The Razor

You may not know it but there’s a greater than zero chance that your 401k is invested in the following company: CYNK

CYNK “was founded as a web based social network that allows individuals to post a profile and link their profile to other friends and organizations.”

According to official filings it has 1 employee, no revenue, and no assets. Until June it was a stretch to call it a penny-stock. Today though it’s trading between $12-15 a share. It is at the time of this writing worth over $5 billion.

In case you are curious to what this looks like, here’s a quick chart of the stock.

What scares me is that someone is buying this stock, and while that person/algorithm may not lose his job, someone is going to get hurt once reality reasserts itself. When you have some commentators at ZeroHedge suggesting it would be immoral to short the stock, you know the situation is bizarre.

Update 7/11/2014: Trading has been suspended by the SEC. It is unlikely to resume. There are firms now holding around $5 billion of worthless stock in their portfolios. Those portfolios represent the sweat and hard work, money earned by real people that cannot be recovered. Let’s just hope that most of that $5 billion was instead owned by the idiots blowing up the current stock market bubble.

Update 7/15/2014: This trader lost his job by shorting the stock too early and getting burned on it the next day during a short squeeze. Of course he doesn’t blame himself; he blames the SEC even though, to quote the now unemployed trader, “My 10-year-old knew it was a scam. It was a complete joke.” Yet neither he – nor the investors who paid for his stupidity – are laughing.

Council Submissions

• The Independent Sentinel – Obama’s Fundamental Transformation Via Smoke And Mirrors
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• The Noisy Room – ACORN for Illegal Aliens – Meet the Southwest Key Programs
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• The Colossus of Rhodey – Does he really not understand the difference?
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• GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – The New Caliphate: Tease Or Threat?
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• Bookworm Room – Hobby Lobby: Trying to get DemProgs to understand what it means
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• Joshuapundit-#HillaryLies – Why Her Outrageous Speaking Fees Don’t ‘Go To Charity’
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• Ask Marion – Costco Caught Again… Removing D’Souza’s ‘America’ From Shelves
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• The Right Planet – Wahabis, ISIS, the King of Clubs and Qatar’s Role in Terrorism
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• The Razor – Illegal Immigrants Are Not Dogs
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• The Glittering Eye -The Breeding Ground
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• VA Right! - Is the Group “Patriots for Economic Freedom” Scamming Dave Brat Supporters? You be the judge.
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• Nice Deb – Cruz Calls For Investigation of MS Runoff: “It Would Be Abominable If Repubs Were Involved In Voter Fraud”
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• Rhymes With Right – The Obama Doctrine
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• Simply Jews – BBC finally gets it
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Honorable Mentions

• The MidKnight Review – A CBO report from 2009, is about to experience a “resurrection from the dead,” and “resurrection news” is death for the Dems in November of 2014.
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• The Elder Of Ziyon – New York Times criticizes Israel for trying to save Arab lives
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• The Pirate’s Cove – Democrats Looking For Legislative Fight Over Abortifacients
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Non-Council Submissions

• Gatestone Institute –ISIS Already In Gaza submitted by The Independent Sentinel
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• Charles C. W. Cooke/National Review –The Civil War of 1776 submitted by The Noisy Room
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• The Volokh Conspiracy/WAPO – The Supreme Court’s secular Jewish cabal’s war on religious freedom? submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey
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• Robert Farley/The National Interest – 5 Russian Weapons of War NATO Should Fear submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
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• Ted McAllister/Library of Law & Liberty-What a Providentially Bad President Can Do for America submitted by Bookworm Room
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• Kevin D. Williamson – Born on the Fifth of July submitted by Joshuapundit
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• Victor Davis Hanson/NRO -Our Roost, Obama’s Chickens submitted by Ask Marion
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• Israel Hayom – Radical Islam: Raging unabate submitted by The Right Planet
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• Ali Khedery/WAPO –Why We Stuck With Maliki – and Lost Iraq submitted by The Razor
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• War Is Boring – China Thinks It Can Defeat America in Battle submitted by The Glittering Eye
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• California Political Review – Berkeley Requires Marijuana Dispensaries To Provide Free Weed For Low-Income Patients submitted by VA Right!
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• Derek Hunter/Right Wing News -The Petulant President submitted by Nice Deb
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• Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion – Arab Violence Against Israel and Jews Continues submitted by Rhymes with Right
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• Blazing Cat Fur – Jihadis have their eyes on Jordan submitted by The Watcher
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• Daniel Hannan – The Forgotten Flag of the American Revolution and What It Means submitted by Watcher
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So why do we treat them worse?

