What completely baffles you?

ben@31

What completely baffles me....

- The USA needs some money.
- So it phones up the Federal Reserve. Which isn't Federal and it has no reserve what so ever. It's a private cartel.
- The Fed literally puts some A4 paper into an inkjet printer and makes some $'s out of thin air.
- The Fed then LOANS this made up money to the USA and expects it paid back WITH INTEREST.
- The USA then has to pay this private cartel which it has no power over. Not even the President can go inside the Fed.
- The only way the USA can pay back this private cartel is by borrowing more conjured up money (perpetual debt) or by taxing the likes of you and me.

How is this scam allowed to happen?

How much money actually exists? They are printing more than what they actually have. If everyone were to get their paper money and do a run to the bank demanding it exchanged for gold or silver or oil or bikes, the bank could not do it. If you get a loan, the bank is giving you money that doesn't exist, it just creates more debt. But the bank collects interest on money it never had.

The paper money is a worthless I.O.U.

How can it be that all the people who work hard producing all the wealth in the world are in debt to those who lend made up wealth?

Peddle Up!

ben@31 wrote:

What completely baffles me....

- The USA needs some money.
- So it phones up the Federal Reserve. Which isn't Federal and it has no reserve what so ever. It's a private cartel.
- The Fed puts some A4 paper into an inkjet printer and makes some $'s out of thin air.
- The Fed then LOANS this made up money to the USA and expects it paid back WITH INTEREST.
- The USA then has to pay this private cartel which it has no power over. Not even the President can go inside the Fed.
- The only way the USA can pay back this private cartel is by borrowing more conjured up money (perpetual debt) or by taxing the likes of you and me.

How is this scam allowed to happen?

How much money actually exists? They are printing more than what they actually have. If everyone were to get their paper money and do a run to the bank demanding it exchanged for gold or silver or oil or bikes, the bank could not do it. If you get a loan, the bank is giving you money that doesn't exist, it just creates more debt. But the bank collects interest on money it never had.

The paper money is a worthless I.O.U.

It's almost as if a rich and powerful elite run the show, and democracy is mostly a show. But that can't be right can it?

Daz555

What would happen if ALL national debt for every nation across the entire planet was cancelled TODAY.

ben@31

Daz555 wrote:

What would happen if ALL national debt for every nation across the entire planet was cancelled TODAY.

No debt = no money

As money is an IOU

seanoconn

Daz555 wrote:

What would happen if ALL national debt for every nation across the entire planet was cancelled TODAY.

That Detective, is the right question.

Daz555

ben@31 wrote:

Daz555 wrote:

What would happen if ALL national debt for every nation across the entire planet was cancelled TODAY.

No debt = no money

As money is an IOU

Of course every transaction in a monetary system involves debt, even if only briefly.

I meant specifically national/public debt. What would happen if all nations suddenly stopped paying the repayments and interest on their national debt - US for example pays $400bn per year in interest alone. What would happen globally if this STOPPED at the same time for every nation on the planet?

Peddle Up!

I'm shocked, shocked to discover that our politicians can behave like mendacious criminals. :shock:

ben@31

Daz555 wrote:

Of course every transaction in a monetary system involves debt, even if only briefly.

I meant specifically national/public debt. What would happen if all nations suddenly stopped paying the repayments and interest on their national debt - US for example pays $400bn per year in interest alone. What would happen globally if this STOPPED at the same time for every nation on the planet?

Unless farmer Giles exchanges miner Mike, a ham sandwich for some coal. But the problem is different people place a different value on things they trade.

National debt has to pay back both the loans AND interest, out of a pool that only contains loans. The debt can't be paid back because the interest money does not exist. The problem is the amount of interest on gov't loans now far exceeds the amount borrowed. So more and more debt money has to be created to pay it back. Perpetual debt.

I think the gov'ts are trapped, dependant on this money printing machine to fund things. If the govt's default the payments they will no longer get loans to pay for schools, hospitals, high speed rail links.

Pross

I've got another one that baffles me but if there's any Welsh speakers on here hopefully they can help! Driving across Anglesey last week and I noticed the signs for the village of Valley (i.e. where the RAF base is) show the Welsh translation as Y Fali. Now I always thought that Cwm is the Welsh word for valley so why the use of what just looks like a Welsh-ized version of the English word?

On a similar subject, I'm always baffled by the Welsh translation of a placename when the placename is apparently Welsh in the first place. For example there is a village near me called Llanelen but the Welsh translation is Llanellen so why not just spell it correctly in the 'English' version?

Giraffoto

Pross wrote:

I've got another one that baffles me but if there's any Welsh speakers on here hopefully they can help! Driving across Anglesey last week and I noticed the signs for the village of Valley (i.e. where the RAF base is) show the Welsh translation as Y Fali. Now I always thought that Cwm is the Welsh word for valley so why the use of what just looks like a Welsh-ized version of the English word?

On a similar subject, I'm always baffled by the Welsh translation of a placename when the placename is apparently Welsh in the first place. For example there is a village near me called Llanelen but the Welsh translation is Llanellen so why not just spell it correctly in the 'English' version?

