Remember states’ rights? Sit back and watch the power of money

Mix Lux sees what's coming. Will it be another bailout for the banks in the form of a federal invasion of states rights? Will it be a federal law that says that banks don't need to obey state law? It could be ugly, and it might involve the transfer of massive amounts of money to banks that caused the current foreclosure problem. Lux cites to the writings of someone named "Numerian":

With increasing desperation, banks along with their enablers in Washington are going to try to jerry-rig a way out of this problem. Unfortunately for the banks, ex post facto laws are strictly forbidden by the Constitution, which is now being treated with new-found reverence by the Congress. It may be impossible to construct a law that solves problems like this that already exist. Perhaps the banks will get lucky, and some courts will begin to find in their favor, though that is certainly not the trend at the moment. Maybe the US Supreme Court will accept the banks’ argument that the securitization process in itself established a valid foreclosure claim even though mortgages were not properly assigned as required by state laws. This, however, would require the Supreme Court to make up a legal doctrine out of the blue (as the banks have done), thereby overturning all state laws and court rulings going back well over 100 years. Only a Supreme Court bought and paid for by bank lobbyists, and willing to prostitute itself publicly to its paymasters, would issue such a ruling. This means that the likely progression of events – the path we are now on - will lead to a near complete collapse of the housing market, because the big banks and the two government enterprises responsible for supporting the housing market will be fatally crippled wards of the state. The US government itself, including the Federal Reserve, will be equally crippled. Try as you might, you will find no words in the Bible – no phrases applicable to The Flood or to the destruction of whole cities at the hands of a vengeful God – that appropriately capture the financial gravity of this situation. But if we are forced to come up with some metaphor, Financial Armageddon will have to do.

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This is why it’s so difficult to get good people to run for political office

Help Wanted:

Now Hiring U.S. Senators and Representatives

We are in desperate need for honest and intelligent citizens of the United States to apply for the jobs of Senators and Representatives as specified in Article I of the United States Constitution. Job Duty: To do anything necessary to keep getting re-elected. Job Requirements: - You must be willing to raise $1,000,000 every two years ($10,000/week for a Representative) or $6,000,000 every six years (about $20,000/week for Senator). To raise one million dollars, you can either convince 10,000 citizens to give you $100 each or you can make secret promises to a few hundred large corporations. It’s your choice. - You must be willing to vote to pass 2,000-page hyper-technical and incoherent bills that were drafted by corporate lobbyists. - You must spend most of your time on the job secretly promising favors to large companies and asking them for money, while simultaneously denying to your constituents that you’ve made secret promises. - You must be willing to expose yourself, your family and your friends to the constant risk of being shot by incoherent disgruntled people. - You must be willing to find a way to avoid spending time with lower-class and middle-class Americans. - You must be willing to expose yourself to constant ridicule and false charges trumped up by the media to sell advertisements. Everything embarrassing you’ve ever done will appear in national publications, especially if it is irrelevant to the issues facing this country. - Once you start campaigning for the very first time, you must agree to stop talking candidly about anything. - You must support America’s war-machine or else you will be called a traitor and run out of office. - You must be willing to expose your family and your closest friends to massive invasions of their privacy. - You must pretend to explain and solve complex social issues using only 8-second sound bites. - You must be willing to expose yourself to scandalous and false Swift-Boating attacks. - Your door must always be open to lobbyists for banks, insurance companies and telecoms. - To win re-election, you must get down in the dirt and personally hurl false charges against your opponent, because the ends will justify the means. - You must constantly speak of our duty to our children while simultaneously crushing the next generation with federal debt, and providing the nation's children with terrible educations.

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Blindsight demonstrated

I spotted this article about blindsightedness at Seed:

TN’s rare condition is known as blindsight. Because his stroke damaged only his visual cortex, his eyes remain functional and as a result can still gather information from his environment. He simply lacks the visual cortex to process and interpret it. Sight has changed for TN from a conscious to a largely subconscious experience. He no longer has a definitive picture of his surroundings, but he has retained an innate awareness of his position in the world. He is, to some degree, able to see without being aware that he is seeing.

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Brain wiring

Meet the new effort to map the wiring of the human brain. The brain connectome "offers a unique opportunity to understand the complete details of neural connectivity. The Human Connectome Project (HCP) is a project to construct a map of the complete structural and functional neural connections in vivo within and across individuals." Do check out the images at the link location.

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