Ask CosmoLady anything, she has lived on 6 continents!

[CosmoLady]

I notice that aside from being on Bahamas/Turks and Caicos, you have steered clear from the Caribbean. Will you grace us with your visit someday?

Also my stepbrother is fascinated with caudillos/strongmen, he loves reading books about Franco, Pinochet, Fujimori, Stroessner,
Trujillo (and Balaguer who came after), Batista, Peron, Videla, the Brazilians, Porfirio Diaz, also Salazar and others,
but I don't know this subject very well, recently in my mind I confused Batista with Trujillo

[Andullero]

Also my stepbrother is fascinated with caudillos/strongmen, he loves reading books about Franco, Pinochet, Stroessner, Fujimori,
Trujillo (and Balaguer who came after), Batista, Peron, Videla, the Brazilians, Porfirio Diaz, also Salazar and others,
but I don't know this subject very well, recently in my mind I confused Batista with Trujillo

Yeah, the difference between them is like the one between heaven and earth: Batista basically ruled over an already made, functioning country, while El Jefe had to basically build the DR from scratch (the rulers that came before him were to busy shooting themselves, indebting the country to foreign powers and looting the state coffer to do much else). Plus, Batista chose the easy way out of going into exile, while El Jefe had to be gunned down (among the early operations of the CIA, but that's a story for another day).

[CosmoLady]

Yeah, the difference between them is like the one between heaven and earth: Batista basically ruled over an already made, functioning country, while El Jefe had to basically build the DR from scratch (the rulers that came before him were to busy shooting themselves, indebting the country to foreign powers and looting the state coffer to do much else). Plus, Batista chose the easy way out of going into exile, while El Jefe had to be gunned down (among the early operations of the CIA, but that's a story for another day).

Yeah the US betrayed a reliable ally,
this is a recurring theme throughout history (also happened with Batista, Ngo Dinh Diem in South Vietnam, many others);
the DR was destabilised and there was a Civil War and nearly a communist takeover,
but no one in the US noticed because the Vietnam War was happening at the time.

[CosmoLady]

My 3rd favourite film is The Beach (2000), for the adventure and for young DiCaprio,
and also because it perfectly shows the feminine tyranny of the aging hippie commune leader played by Tilda Swinton
(not shown in the trailer)

[CosmoLady]

From which online sources do you get your news?

My earlier answer was too brief.

'Mainstream' online sources include the BBC and the Guardian. I like Sky News for mainstream news in Australia.
I used to read the Daily Mail and Breitbart a lot, and I used to read the Intercept often while Glenn Greenwald was there.
I have not watched Fox News (American) since late 2016 I think.

Google News is a typical mainstream news aggregator,
but my favourite news aggregator is Revolver.news, though it is mostly American news and right-wing.
Revolver has a LOT of aggregated mainstream news from the major American newspapers and websites,
as well as non-mainstream sites, Substack, X, etc.
So there is an interesting and entertaining mix of information.
Revolver also has some of its own brief-articles as well as in-depth investigations.

Other 'non-mainstream' sites that I visit include Remix News (Hungarian but covers all of Europe), Rebel News (Canada),
GB News (UK), and RT. Of course I have to corroborate and cross-reference RT.

Some other interesting sites include Wikileaks and anti-imperialist leftist sites such as The Grayzone and Mint Press News.

So I try to have many sources of information.
In my household there are 3 adults consuming and sharing many different sources of information.

[CosmoLady]

Favourite quotes from The Wealth of Nations (1776) by Adam Smith:

Economics:

"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest."

"Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer."

"The work done by freemen comes cheaper in the end than that performed by slaves."

"It is the natural effect of improvement, however, to diminish gradually the real price of almost all manufactures."

"Good roads, canals, and navigable rivers, by diminishing the expence of carriage, put the remote parts of the country more nearly upon a level with those of the neighbourhood of the town. They are upon that the greatest of all improvements."

"It seldom happens, however, that a great proprietor is a great improver."

"Avarice and injustice are always shortsighted, and they did not foresee how much this regulation must obstruct improvement, and thereby hurt in the long-run the real interest of the landlord."

"The liberal reward of labour, therefore, as it is the affect of increasing wealth, so it is the cause of increasing population. To complain of it, is to lament over the necessary effect and cause of the greatest public prosperity."

"The establishment of any new manufacture, of any new branch of commerce, or any new practice in agriculture, is always a speculation, from which the projector promises himself extraordinary profits. These profits sometimes are very great, and sometimes, more frequently, perhaps, they are quite otherwise; but in general they bear no regular proportion to those of other older trades in the neighbourhood. If the project succeeds, they are commonly at first very high. When the trade or practice becomes thoroughly established and well known, the competition reduces them to the level of other trades."

