Help!! Is there a financial Wizard out there somewhere? I need your input! My bank, the Société Générale, is advising
Société Générale
its customers that “a global economic collapse” is very possible within the next two years and that we should make “defensive preparations” for it.
Is this a sign of the bank losing its mind (and they did lose £5 billion a few years ago at the hands of a rogue trader) or do they know something that other pundits don’t?
Where is the Guru that can tell me where I should put my money now? Under the mattress? And in which form? Shirt buttons?
They say gold will skyrocket as the only thing buyable worth buying! And there’s me having just sold all mine at what I thought was the top of the market!!!! Oh Dear …..
Most of the readers of Learning from Dogs will be aware of the global embarrassment that Toyota is facing as a result of the recall of the Toyota Prius model. As described partly on the UK website of Toyota:
Toyota have announced a recall on the latest, third-generation Prius built before 27 January 2010. This will involve 8,500 cars in the UK.
To date, there have been no accidents linked to this issue reported in Europe. No other Toyota or Lexus models are affected by this latest recall action in Europe.
Toyota GB would like to apologise to its customers for any concern this issue has caused.
The recall is being taken in response to reports of inconsistent brake feel during slow and steady braking on bumpy or slick road surfaces when the anti-lock braking system (ABS) is actuated.
Well a few days ago, a friend of mine sent me a text message on my cell phone. It read, “Just driving my new Toyota Prius. Chat later, Can’t stop.”
And I see the Jeremy Clarkson/James May team from BBC’s Top Gear programme are also having a little poke at Toyota. James May was reported to have said:
‘You have to laugh a bit don’t you,’
‘Maybe if you’re going to try to save the world through your car you have to accept that some sacrifices have to be made and one of them is stopping.’
Once again the British Broadcasting Company, BBC, has put together a spectacular television production; the epic story of how geology, geography and climate have influenced mankind. It is remarkable and fabulous viewing as you can sample in these opening minutes from the first episode on Deep Earth.
The four programmes, Deep Earth; Water; Wind; Fire, are testament to both the incredible symbiosis between mankind and the elements and how that relationship is critically balanced in a way that allows us to survive. Some of the images are truly outstanding, for example, the section on Prof. Iain Stewart exploring the Naica Cave system in Mexico.
Naica Cave system, Mexico
This theme of the balance of geological circumstances that allows, just, mankind to survive comes across time and time again in these films. For example, our relationship with fresh water which we all take completely for granted.
Have any of us really pondered how long we would survive if there was insufficient clean, safe drinking water to go around?
The programmes also reveal something of the technological prowess that mankind has achieved to allow the way these films have been produced.
So why, oh why, are we also such a stupid, stupid species – so stupid that we foul our own nest to an incredible degree.
Europe puts on a grand farce for the rest of the world to watch and wonder at.
The “Greece scuppers the euro” soap opera is steaming along at top speed and the iceberg ahead is more than big enough to sink the Euro, the flagship of those seeking a United States of Europe.
The Euro coin
Several very interesting things are becoming clearer about all this:
A) Greece (and for that matter some other countries) was NOT “ready” for the straitjacket of a single currency in the same bed as Germany, Holland and other serious (well, sort of ) countries, particularly in the North ….
B) The EU hierarchy set some stiff rules for entry to the Euro, which Greece LIED about to gain entry.
C) I firmly believe the EU leaders KNEW that Greece’s figures were the delusional fruits of fraudulent pretention, but they PRESSED ON regardless.
The question is, WHY did they let Greece in? And the reason was – I maintain – their GREED. Not directly for money (though that is ever in the background) but for POWER. The more countries in the Euro the bigger the organism and all organisms seek to grow to their maximum.
The bigger the Eurozone the more unstoppable the momentum would appear (and “appear” is certainly the right word) and the more power would accrue to Brussels and Frankfurt. POLITICAL GREED overcame economic and financial logic.
But the chickens always come home to roost and the result could now be the OPPOSITE of what they wanted to achieve.
Coming back to the roost
Instead of a tight core of financially-stable and righteous Eurocountries that could have thrived as a model for others to emulate and join, Euroland has become a haphazard bodge of totally-disparate economies that has every chance of unravelling in chaos.
I have no desire to see the Greeks or anyone else in economic trouble, but we cannot build a new Europe – let alone world – on lies and a lack of realism. A touch of hubris is direly needed. More practically, we need more long-term planning and less short-term political greed and cowardice.
If this Greek crisis had happened when the EU was flush with funds then it could perhaps – temporarily – have been bodged over as usual. Now we are still on a financial knife edge, and it could go either way. There is some talk that this crisis could accelerate political and monetary union, but I can’t see individual countries giving up their financial independence to Frankfurt and Brussels …. what is true is that we are in dangerous waters out of control and maybe heading towards the rapids … (or the iceberg …) Most EU countries are already in serious trouble; the last thing they need is a further drain on scarce resources. The Greek patient could well bring down the German doctor …….
One of the funniest things (if you like black humour) was soon after the EU bigwigs fixed a ceiling of 3% above GDP for countries’ budget deficits. In other words, countries joining the Euro had to guarantee to take steps to ensure this ceiling would not be breached, and this in the interests of Euroland as a whole; a sort of collective responsibility.
