http://nalert.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-many-big-lies-have-you-fallen-for.html
How Many Big Lies Have You Fallen for? Homeownership, College, War, and Voting.
By Steve B Follow Mon, 6 Aug 2012, 7:24am 3,522 views 51 comments
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Just one: monogamy. But I've got over that lie ten years ago and have been making up for loss time.
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I've fallen for College, War, and Voting. I have NOT fallen for houseownership...yet.
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In case the above link doesn't work:
http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2012/08/the-trillion-dollar-lies/
I fell for college and homeownership.
Regarding Iran: http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/117290.html
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Homeownership: Not yet, but it's coming. I don't think people fall for this so much as they're forced into it by the wife.
College: With scholarships and community college, this can still be done affordably. Left college with a good degree at a good school loan free.
War: I think all of us fell for it after 9/11, but that's mostly because of the "weapons of mass destruction" lies.
Voting: I refuse to vote until the two party system is abolished. I will not drive over there and wait in line to pick between two different styles of shit. If votor turnout gets low enough, perhaps honest people will start running under their own beliefs instead of their parties' beliefs and the funders wish list.
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StoutFiles says
lol! What is it with women and houses? Too much HGTV?
StoutFiles says
Community college is like a disco with books. "Give me five dollars so I can get my learn on!"
StoutFiles says
Amen.
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freak80 says
Haha I agree. To be fair I never went; had a full ride scholarship and worked at the same time to cover my housing.
However, community college is very smart if you go for two years and then transfer to a good four year school. Your degree is under the fancy school and you just saved almost 50% of the total cost. It'd be really difficult to convince a kid to do this though, those schools aren't fun like the four year ones.
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Does Santa Claus count?
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Won't be popular, but both college and home ownership have worked out well for me. Especially college. I'm on the elder end of Gen X, but back then college was pretty much the only escape from rural midwestern lower-working class roots. I'd say that well over 90% of my high school class who went on to college also went on to escape the region and have substantially higher standards of living today than those who stayed behind.
For me the big lie has been pretty much anything uttered from the mouth of a Baby Boomer.
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I did not fall for Weapons of Mass Destruction. The biggest Republican lie to date.
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The biggest lie of all isn't mentioned in the article. Retirement. Up until this century, that word had a different meaning. When you grew old, and retired, they toe tagged your ass and had a little ceremony prior to burying you. Now its supposed to have been redefined,,,,that if you follow the rules of their game, sock away some of your labors into 401ks and mutual funds and the like, they will take care of you when your old and at the end of the life cycle.
Who's trillion dollar agenda is that?
I can tell you this much, I ain't buying that boondoggle, and either does much of my generation, at least thru my observations
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Homeownership ... hmm, bought in western MA, not Boston area, thus stayed within the 3:1 mortgage:income barrier of antiquity. Now, it's paid off. Will never, I repeat, will never buy around Boston metro. Many persons there, who are not executives/retired well off, will suffer in the years ahead with decreasing job opportunities, as jobs move to Texas. The towns which are now affordable, are seeing more and more crime over time, and it's spilling into more affluent suburbs in terms of home burglaries. The housing bubble has ruined the region and now, there's little incentive to expand headcount locally.
College ... well, 12-15 years ago it was affordable and my scholarships, etc, covered 50%. I had no outstanding loans, 2 years post-graduation. I wouldn't do it again, at today's prices. It's el cheapo London Univ online for the next generation.
War ... nope, had relatives/friends in 'Nam and I suspected that when John McCain flipped out on the reporter in '03, regarding the Tonkin Gulf resolution of the mid 60s, that this current conflict was something similar.
Voting ... stopped after my mid-20s.
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I have not fallen for the marriage lie yet!, she's easier to get along with when she does not fall for the feminism lie, thinking she owns you.
I fell for the lie that a single person needs a mortgage/house and got rid of that thing while I was still ahead! Today, you need to be mobile, the investors can have them.
