Could you please take a few moments of your online time here to consider making a donation (not tax-deductible, sadly) to the (fully-secure and encrypted, know) Virtual Tip Jar:
...or seeing what's in my e-boutique, The Exaggerator Collection by name and stylee, not to mention these fine e-tailers that this blog is affiliate with:
(part 2):
If you're a blogger or webmaster looking to add value for money to your blog/website, please take a look @ these worthwhile options:
And why not take a moment to look @ PayPal as a way to add online shopping to your website, or otherwise raise funds.
EVEN YOUR BETTER BUSINESS BUREAU WILL TELL YOU THAT, CONTRARY TO A NUMBER OF ADVERTS YOU MAY BE HEARING on disreputable radio stations (especially so the sort specialist in conservative prolefeed) for so-called "debt negotiation" services, there is no legal right to negotiate any outstanding and valid debts down to reasonable levels, and pay such so that the resulting balance is recorded as "paid in full."
As a matter of fact, "debt negotiation" services, technically known as "debt consolidation" or "debt factoring," are subject to licencing and bonding requirements depending on your state; hence, check with the approriate consumer-protection channels for the law in your state.
And check with the Better Business Bureau in your area for reports on the character and repute of any company/ies you may want to use for "debt consolidation."
(As a safeguard, check your local 211 infoservice for availability in your area of debt-counselling agencies such as the Consumer Credit Counselling Service, "operating Purely for Principle and Not for Profit.")
*************
WITH STATE LOTTERIES IN SOME PARTS OF THE COUNTRY REPUTEDLY SEEING HIGHER TICKET SALES THANKS TO THE CURRENT SOCIOECONOMIC UNCERTAINTY, especially so in culturally-deprived environments, something which the Religiopolitical Right may want to think of promoting as a counter to lottery expansion as would "empower" (or so they think) the Lower Classes, rather than almost-constant bellyaching on the problem and its ensuing evils, the likes of mutual savings banks as would promote thrift and self-reliance.
So what stands in the way? Latent anti-Semitism vis-a-vis the banking community? "More pressing issues" like abortion, the Evil of Homosexuality, "threats" to Our Traditional Culture and Heritage and other distractions?
=============
AND SPEAKING OF "OUR TRADITIONAL CULTURE," how are we to guess that the Zealots and True Believers in Cultural Conservatism want to see Die Bransoner Muzikschaukultur as the "litmus test" they have in mind for establishing a Definitive Amerikanischer Realkultur?
*************
AND FOR SUCH WHO SPEAK ABOUT "THE DEFENCE OF EUROPEAN-AMERICAN CULTURE AND HERITAGE" AS ONE WITH "RACIAL AND NATIONAL HONOUR," you have to wonder what prevents their displaying the European Union flag alongside Old Glory as a "display of solidarity" (or so they perceive).
As for what the European Union flag looks like:
So ... what exactly is the fear of displaying Old Glory and the European flag side by side? Fear of facing up to the Harsh Reality that the EU's member states are united in their objections to the same articles of faith as xenophobia, racism, bigotry, intolerance and hate that you hold dear as "healthy" and "patriotic" among your so-called "European-American peoples" who are more than likely poor, ignorant, easily-influenced and socioeconomically vulnerable all the more?
Fear that the European flag might eventually be approriated by that Evil Empire in your mind otherwise known as the "New World Order," especially absent substantiative evidence?
Which brings to mind the following worthwhile and @ once timely video:
Besides: Don't you know this is the 21st century already?
Open Letter to the Greater Conservative Movement, and its several entities
To whom it may concern:
First, I wish to apologise for what you may perceive as "undue and unnecessary intrusion" into your busy schedule and routine.