I don't speak Welsh. A Welsh-speaking friend told me that the Welsh version of words is either traditional, or in the case of relatively recent words, derived from the same roots as the English (so the Welsh for "polyunsaturates" would actually be the Welsh for "lots of things that aren't soaked") He failed to explain why the Welsh for bicycle doesn't translate to "two wheels" but is instead "beic", pronounced "bike". Conclusion: it's their language and they're going to do what they like with it, so there

Garry H

Pross wrote:

I've got another one that baffles me but if there's any Welsh speakers on here hopefully they can help! Driving across Anglesey last week and I noticed the signs for the village of Valley (i.e. where the RAF base is) show the Welsh translation as Y Fali. Now I always thought that Cwm is the Welsh word for valley so why the use of what just looks like a Welsh-ized version of the English word?

On a similar subject, I'm always baffled by the Welsh translation of a placename when the placename is apparently Welsh in the first place. For example there is a village near me called Llanelen but the Welsh translation is Llanellen so why not just spell it correctly in the 'English' version?

I'm originally from the other side of the Menai Straits to Anglesy and a Welsh speaker. As far as i know, there never was a Welsh name for the place now known as Valley. I know that, 20 years ago at least, some wanted to call it "Dyffryn", which is Welsh for Valley, but that never took hold as far as I know.

Llanelen and Llanellen could actually both be Welsh. It's likely that Llanelen is the Anglicised form of Llanellen, or that Llanellen is actually just an error, or that it's actually Welsh. "Elen" is a Welsh female name (Helen perhaps??), Llan usually means some kind of parish associated with a church and may have a connection with "St Helen". You do the homework

As far as more modern words are concerned Giraffoto is right. A lot of them are just "Welshisations" (if you like) of English words. However, saying that, the English for the thing that we call a bicycle would actually be "two wheels" or "two circles", bicycle being itself a corruption of a latin form, probably

Hope that helps.

On a similar note, why is the English word for Caerdydd spelt Cardiff, rather than Cardif? Pronounciation would be the same. That baffles me a wee bit.

byke68

What is baffling me and a few others is why have our wonderful IT Department switched our old work program to read only ( minus most of the menus) BEFORE making sure the new system actually works! We are now into the 3rd day of no working computer system and the work is piling up! :roll:

Pross

Thanks Garry, you are spot on with the name of the church in Llanellen. I still don't get why they have a Welsh and 'English' name that are just different Welsh words though, surely the translation should be something like St Helen's Church if you are going to bother with one at all? Swansea baffles me too, with the Welsh name being completely different. Never realised Dyffryn meant valley, what does Cwm mean then?

verylonglegs

My full sense of smell/taste buds haven't returned since a bad flu type bug over the New year period. wtf is going on?! I can make out the smells and flavours but just not to their usual full effect. Slightly annoying.

Garry H

Pross wrote:

Thanks Garry, you are spot on with the name of the church in Llanellen. I still don't get why they have a Welsh and 'English' name that are just different Welsh words though, surely the translation should be something like St Helen's Church if you are going to bother with one at all? Swansea baffles me too, with the Welsh name being completely different. Never realised Dyffryn meant valley, what does Cwm mean then?

Apparently, "Swansea" has nothing to do with Swans. It's something to do with some Scandinavian king or summat. Same with Anglesey. The "sey" in anglesey and "sea" in Swansea are from the same Scandinavian (?) root. Neither actually meaning th sea. Abertawe just means "mouth of the (river) Tawe". This is all from inside my head, so may not be real

Llanelen may just be a way of making English speakers feel more comfortable. In the same way that the name "Lloyd" is an anglisisation of "Llwyd", which is the Welsh for Gray. Same as English form of Caernarfon was Caernarvon, not "Fortification of Arfon". I guess what I'm trying to say is that it baffles me too

Dyffryn and Cwm are both taken to mean Valley, but there are slight geographical differences between the two. Dyffryn is the same as the Scottish Glen (eg Glen Coe), and Cwm is the same as a Corrie (Eg Corrie an Lochan). Both are glacial creations but the latter being more rounded in form, like a bowl.

Edit: Dyffryn is same as Vale, ie a wide flat-bottomed valley. Glen is Glyn, a long u shaped valley.

Anything else?

Pross

That'll do for now, being from South East Wales I was robbed of the chance to learn my native tongue at school I believe my surname means 'son of a barrel maker' though (I know the son of is correct anyway!)

Garry H

Prosser? If so it's "son of Roger".

Son of is "Ap", eg Llewelyn ap Gruffydd. A lot of welsh surnames that begin in P, are anglicised forms. "Price" being Ap Rhys, so David Price, would have been Dafydd ap Rhys.

Pross

I've been misinformed all my life then. I was told Rosser was the Welsh equivalent of a cooper.

Peddle Up!

Wasn't Welsh made up in the 19C?

Giraffoto

Peddle Up! wrote:

Wasn't Welsh made up in the 19C?

No, it goes back thousands of years to the "Celtic languages split" when Welsh got all the consonants and Irish got all the vowels. The word "Celtic" only goes back about that far though.

