Working in Ottawa today --Now with 7x more bioavailability!

Working in Ottawa today --7x more bioavailability

Good morning folks,

It will be working in Ottawa today.

I don't recall getting any feedback from any of you that tried constructing the homemade Geiger Counter (http://pulp.puckett.ca/2010/01/not-working-in-ottawa-today-homemade.html) from almost 4 years ago, but you may want to refresh your self on the theories.  You see, this is the IRRADIATION special.

Oooh.. Scary.. IRRADIATION.  Yeh.. No.  Not so scary.   Let me share how we got here this morning.  I recently purchased an herbal anti-inflammatory.  It features BCM-95 and 7x MORE bioavailability, also featuring Boswella and .. Olive-leaf! I must say that if it works half as well as the designer of the label thinks it will.. shoulder problems will disappear in no time :)

I am sooooo happy that it has 7x BIOAVAILABILITY!  I was reading the label some more this morning and it states that it is NOT IRRADIATED! I thought Excellent!  It is safe for my cat.  If I had one.

huh?  Safe for a nonexistent cat?  That's rather non-sequitur Uncle Daniel.

Well. Maybe, but what I immediately thought about was Australia.  Need more?  Ok.  In Australia just like just about everywhere else on the planet, food processors has been using food irradiation to make food safer, stay spoilage free and pest free longer.  This is done by subjecting the food with X-rays.  The X-rays cause ionizing radiation damage (Two cell nuclei talking.. Damn, I just lost an electron.  Are you positive?) to some of the DNA and RNA in both the food, food borne bacteria and any pervasive pests, this prevents or slows down reproduction of pests, further ripening and spoilage.

Ok.  Sounds like a good thing yes?  Yes, you would think but detractors say they don't want to eat radioactive food.  They also say that it creates nuclear waste stock piling problems, ground water radiation contamination and masks unhealthy conditions in meat processing plants.

um..  No.  First of all X-rays are generated by firing electrons at a tungsten rod.  You don't need uranium, cesium, cobalt or plutonium and making X-rays does not create radiative waste water.  Not every use of the word RADIOACTIVE means an impending meltdown and China Syndrome.  Masking unhealthy conditions.. sure, just like cooking does?

Subjective food to X-rays also does not magically make the food radioactive and now capable of emitting Alpha, Beta, Gamma or X-ray radiation.  That only happens in comic books.  (Seehttp://pulp.puckett.ca/2012/07/working-in-montreal-today-boson-buddies.html for a briefing on cartoon physics).

Uh.. Australia?

Yes yes , I'm getting there.  Back in 2008 about 40 cats does or were euthanized after experiencing paralysis after eating a particular brand of cat food.  No one was sure what happened to the cats, but a few cat food company scientists (makes for a funny business card) speculated that elevated levels of irradiation caused a vitamin A deficiency in the food, thereby causing paralysis in the cats.  This was however just mere speculation and no causal connection, nor any repeatable experiments were made.  BUT..In a nice bit of reactionary legislation, no cat food may be irradiated in Australia.  The dog food which is irradiated has labels to specifically not feed it to cats.  I don't know if steaks bought at the butcher shop for humans have the same label.

..

Still have a few minutes.. Do you recall my rant (I think that was the trifecta of bullshit rant) regarding Canada Post back in August? (http://pulp.puckett.ca/2013/08/working-in-ottawa-today-keynesian.html). I was particularly irritated with Canada Post failing to fund its pension obligations and instead pushed the debt into the future.

That future is here.  Failing like only a monopoly can, Canada Post has announced that stamps will go up by 1/3 and in exchange for higher prices.. door to door delivery will be stopped.  PM Stephen Harper applauded the move and his Transport Minister Lisa Raitt said that Canadians are sending fewer letters than ever before.   Of course that is also bullshit.  While there was certainly a spike in mailing in 2007 and 2008 with around 11.5 billion pieces, today's level of mailing at close to 10 billion pieces is about the same as 2003, I don't know when she meant by ever before.

....

Do we have time for one more?  How about that sign language interpreter at Nelson Mandela's funeral service..  seems that no one could understand a single word that he bluffed his way through.  Seems by all accounts an absolute fraud, he used a bunch of nonsensical clapping and hand gestures that have never been seen before.

I personally liked it when during U.S. President Obama's speech the imposter showed us the church and its steeple and opened the doors and showed all of the people, weeee!

That's it for me folks, Have a great day and beware of faux science, faux economics and faux interpreters.

Working in Ottawa today --Keynesian Revisited

I don't usually throw back into our collective faces what I have written in previous Pulps (okay, sometimes :).

Back a short eon ago when I had moved the publishing on these missives to this Pulp site away from a simple email distribution group I published an email written to Don (http://pulp.puckett.ca/2009/05/screw-you-gm-or-brief-keynesian.html) about the <bullshit> disparity between North American and Japanese automakers.  Yep...  Like the past always comes back to haunt the present, I bring you...  Canada Post.

In that missive I explained Keynesian economic theory a bit.  The theory runs a bit like this, and this is extremely simplified... do not pay Paul what you owe him today, merely pay the interest, the principal will shrink on its own by the going rate of inflation.  Instead go out and spend the monies that you borrowed from Peter, the debt to him will shrink too.  I read this back in the very early 80s and it scared the shit out of me then for the very reason I will explain.

bullshit bullshit bullshit. Yes, the trifecta of bullshits.

What I realized 30 years ago was that if corporations, banks, and institutional debtors in general adopted the logical strategy and did not fund their debts, then they would continue to push them forward into the distant future and make them someone else's problem, but eventually the debt will need to be serviced and if the entity's growth had not matched the going rate of return, someone would get shafted.  Moreover if it became a widespread practice it could spell an economic crash that no Glass Steagal style legislation could touch.

I had discussed with my friend, the late Hughes M., at the time (we both worked at the Lethbridge Community College -- shout out to my friend Andy that used to work in Environmental Sciences and now works for the man at some TV station, Yo, Andy!  Hughes downplayed the risk really for two reasons.  One, he'd rather shoot hoops, and two he didn't have any interest in economics.

When corp execs realize this bit of flimflammery they may (and often do) put it together that they need not worry about things like employee pensions.

Um.. Uncle Daniel, you were mentioning Canada Post?  Yep.  Buried in the back pages of the Globe last week sometime was an article written by someone that actually read CP's last financial statement.  And..  Surprise surprise, Canada Post projects that it has enough cash flow to meet its obligations until the early part of 2014. 

This means Canada Post will in all likelihood be seeking help from the Gov't in meeting its pension obligations.  That means you and I.  So while you and I are saving our funds into our RRSPs, TFSAs and mattresses, these bastards were spending the money that should have been banked to meet the future payroll obligations.  It makes no sense to believe that you could pay a Postie to walk down my street with revenue from today's mail postage and also pay the pensions of all previous Posties.

Do you know what happens if we didn't pay our employees?  Our employees could go after the officers and directors of the company, because even in a limited liability corporation, although ordinary creditors can't go after the shareholders, officers, and directors, employee wages are an exception.  So I ask the question, how are pension funds any different from wages?  I see no difference, they are merely deferred wages that arose from negotiations between the Posties and Canada Post.  Let 'em go cap in hand to the Gov't, but let's see some accountability for those that made the bad decisions.

Have a good day, plan for your own future.