[vtsnowedin]

Homeless people tend to move to more populated areas as there are more services they can access within walking distance. Begging on a rural road is a poor performer compared to a busy city street.
And then if you sort out the residents of a homeless camp and take out those that are there due to drug abuse or alcoholism, and mental health issues made worse by alcohol and drugs there isn't much left except some single mothers and their children who chose the father of those children poorly.
In Vermont such mothers and children can access services that can get them off the street for the most part but that does not help a mother that is also drug addicted.

[Newfie]

Here is a more pleasant Degrowth to me killer.

https://m.facebook.com/lostnewfoundland/

[Newfie]

Degrowth Christmas humor.

[theluckycountry]

It's not just the metropolitan areas suffering this fate, but so too are many small towns in flyover country, even complete with their own mass homeless encampments. The official statistics on homelessness within the U.S. are easily off by at least one order of magnitude.

It's a complete collapse under way there by the sounds of it TC. The great depression was a disaster but the infrastructure didn't collapse, only the money system that led to people starving and industry going on hold. There was a bright light at the end of that tunnel in the form of abundant cheap energy. Not this time around though. This time it's down for the count. Here's hoping you find a place to weather the decline in the decades to come.

[Newfie]

Well, they seem have convinced my Wife we are on the verge of collapse. Short of time, I will try to explain more Thursday. It is just getting bizarre.

[Doly]

I'm not particularly surprised that Toe_cutter and AdamB talk to each other as if they lived in different countries. First, the USA is a really big country. The good bits are really different from the bad bits. And if you look at the stats, what strikes me the most is the inequality levels. It's obvious to me that people living at one level really don't know about people living at the other level, and they sort of think that they must be lying, somewhat deluded or exaggerating. I think both of you are probably telling the truth as you see it, without exaggeration. And that's one of the big problems that the USA has as a country. Those levels of inequality can't go on for very long.

[Newfie]

Doly,

I agree that we are split and see the world through very different eyes. Inequality has something to do with it but I am not convinced that is the best descriptor. It is one descriptor for sure.

I feel something deeper is going on, something weird.

Yesterday I set a 20# box of kitty liter in the vestibule. I went to get it a couple of hours later and found someone had taken the box, opened it, and poured out the contents into a bag or something, and left the empty box.

Why???

[Newfie]

I offer the below as a contemplation not as a statement of fact. The situation is very complicated and possibly volitile.

We retired and left Philadelphia in 2016, we spend our winters in the Caribbean and summers in Newfoundland. Tough life eh?

Then covid and we came back stateside June 2020, stayed in North Carolina until June 2021. At that time renters of 19 years left and we took over one apartment to do a rehab/upgrade. We had full intentions of keeping the building but as we observed Philly life my Wife became convinced it was time to cash out and leave.

Her account is that it is not the same place it once was. There is a massive building boom going on, and most of it is very poor construction. 4 story stick buildings with brick or vinyl facades. Row upon row, you can almost pass a hot dog from one balcony to the living room of the adjacent block. They are throw backs to the Soviet era mass housing. Many other older houses are being rebuilt, improved, or even torn down and replaced. A twin of our house, on our block, in very good condition just went for $1.85 million. The buyer is gutting it and making it 7 apartments. That will likely cost close to another million considering the scope which includes removing a redundant spiral staircase.

My Wife believes this is an insane bubble which is destroying the good parts of the neighborhood. The quality of life has gone down with the population increase. Everything is overloaded and it just keeps getting pumped up.

I see it in peoples attitudes. Pedestrians and bicyclists. Not all but far too many act like they are out to commit suicide by car. They just walk or ride out into the street. At night they wear all black. I very nearly hit a pedestrian yesterday because she just made a hard left into my path. They have NO sense of self preservation, they rely entirely upon others to protect them. They walk/ride down the middle of streets, engulfed in their phones or whatever, oblivious. The streets have bike lanes but they are seldom used. Bikers have no care of rules and ride counter traffic down one way streets and blow through lights. Motorist are frequently as bad, there seems to be no speed limit and we have seen many folks blow stop lights. Recently I was at a stop light with 3 cars behind me, some guy just comes up and drives around in the in-coming lane, blows the light, and keeps going. No big hurry, just his style.

Talking to my old associates is difficult. There is an extremely high level of aggression toward Republicans, hate speech really. It is clearly dehumanizing propaganda. I am sure there are places where it occurs the other way around, but not in Philly.

