The case for deflation

[BillyStubbsTears]

And a final PS, since you are still criticising other people's grammar when all else fails. It is "Pidgin" English, not "Pigeon".

I know. I know. It was a delibarate error made to catch people out. I know.

[mjdgreg]

Where have I ever claimed that the same data was the work of my own painstaking research? I've never claimed this. You really do have a penchant for trying to twist my words.

Just apologise and all will be forgiven.

[mjdgreg]

And a final PS, since you are still criticising other people's grammar when all else fails. It is "Pidgin" English, not "Pigeon".

I know. I know. It was a delibarate error made to catch people out. I know.

You're right, it was deliberate. At least you spotted my joke. No doubt the rest of them all missed it. That's OK. I don't mind laughing at my own jokes. By the way that wasn't a bad attempt at humour yourself. Well done. You have obviously been learning from the master.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Where have I ever claimed that the same data was the work of my own painstaking research? I've never claimed this. You really do have a penchant for trying to twist my words.

Just apologise and all will be forgiven.

The required information can be found from various sources. This is information that I was aware of but decided not to post it as it would have taken me quite a bit of time

Why would it have taken you quite a bit of time if you can instantly recall the data, the sources and even the formatting? I'd have thought it would have taken you less than 5 minutes to type that out from memory. I'll accept that it would have taken you a hell of a lot longer to collate the data yourself from "various sources". So, what did you do? Collate the data yourself? Or type it out from your photographic memory, formatting and all? You can't have both. So which one was it?

Whatever your wriggle this time Mick, I am truly, really tired of this now and I have far more important things to spend my time on. Feel free to continue. You've made yourself look daft enough as it is and I don't need to help you in the process any further.

[mjdgreg]

Look, it's very simple. I was aware of the information but posting it would have been a painstaking process and would have taken a lot of time. I don't have as suspicious a mind as you, so posted the graph which I was prepared to accept at face value as it mirrored my earlier findings.

Subsequently you called me a liar because you couldn't find the original data. So I  posted a simplified version of this data which I came across after, I repeat after I made the 900% claim. I only bothered to post it for your benefit to prove I wasn't lying and making it up!

Get a grip man. Talk about making a mountain out of a mole hill just because you want everyone to think I'm making it all up. You'd do better to argue against the points I make rather than resorting to puerile attacks on the messenger. This shows to anyone with an open mind that you have lost the debate. These are the actions of a desperate man who only seems to be bothered about maintaining his cult status amongst his gullible leftie friends. You're not bothered about the rights and wrongs of the debate. 

[wilts rover]

You'd do better to argue against the points I make rather than resorting to puerile attacks on the messenger. This shows to anyone with an open mind that you have lost the debate. These are the actions of a desperate man who only seems to be bothered about maintaining his cult status amongst his gullible leftie friends. You're not bothered about the rights and wrongs of the debate. 

If that isn't a perfect example of hypocracy in one paragraph - then I will pick any one of the other couple of dozen of your examples in this thread.

Poster have been giving example after example of why you and 'your' data and conclusions are wrong, and you just sail merrily on by ignoring them. My grammar is appaling because I am typing this as fast as possible - as you are not worth any more time than that.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Look, it's very simple. I was aware of the information but posting it would have been a painstaking process and would have taken a lot of time. I don't have as suspicious a mind as you, so posted the graph which I was prepared to accept at face value as it mirrored my earlier findings.

Subsequently you called me a liar because you couldn't find the original data. So I  posted a simplified version of this data which I came across after, I repeat after I made the 900% claim. I only bothered to post it for your benefit to prove I wasn't lying and making it up!

Get a grip man. Talk about making a mountain out of a mole hill just because you want everyone to think I'm making it all up. You'd do better to argue against the points I make rather than resorting to puerile attacks on the messenger. This shows to anyone with an open mind that you have lost the debate. These are the actions of a desperate man who only seems to be bothered about maintaining his cult status amongst his gullible leftie friends. You're not bothered about the rights and wrongs of the debate. 