"Wherever there is great property, there is great inequality."

"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all."



Political economy:

"Political economy, considered as a branch of the science of a statesman or legislator, proposes two distinct objects: first, to provide a plentiful revenue or subsistence for the people, or more properly to enable them to provide such a revenue or subsistence for themselves; and secondly, to supply the state or commonwealth with a revenue sufficient for the public services. It proposes to enrich both the people and the sovereign."

"Every system which endeavours, either, by extraordinary encouragements, to draw towards a particular species of industry a greater share of the capital of the society than what would naturally go to it; or, by extraordinary restraints, to force from a particular species of industry some share of the capital which would otherwise be employed in it; is in reality subversive of the great purpose which it means to promote. It retards, instead of accelerating, the progress of the society towards real wealth and greatness; and diminishes, instead of increasing, the real value of the annual produce of its land and labour."

"All systems either of preference or of restraint, therefore, being thus completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man, or order of men. The sovereign is completely discharged from a duty, in the attempting to perform which he must always be exposed to innumerable delusions, and for the proper performance of which no human wisdom or knowledge could ever be sufficient; the duty of superintending the industry of private people, and of directing it towards the employments most suitable to the interest of the society."

"According to the system of natural liberty, the sovereign has only three duties to attend to ... first, the duty of protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies; secondly, the duty of protecting, as far as possible, every member of the society from the injustice or oppression of every other member of it, or the duty of establishing an exact administration of justice; and, thirdly, the duty of erecting and maintaining certain public works and certain public institutions, which it can never be for the interest of any individual, or small number of individuals, to erect and maintain; because the profit could never repay the expence to any individual, or small number of individuals, though it may frequently do much more than repay it to a great society."

"The directors of such [joint-stock] companies, however, being the managers rather of other people's money than of their own, it cannot well be expected, that they should watch over it with the same anxious vigilance with which the partners in a private copartnery frequently watch over their own ... Negligence and profusion, therefore, must always prevail, more or less, in the management of the affairs of such a company."

"It is unjust that the whole of society should contribute towards an expence of which the benefit is confined to a part of the society."

"The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities, that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state."

"The tax which each individual is bound to pay ought to be certain, and not arbitrary."

"Every tax ought to be contrived as both to take out and to keep out of the pockets of the people as little as possible, over and above what it brings into the public treasury of the state."

"It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion."

"When national debts have once been accumulated to a certain degree, there is scarce, I believe, a single instance of their having been fairly and completely paid. The liberation of the public revenue, if it has ever been brought about at all, has always been brought about by bankruptcy."



Scepticism of government and protectionism:

"Though the profusion of Government must undoubtedly have retarded the natural progress of England to wealth and improvement, it has not been able to stop it."

"There is no art which one government sooner learns of another than that of draining money from the pockets of the people."

"No regulation of commerce can increase the quantity of industry in any society beyond what its capital can maintain. It can only divert a part of it into a direction into which it might not otherwise have gone; and it is by no means certain that this artificial direction is likely to be more advantageous to the society than that into which it would have gone of its own accord."

"The law ought always to trust people with the care of their own interest, as in their local situations they must generally be able to judge better of it than the legislator can do."

"The statesman who should attempt to direct people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals, would not only load himself with a most unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely be trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it."

"The natural effort of every individual to better his own condition, when suffered to exert itself with freedom and security is so powerful a principle that it is alone, and without any assistance, not only capable of carrying on the society to wealth and prosperity, but of surmounting a hundred impertinent obstructions with which the folly of human laws too often incumbers its operations; though the effect of these obstructions is always more or less either to encroach upon its freedom, or to diminish its security."

"Every individual is continually exerting himself to find out the most advantageous employment for whatever capital he can command. It is his own advantage, indeed, and not that of the society, which he has in his view. But the study of his own advantage naturally, or rather necessarily leads him to prefer that employment which is most advantageous to the society."

"As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it."

"By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it."

"By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good."

"To give the monopoly of the home-market to the produce of domestic industry, in any particular art or manufacture, is in some measure to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals, and must, in almost all cases, be either a useless or a hurtful regulation."

"There seem, however, to be two cases in which it will generally be advantageous to lay some burden upon foreign, for the encouragement of domestic industry. The first is, when some particular sort of industry is necessary for the defence of the country ... The second case, in which it will generally be advantageous to lay some burden upon foreign for the encouragement of domestic industry, is when some tax is imposed at home upon the produce of the latter."

"It is the highest impertinence and presumption, therefore, in kings and ministers, to pretend to watch over the economy of private people, and to restrain their expence, either by sumptuary laws, or by prohibiting the importation of foreign luxuries. They are themselves always, and without any exception, the greatest spendthrifts in the society. Let them look well after their own expence, and they may safely trust private people with theirs. If their own extravagance does not ruin the state, that of their subjects never will."

