In this issue:
Good News | Product Highlight | Brainpower | Finances | Security | Health/Fitness |
Factoid | Thought 4 the Day
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1. Good News
Item 1. Solar cell efficiency hit a new and significant record in
March of this year. Read the full story here:
http://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/renewables/efficiency-of-solar-cells-continues-to-climb
Item 2. The nation's second major political party (after the
Demopublicans) is calling for a 100% repeal of the 1040 system. So the idea of
ending this barbarism is now mainstream.
As I have pointed out previously, this system actually costs the federal
government more money than it takes in. The point of it is not to raise revenue
for the (pseudo) government, but to have a (very) thinly veiled mechanism to
subjugate the population through systematic abuse and terrorism. The fact that
The Party continues to abide this illegal and immoral terrorist group tells you
all you need to know about whether to non-choose between Demopublicans or
Republocrats. Vote liberty, vote Libertarian.
I contacted my Congressman's office about this issue, and the first thing the
Aid said to me was, "Why don't you call Paul Ryan and tell him these things?" It
turns out that my (Republican) Congressman, who has extensive experience in
appropriations committee work actually did the math and brought this very
subject up to Ryan. He was slammed down for it. So for practicality's sake, all
we can aim for at this time is shrinking the footprint of the 1040 system.
For a seated Demopublican Congressman to also be advocating for ending this
stupidity is quite noteworthy. And it's very good news.
Item 3. Almost beyond doubt, the end of Barry Soetoro's 8 year
attack on America was the best news for this country in living memory. Adding to
the good news is that President Trump's policies are already working. Even
better than expected, too!
As reported even in the left-wing, reality-challenged, "The Week," the economy
added 235,000 new jobs during Trump's first full month in office (February).
Most of the jobs were in the private sector; 58,000 new construction jobs and
28,000 manufacturing jobs. Other sources reported the same number, it's just
surprising that "The Week" decided not to lie about it. Now if only President
Trump would re-do his proposed budget so that it shows a surplus, that would
really be good news. Unfortunately, it's got the same deficit figure as
Soetoro's last "Make America Fail" budget.
Item 4. While Barry Soetoro still remains at large (bad news), the good
news is his vicious attacks on America appear to be in hiatus. This could be the
calm before the storm, but let's enjoy it while it lasts.
Item 5. A concerned citizen (guess who) sent a postcard to President
Trump with this message: "If you're going to build The Wall, build it around
Monsanto in St Louis. They put 30 million Mexican farmers out of work." |
2. Product Highlight
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Helps with reading fluency and comprehension by providing immediate
definitions from the American Heritage Children's Dictionary and Thesaurus,
American Heritage College Dictionary, and Roget's II Thesaurus.
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3. Brainpower tip
This article helps explain various forms of willful ignorance:
https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2017/march/information-avoidance.html
Here's an extract:
We live in an unprecedented "age of information," but we use very little of it.
Dieters prefer not to look at the calories in their tasty dessert, people at
high risk for disease avoid screenings and people choose the news source that
aligns with their political ideology.
The article doesn't explain libtardism, because that's a mental disease that
involves several cognitive failures such as irrationality, non-sequitor
analysis, and reading incomprehension in addition to gross and willful
ignorance.
So don't take it as insight into how to help libtards become
intelligence-enabled. Take it as insight into why non-diseased people can often
be so close-minded and misinformed without meaning to. And as insight into
helping non-diseased people have that little light bulb come on.
The broad definition of "willful ignorance" doesn't include intent to be
ignorant, but instead is based on lack of intent to not be ignorant. This is
where the non-diseased, but ignorant, often are. They are usually amenable to
correcting this when it is pointed out in a civil and respectful manner.
Pointing it out indirectly is often the most effective means. You can do this
by asking questions. So, for example, someone always votes Republican because of
the abominable spending record that Democrats, in the aggregate, have. They
don't want to look at individual spending records, and don't consider an
alternative to the "lesser of two evils" non-choice. Rather than argue, you can
get that person to consider new information by asking, "Why has federal spending
increased no matter which 'party' was in control over the past 100 years?" |
4. Finance tip
When he left office three months ago, Barry Soetoro left behind him an America
devastated by his unrelenting attacks on the economy, civil liberties, and
trusted institutions. And, of course, his job-destroying, cost-increasing train
wreck of illegal legislation called Obummercare. This is much worse than farting
just before getting off the elevator. Much, much worse. At least his various
"Czars" are now gone.
What is not gone is the $20 trillion debt that is dragging our economy down.
Over half of this was incurred while Soetoro beat his spending drum for 8 years.
This debt is toxic in many ways (and President Trump's proposed budget just adds
more to it!), but let's look at one aspect. That would be the cost of the
interest on the debt.