Mick

For the record, I did not accuse you of lying on this issue. I accused you of gullibly repeating a lie. Which you have continued to do at length.

As for the numbers you posted mirroring that graph. Well aye. They added up to the same number. But they were composed of totally different numbers. That were mutually incompatible to the tune of £6 trillion. Both sets of data comprised figures  presented as "facts" which turned out to be utterly unsubstantiated.

You really, really don't get it do you? The whole point is that we simply cannot trust anything you ever post. You post "facts" which are not facts. Constantly. Your posting of the numbers data today doesn't "prove" anything, because the data you posted today are incompatible with the graph you posted earlier. Are you incapable of processing that fact?

Pointing that out is not a clever-clever debating style. It is crucial. Fundamental. Because if a debate is not based on real, genuine facts, and genuine approaches to "proving" the veracity of arguments it is worthless. And since you inevitably fail to back up any of the "facts" you post, your arguments based on those "facts" are worthless.

I realise that you will not understand a word of this, but other readers will.

End. Finish. Done.

[MachoMadness]

You know, if you imagine Mick's asinine rambling and bizarre circular arguments as a kind of Chris Morris/Stephen Colbert-esque skewering of right wing nutters, his posts actually become quite brilliant. Can't you imagine him appearing in a comedy sketch:

"Well, I came up with this graph which shows we are severely in debt. I know it's trustworthy because I copied it with my photographic memory. I propose we pull our creditors aside and quietly tell them we're not going to pay them back. The important part is to do it quietly, because if someone else twigs it won't work. While we do this, we can put all the old folks in a landfill somewhere. Then we can melt them down and use them to power machines like in The Matrix. Trust me, I know what I am talking about."

"You can't live your life in the history books" can be your catchphrase, Mick. Let me know how the comedy career goes. Keep this up and you'll make it big someday. Trust me. I know what I am talking about.

[mjdgreg]

For the record, I did not accuse you of lying on this issue.

I'm gob-smacked! You accuse me of posting easily checkable lies and when I challenge you to prove this you come up with the 900% claim. Now you say you are not accusing me of being a liar on this issue when this is the issue you picked to prove I was a liar! Unbelievable.

Despite this I am still prepared to forgive you. Issue an abject apology and I will gracelessly accept it instantly.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Mick

Obtuse to the last. I'll repeat. I did not accuse you on this occasion of lying when you posted that data. I accused you if regularly posting "facts" which turn out to be lies. I don't think you do that deliberately. I think you are just incapable of distinguishing "fact" from polemic. So you post "facts" that turn out to be lies.

However, I did and do accuse you of habitually lying over your approach to just about everything else, from your "deliberate" grammatical mistakes to your approach to plagiarism. The last few posts in this thread regarding your source material have been a textbook example.

[mjdgreg]

mjdgreg

Obtuse to the last. I'll repeat. I did not accuse you on this occasion of lying when you posted that data. I accused you if regularly posting "facts" which turn out to be lies. I don't think you do that deliberately. I think you are just incapable of distinguishing "fact" from polemic. So you post "facts" that turn out to be lies.

I don't think Haver Analytics and Morgan Stanley would be very impressed with you saying their graph is a lie. You yourself said that many leading economists disagreed with their findings. For them to disagree with their findings then they must have thought the graph was real and not made up by some right wing website.

It is perfectly reasonable to disagree with findings of research, but to say it is a lie is going way too far. Then to use this as evidence that I am a liar is off the scale. I even stated I was happy to go along with 507% (your evidence) as once you are so heavily indebted it doesn't make any difference what the true actual figures are.

Above 900% or above 500% it is all academic. This is because I am a big picture sort of person whereas you are a small picture sort of person who will argue the toss over a 900% graph when you yourself agree it should be 507%. At 507% we are still finished as an economy so 900% whether it is fact or not is irrelevant.