2 weeks ago there were 5 murders or rather executions in 3 days. 4 were men sitting in or working on there cars when some guy walks up and shoots him. Some shooters were adept, 2 rounds and done. Others used more like 18 rounds. The 5th was a 25 yo woman. It was all caught on video tape. Some guy is hanging on a corner, this woman walks up a side street, turns and is gunned down. In other incidents a guy was after someone on a bus and opened up through the side of the bus. A guy eating diner was killed by a stray from 2 chaps fighting over booze. 2 days ago a 16 yo and a 14 yo were gunned down in separate incidents. The 14 yo was waiting at a school bus stop when 2 guys came after him. 35 rounds latter he was dead of 18 injuries. The 16 yo was similar.

Nobody nowhere knows nothing. Frankly it sounds like some kind of gang warfare but the news gives just the barest passages. These do not appear to be crimes of passion.

To me this bespeaks a general breakdown if the social contract. John Locke said the ONE fundamental right you give to government is vigilantism. Jared Diamond and others make a similar point; the foundation of civil government is in the reduction of revenge violence/killing through the application of law. Is this people taking back the enforcement of rules even if they are street rules?

There is some weird paradox where the well off whites in our neighborhood have such a feeling of entitlement that they flaunt their own personal disregard for safety and others clearly are taking matters into their own hands to dispense justice as they see it.

If push were to come to shove it is, to me, pretty clear which side would prevail. At what point push comes to shove is unclear. Maybe it is when the police decide to stand down, to quit being the monkey in the middle.

My sense is that the minority black community is split with a fair portion being rather conservative church going, salt if the Earth type citizens who understand the personal power dynamic pretty clearly. They understand the need for a professional government and the city management to provide fundamental services. Does there come a time when they revolt against the D party? As it is the highest anti-bad demographic rests in the black community, quite possibly because there is a deep distrust of the government.

I don’t know the racial make up of the Rittenhouse jury, my guess is majority black ladies. I have served in such a jury and I came away with a deep respect for these women. They took their job very seriously and did some pretty serious soul searching to come up with a fair verdict. They were no dummies, they could see through the baloney easily enough and got to the essential truths in short order. They were sick and tired of “these young hoodlums ruling our streets.” I saw no racial prejudice but a lot of practical knowledge and traditional values. I think thats why Rittenhouse got off, not because he acted properly (he didn’t) but because he was on the side of order vs anarchy; God represents order and the Devil anarchy.

So I can see the stage set for some pretty dramatic civil strife as these various parties attempt to work things out. That strife can then easily fall over into a general disruption which tanks the already wobbly economy. How far it goes is anyones guess. Will it devolve into a general collapse? Who knows. But it is a possibility.

[vtsnowedin]

I don’t know the racial make up of the Rittenhouse jury, my guess is majority black ladies.

You guessed wrong.

The jury is composed of 11 women and nine men; 19 of them are white and one is Hispanic, according to reporting from WISN 12 News’s Hillary Mintz.

That was the pool including alternates.

[Pops]

LOL, gunfights in the street is your idea of "order"? Rittenhouse, Zimmerman proves that if you can legally carry a gun, any murder is justified simply by saying "I was afraid he was gonna take my gun and shoot me!"
Once everyone is armed 24/7 there is no such thing as murder, it is always self-defense. That seems to be the aim anyway
That will help degrowth.

--
Strangely I feel like the current climate is more one of ephemeral decadence rather than untold agony. Especially the last 10 years but really the last 40 years, government is borrowing merely to keep the party going. As I have ranted repeatedly, subtract yearly borrowing from so-called yearly "growth" and you find that we have been de-growing since about 1985. Housing increased 20% last year, because the government props up the mortgage lending market by buying every paper available. The stock market has been overvalued for years and is now approaching the 44x value that proceeded the dot.com bust.

Degrowth has been with us for a while. Diminishing returns from increasing complexity is the diagnosis. Only the foam of trillions in funny money are supporting the whole edifice. Bridges crumble while we wait for the Apple VR goggles to make reality tolerable. Turns out that apps, interest, and real estate commissions don't an economy make.

[Newfie]

I don’t know the racial make up of the Rittenhouse jury, my guess is majority black ladies.

You guessed wrong.

The jury is composed of 11 women and nine men; 19 of them are white and one is Hispanic, according to reporting from WISN 12 News’s Hillary Mintz.

That was the pool including alternates.

As I said I was guessing. I just took a look and found that Kenosha was 79% white in 2019. So that goes a long way to explaining.

My personal observations about the case I was involved in which was 11 people of color, 11 black and 1 asian, remain.


Perhaps it goes to show that at core many people have a similar moral standard.

[Newfie]

Pops wrote:

LOL, gunfights in the street is your idea of "order"?