Let's say the Federal Government (FG) can borrow money at 1%. Remember, 1% is
1/100th. What is 1% of 20 trillion? It's $200 billion. In March (just last
month) the Prime Rate was 4%. I don't know if this is what the FG pays, but if
it is then we are paying $800 billion per year just on the interest on the debt.
The school lunch program costs less than $10 billion a year. So the interest
on the debt is equal to more than eight years of school lunch programs. Think on
that for a moment.
Now let's try to get a handle on this staggering amount another way. I did a
quick check and found the median wage in the USA is about $50,000. Divide $800
billion by $50,000 and you find that 16 million people would turn over their
entire salaries. Just to pay the interest on the debt. That's more than four
times the entire population of Los Angeles, the second most populous city in the
USA.
Here's a way to look at this large quantity:
- $800 billion = $800,000 x 1,000,000.
- $800 billion =$100,000 x 8,000,000.
- $800 billion = $50,000 x 16,000,000.
By any measure, we are in deep doo-doo. On top of this, the various stock
exchanges (collectively, "the stock market") are showing stock prices not
supported by the underlying value of the companies. The stocks are "overvalued,"
or in English, "overpriced." A correction is due. A big one.
Not only that, what pretends to be a federal government did NOTHING about the
factors that caused the 2008 derivatives fiasco, and the same morally bankrupt
people are playing the same games today. The lisping libtard named Barney Frank helped
inflict the Dodd-Frank Act, a travesty that does nothing except increase
overhead on the part of financial services providers, which in turn increase
costs to the consumers of financial services.
Why neither Frank nor Dodd went to jail is a mystery. They, like their
derivatives gambling counterparts, are still at large. And still able to inflict
legislation that takes stupidity to new extremes.
If you are feeling uncomfortable about your financial security at this point,
good. That means you aren't pretending all is well, as so many people are
dangerously doing.
What can you do to help protect yourself? Here are some tips:
- Have you been getting phone calls from various "investment" brokers,
commodity houses, etc.? If so and you've been hanging up on them, keep doing
that. Do not listen to these sales pitches; they are designed only to
separate you from your money.
- Pay down credit card balances. Ideally, you will pay them off every
month. Don't wait for a paper statement to arrive; sign up for
e-notifications and pay off the statement balance as soon as you're
notified.
- If you make a large purchase, pay off the card within a few days. Yes,
that does treat the card like cash and that is the point. This is not a time
to rack up debt.
- If you are contacted by the terrorist group known as the Institute of
Reprobates and Sociopaths, refuse to deal directly with them. Contact your
tax attorney.
- What, you don't have a tax attorney with a Power of Attorney (POA)
signed and on file? Don't wait until you get a 10-day notice from the
Reprobates. Get that done this week, even if you have to take off work to do
it.
- Review your records, especially your tax records. Do you have everything
you need to defend against an attack from the Reprobates, and is it all in
electronic format for fast transmittal to your attorney? And do you have a
backup on a removable drive and an offsite backup service?
- Layoff-proof yourself. What you want to do is make yourself less of a
lay-off target. Ask your boss how you might add value in some new way. Maybe
there's a special project that needs doing or your boss has tasks he'd love
to unload on someone else. Talk with your customers; is there something your
company could do that would improve their experience? Now you have an idea
for a project that can make you a star.
- Get rid of junk and clutter. The less of this you have, the less likely
you are to waste money by accumulating more. It also helps you keep a clear
mind when your environment is clear. If you must move to take a new job,
it'll be far easier without clutter to comb through.
- Think. While you can't fix stupid, you don't have to be stupid. Stand
out from the masses by deliberately using your brain.
- Have a positive attitude. This has a slew of good effects. For one
thing, it empowers you. For another, it draws good people toward you.
- Network. Make those social connections, and not just in your industry as
a job lead kind of thing. Try to expand your base of friends, real friends,
by interacting with people who try to matter. The more robust your network,
the more opportunities you will have for all kinds of things besides just
job searches. Fun, for example. When networking, don't look for people who
are like you. Look for people who differ from you and whose skills, outlook,
and interests can fill in the voids left by your own. And vice-versa, you
can be of service to others. In fact, the best way to network is to look for
ways to be of service.
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5. Security tip
A government unto itself. The single greatest threat faced by the typical
American today is a terrorist organization that pretends to be a government
agency but is in fact a government unto itself.
If your "normal" government violates any of your enumerated
Constitutional rights, you have a viable court case. But if this terrorist
group does the same thing, not only are those rights completely waived but
any mention of them gets you branded as a "tax protestor."
This terrorist group makes up its own laws, has its own "you lose, suckah"
courts, and is not subject to the laws to which federal agencies or private
citizens are subject.
The concept of "due process" to these people means if they process
paperwork showing an absurdly high "debt," then it is due immediately.
