If you are reading this Saturday Oct 22, than you are dead, stop reading go enjoy your afterlife, because Friday Oct 21 the world ended.
"The date was selected by Harold Camping, a Bay Area rapture advocate (rapturist?) who also previously predicted the world would be ravaged by the Almighty on May 21, 2011. When nothing happened, and we all awoke, still here, still having to pay our bills and eat some breakfast and go to work, Camping, a radio evangelist, came up with a handy explanation a few hours later, after a whole lotta prayin':
"On May 21[...] this is where the spiritual aspect of it really comes through. God again brought judgment on the world. We didn't see any difference but God brought Judgment Day to bear upon the whole world. The whole world is under Judgment Day and it will continue right up until Oct. 21, 2011 and by that time the whole world will be destroyed."Yet people still send this guy money, why the world is ending, what does he need money for? Is there pizza in paradise? Please don't tell me the Arch Angel is standing at the pearly gates in his Ray Band sun glass, and gold chains with a clip board, and a Velvet rope line. " Yep your in, you no, club is full,...let me see your proof of age, oh well you have that short skirt and halter top, your in"
Meanwhile Europe battles across the "board room " table debating the fate of the European Union. Because if the economy "tanks" the union is pretty useless.
Back in the good Ol U.S, of A, our congress, turned down the jobs bill and the portion of the jobs bill that would provide 34 billion dollars to keep teachers and fire fighters working or rehired. And they turned down the 1.5 percent surcharge on income over 1,000,000 dollars
President Obama said as recently as today that any senators who vote ”no” on the bill will have to explain their reasons. Today McConnell tried to flip that around a bit.
“Everyone who votes for this second stimulus will have to answer a simple but important question: Why on earth would you support an approach that we already know will not work?” McConnell asked. “The truth of the matter is most Democrats know as well as I do that passing another stimulus and tax hike has allowed the idea, which is why the Democrats are having such a hard time convincing their colleagues to vote for it.”
Lord knows its hard to make ends meet when you are only making a million dollars. How does the end of the world tie in with the Crisis in Europe and the Jobs Bill. Its proof how stupid people really are. Including the people we elect to represent us.
The reason our economy appears so complicated is that dedicated people, work very hard at making the function of trade and money look more complex than it really is.
At the end of the "day" the entire world economy, all the jobs, all the investing, all the sales and interest, is nothing more than you balancing YOUR check book. It doesn't take complex math or calculus to balance your check book! But if every American realized that the economy is not as complex as certain folks want you to believe, than this society would be in real trouble from some very angry people.
Yes there are very complex formulas to work out investing and determining shares of taxes or profits.
But if you can get some one to explain the complex formula to you, you will find yourself asking " why are they making this so hard to understand"
Actually the complex portion of these equations are really just to refine how much money is made or lost. You could do the same with basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Another fun fact is the formula's do not work all the time. Oh, let me clarify, the dollars and cents need to add up, but the forecasting doesn't.
Damn I made that more confusing than I should have. People who's jobs depend on forecasting, have to come up with methods of forecasting, enter complex math. These people are like you and me, they want to be paid. So the fact that the formulas do not work on a consistent basis, is not relevant to them or the people who like them, get paid to make predictions no matter how wrong, as long as they can make up an equally stupid excuse for their poor reasoning.
Any of you watch the science channel ? Did you watch any of the shows about physics, matter, atomic particles ? The math for quantum mechanics is also very complex. But these people are honest unlike economics forecasters. Quantum mechanics is used to predict where certain particles are, there power, their properties, etc. The key word is PREDICT. and the physicist will tell you that. The complex math using data known, helps to determine the properties of particles at the sub ( smaller than ) atomic level
than they do the experiment and refine the information. Economist try to use this method, but the problem is, you and me. They say we are predictable, and over certain periods we are, statistically we will do certain things, at certain times, under certain conditions. However, we do NOT always follow even those patterns, so the mathematical formula does not work all the time.
This is not a bad thing, what it means is that a well done mathematical formula, will be limited by the data available. It is a prediction, NOT a statement of fact.
When the data, or variable as it is call in a math formula, is a human being, the chance for a random action, something totally unpredictable, becomes a huge number.
Example, I say a ball will roll to a certain spot, Force times mass divided by the Resistance x an unexpected wind equals a certain chance the ball will end up where I said it would.
Now try to figure, the price of new home x the cost of living x the given mood of a person on the day they are looking at the house equals the chance they will buy that house divided by something happening that will change there mind again, once making the first decision. equals the movement in the housing industry
The math isn't a problem, it is when some people especially those in power use the math and expect or worse pretend the math is perfect. 80 percent of all Latinos are lazy and on Welfare. 75 percent of all teenagers taught sexual education will have intercourse. Unemployment insurance keeps 90 percent of the unemployed from looking for work.
First I made up those statistics, Second even if those were the actually numbers, for them to be of any use, they have to allow for enough randomness and you have to be told that its an estimate, it is NOT a hard and fast number. Light travels at about 186,000 miles per second, This is measured and proven repeatedly.
Numbers, statistics, formulas are not proven repeatedly, yet our elected officials repeatedly will make statements as if these statistics are fact. " The stimulus package failed " ( see above ), our question should be based on what ? Some jobs were created, several industries were saved, and many of the loans given by the government were and are being paid back with interest. So what is the yard stick this republican is using to prove government stimulus fails? Is the job package really the same type of government stimulus as last time ( the variables change) The answer is this elected official is not bother to see if any of the information he is preaching is fact. But he doesn't explain that to the voters. He doesn't say, I don't like the democrats so any thing they do is wrong.
Harold Camping prediction of the end of the world is as factual as Republican McConnell, statement that the jobs bill is proven to be a failed process. Both use poor data for their results. But we can laugh at Mr. Camping because it doesn't hurt us, Mr. McConnell and those rolling the dice at our expense, do hurt us. You can not look at things in a vacuum ( with poor data or no data ) and tell people this is a good path to follow. Lower taxes work under certain circumstance not all circumstance. Do the work and find out when do they work. Just like constantly raising taxes is not always the answer. Handing money to victims of Katrina proved to be good for some people but , many spent it on not essential items. On the other hand we gave money to the banks so they could loan it back out to people to help with the loans, and the banks didn't loan it out but invested it. Humans don't follow neat little lines, are not so easy to predict we learned that with the Banks and we learned that with the common people.
Now its time for our elected officials their offices and commissioners to come up with real plans based on real information to get us out of this mess, no matter how unpleasant the fix is.
Or we can wait for Harold Camping to be right, statistically it will happen.
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