To make such a mountain out of a molehill on this issue has been totally ridiculous. You'd have been far better pulling the statistics apart (your 507% data) and making the case why at this level of debt we would still be OK as an economy.

You didn't. You resorted to calling me a liar instead of engaging in intelligent debate. I think this is because you knew that I had finally totally exposed your ludicrous arguments to the point where even your hard-core leftie friends secretly had lost faith in your views.

You have obviously found this very hard to deal with. Don't be too hard on yourself. I am a force of nature and I don't think there is anybody out there who could take me on in a debate and win.  You fought valiantly and I respect you for that. You did your best but it was never going to be good enough. At least you now seem to have realised this fact.

Game set and match.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Christ up above Mick, I think I've fallen through a crack in the space-time continuum and emerged in a parallel Universe where the laws of logic no longer apply.

Let me precis for you what has happened in this discussion. In simple words that you can follow. Because it is a textbook example of why you are totally lacking in any logic and rigour when you post your "facts" and opinions.

1) You claimed that we were doomed - doomed ah tell thi - because our total debt was at Weimar Republic levels.
2) To support this, you posted a graph from a website that thinks we're being taken over by a socialist revolution.
3) The graph has the words "Source: Morgan Stanley Haver Analytics" on it.
4) I said that I would be prepared to have a rational discussion about that graph if you could find out how it had been compiled.
5) The reason for that was that the data on that graph was wildly different (by about £6trillon) from any data published anywhere else on the total UK debt.
6) I was particularly interested in finding out why Morgan Stanley had the UK total debt very much higher than other sources claim it to be, but none of the other countries' debt was correspondingly higher.
7) That suggested that either a) there was something worringly unique about the UK's situation or b) the data couldn't be trusted.
8) In the light of the thread I posted on the Iran nuclear bomb research, I take the line of healthy skepticism that, when I see something way out of line with the usual concensus, posted on a site that has a very particular political line to peddle, I doubt its accuracy unless I see how it has been compiled.
9) So I went looking for the original data. I couldn't find it. Neither could several other people who discuss this graph on other website.
10) That left me thinking that the source of the graph was rather dubious.
11) So I invited you to show me where it came from.
12) You found a set of data totting up various bits and pieces data to come up to more or less the same total value.
13) You claimed that this came from "various sources" but interestingly it had precisely the same formatting as one particular source, the moneyweek.com website.
14) I pointed out that the data in your/moneyweek list could not possibly be the same as the data on the "Morgan Stanley" graph, because the total Govt debt and total Financial Sector debt levels were wildly out of line - to the tune of about £6trillion.
15) You then say that the 900% debt level is irrelevant anyway.
16) Despite, at the start of the discussion, having said that "When all of Britain’s unfunded obligations such as  public sector pensions are included, our debts swell to 900% of our economy. When this is all added up we owe ten times what the economy is worth."
(Another quote that comes pretty much verbatim from the moneyweek.com site

http://www.moneyweek.com/news-and-charts/economics/uk/end-of-britain-uk-government-debt-spending-interest-rates
17) That moneyweek article by the way is one where they have the express intention of scaring the living shit out of people so that they will subscribe to the moneyweek investment guide in an effort to save themselves in the wreckage.
18) As usual, you quote this sort of shit verbatim believing that it "proves" your argument.

You see why I hold you in contempt Mick?

You post "facts" that turn out not to be facts.

When you are confronted by this, you lie about where you find information that you claim "proves" your facts.

When you are faced down on this, you then say "Ah well, THAT fact doesn't matter anyway, what about THIS fact?"

And all the way through, you plagiarise. The very definition of intellectual dishonesty.

You don't realise that even if your fabled photographic memory was the reason for your instant and perfect recall of information, repeating what someone else has written and passing it off as your own is still plagiarism.

And you are actually THE most dishonest type of plagiariser. When you first started doing it, you simply cut and pasted entire chunks of text. When you were pulled up on this, you went into the mode that the most devious plagiarisers do - copy and paste large sections, then change a few words in the hope that it won't show up in a search. Academia has been dealing with this sort of intellectual dishonest for years. They boot people out of University with no appeal if they are caught doing that, because it perverts the entire system of intellectual discourse.