How do you protect yourself? The same way you protect yourself from a
laser-guided missile once it is launched. Yes, it really is that bad.
But you can sometimes thwart the launch. If you do not now have a tax
attorney, don't wait until you are under attack before finding one.
Typically, there's not enough time once the launch codes are entered.
Establish a relationship with a tax attorney now, before you get marked
for abuse. One big advantage is that when you are going to that attorney for
the first time, you are not going as "a criminal" but as a prudent person
who doesn't have any problems and hasn't done anything wrong.
Some other tips:
- Keep good records. Back them up offsite (seriously, the terrorists
can sieze your records and then use the fact you don't have them as
evidence against you).
- When filing, mail in a paper version via Certified Mail. This way,
they have to sign for it. If you file electronically, there's no proof
they got it. So 20 years from now, you wake up to the sound of your door
being kicked in and it's armed agents there to arrest you for failing to
file 20 years ago.
- Don't play tax cheat games. IRS assumes everyone is guilty even
after proven innocent, so once they lock onto you they will dig until
they find something. Anything. Then they will blow it all out of
proportion, and you stand no chance of defending yourself because, look,
you're a liar and a tax cheat.
- Frequently remind your legislators of the need to defund and disband
this terrorist group. This is very important, as it helps protect
everyone.
- Never associate with any employee of this terrorist organization.
Yes, some good people do work in it. But you want to reduce your
exposure to attack. Don't risk making an innocent remark that gets
repeated and then twisted into the very noose that goes around your
neck.
- Never mention the "C" word when dealing with this terrorist group.
That is, the Constitution. Since this terrorist group is a government
unto itself, you must forget that you are (presumably) an American
citizen and focus on the fact that you are--first and foremost--subject
to the laws of this separate government. You have only the rights they
give you. Just make sure you know what those are, and use them fully to
your advantage. That's where a good tax attorney comes in.
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6. Health tip/Fitness tips
A question many people have, especially about this time of year, is
"What's the best way to lose weight?" This question reveals a way of
thinking about excess body fat that leads to unsustainable "solutions."
It's why, for example, people try one crazy diet after another. Even if they
see short-term success, most people eventually fall off the diet and get the
"rebound" effect. They may fall off due to how monotonous the diet
is, how
much hassle, the lack of good nutrition, or negative health effects that
take a while to become apparent. Many of these diets seem to work (at
first) because people are actually eating less or because they are foregoing
a few bad foods. But these diets do not solve the underlying problem, and
they do create more problems. People on these diets are trying to fix the
fat with a "solution" to the wrong problem. The bulges of fat are not the
real issue, the malnutrition that caused them is. Fix the malnutrition, and
the body sheds that fat and it keeps it off. Don't ask how to "lose
weight." Ask how to make food choices that actually nourish your body. When
you make the right choices, you'll lower your ratio of fat to lean mass.
Don't view a ripped physique as the goal of a nourishing diet, view it as a
measure of one. In a moment, I'll tell you how to avoid "diets" completely
and how, instead, to eat in a way that is sustainable, enjoyable,
affordable, and nourishing. I want to touch on exercise for a moment. One
"solution" fat people try is putting in treadmill time. Or maybe they take
up jogging. If a lean body is your goal, these are (beyond a certain point)
counterproductive pursuits. Here is the core concept to understand: You
are working with a chemistry set. It's called your endocrine system. The
hormone levels controlled by that system determine whether your body
catabolizes (eats) muscle and stores fat (this is what joggers get as a
reward for their efforts) or whether it builds muscle, stores calcium in the
bones, and burns fat. There are two major ways to influence the endocrine
system to control hormones at the levels that produce the healthy body you
want to see in the mirror:
- What and when you eat.
- Muscle-loading to stimulate the adaptive response.
Let me quickly go over the muscle-loading, as that is a short
discussion from a concept level. |
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Top photo taken 16SEP2016, just days before 56th birthday;
bottom photo taken 3 days after 56th birthday
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When I say "muscle-loading," I am talking about systematically putting
enough workload on your skeletal muscles every day (except one or two rest
days per week) to frequently trigger the adaptive response. Your body
always adapts to the stresses placed on it. The body wants to optimize
itself for efficiency (meaning, usually, less muscle), but also must support
the stresses it encounters (with proper training: more muscle, stronger
ligaments, and denser bones).
So if you run half Marathons, what kind of stress are you putting on your
body? It's a continued low-level, cortisol producing stress. Running slowly
doesn't take much muscle, so to be able to run per the demand you're placing
on your body this way--the body is going to catabolize muscle so there's
enough to do the job but no more. It is going to need fat stores, since this
is an endurance exercise.