Back in the early 90's college was still affordable, we will need an awful lot of inflation to help ease the pain of paying off these loans of today. Still, I went through tech, and 4 year, more than I needed.
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everything says
And we wonder why the Democrats have a problem with the "male vote."
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I didn't fall for Obama and I'm pretty proud of that one.
But then of course I didn't fall for Bush either. I am proud of the fact I voted for Nader, we Nader voters are an exclusive club or Uber smarties, much like the Mensa society.
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Bought college: left with a degree in high science, no job, and 55k in loans due immediately. I dont use my degree, but managed to get into a high paying niche profession that I could have trained for with two years at a occupational center.
Bought war: who didn't want to see Osama pay for what he did?
Bought voting: been a voter every year, still do so out of habit and for local election issues which actually do matter. President? Hah, tell me a new one!
DIDN'T buy house! I was all set up to buy in '05, but didn't believe in the market. Good thing. Been saving and renting ever since, and in another part of the country I'd pay cash for something.
Retirement: the union has a kick ass retirement. I might even see it someday, if the dollar doesn't devalue or the fund administrators don't piss it all away on the next big bubble. I have 401k too.
But even if I have ultimately nothing for retirement because the lawyers and banks steal it all, I have three assets that will endure. My children. Right now they are a drain, but when I get old, I hope they'll compete to house me and their mother. Family is everything.
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Quigley says
I know the feeling well!
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The schooling was awhile back, when private school tuition was in the mid 20k.
Bought college (engineering scholarship=no debt)
Bought law school (law school scholarship = minimal debt)
Bought home ownership 3x (had to move twice but made money on both)
Didn't buy Iraq war (Osama had nothing to do with Hussein, we pretty much all knew that....)
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HEY YOU says
Ditto.
It was obvious Bush was lying as he kept ignoring the U.N.'s statements that there were no WMD and kept pushing for war before the U.N. could further prove the non-existence of the WMDs. Bush didn't want the world to see proof that the WMD accusation was a willful lie.
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CaptainShuddup says
Finally, someone else who realizes that both Bush and Obama are bad.
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I fell for the WMDs. And School. My job does not require a college degree, only a golden tongue. And that can't really be taught in an academic setting.
Never fell for Iran though, it's the most peaceful country in the world, except maybe Switzerland, in terms of starting wars.
The guy who taught me insurance taught me "Insurance Companies NEVER lose." And I've never seen information to the contrary.
Love Altucher, he's a real prick, a Carlinite.
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Dan8267 says
You probably weren't around, when I first came here. I was a huge hit with Patneters. They loved my humor, lambasting, and rants something rotten as long as Bush was on the receiving end. The minute I pointed my piehole in the direction of Obama I became this republican white middle aged racist.
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thunderlips11 says
Why else would Buffett want to own insurance companies?
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I still love you, TPB
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Let me add one Big Lie to the mix: Venezuela as a terror/narco-state human rights violating state run by a Dictator.
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thunderlips11 says
Of course Venezuela is evil. They have oil that we want.
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Good point thunderlips. The Biggest Lie of all, the war on drugs, never even got an honorable mention. I guess everyone is still buying it
Or how about the eating fats is bad, eating grains is good lie? Look where that's gotten us. Ill have to admit, I did buy into that one. Thankfully, the information age has shined the light on that pile of dung and all its corrupted "science", and now I'm a bacon eating machine!
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errc says
Of course everyone is still buying drugs.
errc says
OMG Bacon!
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It's quite possible that the war on drugs is still ongoing because the DEA declassified bacon as a controlled substance!
But seriously folks, let's make like Holland and stop the insanity. How many more people need to die in this needless war we have fought for decades in the name of Public Health?
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Quigley says
The War on Drugs "creates jobs" so we'll keep doing it.
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That article really hits close to home. I remember George Carlin had a good phrase where he said something along the lines... "It's all bullshit and it's bad for ya."