I am actively involved in animal rescue. Over the course of my life I have rescued scores of animals, finding them forever homes when I could or keeping them as pets. The shelters are full of animals, most of which are facing death. Their crime? Having been born in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I do what I can. I spay and neuter everything I get my hands on, provide them health care and a loving home until I find the right place for them, and treat them with the love and respect that Chance has denied them. I have more pets than most people would consider reasonable and my limit has been reached. What is that limit? My ability to provide love and attention to each one.  I know I’m at that limit because I have a young beagle who needs more love and attention than I can provide. I do my best, but the truth is she needs a home where she can be someone’s special girl.

I can’t rescue them all. I don’t rush down to the county “kill” shelter, throw open the cages, open the doors and let all the animals run free even though they are facing certain death staying where they are.

I also don’t force people to take care of pets they don’t want. I believe that one solution to the pet overpopulation problem is for more animal lovers to responsibly take on more animals, but I don’t demand they do so nor do I expect the government to intervene and force them to.

See where I’m going with this?

I have lived abroad and seen true poverty, so I am very sympathetic to those who are coming illegally into our country. I recognize that most of them are innocent men, women and children stuck in a cage facing death back home. Their crime? Having been born in the wrong place at the wrong time. There are others who aren’t so innocent, as wild and untamed as the feral cats who plague our city parks.

Unlike pets the solution is not to spay and neuter them of course, and we can’t save them all – a fact that immigrant advocates seem to forget. What do we do?

Instead of dumping them on people who don’t want them, how about having them live with those who do. Everyone fighting for the immigrants to stay should open their homes to them just as I have the strays that cross my path. Help them take care of themselves here, learn English and find jobs to eventually become citizens instead of forcing them into shelters run by the government in neighborhoods where they are not wanted.

But the fact must be faced. We can’t save them all. America is not big enough; we have our own black, Hispanic, and white underclasses needing jobs and health care. What do we do?

Ultimately we will need to do some “Yankee Imperialism” to build countries in Central America that aren’t failed states run by goons on the payrolls of narcotics traffickers. That will require a lot of work on our part as a people who must learn that not all cultures are equal – that some are indeed better than others – but in the meantime those demanding the illegal immigrants stay should be opening up their homes and their own wallets, just as people who rescue animals do.

These are people. They deserve to be treated better than dogs. The sooner the immigration advocates realize this the better.

 

 

 

It’s hysteria, not mania, and it sure as hell isn’t science.

Council Winners

• *First place with 5 2/3 votes!Three Funerals.. And The End of The Beginning
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• Second place t with 1 2/3 votes – The Right Planet – Gut Check Iraq
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• Second place t with 1 2/3 votes –VA Right! - An Analysis of the US Senate Races – Who Will Win Control in November?
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• Third place with 1 1/3 votes –The Noisy Room – Doubling Down On Operation Choke Point
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• Fourth place with 1 vote –Bookworm Room – John Oliver manages to pack all the Left’s stupid Hobby Lobby arguments into one “comedy” shtick
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• Fourth place t with 2/3 vote –Ask Marion – Obama Racks Up a String of Judicial Losses at Supreme Court
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• Fourth place t with 2/3 vote – The Glittering Eye -What Do You Want Judges To Do?
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• Fourth place t with 2/3 vote – Rhymes With Right – Does Barack Obama Understand The Constitution?
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• Fourth place t with 2/3 vote – Simply Jews – Presbyterian divestment from Israel: The Dying Swan dance or a marketing gimmick?
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• Fifth place t with 1/3 vote – The Independent Sentinel – Watch Out Fishermen, Obama Is Planning a Seafood Fraud Crisis
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Non-Council Winners