In any event, please allow me to proceed:
In the interest of Truth, Common Sense and the Greater Collective Good of the Nation and its Peoples, I would like to ask you, as a Patriotic and Right-Thinking American, to Please Explain @ your soonest opportunity:
whether it is true that you issue prepared and scripted, even to the point of nuanced, "talking points" for conservative-leaning talk radio and TV hosts, columnists and blog writers;
how much it costs to dissemiate said "talking points" on your part, especially where fax and e-mail services are used;
how the daily "talking points" guidance is arrived @ from day to day (in other words, whether some sort of formula is used to determine the tone and phrasing therefor, the better for "winning of hearts and minds" among especially the ignorant and easily-influenced as are open to suggestion all too easily);
whether you have recommended scripts used to advance the day's "talking points" to ensure maximum impact among the "movers and shakers" in Washington and elsewhere;
whether you offer payola to especially radio and TV hosts advancing your daily "talking points" according to the daily guidance in this respect, and in what amounts;
how much payola is paid out in an average year, and the average amounts therefor;
whether such payola is paid out of your organisation's funds, or through so-called "pure trusts" based offshore "for tax reasons;"
whether the rates for such payola are based on how carefully such comments "stick to the script," so to speak, based on any monitoring thereof you conduct; and
what sort of "guidance" you have to especially radio and TV hosts (but also columnists and bloggers) in receipt of the daily "talking points" advice to avoid attracting reader, listener or viewer suspicions that "cash-for-comments" arrangements are influencing the tone and content of their favourite TV and radio programmes, columns or weblogs--and, if such suspcions are raised, what sort of steps should be taken to be on the defensive.
The public interest compels me to ask the above of you, and I sincerely hope and trust you will be forthcoming within measurable distance with honest and sincere answers--not manufactured platitudes and bromides seeking to protect yourself from suspicion. There are those amongst us that know about just such possibilities.
Otherwise, can you Please Explain what prevents your disclosing the answers @ this time, provided that clear and compelling public interest can be justified (let alone "trade secrets" or suchlike other patsy).
MEMO TO READERS: Your Correspondent encourages you to please share this Open Letter with your friends and e-mail contacts--not to mention such causes and movements you support and identify with.
(Hopefully including such of the conservative persuasion, as are the target therefor.)
However, if you can help it, please avoid recourse to "spam," as the device can only prove ineffective to the point of backfiring and undermining the intentions of same.
Sooo--what class of blogger is Your Correspondent?
FOR SUCH AMONG YOU READERS, ESPECIALLY THOSE AS WERE ATTRACTED THROUGH ENTRECARD in recent days, to The Exaggerator, and enquiring as to the kind of blogger Your Correspondent is--here's the answer:
You Are a Pundit Blogger!
Your blog is smart, insightful, and always a quality read.
You're up on the latest news, and you have an interesting spin on things.
Of all the blogging types, you put the most thought and effort into your blog.
Truly appreciated by many, surpassed by only a few
A REGULAR SEGMENT ON FOX PROLEFEED'S THE O'REILLY FACTOR is entitled "Patriots and Pinheads," which serves nothing more than advancing an idealised conservative ideal of patriotism bordering on the hard-wired to the point of parroting out the latest conservative bumper-sticker slogans on cue in the rather reechy-sounding voice thus preferred.
Which brings up the question of who exactly is considered "acceptable" patriot material to the conservative Weltanschauung--IMHO, they would likely see "poor white trash" Joe Sixpack types of the Park and Flush to be "patriots" whereas those in "the projects" for want of a decent credit record as would help them obtain a decent mortgage as opposed to a "sub-prime" such pushed through trick or deception would be seen in this line of thinking as "pinheads."
Not to mention such being borderline appeal to racism.
Especially when the patriotism is expected to be that of the kind epitomised by the Orwellian Newspeak term "goodthoughtful"--as in being orthodox without question or reservation, practicing such True Patriot Love in All Thy Sons Command as it were second nature. (As if implying that any deviation or reservation therefrom was only the first sign of Serious Mental Disorders.)
Remember this, my friends: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."
