Dead Castaway

I originally doodled this at work, and I liked the way it turned out, so I re-drew it at home. This time, I added a ship that is sailing away, which makes the whole scene a little more tragic.

(click image for full size)

Chase Overdraft Coverage

Chase bank has been bombarding me with ads and documentation to renew my overdraft coverage. Which means that even if I have no money in the account, my card is still accepted. But I'm hit with a big fee. That's their scam. They make a lot of money from that program. If I don't have any money my card should get declined!

Almost everyday they've sent me a letter about it. It is getting to the point in annoyance of me calling them up. In these letters, there is always new copy too. Always presented differently, with some new angle.

They charge a $34 fee each time you use your card, with insufficient funds (yet your card is still accepted everywhere). You could unknowingly, which is what they want, buy some gas, a pizza, and a water bottle some place else, and end up paying over a hundred dollars in fees alone.

I remember, I brought that up to a friend, who is a Chase employee, a while ago. He said "it's only 34 dollars". Yes, $34 per transaction. You buy a bus ticket and a hamburger, get slapped with a $68 fee, that doesn't include other charges. How is that not a scam.

I'm not only getting tired of Chase spamming me with this BS. But I know thousands of their customers are falling for their misleading letters. My bank, or any bank, should not try to devise these tricks, scams, and misleading programs to extort money from its customers.

Medvedev Sniping in a Suit

Pure Style

The End of NATO

Interesting article on NATO in Foreign Policy today. A new report says, "NATO should slim down, scale back, and pass the ball". As a result of "crushing fiscal retrenchment and sour memories of Afghanistan will likely leave most member states in Europe incapable of any significant military expeditions". Isn't this a good thing? Maybe we will see a return to the principle of you-leave-me-alone and I-leave-you-alone in international relations. The article speaks about a "inevitable decline in NATO's military capacity" and "NATO's days as an armed-to-the-teeth phalanx blocking the Soviet Army are now in the misty past". NATO is shrinking and "making way for a more purely diplomatic role". That staff in Brussels -- those who remain after the pink slips -- will spend more time coordinating NGOs and contractors than directing tank brigades." I have considered NATO, as it has existed, a unnecessary anachronism for a long time, this is a good development.

At the same time, the scaling back of military capability as a result of economic trouble, is not all good. This is something that Mark Stewart points out in a post on the Fourth Course of Action blog: "when governments spends enormous amounts of wealth they do not have and adopt policies that discourage economic growth [emphasis on consumption over savings], they will eventually lose the ability to pay for one of the most fundamental functions of government: National defense". Because of the economic/finical/deficit crisis in Europe, "The West will continue to rely on the military might of the United States to make up for shortfalls in capability among the other democracies. But what will happen when the United States is served the bill for its own governmental mismanagement of the economy? Who will there be to call on then? " I would like to see individual or nations in bi-lateral partnership be in command and responsible for their own defense. Europe especially has for far too long depended on the United States.

You can be an Economic Prophet

How to be a Gerald Celente or a Peter Schiff.

Decorated Penguin Reviewing Troops!

This Norwegian Penguin is not only a Colonel-in-Chief but also has been Knighted.

USA bailing out Greece? Yes

Americans like to think of the Greek financial fiasco as a European problem. What a majority probably don't know is that they are going to help foot the bill. The United States supplies 20% of IMF funding. This means that US taxpayers will be providing around $8 billion dollars of the $145 billion package to rescue Greece from default. The scam doesn't stop there.

It also looks like the IMF loan is being made "junior" to existing Greek debt. Instead of how in normal finance, the last lender is usually "senior". This means it should get the money back first. Not the case here. Greece is going to pay first, with the new money, the seedy unscrupulous bankers who loaned it the money to get into this mess in the first place. Then when the cash runs out again, and it looks like it will, most analysts only calling this package a "band-aid", Greece will have nothing to pay back the countries, e.g Germany, the US, that have bailed it out. Our loan is never going to be paid back.

This is yet another example of the recent trend of bailing out and rescuing companies that have made bad choices. It is not the responsibility, in any way, of taxpayers or governments to pay companies for making bad investment and lending choices. What happened to risk? These companies and banks have gotten so big and important, "too big to fail" through fraud, that not bailing them out would be disastrous. How long can we keep subsidizing incompetent crooked companies?