• First place with 2 1/3 votes! –Sultan Knish –Our Consensus Rulers submitted by The Independent Sentinel
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• Second place with 2 votes –Mark Steyn –The Morning After submitted by The Noisy Room
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• Third place with 1 2/3 votes -Matt Walsh – Isn’t it mean and hateful to deport illegal immigrants? submitted by Joshuapundit
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• Fourth place t with 2 votes-Isi Leibler – The Klinghoffer Opera and the American Jewish Establishment submitted by Simply Jews
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• Fourth place t with 2 votes- Charles C. Johnson/Got News -Cochran Campaign Manager, Staffer Busted in Illegal Vote Buying Operation submitted by Nice Deb
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• Fifth place t with 1 vote-The Borowitz Report – Moderate Syrian Rebel Application Form submitted by The Glittering Eye
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• Fifth place t with 1 vote-The Federalist – Do Your Politics Require You To Oppose Bill Of Rights? That’s Not Good submitted by Rhymes with Right
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• Fifth place t with 1 vote-The American Interest/Bilahari Kausikan – A Nuclear Weapon Free World and Other Delusions submitted by The Razor
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• Sixth place t with 2/3 vote -Commentary – Mr. Piketty’s Big Book of Marxiness submitted by The Right Planet
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• Sixth place t with 2/3 vote -Noah Pollock – Bias Against Israel submitted by The Watcher
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• Seventh place t with 1/3 vote – John Podhoret/Commentary – The Secret of ‘Asymmetrical Warfare’—There Are Two Actors.. submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
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• Seventh place t with 1/3 vote -Douglas Ernst – Marvel’s Dan Slott stretches his bigotry muscles, tells Christians to build companies in ‘Christ-land’ submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey
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• Seventh place t with 1/3 vote -The Daily Caller – Lois Lerner and Fellow IRS Official Announced Targeting At 2010 Conference The Same Month Their Emails Went Missing submitted by VA Right!
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Council Submissions

• The Independent Sentinel – Watch Out Fishermen, Obama Is Planning a Seafood Fraud Crisis
• 
  
• The Noisy Room – Doubling Down On Operation Choke Point
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• Rhymes With Right – Does Barack Obama Understand The Constitution?
• 
  
• Simply Jews – Presbyterian divestment from Israel: The Dying Swan dance or a marketing gimmick?
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• The Razor – SCOTUS Hobby Lobby Decision Proves Flaw of Employer Based Health Insurance
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• VA Right! - An Analysis of the US Senate Races – Who Will Win Control in November?
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• The Right Planet – Gut Check Iraq
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• The Colossus of Rhodey – “Good thing he ain’t in government anymore”
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• Joshuapundit-Three Funerals.. And The End of The Beginning
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• The Glittering Eye -What Do You Want Judges To Do?
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• Nice Deb – Obama In MN: Pay No Attention To Those ‘Phony Scandals’ – They’re ‘Not On The Level’
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• GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – The Coming Iran-Saudi War
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• Ask Marion – Obama Racks Up a String of Judicial Losses at Supreme Court
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• Bookworm Room – John Oliver manages to pack all the Left’s stupid Hobby Lobby arguments into one “comedy” shtick
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Honorable Mentions

• Right Reason – #King Coyote
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• Seraphic Secret – Our Boys, the NY Times, Jodi Rudoren, PalNazis, and William Tecumseh Sherman
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• The Pirate’s Cove – Are Corporations People?
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• Tina Trent.com – Hillary Clinton and Thomas Alfred Taylor’s Underpants: It Takes a Village to Rape a Child
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Non-Council Submissions