BACK IN 1917, SOON AFTER THE UNITED STATES ENTERED WORLD WAR I, THE PRECEDING AD FOR LUCKY STRIKE CIGARETTES WAS WIDELY SEEN to call attention to the fact that the war-era United States Food Administration encouraged the consumption of various alternative foods in the interest of "our boys Over There" and those in war-devastated areas of Europe.
In this case, suggesting cheese as an alternative to meat dishes.
Come to think of it, how many of you reading this blog have actually tried Welsh rarebit (essentially melted cheese over toast)?
And is it possible to fix Welsh rarebit with the likes of Velveeta?
NO DOUBT THE PRECEDING PHOTO IS CERTAIN TO BE USED BY OPPONENTS OF RENEWABLE ENERGY BASED ON SO-CALLED "WISE USE" ARGUMENTS in their "winning of hearts and minds" propaganda seeking to justify perpetuation of the status quo, and invoking G-d and Country to justify the same.
Especially such appealing to the ignorant and less-sophisticate which electric power companies are secretly counting on to maintain "guaranteed" profit margins through the continued and continuing use of less-energy-efficent lighting and appliances solely because of cost (and, in a way, restricted access to decent channels of consumer credit).
The same who, it turns out, rely all too heavily on Fox Prolefeed for their news and information, or what passeth for it. And to accept its prolefeed as fact without question or reservation, thinking that to so challenge anything seen on TV is one with "error and weakness" which, in its turn, could translate to "serious mental disorders."
=============
MEANWHILE, SPEAKING OF THE IGNORANT AND LESS-SOPHISTICATE, history has shown where they are all the more vulnerable to exploitation, thanks to limited or non-existant job skills on their part, by weird and unwholesome mountebank types promising big-big money by exploiting their unfortunate financial condition (and even more so @ this time).
Recent developments in Colombia, as discussed by Pyramid Scheme Alert, should serve as a warning to especially such who are looking for extra pretty polly in the face of the emerging socioeconomic emergency:
Two people are dead, 13 towns under police curfew and the country's top banking regulator has resigned. This is part of the fallout from the collapse of a large pyramid scheme that operated openly and "legally" in Colombia. The consequences are tragic. However, the more significant story from Colombia is one that is being repeated in many other countries. The authorities let it happen, even as the signs of a massive fraud were obvious.
How obvious? The scheme was called "Easy Money Fast Cash'' and promised investors payments of 70 percent to 150 percent a month. Police reported that the scheme operated for more than a year.
In the wake of the collapse, the country's top banking regulator (the scam masqueraded as a bank) resigned but only after thousands of poor, rural people in Colombia lost $270 million.
The scam's owners, Carlos Alfredo Suarez, fled the country. Investors rioted. Police confiscated $26 million but report that most of the money is gone and Suarez' whereabouts are unknown. The president of Colombia claims the government will try to help but does not specify how.
Bailouts of pyramid scheme victims are rare.
The most common question -- overwhelmingly -- posed to Pyramid Scheme Alert is, "Why does the government allow pyramid schemes to operate? Why doesn't it enforce the law?"
Examples:
In Canada… a scheme is now recruiting all over the country that promises $5,000 commission on a $3,200 "sale." How can this be? The scheme, called Business in Motion (BIM), claims it can do this because it has a system called "perpetual motion." In fact, no one purchases the company's product (membership in a vacation discount program) other than the "sales people." To gain the "commissions" each "sales person" must also make a $3,200 "purchase." The scheme is structured in the classic "8-ball" (1,2,4,8) of a pyramid scheme, in which most of the money paid in by last eight people that join the scam is transferred to the one person at the top, three levels above. Then the structure "spits" and each side must recruit eight each for a total of 16 new people and the cycle repeats over and over again. As the scheme progresses, it must continue to double the number of recruits – 16, 32, 64, 128, etc. If it "spits" just 22 times, the last recruits will need to find 8 billion new people! Yet, Canadian authorities still have not applied either the country's anti-pyramid law or its anti-fraud law.