Never said any such thing whatsoever.

Do try to read. I have no idea what you are ranting about.

Just to clarify my thoughts to you; Rittenhouse et al were dumb for going there, armed or not. The opposing side were also dumb for being there. If “dumb” was a chargeable offense then lock them all up.

However, 12 peers sat and listened to the evidence and charges and came to a decision. I was not one, I did not walk in their shoes, but I respect their decision.

There was and is so much wrong about that event I hardly know where to start. But one thing is for sure, no one out there had respect for the government nmet or its ability to enforce order.

…..

The rest of your post has much merit from a historical perspective. Lots of dumb decisions have been made to get us here.

My post was more about what it feels and looks like. It is about how those decisions are manifesting.

[Pops]

Pops wrote:

LOL, gunfights in the street is your idea of "order"?

Never said any such thing whatsoever.

Do try to read. I have no idea what you are ranting about.

Actually you said exactly that

I think thats why Rittenhouse got off, not because he acted properly (he didn’t) but because he was on the side of order vs anarchy;

Untrained 17 year olds illegally taking semi-autos into the street then killing people and getting off on self defense because they were afraid of the very gun they brought...
not my idea of order.

[Newfie]

No it is not what I said, you are hearing what you want to hear.

Don’t know how to help you threw that.

But I would appreciate you to stop hour interpretations. You clearly are not interested in others viewpoints. So be it.

It is disappointing that you feel so much more entitled than the 12 jurors and our legal system. But you exemplify the problem, you feel entitled to enforce your opinion over the rule of law.

Pity.

[Pops]

I quoted your on words and yet you still deny and instead of interact or debate, you attack and ad hom me and tell me to stop my "interpretations" — which I assume are the viewpoints that don't align with yours.

Nice. You're doing a good job clearing out the board


Rittenhouse was there as a vigilante, no denying that, the local sheriff said as much about quite a few militia wannabes who drove in looking to shoot someone. They are not on the side of order any more than the rioters.

Doesn't excuse the people doing property damage. It does make me wonder how much I would have to take before I resorted to the same actions. Not sure that's really possible to do.

[Pops]

Strangely I feel like the current climate is more one of ephemeral decadence rather than untold agony.

I just saw a headline on CNBC that stock sales by CEOs and insiders are 80% above their 10 year average. One head said primarily due to the market level. Not sure how much this indicates a top but it wouldn't give me the warm fuzzies.

We've had a long string of easy money and inflating assets, are houses really worth 20% more than a year ago or is money worth 20% less? I get the feeling that we're sitting on a big pile of whipped cream that is about to go flat. I could see the beginning of "degrowth" being the disappearance of the current froth.

Not as nice as a global kumbaya but maybe the shock we need.

[gollum]

While I favor tangible assets like farmland or rentals or gold stocks are probably better than cash in the bank or under the mattress for now. It will be really hard for the government to stop printing at this point and doing so will probably crash the whole system so I can't see inflation going away until they've printed their own debt in to worthlessness.

[vtsnowedin]

Strangely I feel like the current climate is more one of ephemeral decadence rather than untold agony.

I just saw a headline on CNBC that stock sales by CEOs and insiders are 80% above their 10 year average. One head said primarily due to the market level. Not sure how much this indicates a top but it wouldn't give me the warm fuzzies.

We've had a long string of easy money and inflating assets, are houses really worth 20% more than a year ago or is money worth 20% less? I get the feeling that we're sitting on a big pile of whipped cream that is about to go flat. I could see the beginning of "degrowth" being the disappearance of the current froth.

Not as nice as a global kumbaya but maybe the shock we need.

I would not worry too much about that insider selling. It is mostly a few big winners cashing in a small portion of their capital gains to settle the tax bill on it now in anticipation of much higher federal and state tax rates next year and beyond. Prudent moves on their part and kept small enough so that the overall values of their companies have not gone down appreciably. Insider selling has been a small fraction of the totals in recent years so an 80% increase in that number still gives a small number.
As to the price of houses I see your dollar as being worth 20% less as that over priced house will soon get a 20% increase in it's yearly taxes and maintenance costs so coming out ahead in five to fifteen years after all your costs are considered appears unlikely.

[Newfie]

Pops,

I have told you twice you are miss interpreting my words.

Yet you insist you understand my meaning better than I do.

I find it odd you don’t ask for clarification.

[vtsnowedin]

Pops,

I have told you twice you are miss interpreting my words.

Yet you insist you understand my meaning better than I do.

I find it odd you don’t ask for clarification.

I for one have lost just which post you are referring to here.
Hard to comment or contribute if the subject is hidden.