It's somewhere on youtube still. One of the first people to tell America to wake up, just like Patrick when he started this blog. And so much of America is just living in the illusion presented to them by the vetted interests.
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CaptainShuddup says
There was no rule against white middle aged racists hating GWB.
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marcus says
How could there be? That's the base!
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I couldn't find the article at the link above. I tried two different browsers.
But I think I found it elsewhere
http://lewrockwell.com/altucher/altucher90.1.html
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Ironically, the one I haven't fallen for (or at least haven't bought) is the one that I still would believe in, i.e. home ownership. I like to do home improvements. I spend time thinking about them, planning, buying supplies, improving my rented apartment. Then, when I move, I have to undo all of it, restoring everything to original condition. Last time nearly broke my heart.
Alas SF prices remain unreasonably high, so I must either (a) buy and await collapse, (b) buy and "convert" to groupthink and become a real estate booster (maybe even start a new career as a realtor), or (c) continue to rent and dread the day when it's time to move and all my work must be undone by my own hands.
http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2012/08/the-trillion-dollar-lies/
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StoutFiles says
Most colleges are limiting or eliminating the ability to do this. They're well aware of that this is a huge cost savings for their students and they don't like it one bit.
This is anecdotal but when I graduated from high school well over a decade ago it was also a well known path to getting a "reputable" degree for almost half the cost, so I really doubt its all that unknown or considered these days when everyone is poorer and grants are getting slashed.
Also its usually the kids of well off or rich that are able to pick and choose colleges based on "fun". While most 18 yr olds these days are definitely not clued in to how bad things are going to be for them out of college they're definitely starting to realize that something is very wrong with the job market and the economy in general.
This of course doesn't mean that the colleges still aren't counseling/pushing the students to get "useless" Liberal Arts degrees. But then its not so surprising that many 18 yr olds wouldn't know which degree to pick or even know what they really want to do at that age, so they'll usually still do what a counseller recommends.
Personally I think its pretty clear that most of those kids are being taken advantage of by the colleges, not only in being charged ridiculous college fees, but also by being pushed into getting an impractical degree that won't help them get or keep a job.
Note: I don't believe Liberal Arts degrees to be useless per se, they just don't do much at all to actually get you ready for a job or Real Life for that matter. And going to college is almost exclusively about getting a job now days, learning for the sake of learning or self enrichment is something only practical for the rich now.
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At some point all of this wasn't so expensive. Once big government and their wall street insiders get involved everything stops being affordable.
Education, housing, just life in general. I remember the days you could work part time at a low paying gig and be fine. That America is all but gone now, at least here in CA.
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FortWayne says
You realize that the exact opposite is true right? Historically before the govt. started to sponsor colleges and offer grants colleges was almost exclusively for the rich/connected. College for the masses was unheard of prior to WWII in the US for a reason you know.
It should be noted too that other countries have had no issue at all for decades offering free or nearly free college to _everyone_ in their country. Sure they pay higher taxes for that and other social welfare support programs, but they're getting something for their money and not going into debt to do it.
Things didn't start to get out of hand until crony capitalism started to get entrenched in our country, which started back in the 80's with Regan.
My thoughts on Regan are perhaps more eloquently elucidated thusly:
And the same is true of many EU countries. Prior to the creation/popping of the Global Credit Bubble several of them were actually running financial surpluses. It was only after the Credit Bubble popped and the banks were bailed out by the various countries that many developed the serious debt problem they find themselves in now. Crony capitialism has ruined the EU as well unfortunately.
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tts says
Moving ahead, ppl will need to gain credentials via national examination system than college. Unfortunately, the current white collar W-2 crowd will refuse to admit that they don't really use much academic know-how on their jobs. And thus, a type of enforced class separation is in effect.
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Peter P says
Only if you believed in him as an adult.
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First of all, I'd like to say that it is ironic and perhaps offensive that James Altucher is a guy that queries people about what lies they fell for.
Same deal if Henry Blodgett had written the article.