Take a look at any world-class sprinter, and you see a totally different
physique from that of a distance runner. Remember this example if you can't
decide between spending long sessions at the gym or doing an intense (short
and hard) workout. Yes, if your fat percentage is excessively high, the
"long and fairly easy" kind of exercise will burn calories and bring it
down. But it can't possibly bring it down into the healthy range. Meanwhile,
you're banging up your joints (say hello to arthritis).
But wait. What about competitive bodybuilders who go for hypertrophy?
They do long workouts. Yes, but you have to understand the type of workout
when they are focusing on getting the pump for hypertrophy. They aren't
obliterating the muscles, they are stimulating capillarization. They know
how to do this without depressing testosterone or jacking up their cortisol.
These same people also do high-intensity sessions to build the strength
needed for the hypertrophy workouts. And they aren't haphazardly jumping
around "working out" randomly-selected muscle groups. They are strategic,
working to a plan. They are systematic about it, which is why all
bodybuilders use split-routines and most consistently train five or more
days per week.
Don't confuse hypertrophy training methods with the cortisol-inducing
kind. You want to stimulate your body to produce testosterone, not cortisol.
And that brings us to diet. Many people think "diet" is about calorie
restriction. For lean body purposes that's not the case, except that you
can't just massively consume calories. What really matters is what your body
does with those calories. And that is controlled by your endocrine system.
The more insulin this system is stimulated to produce, the fatter you will
be (all else being equal).
Also, calorie restriction can trigger the starvation response. You
definitely do not want that.
The typical American diet is very insulin-stimulating. Insulin depresses
testosterone. The villains in this game are wheat, corn, and soy. And any
products made with them such as the many corn-based sweeteners. I have
totally eliminated these grains (and products made from them) from my diet
and suggest you do the same.
Have you noticed I have not said to go low-fat, low-carb, or
high-protein? None of that fits the science.
So you eliminate the insulin-spikers from your diet. Great. But you need
carbohydrates, and you can still get an undesirable insulin response by
eating too many at once. What body builders do is eat six small meals a day.
This spreads the nutrients out, giving you better absorption and less stuff
pushing your guts out while eliminating an undesirable insulin response.
But what foods "can" you eat? My definition of "food" does not include
processed foods. Eliminate those from consideration. What is left? A massive
array of nutrient-dense, delicious foods (plus maybe some not so great).
With all the fantastic choices, the real question is what foods do you WANT
to eat?
If you do a little research on foods with cancer-fighting properties and
compile a list, you will come up with basically a list of what I eat. I
found this out long after deciding what foods I need to eat to have a
lean, healthy body. It turns out, for example, the raw eggplant I eat every
day also attacks colon cancer cells by three different mechanisms. The
broccoli that helps increase my testosterone is a member of the brassica
family; again, powerfully anti-carcinogenic.
Do you notice I am not talking about a restrictive diet? Go into the
produce aisles and get whatever you want. Just make sure to get many
different items, and the more colors the better (but a lot of green is
good). Most of my food is from that area of the store. I refer to it as my
health plan.
Outside that area, you will find other good foods. These include beans,
rice, eggs, nuts, and various spices. What about beverages? Coffee and tea
are good, for several reasons. Soda is so antagonistic to bone health that
it should be banned, but it's not banned. Make sure you ban it from your
home.
So you see, it's not complicated. It's a lifestyle change for those
presently suffering under the typical American diet. Once you've made the
change, you will never want to go back. I say that, because it would mean
going back to being fat, getting sick, feeling tired, becoming progressively
weaker as you age, and having really stinky stools.
Never again think about "losing weight." Think about having a healthy
endocrine system. The results you want will follow. |
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At
www.supplecity.com, you'll find plenty of informative, authoritative
articles on maintaining a lean, strong physique. It has nothing to
do with long workouts or impossible to maintain diets. In fact:- The best workouts are short and intense.
- A good diet contains far more flavors and satisfaction
than the typical American diet.
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7. Factoid
Cleopatra lived closer to the invention of the iPhone than she did to the
building of the Great Pyramid (by hundreds of years). That gives you some idea
about how long "civilization" has been around. |
8. Thought for the Day
People who use dishonesty as their guiding principle have delusions of adequacy. |
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Authorship
The views expressed in this e-newsletter are generally not shared by criminals, zombies, or brainwashed individuals.
Except where noted, this e-newsletter is entirely the work of Mark Lamendola. Anything presented as fact can be independently verified. Often, sources are given; but where not given, they are readily available to anyone who makes the effort.
Mark provides information from either research or his own areas of established expertise. Sometimes, what appears to be a personal opinion is the only possibility when applying sound logic--reason it out before judging! (That said, some personal opinions do appear on occasion).
The purpose of this publication is to inform and empower its readers (and save you money!).
Personal note from Mark: I value each and every one of you, and I hope that shows in the diligent effort I put into writing this e-newsletter. Thank you for being a faithful reader.
Please pass this newsletter along to others.
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