• Sultan Knish –Our Consensus Rulers submitted by The Independent Sentinel
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• Mark Steyn –The Morning After submitted by The Noisy Room
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• The Federalist – Do Your Politics Require You To Oppose Bill Of Rights? That’s Not Good submitted by Rhymes with Right
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• Isi Leibler – The Klinghoffer Opera and the American Jewish Establishment submitted by Simply Jews
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• The American Interest/Bilahari Kausikan – A Nuclear Weapon Free World and Other Delusions submitted by The Razor
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• The Daily Caller – Lois Lerner and Fellow IRS Official Announced Targeting At 2010 Conference The Same Month Their Emails Went Missing submitted by VA Right!
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• Commentary – Mr. Piketty’s Big Book of Marxiness submitted by The Right Planet
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• Douglas Ernst – Marvel’s Dan Slott stretches his bigotry muscles, tells Christians to build companies in ‘Christ-land’ submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey
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• Matt Walsh – Isn’t it mean and hateful to deport illegal immigrants?
  submitted by Joshuapundit
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• The Borowitz Report – Moderate Syrian Rebel Application Form submitted by The Glittering Eye
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• Charles C. Johnson/Got News -Cochran Campaign Manager, Staffer Busted in Illegal Vote Buying Operation submitted by Nice Deb
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• John Podhoret/Commentary – The Secret of ‘Asymmetrical Warfare’—There Are Two Actors.. submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
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• Washington Free Beacon -The Hillary Tapes: Part Two submitted by Ask Marion
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• Prager University/George Gilder-Do you pass the Israel test? submitted by Bookworm Room
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• Kevin D. Williamson/NRO – The Case for a Boring Man submitted by The Watcher
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• Noah Pollock – Bias Against Israel submitted by The Watcher
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Although I support the Hobby Lobby decision rendered by the US Supreme Court, the decision merely points to a bigger problem: employer based health insurance. As an IT professional I have frequently switched jobs or worked for myself, and the health insurance coverage available to me is expensive and often non-existent. I have bought health insurance on the individual market exactly as I do with my car insurance, and the fact that the individual market is regulated to death, provides little competition unlike the auto insurance market and is outrageously more expensive is puzzling. I can spend 15 minutes to save 15% on car insurance yet it would take me twice as long to find a provider in my area and determine which insurance products were available to me then cost me twice as much just doesn’t make sense.

Paul Waldman writing for the Washington Post points out that employer based health insurance is rare in the industrialized world and is the result of an accident of history.

 

The system has its real roots in World War II, when the government imposed wage and price controls. Although there had been some health insurance plans sold through employers before, when companies couldn’t offer increased wages during the war, they began offering health benefits instead. When the IRS ruled that those benefits didn’t count as income and so were tax-free, the momentum toward employer-sponsored insurance was all but unstoppable (the deduction for employer-provided coverage is now the largest tax expenditure in the federal budget, dwarfing even the mortgage interest deduction).

 

Waldman points out that through employer based health insurance I use pre-tax dollars to pay for the insurance whereas when I buy on the individual market I have to use post-tax dollars. This makes any health insurance I purchase on the individual market more expensive depending on my tax bracket.

Now we have the IRS involved in our health insurance system. What next? The EPA to regulate the amount of carbon dioxide we exhale? The NSA to handle our medical records? How about the VA to handle appointment scheduling?  It seems to me you couldn’t design a worse health insurance system than the one we have today.

So conservatives shouldn’t cheer the Supreme Court’s decision to loudly and liberals should stop freaking out. Instead they should work together to end this crazy legacy of World War 2 so that companies can focus on making money and employees can take care of themselves as they see fit.

Update: Laurie Rice, writing for the Atlas Society, adds this:

(G)overnment involvement in the market is the reason why so many women have to get insurance through their employer in the first place. That government involvement in women’s health means today’s contraception victory is tomorrow’s political bargaining chip, to be traded by people like Kathleen Sebelius. That state power is more inescapable, more inflexible, and more insidious to women’s freedoms than any Hobby Lobby conservative craft store could ever be. Feminists need to embrace free-market capitalism.

 

Feminists need to embrace free-market capitalism? Given the alliance with Big Government and Leftism I’m not holding my breath.