yeah I'm no economic expert, but FWIW the our debt to China in large part protects the dollar and the US economy to some extent. The greatest weakness of the dollar and the US economy right now is our debt to China, but one of China's greatest assets is American debt. It's kind of a catch 22. They want us to pay it back, but demanding it get paid back in some short timeline would destroy it's value and the value of their debt. So instead they're going to give us every possible way to maintain the strength of our economy and dollar so that they can continue to rely on our debt as a viable asset in the global economy.

I think it's more likely you'll see the US economy slowly and gradually recede over the next century than simply crash. I don't think China would ever let us crash. It's entirely reasonable to the think the future of the US looks much more like the past of the UK than the past of the Soviet Union.

Sure stocks are good too. But there's something to be said for owning something that you can physically hold in your hands. When SHTF, if you don't hold it you don't own it. Personally, after black friday I just find it hard to trust anyone with my money. Maybe that's what led me to PMs. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

Have you watched The Crash Course by Chris Martensen? It's on Youtube and I would highly recommend for everyone ITT.

"Collapse" is a good documentary on peak oil, too.

On the political side, "Fall of the Republic" by Alex Jones is an entertaining doc. I think he's a bit over the top and I don't agree with all of it. Entertaining, though if you are into conspiracy/NWO type stuff.

I feel the same way, but it is probably a mistake to be overly paranoid and miss out on some really good investment opportunities. This is one thing I am going to have to shake off in the future or I'll turn into a gold/silver only hoarding dumbass.

in.

Spot on as usual Pizzle. There is a currency war ongoing. Not only because of the debt the US has to China but even more so because each country wants their currency to be low in relation to other currencies because this promotes exports. I'm currently reading "Currency Wars" by Jim Rickards. The book is on this exact subject.

http://www.amazon.com/Currency-Wars-...5802483&sr=8-1


Tuco, thanks for those tips, will check them out!

I haven't been keeping up to date on anything related to poker really, but I had a good laugh a couple days ago as I was deleting e-mails from one of my accounts. It read, "Welcome to Full Tilt Poker!". The date? April 4th. That's right, I changed sites juuuuuust in time right? Timing really is everything. Thank goodness 2011 is over, worst year financially of my life!

thanks for the responses RE: FTP guys makes sense

would like to contribute to the latest discussion but I am not as knowledgeable as I would like to be on the subject... I feel like I am more bearish/critical than most about the current state of the US/macro economy than most and that there is a lot of shady **** going on behind closed doors but the whole gold bug movement just strikes me as overly paranoid?

Where do you recommend investing our money?

I have infinitely more questions than answers I am afraid - when it comes to this game I'm the fish who realizes the game has started around him. Personally, I am in diversified index funds with a defensive bias designed to reduce volatility, have some PMs/REITs/etc, nothing too sexy. I'm not thrilled about it, but I don't really have any better ideas so I have just kept it simple. I am pessimistic about the game being beatable long-term for the little guy unless he has some sort of inside info or the company of interest has some sort of constraint on it (ex. market cap too small.) I tried to get really into equities for awhile, just wasn't for me... there is just too much noise out there and it just gets overwhelming for me trying to wrap my head around the infinite variables in play which just causes me to freeze up and do nothing.

cliffs: game is rigged --> read and sit on hands

My friend and I were talking about the importance of a solid screen name in poker. We agreed it can be important depending on how you would like to convey your image to randoms. Thoughts?

Btw, I'm making a list of potential sn's for later. No, you can't see it.

OMG dave4112 sold a big chung of FTP money for 35 cents on the dollar!!! WTF??!!!
He turning scammer or what? Does not make sense, does not make sense.

Source? Maybe he needs money.

Was in the high stakes xfer thread.....

times are tough

when everyone's solid, screen name strat is where a lot of the edge comes from

i don't want to post too much in public but a few pointers:

- if your name is in ALL CAPS you should bluffcatch more/bluff less
- if your name references a war criminal, mass murderer, or politician you should valuebet very, very thinly
- most regs in 2011 were on the level where if your name suggests that you're nitty, they would make thin calls and questionable bluffs
- most regs in 2011 were also on the level where if your name suggests that you are aggro/spewy, they would make thin calls and questionable bluffs
- expect the above level trends to invert around october 2012 if we're still playing internet poker then

i think a longgg time before making my screenname for some reason. i'm not sure my screennames really had much impact. if anything it has more impact against fish as regs just start treating the name as a playstyle eventually.

i do think there's something to be said that the majority of poker regs dont have screennames like ATLANTABRAVES83, unless they did it on purpose...

That sucks man, hope things turn around for you. Was .35 really the best deal that you could find? That just seems pretty low to me, but i havent been following it all that much

I just took an engineering job again. Dream is dead for this guy.

Yeah I'm really surprised at the price. If I wasn't already so exposed I would be willing to pay a lot more. I've been operating under the assumption I could get like .65-.75/$ for my funds. Hope I'm not that far off.

times are tough? dfly will bankroll you for Merge and can probably get you on some other sites with his tentacle of connections that grasp the whole world . And this thread might have given you a better price for your money. Next time ask bro. You beat the games for 4bb+/100 with a ridiculous high vpip preflop, people are not going to forget.

Wawawawewa! 35c sucks! Cmon you could do much better than that. Hope you aren't in any huge financial trouble.

I think I just found my future SN. Seriously though, all caps is a pretty good idea. Has there ever been a good player with all caps? I agree it doesn't matter vs regs. It's underrated vs randoms though. My roommate was pleasebluffme12. With his style + SN, it seemed to work for him.

Who were you on Stars too eazy?



This makes me sad. But happy in a way since that's one less reg to deal with in the future. GL dude.

That's what I was thinkking. Does Dave know something we don't?

Jungleman inferred he knew something everyone else didnt in high stakes chat thread, said something like what are your guys opinions on trading on inside info e.g. stars/tilt

We are def just days away from knowing one way or the other for ROW players. U.S. guys are a lock to get some but likely all of their money back in the next 12-18 months imo I would have found it pretty hard to say no if I knew you wanted 35c/$