In England… England's government is currently trying to close down the MLM giant Amway, as a pyramid scheme. However, an English judge has slowed the process and the case is on appeal. Meanwhile, Pyramid Gifting Schemes are, again, sweeping the country. One of the latest is being promoted by a star from the UK's version of the television show, The Apprentice. The young woman was selected over 20,000 others to be in show. She was revealed in a BBC exposé as now advertising the classic "gifting" pyramid scam. (Perhaps it is not so surprising that a star of Apprentice would start up a pyramid scheme, since, after all, Donald Trump, the host and star of the USA version of the show is a pitchman for the MLM scheme, ACN.) That scheme is only one of many others. Another BBC program, X-Ray uncovered and reported that "the reputations of some of Wales' most respected charities have been used by the organisers of an illegal pyramid scheme to lend an air of legitimacy to their activities, which involve people handing over thousands of pounds in a chain-gifting syndicate." Like Canada, England has good laws to enforce against Amway and other types of pyramids, the Gambling Act 2005 and the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008. Like consumers and taxpayers in Canada and the USA, UK citizens are asking: Why doesn't the government enforce the laws?
What we have learned over and over again is that lack of law enforcement becomes a form of government endorsement of scams. Often the schemers boldly ask, "If we are illegal, how could we be advertising, holding these public meetings and recruiting so many new people?"
An issue, methinks, which the incoming Obama/Biden Administration may want to address in seeking to create jobs for the unemployed and unemployable ... and which the Zealots and True Believers in the Ayn Rand mold may want to think twice about, considering their hard-wired belief that only a pure form of free-market capitalism will actually create "real" jobs, paying "real" money (preferably gold-backed) and, in turn, creating a New Golden Age of Industry, Self-Reliance, Personal Responsibility, Thrift based on Cash Economy and a Wholesome and Simple Home Life rooted, it turns out, in Poverty, Fecundity and Stupidity of the highest order.
=============
MEANWHILE, THOSE OPPOSING ABORTION BASED SOLELY ON THE "LIFE BEGINS @ CONCEPTION" ARGUMENT may want to start thinking about whether they also have "economic arguments" for justifying such articles of faith--as in a need to maintain an unskilled, labour-intensive manufacturing model and paradigm which can easily be excused as "industrial heritage" for tariff reasons.
Especially when there are disincentives in the tax department for new plant and equipment being purchased, out of fear that such would only "prevent jobs creation" as threatens the ultimate Sanctii Sanctorum among the Greater Religiopolitical Right of nil-rate unemployment within the parameters of free-market capitalism, without recourse to "make-work/fake-work" positions which Communist regimes were fond of creating to create the aura of nil-rate unemployment in their propaganda.
And doesn't it seem rather ironic that many of the same elements who oppose abortion also support eugenics, itself based on discredited pseudoscience made all the more so by totalitarian regimes holding eugenics to be the key towards creating a "Master Race" as would be above human error and weakness?
READER, THE ABOVE PHOTO WOULDN'T BE OUT OF PLACE @ THE LIKES OF CYPRESS GARDENS OR WISCONSIN DELLS when you get right down to it ... but I just thought I'd like to explain my EntreCard-dropping technique for any of you who are interested in joining as a way to improve their traffic cf. other blog traffic exchanges, some of which have wound up business in recent months.
Or, for those already in EntreCard, are looking for a fresh strategem to build the traffic.
I prefer to go the random blog route, scouting out such whose blogs have cute-looking EntreCards or blog names, and drop card there. If such blogs display another blog's EntreCard in the widget, I go there, leaving another such, and so on ad infinitum.
(Until I get the maximum 300 drops/day EntreCard allows.)
And since joining late on Thanksgiving night as a way to largely supplant BlogMad (itself being sold to Today.com) for building traffic, there can be no mistaking the obvious: EntreCard dropping has helped attract the visitors to this blog (especially so among some of the more avid blogging types as seem to come from Malaysia, the Phillippines and Singapore) in just the last five days that I've been in EntreCard, mostly from such looking for new blogs to leave cards with.
