And there it is folks

[emptystep]

Dow sets record highs as rally continues | Reuters

Dow hits it; 14,209.94

With the the economy sluggish, so many on food stamps, the sequester about to suck us into a pit what the Hell happened?

The people at the top are, well, going to still be there. They might not get any richer in money but they will get richer in life.

The bottom is coming up. We are going to invest in our future. It is the power of a wider base of innovations; electric cars going from 0-60 in under 3, and adjusting the suspension the whole way, as smooth as an S series; light rail; watches that adjust backlight as it gets darker; glasses that let you see more than the world around you; Hell we're even going to get world peace, that is going to take some work however, and a little longer.

The world ended 2013, welcome to the other side.

 

[emptystep]

Doing my homework and I just could not resist this one.

The broad consensus about the need to develop an understanding of a conflict situation
before seeking to influence it is perhaps best illustrated by the Development Assistance
Committee of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD DAC), a
forum including two dozen of the world’s largest aid donors. A decade ago, OECD DAC issued
a report titled The DAC Guidelines: Helping Prevent Violent Conflict, which concluded, “To
create a ‘culture of prevention’ in development co-operation and foreign policy action, the
international community needs to better analyse the causes and dynamics of conflict and
peace in order to understand how their actions will affect the ‘structural stability’ of a soci-
1
ety or country.” Subsequently, in 2007, the OECD DAC issued Principles for Good International
Engagement in Fragile States and Situations, a touchstone guide for donors. “Take context as
the starting point” is the first of these ten principles. “It is essential,” the report elaborates,
“for international actors to understand the specific context in each country, and
develop a shared view of the strategic response that is required.”
Several individual governments—including Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the
United Kingdom—have developed frameworks for assessing conflict situations to inform
their policy and programming.3 The U.S. government adopted an Interagency Conflict
Assessment Framework (ICAF) in 2008, building on the U.S. Agency for International Devel-
opment’s Conflict Assessment Framework.4 The government’s Principles of the Interagency
Conflict Assessment Framework summarized the rationale for conducting systematic conflict
assessments: “A first step toward a more effective and coordinated response to help states
prevent, mitigate and recover from violent conflict is the development of
shared under-
5
standing among USG agencies about the sources of violent conflict or civil strife.”

Likewise, NGOs and civil society organizations working in conflict situations have rec-
ognized the central role that good analysis should play in designing effective programs.
“Conflict analysis is the foundation of conflict sensitivity,” summarized one resource for
NGOs. “Without a good understanding of the context in which interventions are situated,
organizations that support or directly implement them may unintentionally help to fuel
2
6
violent conflict or to exacerbate existing tensions.” NGOs working in conflict areas now hardly
question the need to engage in conflict analysis, but they continue to grapple with how they
can most effectively go about this task and integrate the results into their programming.

The groundswell of support for more rigorous and regular conflict assessments represents
important progress from the period when rigid templates and “essential task” lists held
more sway. Yet conflict assessment efforts are but one of multiple approaches that govern-
ments and other organizations use to enhance understanding of and to inform their actions
relating to conflict situations. Just as these organizations strive to streamline and coor-
dinate their activities in conflict-affected and at-risk states—whether termed a “whole-of-
government,” “joined-up,” or “comprehensive” approach—they would benefit from bringing
together disparate analytic approaches. Nudging the analytic activities of sprawling institu-
tions toward greater synergy has its own challenges. Maximizing the benefits of different
analytic approaches requires going beyond mere coordination to understand the strengths
and weaknesses of various approaches, and crafting ways they can complement each other.

In addition to conflict assessment, one analytical approach that is important when con-
sidering conflict situations is that typified by national security intelligence organizations.
For a variety of reasons, intelligence analysis and conflict assessment have proceeded for
the most part on separate tracks. However, as this report will argue, despite their different
origins, aims, and methods, they share important commonalities, and global trends tend
to push them toward greater convergence. Furthermore, deliberate efforts to draw on both
conflict assessment and intelligence methods will yield fuller and more useful analysis,
which should in turn improve the formulation of conflict management, peacebuilding, and
national security strategies.

Woocher, Lawrence "Conflict Assessment and Intelligence Analysis Commonality, Convergence, and Complementarity" United States Institute of Peace SPECIAL REPORT United States Institute of Peace, Special Report 27 (June 2011) 2-3.

"and the lamb will lie down with the lion"

(Don't worry. I have not gone over the edge. I just fuckin' with ya. Formating is messed up because I cut-n-pasted from a PDF.)