be minimally invasive.  You have 4th amendment rights (and others), USE THEM.

********************

1. Ask early and often, "Am I being detained, or am I free to go?". The U.S. Supreme court has ruled that once the initial traffic stop is completed, and you receive a ticket, you are under no further obligation to discuss ANYTHING with the officer. Many times the officer will even tell you this, then begin questioning you. Your answers WILL be held against you in court because you offered them voluntarily. If you ask this question, and the answer is, "you're free to go", turn around and walk away / drive off without further comment.

2. If you are asked any intrusive questions, that appear to be phrased in such a way as to get you to imply consent to search, say, "I don't consent to any searches, officer". This makes it clear you don't agree with any search, either implicitly or explicitly.

3. When pulled over, only roll your window down as far as necessary to communicate with the officer, unless he asks you to roll it down all the way of course. This prevents him from sticking his entire head in your vehicle and nosing around.

4. Keep everything out of plain sight. If there is nothing at all in plain sight in your vehicle, no smell of alcohol or drugs, etc. then there is probably no probable cause for a search.

5. Allow the driver to do ALL the talking. Don't offer any more information than is absolutely necessary to answer the question. "Yes", "no", and "I don't know" are perfectly acceptable answers. If in doubt about your rights, ask the officer if you are required to answer a question, and if you are allowed to consult legal counsel before doing so. Always remember that the cops are not your attorney, nor are they on your side. Their job is to find you doing something wrong. Don't believe promises that your life will be made easier if you just go along with them.

6. Know that often, law enforcement will delay arresting you to avoid reading you your rights. If they see something, they may continue to ask questions rather than arrest you immediately. This is another good time to ask, "Am I being detained, or am I free to go?".

7. Remember that attitude is 90% of any situation. Politeness goes a long way. Conversely, if you seem nervous or rattled, law enforcement will sense it and will push as hard as they can to find something to pin on you. Never argue, and certainly never resist with force. Resist the urge to smart off. Save your arguments for the judge, as difficult as that may be.

8. Answer questions, but follow up with a question, such as the ones listed above.

9. If you are stopped, and asked to step out of your vehicle, roll up your windows and lock the doors behind you. This makes it clear that you are not inviting any officer into your car by default. It makes searches much more difficult to defend in court.

10. Don't do anything illegal to begin with. Use the above tactics to avoid harassment, and to strengthen our legal system. It will cause law enforcement to respect our rights, and be much more careful when violating our privacy.

And I'll probably add one more. If a cop tells you to confess having something (drugs) in your car under the threat of getting a k9 to respond, DON'T. Make him bring the K9. I've personally seen them miss some pretty obvious finds.

Not only that, but it's not difficult to get a dog to false alert. Barry cooper recommends spraying the outside of your vehicle with fox urine (available at bass pro or cabelas). It distracts the dogs.

Oh and BTW, coffee grounds do NOT work. Nothing does. Dogs smell differently than people, and they can pick individual odors out. Eventually the smell of drugs will permeate any material, so don't count on it.

For more info - google Barry Cooper never get busted again.

One last tidbit - recently the Supreme Court made another ruling. Passengers in vehicles MAY challenge the legality of searches and seizures of the vehicle. Just another thing to keep in mind.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1101
005/Probe-cosmetic-surgeon-powered-4x4-patients-excess-
flab.html

He calls it "lipodiesel".

It seems he's been using the fat from his patients' liposuctions to make bio-diesel and power his two vehicles.

The feds aren't real happy with him though.