And you don't even plagiarise from reputable sources - just from ones that have a particular interest in getting everyone to believe that we are doomed - you consider no information or argument whatsoever that goes against that line.[/li][/list]

[The L J Monk]

I wonder what Bob Diamond thinks.

[mjdgreg]

Look Billy. I'm sure that report with that graph is out there somewhere. Why would leading economists dispute its findings if they didn't have the original source themselves? They've obviously got the time to check the validity of claims (like you seem to have) but the ordinary bloke in the street (like me) has to prioritise their lives and accept second-hand information. We haven't got  time to waste on finding original sources and when the second-hand sources are reputable there is no need for this anyway.

So do the decent thing and issue me with an abject apology. I'll accept it and we can try and move on and forget about this unsavoury incident.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Mick.

Did you read that post about the AP and the Iran nuclear bomb research?


"Reputable second hand sources"?

Aye, like Smashabana.com?

What the "reputable second hand sources" have done Mick, is either in total ignorance, repeat the graph assuming it were true (like the Washington Post and CBS did with that Iran graph), or, like MoneyWeek, try to find data to make the numbers on that graph work, but find WRONG data.

I gave you a challenge Mick, to find out where the data came from - what information it was based on that made it out of line with ANY other information out there by a cool £6trillion. You were unable to do it. Because the information is NOT out there. it doesn't exist.

YOU Mick were the one who was pissing his pants telling us that we had a worse debt than Weimar Germany, and YOU were the one who posted the "evidence" to back up that wild claim. Since then, the ball has been in your court. It's still there. It'll remain there until you accept that you have (again) posted something that you can't back-up.

[mjdgreg]

Right, that's it. I'm going to find that report if it kills me. I'll post again as soon as I find it.

[mjdgreg]

Right, I've found it. That didn't take long. I await your abject apology.

Right, you need to put FX Outlook - Morgan Stanley into Google. You will then find a pdf file that you can download. Go to page 26 and there you will find the graph in the report.

Game set and match.

[wilts rover]

Morgan Stanley???

A company played a large part in causing the world banking crises in the first place, needing that lost $1billion in tha last quarter and have such reliable forecasts including on the first page of that report
£ to USD 1.5 - sell for target 1.4 (its currently 1.6, you would have lost out big time)

not to mention their current embarrassment

For Morgan Stanley, one of the country’s premier investment banks, landing Facebook’s eagerly awaited initial public offering was one of the biggest banking coups in almost a decade. A successful debut would most likely have cemented the bank’s position as the dominant force in technology I.P.O.s. But Morgan Stanley now faces questions about its role in the events surrounding Facebook’s disappointing debut as a publicly traded company on May 18, 2012.
 
In the days before the company went public, Facebook and Morgan Stanley bankers decided they had enough demand and interest for Facebook to justify an offering price of $38 a share.
 
But when Facebook began trading on May 18, its shares barely budged — closing at $38.23, just 0.6 percent above the I.P.O. price — and they have been falling ever since. On its third day of trading, the stock closed at $31, more than 18 percent below its offering price.
 
Now the continued struggles of Facebook’s I.P.O. have turned up the heat on Morgan Stanley, which has been criticized by rival bankers and investors for pricing the stock too high and selling too many shares to the public. What was supposed to be the bank’s crowning achievement is turning out to be a big embarrassment, raising broader questions from regulators about the I.P.O. process.

Not a company I would put too much faith in if I were you, hope you haven't got too much money tied up with them.

[Glyn_Wigley]

Right, I've found it. That didn't take long. I await your abject apology.

Right, you need to put FX Outlook - Morgan Stanley into Google. You will then find a pdf file that you can download. Go to page 26 and there you will find the graph in the report.

Game set and match.