Something different that has got me baffled: ebay. Anyone whose bought or sold on ebay knows that it's not only very difficult to end an auction early, but against the rules if you do it to avoid paying the fees or to get out of flogging things too cheaply. And yet every time I try to flog stuff on ebay I can guarantee that someone will ask me to do just that. Am I the only one who goes by the rules?

Garry H

Peddle Up! wrote:

Wasn't Welsh made up in the 19C?

No, it was made up last Tuesday when an Englishman walked into a pub in Llanelli and all of a sudden all the other customers started speaking it.

stephenlinden

fast as fupp wrote:

string theory :shock:

Just what I was thinking. Anything that requires more than 4 dimensions to make the maths work is way too complicated.

ben@31

Garry H wrote:

Peddle Up! wrote:

Wasn't Welsh made up in the 19C?

No, it was made up last Tuesday when an Englishman walked into a pub in Llanelli and all of a sudden all the other customers started speaking it.

There was a guy I used to work with who had a Midlands accent, he recently walked into a pub in North Wales and all of a sudden all the other customers did start talking Welsh.

A few pints later, as he was leaving, to the surprise to the other customers he turned around and said his good byes in fluent Welsh.

It turns out his dad worked in the RAF and his family moved all over the UK, at one point he dad was posted to Anglesey so this guy went to a Welsh school and had to do his GCSE's in Welsh!

Garry H

ben@31 wrote:

Garry H wrote:

Peddle Up! wrote:

Wasn't Welsh made up in the 19C?

No, it was made up last Tuesday when an Englishman walked into a pub in Llanelli and all of a sudden all the other customers started speaking it.

There was a guy I used to work with who had a Midlands accent, he recently walked into a pub in North Wales and all of a sudden all the other customers did start talking Welsh.

A few pints later, as he was leaving, to the surprise to the other customers he turned around and said his good byes in fluent Welsh.

It turns out his dad worked in the RAF and his family moved all over the UK, at one point he dad was posted to Anglesey so this guy went to a Welsh school and had to do his GCSE's in Welsh!

you mean they were all talkinh in english until he walked in? Yep, i met dozens who'd experienced the same thing whilst i was working in london.

Garry H

Pross wrote:

I've been misinformed all my life then. I was told Rosser was the Welsh equivalent of a cooper.

Just checked out what roger means, it's way cooler than cooper!

ethanhayes

Garry H wrote:

Pross wrote:

I've got another one that baffles me but if there's any Welsh speakers on here hopefully they can help! Driving across Anglesey last week and I noticed the signs for the village of Valley (i.e. where the RAF base is) show the Welsh translation as Y Fali. Now I always thought that Cwm is the Welsh word for valley so why the use of what just looks like a Welsh-ized version of the English word?

On a similar subject, I'm always baffled by the Welsh translation of a placename when the placename is apparently Welsh in the first place. For example there is a village near me called Llanelen but the Welsh translation is Llanellen so why not just spell it correctly in the 'English' version?

I'm originally from the other side of the Menai Straits to Anglesy and a Welsh speaker. As far as i know, there never was a Welsh name for the place now known as Valley. I know that, 20 years ago at least, some wanted to call it "Dyffryn", which is Welsh for Valley, but that never took hold as far as I know.

Llanelen and Llanellen could actually both be Welsh. It's likely that Llanelen is the Anglicised form of Llanellen, or that Llanellen is actually just an error, or that it's actually Welsh. "Elen" is a Welsh female name (Helen perhaps??), Llan usually means some kind of parish associated with a church and may have a connection with "St Helen". You do the homework

As far as more modern words are concerned Giraffoto is right. A lot of them are just "Welshisations" (if you like) of English words. However, saying that, the English for the thing that we call a bicycle would actually be "two wheels" or "two circles", bicycle being itself a corruption of a latin form, probably

Hope that helps.

On a similar note, why is the English word for Caerdydd spelt Cardiff, rather than Cardif? Pronounciation would be the same. That baffles me a wee bit.

As a welsh speaker who lived on Anglesey, what this guy said (I can vouch, I've got a GCSE and everything)

Another thing that baffles me about Welsh is the way street names can be completely different things in English and Welsh
For example Ffordd Y Ffair in Menai Bridge, which is 'Wood Street' in English.

On a similar note to your last sentence;
Why do we say calais like the French, but not Paris?

ethanhayes

Double post:
I done did foruming wrong.

mallorcajeff

Why I work so hard for such little pay and continue to do it each day. I would love a break from getting fu@k all for all my efforts and a bit more for me and the family. That I will never understand,

ben@31

mallorcajeff wrote:

Why I work so hard for such little pay and continue to do it each day. I would love a break from getting fu@k all for all my efforts and a bit more for me and the family. That I will never understand,

What blows my mind is working so hard to make someone else richer.

And them putting you down, saying what you can not do.

But you can do better than that. Work for yourself, be your own boss.

mallorcajeff

Exactly. I'm looking to do my own thing again. Made my annual salary now every 8 weeks back then. Must do something for myself again.