Yet as soon as FRANCE found it could not apply the self-discipline to keep to this promise (do promises matter at all in politics?) then some French government spokesperson said when challenged on this that “the rule could not be applied to big countries.”
Many of the situations that we face are well understood … or, at least, we think they are! Then someone comes along with a different approach and breaks through into a new regime.
This can be unsettling, but then the new approach becomes the norm. What was previously obvious is now ridiculous; and what was previously ridiculous is now obvious! No wonder these things do not happen often, because, if they did, they would not be so unusual!
Eli Godratt has had an enormous impact on many businesses through his approach to understanding business processes. Some of his most effective works are novels! How many business consultants write novels to help people to learn? “The Goal” was his first and captured the main elements of his approach which he termed the Theory of Constraints. He has gone on to describe new approaches to project management, which he calls Critical Chain.
Three of the authors on Learning from Dogs are or have been pilots although only one, Bob Derham, is a real pilot! I.e. he does it for a living!
Most pilots and many wannabes love the atmosphere of a good air show but after a few visits they can become rather predictable and that applies as much to the flying displays. After all there is only so much that one can do to an aeroplane.
Here’s a YouTube video showing Kyle Franklin ‘stealing’ a Piper Cub. As a past owner of a Piper Super Cub, I have to tell you that the skills being used in this display are supremely clever.
Like most people if most western nations, for many years I had a cell phone, or a mobile phone as they are known in the UK.
I can recall a few years ago there being a scare in the UK about the microwave radiation hazard involved in using a cell phone but it certainly passed me by in terms of not really worrying about it.
Now a recent report in GQ Magazine seems to be gathering some momentum: once again, it’s about how your cell phone may be hazardous to your health. It would be too easy just to dismiss this as just another poke at a very successful technology but something about this article caused me to write this Post – make of it what you will.
Here’s an extract:
Earlier this winter, I met an investment banker who was diagnosed with a brain tumor five years ago. He’s a managing director at a top Wall Street firm, and I was put in touch with him through a colleague who knew I was writing a story about the potential dangers of cell-phone radiation. He agreed to talk with me only if his name wasn’t used, so I’ll call him Jim. He explained that the tumor was located just behind his right ear and was not immediately fatal—the five-year survival rate is about 70 percent. He was 35 years old at the time of his diagnosis and immediately suspected it was the result of his intense cell-phone usage. “Not for nothing,” he said, “but in investment banking we’ve been using cell phones since 1992, back when they were the Gordon-Gekko-on-the-beach kind of phone.” When Jim asked his neurosurgeon, who was on the staff of a major medical center in Manhattan, about the possibility of a cell-phone-induced tumor, the doctor responded that in fact he was seeing more and more of such cases—young, relatively healthy businessmen who had long used their phones obsessively. He said he believed the industry had discredited studies showing there is a risk from cell phones. “I got a sense that he was pissed off,” Jim told me. A handful of Jim’s colleagues had already died from brain cancer; the more reports he encountered of young finance guys developing tumors, the more certain he felt that it wasn’t a coincidence. “I knew four or five people just at my firm who got tumors,” Jim says. “Each time, people ask the question. I hear it in the hallways.”
I was waiting for a flight to London one day in January, a spare seat opposite me at the table in the lounge.
A middle-aged German woman asked to sit down. She was she stopping briefly in Dubai on her way back from Australia and it seemed from the conversation that her month long trip had been some sort of possible life changing experience. By her simple back pack and even her shoes I could tell she was an individual with character.
In the minutes that passed by she talked about Tasmania and how different life was there from the one she knew at home. I don’t recall exactly what I said to share the pleasure of her trip but did agree that it was possible to make major changes in one’s life; it obviously struck a chord.
Not so long after this brief meeting, I received an email. She had made those big changes and she sent me a picture that she took in Tasmania as a thank you.
A Tasmanian bird greeting the morning sun
You never know how sometimes people just need someone who can see that their dreams are possible!
My daughter turned 17 years of age on 4th February, and has been excited about the possibility of being able to drive for some time, apart from a period of concern when the British Government hinted at raising the driving age to 18. Fortunately that passed.
I likewise always wanted to drive and at age 17 moved from two wheels to four and in 10 days had passed my test. The car insurance giving nearly minimum cover was £26 a year, my first car having a 2.6 litre engine. The next was a Jaguar 2.4, and the third, another Jag, this time a 3.8 XK 150S, for which I probably had to pay an extra £10 a year, all while I was 17. (1969 ) Continue reading “What a con!”→
Back in 1955, air travel was an adventure and the age of the jet airliner had already dawned in the UK, albeit with some major setbacks along the way.
As the US prepared to enter the market that summer, there is the well known incident of Boeing test pilot “Tex” Johnston rolling a prototype Boeing 707.
From today’s perspective, under those circumstances , the integrity of the people involved was impressive. As the pilot describes, he was called into the office of the president of Boeing to explain his actions. For me, the most telling comment is his final line:
Learning from Dogs 