All I can see a pretty graph. It doesn't say whether it's based on actual facts, or is a guesstimate projection like the rest of the report. Nor does it say where the figures come from, not even in an appendix. The blurb next to it doesn't even seem to refer to it much, if at all.

Do you know the answers to these questions? Because I can't find them in that document.

[mjdgreg]

Get a f-------g grip. That report is laden with data about the UK and world economy. According to Billy the graph was a lie. It isn't. I await abject apologies from all of you.

[mjdgreg]

mjdgreg.

I'm not saying that you lied about that 900% claim. I'm saying that you posted a lie. Which makes you a gullible fool rather than a devious one.

Show us where the original source is and I will 100% retract my accusations.

So far, you HAVEN'T posted the original source. You've posted a graph on a swivelled-eyed rightwingnutter.com site on which is was claimed that the original source was Haver Analytics/Morgan Stanley. But you haven't shown where the original Morgan Stanley/Haver Analytics graph came from.

Me, at first, I accepted that this would be a real source. But then I went looking for it. And I couldn't find it.

I assume that YOU can, because you posted the data in the first place, and you wouldn't have posted data like that without checking it's veracity would you? Would you mjdgreg?

Prove it to us. Show us where the original data  or report is. My apology is waiting for you. I suspect it'll be waiting a while.

I believe I have satisfied your requirements. I suspect I'll be waiting a while for your abject apology. I wouldn't be at all surprised if I don't get one. No doubt you'll find some weasel words to justify yourself. Unfortunately your post above does not allow any wriggle room. Get on with it man and save what little is left of your battered credibillyty.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Mick

Well done on catching up. I saw that report 6 days ago at the start of this farrago.

As Glyn points out, there is no information on the source data. In fact, after labelling it "Exhibit 1" in a section in "deleveraging", they do not mention where the data in the graph came from (or what in earth it has to do with their discussion about deleveraging, come to that). In fact, nowhere in the entire document is any mention whatsoever made of that graph, the data presented on it, where it came from or what the implications are of it being £6 trillion out if line with any other assessment if our debt. It's presence in that report  doesn't give MORE confidence in its accuracy Mick. It looks like a mistake in an undergraduate report.

So, as I say. When I see data that is wildly out of line with anything that anyone, anywhere in the rest of the world is saying, and when I see that data unsubstantiated, I'll take it with a pinch of salt.

Now. If you can find on what they are basing their assertions that the financial sector debt is £6trillion greater than ANYONE else is saying, I will apologise profusely.

In the absence of that, I will continue to say that you are gullibly peddling a lie. Because if it isn't backed up, that is what it is, whether it is published by Morgan Stanley or not.

I'll ask you again.

[Glyn_Wigley]

I await abject apologies from all of you.

We all still await your 'astonishing evidence'. Looks like we're all going to have a long wait.

[mjdgreg]

mjdgreg

Well done on catching up. I saw that report 6 days ago at the start of this farrago.

As Glyn points out, there is no information on the source data. In fact, after labelling it "Exhibit 1" in a section in "deleveraging", they do not mention where the data in the graph came from (or what in earth it has to do with their discussion about deleveraging, come to that). In fact, nowhere in the entire document is any mention whatsoever made of that graph, the data presented on it, where it came from or what the implications are of it being £6 trillion out if line with any other assessment if our debt. It's presence in that report  doesn't give MORE confidence in its accuracy mjdgreg. It looks like a mistake in an undergraduate report.

So, as I say. When I see data that is wildly out of line with anything that anyone, anywhere in the rest of the world is saying, and when I see that data unsubstantiated, I'll take it with a pinch of salt.

Now. If you can find on what they are basing their assertions that the financial sector debt is £6trillion greater than ANYONE else is saying, I will apologise profusely.

In the absence of that, I will continue to say that you are gullibly peddling a lie. Because if it isn't backed up, that is what it is, whether it is published by Morgan Stanley or not.

I'll ask you again.