"What is prudence in the conduct of every private family, can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom."

"The commodities of Europe were almost all new to America, and many of those of America were new to Europe. A new set of exchanges, therefore, began..and which should naturally have proved as advantageous to the new, as it certainly did to the old continent. The savage injustice of the Europeans rendered an event, which ought to have been beneficial to all, ruinous and destructive to several of those unfortunate countries."



Monopolies and scepticism about businessmen:

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."

"The interest of the dealers, however, in any particular branch of trade or manufactures, is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public. To widen the market and to narrow the competition, is always the interest of the dealers."

"The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order, ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it."

"A merchant, it has been said very properly, is not necessarily the citizen of any particular country."

"In every country it always is and must be the interest of the great body of the people to buy whatever they want of those who sell it cheapest ... Their interest is, in this respect, directly opposite"



Morality and scepticism about the wealthy and powerful:

"A great stock, though with small profits, generally increases faster than a small stock with great profits. Money, says the proverb, makes money."

"They who feed, cloath and lodge the whole body of the people, should have such a share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well fed, clothed, and lodged."

"Our merchants ... say nothing concerning the bad effects of high profits. They are silent with regard to the pernicious effects of their own gains. They complain only of those of other people."

"With the greater part of rich people, the chief enjoyment of riches consists in the parade of riches, which in their eye is never so complete as when they appear to possess those decisive marks of opulence which nobody can possess but themselves."

"All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind."

"The violence and injustice of the rulers of mankind is an ancient evil, for which, I am afraid, the nature of human affairs can scarce admit a remedy."

"In public, as well as in private expences, great wealth may, perhaps, frequently be admitted as an apology for great folly."

"Nothing but the most exemplary morals can give dignity to a man of small fortune."

"Bounty and hospitality very seldom lead to extravagance; though vanity almost always does."

[Mopi Licinius Crassus]

What car/cars do you drive?

What brand/model of car do you like best and why

[CosmoLady]

What car/cars do you drive?

What brand/model of car do you like best and why

I like utility vehicles with a front bench seat for 3 people, usually 4x4, both petrol and diesel, both manual and automatic.

When I am at home, wherever that may be, I usually drive a newer Land Rover Defender 90 (1984-2016) or a 110 pickup.
I have shipped several Land Rovers from Europe to North America.

I also inherited many older vehicles (on 6 continents) from my grandfather and father, from the early 1950s through the 2000s:
Land Rover Series II and IIA (1958-1970) and Series III (1970-1984), including pickup trucks,
as well as the Ford Bronco (1965-1977),
International Harvester Scout 800 (1971-1980),
Toyota J40 Land Cruisers (1960-1984), Toyota J60 Land Cruisers (1980-1990),
classic Volkswagen Minibuses from the 1960s and early 1970s, classic Volkswagen Beetles from the 1950s and 1960s,
and even an early 1950s Land Rover Series I and a 1970 Chevy K5 Blazer (similar to the Ford Bronco but larger).

I love driving the classic Land Rovers, though they are not for the motorway, have very weak engines, and require lead additives.
The other small 4x4 vehicles such as the Bronco and the Scout are also fun, and they have better but still usually weak engines.
The 1980s Toyota J60 Land Cruiser is a great sport utility vehicle!

I also inherited some mid-size cars from more recent years:
pre-2008 Toyota Avalon, Ford Taurus, and Ford Falcon (Australia, South Africa) and the pre-2014 Chevy Impala.
and I also bought/enjoy driving large American cars such as the Ford Crown Victoria (discontinued in 2011).

Obviously I am unable to maintain so many cars scattered across so many locations;
my girlfriends drive them and are responsible for them; I only own them and drive them occasionally when in town.
Almost all of them are paid off. I am able to change tyres, change oil, and do other basic maintenance.



When I am travelling somewhere new, I usually rent a truck such as a Ford Ranger or a Toyota Hilux,
or other trucks made by Ford, Chevy, Toyota, Nissan, Mitsubishi, or sometimes a Ford Explorer.

When I am working on a house, depending on where I am in the world, cargo vans may be more convenient.
I like to rent a Volkswagen Transporter or Ford Transit Custom or Toyota ProAce/Peugeot/Citroen/Opel/Fiat.

[CosmoLady]

From left to right: a Toyota J40 Land Cruiser, International Harvester Scout 800, Land Rover Series II or IIA, Ford Bronco







A Toyota J40, and a J60 Land Cruiser in the foreground



Toyota J40, J50, and J60 (1960-1990) on the left

[Ugo]

Ugo lady, thank you for your motivation. Keep in mind that you are talking to reptiles, there are few people here. The last white free prince is Putin