News Notes

Get The Flock Out

Thanks to reader VT Paladin for sending me this article from the UK Telegraph.  Seems that in Italy, many young men are abandoning hopes of finding white collar or professional jobs in their areas of training and education and are pursuing jobs as shepherds.  The article noted that they are bringing new ideas and practices to the ancient tradition that are starting to result in better quality meat, mild and wool from the sheep.

Kind of makes me think of the movie, The Wooly Boys, starring Kris Kristopherson, Peter Fonda and Keith Carradine.  Long story, short, Fonda and Kristopherson are sheep ranchers in North Dakota, and they bring Peter's grandson out from inner-city Chicago where he was a computer nerd kid and he learns that there is much more to life than a mouse and a keyboard.



Gold Bubble Coming?

From Moneynews comes this interview with a financial guru who supposedly has called a number of recent events pretty accurately.  He sees some sort of "trigger event" in the coming year that will push gold to an amazing $10,000 per ounce, followed by a huge sell off and a plummeting to $50 an ounce.  Now would be a great time to have Doc's Delorean... go back to 2001 and buy a big pile of gold at $300 an ounce, then sell it for $10,000, then bank the profit and reinvest the initial amount at $50.  This is NOT financial advice... although if you do have access to a time machine, please shoot me an email...


Civilized People Don't Buy Gold?

Are you familiar with Berkshire-Hathaway?  It is Warren Buffett's company with a stock price of $122,000 a share (?!?!?!).  Buffett's #2 guy recently discussed gold with CNBC.  According to him, if you are buying gold, you are must be either a savage or a Jew.  Read his own words:

"Gold is a great thing to sew into your garments if you’re a Jewish family in Vienna in 1939," the Berkshire vice chairman said, "but I think civilized people don’t buy gold, they invest in productive businesses."

I'm sorry, I try not to use foul language on here, but to quote Schoolmarm Johnson in Blazing Saddles, this guy is, "the leading asshole in the state."

I'm surprised he bothered to speak to a cable news station.  After all, nobody watches TV except we little people, the peons.  Maybe the great Charles Munger would toss me a shiny new quarter if I would throw myself into a mud puddle so he doesn't soil his bespoke shoes.

Raw Milk Preventing Allergies?

In this article from Yahoo News of Canada, researchers looked at rates of allergies in Amish children compared to Swiss farm children and Swiss non-farm children.  Apparently the Swiss have a long history of being less susceptible to allergies and researchers wanted to see if that applied to the Amish in America as well since they descended from Swiss.  What they found is that Amish farm kids are way less likely to develop allergies.  The researchers did not identify a reason, but a couple of their theories included, increased activity and exposure to animals and crops, less processed foods, and more raw milk rather than pasteurized. 

Wait a minute... Raw milk is evil and will cause all of us to die horrible, painful deaths.  That's what the federal government (funded by big Ag.) wants us to believe.  Yet right here are indicators that it could contribute to fewer allergies in children.  With the way that kids today are hypersensitive to foods and anything other than a sterile environment, and the drastic increases in the numbers and severity of childhood asthma, you'd think someone might want to find out if something as simple as raw milk would help reduce it.  But that just wouldn't be profitable to big Pharma or big Ag.

Guest Post Contest

Time is running out!  Don't miss entering the If It Hits The Fan guest post contest.  Entries must be emailed by May 7th.