I didn't think you could embarrass yourself any further, but unbelievably you have managed to do so. There is no point discussing this graph any more with you. Any objective reader of these last few posts will see that I have provided you with exactly what you wanted. I'll let them make up their minds about the rights and wrongs of the issue.

Here's a reminder of what you said as you conveniently seem to have forgotten. You have been damned by your own words:

mjdgreg.

I'm not saying that you lied about that 900% claim. I'm saying that you posted a lie. Which makes you a gullible fool rather than a devious one.

Show us where the original source is and I will 100% retract my accusations.

So far, you HAVEN'T posted the original source. You've posted a graph on a swivelled-eyed rightwingnutter.com site on which is was claimed that the original source was Haver Analytics/Morgan Stanley. But you haven't shown where the original Morgan Stanley/Haver Analytics graph came from.

Me, at first, I accepted that this would be a real source. But then I went looking for it. And I couldn't find it.

I assume that YOU can, because you posted the data in the first place, and you wouldn't have posted data like that without checking it's veracity would you? Would you mjdgreg?

Prove it to us. Show us where the original data  or report is. My apology is waiting for you. I suspect it'll be waiting a while.

[Glyn_Wigley]

There is no point discussing this graph any more with you.

Of course there's no point. Because you don't know what it says or where it's data comes from, so now you want to stop talking about it.

[mjdgreg]

It's very simple. Did I show where the report was that the graph came from as requested? A yes or no will do.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Mick

Do you understand the meaning of the word "original"?

What you have done is point me to a report I was fully aware of, which posts exactly the same graph with no reference whatsoever to explain where the ORIGINAL data came from.

Let me expand. That Morgan Stanley graph contains what appears to be quite astonishing (!) data. They do not mention it AT ALL in the text. Not once. Not at all. They present information that claims that our debt is SIX TRILLION POUNDS greater than ANYONE else says. They just do that as an incidental issue in passing. Then they don't comment on it AT ALL.

Me, if one of my staff presented such astonishing data in a report that was going to go public, I'd ask:"Can we substantiate this? How have you calculated those numbers? Because no one is going to believe it unless we CAN substantiate it. Because that is the sort of information which, if true, will have an utterly devastating, world-changing effect."

You, apparently, just take it at face value and see nothing strange about it at all.

And then, after presenting this astonishing evidence(!) Morgan Stanley never mention it again, although countless right-wing blogs do.

Doesn't that strike you as just a little odd? Just a little?

[Glyn_Wigley]

Yes you did. And thanks to you showing us it underlined for all of us how much BS it is. Many thanks.

If you don't believe me, answer me one extremely simple but very important question about the 'data' on that graph...what time period is it meant to represent? This year? Last year? Next year? A number of years? Or one specific moment in time (in which case, when)? For some reason. Morgan Stanley seem have left that very important piece of information out...

[mjdgreg]

Yes you did. And thanks to you showing us it underlined for all of us how much BS it is. Many thanks.

If you don't believe me, answer me one extremely simple but very important question about the 'data' on that graph...what time period is it meant to represent? This year? Last year? Next year? A number of years? Or one specific moment in time (in which case, when)? For some reason. Morgan Stanley seem have left that very important piece of information out...

Thank you. I'm quite happy to have a debate about whether the report is BS or not. I've already said I took the graph at face value. If there are issues with the graph then again I'm quite happy to debate them. You ask some valid questions. I don't know the answers.

All I do know is that I did what Billy requested, and he is making himself look unbelievably stupid by using weasel words and going off at a tangent in an attempt to justify not issuing an abject apology.

One of you needs to PM him to let him know this. The longer this goes on the more battered his already ruined credibillyty will become. He's inflicting massive damage on his reputation and I take no pleasure in watching this unfold. For all our disagreements and the abuse he hurls at me I do have respect for him but it is quickly evaporating.

[Glyn_Wigley]

I've already said I took the graph at face value. If there are issues with the graph then again I'm quite happy to debate them. You ask some valid questions. I don't know the answers.

I think your credibility just went down the plughole.