=============
AND THE TRAFFIC NUMBERS BEAR THE STORY OUT, as tracked by SiteMeter.com:
Thanksgiving Day (Thursday, 27 November): 10 visitors and 11 page views.
Friday, 28 November (first full day in EntreCard): 89 visitors (890% gain), 103 page views (936.37% gain).
Saturday, 29 November: 105 visitors (1,050% gain on Thanksgiving Day), 115 page views (1,045% gain on Thanksgiving Day)
Sunday, 30 November: 81 visitors (810% gain on Thanksgiving), 87 page views (791% gain on Thanksgiving) (N.B. Traffic from EntreCard was affected by a shutdown for emergency system maintenance that evening, which cut into the numbers.)
Monday, 1 December: 141 visitors (1,410% gain on Thanksgiving), 150 page views (1,363.63% gain on Thanksgiving Day).
Tuesday, 2 December: 171 visitors (1,710% gain on Thanksgiving Day), 195 page views (1,772.8% gain on Thanksgiving).
Five-day average since joining EntreCard: 117.4 visitors/day, 130 page views/day, with an average of 1.107 pages viewed among blog visitors.
And is this impressive for a newbie, or WHAT?!
=============
FOR THOSE WHO ASK WHY I PREFER GOING THE RANDOM SCOUTING ROUTE IN MY CARD-DROPPING ENDEAVOURS, I'll be the first to admit that it makes things all the easier on myself.
And besides, there's no telling what sort of blogs you're likely to discover in random surf mode.
As for the ensuing ad buys using EntreCredits, which are used to buy ad exposure on member blogs, I, for the time being, am preferring such which charge the cheapest. Let it be hoped that such will actually translate into some further worthwhile traffic.
Not to mention subscriptions to the RSS feed ... further referrals among fellow bloggers and others of interest ... and, may it be hoped, some serious business in the online shopping section of this weblog; I can get some serious supplemental income in the process, especially considering my disability precluding any substantiative employment and the disability benefit only getting so far. (Including my e-boutique, by name of The Exaggerator Collection, featuring wearable ur-billboards guaranteed[?] to call attention to this weblog wherever you may be in the world--especially so the tackiest of tourist traps whose biggest appeal is to the Johnny Bravo/Kanker Sisters sort. Just like Wall Drug and their signs ... and Stew Leonard's and their shopping bags.)
So, all in all, thanks for your support of this blog, and the worthwhile comments you've left in the interim. Now, if you'll just bookmark this in your browser or subscribe to the RSS feed--either way, making The Exaggerator a regular online habit on your part--such displays of interest will be a worthwhile return on the time and effort Your Correspondent puts into same.
Not to mention recommendations to your fellow blogging friends and blog-reading fans across the blogosphere (and yes, there is a "tell a friend" facility off on the side of the page for that purpose).
BY NOW, YOU'VE PROBABLY HEARD ABOUT THE SO-CALLED "HOLY LAND FOUNDATION" HAVING BEEN FOUND GUILTY OF RAISING FUNDS IN FURTHERANCE OF TERRORISM by claiming to be a "humanitarian aid society" which raised funds to (in theory) provide food, clothing and shelter for needy and deserving Palestinian Arabs in Palestinian Gaza--only to turn around and divert the monies to Hamas-affiliated terrorist organisations to commit infamous and notorious acts of terrorism against Israel.
Let this be a lesson and @ once warning to such who see supporting the Palestinian cause over that of the Jewish State of Israel to be one with the defence of European-American Racial Honour and Integrity--and excusing such on the (supposed) logic that "the enemy of my enemy is a friend of mine," never mind the majority of Palestinian Arabs being Muslims, with some Eastern Orthodox Christians in the mix, let alone Palestinian Arabs being otherwise seen by such unconventional sympathisers as "inferior mud peoples."
Not to mention frustrating such wanting to support the Palestinian cause in good faith and trust based on the arguments just summarised, all the while not wanting to be stigmatised as unwittingly supporting terrorism.
