You Can't Bargain with a Psychopath

[abduLMaria]

You can't bargain with a Psychopath.  It just causes you stress and puts a real sick smile on the psychopath's face.

One way to deal with a psychopath is to quietly disengage from them - and to then warn the world about them.

The immediate case that comes to mind is a Canadian bank that i had some savings with.  I started the account about 10 years ago, but the customer service has changed a lot (from existent to non-existent).  Imagine having a good portion of your life savings with a bank that you are unable to contact.

They won't pick up the phone, they won't respond to emails.

Most recently, I did a test wire transfer to a savings account in the US.

The international bank f*cked up the wire transfer & did a double wire transfer - they sent me an extra few $ thousand.  I thought the response to this would be, it would show up in the statement as an additional withdrawal.

It did not show up in the statement.  I thought, "what happens now ?"

As it turned out, instead of contacting me by phone or email, which the bank had done numerous times in the past ... the bank waited a month - and then sent me a certified mail threatening to sue me, re-possess my first-born child, etc.

(Incidentally, I contacted the bank as soon as i was aware of the situation.  The guy I talked to didn't know what I was talking about, so I figured it would sort itself out in the paper work.)

At this point, I know that I am dealing with a different organization than the one I signed up with.  It is time to dis-engage.  So I am quietly & patiently dis-engaging.

Once I am dis-engaged, i may give them some extra PR by putting all the documents online, and telling the story there.

It is odd.  I thought I had fire-walled myself from corporate America, by withdrawing from credit card agreements, closing my BofA account, etc.

but ... perhaps the job is never over.  "eternal vigilance".  the international banks will take their pound of flesh, in the form of exchange rate spreads.  i will get most of my money back, slightly wiser.

At this point I think it's good advice to tell people to put their money & savings & investments where there is none of the following kinds of risk -
*  counterparty risk
*  Enron risk (fraudulent accounting means the investment is worth less)
*  BofA risk (discretionary service fees rob you).

With this international bank, I am dealing with BofA risk.  Big service fees, distorted exchange rates.

This is just one example.

On a different front, I just heard of a local Kaiser patient whose co-pay for a chronic condition just increased from $45 to $1000.  That's not a typo.

This is one of the reasons I am opposed to Obama-care - it will try to force me to
have a contractual relationship with organizations like Kaiser, after I discovered
that they were not healthy for me and successfully dis-engaged from them.

As far as which kind of savings lacks those risks mentioned, the list is getting
shorter & shorter.  I would put the money into dividend paying stocks - but then
I am exposed to Enron risk.

The Street just ran an article about the top 10 dividend paying stocks.  Since we can no longer get 4% on a simple savings account, it is tempting to put money into a company like McDonald's that has a 4% dividend yield (side-stepping the fact that they are on the Boycott Israel campaign, maybe McDonald's is a bad example).

http://www.thestreet.com/story/10691936 ... art-1.html
http://www.thestreet.com/story/10692430 ... art-2.html

maybe ... AFTER the stock market crashes.

So I am saying goodbye to psychopathic international banks and keeping my money
in cash accounts ("demand deposits") with banks that have good reserve ratios,
and also gold and silver.

It's almost like a video game, dodging all the collapsing banks, dis-engaging from organizations that you thought you could trust - because they have been trust-worthy for the last 20 or 30 years.  It's a different world now - a ZOG world.

Well, maybe it's always been a ZOG world - it's just that they've been cranking up the heat lately.

I think this dovetails with a larger project that many of us are involved in, which is "how to de-Zog your life".  De-Zog your finances, De-Zog your food supplies, De-Zog your entertainment, De-Zog your transportation.

Although it is stressful and a pain in the ass, is better than leaving yourself exposed to ZOG. WAY better.

Wishing you the Best in dealing with the Psychopaths, Zio- or otherwise, in your life,

Abdul Maria

[scorpio]

I think this dovetails with a larger project that many of us are involved in, which is "how to de-Zog your life".  De-Zog your finances, De-Zog your food supplies, De-Zog your entertainment, De-Zog your transportation.

Although it is stressful and a pain in the ass, is better than leaving yourself exposed to ZOG. WAY better.

Wishing you the Best in dealing with the Psychopaths, Zio- or otherwise, in your life,

Abdul Maria

Great post. Those are things we can all do TODAY!!
Also, I tell anyone that will listen to me what I know about zog.
People that thought I was crazy only a year ago, now are starting to see the light.

If you must keep any money in the bank, do it with a local one or a local credit union.
Personally, I think silver is a MUCH better investment than gold.
The price of gold is already quite high (around $1000 per oz.) whereas silver is sooooo cheap it's gotta go up quite a bit, maybe double or triple within the next year or so. The last time I checked, it was under $17 per oz. It's hard to believe they can mine, refine it and mint it for that price.
Also, I have friends in Nevada where a lot of silver is mined, and they told me that the EPA is making it very difficult to mine silver or
anything else.  

[abduLMaria]

If you must keep any money in the bank, do it with a local one or a local credit union.
Personally, I think silver is a MUCH better investment than gold.
The price of gold is already quite high (around $1000 per oz.) whereas silver is sooooo cheap it's gotta go up quite a bit, maybe double or triple within the next year or so. The last time I checked, it was under $17 per oz. It's hard to believe they can mine, refine it and mint it for that price.
Also, I have friends in Nevada where a lot of silver is mined, and they told me that the EPA is making it very difficult to mine silver or
anything else.  

yeah, 2 pieces of good advice there.

when it comes to bank, i don't think we can count on the FDIC (or equivalent credit union backstop).  it pays to DYDD (do your due diligence), on any bank.  e.g. asking to see their financial statements, talking with a manager and asking the "tough questions" - e.g. what will their balance sheet look like if 10% of loans default - or if 15% of loans default.

i've actually done that and they do not like it, but you do learn things about the bank.

on the Precious metals front, i've noticed that silver tends to be a lot more volatile than told.  if gold goes up 1%, silver goes up 2%.  sort of reminds me of when kids go ice-skating and hold hands and make a chain, the kid on the end gets whipped around the hardest.  in the precious metal world (sidestepping palladium & platinum), silver is "the kid on the end".

of course the volatility is not necessarily bad.  it creates buying opportunities.

along the lines of what Scorpio11 was talking about, check out world gold & silver production on this Minerals Databrowser (Flash interface to the USGS database) -
http://mazamascience.com/Minerals/USGS/

world production, gold - 2400 tons
world production, silver - 20,000+ tons.

given that the ratio of silver to gold is currently in the range 1/65 to 1/70, that seems odd given the recent world production ratios (1: and historical price ratio (1:15)

my understanding is that paper silver & gold (exchange traded funds) are experiencing record outflows (investors demanding physical metal) - outflows that leave them exhausted (as in EMPTY) in 9 & 18 months (i forget which precious metal corresponds to which outflow rate).  in any case, there is a trend towards investors demanding physical metal.

i also hear a lot about "there's 10 times as much paper silver as physical silver" - like a game of musical chairs - where they take away 90% of the chairs.  also bullish for holders of physical precious metal, if it's true, which i sense that it is.