forex or laissez-faire is everywhere

Money, a little bit or a lot, needs rules and regulations to help guide it to the right and best exchange. After all, it is only a tool and sometimes a bit of a cushion in more turbulent times. Without intervention, I don't think that these systems of systems, self-creating and something that no one can get his or her head around, work themselves out--favourably to anyone concerned and only biased towards the chaos which is more of a natural state than illusory sophistication. The eurozone is certainly not willing to risk the autonomy of outlaw markets, and although I cannot be too sure about the purity of every motive and whether or not austerity measures are a way of respecting money as a means and not as an end, the recent downward trend of the currency (EN/DE), and it is not such a dramatic or worrisome change--in fact, it can stimulate Europe's export market by making its goods cheaper, is not being spurred on by the weak performance of any member economies. It is rather just a natural consequence of binding those members in a situation where they cannot create a differential for competition, outside the union and amongst themselves, by devaluing their own currency. Asceticism or the threat thereof is not a healthy engine for market-rivalry, but wage deflation and general job angst is driving something (so too with the spread of interests levied against weak economies versus more secure ones, and what’s being put up for collateral) that is yet to be seen if it appreciates. The inability of individual members to revise downward is causing the whole of the eurozone to slip in relation to other currencies.

slant

US congressional factions are doing their worst to pass a bill that would not only break the internet but this piece of legislation is being shown nearly as sinister, menacing and interconnected as the elements of the USA Patriot Act combined, liberties, privacy and dignities sacrificed in the name of combating terrorism. As the Guardian reports, America's ambassador to Spain bullied the country into adopting SOPA-style internet regulations, threatening to blacklist Spain, adding them to same group of ne'er-do-wells with Russia and China without stringent copyright enforcement. It is not only about arrogance and ignorance and greed on the part of the entertainment industry. After all, for all of its visibility, music and film labels only account for a small percentage of the US economy and could simply be bought out by any of the top internet or technology firms. It is not, I think, just about box-office receipts but also about preserving credibility and "reliable sources." This tangled web of interests and protections extends far: one publishing dinosaur, an industry heavy-weight that US school kids were introduced to early on in the textbook racket, is the parent company of one of the big three credit rating agencies, who’ve attacked the reputation of Spain and many others from that other front. Free knowledge (sometimes lambasted by nervous members of the old guard) is the biggest threat to educational demagogues, who would be more than happy to restrict the voice of dissent and those who would offer a different approach to the facts. And they have the money and influence to do it. Usually, the winners are the ones who get to write history. Just like with the Patriot Act, US policy spread to become the world's burden, and SOPA too, I don’t think will stop with America's firewall.

badeort

It was another dreary day and H and I decided to visit a nearby spa (Therme) for a few hours. We had been to this place several times before with its naturally heated outdoor pool, saunas and salt water baths, where one can float around effortlessly, and it always proves very relaxing and refreshing. I like the sci-fi adventure look and feel of the place as well: not only do the glowing, colour-changing columns of the space-age main hall look like the warp-core of the Starship Enterprise, at the front desk one is issued a fancy bracelet with a small electronic disk that opens and secures one's locker and records the time when one entered--and the duration of the stay paid for, plus exit pass provided that one has not exceeded it.

The clever system reminds me of the palm-flowers (life-clocks) from Logan’s Run (which that more recent movie In Time is reminiscent of, I think). It is too bad that the disk does not change colour as one’s time is running out. It's easy to lose track in a place like this, and that is probably not just by design.

typebox

Some clever people at Art-Equals-Work have developed an application that is able to identify any font, including size and weight, used on any webpage. That is a pretty handy tool to have at one's disposal for enhancing the look of one's own website, after being inspired by a neat and clean and legible presentation. This is a step towards the tool-box, the quiver that I've been wishing for, an optical character reader that can also match text for fonts, approximating the typeface captured in an image. The tool Fount goes into ones bookmarks bar, latent, for use on any page, like another clever app for the Apple platform, Tap-Translate, which can be a big help in quickly deciphering the lay of foreign websites.

botanical update

I am sure that sometime in the near future, one’s house plants, pets, and evn one’s own bodily organs will be afforded the opportunity to enrich the internet through social media and will be able to update their own status, without us having to speak for them. I seem to remember reading something about some odious smelling flower in a botanical garden "tweeting" its daily impressions or some zoo-captive with a running commentary of its audience--or perhaps I am just imagining that. I am sure that humans would be disinclined to friend or follow a wood under siege from a lumberjack, farm animals, etc after a while. For now, however (and I enjoy speaking for the trees too), the venerable baobab is starting to bloom.

The little flowers are quite nice, delicate and with a repeating five-point symmetry. I also wanted to share a picture of the less attractive primogenitor of all those healthy offspring. Fit to burst that little honey pot, this is the sort of baobab that the Little Prince had to look out for, lest his little planet be split in two.

imperium or neap tide

Speaking from the Pentagon, the US administration announced (DE) some vaguely but patriotically worded plans to transform America's military forces into an agency more compact and agile and with costs commiserate with desired results. Although the reduction is promised to be significant (it remains to be seen what they will be able to deliver, considering the soldiers of fortune, mercenaries and defense contractors probably have other plans) and few details were specified other than what goals are to be sustained--all of them and more with less--the speech was symbolic, not for the cuts to military support which is the only form of social welfare and support that the US has executed well and millions of soldiers and families rely on for careers, education and health care since the number of soldiers can be cut but because I doubt the budget will go down, and they will be replaced with drones and kill-bots and service contracts, but rather symbolic for America abandoning its self-appointed role as world-police.

Though the US was oblivious or otherwise in denial to its decline, this nebulous but surgical extraction from that leadership position does bring into contrast those differences between a vested and a vetted leader. For many decades, the US has not been fighting the world’s wars but rather its own battles, drawing the rest of the world into it, and the other major powers have avoided direct confrontation and fought wars by proxy: the US funding the Taliban in Afghanistan to send the Soviet Union over the tipping point, USSR vs US vs China in Vietnam and Korea, the US vs the British Empire in the Suez Gulf through currency manipulation that devalued the Pound Sterling. I wonder if there’s the potential even for a power-vacuum to be created. Recent military adventures have created more miseries all around than good and it would be a welcome change in attitude and posture if the priorities of the US erred on the side of restraint and partnership, but I think America, pensive and excitable over its faded glory, will try to maintain the same hulking footprint in the world with video games, and with the same costly profligacy and with fewer (soldiers--who put their lives at risk but are valued and cared for) whom stand to profit by it but with just as much to lose.