23 Mar 2014

30 US Survey Results That Sound False But That Are Actually True

By Michael Snyder: You will be shocked at what some Americans actually believe.  For example, close to 90 percent of us believe that we are eating a healthy diet, and yet more than third of the population is officially obese.  65 percent of all Americans say that they are dissatisfied with the government, and yet nearly a third of us would be willing to submit to a "TSA body cavity search" in order to get on an airplane.  As you will see below, Americans are angrier and more frustrated with government and with their lives than ever before, but we also exhibit almost unbelievable levels of sloth and apathy.  Some of the numbers below are quite funny, and others are absolutely stunning.  But they all say something about who we have become as a nation.  The following are 30 survey results that sound false but that are actually true...
#1 According to a recent Rasmussen Reports survey, 52 percent of Americans "do not think the economy is fair to those willing to work hard".
#2 70 percent of all Americans do not "feel engaged or inspired at their jobs".
#3 According to another recent Rasmussen Reports survey, 59 percent of Americans believe that "less government involvement in the economy" would help reduce the size of the income gap in this country.  (And those 59 percent are actually correct.)

What's The Primary Cause Of Wealth Inequality? Financialization

Financialization results when leverage and information asymmetry replace innovation and productive investment as the source of wealth creation.
By Charles Hugh Smith: Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty are leading lights in the exploration of rising wealth inequality.Both are academic economists who have devoted considerable time and effort to assembling data that deepens our understanding of the issues.
For example, Saez's recent essay Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States, provides an in-depth look at the widening gulf between the top 1% and the bottom 90% from 2009 to 2012.
Here is a chart of the top 10% share of income, based on their research: (the note in red marking the beginning of financialization in 1982 is my own)

Men, Math, and Masculinity – Part 2

By : A few weeks ago, I submitted an essay about “Men, Math and Masculinity,” now renamed as Part 1 for this is a Part 2 I did not intend to write.
There was a backlash, on Facebook and on other web sites. The backlash began as an email trickle and I was soon overwhelmed with hate mail informing me I should not be teaching and that I hated women.  I had to stop reading the emails.
So now I would like to respond, point-wise.
First: I never said women cannot do math.
Second: I stated that after forty years of interventions, there remains a 30 point gap in math scores between high school men and women; this gap will not go away.  That is a fact.
Third: I stated that this 30 point gap is due exclusively to the top one percent scores.  If one ignores the top one percent, the average math scores are the same for men and women.  However, what has happened is that math competence is dropping precipitously for both men and women.  And that is a fact.

It Is Time To End "Rape Culture" Hysteria - MANstream Media

"More men than women are being raped in P.I.G.* USA today."
Paul Elam: Rape culture, or the idea that we live in a society where the sexual assault and abuse of women by men is routinely condoned and normalized, has been an overarching concern and cause célèbre for gender ideologues for a number of years.

This is particularly true on our college campuses.

How China Imported A Record $70 Billion In Physical Gold Without Sending The Price Of Gold Soaring

Tyler Durden's picture A little over a month ago, we reported that following a year of record-shattering imports, China finally surpassed India as the world's largest importer of physical gold. This was hardly a surprise to anyone who has been following our coverage of the ravenous demand for gold out of China, starting in September 2011, and tracing it all the way to the present.

China's appetite for physical gold, which is further shown below focusing just on 2012 and 2013, has been estimated by Goldman to amount to over $70 billion in bilateral trade between just Hong Kong and China alone.

89% Of Veneto Residents Vote For Independence From Rome


RT: Over 89 percent of residents in Italy's Veneto region have voted in an unofficial referendum in favor of independence from the rest of the country as Venetians seek to restore the glory of the old days by creating a state of their own.
Over two million residents of Veneto – the region of Italy surrounding Venice – took part in the so-called 'Veneto independence referendum' that lasted from Sunday to Friday. The survey, conducted online and backed by the region’s independence parties, has no legal power but aims to gather support for a bill calling for a referendum.

Jitters Mount Over Prospect Of Catalonian Independence

President, you are making a grave mistake.
By Don Quijones: These are the words that Isidro Fainé, the CEO of Catalonia’s megabank La Caixa, is alleged to have said to the region’s president, Artur Mas, during a private face-to-face meeting last year.

Like many of Spain’s business and finance big shots, Fainé is growing a little jittery over the prospect of Catalonian independence; the last thing transnational companies or banks want is for new national borders to be erected that restrict their flow of trade or capital.
An unofficial, symmetric trade boycott has already taken its toll on both the Spanish and Catalonian economies. Not even Spain’s biggest bank, Banco Santander, has escaped the fallout. An associate of mine who works for the bank recently reported losing a high-net worth Catalan client, with over four million euros invested in the bank. The customer had taken offense to Santander President Emilio Botin’s criticism of the Catalonian independence movement.
For Catalan banks such as La Caixa and Banco Sabadell, the stakes are even higher since so much of their business is based in Spain’s north-eastern province. Indeed, as the governor of the Bank of Spain, Luis María Linde, warned late last year, the Catalan independence movement could even pose an existential threat to the region’s banks.

Honey, I love you. Let’s get divorced.

I am often asked what led me, a woman, to become a men’s human rights activist (MHRA/MRA). The question doesn’t particularly make sense to me. The answer to the question is that I am a rational, logical person. But aside from that, who I am doesn’t matter. My gender is irrelevant.
The mainstream, feminist culture has a current perception of the men’s human rights movement (MHRM) as some sort of cult that fills vulnerable minds with an “angry white male” world view. Nothing could be further from the truth. I didn’t become an MRA, I was an MRA before I even knew about the movement. It’s the natural result of being a rational human being.
Just as my opinions about feminism, women, men, and mainstream culture have not significantly been altered by discovering the MHRM, my beliefs about marriage have not been affected by my discovery of MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way). I have been a critic of the institution of marriage since the age of 16. When I discovered men were abandoning marriage to women my reaction was well, duh!”

Misandry: The Right To Be There

By : I respect the National Parents Organization. I have been reading their publications for years, reaching far back into their years known as Fathers and Families. They do good work and Robert Franklin covers a wide range of vitally important topics in regards to father’s rights, a core part of the Men’s Rights Movement.
Now, however, I must cry foul.
In an article published on March 17th titled  New Jersey Father Barred by Law from Delivery Room, Franklin discusses a judge’s ruling in New Jersey:
A New Jersey Superior Court judge ruled last week that an unmarried father, Steven Plotnik, has no right to be in the delivery room for the birth of his child and no right to be notified of when the mother, Rebecca DeLuccia, goes into labor.
Franklin goes on to agree with the decision, although he says “reluctantly”:
Within its limited context, Judge Mohammed’s decision makes sense

Do I want courts to start ordering mothers in labor to allow fathers into their delivery rooms whether they want them there or not? No. And if the rest of the law on fathers and children were set aright, Judge Mohammed’s ruling would be no big deal.
And it is there I must disagree. The decision does not make sense, it is a big deal and I absolutely do want courts ordering for those men to have access to the birth of their children.